Repair Services for vintage Alps boards

[keyboard Kultist]

Hey folks. Recently I obtained an ANSI Blue Alps board made for Packard Bell. The switchs seem in good shape but about 8 of the keys don't work, including both the enter key and numpad enter. I kludtzed around and managed to get numpad enter working, but the experience convinced me that my soldering skills are not up to snuff.

Does anyone know of a repair service that I can have it shipped to in order to get it working again? Thanks!

[Polecat]

Bob Tibbetts at Northgate Keyboard Repair will probably be able to help:

http://www.northgate-keyboard-repair.com/

[ZedTheMan]

Seconding Northgate Bob.

[andrewjoy]

Northgate bob has been in the keyboard repair business for years, before the whole keyboard community got started.

However his web design skills could use work.

[Muirium]

I dunno man, looks legit to me. From the centred text on down to the animated gifs. Thought that mid nineties aesthetic would float your boat!

[andrewjoy]

I dunno man, looks legit to me. From the centred text on down to the animated gifs. Thought that mid nineties aesthetic would float your boat!

They do.

But its the layout and the yellow and the centre aligned text

All websites should look like this

http://www.toad.com/gnu/sysadmin/index.html

[keyboard Kultist]

Thanks for the pointers guys. When the start of semester craziness subsides I'll give Northgate Bob a call

[cli]

Thanks for the pointers guys. When the start of semester craziness subsides I'll give Northgate Bob a call

Did you tried cleaning switchplate.
- First use a fine precision tweezer and remove the metal leaf from the switchplate
- Blow some compressed air at the switchplate.
- Use a q-tip and alcohol to clean the metal contacts

[keyboard Kultist]

Thanks for the pointers guys. When the start of semester craziness subsides I'll give Northgate Bob a call

Did you tried cleaning switchplate.
- First use a fine precision tweezer and remove the metal leaf from the switchplate
- Blow some compressed air at the switchplate.
- Use a q-tip and alcohol to clean the metal contacts

Thanks! Is there any particular type of alcohol, or will drug store rubbing alcohol do? Following the measure twice cut one school of thought I'll practice on a broken white alps board for getting the metal leaf out and replaces.

[cli]

Thanks for the pointers guys. When the start of semester craziness subsides I'll give Northgate Bob a call

Did you tried cleaning switchplate.
- First use a fine precision tweezer and remove the metal leaf from the switchplate
- Blow some compressed air at the switchplate.
- Use a q-tip and alcohol to clean the metal contacts

Thanks! Is there any particular type of alcohol, or will drug store rubbing alcohol do? Following the measure twice cut one school of thought I'll practice on a broken white alps board for getting the metal leaf out and replaces.

I use acohol from the drugstore (96% alcohol ketonatus). It will dry up quickly.
Don't use contact cleaners, I've read posts from others who killed their keyboard after cleaning the switches with it.

[orihalcon]

I wouldn't mind doing the actual switch replacement, though cleaning a plate is pretty tedious unless you desolder all of the switches first which is much more time consuming. I don't quite recall NB's rates for repair, but I think it was something like $20 plus a certain amount per switch for general switch replacement (doubt would include plate cleaning) and probably shipping beyond that. Maybe get a quote from him for the services you want and PM me what you find if you're thinking it sounds unreasonable.

The only odd comment I'd heard quoted from Northgate Bob from a forum a while back was that he'd reportedly said that there is no difference between White and Blue ALPS switches, so you might end up with White replacement switches in your Blue ALPS board Other than that, I've heard nothing but good things about him, though I have not personally used his services.

[keyboard Kultist]

I wouldn't mind doing the actual switch replacement, though cleaning a plate is pretty tedious unless you desolder all of the switches first which is much more time consuming. I don't quite recall NB's rates for repair, but I think it was something like $20 plus a certain amount per switch for general switch replacement (doubt would include plate cleaning) and probably shipping beyond that. Maybe get a quote from him for the services you want and PM me what you find if you're thinking it sounds unreasonable.

