Secrets About Windows Operating System This time I have a collection of Tips and Tricks which no body normally knows, the secrets which Microsoft is afraid to tell the people, the information which you will seldom find all gathered up and arranged in a single file. To fully reap this Manual you need to have a basic understanding of the Windows Registry, as almost all the Tricks and Tips involve this file. Important Note: Before you read on, you need to keep one thing in mind. Whenever you make changes to the Windows Registry you need to Refresh it before the changes take place. Simply press F5 to refresh the registry and enable the changes. If this does not work Restart your system Exiting Windows the Cool and Quick Way Normally it takes a hell lot of time just Shutting down Windows, you have to move your mouse to the Start Button, click on it, move it again over Shut Down, click, then move it over the necessary option and click, then move the cursor over the OK button and once again (you guessed it) click.This whole process can be shortened by creating shortcuts on the Desktop which will shut down Windows at the click of a button. Start by creating a new shortcut( right click and select New> Shortcut). Then in the command line box, type (without the quotes.) 'C:windowsrundll.exe user.exe,exitwindowsexec' This Shortcut on clicking will restart Windows immediately without any Warning. To create a Shortcut to Restarting Windows, type the following in the Command Line box: 'c:windowsrundll.exe user.exe,exitwindows' This Shortcut on clicking will shut down Windows immediately without any Warning. Ban Shutdowns : A trick to Play on Lamers This is a neat trick you can play on that lamer that has a huge ego, in this section I teach you, how to disable the Shut Down option in the Shut Down Dialog Box. This trick involves editing the registry, so please make backups. Launch regedit.exe and go to : HKEY_CURRENT_USERSoftwareMicrosoftWindowsCurrentVersionPoliciesExplorer In the right pane look for the NoClose Key. If it is not already there then create it by right clicking in the right pane and selecting New > String Value.(Name it NoCloseKey ) Now once you see the NoCloseKey in the right pane, right click on it and select Modify. Then Type 1 in the Value Data Box. Doing the above on a Win98 system disables the Shut Down option in the Shut Down Dialog Box. But on a Win95 machine if the value of NoCloseKey is set to 1 then click on the Start > Shut Down button displays the following error message: This operation has been cancelled due to restrictions in effect on this computer. Please contact your system administrator. You can enable the shut down option by changing the value of NoCloseKey to 0 or simply deleting the particular entry i.e. deleting NoCloseKey. Instead of performing the above difficult to remember process, simply save the following with an extension of .reg and add it's contents to the registry by double clicking on it. REGEDIT4 [HKEY_CURRENT_USERSoftwareMicrosoftWindowsCurrentVersionPoliciesExplorer] "NoClose"="1" Disabling Display of Drives in My Computer This is yet another trick you can play on your geek friend. To disable the display of local or networked drives when you click My Computer go to : HKEY_CURRENT_USERSoftwareMicrosoftWindowsCurrentVersionPoliciesExplorer Now in the right pane create a new DWORD item and name it NoDrives. Now modify it's value and set it to 3FFFFFF (Hexadecimal) Now press F5 to refresh. When you click on My Computer, no drives will be shown. To enable display of drives in My Computer, simply delete this DWORD item. It's .reg file is as follows: REGEDIT4 [HKEY_CURRENT_USERSoftwareMicrosoftWindowsCurrentVersionPoliciesExplorer] "NoDrives"=dword:03ffffff Take Over the Screen Saver To activate and deactivate the screen saver whenever you want, goto the following registry key: HKEY_CURRENT_USERSoftwareMicrosoftWindowsCurrentVersionScreenSavers Now add a new string value and name it Mouse Corners. Edit this new value to -Y-N. Press F5 to refresh the registry. Voila! Now you can activate your screensaver by simply placing the mouse cursor at the top right corner of the screen and if you take the mouse to the bottom left corner of the screen, the screensaver will deactivate. Pop a banner each time Windows Boots To pop a banner which can contain any message you want to display just before a user is going to log on, go to the key: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESOFTWAREMicrosoftWindowsCurrentVersionWinLogon Now create a new string Value in the right pane named LegalNoticeCaption and enter the value that you want to see in the Menu Bar. Now create yet another new string value and name it: LegalNoticeText. Modify it and insert the message you want to display each time Windows boots. This can be effectively used to display the company's private policy each time the user logs on to his NT box. It's .reg file would be: REGEDIT4 [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESOFTWAREMicrosoftWindowsCurrentVersionWinlogon] "LegalNoticeCaption"="Caption here." Delete the Tips of the Day to save 5KB Windows 95 had these tips of the day which appeared on a system running a newly installed Windows OS. These tips of the day are stored in the Windows Registry and consume 5K of space. For those of you who are really concerned about how much free space your hard disk has, I have the perfect trick. To save 5K go to the following key in Regedit: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESoftwareMicrosoftWindowsCurrentVersionExplorerTips Now simply delete these tricks by selecting and pressing the DEL key. Change the Default Locations To change the default drive or path where Windows will look for it's installation files, go to the key: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESoftwareMicrosoftWindowsCurrentVersionSetupSourcePath Now you can edit as you wish. Secure your Desktop Icons and Settings You can save your desktop settings and secure it from your nerdy friend by playing with the registry. Simply launch the Registry Editor go to: HKEY_CURRENT_USERSoftwareMicrosoftWindowsCurrentVersionPoliciesExplorer In the right pane create a new DWORD Value named NoSaveSettings and modify it's value to 1. Refresh and restart for the settings to get saved. CLSID Folders Explained Don't you just hate those stubborn stupid icons that refuse to leave the desktop, like the Network Neighborhood icon. I am sure you want to know how you can delete them. You may say, that is really simple, simply right click on the concerned icon and select Delete. Well not exactly, you see when you right click on these special folders( see entire list below)neither the rename nor the delete option does not appear. To delete these folders, there are two methods, the first one is using the System Policy Editor(Poledit in the Windows installation CD)and the second is using the Registry. Before we go on, you need to understand what CLSID values are. These folders, like the Control Panel, Inbox, The Microsoft Network, Dial Up Networking etc are system folders. Each system folder has a unique CLSID key or the Class ID which is a 16-byte value which identifies an individual object that points to a corresponding key in the registry. To delete these system Folders from the desktop simply go to the following registry key: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESoftwareMicrosoftWindowsCurrentVersionExplorerDesktopNamespace{----} To delete an icon simply delete the 16 byte CLSID value within "NameSpace". The following are the CLSID values of the most commonly used icons: My Briefcase:{85BBD920-42AO-1069-A2E4-08002B30309D} Desktop: {00021400-0000-0000-C000-0000000000046} Control Panel:{21EC2020-3AEA-1069-A2DD-08002B30309D} Dial-Up-Networking:{992CFFA0-F557-101A-88EC-00DD01CCC48} Fonts: {BD84B380-8CA2-1069-AB1D-08000948534} Inbox :{00020D76-0000-0000-C000-000000000046} My Computer :{20D04FE0-3AEA-1069-A2D8-08002B30309D} Network Neighborhood:{208D2C60-3AEA-1069-A2D7-O8002B30309D} Printers :{2227A280-3AEA-1069-A2DE-O8002B30309D} Recycle Bin :{645FF040-5081-101B-9F08-00AA002F954E} The Microsoft Network:{00028B00-0000-0000-C000-000000000046} History: {FF393560-C2A7-11CF-BFF4-444553540000} Winzip :{E0D79300-84BE-11CE-9641-444553540000} For example, to delete the Recycle Bin, first note down it's CLSID value, which is: 645FF040-5081-101B-9F08-00AA002F954E. Now go to the Namespace key in the registry and delete the corresponding key. HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESOFTWAREMicrosoftWindowsCurrentVersionexplorerDesktopNameSpace{645FF040-5081-101B-9F08-00AA002F954E} Similarly to delete the History folder, delete the following key: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESOFTWAREMicrosoftWindowsCurrentVersionexplorerDesktopNameSpace{FBF23B42-E3F0-101B-8488-00AA003E56F8} Sometimes, you may need to play a trick on your brother or friend, well this one teaches you how to hide all icons from the Desktop. Go to the following registry key: HKEY_CURRENT_USERSoftwareMicrosoftWindowsCurrentVersionPoliciesExplorer In the right pane create a new DWORD value by the name: NoDesktop and set its value to: 1. Reboot and you will find no icons on the desktop. Till now you simply learnt how to delete the special system folders by deleting a registry key, but the h@*k would have been better if there was a way of adding the DELETE and RENAME option to the right click context menus of these special folders. You can actually change the right click context menu of any system folder and add any of the following options: RENAME, DELETE, CUT, COPY, PASTE and lots more. This h@*k too requires you to know the CLSID value of the system folder whose menu you want to customize. In this section, I have taken up Recycle Bin as the folder whose context menu I am going to edit. Firstly launch the registry editor and open the following registry key: HKEY_CLASSES_ROOTCLSID{645FF040-5081-101B-9F08-00AA002F954E}ShellFolder. In Case you want to edit some other folder like say the FONTS folder, then you will open the following key: HKEY_CLASSES_ROOTCLSID{CLSID VALUE HERE}ShellFolder. In the right pane there will be a DWORD value names attributes. Now consider the following options: To add the Rename option to the menu, change the value of Attributes to 50 01 00 20 To add the Delete option to the menu, change the value of Attributes to 60 01 00 20 3. To add both the Rename & Delete options to the menu, change the value of Attributes to 70,01,00,20 4. Add Copy to the menu, change Attributes to 41 01 00 20 5. Add Cut to the menu, change Attributes to 42 01 00 20 6. Add Copy & Cut to the menu, change Attributes to 43 01 00 20 7. Add Paste to the menu, change Attributes to 44 01 00 20 8. Add Copy & Paste to the menu, change Attributes to 45 01 00 20 9. Add Cut & Paste to the menu, change Attributes to 46 01 00 20 10.Add all Cut, Copy & Paste to the menu, change Attributes to 47 01 00 20 We want to add only the Rename option to the right click context menu of the Recycle Bin, so change the value of attributes to: 50 01 00 20. Press F5 to refresh and then after rebooting you will find that when you right click on the Recycle Bin a RENAME option pops up too. To reset the default Windows options change the value of Attributes back to 40 01 00 20 The Registry File which one can create for the above process would be something like the below: REGEDIT4 [HKEY_CLASSES_ROOTCLSID{645FF040-5081-101B-9F08-00AA002F954E}Shell-Folder] "Attributes"=hex:50,01,00,20 To access say the Modem Properties in the Control Panel Folder, the normal procedure is: Click on Start, Click on Settings> Control Panel and then wait for the Control Panel window to pop up and then ultimately click on the Modems icon. Wouldn't it be lovely if you could shorten the process to: Click on Start> Control Panel>Modems. Yes you can add the Control Panel and also all other Special System Folders directly to the first level Start Menu. Firstly collect the CLSID value of the folder you want to add to the start menu. I want to add Control Panel hence the CLSID value is: 21EC2020-3AEA-1069-A2DD-08002B30309D Now right click on the Start Button and select Open. Now create a new folder and name it: Control Panel.{21EC2020-3AEA-1069-A2DD-08002B30309D} NOTE: Do not forget the period after the 'l' in Panel. Similarly all system folders can be added to the Start Menu.(accept My Briefcase, I think) Deleting System Options from the Start menu You can actually remove the Find and Run options from the start menu by performing a simple registry h@*k. Again like always Launch the registry editor and scroll down to the below key: HKEY_CURRENT_USERSoftwareMicrosoftWindowsCurrentVersionPoliciesExplorer Right-click on the right pane and select New, DWORD Value. Name it NoFind.(To remove the RUN option name it NoRun). Double-click the newly create DWORD to edit it's value and enter 1 as its value. This will disable the FIND option of the Start Menu and will also disable the default Shortcut key(F3 for Find.) To restore the Run or find command modify the value of the DWORD to 0 or simply Delete the DWORD value. Fed Up of the boring Old Yellow Folder Icons?[Drive Icons Included] NOTE: This trick hasn't been tried on Win98. You can easily change the boring yellow folder icons to your own personalized icons. Simply create a text file and copy the following lines into it: [.ShellClassInfo] ICONFILE=Drive:PathIcon_name.extension Save this text file by the name, desktop.ini in the folder, whose icon you want to change. Now to prevent this file from getting deleted change it's attributes to Hidden and Read Only by using the ATTRIB command. To change the icon of a drive, create a text file containing the following lines: [Autorun] ICON=Drive:PathIcon_name.extension Save this file in the root of the drive whose icon you want to change and name it autorun.inf For Example, if you want to change the icon of a floppy, SAVE THE icon in a:icon_name.ico One can also create a kewl icon for the Hard Disk and create a text file [autorun.inf] and store it in "c:". Securing NT By default, NT 4.0 displays the last person who logged onto the system. This can be considered to be a security threat, especially in the case of those who choose their password to be same as their Username. To disable this bug which actually is a feature, go to the following key in the registry editor: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESoftwareMicrosoftWindowsNTCurrentVersionWinlogon Click and select the ReportBookOK item and create a new string value called DontDisplayLastUserName. Modify it and set it's value to 1. As a system administrator, you can ensure that the passwords chosen by the users are not too lame or too easy to guess. NT has this lovely utility called the User Manager which allows the administrator to set the age limit of the password which forces the users to change the password after a certain number of days. You can also set the minimum length of passwords and prevent users to use passwords which already have been used earlier and also enable account lockouts which will deactivate an account after a specified number of failed login attempts. When you log on to Win NT, you should disable Password Caching, this ensures Single NT Domain login and also prevents secondary Windows Logon screen. Simply copy the following lines to a plain text ASCII editor like: Notepad and save it with an extension, .reg ----------------DISABLE.reg----------------- REGEDIT4 [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESOFTWAREMicrosoftWindowsCurrentVersionPoliciesNetwork] "DisablePwdCaching"=dword:00000001 ----------------DISABLE.reg----------------- To Enable Password Caching use the following .reg file: --------------Enable.reg----------------- REGEDIT4 [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESOFTWAREMicrosoftWindowsCurrentVersionPoliciesNetwork] "DisablePwdCaching"=dword:00000000 --------------Enable.reg----------------- Cleaning Recent Docs Menu and the RUN MRU The Recent Docs menu can be easily disabled by editing the Registry. To do this go to the following Key: HKEY_CURRENT_USERSoftwareMicrosoftWindowsCurrentVersionPoliciesExplorer Now in the right pane, create a new DWORD value by the name: NoRecentDocsMenu and set it's value to 1. Restart Explorer to save the changes. You can also clear the RUN MRU history. All the listings are stored in the key: HKEY_USERS.DefaultSoftwareMicrosoftWindowsCurrentVersionExplorerRunMRU You can delete individual listings or the entire listing. To delete History of Find listings go to: HKEY_CURRENT_USERSoftwareMicrosoftWindowsCurrentVersionExplorerDoc Find Spec MRU and delete. Customizing the Right Click Context Menu of the Start Menu When you right click on the start menu, only 3 options pop up: Open, Explore, and Find. You can add your own programs to this pop up menu( which comes up when we right click on it.) Open Regedit and go to the following registry key: HKEY_CLASSES_ROOTDirectoryShell Right click on the shell and create a new Sub Key (You can create a new SubKey by right clicking on the Shell Key and selecting New > Key.). Type in the name of the application you want to add to the start menu. I want to add Notepad to the Start Menu and hence I name this new sub key, Notepad. Now right click on the new registry key that you just created and create yet another new key named Command. Enter the ful path of the application, in this case Notepad in the default value of Command in the right pane. So I Modify the value of the default string value and enter the ful pathname of Notepad: c:wndowsnotepad.exe. Now press F5 to refresh. Now if you right click on the Start Button you will find a new addition to the Pop Up Menu called Notepad. Clicking on it will launch Notepad. We can not only add but also remove the existing options in this pop up box. To delete the Find option, go to the following registry key: HKEY_CLASSES_ROOTDirectoryShellFind Delete Find. DO NOT delete Open else you will not be able to open any folders in the Start Menu like Programs, Accessories etc. BMP Thumbnail As Icon You can actually change the default BMP icon to a thumbnail version of the actual BMP file. To do this simply go to HKCUPaint.PictureDefault. In the right pane change the value of default to %1. Please note however that this will slow down the display rate in explorer if there are too many BMP thumbnails to display. You can use other icons too, simply enter the pathname.To restore back to the normal change the vale of default back to: C:Progra~1Access~1MSPAINT.EXE,1. Customizing The Shortcut Arrow All shortcuts have a tiny black arrow attached to it's icon to distinguish from normal files. This arrow can sometimes be pretty annoying and as a Hacker should know how to change each and everything, here goes another trick. Launch the Registry Editor and go to: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESOFTWAREMicrosoftWindowsCurrentVersionexplorerShell Icons. Now, on the right pane is a list of icons ( we found out that on some systems, Windows 98 especially, the right pane is blank. Don't worry, just add the value as required ). Find the value 29. If it isn't there, just add it. The value of this string should be C:Windowssystemshell32.dll, 29 ( which means the 30th icon in shell32.dll - the first one begins with 0 ). Now, we need blank icon to do this. Just create one with white as the whole icon. Go here to learn how to create an icon. Once done just change the value to C:.ico, 0 where "" is the ful path of the icon file and "0" is the icon in it. Now for some fun. If the blank icon is a bit boring, change it again. You will find that under shell32.dll there is a gear icon, a shared folder ( the hand ) and much more. Experiment for yourself! Use Perl to Get List or Services Running on your NT box Use the following Perl Script to get a list of Services running on your NT system --------------script.pl----------------- #!c:perbinperl.exe use Win32::Service; my ($key, %service, %status, $part); Win32::Service::GetServices(' ',%services); foreach $key (sort keys %services) { print "Print Namet: $key, $services{$key}n"; Win32::Service::GetStatus( ' ',$services{$key}; %status); foreach $part (keys %status) { print "t$part : $status{$part}n" if($part eq "CurrentState"); } } -------------script.pl------------------- Internet Explorer Tricks and Tips Resizable ful Screen Toolbar The ful Screen option increases the viewable area and makes surfing more enjoyable but sometimes we need the Toolbar but also need to have extra viewing area. Now this h@*k teaches you how to change the size of the Internet Explorer toolbar. This registry h@*k is a bit complicated as it involves Binary values, so to make it simple, I have included the following registry file which will enable the resizable option of the Internet Explorer toolbar which was present in the beta version of IE. REGEDIT4 [HKEY_CURRENT_USERSoftwareMicrosoftInternet ExplorerToolbar] "Theater"=hex:0c,00,00,00,4c,00,00,00,74,00,00,00,18,00,00,00,1b,00,00,00,5c, 00,00,00,01,00,00,00,e0,00,00,00,a0,0f,00,00,05,00,00,00,22,00,00,00,26,00, 00,00,02,00,00,00,21,00,00,00,a0,0f,00,00,04,00,00,00,01,00,00,00,a0,0f,00, 00,03,00,00,00,08,00,00,00,00,00,00,00 ******************* h@*king TRUTH: Internet Explorer 5 displays the friendly version of HTTP errors like NOT FOUND etc . They are aimed at making things easier for newbies. If you would rather prefer to see the proper error pages for the web server you're using, go to Tools, Internet Options and select the Advanced tab. Then scroll down and uncheck the Show friendly http errors box. Making the Internet Explorer & the Explorer Toolbars Fancy The Internet Explorer toolbar looks pretty simple. Want to make it fancy and kewl? Why not add a background image to it. To do this kewl h@*k launch the Windows Registry Editor and go to the following key: HKEY_CURRENT_USERSOFTWAREMicrosoft Internet ExplorerToolbar. Now in the right pane create a new String Value and name it BackBitmap and modify it's value to the path of the Bitmap you want to dress it up with by rightclicking on it and choosing Modify. When you reboot the Internet Explorer and the Windows Explorer toolbars will have a new look. Change Internet Explorer's Caption Don't like the caption of Internet Explorer caption? Want to change it? Open the registry editor and go to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESOFTWAREMicrosoftInternet ExplorerMain. In the right pane create a new String Value names Window Title (Note the space between Window and Title). Right click on this newly created String Value and select Modify. Type in the new caption you want to be displayed. Restart for the settings to take place. Now let's move on to some Outlook Express Tricks. Colorful Background Don't like the boring background colors of Outlook Express? To change it launch the Windows Registry Editor and scroll down to the HKEY_CURRENT_USERSoftwareMicrosoftInternet Mail And News key. On the left pane, click on ColorCycle or select Edit and Modify in the menu. Now change the value to 1. Close and restart. Now, launch Outlook Express and whenever you open up a New Message, hold down ctrl-shift and tap the z key to scroll to change the background color. Repeat the keystroke to cycle through the colors. Internet Explorer 5 Hidden Features Microsoft Internet Explorer 5 has several hidden features which can be controlled using the Windows Registry. Open your registry and scroll down to the following key: HKEY_CURRENT_USERSoftwarePoliciesMicrosoftInternet ExplorerRestrictions Create a new DWORD value named x(See complete list of values of x below) and modify it's value to 1 to enable it and to 0 to disable it. NoBrowserClose : Disable the option of closing Internet Explorer. NoBrowserContextMenu : Disable right-click context menu. NoBrowserOptions : Disable the Tools / Internet Options menu. NoBrowserSaveAs : Disable the ability to Save As. NoFavorites : Disable the Favorites. NoFileNew : Disable the File / New command. NoFileOpen : Disable the File / Open command. NoFindFiles : Disable the Find Files command. NoSelectDownloadDir : Disable the option of selecting a download directory. NoTheaterMode : Disable the ful Screen view option. h@*king Secrets Almost all system administrators make certain changes and make the system restricted. System Administrators can hide the RUN option, the FIND command, the entire Control Panel, drives in My Computer like D: A: etc. They can even restrict activities of a hacker my disabling or hiding, even the tiniest options or tools. Most commonly these restrictions are imposed locally and are controlled by the Windows Registry. But sometimes the smart system administrators control the activities of the hacker by imposing restrictions remotely through the main server. Poledit or Policy Editor is a small kewl tool which is being commonly used by system administrators to alter the settings of a system. This utility is not installed by default by Windows. You need to install in manually from the Windows 98 Installation Kit from the Resource Kit folder. user.dat file that we saw earlier. The Policy Editor tool imposes restrictions on the user's system by editing the user.dat file which in turn means that it edits the Windows Registry to change the settings. It can be used to control or restrict access to each and every folder and option you could ever think of. It has the power to even restrict access to individual folders, files, the Control Panel, MS DOS, the drives available etc. Sometimes this software does make life really hard for a Hacker. So how can we remove the restrictions imposed by the Policy Editor? Well read ahead to learn more. You see the Policy Editor is not the only way to restrict a user's activities. As we already know that the Policy Editor edits the Windows Registry(user.dat) file to impose such restrictions. So this in turn would mean that we can directly make changes to the Windows Registry using a .reg file or directly to remove or add restrictions. Launch Regedit and go to the following Registry Key: HKEY_CURRENT_USER/Software/Microsoft/CurrentVersion/Policies Under this key, there will definitely be a key named explorer. Now under this explorer key we can create new DWORD values and modify it's value to 1 in order to impose the restriction. If you want to remove the Restriction, then you can simply delete the respective DWORD values or instead change their values to 0. The following is a list of DWORD values that can be created under the Explorer Key-: NoDeletePrinter: Disables Deletion of already installed Printers NoAddPrinter: Disables Addition of new Printers NoRun : Disables or hides the Run Command NoSetFolders: Removes Folders from the Settings option on Start Menu (Control Panel, Printers, Taskbar) NoSetTaskbar: Removes Taskbar system folder from the Settings option on Start Menu NoFind: Removes the Find Tool (Start >Find) NoDrives: Hides and does not display any Drives in My Computer NoNetHood: Hides or removes the Network Neighborhood icon from the desktop NoDesktop: Hides all items including, file, folders and system folders from the Desktop NoClose: Disables Shutdown and prevents the user from normally shutting down Windows. NoSaveSettings: Means to say, 'Don't save settings on exit' DisableRegistryTools: Disable Registry Editing Tools (If you disable this option, the Windows Registry Editor(regedit.exe) too will not work.) NoRecentDocsHistory: Removes Recent Document system folder from the Start Menu (IE 4 and above) ClearRecentDocsOnExit: Clears the Recent Documents system folder on Exit. Nolnternetlcon: Removes the Internet (system folder) icon from the Desktop Under the same key: HKEY_CURRENT_USER/Software/Microsoft/CurrentVersion/Policies you can create new subkeys other than the already existing Explorer key. Now create a new key and name it System. Under this new key, system we can create the following new DWORD values(1 for enabling the particular option and 0 for disabling the particular option): NODispCPL: Hides Control Panel NoDispBackgroundPage: Hides Background page. NoDispScrsavPage: Hides Screen Saver Page NoDispAppearancePage: Hides Appearance Page NoDispSettingsPage: Hides Settings Page NoSecCPL: Disables Password Control Panel NoPwdPage: Hides Password Change Page NoAdminPaqe: Hides Remote Administration Page NoProfilePage: Hides User Profiles Page NoDevMgrPage: Hides Device Manager Page NoConfigPage: Hides Hardware Profiles Page NoFileSysPage: Hides File System Button NoVirtMemPage: Hides Virtual Memory Button Similarly, if we create a new subkey named Network, we can add the following DWORD values under it(1 for enabling the particular option and 0 for disabling the particular option): NoNetSetupSecurityPage: Hides Network Security Page NoNelSetup: Hides or disables the Network option in the Control Panel NoNetSetupIDPage: Hides the Identification Page NoNetSetupSecurityPage: Hides the Access Control Page NoFileSharingControl: Disables File Sharing Controls NoPrintSharing: Disables Print Sharing Controls Similarly, if we create a new subkey named WinOldApp, we can add the following DWORD values under it(1 for enabling the particular option and 0 for disabling the particular option): Disabled: Disable MS-DOS Prompt NoRealMode: Disable Single-Mode MS-DOS. So you see if you have access to the Windows Registry, then you can easily create new DWORD values and set heir value to 1 for enabling the particular option and 0 for disabling the particular option. But Sometimes, access to the Windows Registry is blocked. So what do you do? Go to the Windows Directory and delete either user.dat or system.dat (These 2 files constitute the Windows Registry.) and reboot. As soon as Windows logs in, it will display a Warning Message informing you about an error in the Windows Registry. Simply ignore this Warning Message and Press CTRL+DEL+ALT to get out of this warning message.(Do not press OK) You will find that all restrictions have been removed. The most kind of restriction found quite commonly is the Specific Folder Restriction, in which users are not allowed access to specific folders, the most common being the Windows folder, or sometimes even access to My Computer is blocked. In effect, you simply cannot seem to access the important kewl files which are needed by you to do remove restrictions. What do you? Well use the RUN command. (START >RUN). But unfortunately a system administrator who is intelligent enough to block access to specific folder, would definitely have blocked access to the RUN command. Again we are stuck. Windows is supposed to be the most User Friendly Operating System on earth. (At least Microsoft Says so.) It gives the User an option to do the same thing in various ways. You see the RUN command is only the most convenient option of launching applications, but not the only way. In Windows you can create shortcuts to almost anything from a file, folder to a Web URL. So say your system administrator has blocked access to the c:windowssystem folder and you need to access it. What do you do? Simply create a Shortcut to it. To do this right click anywhere on the desktop and select New > Shortcut. A new window titled Create Shortcut pops up. Type in the path of the restricted folder you wish to access, in this case c:windowssystem. Click Next, Enter the friendly name of the Shortcut and then click Finish. Now you can access the restricted folder by simply double clicking on the shortcut icon. Well that shows how protected and secure *ahem Windows *ahem is. h@*king TRUTH: Sometimes when you try to delete a file or a folder, Windows displays an error message saying that the file is protected. This simply means that the file is write protected, or in other words the R option is +. Get it? Anyway, you can stop Windows from displaying this error message and straightaway delete this file by changing its attributes to Non Read Only. This can be done by Right Clicking on the file, selecting Properties and then unselecting the Read Only Option. There is yet another way of accessing restricted folders. Use see, DOS has a lovely command known as START. Its general syntax is: START application_path It does do what it seems to do, start applications. So in you have access to DOS then you can type in the START command to get access to the restricted folder. Now mostly access to DOS too would be blocked. So again you can use the shortcut trick to launch, c:command.com or c:windowscommand.com. (Command.com is the file which launches MS DOS). Accessing Restricted Drives. The problem with most system administrators is that they think that the users or Hackers too are stupid. Almost all system administrators use the Registry Trick (Explained Earlier) to hide all drives in My Computer. So in order to unhide or display all drives, simply delete that particular key.(Refer to beginning of Untold Secrets Section.) Some systems have the floppy disk disabled through the BIOS. On those systems if the BIOS is protected, you may need to cr@ck the BIOS password. (For that Refer to the Windows h@*king Chapter). Sometimes making drives readable (Removing R +) and then creating Shortcuts to them also helps us to get access to them. Further Changing your Operating System's Looks by editing .htt files If you have installed Windows Desktop Update and have the view as Web Page option enabled, you can customise the way the folder looks by selecting View > Customise this folder. Here you can change the background and other things about that particular folder. Well that is pretty lame, right? We hackers already know things as lame as that. Read on for some kewl stuff. Well, you could also change the default that is stored in a Hidden HTML Template file (I think so..) which is nothing but a HTML document with a .htt extension. This .htt file is found at: %systemroot%webfolder.htt. The %systemroot% stands for the drive in which Windows is Installed, which is normally C: You can edit these .htt files almost just like you edit normal .HTM or .HTML files. Simply open them in an ASCII editor like Notepad. The following is a list of .htt files on your system which control various folders and which can be edited to customise the way various folders look. controlp.htt Control Panel printers.htt Printers mycomp.htt My Computer safemode.htt Safe Mode All these files are found in the web folder in %systemfolder%. The folder.htt file has a line: Microsoft® Windows XP Advanced Customization Welcome In this course, you'll learn some advanced techniques for making your Microsoft® Windows® XP computer run better, faster, and more to your liking. This course is for experienced and adventurous users only. Coming into this course, you should already know how to do the following: ·                                 Run applications and manage files in Windows XP. ·                                 Run all the standard disk utilities, such as Disk Defragmenter, Check Disk, and System Restore. ·                                 Get system information with System Information. ·                                 Check your hardware with Device Manager. ·                                 Shut down an unresponsive program with Task Manager. ·                                 Back up and restore your important files. You'll be diving headfirst into tweaks and hacks that can potentially disable your system if you do them incorrectly. You'll learn how to disable services, stop running processes, edit the registry, and even hack some binaries. If that sounds scary, or you aren't sure you have the prerequisite knowledge, it's not too late to back out and decide to try one of the more basic Windows XP courses first. If you're still here, fasten your seatbelts. You're going to have some fun. Working with Services A service is a background process that serves an administration-related purpose in Microsoft Windows. Many of the features that we take for granted as part of Windows XP are actually services. For example, the print spooler is a service, as is event logging, fast user switching, and Plug-and-Play. Services are spawned from a program called Services.exe. Services differ from most third-party applications that run in the background because those are typically spawned from Explorer.exe. Some background-running programs involve services for some of their functionality. For example, when you install an antivirus program such as Norton® Antivirus, it sets up certain additional services to load automatically at startup, such as an update scheduler and a settings manager. In addition, when you perform certain activities, Windows automatically starts services to support them; then Windows stops the services when they're no longer needed. For example, the Windows Installer service runs only when you're installing new software. The Services applet, shown in Figure 1-1, is accessed from the Control Panel, in Administrative Tools (Start > Control Panel > Administrative Tools > Services). It lists each local service -- that is each service that originates on the individual PC, not the network. It shows each service's status (Started or not) and how it's set to behave at startup (Automatic or Manual). Drag the dividers between the column heads to resize the columns -- for example, to enlarge the Description column if desired.   To start, stop, or restart a service, click it and then click the Start, Stop, or Restart hyperlink at the left. You can also work with the properties of a service by double-clicking it. One of the most useful parts of a service's Properties box is the Dependencies tab, shown in Figure 1-2. On this tab, you can see on which other services the currently selected one depends, and which services depend on it. This is critical information to have if you're considering manually stopping a service for some reason. You can create some nasty, difficult-to-troubleshoot problems by disabling a service that other important services depend upon. Figure 1-2: Dependencies for the service. Why Start and Stop Services? The Services applet is most commonly used for troubleshooting. If a certain function in Windows isn't working, you can use this applet to find out if its service is started. If not, you can try starting it. If it's already started, you can try stopping it and restarting it, hoping to shake off whatever glitch is causing the problem. For example, if your print spooler is not working properly, one of the first things to try is to stop and restart the Print Spooler service in the Services applet. Some people also claim to have bumped up their system's performance by setting certain Microsoft-provided services to Manual that normally are set to Automatic. Each running service uses a small amount of system resources, so by stopping a service (and preventing it from starting at Windows startup) you can free up some resources. And generally speaking, the more free resources, the better Windows XP performs. However, on a per-service basis, the performance bump is small. You would have to disable a lot of services to make a significant difference. And then there's the thorny matter of the service's functionality being disabled. Services don't just run for no reason -- each one serves a purpose. Each time you elect to stop a service, you take that functionality away from Windows. What All Those Services Do Before you even consider stopping a service, you should know exactly what it does and what the implications will be. There are entire Web sites, such as The Elder Geek, devoted to explaining the various services in Windows and recommending which ones you should start or stop. The Services applet provides one look at the running services. Another way to see what's running is through Task Manager. Right-click the taskbar, select Task Manager, and then look at the Processes tab, shown in Figure 1-3. Unlike the Services applet, this list consists of only services that are started, and it lists processes that are spawned both by Services.exe and Explorer.exe. Figure 1-3: The Processes list in Windows Task Manager. Other Ways to Look at the Services Yet another way to look at the running services is through the System Configuration Utility. Select Start > Run, type msconfig, click OK, and then look at the Services tab, as shown in Figure 1-4. Notice that most of them have Microsoft Corporation as the manufacturer; these are the ones to mostly leave alone, because they're part of Windows XP's basic offerings. Scrutinize the others to determine what's loaded and deduce which program loaded it. For example, in Figure 1-4, there are several Symantec items, which you can assume are for Norton Antivirus. Figure 1-4: The services in the System Configuration Utility. Examining Background Applications Often when a system is performing sluggishly, it's due to a lot of unnecessary third-party background applications being set to load at startup. Background applications are related to Windows services, but they load from Explorer.exe rather than Services.exe, and they are typically third-party applications installed after Windows XP has been installed. Stripping out the unnecessary background applications can make a tremendous difference in your system's performance. The definition of "necessary" varies from person to person, but here are some broad categories of programs that load at startup that are not essential and that can bog down the system: ·                                 Adware and spyware, either blatant or hidden ·                                 Instant-on features of media players, such as QuickTime or hardware interfaces such as scanning software or a digital camera interface ·                                 Update-checkers that will automatically update the drivers or software for a certain application or piece of hardware (although the one for your antivirus and for Windows Update should remain enabled) ·                                 Utilities that collect and present information from the Internet, such as programs that show the current weather in your area ·                                 Reminder tools for applications, such as the reminder for Quicken or Microsoft Money that tell you when bills are due ·                                 Special toolbars that work with your Web browser to redirect your searches Because most of these run in the background, there isn't an obvious sign that they're running, such as an open window or a taskbar indicator. There might be an icon for some of them in the notification area (down next to the clock), but not always. To see which third-party items are set to load at startup, open msconfig again and this time look at the Startup tab. The list is shorter there than on the Services tab. The Startup list shows only third-party auto-starting items, as shown in Figure 1-5. Figure 1-5: The Startup tab shows third-party items loading at startup. Look in the Location column in Figure 1-5. There are three locations listed for items here: ·                                 HKLMSoftwareMicrosoftWindows CurrentVersion Run: HKLM stands for HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE, an area of the registry, and the rest of that line is the complete path to that location within the registry. You'll learn more about the registry in upcoming lessons. For now, simply know that when an item's location starts with HKLM, it's set to be available to all users of that PC, regardless of logon name. ·                                 HKCUSoftwareMicrosoftWindows CurrentVersion Run: HKCU stands for HKEY_CURRENT_USER, an area of the registry for settings related only to a particular user. When an item's location starts with HKCU, that item is set for automatic startup only for the currently logged-in user. ·                                 Common Startup: Common Startup refers to the Startup folder on the Start menu. When shortcuts to programs are placed here, they automatically load at startup. Items load here later in the startup process than those referenced in the registry. What Does That Service Do? The key to intelligently "degunking" your startup is to understand what each item does that is listed on the Startup tab of the System Configuration Utility. Once you know what a particular item is used for, you can decide whether to disable it. Sometimes you can tell what an item does by examining the path to it in the Command column of the System Configuration Utility (Startup tab). Often, the item will be in a folder with the application's or parent company's name. For example, in Figure 1-6, there are a couple of items loading from a folder called HP DVD. You can guess that these are for controlling an HP DVD writer. Figure 1-6: The Startup tab shows third-party items loading at startup. Some people like to work from the Processes tab of the Task Manager when examining their running processes and services. However, the Processes tab contains a mixture of Windows services and third-party items, so you have to wade through a lot of perfectly okay items to find the questionable ones. If you can't tell what a particular item does, consult an online resource. There are many good sources of information available. These directories are often called Task Lists because they show items according to the names that they have on the Processes tab of the Task Manager. AnswersThatWork.com has a very good one, for example, and you can easily find others by typing Task List in any search engine. Here are some additional sources of information for determining the origin and usefulness of a file: ·                                 Microsoft DLL Help Database: A searchable list of many DLLs (Dynamic Link Libraries). ·                                 Computer Associates' Spyware Information Center: Up-to-date information about the symptoms of various spyware infections. ·                                 Pest Encyclopedia: Part of the for Pest Research. Disabling Startup Programs Once you've determined that a particular startup process is unwanted, the next step is to figure out the best way to get rid of it. The best way (that is, tidiest and most healthy for your system) to remove an automatically loading application is to simply remove the entire application from Add/Remove Programs in the Control Panel. This is the way to go if the application is altogether useless -- for example, an adware program or a utility that you'll never use. (However, some really insidious adware will not allow you to remove it this way.) The second-best way is to root around in the application's settings to turn off the portion that's causing it to load itself automatically at startup. This is the proper way to proceed if the application itself is useful but it's loading an unnecessary portion at startup. Examples include the