Odd keyboard issue

The last few months I've had a weird issue where my Dell Inspiron Laptop's keyboard doesn't work properly. When I first boot the computer and click on any icon, it pulls up the properties of that icon. If i right click I can open a program, but can't type in said program. Like in Firefox, a F will open up the file menu. However, after months of frustration, I figured out a weird combo of key strokes that well temporarily fix the issue. I hit ATL, then right click, then pull up a program that pulls up the User Account Control (Vista) asking for permission to open a program. Then it works for an hour or so before going haywire again. Does anyone have any idea what happened or what I could do to get rid of this? Thanks!

 

Hard to tell whether this is a software problem or a hardware problem. Just before this problem started, did you spill something on the keyboard or have some other mishap that might have damaged the keyboard?

Have you tried using an external keyboard? Do you have a USB keyboard that you could use as a test to see whether your computer would work right with an external keyboard?

Do you have your important files backed up? If not, I suggest you do so ASAP.

Does that computer have a recovery partition? Have you considered reformatting the hard drive and restoring the system to it's original configuration?

 

Thanks so much for the response.

Yes, actually i did spill a little water on it about a week before the issues starting happening. I tried the external keyboard and the same thing happens.

I took your advice and backed everything up.

I believe it has a recovery partition. I'm willing to try anything to correct this as it's painful.

 

In safe mode it does the same thing. I tried looking at the processes and nothing

 

I backed everything up and just want to reset the thing. What's the best way to go back to factory settings? Booting from the vista disk? Thanks!