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Enabling Num Lock by default

If you have a password that has both numbers and letters and you frequently use the number pad to enter part of your password, this hack is for you. I cannot count the number of times that I started to type my password and was then presented with a logon error telling me that my password was incorrect. I would sit there staring at the screen for a second before I realized that Num Lock on my keyboard was not on.

This is a great hack for every desktop computer with a full-size keyboard with a separate number pad. Turning on Num Lock by default on a laptop is not a good idea because usually most laptops do not have a separate number pad. Enabling this feature on a laptop will result in almost half of your keyboard functioning as the number pad, and you would be much better off using the numbers above the letters. To get started, follow these steps:

1. Click the Start menu, type regedit, and press Enter.
2. When the Registry Editor loads, navigate through HKEY_USERS\.DEFAULT\Control Panel\Keyboard.
3. Locate the InitialKeyboardIndicators entry, right-click it, and select Modify. To enable Num Lock, enter 2 into the box. If you want to disable it, enter 0 into the box.
4. Then click OK to save the changes. That’s it!

If you are on a laptop and you attempted to enable Num Lock even though I told you not to and need to fix your system, repeat the preceding directions but replace the value of InitialKeyboardIndicators with 0 to disable the feature.