[Asus  Eee Pad Transformer Prime] xnopasaranx:
Hello there. I am an early adopter of this device.

After all the disappointment with the wifi and gps capabilities and failing to utilize the tf201 as a light netbook replacement, I stowed it away somewhere and lost interest, as I didn't buy the thing to play angry birds. Now about two weeks ago I remembered the tablet and wanted to try amusing our cat with it (which amazingly works great, he is all about those cat video games now :D) and got out the dock as well, since someone had apparently ported a few linux images to the tf201 more successfully then last time I read up on it.

The keyboard dock was pretty much an external battery it seemed. None of the keys would work whatsoever but the touchpad did. The battery was recognized and charged fine. I tried the sd-card slot and usb connector, both also working.

I have been searching the net for similar issues and found a lot of people whose docks were dead, with various symptoms. I tried a lot of things unsuccessfully and continued to use the dock as an external battery and for quick charging with the wall plug.

Well then yesterday I connected the dock again to charge the tablet a bit, and what do you know? the keyboard is working again. WTF? I have reconnected the tablet multiple times now, folded and unfolded the whole combo and it is still working today? Could it be a software problem? Is it multiple things causing this?

I decided to open a thread and gather information in one place, so that others might find it easier to troubleshoot this.

Following is a list of things that other's who have similar problems might try to fix/investigate. After that I will post some things that I have tried in order to troubleshoot my problems and please share what ideas you might have, as I am sure the problems with my keyboard dock will return eventually.

Here is what I was able to gather as potential root causes and possible fixes for dead keyboard docks:

1) The ingenious product design of the dock hinge makes it a premium dirt trap. Lots of bits and dust can get inside and will all the time, as the gap is wide open and there is convenient rubber on the sides with glue that dissolves and attracts crap that is basically uncleanable. But the connector is! So try cleaning the first. Sadly it is not easy to access but cotton swabs and a tooth brush with some cleaning alcohol will do it. The tablet side can be cleaned more easily but also isn't so problematic as a dust trap.

2) The flex cable inside the dock can become loose due to vibrations. This was a problem with the transformer generation before and they seem to have improved the design but I still read reports from people who had this happen. This is the easiest to fix out of all of these problems and if you have connection problems with your dock, make sure to check this. The dock is very easily opened with a phillips screw driver, a plastic prod (guitar pick, old credit card, cheap phone repair tools etc) and some patience. Be sure to not lift the two halves away from each other, as the cable connecting the top to bottom is very short and if you are not careful, you'll rip off the connector on the pcb. Check the flex cables and reseat them.

3) The connector between the tf201 and the dock is built very flimsily, but better then the first transformer series. The connector on the tablet side can lift off the pads it's soldered to due to flex and stress because it carries the tablets weight partially without a lot of support. The good news about this is, that if you have a decent rework station, this is potentially fixable. Opening the tablet is a hassle, you need a heatgun to soften the adhesive around the case (noone mentions this it seems) and slide the locking tabs in the recesses (where the tablet usually locks to the dock, left and right from the connector) to the open position. Then carefully pry the whole assembly open and get access to where the flex cable is connected to the dock/charge port. with a proper hot air rework station, that port can be reflown if the pins have indeed lifted from the pads on the little pcb. But this is also very finicky, as you will melt stuff in the process without shielding it from the heat (captone tape or maybe aluminum foil can do the trick).

4) Software? I only have theories on this but I think a lot of cases have some sort of software problem. What is known about how the dock functions?

- it contains a battery, which can be charged independently of the tablet. Charging this battery requires 15V and cannot be done with a common usb connection.

- there is a usb host connector, so there must be a controller for that inside the dock. it's not just wired through to the tablet, there is stuff happening here.

- there is an sdcard slot, so there must be some hardware responsible for powering and reading/writen to that as well.

- there has to be some sort of firmware, responsible for the low level things going on in the dock I am thinking, it has to do powermanagement for several internal devices.

so my conclusion from this information is, that maybe some of the problems could be caused there. how could this be debugged?

or:

- the custom rom could have a problem with the dock. The software side might be wonky for whatever reason. I am running a KatKiss 7.1.2 rom and AOSP is the only choice I can set as the hardware keyboard. Some people had success with hard reseting their tf201 or even a factory reset or reflash. A lot of people reported this did nothing for them.

TL;DR if your keyboard isn't working, your dock isn't charging, or some other feature on your dock seems dead suddenly, try the above things and please report. I am trying to collect all info on this to help people troubleshoot and investigate these issues.