Missing keystrokes in OS and various applications

Over the holidays I installed a few apps and updates on my computer.

A while later I noticed that the letter "f" both lower case and upper case, doesn't show up anymore each time I hit the key on the built-in keyboard. There is not rhyme and reason to its behavior, sometimes it prints on the screen immediately, whereas other times I need to hit the key many times to just get it to display a single "f" (this one, for instance required hitting it four times, the one in "for" seven times and the one in "four" two times). But for the last couple of days, the "n" key now also has started to act up.

This is an Acer TravelMate 4202 WLMi, Win XP Home SP3, upgraded to a larger hard disk more than a year ago, with four external USB hard disks attached. All the Acer drivers are up-to-date as well as the BIOS.

Except for an Adobe Flash update, I have pretty much removed everything that I recall installing since the end of December '09. Revo Uninstaller was quite helpul in properly identifyinng what was installed when.

Norton Internet Security 2010 is the only Firewall/AV/AntiSpyware program currently running on my computer.
Due to Norton's lousy AntiSpam component I had to reinstall the AntiSpam component of CA Internet Security a while back.

I am running a Malwarebytes scan now to see if it can find anything Norton might have missed.

Also, I already removed the "f" key and cleaned everything underneath it, didn't make a difference, though.

Going to get an external USB keyboard to see if that makes any difference.

Similarly, I found annecdotal references that removing the laptop battery and/or setting a different power scheme might help.

I used to have Lavasoft Ad-aware, Spybot Search & Destroy, SpywareBlaster, ZoneAlarm Free and F-Prot on this computer but had to get rid of all of them when I installed NIS2010 a little more than 2 months ago.

Below is output from HijackThis as a starting point.

If something catches your eye or you have a thought as to what else I should be looking for, let me know, please.

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📎DSMHJTlog.txt

Reason for edit: Removed HJT log, not allowed in this forum.

Okay, the Malwarebytes Anti-Malware scan finished and found a few items (see below). Would it be reasonably safe to let MBAM take care of all of them? Or are any of them false positives in your opinion? Malwarebytes' Anti-Malware 1.44 Database version: 3603 Windows 5.1.2600 Service Pack 3 Internet Explorer 8.0.6001.18702 1/20/2010 5:32:25 PM mbam-log-2010-01-20 (17-32-12).txt Scan type: Full Scan (C:\|) Objects scanned: 499485 Time elapsed: 4 hour(s), 2 minute(s), 43 second(s) Memory Processes Infected: 0 Memory Modules Infected: 0 Registry Keys Infected: 5 Registry Values Infected: 1 Registry Data Items Infected: 0 Folders Infected: 1 Files Infected: 3 Memory Processes Infected: (No malicious items detected) Memory Modules Infected: (No malicious items detected) Registry Keys Infected: HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\TypeLib\{67450775-3b18-49b1-aa83-0e010f07f4df} (Trojan.Dropper) -> No action taken. HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Interface\{69b3ebfa-0015-4914-9312-e7758eacfac1} (Trojan.Dropper) -> No action taken. HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\CLSID\{30de9920-2e84-40a2-88a5-b8d256e15101} (Trojan.Dropper) -> No action taken. HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\The Weather Channel (Adware.Hotbar) -> No action taken. HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Uninstall\Weather Services (Adware.Hotbar) -> No action taken. Registry Values Infected: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\SharedDLLs\C:\Program Files\Common Files\ACD Systems\Filters\EITCC_LinearBlur.dll (Trojan.Dropper) -> No action taken. Registry Data Items Infected: (No malicious items detected) Folders Infected: C:\Documents and Settings\Roland\Start Menu\Programs\DVDTool (Trojan.DNSChanger) -> No action taken. Files Infected: C:\Program Files\Common Files\ACD Systems\Filters\EITCC_LinearBlur.dll (Trojan.Dropper) -> No action taken. C:\Documents and Settings\Roland\My Documents\_suspicious_\Windows.Media.Player.License.exe (Rogue.Installer) -> No action taken. C:\Documents and Settings\Roland\My Documents\____tmp\Windows 95 Arcade Pack\WIN32\W32SKRNL.DLL (Trojan.Dropper) -> No action taken.

I just tried an external keyboard and found that whatever it is that's causing this behavior is only affecting the internal keyboard. Here are ten groups of ten keystrokes of the f key performed with the built-in keyboard ffff f fffff fffff ff fff ff fff fffff ffffffff And here are ten groups of ten keystrokes of the f key performed with the external USB keyboard ffffffffff ffffffffff ffffffffff ffffffffff ffffffffff ffffffffff ffffffffff ffffffffff ffffffffff ffffffffff While using an external keyboard would be a stop gap solution at the office, it won't help while I'm lugging the laptop around. So, hopefully we'll be able to get to the bottom of this. I encountered a similar situation with this laptop about a year ago but was able to track it down to some add-on software for my then new monitor. Back then, the left shift key of the built-in keyboard behaved the very same way the f key is behaving now. Once I had uninstalled said add-on software, the left stuff key worked again the way it was supposed to. Back then, however, said behavior also affected an external USB keyboard I had borrowed to check if the problem was limited to the built-in keyboard or of a more general nature. As such, the current situation is not quite the same.

First, let MBAM delete the junk it found.

As for the keyboard problem, sounds to me like it's the keyboard itself. They are easy to replace and reasonably cheap to buy.

See this Google search: keyboard for Acer TravelMate 4202 WLM

Before doing that, try booting the PC from a Linux Live CD like Puppy Linux. You download the .iso image then use it to create a bootable CD from. A good program to do this with is ImgBurn. If you don't want to use Linux, you could build the UBCD4WIN CD, but this requires that you have a XP Install CD, Do you have a one?

Hi Rich, MBAM removed what it detected and rebooted the computer. I only have a recovery disk for this laptop but no real Windows install media. What did you have in mind with respect to the Linux Live disk? I would have a Debian-based live disk available dating back to 06/2008. Probably ought to pop it in to see if the error occurs outside of the Windows environment, too. Duh. Thanks for the kind reminder, Roland

Booted from the Linux Live disk and the problem with the f key persisted. Looks like I am going to have to replace the laptop's keyboard. Hopefully the system will also start booting a bit faster again once the keyboard has been replaced. That's another thing that started to happen around the same time. Initially, after I had cleaned up the startup entries a couple of months ago (using ccleaner), the system booted pretty fast, but roundabout since the time that the keyboard problems started I also noticed that the system takes several minutes to get from the boot screen to the login screen. Detaching the external disks doesn't change anything about that.

Before ordering a replacement keyboard, is there any test I can ran that would help to assure that only the keyboard is on the fritz and not the keyboard controller? Or is the controller built into the keyboard? Or does the same controller operate both the built-in keyboard and the external USB keyboard?

I don't know about the controller, nor do I know how to find that information. I did some searches but had no success.

My recommendation would be to go ahead and replace it, as that is what I would do.

You could try asking in our hardware forum: http://forums.whatthetech.com/General_Hardware_f126.html

or in a Tom's Hardware forum.

Thanks, the new keyboard is going to arrive on Saturday.

Hopefully replacing it is going to be as easy as shown at
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hzmkUjDxbBs

I'll keep you posted.

I replaced the keyboard about an hour ago and judging by the typing so far, it was the culprit. ffffffffff ffffffffff ffffffffff ffffffffff ffffffffff fffffffff fffffffff fffffffff fffffffff fffffffff ffffffff As far as replacing it is concerned, it's really as simple as the video in my previous post suggests. Thanks for your help in pinpointing it, Rich. Looks like we can close this thread.

That's good to hear. Take care.