The only odd comment I'd heard quoted from Northgate Bob from a forum a while back was that he'd reportedly said that there is no difference between White and Blue ALPS switches, so you might end up with White replacement switches in your Blue ALPS board Other than that, I've heard nothing but good things about him, though I have not personally used his services.

PM'd. I'm the guy you exerted so much effort with to get the beamspring working, I wouldn't mind sending you more buisnes

[JP!]

Looks like Bob really has a passion for cleaning and repair.

Truly a labor of love

[snacksthecat]

Are you willing to open the keyboard up? Try to see if the non-working switches are all connected as either a row or a column.

I had this same keyboard and had a similar problem with a handful of keys not working. It turned out to be a dead diode of all things. To repair it, I desoldered the diode then shattered it so I could pull it out of the pcb hole. The diodes are on the top side of the pcb but to replace it, I just soldered a new one in from the bottom.

I'd suggest investing in a cheap multimeter. They go a long way in helping troubleshoot things like this. If you do have a multimeter, you can check if these switches are "dead" while they're still soldered in place. Just put the multimeter in continuity mode, touch the probes to the pins, and press the key. This should help you determine if it's a switch issue or something else like the diode issue I mentioned above.

Lastly, if you are instead just looking for someone to fix it, I'm happy to help. I'm located in USA (Illinois).

[keyboard Kultist]

Are you willing to open the keyboard up? Try to see if the non-working switches are all connected as either a row or a column.

I had this same keyboard and had a similar problem with a handful of keys not working. It turned out to be a dead diode of all things. To repair it, I desoldered the diode then shattered it so I could pull it out of the pcb hole. The diodes are on the top side of the pcb but to replace it, I just soldered a new one in from the bottom.

I'd suggest investing in a cheap multimeter. They go a long way in helping troubleshoot things like this. If you do have a multimeter, you can check if these switches are "dead" while they're still soldered in place. Just put the multimeter in continuity mode, touch the probes to the pins, and press the key. This should help you determine if it's a switch issue or something else like the diode issue I mentioned above.

Lastly, if you are instead just looking for someone to fix it, I'm happy to help. I'm located in USA (Illinois).

Thanks! I'm going to get a multimeter and muck around with it. I'll probably ship it off, but a little measuring can't hurt.


Btw guys, I want to say something. When someone who is somewhat clueless (that would be me) comes into a lot of forums and asks a question, even politely, there's a lot of sneering elitism. I don't see any of that around here, you guys rule

[Muirium]

Compliment gladly accepted! Thing is, we’re all clueless. Keeps us humble!

Every once in a while, someone breezes through and says DT is so austere and elitist compared to which ever other forum they’re from. Apparently, we have this reputation as a tight group of tight assed, sentence-finishing, emoji-less snobs who’ll type full words and even paragraphs on our keyboards and aren’t afraid to prove it! There’s a bit of confusion over how clean DT looks—no dumb repeating sigs or walls of animated gifs in this place—and how we treat people here. Amusing! Because now I get what people see in the other aesthetic: seizure inspiring, jacked up mess with people hollering one word answers = friendly? Uh huh!? We do things a little differently. We show we’re friendly by being friends.

[andrewjoy]

Thanks! I'm going to get a multimeter and muck around with it. I'll probably ship it off, but a little measuring can't hurt.

Make sure you get one with a good continuity buzzer (ideally a latching one altho that is usualy on the super expensive flukes etc), you will want to kill yourself if you have to test a board with one with a slow or no buzzer.

UNI-T are a good mid range option .

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Ranging-Multi- ... ay&sr=8-24

[Polecat]

Thanks! I'm going to get a multimeter and muck around with it. I'll probably ship it off, but a little measuring can't hurt.

Btw guys, I want to say something. When someone who is somewhat clueless (that would be me) comes into a lot of forums and asks a question, even politely, there's a lot of sneering elitism. I don't see any of that around here, you guys rule

We cannot abide intolerance here. Uh...no room for sarcasm either.

Be aware that digital and analog multimeters act differently when testing diodes. Analogs (usually) have enough voltage to turn on a diode, but most digitals do not, so those usually have a separate range just for testing diodes and other semiconductors.