disable the printscreen keyboard option from windows

Question

Is there any way to disable the Print Screen button from keyboard (without breaking it the key of-course). I am using the windows 7.

I need it because increase the security of my database which is used by few employees.

Solution 1

Steps to disable the print screen key:

1. Click Start, click Run, type "regedt32" (without the quotation marks), and then click OK.
2. On the Windows menu, click "HKEY_LOCAL_ MACHINE on Local Machine".
3. Click the System\CurrentControlSet\Control folder, and then double-click the Keyboard Layout folder.
4. On the Edit menu, click Add Value, type in "Scancode Map" (without the quotation marks), click REG_BINARY as the Data Type, and then click OK.
5. Type "0000000000000000040000002AE037E0000037E00000540000000000" (without the quotation marks) in the Data field, and then click OK.
6. Close the Registry Editor and restart the computer.

Solution 2

You can disable any key if you manipulate the scancode map registry key. A small tutorial with explanation of the settings can be found here (a more detailed explanation of the scancode map here).

For the print screen key in particular you can create a new textfile containing:

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Keyboard Layout]
"Scancode Map"=hex:00,00,00,00,00,00,00,00,04,00,00,00,00,00,2a,e0,00,00,37,e0,\
00,00,54,00,00,00,00,00

and save it as disable_printscreen.reg. You can then import it, as it is described here.

If you want to undo your changes you can make a file with the content:

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Keyboard Layout]
"Scancode Map"=-

Or delete the key HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Keyboard Layout\Scancode Map manually.

As with all changes in the registry be sure that you understand what you are doing and make a backup first.

EDIT: Sorry the link I had posted first was not good enough.

Comments

[iqbalgndp gold]

Can you plz tell me where can i find this reg file in windows 7?

[Syberdoor]

if you follow the third link i posted you can download a reg file from a microsoft managed page. This would be enough. What do you mean with "where to find" ? If you want to look at the key beforehand you would ahve to open regedit and browser to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Keyboard Layout

[iqbalgndp gold]

You can only import registery files from withiin the registery editor. This is the error when i run the file

[Syberdoor]

to import files with the registry editor you can use REGEDIT.EXE /S <reg_file>. You are an administrator on this system right?

[Syberdoor]

Ok sorry I thought as the file was hosted on a technet site and downloaded 1000 times it would be reliable but it was not a real .reg file. I updated my post accordingly.