Microsoft Windows Vista users must have used the search box on the Start menu and after using it they must have experienced its sheer power. This search box not only searches in your start menu and control panel but also your personal files like pictures, documents and even your emails. This makes it very useful for everyday tasks. It also saves time and we also tend to get the habit of getting what we want by just typing a few letters and the reason why I love it!
Getting back to the topic, if you are having a lot of personal files then this feature of the search box, i.e., searching through files takes toll on its performance and causes it to slow down. But if we narrow down the search to only start menu and control panel then we can easily get some performance benefits. This tip will help us to find the program or setting easily and faster. Follow these steps to make search box faster:
1. First right-click on the Start button and select Properties.
2. Then select the Customize button.
3. Remove the check where it says Search Communications.
4. Then for Search Files set Don’t search for files.
5. Click OK, then OK again and you are done.
If you have multiple pen drives you might have noticed that every time you put in your drive it will be assigned a different drive letter.
This can be frustrating when trying to run backups or opening files from software as recent drive letter is changed. Even if you have created playlist of the songs which are in your pen drive it won’t work if the drive letter is changed.
Here are the steps you will have to follow to assign a permanent drive letter:-
1. Go to Start > Run
2. Type mmc in the box and hit enter.
3. Select File > New
4. Now select File > Add/Remove Snap-in.
5. Select “Disk Management” and click “Add”
6. Select “OK“.
7. Select “This computer” and then “Finish”
8. Now press “OK” on the “Add or Remove snap-ins” screen.
9. Now select “Disk Management” from the left menu.
10.You will now see all of your drives/partitions in the right hand side panel.
11.Right click the USB drive you want to assign a permanent letter to and select “Change Drive Letter and Paths…”
12. Click on “Change”
13. Select a permanent letter
14. Click “OK”
15. It will warn you about making the change - there is little chance programs you use will be affected by this. If they will, you will probably already be aware of this so don’t worry.
16. The final step is to select File > Save and save the file in the default directory. Close the Console and you are done.
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Fix Slow Tab and Broken Tab Issues in Internet Explorer 8
Posted by Freaks Labels: Something InterestingThere are many users who upgraded to the latest version of Internet Explorer, i.e. Internet Explorer 8. But they are experiencing issues with tabs not working properly or taking a very long time to load. It seems for majority of the users the issue can be attributed to a problem related with actxprxy.dll not installing and registering properly during the upgrade of the browser. If you are facing a similar problem while using Internet Explorer 8, then fixing this issue is very simple. You have to run just a single command.
To resolve this issue:
1. Click on the Start Button, and then click Run.
2. In the Run… dialog box, type regsvr32 actxprxy.dll
3. Click OK, and then click OK again when you receive the following message: “DllRegisterServer in actxprxy.dll succeeded“.
4. Reboot your computer for the tab issue should be resolved.
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Windows 7 can run on machines with lower specs than required for Windows Vista, and many users are actually finding it runs better than Windows XP on lower spec machines. It’s also ideal to run on newer netbook machines, but unfortunately many of these do not include a DVD drive so how do you install windows 7 on a machine without a DVD drive?
How To Install Windows 7 From A USB Drive
1. Find a standard 4GB USB Drive and plug it into your machine
2. Click Start in your enter ‘cmd’ in the run field. Once cmd is open type in ‘diskpart’ and a new window will open
3. In the new diskpart window type:
* ‘list disk’ : This lists all the disk drives attached to your machine
* Look for your USB drive and note the number and then type: ’select disk #’, where ‘#’ is your USB disk number
* then type ‘clean’
* then type ‘create partition primary’
* then ’select partition 1′
* then ‘active’
* then ‘format fs=fat32 quick’
Once you’ve finished these steps you then need to copy your Windows 7 files to the USB. To do this you have to mount your Windows 7 ISO as a virtual DVD. Doing this is easy:
1. Install MagicDisk (free)
2. once installed, right-click on MagicDisk in your system tray click on ‘Virtual CD/DVD-Rom’, select your DVD drive
3. then ‘Mount’ and in the dialog window that opens up, select your Windows 7 ISO
4. Now in windows Explorer, click on your DVD drive and you should see all the Windows 7 Files. All you have to do now is copy and paste all the files to your USB key and you have a Windows 7 USB Installation Stick!
