Do you have a question about LG Gram? It doesn't come with a keyboard or trackpad!
Do you have a question about LG Gram? It doesn't come with a keyboard or trackpad!
I work at a school. We have an LG Gram 16" convertible touchscreen laptop used by a student who is visually impaired. In the last week, they said two things stopped working: the auto-rotate feature when folding the laptop flat to look like a tablet, and both the keyboard and trackpad. I tried many driver updates and tweaks for the keyboard/trackpad but nothing fixed it. I also reset the computer to reinstall Windows 11 22H1 and that didn't help. Finally, I used a recovery flash drive to delete everything and re-install Windows 10 from scratch, and it still doesn't work.
I will try upgrading back to Windows 11 just in case, but I don't think it will be the solution. I also tried unplugging the battery and holding the power button to reset it that way. External USB keyboards and mice still work perfectly, so I thought it was a hardware problem. But here is the real issue: both the keyboard and trackpad actually work in BIOS mode, but when they are on Windows, they register zero input.
My guess is there is a sensor inside the laptop that talks to Windows to tell it if the device is flipped from a normal laptop into a tablet. That sensor gets stuck thinking it's in tablet mode, which disables both the keyboard and trackpad. When I took back the back panel, I could see what I think is the sensor cable; it looks connected, but I'm worried it might be hidden behind the touchscreen cover because that area isn't easy to reach.
I am hesitant to send this to LG support because a similar problem happened once before and it took over three months to get the device fixed again. The visually impaired student needs this laptop every single day for school, so they are really worried about having it down for such a long time. I would really like to avoid that happening now.
Thank you for listening!
If you still have trouble after reinstalling drivers or making sure your computer's operating system (OS) brand new, then it probably isn't just a software problem but might be broken hardware in your laptop itself. The ribbon cable could definitely need changing, though that is just one guess. When talking about putting the OS back on your machine, where did you get those installers from? Did you go all the way through manually installing every single driver for this specific computer while running as an administrator (like right-clicking the installer and choosing Run)? Having your system stay connected to the internet can cause the OS to download drivers that might not fit your hardware at all. It is better to disconnect from the internet before starting your OS install. Once you finish installing, go back online just to run a final update for your computer.
I tried fixing it by reinstalling the OS through a "Reset this PC" option inside Windows. If that didn't work, I made a bootable flash drive using the Media Creation Tool. This let me format the drive, delete all partitions, and install Windows from scratch. I did not try to manually install drivers because LG only offers network drivers on their support page for this model of laptop and points you to their "LG Update Center" app instead (which I have already run). That is what I don't understand though: why does it always work in BIOS? Sometimes, when Windows starts up and loads the login screen, they will even function for a couple of seconds. The keyboard backlight also works, so it doesn't look like everything is completely dead. I think I am going to chalk this up as intermittent hardware failure at this point. It has been very frustrating.
Sometimes, when Windows starts up for the first time, it works okay for a few seconds while loading the login screen. It might be downloading the right drivers for the system. I'm pretty sure the app you mentioned will download those files onto your computer before running the installer, which means the actual installer file is sitting on your hard drive. You could try removing the keyboard from Device Manager and see if that fixes the issue or makes it work again.
Did you ever figure this out? My new LG Gram started having trouble today with the same thing happening to my keyboard. It works fine right after I hit enter in settings, but as soon as Windows launches, it turns off again. If I tilt the monitor past 180 degrees, the keyboard comes back on. It feels like a switch that flips opposite ways. Turning off tablet mode didn't fix it either.
if you need a list of every piece of equipment used to build or sell each device, along with details about how each item fits into the overall process, I can provide that for you.
I didn't do anything wrong, but we finally gave up and sent it back. LG was so stubborn they let us send it back even though it broke. We sent it back again and they've been holding onto it for almost a month. I think you're getting closer to the real issue. Something is clearly broken in the sensors. It's probably thinking this phone is set to tablet mode when it's actually just running on laptop mode, so it gets stuck trying to do two things at once.
Thanks for reaching out and telling me about what's going on! It sounds like things are really tough right now - hopefully the school has found someone else who can take that child's place. I'll keep trying to get this sorted out all by myself; if I figure it out, I'll tell you.