Macbook Air Keyboard & Trackpad DEAD!

barochoc

Hi Guy's,

Have any of you experienced this yet? Basically my MBA is working fine with external or bluetooth keyboard & mouse.

I've tried everything from reseting the PRAM, reset the SMC (opened the MBA, took battery out), I've disassembled the entire thing & reassembled it making sure all connections are good.

I've been all over the web & it seems like a very common problem not just with the MBA but the Pro too. Everything from using Disk Utility to Verify Permissions, Fix Permissions, Verify Disk and Repair Disk have worked for some people on the Pro.

Simple restarts have worked for others on both the MBA & Pro. Full software re-installations were necessary for others to get it working again & worst case scenario was a new top casing with keyboard & trackpad. Some bought new & others 2nd hand.

I bought a 2nd hand top casing & spent over an hour transferring all the components over tonight to no avail. Keyboard & trackpad still dead.

Has anyone any idea's other than those stated above? I don't want to get violated by any of the Apple service centers here as I always sort my machines out. This one is breaking me down though

It's out of warranty. 13" 1.8Ghz 80GB MBA

Liameter

barochoc wrote: »

Full software re-installations were necessary for others to get it working again

So did you try this?

Sounds like a good advert for AppleCare!

acous

If you hold option on boot do you get a working pointer for boot device selection? If that doesn't work it sounds like you could be in trouble

barochoc

I'll try that Acous. I just completed a fresh Snow Leopard install & updated to 10.6.6 & still no change

I reckon it's performing a lot slower than normal too. HD tested ok, RAM ok, everything else checks out ok. Not making much sense.

I suspect it's one of the ribbon cables between the top casing/keyboard & the Mobo. I really can't think of anything else. I wonder can I buy them anywhere?

acous

I don't think you can buy them "officially". I bought a top case ribbon cable for my macbook pro on ebay, $50 though . Also it arrived with a tiny piece of plastic lodged in the connector. Luckily I was able to sort it out with a needle.

K.O.Kiki

With older Macbook Pros, it was a case of loose ribbon cables on the underside of the trackpad.
Happened to me, and my attempts to fix it also necessitated a new top panel.

Strange how replacing yours didn't fix it.

barochoc

Well I've disconnected & reconnected all ribbon cables & no change. My suspicions are one or both ribbon cables from the mono to the keyboard & trackpad are faulty or damaged. Some tool opened it before me & hadn't a breeze what he was doing. He also lost half (not just one or two) of the screws. I noticed the metal clamp that screws to the top panel & holds the connectors from the ribbon cables firmly in place on the mobo is missing too.

Some people eh?

moleza

barochoc, did you solve your problem? I'm in the exactly same scenario... did the same things, and it still doesn't work.

The strange thing is that the shift+control+option+power buttons work for the SMC reset. Other than that they are dead.

I think that if it was a malfunction cable, no keys were working at all at any situation....

JonMac

Don't know if this will help, but my MacBook [white] had this problem and it was due to the fact the battery had bulged from old age. New battery, no problem.