5. Install the stick in the PC you want to install Windows 7 on and boot up. Remember to change your bios to allow booting from USB.
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Here’s a very good trick for Windows Vista Aero users! If you are using Windows Aero, you can use this Registry trick to slow down the animations (i.e. maximize/minimize) when you hold down the Shift key on your keyboard. You have to modify the Registry a little to achieve this!
The advantages of using this trick is that not only does this allow you to see the animations clearer but it also leaves the Flip 3D on the screen even after you let go of the [Ctrl] + [Windows Key] + [Tab] combination. Normally what happens is that Flip 3D exists the screen as soon as you leave this key combination. Whenever you minimize or maximize or close a window, if you hold the Shift key down you will be able see how impressive Vista is in slow motion. Follow these steps:
• Click on the Start button. Then open the Run dialog box (Windows Key + R combination will also open the Run dialog box).
• Type regedit.exe, click OK. If User Account Control (UAC) prompts you to allow the action, click Continue.
• Now, navigate to this key: HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\DWM.
• In the right side of the Registry editor window, right-click on an empty space and select New
• Now, from this context menu that appears, select DWORD (32-bit) Value.
• Name this new DWORD value as AnimationsShiftKey.
• Now, Double-click on this newly created DWORD and give it a value of 1.
• Click on OK and close the Registry Editor.
• To see the changes, Log off of Windows and then log in back again.
• Now, Just hold the Shift key and minimize or maximize a window. You will notice that the animation is slowed down and it looks very nice too!
• If you want to get back to normal and stop this effect, then simply do not press the Shift key on your keyboard while using Flip3D or Aero.
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While it may seem odd to think about purposefully causing a Blue Screen Of Death (BSOD), Microsoft includes such a provision in Windows XP. This might come in handy for testing and troubleshooting your Startup And Recovery settings, Event logging, and for demonstration purposes.
Here's how to create a BSOD:
1. Launch the Registry Editor (Regedit.exe).
2. Go to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\i8042prt\Parameters.
3. Go to Edit, select New | DWORD Value and name the new value CrashOnCtrlScroll.
4. Double-click the CrashOnCtrlScroll DWORD Value, type 1 in the Value Data textbox, and click OK.
5. Close the Registry Editor and restart Windows XP.
When you want to cause a BSOD, press and hold down the [Ctrl] key on the right side of your keyboard, and then tap the [ScrollLock] key twice. Now you should see the BSOD.
If your system reboots instead of displaying the BSOD, you'll have to disable the Automatically Restart setting in the System Properties dialog box. To do so, follow these steps:
1. Press [Windows]-Break.
2. Select the Advanced tab.
3. Click the Settings button in the Startup And Recovery panel.
4. Clear the Automatically Restart check box in the System Failure panel.
5. Click OK twice.
Here's how you remove the BSOD configuration:
1. Launch the Registry Editor (Regedit.exe).
2. Go to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\i8042prt\Parameters.
3. Select the CrashOnCtrlScroll value, pull down the Edit menu, and select the Delete command.
4. Close the Registry Editor and restart Windows XP.
Note: Editing the registry is risky, so make sure you have a verified backup before making any changes.
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This is truly a work of clever technical intelligence, You have a 42 KB zip file that expands to 45 PB ( 1 Peta bytes=1012 bytes). Here is what the web site hosting this file says,
The file contains 16 zipped files, which again contains 16 zipped files, which again contains 16 zipped files, which again contains 16 zipped, which again contains 16 zipped files, which contain 1 file, with the size of 4.3GB
So, if you extract all files, you will most likely run out of space :-)
Now, how on earth does that can happen, well the answer is a characteristic property of zip compression, data redundancy, actually this file has a 4.2 GB file consisting of all zeroes, this means high redundancy and so zip is able to compress it that small.
Now, go ahead and unzip it!!!
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ReadyBoost is a component of Microsoft’s Windows Vista operating system. It works by using flash memory, USB 2.0 drive, SD card, CompactFlash or any kind of portable flash mass storage system as a drive for disk cache. ReadyBoost is present, with fewer restrictions than in Vista, in the beta version of Windows 7. ReadyBoost is also used to facilitate SuperFetch, an updated version of Windows XP’s prefetcher which performs analysis of boot-time disk usage patterns and creates a cache which is used in subsequent system boots.
