Safe mode with an F-Lock keyboard

[Keith Patrick]

My apologies if this appears twice. Windows Mail tends to hang when I post
to MS Communities, and some of these show up days later while other just get
lost...I am really starting to hate Vista's UI bugs. Anyway:
I've got a bit of a dilemma. In a nutshell, I turned off admin rights to my
account but UAC's password prompt is not showing any password box (this
can't be by design because the message is saying that I have to enter a
password on the window), so I can't try to do anything as an admin. So I'm
trying to login as an admin, but it requires starting Windows in Safe Mode,
which requires hitting F8 before Windows starts. Problem is, the F-Lock key
is forced OFF for almost the entire bootup duration.

Has anone with one of MS' F-Lock keyboards run into this problem and seen a
solution? It's really, really crucial that I regain admin rights to my
machine soon, but the flakiness I'm starting to discover in Vista has now
gone from annoying to highly disruptive.

 

[Keith Patrick]

Or actually, if there's some way to pop up an account impersonation dialog
that is NOT the UAC dialog, that might suffice (basically, there's some bug
in UAC that is preventing it from showing me any admin accounts when it
prompts for admin credentials...seriously, I've been locked out of
everything from reinstalling the OS to debugging ASP.Net apps to installing
anti-virus software)
And just my luck, the UAC blog is now shut down I've spent 2 hours
talking to Microsoft trying to explain to them that using their own
keyboard, you can get locked out of the OS...all because the UAC dialog
won't give me a damn password box!

 

[Michael]

I have a Microsoft Multimedia Keyboard with the F-lock feature.
Start the boot sequence, push the F lock the 'f' light comes on', during the
boot the f-lock light goes off, push the f-lock key again
(every time it goes off turn it back on) between F-lock key pushes
continually push (not push and hold) the F8 key.

On my machine there is plenty of time from when the F-light goes out to turn
it back on and start hittting the F8 key.

Michael

 

[Jim]

Run msconfig, select boot.ini and check safe mode. Restart
On completion of safe mode run msconfig again, select boot.ini and uncheck safe mode
It works in XP so presume also in Vista

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