The Worst Foods to Eat Over a Keyboard

An anonymous reader writes "Pasta? Pizza? Keyboards are often subject to the harshest of conditions -- spaghetti sauce, coffee spill, et al. ZDNet is running a list of worst-food nominations. What is your pick?"

I only agree with one of those

[polysylabic psudonym]

The flake bar could be disaterous - I've had electronic equipment destroyed by chocolate before!

But seriously, add in likelyhood of the food being eaten over a keyboard and top of the list of most dangerous foods would have to be potato chips (what I think USofAmericans call crisps).

Twisties == death to keyboards.

BTW. easiest way of cleaning them is pull off the keys,turn the board upside down and shake. To pull off the keys using common office equipment, take a paperclip, straighten it, bend it into a U shape about as wide as a key, put a small hook on each end of the U, pointing inwards. The hooks can be made by bending the paperclip around the shirt clip of a pen. Slip the open end of the U over a key, engage the hooks underneath the keycap and pull.

Laptop keyboards are often most easily de-keyed with a butter knife (pref. without butter)

Re:What the...???

[Wade Tregaskis]

I've never heard of Rice Krispies, but Rice Bubbles are a very common breakfast cereal in Australia. They are exactly as the author describes them in the original story, so I suspect they're also available in the U.S.A.

Re:IBM Model M

[Jacques Chester]

IBM's Model M keyboard patents (on the buckling switch which makes the keys so crisp and clicky) went out of IBM with Lexmark.

Lexmark subsequently sold the designs and patents to another company called Unicomp. So far as I can make out, it's essentially a spinoff operation.

So you can still buy what are actually Model M keyboards, brand new. In fact I'm sitting in front of one right now. It's a Model M right down to the small oval where the IBM logo would normally live.

http://pckeyboard.com/ [pckeyboard.com]

Go get 'em.

Absolutely

[rev0102]

Garlic bread, hands down. Crisp and crumbly, it's small enough to get between and then underneath the keys, causing a 'crunch crunch crunch' when typing (assuming the key can still be activated).

And of those who need a bib...

[MWelchUK]

I suggest one of these [thinkgeek.com].

Re:IBM Model M

[adam1101]

Or you can buy the real thing here [clickykeyboards.com]. They even have IBM AT keyboards sometimes, although those are REALLY expensive. What few Model M fans know is that the original IBM PC/XT/AT keyboards have even better mechanisms then the Model M (but only the AT keyboards can be converted to work with modern PCs). The Model M used a membrane underneath the key switches, but the older XT and AT keyboards used capacitance switches, which are more expensive.

Two things

[Presidential]

I thought up all kinds of foods people aren't likely to have in front of a computer, like Maine Lobster with Drawn Butter. However, sticking (pun intended) to foods one might actually try to eat while geeking it up a notch, I thought about two of my favorites: soup (most any kind) and Swiss Miss pudding cups. These bastards more or less ruin a keyboard.

So I went and bought one of these http://www.radioshack.com/product.asp?catalog_name =CTLG&product_id=26-773# [radioshack.com] and now I can actually wash the keyboard in the sink with the dishes.

Not much of anything has ever stuck permanently on this new keyboard.

Incorrect use of latin

[Dougthebug]

spaghetti sauce, coffee spill, et al.

'et al.' is short for 'et alii'. This translates directly to "and others." However it is only used to refer to people, not things.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Latin_phrases [wikipedia.org]

Just sitting by the keyboard fizzing

[ishmalius]

It doesn't even need to be spilled. Just placing one near the keyboard while effervescing is sufficient. Those tiny unseen droplets accumulate in all of the worst places. The board gets sticky, the key motion is screwed, the same as if you spilled it.

Re:Without a Doubt

[moranar]

Well, the sugar and water in the sprite form molasses when the water dries slowly, and it sticks to your keys. Haven't you ever dropped sprite on your hands? They feel very sticky after a short while. My cure for this, if the keyboard allows it, is a bath with hot water first, then some alcohol. Better use a lot of alcohol to clean thoroughly, then dry it with a hairblower or just leave it somewhere warm. I saved a keyboard with the same symptoms (actually, it was strong nocino liquor, very very sticky keys). This treatment is possible if the patient^Wkeyboard has a separate top with the keys , which you wash; and a plastic film with the electrical contacts, which you don't. You might want to douse a cotton ball in alcohol and clean the plastic film too.

Re:Coke - yyup, it's an expensive killer

[vik]

Not that I drink the crap, but my kids do.

If they spilt it on their keyboards, that would be fine. But, oh no, not good enough for 'em. They have to pick my $100 wireless keyboard to spill it on.

Useful tip: After cleaning, dissolved tracks can be replaced with conductive silver PCB repair paint.

My last keyboard survived 3 coke washes with this technique before they finally killed it off.

Vik :v)

Salsa Suprema!

[El Jynx]

Hot sauces seem to be absolutely vicious to metal components, especially when there's a DC flowing through them. Saw it on Mythbusters, so it MUST be true ;)

PediaLyte

[bigattichouse]

Pedialyte.. once those grape-flavored elctrolytes get inbetween the plastic layers, they do wonderful things to a ps-2 bus.

Re:Pepsi

[wodon]

I dont really like coke, but when I order pizza they always give us a free 2L bottle. It works great for cleaning the limescale of skinks and toilets. just pour it in with the plug in, leave overnight and wrinse out. sparkly clean!

it is a little worrying though....

Re:BEER!!!

[Vo0k]

No worries. By now I'd say I have about a glass of beer total sitting in my keyboard (spilled at VARIOUS occasions) and it still works, no problem. Beer seems to be harmless to keyboards.

