Caps Lock problem ... sorta

[Austruck]

My stepdaughter has a problem on her HP laptop. She thinks she hit a weird key combination that has now done a sort of permanent "caps lock" to ALL her keys, not just the letters. This includes the numbers and symbols, which are all now showing up as opposite of what they normally are (as if she were holding the shift key down all the time). Rebooting doesn't get rid of it. It's happening in all programs, whenever she types.

Other symptoms:

-- Holding the shift key down doesn't change anything.
-- Holding the Caps Lock key down changes the letters to lowercase but doesn't fix the number keys or punctuation keys.

She's trying to find out what key combination she could have hit that would have done this ... and, of course, how she can change it back. She cannot type numbers at all now, not even embedded ones using the Function key.

THANKS for anything that can point us in the direction of a solution! This is driving us nuts!

[Holden Pike]

Have you tried prayer? A little Christian Science Computer Repair?

[Austruck]

No, why would I? *cough*

I can't imagine what your definition of Christianity must be, Holds, but no, I get online in three forums and ask questions. That usually works. No Tom Cruise or John Travolta needed.

[Piddzilla]

I've experienced something similar and I never figured out how to get rid of the problem. It just went away by itself after a while, or I must have hit the right key combination without knowing it.

Those things are really irritating.

[Austruck]

I also posted on the MS forums but sometimes they're a pain to deal with. Sometimes it's easier to ask fellow computer users that you know.

So far no good answers. Very frustrating. One person at MS thinks it might be a Sticky Keys problem, but I would think that would correct itself on a reboot.

[7thson]

Need to find out if it a Windows environment problem or a hardware problem, if you have not already. Boot into DOS or into any non-windows environment and see if the problem is still there. Does the caps lock light come on and off normally? If sticky keys is on you will see an icon in the bottom right that looks like a few squares. Another thing you may try is an external keynoard to see if it does the same thing. You may also try to open the onscreen keyboard and set it on caps lock there, which may reverse it back, Good luck.

[Austruck]

http://www.notebookreview.com/default.asp?newsID=3262

Yikes, I hope it's not a hardware problem....but it might be. Apparently some models of HP laptops have problems with keyboards, including a shift key that can get totally stuck.