
The Great Apple Keyboard Cover-Up - shritesh
https://ifixit.org/blog/10279/apple-macbook-keyboard-cover-up/
======
userbinator
The fact that the membrane is still vented (labeled 321 in the diagram)
suggests that this will only delay, and not fix the dust ingress problem.
Indeed, it could make things worse by creating a tiny pump[1] that draws
particles in on each keystroke.

I don't know why they didn't vent from the bottom instead, but that's how
completely sealed (i.e. waterproof) keypads are vented.

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diaphragm_pump](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diaphragm_pump)

Edit: wow, downvotes? Care to explain...?

~~~
tinus_hn
>> Edit: wow, downvotes? Care to explain...?

> Please don't comment about the voting on comments. It never does any good,
> and it makes boring reading.

Don’t worry about downvotes, even if you care about the karma points you can
at most get to -4 anyway.

~~~
drewmol
Concerning points, here's what works for me: I act on the assumtion that I
can't take the points with me when (I'm || HM) is dead. So... while I need
enough to enable free speech, accumulating internet points is not the reason I
participate in this forum.

~~~
TomK32
Let's wait for the Black Mirror episode where your internet points will make
your Avatar's afterlife more enjoyable.

~~~
wll
See Tom Scott’s Welcome to Life. [0]

[0]
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IFe9wiDfb0E](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IFe9wiDfb0E)

------
corey_moncure
Was the old keyboard engineering so bad? I feel like Apple has been fixing
what wasn't broken since about 2010, regarding the MBP at least.

Literally all they needed to do was retina screen, upgrade the internals, and
add a few USB-C ports. Was anyone ever legitimately inconvenienced by the
thickness of the 2010 MBP? I know I was directly inconvenienced by the loss of
MagSafe, ethernet, SD card and USB-A, the loss of the FN key row, and loss of
serviceability.

So much so that my 2010 MBP will very likely be my last Apple purchase ever.

~~~
designcode
After using my 2016 MBP for two years, going back to my 2014 MBP just feels
wrong.

The keyboard is so much better on the modern ones, so I’d recommend giving it
a chance !

~~~
saagarjha
Wow, your comment was killed within seconds. I’d suggest expanding on your
opinion.

~~~
SirHound
The 2016 keyboard feels, IMO, way better to type of. In comparison the old MBP
feels like a much sloppier machine.

It’s size was also the only thing putting me off a personal purchase.
Reliability issues aside (I haven’t been affected but I assume it’s a matter
of time) it is a nicer machine.

------
lancewiggs
They fixed the keyboard, increased the max memory to 32GB and stuck to their
guns on the touch bar - and that all seems reasonable to me. (I’m far more
annoyed by Microsoft removing ESC as the dbox cancel key for errors in Excel
than the disappearance of the ESC key)

~~~
tedivm
Remapping the "caps lock" key to ESC has worked out really well for me.

~~~
copperx
It makes no sense to remap a home row key to such an infrequently used key.
It's much better to remap Caps Lock to Control (by the way, how do you press
Control A and Control E and Control L and Control R hundreds of times a day in
bash? By reaching to the far away corner located Control? That's absolute
madness).

Traditional UNIX keyboards had the control key in the position of where the
caps lock key is now. If you remap your keyboard like that, bash and the Emacs
shortcuts enabled throughout macOS will suddenly make A LOT of sense. After a
few days it will seem be impossible to work in any other keyboard, which is
further proof that the remapping is essential for working efficiently in a
Unix environment.

I would personally remap the far away control key to act like an Escape key
instead.

Sure, if you're a vi user, the caps lock as ESC will seem rational at first,
but outside of vi, all other Unix tools work with control key combinations.

~~~
cerberusss
> Traditional UNIX keyboards had the control key in the position of where the
> caps lock key is now

Couterpoint: when I was working at Lucent around 1999, they gave me a Sun
workstation with a keyboard that had Esc instead of Caps Lock. There were
others that had a Control key there, though.

Edit: I'm searching online and can't find a Sun keyboard with that layout. Now
I'm wondering if I misremembered...

~~~
copperx
That's interesting. All the Sun keyboards that I have seen have the control
key in the place of the caps lock key. I do know that some had the Esc key
closer to the home row (back-tick position, I believe).

------
madeofpalk
This is in-line with the the 'under promise and over deliver" mantra I was
taught at Apple Retail. Don't make any promises you can't keep, and silently
start to fix issues like this.

Apple having a hardware fix for their keyboard disasters in this revision is
also inline with their repair program they just issued.

~~~
garmaine
> Apple having a hardware fix for their keyboard disasters in this revision is
> also inline with their repair program they just issued.

Yes, they _just_ issued a repair program. Until precisely 3 weeks ago Apple
refused to acknowledge the issue and forced customers to pay for costly
repairs on their own dime. This patent was filed in September 2016. Apple was
fucking lying through their teeth for a full 22 months and have been caught in
that lie.

