Adjust display brightness on CF W7

Hi there
I was wondering if anyone can help me.
I need to increase the screen brightness on my W7. The [Fn] F2 hotkey for some reason does not work (?faulty F2 key) and I wondered if there is any other way to do this?
Thanks
Andrew

 

Time for a new keyboard it seems.

 

can you map another key to adjust brightness?

 

Do the other Fn keys work? Could be no/bad driver

 

Take it into a very dark room, it will magically seem brighter without pressing any function keys at all.

 

Andrew


Toughbook has suggested the best and cheapest way
Make sure that the hotkey driver is loaded and working
To check hit Fn +F9 and see if the battery level is displayed
If it is then you have the drivers installed correctly.. maybe?

Then you can try installing a software based keyboard that has a Fn key

Or there is software that will re-map the keyboard functions

Replace keyboard

Alex

 

Andrew, you say that the F2 does not work, but does it show the brightness window with the yellow triangle? If not, it's probablay a driver issue. Does [Fn] F1 decrease brightness?

Dave

 

You can also check in the control panel. Select Intel GMA driver for Mobile. Select Nobebook, then select Display Settings then Power Settings. See how it is set up...

 

We can't help you if you don't come back and answer questions!

 

Thanks for all your helpful replies.

All the other hotkeys work, including Fn F1 to make screen dimmer. In fact my daughter pressed that so many times it's now as dim as it goes, but the Fn F2 won't work to make it brighter again! (The yellow box comes up with F1 but not F2.)

I thought perhaps a software keyboard might be easiest but the ones I've seen so far don't have Fn key. I wondered if there is any other way to access this function? I havn't managed to change the brightness using intel graphics driver power settings.

Thanks again
Andrew

 

One more thing. Do the Fn hotkeys actually work on an external keyboard?

 

I would uninstall and reinstall the driver...

 

No the hotkeys will not work via any external keyboard only the main functions do.

Brightness is the only function that should work even without the hot key drivers loaded. Does the F2 key work to get into the BIOS ? If not then your only option is a new keyboard.

 

WAIT.... Before you do ANYTHING else... Try resetting the BIOS to default... Then reboot, go back in and make the changes to where you are now. I think the constant pushing of one button caused a fault or a hiccup somewhere. TTG is correct... I was thinking about hotkeys... The Brightness is controlled by the BIOS and may not need the hotkey driver.

Reset to factory specs and let us know...

Rick

 

No, unfortunately the F2 key does not work to get into the BIOS, so I'm a bit stuck. Changing the keyboard seems a bit drastic but maybe it's my only option unless I can find some way to fix the F2 key.
Does anyone know how much a relacement keyboard might cost? Is it an easy job?
Thanks
Andrew

 

Before you do that have you tried popping the key off the keyboard and blowing it out with a can of compressed air in case you just have some obstruction under there which is stopping it making contact?

Sorry, I don't know how much a new keyboard would cost but I'd imagine it's more than you'd really want to pay especially as there are none on ebay right now. I'd estimate $100 to be on the safe side but I've seen some keyboards online at over $200 - http://www.laptoppartsexpert.com/c-46110-panasonic-toughbook-37-cf-37.html - which I feel is ridiculous. (No keyboard on that site for the W7 though - http://www.laptoppartsexpert.com/c-62300-panasonic-toughbook-w7-cf-w7.html)

Keyboard replacement should be an easy job. It just depends how confident you are with a screwdriver and/or how difficult it is to get to where the connector plugs into the motherboard. I'm sure someone on here has interfered with a W7 before now and knows how many screws you need to take out.

 

Well I just made an interesting discovery, it seems that the original keyboard for the W7 has a slightly different layout in that the ~ (tilde) key is in the position between the Esc key and the F1 key. So I am wondering if your keyboard is an original W7 keyboard and you are in effect pressing the wrong key? The W7 keyboard would have the F2 key in the position where the F3 key is on the standard keyboard. So look at your keyboard and tell what key is right next to your Esc key. If it is the ~ then you have the correct keyboard if it is the F1 key you have the wrong keyboard and the mapping will be off. I hope this made sense.

