14 DAY TRIAL // Some customers running computers leveraging the Extensible Firmware Interface (EFI) technology instead of BIOS might come across issues with the F11 and F12 keys when installing a 64-bit (x64) version of Windows 7 Service Pack 1. Microsoft has confirmed the problem officially, and is noting that x64 Windows Server 2008 R2 SP1 can also be impacted in the same type of scenario.
Pressing either F11 or F12 during the deployment of Windows 7 SP1 or Windows Server 2008 R2 SP1 does absolutely nothing, the software giant said.
“The F11 and F12 keys are assigned to an OEM-specific recovery sequence,” Microsoft explained. “You press the F11 or F12 key during the installation process. In this scenario, F11 and F12 keys do not work.”
Users might recognize the symptoms, especially if the remaining keys, F1 through F10, continue to function under normal parameters as they deploy the either of the two operating system mentioned above.
At the same time, according to the Redmond company, customers will not notice anything wrong as long as they install Windows in legacy mode.
Microsoft has already identified the source of the glitch, and noted: “This issue occurs because Windows 7 SP1 and Windows Server 2008 R2 SP1 do not support the EFI_SIMPLE_TEXT_IN_PROTOCOL_EX protocol.”
The software giant plans to resolve this problem for good with the advent of Windows 7 SP2 and Windows Server 2008 R2.
However, customers that cannot wait until the second upgrade for Windows 7 becomes available for download can go ahead an access a fix from Microsoft Support.
The hotfix offered by Microsoft is designed to resolve only the issue described above, and customers should not deploy it unless they have experiencing the problems noted in this article. KB 2561821 supports only Windows 7 SP1 and Windows Server 2008 R2 SP1, and not for the RTM flavor of the two platforms.