When I press and hold CTRL + Up Arrow + Left Arrow the controls are
irresponsive and my computer begins to beep every second that I hold
it.  This is incredibly annoying in video games.  I think it may have
something to do with my bios as it's affecting my PC speaker and
happening at any time I try to do it.

My motherboard is an Asus AN78X-E Deluxe and I am running Windows XP

Do you know what is causing this?

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Request for Question Clarification by sublime1-ga on 25 Jul 2006 01:03 PDT

codexile...

I'm running Windows 2000 and mine does the same thing no matter
where the focus is (game or not).

It might be interesting to know what game requires the use of
Ctrl in conjunction with the arrow keys. I suspect it's this
combination that's causing the problem, and the beep is Windows'
way of letting you know it's a conflicted combination.

Most games use the arrow keys all by themselves, and the use
of the Ctrl key in most games is unnecessary. I've never heard
of a situation where you'd use them together.

Perhaps you're camping a finger on the Ctrl key in order to 
use it in conjunction with some other key during game play.
I suggest you try using the arrow keys on their own and only
hitting Ctrl when you need it for the other combo.

Let me know where this takes you...

sublime1-ga

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Request for Question Clarification by keystroke-ga on 25 Jul 2006 07:55 PDT

I believe this could be a common problem caused by the KEYBOARD maps
on certain keyboards.

I read an article many years ago about how the keys on a keyboard are
split into certain groups. You are able to press as many keys as you
wish provided each key is in a diffent channel, however if you press
more than one key at once from the same channel the motherboard BEEPS.

I too have this problem on my computer, the sound comes from the
motherboard but i think, if i remember correctly, it is instantiated
by the keyboard.

Try pressing other random combinations of keys and see if it does the
same. I suffer from this a lot (and I am too lazy to change my
Keyboard) but that is the issue i have.

Think of it like a road, two cars cannot exit a 1 car road at the same
time, all that happens is the two cars collide and nothing comes out.
Pressing two keys from the same keyboard section causes the keys to
collide and the motherboard to beep! This was the problem that caused
software programmers to change from ARROW KEYS to WASD.

I have just spoken to a friend of mine who knows about electronics and
he said that what I have said sounds like it is the reason your PC is
beeping.

If my answer is not correct the Stickykeys answer is the reason.

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Request for Question Clarification by keystroke-ga on 25 Jul 2006 07:59 PDT

Another option could be your Stickykeys, which, when keys such as
CTRL, SHIFT and ALT are pressed and held down the Stickykeys options
becomes activated automatically and allows for physically impaired
people to use the keyboard a lot easier.

If this is the issue and you wish to disable it follow the following text.

By Default a feature called Sticky Keys will be enabled on your PC. To
disable this feature follow these steps:

1. Press SHIFT 5 times consecutively. The StickyKeys box will pop up.

2. Click Settings. Accessibility Options pops up.

3. On the "Keyboard" tab click the "Settings" button in the "StickyKeys" section.

4. Uncheck the items in this window and click OK.

5. Click Apply and OK on Accessibility Options.

 

To learn more about StickyKeys and other Accessibility Features open
Help and Support and search for "StickyKeys" or "Accessibility"

I believe it could be either of these issues.

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Request for Question Clarification by keystroke-ga on 25 Jul 2006 08:14 PDT

I am slowly finding the information that you reqire.

This website gives you information on keyboard buffers (which i
believe could be causing the beeps due to two keys from the same
keyboard map trying to write to the buffer at the same time)

http://www.computer-engineering.org/ps2keyboard/

When the beep happens does the computer screen lag?

http://discussions.virtualdr.com/showthread.php?threadid=208576

I believe this thread could answer your question perfectly as to what
is causing the noise.
http://zurich.ai.mit.edu/hypermail/thinkpad/2004-06/0115.html

Try pressing the JKL keys at the same time and see if the same happens.
On my laptop it doesn't on the desktop it does (on my boss's laptop he
gets the beep too).

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Request for Question Clarification by keystroke-ga on 25 Jul 2006 08:16 PDT

I am going to post this as my answer as I believe I have correctly
identified your problem and given an answer.

Any problems leave me a message and I will help you some more.

I believe this could be a common problem caused by the KEYBOARD maps
on certain keyboards.

I read an article many years ago about how the keys on a keyboard are
split into certain groups. You are able to press as many keys as you
wish provided each key is in a diffent channel, however if you press
more than one key at once from the same channel the motherboard BEEPS.

I too have this problem on my computer, the sound comes from the
motherboard but I think, if I remember correctly, it is instantiated
by the keyboard.

Try pressing other random combinations of keys and see if it does the
same. I suffer from this a lot (and I am too lazy to change my
keyboard) but that is the same issue I have. If i press two keys
together of a certain combination, the PC beeps and lags until it has
caught up and it carries on as normal.

Think of it like a road, two cars cannot exit a 1 car road at the same
time, all that happens is the two cars collide and nothing comes out.

Pressing two keys from the same keyboard section causes the keys to
collide and the motherboard to beep! This was the problem that caused
software programmers to change from ARROW KEYS to WASD.

