Maintenance
Laptop keyboard replacement: dead keys, trackpads and ports
The keyboard is the part people touch most, so it fails most. It is also blamed for faults that sit on the board beneath it.
A laptop keyboard replacement is usually straightforward, and it is one of the more affordable repairs. The mistake worth avoiding is replacing the keyboard when the fault was never in it.
Two tests before you book anything
First, plug in a USB keyboard. If every key works on the external one, the laptop board and Windows are fine and the fault sits in the built-in keyboard or its ribbon cable.
Second, restart and enter the BIOS, usually with F1, F2 or Enter depending on the model. If the keys fail there too, this is hardware rather than a driver or a software problem.
What actually fails
Individual dead keys usually mean the membrane under that key has worn through, which happens naturally after enough presses on the letters you use most.
A whole row failing at once points at the ribbon cable instead, because the keyboard wires its keys in a grid rather than one by one.
Keys that repeat or type on their own usually mean contamination rather than wear. Similarly, a jumping trackpad usually means a loose cable rather than a failed pad.
Ports fail differently
A USB or HDMI port that only works at an angle has cracked solder joints where it meets the board. The port itself still works, so we repair the joint rather than fit a whole new part.
That is component-level work, and it costs considerably less than the board replacement some shops quote for it. Our piece on Lenovo motherboard price explains why those quotes differ so widely.
If liquid was involved
A keyboard that stopped after a spill is a different job entirely, because liquid passes through the keyboard on its way to the board. Replacing the keyboard alone leaves corrosion working underneath. Read laptop liquid damage first.
Getting the right part
Keyboards vary by region layout, by backlight, and sometimes by production batch inside one model. So we match the part number on the original rather than the model name.
Keyboards are one of the parts where a good compatible unit performs the same as genuine, which we explain in our guide to Lenovo parts. Either way, we name the part on your quote before we start.
Keys not responding?
Try a USB keyboard first, then bring it in for a free look.