Cliff's Windows XP Tips Collection Compiled and freely distributed by Cliff (cliffs@strato.net): http://thor.prohosting.com/~1cls/Index1.html Cliff's Windows XP Tips page: http://thor.prohosting.com/~1cls/windows_xp.htm Get Cliff's Windows XP Tips RTF (Rich Text Format) file [143 KB, zipped]: http://thor.prohosting.com/~1cls/Freeware/XP%20Tips.zip All this info is Free and Tested! ALWAYS BACKUP YOUR SYSTEM BEFORE MAKING ANY CHANGES! XPTIPS.TXT Contents: CAUTION: REG TIPS! NEVER REACTIVATE AGAIN WINDOWS EXPLORER TIP BACKUP AFTER FRESH INSTALL 10 TIPS FROM SPOOKY JAVA NO JAVA XP BROWSING SPEED TWEAK GROUP MULTIPLE OPEN WINDOWS NO RECENT HISTORY WANNA NETWORK BUT DON'T HAVE ALL THE STUFF? HELP IS JUST A DIRECTORY AWAY! SPEED THINGS UP A BIT UNLOCK WINXP SETUPP.INI ADMINISTRATOR NAME ON WELCOME SCREEN FIX AVI MOVIE INTERFERENCE CREATE PASSWORD RESET DISK CHANGE WEB PAGE FONT SIZE ON THE FLY CLEAR PAGEFILE ON SHUTDOWN WINXP GROUP POLICY FORGOT WHAT YOUR FILES ARE? TEMPORARILY ASSIGN YOURSELF ADMINISTRATIVE PERMISSIONS CREATE SHORTCUT TO LOCK YOUR COMPUTER CREATE SHORTCUT TO START REMOTE DESKTOP ACTIVATE SCREEN SAVER INSTANTLY ADD MAP DRIVE BUTTON TO THE TOOLBAR SOFTWARE NOT INSTALLING? USE WINDOWS KEY CHANGE CD KEY REMOVE SHARED DOCUMENTS FOLDERS FROM MY COMPUTER BETA COMMENTS LINK RIP HIGH QUALITY MP3S IN WINDOWS MEDIA PLAYER 8 SPEED UP START MENU - PART 1 SPEED UP START MENU - PART 2 SPEED UP INTERNET EXPLORER 6 FAVORITES UNATTENDED INSTALL REMOVE DESKTOP VERSION TEXT ENABLE CLEARTYPE ON WELCOME SCREEN STOP WINDOWS MESSENGER FROM AUTO STARTING DISPLAY HIBERNATE OPTION ON SHUT DOWN ADD ALBUM ART TO ANY MUSIC FOLDER CHANGE LOCATION OF MY MUSIC + MY PICTURES FOLDERS ADD/REMOVE WINXP OPTIONAL FEATURES REMOVE WINDOWS MESSENGER XP AUTOLOG ON ASPI PRINT DIR RENAME MULTIPLE FILES MORE THEMES FOR WINDOWS BLINDS XP SHOW FILE EXTENSIONS XP MEMORY TWEAKS ______________________________________________________________________________ CAUTION: REG TIPS! Please note that some of these tips require you to use the Registry Editor (Regedit.exe or Regedt32.exe), which could render your system unusable. Thus, none of these tips are supported in any way: use them at your own risk. Also note that most of these tips will require you to be logged on with Administrative rights. NEVER REACTIVATE AGAIN If you have to reinstall Windows XP you normally will have to reactivate it too. Well not anymore. Just backup the Wpa.dbl file after you activated the first time. It is located in the System32 subfolder. Now if you reinstall Windows XP just copy the file back and you're up and running again. Here's how to check if your copy of XP is Activated. Go to the Run box and type in: %systemroot%\system32\oobe\msoobe /a and hit OK. There's your answer. WINDOWS EXPLORER TIP When launched in Windows ME/2000/XP Windows Explorer by default will open the "My Documents" folder. Many people prefer the behavior from previous versions of Windows, where Explorer would open and display "My Computer" instead of the new way. To revert to the old way (My Computer rather than My Documents as default), simply edit the shortcut to Windows Explorer by right-clicking on it, then left-clicking "Properties" and changing the "Target" box to: %windir%\EXPLORER.EXE /n,/e, The key is to add "/n,/e," at the end of the shortcut (don't type the quotes). BACKUP AFTER FRESH INSTALL After you complete your clean install and get all your software installed I would recommend that you use something like Drive Image 3 or 4 to do an image of your install partition, then burn the image to CD and keep it. XP is a different creature for some people. If you mess it up when playing around with it, just bring the image back. You can be up and running again in 20 minutes vs. the two to three hours it will take to get the whole thing and all your stuff installed again. Note the default install of XP is about 1.5 GB and the download image may be larger that 700 MB. So don't install too much on the OS partition. To help downsize the Image I run the System File Checker (SFC) and reset the cache size to 40 or 50 MB (it's well over 300 MB by default). To run it open a command prompt and run: SFC /? SFC /purgecache SFC /cachesize=50 and finally rebuild the cache by typing (have your XP Setup CD ready): SFC /scannow I also delete the Pagefile.sys and Hibernate.sys files before running Drive Image. 10 TIPS FROM SPOOKY 1. When setting up the system with tweaks or making changes to the core OS or hardware always be logged in as administrator. Seems that while XP does create an account upon install that has administrator privileges, its not the same as the administrator account is. Think about it this way - if the account created was the same then why have an administrator account period? 2. It is always better to install WinXP clean than to do an upgrade. 3. The Files and Settings Wizard is your friend. However it doesn't save the account passwords for your e-mail and newsgroups accounts in OE. Export these accounts manually from within OE first beforehand and save them in a safe place. This way you will not need to remember what the account info was, just import the account again. 4. If using a SB Live! sound card and trying to run Unreal (the game) you may have some problems. This is not the fault of WinXP or Unreal. The problem is a bad driver design from Creative and the Devloader portion. There is currently no workaround for this problem. 5. Many games do run in WinXP in compatibility mode. The easiest way to do this is to simply create a shortcut (on the desktop) to the game executable, right-click on it, select the compatibility tab of the shortcut and set it up for Win98 or WinME. 