QuickTime browser plug-in, shown in Figure 1-7, and the Quicken Bill Pay reminder. It may take a little work to find where the feature is controlled in the application, because they're all different. Figure 1-7: Locate the automatic load setting in the application's preferences. Next in preference is to use a spyware/adware removal utility to locate and remove any spyware or adware applications that are loading at startup. This is less preferable than removal from the Control Panel because sometimes these removal utilities do not get rid of every trace of the program -- they just prevent it from loading at startup. Its files are still on your hard disk. Spybot Search & Destroy is free and there's also a free version of Lavasoft's Ad-Aware. If none of these has gotten rid of the application, the next thing to try is to stop its service in the Services applet if possible. Not all applications that load at startup have corresponding entries in the Services applet. But it's worth a look. Next, try disabling the item from the Startup tab of the System Configuration Utility (msconfig), shown in Figure 1-8. Clear the checkbox next to each item to prevent the item from loading at startup. If you run into problems, reboot and turn its checkbox back on. (Boot into Safe Mode if you can't start normally.) Figure 1-8: Disabling an item from msconfig. If you disable an item from msconfig, each time you start your PC, a message appears warning you that you're in Selective Startup mode. There's a checkbox in that warning message that enables you to turn off the warning. The last resort is to edit the registry with the Registry Editor (regedit) and manually rip the program's line out of its startup location (HKLM or HKCU). You'll learn about registry editing in upcoming lessons, so postpone that activity for now. Third-party Applications It's no shame to need a little help figuring out your system's processes and services. In addition to the resources described so far in this lesson, you might want to consider a third-party utility. Sysinternals offers a free program called Process Explorer, for example, that tells you which application spawned a certain process. It's useful when perusing the Task Manager's Processes list and finding unrecognized processes there. It's especially good for determining whether something is a service (from Services.exe) or a background application (from Explorer.exe), as it groups items neatly beneath those headings, as shown in Figure 1-9. Process Explorer can also show a lot more information; select View > Select Columns to add more columns of information to the display. If you want a really full-featured application that makes identifying processes virtually a no-brainer and eliminates laborious line-by-line lookups, consider The Ultimate Troubleshooter, created by the good folks at AnswersThatWork.com (yes, the same ones who created the task list we used earlier in this lesson). The evaluation version is too heavily crippled to be of much use in looking up processes, but the full version ($35) is excellent, linking each item automatically to the AnswersThatWork Task List database (actually the database here is 1/3 larger than the free one online) and reporting a recommendation. For each item, it explains why it is or is not okay, and it provides instructions for removal if applicable. It also lists and evaluates running tasks and services and supplies hardware information. Moving On In this lesson, you learned about services and background applications, and you found out how to start them, stop them, examine them, , and prevent them from running at startup. These skills will help you take firm control of your Windows XP system and perhaps even make it run better and faster. In the rest of this course, you'll examine some hacks and tweaks you can make to your system to improve its performance even further. To complete the lesson, do the assignment and take the quiz. In Lesson 2, you'll learn some great Windows customization and optimization techniques that bypass Registry editing entirely. Tricks : Hidden Comands in XP 1- Private Character Editor This program is for designing icons and Characters(Alphapet) Click :start Then :Run type :EUDCEDIT 2- iExpress This Program is for conerting your files to EXCUTABLE files Click : start Then : run type : iexpress 3-Disk Cleanup This program used for cleaning harddisk to offer space Click : start Then : run type : cleanmgr 4-Dr Watson This program Is for repairing problems in Windows Click : start Then : run type : drwtsn32 5-Windows Media Player 5.1 Opens the old media player Click : start Then : run type : mplay32 Program CODE Character Map = charmap DirectX diagnosis = dxdiag Object Packager = packager System Monitor = perfmon Program Manager = progman Remote Access phone book = rasphone Registry Editor = regedt32 File siganture verification tool = sigverif Volume Contro = sndvol32 System Configuration Editor = sysedit Syskey = syskey Microsoft Telnet Client = telnet Tips : Hide Drives and Partitions Do you have data on a partition or hard drive that you don't want tampered with or easily accessible to other users? Well, you can hide any drive/partition in Windows XP, NT, and 2000. That means that they won't show up in Explorer or My Computer. If you want access to that drive from your user account you should create a desktop shortcut before proceeding. Once hidden, you can still access by typing the drive letter and a colon in Start/Run �for example, "D:" will bring up a folder of the contents on your D drive. The easiest way with Win XP is to use the TweakUI power toy from Microsoft. Go to Start/Run and type in "tweakui" (without the quotes). Go to My Computer/Drives and uncheck the drive/partition(s) you want hidden. Click "Apply" or "OK" when finished. For Win NT, 2000, and XP you can use the following Registry edit: *Be sure to back up the Registry before proceeding Open the Registry Editor by going to Start/Run and typing in "regedit" (without the quotes). Find your way to... HKEY_CURRENT_USERSoftwareMicrosoftWindowsCurre ntVersionPolicies Click on "Explorer". Double-click the "NoDrives" key in the right column. If you don't find a "NoDrives" registry key, just right-click in the right pane and choose "New/DWORD Value" then name the key "NoDrives". You'll see a value like "0000 00 00 00 00". This is where the fun starts. The four sets of double zeros (after the "0000") are where you'll enter the values for the drive/partitions. Now, stay with me on this. Iit's not as complicated as it sounds: The first column is for drives A-H, the second for I-P, the third for Q-X, and the fourth for Y-Z. The values for each drive are as follows: 1 - A I Q Y 2 - B J R Z 4 - C K S 8 - D L T 16 - E M U 32 - F N V 64 - G O W 80 - H P X So, let's say you want to hide drive D. In the first column you would put "08". For drive K you would put "04" in the second column. But what if you want to hide more than one drive in a column? Simply add the values together: D+E = 8+16 = 24. So in the first column you would put "24". Still baffled? If you have XP then go get TweakUI and save yourself the math. Whichever method you use, you can rest easy knowing that the files on that drive or partition are less accessible to other users. Security for Windows XP Don't you hate it when people mess with your computer without you knowing it? Here are two ways to prevent this, (and still be lazy): create a desktop icon to lock your computer, and password protect after the screen saver is activated. Both of these only work if you already have your computer password protected on login. If you already have a password, skip to the next part. To create a password, go to the control panel , then to user accounts . Click your account, and then the " change my password " button, enter the requested fields and click on " change password " and then close the window. How to create a lock-down icon: First, pick any icon on your desktop. Right click it and drag it to another place on the desktop. In the menu that appears select " copy. " Now we need to change the name and the target of the new shortcut. Right click this shortcut, and click " properties. " Make sure you are in the shortcut tab . In the box labeled " target, " copy and paste this line: %windir%System32rundll32.exe user32.dll,LockWorkStation In the box labeled " Start in, " copy paste: %windir% To apply these changes click " apply. " Next you can change the icon. Just click the " change icon " button. If you're not already there hit the browse button and go to: C:WINDOWSsystem32shell32.dll You'll find a nice selection of icons there. Select an icon from the ones that appear in the box and click " ok. " Now move to the general tab . The box on the top contains the name of your icon. Change it to whatever you want. I used "Fun Game" in the hope that if someone comes to the computer and it is not locked that they will click this icon, locking the computer. (This actually worked once!) After you are finished, click " apply ," and then " ok. " To test your icon, double click it. You should be taken to something like a log on screen. Just enter the password to get back into windows, just as you left it too. This is different from actually logging off. Whenever you know you will be away for a while, just click that icon, and your computer will be safe. How to lock down on screen saver: Right click on your desktop in any empty space. Click " properties " in the menu that opens. Go to the screensaver tab. All you have to do now is click the box next to " On resume, password protect ." Click " apply, " and then " ok. " Let your screen saver run, and see what happens after you move your mouse. This is good in case you leave suddenly and forget to click the icon we made earlier. Unlike hibernation, this will allow other programs, such as Kazaa or iMesh, to run in the background. Cleaning up unwanted startup programs Windows XP : Cleaning up unwanted startup programs Many freeware and commercial software programs have a habit of setting themselves up to run automatically upon Windows startup. This can contribute to the gradual decline in startup speed that most Windows XP systems (and windows PCs in general) experience. Also, having programs that you only use selectively, or not at all, load automatically is a waste of system resources that could be better used for other things. To top it off, many internet nasties such as spyware programs, viruses and Trojan horses will install themselves into one of the automatic start locations on your system in order to make sure that they are run on startup. So the point is, take a look at what is currently running every time you load your PC, and disable what you don't need or can't identify. To do this: The first place you should go is 'startprogramsstartup' which is a directory Windows XP uses to launch application shortcuts on boot-up. If you remove the shortcuts from this directory, the applications will not load on startup. This directory can also be a repository for various badness such as spyware and virus software, so if there are files here which are not shortcuts and you don't recognize them, you may wish to consider removing them anyways, as Windows will not place critical files in this directory. The next location for removing unnecessary startup files is the handy MSCONFIG utility that has been resurrected from the graveyard of Windows 9x especially for XP. Go to 'startrun' and type 'msconfig' to access the utility. The 'startup' tab in MSCONFIG provides access to several other applications that are started at boot up and are running in the background. By examining their Filenames and directories, you should be able to get a feeling for what is necessary and what is not. Be aware than several viruses and worms have a habit of disguising themselves with authoritative sounding Windows system file names. The other method for removing these programs is through the programs themselves, as many applications, for example MSN messenger, contain the option to remove the software from startup. Tips : For More Efficient Google Searches 1. Either/or. Google normally searches for pages that contain all the words you type in the search box, but if you want pages that have one term or another (or both), use the OR operator — or use the “” symbol (pipe symbol) to save you a keystroke. [dumb little man] 2. Quotes. If you want to search for an exact phrase, use quotes. [”dumb little man”] will only find that exact phrase. [dumb “little man”] will find pages that contain the word dumb and the exact phrase “little man”. 3. Not. If you don’t want a term or phrase, use the “-” symbol. [-dumb little man] will return pages that contain “little” and “man” but that don’t contain “dumb”. 4. Similar terms. Use the “~” symbol to return similar terms. [~dumb little man -dumb] will get you pages that contain “funny little man” and “stupid little man” but not “dumb little man”. 5. Wildcard. The “*” symbol is a wildcard. This is useful if you’re trying to find the lyrics to a song, but can’t remember the exact lyrics. [can’t * me love lyrics] will return the Beatles song you’re looking for. It’s also useful for finding stuff only in certain domains, such as educational information: [”dumb little man” research *.edu]. 6. Advanced search. If you can’t remember any of these operators, you can always use Google’s advanced search. 7. Definitions. Use the “define:” operator to get a quick definition. [define:dumb] will give you a whole host of definitions from different sources, with links. 8. Calculator. One of the handiest uses of Google, type in a quick calculation in the search box and get an answer. It’s faster than calling up your computer’s calculator in most cases. Use the +, -, *, / symbols and parentheses to do a simple equation. 9. Numrange. This little-known feature searches for a range of numbers. For example, [”best books 2002..2007] will return lists of best books for each of the years from 2002 to 2007 (note the two periods between the two numbers). 10. Site-specific. Use the “site:” operator to search only within a certain website. [site:dumblittleman.com leo] will search for the term “leo” only within this blog. 11. Backlinks. The “link:” operator will find pages that link to a specific URL. You can use this not only for a main URL but even to a specific page. Not all links to an URL are listed, however. 12. Vertical search. Instead of searching for a term across all pages on the web, search within a specialized field. Google has a number of specific searches, allowing you to search within blogs, news, books, and much more: * Blog Search * Book Search * Scholar * Catalogs * Code Search * Directory * Finance * Images * Local/Maps * News * Patent Search * Product Search * Video 13. Movies. Use the “movie:” operator to search for a movie title along with either a zip code or U.S. city and state to get a list of movie theaters in the area and show times. 14. Music. The “music:” operator returns content related to music only. 15. Unit converter. Use Google for a quick conversion, from yards to meters for example, or different currency: [12 meters in yards] 16. Types of numbers: Google algorithms can recognize patterns in numbers you enter, so you can search for: * Telephone area codes * Vehicle ID number (US only) * Federal Communications Commission (FCC) equipment numbers (US only) * UPC codes * Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) airplane registration number (US only) * Patent numbers (US only) * Even stock quotes (using the stock symbol) or a weather forecast regarding the next five days 17. File types. If you just want to search for .PDF files, or Word documents, or Excel spreadsheets, for example, use the “filetype:” operator. 18. Location of term. By default, Google searches for your term throughout a web page. But if you just want it to search certain locations, you can use operators such as “inurl:”, “intitle:”, “intext:”, and “inanchor:”. Those search for a term only within the URL, the title, the body text, and the anchor text (the text used to describe a link). 19. Cached pages. Looking for a version of a page the Google stores on its own servers? This can help with outdated or update pages. Use the “cached:” operator. 20. Answer to life, the universe, and everything. Search for that phrase, in lower case, and Google will give you the answer. Windows XP File System NTFS - Faster, Secure, Stable : Microsoft.com To NTFS or not to NTFS—that is the question. But unlike the deeper questions of life, this one isn't really all that hard to answer. For most users running Windows XP, NTFS is the obvious choice. It's more powerful and offers security advantages not found in the other file systems. But let's go over the differences among the files systems so we're all clear about the choice. There are essentially three different file systems available in Windows XP: FAT16, short for File Allocation Table, FAT32, and NTFS, short for NT File System. FAT16 The FAT16 file system was introduced way back with MS–DOS in 1981, and it's showing its age. It was designed originally to handle files on a floppy drive, and has had minor modifications over the years so it can handle hard disks, and even file names longer than the original limitation of 8.3 characters, but it's still the lowest common denominator. The biggest advantage of FAT16 is that it is compatible across a wide variety of operating systems, including Windows 95/98/Me, OS/2, Linux, and some versions of UNIX. The biggest problem of FAT16 is that it has a fixed maximum number of clusters per partition, so as hard disks get bigger and bigger, the size of each cluster has to get larger. In a 2–GB partition, each cluster is 32 kilobytes, meaning that even the smallest file on the partition will take up 32 KB of space. FAT16 also doesn't support compression, encryption, or advanced security using access control lists. FAT32 The FAT32 file system, originally introduced in Windows 95 Service Pack 2, is really just an extension of the original FAT16 file system that provides for a much larger number of clusters per partition. As such, it greatly improves the overall disk utilization when compared to a FAT16 file system. However, FAT32 shares all of the other limitations of FAT16, and adds an important additional limitation—many operating systems that can recognize FAT16 will not work with FAT32—most notably Windows NT, but also Linux and UNIX as well. Now this isn't a problem if you're running FAT32 on a Windows XP computer and sharing your drive out to other computers on your network—they don't need to know (and generally don't really care) what your underlying file system is. The Advantages of NTFS The NTFS file system, introduced with first version of Windows NT, is a completely different file system from FAT. It provides for greatly increased security, file–by–file compression, quotas, and even encryption. It is the default file system for new installations of Windows XP, and if you're doing an upgrade from a previous version of Windows, you'll be asked if you want to convert your existing file systems to NTFS. Don't worry. If you've already upgraded to Windows XP and didn't do the conversion then, it's not a problem. You can convert FAT16 or FAT32 volumes to NTFS at any point. Just remember that you can't easily go back to FAT or FAT32 (without reformatting the drive or partition), not that I think you'll want to. The NTFS file system is generally not compatible with other operating systems installed on the same computer, nor is it available when you've booted a computer from a floppy disk. For this reason, many system administrators, myself included, used to recommend that users format at least a small partition at the beginning of their main hard disk as FAT. This partition provided a place to store emergency recovery tools or special drivers needed for reinstallation, and was a mechanism for digging yourself out of the hole you'd just dug into. But with the enhanced recovery abilities built into Windows XP (more on that in a future column), I don't think it's necessary or desirable to create that initial FAT partition. When to Use FAT or FAT32 If you're running more than one operating system on a single computer (see my earlier column Multibooting Made Easy), you will definitely need to format some of your volumes as FAT. Any programs or data that need to be accessed by more than one operating system on that computer should be stored on a FAT16 or possibly FAT32 volume. But keep in mind that you have no security for data on a FAT16 or FAT32 volume—any one with access to the computer can read, change, or even delete any file that is stored on a FAT16 or FAT32 partition. In many cases, this is even possible over a network. So do not store sensitive files on drives or partitions formatted with FAT file systems. Source And Credit Microsoft.com Many of us Dont know about RSS Feed. It is very useful and helpful key of SEO. Pleasea read below to know more about RSS Feed. RSS is a family of web feed formats used to publish frequently updated content such as blog entries, news headlines or podcasts. An RSS document, which is called a "feed," "web feed," or "channel," contains either a summary of content from an associated web site or the full text. RSS makes it possible for people to keep up with their favorite web sites in an automated manner that's easier than checking them manually. RSS content can be read using software called a "feed reader" or an "aggregator." The user subscribes to a feed by entering the feed's link into the reader or by clicking an RSS icon in a browser that initiates the subscription process. The reader checks the user's subscribed feeds regularly for new content, downloading any updates that it finds. The initials "RSS" are used to refer to the following formats: * Really Simple Syndication (RSS 2.0) * RDF Site Summary (RSS 1.0 and RSS 0.90) * Rich Site Summary (RSS 0.91) RSS formats are specified using XML, a generic specification for the creation of data Tips : To Setup a Virtual Private Network Steps Setting up a VPN in Windows is a two step process. 1. Set up one computer to share files (server). 2. Set up another computer to access them (client). Begin by setting up the server: 1. Open Internet Explorer and go to www.whatismyip.com. Write down the IP address. You will need it to configure the client. 2. Click the Start button and click Run. 3. Type control and hit Enter. 4. Click Network and Internet Connections. 5. Click Network Connections. 6. Click Create a New Connection, which is the first option on the left toolbar. 7. The New Connection Wizard will open. Click Next. 8. Choose Set up an advanced connection, the last element on the list. Click Next. 9. Choose Accept incoming connections. Click Next. 10. You will see the Devices for Incoming Connections screen. Do not select anything on this screen. Click Next. 11. Select Allow virtual private connections. Click Next. 12. Select to whom you want to give access. Click Next. If a user is not listed, you will have to add an account. See “Related Wikihows” for more information. 13. Do not change anything on the Networking Software screen. Click Next. 14. That’s it! Your computer is now set up to allow for VPNs. Click Finish to complete the wizard. Now proceed to connect the client: 1. Click the Start button and click Run. 2. Type control and hit Enter. 3. Click Network and Internet Connections. 4. Click Network Connections. 5. Click Create a New Connection, which is the first option on the left toolbar. 6. The New Connection Wizard will open. Click Next. 7. Select Connect to the network at my workplace and click Next. 8. Select Virtual Private Network connection and click Next. 9. Type the name of your network in the blank box. Click Next. 10. Enter the IP address you wrote down earlier and click Next. 11. Select Add a shortcut to this connection to my desktop and click Finish. Tips * Both computers must be connected to the internet. * The user name and password must be entered exactly as you saved them. * The IP address must be written exactly as listed on the screen. * If the VPN doesn’t work, turn off your firewall. Warnings * Do not give access to the “guest” account. It does not require a password, allowing anyone to access the VPN. Tips : To Fix Errors on Page After Updating IE7 Steps 1. Run the most recent version of javascript. 2. Adjust settings in the browser. 3. Click on tools in IE7. 4. Open Internet Options and click on security tab, then custom level. 5. Shut off the internet security controls while doing the security settings. * .NET Framework: enable all settings * ActiveX controls and plug-ins: * Previously used ActiveX controls: disable * Allow scriptlets, automatic prompting, Binary and script behaviors, Display video and animation on webpage: enable * Download signed ActiveX controls, download unsigned activeX controls, initialize and script activeX controls: Prompt * Run ActiveX controls and plug-ins (again), script ActiveX controls marked safe for scripting: Enable * Downloads: Automatic prompting for file downloads: Disable * Downloads: File download, font download: Enable * Enable .NET framework setup: Enable * Microsoft VM: Medium safety * Misc: access data sources across domains: Disable * Allow META refresh: Enable * Allow scripting of internet explorer web-browser control, allow script initiated windows without size or position: Disable * Allow webpages to use restricted protocols: Prompt * Allow websites to open windows without address or status bars: Disable * Display mixed content: Prompt * Don't prompt for client certificate selection: Disable * Drag and drop or copy and paste files, include local directory path: Enable * Install desktop items, launching applications and unsafe files, launching programs and files in iframe: Prompt * Navigate subframes across different domains: Disable * Open files based on content: enable * Software channel permissions: Medium * Submit nonencrypted data: Enable * Use phishing filter, use pop-up blocker: Disable * Userdata persistence, websites in less privileged content zone, Scripting: active scripting: Enable * Allow programtic clipboard access: Prompt * Allow status bar updates via script, allow websites to prompt for information: Disable * Scripting of java applets: Enable * Logon: Auto logon for intranet zone 6. After settings are adjusted, click OK. You will get IE WARNING message: Click Yes 7. Click on Advanced folder and go to bottom. 8. Click on Empty Internet Files. * Disable Phishing filter: Click Apply * For Tab settings: Click on General 9. Click on Settings under tabs (how webpages...). 10. Check off circles: Always open pop-ups in new tab and a new tab in the current window. 11. Click OK. 12. Close IE7 browser. 13. Right click on IE7 icon on desktop and click Start without add-ons. You will get warning: ignore 14. Close IE7 and repeat last step. Tips : To Configure DHCP in Your PC Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol (DHCP) is the configuration of your Internet Protocol (IP) address, subnet mask, DNS servers, domain name suffix and about 200 other possible options to let your computer communicate with a network automatically via a server or router. It sounds complicated, but once set up, it can make connecting to a network much easier. Steps 1. Log into Windows XP with administrator rights. This makes setting up the network for you, and other users, easier as you can make all the necessary changes to settings. 2. Look for the Network Neighborhood or My Network Places icon in your desktop. If it is not there, try your Start Menu. 3. Right-click the Network Neighborhood/My Network Places icon. A drop-down menu will appear. 4. Choose the "Properties" option, generally found at the bottom of the menu. 5. Look for an icon named "Local Area Connection". The icon looks like a pair of computer connected by a link. Double-click this icon. 6. Click the "General" tab, if it is not already selected. You will see a list of protocols to choose form. 7. Scroll down and choose Internet Protocol (TCP/IP), and then click the button that is labeled "Properties". 8. Again, click the "General" tab, it it is not alreay selected. You will see two choices: 1. "Obtain an IP address Automatically" 2. "Use the following IP address..." 9. Choose option 1. 10. You have effectively configured DHCP for your PC. When your computer obtains the IP address, it will also obtain DNS server information automatically. This is provided by your dhcp server. Tips * Make sure your NIC (Network Card)is working properly. * Make sure you are connected directly to a router, switch or hub. * Make sure the Link light is on. (small green light where the cable plugs into the computer) * If you are connected to a LAN, make sure that you have a router that will give addresses away, since the address will be obtained by the PC from the router. * If you have a Server on the LAN such as Windows 2000 or 2003, make sure the server is configured DHCP enabled as well. Tips : To Connect Two Computers Steps 1. Connect the two computers together either with a Crossover cable or a Hub/Switch to the ethernet card in your computer. 2. Set the IP address on both computers. Goto Start > Control Panel > Network Connections (choose switch to classic view if you cannot see network connections) 3. Look for your Local Area Connection ethernet adapter, right-click and choose properties. 4. Select Internet Protocol TCP/IP and choose properties. 5. Setup the IP as 192.168.1.1 and the subnet mask of 255.255.255.0 on the first computer and 192.168.1.2 on the second with the same subnet mask. 6. Choose OK then OK/close again. Tips * To share your files, right click on any folder and choose Sharing to make them shared. * You can also do this with your printers to be able to print from one computer while the printer is connected to the other. Things You'll Need * A Crossover cable. This a Cat5 Ethernet Cable that the wires have been switched around to allow two computer only to talk to each other * OR, you can purchase a switch/hub with two Standard "Straight-Through" Ethernet Cables * Check to see if your computer has an Ethernet Adapter in the back of the computer. Most new computers have this. You can tell by the documentation from the computer or by looking at the back of the computer. It looks like a phone jack, but larger. This Will Help you to share files and folders, printers, play network games, Etc Tips : To Install RAM These instructions will assist you in installing memory (RAM) into your computer. Steps 1. Find out what type of RAM is required for your computer. 2. Find out how much of that type of RAM your computer can take. 3. Purchase RAM online; it's much cheaper. 4. Open your computer case (this may require a screw driver; usually a Phillips-Head.) 5. Once you have the case open, you need to locate the RAM slots on your motherboard. Most RAM slots are located on the top of the motherboard, on the right-hand side. You should see something in the computer that is similar to what you bought at the store. 6. Push the clamps OPEN to release the memory (if there is RAM already in there, which there may or may not be, depending on whether you're building a computer or altering an existing one). Remove old memory. 7. Look at the new memory and survey the motherboard memory slots. They should have a notch in each memory slot. 8. Line the notch on the motherboard up with the notch on the new memory. 9. Press gently but firmly until claps close completely. Once you have done this, the memory should be installed correctly. 10. Turn on the computer. 11. Once you have successfully booted the system, turn the machine off again and put the side panel back on the computer. 12. VOILA! You have just installed new RAM. Tips * If you are getting a beep when you turn on the computer, you have either installed an incorrect memory type, or you have installed the memory incorrectly. If this is a computer that you purchased at a store, you should contact the store or the manufacturer of the computer to find out what the beep code means. * If you hear anything other than a single beep lasting one second, check your motherboards' documentation for an explanation of beep codes. Beep codes are a warning system when one or more components fails the POST (Power On Self Test), and is usually due to malfunctioning or incompatible hardware. * If you are adding more RAM (not replacing), make sure there are enough RAM slots. Often you need to buy the exact same RAM as you currently have. Also, having a pair of 512MB is often cheaper than replacing a 512MB with a 1024MB. * A good website to use is the crucial memory website http://www.crucial.com/ as they have a memory advisor tool which tells you how much and what type of ram your computer takes . you can also buy memory from here Warnings * These instructions are for Desktop computers, not Laptops. * Make sure to discharge any possible static buildup before touching RAM; it is extremely sensitive to ESD (Electro-Static Discharge). Do this by touching something metal before touching your computer Tips : To assign a Static IP Address To Your Network To assign a Static IP Address to your network connection follow these steps: 1. Open Network Connections 2. Right click the connection you wish to assign a Static Address to and choose Properties. 3. In the Properties box that comes up select "Internet Protocol TCP/IP" and click the Properties button beneath. 4. In Internet Protocol TCP/IP Properties place a dot in "Use the following IP Address". 5. Enter the IP address you wish to use and OK the change. Click OK on Local Area Connection Properties. 6. Reboot Tips : Allow more than 2 simultaneous downloads in IE 6 This is to increase the the number of max downloads to 10. 1. Start Registry Editor (Regedt32.exe). 2. Locate the following key in the registry: HKEY_CURRENT_USERSoftwareMicrosoftWindowsCurrentVersionInternet Settings 3. On the Edit menu, click Add Value (a dword) , and then add the following registry values: "MaxConnectionsPer1_0Server"=Dword:0000000a "MaxConnectionsPerServer"=Dword:0000000a 4. Quit Registry Editor. Tips : To Make Menus Load Faster Go to Start >>Run Type 'Regedit' then click 'Ok' Find "HKEY_CURRENT_USERControl PanelDesktop" Select "MenuShowDelay" Right click and select "Modify' Reduce the number to around "100" This is the delay time before a menu is opened. You can set it to "0" but it can make windows really hard to use as menus will open if you just look at them - well move your mouse over them anyway. Tips: To Change Internet Explorer Title How to change the Internet Explorer tiltle? 1. start ->run-> gpedit.msc 2. choose User Configuration, Windows Settings, Internet Explorer Maintainance, Browser User Interface, and doubleclick Browser Title. 3. Activate Customize Title Bars, and type something in there. Doesn't matter what. Let's type: QWERTY. Click Okay. 4. Fire up Reg editor. (start, run, regedit) 5. goto HKEY_CURRENT_USERSoftwareMicrosoftInternet ExplorerMain. 6. Look for the key: Window Title. There you'll find the value: Microsoft Internet Explorer provided bt QWERTY. 7. Change this key to anythig you like and exit regedit. 8. Fire up IE and look at the titlebar! suppl: WinXP security: If you don't do steps 1 to 3, you won't find the Window Title key! Tips: To Change Browser Toolbar Background Change Browser Toolbar Background This tweak Customize the apperance of the Internet Explorer Toolbar 1. Click Start > Run > Type gpedit.msc 2. Click User Configuration > Windows Setting > Internet Explorer Maintenance > Browser User Interface 3. Double click on Browser Toolbar Customization 4. Click on Customize Toolbar Background Bitmap 5. Browse for the new Background Note: Because you can customize your browser toolbar there isn't a specific size which you need to make this tweak work. Play around with the size until you get it right. The Width of your toolbar with be the width of your resolution. 1024 will be your width if your resolution is 1024x768. Now you changed the Toolbar Background of your browser and you sure see what you wrote when you open a New Widow. Enabling USB 2.0 Support For INTEL Boards Desktop Boards Enabling USB 2.0 Support The Intel® Desktop Boards listed below are enabled to support USB 2.0 peripherals. The operating system must support USB 2.0 in order to achieve USB 2.0 performance. If your operating system does not support USB 2.0, your USB 2.0 peripheral will only operate at USB 1.1 (12Mbit) speeds. USB 2.0 Supported Operating Systems Microsoft* Windows* XP (all editions) Microsoft* Windows* 2000 (be sure to have latest Service Pack installed) Microsoft Windows 98SE Microsoft Windows Me To Enable USB 2.0: Reboot (or power on) system. Press "F2" during POST (Power-on Self Test) to enter system BIOS setup program. Select "ADVANCED" menu using arrow (left and right) keys. Select "USB Configuration" and press . Enable "High-speed USB". Press "F10" to Save & Exit BIOS setup program. ( Hi-Speed USB 2.0 controllers are now enabled and your operating system should detect New Hardware during the next normal boot cycle. Cancel "New Hardware Found". For additional BIOS Setup program configuration information, be sure to refer to the Technical Product Specification for your Intel Desktop Board. If you do not have an operating system that supports USB 2.0, the recommendation is to disable the feature in the System BIOS Setup program. Tips : Remove "unremovable" Desktop Icons Please do the Below Step carefully as it is very dangerious to mess around in. Please Note there is no Edit>Undo. If you make a mistake it could mean you'll be reinstalling your OS! Remove "unremovable" Desktop Icons 1. Run Regedit by going to Start>Run and typing "Regedit" 2. Go to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESOFTWAREMcftWindowsCurrentVersionExplorerDesktopNameSpace For some reason the word M i c r o s o f t is shortened to Mcft 3. Here you will see a list of various icons. They are not listed by name but by CLSID. 4. To remove an icon from your desktop, simply delete the key and hit F5 to refresh your desktop. {645FF040-5081-101B-9F08-00AA002F954E} - Recycle Bin. {20D04FE0-3AEA-1069-A2D8-08002B30309D} - My Computer. {208D2C60-3AEA-1069-A2D7-08002B30309D} - My Network Places. WARNING: Regedit has no mercy. It is very dangerious to mess around in. Note there is no Edit>Undo. If you make a mistake it could mean you'll be reinstalling your OS! Tips : Reduce Size Of Windows Folder There are many reasons for making your windows folder smaller, first it saves space and removes windows features you will probably never use that are just slowing down your computer. What can you delete? That is what this article is about, I will explain everything I know is safe to delete, and what happens if you do! Will this really improve the speed of my system? I don’t have any results to prove it, but I think it does improve boot time a little, and after a clean install, it does seem to make the system slightly faster after deleting these things. Final notes: This has been tested on Windows XP Pro Final and SP1 (Not home, but it should work fine) Windows 2003 Enterprise Server 3700, RTM, and The Free Evaluation version (Any 2k3 version should work fine), and Windows 2000 Pro. If the following folders are not on your 2k/2k3 system it means they are only in XP and you don’t need to worry about them. If for some reason you can not delete a folder, just delete the files inside, I tried to make not of the folders that cant be deleted, but depending on your system and if you use FAT32 or NTFS it may be different. All of the paths listed in there are C:Windows and C:Program Files, if your folders have different names (Like C:WINNT on windows 2k) then you should use that path instead. Well, lets get started deleting, these start out ordered from largest to smallest, but after the first few files they are all fairly small, and are just in a random order. 1. c:windowssystem32dllcache NOTE: DON’T DELETE THIS FOLDER, JUST ALL THE FILES INSIDE! This folder uses a LOT of hard drive space, it holds a backup of every system file that windows uses. Deleting this will cause a SFC error when you replace a system file instead of windows putting back the original file. For people who want to mod there system, this is a good thing. 2. c:windowsservicepackfilesi386 NOTE: DON’T DELETE THIS FOLDER, JUST ALL THE FILES INSIDE! This folder only exists if you installed a service pack on XP, if you did a slipstream it won’t be here either. This folder is the same as the dllcache, but has the new files that were updated by a service pack. If you delete the dllcache, deleting this is just like finishing the job. 3. c:windows$Uninstall----$ These $uninstall----$ folders are used whenever you want to uninstall a windows update. If you delete them, you can not uninstall the update(s), but if the updates are working fine for you, there should be now reason to remove them. 4. c:windowscursors This folder contains some custom cursers for windows, if you are happy with the default cursers, or use your own set like Blue Curve, then deleting this wont effect you at all. 5. c:windowsdriver cachei386 NOTE: DON’T DELETE THIS FOLDER, JUST ALL THE FILES INSIDE! This is one you may not want to delete, this takes up a bit of space (about 80mb) but windows uses if you ever add or remove windows components and things like printer drivers. If you’re your hardware is already working fine, you don’t need this folder on your hard drive. For example, if you delete this folder, and try to install IIS, windows will ask for the CD or Network share with the files on it, if you don’t need to add or remove windows components often, deleting this will free up some space for you. 6. c:windowshelp NOTE: DON’T DELETE THIS FOLDER, JUST ALL THE FILES IN SIDE! This folder contains all of the windows help files. If you are like me, and think they having 50mb of help files is a waste, then you probably want to delete it. If you delete this folder and try to view a help file, the Help and Support center will come up with a 404 error. No harm is done, you just can’t view the help files (because you deleted them…). There is also a tours folder inside of the help folder, you can delete everything in this folder also, but windows won’t let you remove the actual folder. 7. c:windowsinf NOTE: DON’T DELETE THIS FOLDER, JUST ALL THE FILES INSIDE! This folder contains a lot of windows drivers, if you ever add new hardware, windows looks in this folder, then on your CD drive for the latest drivers. Any hardware you might get will probably come with the drivers on a disk, so this folder is just a wasting space on your hard drive with outdated drivers. If all of your hardware is working fine, and you don’t plan on adding any new hardware for a while, deleting this wont effect your system at all. If you don’t want to delete everything in it, you can go into the folder, press CRTL+F and search for mdm*.* and delete everything that comes up. These are all modem drivers, and it is very unlikely you will ever need them because you either have a modem installed already, or if you do add one, it will come with newer drivers. 8. c:windowssrchasst This folder is the XP Search assistant, if you delete it, windows will just use the classic 2k style search instead, which is more functional and easier to use. 9. c:windowsdownloaded installations This folder holds the installers for some programs you download and install, for example, Tweak UI puts its installer in this folder, and so you can repair it or update its components later. Deleting this folder won’t harm any programs I have ever seen, but you should look inside this and see what you are deleting first. 10. c:windowsmedia These are the default windows sounds, if you don’t want them, deleting them wont hurt anything. 11. c:windowssystem32restore This is the system restore apps, if you delete this, system restore will no longer work. Before you delete this, you should go into System Restore, and delete all your restore points, and then you should go to the system properties and disable system restore. After that, you can delete this folder, and not worry about system restore slowing down your system or sucking up space. 12. c:windowssystem32usmt This folder is the File and Settings Transfer wizard. If you have no need for it, then deleting this wont have any other effects besides the File and Settings Transfer wizard not working anymore. 13 A. c:program filesmsn 13 B. c:program filesnetmeeting These are the MSN Explorer and Net Meeting applications. If you don’t need or use them, then you can delete these folders (For net meeting, you can only delete the files inside) and the only thing it will effect is that these programs will know longer work. 14. C:windowssystem32oobe NOTE: DON’T DELETE THIS FOLDER, JUST ALL THE FILES INSIDE! In this folder is the Out of Box Experience (The screens you see right after you have installed XP for the first time), and the XP Product Activation stuff. If you have a Retail or OEM version of XP, and you think you might ever need to activate again, DON’T DELETE THIS. So unless you are using XP or 2k3 CORP, you may still need this folder someday. 15. c:windowsmsagent This folder holds the MS Agent program. The MS Agent is a gay little wizard thing that looks like the Office Assistant, I personally hate this thing, and removing it will get rid of it for good! If windows wont let you remove the folder, just delete everything inside of it, and everything inside of the intl folder. 