 

I just thought of another way of changing the brightness... Download and burn yourself an Ubuntu CD and run it as a Live CD rather than installing the operating system. There's a laptop brightness applet in Ubuntu with sliders on it which you can use to change the brightness on your screen using your mouse. If you are lucky then when you reboot without the CD, the settings will stay the same.

 

The settings are OS specific... It won't stay from Ubuntu to Windows.

 

Time to actually install Ubuntu then. It's a good OS and with the new Long Term Support version coming out any day now (9.10) there's no reason to cling onto Windows anymore anyway.

It's also a lot cheaper than buying a new keyboard.

 

Well scratch that great idea then
I will edit my post so not to confuse anyone
I checked and of course the Fn keys on the pdrc keyboard are on a separate cord that interfaces only with the Panasonic screen
Thanks for straightening me out again tough-2-go, its good to have an expert around
I have all the Panasonic toys ..I just don’t have the time to play with them
Back to the original problem
If it is the keyboard then you must replace it


Alex

 

I work a lot with PDRC and having the Function cable connected between the keyboard and the screen only connects the Function buttons from the screen to the keyboard it has no effect on the Fn (blue) hotkeys to control the brightness, sound volume etc.

 

Well, I checked the keyboard is the correct one, with ~ next to esp.
I also need to run windows-based software at the moment (XP), so it's looking like a new keyboard or a repair. I happened to find a panasonic keyboard repair place advertised in London, where I'm based, so I might them a try if a new keyboard is difficult to b find?
http://www.creativeit.tv/panasonic-laptop-keyboard-repair.htm
It's just frustrating there is NO other way to get the brightness back up to a useable level (on battery), and then I could just leave it. Everything else works fine.
Thanks
Andrew

 

I also noticed F3 does not work but every other key is fine. I wonder how this could have happened?

Do you think if i reinstalled XP, or moved over to vista, the brightness level would automatically reset to a useable default level? I'm not sure because you can see the screen is dim right from turning it on, before windows boots up. This only applies when running from battery. Off mains is OK, but I need to use with battery

 

No it will be the same

In older laptops there was an option in the bios to disable power properties for battery ,and you could set full power for screen and processer with that setting
Its not an option in the new models


Alex

 

Are you the original owner? The laptop may still be under warranty have you checked into it? call 1-800-laptop5 and see if it is. If not you may want to see if other keyboards such as the one from a w2 or w5 will work on it as they may be easier to find on Ebay. It seems odd that those keys would have worn out on such a new laptop.

 

I am sure the highlighted area has something to do with your issue.

 

Have you tried adjusting it from software? We used to have a place to download an application, Hardware Control Manger I believe, that was good for monitoring your battery level, but I believe it also allowed different profiles (ac power and batter power) with different setting such as screen brightness et all. This might allow you to set batter brightness the same as ac power brightness. Anyone know what I am talking about?

EDIT: Here is the app I was thinking of, sucks it looks like it is no longer free to use, but maybe you can find something similar for free:

http://www.pbus-167.com/

 

I think most of us by now would have popped the key off and rattled a paperclip around in the hole to see if we could make it work... Only saying.

 

The machine was bought secondhand on ebay and has generally been great. I guess it is out of warranty. I didn't notice about the F2 key until i needed to turn screen brightness back up and couldn't. This is just a really annoying issue though. I can't believe there is no work around to increase screen brightness.

Doobi, thanks for the link to Hardware Control Manager. It looks the most promising so far, but unfortunately ACPI is needed for brightness adjustment and is not configured for panasonic laptops. Does anyone know how to do that?

 

A dumb question... But have you gone into the Control Panel and gone into display settings?

 

Well, I think the display settings change lightness of colour, but not brightness of LCD

 

This may sound stupid but in the days of my CF-28, which all had dim displays when compared to the 29+... You can adjust the Gamma settings and make it "Artifically brighter"... It won't fix the issue but it may make it liveable until you do.

At this point I would try a new keyboard and see if that does it. If its not.. There is a driver or registry setting that is amiss somewhere...

Just my two cents.