6. Do not disable all the services outlined in the Win2K tweak guides floating around. Set them to manual instead of disabled. This will allow something to start up when it is needed and you'll avoid the BSOD thing that can occur if something gets disabled that wasn't supposed to. 7. The WinXP firewall is actually decent. However it is not very configurable. I recommend Kerio Personal Firewall (KPF): http://www.kerio.com/dwn/kpf2-en-win.exe It's free and all you need. So far it is the most compatible with WinXP - why you may ask? - because KPF improved on Tiny Personal Firewall (TPF), and (little known trivia fun fact here) TPF is where the XP firewall came from. Both the XP built-in firewall and KPF will give you complete stealth. However what you can do - which is kind of cool - is divide the work between the two and use both. Use KPF to just filter the ports you want to block instead of everything and let the built-in XP firewall take care of the rest. The result is a smoother running firewall system that reacts much more quickly. I've used Norton's, Zone Alarm (which contrary to popular belief is not a real firewall and a joke in the IT community as a whole) and several of the rest, KPF has been the best so far. 8. After your clean XP setup is completed and get all your software installed, I recommend to use something like Drive Image 4 to create an image of your install partition, then burn the image to CD and keep it. XP is a different creature for some people. If you mess it up while playing around with it, just bring the saved image back. You can be up and running again in 20 minutes vs. the 2 to 3 hours it will take to get the whole thing and all your stuff installed again. 9. Choose WinXP Professional over the Home version because it has more bells and whistles. However if the bells and whistles do not appeal to you then the Home (Personal) version is the way to go. 10. Avoid problems with WinXP. Ensure that your hardware is on the MS HCL (Hardware Compatibility List): http://www.microsoft.com/hcl/ Don't be mad because the latest and greatest doesn't work with your hardware. It is not MS's fault, WinXP's or anything/anyone else's. Not defending them here, just being practical. Look at it this way - if your dream car costs $100,000 dollars and you don't have $100,000 is it the car manufacturer's fault? Nope, because that's the free enterprise system and the way it works. Try to upgrade your hardware if you can. If you can't, wait for drivers from the manufacturer that support WinXP. I would highly recommend before installing WinXP that you get the Win2000 drivers for all your hardware. 99% of the Win2000 drivers will work in XP. This way if WinXP doesn't have drivers, you do. JAVA NO JAVA MS Java Virtual Machine (JVM) may not appear on the Microsoft Windows Update site. Some web sites will prompt you to install it upon visiting their pages. However this might change in the near future due to problems between SUN and MS so the link you get pointed to might not be there. You can download JVM and have it ready to use when you install XP [5.07 MB]: http://www.gwdg.de/samba/updates/win98/msjavwu.exe Keep it in a safe place and run it after you install XP. XP BROWSING SPEED TWEAK When you connect to a web site your computer sends information back and forth, this is obvious. Some of this information deals with resolving the site name to an IP address, the stuff that TCP/IP really deals with, not words. This is DNS (Domain Naming System) information and is used so that you will not need to ask for the site location each and every time you visit that site. Although WinXP and Win2000 have a pretty efficient DNS cache, you can increase overall performance by increasing its size. All you need is the Registry entries below: -----Begin cut & paste here----- Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00 [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\Dnscache\Parameters] "CacheHashTableBucketSize"=dword:00000001 "CacheHashTableSize"=dword:00000180 "MaxCacheEntryTtlLimit"=dword:0000fa00 "MaxSOACacheEntryTtlLimit"=dword:0000012d ------End cut & paste here------ Copy & paste this text in Notepad and save it as DNSCACHE.REG. Then merge it into your Registry by (double)-clicking on it. GROUP MULTIPLE OPEN WINDOWS WinXP will group multiple open windows (IE windows for example) into one group on the taskbar to keep the desktop clean. This can be annoying at times, especially when comparing different web pages because you have to go back to the taskbar, click on the group and then click on the page you want and then you only get one page because you have to click on each one separately. I think the default for this is 8 windows - any combination of apps or utilities open. You can modify this behavior by adding a Registry value at: HKEY_CURRRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Advanced Change the number of windows that are open before XP will start grouping them on the Taskbar by adding a new REG_DWORD entry called "TaskbarGroupSize". Modify "TaskbarGroupSize" to show the number of windows you want open before XP starts to group them on the task bar. A value of 2 will cause the Taskbar buttons to always group. NO RECENT HISTORY Disable or enable recent documents history. Start Regedit and go to: HKEY_CURRRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\Explorer This Registry value should already be present. If it isn't you need to add it: REG_BINARY = "NoRecentDocsHistory" (no quotes). Modify it so its value reads 01 00 00 00 for disabled or 00 00 00 00 for enabled (don't type spaces). WANNA NETWORK BUT DON'T HAVE ALL THE STUFF? If you want to network two XP machines together you don't have to install a full blown network setup, i.e. switches, hubs, routers, etc... All you need is 2 NIC cards (3 if you want to share an Internet connection) and a crossover cable. 1. Connect one NIC to your broadband connection device as normal. 2. Install a second NIC in the machine with the broadband connection. 3. Install a NIC in the second machine. 4. Connect the crossover cable between the second machine NIC and the second NIC in the broadband connection machine. 5. Reboot both computers. 