power button on my new Acer Swift 3

hello - recently i purchased my tenth Acer laptop, the Acer Swift-3. most of these i have purchased as gifts, to get people to quit using the evil HP laptops.

For whatever reason, Acer put the laptop power on/off button on the top-right corner of the keyboard, very close to the BACKSPACE key and the DELETE(insert) key. being very clumsy-fingered as i am, i keep inadvertly hitting the power button rather than the BACKSPACE key.

usually on any new laptop, i immediately remove the CAPS-LOCK key, since that is another one i keep accidentally hitting. alternatively, i remove the key and put a rubber band underneath it, making it far more difficult to press that key, although with this keyboard, that does not appear possible.

i am ready to return the laptop, but was wondering if there any solutions to this? perhaps some sort of cover for the key?

Accepted answers

billsey

Sure, in Power Options you can set the power button to do nothing instead of the default.

billsey

Never too easy is my watchword!

All comments

edwardsmarkf

i should have said normally i carefully remove the caps-lock kek and put a small rubber band underneath it, then replace the key, so it is much more difficult to press. or just break it off completely.

billsey

Sure, in Power Options you can set the power button to do nothing instead of the default.

edwardsmarkf

TOO EASY! thank you very much.

billsey

Never too easy is my watchword!

edwardsmarkf

if "never too easy" is your watchword, why are the later models of Acer so darn difficult to work on? my first three Acers were all serviceable with a back-panel held on one simple phillips head screw?? 🙂🙂

billsey

That's driven by the market which wants lighter and thinner laptops. In order to get the thickness down things like CPU or memory sockets have to go by the wayside, as well as separate keyboards and case parts. Everywhere you put a screw requires a standoff in the molding, and that means more thickness...

edwardsmarkf

one last dumb question for BIllsey: you kindly gave me a solution to DISABLE the power button.

there have been times that my computers would seem to "freeze up" and it required to hold down the power button for several seconds. once or twice (or three times) it even required me to physically remove the battery on the laptop, or disconnect the power supply on the desktop.

is the disabling of the power button in the m$ console prevent me from holding down the power button for several seconds? and YES of course i could try it & see what happens but thought it better to ask here first.

regarding your other reply about not being serviceable anymore, i was afraid you were going to say that. it makes sense, but i sure miss the "good old days" when a battery, ssd & memory could all be replaced with minimum effort. this new Acer swift-3 reminds me a bit of a Chrysler, if/when anything goes wrong, you simply get a new one. (or reinstall the OS)

billsey

Nope, the power button has a hardwired connection that gets triggered when you press and hold it. That allows it to force a power off even when the OS is completely hung.

There is a good side to not being able to replace the CPU or memory... Soldered in is much less likely to gradually build up corrosion on the socket, so you're actually less likely to get a failure after the system starts aging. Child failures are just as common, but later ones are less so.