exxos's Atari, Amiga & retro forum

My PC keyboard suddenly started to repeat space keystrokes. Whenever I hit the space bar, it produces two (sometimes three) spaces. I read that this mean that it likely needs some cleaning. Ok, so I remove the space bar and perform a quick cleanup of the area and the bar itself. It works ok ... for a couple of days, may be more, but then it starts again. Clean again, some story, works ok only for a few days.

Time to change the keyboard? A major cleanup removing all the keys?

I don't know what the mechanicals are like of your keyboard but I have used contact cleaner in the past to avoid a full strip-down. Just test it first to make sure it dries non-greasy but it should.

Whilst the mechanicals can get sticky, it's possible that you'll need to go a bit deeper and look at the the key switch, be it a membrane, rubber dome or mechanical switch. For membrane and rubber dome I find that a clean with IPA is usually enough, but for mechanical switches you probably need some sort of contact cleaner like DeOxit or Electrolube.

If it is a USB keyboard I would certainly spray some contact cleaner on the USB socket and plug or try a different USB socket. I've been "had" of thinking I have a faulty keyboard when it was simply a bad connection.

Thanks for the replies.

It's a mechanical keyboard, not an expensive gamer keyboard, but not a very cheap keyboard either:

Logitech G413 Backlit Mechanical Gaming Keyboard with USB Passthrough – Carbon

Edit: For some reason a link to Amazon doesn't work.

ijor wrote: 24 May 2024 14:03 Thanks for the replies.

It's a mechanical keyboard, not an expensive gamer keyboard, but not a very cheap keyboard either:

Logitech G413 Backlit Mechanical Gaming Keyboard with USB Passthrough – Carbon

Edit: For some reason a link to Amazon doesn't work.

Probably a squirt of contact cleaner in the switch would do then.

rubber_jonnie wrote: 24 May 2024 14:08 Probably a squirt of contact cleaner in the switch would do then.

For doing that I would need to remove the switch, right?

ijor wrote: 24 May 2024 14:03 Edit: For some reason a link to Amazon doesn't work.

Thats because of HTTPS links are not allowed across different domains. If you remove HTTPS, it should work fine.

ijor wrote: 24 May 2024 15:36

rubber_jonnie wrote: 24 May 2024 14:08 Probably a squirt of contact cleaner in the switch would do then.

For doing that I would need to remove the switch, right?

Depends on the switch, some do allow a little access with the keycaps removed and the stem depressed, others may need removal.