Keyboard going crazy ... not hardware issue .. probably OS?

My macbook has lately acted weird.

Every so often, sometimes after hours of work, the alphanumeric keys disengage. Every other key works. I image maybe some thread or process in the OS takes hold of the event handlers for the keys or keyboard buffer memory or whatnot and fails to return it for other programs to use. It resolves if I log out and log back in, the alphanumeric keys function again. Demonstrating it's not the hardware, it's a software problem.

What's going on? Why does this suddenly happen? It seems completely independent of any particular program I have running, so I suspect it has something to do with the OSX itself. Anyone ever hear anything about this?

I'm running the following specs,
http://i.imgur.com/y5Nskfb.png

You can trouble shoot this by attaching an external USB keyboard to your Mac to see if the same thing occurs. That will definitely eliminate hardware. Any USB keyboard can be used, even one of those inexpensive Windows models.

And please don't use a URL for your Mac specs. Always include them in your post to make it easier for someone to respond.

Sorry about the link. That's a good idea. I'll see if I can get my hands on a USB keyboard, and report back. Thanks!

From a software perspective. Assuming no OS or configuration files were deleted accidentally…maybe the files that control the keyboard got corrupted in some way.

I would run this free maintenance program called "Onyx":

Titanium's Software • Index page

After downloading, installing, and launching Onyx…just click on the "Auto" button…and let it do it's thing.

- Nick

p.s. Of course if when using an external USB keyboard…you find that the problem disappears (but remains with the built-in keyboard)…then we may be looking at a hardware problem.

Can we assume no liquids were spilled on this computer??