Macbook function keys help?

Question

none of my F keys work. the brightness just makes a beep sound... the volume up button opens the dashboard... theyre all messed up. the box in system prefs that says use standard function of F keys is checked. someone help me... im going crazy

Answer 1

Yes, that's what the 'standard function keys' checkbox does, it' turns off the special features like volume up/down etc...

If you want those functions to work the other way you just need to either turn that checkbox off or hold down the function key while using them.

EDIT: it turns off the special features and makes them behave like standard mac function keys, which do different things than the special features. What the caption says is if you want them to work the other way to hold down the 'fn' key (which is like a shift key is many ways) while pressing the function keys. Is it the most intuitive way to do things... no. But try switching it off, you'll discover all your keys are back to normal.