16. c:windowsjava This is the crappy MS Java components that don’t work well, and MS got sued over. If you have Windows XP slipstreamed with SP1a you wont have this because MS no longer distributes it. If you use websites that use Java Applets, you should keep this, or remove it and install Suns Java VM. 17. c:windowsmui This is a little app that allows you to switch between multiple languages, if you only use one language, then deleting this wont effect you at all. NOTE: I think this folder only exists on XP Pro because Home Edition doesn’t support multiple languages. Post Deletion: After you have deleted everything you want to, I recommend you run the Regisrty Cleaner.This will remove all the references to things you deleted so a window doesn’t look for the files any more. If you delete the Java Folder, RegCleaner will find at least 50 reg entries related to it, and can remove them for you if you want. What else can I do to make the windows folder smaller? If you want to make your windows folder even smaller, and you use NTFS, you can use NTFS compression to make the windows folder smaller. Although you can compress everything it, compressing EXEs and DLL files will make you system a little bit slower, so I recommend compressing everything BUT EXE and DLL files. Using this guide, you should easily be able to make your windows folder less then 1gb, but because some programs add there own files to the windows dir, your results may differ from what other people have gotten there folder sizes to. After a clean install, it is fairly easy to get your windows folder less then 700mb so you can put a image file of your clean install on one CD and be able to restore it easily. Tips : Bios Ripped, useful Tips on BIOS As you can see there are various ways on bypassing/changing BIOS passwords. I have successfully used all of the options below on various computers many years ago. These methods will work on computers of today. I have updated the Standard BIOS backdoor passwords for current computers made as of last week. ( big grin ). READ EVEYTHING BEFORE YOU USE ANY METHOD LISTED BELOW. Basic BIOS password crack - works 9.9 times out of ten This is a password hack but it clears the BIOS such that the next time you start the PC, the CMOS does not ask for any password. Now if you are able to bring the DOS prompt up, then you will be able to change the BIOS setting to the default. To clear the CMOS do the following: Get DOS prompt and type: DEBUG hit enter -o 70 2e hit enter -o 71 ff hit enter -q hit enter exit hit enter Restart the computer. It works on most versions of the AWARD BIOS. Accessing information on the hard disk When you turn on the host machine, enter the CMOS setup menu (usually you have to press F2, or DEL, or CTRL+ALT+S during the boot sequence) and go to STANDARD CMOS SETUP, and set the channel to which you have put the hard disk as TYPE=Auto, MODE=AUTO, then SAVE & EXIT SETUP. Now you have access to the hard disk. Standard BIOS backdoor passwords The first, less invasive, attempt to bypass a BIOS password is to try on of these standard manufacturer's backdoor passwords: AWARD BIOS AWARD SW, AWARD_SW, Award SW, AWARD PW, _award, awkward, J64, j256, j262, j332, j322, 01322222, 589589, 589721, 595595, 598598, HLT, SER, SKY_FOX, aLLy, aLLY, Condo, CONCAT, TTPTHA, aPAf, HLT, KDD, ZBAAACA, ZAAADA, ZJAAADC, djonet, %шесть пpобелов%, %девять пpобелов% AMI BIOS AMI, A.M.I., AMI SW, AMI_SW, BIOS, PASSWORD, HEWITT RAND, Oder Other passwords you may try (for AMI/AWARD or other BIOSes) LKWPETER, lkwpeter, BIOSTAR, biostar, BIOSSTAR, biosstar, ALFAROME, Syxz, Wodj Note that the key associated to "_" in the US keyboard corresponds to "?" in some European keyboards (such as Italian and German ones), so -- for example -- you should type AWARD?SW when using those keyboards. Also remember that passwords are Case Sensitive. The last two passwords in the AWARD BIOS list are in Russian. Flashing BIOS via software If you have access to the computer when it's turned on, you could try one of those programs that remove the password from the BIOS, by invalidating its memory. However, it might happen you don't have one of those programs when you have access to the computer, so you'd better learn how to do manually what they do. You can reset the BIOS to its default values using the MS-DOS tool DEBUG (type DEBUG at the command prompt. You'd better do it in pure MS-DOS mode, not from a MS-DOS shell window in Windows). Once you are in the debug environment enter the following commands: AMI/AWARD BIOS O 70 17 O 71 17 Q PHOENIX BIOS O 70 FF O 71 17 Q GENERIC Invalidates CMOS RAM. Should work on all AT motherboards (XT motherboards don't have CMOS) O 70 2E O 71 FF Q Note that the first letter is a "O" not the number "0". The numbers which follow are two bytes in hex format. Flashing BIOS via hardware If you can't access the computer when it's on, and the standard backdoor passwords didn't work, you'll have to flash the BIOS via hardware. Please read the important notes at the end of this section before to try any of these methods. Using the jumpers The canonical way to flash the BIOS via hardware is to plug, unplug, or switch a jumper on the motherboard (for "switching a jumper" I mean that you find a jumper that joins the central pin and a side pin of a group of three pins, you should then unplug the jumper and then plug it to the central pin and to the pin on the opposite side, so if the jumper is normally on position 1-2, you have to put it on position 2-3, or vice versa). This jumper is not always located near to the BIOS, but could be anywhere on the motherboard. Tips: Cleaning the TEMP Directory One thing that is often overlooked, and can have a negative affect on your computer's performance, are all the files that are in the TEMP directory. I've had quite a few people ready to get new computers until this was cleaned. These are easy to clean and slightly different in Win9x and Windows2000 or WindowsXP Windows98 Open up a DOS prompt CD windowstemp (make sure you are in that directory before running the next line. Run deltree /y *.* CD windows Run del *.tmp (be very careful of the spelling) Windows2000 / WindowsXP Go to C:Documents and SettingsUser_NameLocal SettingsTemp (where User_Name is replaced by the person who is logged in) Delete all the files Tips : Change The Start Button Name 1. Navigate to your windows or winnt directory. 2. Make a copy of explorer.exe put it somewhere safe. make another copy name it explorer1.exe, put it in the windows directory. 3. Download a version of a Hex editor on a freeware site. 4. Open up explorer1.exe in the Hex editor . 5. Search for strings named Start 6. Heres some help with the offsets: # Windows 98 Offset: 0x00028D6E - 0x00028D76 # Windows NT4 Offset: 0x00028BEE - 0x00028BF6 # Windows ME Offset: 0x00033DDE - 0x00033DE6 # Windows 2000 Offset: 0x0003860E - 0x00038616 # Windows XP (Enhanced Start Menu) Offset: 0x000412B6 - 0x000412BE # Windows XP (Classic Start Menu) Offset: 0x0004158A - 0x00041592 # Windows XP SP1 (Enhanced Start Menu) Offset: 0x0004208E - 0x00042096 # Windows XP SP1 (Classic Start Menu) Offset: 0x0004259A - 0x000425A2 start will be just before this: There was an internal error and one of the windows you were using has been closed.". now rename start to another five letter word of your choice like Help save the modified explorer1.exe open up regedit, you are looking for this key: [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESOFTWAREMicrosoftWindows NTCurrentVersionWinlogon] search for the value named Shell and make it equal to explorer1.exe. restart for changes to take place. alternatively, close all apps, fire up task manager and end the process explorer.exe, start new traske explorer1.exe and there you go. if PC dont boot, slave off , navigate to your windows delete explorer1.exe and rename explorer.exe to explorer1.exe, plug back into your PC and there you go back to normal, i assure you it works great!   Tips And Tricks: PC Upgrade Tired of your out dated personal computer configuration? Think your computer is no good anymore? With the price of the personal computers having hit rock bottom in the past couple of years, one can't help but think of getting the latest replacement. Also, with the extensive promises that chip manufacturers, video card designers and peripheral manufacturers make these days, your computer might seem far outdated than it actually is for your needs. However, before you jump to any conclusions, here are a few questions you need to answer first. ~ How long ago did you buy your machine? ~ What do you use your computer for? ~ Where exactly does it fall short? Read on to understand the kind of performance an average computer user actually needs from his machine.Then evaluate if you really need an upgrade. Hard drives There isn't much to choosing or upgrading a hard drive. When you fall short of storage on your machine, which is sooner rather than later, just get a new 160 or 300 GB disk. Go for companies like Seagate, Western Digital or Hitachi since they have well-established dealer networks in most Indian metros. A 300 GB, 7500 rpm hard disk should cost you between Rs 4,400 -- 4,700. Once bought, just complete the formality of partitioning it to facilitate storage of programme files. Motherboard Look at the right reasons before upgrading your motherboard. One of the primary reasons for the upgrade could be the fact that you want a more responsive, faster central processing unit, CPU. Perhaps your present motherboard needs a new socket, or does not adequately support the speed. In case of an upgrade, go for a motherboard with integrated sound, video, network and modem. This will free up quite a few slots to help you upgrade to perhaps a, 8X AGP adapter. Remember that upgrading your motherboard is quite pointless unless you simultaneously upgrade your CPU and random access memory, RAM, too. Upgrading your AGP card or getting PCI Express means an additional expense on a DDR2. Once you reach the point where the only old components on your machine are the drives and the peripherals, seriously consider getting a new machine. CPU Let's get it clear what a CPU upgrade practically means: * Your motherboard has to support it first, and it needs to be at least 40-50 per cent faster than your earlier CPU for you to even notice the difference. * The memory and hard drive will be running at an unchanged speed. * A CPU upgrade means more on-chip cache, and faster command execution. A CPU upgrade makes a lot of sense if you manage to get a substantial upgrade in the chipset and the CPU at under Rs 3,000. Also socket compatibility and compatible chip set models are factors you should ascertain prior to upgradation. RAM This is the best value for your buck as far as improving performance is concerned. Anything under 256 MB surely needs an upgrade. Most softwares and applications today struggle to run smoothly on machines with 128 MB RAM, say for example running Windows XP. Upgrade over 256 MB at your own discretion in case of usage of heavy applications like graphics-heavy games, animation software or speech recognition. It is recommended to replace your entire RAM with the new one at the time of the upgrading. Do not upgrade just the required additional RAM over your old one. It leads to complications, and quite simply for the marginal cost difference, it's not worth the trouble. CD ROMs Some points to remember: * Faster CD or DVD drives do not affect any application or program that you run. So whether the player is a 16X or a really old 2X, there isn't much to gain with a faster drive. * Choose to go for a DVD burner upgrade over a CD burner. The cost difference is negligible for the advantages. * Check for software compatibility with the drive upgrade as that is the area of highest concern while upgrading. * Upgrading from an existing burner to a faster burner is pointless, unless you plan to burn CDs or DVDs for commercial purposes in large quantities. Video card An AGP adapter or a top-end PCI Express can cost you more than your entire machine at times. Similarly, a Rs 25,000 video card in a Rs 20,000 machine will not make your machine gain much performance edge, besides bettering the 3D effect a little bit. If you are into hard-core gaming, make sure that you have an AGP slot and not onboard video before you go for an expensive video card upgrade. Sound card Keep a few pointers in mind: * There is no 'ultimate' sound system. It depends whether you want your speakers to produce 3D surround effect for games or a home theater effect or rather take the place of your music system. Choosing a sound system is one of the most subjective calls you could take among all hardware choices for your computer. * For 3D surround sound in games, first check if you have a 3D sound card installed before installing the four speakers. It is the card that actually gets you to hear enemies closing up on you from behind, not the number of speakers. * If you are simply interested in recording music, go for a sound card with a good A/D conversion. Choose a top shelf card if you want to compose music on your machine. * Dolby Surround Sound is the same as 3D surround, and usually most motherboards support 6 channel speakers (5.1 audio) that come with a sub-woofer. If the cost of an upgrade exceeds Rs 15,000, don't even consider an upgrade; go for a new machine. If the cost for upgrading is between Rs 10,000 to Rs 15,000, take a call on how old your machine is. If it exceeds 3 years, you might consider buying a new one. Don't upgrade your machine in a hurry. Understand and list your needs of a computer. Check your current system configuration and check if you are really falling short of an upgrade. Most times, upgrading your machine might not be worth it in terms of time and efforts required, since new ones cost so little. Keep in mind that system crashes and software failures might just mean you need to clear some memory space, curb a few applications or defrag your machine; not that your machine is 'out-dated' for your needs. Note ~ Basic hardware requirements have been addressed in the article. ~ Prices are subject to fluctuation across markets. ~ The article does not endorse any brand/ brands of hardware or computers. Tricks : Some Windows Short Cut Keys Some Windows Short Cut Keys task manager shortcut --> ctrl + shift + Esc. ctrl + shift + clicking on hyperlink - opens page in new window (works in firefox too!) ctrl + click a file and then draging it creates a copy of that file. Windows key + e Opens Windows Explorer Refresh webpage - Ctrl + R Windows key + e Opens Windows Explorer ctrl + shift + click a file and then draging it creates a shortcut of that file. Alt + F4 close the window currently being used or If no windows are open then it brings you to a shut down screen windows key + m minimizes all windows windows key + f open the search window windows key + L locks your station F9-Volume Up F10-Volume Down windows key + pause/break key opens up system properties. if multiple windows are opened: alt + tab - will show the next page under the currently viewed one Tips : To Configure DHCP In Your PC Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol (DHCP) is the configuration of your Internet Protocol (IP) address, subnet mask, DNS servers, domain name suffix and about 200 other possible options to let your computer communicate with a network automatically via a server or router. It sounds complicated, but once set up, it can make connecting to a network much easier. Steps Log into Windows XP with administrator rights. This makes setting up the network for you, and other users, easier as you can make all the necessary changes to settings. Look for the Network Neighborhood or My Network Places icon in your desktop. If it is not there, try your Start Menu. Right-click the Network Neighborhood/ My Network Places icon. A drop-down menu will appear. Choose the "Properties" option, generally found at the bottom of the menu. Look for an icon named "Local Area Connection". The icon looks like a pair of computer connected by a link. Double-click this icon. Click the "General" tab, if it is not already selected. You will see a list of protocols to choose form. Scroll down and choose Internet Protocol (TCP/IP), and then click the button that is labeled "Properties" . Again, click the "General" tab, it it is not alreay selected. You will see two choices: "Obtain an IP address Automatically" "Use the following IP address..." Choose option 1. You have effectively configured DHCP for your PC. When your computer obtains the IP address, it will also obtain DNS server information automatically. This is provided by your dhcp server. Tips Make sure your NIC (Network Card)is working properly. Make sure you are connected directly to a router, switch or hub. Make sure the Link light is on. (small green light where the cable plugs into the computer) If you are connected to a LAN, make sure that you have a router that will give addresses away, since the address will be obtained by the PC from the router. If you have a Server on the LAN such as Windows 2000 or 2003, make sure the server is configured DHCP enabled as well. Tips: Set Your Favourite Video As Wallpaper Tips And Tricks to Set your favourite video as Wallpaper Just follow the steps given below: 1.Download VLC Media Player and install it. 2.Run VLC media player,go to Settings->preferences->Interface->Main interfaces,then click on wxWidgets.Remove the tick on "Taskbar" and put a tick on "Systray icon". 3.Now go to Video->Output Modules->DirectX.On the bottom right put a tick on advanced options check box.You will now see some options.Put a tick on "Enable Wallpaper Mode ". 4.Now,select playlist and put a check or tick on "Repeat current item ". 5.Press the Save button.Now close the Vlc player and run it again(to save the settings permanently). 6.Now play any video you would like to set as Wallpaper.Right click on the video and click on "Wallpaper".The video would be set as your wallpaper!!!! Since you have checked the option "repeat current item ",the selected video will play on continuously.It will start again when finished.VLC player will remain in your system tray.If you wish to remove the wallpaper simply close the player and you will get back your original wallpaper. Tips : To Make Free Pc to Phone Calls Anywhere in the World Most of us have been using voice chat in messengers for very long.It is indeed an excellent way of talking to your friends and relatives for free.But obviously the better option would be if we could make Free Pc to Phone calls. There is this site called Gizmocall where you can register for free. After free registration you can make 10 minutes of Free Pc to phone calls anywhere in the world to most landlines and mobiles.And the nice part about it is that You get 10 minutes of Free Calling Everyday, not just once.After you register you just have to download a flash plugin and you are ready to make free calls. But there is one restriction as well, the maximum call duration can be only 3 min/call. The voice clarity is very good.You just need a microphone to make your calls. Tips: To Find Who Is Invisible On Yahoo Messenger Sometimes some of your friends who appear offline in yahoo messenger may not be actually offline,they may in the 'Invisible' mode.This maybe if they are trying to ignore you or are too busy to talk to anyone. There is this small trick that you can use to find out what the truth is. Firstly open your yahoo messenger main window and double click on the name of the person whom you want to check.The chat window will open obviously. Click IMVironment button, select See all IMVironments, select Yahoo! Tools or Interactive Fun, and click on Doodle. After loading the Doodle imvironment there can be two possibilities 1.If the user is offline Doodle are will show this "waiting for your friend to load Doodle" continuously .See in the picture below:     2. If the user is online (but in invisible mode), after few seconds (it can take up to one minute, depending on your connection speed), you should get a blank page like in the picture below.So you know that the user is online.   Alternate Method: Chose a person you want to check .Double click to open the chat window.Now simply invite the person for a voice conference.This is done by clicking on the "conference' button on the top of the chat window. If the talk button appears and turns green then that person is online.But if you receive the message 'Voice chat could not be started ' then the person is offline. Note:Some people use softwares like buddy spy to check who is invisible.I DONT RECOMMEND you to use such third party softwares as they can expose your Pc to hackers by sending your personal information and can even steal information from your Pc.So avoid such softwares and instead use the simple tricks given above. If you have any queries or would like to make some useful contribution to this topic feel free to drop a line in the comments section. Posted by Master Key at 6:27 AM 0 comments Labels: Tips: To Find Who Is Invisible On Yahoo Messenger Rescue Windows 98/2000/XP Rescue Windows With new viruses on the prowl and uncertainty about OS stability, creating a rescue startup disk for your system can prove to be a lifesaver. But how does one create a startup disk under various flavors of Windows? Windows 98 Go to Start>Settings>Control Panel and select Add/Remove Programs. Select the startup disk tab and then press the Create disk button. When prompted for a floppy, insert one and click Ok’ This startup disk contains DOS utilities that let you scan your hard drive, copy system files, formatting your system and use the CD-ROM drive. Windows 2000 The rescue disk here is known as ERD (Emergency Repair Disk). For creating an ERD, go to Start>Programs>Accessories>System tools>Backup. From the Tools menu, choose Create an Emergency Repair Disk option. When prompted, insert a formatted floppy disk into the drive and press the Ok button. You can also choose to backup registry files through this wizard but the registry files are saved in a folder called Repair in your system root directory instead of the floppy disk. Windows XP Here the rescue disk is called ASR (Automated System Recovery) disk. This disk can only be created when you take a back up of your system files. For the same, go to Start>Programs>Accessories>System tools>Backup. From the Tools menu, select the ASR wizard and take a back up of the files. You can create a disk for starting up the system in MS-DOS mode by right clicking on the floppy disk icon, selecting the format option and then checking Create a Disk to start in MS_DOS only option. While using rescue disks, remember that if your system crashes, you will also need to have the Windows installation CD for complete recovery of your OS. The default installation of Windows XP Prof/Home Edition starts many services in the background, which you could do without, as they eat up a significant amount of your system RAM. Depending upon your hardware, the default installation runs about 30 to 35 services in the background. If you want to optimize XP purely for gaming, then you just need to enable 7 of these services and disable the rest. In addition to this, you also need to do a few other things to optimize XP. Let’s look at them one by one. Right click My Computer and select properties. Click on the Advanced tab, and from the performance option, click the settings button. This will open a performance window. Select the Adjust for best performance radio button and click OK. Remove everything from the task bar, such as clock, sound, etc. Disable all programs that automatically start when the system boots up, such as messenger, other system tools. To do this, run msconfig from Start Menu>Run. Select the Start Up tab to see which programs load during system startup. Uncheck all the check boxes here. Posted by Master Key at 6:26 AM 0 comments Labels: Rescue Windows 98/2000/XP Difference Between A Virus, Trojan, And Worm Basically, they all fall under the generally category of "viruses". However, there are a few distinctions. Virus - Technically, a virus infects another file (attaches or inserts itself into it). They usually infect program files or MS Office documents. From there, it can replicate, do damage, etc. Unlike a worm, these do not function as a stand alone (except possibly to infect a given file). Worm - This is almost identical to a "true virus", except that it lives on its own and generally doesn't infect other files (although it can replace them). Usually, these copy themselves using e-mail, networks, disks, etc. Again, these are very close to a true virus, and can do the same kind of damage. Trojan Horse - This type of program doesn't copy itself but does do damage to your computer. These types of programs rely on people to pass them around and to run them. They do not e-mail themselves. The idea is to make the program look like it's something harmless, like a screen saver or joke, so it gets sent around. That's the crash course on virus types. Bottom line, you don't want any of the little nastys on your computer! Posted by Master Key at 6:25 AM 0 comments Labels: And Worm, Difference Between A Virus, Trojan Tips : To Quit Printing The Page Header And Footer In Notepad Here's how to quit printing the page header and footer in Notepad: 1. Open Notepad. 2. Click File and select Page Setup. 3. Clear the textboxes for both Header and Footer. 4. Click OK Posted by Master Key at 6:18 AM 0 comments Labels: Tips : To Quit Printing The Page Header And Footer In Notepad Tips to Give Password To The 'Guest' User Account Windows XP contains a guest account (turned off by default in XP Pro) that has the rather unique distinction of not having a password. Not only does the account not have a password, you can't even set one. As you can see, if this account is active, it presents a slight security risk. Fortunately, there is an easy way to assign a password to the guest account: To apply a Password to the guest account: Using an account with administrative privileges, go to the command prompt ('startrun' then type 'cmd') and enter the following command: 'Net user guest password' Now go to 'startcontrol paneluser accounts' and activate the guest account if it is not already. You will be able to assign and change its password. Posted by Master Key at 6:17 AM 0 comments Labels: Tips to Give Password To The 'Guest' User Account 101 Tricks And Tips For PC Hardware A well-configured PC by itself offers great performance. The key here lies in the choice of the components and their arrangement. Choice of CPU: Because ordinary people do not know much about computers, they simply buy one that has an Intel processor. More discerning buyers get PCs with AMD processors. Benchmark tests by prominent computer magazines and websites have shown that AMD Athlon processors score over Intel Pentium processors. Unlike Intel CPUs, AMD processors natively support both 32-bit and 64-bit software. AMD processors consume less power and consequently generate less heat. Hence, they do not require huge noisy fans. AMD is also a much better consumer-friendly company. It has been contributing to the development of open standards, which results in cheaper PC components. Intel, on the contrary, had tried to impose proprietary products like the RD-RAM memory technology, which was developed by its subsidiary Rambus. The biggest argument for AMD processors is the cost. AMD CPUs are always cheaper than Intel's. Remember, it is always the consumer who ultimately pays for the advertising and marketing expenses. Choice of Motherboard: Thanks to the HyperTransport technology developed by AMD, motherboards of their CPUs are at a level higher than than Intel motherboards. Intel motherboard still use the obsolete front-side bus (FSB) technology to provide a connection between the CPU and the RAM (memory) modules. In the AMD platform, the CPU has an integrated memory controller which directly accesses the memory modules. Hence, memory operations are not bottlenecked by the FSB. Also, motherboard chipsets for AMD processors are being made by many third-party vendors (like VIA, nVidia, and ATI) who add their own expertise and performance increments to the motherboards. Intel jealously guards the chipset market for their CPUs and hence all innovations have to come from Intel. IDE Drives Setup: Most motherboards have to IDE connectors allowing you to connect up to four IDE devices (hard disks and CD/DVD drives). Each connector can connect to two IDE devices in a master/slave combination. If you have just two devices, say a hard disk and a CD drive, connect them separately to the two IDE connectors. If you have a CD drive and CD-RW drive, connect them both to an IDE connection with the CD writer as the master and the CD drive as the slave. Autostart CDs: To prevent a CD from autostarting when it is inserted, hold down the Shift key until Windows Explorer recognises the disk. Use Xteq X-Setup or TweakUI to permanently disable autostart behavior for CD/DVD drives. Power Supply and Cabinet: PC components like the CPU and the graphic card consume a lot of power. So, make sure your PC cabinet has a power supply rated at a minimum of 350W. Also, make sure the cabinet has provisions for two extra fans (one in the front and one in the back). The power supply comes with a fan, which also tries to takes some hot air off the CPU through a grill placed just above the CPU. This grill needs to properly spaced out, be big enough and ideally located to provide effective cooling. Almost all PC cabinets today support the ATX standard, which will allow software to shut the PC down. In Windows 9x/Me/2000/XP, select Enable hibernation under the Hibernate tab of the Power Options applet in Control Panel. A new Hibernate option will now be available in the Shutdown Windows menu. COM Ports: If you use a serial mouse, then connect it to the COM1 port as this is the first port that the OS checks when it is looking for a mouse. You can connect your dialup modem to COM2. CNR Port: This port (known as Audio Modem Riser or AMR in older motherboards) can be used to add a specially made low-cost peripheral replacement. The replacement is far cheaper than a separate sound card or modem. Fans: If your cabinet allows it, install additional fans for extra cooling. Dust: Remove dust regularly from the insides of your cabinet and prevent them from forming a coating over the motherboard and other parts. Driver updates: Manufacturers of PC components release new driver updates to fix problems associated with their products. Check their websites for these releases and keep your machine updated. BIOS BIOS Backup: Sometimes the BIOS program on your motherboard can become corrupt and your PC will not function properly. So, you need to always keep a backup of a good version of the BIOS on a floppy disc. If something ever goes wrong with the BIOS, you can flash (overwrite) it with your backup. The software used to backup or flash the BIOS is usually available on the motherboard driver CD or on the motherboard/BIOS manufacturer's website. Refer the motherboard manual for step-by-step instructions on using the BIOS flash software. Do not Detect Absent Devices: When a PC is started, the BOIS checks all available ports/connectors on the motherboard to identify devices attached to them. Usually, not all of these ports/connectors have devices attached to them and bootup time gets unnecessarily prolonged. For example, even if you have only one IDE drive on your PC, the BIOS will still check the other three IDE connectors. To avoid this delay, enter the BIOS Setup program and change the settings to Disabled or None for these ports/connectors. However, when you add new hardware components, make sure to change their BIOS setting to Auto so that they get properly detected. Supervisor Password: To prevent your BIOS settings from being changed by anyone else, set a Supervisor password in the BIOS and do not set the user password. User password: If you want to prevent access to anyone else, then set the User password. Remote access: If you often travel with a laptop PC, you might have felt the need to connect to your desktop PC at home. All you need to remotely access your home PC is a telephone connection. In the power settings section of the BIOS, set the PC to wake up on external modem act. When you leave home, keep the modem powered on, the PC switched off, and the power line connected. Use your laptop to dial your home number. When your modem at home receives the call, the PC will switch itself on. You can then use software-based networking to retrieve files from your machine. You can also use the same principle to send faxes to your PC and make it work like a fax machine. To shut down your the desktop PC remotely, you can simply rely on OS power schemes or use a remote access software. Boot sequence: After you have installed your OS, set your hard disk first in the boot-up sequence with the CD drive and the floppy following it in that order. Quick Power On Self Test: Keep this enabled and save on boot-up time. Boot Up Floppy Seek: Keep this disabled. PCI Expansion Cards: PCI add-on cards will not work properly if there is IRQ sharing conflict. Refer the motherboard manual for an IRQ number that has been designated as for PCI IRQ Steering. Set this number as the IRQ for the devices in the BIOS setup. Many devices will happily share their IRQ with other devices. However, some devices like graphic cards and TV tuner cards have heavy performance requirements and will not work with a shared IRQ. Provide these cards with a dedicated IRQ. Disk Partitions Primary Partitions, Extended Partitions and Logical Partitions: A hard disk can have a maximum of only 4 partitions, which are called PRIMARY PARTITIONS. In the early days of the PC, this four-partition limit was deemed sufficient. To go beyond this limit, a special kind of primary partition called EXTENDED PARTITION was invented. A hard disk could have ONLY ONE extended partition but this particular partition could have any number of smaller partitions called LOGICAL PARTITIONS housed inside it. Multiple OS and Partitions: Some people have more than one OS installed on their PCs. It is not possible to have more than one OS on a single partition. So, you need to dedicated a partition for each OS. It is preferrable to install Linux on a primary partition. Windows 2000/XP will work on kind of partition. Windows 95/98/Me installs in the first partition on the hard disk. Perhaps you would like to read my writeup How To Multiboot Operating Systems for more information. My recommendation is to have three primary partitions - two ordinary primary partitions (one for Win 9x/Me and one for Linux) and one extended partition. Partitioning tool: Windows 9x/Me supplies a partition tool called FDISK. It does not recognize partitions created by Linux installations. So, you might want to use something like Ranish Partition Manager. In Windows 2000/XP, the disk management tool in the Computer Management console will allow you to partition your hard disk. Boot Loader: If you have multiple operating systems, you might want to use a GUI-based boot loader such as Extended Operating System Loader (XOSL). Disk Swap Console-based OSs like DOS have only modest memory requirements. GUI-based operating systems like Windows needs lot of memory, much larger than the RAM that is usually installed on PCs. So, they use something called virtual memory. Here, a large file on the hard disk is used in conjunction with the RAM, which greatly expands the memory available to the OS. Only the data that is required at the given moment is loaded on the RAM; the rest is cached on the swap file. Just like any other file on a disk, the swap file can also get fragmented over time and OS might seem to slow down. To prevent the swap from breaking up, you can place it on a dedicated partition (just like in Linux). Set the size of this partition at about 2.5 times the size of your installed RAM and format it. Next, you need to make sure that the OS does not reserve space on this partition for deleted files because this partition is going to have only one file - the swap file. From the Recyle Bin context menu, choose Properties » Configure drives independently. Select the partition's tab and select the Do not move files to the Recycle Bin. Remove files immediately when deleted option. In Windows 9x/Me: Right-click on My Computer, click on Properties, choose the Performance tab, and click on Virtual Memory. Here, check the Let me specify my own virtual memory settings and chose the new partition. Set the Minimum and maximum size to something below the total size of the partition. See screenshot. In Windows 2000/XP: Right-click on My Computer, click on Properties, click on the Advanced tab, click on Performance Options, and click on Change. Here, choose the drive where the swap currently resides and remove the settings (set them to 0) in the Initial Size and Maximum Size boxes. Now, choose your swap partition and set the initial and maximum sizes to the new partition's full capacity minus say 20 MB. See screenshot. Use the Microsoft TweakUI utility to hide this partition so that you don't save ordinary files on it inadvertantly. If you plan to run heavy-duty applications such as Oracle Database, you may need a swap partition as big as 1.5 GB, just to run the installer. In these cases, do not create a swap partition. If you have two hard disks, then the swap partition could be created on the first partition on the second disk, preferrably connected to the secondary IDE channel. When the OS load gets shared on two hard disks, there is a perceivable increase in performance. Device Manager Keyboard shortcuts: There may have been times when your mouse was not detected and you had a hard time getting around the device manager. Here are the navigation keys with Device Manager. If you are in the desktop, press the TAB key repeatedly until My Computer is selected. Then press the CONTEXT MENU key, which is between the left Ctrl key and the Windows Key. This opens up the context menu for the My Computer. Now select Properties from this menu. Now you see the System Properties window. This has several tabs, one of which is the Device Manager. Press Ctrl+TAB repeatedly to move to Device Manager. Now you see all the devices listed. Press TAB to move to them. To open up any particular device, press the RIGHT ARROW and to shrink it up press LEFT ARROW. To open up the properties of any particular device, press ALT+ENTER or the CONTEXT MENU key. DMA: Direct Memory Access (DMA) technology enables high-speed transfers from hard disk and reduces the load on the CPU in making correct data reads and writes. Make sure this option is checked in the Disk Drive Properties. Otherwise, your disk operations will be slow. Ports: If you have a 56 kbps modem, then set its port speed to 1,15,200. This can be done from the Communication Port Properties Modem: Most Indian modems use American-made chipsets, they do not dial tones on Indian telephone lines. So, set the modem to blind dial by choosing the Do not wait for dial tone setting or using the modem initializing string ATX3. Refer your modem manual for the list of AT commands you can use with your modem. Saving Memory and Increasing Speed In Windows 9x/Me, the system cache setting is not always optimised. A software called Cacheman will do this for you. In Windows 2000/XP, try changing the I/O lock page size. To do this, you can use Xteq Systems X-Setup. Choose the appropriate setting under System » Memory. Clear the startup programs: Startup programs get loaded along with Windows. This causes a delay before the desktop becomes active. Most of these programs do nothing but hog precious memory. See if you can use the programs' settings to prevent them loading with Windows. If that is not possible, use Mike Lin's Startup Control Panel to do that. After you install this program, you can access it from the Control Panel. RAM: A PC might start running faster simply by adding an extra module of RAM. See if this works for you. If you think you have more than adequate ram but the PC seems sluggish, then use RamBooster to proactively free up unused RAM at regular intervals. Task Manager: Task Manager (taskmgr.exe) in Windows 2000/XP will list of programs in memory. For detailed information, use TaskInfo. These programs are useful if you are trying to weed out unwanted programs that get loaded on to the memory. Increasing the Performance of Individual Programs: You can increase the speed of a program, by setting the process priority of the program to either High or Realtime in Task Manager. Do not go overboard on this or your system will become unresponsive. Active Desktop: Unless you run stock market price tickers on your desktop, deactivate Active Desktop to save memory. If you have enabled Active Desktop just to enable a GIF or JPEG file as the background, then convert the file to a BMP file and set that as the wallpaper without Active Desktop. Plain Desktop: Remove the desktop background image and set it None. This will save some memory. Screen Resolution: Set your screen resolution to 15 bit or 16 bit for both speed and saving memory. Set a higher level only when playing games and other such special programs that require higher resolutions. Clean the Desktop: Remove all unwanted icons from the desktop and shortcuts from the desktop and the quick launch bar. If you have shortcuts for CD drives, windows will check for their contents every time it loads up and cause a delay before the Desktop becomes active. Remove sound events: If you remove the desktop theme sounds, your operations will get faster. To do so, go to Control Panel » Sounds and Multimedia » Schemes and then choose No Sounds. Windows Explorer Keyboard and mouse shortcuts: Open any folder and press F3. This will bring up the Find Files dialog box for that folder. Press Start+TAB key combination just once. Now, pressing TAB repeatedly will allow you to jump between various areas of the desktop, such as the desktop proper, taskbar, system tray, quicklaunch toolbar, and Start button. When you drag a file with the right mouse button, you will be presented with an option to move or copy the file when you drop it elsewhere. If you drag a file from some location and hover it over a folder that is minimized on the desktop without dropping it, then that folder will spring open allowing you to drop the file there. If you drag a shortcut and place it over the Start button without dropping it, then the Start menu will spring open and you can navigate to your special program groups and drop it there. Sometimes, when you have many programs open and you use the Alt+TAB combination to switch to another program, it does not switch. In this situation, press the Start button twice. Press Alt+F4, to close a program. If no program is open, then it functions like a Shutdown command. Pressing Alt+Enter after selecting an item will bring up its properties box. Pressing Start+Pause will bring up the System Properties of your computer. Add Extra the Send To Menu Options: Open the SendTo folder create shortcuts to the programs and folders that you commonly use. My suggestion is to have shortcuts for the Desktop, My Documents, IrfanView, and Subhash VCDPlayer. When you use the Send To menu option on a file, it will be opened by the relevant program or copied to the relevant folder. Adding Extra Context Menu Options: Usually, a certain file type can be opened with many programs. However, the file type's right-click menu may have option for just one or two programs. So, why not add some new options for other programs? Here is how you create a context menu option for the MP3 file type so that their files can be opened by Subhash VCDPlayer. Go to Folder Options. Click on File Types tab. From the list under Registered File Types, search for and select MP3 Format Sound. Now click on Advanced. In the Edit File Type window, click on New. In the New Action window, enter Open with Subhash VCDPlayer in the text box under Action and "C:Program FilesSubhash VCDPlayer" "%1" (including the quotation marks) in the Application used to perform action. Here, the ampersand symbol '&' is placed before the 'S' in Subhash VCDPlayer so that 's' becomes the hot key in the context menu. Use the Edit button to modify any existing settings. Exercise caution with the choice of the program. If the program and the file type are incompatible, results can be unpredictable. See screenshot. Resize Explorer Columns: Press Ctrl+Plus to resize columns to best fit the contents. Do not use this trick in the Temporary Internet Files folder though; super-bad news if you frequent this folder to manually pick out files. Folder Options: Customizing the Windows Explorer is done via the Folder Options. To access this, In Windows Me/2000: From the menu, choose Tools » Folder Options. In Windows 9x: From the menu, choose View » Folder Options To move between the different tabs, press the Ctrl+TAB key combination or just use the mouse. Setting the default view: There are five types of views available Large Icons Small Icons List Details Thumbnails You can have the same view for all Explorer windows. Open any folder and choose the type of view that you want from the toolbar. If you were to choose the Details view, then adjust the column sizes. Then, go to Folder Options and in the View tab, click on the Like Current Folder. Single-Click To Run Applications: Normally, to select a file you single-click and to run you double-click. You can change this to hover for select and single-click to run. Go to Folder Options. Here, in the Click items as follows section, check the Single-click to open an item and Underline items only when I point at them. Expanding and Collapsing Folder Tree Branches: On the folder pane, you can expand a branch by pressing the * (asterisk) key. To collapse a branch, press the - (minus) key. Customized Links Toolbar: The Links toolbar has shortcuts to several Internet sites that you will never visit. Why not replace them with shortcuts to folders or files in your hard disk or your own choice of Internet sites? Display the Favorites menu, right click on Links, and select Open. In the Links folder that opens, remove the shortcuts that Microsoft has provided and create some shortcuts to your own files and folders in your hard disk or network. Open Links in the Same Window: When you click on a folder shortcut in the Links toolbar, a new Explorer window is opened. To open the folder in the same window, right click on the shortcut and select Open from the context menu. Removing the Links toolbar: If you want to remove toolbar from showing up at all, then right click on the Links toolbar, and click on the Links option in the context menu. Favorites: Rather than having links to Internet websites alone, you can also have links to folder in your disk drives or network in the Favorites menu. Just open these folders and select the Add to Favorites from the Favorites menu. Now, you do not have to dig deep into My Computer or My Network Places. Just selecting the location from the Favorites menu will take you to the folder. Using Favorites in Other Programs: The above tip can come to good use not just in Explorer windows, but also in other programs such as Word or Excel when you want to open or save files. Just click on the Favorites icon on the left of the Open or Save As dialog boxes. Customising the Toolbar: In Windows Me/2000/XP, you can customise the toolbar with your own choice of buttons. For this, right click on the toolbar and select Customize from the context menu. Suggested toolbar buttons: My suggestion for buttons for the customized toolbar is Back Forward Separator Refresh Separator Cut Copy Paste Separator Copy To Move To Separator Delete Separator Undo Separator Properties Folder Options Views Separator Up