attn ! Cosmic Impossibility- wasted $450 on new system

[preventec47]

Some of you may have followed my troubleshooting
adventure very recently under the thread of ERRATIC
SHIFT keys and keyboard operation.
My 30 years of experience and the best minds in this group
missed this completely. Problem was that I could not
type numbers on my keyboard and it appeared that a ghost
was pressing the Caps Lock intermittently.
1. replaced keyboard- no good
2. tried On-Screen-Keyboard ... still would not work
even though presumably it uses no keyboard hardware ?
3. suspected malware or virus and ran numerous scans- no good
4. finally booted system with DOS diskette and found
that I could not type numbers at dos prompt or get
the shift key to work properly- this ruled out XP-Pro
op sys corruption etc.

We all concluded therefore that the motherboard
must have a failed component and I dismantled and
scrapped the system. Bear in mind I was using it
to leave all my previous messages in this forum with
erratic captial letters throughout

Today I had a custom system built and brought it
home and plugged in with my new keyboard and my previously
used wireless microsoft mouse along with my old monitor.

DANGIT ! ! ! same weird keyboard behavior.

I changed monitors.-- No good.
Suspecting RFI frequency interference from my
router I turned the power to it off and took system
off the network. -- no good.

OK, must be bad 110V city power so I hooked up automotive
battery charger to large auto battery and connected it
to expensive pure sine wave 110 volt inverter to create
my own perfect power source --- still no good.

WHATS LEFT TO TRY by trial and error ? ? ?
only one thing left.

The last thing I checked was my mouse.. I unplugged
the wireless mouse transmitter from the USB port
and plugged in direct a USB mouse. BINGO ! ! !

Finally found the problem after two days and
$450 dollars and will be spending a dozen hours
rebuilding software function and have lost many
old programs that I cannot replace

ALL BECAUSE OF RFI INTERFERENCE FROM THE WIRELESS
MICROSOFT MOUSE TRANSMITTER ! ! ! !

I dont know why after almost a full year of use
of this wireless mouse that it would suddenly now
cause this type of problem. Consider that it
was also messing with my MS-DOS booted computer also
.... how was it doing that? Just because it was
powered and connected to the system?

Well I dont know for sure it is RFI interference...
it could be an internal system conflict,who knows?
but when I got rid of it everything started working
correctly. Anyone have more informed thoughts
on the wireless mouse being the culprit ?

 

[rclarke250]

ahhh, but we didn't know you had a rf mouse. glad you figured it out, and thanks for the post back.

 

[guitarzan]

Definitely a bizarro issue, glad you got it worked out... but I have to call you out on this statement: "...and the best minds in this group missed this completely."; Linney's post, the second reply you received, asked the following question:

You tried different Keyboards, did you try a different Mouse?

 

[preventec47]

Absolutley right. I read right over the mouse
comment because as far as I could tell my mouse
was working fabulously. which it was at least
as far as pointing and clicking etc.

There are a trillion things I dont know about the
technology but I sure didnt think a wireless mouse
could affect the on screen keyboard operation or
for that matter the recognition of Function keys
at bootup etc.

 

[linney]

It was preventec47 comment that he and "the best minds in this group missed this completely", which is true as I don't quite fit into the "best minds" group, I am more a member of the "stab in the dark group", sometimes we just get lucky.

Thanks for the feedback, sorry about the expense you incurred. Maybe you can build yourself a new system with the extra bits and pieces, and either keep it or sell it for profit?

You should also, if you haven't, post a solution in that first thread for anybody else passing that way. (I have posted this new thread's link in your old post in the meanwhile).

This is the first thread's link too.

ERRATIC SHIFT_CTRL_keys and cursor movement?
thread779-1604454

 

[stduc]

Best minds - hmmmm - obviously not - LOL. I would def include myself in the 'stab in the dark' group too.

What we all missed was the bleeding obvious. Remove everything non essential when diagnosing a problem. So lesson learned hopefully. When diagnosing keyboard issues - remove the mouse!

As to the problem - The mouse transmitter was presumably sending corrupt data to the USB port that the PC was misinterpreting as keyboard data!

In my experience wireless mice and keyboards are often the source of many issues. I love them - but they have caused and do cause me much grief.

[navy]When I married "Miss Right" I didn't realise her first name was 'always'. LOL[/navy]