Can't Vista Tell If a Laptop Is Docked?

[Guest]

Can it be that Vista continues the stupid NumLock "tradition" of W2K and XP,
which do their own things, regardless of what a user may have set up in their
machine's BIOS?

From discussions here it seems that when a machine starts, the state of
NumLock will be the same as when the profile last shutdown, and there is no
provision for discerning whether a laptop happens to be docked or not.

This is terribly annoying to laptop users who frequently change from docked
to undocked: No undocked small-keyboard laptop should ever start with
NumLock on. But it is natural to expect a full-sized keyboard to have its
NumLock on. Forgetting to manually switch has caused many a call to reset
passwords.

Many thoughtful manufacturers recognized this problem and have created BIOS
settings that permit different NumLock conditions for docked and undocked.

But all this benefit was destroyed when Microsoft "improved" Windows with
the persistent state disease.

Can't Vista return this choice to the user? Or are we forever stuck with
the "eternal wisdom" of some non-laptop user who was responsible for that
part of Windows?

 

[ThePro]

This is terribly annoying to laptop users who frequently change from
docked
to undocked: No undocked small-keyboard laptop should ever start with
NumLock on. But it is natural to expect a full-sized keyboard to have its
NumLock on. Forgetting to manually switch has caused many a call to reset
passwords.

I don't know about your setup, but on my Dell Inspiton laptop running Vista
Enterprise at normal i.e. non-docked boot the NumLock state is "off".

When in the office I do not use a docking station per se but I plug an
external LCD screen and a Microsoft wireless keyboard + mouse combo, then I
boot the laptop. The state of the external keybord is then NumLock "on". I
never had to do anything special about it, it just always worked that way.

ThePro

 

[mikeyhsd]

my normal state is NUM LOCK OFF.



(e-mail address removed)



Can it be that Vista continues the stupid NumLock "tradition" of W2K and XP,
which do their own things, regardless of what a user may have set up in their
machine's BIOS?

From discussions here it seems that when a machine starts, the state of
NumLock will be the same as when the profile last shutdown, and there is no
provision for discerning whether a laptop happens to be docked or not.

This is terribly annoying to laptop users who frequently change from docked
to undocked: No undocked small-keyboard laptop should ever start with
NumLock on. But it is natural to expect a full-sized keyboard to have its
NumLock on. Forgetting to manually switch has caused many a call to reset
passwords.

Many thoughtful manufacturers recognized this problem and have created BIOS
settings that permit different NumLock conditions for docked and undocked.

But all this benefit was destroyed when Microsoft "improved" Windows with
the persistent state disease.

Can't Vista return this choice to the user? Or are we forever stuck with
the "eternal wisdom" of some non-laptop user who was responsible for that
part of Windows?

 

[Darrell Gorter[MSFT]]

Hello,
What is the value of this key:
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Control Panel\Keyboard:InitialKeyboardIndicators
try setting it to 2147483648 which is supposed to be the setting to honer
the bios setting for numlock.

Thanks,
Darrell Gorter[MSFT]

This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights
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|> Thread-Topic: Can't Vista Tell If a Laptop Is Docked?
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|> Subject: Can't Vista Tell If a Laptop Is Docked?
|> Date: Fri, 22 Jun 2007 11:16:02 -0700
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|>
|> Can it be that Vista continues the stupid NumLock "tradition" of W2K and
XP,
|> which do their own things, regardless of what a user may have set up in
their
|> machine's BIOS?
|>
|> From discussions here it seems that when a machine starts, the state of
|> NumLock will be the same as when the profile last shutdown, and there is
no
|> provision for discerning whether a laptop happens to be docked or not.
|>
|> This is terribly annoying to laptop users who frequently change from
docked
|> to undocked: No undocked small-keyboard laptop should ever start with
|> NumLock on. But it is natural to expect a full-sized keyboard to have
its
|> NumLock on. Forgetting to manually switch has caused many a call to
reset
|> passwords.
|>
|> Many thoughtful manufacturers recognized this problem and have created
BIOS
|> settings that permit different NumLock conditions for docked and
undocked.
|>
|> But all this benefit was destroyed when Microsoft "improved" Windows
with
|> the persistent state disease.
|>
|> Can't Vista return this choice to the user? Or are we forever stuck
with
|> the "eternal wisdom" of some non-laptop user who was responsible for
that
|> part of Windows?
|>
|>