Nail polish remover

[Knights who say 'INT]

Not a food, but my gf spilled it over her keyboard and it essentially melted it.

Re:Pepsi

[Anonymous Coward]

It's the carbonic acid (carbonated water) that gives it the cleaning effect.. You can get a similar effect with lemonade, or probably even orange juice.

It won't dissolve your teeth unless you leave it sitting in your mouth for days on end. (And by the time it gets to your stomach, there's acid so much more powerful that it doesn't matter anyhow.

Re:I'm not wowbagger but yet...

[manojar]

payasam: made of milk, sugar, vermicelli, rice, coconut, cashew, grapes, and some other stuff for which I don't know the English name. made as a thick syrup and is very sweet, sort of a rice pudding (I guess). My mom says she makes the best stuff and grandma says the same too.

Re:1 Litre of Chocolate Soy Milk

[manojar]

goo that was earlier called breast milk. I was feeding my nephew with bottled breast milk and he spat it all over my keyboard. still smells.

Re:Not the best one..

[Agret]

lol yesterday at work a customer asked for mango juice but i seriouisly thought she said mancake and so i repeatedit to her, sorry was that.. mancake? she looked at me strangely and then said MANGO and i walked away feeling like a dumbass

Re:Wet Cement

[Anonymous Coward]

The explanation provided by Compaq is incorrect. There are several keys on my keyboard that don't work for "any key." Most notably 2 each of Ctrl, Alt and Shift.

Amiga and beer

[barkholt]

In the old Amiga and Commodore64 days, spilling stuff in your keyboard was a lot more serious than it is these days (laptops excluded). Pouring stuff down your keyboard was basically the same as pouring it diretly unto your motherboard - it was especially problematic on your Amiga since most people had removed different forms of shielding to get room for a 3.5" harddrive. Anyway, the worst substance in my experience is beer - have lost two PC keyboards to that stuff.

Re:Festival toilets

[BreadMan]

>> urine is sterile?
Triva fact, from an Army buddy:

If you're stuck some place w/o fresh water, you can drink your urine, but no more than three times; by then the water to waste ratio will be too low.

No surprise

[bluGill]

That isn't a surprise. Wood isn't very conductive when dry, and wood chips dry fast. Computers run on low voltages. That machine was very old, before heat sinks were required on the CPU. So there is no surprise the chips didn't stop the machine. Only the power supply had any vulnerabilities.

Not that urban legend again!

[vyruss000]

Please see http://www.snopes.com/cokelore/tooth.asp [snopes.com]

Re:IBM Model M

[adam1101]

I am indeed talking about the same Model M as the rest of the world, assuming they are talking about the keyboards shipped with IBM PS/2 computers starting from 1986 until the early ninties). The figure you refer to comes from United States Patent 4,118,611 [clickykeyboard.com] granted in 1978. The XT and AT keyboards from 1984-1986 used the capacitance switches shown in the patent. The PS/2 Model Ms replaced those with a membrane under the keys, but still kept the buckling spring that is responsible for most of the noise and the tactile feel. The Japanese link on this page [kev009.com] used to show some actual Model M keys sawed in half, where you could see both the buckling spring mechanism, as well as the membrane. Unfortunately the link is down at the moment.

Re:IBM Model M - You got it!

[bhtooefr]

Cutoff dates really don't apply here, except in one instance.

If the keyboard says "Manufactured for IBM by Lexmark" or "Manufactured for IBM by Unicomp" (some actually say this), it's a non-removable cord model. Lexmark's low quality shows in those, and Unicomp is using Lexmark's old factory (actually, I think it's also IBM's old factory, but quality DID go down). Part number 42H1292 (FWIW, the Unicomp Customizer 101 is 42H1292U - coincidence?)

If it says that it was made in the USA, and makes no mention of Lexmark or Unicomp, it is a first-generation Model M. Removable cord, rock solid. Part number 1391401.

If it says that it was made in Great Britain (most likely in 1998 or 1999), it's a third-generation Model M - the "newer removable-cord" Model M you refer to. It's also 1391401.

My keyboard was made in 1991 (haven't looked lately, and I'm at my laptop right now), part no. 1391401, (IIRC) Plt No F4 (that's the Kentucky (read: original) plant, IIRC). They're all (C) 1984, as far as I know.

Re:Pepsi

[homer_ca]

Pepsi has more sugar to gum up the keys.

BIG Calorie culprit

[Mr Guy]

I never thought about diet soda before I went on weight watchers. Once I started totaling up the calories from the Mountain Dew I drive almost constantly, it become very apparent that it was a major source of my problems.

Regular (8 fl. oz)
Calories (kcal) 110

x 1.5 fl. oz per can
= 165 Calories
x 3 cans per work day
= 495 Calories

+ ( 32 fl. oz per glass x 2 meals a day)

= 1375 Calories in the average work day

I now drink Diet Coke (which I did, of course, just for the taste of it anyway) and Dt. Mtn Dew exclusively and drink water or unsweet tea if neither choice is available

Re:In-N-Out Burger!!!!!

[Squib]

Wouldn't that be a 20x20? He ordered a 4x4 and added a 16x16.

Actually, comes out the be pretty economical, as the burger/cheese combo comes out to $1.01 per patty/cheese unit.

Also, they probably got a small Coke because some In-N-Outs have free refills (I think the Santa Ana one does).

Re:Maybe it's the keyboard, not the thing spilled

[Gribflex]

This is exactly what happened to my keyboards. Fujitsu keyboards are built with the same mechanism.

The nice thing about it is that you can buy a pen at local electronic stores that will allow you to draw the circuits back in, thus recovering the keyboard.