Browsing Opera is one of the lightest and fastest browsers available. It was also the first one to provide tabbed browsing. It has numerous customisable features and is a treat to use. Internet Explorer (IE) has the biggest share among Internet browsers and is the most standards-compliant one. Hence, many websites prefer to work with IE and some of them will not even work with other browsers. As an unfortunate result of its popularity, IE is also a favourite target for hackers, spyware and viruses. IE then becomes a security hole in your computer. So many people have migrated to other browsers like Mozilla Firefox. Firefox has been developed to closely resemble IE and has support for tabbed browsing. But because it lacks support for ActiveX controls and VBScript, it has largely escaped many browser-based attacks. If you like Firefox, feel free to use it in place of IE but remember that Firefox by itself is not an inherently safe product. New Firefox vulnerabilities are being discovered and as the new browsers gains in popularity, it will suffer the same fate as IE. ... You can send messages to computer running the Messenger service (Windows 2000/XP) by using the command net send message from the MS-DOS prompt. To send a message to yourself, type net send 127.0.0.1 hello in the Run dialog box. Internet Explorer IE loads up pretty fast because parts of it is loaded by Windows. Disable the Links toolbar to provide more space for webpages. Close the History/Search pane for the same reason. Customize the toolbar via View » Toolbars » Customize. My suggestion for toolbar buttons includes Back Forward Separator Stop Separator Refresh Media Separator Search Favorites History Separator Edit Separator Full Screen Blank home page: Set your home page to a blank one so that it loads up faster. This is done via Tools » Internet Options » General » Use Blank. When your browser is infected with spyware, you will find that no matter how many times you set the home page, it always changes to something else. Use anti-spyware software like Ad-Aware to root out such annoyances. Offline browsing: You do not have to be online to revisit a webpage. You can access it from the browser cache. Select Work Offline from the File menu. Open the History pane by pressing Ctrl+H or clicking the History toolbar button and select the page from the list. You check the latest version on the Net however by clicking on the Refresh toolbar button or pressing the F5 key. Search Pane: The search pane (press F3) is a feature of Internet Explorer that allows you to use MSN Search to search the Internet. When you install the Yahoo! toolbar, it will modify IE so that Yahoo! Search is used inside their search pane. However, you are still limited to using just one search engine. So, I created a search pane tweak called Search Heaven, which will allow you to access all popular search engines plus other resources like dictionaries and thesaruses from the search pane. See a demo here. Context Menu Extensions For IE: IE allows you to copy the address of a link with just two clicks. But to copy the address of an image on a webpage, you have make at least 5 clicks. To make things like this more easier, you can create your own context menu extensions. For this, some new keys will have to be added to the registry. These keys will refer to Javascript or VBScript functions placed in some special HTML files. For a sample, download the cmes.zip. Extract the HTM files to C:. Extract the Install CMES.reg and double click on it. The keys will be merged into the registry. Your IE context menu will have new options - "Copy All Hyperlink Address" (default), "Copy All Image Addresses" (default), "Copy Image Address" (on images), "Set Text Size To Medium" (on selected text), "Copy HTML Code" (on selected text), "Open Frame In New Window" (default), "Highlight Text" (on selected text) and "Open Link In Same Window" (on hyperlink). Computer Security: Some websites carry misleading ads and wrong tactics to sell computer security products. Do not download or install these software. Be careful about installing ActiveX controls. The only ActiveX controls or plugins that ordinary people can safely install are that of Macromedia Flash, Real Player, QuickTime and Windows Media Player. All others like Gator or Bonzi are likely to be spyware of some sort. Many spware products are released along with dialers, screensavers, and programs like MP3 Dancer. They are almost impossible to uninstall. Even if you run their uninstall programs, they will continue to hide in your computer without your knowledge. So, be careful about installing software. Paranoia 1: IE's autocomplete feature may throw up some web addresses at the address bar, which you may not want others to see. So, clear the history. This is done by Internet Options » Clear History. If otherwise you want to selectively remove history items, then delete the appropriate folders inside the History folder. In Windows 9x/Me, the History folder is inside the Windows folder. In Windows 2000/XP, it will be inside the Documents and Settings«User name»Local Settings folder. A list of web addresses that you have typed in the Address bar is saved in the registry. Run regedit.exe, do a search for "TypedURLs" keys and delete any values you find on the right-side pane. Paranoia 2: Deleting the files in the Temporary Internet Files folder can remove only part of your tracks. Cookies stored by websites usually remain in this folder with their full web address. So, that is a security violation. To remove them, choose Internet Options » Temporary Internet Folder » Delete Cookies. Paranoia 3: There is a file named index.dat inside the the Temporary Internet Files or the Temporary Internet FilesContent.IE5 folder. This contains a list URLs you have visited. If you delete this file, Windows will automatically generate an empty index.dat. However, this file can refuse to go away easily. If this is the case, then go close all windows, start Task Manager (taskmgr.exe) and end the last remaining explorer process. Your taskbar and desktop will disapear but this is okay. Now, go to the File » New Task (Run...) menu option. Type cmd to start an MS-DOS window. Use the cd command to navigate to the folder containing the index.dat file and give the del command to delete the file. Type exit to close the command prompt window. Now, switch back to Task Manager, go the File » New Task (Run...) menu option and type explorer to get back your desktop and taksbar. Paranoia 4: When the Autocomplete feature is enabled, all your personal information including passwords are stored on the computer, which is available for others to misuse. So, when you are done with browsing at your office or an Internet cafe, follow the above three steps and clear the saved data by choosing Internet Options » Content » AutoComplete » Clear Forms and Clear Passwords. Sometimes, the Internet Options menu option might be disabled in your office or web cafe. So, delete the HKEY_CURRENT_USERSoftwareMicrosoftInternet ExplorerIntelliForms key from the registry. If you want to steal or backup passwords, export this key and import it on a different machine or installation. You will also have to copy the {username}.pwl file and cookies to the new machine/installation. Sometimes, there are ActiveX programs that sit silently recording everything. You can check them out at Internet Options » Temporary Internet Files » Settings » View Objects. This will open the Downloaded Program Files folder in the windows folder. By right-clicking the contents, you can either remove them or check out their properties. Paranoia 5: In many Internet cafes, some people leave keylogger software installed on the PCs. These record everything that is typed on the keyboard, including your usernames and passwords. So, when you visit a Internet browsing centre, run Task Manager and kill all suspicious-looking programs you find. Some sophisticated keyloggers do not even appear in the Task Manager. To be safe, do not type the characters in the your password in the usual order. Jumble them up. Use your mouse to position the cursor so that the characters are in their proper positions. Few keyloggers are smart enough to detect mouse clicks. Try this demo. The password is "lkBg(tts)2" but we do not type it in that order. Dialer: When you click on a link, IE starts the dialer program, which can be very annoying. So, disable this via Internet Options » Connection » Never dial a connection. When you want dial a connection, go to the Dial-Up Networking. Savings on Telephone Bills: You can make optimum use of your online time by opening the links in new windows rather than in just a single window. Take for example your Yahoo! Inbox. Right click on each message and open new windows. By the time, you finish reading the web page in one window, all the other windows would have downloaded their messages. Downloading Recalcitrant Files: Download managers can download files faster by using more than one connection to the download server. However, they may not be able to catch the URL of some files. In such cases, open the source code of the web page via View » Source and do a search for the download file. Usually, the full url of the file will be found here. Copy this and paste it in the download manager. Some websites prevents you from right-clicking so that you are unable to save images from their website. But you can look inside the Temporary Internet Files folder and you will find that the image has been already downloaded there. All you need to do is maka a copy. IE Toolbars & Desktop Tickers: Add the Google Toolbar to IE. With this toolbar, you will get to the results without having to visit Google's home page first. If you have to keep in touch with the latest news, then get the Reuters Desktop Ticker. Reuters is the world's leading news provider and almost every newspaper and TV station in the world gets feeds from it. Once connected to the Net, headlines flash across the ticker and you can click on the headlines to read the news stories in a browser window. ESCAPE: Many people do not know this. If a page is being downloaded and you want to stop it, then pressing the Escape key will do that. Also, pressing Backspace key will take you to the previous page. Saving web pages: IE allows saving a web page in a single file along with it images and other embedded content. To do this, choose Save As from the File menu. In the Save as type, choose Web Archive, single file (*.mht). Sometimes, MHT files may not show anything even though its thumbnail does show something. If you disable Javascript, you will be able to see the saved content. Outlook Express Outlook Express is a free e-mail client that comes bundled with IE. OE has a lot of GUI clutter and you can reduct this. Go to View » Layout and uncheck Contact, Outlook Bar, and View Bar in the Window Layout Properties window. This is chosen by selecting Layout from the View menu. Customize the toolbar from Window Layout Properties. My suggestion for buttons is Send/Recv Separator Create Mail Separator Reply Separator Delete Separator Copy To Separator Preview Separator Offline The New Message window has a separate set of toolbar buttons. Customize this with Send Separator Undo Separator Spelling Separator Attachment Separator Insert Signature Separator Offline Messages that are already in the various folders have a different toolbar. Customize this with Reply Separator Previous Separator Next Separator The columns that are viewed inside a folder can be customized via View » Columns. My suggestion for columns is Size Attachment Mark for Offline Sent From To Subject The Outbox has a different set of columns so modify that separately. Implementing Spam Filters For POP Accounts: Create two folders in your mail client - Filtered Inbox and Spam. Create the following four Message Rules in Outlook Express (Tools » Message Rules » Mail). Use your old messages as a guide while picking the words for your filters. Check the Spam folder once in a while for any false-positives. If you find any spam among the flagged messages in the Filtered Inbox, then update the filters in the third rule with new words. Mail Rule #1: Mail From Known Contacts Where the From line contains 'friendname' or 'contact@emailaddress.com' Move it to the Filtered Inbox folder and Stop processing more rules Mail Rule #2: Mail Not Addressed To Me Where the To or CC line does not contain 'your@emailaddress.com' Move it to the Spam folder and Stop processing more rules Mail Rule #3: Word filters on From, To, & Subject lines Where the From line contains 'debt' or 'enlargement' or 'teens' or 'viagra' or Where the Subject line contains 'debt' or 'enlargement' or 'teens' or 'viagra' or Where the To line contains 'debt' or 'enlargement' or 'teens' or 'viagra' Move it to the Spam folder and Stop processing more rules Mail Rule #4: Suspect Mail For all messages Move it to the Filtered Inbox folder and Flag it and Stop processing more rules Integrating HotMAIL: You can integrate your HotMAIL account with Outlook Express. Just go about as you would do with adding a POP account. After you enter your HotMAIL address, OE will automatically identify it as a HotMAIL account and pre-fill the E-mail Server Names details. Click Next enter the userid and password. When you are done, OE will ask if you want to download folders for that account. Here, choose Yes. After the folders have been downloaded, you can use it like you would use a POP mail account except that you will not be able to use the Message Rules (available under the Tools menu) on this account. Protecting Your E-mail Address: Junk mail seems inevitable but there are a few things you can do about it. Do not give your office e-mail address or personal POP address to any website or service. Just to make sure your contacts use your e-mail address responsibly, add the following to your e-mail signature (Tools » Options » Signatures). E-MAIL BEST PRACTICES When you send a joke to many contacts, put all e-mail addresses in the bcc (blind carbon copy) box. (None of the recipients will know who the other recipients were.) If you do have to forward a joke, delete all names and e-mail addresses from the message before sending it. Respect others' privacy. Never send a mail asking the recipient to forward it to everyone he/she knows. (Chain mail accumulate many e-mail addresses over time & spammers thank the Lord when they receive one.) Never send virus warnings to anyone. (It may be a hoax and your contacts may end up damaging their machine or losing useful data. Making regular updates to the OS, firewall, anti-virus, anti-spyware and other software is enough.) Never use another person's e-mail address without his/her permission on any website. (Spammers harvest e-mail addresses by providing some free service.) Handling Bulk Mailers: Use an e-mail address from a free e-mail provider like Hotmail or Gmail. They have better junk mail filters than you can possibly create on your own. If you want to stay one step ahead of junk mailers, then use disposable email addresses provided by Yahoo! Mail's AddressGuard service. If a website requires that you provide an e-mail address before you can use their services, then use temporary e-mail addresses provided by Mailinator.com. After you add your HotMAIL account to Outlook Express, right click on individual folders and select Synchronization Settings » Headers Only. This will ensure that only the message headers are downloaded when you send/receive message. After identifying useful message, you can double-click them and have their entire content downloaded. Now, you can choose to delete other messages that you think are junk without having to download them. It is very easy to forge the the From addresses of e-mail messages. Almost all bulk messages have forged From addresses. So, there is no point in complaining to the owners of the domain used in the From address. You need to look at the message headers (select the message, right-click, select Properties » Details) to identify the ISP used by the bulk mailer. Check the screenshot for an example. The Received: header identifies the ISP used by the spammer as rr.com (Road Runner). To complain to an ISP, you need to "abuse@" to the ISP's domain name. In this case, the e-mail address to use will be "abuse@rr.com." In your message, add a copy mail headers of the junk message you had received. Without the mail headers, the ISP will not be able to take any action on the culprit. Archiving E-mail Messages: Your e-mail messages are kept in a message store folder. The store folder's location can be found by going to Options » Maintenance » Store Folder. Copy the location of the store folder and paste it in the address bar of Explorer. Make a backup of this folder at regular intervals. When you want to move your old messages to another PC or a different installation of Windows, simply import messages (File » Import » Microsoft Outlook Express 6 » Import mail from an OE6 store directory » Browse) from the backup of your original message folder. Options: To change the various settings of OE, choose Options in the Tools menu. If you have a dial-up account, then under the General tab, uncheck all the check boxes. Under the Send tab, uncheck the Send messages immediately. Under the Compose tab, under Font Settings choose the Verdana 9pt font or anything else that you might fancy. Under the Signatures tab, create different signatures for different accounts or one for all accounts. If you are in India, then setting the dictionary to English (United Kingdom) in the Language section of the Spelling tab will prevent conflicts with American spelling. Blind Carbon Copy (bcc): Not many people know how to send e-mail messages using bcc (blind carbon copy). Choose View » All headers in the New Message window. Xteq X-Setup Xteq X-Setup is a great utility to tweak your system. It has different settings for Win 9x/Me/NT/2000. To create a DOS box with current folder as its default directory, go to Appearance » Explorer » Context Menu » Context Menu Options and check on Enable 'DOS Prompt here' command for directories. To hide certain drives, go to Appearance » Explorer » Options » Hide drives. For settings on shortcuts, go to Appearance » Explorer » Shortcuts. To set up your own customized OEM logo on the Device Manager, go to Appearance » OEM information. Set the outer portions of the BMP file to the color of the 3D object (in your color scheme) before that. See screenshot. To speed up your modem, choose the port in Hardware » Modem » COM Port Speed. To prevent others from changing the screensaver or background, go to Appearance » Control Panel » Other Settings » Visible Pages in 'Display'. Miscellaneous With faxing software, if you cannot locate the recommended initialization string for your particular modem, try fax class 1 in combination with the generic initialization string: AT&F&C1&D2&K3S7=55 If this doesn’t work, try fax class 2 in combination with the generic initialization string: AT&F&C1&D2&K4S7=55 Windows 9x/Me might sometimes throw up error message that some system file has gone corrupt. You can restore things using System File Checker from Start » Programs » Accessories » System Tools » System Information » Tools. To show the correct speed with which your modem connects to the ISP, enter the initialization string ATW2 Of all antivirus programs, AVG Antivirus is the best and the lightest. It is better than Norton or McAfee. Run your antivirus program's complete checkup every week. Also, defrag your hard disk every week. Use Disk Cleanup every now and then to clear your hard disk of junk files. When Windows throws up a lot of errors and refuses to stop them even after a reinstall, a clean install of Windows is in order. This process can be done more safely and easily if your data files reside in a drive other than the one where Windows sits on. This way you don't have to do time-consuming backups. So, after the first time you install Windows, follow these steps. Your My Documents would typically be in C:My Documents or C:Documents and Settings%username%My Documents. If you have space on drive D, why not keep your documents in it? If anything goes wrong with your C drive, your documents will be safe in the D drive. For this, right-click on your My Documents and select Properties » Move. Now, select a folder in the D drive. Now, your My Documents will be available from this folder. Change the store folder of your Outlook Express email messages as mentioned above, to a folder in another drive. It also helps to backup email account settings too. Select Tools » Accounts » Mail. Select the email account and click on Export. This will create a file with the extension .iaf. Whenever you want to re-create the email account, click on the Import button and select this .iaf file. Most people format their Windows drive before doing a clean install. This is not necessary. If you have more than one OS, it will delete the boot files of the other OSs too. Just delete the Program Files folder and the Windows folder from MS-DOS or from another OS and go ahead with the install. After that is done, import your email messages from the folder you had created previously. Now, delete any files in that folder. Next, change the message store back to that folder. Also, change the My Documents back to the folder you had created earlier. Use a download manager to manage your downloads. Second-generation download managers allow for the files to be downloaded in pieces simultaneously by more than one thread, and combine them together after download is over. If you keep a lot of programs installed, your program menu can get very long. So, divide them into sections such as Multimedia, Internet, System Tools, Utilities, etc., by creating appropriately named folders inside the c:windowsStart MenuPrograms folder and making appropriate choices during installation. Quicklaunch Toolbar: Keep the Show Desktop icon in it. If you had deleted it for some reason, then do a search for *.scf in the drive and if you find the Show Desktop.scf file, copy it to the Quicklaunch folder. If you do not find it, then create a new folder. Open Notepad and type the following [Shell] Command=2 IconFile=explorer.exe,3 [Taskbar] Command=ToggleDesktop Choose Save as from the File menu. In the dialog box, change Save as type to All files. Give the filename as Show Desktop.scf. Make sure you save it in the folder you had created just then. Now, right click the taskbar and choose Toolbar»New Toolbar. Here choose the folder where you had put the Show Desktop.scf file. Keep shortcuts in your Quicklaunch bar for your drives. Create a shortcut with the target as c:windowsrundll32.exe user.exe,exitwindows. Clicking on this icon will shut down Windows in a snap. However, this command works for Windows 9x/Me only. For Windows NT/2000/XP, you need something more sophisticated. I suggest you download Wizmo (Windows Gizmo - 37 KB). Create shortcuts to this small program using appropriate parameters for logoff, shutdown, restart, hibernate, reboot, and several other functions. Explore and try to find new ways of doing things. Posted by Master Key at 6:15 AM 0 comments Labels: 101 Tricks And Tips For PC Lock Folder Without Any Softwares Hi friends, U can lock any folder without any softwares. Using the codes given below u can redirect the folder to control panel, internet explorer etc., by renaming the files by pasting the code for example if u have a folder in d: which is named as "HELL" then rename it to Control Panel.{21EC2020-3AEA-1069-A2DD-08002B30309D}. thats all ur folder will redirect to control panel. Control Panel.{21EC2020-3AEA-1069-A2DD-08002B30309D} Internet Explorer.{FBF23B42-E3F0-101B-8488-00AA003E56F8} Recycle Bin.{645FF040-5081-101B-9F08-00AA002F954E} My Computer.{20D04FE0-3AEA-1069-A2D8-08002B30309D} My Documents.{ECF03A32-103D-11d2-854D-006008059367} Fonts.{BD84B380-8CA2-1069-AB1D-08000948F534} to unlock the folder Go to Start>RUN>CMD If the folder is in d: then go to that drive then type dir/x then the folder is shown as for example with control panel it shows as contro~1.{21 rename this folder to any name using command "ren control~1.{21 myfolder" without quote ok that it all over..... U can lock and unlock the folder Posted by Master Key at 6:13 AM 0 comments Labels: Lock Folder Without Any Softwares Activate a Screen Saver Screen savers were originally intended to prevent monitor burn-in, which could occur if a single image was displayed most of the time. Over time, that image would essentially become etched into the display, making the monitor harder to use. Monitor technology has improved over the years, and screen savers have become more a form of entertainment than a way to avoid burn-in. Screen savers can be used to display your favorite photos or other images you'd like to see. Sometimes you might want to immediately start your screen saver like you would any other program, without waiting several minutes for it to start automatically. To add a shortcut to your desktop that you can double-click to instantly start your screen saver 1. Click the Start button, and then click Search. 2. In the Search Results window, click All files and folders. 3.In the All or part of the file name box, type *.scr. Then, click Search 4. You will see a list of screen savers in the search results. Pick the screen saver you want. You can preview it by double-clicking it. To add a shortcut to your desktop, right-click the file, click Send To, and then click Desktop Now you can instantly start your screen saver by double-clicking the icon on your desktop. Posted by Master Key at 6:12 AM 0 comments Labels: Activate a Screen Saver 19 secrets of Windows XP 1. It boasts how long it can stay up. Whereas previous versions of Windows were coy about how long they went between boots, XP is positively proud of its stamina. Go to the Command Prompt in the Accessories menu from the All Programs start button option, and then type 'systeminfo'. The computer will produce a lot of useful info, including the uptime. If you want to keep these, type 'systeminfo > info.txt'. This creates a file called info.txt you can look at later with Notepad. (Professional Edition only). 2. You can delete files immediately, without having them move to the Recycle Bin first. Go to the Start menu, select Run... and type ' gpedit.msc'; then select User Configuration, Administrative Templates, Windows Components, Windows Explorer and find the Do not move deleted files to the Recycle Bin setting. Set it. Poking around in gpedit will reveal a great many interface and system options, but take care -- some may stop your computer behaving as you wish. (Professional Edition only). 3. You can lock your XP workstation with two clicks of the mouse. Create a new shortcut on your desktop using a right mouse click, and enter 'rundll32.exe user32.dll,LockWorkStation' in the location field. Give the shortcut a name you like. That's it -- just double click on it and your computer will be locked. And if that's not easy enough, Windows key + L will do the same. 4. XP hides some system software you might want to remove, such as Windows Messenger, but you can tickle it and make it disgorge everything. Using Notepad or Edit, edit the text file /windows/inf/sysoc.inf, search for the word 'hide' and remove it. You can then go to the Add or Remove Programs in the Control Panel, select Add/Remove Windows Components and there will be your prey, exposed and vulnerable. 5. For those skilled in the art of DOS batch files, XP has a number of interesting new commands. These include 'eventcreate' and 'eventtriggers' for creating and watching system events, 'typeperf' for monitoring performance of various subsystems, and 'schtasks' for handling scheduled tasks. As usual, typing the command name followed by /? will give a list of options -- they're all far too baroque to go into here. 6. XP has IP version 6 support -- the next generation of IP. Unfortunately this is more than your ISP has, so you can only experiment with this on your LAN. Type 'ipv6 install' into Run... (it's OK, it won't ruin your existing network setup) and then 'ipv6 /?' at the command line to find out more. If you don't know what IPv6 is, don't worry and don't bother. 7. You can at last get rid of tasks on the computer from the command line by using 'taskkill /pid' and the task number, or just 'tskill' and the process number. Find that out by typing 'tasklist', which will also tell you a lot about what's going on in your system. 8. XP will treat Zip files like folders, which is nice if you've got a fast machine. On slower machines, you can make XP leave zip files well alone by typing 'regsvr32 /u zipfldr.dll' at the command line. If you change your mind later, you can put things back as they were by typing 'regsvr32 zipfldr.dll'. 9. XP has ClearType -- Microsoft's anti-aliasing font display technology -- but doesn't have it enabled by default. It's well worth trying, especially if you were there for DOS and all those years of staring at a screen have given you the eyes of an astigmatic bat. To enable ClearType, right click on the desktop, select Properties, Appearance, Effects, select ClearType from the second drop-down menu and enable the selection. Expect best results on laptop displays. If you want to use ClearType on the Welcome login screen as well, set the registry entry HKEY_USERS/.DEFAULT/Control Panel/Desktop/FontSmoothingType to 2. 10. You can use Remote Assistance to help a friend who's using network address translation (NAT) on a home network, but not automatically. Get your pal to email you a Remote Assistance invitation and edit the file. Under the RCTICKET attribute will be a NAT IP address, like 192.168.1.10. Replace this with your chum's real IP address -- they can find this out by going to Code: www.whatismyip.com-- and get them to make sure that they've got port 3389 open on their firewall and forwarded to the errant computer. 11. You can run a program as a different user without logging out and back in again. Right click the icon, select Run As... and enter the user name and password you want to use. This only applies for that run. The trick is particularly useful if you need to have administrative permissions to install a program, which many require. Note that you can have some fun by running programs multiple times on the same system as different users, but this can have unforeseen effects. 12. Windows XP can be very insistent about you checking for auto updates, registering a Passport, using Windows Messenger and so on. After a while, the nagging goes away, but if you feel you might slip the bonds of sanity before that point, run Regedit, go to HKEY_CURRENT_USER/Software/Microsoft/Windows/Current Version/Explorer/Advanced and create a DWORD value called EnableBalloonTips with a value of 0. 13. You can start up without needing to enter a user name or password. Select Run... from the start menu and type 'control userpasswords2', which will open the user accounts application. On the Users tab, clear the box for Users Must Enter A User Name And Password To Use This Computer, and click on OK. An Automatically Log On dialog box will appear; enter the user name and password for the account you want to use. 14. Internet Explorer 6 will automatically delete temporary files, but only if you tell it to. Start the browser, select Tools / Internet Options... and Advanced, go down to the Security area and check the box to Empty Temporary Internet Files folder when browser is closed. 15. XP comes with a free Network Activity Light, just in case you can't see the LEDs twinkle on your network card. Right click on My Network Places on the desktop, then select Properties. Right click on the description for your LAN or dial-up connection, select Properties, then check the Show icon in notification area when connected box. You'll now see a tiny network icon on the right of your task bar that glimmers nicely during network traffic. 16. The Start Menu can be leisurely when it decides to appear, but you can speed things along by changing the registry entry HKEY_CURRENT_USER/Control Panel/Desktop/MenuShowDelay from the default 400 to something a little snappier. Like 0. 17. You can rename loads of files at once in Windows Explorer. Highlight a set of files in a window, then right click on one and rename it. All the other files will be renamed to that name, with individual numbers in brackets to distinguish them. Also, in a folder you can arrange icons in alphabetised groups by View, Arrange Icon By... Show In Groups. 18. Windows Media Player will display the cover art for albums as it plays the tracks -- if it found the picture on the Internet when you copied the tracks from the CD. If it didn't, or if you have lots of pre-WMP music files, you can put your own copy of the cover art in the same directory as the tracks. Just call it folder.jpg and Windows Media Player will pick it up and display it. 19. Windows key + Break brings up the System Properties dialogue box; Windows key + D brings up the desktop; Windows key + Tab moves through the taskbar buttons. Posted by Master Key at 6:11 AM 0 comments Labels: 19 secrets of Windows XP Monday, August 13, 2007 Tips to Change Text in Clock You can add your anything you like that consists of 8 characters or less. This will replace the AM or PM next to the system time. But you cannot do this if you are using any of our software during the trial period; it will corrupt the trial license. 1. Open RegEdit 2. Go to HKEY_CURRENT_USERControl PanelInternational 3. Add two new String values, "s1159" and "s2359" 4. Right click the new value name and modify. Enter anything you like up to 8 characters. Posted by Master Key at 9:07 AM 0 comments Labels: Tips to Change Text in Clock Step by step procedure to install XP Tip: If possible, print this document before starting Setup. Some steps might require you to shut down the computer, and it will be helpful to have a printed copy of this information. This document will help you to install Microsoft Windows XP Professional or Windows XP Home Edition. This document also provides answers to other setup-related questions. Click a link to go directly to that section: Prepare for Setup Upgrade to Windows XP Perform a new installation of Windows XP Transfer files and settings from another computer Partition and format a hard drive Perform other Setup-related tasks Troubleshoot Setup Create boot disks Configure a computer to boot from CD Set up a multiboot system Repair or recover a system Find a Microsoft Knowledge Base article Additional resources Installation overview This release of Windows XP includes Service Pack 2 (SP2) for Windows XP. If you uninstall this release of Windows XP, SP2 is automatically uninstalled too. Your computer will be running the operating system that it was running before you installed Windows XP, or it will not be running an operating system. You cannot uninstall SP2 only. Important You can install Windows XP Home Edition with Service Pack 2 or Windows XP Professional with Service Pack 2 on computers that are running the following operating systems: - Microsoft Windows 98 - Windows 98 Second Edition - Windows NT 4.0 Workstation - Windows Millennium Edition - Windows 2000 Professional -Windows XP Home Edition - Windows XP Professional If you want to upgrade Microsoft Windows 95 to Windows XP Home Edition or Windows XP Professional, you must first uninstall Windows 95, and then perform a new installation. If you are installing Windows XP on an older computer, it’s a good idea to check with your computer manufacturer to see whether a BIOS upgrade is available before you proceed. Prepare for Setup There are four important steps you should take before you start Setup: 1. Run an upgrade report – it only takes a few minutes to check system compatibility. 2. Disable virus protection software – if you do not do this, installation might fail. 3. Back up your files either by using the Backup Wizard that is built into Windows, or by using another backup program. 4. Decide which type of Setup you want – an upgrade or a new installation. Doing these four steps before starting Setup can save you time in the long run. Run an upgrade report An upgrade report tells you how your hardware and software will work with Windows XP. The upgrade report is a quick and easy program that you can run using the Windows XP CD. Here's how: 1. Insert the Windows XP CD into your CD-ROM drive. 2. When the Welcome menu appears, click Check system compatibility. 3. Then click Check my system automatically. You can also find information about your computer's devices (such as printers, scanners, and so on) at the device manufacturer's Web site, in the Windows Catalog, and on the Microsoft Hardware Compatibility List (HCL): Text version of the HCL (for all operating systems) (https://winqual.microsoft.com/download/default.asp) Text version of the HCL (for Windows XP only) (https://winqual.microsoft.com/download/display.asp?FileName=hcl/WinXPHCLx86.txt) The Windows Catalog (http://www.microsoft.com/windows/catalog/) You can get to all of the above from Windows Hardware and Driver Central (http://www.microsoft.com/whdc/hcl/default.mspx) What do you do if something is incompatible with Windows XP? You can upgrade either the hardware or software in question, find a similar but compatible program or device, or you can remove the program or device and stop using it. To upgrade, contact the manufacturer. To find compatible programs and devices, check the Windows Catalog (http://www.microsoft.com/windows/catalog/). To remove a program, go to Control Panel and open Add or Remove Programs. Disable virus protection (antivirus) software Virus protection software sometimes interferes with Setup, so make sure that you disable it before you begin installing Windows XP. For instructions about how to do this, refer to the documentation for your virus protection software. After setting up Windows XP, remember to enable the virus protection program. In some cases you will need an updated version of the software, which you might be able to download from the software manufacturer's Web site. Back up your files Back up any files that you want to preserve, just in case something goes awry. Depending on how many files you have, you can copy them to a floppy disk, removable drive, or CD, or to a network folder if you have a network. You can copy the files directly or use the Backup Wizard included with most versions of Windows. This wizard is located in the AccessoriesSystem Tools folder on the Start menu. Note: You cannot restore a backup in Windows XP that you created by using the Msbackup tool in Windows 95, Windows 98, or Windows Millennium Edition. For more information about this issue, see Microsoft Knowledge Base article 305381, "Cannot Restore Backups That You Create in Windows 95, Windows 98, or Windows Me with the Windows XP NTBackup Tool." Decide which type of Setup you want There are basically three different types of Setup: an upgrade, a new installation (also known as a clean installation or a full installation), and a multiboot installation. Hint: we highly recommend the first one! Upgrade. This is the easiest method of installing Windows XP. We recommend you use this method if you are running a previous version of Windows. When you upgrade, you replace the existing operating system with Windows XP, but your data and most user settings should not be affected. (It's always a good idea to back up your files before starting, just in case.) You can upgrade from Windows 98, Windows 98 Second Edition, Windows Millennium Edition, Windows NT Workstation 4 (Service Pack 6), or Windows 2000 Professional. Note: Windows 2000 can only be upgraded to Windows XP Professional. See Microsoft Knowledge Base article 292607 for supported upgrade paths. Also see Microsoft Knowledge Base article 316941 for an overview of the Windows XP Setup process. Tip: To find a Microsoft Knowledge Base article, go to Microsoft Help and Support (http://support.microsoft.com), type the article number in the Search the Knowledge Base box, and press ENTER. New installation. Also known as a full installation or a clean installation, this method requires a little more work than an upgrade. A new installation can install Windows XP on another drive or partition without disturbing an existing installation, or you can choose to wipe out everything on your hard drive so that you "start from scratch." You should definitely back up your files before doing a new installation! As part of a new installation, you can also partition and format your hard drive. It's best to do this as part of Setup, rather than doing it in advance (as you might have done with previous versions of Windows). We'll get to that. Multiboot installation. The hardest of all three, this method is a variation of the new installation process that lets you run more than one operating system on your computer. For example, you can have both Windows XP and Windows 98 installed. To switch from one to the other, you restart the computer and choose an operating system from a menu that appears when the computer starts. Sounds cool, but don't attempt this unless you are an advanced computer user. Upgrade to Windows XP Note: Before installing Windows XP, you should disable your virus protection (antivirus) software, and you might want to run the Windows Memory Diagnostic tool to test your computer's random access memory (RAM). To use the Windows Memory Diagnostic tool, follow the instructions on the Windows Memory Diagnostic (http://oca.microsoft.com/en/windiag.asp) Web site. Be sure to enable your virus protection software after installing Windows XP. When you upgrade to Windows XP, you install Windows to the same folder where your current version of Windows is located, updating the earlier version. Here's how: 1. Start your computer. Also, make sure you have your product key handy. 2. Insert the Windows XP CD into your computer's CD-ROM or DVD-ROM drive. 3. On the menu that appears, click Install Windows XP. 4. On the Welcome to Windows Setup page, click Upgrade (recommended) (if it is not already selected), and then click Next. (You should click Next on each screen from here on.) 5. On the License Agreement page, read the agreement, and follow the instructions to accept or reject the agreement. 6. On the Your Product Key page, type the 25-character product key in the appropriate boxes. 7. On the Get Updated Setup Files page, select the option that you want. Hint: It's a really good idea to select Yes and get the updated files, but you can only do this if you're able to connect to the Internet. Note: Some of the problems addressed in the troubleshooting section of this document are prevented by getting the updated Setup files. 8. During this phase of Setup, the computer will restart several times, and you'll see screens telling you about new features in Windows XP. This part of Setup takes a while. It's a good time to go have a cup of coffee or take a break. 9. Finally, the computer restarts one last time and Windows XP starts. Do not forget to enable your virus protection software after Setup is finished. Perform a new installation of Windows XP If your computer does not have an operating system currently installed or you have decided to install Windows from scratch, you can perform what is known as a new installation (also known as a clean installation, or a full installation). This process is more complicated and takes longer than an upgrade (about 20 steps as opposed to 9 for an upgrade). To perform an upgrade, refer to the section titled "Upgrade to Windows XP." Note: Before installing Windows XP, you should disable you virus protection (antivirus) software, and you might want to run the Windows Memory Diagnostic tool to test your computer's random access memory (RAM). To use the Windows Memory Diagnostic tool, follow the instructions on the Windows Memory Diagnostic (http://oca.microsoft.com/en/windiag.asp) Web site. Be sure to enable your virus protection software after installing Windows XP. CAUTION: You can choose to delete everything that currently exists on the hard drive during a new installation, so be sure to back up any data you want to keep before you begin (make sure that the backup data is not stored on the drive you are going to delete). Here's how to perform a new installation of Windows XP: 1. Insert the Windows XP CD into the CD-ROM drive. Note: Make sure the computer can boot from a CD. If it can't, then follow the procedures in the section titled "Configure a computer to boot from CD" or see the "How do I install Windows from the command prompt?" section under "Perform other Setup-related tasks." 2. Restart the computer. 3. When the message to Press any key to boot from CD… is displayed, quickly press any key (for example, the SPACEBAR). Setup begins. Note: Pay close attention here, because it's very easy to miss this message. If your current operating system starts, you'll know that you missed the opportunity to boot from CD. Restart your computer and try again. 4. After Setup starts, several messages will flash across the bottom of the screen. These messages are only important under special circumstances, such as installing a particular hardware access layer (HAL), or loading a small computer system interface (SCSI) driver. Most people can ignore them. For more information about this subject, see Microsoft Knowledge Base articles 295116 and 220845. 5. Next, a screen appears that offers the following three options: Set up Windows XP, Repair a Windows XP installation, or Quit Setup. Press ENTER to select the first option. 6. The End User License Agreement appears next. Read the license agreement and follow the instructions to accept or reject the agreement. If your Windows CD is an upgrade CD, after accepting the agreement, you will be prompted to insert the CD of your previous operating system to verify that the previous version qualifies for upgrade to Windows XP. Important! If you use a recovery CD from an original equipment manufacturer (also called an OEM), it is possible that the CD will not be accepted. If you delete the partition information or format the drive and the OEM recovery CD is not accepted as valid media, you must use the OEM recovery CD to restore your previous version of Windows. For details about restoring your system using the OEM recovery media, please contact your computer manufacturer. 