Razer Blackwidow Water Mishap

[Thomas Kendrick]

Hello folks,

So the missus decided to spill a glass of water over my Blackwidow, I have dried it completely, however the Num Enter key is now refusing to work. Not the end of the world I know, but it is annoying me to the extent that I don't even want to use the keyboard anymore. I have read Ripsters thread RE cleaning keyswitches and have yet to attempt anything major, one thing I couldn't work out is what exactly the water is doing inside the keyswitch that is causing it not to function?

 I'm slightly disheartened as I understand Blackwidows are very difficult to dissasemble, and wondering if keyswitch replacement is even possible if other methods don't work.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

[cactux]

Is very unlikely that you have a bad switch since is just a simple mechanical component.
IMHO you need to open the board

[Thomas Kendrick]

What would I be looking for, is it possible that something simply got fried?

[cactux]

Well you going to need a multimeter in order to know if the controller is on bad shape or the pcb track has been damage. if the pcb track has been damage is very simple to fix, but if the controller is in bad shape you will need to replace it.

I will try to find a more detail steps on how to troubleshoot your board.

In the mean time try to open the board (disconnect first) and find out if there still some water inside

[dorkvader]

If you know a little electronics, but have no multimeter, you can make do with a small LED and a small battery (and a resistor: very important). You can use this to test for continuity through the keyswitch.

There used to be a spill section in the cherry corp switch wiki. bit I'm not seeing it now. That said, here's a short thing about cleaning that does mention spills:
http://geekhack.org/showthread.php?29591-Ripster-s-ALL-ABOUT-Keys-Guide

Ah: Here it is: another resource.
http://geekhack.org/showthread.php?31198-Ripster-s-Guide-To-Fixing-Your-Keyboard-Switch