Thinkpads Forum

I used to use this to turn off my display but keep the TP running. Do it again to fire up the display again. I did some System Updates the last day or two and now I get a menu of choices of what I want the combo to do and schemes to choose from. Well, I'm not currently doing any presentations but I'd like to be able to at some time, of course, but I'd like to again be able to turn off the display short of putting the machine to sleep. No success yet. On one TP I tried setting it to the scheme to toggle between the TP and an external display, figuring that would accomplish the same thing. But now when I hit Fn+F7 I get a tingle out of Windows and nothing happens.

I have no idea what 'menu' you are talking about. If you've installed the Hotkey utility that should enable FN-F7.

Fn+F7 isn't meant to turn off the display. If you don't have HotKey Utility installed, it will switch between laptop's display, external monitor or both. With the utility, you get a menu that gives you access to all combinations.

Fn+F3 is meant as a standard way to turn off the display (with the utility). You can configure it to either display a menu with all power schemes (with the display off option at the bottom) or to just turn the display off.

When I ran System Update yesterday I downloaded (and presumably installed) the Hotkey Utility. However, I don't see it, or is what I see when I press Fn+F7 the Hotkey Utility?

Fn + F3 would give you the option of turning the screen off, presuming that the Hotkey Utility is installed.

Fn + F7 toggles the options between external and internal monitor...

Ref this thread, and your other thread about the TV Toolbox: This is why I like to do all the system driver/files installs manually. Then you can better choose what you want to have. I do install the Hotkey features and most of the functions/menus it should have, but on the T60s I have configured, I have chose to not install Access Connections and the TV Toolbox. I am not necessarily recommending people to do it this way, but in case you were wondering about it, this is why I do it.

Btw, your CD is on it's way, but from the last posts it seems like your T60 is going now.

This is why I like to do all the system driver/files installs manually. Then you can better choose what you want to have. I do install the Hotkey features and most of the functions/menus it should have, but on the T60s I have configured, I have chose to not install Access Connections and the TV Toolbox. I am not necessarily recommending people to do it this way, but in case you were wondering about it, this is why I do it.

I agree with this - I do all laptops manually, including Thinkpads, and seem to avoid 99% of the issues that folks talk about here in the forum, but it is not for the faint of heart or those that like apple-style turnkey ease of setup!

I even deviate from straight Lenovo drivers on some things, such as using the latest Intel chipset drivers that are often new and improved over the ones at Lenovo, for example.

Norway Pad wrote:Ref this thread, and your other thread about the TV Toolbox: This is why I like to do all the system driver/files installs manually. Then you can better choose what you want to have. I do install the Hotkey features and most of the functions/menus it should have, but on the T60s I have configured, I have chose to not install Access Connections and the TV Toolbox. I am not necessarily recommending people to do it this way, but in case you were wondering about it, this is why I do it.

Btw, your CD is on it's way, but from the last posts it seems like your T60 is going now.

I did get a tip about Access Connections, indicating that I'd not need or use it and that it can actually cause certain problems, so I chose not to download that one. Just about all the rest I did accept from System Update, not having a reason not to, including the Hotkey Utility, however I don't see it. Don't know what happened to it. On this, my newly acquired and configured T61 (running Windows 7 64bit Ultimate), I evidently don't have it. Fn+F7 brings up the TV Toolbox (I may well remove it) and Fn+F3 brings up power options (I don't have the battery inserted presently). So, there's no way I can see to turn off the display on this machine presently, which annoys me. Fn+F7 used to do that. Maybe if I remove the Toolbox Fn+F7 will resume the display toggle functionality.

Thanks for the XP install. I may not use it soon, but one day I may. Some folks prefer it to a R&R ---> Factory Default installation, and I must say that was a lot of work and waiting and once installed, there was a ton of work necessary to update the system. I'm nowhere near done setting up my two "new" systems. I'm wondering if it might not be better to clone a working system to another, although I've never done that. I was pipe dreaming about maybe booting to a Ghost CD, making an image of the boot partition to a 2nd partition, getting a 2nd HD caddy and putting a 2 partition HD in that and writing the Ghost image to the 2nd partition and then inserting the HD in a 2nd machine, boot that machine from a Ghost CD and restore the image to the first partition. I haven't been messing with Ghost for a long time, but it seems to me theoretically possible to do this. As long as there aren't hardware conflicts, maybe it will work. I suppose none of my motherboards are the same, however with a factory default R&R it might not matter. With a Ghost image of a working system, it could be an issue, seems to me.

ghosting works great to have a snapshop of a working system that is configured just like you want it, in case of a "restore" type of situation (I don't use Windows system restore) however, due to registry differences concerning hardware specifics that are configured during setup, not to mention system security (SAM) you cannot "ghost" the entire hard drive from one computer to another as far as the OS and everything on a particular drive, it only works for the same physical computer and that is only if you don't make any hardware changes.

Harryc wrote:I have no idea what 'menu' you are talking about. If you've installed the Hotkey utility that should enable FN-F7.

When I run System Update I'm not given the opportunity to download the Hotkey Utility. I believe I already did the download. How can I tell if it's been properly installed? Where do I get access to it? I don't see anything pertaining to the Hotkey Utility anywhere in the ThinkVantage Productivity Center.

Is the Hotkey Utility the same thing as the "Keyboard Customizer Utility?" I see that under Start Menu/Programs/ThinkVantage.

No, the KCU is a different thing.

What is it that you want? Turn off the display? Fn+F3 should do that if the hotkey utility, the power management driver, and the power manager are all installed.

Fn+F7 is a totally different thing, as you were repeatedly told throughout this thread.