Frankly I'm amazed there isn't more outrage at this. How could anyone trust
them going forward?

~~~
coldtea
> _Yes, they just issued a repair program. Until precisely 3 weeks ago Apple
> refused to acknowledge the issue and forced customers to pay for costly
> repairs on their own dime. This patent was filed in September 2016. Apple
> was fucking lying through their teeth for a full 22 months and have been
> caught in that lie._

Do you expect companies to immediately jump to full repair programs the minute
the first few users complain?

Especially when people will complain about anything.

Of course they'd wait to see if it's a widespread issue.

~~~
garmaine
> Do you expect companies to immediately jump to full repair programs the
> minute the first few users complain?

They designed a fix innovative enough to file a patent on, 22 months before
they acknowledged the issue. That requires costly engineering time and
organizational direction that is not used on a whim. They knew back then that
this was a real issue.

~~~
coldtea
> _They designed a fix innovative enough to file a patent on, 22 months before
> they acknowledged the issue._

They work on changes, ideas, and improvements all the time, and they have
1000s of similar patents for everything, doesn't mean the work that lead to
that patent was a response to the specific product issue -- could be just a
patent about avoiding dust in keyboards in general (a problem that harks back
to the ages).

> _That requires costly engineering time and organizational direction that is
> not used on a whim._

Again, you'd be surprised. It just requires the idea, and someone to write it
in patent-ease. They have patents for all sorts of ideas and some make it into
products while others never see the light of day. They literally use those "on
a whim". For Apple filling a patent is peanut money.

[https://appleinsider.com/articles/13/01/24/apple-
exploring-s...](https://appleinsider.com/articles/13/01/24/apple-exploring-
sensor-system-that-tells-users-when-their-shoes-wear-out)

[https://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/2017/03/23/apple-
pate...](https://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/2017/03/23/apple-patent-
reveals-unusual-designs-iphone-laptop-hybrid/)

[http://www.businessinsider.com/apple-weight-lifting-
fitness-...](http://www.businessinsider.com/apple-weight-lifting-fitness-
sensor-patent-2014-6)

[https://www.theverge.com/2017/10/10/16452402/apple-patent-
wa...](https://www.theverge.com/2017/10/10/16452402/apple-patent-watch-band-
automatic-adjustment-biometric)

[https://gizmodo.com/5058161/apple-patent-adds-quicklook-
capa...](https://gizmodo.com/5058161/apple-patent-adds-quicklook-capabilities-
to-mouse-pointer)

[https://www.forbes.com/sites/gordonkelly/2015/09/23/apple-
cu...](https://www.forbes.com/sites/gordonkelly/2015/09/23/apple-cuts-
headphone-jack/#4b8992d6d24d)

[https://www.macstories.net/news/apple-patents-lcd-screen-
tha...](https://www.macstories.net/news/apple-patents-lcd-screen-that-plays-
nice-with-sunglasses/)

------
phil248
I'm sorry, but are people actually more concerned with the sound of the
keyboard than the arrow keys?

It took me a week to get used to the sound. Six months in and I still can't
reliably hit the arrow keys. It's as if they're designed to be as difficult as
possible.

~~~
npunt
Put a bit of tape on the bottom half of the left and right keys if you need
some tactile guidance and have old muscle memory. I do this on all my
keyboards (my daily driver is a Microsoft sculpt) and it helps immensely with
finding the correct key. Arrow keys in particular are just distant enough from
default position to need that extra bit of tactile feedback.

~~~
wingspar
On other keyboards, I’ve used a drop of CA glue (superglue) to add tactile
feedback. Much like some keyboards have a bump on two of the home row keys

~~~
JustSomeNobody
Clear nail polish works too. It's also a good makeshift loctite for tiny
screws.

~~~
dfee
Never heard of this. Interesting.

~~~
JustSomeNobody
Yeah, I worked at an optical lab to pay for college. We'd have customers come
in with screws that wouldn't stay in so we'd use clear nail polish. I'm sure
for some uses, loctite would be better, but nail polish does very good. We'd
also use it on metal temple pieces when someone's facial oils had done a
number on it. We'd buff the pieces smooth and coat with clear nail polish. Not
a perfect fix, but would get someone who could afford new glasses by for a
while longer.

------
sillysaurus3
My too-expensive 2015 MBP has a nonfunctional keyboard. I have to type using
external keyboards, which is quite "fun". Apple wants $500.

Dragging an old $10 USB keyboard around with you makes you look like you
_really_ like mechanical keyboards.

It's been about a year and a half now. I guess you get used to it.

~~~
princekolt
There is a service program to replace these keyboards for free. They are even
refunding people who paid to get their keyboards fixed before the program
launched. This is almost a non-issue at this point if you can use a
replacement computer while they fix yours.

~~~
wild_preference
They don’t fix the keyboard. They only “reset” it which means you’ll have to
bring it in again once it accumulates enough issues to make it worthwhile. My
first key failed within one month. Eventually seven keys came off with ny
fingers as I typed.