6. Run the Networking Wizard if necessary. Or: Use a Direct Connection setup with a parallel port to parallel port connection between the 2 machines. You will NOT be able to share a connection using Direct Connect. HELP IS JUST A DIRECTORY AWAY! In Windows XP Pro in C:\Windows\Help you will find many *.chm files. These are help files. Just start one up and find what you're looking for without going thru the main Help menu. If for example you are interested in command line tools or command line references start up the Ntcmds.chm file. If you use the command line a lot, just create a shortcut on your desktop to Cmd.exe and simply start it up when you need it. You could go thru the Help menu to find these but on the Home version of XP some are not linked in some of the help files. SPEED THINGS UP A BIT This might help some of you: 1. Go to Control Panel -> System. 2. Click on the Advanced tab. 3. Under Performance click on the Settings button. 4. Click on the Advanced tab. 5. Click on the Background Services button. 6. Click OK. UNLOCK WINXP SETUPP.INI WinXP's Setupp.ini controls how the CD acts. I.e. is it an OEM or retail version? First, find your Setupp.ini file in the I386 directory on your WinXP Setup CD. Open it up in Notepad, it looks something like this: [Pid] ExtraData=707A667567736F696F697911AE7E05 Pid=55034000 The Pid value is what we're interested in. What's there now looks like a standard default. There are special numbers that determine if it's a retail, OEM, or Volume License Edition. First, we break down that number into two parts. The first 5 digits determine how the CD will behave, i.e. is it a retail CD that lets you clean install or upgrade, or an OEM CD that only lets you perform a clean install? The last 3 digits determine what CD key it will accept. You are able to mix and match these values. For example you could make a WinXP CD that acted like a retail CD, yet accepting OEM keys. Now, for the actual values. Remember the first and last values are interchangeable, but usually you'd keep them as a pair: ; Retail: Pid=51882 335 ; Volume License: Pid=51883 270 ; OEM: Pid=82503 OEM So if you wanted a retail CD that took retail keys, the last line of your Setupp.ini file should read: Pid=51882335 And if you wanted a retail CD that took OEM keys, you should use: Pid=51882OEM Note that this does NOT get rid of WinXP's activation (WPA). Changing the Pid to a Volume License will NOT bypass activation. You MUST have a Volume License (Corporate) Product Key to do so. ADMINISTRATOR NAME ON WELCOME SCREEN To get the Admin account on the Welcome Screen, as well as the other user names, make sure that first there are no accounts logged in. Press Ctrl-Alt-Del twice and you should be able to login as administrator! FIX AVI MOVIE INTERFERENCE If you have any AVI files you saved in Windows 9x/ME, which show interference when opened in Windows XP, here's an easy fix: Open Windows Movie Maker. Click View and then click Options. Click in the box to remove the check mark beside Automatically create clips. Now, import the movie file that shows interference, and drag it onto the timeline. Then save the movie, and during the re-rendering, the interference will be removed. CREATE PASSWORD RESET DISK If you're running Windows XP Professional as a local user in a workgroup environment, you can create a password reset disk to log onto your computer when you forget your password. To create the disk: Click Start, click Control Panel and then click User Accounts. Click your account name. Under Related Tasks, click Prevent a forgotten password. Follow the directions in the Forgotten Password Wizard to create a password reset disk. Store the disk in a secure location, because anyone using it can access your local user account. CHANGE WEB PAGE FONT SIZE ON THE FLY If your mouse contains a wheel for scrolling, you can change font size on the fly when viewing a web page in MS IE. To do so: Press and hold Ctrl. Scroll down (or towards yourself) to enlarge the font size. Scroll up (or away from yourself) to reduce the font size. You might find it useful to reduce font size when printing a web page, to fit more content on the page. CLEAR PAGEFILE ON SHUTDOWN Create WINXPCPS.REG (WinXP Clear Pagefile on Shutdown) in Notepad: -----Begin cut & paste here----- Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00 [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\Session Manager\Memory Management] "ClearPageFileAtShutdown"=dword:00000001 ------End cut & paste here------ This Registration (.REG) file clears the Pagefile when you power off the computer. Restart Windows for this change to take effect! You can also do this without hacking the Registry: go to Control Panel -> Administrative tools -> Local security policy -> Local policies -> Security options -> change the option for "Shutdown: Clear Virtual Memory Pagefile". WINXP GROUP POLICY One of the most full featured Windows XP configuration tools available is hidden right there in your system, but most people don't even know it exists. It's called the Local Group Policy Editor, or Gpedit for short. To invoke this editor: select Start -> Run -> type: gpedit.msc After you hit ENTER, you'll be greeted by Gpedit, which lets you modify virtually every feature in Windows XP without having to resort to Regedit. Dig around and enjoy! FORGOT WHAT YOUR FILES ARE? This procedure works ONLY under NTFS. As times goes along you have a lot of files on your computer. You are going to forget what they are. Well here is a way to identify them as you scroll through Windows Explorer in the future. 1. Open up a folder on your system that you want to keep track of the different files you might one to identify in the future. 2. Under View make certain that you set it to show Details. 3. Highlight the file you want to keep more information on. Right-click the file and you will get a pop-up menu. Click on Properties. 