i book keys wearing off

Me too, Elizabeth. The letters began wearing off after about three months. I called Apple. The rep wasted 48 minutes attempting to persuade me that it was my hands and not the product.
I referred him to Apple Discussions. He had a great deal of difficutly finding all these posts.

Finally he agreed to replace the keyboard. I still have it in the box. Will replace if my husband "inherits" my iBook.

For now, I am not thinking of additional Apple products. I have never had anything elso, but i may go to the dark side just to see if it is really as bad as Apple claims.

I agree with your sentiments about Apple's quaility, of lack thereof.
They made quality while Steve was on haitus

Susan

Hi Elizabeth,

Welcome to the ibook forum. The letters wearing off on the ibook is a fairly common issue. I'm on my second Powerbook neither of which have any signs of letters wearing or even fading. It might be the fact the powerbook keyboard is made out of a different material and resists wear much better. I'm sure there's not a single root cause to the problem.

If your ibook is still under warranty I'd see about getting a replace keyboard or sometimes they'll just replace the worn keys. Then get an iskin keyboard protector, which will prevent wear in the future, plus prevent any dust and food getting into the keyboard. It's well worth the $19 for one, the iskin is probably the best & cheapest solution.

Rick

I had an iSkin shipped in December, and tried it for two weeks. The iBook then suffered from static electricity, so much that I couldn't use the iSkin! When I pulled the iSkin off to shake off the dust, the screen would go black, and the machine would shut down, or freeze. I thought it was a coincidence, until the 3rd time. So beware. The makers of the iSkin says that it can happen, in rare cases.

I was thinking of getting one of those but now it doesn't sound like such a good idea. Are you using anything else now?

No. Keep my nails short, and tread lightly! The thing is, at least when the next keyboard looks hideous, they're around $60, so it hurts only a little...

Elizabeth: "There seems to be quite a few people leaving posts on the discussion forum because they are finding that the letters are wearing off on their new G5 i books..."

G5 iBooks? Wow. I'd love to know where they got them! 😉

Rick: "The letters wearing off on the ibook is a fairly common issue."

Really? I'm glad I bought an iSkin!

Edmonton Eskimos: "I had an iSkin shipped in December, and tried it for two weeks. The iBook then suffered from static electricity, so much that I couldn't use the iSkin! When I pulled the iSkin off to shake off the dust, the screen would go black, and the machine would shut down, or freeze. I thought it was a coincidence, until the 3rd time. So beware."

Yikes! Luckily, I haven't had any problems like that, though I did notice that my iSkin tends to attract cat hair like a magnet! Other than that, it's great - and I was very glad that I'd bought it during a recent Diet Pepsi dribble! If it weren't for the iSkin, those little drops could have cause major problems... but as it was, I lifted off the iSkin, wiped it down, and all was well. Go iSkin!!

Of course, YMMV.

Kittenmommy.

Welcome to my world!

I had 2 replacement keyboards on my old iBook G3 700MHz - I wore the A and S right off it. I'm on a replacement keyboard on my iBook G4, now 15 months old. I bought an iSkin when I put the replacement keyboard on back in October, and there is absolutely no wear. I think the wear has to do with oils in the skin or fingernails hitting the key and flaking the paint off over time. The iSkin prevents both of these from being an issue.

Anyway, unlike another poster, I have had no issues of static electricity related to the iSkin on my keyboard....

yes, my wifes keys are wearing off too. I've had many apples going back to Fat Macs and have never seen this one before. Her G4 Ibook is nearly a year old.

I am so glad that this board is here. My letters wore off only having my ibook for a few months. The guy at the genius bar said it was a "cosmetic" flaw. I'm sorry but if you can't see the letters on your keyboard, you can't use them. I find that to be a product defect and not a "cosmetic" flaw. I've been using macs since 1996 and have never had this problem. There should be a recall and they should replace them with keyboards that do not wear down.

Lori,

I am more convinced every day that the purpose of the genius bar and the phone support is to talk people out of adjustments on known defective equipment purchased from Apple.

There was a time I wondered why people bought a PC. Now, however, my next computer will be a PC.

Apple apparently junk shops for components, slaps machines together and then plays blame the customer.

