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MacBook Pro Keys Suddenly Stopped Working (Y, U, I and O)

Well this was a fun morning.

Deadlines to meet, busy busy busy, and what should be the stumbling block?

Tricky PHP code?  No.

Gnarly CSS tweaks?  No.

No, no, no.  It’s just a simple case of my beloved MacBook Pro keys not working.

Say what.

Yup.  Keys.  Not working.

Crazy, I know.

So off to the Apple forums I electronically trundle.

This marvellous article (http://support.apple.com/kb/ts1381) keeps popping up, so I follow it all the way through, down to every last drop of detail.

Any luck?

No.

So I go off-piste.

 

And here’s the fix that worked for me:

  1. Go to System Preferences (you can get there from Mission Control, or the top left Apple icon on your screen, and then click System Preferences.
  2. Go to Keyboard.
  3. Go to the Input Sources tab.
  4. Click the + button (bottom left of window).
  5. Add a new keyboard (preferably of a similar language).  We had British running originally, so we added U.S. below it (i.e. you should now have 2 keyboards in the list).
  6. Your “broken” keys should now be working again (try with glee in an open text edit window, or similar).
  7. Feel free to remove your newly added keyboard (i.e. you should just be left with your original keyboard), as the fix should still work.  You can do this by selecting the newly added keyboard and clicking the button to remove.

So why does this happen?

No idea.  But it seems to be a software hiccup that’s tenderly reminded of all it’s appropriate keys when a new keyboard is added.

All I know is I can now get back to work. 🙂

 

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Sara Thornton

Sara is a Jack (or Jill) of many trades. A web designer and developer, an ethical SEO implementer, an AdWords advocate, as well as being our in house user-guide creator and trainer. In her spare time she loves a bendy/stretchy yoga session, and feels most happy when she's near the ocean (ideally with a ridiculously absorbing book).

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