ScuzzBlog: Diaries May 2018
Entry 1st May 2018: Post: 2
Amstrad PCW8256 keyboard issues
Don't you just hate when the weather is fine and you simply have
to go out and do that long overdue gardening. Never mind. Got back
to the retro late and decided to have another go at seeing if I
could get any joy out of the 8256 keyboard.
I couldn't use the thing yesterday as when I was in Locoscript
I kept getting a beep for every action and it refused to access
the various function keys.
So I took the keyboard apart and gave it a good clean. When I
put it back together I had gained a number of keys and the
repeat aspect of key actions was not so great. What was happening
was when I pressed 's' say I would get three characters on the
screen. Now I only go two.
I took the keyboard apart again and thoroughly cleaned the
membrane and set too testing all the springs. Having again put
it back together I gained most of the keys. I then put stars
on those that were missing and continued to repeat. In the end
I was just five keys down and I started to worry about the
connector as it is very delicate.
I then discovered that if I pressed another key , like say
WORDCHAR I could actually activate the broken key to enter the
correct character. I determined that the actual chasis of the
keyboard that holds the springs is flexing too much. This may
be a consequence of heavy items being left on top of the board.
I may have been responsible, but difficult to say.
The work around is fine for now. I may have one more go, but
I do think that the pressing of the keys is flexing the bottom
board and causing the springs adjacent to connect. Dunno. I'll
keep my eyes open for another keyboard. I do have others for other
PCWs, but I would like a fresh one. Thing is I love the PCWs
cus of the CP/M. Same with the 6128, I just love CP/M. Normally
I do use the 6128 or 9512 for this but it has been quite fun
playing with the 8256. So fast at accessing CP/M and the machine
boots in seconds.
All back together now and so not exactly a failure. Fortunately
I finished the gardening so more computing tomorrow. Hooray !!
U P D A T E D
Well I never, switched on this morning and
all the keys worked. Must have had a visit
from the Sugar fairy over night. I switched off
and on and the keys still worked. Left the
machine running for a good while and all
still working. It's like that sometimes
with old computers. After all the kit did
work at one point... So hey she's OK now
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