4. Click on the Summary Tab (make sure it says Simple not Advanced on the button in the box). You should now get the following fields: Title, Subject, Author, Category, Keywords, Comments. You will see Advanced also if you have changed it to Simple. Here will be other fields you can fill in. 5. Next you can fill in what ever field you want. 6. After you finished click the Apply button then OK. 7. Next right-click the bar above your files, under the address bar and you should get a drop down menu. Here you can click the fields you want to display. 8. You should now see a list with the new fields and any comments you have done. 9. Now if you want to sort these, just right-click a blank spot to sort the information to your liking. TEMPORARILY ASSIGN YOURSELF ADMINISTRATIVE PERMISSIONS Many programs require you to have Administrative permissions to be able to install them. Here is an easy way to temporarily assign yourself Administrative permissions while you remain logged in as a normal user. Hold down the Shift key as you right-click on the program's setup file. Click Run as. Type in a username and password that have Administrative permissions. This works also with the Start menu applications. CREATE SHORTCUT TO LOCK YOUR COMPUTER Leaving your computer in a hurry but you don't want to log off? You can double-click a shortcut on your desktop to quickly lock the keyboard and display without using CTRL+ALT+DEL or a screen saver. To create a shortcut on your desktop to lock your computer: Right-click on the Desktop. Point to New -> click Shortcut. The Create Shortcut Wizard opens. In the text box, type the following: rundll32.exe user32.dll,LockWorkStation Click Next. Enter a name for the shortcut. You can call it "Lock Workstation" or choose any name you like. Click Finish. You can also change the shortcut's icon (my personal favorite is the padlock icon in Shell32.dll). To change the icon: Right click the shortcut and then select Properties. Click the Shortcut tab, and then click the Change Icon button. In the Look for icons in this file text box, type: Shell32.dll Click OK. Select one of the icons from the list and then click OK. You could also give it a shortcut keystroke such CTRL+ALT+L. This would save you only one keystroke from the normal command, but it could be more convenient. CREATE SHORTCUT TO START REMOTE DESKTOP You can add a shortcut to the desktop of your home computer to quickly start Remote Desktop and connect to your office computer. To create a shortcut icon to start Remote Desktop: Click Start, point to More Programs, point to Accessories, point to Communications, and then click on Remote Desktop Connection. Click Options. Configure settings for the connection to your office computer. Click Save As, and enter a name, such as Office Computer. Click Save. Open the Remote Desktops folder. Right-click on the file named Office Computer, and then click Create Shortcut. Drag the shortcut onto the desktop of your home computer. To start Remote Desktop and connect to your office computer, double-click on the shortcut. ACTIVATE SCREEN SAVER INSTANTLY Turn on a screen saver without having to wait by adding a shortcut to your Desktop: Click the Start button -> click Search. In the Search Companion window, click All file types. In the file name box, type *.scr. In the Look in box, choose Local Hard Drives (C or the drive where you have system files stored on your computer). Click Search. You will see a list of screen savers in the results. Pick a screen saver you want. You can preview it by double-clicking it. Right click on the file, choose Send To and then click Desktop (create shortcut). To activate the screen saver double-click the icon on your Desktop. ADD MAP DRIVE BUTTON TO THE TOOLBAR Do you want to quickly map a drive, but can't find the toolbar button? If you map drives often, use one of these options to add a Map Drive button to the folder toolbar. Option One (Long Term Fix): Click Start, click My Computer, right-click the toolbar, then unlock the toolbars, if necessary. Right-click the toolbar again, and then click Customize. Under Available toolbar buttons, locate Map Drive, and drag it into the position you want on the right under Current toolbar buttons. Click Close, click OK and then click OK again. You now have drive mapping buttons on your toolbar, so you can map drives from any folder window. To unmap drives, follow the above procedure, selecting Disconnect under Available toolbar buttons. To quickly map a drive, try this option. Option Two (Quick Fix): Click Start and right-click My Computer. Click Map Network Drive. If you place your My Computer icon directly on the desktop, you can make this move in only two clicks! SOFTWARE NOT INSTALLING? If you have a piece of software that refuses to install because it says that you are not running Windows 2000 (such as the Win2K drivers for a Mustek scanner) you can simply edit: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\ProductName to say Microsoft Windows 2000 instead of XP and it will install. You may also have to edit the version number or build number, depending on how hard the program tries to verify that you are installing on the correct OS. I had to do this for my Mustek 600 CP scanner (compatibility mode didn't help!) and it worked great, so I now have my scanner working with XP (and a tech at Mustek can now eat his words). BTW: don't forget to restore any changes you make after you get your software installed. Do this at your own risk. USE WINDOWS KEY The Windows logo key, located in the bottom row of most Win95/98 keyboards is a little used treasure. Don't ignore it. Provides shortcut anchors for these commands: WinKey: Display Start menu WinKey + D: Minimize or restore all open windows WinKey + E: Display Windows Explorer WinKey + F: Display Search for files WinKey + Ctrl + F: Display Search for computer WinKey + F1: Display Help and Support Center WinKey + R: Display Run dialog box WinKey + Break: Display System Properties dialog box WinKey + Shift + M: Undo minimize all open windows WinKey + L: Lock the workstation WinKey + U: Open Utility Manager WinKey + Q: Hold WinKey and then tap Q to scroll and switch thru the different users on your PC (XP Power Toys only). CHANGE CD KEY You don't need to reinstall if you want to try the key out. Just do this: 1. Go to Activate Windows. 