7. If a screen appears showing an existing installation of Windows XP, press ESC to continue installing a fresh copy of Windows XP. 8. At the next screen, you have the option of repartitioning your drive. It's a good idea to repartition if you want to merge several smaller partitions into one large one, or if you want to create several smaller partitions so that you can set up a multiboot configuration. If you want to repartition, follow the instructions to delete existing partitions, if needed, and then select unpartitioned space and press ENTER to proceed. CAUTION: Deleting a partition will remove all data stored on that partition. Before you continue, make sure you have backed up everything you want to keep. 9. Select the formatting method you would like to use, and then press ENTER. NTFS offers both enhanced formatting capabilities and security technologies. If you need to access drives or DOS files (such as from a DOS-based boot disk) using Windows Millennium Edition or earlier versions of Windows, you might need to select FAT32 instead. Select either format method (quick or slow). 10. Setup will format the drive, copy initial Setup files, and restart the computer. Note: After the computer restarts, you will again receive the message Press any key to boot from CD but you should ignore it so that you do not interrupt the current installation process. 11. After another restart, the next part of Setup will begin. 12. On the Regional and Language Options page, follow the instructions to add language support or change language settings, if desired. 13. On the Personalize Your Software page, type your name and the name of your company or organization (if applicable). 14. On the Your Product Key page, type the 25-character product key that came with your copy of Windows XP. 15. On the Computer Name and Administrator Password page, make up a computer name (if your network administrator gave you a name to use, type that). Then make up a password for the Administrator account on your computer. Type it once, and then confirm it by typing it again. Important: Be sure to remember the Administrator password. You'll need this password when you want to make changes to your system in the future. 16. On the Date and Time Settings page, make any changes that are necessary. 17. On the Networking Settings page, if it appears, select Typical settings (unless you plan to manually configure your networking components). 18. On the Workgroup or Computer Domain page, click Next. If you want to add your computer to a domain, select the second option and fill in the domain name. (If you do this, you will be prompted for a user name and password.) Note: Connecting to a domain is only possible in Windows XP Professional, not in Windows XP Home Edition. 19. Next, while Setup copies files to your computer and completes a few other tasks, you'll see a series of screens that tell you about new features in Windows XP. 20. Finally, your computer will restart. Again, ignore the message to press any key. After Setup completes, eject the CD from the CD-ROM drive. Do not forget to enable your virus protection software after Setup is finished. Transfer files and settings from another computer Did you ever wish that you could easily transfer your files and settings from an old computer to a new one? The Files and Settings Transfer Wizard available in Windows XP can assist you in doing this. This wizard helps take the pain out of upgrading to a new computer. Here's how to use this wizard: On your new computer: 1. Click Start, and then click Files and Settings Transfer Wizard. 2. On the Welcome page of the wizard, click Next. 3. On the Which computer is this? page, select New computer. 4. On the Do you have a Windows XP CD? page, select I will use the wizard from the Windows XP CD, unless you don't have a Windows XP CD. If that is the case, you will need to make a Wizard Disk so that you can run the wizard on your old computer. Select the first option and follow the instructions to make the Wizard Disk. 5. Now go to your old computer (or the computer that you're transferring files and settings from). On your old computer: 1. If you don't have a Windows XP CD, insert the Wizard Disk that you created into the floppy drive. Click Start, click Run, and then click Browse. Browse to your floppy drive and then double-click the MigWiz.exe file. In the Run dialog box, click OK. If you do have a Windows XP CD, insert it into the CD-ROM drive of the computer you want to copy files and settings from and wait for the startup menu to appear. If the menu does not appear automatically, click Start, click Run, and then click Browse. Browse to your CD-ROM drive and then double-click the Setup.exe file. In the Run dialog box, click OK. Click Perform additional tasks, and then click Transfer files and settings. 2. On the Welcome page of the Files and Settings Transfer Wizard, click Next. 3. On the Which computer is this? page, select Old computer. 4. On the Select a transfer method page, choose a method that will work for both computers. For example, you can place the files and settings on a network drive that both computers have access to, or you can use a removable drive. Whatever method you choose, both computers must be able to use it. 5. On the What do you want to transfer? page, select one of the three options. Depending on the type of transfer method you choose, some options are better than others here. For instance, if you plan to transfer more than just a few files and settings, choose a method other than floppy disks (since those have the lowest storage capacity). If you decide to change your transfer method, you can always click Back. On this page, you can also select a check box that lets you choose a custom list of files and settings to be transferred. This option is for advanced users. 6. At this point, you might see a message telling you to install certain programs on your new computer before continuing. This step is not required, but those programs might not work correctly without doing this. 7. The wizard now collects the files and settings you requested and prepares to transfer them to the new computer. Insert a disk or removable drive when prompted, if you are using one of those methods. 8. On the Completing the Collection Phase page, click Finish. Then go to your new computer, taking along any disk or CD you have used. On your new computer: 1. Click Start, and then click Files and Settings Transfer Wizard. 2. On the Welcome page, click Next. 3. On the Which computer is this? page, select New computer. 4. If you placed your files and settings on a disk or CD, insert it now. On the Where are the files and settings? page, tell the wizard where to find the files and settings. The wizard transfers the files and settings to the new computer. 5. On the Completing the Files and Settings Transfer Wizard page, read any messages about the status of your transfer, and then click Finish. 6. You might see a message telling you that you need to log off before the new settings will appear on your new computer. You can just log off and log back on. There is no need to restart the computer. That's it! The transferred files and settings should now be on your new computer. Partition and format a hard drive If there are no partitions on your hard drive, you will need to create a partition and format it. Alternatively, it's a good idea to repartition your hard drive if you want to merge several smaller partitions into one large one, or if you want to create several smaller partitions so that you can set up a multiboot configuration. If you want to partition or format your hard drive, we recommend that you use the disk partitioning and formatting tools that are built into Windows XP Setup. These tools allow you to delete existing partitions and to create one or more new partitions. IMPORTANT: If you follow these steps on a hard disk that is not empty, all of the data stored on that hard disk will be permanently deleted. To use the disk partitioning and formatting tools in Windows XP Setup: 1. Insert the Windows XP CD into your CD/DVD drive (or insert the first Windows XP Setup boot disk into the floppy disk drive), and then restart the computer. Note: To start your computer from the Windows XP CD (or from the Setup boot disk), your computer must be configured to start from the CD/DVD drive (or the floppy disk drive). In some cases, you might have to modify your computer's BIOS settings to do this. For more information, see "Configure a computer to boot from CD." 2. If you are starting the computer from the Windows XP CD, press a key to boot from CD when you are prompted to do so. If you are starting from the Windows XP Setup boot disks, insert each of the additional disks when prompted, and then press ENTER to continue after inserting each disk. 3. At the Welcome to Setup page, press ENTER to continue. 4. On the License Agreement page, read the agreement, and then follow the instructions for accepting or rejecting the agreement. 5. If an existing Windows XP installation is detected, you will be prompted to repair it. Press ESC (do not repair). 6. All existing partitions and unpartitioned spaces are listed for each physical hard disk. Use the arrow keys to select the partition or unpartitioned space where you want to create a new partition, and then press D to delete an existing partition or press C to create a new partition using unpartitioned space. If you press D to delete an existing partition, you must then press L (or press ENTER, and then press L if it is the System partition) to confirm that you want to delete the partition. Repeat this process for each of the existing partitions that you want to use for the new partition. When all the partitions are deleted, select the resulting unpartitioned space and press C to create a new partition. Note: If you want to create a partition where one or more partitions already exist, you must first delete the existing partition or partitions and then create the new partition. 7. Type the size (in megabytes, or MB) that you want to use for the new partition, and then press ENTER, or just press ENTER to create the partition using the maximum size. 8. If you want to create additional partitions, repeat steps 6 and 7. 9. If you want to install Windows XP, use the arrow keys to select the partition you want to install it on, and then press ENTER. If you do not want to format the partition and install Windows XP, press F3 two times to quit Setup, and then do not continue with the following steps. In this case, you must use another program to format the partition. 10. Select the format option that you want to use for the partition, and then press ENTER. The options are: o Format the partition by using the NTFS file system (Quick) o Format the partition by using the FAT file system (Quick) o Format the partition by using the NTFS file system o Format the partition by using the FAT file system o Leave the current file system intact (no changes) For most configurations, NTFS is a good choice for security and flexibility. If you plan to install a multiboot configuration and access data on the drive using older operating systems such as Windows 95, Windows 98, or Windows Millennium Edition, however, select FAT. When you format a volume, files are removed from the volume and the hard disk is scanned for bad sectors. The majority of the time required to format a volume is devoted to scanning the disk. If you choose the Quick format option, files are removed from the partition, but the disk is not scanned for bad sectors. You should only use this option if your hard disk has been previously formatted and you are sure that your hard disk is not damaged. Note: During Windows XP Setup, the option to leave the current file system intact is not available if the selected partition is a new partition. For partitions up to 2 gigabytes (GB) in size, Setup uses the FAT (also known as FAT16) file system. For partitions greater than 2 GB but less than 32 GB, Setup uses the FAT32 file system. For partitions greater than 32 GB, Setup uses NTFS. Note: If you deleted and created a new System partition but you are installing Windows XP on another partition, you will be prompted to select a file system for both the System and Boot partitions at this point. 11. After Setup formats the partition, follow the on-screen instructions to continue Setup. After Setup is complete, you can use the Disk Management tools in Windows XP to create or format additional partitions. Perform other Setup-related tasks How do I install Windows from the command prompt? If your computer will not boot from a CD, you can still use the Windows XP Setup floppy disks to start Setup. During Setup, you will be prompted to insert the Windows XP CD. For more information, see "Create boot disks." Otherwise, you can use a Windows 98 or Windows Millennium Edition Startup disk to start the computer, and then run Winnt.exe from the i386 folder of your Windows XP CD. 1. The Smartdrv.exe tool will speed up the process of copying files from the CD to your hard drive. To use the Smartdrv.exe tool, make sure the Smartdrv.exe file is present on the startup disk. If you do not have Smartdrv.exe, file copying will take much longer but it can still be done successfully. Verify that the following entries exist in the following files on your startup disk; add the entries if they do not already exist: In Autoexec.bat, add this line: smartdrv.exe In Config.sys, add this line: device=himem.sys Note: For information about modifying the Config.sys and Autoexec.bat files, see Microsoft Knowledge Base article 232558. 2. Insert the startup disk into your computer's floppy drive, and restart the computer. 3. When the DOS prompt appears (it looks like this: C:>), type the following lines, pressing ENTER after each one. Substitute the drive letter of your CD-ROM drive for the letter D, if yours is different. D: cd i386 winnt When Setup begins, follow the prompts on your screen. How do I set the default operating system (when multiple systems are installed)? If you have more than one operating system installed, you can select the operating system that you want to use as the default: 1. In Windows XP, right-click My Computer, and then click Properties. 2. On the Advanced tab, under Startup and Recovery, click Settings. 3. Under System startup, in the Default operating system list, click the operating system that you want to start when you turn on or restart your computer. 4. Select the Time to display list of operating systems check box, and then select the number of seconds for which you want the list displayed before the default operating system starts. Warning: The boot options file (Boot.ini) controls the number and order of operating systems on your computer. To manually edit this file, click Edit on the Startup and Recovery tab. Use caution when modifying the boot options file. Doing so incorrectly might make your computer unusable. For more information, see Microsoft Knowledge Base article 289022. How do I uninstall Windows XP? If you need to uninstall Windows XP and return to the operating system from which you originally upgraded, follow these instructions. Note: If you performed a new installation instead of upgrading, you cannot uninstall Windows XP. In this case, you need to perform a new installation of your previous operating system. Important Notes: If enough space is available, the Windows XP uninstallation files are automatically saved during the upgrade process. If space is not available, the files are not saved. If the files were not saved, you cannot use the uninstallation process that is described in this section. Any programs that were installed prior to the Windows XP upgrade will be preserved. However, any programs that were installed after the Windows XP upgrade will not be available after you uninstall Windows XP. You might need to reinstall these programs. To be able to successfully uninstall Windows XP SP2, you must have upgraded from Windows 98, Windows 98 Second Edition, or Windows Millennium Edition. If you upgraded from Windows XP, Windows 2000, Windows NT 4.0, or Windows 95, you cannot uninstall Windows XP SP2. If you converted your hard disk to the NTFS file system, you cannot revert back to an operating system that is incompatible with NTFS (for example, you cannot revert back to Windows 98 or Windows Millennium Edition). To uninstall Windows XP: 1. Restart your computer in Safe Mode. To do so, restart your computer and press F8 while Windows is starting. 2. Log on using the Administrator account. 3. Click Start, click Control Panel, and then double-click Add or Remove Programs. 4. In the list of installed programs, double-click Uninstall Windows XP. Important: If Uninstall Windows XP is not in the list of installed programs, you must manually reinstall the original operating system. If this is the case, be sure to back up all of your critical data before you proceed. If you have upgraded to Windows XP from Windows 98 or Windows Millennium Edition, it might be possible to manually uninstall Windows XP if the Undo folder is still available. For more information, see Microsoft Knowledge Base article 312569. 5. When you receive the "Are you sure you want to uninstall Windows XP and restore your previous operating system?" message, click Yes to start the Windows XP uninstallation process. 6. After the Windows XP uninstallation process is finished, your computer will shut down and then restart using the previously installed operating system. How do I remove Windows XP from one computer and install it on another? Follow the instructions above for uninstalling Windows XP. Then, use the Windows XP CD to install Windows XP on the new computer. For more information, see Microsoft Knowledge Base article 303661 and read the topic about activation failures when moving Windows XP to another computer. How do I deal with activation problems? If you are prompted to activate your installation of Windows XP, defer activation until you have completed planned upgrades or changes to your computer's fixed hardware and related device drivers. Otherwise, you may need to reactivate after making such changes. Fixed hardware/drivers include the first instance of devices such as video, network (excluding modems), SCSI, hard drives, CD-ROM/DVD, and system memory. USB or other removable devices (such as cameras and printers) do not affect activation. If you uninstall Windows XP from one computer (Computer A) and then install it on a second computer (Computer B), the following can occur: If fewer than 120 days have passed since the first installation of Windows XP on Computer A, you cannot activate Windows on Computer B over the Internet. Instead, when you are prompted to activate, you must call the phone number listed in the Activation Wizard, explain that you uninstalled and then reinstalled to a different computer, and be given a valid product key. If it has been more than 120 days since the first installation of Windows XP on Computer A, activation on Computer B should work normally. For more information about troubleshooting activation problems, see Microsoft Knowledge Base articles 293764, 293764, 312295, 314935, and 318702. Troubleshoot Setup Did you run into problems during Setup? Unfortunately, it does sometimes happen. Some problems can be solved by using the information in this section. Important: If you have virus protection software installed on your computer, disable it. Virus protection software can cause problems during setup. Be sure to enable your virus protection software after installing Windows XP. You can use the following troubleshooting steps if you have problems when you are upgrading to Windows XP from Windows 98, Windows 98 Second Edition, or Windows Millennium Edition. General troubleshooting If you encounter problems while running Setup, exit Setup and run the Upgrade Advisor from the Windows XP CD. Here's how: 1. Insert the Windows XP CD into your CD-ROM drive. 2. When the Welcome menu appears, click Check system compatibility. 3. Then click Check my system automatically. Upgrade Advisor will check for hardware and software incompatibilities. These are often the cause of Setup problems. Remove or uninstall the incompatible hardware or software, and then run Setup again. If Upgrade Advisor does not find the problem, you can also clean boot your computer and run Setup again. Clean-boot troubleshooting is simply a way of removing variables that could cause problems. To perform clean boot troubleshooting in Windows Millennium Edition: 1. Click Start, click Run, in the Open box, type msconfig and then click OK. 2. On the General tab, click Selective startup. 3. Clear all the check boxes under Selective startup. 4. On the Startup tab, select the *StateMgr check box (Windows Millennium Edition only), and then click OK. 5. When you are prompted to restart your computer, click Yes. 6. After the computer restarts, click Start, click Run, in the Open box, type msconfig, and then click OK. Important: Look closely at the General tab to make sure that the check boxes under Selective startup are clear. Proceed to the next step if none of the check boxes are selected. If you see a disabled or gray check box, your computer is not truly clean-booted and you might need assistance from the manufacturer of the program that is affecting Msconfig. 7. After you verify that your computer is clean-booted, try running Windows XP Setup again. For more information, see Microsoft Knowledge Base article 267288. To return from a clean boot state 1. Click Start, click Run, in the Open box, type msconfig, and then click OK. 2. On the General tab, click Normal startup, and then click OK. 3. Click Yes when you are prompted to restart your computer. To perform clean boot troubleshooting in Windows 98: For information about performing a clean boot for troubleshooting purposes in Windows 98, see Microsoft Knowledge Base article 192926. File copy error during Setup Suppose Setup stops when copying files, and you see a message like this: Setup cannot copy the file . Press X to retry, Y to abort. Here are some possible causes and solutions for this problem: Your Windows XP CD is scratched, smudged, or dirty. Clean the CD with a soft cloth, insert it into the CD drive, and then click OK. Your CD drive is not working properly or the CD might be vibrating too much for the laser to accurately read the data. For more information about this problem, consult your hardware documentation, or contact the CD drive manufacturer. If you are using multiple CD drives, your computer might be trying to locate files on the wrong drive. If your hardware has a feature to disable CD drives that are not being used, disable the CD drives that you are not using. Note: To disable a device in Windows 95, right-click My Computer, click Properties, open Device Manager, and then clear Original Configuration (Current). In Windows 98 and Windows Millennium Edition, select the Disable in this hardware profile check box in Device Manager. If required, re-enable the device after upgrading to Windows XP. For more information, see Microsoft Knowledge Base article 283658. There is a virus on your computer. Run a virus-scanning program to check your system and identify needed repairs. Note: If you experience problems during installation, you can use the Windows Memory Diagnostic tool to test your computer's random access memory (RAM). This tool helps determine whether installation problems are caused by failing hardware, such as RAM or the memory system of the motherboard. To use the tool, follow the instructions on the Windows Memory Diagnostic (http://oca.microsoft.com/en/windiag.asp) Web site. For information about several more technical issues that might be causing the problem, see Microsoft Knowledge Base article 310064: How to Troubleshoot Windows XP Problems During Installation. If you can rule out all of the causes listed above, and you continue to receive the error message, copy the i386 folder from the CD drive to your local hard disk, and then try to run Setup from your hard disk. Here's how: 1. The Smartdrv.exe tool will speed up the process of copying files from the CD to your hard drive. To use the Smartdrv.exe tool, make sure the Smartdrv.exe file is present on the startup disk. If you don't have Smartdrv.exe, file copying will take much longer but it can still be done successfully. Verify that the following entries exist in the following files on your startup disk; add the entries if they do not already exist: In Autoexec.bat, add this line: smartdrv.exe In Config.sys, add this line: device=himem.sys Note: For information about modifying the Config.sys and Autoexec.bat files, see Microsoft Knowledge Base article 232558. 2. Insert the startup disk into your computer's floppy drive, and restart the computer. 3. When the DOS prompt appears (it looks like this: C:>), type the following lines, pressing ENTER after each one. Substitute the drive letter of your CD-ROM drive for the letter D, if yours is different. D: cd i386 winnt When Setup begins, follow the prompts on your screen. Note: There is no option to boot to a command prompt on the initial startup menu in Windows Millennium Edition. However, you can boot to a startup floppy disk and then type C: and press ENTER to access the hard drive, as long as the startup disk uses the same file system as the hard disk. Your computer hangs or stops responding and displays a black screen When you try to upgrade to Windows XP, your computer might stop responding (hang) and a black screen might be displayed. This is usually caused by hardware or software that is incompatible with Windows XP. Note: Before beginning Setup, you should compare your system's hardware to the Hardware Compatibility List (HCL). You can also find information about each of your computer's devices (such as printers, scanners, and so on) at the device manufacturer's Web site, in the Windows Catalog: Text version of the HCL (for all operating systems) (https://winqual.microsoft.com/download/default.asp) Text version of the HCL (for Windows XP only) (https://winqual.microsoft.com/download/display.asp?FileName=hcl/WinXPHCLx86.txt) The Windows Catalog (http://www.microsoft.com/windows/catalog/) You can get to all of the above from Windows Hardware and Driver Central (http://www.microsoft.com/whdc/hcl/default.mspx) If your computer stops responding and displays a black screen during Setup, follow these steps: 1. Wait at the black screen for 10 minutes to make sure that the computer does not continue with the Setup procedure. Watch the hard drive indicator to see if there is any disk activity. Setup might resolve the problem on its own. 2. Restart the computer to see if it stops again at the same place during Setup. Occasionally, Setup will proceed farther than the last time it stopped responding. If this occurs, restart your computer several times so that Setup will finish. 3. If steps 1 and 2 don't work, to revert back to Windows 98 or Windows Millennium Edition, restart the computer and choose the option to Cancel Windows XP Setup. If canceling Windows XP Setup is not an option when you restart your computer, see step 5. 4. After you revert back to Windows 98 or Windows Millennium Edition, uninstall all virus protection programs, uninstall all boot manager programs (such as GoBack), and then perform a clean boot of your computer. 5. If the upgrade fails again, there might be a hardware incompatibility issue. You can try to disable ACPI functionality. To do this, when your computer restarts, watch for an option to press F6 to install SCSI drivers. On this screen, press F7 (not F6). 6. If Setup continues to stop responding, disable any unnecessary hardware. Remove any USB devices, remove or disable network cards, sound cards, and serial cards, and then restart Setup. 7. If you continue to receive this error message, you might need to flash (update) the BIOS on the motherboard. Please refer to the manufacturer of your computer or to the motherboard Web site for information about how to flash the BIOS. Warning: Do not attempt to flash the BIOS unless you are an advanced user. Doing this incorrectly can make your computer unusable. 8. If a BIOS update does not resolve the issue, or if you are unable to obtain an updated BIOS version for the computer, you might want to install Windows XP with a Standard PC Hardware Abstraction Layer (HAL). To do so, press F7 (not F6) when you are prompted to press F6 after Setup restarts the computer for the first time. For more information about how to force the Standard PC HAL, see Microsoft Knowledge Base article 299340: How to Force a HAL During Windows XP Setup. You receive an error message or Stop message during Setup If you receive one of the following error messages during Setup, refer to the appropriate Microsoft Knowledge Base article: 311562: 'An Unexpected Error (768) Occurred at Line 5118@ind:XpClientBootSetupSetup.c' Error Message During Windows XP Setup 311564: 'Stop 0x0000000A Irql_Not_Less_or_Equal' Error Message During Windows XP Upgrade 311442: Error Message: Setup Cannot Continue. Please Contact Microsoft Technical Support. (Error: 3E6h) Troubleshooting other errors: Note: If you experience problems during installation, you can use the Windows Memory Diagnostic tool to test your computer's random access memory (RAM). This tool helps determine whether installation problems are caused by failing hardware, such as RAM or the memory system of the motherboard. To use the tool, follow the instructions on the Windows Memory Diagnostic (http://oca.microsoft.com/en/windiag.asp) Web site. Problem Solution A program or a device doesn't work after upgrading to Windows XP. First, try reinstalling the program or device. If that doesn't solve the problem, check with the manufacturer for a newer version of the software or hardware that is designed to work with Windows XP. If this is an older program, search Windows Help and Support for the word "compatibility" to see instructions for running the Program Compatibility Wizard. Message: Incomplete file copy Refer to the file copy troubleshooting section in Microsoft Knowledge Base article 310064. Message: NTLDR is missing If you choose to update files at the beginning of Setup, this will be fixed automatically. See Microsoft Knowledge Base article 322069. For troubleshooting this error, see Microsoft Knowledge Base article 314057. Message: Error 127 or error code fffffdf0 in catroot2 folder Rename the WindowsSystemCatroot2 folder and run Setup again. See Microsoft Knowledge Base article 307153. This has been fixed in Dynamic Update 1.3. Run Setup again and download the updated Setup files when prompted. Message: "File not found: ASMS" For troubleshooting tips, see Microsoft Knowledge Base article 311755. Setup hangs during "finalizing settings" phase. This error is usually caused by virus protection software. Cancel Setup, disable your virus protection software, and then start Setup again. (Or, if you choose to update files at the beginning of Setup, this will be fixed automatically.) Create boot disks A boot disk is a floppy disk or set of disks that lets you start the computer without using Windows. It can be useful to have this when doing certain types of troubleshooting and when performing a new installation of Windows. You can download a program to create the six Windows XP Setup boot floppy disks that contain the files and drivers required to access the CD-ROM drive and begin the Setup process. To do this, go to Obtaining Windows XP Setup Boot Disks (http://support.microsoft.com:80/support/kb/articles/q310/9/94.asp). However, rather than creating boot disks, we recommend that you boot your computer from the Windows XP CD to start Setup. If your computer is not already able to do this (most newer computers are), refer to the section titled "Configure a computer to boot from CD" for more information. If your computer does not support booting from CD, you can download a file that will help you create boot disks. See the list at the end of this section for download locations. Creating the Setup boot disks 1. When you download the Setup disks, the download contains only one large program file. When you run the downloaded file, it extracts the files to individual floppy disks. You receive the following prompt: This program creates the Setup boot disks for Microsoft Windows XP. To create these disks, you need to provide 6 blank, formatted, high-density disks. Please specify the floppy drive to copy the images to. 2. Type the drive letter for the floppy disk drive (this is typically drive A). After you type the floppy disk drive letter, you see the following prompt: Insert one of these disks into drive :. This disk will become the Windows XP Setup Boot Disk. Press any key when you are ready. 3. When you press a key, the downloaded file starts extracting and copying the files. Continue inserting the blank disks as you are prompted to do so until all six disks are created. If the process is interrupted, you must run the downloaded program file again to create all six disks. 4. Label each disk with the number that is specified by the program. You must use the disks in the correct order during the Setup process. 5. After you create all six disks, insert the first disk in the floppy disk drive, and then restart the computer. Note that the computer must be configured to boot from the floppy disk drive. Most computers will do this automatically, but in some cases, you might need to modify your computer's BIOS settings to do this. For information about modifying your computer's BIOS settings, refer to the section titled "Configure a computer to boot from CD." 6. When you restart the computer, the Setup process begins. Insert each floppy disk as you are prompted to do so. You will then be prompted for the Windows XP CD to finish Setup. Configure a computer to boot from CD Some computers might automatically offer the option to boot from CD if they detect a bootable CD in the CD-ROM drive. If so, when you start the computer with a bootable CD in the CD-ROM drive, you'll see the message "Press any key to boot from CD." Otherwise, you can set your computer to boot from CD by using the setup program for your computer's BIOS (basic input/output system). Here's how: When you first start the computer, look for a short message telling you which key to press for setup. For example, some computers will have this message: Press DELETE to enter setup. If your computer doesn't give you such a message, try pressing these commonly used keys during startup: - DELETE - F1 - F2 - F3, then F2 - F10 - CTRL+ALT+ESC - CTRL+ALT+S - ESC If graphics appear during startup, pressing ESC often makes the graphics disappear so that you can see the correct key for entering BIOS setup. When you see the message, quickly press the indicated key. You will enter a DOS-like program that consists of one or more screens. You probably won't be able to use the mouse while in this program. BIOS programs vary widely, but look for an option called "Boot order" or something similar. Set the boot order to boot from CD before booting from the hard drive. Some newer laptop computers have a Windows-based utility for configuring the BIOS. If your computer won't boot from a CD, refer to the section titled "Other Setup-related tasks" for information about starting Setup from the command prompt. Set up a multiboot system You can install more than one operating system on your computer and choose which operating system you want to use every time you start your computer. This is called a dual-boot or multiboot configuration. This section explains how to set up Windows XP as a multiboot system with the following operating systems: Windows 2000, Windows NT 4.0, and Windows NT 3.51 Windows 95, Windows 98, and Windows Millennium Edition MS-DOS or Windows 3.x Precautions Before creating a multiboot configuration with Windows XP and another operating system, review the following precautions: Be sure to back up your current system and all data files. Each operating system must be installed on a separate volume. Microsoft does not support installing multiple operating systems on the same volume. If you have only one volume on your computer, you have to reformat and repartition your hard disk to contain multiple volumes before you begin creating a multiboot configuration, unless you are simply installing another copy of Windows XP. Do not install Windows XP on a compressed drive that was not compressed using the NTFS compression utility. Before installing Windows XP, you should disable antivirus software, and you might want to run the Windows Memory Diagnostic tool to test your computer's random access memory (RAM). To use the Windows Memory Diagnostic tool, follow the instructions on the Windows Memory Diagnostic (http://oca.microsoft.com/en/windiag.asp) Web site. Be sure to enable your virus protection software after installing Windows XP. You must use a different computer name for each operating system if the computer is on a Windows 2000 or Windows XP domain. The operating systems should be installed from oldest to newest. If possible, install operating systems in the following order: - MS-DOS - Windows 95, Windows 98 or Windows Millennium Edition Note: You cannot install Windows Millennium Edition over any version of Windows NT, but they can exist together on a single system. It is recommended that you install each to a separate hard disk or partition. If Windows NT is already installed, Windows Millennium Edition Setup will add itself to the Windows NT boot menu to allow you to multiboot between Windows Millennium Edition and Windows NT. For more information, see Microsoft Knowledge Base article 271240. - Windows NT - Windows 2000 - Windows XP (Professional or Home Edition) Partitioning the hard disk and selecting file systems A partition is a logical section of a hard disk. Each partition normally has its own file system. For more information about partitions, see Microsoft Knowledge Base article 313348. You might need to reformat and repartition your hard disk if: 1. You have only one volume but you want to set up a multiboot configuration. You have to install each operating system on a separate volume so that each installation can retain its own files and configuration information. 2. The boot volume is not formatted with the correct file system: 1. If you want to create a multiboot system by using Windows 95, Windows 98 or Windows Millennium Edition along with Microsoft Windows XP, you have to format the boot volume by using FAT because Windows 95, Windows 98 and Windows Millennium Edition do not support the NTFS file system. 2. If you want to install Windows 95 (retail version 4.00.950), your boot volume must be formatted as FAT. Windows 95 (OSR2.1 and above) can have a FAT32 boot volume and dual boot with Windows 2000 and Windows XP. For more information, see Microsoft Knowledge Base article 258662. 3. If you want to create a multiboot system using Windows 95 OSR2, Windows 98, or Windows Millennium Edition with Windows 2000 or Windows XP, you can format the boot volume by using FAT32. Note: If you format a Windows NT 4.0, Windows 2000, or Windows XP volume with any file system other than NTFS, you will lose all NTFS-specific features. This includes Windows XP features such as file system security, Encrypting File System (EFS) settings, disk quotas, and remote storage. Likewise, Windows 95, Windows 98, and Windows Millennium Edition do not recognize an NTFS partition; they will identify it as unknown. Therefore, if you format a Windows 98 or Windows Millennium Edition partition as FAT, and a Windows XP partition as NTFS, any files on the NTFS partition will not be available or visible if you try to access them while running Windows 98 or Windows Millennium Edition. Supported file systems The following table lists the supported file systems for Microsoft operating systems: Operating system Supported file systems MS-DOS FAT Windows 3.1 FAT Windows NT FAT, NTFS Windows 95 FAT Windows 95 OSR2 FAT, FAT32 Windows 98 FAT, FAT32 Windows Millennium Edition FAT, FAT32 Windows 2000 FAT, FAT32, NTFS Windows XP (both Professional and Home Edition) FAT, FAT32, NTFS To create a multiboot system with Windows XP and MS-DOS, Windows 95, Windows 98, or Windows Millennium Edition You cannot install two or more of the following in a multiboot configuration: Windows 95, Windows 98, and Windows Millennium Edition. These combinations work: MS-DOS, Windows 95, and Windows XP MS-DOS, Windows 98 or Windows Millennium Edition, and Windows XP This combination does not work: Windows 95, Windows 98, and Windows Millennium Edition You should install Windows XP only after installing MS-DOS, Windows 95, Windows 98, or Windows Millennium Edition. This will prevent these operating systems from overwriting the Windows XP boot sector and the Windows XP startup files. Note: If you install the operating systems in the wrong order, you will need to use the Recovery Console or run Windows XP Setup again to get Windows XP back. For more information, see Microsoft Knowledge Base article 307654. To create a multiboot system with Windows XP and MS-DOS, Windows 95, Windows 98, or Windows Millennium Edition: 1. Make sure that you have a separate partition or hard disk for each operating system you plan to install, and that each partition or hard disk is formatted with the correct file system. 2. Do one of the following: - If you want a multiboot system with MS-DOS, Windows 95, Windows 98 or Windows Millennium Edition along with Windows XP, first install MS-DOS; followed by Windows 95, Windows 98, or Windows Millennium Edition; and then install Windows XP. - If you want a dual-boot system with only Windows 95, Windows 98 or Windows Millennium Edition, install either Windows 95, Windows 98 or Windows Millennium Edition, and then install Windows XP. 3. Install each operating system according to the standard installation procedure. To create a multiboot system with Windows NT 4.0 and Windows XP Using a multiboot system with both Windows NT 4.0 and Windows XP is not recommended as a long-term solution. The NTFS update in Service Pack 5 (SP5) for Windows NT 4.0 is provided only to help you evaluate and upgrade to Windows XP. To create a multiboot system with Windows NT 4.0 and Windows XP: 1. Make sure that your hard disk is formatted with the correct file system: either FAT32 or NTFS. 2. Install Windows NT 4.0, download Windows NT Service Pack 5 from Microsoft, and install the service pack. Then install Windows XP to a separate volume. 3. Install each operating system according to the standard installation procedure. Note: If you intend to install more than one operating system consisting of some combination of Windows NT 4.0 with either Windows 2000 or Windows XP as the only installed operating systems, you must make sure that you have installed Service Pack 5 or higher for Windows NT 4.0. You can download the latest Windows NT 4.0 Service Pack here: Windows NT 4.0 Service Pack 6a (http://www.microsoft.com/ntserver/nts/downloads/recommended/SP6/allSP6.asp). Windows XP automatically upgrades any NTFS partitions that it finds on your system to the version of NTFS that is used in Windows 2000 and Windows XP. However, Windows NT 4.0 requires Service Pack 5 to read and write files on a volume that is formatted with the version of NTFS used in Windows 2000 and Windows XP. Installing programs on more than one operating system If you have more than one operating system, and you want certain programs or drivers to work on both systems, you must install those items on each system separately. For example, if you want to use Microsoft Word on a computer with both Windows 98 and Windows XP installed, you have to install Microsoft Word two times (once on Windows 98 and once on Windows XP). You can install the program to the same path for different operating systems, as long as the target location uses a file system both operating systems can read. Note: Windows 95 or Windows 98 might reconfigure hardware settings the first time you use them, which might cause configuration problems when you start Windows XP. Specifying the default operating system for startup If you have more than one operating system on your computer, you can set the operating system that you want to use as the default when you start your computer: 1. Click Start, click Control Panel, and then double-click System. 2. On the Advanced tab, under Startup and Recovery, click Settings. 3. Under System startup, in the Default operating system list, click the operating system that you want to start when you turn on your computer. 4. Select the Display list of operating systems for check box, and then type the number of seconds for which you want the list displayed before the default operating system starts. Warning: The boot options file (Boot.ini) controls the number and order of operating systems on your computer. To manually edit this file, click Edit on the Startup and Recovery tab. Use caution when modifying the boot options file. Doing so incorrectly might render your computer unusable. For more information, see Microsoft Knowledge Base article 289022. Troubleshooting problems with multiboot systems These additional troubleshooting ideas might help you resolve your issue without having to call technical support: Errors with Internet Explorer: When you start Microsoft Internet Explorer, the browser might quit and you might receive an error message that is similar to the following: iexplore caused an Invalid Page Fault in module kernel32.dll This error might occur if you install multiple operating systems on a single volume. To resolve this issue, install each operating system on a separate volume. You cannot configure your computer to start both Windows 95 and Windows 98 (or Windows Millennium Edition) You cannot configure a computer to multiboot Windows 95 and Windows 98 (or Windows Millennium Edition) because those platforms use the same boot file. Therefore, multibooting Windows 95, Windows 98 and Windows Millennium Edition at the same time is not supported. The boot menu does not appear upon startup When you start your computer, the boot menu does not appear and you are unable to start Windows XP. This problem might occur if you install Windows 95, Windows 98 or Windows Millennium Edition after you install Windows XP. To resolve this issue, repair or reinstall Windows XP. For more information about multibooting with Windows 2000 and Windows XP, see Multibooting with Windows 2000 and Windows XP (http://www.microsoft.com/windows2000/techinfo/administration/management/mltiboot.asp). Also, see Microsoft Knowledge Base article 205287. Repair or recover a system You can repair or recover your system in several different ways. Instructions for each method are below. Try the methods in this order: 1. Revert to the "Last Known Good" configuration. 2. Start the computer in Safe Mode and try to fix the problem. 3. Use the Windows XP Recovery Console. 4. Use System Restore. 