In order to take advantage of this feature and boost performance as stated above you will need a flash memory device. But if you really want to see the boost your device should meet some minimum performance and space requirements:
• The device must be at least 64 MB
• The device must be USB 2.0
• It has to be able to read at 3.5 MB/s
• It has to be able to write at 2.5 MB/s
But don’t worry if you do not know the device’s specs or is unsure about it, just give it a try. To get started using ReadyBoost, follow these steps:
• First, plug in USB storage device.
• If autorun is enabled, Vista or Windows 7 will ask you what you want to do with it. Just select the option that says “Speed up my system”
- If your device is fast enough you will see a properties dialog box for further configuration.
- Select “Use this device”
- Select the amount of space on it you want to dedicate for the ReadyBoost system file.
- Click OK and you are finished.
• If autorun is disabled, then go to Computer and right click on the removable storage device and select Properties.
- If your device is compatible, you will see a ReadyBoost tab. Select that tab by clicking on it.
- Then select “Use this device”
- Select the amount of space on it you want to dedicate for the ReadyBoost system file.
- Click OK and you are finished.
From now on your memory device will be used instead of hard disk as virtual memory. If you have any questions regarding ReadyBoost you can visit Tom Archer’s blog. Feel free to comment below your experience with ReadyBoost.
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Pin Folders To Start Menu In Windows XP, Vista Or 7
Posted by Freaks Labels: Vista Tips n Tricks, Windows 7 Tips n Tricks, XP Tips n TricksWindows XP, Vista or 7 allows us to pin our most frequently used application to the Start menu by right clicking on it and selecting Pin to Start Menu. This gives us instant access to these applications. If we want any other item to pinned list, we can do so by dragging and dropping it to the Start button or the Start menu. If we want to remove these pinned item we can do so by right-clicking it and clicking Unpin from Start Menu or Remove from This List. The order of the items in this list can be arranged by dragging and dropping them to the preferred location. To add a folder to the Start Menu Pin list, you may use the drag-drop method as stated above. But we cannot pin our frequently used or favourite folders to the Start menu by right clicking on it. Here is a cool trick to pin your folders to the Start menu by right clicking on the folder and selecting Pin to Start Menu:
• Click on the Start menu button and type regedit in the Start menu search box and press Enter. For XP users select Run from the Start Menu and type regedit in the Run dialog box and press enter.
• This will open the registry editor.
• Now browse to the key
HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Folder\shellex\ContextMenuHandlers
• Once you are there right click on the right pane and select New and then Key.
• Type in {a2a9545d-a0c2-42b4-9708-a0b2badd77c8} and press Enter.
• Once this is done, close the registry and restart your computer for the changes to take place.
Now, to pin a folder to the Start Menu, press and hold the Shift key and then right-click a folder. The Pin to Start Menu entry will appear in the context menu.
Voila! You can now pin your folders to the Start menu too!
Note: If you want to undo this trick just delete the key {a2a9545d-a0c2-42b4-9708-a0b2badd77c8} from the registry. This tip will not work if you are using the classic start menu.
Help at hand: If you don’t want to go through all the tedious work of editing the registry, download PinFolderToStartMenu.zip and run Pin.reg to automatically insert the values. To undo or delete the created key run the file UndoPin.reg.
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Deleting temporary internet files that are cluttering up your computer
Posted by Freaks Labels: Vista Tips n Tricks, XP Tips n TricksTemporary Internet Files
RunDll32.exe InetCpl.cpl,ClearMyTracksByProcess 8
Cookies
RunDll32.exe InetCpl.cpl,ClearMyTracksByProcess 2
History
RunDll32.exe InetCpl.cpl,ClearMyTracksByProcess 1
Form Data
RunDll32.exe InetCpl.cpl,ClearMyTracksByProcess 16
Passwords
RunDll32.exe InetCpl.cpl,ClearMyTracksByProcess 32
Delete All
RunDll32.exe InetCpl.cpl,ClearMyTracksByProcess 255
Delete All - "Also delete files and settings stored by add-ons"
RunDll32.exe InetCpl.cpl,ClearMyTracksByProcess 4351
These commands should work in Internet Explorer 7 on XP or on Windows Vista.