2. Select the "Activate by phone" option. 3. Click "Change Product Key". 4. Enter RK7J8-2PGYQ-P47VV-V6PMB-F6XPQ. 5. Click "Update". Now log off and log back in again. It should now show 60 days left, minus the number of days it had already counted down. NOTE: If you deactivated REGWIZC.DLL + LICDLL.DLL, you will have to re-register them. REMOVE SHARED DOCUMENTS FOLDERS FROM MY COMPUTER One of the most annoying things about the new Windows XP user interface is that Microsoft saw fit to provide links to all of the Shared Documents folders on your system, right at the top of the My Computer window. I can't imagine why this would be the default, even in a shared PC environment at home, but what's even more annoying is that you cannot change this behavior through the shell. Those icons are stuck there and you have to live with it. Until now, that is. Simply fire up the Registry Editor and go to: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\My Computer\NameSpace\DelegateFolders You'll see a subkey named {59031a47-3f72-44a7-89c5-5595fe6b30ee}. If you delete it, all of the Shared Documents folders (which are normally under the group called "Other Files Stored on This Computer") will be gone. You do not need to reboot your system to see the change. Before: a cluttered mess with icons no one will ever use (especially that orphaned one). After: simplicity itself, and the way it should be by default. BETA COMMENTS LINK Edit or remove the "Comments" link in window title bars. During the Windows XP beta, Microsoft has added a "Comments?" hyperlink to the title bar of each window in the system so that beta testers can more easily send in a problem report about the user interface. But for most of us, this isn't an issue, and the Comments link is simply a visual distraction. And for many programs that alter the title bar, the Comments link renders the Minimize, Maximize, and Close window buttons unusable, so it's actually a problem. Let's get rid of it. Or, if you're into this kind of thing, you can edit it too. Open the Registry Editor and go to: HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Control Panel\Desktop Modify these values: - "LameButtonEnabled": determines whether the link appears at all. Change its value to 0 to turn it off. - "LameButtonText": lets you have a little fun with the hyperlink. You can change the text to anything you like. You can just remove them entirely. Editing either value requires a restart before the changes take effect. RIP HIGH QUALITY MP3S IN WINDOWS MEDIA PLAYER 8 The relationship between Windows Media Player 8 and the MP3 audio format is widely misunderstood. Basically, WMP8 will be able to playback MP3 files, but encoding (or "ripping" CD audio into MP3 format) will require an MP3 plug-in. So during the Windows XP beta, Microsoft is supplying a sample MP3 plug-in for testing purposes, but it's limited to 56 Kbps rips, which is pretty useless. However, if you have an externally installed MP3 codec, you can use WMP8 to rip at higher bit rates. But you'll have to edit the Registry to make this work. Fire up the Registry Editor and navigate to the following key: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\MediaPlayer\Settings\MP3Encoding Here you'll see subkeys for LowRate and LowRateSample, which of course equates to the single 56 Kbps sample rate you see in WMP8. To get better sampling rates, try adding the following keys (using New -> DWORD value): "LowRate" = DWORD value of 0000dac0 "MediumRate" = DWORD value of 0000fa00 "MediumHighRate" = DWORD value of 0001f400 "HighRate" = DWORD value of 0002ee00 Now, when you launch WMP8 and go into Tools -> Options -> Copy Music, you will have four encoding choices for MP3: 56 Kbps, 64 Kbps, 128 Kbps, and 192 Kbps. Note that you will not get higher bit rate encoding unless you have installed an MP3 codec separately. The version in Windows Media Player 8 is limited to 56 Kbps only. And now you'll be ripping CDs in higher quality MP3 format! SPEED UP START MENU - PART 1 The default speed of the Start Menu is pretty slow, but you can fix that by editing a Registry Key. Fire up the Registry Editor and navigate to the following key: HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Control Panel\Desktop "MenuShowDelay" default value is 400. Change this to 0 to speed it up. SPEED UP START MENU - PART 2 If you're frustrated by the slow speed of the Start Menu, even after using the tip above, then you might try the following: navigate to Display Properties -> Appearance -> Advanced -> turn off the "Show menu shadow" option. You will get much better overall performance. SPEED UP INTERNET EXPLORER 6 FAVORITES For some reason, the Favorites menu in IE 6 seems to slow down dramatically sometimes. I've noticed this happening when you install MS TweakUI 1.33: http://download.microsoft.com/download/winme/Install/1.0/WinMe/EN-US/Tweakui.exe for example, and when you use the previous tip to speed up the Start menu. But here's a fix for this problem, that does work, though it's unclear why: Just open a command line window: Start button -> Run -> cmd -> type sfc -> hit Enter. This command runs the System File Checker, which performs a number of services, all of which are completely unrelated to IE 6. But here you go: it works. UNATTENDED INSTALL The Windows XP Setup routine is much nicer than that in Windows 2000 or Windows ME, but it's still an hour long process that forces you to sit in front of your computer, answering dialog boxes and typing in product keys. But Windows XP picks up one of the more useful features from Windows 