Surface Pro 4 Keyboard not working / type cover keyboard driver missing

I worked on my surface pro 4 for 4 months to no avail trying to get the type cover to work. I researched every fix I could find and tried it. The type cover keyboard would only operate in bios screen, but no where else.

Finally I came upon the instructions for creating a bootable usb, which essentially loads a new operating system image for my surface pro 4 from Microsoft.

Then you have to then look for the instructions on how to boot your surface pro 4 from the usb instead of going to your hard drive for booting. Of course, everything on your computer is wiped out, but you essentially have a computer with everything new. It worked and I have been using it ever since.

I have been working on this issue for months, off and on; on both a Pro 3 and Pro 4, with two keyboards. It appears one of the Microsoft updates disabled the keyboard port on the surface. And I can find no way of turning it back on. I have totally reset both units with different procedures, re-installed all drivers and several different versions of firmware, with no luck. So I agree with the above suggestions. One can find a few different type covers on Amazon and eBay, which are Bluetooth, not direct connect. I have checked a different Bluetooth keyboard on the surface and it works ok. It's not the best solution, but at least it works.

Help, I am not computer Savy, I just moved to San Miguel de Allende, Mexico and I do not have a printer. My original pro 4 keyboard worked fine until a few weeks ago ( except for the purple "suede" that started peeling off three years ago!). Now I use the on-screen keyboard that takes up half the screen & is not a good replacement.

So #1- How do I go about splitting the screen so that I might read & follow your instructions at the same time???

#2- please remain aware that many Microsoft subscribers are not comfortable doing tech stuff to their computer! The above answer was pretty all-inclusive because there are many things mentioned that the computer will diagnose and fix just by going to the underlined site. But " download, run and install the.msi" is WAY above my paygrade. need help with that

#3_ Where in Mexico can I speak to someone knowledgeable about Surface AND speaks English? (1 800/888 etc numbers not very clear from here)

#4- Where in Mexico can I purchase a new Surface Pro 4 keyboard OR how much will a US Microsoft store charge to ship a new one to me?

Thanks for helping me in any way you can!

Beth Masino,

San Miguel de Allende, Mexico

Hello all desperate type cover owners ! There's still a hope !

I succeed today to get my keyboard alive and 100% running after a lot of time of loose and a lot of things tried :

• Cleaning
• Uninstall of drivers
• Different installation of Firmwares
• Recovery of windows with keep of files
• Recovery of windows without keeping the files
• Recoveries with redownloading windows from the web
• Hard reset
• ...
• ...

Keyboard was not working during months in Windows (just backlight, fn button led, and volume buttons)

It was however working in the bios, for what can be used in it : arrows, enter, mouse that had to be activated with two fingers)

Finally, a kind of combination of all the attempts has allowed me finally to recover the keyboard in Windows.

I pursued the idea to recreate the situation a type cover has never been attached to the Surface.

01 - With Windows running, remove (disconnect from the physical port) the Type Cover from the Surface

02 - Open "Device manager", go in menu "View" on top and choose "Devices by container"

03 - In the same menu "View", enable "Show hidden devices"

04 - This should make appear a "Surface Type Cover" section in the list, even if the keyboard is not attached to the Surface

05 - For each driver you see under this section and for which you can do it, right clic + uninstall / check the box to delete drivers and validate. Do it for all of them, even wacom, until the "Surface Type Cover" section disappears by itself from the container list.

06 - Then force the Surface to power off and go towards "hard" reset by maintaining the power button during more than 30 seconds (to be sure)

07 - The surface should be off, so run the tablet in UEFI bios by pressing and maintaining Power and (+) buttons

08 - Go in Device menu and disable the last option "Type Cover Port"

09 - Go in Exit menu and touch Restart button

10 - Let Windows start completely and when it's done, again, force power off and go towards "hard" reset by maintaining power button during more than 30 seconds

11 - From its off state, run again the tablet in UEFI bios by starting the tablet with Power + (+) button

12 - Re-activate "Type cover port" in menu Device

13 - Go to "Exit" / "Restart"

14 - Let Windows start properly and attached your Type Cover to the Surface Pro

After I did the last step, Windows recognized it as a new device, took some time to set it up and tell me that is was installed.

The keyboard was fully functional and I was happy.

I hope you'll be too !

Thank you, and your proceddure worked for me.

Worked for me! Thanks a lot!!