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Spacebar won't work: tried 2 keyboards

K

KJW

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Feb 12, 2007
7
0
Problem is on an imac G3 running OS X.4 Tiger). Spacebar completely ineffective in all programs. I tried a second keyboard, same problem! Tried all sorts of restarts, reset PRAM, etc. Tried reinstalling Tiger from DVD but with the "Save settings" function, but that failed 3 times. (Error installing software.) Removed all peripherals. Assume this is a software problem? Is there a solution short of erasing everything and reinstalling? Thanks for input from anyone who might have encountered this problem.

KJW
 
Tried repairing permissions too

I can try it again, though. Thanks for the suggestion.

KJW
 
Odd, I'd have thought bugs where individual keys stop working would be rare, but I saw something similar on my G5 at home, the sound volume and disk eject buttons stopped working - but would if I booted off an external hard disk.
 
Well, I just tried repairing disk permissions again. . .it didn't correct the problem.

Going to check now to see if it does it in "classic" mode.

KJW
 
Nothing's working

Is there a "keyboard driver" or something that can be accessed?

I have also tried "International" in the system preferences and made sure it's set on US.

KJW
 
I'd trying reinstalling OSX again, using the archive & install option. If it fails, check the console to see if that gives any hints what's going wrong.
 
whooleytoo said:
I'd trying reinstalling OSX again, using the archive & install option. If it fails, check the console to see if that gives any hints what's going wrong.
Click to expand...

I second that. But don't restore any files, or update the system unless you're sure that the keyboard works again, that way you can be sure it's not any problems with corrupt library files, or any issues with system updates.

Good luck
 
Try this- it might not work, but it's worth a shot. Create another account under Preferences. Log into it, and try the space bar. It could be some account preferences settings. If it works, then you can backup your files and reinstall Tiger, or simply import your files on the new account and delete the old account.
 
have you tried another USB port and another computer? if it works in either of those two situations, then it wont be a problem with they keyboard
 
Here's what I've tried

Thanks, everyone, for the good suggestions. So far, it's still screwed up. Here's what I've tried:
Reset PRAM, open firmware and reboot, remove Universal access prefs from library, remove keyboard prefs file from library, rebuild desktop, unplug everything, try different keyboards, try different usb ports (including hub with power supply), load OS9, and reinstall os 10.4. Oh, and go on the Internationl prefs and also the universal access prefs.

The spacebar DOES work when I am in the whitescreen mode after restarting with apple+option+O+F.

As you can see, I've gotten lots of advice! Here's one question:

After I had reinstalled the system software with archive/preserve user settings, it asked me what to use as startup disk, the DVD or the system on my hard drive. I chose hard drive. Was that correct, or was that just using my old system that was archived?

Thanks again.

KJW
 
You did the right thing re: the boot drive selection.

Hmm.... your keyboard spacebar works in open firmware but not in a freshly re-installed OS X with all the NVRAM/PRAM/etc reset? That's surreal. I'm stumped! :(
 
And the winner is. . .

Lovesong! With "create a new user account." (Where were you yesterday when I sat at this thing for 6 hours trying to fix it?) Strange that the answer is this simple, yes?

Any ideas what might be corrupt on my old user account?
 
KJW said:
Lovesong! With "create a new user account." (Where were you yesterday when I sat at this thing for 6 hours trying to fix it?) Strange that the answer is this simple, yes?

Any ideas what might be corrupt on my old user account?
Click to expand...

Oh boy- that I don't know. It could be a number of the files in your user library. Have you been messing around in terminal?
Could have changed permissions on something...but that wouldn't make sense just for the space bar.
In either case, glad it worked. Sorry I couldn't be there for you earlier... "I'm only one man!";)

Good luck
 
The culprits

were obviously two teenage boys who were "messing around" with it on Saturday night (kids belonging to friends of mine, about 14 yrs old.) Should have had THEM come over and fix the !&*@ thing.
 
KJW said:
Lovesong! With "create a new user account." (Where were you yesterday when I sat at this thing for 6 hours trying to fix it?) Strange that the answer is this simple, yes?

Any ideas what might be corrupt on my old user account?
Click to expand...

Hi,
I just had this problem a couple days ago. As it turned out, something in system preferences for my account had accidentally been set to do something when I pressed the space bar. Thus, it was trying to do whatever that something was... so my spacebar appeared to be broken.

My problem today is that System Preferences is broken after doing the Security Update this morning.. otherwise I'd tell you exactly what I had to change to make it work again.

I'm off to find the answer to that problem!

Michelle
 
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