Num Lock on at Boot

“Who the hell cares about Num Lock being enabled by default?”  That was my first thought when I was first asked to make this happen. I mean, seriously, who cares, right?

Well, I work with a lot of accountants, and guess what, they do. I had never really thought this was an issue, but with the number pad for accountants being the equivalent of Burger King to a Sumo wrestler, it matters.

A lot of people out there seem to think that they have this already figured out. A lot of people are already screaming – it’s a BIOS setting…It’s a BIOS setting…It’s a BIOS setting….FUCK.. I hear you all already, but it’s not just the BIOS.  There is a little more to it than that.

In fact, you’ll notice on computer where the BIOS setting is enabled, that the Num Lock Key actually stays on right up until the point where Windows takes over. Then it will flash a couple of times, and Poof…it’s gone.

The following tutorial will show you how to change that default behaviour in the windows registry and you will be fast on your way to have your very own auto-enabled Num Lock ….whooo..wow….

The following fix involves modifying the windows registry, so the usual advice about backing up your registry applies. IF you don’t know how to modify the registry, maybe ask a buddy to do the following for you as you could end up with more than just a Num Lock key not working if you mess up. But, that being said, this registry entry is a snap and I am sure that with a little confidence you will have this finished in no time at all.

Your first step involves opening up the Windows registry.

Simply push the Windows key and R at the same time, and type the word regedit in the box. This will start up the windows registry editor.

Then migrate to the HKEY_USERS\.DEFAULT\Control Panel\Keyboard\InitialKeyboardIndicators key, right click on it and select “modify”.

Finally, change the value from 0 to 2 and voila, you are done. Close the key, and the registry and reboot to check it out.

Now, I know some of you don’t like registry changes, so there is an alternate way to do this through scripting.

set up a script by using notepad with the following, name it “numlock.vbs” and save it into your startup file.

set WshShell = CreateObject("WScript.Shell")
WshShell.SendKeys "{NUMLOCK}"

All of the above works on Windows 2000/XP/2003 but is untested in Windows Vista and will not work in Windows 7 – Windows 7 must be configured with the same settings, but under the HKEY Current Users key. .

Enjoy!