Puzzling problem & fix

I've gotten a lot of help here so thought this might help somene in the
future in return.

This morning couldn't type into programs with keyboard or start programs
from the bottom of the screen. Lots of other problems as well. Rebooted
several times. About ready to reinstall XP. For some reason tried MS Word.
First off it told me control key was down! Sure enough - stuck halfway
down. Pulled it up and all works again! Will switch to another keyboard
tomorrow before I boot up. I'd have never noticed it without Word's help.

Just a tip to put in the back of your mind. In all my ~50 years or so of
computing never had this happen before so it really stumped me.



--
I love a good meal! That's why I don't cook.

Ken,

First off it told me control key was down! Sure enough - stuck
halfway down. Pulled it up and all works again!

lol. Almost but-not-quite in par with the old story of the people who could
not log in to their computers ... because of the capslock being on -- though
yours is nastier.

And I think several of us have "it stumped me" stories of ourselves.

Mine was with a computer which attempted to boot, but shut down after a few
seconds. I was about to replace the motherboard (*obviously* it
malfunctioned somewhere (bad caps or something like it), causing the power
supply to detected a too-low voltage and subsequently shutting down the
whole thing ...) when for some reason I stil thought of replacing the power
supply (it cannot hurt to double-check). Lo-and-behold the whole thing kept
working.

Turns out the ATX power supply itself was OK too, it was just the "power"
pushbutton which sometimes got stuck, which the power supply than understood
as a forced powerdown. :-(

TL;DR: (double-)check everying, even when you're absolutily sure that what
you're about to check can't ever be the cause of the current problem. Also:
Murphys law.

Regards,
Rudy Wieser


-- Origional message:
KenK schreef in berichtnieuws
...
I've gotten a lot of help here so thought this might help somene in the
future in return.

This morning couldn't type into programs with keyboard or start programs
from the bottom of the screen. Lots of other problems as well. Rebooted
several times. About ready to reinstall XP. For some reason tried MS Word.
First off it told me control key was down! Sure enough - stuck halfway
down. Pulled it up and all works again! Will switch to another keyboard
tomorrow before I boot up. I'd have never noticed it without Word's help.

Just a tip to put in the back of your mind. In all my ~50 years or so of
computing never had this happen before so it really stumped me.

--
I love a good meal! That's why I don't cook.