Disable the Caps Lock key

Owners of Logitech and Microsoft keyboards may already have a utility installed that can disable the Caps Lock key. Logitech uses the Setpoint utility, while the Microsoft equivalent is Intellitype. To check whether these are installed, press Start, then click Control Panel (in Windows 7, click Devices and Printers instead, then right-click the keyboard icon and choose Keyboard settings). In XP, double-click Keyboard, and in Vista click Hardware and Sound, then click Keyboard. In all cases, the Keyboard Properties dialogue box should appear. If Setpoint is installed there will be a tab labelled Setpoint Settings, and Intellitype has a Key Settings tab.

If Setpoint is installed, click Setpoint Settings, then click the My Keyboard tab. Click the bottom icon on the list at the left of the dialogue box that looks like a no-entry sign, and then click to tick the box labelled ‘Disable Caps Lock key’ then click OK. For Intellitype, click the Key Settings tab, select Caps Lock in the Key Settings List, click Configure and tick the Disable Caps Lock Key box. If you have a Logitech keyboard but Setpoint is not installed, download it here.

If you have a Microsoft keyboard but Intellitype is missing, download the latest version here (32-bit and 64-bit versions are available; if you're not sure which, choose 32-bit). For other keyboards, download version 7.1 (again, 32-bit or 64-bit versions are available). When the setup program asks for the keyboard model, choose Wired Keyboard 400. Now proceed as in Step 2 to disable Caps Lock. If you experience problems with some keys not working properly, uninstall Intellitype (open Control Panel, then Add/Remove Programs or Uninstall a program and choose Microsoft Intellitype) and try the following steps.

The next three steps are for confident users only, so proceed at your own risk. Open the Registry Editor by pressing the Windows key and R together, type regedit in the Open box and press Enter. In the left-hand pane, click the small arrow (plus sign in XP) to the left of the HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE folder to expand it. Expand the SYSTEM folder in the same way, then the CurrentControlSet folder, then Control then click on the Keyboard Layout folder. Click File followed by Export, then choose ‘Registry Hive Files’ from the Save As Type dropdown menu. Choose a location to save the file and name it EnableCapsLock.reg. (You must type the full name including the file extension .reg). Click Save.

Now click anywhere in the Registry Editor’s right-hand pane, open the Edit menu, point to New then click Binary Value. A new entry will appear called ‘New Value #1’. Select this, then click Edit, then Rename and rename it ‘Scancode Map’. Select this entry and click Edit, then click Modify. In the box that appears, type the following numbers: 00000000000000000200000000003A0000000000. (to save you counting, this is 17 zeroes, followed by 2, then 10 zeroes, then 3A, then 10 zeroes). Pay no attention to how these appear in the box – they will be automatically grouped into pairs. Take care here and double-check you’ve done it exactly right. When done, click OK and restart the PC.

When the PC restarts, the Caps Lock key should no longer be functional. If not, you might have entered the numbers incorrectly. Launch the Registry Editor again (see Step 4), find the Scancode Map key created in Step 5, right-click it and choose Delete. Now repeat Step 5. To re-enable the Caps Lock key, simply delete the Scancode Map key and restart the PC. Alternatively, launch Registry Editor, click File, Import and choose the EnableCapsLock.reg file saved in Step 4. When a warning message appears, click Yes. Restart the PC and you’ll find Caps Lock should be working again.