Karl’s Asylum ... for the terminally deranged

Not often I feel moved to thank a company, but these guys are miracle workers. I may have mentioned a few times before about the keyboard being intermittent on my several year old Dell Inspiron 3800.

Recently, it’s been getting unbearable. Losing keys at random, 1 press of the spacebar giving 5 spaces, or occasionally random characters etc. I had to keep “m” in Ctrl-c so I could paste it where needs be as the physical M key was dead. Nightmare.

I tried cleaning it, I tried contact cleaner..everything. It’s a long-standing fault with it. Well, it was.

Dell wanted loads of cash for a new Keyboard, and i’d have had to send the whole laptop back to them for it to be fitted, even though they detail stripdown of the notebook on their site. Bearing in mind that it’s an old P600 laptop well past warranty, it wasn’t worth that.

Then I came across PC-Hub. They seem to be based in Singapore, and deal in Laptops and laptop spares. They list virtually every component of my 3800 (PPX, as they call it), including about 6 different models of keyboard.

The UK and US keyboards are more expensive, and were out of stock. So I ordered a cheap one at random. I ordered one that does NOT have the little rubber “tit” in the middle for the trackpoint as I detest them. The original KB had it’s tip removed for this reason.

I ordered it on Friday last week, and it arrived yesterday! It was a brand new, spanish keyboard. One keycap change later, and it’s in and working perfectly! It’s really freshened the laptop up..matt, not shiny with wear, and it feels and sound so much better.

I also ordered a “pack of 3800 PPX screws”. I think that is the BEST thing I’ve ever seen..a company selling little bags of every screw and screw cover that goes into a laptop, as a standalone product. I now no longer have a screw loose..;)

Total cost? Under £30 delivered to my door. Incredible.

In other news, I executed my first oil and filter change on the Astra last night, and it didn’t even drip afterwards..I was expecting the usual “car from hell” maintenance task it seems to love. No such worry. Peice of piddle..:)

This entry was posted on Friday, August 18th, 2006 at 7:49 pm and is filed under General. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.