Controlling F13-F15

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Level 2

290 points

Controlling F13-F15

I use some programs that occasionally need me to use one of the higher F keys. I plug in an external keyboard and find out that F14 and F15 are already mapped to the brightness control by Apple. This is annoying because I can't find any way to actually get my F14 and F15 keys to work. Does anyone know how to get these keys to operate normally?

(I think it's doubly silly because F1 and F2 already control brightness and playing with the fn key doesn't help in this situation.)

MacBook Pro 2.0GHz, 2GB RAM, 120GB HDD, Mac OS X (10.4.8)

Posted on Nov 23, 2006 1:21 PM

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Answer 1

JASimon Author

Level 2

290 points

Jan 13, 2007 4:14 AM in response to JASimon

Not answered at all - just marked that way to clean up that annoying message in my sidebar that I have unresolved questions.

Of course if this bump brings it to the attention of someone who could help, I've still got answer points to give away...

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Answer 2

Jan 13, 2007 7:06 AM in response to JASimon

Have you tried adjusting the keyboard settings in System Preferences? There's an option in the Keyboard preference pane like "Use the F1-F12 keys to control software features" - if you select that, the function keys go straight through to software and you have to use the fn (function) key to access hardware features like screen brightness, etc.

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Answer 3

JASimon Author

Level 2

290 points

Jan 13, 2007 10:09 PM in response to Herb Schaltegger

Yes - I've tried that. That toggles which way the 'fn' key functions for the MacBook keyboard with respect to the laptop specific controls. But it doesn't have any effect on the keys you press on the external keyboard which is the one with F13-F15.

Thanks for the idea though.

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