 

just so you know, go ahead and install 9.10. I just put it on my y5 with almost identical hardware. It's really kick ! Also I believe that the brightness settings may stay in Windows after adjusting them in ubuntu. It used to be you needed to compile a module to get the brightness working in ubuntu. I'm happy to say that is no longer the case. anyways 9.10 smokes!!

 

In desperation i burnt a CD of 9.10 and ran it live. Very impressive, but unfortunately the laptop brightness applet doesn't work - it turns red and comes up with message 'can't get laptop brightness'. Any idea how to fix this?

 

yeah ok, my first bit of advice is to go ahead and install, I've never had that much luck with running live cd's. Also it will not be that up to date, since the live cd image is like 2 weeks old. After you install there are still like 200mb of upgrades since it hasn't been released.

I'm assuming that your laptop is similar to my Y5, which I believe is true since I know mine is like the Y7. Anyways when you start up open a terminal and type lsmod to list your modules. you should be able to see a panasonic_laptop module loaded. If not, then type sudo modprobe panasonic_laptop . That should load the module. go ahead and lsmod again to check. Now on the panel right click and add the brightness applet. That should be it. It works fine on my laptop and I'm quite certain the hardware is quite similar. Let me know if it works.

 

From kernel.org documentation for kernel v2.6.31

PANASONIC_LAPTOP
Panasonic Laptop Extras

This driver adds support for access to backlight control and hotkeys
on Panasonic Let's Note laptops.

If you have a Panasonic Let's note laptop (such as the R1(N variant),
R2, R3, R5, T2, W2 and Y2 series), say Y.

 

Why don't you just call Panasonic support and explain your problem. I have always found them very helpful, even with laptops I bought off eBay.

 

discord - it worked!!! Thankyou

After instaling Ubuntu 9.10 it seemed as before. I checked the Panasonic module was loaded, yet still the brightness applet didn't do anything, instead displaying the message 'can't get brightness'. But then when I rebooted the brightness came back up to normal and stayed so in XP. Brilliant - no new keyboard for me! Made my week. Just need to make sure the kids don't meddle with the controls again.

Thanks again and also thanks to all the other members of this board who offered advice

 

Okay... Do the brightness controls work in XP? It sounds like you booted into Ubuntu to adjust brightness then back into XP and it took... But can you adjust the brightness now while booted into XP?

 

No, I still can't adjust the brightness in XP (F2 key still doesn't work), but at least now I can see the screen..

 

So the end result was installing Linux to adjust it when you booted into that OS and it stuck when you booted into XP Pro after making the adjustment in Linux?

I just wanted to make sure... Thanks...

I would start looking for a deal on a keyboard. At least now you can take your time!

 

Or ditch that 10 year old operating system and run Ubuntu full time. A windows 7 upgrade will cost you $120, but Ubuntu is free!

 

I agree.

I also knew it would work. It's strange that the brightness applet doesn't seem to be doing anything. Ubuntu 9.10 will probably have a fix for that though and only 11 days to go until you can download it.

As for the Windows applications that you say you still need to use, there's always WINE which you can add to Ubuntu through Add/Remove programs or Synaptic. It's worth looking into anyway.

Although slightly off topic, who here even still uses the function keys for anything on their computers except to get into the BIOS or to make Firefox go full screen anyway? I've been wondering about that for for quite some time. Since I stopped playing Doom and Quake, I've had no use for F2 - F10 whatsoever.

 

windows help and support? hahaha.
nah i actually disabled it...

i use the volume function keys

 

I use pretty much all my function keys all the time. But then I use my CF-30 in all sorts of conditions and need to adjust brightness up/down and the same for volume... Plus checking the battery on occasion... Even though I can click on the battery icon and get a quick glance... Ones I never or rarely use... F3 for the monitors, F7, F10 and F11 (Obviously). I probably use the screen brightness button most.

 

brightness applet works for me. i use the function key shortcuts for volume brightness. Sometimes I alt+F2

 

I use pretty much all of em; volume, keyboard AND LCD brightness, LCD/CRT, F11 for fullscreen, F10 for boot menu to load OTHER STUPHS...

mnem
Live cats do not make good doorstops.