5. Use Automated System Recovery (works for Windows XP Professional only, not Windows XP Home Edition). To use the Last Known Good configuration: If Windows XP will not start, you can restore your system to the Last Known Good configuration – in other words, your most recent settings that worked. Here's how: 1. Start the computer and then press the F8 key when Windows begins to start. The Windows Advanced Options menu appears. 2. Use the arrow keys to select Last Known Good Configuration (your most recent settings that worked), and then press ENTER. 3. If a boot menu appears, use the arrow keys to select Microsoft Windows XP, and then press ENTER. Windows XP restores the computer to the most recent restore point. To use the Windows XP Recovery Console: Posted by Master Key at 9:00 AM 0 comments Labels: install XP, Step by step procedure to install XP XP Game Compatibility You want to know if all your favorite games are still going to run under Windows XP. Remember what happened when we tried to run games on our Windows 2000 machines? Sometimes we were a little disappointed. Windows 2000 was made more for corporate applications than "Quake," but true techno-geeks know they don't have to sacrifice death matches for a robust business environment -- at least not anymore. Windows XP has shown an impressive track record of game compatibility. Some of the standard games, such as "Tiger Woods Golf," "NHL 2001," "Max Payne," and "Unreal" on our Windows XP Professional machine were specifically slated for Windows 95 and 98, and were shown not to work in Windows 2000. The installation in XP was as smooth as silk. The games ran quickly and beautifully -- not a problem in sight (except for my bad chip shot -- Tiger was hanging his head in shame). Some less-sophisticated programs may not run as smoothly, older applications such as the Atari 2600 Classic Game Collection, did not appreciate the Windows XP environment. In this case you can use the Application Compatibility Wizard, found in the accessories menu. XP includes integrated compatibility layers to mimic older versions of Windows, so if your program does not work in Windows XP, the compatibility wizard will walk you through the process of getting even your favorite DOS games up and running. Atari Classic Game Collection run very well in the Windows 95 environment, at 256 colors and 640x480 screen resolution. So setting XP to always run Atari application in this environment, and everything was smooth sailing after that. One final tip about compatibility: Don't run the compatibility wizard if your program appears to be running well in the normal environment, as the wizard will give you an error message. In general, XP has great program compatibility, so you can upgrade your operating system without giving up all your old favorites. Posted by Master Key at 9:00 AM 0 comments Labels: XP Game Compatibility Speeding Up Your Pentium 2 by 50% We all know that you really shouldn't try to run Windows XP on anything less that about a Pentium 3 of some sort if you are out for speedy operations and amazing reaction times, but for those of us with the good old Pentium 2's who want to see just how well we can run XP, we have to tweak as much as we can where-ever we can. A real killer to the system's performance is Windows Media Player. Although it may look desirable and fancy with it's rounded off edges and 3rd-Dimensional appearance, the truth is, it takes up a large amount of that precious processing power. All of these troubles however, lead to one thing in particular with this 'new-look' over-rated music and video player...the Visualizations. The look-great I'll admit but like a lot of software these days, it has no purpose. If you run the task manager, and click the Performance tab along the top, you'll see that when Windows Media Player is running and nothing else is active, it takes up around 50% of the processors power. Once these visualizations are turned off, it barely takes up 2-3% of the processors power, which leaves much more room for other applications to work efficiently. Here's how to disable the feature: Open Media Player. Make sure the Now Playing tab on the left is selected. Click the View menu along the top. Go down to Now Playing Tools. In the sub-menu that has just 'popped-out', uncheck Show Visualization Posted by Master Key at 8:58 AM 0 comments Labels: Speeding Up Your Pentium 2 by 50% Sunday, August 12, 2007 Reduce 10 Seconds Scandisk Count Down Time During XP Boot To reduce the count down time of Windows XP during boot process ( You see this normally when your computer is not shutdown properly, Electricity failure is one of the major reasons ) , You can use the following method. Start MS Dos Prompt (or Goto Start menu-> Run and here type CMD). Now at command Prompt type the following command CHKNTFS /T:4 Where 4 is the amount of time in seconds to wait before scandisk starts ( You may set it to 0 or 1 so that scandisk instantly starts or whatever you prefer ) For help about this command, You can type the following command at command prompt CHKNTFS /? Note: You can also type the command CHKNTFS /T:4 at run command but in this case you will only see a splash screen of command promt and it will disappear, but your task will be done. Posted by Master Key at 3:18 AM 0 comments Labels: Reduce 10 Seconds Scandisk Count Down Time During XP Boot Change Drive Letters in Windows XP When you add drives to your computer, such as an extra hard drive, a CD drive, or a storage device that corresponds to a drive, Windows automatically assigns letters to the drives. However, this assignment might not suit your system; for example, you might have mapped a network drive to the same letter that Windows assigns to a new drive. When you want to change drive letters, follow these steps: Right-click My Computer, and then click Manage. Under Computer Management, click Disk Management. In the right pane, youll see your drives listed. CD-ROM drives are listed at the bottom of the pane. Right-click the drive or device you want to change, and then click Change Drive Letter and Paths. Click Change, click Assign the following drive letter, click the drive letter you want to assign, and then click OK. Posted by Master Key at 3:15 AM 0 comments Labels: Change Drive Letters in Windows XP Do Not Highlight Newly Installed Programs Tired of that annoying little window that pops up to tell you that new software is installed? If it gets in the way when youre logging off, turn it off completely. To do this: Click Start, right-click at the top of the Start menu where your name is displayed, and then click Properties. In the Taskbar and Start Menu Properties dialog box, on the Start Menu tab, click Customize. Click the Advanced tab, and then clear the Highlight newly installed programs check box. Click OK, and then click OK again. Posted by Master Key at 3:13 AM 0 comments Labels: Do Not Highlight Newly Installed Programs windows xp configuration tools available is hidden right there in your system 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 and then Run, then type the following: 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. Posted by Master Key at 3:13 AM 0 comments Labels: windows xp configuration tools available is hidden right there in your system Stop Password Expiration After you have run Windows XP for a while, you may receive this message when you log on: "Your password will expire in 14 days.....". By default, Windows XP is set up with passwords which will expire after 42 days. And 14 days in advance, Windows will start warning you of this fact. Go to Start > Run > type control userpasswords2 Select the Advanced tab in the User Accounts window. Press the Advanced button below the Advanced user management header. Select Users in the Local Users and Groups. In the right pane, right-click the user name for which you want to change the setting, and select Properties. On the General tab, check Password never expires. Click Apply and OK (all the way out). Posted by Master Key at 3:08 AM 0 comments Labels: Stop Password Expiration Make any Folder INVISIBLE in Windows XP Have you ever wondered, how can you make a folder invisible without even using any kind of softwares in windows XP? Well, here is the answer to that. It is very much possible and Windows will help us in doing this. How? Lets see the answer 1. Create any new Folder. 2. Right click and go to Rename, remove the content, press “Alt” and type “0160″. The Folder name would become NIL. 3. Now go on to the properties of the folder and click “Customize”, and click “Change Icon”. 4. Here you will find some icons without any kind of images. 5. Select any of these images and click “OK”. You will now see that your folder is now invisible. If you will select it then it will be shown like this. But in a normal manner when you will open your Drive/Folder, it will be Invisible. Posted by Master Key at 3:06 AM 0 comments Labels: Make any Folder INVISIBLE in Windows XP Multiple login in yahoo Without Using any Software Hi All, Here is a simple trick to multiple login to yahoo 1. Go to Start ----> Run . Type regedit, then enter. 2. Navigate to HKEY_CURRENT_ USER --------> Software --->yahoo ----->pager---->Test 3. On the right page , right-click and choose new Dword value . 4. Rename it as Plural. 5. Double click and assign a decimal value of 1. Its done!! Now close registry and restart yahoo messenger and try Multiple Login. Posted by Master Key at 3:05 AM 0 comments Labels: Multiple login in yahoo Without Using any Software Top 10 tips and tricks for Windows Vista 1.Explore the new Windows Vista start menu. Looking for specific applications, Web sites, and e-mails is faster than ever with the streamlined Windows Vista start menu. To find a specific application or file, click the Windows key on the keyboard (or open the start menu) and enter the file name in the Instant Search field. As you type, Windows Vista dynamically searches filenames, metadata, and the full text of all files and displays the choices by file type. For example, type “out” to find Microsoft® Outlook®. 2. Discover the new search explorer. Try filtering by type using the search pane and selecting Documents. Next choose to see your files in another way, via the new stack view. Select the author column header control drop down menu, and choose the option to Stack by author. Explore all the documents by a particular author by double clicking on an author’s stack. Now, save that search as a new search folder. Choose the option Save Search found on the top command bar and name and save your search folder. In the future, to re-run it, simply select the Searches folder link on the left side navigation pane, and double click on your search folder. 3. Experience the enhanced user interface. If your PC supports the Windows® Aero™ user experience, open multiple files and see how easy it is to locate the right open window using the breakthrough Windows Flip (simply ALT+TAB) or Flip 3D (Windows key+TAB). 4. Browse multiple Web sites. Tabbed browsing in Internet Explorer® 7 enables a single Internet Explorer window to run with the convenience of multiple pages. Open a new page by clicking the empty tab on the toolbar or by right-clicking any hyperlink and choosing New Tab. Tabs can also be right-clicked to refresh individual pages or refresh pages as a group. You can close either individual tabs or an entire group, and you can save tabs as one favorite group. With the Quick Tabs feature, the icon just to the right of the Favorites icon, thumbnail images of all open tabs can be seen in a single view helping you manage multiple open tabs. 5.Print picture perfect Web content. Most Web sites are simply not formatted to fit cleanly on a standard piece of paper. With the new shrink to fit printing feature found in Internet Explorer 7 Web sites will no longer get cut off when sent to the printer. 6. Collaborate with a co-worker. Want an easy way to share files and applications with a colleague or customer—even when you may not be part of the same network? Windows Meeting Space is a new experience in Windows Vista that enables you to start an impromptu collaboration session with other Windows Vista users. Simply open Windows Meeting Space and start a session. Windows Vista will automatically detect other Windows Vista users that are on the same sub-net infrastructure or close enough for you to create an ad hoc (direct PC-to-PC connection) wireless connection. Once you have invited them and they have accepted, you can share documents by simply dragging a document to the Handouts area on the bottom right which instantly replicates that file across the other meeting participants’ machines. Dragging the file to the presentation area on the left side starts application sharing, enabling the other participants to watch as you present that file. If someone has a good edit for your file, you can make that edit in real time, or pass control of the application directly to that participant for them to make that edit for you. 7. Share a folder or file directly from your PC. Windows Vista improves on the Windows network folder sharing experience first introduced with Windows XP by giving you more flexibility in what you can share with other people and improving the setup process. With Windows Vista you can now share folders and individual files with any other user on the same corporate network. From any explorer, select a file or folder and on the command bar choose the option to Share. Enter the name of another user on the same network, and give them appropriate rights of access—reader, co-owner, etc. To help close the loop, Windows Vista can even automatically compose an e-mail to the individuals with which you have shared the content. The auto-generated e-mail contains a hyperlink to the shared content, enabling the recipient to instantly be taken to the shared content 8. Create an XPS Document. XPS documents are a new archiving format perfect for preserving content and for securely sharing information in an application independent way. To create an XPS document, open any document in virtually any application, and select the print option. In the printer selection menu, choose Microsoft XPS Document Writer, and save the file. Double click on the file, which should open it in the XPS Viewer, which is hosted by Internet Explorer 7. The XPS document is a pixel-perfect rendition of the original source material. 9. Speed up your PC’s performance. Windows Vista introduces a new concept for adding additional performance to a running system. Windows ReadyBoost™ lets people use flash memory on a USB 2.0 drive, SD Card, Compact Flash, or other memory form factor to provide additional memory cache—memory that the computer can access much more quickly than it can access data on the hard drive. Insert a USB 2.0 memory drive with at least 512 MB capacity. When prompted, click use this device to speed up my computer. 10. Recover a previous version of a document. Windows Vista introduces a new feature: Previous Versions. This allows you to “roll back” the clock to an earlier version of a file that you may have accidentally saved over or edited. In the Documents Explorer, open a document, edit it, save it, and then close it. While selecting the document, choose the Previous Versions option on the command bar, which will bring up a list of previously saved versions of the individual file. Choose a previous version and Windows Vista will restore your file to that version. Careful: all edits since that version will be lost. Posted by Master Key at 3:03 AM 0 comments Labels: Top 10 tips and tricks for Windows Vista Ms Word Secret Open Microsoft word And then type =rand (200, 99) then press enter See the Magic It is wonderful. Posted by Master Key at 3:02 AM 0 comments Labels: Ms Word Secret Disable Windows Error Reporting Messages You must be well aware of Error Messages that come up whenever there is a problem with windows or any other component. Actually this service is by Microsoft that allows you to send a Error report of the problem so that they can fix it in the coming versions. However, sometimes this service can really irritate you. Well, you don’t need to get angry any more, you can disable it with few clicks. Just follow these steps.     1 Go to My computer –> Properties –> Advanced. 2 In this tab click on Error Reporting button down below. 3 Choose Disable Error reporting from there. That’s all. You are now free of those error messages   Posted by Master Key at 2:26 AM 0 comments Labels: Disable Windows Error Reporting Messages How Cable Television Works In the 1950s, there were four television networks in the United States. Because of the frequencies allotted to television, the signals could only be received in a "line of sight" from the transmitting antenna. People living in remote areas, especially remote mountainous areas, couldn't see the programs that were already becoming an important part of U.S. culture. In 1948, people living in remote valleys in Pennsylvania solved their reception problems by putting antennas on hills and running cables to their houses. These days, the same technology once used by remote hamlets and select cities allows viewers all over the country to access a wide variety of programs and channels that meet their individual needs and desires. By the early 1990s, cable television had reached nearly half the homes in the United States. Today, U.S. cable systems deliver hundreds of channels to some 60 million homes, while also providing a growing number of people with high-speed Internet access. Some cable systems even let you make telephone calls and receive new programming technologies! In this article, we'll show you how cable television brings you so much information and such a wide range of programs, from educational to inspirational to just plain odd. The earliest cable systems were, in effect, strategically placed antennas with very long cables connecting them to subscribers' television sets. Because the signal from the antenna became weaker as it traveled through the length of cable, cable providers had to insert amplifiers at regular intervals to boost the strength of the signal and make it acceptable for viewing. According to Bill Wall, technical director for subscriber networks at Scientific-Atlanta, a leading maker of equipment for cable television systems, limitations in these amplifiers were a significant issue for cable system designers in the next three decades.   10 Most Prevalent Global Malware 1. TROJ_GENERIC Malware Type: Trojan This is the Trend Micro generic detection for low-threat Trojans. It also installs itself as a browser helper object (BHO) by creating certain registry keys. 2. WORM_NUWAR.CQ Malware Type: Worm This worm arrives as an attachment to mass-mailed email messages. It spreads by attaching a copy of itself to an email message, which it sends using its own Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP) engine. Having its own SMTP engine allows it to send messages without using any mailing application, such as MS Outlook. 3. WORM_NYXEM.E Malware Type: Worm This worm propagates by attaching copies of itself to email messages that it sends to target addresses, using its own SMTP engine. Through this SMTP engine, it is able to easily send the email message without using other mailing applications, such as Microsoft Outlook. 4. WORM_NETSKY.DAM Malware Type: Worm This is Trend Micro's detection for the damaged samples of WORM_NETSKY variants. It runs on Windows 95, 98, ME, NT, 2000 and XP. 5. HTML_NETSKY.P Malware Type: HTML This HTML malware arrives as an email with an executable file attachment that is detected by Trend Micro as WORM_NETSKY.P. It exploits a known vulnerability in Internet Explorer versions 5.01 and 5.5 known as the Automatic Execution of Embedded MIME Type. This vulnerability causes Internet Explorer to automatically run executable file attachments in email messages. 6. TROJ_SMALL.EDW Malware Type: Trojan This Trojan arrives as a file dropped by other malware like WORM_NUWAR.CQ or as a file downloaded unknowingly by a user when visiting malicious URLs. It may also arrive as a downloaded copy by earlier variants. It is also spammed via email using subject lines related to specific events. The image below is a sample of the said email message. 7. WORM_RONTKBR.GEN Malware Type: Worm This is Trend Micro's detection for unknown and future variants of WORM_RONTOKBRO and WORM_BRONTOK malware programs. It serves as a proactive means of safeguarding against possible attacks of the aforementioned malware. 8. WORM_ANIG.A Malware Type: Worm This memory-resident worm propagates by dropping copies of itself in shared network drives. It steals login information and saves the obtained data in a file, which can be retrieved by a remote user. Its keylogger component substitutes the standard Microsoft Graphical Identification and Authentication DLL (MSGINA.DLL) to carry out its information-stealing routine. 9. PE_PARITE.A Malware Type: Worm This file infector infects .EXE and .SCR files on an infected system and on remote network shares with read and write access. It makes use of port 30167 in order to access network shares. It stays in memory by injecting itself into EXPLORER.EXE; thus, hiding its running process. 10. WORM_MOFEI.B Malware Type: Worm This destructive, memory-resident worm attempts to log on to remote machines using a list of user names. It then drops and executes a copy of itself on the remote machines. It has backdoor capabilities, and may execute commands coming from a remote malicious user. The said routine provides the remote user virtual control over the affected machine, thus compromising system security. Posted by Master Key at 8:26 AM 0 comments Labels: 10 Most Prevalent Global Malware Security for Windows XP Don't you hate it when people mess with your computer without you knowing it? Here are two ways to prevent this, (and still be lazy): create a desktop icon to lock your computer, and password protect after the screen saver is activated. Both of these only work if you already have your computer password protected on login. If you already have a password, skip to the next part. To create a password, go to the control panel , then to user accounts . Click your account, and then the " change my password " button, enter the requested fields and click on " change password " and then close the window. How to create a lock-down icon: First, pick any icon on your desktop. Right click it and drag it to another place on the desktop. In the menu that appears select " copy. " Now we need to change the name and the target of the new shortcut. Right click this shortcut, and click " properties. " Make sure you are in the shortcut tab . In the box labeled " target, " copy and paste this line: %windir%System32rundll32.exe user32.dll,LockWorkStation In the box labeled " Start in, " copy paste: %windir% To apply these changes click " apply. " Next you can change the icon. Just click the " change icon " button. If you're not already there hit the browse button and go to: C:WINDOWSsystem32shell32.dll You'll find a nice selection of icons there. Select an icon from the ones that appear in the box and click " ok. " Now move to the general tab . The box on the top contains the name of your icon. Change it to whatever you want. I used "Fun Game" in the hope that if someone comes to the computer and it is not locked that they will click this icon, locking the computer. (This actually worked once!) After you are finished, click " apply ," and then " ok. " To test your icon, double click it. You should be taken to something like a log on screen. Just enter the password to get back into windows, just as you left it too. This is different from actually logging off. Whenever you know you will be away for a while, just click that icon, and your computer will be safe. How to lock down on screen saver: Right click on your desktop in any empty space. Click " properties " in the menu that opens. Go to the screensaver tab. All you have to do now is click the box next to " On resume, password protect ." Click " apply, " and then " ok. " Let your screen saver run, and see what happens after you move your mouse. This is good in case you leave suddenly and forget to click the icon we made earlier. Unlike hibernation, this will allow other programs, such as Kazaa or iMesh, to run in the background. Posted by Master Key at 8:25 AM 0 comments Labels: Security for Windows XP Secrets About Windows Operating System This time I have a collection of Tips and Tricks which no body normally knows, the secrets which Microsoft is afraid to tell the people, the information which you will seldom find all gathered up and arranged in a single file. To fully reap this Manual you need to have a basic understanding of the Windows Registry, as almost all the Tricks and Tips involve this file. Important Note: Before you read on, you need to keep one thing in mind. Whenever you make changes to the Windows Registry you need to Refresh it before the changes take place. Simply press F5 to refresh the registry and enable the changes. If this does not work Restart your system Exiting Windows the Cool and Quick Way Normally it takes a hell lot of time just Shutting down Windows, you have to move your mouse to the Start Button, click on it, move it again over Shut Down, click, then move it over the necessary option and click, then move the cursor over the OK button and once again (you guessed it) click.This whole process can be shortened by creating shortcuts on the Desktop which will shut down Windows at the click of a button. Start by creating a new shortcut( right click and select New> Shortcut). Then in the command line box, type (without the quotes.) 'C:windowsrundll.exe user.exe,exitwindowsexec' This Shortcut on clicking will restart Windows immediately without any Warning. To create a Shortcut to Restarting Windows, type the following in the Command Line box: 'c:windowsrundll.exe user.exe,exitwindows' This Shortcut on clicking will shut down Windows immediately without any Warning. Ban Shutdowns : A trick to Play on Lamers This is a neat trick you can play on that lamer that has a huge ego, in this section I teach you, how to disable the Shut Down option in the Shut Down Dialog Box. This trick involves editing the registry, so please make backups. Launch regedit.exe and go to : HKEY_CURRENT_USERSoftwareMicrosoftWindowsCurrentVersionPoliciesExplorer In the right pane look for the NoClose Key. If it is not already there then create it by right clicking in the right pane and selecting New > String Value.(Name it NoCloseKey ) Now once you see the NoCloseKey in the right pane, right click on it and select Modify. Then Type 1 in the Value Data Box. Doing the above on a Win98 system disables the Shut Down option in the Shut Down Dialog Box. But on a Win95 machine if the value of NoCloseKey is set to 1 then click on the Start > Shut Down button displays the following error message: This operation has been cancelled due to restrictions in effect on this computer. Please contact your system administrator. You can enable the shut down option by changing the value of NoCloseKey to 0 or simply deleting the particular entry i.e. deleting NoCloseKey. Instead of performing the above difficult to remember process, simply save the following with an extension of .reg and add it's contents to the registry by double clicking on it. REGEDIT4 [HKEY_CURRENT_USERSoftwareMicrosoftWindowsCurrentVersionPoliciesExplorer] "NoClose"="1" Disabling Display of Drives in My Computer This is yet another trick you can play on your geek friend. To disable the display of local or networked drives when you click My Computer go to : HKEY_CURRENT_USERSoftwareMicrosoftWindowsCurrentVersionPoliciesExplorer Now in the right pane create a new DWORD item and name it NoDrives. Now modify it's value and set it to 3FFFFFF (Hexadecimal) Now press F5 to refresh. When you click on My Computer, no drives will be shown. To enable display of drives in My Computer, simply delete this DWORD item. It's .reg file is as follows: REGEDIT4 [HKEY_CURRENT_USERSoftwareMicrosoftWindowsCurrentVersionPoliciesExplorer] "NoDrives"=dword:03ffffff Take Over the Screen Saver To activate and deactivate the screen saver whenever you want, goto the following registry key: HKEY_CURRENT_USERSoftwareMicrosoftWindowsCurrentVersionScreenSavers Now add a new string value and name it Mouse Corners. Edit this new value to -Y-N. Press F5 to refresh the registry. Voila! Now you can activate your screensaver by simply placing the mouse cursor at the top right corner of the screen and if you take the mouse to the bottom left corner of the screen, the screensaver will deactivate. Pop a banner each time Windows Boots To pop a banner which can contain any message you want to display just before a user is going to log on, go to the key: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESOFTWAREMicrosoftWindowsCurrentVersionWinLogon Now create a new string Value in the right pane named LegalNoticeCaption and enter the value that you want to see in the Menu Bar. Now create yet another new string value and name it: LegalNoticeText. Modify it and insert the message you want to display each time Windows boots. This can be effectively used to display the company's private policy each time the user logs on to his NT box. It's .reg file would be: REGEDIT4 [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESOFTWAREMicrosoftWindowsCurrentVersionWinlogon] "LegalNoticeCaption"="Caption here." Delete the Tips of the Day to save 5KB Windows 95 had these tips of the day which appeared on a system running a newly installed Windows OS. These tips of the day are stored in the Windows Registry and consume 5K of space. For those of you who are really concerned about how much free space your hard disk has, I have the perfect trick. To save 5K go to the following key in Regedit: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESoftwareMicrosoftWindowsCurrentVersionExplorerTips Now simply delete these tricks by selecting and pressing the DEL key. Change the Default Locations To change the default drive or path where Windows will look for it's installation files, go to the key: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESoftwareMicrosoftWindowsCurrentVersionSetupSourcePath Now you can edit as you wish. Secure your Desktop Icons and Settings You can save your desktop settings and secure it from your nerdy friend by playing with the registry. Simply launch the Registry Editor go to: HKEY_CURRENT_USERSoftwareMicrosoftWindowsCurrentVersionPoliciesExplorer In the right pane create a new DWORD Value named NoSaveSettings and modify it's value to 1. Refresh and restart for the settings to get saved. CLSID Folders Explained Don't you just hate those stubborn stupid icons that refuse to leave the desktop, like the Network Neighborhood icon. I am sure you want to know how you can delete them. You may say, that is really simple, simply right click on the concerned icon and select Delete. Well not exactly, you see when you right click on these special folders( see entire list below)neither the rename nor the delete option does not appear. To delete these folders, there are two methods, the first one is using the System Policy Editor(Poledit in the Windows installation CD)and the second is using the Registry. Before we go on, you need to understand what CLSID values are. These folders, like the Control Panel, Inbox, The Microsoft Network, Dial Up Networking etc are system folders. Each system folder has a unique CLSID key or the Class ID which is a 16-byte value which identifies an individual object that points to a corresponding key in the registry. To delete these system Folders from the desktop simply go to the following registry key: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESoftwareMicrosoftWindowsCurrentVersionExplorerDesktopNamespace{----} To delete an icon simply delete the 16 byte CLSID value within "NameSpace". The following are the CLSID values of the most commonly used icons: My Briefcase:{85BBD920-42AO-1069-A2E4-08002B30309D} Desktop: {00021400-0000-0000-C000-0000000000046} Control Panel:{21EC2020-3AEA-1069-A2DD-08002B30309D} Dial-Up-Networking:{992CFFA0-F557-101A-88EC-00DD01CCC48} Fonts: {BD84B380-8CA2-1069-AB1D-08000948534} Inbox :{00020D76-0000-0000-C000-000000000046} My Computer :{20D04FE0-3AEA-1069-A2D8-08002B30309D} Network Neighborhood:{208D2C60-3AEA-1069-A2D7-O8002B30309D} Printers :{2227A280-3AEA-1069-A2DE-O8002B30309D} Recycle Bin :{645FF040-5081-101B-9F08-00AA002F954E} The Microsoft Network:{00028B00-0000-0000-C000-000000000046} History: {FF393560-C2A7-11CF-BFF4-444553540000} Winzip :{E0D79300-84BE-11CE-9641-444553540000} For example, to delete the Recycle Bin, first note down it's CLSID value, which is: 645FF040-5081-101B-9F08-00AA002F954E. Now go to the Namespace key in the registry and delete the corresponding key. HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESOFTWAREMicrosoftWindowsCurrentVersionexplorerDesktopNameSpace{645FF040-5081-101B-9F08-00AA002F954E} Similarly to delete the History folder, delete the following key: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESOFTWAREMicrosoftWindowsCurrentVersionexplorerDesktopNameSpace{FBF23B42-E3F0-101B-8488-00AA003E56F8} Sometimes, you may need to play a trick on your brother or friend, well this one teaches you how to hide all icons from the Desktop. Go to the following registry key: HKEY_CURRENT_USERSoftwareMicrosoftWindowsCurrentVersionPoliciesExplorer In the right pane create a new DWORD value by the name: NoDesktop and set its value to: 1. Reboot and you will find no icons on the desktop. Till now you simply learnt how to delete the special system folders by deleting a registry key, but the h@*k would have been better if there was a way of adding the DELETE and RENAME option to the right click context menus of these special folders. You can actually change the right click context menu of any system folder and add any of the following options: RENAME, DELETE, CUT, COPY, PASTE and lots more. This h@*k too requires you to know the CLSID value of the system folder whose menu you want to customize. In this section, I have taken up Recycle Bin as the folder whose context menu I am going to edit. Firstly launch the registry editor and open the following registry key: HKEY_CLASSES_ROOTCLSID{645FF040-5081-101B-9F08-00AA002F954E}ShellFolder. In Case you want to edit some other folder like say the FONTS folder, then you will open the following key: HKEY_CLASSES_ROOTCLSID{CLSID VALUE HERE}ShellFolder. In the right pane there will be a DWORD value names attributes. Now consider the following options: To add the Rename option to the menu, change the value of Attributes to 50 01 00 20 To add the Delete option to the menu, change the value of Attributes to 60 01 00 20 3. To add both the Rename & Delete options to the menu, change the value of Attributes to 70,01,00,20 4. Add Copy to the menu, change Attributes to 41 01 00 20 5. Add Cut to the menu, change Attributes to 42 01 00 20 6. Add Copy & Cut to the menu, change Attributes to 43 01 00 20 7. Add Paste to the menu, change Attributes to 44 01 00 20 8. Add Copy & Paste to the menu, change Attributes to 45 01 00 20 9. Add Cut & Paste to the menu, change Attributes to 46 01 00 20 10.Add all Cut, Copy & Paste to the menu, change Attributes to 47 01 00 20 We want to add only the Rename option to the right click context menu of the Recycle Bin, so change the value of attributes to: 50 01 00 20. Press F5 to refresh and then after rebooting you will find that when you right click on the Recycle Bin a RENAME option pops up too. To reset the default Windows options change the value of Attributes back to 40 01 00 20 The Registry File which one can create for the above process would be something like the below: REGEDIT4 [HKEY_CLASSES_ROOTCLSID{645FF040-5081-101B-9F08-00AA002F954E}Shell-Folder] "Attributes"=hex:50,01,00,20 To access say the Modem Properties in the Control Panel Folder, the normal procedure is: Click on Start, Click on Settings> Control Panel and then wait for the Control Panel window to pop up and then ultimately click on the Modems icon. Wouldn't it be lovely if you could shorten the process to: Click on Start> Control Panel>Modems. Yes you can add the Control Panel and also all other Special System Folders directly to the first level Start Menu. Firstly collect the CLSID value of the folder you want to add to the start menu. I want to add Control Panel hence the CLSID value is: 21EC2020-3AEA-1069-A2DD-08002B30309D Now right click on the Start Button and select Open. Now create a new folder and name it: Control Panel.{21EC2020-3AEA-1069-A2DD-08002B30309D} NOTE: Do not forget the period after the 'l' in Panel. Similarly all system folders can be added to the Start Menu.(accept My Briefcase, I think) Deleting System Options from the Start menu You can actually remove the Find and Run options from the start menu by performing a simple registry h@*k. Again like always Launch the registry editor and scroll down to the below key: HKEY_CURRENT_USERSoftwareMicrosoftWindowsCurrentVersionPoliciesExplorer Right-click on the right pane and select New, DWORD Value. Name it NoFind.(To remove the RUN option name it NoRun). Double-click the newly create DWORD to edit it's value and enter 1 as its value. This will disable the FIND option of the Start Menu and will also disable the default Shortcut key(F3 for Find.) To restore the Run or find command modify the value of the DWORD to 0 or simply Delete the DWORD value. Fed Up of the boring Old Yellow Folder Icons?[Drive Icons Included] NOTE: This trick hasn't been tried on Win98. You can easily change the boring yellow folder icons to your own personalized icons. Simply create a text file and copy the following lines into it: [.ShellClassInfo] ICONFILE=Drive:PathIcon_name.extension Save this text file by the name, desktop.ini in the folder, whose icon you want to change. Now to prevent this file from getting deleted change it's attributes to Hidden and Read Only by using the ATTRIB command. To change the icon of a drive, create a text file containing the following lines: [Autorun] ICON=Drive:PathIcon_name.extension Save this file in the root of the drive whose icon you want to change and name it autorun.inf For Example, if you want to change the icon of a floppy, SAVE THE icon in a:icon_name.ico One can also create a kewl icon for the Hard Disk and create a text file [autorun.inf] and store it in "c:". Securing NT By default, NT 4.0 displays the last person who logged onto the system. This can be considered to be a security threat, especially in the case of those who choose their password to be same as their Username. To disable this bug which actually is a feature, go to the following key in the registry editor: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESoftwareMicrosoftWindowsNTCurrentVersionWinlogon Click and select the ReportBookOK item and create a new string value called DontDisplayLastUserName. Modify it and set it's value to 1. As a system administrator, you can ensure that the passwords chosen by the users are not too lame or too easy to guess. NT has this lovely utility called the User Manager which allows the administrator to set the age limit of the password which forces the users to change the password after a certain number of days. You can also set the minimum length of passwords and prevent users to use passwords which already have been used earlier and also enable account lockouts which will deactivate an account after a specified number of failed login attempts. When you log on to Win NT, you should disable Password Caching, this ensures Single NT Domain login and also prevents secondary Windows Logon screen. Simply copy the following lines to a plain text ASCII editor like: Notepad and save it with an extension, .reg ----------------DISABLE.reg----------------- REGEDIT4 [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESOFTWAREMicrosoftWindowsCurrentVersionPoliciesNetwork] "DisablePwdCaching"=dword:00000001 ----------------DISABLE.reg----------------- To Enable Password Caching use the following .reg file: --------------Enable.reg----------------- REGEDIT4 [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESOFTWAREMicrosoftWindowsCurrentVersionPoliciesNetwork] "DisablePwdCaching"=dword:00000000 --------------Enable.reg----------------- Cleaning Recent Docs Menu and the RUN MRU The Recent Docs menu can be easily disabled by editing the Registry. To do this go to the following Key: HKEY_CURRENT_USERSoftwareMicrosoftWindowsCurrentVersionPoliciesExplorer Now in the right pane, create a new DWORD value by the name: NoRecentDocsMenu and set it's value to 1. Restart Explorer to save the changes. You can also clear the RUN MRU history. All the listings are stored in the key: HKEY_USERS.DefaultSoftwareMicrosoftWindowsCurrentVersionExplorerRunMRU You can delete individual listings or the entire listing. To delete History of Find listings go to: HKEY_CURRENT_USERSoftwareMicrosoftWindowsCurrentVersionExplorerDoc Find Spec MRU and delete. Customizing the Right Click Context Menu of the Start Menu When you right click on the start menu, only 3 options pop up: Open, Explore, and Find. You can add your own programs to this pop up menu( which comes up when we right click on it.) Open Regedit and go to the following registry key: HKEY_CLASSES_ROOTDirectoryShell Right click on the shell and create a new Sub Key (You can create a new SubKey by right clicking on the Shell Key and selecting New > Key.). Type in the name of the application you want to add to the start menu. I want to add Notepad to the Start Menu and hence I name this new sub key, Notepad. Now right click on the new registry key that you just created and create yet another new key named Command. Enter the ful path of the application, in this case Notepad in the default value of Command in the right pane. So I Modify the value of the default string value and enter the ful pathname of Notepad: c:wndowsnotepad.exe. Now press F5 to refresh. Now if you right click on the Start Button you will find a new addition to the Pop Up Menu called Notepad. Clicking on it will launch Notepad. We can not only add but also remove the existing options in this pop up box. To delete the Find option, go to the following registry key: HKEY_CLASSES_ROOTDirectoryShellFind Delete Find. DO NOT delete Open else you will not be able to open any folders in the Start Menu like Programs, Accessories etc. BMP Thumbnail As Icon You can actually change the default BMP icon to a thumbnail version of the actual BMP file. To do this simply go to HKCUPaint.PictureDefault. In the right pane change the value of default to %1. Please note however that this will slow down the display rate in explorer if there are too many BMP thumbnails to display. You can use other icons too, simply enter the pathname.To restore back to the normal change the vale of default back to: C:Progra~1Access~1MSPAINT.EXE,1. Customizing The Shortcut Arrow All shortcuts have a tiny black arrow attached to it's icon to distinguish from normal files. This arrow can sometimes be pretty annoying and as a Hacker should know how to change each and everything, here goes another trick. Launch the Registry Editor and go to: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESOFTWAREMicrosoftWindowsCurrentVersionexplorerShell Icons. Now, on the right pane is a list of icons ( we found out that on some systems, Windows 98 especially, the right pane is blank. Don't worry, just add the value as required ). Find the value 29. If it isn't there, just add it. The value of this string should be C:Windowssystemshell32.dll, 29 ( which means the 30th icon in shell32.dll - the first one begins with 0 ). Now, we need blank icon to do this. Just create one with white as the whole icon. Go here to learn how to create an icon. Once done just change the value to C:.ico, 0 where "" is the ful path of the icon file and "0" is the icon in it. Now for some fun. If the blank icon is a bit boring, change it again. You will find that under shell32.dll there is a gear icon, a shared folder ( the hand ) and much more. Experiment for yourself! Use Perl to Get List or Services Running on your NT box Use the following Perl Script to get a list of Services running on your NT system --------------script.pl----------------- #!c:perbinperl.exe use Win32::Service; my ($key, %service, %status, $part); Win32::Service::GetServices(' ',%services); foreach $key (sort keys %services) { print "Print Namet: $key, $services{$key}n"; Win32::Service::GetStatus( ' ',$services{$key}; %status); foreach $part (keys %status) { print "t$part : $status{$part}n" if($part eq "CurrentState"); } } -------------script.pl------------------- Internet Explorer Tricks and Tips Resizable ful Screen Toolbar The ful Screen option increases the viewable area and makes surfing more enjoyable but sometimes we need the Toolbar but also need to have extra viewing area. Now this h@*k teaches you how to change the size of the Internet Explorer toolbar. This registry h@*k is a bit complicated as it involves Binary values, so to make it simple, I have included the following registry file which will enable the resizable option of the Internet Explorer toolbar which was present in the beta version of IE. REGEDIT4 [HKEY_CURRENT_USERSoftwareMicrosoftInternet ExplorerToolbar] "Theater"=hex:0c,00,00,00,4c,00,00,00,74,00,00,00,18,00,00,00,1b,00,00,00,5c, 00,00,00,01,00,00,00,e0,00,00,00,a0,0f,00,00,05,00,00,00,22,00,00,00,26,00, 00,00,02,00,00,00,21,00,00,00,a0,0f,00,00,04,00,00,00,01,00,00,00,a0,0f,00, 00,03,00,00,00,08,00,00,00,00,00,00,00 ******************* h@*king TRUTH: Internet Explorer 5 displays the friendly version of HTTP errors like NOT FOUND etc . They are aimed at making things easier for newbies. If you would rather prefer to see the proper error pages for the web server you're using, go to Tools, Internet Options and select the Advanced tab. Then scroll down and uncheck the Show friendly http errors box. Making the Internet Explorer & the Explorer Toolbars Fancy The Internet Explorer toolbar looks pretty simple. Want to make it fancy and kewl? Why not add a background image to it. To do this kewl h@*k launch the Windows Registry Editor and go to the following key: HKEY_CURRENT_USERSOFTWAREMicrosoft Internet ExplorerToolbar. Now in the right pane create a new String Value and name it BackBitmap and modify it's value to the path of the Bitmap you want to dress it up with by rightclicking on it and choosing Modify. When you reboot the Internet Explorer and the Windows Explorer toolbars will have a new look. Change Internet Explorer's Caption Don't like the caption of Internet Explorer caption? Want to change it? Open the registry editor and go