Increasing the Foreground Application's Keyboard Response

 Last reviewed: November 23, 1994
Article ID: Q77057
The information in this article applies to:
  • Microsoft Windows operating system versions 3.0, 3.0a

SUMMARY

When running more than one application at a time, you may find that your system's keyboard response is slower. To alleviate this, you can adjust the amount of time allocated to processing keystrokes when running Windows 3.0 in 386 enhanced mode.

MORE INFORMATION

To increase the priority of the foreground application's scanning of the keyboard, add the KeyBoostTime= setting to the [386Enh] section of the SYSTEM.INI file. You can do this with a text editor such as Notepad.

The KeyBoostTime default setting is: 

   KeyBoostTime=.001
When you set up your system, this line is not automatically added to the [386Enh] in this section and you must add it. If you need to change this setting, start with 

   KeyBoostTime=.005
Increase the setting in small increments until you achieve the desired response.

NOTE: When Windows runs multiple programs, it divides the processor's time among them. The amount of time each application receives depends upon the foreground and background priority settings for each application. As you increase the number of background applications, the foreground application receives less and less time to process keystrokes.

REFERENCES

SYSINI3.TXT

"Inside Microsoft Windows," September 1991. Vol 2 No. 9

KBCategory: kbtool
KBSubcategory: win30
Additional reference words: 3.00 win30 3.00a key board

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Last reviewed: November 23, 1994
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