Surface Pro 4 Jul 2017 Update - Type Cover not working

NeilXP,

I went through this same issue recently with my Surface Pro 2. It worked just fine until some firmware bricked my keyboard port (not the Type Cover itself, but the connector port/pins on the Surface).

I went through every silly troubleshooting step, reinstalled fresh and restored factory image, numerous times. I even bought a second Type Cover 2 only to find it didn't solve the problem.

You might be in luck... Since you have the Surface Pro 4, it should still be covered by some kind of support. I don't mean warranty, unless you have the warranty, then MS would be obligated to replace your device.

I mean End of Life dates. MS has strangely removed EOL dates online (?), but my SP2 EOL date was April, 2018 (funny, that was 1 month before my Touch Type Cover stopped working). Therefore, it's very doubtful MS would ever "fix" the firmware for the older SP2. Although, morally, they should fix it, but they aren't going to waste resources and time on an older device that is past its EOL date.

https://www.computerworld.com/article/3250691/microsoft-windows/when-does-your-surface-support-life-cycle-end-will-it-get-fixed.html

Your SP4 released in 2015 surely has not reached End of Life, and MS should provide some kind of support until 2020 or so (it's usually 5 years). At least a chance for future firmware updates to fix it. After 2020, you may as well sell it or buy yourself a Bluetooth folio type cover case.

This problem drove me nuts for nearly a month until I realized the EOL thing and gave up, and bought a new 2017 Surface Pro on Ebay, which I'm currently typing on and LOVE. And I made sure to get the extra warranty in case this happens again.

In your case, you should contact MS for support and even if they charge you a labor/repair fee, at least they are obligated to fix it or give you something newer if they can't.  Being in Australia, you might have to ship it somewhere.

I'm surprised after your MS phone support for 1 hour, they did not request for you to send it in for service? Did they just give up?

Good luck man, I feel your pain and am very familiar with this issue! I'm a certified Microsoft tech but I do not work for MS.

Mine, SP3 with typecover, used to be able to fix by 2 button, now it stops working totally. I tried all the ways (vol+power button, refresh windows totally, even in the UEFI environment). I tried to do TPM update as following guide (https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/4100374/surface-pro-3-trusted-platform-module-tpm-update-tool). Suddenly the keyboard worked again after disabling Bitlocker and vol+power button. I do all the steps and now, I got into the new state: every time my SP3 sleep/restart/shutdown and keyboard stop working, use vol+power until the keyboard lighting up and the keyboard works again. I feel very disappointed for the quality of Surface Pro vs. the cost of it.

Add Surface Pro 2 Type/Touch Covers to the list:

Same issue here. Worked fine for 2 years, then noticed on my Surface Pro 2 around April 2018 off and on, then by May 2018 my Touch Cover 2 was completely bricked. After trying all kinds of remedies, I bought a "new" Type Cover 2, same issue. Cleaned the connector pins on Surface, did all the steps and realized that it's a Firmware issue. Somewhere along the way, these updates made either the Surface Pro (2/3/4) firmware and/or the Type/Touch Cover firmware incompatible. It's almost as if something in the Surface BIOS is telling the pins not to send power to the Covers (no LEDs, no Caps lock, nothing). My type and touch covers are not recognized in the UEFI. I'm finding HUNDREDS maybe thousands of others having this issue, especially recently.

I've wasted around 1 week of my life trying to fix this, even looking at new computers to buy. And I'm an experienced MS tech! Why can't MS release a new firmware update or downgrade to fix all of the Surfaces and covers?

I called MS support today, and their solution was to bring it to an MS store (3 hours drive), where they MIGHT give me a discount on a newer system. My system was perfectly fine before these updates this year, I shouldn't be forced to buy a new computer because of MS's firmware mistake. 20+ years MS user and tech supporter, this is ridiculous. If this is their quiet way of pushing users to buy new hardware, that would be a new low for any company. MS needs to realize that no keyboard/mouse on any Surface basically BRICKS it, and defeats the purpose of the once amazing device. I spent about 10 hours today researching all of the ways to try to fix this. This is my post before I try resetting/refreshing/clean install tomorrow - which I'm afraid may not fix it due to all the other stories I've read. I'm glad I don't have to explain this to a client if it were an enterprise computer! Good luck to all with this issue. MS, you can do so much better, easily. It's got to be something with the USB internals and of course the firmware all need to play nice together (and have a way to restore older firmware for issues like this).

Same problem. I have a SP3 with SP4 keyboard. Suddenly it just stops dead.

Managed to get it going again yesterday by removing the SDcard (not sure if this step actually helps) and uninstalling everything related to the cover in the device manager. If I remember correctly it was uninstalling the HID Keyboard Device after some other things that made it start up again. I then did a full reset of Windows 10 to be sure.

Today though after removing the keyboard again for a while and plugging it back in as you do... nothing again. Have been trying different versions of uninstalling every driver and popping the keyboard back on that I could possibly do but no luck yet.

It makes sense to me if it is the firmware update causing the issues but it's not like you could actually reach anyone at Microsoft to confirm.

Back to my 9 year old (flawless) Logitech keyboard we go.

it almost 1 year that problem start but this **** company don t do anything .plz surface user in us plz do something .another country user can t do anything about this problem but you guy can .plz sue them or find a good lawyer to kick their ass .don t let them away from this problem for free