to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESOFTWAREMicrosoftInternet ExplorerMain. In the right pane create a new String Value names Window Title (Note the space between Window and Title). Right click on this newly created String Value and select Modify. Type in the new caption you want to be displayed. Restart for the settings to take place. Now let's move on to some Outlook Express Tricks. Colorful Background Don't like the boring background colors of Outlook Express? To change it launch the Windows Registry Editor and scroll down to the HKEY_CURRENT_USERSoftwareMicrosoftInternet Mail And News key. On the left pane, click on ColorCycle or select Edit and Modify in the menu. Now change the value to 1. Close and restart. Now, launch Outlook Express and whenever you open up a New Message, hold down ctrl-shift and tap the z key to scroll to change the background color. Repeat the keystroke to cycle through the colors. Internet Explorer 5 Hidden Features Microsoft Internet Explorer 5 has several hidden features which can be controlled using the Windows Registry. Open your registry and scroll down to the following key: HKEY_CURRENT_USERSoftwarePoliciesMicrosoftInternet ExplorerRestrictions Create a new DWORD value named x(See complete list of values of x below) and modify it's value to 1 to enable it and to 0 to disable it. NoBrowserClose : Disable the option of closing Internet Explorer. NoBrowserContextMenu : Disable right-click context menu. NoBrowserOptions : Disable the Tools / Internet Options menu. NoBrowserSaveAs : Disable the ability to Save As. NoFavorites : Disable the Favorites. NoFileNew : Disable the File / New command. NoFileOpen : Disable the File / Open command. NoFindFiles : Disable the Find Files command. NoSelectDownloadDir : Disable the option of selecting a download directory. NoTheaterMode : Disable the ful Screen view option. h@*king Secrets Almost all system administrators make certain changes and make the system restricted. System Administrators can hide the RUN option, the FIND command, the entire Control Panel, drives in My Computer like D: A: etc. They can even restrict activities of a hacker my disabling or hiding, even the tiniest options or tools. Most commonly these restrictions are imposed locally and are controlled by the Windows Registry. But sometimes the smart system administrators control the activities of the hacker by imposing restrictions remotely through the main server. Poledit or Policy Editor is a small kewl tool which is being commonly used by system administrators to alter the settings of a system. This utility is not installed by default by Windows. You need to install in manually from the Windows 98 Installation Kit from the Resource Kit folder. user.dat file that we saw earlier. The Policy Editor tool imposes restrictions on the user's system by editing the user.dat file which in turn means that it edits the Windows Registry to change the settings. It can be used to control or restrict access to each and every folder and option you could ever think of. It has the power to even restrict access to individual folders, files, the Control Panel, MS DOS, the drives available etc. Sometimes this software does make life really hard for a Hacker. So how can we remove the restrictions imposed by the Policy Editor? Well read ahead to learn more. You see the Policy Editor is not the only way to restrict a user's activities. As we already know that the Policy Editor edits the Windows Registry(user.dat) file to impose such restrictions. So this in turn would mean that we can directly make changes to the Windows Registry using a .reg file or directly to remove or add restrictions. Launch Regedit and go to the following Registry Key: HKEY_CURRENT_USER/Software/Microsoft/CurrentVersion/Policies Under this key, there will definitely be a key named explorer. Now under this explorer key we can create new DWORD values and modify it's value to 1 in order to impose the restriction. If you want to remove the Restriction, then you can simply delete the respective DWORD values or instead change their values to 0. The following is a list of DWORD values that can be created under the Explorer Key-: NoDeletePrinter: Disables Deletion of already installed Printers NoAddPrinter: Disables Addition of new Printers NoRun : Disables or hides the Run Command NoSetFolders: Removes Folders from the Settings option on Start Menu (Control Panel, Printers, Taskbar) NoSetTaskbar: Removes Taskbar system folder from the Settings option on Start Menu NoFind: Removes the Find Tool (Start >Find) NoDrives: Hides and does not display any Drives in My Computer NoNetHood: Hides or removes the Network Neighborhood icon from the desktop NoDesktop: Hides all items including, file, folders and system folders from the Desktop NoClose: Disables Shutdown and prevents the user from normally shutting down Windows. NoSaveSettings: Means to say, 'Don't save settings on exit' DisableRegistryTools: Disable Registry Editing Tools (If you disable this option, the Windows Registry Editor(regedit.exe) too will not work.) NoRecentDocsHistory: Removes Recent Document system folder from the Start Menu (IE 4 and above) ClearRecentDocsOnExit: Clears the Recent Documents system folder on Exit. Nolnternetlcon: Removes the Internet (system folder) icon from the Desktop Under the same key: HKEY_CURRENT_USER/Software/Microsoft/CurrentVersion/Policies you can create new subkeys other than the already existing Explorer key. Now create a new key and name it System. Under this new key, system we can create the following new DWORD values(1 for enabling the particular option and 0 for disabling the particular option): NODispCPL: Hides Control Panel NoDispBackgroundPage: Hides Background page. NoDispScrsavPage: Hides Screen Saver Page NoDispAppearancePage: Hides Appearance Page NoDispSettingsPage: Hides Settings Page NoSecCPL: Disables Password Control Panel NoPwdPage: Hides Password Change Page NoAdminPaqe: Hides Remote Administration Page NoProfilePage: Hides User Profiles Page NoDevMgrPage: Hides Device Manager Page NoConfigPage: Hides Hardware Profiles Page NoFileSysPage: Hides File System Button NoVirtMemPage: Hides Virtual Memory Button Similarly, if we create a new subkey named Network, we can add the following DWORD values under it(1 for enabling the particular option and 0 for disabling the particular option): NoNetSetupSecurityPage: Hides Network Security Page NoNelSetup: Hides or disables the Network option in the Control Panel NoNetSetupIDPage: Hides the Identification Page NoNetSetupSecurityPage: Hides the Access Control Page NoFileSharingControl: Disables File Sharing Controls NoPrintSharing: Disables Print Sharing Controls Similarly, if we create a new subkey named WinOldApp, we can add the following DWORD values under it(1 for enabling the particular option and 0 for disabling the particular option): Disabled: Disable MS-DOS Prompt NoRealMode: Disable Single-Mode MS-DOS. So you see if you have access to the Windows Registry, then you can easily create new DWORD values and set heir value to 1 for enabling the particular option and 0 for disabling the particular option. But Sometimes, access to the Windows Registry is blocked. So what do you do? Go to the Windows Directory and delete either user.dat or system.dat (These 2 files constitute the Windows Registry.) and reboot. As soon as Windows logs in, it will display a Warning Message informing you about an error in the Windows Registry. Simply ignore this Warning Message and Press CTRL+DEL+ALT to get out of this warning message.(Do not press OK) You will find that all restrictions have been removed. The most kind of restriction found quite commonly is the Specific Folder Restriction, in which users are not allowed access to specific folders, the most common being the Windows folder, or sometimes even access to My Computer is blocked. In effect, you simply cannot seem to access the important kewl files which are needed by you to do remove restrictions. What do you? Well use the RUN command. (START >RUN). But unfortunately a system administrator who is intelligent enough to block access to specific folder, would definitely have blocked access to the RUN command. Again we are stuck. Windows is supposed to be the most User Friendly Operating System on earth. (At least Microsoft Says so.) It gives the User an option to do the same thing in various ways. You see the RUN command is only the most convenient option of launching applications, but not the only way. In Windows you can create shortcuts to almost anything from a file, folder to a Web URL. So say your system administrator has blocked access to the c:windowssystem folder and you need to access it. What do you do? Simply create a Shortcut to it. To do this right click anywhere on the desktop and select New > Shortcut. A new window titled Create Shortcut pops up. Type in the path of the restricted folder you wish to access, in this case c:windowssystem. Click Next, Enter the friendly name of the Shortcut and then click Finish. Now you can access the restricted folder by simply double clicking on the shortcut icon. Well that shows how protected and secure *ahem Windows *ahem is. h@*king TRUTH: Sometimes when you try to delete a file or a folder, Windows displays an error message saying that the file is protected. This simply means that the file is write protected, or in other words the R option is +. Get it? Anyway, you can stop Windows from displaying this error message and straightaway delete this file by changing its attributes to Non Read Only. This can be done by Right Clicking on the file, selecting Properties and then unselecting the Read Only Option. There is yet another way of accessing restricted folders. Use see, DOS has a lovely command known as START. Its general syntax is: START application_path It does do what it seems to do, start applications. So in you have access to DOS then you can type in the START command to get access to the restricted folder. Now mostly access to DOS too would be blocked. So again you can use the shortcut trick to launch, c:command.com or c:windowscommand.com. (Command.com is the file which launches MS DOS). Accessing Restricted Drives. The problem with most system administrators is that they think that the users or Hackers too are stupid. Almost all system administrators use the Registry Trick (Explained Earlier) to hide all drives in My Computer. So in order to unhide or display all drives, simply delete that particular key.(Refer to beginning of Untold Secrets Section.) Some systems have the floppy disk disabled through the BIOS. On those systems if the BIOS is protected, you may need to cr@ck the BIOS password. (For that Refer to the Windows h@*king Chapter). Sometimes making drives readable (Removing R +) and then creating Shortcuts to them also helps us to get access to them. Further Changing your Operating System's Looks by editing .htt files If you have installed Windows Desktop Update and have the view as Web Page option enabled, you can customise the way the folder looks by selecting View > Customise this folder. Here you can change the background and other things about that particular folder. Well that is pretty lame, right? We hackers already know things as lame as that. Read on for some kewl stuff. Well, you could also change the default that is stored in a Hidden HTML Template file (I think so..) which is nothing but a HTML document with a .htt extension. This .htt file is found at: %systemroot%webfolder.htt. The %systemroot% stands for the drive in which Windows is Installed, which is normally C: You can edit these .htt files almost just like you edit normal .HTM or .HTML files. Simply open them in an ASCII editor like Notepad. The following is a list of .htt files on your system which control various folders and which can be edited to customise the way various folders look. controlp.htt Control Panel printers.htt Printers mycomp.htt My Computer safemode.htt Safe Mode All these files are found in the web folder in %systemfolder%. The folder.htt file has a line: 'Here's a good place to add a few lines of your own" which is the place where you can add your own A HREF links. These links would then appear in the folder whose folder.htt file you edited. All this might sound really easy and simple, but you see these .htt files do not contain normal HTML code, instead they contain a mixture of HTML and web bots. Hence they can be difficult for newbies to understand. Posted by Master Key at 8:20 AM 0 comments Labels: Secrets About Windows Operating System Tricks : Access Blocked Websites Websites which have been blocked in many countries can be accessed.Here are some tricks that might help : 1.Proxy server :Use a proxy server to access restricted sites.A proxy server (or proxies) is a normal computer that hides the identity of computers on its network from the Internet. Which means that only the address of the proxy server is visible to the world and not of those computers that are using it to browse the Internet. Just visit the proxy server website with your Web browser and enter a URL (website address) in the form provided. List of Proxy servers Just click on this link and it will take you to a page having a long list of proxies.You can either choose one yourself or let the service choose a random proxy for you.You can now visit any site with these proxy servers. Also bookmark the DMOZ directory of free web-based proxy services and DMOZ directory of free proxy servers . 2.Convert ip to decimal:The third trick may work at some places and wont at others.This is a lesser known trick i came across recently.Suppose you want to access www.orkut.com. Go to start->run type cmd. Now type ping www.orkut.com (space between ping and www) You will get an ip address for www.orkut.com ,note it down. Now go to http://www.allredroster.com/iptodec.htm Enter the ip in the enter ip address field and press calculate.You will get an address in Decimal field.This is it.Copy this address and type it in your browser,if lucky www.orkut.com or any other blocked site for which you do this should open. For example,for orkut you get the decimal address as http://72.14.209.87 Note:Press ctrl+d to bookmark this page.Visit the site often as it is reularly updated with the latest Tips And Tricks. Posted by Master Key at 8:13 AM 1 comments Labels: Tricks : Access Blocked Websites Tricks : Hidden Comands in XP 1- Private Character Editor This program is for designing icons and Characters(Alphapet) Click :start Then :Run type :EUDCEDIT 2- iExpress This Program is for conerting your files to EXCUTABLE files Click : start Then : run type : iexpress 3-Disk Cleanup This program used for cleaning harddisk to offer space Click : start Then : run type : cleanmgr 4-Dr Watson This program Is for repairing problems in Windows Click : start Then : run type : drwtsn32 5-Windows Media Player 5.1 Opens the old media player Click : start Then : run type : mplay32 Program CODE Character Map = charmap DirectX diagnosis = dxdiag Object Packager = packager System Monitor = perfmon Program Manager = progman Remote Access phone book = rasphone Registry Editor = regedt32 File siganture verification tool = sigverif Volume Contro = sndvol32 System Configuration Editor = sysedit Syskey = syskey Microsoft Telnet Client = telnet Posted by Master Key at 8:08 AM 0 comments Labels: Tricks : Hidden Comands in XP Tips : Fasten your BroadBand Speed If you are using a BroadBand connection at your home and using Windows Xp as your Operating System, and you feel that your BB speed is a bit less, then in that case you have the option to increase your Broadband speed upto 20%. 1. First of all make sure you are logged in as Administrator. 2. Go to Start -> Run -> gpedit.msc, press OK. 3. Then go to Computer Configuration -> Administrative Templates -> Network -> QOS packet Scheduler. 4. On the right it will give you the option of Limit Reservable bandwidth, open and and select Enabled, and change the value to 0. Posted by Master Key at 8:06 AM 0 comments Labels: Tips : Fasten your BroadBand Speed Friday, October 5, 2007 Tips : Configuring Outlook Express for Dataone Email Configuring Outlook Express for Dataone Email:- Open Outlook Express ->click on Tools -> Click on Accounts -> Click on Mail ->Click on Add ->Click on Mail -> Fill – Display Name: e.g. Arun Nair ->Click on Next -> Fill – Email address: e.g. xyz@dataone.in -> Click on Next -> Select My Incoming Mail server is a POP3 Server -> Fill – Incoming Mail(POP3,IMAP or HTTP) Server: smma.sancharnet.in -> Fill Outgoing mail (SMPT) Server: smra.sancharnet.in -> Click on Next -> Fill –Account name: e.g. xyz@dataone.in ->Un-tick Remember Password -> Click on Next -> Click on Finish -> Select the Account created and Click on Properties -> Click on Servers -> Tick My Server requires authentication -> Click on Apply -> Click on OK ->Click on Close. Posted by Master Key at 10:30 AM 0 comments Labels: Tips : Configuring Outlook Express for Dataone Email Tips : Hide Drives and Partitions Do you have data on a partition or hard drive that you don't want tampered with or easily accessible to other users? Well, you can hide any drive/partition in Windows XP, NT, and 2000. That means that they won't show up in Explorer or My Computer. If you want access to that drive from your user account you should create a desktop shortcut before proceeding. Once hidden, you can still access by typing the drive letter and a colon in Start/Run �for example, "D:" will bring up a folder of the contents on your D drive. The easiest way with Win XP is to use the TweakUI power toy from Microsoft. Go to Start/Run and type in "tweakui" (without the quotes). Go to My Computer/Drives and uncheck the drive/partition(s) you want hidden. Click "Apply" or "OK" when finished. For Win NT, 2000, and XP you can use the following Registry edit: *Be sure to back up the Registry before proceeding Open the Registry Editor by going to Start/Run and typing in "regedit" (without the quotes). Find your way to... HKEY_CURRENT_USERSoftwareMicrosoftWindowsCurre ntVersionPolicies Click on "Explorer". Double-click the "NoDrives" key in the right column. If you don't find a "NoDrives" registry key, just right-click in the right pane and choose "New/DWORD Value" then name the key "NoDrives". You'll see a value like "0000 00 00 00 00". This is where the fun starts. The four sets of double zeros (after the "0000") are where you'll enter the values for the drive/partitions. Now, stay with me on this. Iit's not as complicated as it sounds: The first column is for drives A-H, the second for I-P, the third for Q-X, and the fourth for Y-Z. The values for each drive are as follows: 1 - A I Q Y 2 - B J R Z 4 - C K S 8 - D L T 16 - E M U 32 - F N V 64 - G O W 80 - H P X So, let's say you want to hide drive D. In the first column you would put "08". For drive K you would put "04" in the second column. But what if you want to hide more than one drive in a column? Simply add the values together: D+E = 8+16 = 24. So in the first column you would put "24". Still baffled? If you have XP then go get TweakUI and save yourself the math. Whichever method you use, you can rest easy knowing that the files on that drive or partition are less accessible to other users. Posted by Master Key at 10:29 AM 0 comments Labels: Tips : Hide Drives and Partitions Wednesday, August 22, 2007 Cleaning up unwanted startup programs Windows XP : Cleaning up unwanted startup programs Many freeware and commercial software programs have a habit of setting themselves up to run automatically upon Windows startup. This can contribute to the gradual decline in startup speed that most Windows XP systems (and windows PCs in general) experience. Also, having programs that you only use selectively, or not at all, load automatically is a waste of system resources that could be better used for other things. To top it off, many internet nasties such as spyware programs, viruses and Trojan horses will install themselves into one of the automatic start locations on your system in order to make sure that they are run on startup. So the point is, take a look at what is currently running every time you load your PC, and disable what you don't need or can't identify. To do this: The first place you should go is 'startprogramsstartup' which is a directory Windows XP uses to launch application shortcuts on boot-up. If you remove the shortcuts from this directory, the applications will not load on startup. This directory can also be a repository for various badness such as spyware and virus software, so if there are files here which are not shortcuts and you don't recognize them, you may wish to consider removing them anyways, as Windows will not place critical files in this directory. The next location for removing unnecessary startup files is the handy MSCONFIG utility that has been resurrected from the graveyard of Windows 9x especially for XP. Go to 'startrun' and type 'msconfig' to access the utility. The 'startup' tab in MSCONFIG provides access to several other applications that are started at boot up and are running in the background. By examining their Filenames and directories, you should be able to get a feeling for what is necessary and what is not. Be aware than several viruses and worms have a habit of disguising themselves with authoritative sounding Windows system file names. The other method for removing these programs is through the programs themselves, as many applications, for example MSN messenger, contain the option to remove the software from startup. Posted by Master Key at 9:01 AM 1 comments Labels: Cleaning up unwanted startup programs Tips : For More Efficient Google Searches 1. Either/or. Google normally searches for pages that contain all the words you type in the search box, but if you want pages that have one term or another (or both), use the OR operator — or use the “” symbol (pipe symbol) to save you a keystroke. [dumb little man] 2. Quotes. If you want to search for an exact phrase, use quotes. [”dumb little man”] will only find that exact phrase. [dumb “little man”] will find pages that contain the word dumb and the exact phrase “little man”. 3. Not. If you don’t want a term or phrase, use the “-” symbol. [-dumb little man] will return pages that contain “little” and “man” but that don’t contain “dumb”. 4. Similar terms. Use the “~” symbol to return similar terms. [~dumb little man -dumb] will get you pages that contain “funny little man” and “stupid little man” but not “dumb little man”. 5. Wildcard. The “*” symbol is a wildcard. This is useful if you’re trying to find the lyrics to a song, but can’t remember the exact lyrics. [can’t * me love lyrics] will return the Beatles song you’re looking for. It’s also useful for finding stuff only in certain domains, such as educational information: [”dumb little man” research *.edu]. 6. Advanced search. If you can’t remember any of these operators, you can always use Google’s advanced search. 7. Definitions. Use the “define:” operator to get a quick definition. [define:dumb] will give you a whole host of definitions from different sources, with links. 8. Calculator. One of the handiest uses of Google, type in a quick calculation in the search box and get an answer. It’s faster than calling up your computer’s calculator in most cases. Use the +, -, *, / symbols and parentheses to do a simple equation. 9. Numrange. This little-known feature searches for a range of numbers. For example, [”best books 2002..2007] will return lists of best books for each of the years from 2002 to 2007 (note the two periods between the two numbers). 10. Site-specific. Use the “site:” operator to search only within a certain website. [site:dumblittleman.com leo] will search for the term “leo” only within this blog. 11. Backlinks. The “link:” operator will find pages that link to a specific URL. You can use this not only for a main URL but even to a specific page. Not all links to an URL are listed, however. 12. Vertical search. Instead of searching for a term across all pages on the web, search within a specialized field. Google has a number of specific searches, allowing you to search within blogs, news, books, and much more: * Blog Search * Book Search * Scholar * Catalogs * Code Search * Directory * Finance * Images * Local/Maps * News * Patent Search * Product Search * Video 13. Movies. Use the “movie:” operator to search for a movie title along with either a zip code or U.S. city and state to get a list of movie theaters in the area and show times. 14. Music. The “music:” operator returns content related to music only. 15. Unit converter. Use Google for a quick conversion, from yards to meters for example, or different currency: [12 meters in yards] 16. Types of numbers: Google algorithms can recognize patterns in numbers you enter, so you can search for: * Telephone area codes * Vehicle ID number (US only) * Federal Communications Commission (FCC) equipment numbers (US only) * UPC codes * Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) airplane registration number (US only) * Patent numbers (US only) * Even stock quotes (using the stock symbol) or a weather forecast regarding the next five days 17. File types. If you just want to search for .PDF files, or Word documents, or Excel spreadsheets, for example, use the “filetype:” operator. 18. Location of term. By default, Google searches for your term throughout a web page. But if you just want it to search certain locations, you can use operators such as “inurl:”, “intitle:”, “intext:”, and “inanchor:”. Those search for a term only within the URL, the title, the body text, and the anchor text (the text used to describe a link). 19. Cached pages. Looking for a version of a page the Google stores on its own servers? This can help with outdated or update pages. Use the “cached:” operator. 20. Answer to life, the universe, and everything. Search for that phrase, in lower case, and Google will give you the answer. Posted by Master Key at 8:59 AM 5 comments Labels: Tips : For More Efficient Google Searches Windows XP File System NTFS - Faster, Secure, Stable : Microsoft.com Article Taken From Microsoft.com To NTFS or not to NTFS—that is the question. But unlike the deeper questions of life, this one isn't really all that hard to answer. For most users running Windows XP, NTFS is the obvious choice. It's more powerful and offers security advantages not found in the other file systems. But let's go over the differences among the files systems so we're all clear about the choice. There are essentially three different file systems available in Windows XP: FAT16, short for File Allocation Table, FAT32, and NTFS, short for NT File System. FAT16 The FAT16 file system was introduced way back with MS–DOS in 1981, and it's showing its age. It was designed originally to handle files on a floppy drive, and has had minor modifications over the years so it can handle hard disks, and even file names longer than the original limitation of 8.3 characters, but it's still the lowest common denominator. The biggest advantage of FAT16 is that it is compatible across a wide variety of operating systems, including Windows 95/98/Me, OS/2, Linux, and some versions of UNIX. The biggest problem of FAT16 is that it has a fixed maximum number of clusters per partition, so as hard disks get bigger and bigger, the size of each cluster has to get larger. In a 2–GB partition, each cluster is 32 kilobytes, meaning that even the smallest file on the partition will take up 32 KB of space. FAT16 also doesn't support compression, encryption, or advanced security using access control lists. FAT32 The FAT32 file system, originally introduced in Windows 95 Service Pack 2, is really just an extension of the original FAT16 file system that provides for a much larger number of clusters per partition. As such, it greatly improves the overall disk utilization when compared to a FAT16 file system. However, FAT32 shares all of the other limitations of FAT16, and adds an important additional limitation—many operating systems that can recognize FAT16 will not work with FAT32—most notably Windows NT, but also Linux and UNIX as well. Now this isn't a problem if you're running FAT32 on a Windows XP computer and sharing your drive out to other computers on your network—they don't need to know (and generally don't really care) what your underlying file system is. The Advantages of NTFS The NTFS file system, introduced with first version of Windows NT, is a completely different file system from FAT. It provides for greatly increased security, file–by–file compression, quotas, and even encryption. It is the default file system for new installations of Windows XP, and if you're doing an upgrade from a previous version of Windows, you'll be asked if you want to convert your existing file systems to NTFS. Don't worry. If you've already upgraded to Windows XP and didn't do the conversion then, it's not a problem. You can convert FAT16 or FAT32 volumes to NTFS at any point. Just remember that you can't easily go back to FAT or FAT32 (without reformatting the drive or partition), not that I think you'll want to. The NTFS file system is generally not compatible with other operating systems installed on the same computer, nor is it available when you've booted a computer from a floppy disk. For this reason, many system administrators, myself included, used to recommend that users format at least a small partition at the beginning of their main hard disk as FAT. This partition provided a place to store emergency recovery tools or special drivers needed for reinstallation, and was a mechanism for digging yourself out of the hole you'd just dug into. But with the enhanced recovery abilities built into Windows XP (more on that in a future column), I don't think it's necessary or desirable to create that initial FAT partition. When to Use FAT or FAT32 If you're running more than one operating system on a single computer (see my earlier column Multibooting Made Easy), you will definitely need to format some of your volumes as FAT. Any programs or data that need to be accessed by more than one operating system on that computer should be stored on a FAT16 or possibly FAT32 volume. But keep in mind that you have no security for data on a FAT16 or FAT32 volume—any one with access to the computer can read, change, or even delete any file that is stored on a FAT16 or FAT32 partition. In many cases, this is even possible over a network. So do not store sensitive files on drives or partitions formatted with FAT file systems. Source And Credit Microsoft.com Posted by Master Key at 8:55 AM 0 comments Labels: Secure, Stable, Windows XP File System NTFS - Faster : Microsoft.com About RSS Feed Many of us Dont know about RSS Feed. It is very useful and helpful key of SEO. Please read below to know more about RSS Feed. RSS is a family of web feed formats used to publish frequently updated content such as blog entries, news headlines or podcasts. An RSS document, which is called a "feed," "web feed," or "channel," contains either a summary of content from an associated web site or the full text. RSS makes it possible for people to keep up with their favorite web sites in an automated manner that's easier than checking them manually. RSS content can be read using software called a "feed reader" or an "aggregator." The user subscribes to a feed by entering the feed's link into the reader or by clicking an RSS icon in a browser that initiates the subscription process. The reader checks the user's subscribed feeds regularly for new content, downloading any updates that it finds. The initials "RSS" are used to refer to the following formats: * Really Simple Syndication (RSS 2.0) * RDF Site Summary (RSS 1.0 and RSS 0.90) * Rich Site Summary (RSS 0.91) RSS formats are specified using XML, a generic specification for the creation of data Posted by Master Key at 8:52 AM 0 comments Labels: About RSS Feed Monday, August 20, 2007 Tips : To Setup a Virtual Private Network Steps Setting up a VPN in Windows is a two step process. 1. Set up one computer to share files (server). 2. Set up another computer to access them (client). Begin by setting up the server: 1. Open Internet Explorer and go to www.whatismyip.com. Write down the IP address. You will need it to configure the client. 2. Click the Start button and click Run. 3. Type control and hit Enter. 4. Click Network and Internet Connections. 5. Click Network Connections. 6. Click Create a New Connection, which is the first option on the left toolbar. 7. The New Connection Wizard will open. Click Next. 8. Choose Set up an advanced connection, the last element on the list. Click Next. 9. Choose Accept incoming connections. Click Next. 10. You will see the Devices for Incoming Connections screen. Do not select anything on this screen. Click Next. 11. Select Allow virtual private connections. Click Next. 12. Select to whom you want to give access. Click Next. If a user is not listed, you will have to add an account. See “Related Wikihows” for more information. 13. Do not change anything on the Networking Software screen. Click Next. 14. That’s it! Your computer is now set up to allow for VPNs. Click Finish to complete the wizard. Now proceed to connect the client: 1. Click the Start button and click Run. 2. Type control and hit Enter. 3. Click Network and Internet Connections. 4. Click Network Connections. 5. Click Create a New Connection, which is the first option on the left toolbar. 6. The New Connection Wizard will open. Click Next. 7. Select Connect to the network at my workplace and click Next. 8. Select Virtual Private Network connection and click Next. 9. Type the name of your network in the blank box. Click Next. 10. Enter the IP address you wrote down earlier and click Next. 11. Select Add a shortcut to this connection to my desktop and click Finish. Tips * Both computers must be connected to the internet. * The user name and password must be entered exactly as you saved them. * The IP address must be written exactly as listed on the screen. * If the VPN doesn’t work, turn off your firewall. Warnings * Do not give access to the “guest” account. It does not require a password, allowing anyone to access the VPN. Posted by Master Key at 8:42 AM 0 comments Labels: Tips : To Setup a Virtual Private Network Tips : To Fix Errors on Page After Updating IE7 Steps 1. Run the most recent version of javascript. 2. Adjust settings in the browser. 3. Click on tools in IE7. 4. Open Internet Options and click on security tab, then custom level. 5. Shut off the internet security controls while doing the security settings. * .NET Framework: enable all settings * ActiveX controls and plug-ins: * Previously used ActiveX controls: disable * Allow scriptlets, automatic prompting, Binary and script behaviors, Display video and animation on webpage: enable * Download signed ActiveX controls, download unsigned activeX controls, initialize and script activeX controls: Prompt * Run ActiveX controls and plug-ins (again), script ActiveX controls marked safe for scripting: Enable * Downloads: Automatic prompting for file downloads: Disable * Downloads: File download, font download: Enable * Enable .NET framework setup: Enable * Microsoft VM: Medium safety * Misc: access data sources across domains: Disable * Allow META refresh: Enable * Allow scripting of internet explorer web-browser control, allow script initiated windows without size or position: Disable * Allow webpages to use restricted protocols: Prompt * Allow websites to open windows without address or status bars: Disable * Display mixed content: Prompt * Don't prompt for client certificate selection: Disable * Drag and drop or copy and paste files, include local directory path: Enable * Install desktop items, launching applications and unsafe files, launching programs and files in iframe: Prompt * Navigate subframes across different domains: Disable * Open files based on content: enable * Software channel permissions: Medium * Submit nonencrypted data: Enable * Use phishing filter, use pop-up blocker: Disable * Userdata persistence, websites in less privileged content zone, Scripting: active scripting: Enable * Allow programtic clipboard access: Prompt * Allow status bar updates via script, allow websites to prompt for information: Disable * Scripting of java applets: Enable * Logon: Auto logon for intranet zone 6. After settings are adjusted, click OK. You will get IE WARNING message: Click Yes 7. Click on Advanced folder and go to bottom. 8. Click on Empty Internet Files. * Disable Phishing filter: Click Apply * For Tab settings: Click on General 9. Click on Settings under tabs (how webpages...). 10. Check off circles: Always open pop-ups in new tab and a new tab in the current window. 11. Click OK. 12. Close IE7 browser. 13. Right click on IE7 icon on desktop and click Start without add-ons. You will get warning: ignore 14. Close IE7 and repeat last step. Posted by Master Key at 8:41 AM 0 comments Labels: Tips : To Fix Errors on Page After Updating IE7 Tips : To Configure DHCP in Your PC Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol (DHCP) is the configuration of your Internet Protocol (IP) address, subnet mask, DNS servers, domain name suffix and about 200 other possible options to let your computer communicate with a network automatically via a server or router. It sounds complicated, but once set up, it can make connecting to a network much easier. Steps 1. Log into Windows XP with administrator rights. This makes setting up the network for you, and other users, easier as you can make all the necessary changes to settings. 2. Look for the Network Neighborhood or My Network Places icon in your desktop. If it is not there, try your Start Menu. 3. Right-click the Network Neighborhood/My Network Places icon. A drop-down menu will appear. 4. Choose the "Properties" option, generally found at the bottom of the menu. 5. Look for an icon named "Local Area Connection". The icon looks like a pair of computer connected by a link. Double-click this icon. 6. Click the "General" tab, if it is not already selected. You will see a list of protocols to choose form. 7. Scroll down and choose Internet Protocol (TCP/IP), and then click the button that is labeled "Properties". 8. Again, click the "General" tab, it it is not alreay selected. You will see two choices: 1. "Obtain an IP address Automatically" 2. "Use the following IP address..." 9. Choose option 1. 10. You have effectively configured DHCP for your PC. When your computer obtains the IP address, it will also obtain DNS server information automatically. This is provided by your dhcp server. Tips * Make sure your NIC (Network Card)is working properly. * Make sure you are connected directly to a router, switch or hub. * Make sure the Link light is on. (small green light where the cable plugs into the computer) * If you are connected to a LAN, make sure that you have a router that will give addresses away, since the address will be obtained by the PC from the router. * If you have a Server on the LAN such as Windows 2000 or 2003, make sure the server is configured DHCP enabled as well. Posted by Master Key at 8:40 AM 0 comments Labels: Tips : To Configure DHCP In Your PC Tips : To Connect Two Computers Steps 1. Connect the two computers together either with a Crossover cable or a Hub/Switch to the ethernet card in your computer. 2. Set the IP address on both computers. Goto Start > Control Panel > Network Connections (choose switch to classic view if you cannot see network connections) 3. Look for your Local Area Connection ethernet adapter, right-click and choose properties. 4. Select Internet Protocol TCP/IP and choose properties. 5. Setup the IP as 192.168.1.1 and the subnet mask of 255.255.255.0 on the first computer and 192.168.1.2 on the second with the same subnet mask. 6. Choose OK then OK/close again. Tips * To share your files, right click on any folder and choose Sharing to make them shared. * You can also do this with your printers to be able to print from one computer while the printer is connected to the other. Things You'll Need * A Crossover cable. This a Cat5 Ethernet Cable that the wires have been switched around to allow two computer only to talk to each other * OR, you can purchase a switch/hub with two Standard "Straight-Through" Ethernet Cables * Check to see if your computer has an Ethernet Adapter in the back of the computer. Most new computers have this. You can tell by the documentation from the computer or by looking at the back of the computer. It looks like a phone jack, but larger. This Will Help you to share files and folders, printers, play network games, Etc Posted by Master Key at 8:39 AM 0 comments Labels: Tips : To Connect Two Computers Tips : To Install RAM These instructions will assist you in installing memory (RAM) into your computer. Steps 1. Find out what type of RAM is required for your computer. 2. Find out how much of that type of RAM your computer can take. 3. Purchase RAM online; it's much cheaper. 4. Open your computer case (this may require a screw driver; usually a Phillips-Head.) 5. Once you have the case open, you need to locate the RAM slots on your motherboard. Most RAM slots are located on the top of the motherboard, on the right-hand side. You should see something in the computer that is similar to what you bought at the store. 6. Push the clamps OPEN to release the memory (if there is RAM already in there, which there may or may not be, depending on whether you're building a computer or altering an existing one). Remove old memory. 7. Look at the new memory and survey the motherboard memory slots. They should have a notch in each memory slot. 8. Line the notch on the motherboard up with the notch on the new memory. 9. Press gently but firmly until claps close completely. Once you have done this, the memory should be installed correctly. 10. Turn on the computer. 11. Once you have successfully booted the system, turn the machine off again and put the side panel back on the computer. 12. VOILA! You have just installed new RAM. Tips * If you are getting a beep when you turn on the computer, you have either installed an incorrect memory type, or you have installed the memory incorrectly. If this is a computer that you purchased at a store, you should contact the store or the manufacturer of the computer to find out what the beep code means. * If you hear anything other than a single beep lasting one second, check your motherboards' documentation for an explanation of beep codes. Beep codes are a warning system when one or more components fails the POST (Power On Self Test), and is usually due to malfunctioning or incompatible hardware. * If you are adding more RAM (not replacing), make sure there are enough RAM slots. Often you need to buy the exact same RAM as you currently have. Also, having a pair of 512MB is often cheaper than replacing a 512MB with a 1024MB. * A good website to use is the crucial memory website http://www.crucial.com/ as they have a memory advisor tool which tells you how much and what type of ram your computer takes . you can also buy memory from here Warnings * These instructions are for Desktop computers, not Laptops. * Make sure to discharge any possible static buildup before touching RAM; it is extremely sensitive to ESD (Electro-Static Discharge). Do this by touching something metal before touching your computer Posted by Master Key at 8:37 AM 0 comments Labels: Tips : To Install RAM Tips : To assign a Static IP Address To Your Network To assign a Static IP Address to your network connection follow these steps: 1. Open Network Connections 2. Right click the connection you wish to assign a Static Address to and choose Properties. 3. In the Properties box that comes up select "Internet Protocol TCP/IP" and click the Properties button beneath. 4. In Internet Protocol TCP/IP Properties place a dot in "Use the following IP Address". 5. Enter the IP address you wish to use and OK the change. Click OK on Local Area Connection Properties. 6. Reboot Posted by Master Key at 8:36 AM 0 comments Labels: Tips : To assign a Static IP Address To Your Network Tips : Allow more than 2 simultaneous downloads in IE 6 This is to increase the the number of max downloads to 10. 1. Start Registry Editor (Regedt32.exe). 2. Locate the following key in the registry: HKEY_CURRENT_USERSoftwareMicrosoftWindowsCurrentVersionInternet Settings 3. On the Edit menu, click Add Value (a dword) , and then add the following registry values: "MaxConnectionsPer1_0Server"=Dword:0000000a "MaxConnectionsPerServer"=Dword:0000000a 4. Quit Registry Editor. Tips : To Make Menus Load Faster Tips : To Make Menus Load Faster Go to Start >>Run Type 'Regedit' then click 'Ok' Find "HKEY_CURRENT_USERControl PanelDesktop" Select "MenuShowDelay" Right click and select "Modify' Reduce the number to around "100" This is the delay time before a menu is opened. You can set it to "0" but it can make windows really hard to use as menus will open if you just look at them - well move your mouse over them anyway. Tips: To Change Internet Explorer Title How to change the Internet Explorer tiltle? 1. start ->run-> gpedit.msc 2. choose User Configuration, Windows Settings, Internet Explorer Maintainance, Browser User Interface, and doubleclick Browser Title. 3. Activate Customize Title Bars, and type something in there. Doesn't matter what. Let's type: QWERTY. Click Okay. 4. Fire up Reg editor. (start, run, regedit) 5. goto HKEY_CURRENT_USERSoftwareMicrosoftInternet ExplorerMain. 6. Look for the key: Window Title. There you'll find the value: Microsoft Internet Explorer provided bt QWERTY. 7. Change this key to anythig you like and exit regedit. 8. Fire up IE and look at the titlebar! suppl: WinXP security: If you don't do steps 1 to 3, you won't find the Window Title key! Tips: To Change Browser Toolbar Background Change Browser Toolbar Background This tweak Customize the apperance of the Internet Explorer Toolbar 1. Click Start > Run > Type gpedit.msc 2. Click User Configuration > Windows Setting > Internet Explorer Maintenance > Browser User Interface 3. Double click on Browser Toolbar Customization 4. Click on Customize Toolbar Background Bitmap 5. Browse for the new Background Note: Because you can customize your browser toolbar there isn't a specific size which you need to make this tweak work. Play around with the size until you get it right. The Width of your toolbar with be the width of your resolution. 