Ever seen a keyboard ribbon cable clip missing?
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From: ~misfit~ on 23 Dec 2009 09:03 Somewhere on teh intarwebs BillW50 wrote: > ~misfit~ wrote: >> Somewhere on teh intarwebs BillW50 wrote: >>> Now my question is, I have a hard time believing those clips can >>> come loose on its own and just fall out. Instead it seems to me the >>> guy probably wanted to change the keyboard for some reason and he >>> didn't know how to release the ribbon cable and broke the clip. >>> What do you all think? And have anybody got one to work with a >>> missing clip before? As now, I am one clip short. >> >> I once managed to use a thin piece of plastic as a wedge (the same >> width as the ribbon, inserted on the opposite side to the contacts) >> and then, after testing that it worked, hot glued it in place. AFAIK >> it's still working although it was half a decade ago and I've lost >> track of the laptop. > > Sounds like a plan to me. I still want to connect up a keyboard to > that motherboard here pretty soon. Although that hot glue idea! Maybe > I'll skip that part. <grin> Mate, hot glue, or 'hot melt glue' depending on where you hail from is the scoth-tape of electronics. A friend of mine who's been concocting his own electronic devices at least since 1975, when he was 13 and I met him put me onto it. He's an engineer by trade but knows more about electronics than I could ever hope to know. At 15, while at high school he was sub-contracting desiging and etching PCBs for alarm systems. It's great stuff. Ok, it's hot. Probably hot enough to melt some plastics. (I have my glue gun warming as we speak and I'll test it with my old faithful laboratorby thermometer. It only goes up to 110 deg C so I hope I don't destroy it. I've had it for years. Mind you, it'd be a good excuse to go a bit more hi-tech with the temp monitoring equipment, finances allowing.) He's used it for years to mount PCBs into cases etc. It's non-conductive and holds on pretty good. Also, if you *do* want to remove it at a later date it can be pried away. Just the other day I took delivery of a Compaq laptop (to get back on topic) that only had two USB2 ports, both at the back. However some clown has broken the plastic tongue on one of the ports and the power and data contacts were just floating around. A disaster waiting to happen if someone tried to plug a USB device into that port. It's now completely blocked with hot glue. Everything is insulated and there's no way anyone is going to fry the mobo by jamming a stick in there. (I bought a PCMCIA / PC Card to 2 x USB2 ports for it from dealextreme for US$10 delivered http://www.dealextreme.com/details.dx/sku.24875 as 1 x USB2 really isn't enough so all's well now.) Those PCMCIA/PC Cards are so good I ordered another four. You can never have enough usb ports right? (BTW, DealExtreme's Bluetooth dongles are cheap as chips and I just took delivery of 4 this morning. http://www.dealextreme.com/details.dx/sku.11866 All test out just fine. I don't have a financial interest, I'm just sharing a source that I've found very useful recently.) The thing is, if you're careful you can use hot glue for lots of things. It cools pretty quickly on contact with colder surfaces (heat sinks) so, if heat sensitivity is an issue (perhaps for wire insulation) just add a little at a time. It really is magic. I wasn't a believer until I bought a glue gun. Now I'd be lost withut it. I'll check if it's up to temp. It smells like it is..... Ok, I applied copious quantities to the bulb of the thermometer and it went off-scale. From the way it was rising I'd say it was maybe 130 - 150 deg C? Maybe a little less. However, when you get good at applying it you can just apply dabs of the stuff and they 'sink their heat quickly and don't get so hot. (I really pumped the stuff onto the thermometer bulb to get that temp.) It really is useful stuff, either for delicate work or for 'filling'. It's not hard to tack something like a ribbon cable (or the lock tabs) in place if you're deft. >>> And another note, why do they say not to use scotch tape to hold the >>> wires in place inside of laptops? As what is wrong with scotch? >> >> Nothing. I love Ardbeg. > > lol When I heard that Jim Murray had named Ardbeg Supernova as his Scotch whisky of the year for 2010 I just had to buy a bottle. I love my Ardbeg. Jim's Scotch whisky of the year last year was Ardbeg Uigeadial and the year before was Ardbeg 10 y/o. As I'd tried the first two I felt compelled to try the Supernova, even though it's really out of my price-range. Damn it's fine! I just have to save the second half of the bottle for special occaisions. <g> -- Cheers, Shaun. "Give a man a fire and he's warm for the day. But set fire to him and he's warm for the rest of his life." Terry Pratchet, 'Jingo'.