2000, the ability to do an unattended installation, so you can simply prepare a script that will answer all those dialogs for you and let you spend some quality time with your family. I've written about Windows 2000 unattended installations and the process is pretty much identical on Windows XP, so please read that article carefully before proceeding. And you need to be aware that this feature is designed for a standalone Windows XP system: If you want to dual-boot Windows XP with another OS, you're going to have to go through the interactive Setup just like everyone else: An unattended install will wipe out your hard drive and install only Windows XP, usually. To perform an unattended installation, you just need to work with the Setup Manager, which is located on the Windows XP CD-ROM in D:\SupportTools\DEPLOY.CAB by default: extract the contents of this file and you'll find a number of useful tools and help files; the one we're interested in is named setupmgr.exe. This is a very simple wizard application that will walk you through the process of creating an answer file called Winnt.sif that can be used to guide Windows XP Setup through the unattended installation. One final tip: there's one thing that Setup Manager doesn't add: your product key. However, you can add this to the Unattend.txt file manually. Simply open Winnt.sif in Notepad and add the following line under the [UserData] section: ProductID=RK7J8-2PGYQ-P47VV-V6PMB-F6XPQ (This is a 60 day CD key). Then, just copy Winnt.sif to a floppy, put your Windows XP CD-ROM in the CD drive, and reboot. When the CD auto-boots, it will look for the Unattend.txt file in drive A automatically, and use it to answer the Setup questions if it's there. Finally, please remember that this will wipe out your system! Back up first, and spend some time with the help files from DEPLOY.CAB before proceeding. Valid for Older Builds or not using Setupreg.hiv. REMOVE DESKTOP VERSION TEXT During the Windows XP beta days, you could see text in the lower right corner of the screen saying Windows XP Professional, Evaluation Copy, Build 2462 or similar. A lot of people would like to remove this text, and while it's possible to do so, the cure is more damaging than the problem, in my opinion. So the following step will remove this text, but you'll lose a lot of the nice graphical effects that come with Windows XP, such as see-through icon text. To remove the desktop version text, open Display Properties: right-click the desktop, then choose Properties, and navigate to the Desktop page. Click Customize Desktop and then choose the Web page in the resulting dialog. On this page, check the option titled Lock desktop items. Click OK to close the dialog, and then OK to close Display Properties. The text disappears. But now the rest of your system is really ugly. You can reverse the process by unchecking Lock desktop items. There's also a shortcut for this process: right-click on the Desktop -> choose Arrange by -> Lock Web Icons on the Desktop. ENABLE CLEARTYPE ON WELCOME SCREEN As laptop users and other LCD owners are quickly realizing, Microsoft's ClearType technology in Windows XP really makes a big difference for readability. But this feature is enabled on a per user basis in Windows XP, so you can't see the effect on the Welcome screen; it only appears after you logon. But you can fix that. Fire up the Registry Editor and look for the following Values under this Registry key (default user): HKEY_USERS\.Default\Control Panel\Desktop - FontSmoothing (String Value). - FontSmoothingType (Hex DWORD Value). Make sure both these values are set to 2 and you'll have ClearType enabled on the Welcome screen and for each new user by default. STOP WINDOWS MESSENGER FROM AUTO STARTING If you're not a big fan of Windows Messenger simply delete the "MSMSGS" Registry value from: HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run DISPLAY HIBERNATE OPTION ON SHUT DOWN For some reason, Hibernate may not be available from the default Shut Down dialog. But you can enable it by holding down the SHIFT key while the dialog is visible. Now you see it, now you don't! ADD ALBUM ART TO ANY MUSIC FOLDER One of the coolest new features in Windows XP is its album thumbnail generator, which automatically places the appropriate album cover art on the folder to which you are copying music (generally in WMA format). But what about those people that have already copied their CDs to the hard drive using MP3 format? You can download album cover art from sites such as www.cdnow.com or www.amguide.com and then use the new Windows XP folder customize feature to display the proper image for each folder. But this takes time--you have to manually edit the folder properties for every single folder--and you will lose customizations if you have to reinstall the OS. There's an excellent fix, however. When you download the album cover art from the Web, just save the images as folder.jpg each time, and place them in the appropriate folder. Then, Windows XP will automatically use that image as the thumbnail for that folder and, best of all, will use that image in XP Windows Media Player (WMP) if you choose to display album cover art instead of a visualization. And the folder customization is automatic, so it survives an OS reinstallation as well. Your music folders never looked so good. :) Album cover art makes music folder thumbnails look better than ever! CHANGE LOCATION OF MY MUSIC + MY PICTURES FOLDERS In Windows 2000, Microsoft added the ability to right-click the My Documents folder and choose a new location for that folder in the shell. With Windows XP, Microsoft has elevated the My Music and My Pictures folders to the same "special shell folder" status as My Documents, but they never added a similar (and simple) method for changing those folder's locations. However, it is actually pretty easy to change the location of these folders, using the following method. Open