Surface Pro 4 type cover suddenly not working.

Ok I have it working again.  This time it survives a reboot, closing the lid, shutdown, etc.

I also now get the proper "Do want to switch to tablet mode" prompts, etc.

And, the rotation now works correctly in Tablet mode (it did not work at all prior).

Now being a sys admin, I normally only change one thing at a time, but I didn't follow my own rule and I made two changes.  Not sure which resolved it, or if both did.  But anyway here is what I did:

The keyboard is disconnected and the Surface is in Tablet mode. I have a USB keyboard and mouse connected.

1. Downgrade UEFI firmware to v103.2851.256.0.

http://www.catalog.update.microsoft.com/Search.aspx?q=Surface%20-%20Firmware

and look for that version.

To install it, go into Device Manager, look in the Firmware section, and update Surface UEFI with the file(s) inside the .cab file.

You may need to modify your registry to allow downgrades.

Reboot.

2. Uninstall the "I2C HID Device" in Device Manager, under Human Interface Devices.

Scan for changes.

Reboot.

Power down, Power on.  (I did a full power cycle as an afterthought, since I know that some firmware updates require full power down, and many changes require two reboots)

Picked up the tablet, turned it sideways, and it switched to Portrait mode.  Yay! Then I connected the keyboard and it immediately worked. Doubleyay!  I went through various combinations of shut down, power cycle, hot/cold disconnecting keyboard, etc.  and it still works.

@ElegantPen, I do not have Hibernation enabled, that was one of the first things I disabled when originally purchased. That might be a different issue, although glad it worked in your case.

I've tried this with the .msi files instead, but still doesn't work for me.  I see that it's installing the files appropriately to the ProgramFiles>Surfaceupdate folder, but not installing the typecoverfilter firmware, nor the surfacepro4typecover firmware.  Everything else seems to get installed.  Is there a way to manually install these from the files (.cat, .sys, .inf, and .dll) from the surfaceupdate folder(s)?

Thank you.  But here's another thing, the whole process still doesn't install the surfacepro4typecover firmware or associated drivers.  It unpacks the files for this I think in the Program Files/SurfaceUpdate folder (several folders in here, one of which is the integration files for the surfacepro4typecover firmware I bet or something around this...  What I need to know now is how to install this firmware if it's not detecting it and installing it?

As in there is no device showing up in the device manager for the typecover.  It just keeps showing up as HID Keyboard.  I uninstall that and it's HID devices version, downgrade the various firmware... and still not working and still not showing the/these related typecover device(s).

It is written step by step on page 56, this forum, post from Shadow Chaser.

How do you do this downgrade, in that what are the steps specifically?  I couldn't find any way to do this via google.  I know how to get into device manager, but can't figure out how to use this cab file to go backwards, it just keeps saying when I try to "upgrade" to the lower version that it already has the best drivers for this device...

I tried this via the msi file "downgrade" path instead of the .cab file, with another version.  But it isn't working either.  Seems it is not installing or activating the type cover firmware or drivers.  I see the files installing into the surfaceupdate folder, but the typecover stuff isn't getting installed into device manager.

Hello lwarnerADM, João Nuno Martins Sereno,

thank you for your posts. Congratulation for your keyboards :)

Just to reply - uninstalling "I2C HID Device" only has no effect.

Actually I have another question. How did you forced UEFI to downgrade?

Once I load previous driver, there is no flashing process during reboot and I only get exclamation mark in device manager saying that driver is not compatible with the system, so no actual downgrading is happening...

Does I do something wrong? Did you see firmware flashing progress bar after boot and after surface logo?

The only firmware I'm able to downgrade is embedded controller. I was never been able to downgrade UEFI, ME or System Aggregator...