Holding down shift key too long windows 7

Click here and get The Ask Leo! Have you ever gotten so frustrated with your computer that you just start randomly pounding on the keyboard… or perhaps a particular key? That is often the source of the problem. Become a Patron of Ask Leo! They all have corresponding shortcut sequences to turn on — which can be done accidentally. Perhaps too easily. Sticky Keys is a feature that makes the Shift, Alt, Ctrl, and Windows keys toggle instead of needing to be held down.

Press and release the Shift key, and Shift is on. Press and release it again, Shift is off. Sticky Keys is enabled in two ways: in the settings app, or by pressing and releasing the Shift key five times in a row. Filter Keys is a way to ignore brief or accidentally-repeated keystrokes.

The good news is, these features are easy to turn off. Here you can turn off or on, if you like each of the three features: Sticky Keys, Toggle Keys, and Filter keys. More importantly, though, each feature has a corresponding checkbox checked by default , controlling whether or not the corresponding shortcut key sequence is enabled. Subscribe to Confident Computing! Less frustration and more confidence, solutions, answers, and tips in your inbox every week.

Download right-click, Save-As Duration: — 3. Its now stopped working in Windows itself, but when i play a game like Counter-Strike or Hitman, i have Shift assigned as duck and the bloody pc still beeps at me as i hold the shift key down!!!

There is a similar box to be unchecked in FilterKeys section which monitors pressing shift for 8 seconds. I have windows XP on my laptop and the filter keys immediately pops up. I also notice that the Numlock key stays ON and I cannot disable it.

Do you think this is still related to the sticky keys or probably a bad keyboard? I just got the solution…it took me about 5 minutes. Now disable the damn thing altogether. One possibility is that you have some dirt stuck in the key. And it might just be a broken keyboard. They can go bad. A quick test would be to borrow and try a different one. I have two keyboards and the lower case fff is ok it is the capital I get no letter at all on either keyboard. Hey go to languages section in control panel and then change the keyboard language to English US , i think you currently have it as English UK change it to English US … Hope it works, it did worked for me!!

So I got frustrated and pressed too many keys on the keyboard. I think I pressed the shift key a couple times or held down on it for a couple of seconds. The only time something does happen when I hit the keyboard, is when I hit the function button and F3 at the same time, and that just refreshes the page. Please help. Sounds like what the article above addresses.

Have you rebooted since? That would be my other suggestion. I JUST had the same problem with this on my laptop. I was using Excel I would recommend trying it once…. Sounds like your keyboard might be broken. That can often reset a keyboard problem. Now my computer is acting weird. When i am in a word document, I select with the mouse a point in the file and the behavior that i see is that word is highlighting from the beginning of the document to the point in the file that i clicked on with the mouse.

Did those steps not help? That sure looks like a hardware problem to me. See if that helps. It has been there since and not been fixed yet! The laptop thinks that I am pressing my alt key repeatedly. This is very frustrating as whenever I am in a window and trying to type, the laptop bring down all sorts of various menus from the menu bar. Thank you for your help! To put sticky keys off: 1.

If yes turn it off. Then go to Settings-Options. My first suggestion would be to try a different keyboard. Borrow one if you have to, just to make sure, or rule out, that the keyboard itself is the problem. Hold down BOTH shift keys to turn it off. Worked for me! Good Luck. I hope they fix this annoyance in the future. I just got finished dealing with it and had come to this page seeking a solution. Thanks Leo for being out there for us. Again, this is an annoyance more than a help for most people who use the system.

Better yet, fix the damned problem so the regular user does not have to search the web begging others who have figured out how to deal with the people to show them. I tried removing the key and making sure that the key was not sticking.

I made sure caps loc was off. I even tried turning each option off and on again and it would not go away. I disabled the shortcut for these filters too. Finally, I fixed the problem by holding down the left shift key for while instead of the right. Go figure. I went through all the steps to cut it off… yet it still kept coming on. I then discovered the chunk of Granola jamming the right shift key down… unchecked all of the shortcut keys so it never gets cut again and all is good!

Nice article and find… although the food stuck shift key is a new twist. Thank you all! I did not even hit ok…just the X to get rid of the dialog box!

