Keys Melting on P 7811

I've owned my p 7811 for 3 weeks so far an I just noticed that the Tab Key, Caps Key, and Shift key are bulged upward in the middle. The keys stopped working also and I popped on off one of them and it worked when I pressed the rubber thingy. Of course this is not normal.
After a while I deduced that it was from the heat of the laptop.

Has anybody ever had this happen to them?

I'm planning on calling gateway tomorrow and having them fix it.

 

Dang, that's right by the cooling vent. keep us posted on what happens. I hope this wont happen on mine I'm nearing 3 weeks myself.

 

Good thing I bought a cooler.

 

post some pix

 

How are you keys in the top center of the notebook doing? I'm talking about the keys around F6, F7, 7, 8, 9, and U. That area. On my P-7811FX that's where all the heat is. I have very little heat coming up into the keyboard on the left side by the tab key.

 

+1 for pictures
did you monitor your notebook temps from time to time ?
can you run cpuid hwmonitor and report ?

 

Sorry, I will get some pics posted and questions answer in a while

 

I,also, am looking forwards to pics. This is quite interesting to say the least.

 

after reading about the other problems and now this, i'm glad i don't have a 7811 and have my 6860.

 

don't believe this until you see the pictures. also remember that those with problems are far more likely to post than those without problems. the amount of problem threads created about the 7811 is normal compared to most other laptop releases... and also, many of the problems are OS, software, and/or negligence related. I've had 0 problems with my 7811, and the vast majority of other owners haven't had problems either. But if you want an excuse to reassure yourself about why you shouldn't upgrade, go ahead. The 6860 is undoubtedly a good computer. The 7811 is better.

 

I think people fail to realize that there is a difference between flawed design and quality control.

Mass produced machines will always have a lot more defects compared to custom ones, that is just how things go. There is absolutely no reason why you should not upgrade so long as you live within reasonable distance of a bestbuy or plan to test it extensively before you leave the area.

I would never recommend this machine (Or any mass produced machine) to people who aren't willing or able to mess with returns and exchanges.

Now that I have a working one... I am quite happy.

 

Ok here's some visible proof of my claim
Btw sorry for not getting this on sooner but my camera had to be fixed and I just got it back yesterday noon.
So I got a good picture of the keys to show you.
Also I called gateway and they said it was covered by the warranty. They gave me 2 choices.
1- Send them the notebook and pay shipping for them to fix.
2- Have them send me a new keyboard at no cost for me to replace.
I chose option 2 cause all I need to do is pop off the 3 keys from the new keyboard and replace the bad melted keys.

 

It shouldn't be melting the keys, if you put new keys on it's just gonna do it again, right?

 

You better be replacing whole keyboard instead of just 3 keys.

 

They probably wont send out spare keys and just make him replace the whole keyboard and knowing gateway they will make him send the unit in and not just ship him a new keyboard because they would want to know why the keys were melting to begin with.

 

Did you have anything sitting outside the vent? Even within like 6 inches? I noticed when I had a drink sitting next to my laptop even fairly far away my temps rise a bit. I really hope my keys don't start melting. Although today my CPU's are running at like 27*C and I have no idea why it went down from 34.

 

and it also make your drink warm. i always seem to put my drink close to the vent, and everytime i have to go back and get ice more than usual.

if i were you i would have sent the laptop it, cause it shouldn't be melting keys. i mean what if the thermal paste on the gpu was applied poorly, and thats why it is getting so hot. but they sent me a box to send mine in for free. i remember another person saying they had to pay for the box, but someone else also saying they got one free. i just have to send mine in still.

 

I recently bought a P-7811FX this past weekend (since I sold my P-6860FX to my sister) and all this talk about heating problems has made me wonder if I should've just gotten another P-6860FX since BB still has a few in stock. Hopefully these issues are few and not the norm.

Are you using any kind of Chilling mat? I am using a Targus ChillHub and I do notice a big difference in how hot it gets.

http://www.targus.com/us/product_details.asp?sku=AWE12US

CRU1966

 

mjoshi is right, I'd refer you to this thread about why it's dangerous to try to replace only a few keys rather than the whole board:

http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=289384

 

I've had my 7811fx for about 3 weeks aswell and I have had no melting of the keys. The air that gets blown out the left vent is really hot. I have noticed that between my touch pad and space bar that a lot of flex has started. I'm not sure if its due to heat or what because it wasn't like that when I got it. But I mean everything still works fine and I still really enjoy my 7811 fx

 

No melting, but I do notice the left hand side of the computer gets really hot when gaming. Would a laptop cooler be helpful for this?