Registered: Jan 2000
Location: Columbia, MO
Posts: 4

My problem is this: Mid-July, I bought a Stowaway with this clever idea that I would use it for taking notes in my classes once the academic year got started. The benefit of this would be that I could finally ditch all of those legal pads I'd go through during the course of a semester, and be able to edit this material into useful study guides on my PC. This plan worked fine until about a week ago. My Stowaway had survived a number of trips, 13 hours of classes, and general use, and then the function buttons on the far right stopped working. Then the right arrow stopped. Then the Enter key stopped working. After some fiddling, I found that if I didn't slide that section in to meet the rest of the keys, they would work. I, being incredibly adaptable, starting typing on the keyboard like that.

Then, yesterday, the entire thing stopped functioning all together. I then experimented with sliding the sections apart and together a variety of distances, thinking that there was some sort of bad connection somewhere. It now functions if nothing is slid together to form the keyboard. Unfortunately, I am not that adaptable.

Does anyone in here have any ideas on if this is something that can be remedied, or am I just out of luck and need to get a new Stowaway?

I carried this thing in an outer pouch of a laptop bag along with my books, folder, and writing utensils. Right now, I'm thinking that wasn't a place that was protective enough for it and it got beaten into oblivion.

Any particularly helpful thoughts?

Registered: Feb 2001
Location: Not so sunny, San Diego, CA
Posts: 51

Check your warranty

I've been using a Stowaway for the same use just this semester. However, considering the thing folds up with all important bits (wires, keys, connectors) on THE INSIDE of the fairly tough metal case/bottom, I highly doubt normal wear & tear of being in a book bag damaged the internals. From the sound of it, the connectors have somehow come loose/disconnected. Unless you've been using the Stowaway as a catapult launch pad, or testing how many times you can open/close the stowaway in any given 24-hr period, I'd say you probably just have some poor connections, and you probably can get some service from Targus. (You naturally saved every scrap of paper AND the box the Stowaway came in, right?) If you registered with Targus when you installed the software, you should probably be covered. Give 'em a call and see what they can do for ya.