# Questions about Windows 10 and a new laptop

Category: Geeks r Us

## Post 1 by Shepherdwolf (I've now got the bronze prolific poster award! now going for the silver award!) on Wednesday, 15-Nov-2017 17:34:44

Hi all,
So I've recently laid my hands on an HP ProBook. It's pretty sweet, has a quad-core i5-8250 (8th gen) at 1.6GHZ, 16GB of RAM and a 256SSD. It's running Windows 10, which I'm still getting used to. I'm also running the latest version of Jaws.
So I set Jaws up the best I could - this is always a days-long treasure hunt for all the settings I want to get right, I can never remember how to stop Jaws saying stuff like "list" "list end" on webpages, for instance - but I'm generally okay with this part.
...except my function keys don't work.
If I hit f1, it tries to bring up some sort of Windows project thing. If I hit f4 on its own, Jaws says "escape" just as if I'd actually hit escape. And I've been all over the machine looking for some way to give me normal function keys...can't find it. I went through Jaws itself, I went through the keyboard.
Is this going to be a BIOS thing? Am I just going to have to live with it? I really did like using my function keys the way I used to (jaws+f11 was especially nice so I could check on, say, my network, my volume and my battery power all in one place), and now none of that works.
A secondary question: the version of Skype which ships with Windows 10...am I going to be stuck with that, or can I get a setup which looks like the one I'm using on Windows 8.1 on the machine I'm using right this second? is there, say, a full version and a mobile version? This one is something I just haven't had time to dig into yet, but I really do hope so, because the version I have on my new laptop is borderline inaccessible and I hate it, though I dearly love skype itself.
On a completely non help-related note, this laptop is spooky. I can put it right up to my ear and it makes almost no sound at all. Which stands to reason, of course, since it's an SSD, but still.
My only gripe so far is that this new one's sound is just not as good as my old Lenovo. But then, the Lenovo was actually a gaming laptop while the ProBook is more a business model. And it's perfectly workable, it's just not quite as good, that's all. On the plus side though, it's only 13 inches, has no numpad (which I didn't use obsessively anyway), is less than three pounds I think, and is very, very slim. It'll travel well, which is good since I'm going to Alaska next week.
Anyway, if anyone's got any experience with HP computers in particular, and what I might do to fix this function-key thing, please let me know. I'd dearly love to finish customizing this thing just the way I like it. Thanks in advance.

## Post 2 by maddog (I'll have the last word, thank you!) on Wednesday, 15-Nov-2017 18:31:27

Unfortunately, HP thinks they know what's best for the customers, even
though they're wrong 90% of the time. I'll try to address your points one
by one.
1. Function keys: there is a key to the right of the left control key. Press
that, along with any of the commands you're use to which involves one of
the F keys, and it should treat it as a normal F1 through F12 key. For
example, if you want to quit JAWS, you would press insert, the button to
the right of the left control key, and F4. That should unload JAWS.
Apparently, there is a way to fix that in the bios settings so you could just
press insert F4, but well, the bios is as accessible to blind people as it's
ever been; not at all.
2. If you go to www.skype.com, you can still download the normal desktop
version of skype. I would recommend uninstalling the store version of
skype, since it's still not very good with JAWS.

## Post 3 by Shepherdwolf (I've now got the bronze prolific poster award! now going for the silver award!) on Wednesday, 15-Nov-2017 18:49:03

Okay, thanks for this. I'm going to unload the store version, but when I tried using the desktop version it said something like, "Please install via the store for a better experience". I may have hit up against a roadblock.
Going to get a friend of mine to check out the bios, because I dearly want that functionality back and absolutely don't want to have to use that function key unless I must. I'd rather use it as needed for those special times than have to use it for commands I use all the bloody time.
Thanks so much for your help though.

