Re: //e Keyboard problems

[salfter@salfter.dyndns.org (Scott Alfter)]

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In article <1045090319.508344@envoy>, Martin <martinf@ot.com.au> wrote:
>After an absence of 16 years, I have just picked up an (original
>non-enhanced) Apple IIe (also picked up a IIgs last year but thats another
>story).
>
>Now, a couple of things:
>
>(1) One of the keys seems to be very iffy, and more often than not doesn't
>appear to make a good contact. I am assuming its just some dirt or dust, as
>the rest of the keyboard seems to work fine.
>
>After pulling the keyboard out, unscrewing the PCB, the PCB doesn't want to
>come away from the rest of the keyboard.

Several different keyboards were used in Apple IIs.  Some used multiple
keyswitches that were soldered to a circuit board.  OTOH, I have a II+ with
a different switch arrangement...the stems go into a plastic frame with
spring contacts pressed onto some plastic "nubs."  The board screws onto
this, with a plastic-film sheet between the two so that only the contacts in
the middle are exposed.  At first, I got that going by disassembling it and
blowing the dust out.  More recently, though, the M key decided not to work. 
I disassembled it again and thought I fixed the problem, but now most of the
home-row keys don't work.

(If someone has a working II+ keyboard at a reasonable price, send me email. 
If push comes to shove, I could buy one from Shreve Systems for $40...but
you can get entire systems for less than that.  Sun Remarketing is even
worse...over $200!)

>(2) Embarrasing question, but as I said, it has been a very long time. Can
>someone refresh my memory on what the switch on the outside of the
>bottom-front-right does ? I can't even remember using it when I had my apple
>all those years ago.

It sounds like you have a foreign-spec IIe (not surprising, given your TLD). 
The ones sold in the US don't have that switch.  I ran across one in Germany
years ago...it switches the character-generator ROM (and maybe the keyboard
layout) between ASCII (and the US keyboard layout) and a foreign character
set (and the corresponding keyboard layout).  If I had to guess, you
probably have a UK-spec IIe...the only difference in the character set,
IIRC, is that # gets replaced with � (you probably have both markings on the
3 key).

  _/_   Scott Alfter
 / v \  salfter@salfter.dyndns.org
(IIGS(  http://alfter.us            Top-posting!
 \_^_/  pkill -9 /bin/laden         >What is the most annoying thing on Usenet?

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