Bluetooth Keyboard goes nuts

[Peter Aretin]

I've been using a Bluetooth mouse and Logitech K360 Keyboard with my macmini running 10.9.5 without incident for quite a while. Yesterday the keyboard went nuts. At first the "c" key stopped working, then it just got crazier, with keystrokes trigging random actions like opening search windows, activating characters not associated, just generally nuts. The mouse seems to be behaving normally. Bluetooth is obviously working, though neither the Keyboard or Logitech control panel can see the keyboard. Put in new batteries, restarted computer, switched keyboard on/off, nada. So far I have resisted massaging it with a very large hammer. I had a sticky key at one point due to a drop of wayward Tamari sauce, which I freed with a little isopropyl alcohol. This produced no adverse reaction at the time. I thought a little alcohol would be benign, and so it seemed. I can't think of anything else that could be a cause. A regular USB keyboard works fine. Is the Logitech toast?

 

[Cory Cooper]

Hello,

It could be due to the sauce and alcohol, even though it has worked up to this point. I would try it on another computer and see if the issue persists. That will determine if it is an issue with the Logitech or the Mac.

C

 

[Peter Aretin]

After horsing around on the web for a couple of hours looking for fixes, I decided I had about as much time in as the device was worth, tossed it onto the pile of dysfunctional gear I'm going to have to pay local recyclers a pile of money to take off my hands someday, and went to the nearest big box store. I bought a little kb intended for use with laptops that is much more economical of space on the little table in the living room in front of the couch. Setup involved removing a paper strip and pressing a key. No dongle. Ironically, it appears that, even before it went nuts, the old kb was interfering with the Bluetooth mouse and not behaving very crisply. Everything works much better now. So it probably wasn't that drop of Tamari sauce after all. I'm old fashioned enough to be irked by junking stuff instead of fixing it, but sometimes that's the best way.

Thanks for your suggestion.