Susan

I've dealt with this on a G3 and now a G4 iBook - and had two keyboard replacements on a G3 iBook purchased in 2002, and 1 on a G4 iBook that I received in March 2004 as a replacement for the iBook G3 (logic board failure!). In all cases the letters that wore off are the same ones that are "shiny" from wear on my desktop keyboards. However, the letters have never come off on those! What is funny is that I use my iBook on my desk with a USB keyboard more than 75% of the time - yet the letters still wore off the keys.

I am firmly convinced this is a problem unique to the iBook keyboards. No one I know with a Powerbook has ever had a keyboard wear in this manner. I have friends with old "clamshell" iBook's that have not had any keys wear off. I've got a 5 year old desktop keyboard I am typing on now, and while certain keys are very worn, the letters are still there. The newer iBooks appear to have the letters painted on the surface of the keys, and the paint or process is definitely inferior. If you look at a Powerbook keyboard, the letters on the black keycaps are more of a transparent "cutout" in the keys. That makes sense given the backlighting on the 15" and 17". There is no way those could wear off.

I would never let this problem drive me back to a PC laptop, but do think it is lousy quality control or design on the iBook keyboard. My solution that has been in place for 9 months now is to keep an iSkin Protouch keyboard protector on my keyboard most of the time. There is no sign of any wear on any keys at this point, which is a record for me. The previous keyboards would have blank A and S keys by now. The iSkin takes a little getting used to. The bonuses are that it really quiets things down and also keeps trash and liquid out of my keyboard.

For what it's worth, I talked to Apple technical support and they were willing to replace the keyboard under warranty. If you are out of warranty, I guess you live with it. Seems to me that someone used to make stickon key labels for dealing with foreign languages.

I am so glad to hear that this problem is happening to others! I called the Apple corporate office to issue a formal complaint and they claim to have never heard of this problem and basically told me that there is NOTHING I can do about it.

I'm angry! This is the second iBook G4 keyboard I've had replaced within 3 months of purchase and it continues to happen. The same as others who've experienced this, the "Genius Bar" folks claim that the fault lies in my finger oils and heavy typing (I doubt it) and the Apple resellers tell me to buy the iSkin keyboard covers. But I'm irked to have taken the time out of my busy day to make a complaint so that Apple can improve their products and they respond that I now need to make an additional keyboard cover purchase (that may or may not even help, per comments on this Discussion Board) to supposedly alleviate the situation of their shoddy workmanship.

I am such a fan of Apple products, yet I am immensely dissatisfied with my iBook purchase and believe the product is not performing according to their promised standards. My previous iBook was much more powerful and durable and my workplace Powerbook has a keyboard with superior etched letters.

In addition, Apple tells me that I am stuck with this computer and will receive no assistance or benefit from them. Under warranty, I can continue to have the keyboard repeatedly replaced (an annoying and poor solution), I can sell this one on my own (and never recover the full price I recently paid for it) and buy something else or I can attempt a trade-in from some non-Apple affiliated web site. Naturally, none of these options are satisfying and I believe Apple should take some responsibility for this defect or at least offer purchasers some reasonable compensation for their inconvenience and loss of faith in iBook products. We paid a lot of money for this product and if we aren't happy with this product, wouldn't it just be good business practice to ensure that we have a positive and fair experience?

Any advice from those of you who have experienced this? Is there anything I/we can do?

I am so relieved to find that it isn't just me, I don't have weird fingers and that the fact that this is the second keyboard that has keys rubbing off is a universal problem with ibook G4's. I had to argue for a long time with Apple for them to send me a keyboard FOC after the warranty ran out - my argument being that it is not 'normal' wear and tear that causes keys to disappear and that it must be a fault with the machine. I'm now going to have to have the same discussion again, as within 2 months of fitting a new keyboard, I've already lost S, E & N with H on the way to disappearing......

I don't think this is good enough, and I'd appreciate any ideas of what else can be done to make sure the problem is rectified. I'm also considering purchasing an i-skin cover next time.

Is there any way to just get new keycaps, or do you have to replace the entire keyboard?

I've never had the letters wear off any keyboard before -- mac or windows -- although I will admit that I do type a lot.

Donna