help...keyboard is typing numbers- numlock disabled

[wags1970]

I have a Thinkpad T30 that all of the sudden the "U,I,O,P,J,K,L,M" keys are typing numbers instead. I don't know what happened. I literally was working on it one minute, went back to it a while later (it was still booted up) and it started happening. I have since verified numlock is off, I even disabled it in the BIOS. I have rebooted several times. I've tried using the Fn key, shift keys, and any other combination I can think of and it doesn't fix it. What else could it be? Is there some magic key sequence that will restore this? It's basically unsuable at this point without an external keyboard. Any ideas?

[vanaya]

Does the number lock led light up, when you confirm that is is on or off?? If it doesn't light on or off, maybe bad/stuck button. I pop of my keys when clean my keyboards, maybe wrong key on button? Just a thought.

[Mike Blake]

We're assuming you don't see the NumLock light on (it looks like an arrow with the number 1 in it). If it is, you can just hold down the SHIFT key and press the SCRLK/numlk key above the F11 key (usually). This can often be configured to boot turned off in the BIOS.

Vanaya has a point on cleaning the keyboard. When I saw similar issues doing support for desktops, it often was related to a dirty keyboard. Since they had separate keyboards, I'd ask them to turn it upside down and shake hard to see if junk started to fall out. Then hear them curse as they saw the crumbs, etc. on the desk.

I'd also have them press every key on the keyboard down repeatedly in case one key was imperceptibly pressed down, creating a key combo when another key was pressed. An example would be the Windows key being the culprit, and when they pressed M, the app they were in -- and all others -- would minimize. Users would often call and say Windows was shutting down and restarting itself when this happened!

Ah, the memories. Another thing to check, could there be something funky set in the Keyboard Customizer, if you have it loaded? Or could the Windows accessory feature "Sticky Keys" have been accidentally turned on? Go to Control Panel / Accessibility Options for the last.

[wags1970]

Fixed!! It was the Shift-scroll lock combination that did it. I swore I tried that, but apparently not.

when I hit just scroll lock, the button did go on and back off when I turned it off. But when I hit with Shift-scroll -lock a different button lit up, the one next to the hard drive activity light. It looks like an up arrow with the number 1 in it. Not sure what it is, but it was the culprit. Anyways, thanks for the help. what a relief!

[nikki605]

...the one next to the hard drive activity light. It looks like an up arrow with the number 1 in it. Not sure what it is, but it was the culprit.

The indicator light you described to the right of the HDD activity light is the Num Lock indicator. To the right of it is the Caps Lock indicator.