But it was automatically turned on regardless. MS really should make it easier to turn these options off…at the very least! Because unchecking these boxes did not turn it off for me.

I had to check and uncheck a bunch of stuff and then hold both of the shift keys down simultaneously before it actually reset. Among other random things I did while I was freaking out trying to turn these options off.

And the current default should not be what it is with shortcuts to these options turned on but rather that a person should have to go into the options and select them instead. I mean, the majority of PC users are not going to be using these sticky, filter, and toggle key options. What were they thinking?! How annoying!! Again, thank you, thank you, thank you! Could you help witha keyboard problem I have. I recently had to wipe my hard drive after some fatal error messages.

My first reaction would be to try another keyboard. I tried different keyboard but it is the same so I assume it is a prog fault? When I had to wipe the hard disk I wonder if the keyboard is now set to a different language? I tried to check in control panel but got lost.

If you get by doing that it means your keyboard is set up as an american keyboard. Check out Control Panel, Regional and Language options, Languages, Details, Settings, and make sure that they keyboard selected matches what you have.

Pls help. Neither of the shift keys work and I am going to get very angry. Leo, Found your site via google search. I, too,have a keyboard problem which I suspect is caused by the Microsoft accessibility program. Below are the problems that appear on my laptop. Have you ever seen this happen, and how can I cure it? I have unchecked all the shortcut boxes as you recommend but it still keeps happening with frustrating regularity. Microsoft support could not offer a solution.

If you can, plug in an external keyboard and see how that behaves. Thanks for posting that! Okay, I found this searching for MY problem. I have a Sony laptop mistake 1. I have to then click back to the desktop to make that stop. NO ONE has been able to tell me what to do to fix it. Well, it does sound like a hardware so getting a new keyboard is an appropriate response. It should then pop back on. If you have a repair technician available to look at the machine, that might be a safer alternative.

Thanks for the advice. Is is both, or just one? I would try borrowing another keyboard. It sounds like the keyboard itself, perhaps. All the short cuts they were opening the start button menu. On the notepad, I hit the shift, I release it, I hit any letter a for example , and bingo! I had A on the notepad! For anyone who has their SHIFT key stuck on, causing you to highlight text when clicking on it such as in a word processor , just unplug the keyboard and plug it in again.

On some computers you can damage your keyboard. Rebooting including turning off the power will do everything that unplugging would have. NM I fixed it Im sorry to bother you I should have waited and tryed mroe things its seems both of the keyboards i tryed had the shift key stuck literaly so im using this 3rd one and the lesson learned is take time and calm down dont hit sensative equipment. Offhand is sounds like a broken keyboard. I would plug in an external keyboard, and if that works properly, that pretty much nails it.

Thank you. Thanks for the advice Leslie. I had I weird problem with my keyboard. It happened after I had that Filterred Shift Key window from windows XP coming up because I was pressing since a while the shift key button. Since I was thinking about something else, I am not quite sure what I have done.

I just wanted this window who just came-up to get out my sight. It was like I was holding the shift key all the time for those. When I was clicking on an Icone on the Desktop, Windows was selecting all the icones.

If I was opening a icone, Windows was starting all the icones of that window. After the installation, Windows reboot, so make sure all your works are saved. The stupid Filter Key menu comes up. No matter what you check or uncheck in the stupid thing, my caps lock becomes reversed.

The only way to get my keyboard working normally again is by restarting my computer. But it has interrupted my work and that is a big time irritant. It does sound like a hardware problem. You might try plugging in an external keyboard for a while and see if the problem is there as well. I always reboot if something weird is going on unless I suspect a virus is the culprit.

Then I scan and clean before rebooting. I have the professor teaches for office including excel access word ect. I can not type in text or letters. I get one letter and then can not type another thing. Does anyone have a solution for me. My key board works fine, just not in the professor teaches. You should contact the software manufacturer about the problem you are having with their software.

One way you can simplify your configuration is to disable startup applications. By holding down the Shift key during the logon process, you can prevent the operating system from running startup programs or shortcuts in the following folders:.

To disable the applications or shortcuts in the preceding folders, you must hold down the Shift key until the desktop icons appear.