does this happen on every ThinkPad with a TrackPoint??

[A31]

Hey guys, just discovered something interesting on my A31...if you press the B, G and H buttons on the keyboard at the same time (the keys that surrond the trackpoint), the laptop "blips" at you. Now if my R40 was actually working, I could try it on that to see if it was common to all ThinkPads with a TrackPoint or wether it was the A31, but as it isn't powering up at all (the battery charge light isn't even showing!!) I don't have another laptop to try it on. Just try it an see if you blips at you on your TP, just interested to know if it's a general "Thinkpad thing" or just the A31.

[goofyGAguy]

This happens with many other keys as well.

[Harryc]

If you mash down any two or three keys at the same time the Thinkpad will beep at you. Slow day in Norwich is it?

[A31]

yesss...can't wait for tomorrow!! This is the only bad thing about on GMT!!

[Colonel O'Neill]

The issue you mention happens with any keyboard connected by PS/2.

Something called unmanageable combinations (almost every simultaneous three key press) causes the keyboard to send some condition. Also, for some reason, ThinkPads just happen to like beeping when this happens (incredibly irritating), so I turned it off in BIOS.

[A31]

the good thing about this "Feature" is that when Vista loads on my ThinkPad, it has quite a lot of black screens during the boot up (Vista does lol!), so to test the laptop hasn't died on me, I just press the B, G and H keys!! and if it blips, it hasn't died it's just taking a while to load!

[dr_st]

The issue you mention happens with any keyboard connected by PS/2.

Something called unmanageable combinations (almost every simultaneous three key press) causes the keyboard to send some condition.

No-no-no-no-no. It does not have anything to do with PS/2 or USB interfaces, at least not directly / to this extent. It depends mostly on the keyboard. Now, I can imagine that no keyboard will be able to register too many simultaneous keypresses (say - 10), but there is great variability between different keyboards as to what keys can actually be registered, and what combinations are unmanageable. It has to do with the controller in the keyboard itself.

As an avid keyboard gamer (at least in the past), I care a lot about keyboards, and changed several keyboards that simply refused to accept certain common combinations, which were important to me while gaming (while other keyboards processed them just fine). This was all many years ago, on PS/2 keyboards, way before USB keyboards were even around.

ThinkPads just happen to like beeping when this happens (incredibly irritating), so I turned it off in BIOS.

That's one way, but also you can just disable the BEEP in device manager (need to choose "show hidden devices" and find it in "non plug-n-play" section.

[RealBlackStuff]

I think you're really unnecessarily straining your poor A31 with this crappy Vista.
Put on XP-Pro or Windows 7 instead.

[A31]

Yes...I am!! Got a new (bigger!) HDD today, and seeings as Vista was slow, XP pro is going on, again!!