Fn+F5, Fn+F7 Combinations Not Working [ Edited ]

[BMGRAHAM]

My ThinkVantage button works, and the programs assigned to FN+F5 and FN+F7 work (I looked at the registry and they are defined under TPHOTKEY\Class\01\05 and 07, and if I cut and paste them into "Start>Run" they make the right menus appear).  However when I press Fn+F5 the wireless menu does not come up, and when I press Fn+F7 the presentation director menu does not come up.

The F keys are working, and Fn is working because Fn+PgUp makes the light come on, and the brightness combinations work.  Access Connections and Presenation Director are installed and working.

I have uninstalled and reinstalled everything, in fact I had to do that in order to make the ThinkVantage button work.  I am running the latest version of the Hotkey driver.

This is very frustrating, I have seen similar issues reported online, but all of the suggested solutions don't work.

I have a T61 running Windows XP.

Does anyone know how to fix this?


Message Edited by BMGRAHAM on 04-24-2008 01:27 PM

[icantux]

You may have to reinstall the wireless/bluetooth drivers from Lenovo. If you install a third party driver (for example if you install the Intel driver supplied by Intel for an Intel wifi card in your box) instead of the Lenovo driver, then the hotkey combination will NOT activate the device. Lenovo drivers are specifically "tweaked" for the hardware in your machine... and don't forget to turn on the master wireless/bluetooth switch on the front of the computer either! If it's set to off, then you will not be able to access the wifi or bluetooth no matter what you press.

If you go to Device Manager (right-click "My Computer" on the desktop, then select "Properties", then select the "Device Manager" tab, check that the drivers are properly installed for the wireless card and make sure you install the Lenovo drivers (as explained above). Then, slide the master switch on the front of the computer, and press Fn-F5 to see if the menu comes up. If it still doesn't then you may need to uninstall the hotkey driver, then the wifi driver and then re-install the wifi driver first, then the hotkey driver. If you've installed the hotkey driver before the wifi driver, then that may also be causing the problem you're facing.

BTW, the ThinkLight, brightness control and the volume keys are all hardwired and thus work independently of the hotkey driver (i.e. those work whether or not you install the hotkey driver). All other keys require 1) the proper driver for the device (wifi, bluetooth, etc) and 2) the hotkey driver.

Hope this helps

[BMGRAHAM]

Thanks for your suggestion.  The only driver that I did not uninstall and reinstall was the wireless driver, and since this machine was supplied with drivers already installed, perhaps that's the issue, I will take a look, thank you.  Any suggestions as to how to make the Fn+F7 work (since this is related to the presentation director, not to the wireless)?

One point though.  I just replaced the File value for the 8001 registry key (the one that determines what happens when you press the ThinkVantage button) with the file AcFnF5 and now when I press the ThinkVantage button the wireless menu appears as I expect it to.  So I am not sure that the drivers are the issue after all, but rather something else seems to be hijacking the FnF5 and FnF7 combinations.


Message Edited by BMGRAHAM on 04-25-2008 10:29 AM

[icantux]

The installation of the drivers coupled with the installation of the hotkey drivers already are responsible for setting the appropriate values in the system's registry, therefore there is no need to alter the values in the registry at all, unless you have a specific and very good reason to do so.

My suggestion would be the following:

1) Uninstall the wifi (bluetooth - if applicable) drivers, the video drivers, presentation director and the hotkey drivers.
2) Use CCleaner to verify the registry in order to remove the "orphaned" CLSID's that would remain following uninstallation of the drivers mentioned in step 1.  (CCleaner is a freeware program, very powerful, that does a superb job of locating issues in the registry. Please keep in mind that the registry should be completely backed-up before proceding in case something goes wrong. CCleaner does prompt you for a registry backup)
3) Install the drivers in the following order:
    - video drivers from Lenovo  (These are important to get Fn-F7 back up and running properly)
    - presentation director
    - wifi drivers from Lenovo (Fn-F5 capability)
    - bluetooth drivers from Lenovo (if required)
    - hotkey drivers provided by Lenovo (controls all the hotkey Fn-Fx combinations)

Keep in mind that you need to login to Windows with "administrative privileges" to install the drivers for those to work properly. If you install those as a regular user (with no admin privileges) then Fn-key combinations will not work correctly in a regular user account.

