How to disable page-forward and page-back keys on X220?

Hi all,

I've been burned a few times by accidentally pressing the page-forward/backward keys while in firefox and losing what I was typing. Grizzling!

How can I disable those keys? I've done a bit of googling:

This didn't work for me:
W500 - Disable page-back, page-forward keys - Lenovo Community

And I am weary of trying this:
How do I disable the Lenovo forward/back keys? | About Lenovo

Any assistance would be appreciated!

Thanks,

Wayne

 

I ordered a x220 and haven't received it yet, but I'm already aware of a program called KeyTweak. Maybe try installing that and see if you can unmap the keys?

I use this program on my main desktop and use it to remap Num Lock to Backspace and it works great.

 

You could try the reverse of the following (see step 5 below).

forum.thinkpads.com • View topic - forward/backward buttons on T40 in ubuntu (gusty)

 

Slick little program. Couldn't be easier, and it worked like a charm! No more grizzle

Btw, rather than unmapping, I just mapped page-back to left-arrow, and page-forward to right-arrow, so now my clumsy typing is productive rather than grizzling LOL!

Thanks!

 

Thank you for this. My T61 drove me crazy with this until I figured out what it was and typed much more carefully.

Now I have fixed it on both new machines.

 

Might want to consider Lazarus for Firefox. Or typing into a Notepad window first.

 

Glorious isn't it?

When I lost my work TWICE last night, I was so annoyed that even my dog was unsettled (sorry Max!).

Tonight I am a very happy camper, hitting those keys with happy abandon LOL!

 

Thanks. I did end up resorting to the Notepad last night. But as part of the work I do, I am constantly entering text into the browser, so the Notepad approach wasn't going to fly for long. I'm glad I posted this and found the KeyTweak program, because it is working very well. I will check out Lazarus though for fun. Thanks again.

 

Thanks to this thread I have just installed KeyTweak on my T420s. Now Page Forward has become PgDn and Page Backward = PgUp. It saves having to reach to the back of the keyboard.

John

 

You know, that's not the dumbest thing I've heard before - good idea! I'll have that a whirl. Thanks!

 

My Dell E4300 had that layout - very convenient to use. And it shouldn't reactivate your original problem (the cursor can't move far inside a text box).

John

 

Awesome to hear everyone is having luck with the KeyTweak program I suggested! Thanks!

 

This is pretty much what I was thinking. I use ALT+Left/Right for Back/Forward anyhow, so those keys are really superfluous right now.

Doing it as you suggested has another added benefit: CTRL+PgDn/PgUp = Tab Forward/Backward. Works in pretty much any tabbed program (Firefox, Chrome, Excel, etc). I use those shortcuts often enough that remapping them seems worthwhile.

 

Yup - works great! I also remapped the right hand "Alt" and "Ctrl" keys (which I never use) to be "Home" and "End", and whatever the key is between them to be "delete". Awesome.

Indeed colinstu! Thanks a bunch.

 

I remapped those to PgUp & PgDn, along with the right Ctrl key to Delete. When skimming through a lot of e-mail I prefer having a Del key down close to the arrows and touchpad. Now I can move through and delete without having to reach up to the regular Del key. Interesting idea about Home/End, but I have myself needing to use the 'context menu' key now and then.

I've not yet decided if I'm going to swap the Fn and left Ctrl key yet. Does Lenovo (or anyone else) sell properly sized keycaps to make the swap look right?

 

Actually we could still use the official software from Lenovo. For Windows 7, use the following:

Keyboard Customizer Utility for Windows Vista ( 7kkd03ww.exe)

I have tested and verified that it is compatible with Windows 7. Once installed and rebooted, start the utility, go to the "Key sensitivity" tab, uncheck "Enable Browser Keys" and click "Apply".

You don't have to download a 3rd party software.

 

I have mine remapped to home/end.

Dont think it exists, but it would be nice for there to be a way to remap single keys into key combinations/macros.

 

You might wanna check out a program called "AutoHotkey"...give it a search.

 

This may be a really, really stupid question - where are these keys on the x220?

 

Right above the left and right arrow keys.

I got frustrated using the arrow keys on webpages and accidentally hitting one of these... making me go back a page and resetting what I wrote.

 

Nothin' wrong with 3rd party, especially when it does the job. KeyTweak makes changes to the keyboard tables in the registry. It does the job and quits. There's nothing that stays running It's just an editor. Use it, save the settings and it never needs to run again.

 

No thanks, I'm not going to run anything downloaded from the Internet, especially giving administrator privilege, unless I know what it dows. I don't have the time to reinstall Windows and change my long list of passwords every a few months.

 

Yes, of course, everything on the Internet is evil. And a Chinese company isn't.

Got enough tinfoil for your hat?

As for admin privileges, how else do you think a change the OS's keyboard table would take place?

Here's what the program edits:

Code:

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Keyboard Layout]
"Scancode Map"=hex:00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,04,00,00,00,49,e0,6a,e0,51,e0,69,e0,\
  53,e0,1d,e0,00,00,00,00

Put that into a file ending in .reg and merge it into the registry. That will do three things. It will remap your page forward, page backward keys to page up and page down. It will also remap the right Ctrl key to Del. That's it, that's all it does.

 

1) A company holds information of a lot more customers, than an author of a third-party software. Do you feel safer if you go with an iPhone with jailbreak or without?

2) I'm also interested to see if the US gov still dare use ThinkPads. The digital signature of the "System Update" is now already signed in Lenovo Shenzhen (in China). However some drivers are still signed in Japan or somewhere else.

By the way, thanks for the registry file.

 

Hey guys, I'm trying to use Keytweak to remap the browser back/forward keys but I can't get it work for some reason.

Question for the people that got them to remap... did you use the "Half Teach Mode"? If so what was the scancode for the browser keys? I keep getting "57344" for both the browser back and forward keys which leads me to believe that Windows thinks they are the same button. How did you guys get it to work?

 

I have the same problem. I get the same scan code for both keys, and even if I try to remap only the "page back" key, it doesn't work.

Am on windows 8