“Non-issue” is comical word choice.

~~~
gnicholas
In my case, they are sending out to have the top case replaced. Can’t speak
for others, but they’re not just kicking the can down the road.

The Apple genius also told me that the replacement part won’t be identical to
the original keyboard. We’ll see if it’s the new 3rd generation butterfly or
just a tweaked 2nd gen.

~~~
protomyth
That's my big problem with the whole "free" repair. If I send in my computer,
what do I get back? Will it have some fix that prevents future problems or
will I be SOL in a couple of weeks when one of the keys fails again?

> In my case, they are sending out to have the top case replaced. Can’t speak
> for others, but they’re not just kicking the can down the road.

They built the thing so they have no real option other the replacing the whole
top case. The in store repair is blowing air into the keyboard and hoping it
fixes it.

------
tcoff91
I’m curious to know if the membrane improves the feel of the keys. I hate how
the butterfly switches feel.

~~~
pier25
Some articles say it feels a bit softer, but I doubt it will make much of a
difference.

------
phlyingpenguin
I’m confused. Are we supposed to be bandwagon mad that Apple took steps to fix
their busted keyboard?

~~~
paxys
No, we're supposed to be mad because they still refuse to acknowledge that it
was a real problem to begin with.

~~~
zaroth
They did announced a repair program, is that not acknowledging the issue?

~~~
mrep
Is their keyboard replacement program valid for the new laptops and how long
does it last?

I ask how long because my late 2013 MBP (granted, maxed out top of the line 15
inch) is still running like a complete champ and with how slow cpu/ram is
increasing in power these days (mine has 4 cores/16GB ram and now 5 years
later, you can only get 6 cores and 32GB of ram) I would expect a top of the
line laptop to last a decade before recycling.

Laptop keyboards are not something you can easily/cheaply replace because if
they fail, it totally screws over the "laptop" feature since now you need to
pay to replace the entire keyboard or get an external one.

So no, laptop keyboards should have even higher standards for reliability
these days and I haven't seen any commitment for these new ones.

~~~
Nullabillity
> Laptop keyboards are not something you can easily/cheaply replace because if
> they fail, it totally screws over the "laptop" feature since now you need to
> pay to replace the entire keyboard or get an external one.

There are many laptops with easily replaceable keyboards, this is just typical
Apple being Apple.

------
dingo_bat
Reading the comment under TFA it seems macbook keyboards have no water
resistance? Seems a bit weird for such an expensive device.

~~~
BugsJustFindMe
Oh god. Forget about keyboards. I once watched a droplet of water so small
that it had to have been affected more by subtle air currents than by gravity
hit the edge of the trackpad on a pre-force-touch model and then vanish inside
the gap, say around 2011, at which point the trackpad promptly stopped working
properly for several days (phantom touches, cursor jumping, dead zones). Be
careful out there with the expensive toys, eh?

~~~
stefanfisk
OMG, this reminds me of when I wrecked my MBA after getting out of the shower!

A drop of water managed to break the power button such that is was constantly
being pressed if no other key was pressed, causing hard shutdowns. BUT - if I
used a tooth pick to stick one of the unused F-keys I could continue using the
computer, with the downside that certain key combinations stopped working
(mostly shift combos).

Until I figured out the toothpick fix coding was like a Lost episode in high
speed, where all was lost if I forgot to press the button within the allotted
timespan.

------
smsm42
I am not sure what they did, but not only on my new 2016 laptop keyboard felt
worse, it also broke around half a year in service (shift key just refused to
work. Good think there's two of them, but majorly annoying still). I
temporarily went back to a 2013 one and my first thought was "man, the old
keyboard feels so much nicer"...

------
bogomipz
I wonder if the keyboard replacement program Apple announced recently[1] for
affected keyboards is replacing them with this newer design?

[1] [https://www.apple.com/support/keyboard-service-program-
for-m...](https://www.apple.com/support/keyboard-service-program-for-macbook-
and-macbook-pro/)

------
darth_mastah
Apple cast away Steve Jobs and then came begging for him to come back. He did
and steered the company from the verge of collapse to a massive worldwide
success. Since SJ passed away, Apple is getting worse each year. I guess this
might be Jobs' spirit fading away and people thinking they could do better
than him. Clearly, they fall short.

------
basicplus2
<Apple has a patent for this exact tech designed to “prevent and/or alleviate
contaminant ingress.”>

This is a pretty sad day that sonething like this can be patented..

Anything wrapped in a cover can “prevent and/or alleviate contaminant ingress”

Does any patent office in the world really think nobody has thought of this
before?

~~~
skygazer
The patent [0] does seem a bit more extensive than just wrap it in a membrane.
It discusses using venting/gas pressure (from depressing the key) to expel
debris, for instance.

[0]
[http://pdfaiw.uspto.gov/.aiw?PageNum=0&docid=20180068808&IDK...](http://pdfaiw.uspto.gov/.aiw?PageNum=0&docid=20180068808&IDKey=&HomeUrl=http%3A%2F%2Fpdfaiw.uspto.gov%2F)

