And so it is with laptops. Or at least with laptop keyboards--I've replaced four of them in the past two years, and I'm not a violent typer. On two keyboards, the finger-placement nubs (on the F and J keys) wore off, and the third had a Coke emptied into it. The fourth was a replacement that had a bad space bar.
Bottom line, things break. Some wear out from use, some break from misuse. So props to Toshiba for taking the Ford approach. Compaq went the Chevy route--keyboard replacement on several of their laptops involves removal of parts off the back of the laptop. And from the sounds of internet rumblings (not from personal experience), Mac went the "let's glue shit together" route. For the sake of most Mac owners, I truly hope that is the case--elitist snobs generally deserve most of the bad things that come their way.
So how does one replace a keyboard on a Toshiba C-655 series laptop?
1: Remove the plastic strip just above the F keys on the keyboard. Just pry up one end and use a gentle ripping motion to remove.
2: Remove the four screws that were hiding under the strips.
The bottom edge of the keyboard is held in place by seven small tabs that tuck under the plastic shell of the laptop. Not exactly worthy of a step 2.5:
3: Did you turn off the computer? Ha ha ha, do that now. Remove the battery, if that's your thing.
4: The keyboard connects to the motherboard via a ribbon cable of sorts, which slides into a slot on the motherboard. Two little tabs lock the ribbon in place. Using a fingernail or a small screwdriver, push the tabs up (towards the laptop screen, away from the touch pad).
5: Pull the ribbon out of the slot.
6: Re-installation is the reverse of removal.