a My Computer window and navigate to the location where you'd like My Music (or My Pictures) to reside. Then, open the My Documents folder in a different window. Drag the My Music (or My Pictures) folder to the other window, and Windows XP will update all of the references to that folder to the new location, including the Start menu. Or use MS TweakUI Power Toy for XP/2003 [147 KB, free, unsupported]: http://download.microsoft.com/download/f/c/a/fca6767b-9ed9-45a6-b352-839afb2a2679/TweakUiPowertoySetup.exe ADD/REMOVE WINXP OPTIONAL FEATURES To dramatically expand the list of applications you can remove/(re)install from Windows XP retail or upgraded with SP1, navigate to C:\Windows\Inf (substituting the correct path for your version of Windows) and open the Sysoc.inf file in Notepad. This is how it looks like (by default) in Windows XP Professional final retail RTM (Gold): [Version] Signature="$Windows NT$" DriverVer=07/01/2001,5.1.2600.0 [Components] NtComponents=ntoc.dll,NtOcSetupProc,,4 WBEM=ocgen.dll,OcEntry,wbemoc.inf,HIDE,7 Display=desk.cpl,DisplayOcSetupProc,,7 Fax=fxsocm.dll,FaxOcmSetupProc,fxsocm.inf,,7 NetOC=netoc.dll,NetOcSetupProc,netoc.inf,,7 iis=iis.dll,OcEntry,iis.inf,,7 com=comsetup.dll,OcEntry,comnt5.inf,HIDE,7 dtc=msdtcstp.dll,OcEntry,dtcnt5.inf,HIDE,7 IndexSrv_System = setupqry.dll,IndexSrv,setupqry.inf,,7 TerminalServer=TsOc.dll, HydraOc, TsOc.inf,HIDE,2 msmq=msmqocm.dll,MsmqOcm,msmqocm.inf,,6 ims=imsinsnt.dll,OcEntry,ims.inf,,7 fp_extensions=fp40ext.dll,FrontPage4Extensions,fp40ext.inf,,7 AutoUpdate=ocgen.dll,OcEntry,au.inf,HIDE,7 msmsgs=msgrocm.dll,OcEntry,msmsgs.inf,HIDE,7 RootAutoUpdate=ocgen.dll,OcEntry,rootau.inf,,7 IEAccess=ocgen.dll,OcEntry,ieaccess.inf,,7 Games=ocgen.dll,OcEntry,games.inf,,7 AccessUtil=ocgen.dll,OcEntry,accessor.inf,,7 CommApps=ocgen.dll,OcEntry,communic.inf,HIDE,7 MultiM=ocgen.dll,OcEntry,multimed.inf,HIDE,7 AccessOpt=ocgen.dll,OcEntry,optional.inf,HIDE,7 Pinball=ocgen.dll,OcEntry,pinball.inf,HIDE,7 MSWordPad=ocgen.dll,OcEntry,wordpad.inf,HIDE,7 ZoneGames=zoneoc.dll,ZoneSetupProc,igames.inf,,7 [Global] WindowTitle=%WindowTitle% WindowTitle.StandAlone="*" [Components] msnexplr=ocmsn.dll,OcEntry,msnmsn.inf,,7 [Strings] WindowTitle="Windows Professional Setup" WindowTitle_Standalone="Windows Components Wizard" The entries that include the HIDE text string will NOT show up in Add/Remove Windows Components by default. To fix this, replace all HIDE instances with a comma (,). Then save the file, reboot, and finally relaunch Add/Remove Windows Components to tweak the installed applications to your heart's content. There are even more new options now under Accessories and Utilities. REMOVE WINDOWS MESSENGER It seems that a lot of people are interested in removing Windows Messenger for some reason, though I strongly recommend against this: in Windows XP, Windows Messenger will be the hub of your connection to the .Net world, and now that this feature is part of Windows, I think we're going to see a lot of .Net Passport-enabled Web sites appearing as well. But if you can't stand the little app, there are a couple of ways to get rid of it, and ensure that it doesn't pop up every time you boot into XP. The best way simply utilizes the previous tip (see above). If you'd like Windows Messenger to show up in the list of programs you can add and remove from Windows, navigate to C:\Windows\Inf (substituting the correct drive letter/folder name for your version of Windows) and open Sysoc.inf in Notepad (see the previous tip for more information about this file). Change this line: msmsgs=msgrocm.dll,OcEntry,msmsgs.inf,HIDE,7 to read this: msmsgs=msgrocm.dll,OcEntry,msmsgs.inf,7 and Windows Messenger will appear in Add or Remove Programs -> Add/Remove Windows Components, where you can remove it for good. XP AUTOLOG ON Real easy and straight forward: 1. Click Start -> click Run... -> type "control userpasswords2" -> click OK. 2. Click Start -> Settings -> Control Panel -> Users and Passwords -> Users tab -> clear the "Users must enter a user name and password to use this computer" check box -> a dialog will appear that asks you what user name and password should be used to logon automatically -> type your info -> click OK. You're all set. ASPI WinXP does not come with an ASPI layer. So far almost 90% of the problems with WinXP and CD burning software are ASPI layer problems. After installing WinXP, before installing any CD burning software do a few things first: 1. Open up "My Computer" and right click on the CD Recorder. If your CD recorder/rewritable was detected as a CD recorder there will be a tab called "Recording". On this tab uncheck ALL the boxes. Click Apply/OK and close My Computer. 2. Next install the standard Adaptec ASPI Layer for Windows XP [510 KB, free]: ftp://ftp.adaptec.com/software_pc/aspi/aspi_471a2.exe Reboot when asked. That's it. After the reboot you can install any of the currently working CD recording applications with no problems. If using Easy CD Creator, Direct CD or Take Two, you must get the XP fixes Roxio: http://www.roxio.com/ PRINT DIR XP alas does not include a way to print a directory listing aside from using the command prompt. I'm talking about a right click on the directory and print the files names on the printer type of Dir print. We will need to add it. Start up Regedit and add the following: [HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Folder\shell\print\command] @="cmd.exe /c dir %1 > PRN" or: [HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Folder\shell\print\command] @="cmd.exe /c dir %1 > Dirprnt.txt" Right-click on a folder in Windows Explorer and choose Print. The contents of the folder will appear in a file called Dirprnt.txt in the respective folder. Open this file and print it out. If you want to print directly to the printer remove the second line containing "Dirprnt.txt". RENAME MULTIPLE FILES A new, small, neat feature for WinXP deals with renaming files. I