Number lock  

For the Num Lock question.
I have always found that I only have to press the Num Lock button and shut down immediately.
When you start up again, Num Lock will be on.




You could even do a restart, as long as you don't have "Turn on fast start-up (recommended)" selected in your Power Options.

I found a solution online. It's a script that runs under AutoHotKey.
I already had the latter ... so adding the author's script code was easy. Now the Num Lock is always on. If I press the Num Lock key to turn it off ... it turns right back on again.

; NumLock Enforcer - Monitors the Num Lock key ... turns it back on after someone turns it off
; hxxp://www.donationcoder.com/Forums/bb/index.php?topic=9018
;
; #SingleInstance force
; ;#NoTrayIcon ; UNCOMMENT THIS LINE IF YOU NEED A TRAY ICON
; #InstallKeybdHook
; #Persistent

;Menu, tray, Icon, %A_WinDir%\System32\shell32.dll, 105
appname=NumLock Enforcer
SetTimer, EnforceNumLock, 500
return

EnforceNumLock:
NumLockStatus := GetKeyState("Numlock", "T")
IfEqual, NumLockStatus, 0
{
SetNumLockState, On
;TrayTip,%appname%,NumLock Status = On,,1 ; UNCOMMENT THIS LINE IF YOU WANT SOME KIND OF FEEDBACK
}
return

; Win+p pauses the script,just in case you need the NumLock.
#p::Pause