Monday, April 17, 2006

Returnng faut eybard

I've had problems with my hands from typing before, so I was so happy to get the new the Microsoft Ergonomic Keyboard 4000 when I landed in Canada. Unfortunately it does seem to have build quality issues. The space bar was very stiff - I ended up with a sore thumb in a few days. That softened up, but the semicolon (;) required a lot more push than any other key on the keyboard. As a programmer and chatter, the semicolon key is really important. So I exchanged it for another one.

The replacement had a similar problem, but now with a bunch of keys (milko) instead of semicolon. So within 24 hours I exchanged again, and this one seems OK. Will see how it goes. If there are problems, I'm returning for a cash refund and getting a different keyboard.

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

This is pretty much why I haven't replaced my keyboard in ahh.. hmm.. well.. hmm.. 8? years. I like the old style IBM keyboards. Nothing like having an input device which is faulty; especially a mouse when playing games.

In other news.. the MicroSoft Mouse I purchased back in 2000 or so still works fine. Say what you like about their software, but their hardware can be quite good.

harves said...

Agreed, hardware can be quite good. Found them faultless before, which is why I bought this keyboards. Anyway, the third one seems good. Now I just have a pair of buzzing Altec Lansing speakers to return to Future Shop.

You know, Future Shop offered to sell me extra speaker insurance, in case they started buzzing later. Is there just production quality issues here that everyone expects dodgy equipment? :(

Anonymous said...

Okay... 'buzzing insurance'. You shouldn't need that: It's called Warrenty. Most computer equipment will screw up, if it's going to, in the first year of it's life - hence the 12 month warrenty we see on most products.

From your description I'd say that they have had a lot of returns on those speakers. See if you can get a different brand.

Anonymous said...

Future shop tries to sell you Warranty on *everything*. It's just the way they make money.. It really has nothing to do with the return rates, etc. Canada is kinda like that.. they make the money on the Warranty if you can get the stuff generally cheap.

Anonymous said...

Altec Lansing *used to be* a good brand of audio equipment.
Generally buzzing is caused by piss poor power supply. Does it have inbuilt power supply? If its a plug pack then try another one.
My understanding is undersized capacitors failing to smooth the ac to dc.
Some let you use batteries and quite often you will notice no hum.

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