Remove the keyboard from a Pavilion dm4 notebook ?

[Woodwood]

How do you, in practice, remove the keyboard from a HP pavilion dm4-1000 series laptop ?  I am working on a Pavilion dm4-1050ea, to be specific.

I have been working from the service manual, a you tube video and an "Inside my laptop" guide, to clean out the fan  in my laptop because it  is over-heating.  Thios requires disassembly of the computer. I also want to take the opportunity to upgrade the CPU from an i5-430M to an i5-560M

I have reached the stage in the disassembly where I need to remove the keyboard, but nothing moves.  The keyboard won't lift.  I know how it's supposed to come out, but I can't get it to shift even a minute amount any way I try, including the method described in the "Inside my laptop" guide.  I found the keyboard is surrounded by a very thin bezel or seal, and some of the keys pop out easily but are more easily replaced than those of an IBM T41, but actual keyboard stays firmly in place with absolutely no gap between it and the top cover to get anything in, no fingernail or tool.  That guide also tells me HP stick the keyboard in place with double sided tape, which, as the computer is several years old and has never been taken apart, has probly become hardened.

could anyone help ?  Offer suggestions ? Propose a method that will work ?  Has anyone actually ever taken one of these apart for cleaning the inside ?

h

Woodwood

29.Mqarch.2019

[erico]

With plastic parts, I tend to use a spudger tool. It helps avoid damage that metal tools would cause.

[Woodwood]

Thanks, Erico

I found the correct video with no difficulty, and noted that the others which may prove useful in future.

The video showed the same things I had already seen, except as with all different aspects of the same thing, it showed them differently, being particularly clear on where the screws that needed to be removed were.  However, unlike, in fact it couldn't be more different, my experience, after the two screws had been removed, the keyboard in the video just seemed to drop out !

The acompanying text did mention the hole in the ODD compartment, but did not show it, and the picture in the "Inside my laptop" guide I did not find very clear.   The text was not as clear, in some ways, as that in the service manual, eg 6mm P1 screws vs Phillips PM2.5x6.5, but at least the former has a direct correlation with the screwdrivers used in the service manual (P0 and P1)

So the help given by Enrico was periphally helpful, but the problen still exists.  Any more ?

it has been a while sionce I wrote anything in this forum excepting my question about vents, but the editor has changed....where has (carriage) return gone ?  How do you insert a new line ? 

Woodwood

29.March.2019

[Woodwood]

I got the keyboard off by pushing away from the top cover a bit so that it bent up by a fraction of a mm, and then inserted a small lever, by workind my around the keyboard gradually wiith a succesion  of small levers I was able to prise the keyboard away, from the top,  The hole in the ODD compartment is actually more of a slot about 0.5mm high and 4mm long along the side of the computer.  Reading on,  I found that tat it was adequately illustrad in the "Inside my laptop" duide.

However it was very difficult and the keyboard was definitely stuck down with double sided paper tape.  I was fearful of breaking the keybaord and some keys popped out while was doing this because of flexure the keyboard.  Mothing like the HP manuals and other guides, even the "Inside My Laptop" guide which hints that it may be more diffucult than it's supposed to be.

I would add that removing the top cover is considerably more difficult than any of the manuals suggest, and with removing the keyboard and failing to remove the top cover, it took me a whole day whereas the youtube video runs for 16 minutes for the complete process, starting from the intact laptop to having cleaned the fan !

Woodwood

29.March.2019