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Cleaning My Mechanical Keyboard

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Qharmonix Australia12 Posts January 26 2014 09:53 GMT #1 Hey guys, I recently moved house and went through a long painful month without internet. Naturally, I ran out of things to do and went on to discover the true meaning of profound boredom. Then I realized that my keyboard hadn’t been cleaned in over 6 months and that it was in a pretty disgusting state. Prior to this, if I cleaned my keyboard I did it quite swiftly and treated it like a chore, but this time I was determined to keep myself distracted from my inability to connect to the world and so ended up doing the best cleaning job I’ve done in my life. So here is a little walk through of how I like to clean my keyboard, with tricks and tips that some of you may not know. Here are some of the things I used: • Alcohol wipes (moist tissue works too) • Q-tips • Key Cap remover (I just use a plastic card) Step 1: Removing key caps This bit is always quite fun, as your motivation is at its highest and you get that false sense of productiveness. I tend to do this bit as I watch a video, but as mentioned before I didn’t have internet, so I had to settle for listening to music (Chili Peppers all the way!!!!!!!). I know that there are special keycap removers out there, but to be honest it’s a rip off to buy them, so I used a plastic card. To remove the caps, wedge a corner of the card in under the key and gently wiggle it loose. Make sure you are careful when doing this because although mechanical keys are quite durable, you really don’t want to break any thing. I like to organize the removed keycaps into the keyboard’s layout just because it makes it easier when you put them back on. Step 2: Cleaning the inside of the keyboard At this stage I was starting to lose interest and wanted to go do something else because I have a pretty short attention span when it comes to non-game related things. However I had all my keys sitting on my table and didn’t want to just leave them there. So I continued on in disgust, as I started to find 6 months worth of food crumbs, dust and to my surprise a dead bug! I start by blowing really hard from an angle to remove all the dust that you can initially. Now you use the Q-tips to get in between the narrow nooks and crannies and clean away any residual dust. If you are feeling really anal, clean the inside of your keyboard twice; once with dry Q-tips and once with moist Q-tips. Putting a drop of water on the Q-tips helps to wipe away any stains from prior mini spillages of food or drink. After I clean the inside, it’s also good to wipe down the frame of the keyboard, as this is where the drops of instant ramen soup seem to land. Using alcohol wipes or wet tissue both work for this. I found this little dead fella among the many crumbs and hairs. Is it bad that I am glad that my shift key killed it before it could lay any eggs? Step 3: Cleaning the Key Caps This is the most tedious part of cleaning a keyboard, because you have to wipe each key cap individually. But I knew I was nearly finished, so the excitement having a clean keyboard for the first time in 6 months encouraged me on. For this I use alcohol wipes. Mostly because they seem to wipe away that congealed, build-up of hand and finger oil really nicely. You can use moist tissue for this, but I find that it’s not as effective and can cause you to miss some spots because when the keys are wet it’s hard to see the dirt. Step 4: Final Touches Be careful when putting the key caps back on, because there is nothing more confusing than having a few keys out of place. But once all the keys are in place, I like to do a final check to see if all the keys are clean and if there are any visible stains left anywhere on the keyboard. And I was done :D

myxoma_strain United Kingdom371 Posts January 26 2014 10:19 GMT #2 I think this might make more sense to be in the tech support section

HaruRH Singapore2780 Posts January 26 2014 10:21 GMT #3 Thanks alot for this little guide, I have the same keyboard and the same amount of nonsense inside. I was considering soaking the whole darn thing in water lol

Sicion Germany131 Posts January 26 2014 11:09 GMT #4 Please make a spoiler for the third picture. It is disgusting and not safe for eating! Step 3 easy mode: Take all caps throw them in the dishwasher on low heat Done Also you can take a picture before taking all caps off just in case you dont remember their place

farhanjani12 11 Posts April 24 2025 23:08 GMT #5 --- Nuked ---

farhanjani12 11 Posts May 07 2025 10:52 GMT #6 --- Nuked ---

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