Oppps, just spilled a soda in my keyboard!

This is a typical accident, liquids in keyboards. ( Was kidding about the soda, no smoking, drinking, or eating around my computers!)

Most major corporations have a policy of no eating or drinking around computers.

Why?

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The cost to a medium size business with say 500 computers to replace them, mice, and peripheral devices destroyed by liquids on a yearly basis would be prohibitive.

When computers became one of the most expensive tools a company could buy they found out very quickly how vulnerable a it is to liquids such as coffee, water, soda, milk shakes (seen one once - yuk!), beer, wine, and whisky [whisky odor stays around even after the liquid evaporates].

Now I am going to tell you a Geek secret: You can not reliably clean most liquids from a one.

Oppppss, clumsy humans...

You can try but once the carbon trace has been flooded by a liquid containing sugar, oil, or any other substance the the carbon can absorb, it will loose it's ability to conduct voltage at the resistance the trace was made for.

That is each key has a small carbon trace under the key, when you press the key a contact pad touches the trace and a certain amount of voltage flows through the trace circuit to the kb processor then the signal goes from the processor to the kb controller. The controller decodes the signal and then sends the data to the processor for further processing.

So what liquids can you clean a keyboard from one? Water, maybe.

Guru's and geek's will say: "Water that has trace amounts of minerals in it that will not change the carbon trace resistance, once allowed to dry it will not effect it. "

Now this is not a 100% true statement, there is always the chance that there is enough dirt inside it that the carbon traces will absorb enough minerals that when you press the key it either will not work or produces the wrong keystroke for that key.

Companies that use computers in an environment that has a lot of dirt and dust use a cover over / around them called a "covering membrane". Like a warehouse such as UPS or FedEx where trucks pull in and out all day to be loaded or unloaded.

You can even get the Mylar cover for a laptop kb.

So do you have liquids around your computer? Have a spare one for when you knock that soda over? Hummm? (Ya, I have three)

P.S.

Do you know why you should NOT smoke cigarettes (if you smoke) around a computer?