How to disable my laptop's defective keyboard?
- by Kolink
I have an Alienware M17x R2, and after a couple years of use I started having problems with the keyboard: Intermittently, and without warning or apparent cause (even if I'm not touching the computer), the S key (and more recently the D key) will start firing incessant signals until I hit the offending key.
I've been using a USB keyboard, which is conveniently exactly the right size to fit over the built-in keyboard without touching any buttons. However, even as I type the defective keyboard will fire its stream of signals.
I have contacted Dell about this, twice in fact. The first time, I was just bluntly told that they don't ship replacement keyboards. The second time I was told that they did, but they were out of stock and they would contact me when they were in stock again. They haven't contacted me since.
I can't seem to work out which device to disable in the device manager. Here's a screenshot of what I have:
None of the keyboard devices have "Disable" in their context menus, only "Uninstall"... so you'll understand if I'm hesitant to try anything myself.
Any advice on how to fix this?