I have just spoken to a friend of mine who knows about electronics and
he said that what I have said sounds like it is the reason your PC is
beeping.

If my answer is not correct I think that Stickykeys is the reason.

When keys such as CTRL, SHIFT and ALT are pressed and held down the
Stickykeys options becomes activated automatically and allows for
physically impaired people to use the keyboard a lot easier.

If this is the issue and you wish to disable it follow the following text.

"   By Default a feature called Sticky Keys will be enabled on your PC. To
    disable this feature follow these steps:

    1. Press SHIFT 5 times consecutively. The StickyKeys box will pop up.

    2. Click Settings. Accessibility Options pops up.

    3. On the "Keyboard" tab click the "Settings" button in the
"StickyKeys" section.

    4. Uncheck the items in this window and click OK.

    5. Click Apply and OK on Accessibility Options.

     

    To learn more about StickyKeys and other Accessibility Features open
    Help and Support and search for "StickyKeys" or "Accessibility""

I believe it could be either of these two issues.

I am slowly finding more information on the reasons behind the beeping.

This website gives you information on keyboard buffers (which i
believe could be causing the beeps due to two keys from the same
keyboard map trying to write to the buffer at the same time)

http://www.computer-engineering.org/ps2keyboard/

When the beep happens does the computer screen lag?

http://discussions.virtualdr.com/showthread.php?threadid=208576

I believe this thread could answer your question perfectly as to what
is causing the noise.

http://zurich.ai.mit.edu/hypermail/thinkpad/2004-06/0115.html

Try pressing the JKL keys at the same time and see if the same happens.

On my laptop it doesn't on the desktop it does (on my boss's laptop he
gets the beep too).

This website may be of interest too
http://www.wonko.info/cybertext/comsys/comsys5.htm

"Scan codes are bussed to the CPU. If the CPU is told (by an
intermediary chip) that the keypresses are of a higher priority than
the CPU's current task, it first pushes its registers onto the stack.
The CPU then checks the keyboard status bytes to determine the overall
effect of the keypress, then looks up the key combination to turn the
code into ASCII if appropriate - this character is then placed in the
keyboard buffer, break scan codes are discarded. If there was a delay
(hardware/software configurable) before a corresponding break scan
code is received, the CPU generates multiple copies of the ASCII
sending them to the keyboard buffer as well.

The keyboard buffer is a circular queue (FIFO structure). When the
keyboard buffer is full, extra key presses are discarded (along with a
warning beep)."

This site gives information on programming a keyboard buffer, along
with the notice that the PC will beep when the Keyboard Buffer is
full.
http://guideme.itgo.com/atozofc/ch22.pdf

"Whenever a key is been inputted through keyboard, it is being
temporarily stored in keyboard buffer, before it is processed by the
BIOS. When we try to input more keystrokes, we will get a beep sound
indicating that the keyboard buffer is full."

In summary, the reason your keyboard beeps is due to the buffer or
keyboard controller not being able to process the keys that you press
concurrently on your keyboard.

If you try pressing hjk you may hear a beep, but if you try pressing
jkl (one letter to the right) you hear no beep and the PC works fine.

If I do exactly this on my Dell Latitude D510 i get the following output.

hjk: hk
jkl: jkl

as you can see, when I press the hjk keys the J is not displayed (i
tried this 5 or 6 times to make sure it was not me pressing it after
the other keys) when i press the jkl keys all keys display fine.

Hope this helps, if you have any queries don't hesitate to leave me a comment.

--keystroke-ga

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Request for Answer Clarification by codexile-ga on 25 Jul 2006 14:55 PDT

I believe you're probably correct about this being the source of the
problem, thanks!

During your research, did you come across a fix though?  Is this an
issue with my keyboard?  A BIOS issue?  An OS issue?  Is this
correctable without purchasing new hardware?

Thanks a lot for all of the depth in your answer.

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Clarification of Answer by keystroke-ga on 25 Jul 2006 17:05 PDT

To be honest the best thing I can find to help you fix this is to
borrow a keyboard from a friend.

If you use a PS2 keyboard (like I do) then try to obtain a USB based
keyboard, if you use a USB based keyboard try a PS2 (you will most
probably need to reboot for this to work!).

Now press the keys that cause you to mess up. Just to let you know
that on this keyboard (PS2 wireless A4Tech) i can press CTRL+UP+LEFT
without a problem but I press hjk i get the BIOS beeping (which messes
me up on games a lot too) :)

If you have no keyboards you can borrow for a few minutes you may want
to try out this registry change, it may work it may not (I believe it
probably won't) but it could be worth a try.

http://www.winguides.com/registry/display.php/652/

I found one person saying that on Windows 98 they never had this
problem, on Windows 2000, after installing it this problem occured,
this made me wonder if it was a Windows issue, however with the Bios
beep I feel this is more of a hardware issue. Without buying/borrowing
a new Keyboard I don't think there is an easy fix for it.

--Keystroke-ga

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Clarification of Answer by keystroke-ga on 25 Jul 2006 17:10 PDT

It could also be fun to test out your keyboard to see what it can do,

http://www.passmark.com/products/keytest.htm