I want to turn off the monitor while keeping the computer fully awake and running. The keyboard should remain completely functional in the background, including typing, macro keys, and multimedia shortcuts, but keyboard activity must not turn the display back on. Only mouse movement should wake the screen.
I have already tried disabling "Allow this device to wake the computer" for the keyboards in Device Manager, using powercfg to disable keyboard wake, and sending the monitor-power command through AutoHotkey v1. Those approaches did not help because Windows appears to treat keyboard hardware activity as a reason to restore the display whenever it has been powered off through software. UAC is disabled, and I am using AutoHotkey v1.
Is there a registry setting, low-level hook, or other Windows method that can prevent keyboard input from triggering the monitor-wake behavior while still allowing Windows and background applications to process the keystrokes normally?
2 Answers
A black AutoHotkey overlay can make the screen appear off, but it does not really solve the hardware power-management behavior. You can cover all monitors with a borderless black window and remove it when the mouse moves or a button is clicked, but keyboard input would still be received by Windows and the physical display would remain powered on. That may work as a workaround, though it will not provide the OLED lifespan or energy-saving benefits of actually turning the panel off.
Windows does not provide a normal setting that separates keyboard input processing from the display’s wake decision in this way. Once the monitor is turned off through the display-power mechanism, low-level keyboard activity can cause Windows or the display driver to restore the output before AutoHotkey can intercept it. Device wake permissions and powercfg settings generally control waking the computer from sleep, not this separate monitor-wake behavior. The practical workaround is to disable the display output and use mouse input to enable it again, likely through a small utility or custom program, rather than trying to filter keyboard events after Windows has already detected them.
That sounds closer to what I need. I only have one monitor, so a utility that disables and re-enables the display output based on mouse activity may be the most realistic approach.
I have already considered a black desktop or overlay. My main goal is to reduce OLED wear and power consumption, so I need the display itself to power down rather than merely show a black image.