Hi,

I did a fresh install of Slackware 13 in a new Dell Vostro 1520 notebook.

The problem is that some times when I power on the notebook the keyboard does not work so I cannot login. This was in text mode, before startx. In fact I can not do startx because I can even type my login.

Is a strange problem, usually it happens after a long period of power off. Per exemple, at night I shutdown the notebook and next morning when power on, then the keyboard does not work.

The only thing I can do is powering off the system pressing the power button.

After the power off and power on again, then usually the keyboard works.

I think may be the keyboard module is not loading correctly?

Some one knows what is the module for the keyboad?

So I can modprobe keyboadmodule in rc.local to solve the problem.

This problem sounds more like a hardware issue. Try a different operating system (or slackware version) and see if the problem persists.

don't know about slackware, but a lot of us got the problem resolved on ubuntu by adding i8042.reset to the respective /boot/grub/menu.lst for our kernel image.

kernel /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.28-15-generic root=UUID=9857b13b-1907-493f-a6bd-61f8a868ebea ro quiet splash i8042.reset

I was having the same issue with a Dell Studio 14z 1440. Added the following line to the Slackware image section in lilo.conf and the problem appears to have been fixed. It was weird because the keyboard would work fine at the lilo prompt, but about 50% of the time it wouldn't work once Slackware booted. I'm running Slack13 64-bit btw.
Does anyone know why this would be happening?

Lilo add:
addappend="i8042.reset"

I also got this problem on my Dell Vostro 1720 with Slackware 13 64bit. It seems like I have to touch the keyboard reguarly while the system is booting. I have added addappend="i8042.reset" to lilo.conf with no luck. Is there anything else i can try?

yeah, make sure your bios is fully updated. when i was still having this problem i was running bios version a03. i updated all the way to a07 a month or two ago and haven't had any problems since. i'm using a vostro 1520.

Ok, I was running A06, so I booted into Win7 and downloaded the update from Dell's webpages. I started the application and I was asked for some questions before it would update the BIOS. I closed all other applications, before I started a chipset updater from Dell with a mistake. I tried to close the chpsetupdater, but the whole computer froze, and not even the power button would respond, so I had to take out the battery, wich I guess I should not have done because when I restarted the computer it only show a black screen, not even the background light works.

At startup the CD-station spins around, and the HDD light blinks. before it stops blinking and the caps-lock and the scroll lock-light lights up and the num-lock light starts blinking.

Anyone who nows what to do?

Edit: I will send it into Dell, so they can fix it.

wow. sorry your laptop got messed up but there should have been multiple prompts warning you not to disconnect the power while the bios is being flashed...for this reason

if you ever need to perform such a procedure again in the future you should let the updater run its course and not try to stop it once it's started.

hopefully they'll fix or replace it for you.

I now that risk, but I didn't now that the flashing actually had started since I still could choose where to place the backup of the old bios, which file to read the new BIOS from e.t.c.

They should have been here today and fixed it, but they haven't. I get it on the warranty though

Edit: The computer is fixed now, the problem was not the BIOS, but some screws wich was to short to fit wich had messed up soemething. I have done the BIOS upgrade to A08, but i still got the problem. I guess I will make a new topic with some other problems I've got.