personally have always wanted the OS to include a way to do a mass file renaming on a bunch of files. You can now rename multiple files at once in WinXP. It's real simple: Select several files in Windows Explorer, press F2 and rename one of those files to something else. All the selected files get renamed to the new file name (plus a number added to the end). I recommend that you only have the files you want to rename in the directory you're working in. I also recommend until you get used to this neat little trick that you save copies of the files in a safe location. Handy for renaming those mass amounts of x-rated pics you d/l from the web. :) MORE THEMES FOR WINDOWS BLINDS XP Windows Blinds XP has been integrated into the Windows XP operating system. Microsoft and Stardock have entered into a partnership in which Microsoft will use their technology in the Windows XP operating system. With Windows Blinds XP installed you have additional styles to choose from in Display Properties. And the best part is you can download over 1000 different styles and even make your own very easily using the SDK. To get started you need to download the Windows Blinds XP extension [1.2 MB]: http://www.stardock.com/files/wbxp-b5_private.exe Then download the latest beta. NOTE: You must register at: http://scripting.stardock.com/customer/wbxp_beta.asp to be able to legally download the Windows Blinds XP beta. Once you register, they will even e-mail you when new builds are available for download. Once downloaded, install the program and you will notice the extra styles in the Display Properties when you run the program. To download more styles, go to: http://www.wincustomize.com/ and select Windows Blinds from the menu. SHOW FILE EXTENSIONS Ever wonder where your file extensions went? Working with files when you cannot tell what the file extension is can be a huge pain in the butt. Thankfully, MS has made it possible for all file extensions to be shown. In any folder that contains files, click on the Tools menu and select Folder Options. Then click on the View tab. Locate the Hide extensions of known file types box and uncheck it. Click OK. XP MEMORY TWEAKS Below are some Windows XP memory tweaks, located in the Registry at: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Session Manager\Memory Management - DisablePagingExecutive = When enabled, this setting will prevent the paging of the Win2000 Executive files to the hard drive, causing the OS and most programs to be more responsive. However, it is advised that people should only perform this tweak if they have a significant amount of RAM on their system (more than 128 MB), because this setting does use a substantial portion of your system resources. The default value of this key is 0. To enable it set it to 1. - LargeSystemCache = When enabled (the default on Server versions of Windows 2000), this setting tells the OS to devote all but 4 MB of system memory (which is left for disk caching) to the file system cache. The main effect of this is allowing the computer to cache the OS Kernel to memory, making the OS more responsive. The setting is dynamic and if more than 4 MB is needed from the disk cache for some reason, the space will be released to it. By default, 8 MB is earmarked for this purpose. This tweak usually makes the OS more responsive. It is a dynamic setting, and the kernel will give up any space deemed necessary for another application (at a performance hit when such changes are needed). As with the previous key, change the value from 0 to 1 to enable it. Note that by doing this, you are consuming more of your system RAM than normal. While LargeSystemCache will cut back usage when other apps need more RAM, this process can impede performance in certain intensive situations. According to Microsoft, the 0 setting is recommended for servers running applications that do their own memory caching, such as Microsoft SQL Server, and for applications that perform best with large amounts of memory, such as Internet Information Services. - IOPageLockLimit = This tweak is of questionable value to people that aren't running some kind of server off of their computers, but I will include it anyway. Boosts the Input/Output performance of your computer when it is processing large amounts of file transfers and other similar operations. This won't do much for a system without a significant amount of RAM (don't even bother if you don't have more than 128 MB), but systems with more than 128 MB of RAM will generally see a performance boost by setting this to between 8 and 16 MB. The default is 0.5 MB (512 KB). This setting requires a value in Bytes, so multiply the desired number of MegaBytes * 1024 * 1024. That's X * 1048576 (where X is the number in MegaBytes). Test several settings and keep the one which seems to work best for your system. ______________________________________________________________________________ Finished on September 8 2001 Special thanks to TweakXP.com Links: http://www.tweakxp.com/ http://bink.nu/ http://members.aol.com/axcel216/ http://www.wincustomize.com/ http://thor.prohosting.com/~1cls/Index1.htmlDownload Driver Pack
After your driver has been downloaded, follow these simple steps to install it.
Expand the archive file (if the download file is in zip or rar format).
If the expanded file has an .exe extension, double click it and follow the installation instructions.
Otherwise, open Device Manager by right-clicking the Start menu and selecting Device Manager.
Find the device and model you want to update in the device list.
Double-click on it to open the Properties dialog box.
From the Properties dialog box, select the Driver tab.
Click the Update Driver button, then follow the instructions.
Very important: You must reboot your system to ensure that any driver updates have taken effect.
For more help, visit our Driver Support section for step-by-step videos on how to install drivers for every file type.