Miraculous keyboard resurrections

[FoxWolf1]

So, a month or so ago, we had some big storms where I live. Lots of rain/lightning/hail/tornadoes/flash floods/etc. My power went down for a few days and, when it came back, my hitherto trustworthy Das Ultimate was dead as a doornail. As in, indistinguishable from an oddly shaped brick in terms of functionality. There may or may not have been a power surge when the power went out; aside from my keyboard, my computer (which is behind a pretty beefy UPS) was fine, but my microwave took a couple of days to regain functionality after the power came back.

I swapped out the Das for my old Noppoo, which I'd put away due to chatter issues. Thankfully, opening it up and brushing off the exposed side of the PCB seemed to fix the issue. After a couple of days, I tried the Das again, hoping it had come back to life like the microwave, but no dice. Tried again after a week...nothing. After two weeks...still nothing. Three weeks...nope.

And then I tried it today, and suddenly, it works again. The O and comma keys were glitching out a bit (pressing either one caused both characters to be sent), but after plugging and unplugging it, that problem went away as well.

Anyone else had a keyboard suddenly come back from the dead? Why would it do this?

[Janeiac]

I have to wonder if it a charge built up that dissipated, or if it had some moisture from condensation that dried up.

[FoxWolf1]

I have to wonder if it a charge built up that dissipated, or if it had some moisture from condensation that dried up.

Maybe...

Although, my microwave, which died at the same time and then came back to life, has now re-died, and the Das seems to be having problems again. *sigh*

[merlin64]

Open up the keyboard and see if any of the traces look busted or burnt. Pay attention to the microcontroller as well. I would use a multimeter to check the traces.

If anything, you may also want to try using 90% isopropyl alcohol and a toothbrush to scrub the whole circuit board.

[FoxWolf1]

Open up the keyboard and see if any of the traces look busted or burnt. Pay attention to the microcontroller as well. I would use a multimeter to check the traces.

If anything, you may also want to try using 90% isopropyl alcohol and a toothbrush to scrub the whole circuit board.

Looked normal to me-- not that I can really tell what's normal and what isn't, unless there are huge brown scorch marks or something. Unfortunately, I don't own a multimeter or 90% isopropyl alcohol (I do own a toothbrush, at least). I tried cleaning off the PCB, but with no effect.

I figure I'll probably either replace it or just accept the decrease in the size of my collection...the quality of my workmanship is so low that, even if I fixed it (against all odds), I'd have to consider it unreliable just because I was the one who did the fix. I just thought that it was weird that it died without the computer it was attached to suffering any obvious damage, and then miraculously came back to life weeks later, only to die again after another week (without me doing anything to it...I went to sleep one night with it working, and the next morning it was dead again).