El Capitan problems with Apple Wireless Keyboard

Which version el cap are you using?

I see this a lot, too. You don't need to reboot. To work around the problem, recycle the power on your keyboard.

Hi comptonsw

Thank you for the idea to try. I assume you maen that when it happens just disconnect the batteries in the keyboard and when they are reconnected the computer should 'find' the keyboard again. I will certainly give that a go and in doing so it will free up the USB socket again used by the current keyboard. Assuming that does work it does not of course put right the root cause of the fault which I assume will, at some point, be addressed by a patch or update to the system.

Same issue here. iMac 5K (late 2014) with wireless keyboard. Same symptoms. Cycling power to the keyboard fixes the issue maybe 50% of the time, the rest, I have to power off then on the iMac in order to get bluetooth to connect the keyboard. Magic Mouse and trackpad don't appear involved. Running 10.11.2 beta 5. This has been an issue since I bought the iMac a few months ago. None of my other Macs exhibit this behaviour. Mac Book Pro running 10.11.2 beta 5 and Mac mini running 10.11.1 are without symptoms.

Almost seems to be an interference issue, but I have no way to prove or disprove that theory. I have swapped keyboards, turned the others off, nothing changes anything.

If I thought it was an issue with El Capitan, I'd file a bug report, but can't prove that either.

Ideas anyone?

Charles Johnson

All I do is power off and power back up the keyboard. You don't need to take the batteries out. The power button is at the upper right corner of the keyboard.

Interesting. I have the same configuration - iMac 5K late 2014 with wireless keyboard. I wonder if it's hardware related. But as I say, cycling power works fairly well. I also wonder if it's related to battery levels. I've found that rechargable batteries don't perform that well.

Since my last post the keyboard worked fine until last night when the problem returned. I carried out your procedure of disconnecting the batteries and reconnecting them and was successful at the next attempt. Thank you for that tip. I cannot put a finger on why it happened last night as nothing untoward happend - although I guess something did for the fault to occur, but what, a complete mystery!!!

I’m having the same issue with regularity myself, lately. Again, you don’t need to pull the batteries out. Just turn off the power by pressing the keyboard's power button for several seconds. Then power it back up and let the keyboard reconnect.

Here’s another option to try: If you have a wired mouse handy, disable bluetooth on the mac momentarily, and then re-enable it. Obviously you need wired accessories to try this test.

I've had this happen to both my iMac Late 2010 and my iMac Late 2013 using either the Apple Magic Keyboard 1 or 2. By turning off and the back on the keyboard I was able to get around the problem. This is actually a little easier using version 2 of the keyboard since it has an off/on switch I can toggle. This also started happening to me after I first upgraded to El Capitan back in 10.11.0 (beta 3). Has not been fixed as of yet. I will check the official 10.11.2 release now that it is out and report back.

iMac 2015 - 27" 5k. Wireless keyboard, mouse and trackpad all connected bia bluetooth.

I have the same issue with my wireless keyboard adding random keystrokes to the password box after the Mac has been asleep and also being erratic (basically unusable) on occassion during normal working. In another thread on this issue there was a recommendation to move trackpad off to one side. This seems to have helped some people. Not me. The problems started after upgrading to El Capitan.

Does anyone have a solution for this keyboard problem besides taking the batteries out and putting them back in again. That works for me but is inconvenient to say the least.By the way the on/off button top right does not have any effect on the problem when toggled 'on and off'.

I have to R & R batteries too when I get into this spot. Found this out when trying and failing to get wi-fi to work...someone suggested to create a wi-fi network on the computer, and when I did that, I lost both my BT mouse and keyboard. Had to jump thru several hoops before I got them back and never did get wi-fi to work. Also couldn't get my ipad to stay connected to my router...had to move it across the room. Never had any of this before el cap.

I just power cycle the keyboard. No need to remove the batteries. You need to hold the power off for a few seconds. Toggling isn't sufficient. That seems to work fine.

I wonder if this problem occurs with the new Magic lightning connector keyboard.

Thank you for the help with how to restart the keyboard. I have now found that the tip about moving the trackpad to one side has helped alleviate the problem. It took awhile but now for the last 2 days no more issues. I think it must be something to do with using all three: keyboard, mouse and trackpad on El Capitan.

Very interesting. What exactly do you mean about "moving the trackpad" to one side? Does it matter which direction, left or right? How far away? And yes, I use all three devices as well. Does everyone on this thread use all 3 devices? I'd be interested to see if the problem recurs for you -- it seems to happen with no particular pattern.

To the right about 20 cm. I used to put the trackpad under my screen. Looked neat sitting there on the metal. I also think it may be an issue affecting people with all three input devices connected at the same time.

I KNOW WHAT IS CAUSING THIS! I have done the many suggestions from these forums and have just had my keyboard replaced. The problem still occurred when waking up from sleep with my trackpad next to my keyboard.

If you go into System Preferences/General and untick the "allow handoff between this Mac and your iCloud devices" the problem will go away!