From: BillW50 on 23 Dec 2009 09:32 In news:hgt7vs$qnv$1(a)news.eternal-september.org, ~misfit~ typed on Thu, 24 Dec 2009 03:03:36 +1300: > Mate, hot glue, or 'hot melt glue' depending on where you hail from > is the scoth-tape of electronics. Oh don't get me wrong, Shaun. When you got a choice to either toss out a motherboard or simply hot glue it, I am with you. <grin> -- Bill Gateway MX6124 ('06 era) - Windows XP SP2
From: ~misfit~ on 24 Dec 2009 17:08 Somewhere on teh intarwebs BillW50 wrote: > In news:hgpftc$ql3$1(a)news.eternal-september.org, > BillW50 typed on Mon, 21 Dec 2009 21:55:02 -0600: >>> I once managed to use a thin piece of plastic as a wedge (the same >>> width as the ribbon, inserted on the opposite side to the contacts) >>> and then, after testing that it worked, hot glued it in place. AFAIK >>> it's still working although it was half a decade ago and I've lost >>> track of the laptop. >> >> Sounds like a plan to me. I still want to connect up a keyboard to >> that motherboard here pretty soon. Although that hot glue idea! Maybe >> I'll skip that part. <grin> > > I worked on this other motherboard without the clip yesterday. And the > only way I could get the keyboard to work is to create a mound so high > that the keyboard would no longer lie flat. And that won't work out > too well. And I noticed that you could get by with an external > keyboard, except for one task. As without an internal keyboard, there > is no way to adjust the brightness. As virtually no external > keyboards has an Fn key. > Worse. I just Googled this and it appears Fn keys doesn't return scan > codes, so key remappers don't work. And worse, Fn keys are all > non-standard. So if you do get something to work for one, it won't for > another. Also Dells have a nice feature that allows the Scroll Lock to > act as an external Fn key. But it isn't a Dell. <sigh> Odd coincidence. The day before yesterday, after I wrote my reply I received what was supposed to be a new replacement keyboard for an old Tosh TE2100 P4-M 2GHz machine (that I was given as it had too many things wrong with it for it to be economically professionally repaired). I have no use for it other than as a project/hobby, hopefully repair and sell it and perhaps regain any investments. Anyway, the keyboard duly arrived and was obviously second-hand. That wasn't the big problem though. The main issue is that the thick clear plastic backing part of the ribbon connector is missing. (Who in their right mind would remove that?) Not only does it provide the correct thickness so that the clip will hold it in place but it correctly positions the two ribbons, the large one from the keyboard and the smaller one from the 'joystick' pointing device. There is a small gap between them. I've tried to use the backing from the old keyboard but with no luck so far. Once removed from the other ribbon the adhesive doesn't work as well as it did and my hands are far too big to make positioning the two ribbons and then locking them in place easy. Add to that the clip now doesn't seem to want to hold it tight..... I'm having a go at claiming my money back (auction site similar to ebay but NZ based, trademe.co.nz) but so far haven't got a reply to my email of a couple days ago. Oh well, it was purchased from a business, the staff could all be on holidays, I'll give them a wee while before taking it up with the site. Other than that I'll invent a way of getting it to stay in place although my results so far suggest that this 'new' keyboard may in fact be faulty as well. :-( -- Shaun. "Give a man a fire and he's warm for the day. But set fire to him and he's warm for the rest of his life." Terry Pratchet, 'Jingo'.