## Post 4 by Shepherdwolf (I've now got the bronze prolific poster award! now going for the silver award!) on Wednesday, 15-Nov-2017 19:34:06

Quick update: I have skype working more or less perfectly now. I still don't know how to uninstall the store version, but I got version 7.something (the new skype 8 isn't too friendly, by all accounts), and tricked my machine into running it by having it compatible with Windows 8. Heh. I love online hacks, even little tiny ones like this. So yeah. Skype's up. Dropbox is up. Even installed a couple of my favourite programs. And god is this thing ever slick.
Still having issues with the function keys, but that will mean the bios issue I alluded to earlier.
Now all that's really left for me to do is to play around with Jaws settings until things are exactly the way I want them. Then I can migrate safely. Right now I'm just glad to have two laptops, since the other one (the new one) still feels pretty alien and strange just yet. The keyboard's different, the arrow keys are strangely shaped and there's very little clearance between keys. But I'm figuring it out.
Anyway, thanks for the help.

## Post 5 by forereel (Just posting.) on Thursday, 16-Nov-2017 8:19:15

There is supposed to be a tool to set your function keys. HP is sort of difficult and I've honestly forgotten how.
Do a search for this tool online.
As to Skype, no need to uninstall the app version, it won't bother you.
I like the scrits for Skype. Have you installed these?
Last I always change the default web browser to whatever I like.
Do this if you like by typing default programs in the search box.
Tab and you find the settings.
Otherwise, it gets sort of personal how you set things up.

## Post 6 by Shepherdwolf (I've now got the bronze prolific poster award! now going for the silver award!) on Thursday, 16-Nov-2017 10:45:52

Yeah, I've done most of that. I'm using IE because I like it, but I may try Chrome or FF since I've heard that the newest version of Jaws is friendlier with them, and I may have fewer web issues that way. It really is just going to be a matter of customization in the next little while, I think. I even figured out that weird list thing...it was buried in web verbosity settings, which is new as of at least jaws 15 where things were laid out in a different spot).
I will look up that tool you mentioned, and hope it's accessible. Barring that, I may be able to get sighted help possibly as soon as tomorrow and, if not then, Saturday or Sunday, so I'm not insanely worried. Just thought there might be a fix one of you people knew about.

## Post 7 by Shepherdwolf (I've now got the bronze prolific poster award! now going for the silver award!) on Thursday, 16-Nov-2017 11:15:48

And, wouldn't you know it, I found a fix. It wasn't a tool, just a shortcut key. I think it was control+function, but I'm honestly not sure, because repeating it didn't actually change it back. So now my f-keys are working the way I want them, Jaws is behaving in about 99% the normal way for me (which is good enough), and now I just get to play with it.
Thanks for bearing with, guys, and sorry for all the posts. The first couple of days are always sorta touch and go with me on a new machine.

## Post 8 by maddog (I'll have the last word, thank you!) on Friday, 17-Nov-2017 11:37:07

I would not recommend that you use JAWS with the latest version of firefox,
as there are some major issues with the new firefox Quantum. However, it still
works great with Chrome, which is my personal browser of choice.

## Post 9 by forereel (Just posting.) on Friday, 17-Nov-2017 12:30:49

And you know, the other day I'd have agreed with you about firefox.
For some reason, it simply didn't work at all.
Today, however, I used it just fine.
I have heard, and read your post about Firefox, but it seems to be catch and catch can.
I just make one default because of email reasons, like emailing from a web page, or something web related using Outlook, but otherwise, it doesn't much matter.

## Post 10 by forereel (Just posting.) on Friday, 17-Nov-2017 12:33:44

Also, a reason for this is Firefox recently has updated. I mean in the last day, or so. Maybe that has solved the issues.
FS/GSA claims the latest Jaws should work, so.
Gofish, I say.

## Post 11 by Raskolnikov (I'll have the last word, thank you!) on Friday, 17-Nov-2017 15:34:57

I was able to use Firefox fine until a few days ago. That's no longer the case. This is the message I am getting now:
"Alert. Display of tab content is disabled due to incapatibility between firefox and your accessibility software. Please update your screen reader or switch to firefox extended support release."
It's mentioned on the Freedom Scientific blog:
http://blog.freedomscientific.com/2017/10/25/important-information-for-users-of-mozilla-firefox/

## Post 12 by Senior (I've now got the bronze prolific poster award! now going for the silver award!) on Saturday, 18-Nov-2017 11:43:29

I am using NVDA with Firefox now and it works well.

## Post 13 by forereel (Just posting.) on Saturday, 18-Nov-2017 12:41:59

I finally had some time to play. I put the fox through a couple test. Sometimes, it works, other time...
Depends on the page.
It will most likely get fixed shortly however.