I am running OSX 10.11.2, hopefully this will be fixed in the next release to give back the new functionality that we must now disable to fix this bug.

Bingo - I have now have my wi-fi back. Thanks and Happy New Year!

Hello Looperp55. I am still having the same problem but reading your response has prompted me to untick "allow handoff...." in the General Prefeneces. Not sure what the consequences of that will be elsewhere but it will be interesting to see if that resolves the problem for me.

I am one of those who also uses all three wireless devices, keyboard, trackpad and mouse and they sit next to each other on the desk in front of me. I have also lost contact with the mouse on ocassion but the track pad (so far) has never failed.

I will let you know after a while if the it has resolved the problem for me. Great Joy!!

Hello again Looperp55. Alas, having had a week or so of uninterrupted 'log ons' on my iMac the porblem has returned even though I followed your suggestion and unticked the "allow handoff.....". I hope that at next Apple update a solution will be found.

I do have a ***** driver to hand and I am getting quite adept at disconnecting the batteries, reconnecting and back up and running in a short space of time, just becoming an annoyance now. This problem only happens at log in and never once the computer is up and running.

Keep calm and carry on!!

Still having this issue with OSX 10.11.4 beta 2 (15E33e). Very frustrating to take an hour or more to get the iMac and the keyboard connected again. Tried everything I can think of to isolate this somehow, but nothing seems to make any difference. I've tried all the suggestions posted in this thread, and nada. Normally, just turning the keyboard off and back on again will solve the issue, but not today. Once I turned the keyboard off, I could not get it to reconnect. Finally deleted the keyboard in Bluetooth preferences, then had trouble getting it to pair again. Finally, removed the batteries from the keyboard for an hour, then replaced them. The keyboard then tried to pair (blinking green light), and the iMac found it. What's up with this?????

> I have the same issue with my wireless keyboard adding random keystrokes to the password box after the Mac has been asleep and also being erratic (basically unusable) on occassion during normal working.

OK. I am having this exact problem too. Just upgraded my MacBook Pro to El Cap in the last week and it started shortly thereafter. Crazy wireless keyboard response when trying to login after sleep--slow response and tons of repeated keys for a single keystrokes. And this behavior continues even after I have logged in via the MacBook's keyboard.

As others have pointed out, it seems to be the wireless trackpad interacting with the wireless keyboard. Disconnecting the bluetooth trackpad fixes the wirelesskeyboard problem. Re-connecting the trackpad it starts the problem up again. Power cycling the MacBook Pro seems to be the only solution to have both the wirelss keyboard and trackpad working properly again.

Moving the trackpad to the side does not help. And even if it did, it would not be a good soluction since the trackpad needs to be near the keyboard to be useful.

Sounds like "If you go into System Preferences/General and untick the "allow handoff between this Mac and your iCloud devices" the problem will go away!" has not been effective for all. And I too am leery of the futher impliatons of changing this setting.

Anything new on this? -a

Hello again, for those who have followed this, and other similar posts, on this subject it may be of interest to read my latest offering on this problem.

I have completly removed the 'Wireles Trackpad' from my workstation and reverted back to using just the mouse. The Trackpad, with batteries removed, sits forlornly at the back of the desk but the result has been that since removal, about 3 weeks ago, I have not experienced the problem at all.

I will give it another couple of weeks and the real test will be, when reconnected, whether the problems returns. If that is the case then that could be conclusive evidence of the cause.

Keep Calm and Carry On!!!!

I followed the suggestions of several posters and removed (actually turned off) the trackpad for several weeks. Today, I turned it on and left it on while the iMac went to sleep. Sure enough, on the very first time I woke the iMac, the problem returned. As I started to post this reply, I noticed the trackpad generating nondescript characters as I tried to type. Turned the trackpad off, and now I can type normally.

There is obviously some interaction between the wireless keyboard (version 1 with batteries) and the trackpad (version 1 with batteries) under OS X 10.11.X. I am running beta 7 of 10.11.4, loaded just last night, and this was a test to see if the issue had been fix. NO, it hasn't.

Not sure if this is an issue just with iMacs or does it apply to all Macs? Has anyone seen this behavior with a MBP or Mac Mini?

Thanks, Charles Johnson

Hi Charles, I reconnected my Trackpad 24 hours ago and the problem has immediately returned. I think that conclusively shows that the Trackpad is the cause - or ceratinly something that it intereacts with it to create the problem. I don't know what can be done about it but hopefully Apple will pick up on our conclusions and provide a solution. I am using OS X El Capitan version 10.11.1.

I guess for me it means that my system will have to do without the convenience of the Trackpad and I will just use the mouse (also wireless) and the keyboard.

Just Keep Calm and Carry On!!

I agree with you Llanilad, I hope Apple will pick up on this because it's so annoying. I've had this problem since going to El Capitan and I'm currently on 10.11.4 and it still happens. Based on history with Apple, I think we'll be waiting a while, but I hope I'm wrong.