From: BillW50 on 25 Dec 2009 10:25 In news:hh0ooa$1ts$1(a)news.eternal-september.org, ~misfit~ typed on Fri, 25 Dec 2009 11:08:07 +1300: > Odd coincidence. The day before yesterday, after I wrote my reply I > received what was supposed to be a new replacement keyboard for an > old Tosh TE2100 P4-M 2GHz machine (that I was given as it had too > many things wrong with it for it to be economically professionally > repaired). I have no use for it other than as a project/hobby, > hopefully repair and sell it and perhaps regain any investments. > > Anyway, the keyboard duly arrived and was obviously second-hand. That > wasn't the big problem though. The main issue is that the thick clear > plastic backing part of the ribbon connector is missing. (Who in > their right mind would remove that?) Not only does it provide the > correct thickness so that the clip will hold it in place but it > correctly positions the two ribbons, the large one from the keyboard > and the smaller one from the 'joystick' pointing device. There is a > small gap between them. > I've tried to use the backing from the old keyboard but with no luck > so far. Once removed from the other ribbon the adhesive doesn't work > as well as it did and my hands are far too big to make positioning > the two ribbons and then locking them in place easy. Add to that the > clip now doesn't seem to want to hold it tight..... > > I'm having a go at claiming my money back (auction site similar to > ebay but NZ based, trademe.co.nz) but so far haven't got a reply to > my email of a couple days ago. Oh well, it was purchased from a > business, the staff could all be on holidays, I'll give them a wee > while before taking it up with the site. Other than that I'll invent > a way of getting it to stay in place although my results so far > suggest that this 'new' keyboard may in fact be faulty as well. :-( Hi Shaun. What a sad story. Once you get a replacement keyboard, I would use tape on the ribbon cables (you can fold over one end of the tape) to use as a tab to hang on to. This makes handling and inserting the ribbon cables very easy. Tape can be removed if you like once in place. -- Bill Gateway MX6124 ('06 era) 1 of 3 - Windows XP SP2
From: ~misfit~ on 25 Dec 2009 17:45
Somewhere on teh intarwebs BillW50 wrote: > In news:hh0ooa$1ts$1(a)news.eternal-september.org, > ~misfit~ typed on Fri, 25 Dec 2009 11:08:07 +1300: >> Odd coincidence. The day before yesterday, after I wrote my reply I >> received what was supposed to be a new replacement keyboard for an >> old Tosh TE2100 P4-M 2GHz machine (that I was given as it had too >> many things wrong with it for it to be economically professionally >> repaired). I have no use for it other than as a project/hobby, >> hopefully repair and sell it and perhaps regain any investments. >> >> Anyway, the keyboard duly arrived and was obviously second-hand. That >> wasn't the big problem though. The main issue is that the thick clear >> plastic backing part of the ribbon connector is missing. (Who in >> their right mind would remove that?) Not only does it provide the >> correct thickness so that the clip will hold it in place but it >> correctly positions the two ribbons, the large one from the keyboard >> and the smaller one from the 'joystick' pointing device. There is a >> small gap between them. >> I've tried to use the backing from the old keyboard but with no luck >> so far. Once removed from the other ribbon the adhesive doesn't work >> as well as it did and my hands are far too big to make positioning >> the two ribbons and then locking them in place easy. Add to that the >> clip now doesn't seem to want to hold it tight..... >> >> I'm having a go at claiming my money back (auction site similar to >> ebay but NZ based, trademe.co.nz) but so far haven't got a reply to >> my email of a couple days ago. Oh well, it was purchased from a >> business, the staff could all be on holidays, I'll give them a wee >> while before taking it up with the site. Other than that I'll invent >> a way of getting it to stay in place although my results so far >> suggest that this 'new' keyboard may in fact be faulty as well. :-( > > Hi Shaun. What a sad story. Once you get a replacement keyboard, I > would use tape on the ribbon cables (you can fold over one end of the > tape) to use as a tab to hang on to. This makes handling and > inserting the ribbon cables very easy. Tape can be removed if you > like once in place. Hi Bill. Thanks. Yeah, it was a bit disappointing as I'm not even sure that I'm going to get my money back on this one but I just hate the idea of waste; A machine that could/would do everything that someone wants going into landfill for the sake of a few parts/dollars and some time... I'll try making a tape tab if I can get another keyboard at a reasonable price, thanks for the tip. I've never had one that was quite this tight for space before. I mean, they could have made the cable a couple inches longer so that it was easier to connect. -- Cheers, Shaun. "Give a man a fire and he's warm for the day. But set fire to him and he's warm for the rest of his life." Terry Pratchet, 'Jingo'. |