Also mentioned previously, Lenovo drivers are "tweaked" for the purpose of working properly in conjunction with the hotkeys, so it's important to install the Lenovo drivers and not third-party drivers. The 3rd party drivers will interfere with the hotkey drivers and thus you'll be stuck by not having the "menu" appear when pressing the Fn-Fx key combination.

No further "registry" tweaks are necessary to have the hotkeys working properly. The combination of proper hardware drivers and the hotkey drivers takes care of all actions for you.

Hope this helps.





Message Edited by icantux on 04-25-2008 11:34 AM

[BMGRAHAM]

Thanks for the detailed response again.

I tried your suggestions and it did not fix the problem.   In fact the Lenovo drivers were already installed but I uninstalled and reinstalled.  By the way you have to install Hotkey drivers first (although I tried both ways - in the order you said and with the hotkey driver first - the only way that works is with the Hotkey drivers first, in fact if you go into System Update it tells you that this and Power Management are prereqs for pretty much everything else).

Any other ideas?


Message Edited by BMGRAHAM on 04-25-2008 05:38 PM

[icantux]

Hmm.. This seems perplexing. Perhaps someone here encountered a similar situation and could chime in. Take a look at the thinkpads.com forums to see if there's some post regarding this issue as well.

[BMGRAHAM]

I uninstalled the wireless, display and bluetooth drivers, power management, power manager, easy eject, access connections, presentation director, hotkeys, and installed an earlier version of hotkeys.  I also installed the drivers manually rebooting each time rather than using system update.  I also uninstalled a company (my company) suppled tool that I thought might have been causing the problem.  I then reinstalled Power Management, Hotkeys, drivers, apps, company app.

It all now almost works, but since the company supplied tool is also installed I don't think that was the culprit unless I needed to uninstall that and install that last (which I did this time).  So it's looking like the version of hotkey drivers was the issue.

There is one remaining issue.  Although FnF3 (power manager), FnF5 (access connections), FnF8 (ultranav), FnF9 (easy eject) all work now, as does the Thinkvantage button.  However FnF7 still doesn't bring up a menu even though if I run TPFnF7SP it does bring up the menu - so clearly it's the button combination itself that is broken.  Perhaps the latest version of PDIRECT has an issue?

[icantux]

Perhaps try an older version of the software... ?

Seems like you've made progress on this issue.

[BMGRAHAM · Accepted solution]

The issue is definitely with the latest version of the Hotkeys driver (2.07.1003).  When I upgraded to it, the Fn+ keys stopped working, when I uninstalled and reinstalled the older version (2.07.1001), they started working again (except for Fn+F7).  Also the on screen display started crashing.

I just however noticed that on the Lenovo support site in http://www-307.ibm.com/pc/support/site.wss/MIGR-67853.html, the version of the Hotkey manager that it says is the correct one (07 Aug 2007 v2.06.0708), is not actually the version that it takes you to , which is 2.07.1003.  http://www-307.ibm.com/pc/support/site.wss/document.do?lndocid=MIGR-68000.  Furthermore when I went out and found the version it claims is the right one, all my problems disappear and FN+F7 starts working.


Message Edited by BMGRAHAM on 05-02-2008 01:30 PM

[lakr]

I've tried all the things mentioned in this thread on my T60, but I am still having trouble.  The hotkey driver version that I was able to find on the internet is 1.23.0601, and with this old version, I can get the Fn + F5 Wireless Setting list, but Fn + F7 still ignores the setting, and just toggles between modes.

Does anybody have a different tip?  Anyone knows where to find hot key version 2.07.1001?  The one on lenovo web site is 2.07.1003, and with that version, even Fn + F5 reverts to simple toggling of blue tooth.

Thank you.