1024 will be your width if your resolution is 1024x768. Now you changed the Toolbar Background of your browser and you sure see what you wrote when you open a New Widow. Enabling USB 2.0 Support For INTEL Boards Desktop Boards Enabling USB 2.0 Support The Intel® Desktop Boards listed below are enabled to support USB 2.0 peripherals. The operating system must support USB 2.0 in order to achieve USB 2.0 performance. If your operating system does not support USB 2.0, your USB 2.0 peripheral will only operate at USB 1.1 (12Mbit) speeds. USB 2.0 Supported Operating Systems Microsoft* Windows* XP (all editions) Microsoft* Windows* 2000 (be sure to have latest Service Pack installed) Microsoft Windows 98SE Microsoft Windows Me To Enable USB 2.0: Reboot (or power on) system. Press "F2" during POST (Power-on Self Test) to enter system BIOS setup program. Select "ADVANCED" menu using arrow (left and right) keys. Select "USB Configuration" and press . Enable "High-speed USB". Press "F10" to Save & Exit BIOS setup program. ( Hi-Speed USB 2.0 controllers are now enabled and your operating system should detect New Hardware during the next normal boot cycle. Cancel "New Hardware Found". For additional BIOS Setup program configuration information, be sure to refer to the Technical Product Specification for your Intel Desktop Board. If you do not have an operating system that supports USB 2.0, the recommendation is to disable the feature in the System BIOS Setup program. Tips : Remove "unremovable" Desktop Icons Please do the Below Step carefully as it is very dangerious to mess around in. Please Note there is no Edit>Undo. If you make a mistake it could mean you'll be reinstalling your OS! Remove "unremovable" Desktop Icons 1. Run Regedit by going to Start>Run and typing "Regedit" 2. Go to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESOFTWAREMcftWindowsCurrentVersionExplorerDesktopNameSpace For some reason the word M i c r o s o f t is shortened to Mcft 3. Here you will see a list of various icons. They are not listed by name but by CLSID. 4. To remove an icon from your desktop, simply delete the key and hit F5 to refresh your desktop. {645FF040-5081-101B-9F08-00AA002F954E} - Recycle Bin. {20D04FE0-3AEA-1069-A2D8-08002B30309D} - My Computer. {208D2C60-3AEA-1069-A2D7-08002B30309D} - My Network Places. WARNING: Regedit has no mercy. It is very dangerious to mess around in. Note there is no Edit>Undo. If you make a mistake it could mean you'll be reinstalling your OS! Tips : Reduce Size Of Windows Folder There are many reasons for making your windows folder smaller, first it saves space and removes windows features you will probably never use that are just slowing down your computer. What can you delete? That is what this article is about, I will explain everything I know is safe to delete, and what happens if you do! Will this really improve the speed of my system? I don’t have any results to prove it, but I think it does improve boot time a little, and after a clean install, it does seem to make the system slightly faster after deleting these things. Final notes: This has been tested on Windows XP Pro Final and SP1 (Not home, but it should work fine) Windows 2003 Enterprise Server 3700, RTM, and The Free Evaluation version (Any 2k3 version should work fine), and Windows 2000 Pro. If the following folders are not on your 2k/2k3 system it means they are only in XP and you don’t need to worry about them. If for some reason you can not delete a folder, just delete the files inside, I tried to make not of the folders that cant be deleted, but depending on your system and if you use FAT32 or NTFS it may be different. All of the paths listed in there are C:Windows and C:Program Files, if your folders have different names (Like C:WINNT on windows 2k) then you should use that path instead. Well, lets get started deleting, these start out ordered from largest to smallest, but after the first few files they are all fairly small, and are just in a random order. 1. c:windowssystem32dllcache NOTE: DON’T DELETE THIS FOLDER, JUST ALL THE FILES INSIDE! This folder uses a LOT of hard drive space, it holds a backup of every system file that windows uses. Deleting this will cause a SFC error when you replace a system file instead of windows putting back the original file. For people who want to mod there system, this is a good thing. 2. c:windowsservicepackfilesi386 NOTE: DON’T DELETE THIS FOLDER, JUST ALL THE FILES INSIDE! This folder only exists if you installed a service pack on XP, if you did a slipstream it won’t be here either. This folder is the same as the dllcache, but has the new files that were updated by a service pack. If you delete the dllcache, deleting this is just like finishing the job. 3. c:windows$Uninstall----$ These $uninstall----$ folders are used whenever you want to uninstall a windows update. If you delete them, you can not uninstall the update(s), but if the updates are working fine for you, there should be now reason to remove them. 4. c:windowscursors This folder contains some custom cursers for windows, if you are happy with the default cursers, or use your own set like Blue Curve, then deleting this wont effect you at all. 5. c:windowsdriver cachei386 NOTE: DON’T DELETE THIS FOLDER, JUST ALL THE FILES INSIDE! This is one you may not want to delete, this takes up a bit of space (about 80mb) but windows uses if you ever add or remove windows components and things like printer drivers. If you’re your hardware is already working fine, you don’t need this folder on your hard drive. For example, if you delete this folder, and try to install IIS, windows will ask for the CD or Network share with the files on it, if you don’t need to add or remove windows components often, deleting this will free up some space for you. 6. c:windowshelp NOTE: DON’T DELETE THIS FOLDER, JUST ALL THE FILES IN SIDE! This folder contains all of the windows help files. If you are like me, and think they having 50mb of help files is a waste, then you probably want to delete it. If you delete this folder and try to view a help file, the Help and Support center will come up with a 404 error. No harm is done, you just can’t view the help files (because you deleted them…). There is also a tours folder inside of the help folder, you can delete everything in this folder also, but windows won’t let you remove the actual folder. 7. c:windowsinf NOTE: DON’T DELETE THIS FOLDER, JUST ALL THE FILES INSIDE! This folder contains a lot of windows drivers, if you ever add new hardware, windows looks in this folder, then on your CD drive for the latest drivers. Any hardware you might get will probably come with the drivers on a disk, so this folder is just a wasting space on your hard drive with outdated drivers. If all of your hardware is working fine, and you don’t plan on adding any new hardware for a while, deleting this wont effect your system at all. If you don’t want to delete everything in it, you can go into the folder, press CRTL+F and search for mdm*.* and delete everything that comes up. These are all modem drivers, and it is very unlikely you will ever need them because you either have a modem installed already, or if you do add one, it will come with newer drivers. 8. c:windowssrchasst This folder is the XP Search assistant, if you delete it, windows will just use the classic 2k style search instead, which is more functional and easier to use. 9. c:windowsdownloaded installations This folder holds the installers for some programs you download and install, for example, Tweak UI puts its installer in this folder, and so you can repair it or update its components later. Deleting this folder won’t harm any programs I have ever seen, but you should look inside this and see what you are deleting first. 10. c:windowsmedia These are the default windows sounds, if you don’t want them, deleting them wont hurt anything. 11. c:windowssystem32restore This is the system restore apps, if you delete this, system restore will no longer work. Before you delete this, you should go into System Restore, and delete all your restore points, and then you should go to the system properties and disable system restore. After that, you can delete this folder, and not worry about system restore slowing down your system or sucking up space. 12. c:windowssystem32usmt This folder is the File and Settings Transfer wizard. If you have no need for it, then deleting this wont have any other effects besides the File and Settings Transfer wizard not working anymore. 13 A. c:program filesmsn 13 B. c:program filesnetmeeting These are the MSN Explorer and Net Meeting applications. If you don’t need or use them, then you can delete these folders (For net meeting, you can only delete the files inside) and the only thing it will effect is that these programs will know longer work. 14. C:windowssystem32oobe NOTE: DON’T DELETE THIS FOLDER, JUST ALL THE FILES INSIDE! In this folder is the Out of Box Experience (The screens you see right after you have installed XP for the first time), and the XP Product Activation stuff. If you have a Retail or OEM version of XP, and you think you might ever need to activate again, DON’T DELETE THIS. So unless you are using XP or 2k3 CORP, you may still need this folder someday. 15. c:windowsmsagent This folder holds the MS Agent program. The MS Agent is a gay little wizard thing that looks like the Office Assistant, I personally hate this thing, and removing it will get rid of it for good! If windows wont let you remove the folder, just delete everything inside of it, and everything inside of the intl folder. 16. c:windowsjava This is the crappy MS Java components that don’t work well, and MS got sued over. If you have Windows XP slipstreamed with SP1a you wont have this because MS no longer distributes it. If you use websites that use Java Applets, you should keep this, or remove it and install Suns Java VM. 17. c:windowsmui This is a little app that allows you to switch between multiple languages, if you only use one language, then deleting this wont effect you at all. NOTE: I think this folder only exists on XP Pro because Home Edition doesn’t support multiple languages. Post Deletion: After you have deleted everything you want to, I recommend you run the Regisrty Cleaner.This will remove all the references to things you deleted so a window doesn’t look for the files any more. If you delete the Java Folder, RegCleaner will find at least 50 reg entries related to it, and can remove them for you if you want. What else can I do to make the windows folder smaller? If you want to make your windows folder even smaller, and you use NTFS, you can use NTFS compression to make the windows folder smaller. Although you can compress everything it, compressing EXEs and DLL files will make you system a little bit slower, so I recommend compressing everything BUT EXE and DLL files. Using this guide, you should easily be able to make your windows folder less then 1gb, but because some programs add there own files to the windows dir, your results may differ from what other people have gotten there folder sizes to. After a clean install, it is fairly easy to get your windows folder less then 700mb so you can put a image file of your clean install on one CD and be able to restore it easily. Tips : Bios Ripped, useful Tips on BIOS As you can see there are various ways on bypassing/changing BIOS passwords. I have successfully used all of the options below on various computers many years ago. These methods will work on computers of today. I have updated the Standard BIOS backdoor passwords for current computers made as of last week. ( big grin ). READ EVEYTHING BEFORE YOU USE ANY METHOD LISTED BELOW. Basic BIOS password crack - works 9.9 times out of ten This is a password hack but it clears the BIOS such that the next time you start the PC, the CMOS does not ask for any password. Now if you are able to bring the DOS prompt up, then you will be able to change the BIOS setting to the default. To clear the CMOS do the following: Get DOS prompt and type: DEBUG hit enter -o 70 2e hit enter -o 71 ff hit enter -q hit enter exit hit enter Restart the computer. It works on most versions of the AWARD BIOS. Accessing information on the hard disk When you turn on the host machine, enter the CMOS setup menu (usually you have to press F2, or DEL, or CTRL+ALT+S during the boot sequence) and go to STANDARD CMOS SETUP, and set the channel to which you have put the hard disk as TYPE=Auto, MODE=AUTO, then SAVE & EXIT SETUP. Now you have access to the hard disk. Standard BIOS backdoor passwords The first, less invasive, attempt to bypass a BIOS password is to try on of these standard manufacturer's backdoor passwords: AWARD BIOS AWARD SW, AWARD_SW, Award SW, AWARD PW, _award, awkward, J64, j256, j262, j332, j322, 01322222, 589589, 589721, 595595, 598598, HLT, SER, SKY_FOX, aLLy, aLLY, Condo, CONCAT, TTPTHA, aPAf, HLT, KDD, ZBAAACA, ZAAADA, ZJAAADC, djonet, %шесть пpобелов%, %девять пpобелов% AMI BIOS AMI, A.M.I., AMI SW, AMI_SW, BIOS, PASSWORD, HEWITT RAND, Oder Other passwords you may try (for AMI/AWARD or other BIOSes) LKWPETER, lkwpeter, BIOSTAR, biostar, BIOSSTAR, biosstar, ALFAROME, Syxz, Wodj Note that the key associated to "_" in the US keyboard corresponds to "?" in some European keyboards (such as Italian and German ones), so -- for example -- you should type AWARD?SW when using those keyboards. Also remember that passwords are Case Sensitive. The last two passwords in the AWARD BIOS list are in Russian. Flashing BIOS via software If you have access to the computer when it's turned on, you could try one of those programs that remove the password from the BIOS, by invalidating its memory. However, it might happen you don't have one of those programs when you have access to the computer, so you'd better learn how to do manually what they do. You can reset the BIOS to its default values using the MS-DOS tool DEBUG (type DEBUG at the command prompt. You'd better do it in pure MS-DOS mode, not from a MS-DOS shell window in Windows). Once you are in the debug environment enter the following commands: AMI/AWARD BIOS O 70 17 O 71 17 Q PHOENIX BIOS O 70 FF O 71 17 Q GENERIC Invalidates CMOS RAM. Should work on all AT motherboards (XT motherboards don't have CMOS) O 70 2E O 71 FF Q Note that the first letter is a "O" not the number "0". The numbers which follow are two bytes in hex format. Flashing BIOS via hardware If you can't access the computer when it's on, and the standard backdoor passwords didn't work, you'll have to flash the BIOS via hardware. Please read the important notes at the end of this section before to try any of these methods. Using the jumpers The canonical way to flash the BIOS via hardware is to plug, unplug, or switch a jumper on the motherboard (for "switching a jumper" I mean that you find a jumper that joins the central pin and a side pin of a group of three pins, you should then unplug the jumper and then plug it to the central pin and to the pin on the opposite side, so if the jumper is normally on position 1-2, you have to put it on position 2-3, or vice versa). This jumper is not always located near to the BIOS, but could be anywhere on the motherboard. Tips: Cleaning the TEMP Directory One thing that is often overlooked, and can have a negative affect on your computer's performance, are all the files that are in the TEMP directory. I've had quite a few people ready to get new computers until this was cleaned. These are easy to clean and slightly different in Win9x and Windows2000 or WindowsXP Windows98 Open up a DOS prompt CD windowstemp (make sure you are in that directory before running the next line. Run deltree /y *.* CD windows Run del *.tmp (be very careful of the spelling) Windows2000 / WindowsXP Go to C:Documents and SettingsUser_NameLocal SettingsTemp (where User_Name is replaced by the person who is logged in) Delete all the files Tips : Change The Start Button Name 1. Navigate to your windows or winnt directory. 2. Make a copy of explorer.exe put it somewhere safe. make another copy name it explorer1.exe, put it in the windows directory. 3. Download a version of a Hex editor on a freeware site. 4. Open up explorer1.exe in the Hex editor . 5. Search for strings named Start 6. Heres some help with the offsets: # Windows 98 Offset: 0x00028D6E - 0x00028D76 # Windows NT4 Offset: 0x00028BEE - 0x00028BF6 # Windows ME Offset: 0x00033DDE - 0x00033DE6 # Windows 2000 Offset: 0x0003860E - 0x00038616 # Windows XP (Enhanced Start Menu) Offset: 0x000412B6 - 0x000412BE # Windows XP (Classic Start Menu) Offset: 0x0004158A - 0x00041592 # Windows XP SP1 (Enhanced Start Menu) Offset: 0x0004208E - 0x00042096 # Windows XP SP1 (Classic Start Menu) Offset: 0x0004259A - 0x000425A2 start will be just before this: There was an internal error and one of the windows you were using has been closed.". now rename start to another five letter word of your choice like Help save the modified explorer1.exe open up regedit, you are looking for this key: [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESOFTWAREMicrosoftWindows NTCurrentVersionWinlogon] search for the value named Shell and make it equal to explorer1.exe. restart for changes to take place. alternatively, close all apps, fire up task manager and end the process explorer.exe, start new traske explorer1.exe and there you go. if PC dont boot, slave off , navigate to your windows delete explorer1.exe and rename explorer.exe to explorer1.exe, plug back into your PC and there you go back to normal, i assure you it works great! Tips And Tricks: PC Upgrade Tired of your out dated personal computer configuration? Think your computer is no good anymore? With the price of the personal computers having hit rock bottom in the past couple of years, one can't help but think of getting the latest replacement. Also, with the extensive promises that chip manufacturers, video card designers and peripheral manufacturers make these days, your computer might seem far outdated than it actually is for your needs. However, before you jump to any conclusions, here are a few questions you need to answer first. ~ How long ago did you buy your machine? ~ What do you use your computer for? ~ Where exactly does it fall short? Read on to understand the kind of performance an average computer user actually needs from his machine.Then evaluate if you really need an upgrade. Hard drives There isn't much to choosing or upgrading a hard drive. When you fall short of storage on your machine, which is sooner rather than later, just get a new 160 or 300 GB disk. Go for companies like Seagate, Western Digital or Hitachi since they have well-established dealer networks in most Indian metros. A 300 GB, 7500 rpm hard disk should cost you between Rs 4,400 -- 4,700. Once bought, just complete the formality of partitioning it to facilitate storage of programme files. Motherboard Look at the right reasons before upgrading your motherboard. One of the primary reasons for the upgrade could be the fact that you want a more responsive, faster central processing unit, CPU. Perhaps your present motherboard needs a new socket, or does not adequately support the speed. In case of an upgrade, go for a motherboard with integrated sound, video, network and modem. This will free up quite a few slots to help you upgrade to perhaps a, 8X AGP adapter. Remember that upgrading your motherboard is quite pointless unless you simultaneously upgrade your CPU and random access memory, RAM, too. Upgrading your AGP card or getting PCI Express means an additional expense on a DDR2. Once you reach the point where the only old components on your machine are the drives and the peripherals, seriously consider getting a new machine. CPU Let's get it clear what a CPU upgrade practically means: * Your motherboard has to support it first, and it needs to be at least 40-50 per cent faster than your earlier CPU for you to even notice the difference. * The memory and hard drive will be running at an unchanged speed. * A CPU upgrade means more on-chip cache, and faster command execution. A CPU upgrade makes a lot of sense if you manage to get a substantial upgrade in the chipset and the CPU at under Rs 3,000. Also socket compatibility and compatible chip set models are factors you should ascertain prior to upgradation. RAM This is the best value for your buck as far as improving performance is concerned. Anything under 256 MB surely needs an upgrade. Most softwares and applications today struggle to run smoothly on machines with 128 MB RAM, say for example running Windows XP. Upgrade over 256 MB at your own discretion in case of usage of heavy applications like graphics-heavy games, animation software or speech recognition. It is recommended to replace your entire RAM with the new one at the time of the upgrading. Do not upgrade just the required additional RAM over your old one. It leads to complications, and quite simply for the marginal cost difference, it's not worth the trouble. CD ROMs Some points to remember: * Faster CD or DVD drives do not affect any application or program that you run. So whether the player is a 16X or a really old 2X, there isn't much to gain with a faster drive. * Choose to go for a DVD burner upgrade over a CD burner. The cost difference is negligible for the advantages. * Check for software compatibility with the drive upgrade as that is the area of highest concern while upgrading. * Upgrading from an existing burner to a faster burner is pointless, unless you plan to burn CDs or DVDs for commercial purposes in large quantities. Video card An AGP adapter or a top-end PCI Express can cost you more than your entire machine at times. Similarly, a Rs 25,000 video card in a Rs 20,000 machine will not make your machine gain much performance edge, besides bettering the 3D effect a little bit. If you are into hard-core gaming, make sure that you have an AGP slot and not onboard video before you go for an expensive video card upgrade. Sound card Keep a few pointers in mind: * There is no 'ultimate' sound system. It depends whether you want your speakers to produce 3D surround effect for games or a home theater effect or rather take the place of your music system. Choosing a sound system is one of the most subjective calls you could take among all hardware choices for your computer. * For 3D surround sound in games, first check if you have a 3D sound card installed before installing the four speakers. It is the card that actually gets you to hear enemies closing up on you from behind, not the number of speakers. * If you are simply interested in recording music, go for a sound card with a good A/D conversion. Choose a top shelf card if you want to compose music on your machine. * Dolby Surround Sound is the same as 3D surround, and usually most motherboards support 6 channel speakers (5.1 audio) that come with a sub-woofer. If the cost of an upgrade exceeds Rs 15,000, don't even consider an upgrade; go for a new machine. If the cost for upgrading is between Rs 10,000 to Rs 15,000, take a call on how old your machine is. If it exceeds 3 years, you might consider buying a new one. Don't upgrade your machine in a hurry. Understand and list your needs of a computer. Check your current system configuration and check if you are really falling short of an upgrade. Most times, upgrading your machine might not be worth it in terms of time and efforts required, since new ones cost so little. Keep in mind that system crashes and software failures might just mean you need to clear some memory space, curb a few applications or defrag your machine; not that your machine is 'out-dated' for your needs. Note ~ Basic hardware requirements have been addressed in the article. ~ Prices are subject to fluctuation across markets. ~ The article does not endorse any brand/ brands of hardware or computers. Tricks : Some Windows Short Cut Keys Some Windows Short Cut Keys task manager shortcut --> ctrl + shift + Esc. ctrl + shift + clicking on hyperlink - opens page in new window (works in firefox too!) ctrl + click a file and then draging it creates a copy of that file. Windows key + e Opens Windows Explorer Refresh webpage - Ctrl + R Windows key + e Opens Windows Explorer ctrl + shift + click a file and then draging it creates a shortcut of that file. Alt + F4 close the window currently being used or If no windows are open then it brings you to a shut down screen windows key + m minimizes all windows windows key + f open the search window windows key + L locks your station F9-Volume Up F10-Volume Down windows key + pause/break key opens up system properties. if multiple windows are opened: alt + tab - will show the next page under the currently viewed one Tips : To Configure DHCP In Your PC Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol (DHCP) is the configuration of your Internet Protocol (IP) address, subnet mask, DNS servers, domain name suffix and about 200 other possible options to let your computer communicate with a network automatically via a server or router. It sounds complicated, but once set up, it can make connecting to a network much easier. Steps Log into Windows XP with administrator rights. This makes setting up the network for you, and other users, easier as you can make all the necessary changes to settings. Look for the Network Neighborhood or My Network Places icon in your desktop. If it is not there, try your Start Menu. Right-click the Network Neighborhood/ My Network Places icon. A drop-down menu will appear. Choose the "Properties" option, generally found at the bottom of the menu. Look for an icon named "Local Area Connection". The icon looks like a pair of computer connected by a link. Double-click this icon. Click the "General" tab, if it is not already selected. You will see a list of protocols to choose form. Scroll down and choose Internet Protocol (TCP/IP), and then click the button that is labeled "Properties" . Again, click the "General" tab, it it is not alreay selected. You will see two choices: "Obtain an IP address Automatically" "Use the following IP address..." Choose option 1. You have effectively configured DHCP for your PC. When your computer obtains the IP address, it will also obtain DNS server information automatically. This is provided by your dhcp server. Tips Make sure your NIC (Network Card)is working properly. Make sure you are connected directly to a router, switch or hub. Make sure the Link light is on. (small green light where the cable plugs into the computer) If you are connected to a LAN, make sure that you have a router that will give addresses away, since the address will be obtained by the PC from the router. If you have a Server on the LAN such as Windows 2000 or 2003, make sure the server is configured DHCP enabled as well. Tips: Set Your Favourite Video As Wallpaper Tips And Tricks to Set your favourite video as Wallpaper Just follow the steps given below: 1.Download VLC Media Player and install it. 2.Run VLC media player,go to Settings->preferences->Interface->Main interfaces,then click on wxWidgets.Remove the tick on "Taskbar" and put a tick on "Systray icon". 3.Now go to Video->Output Modules->DirectX.On the bottom right put a tick on advanced options check box.You will now see some options.Put a tick on "Enable Wallpaper Mode ". 4.Now,select playlist and put a check or tick on "Repeat current item ". 5.Press the Save button.Now close the Vlc player and run it again(to save the settings permanently). 6.Now play any video you would like to set as Wallpaper.Right click on the video and click on "Wallpaper".The video would be set as your wallpaper!!!! Since you have checked the option "repeat current item ",the selected video will play on continuously.It will start again when finished.VLC player will remain in your system tray.If you wish to remove the wallpaper simply close the player and you will get back your original wallpaper. Tips : To Make Free Pc to Phone Calls Anywhere in the World Most of us have been using voice chat in messengers for very long.It is indeed an excellent way of talking to your friends and relatives for free.But obviously the better option would be if we could make Free Pc to Phone calls. There is this site called Gizmocall where you can register for free. After free registration you can make 10 minutes of Free Pc to phone calls anywhere in the world to most landlines and mobiles.And the nice part about it is that You get 10 minutes of Free Calling Everyday, not just once.After you register you just have to download a flash plugin and you are ready to make free calls. But there is one restriction as well, the maximum call duration can be only 3 min/call. The voice clarity is very good.You just need a microphone to make your calls. Tips: To Find Who Is Invisible On Yahoo Messenger Sometimes some of your friends who appear offline in yahoo messenger may not be actually offline,they may in the 'Invisible' mode.This maybe if they are trying to ignore you or are too busy to talk to anyone. There is this small trick that you can use to find out what the truth is. Firstly open your yahoo messenger main window and double click on the name of the person whom you want to check.The chat window will open obviously. Click IMVironment button, select See all IMVironments, select Yahoo! Tools or Interactive Fun, and click on Doodle. After loading the Doodle imvironment there can be two possibilities 1.If the user is offline Doodle are will show this "waiting for your friend to load Doodle" continuously .See in the picture below:     2. If the user is online (but in invisible mode), after few seconds (it can take up to one minute, depending on your connection speed), you should get a blank page like in the picture below.So you know that the user is online.   Alternate Method: Chose a person you want to check .Double click to open the chat window.Now simply invite the person for a voice conference.This is done by clicking on the "conference' button on the top of the chat window. If the talk button appears and turns green then that person is online.But if you receive the message 'Voice chat could not be started ' then the person is offline. Note:Some people use softwares like buddy spy to check who is invisible.I DONT RECOMMEND you to use such third party softwares as they can expose your Pc to hackers by sending your personal information and can even steal information from your Pc.So avoid such softwares and instead use the simple tricks given above. If you have any queries or would like to make some useful contribution to this topic feel free to drop a line in the comments section. Rescue Windows 98/2000/XP Rescue Windows With new viruses on the prowl and uncertainty about OS stability, creating a rescue startup disk for your system can prove to be a lifesaver. But how does one create a startup disk under various flavors of Windows? Windows 98 Go to Start>Settings>Control Panel and select Add/Remove Programs. Select the startup disk tab and then press the Create disk button. When prompted for a floppy, insert one and click Ok’ This startup disk contains DOS utilities that let you scan your hard drive, copy system files, formatting your system and use the CD-ROM drive. Windows 2000 The rescue disk here is known as ERD (Emergency Repair Disk). For creating an ERD, go to Start>Programs>Accessories>System tools>Backup. From the Tools menu, choose Create an Emergency Repair Disk option. When prompted, insert a formatted floppy disk into the drive and press the Ok button. You can also choose to backup registry files through this wizard but the registry files are saved in a folder called Repair in your system root directory instead of the floppy disk. Windows XP Here the rescue disk is called ASR (Automated System Recovery) disk. This disk can only be created when you take a back up of your system files. For the same, go to Start>Programs>Accessories>System tools>Backup. From the Tools menu, select the ASR wizard and take a back up of the files. You can create a disk for starting up the system in MS-DOS mode by right clicking on the floppy disk icon, selecting the format option and then checking Create a Disk to start in MS_DOS only option. While using rescue disks, remember that if your system crashes, you will also need to have the Windows installation CD for complete recovery of your OS. The default installation of Windows XP Prof/Home Edition starts many services in the background, which you could do without, as they eat up a significant amount of your system RAM. Depending upon your hardware, the default installation runs about 30 to 35 services in the background. If you want to optimize XP purely for gaming, then you just need to enable 7 of these services and disable the rest. In addition to this, you also need to do a few other things to optimize XP. Let’s look at them one by one. Right click My Computer and select properties. Click on the Advanced tab, and from the performance option, click the settings button. This will open a performance window. Select the Adjust for best performance radio button and click OK. Remove everything from the task bar, such as clock, sound, etc. Disable all programs that automatically start when the system boots up, such as messenger, other system tools. To do this, run msconfig from Start Menu>Run. Select the Start Up tab to see which programs load during system startup. Uncheck all the check boxes here. Difference Between A Virus, Trojan, And Worm Basically, they all fall under the generally category of "viruses". However, there are a few distinctions. Virus - Technically, a virus infects another file (attaches or inserts itself into it). They usually infect program files or MS Office documents. From there, it can replicate, do damage, etc. Unlike a worm, these do not function as a stand alone (except possibly to infect a given file). Worm - This is almost identical to a "true virus", except that it lives on its own and generally doesn't infect other files (although it can replace them). Usually, these copy themselves using e-mail, networks, disks, etc. Again, these are very close to a true virus, and can do the same kind of damage. Trojan Horse - This type of program doesn't copy itself but does do damage to your computer. These types of programs rely on people to pass them around and to run them. They do not e-mail themselves. The idea is to make the program look like it's something harmless, like a screen saver or joke, so it gets sent around. That's the crash course on virus types. Bottom line, you don't want any of the little nastys on your computer! Tips : To Quit Printing The Page Header And Footer In Notepad Here's how to quit printing the page header and footer in Notepad: 1. Open Notepad. 2. Click File and select Page Setup. 3. Clear the textboxes for both Header and Footer. 4. Click OK Tips to Give Password To The 'Guest' User Account Windows XP contains a guest account (turned off by default in XP Pro) that has the rather unique distinction of not having a password. Not only does the account not have a password, you can't even set one. As you can see, if this account is active, it presents a slight security risk. Fortunately, there is an easy way to assign a password to the guest account: To apply a Password to the guest account: Using an account with administrative privileges, go to the command prompt ('startrun' then type 'cmd') and enter the following command: 'Net user guest password' Now go to 'startcontrol paneluser accounts' and activate the guest account if it is not already. You will be able to assign and change its password. 101 Tricks And Tips For PC Hardware A well-configured PC by itself offers great performance. The key here lies in the choice of the components and their arrangement. Choice of CPU: Because ordinary people do not know much about computers, they simply buy one that has an Intel processor. More discerning buyers get PCs with AMD processors. Benchmark tests by prominent computer magazines and websites have shown that AMD Athlon processors score over Intel Pentium processors. Unlike Intel CPUs, AMD processors natively support both 32-bit and 64-bit software. AMD processors consume less power and consequently generate less heat. Hence, they do not require huge noisy fans. AMD is also a much better consumer-friendly company. It has been contributing to the development of open standards, which results in cheaper PC components. Intel, on the contrary, had tried to impose proprietary products like the RD-RAM memory technology, which was developed by its subsidiary Rambus. The biggest argument for AMD processors is the cost. AMD CPUs are always cheaper than Intel's. Remember, it is always the consumer who ultimately pays for the advertising and marketing expenses. Choice of Motherboard: Thanks to the HyperTransport technology developed by AMD, motherboards of their CPUs are at a level higher than than Intel motherboards. Intel motherboard still use the obsolete front-side bus (FSB) technology to provide a connection between the CPU and the RAM (memory) modules. In the AMD platform, the CPU has an integrated memory controller which directly accesses the memory modules. Hence, memory operations are not bottlenecked by the FSB. Also, motherboard chipsets for AMD processors are being made by many third-party vendors (like VIA, nVidia, and ATI) who add their own expertise and performance increments to the motherboards. Intel jealously guards the chipset market for their CPUs and hence all innovations have to come from Intel. IDE Drives Setup: Most motherboards have to IDE connectors allowing you to connect up to four IDE devices (hard disks and CD/DVD drives). Each connector can connect to two IDE devices in a master/slave combination. If you have just two devices, say a hard disk and a CD drive, connect them separately to the two IDE connectors. If you have a CD drive and CD-RW drive, connect them both to an IDE connection with the CD writer as the master and the CD drive as the slave. Autostart CDs: To prevent a CD from autostarting when it is inserted, hold down the Shift key until Windows Explorer recognises the disk. Use Xteq X-Setup or TweakUI to permanently disable autostart behavior for CD/DVD drives. Power Supply and Cabinet: PC components like the CPU and the graphic card consume a lot of power. So, make sure your PC cabinet has a power supply rated at a minimum of 350W. Also, make sure the cabinet has provisions for two extra fans (one in the front and one in the back). The power supply comes with a fan, which also tries to takes some hot air off the CPU through a grill placed just above the CPU. This grill needs to properly spaced out, be big enough and ideally located to provide effective cooling. Almost all PC cabinets today support the ATX standard, which will allow software to shut the PC down. In Windows 9x/Me/2000/XP, select Enable hibernation under the Hibernate tab of the Power Options applet in Control Panel. A new Hibernate option will now be available in the Shutdown Windows menu. COM Ports: If you use a serial mouse, then connect it to the COM1 port as this is the first port that the OS checks when it is looking for a mouse. You can connect your dialup modem to COM2. CNR Port: This port (known as Audio Modem Riser or AMR in older motherboards) can be used to add a specially made low-cost peripheral replacement. The replacement is far cheaper than a separate sound card or modem. Fans: If your cabinet allows it, install additional fans for extra cooling. Dust: Remove dust regularly from the insides of your cabinet and prevent them from forming a coating over the motherboard and other parts. Driver updates: Manufacturers of PC components release new driver updates to fix problems associated with their products. Check their websites for these releases and keep your machine updated. BIOS BIOS Backup: Sometimes the BIOS program on your motherboard can become corrupt and your PC will not function properly. So, you need to always keep a backup of a good version of the BIOS on a floppy disc. If something ever goes wrong with the BIOS, you can flash (overwrite) it with your backup. The software used to backup or flash the BIOS is usually available on the motherboard driver CD or on the motherboard/BIOS manufacturer's website. Refer the motherboard manual for step-by-step instructions on using the BIOS flash software. Do not Detect Absent Devices: When a PC is started, the BOIS checks all available ports/connectors on the motherboard to identify devices attached to them. Usually, not all of these ports/connectors have devices attached to them and bootup time gets unnecessarily prolonged. For example, even if you have only one IDE drive on your PC, the BIOS will still check the other three IDE connectors. To avoid this delay, enter the BIOS Setup program and change the settings to Disabled or None for these ports/connectors. However, when you add new hardware components, make sure to change their BIOS setting to Auto so that they get properly detected. Supervisor Password: To prevent your BIOS settings from being changed by anyone else, set a Supervisor password in the BIOS and do not set the user password. User password: If you want to prevent access to anyone else, then set the User password. Remote access: If you often travel with a laptop PC, you might have felt the need to connect to your desktop PC at home. All you need to remotely access your home PC is a telephone connection. In the power settings section of the BIOS, set the PC to wake up on external modem act. When you leave home, keep the modem powered on, the PC switched off, and the power line connected. Use your laptop to dial your home number. When your modem at home receives the call, the PC will switch itself on. You can then use software-based networking to retrieve files from your machine. You can also use the same principle to send faxes to your PC and make it work like a fax machine. To shut down your the desktop PC remotely, you can simply rely on OS power schemes or use a remote access software. Boot sequence: After you have installed your OS, set your hard disk first in the boot-up sequence with the CD drive and the floppy following it in that order. Quick Power On Self Test: Keep this enabled and save on boot-up time. Boot Up Floppy Seek: Keep this disabled. PCI Expansion Cards: PCI add-on cards will not work properly if there is IRQ sharing conflict. Refer the motherboard manual for an IRQ number that has been designated as for PCI IRQ Steering. Set this number as the IRQ for the devices in the BIOS setup. Many devices will happily share their IRQ with other devices. However, some devices like graphic cards and TV tuner cards have heavy performance requirements and will not work with a shared IRQ. Provide these cards with a dedicated IRQ. Disk Partitions Primary Partitions, Extended Partitions and Logical Partitions: A hard disk can have a maximum of only 4 partitions, which are called PRIMARY PARTITIONS. In the early days of the PC, this four-partition limit was deemed sufficient. To go beyond this limit, a special kind of primary partition called EXTENDED PARTITION was invented. A hard disk could have ONLY ONE extended partition but this particular partition could have any number of smaller partitions called LOGICAL PARTITIONS housed inside it. Multiple OS and Partitions: Some people have more than one OS installed on their PCs. It is not possible to have more than one OS on a single partition. So, you need to dedicated a partition for each OS. It is preferrable to install Linux on a primary partition. Windows 2000/XP will work on kind of partition. Windows 95/98/Me installs in the first partition on the hard disk. Perhaps you would like to read my writeup How To Multiboot Operating Systems for more information. My recommendation is to have three primary partitions - two ordinary primary partitions (one for Win 9x/Me and one for Linux) and one extended partition. Partitioning tool: Windows 9x/Me supplies a partition tool called FDISK. It does not recognize partitions created by Linux installations. So, you might want to use something like Ranish Partition Manager. In Windows 2000/XP, the disk management tool in the Computer Management console will allow you to partition your hard disk. Boot Loader: If you have multiple operating systems, you might want to use a GUI-based boot loader such as Extended Operating System Loader (XOSL). Disk Swap Console-based OSs like DOS have only modest memory requirements. GUI-based operating systems like Windows needs lot of memory, much larger than the RAM that is usually installed on PCs. So, they use something called virtual memory. Here, a large file on the hard disk is used in conjunction with the RAM, which greatly expands the memory available to the OS. Only the data that is required at the given moment is loaded on the RAM; the rest is cached on the swap file. Just like any other file on a disk, the swap file can also get fragmented over time and OS might seem to slow down. To prevent the swap from breaking up, you can place it on a dedicated partition (just like in Linux). Set the size of this partition at about 2.5 times the size of your installed RAM and format it. Next, you need to make sure that the OS does not reserve space on this partition for deleted files because this partition is going to have only one file - the swap file. From the Recyle Bin context menu, choose Properties » Configure drives independently. Select the partition's tab and select the Do not move files to the Recycle Bin. Remove files immediately when deleted option. In Windows 9x/Me: Right-click on My Computer, click on Properties, choose the Performance tab, and click on Virtual Memory. Here, check the Let me specify my own virtual memory settings and chose the new partition. Set the Minimum and maximum size to something below the total size of the partition. See screenshot. In Windows 2000/XP: Right-click on My Computer, click on Properties, click on the Advanced tab, click on Performance Options, and click on Change. Here, choose the drive where the swap currently resides and remove the settings (set them to 0) in the Initial Size and Maximum Size boxes. Now, choose your swap partition and set the initial and maximum sizes to the new partition's full capacity minus say 20 MB. See screenshot. Use the Microsoft TweakUI utility to hide this partition so that you don't save ordinary files on it inadvertantly. If you plan to run heavy-duty applications such as Oracle Database, you may need a swap partition as big as 1.5 GB, just to run the installer. In these cases, do not create a swap partition. If you have two hard disks, then the swap partition could be created on the first partition on the second disk, preferrably connected to the secondary IDE channel. When the OS load gets shared on two hard disks, there is a perceivable increase in performance. Device Manager Keyboard shortcuts: There may have been times when your mouse was not detected and you had a hard time getting around the device manager. Here are the navigation keys with Device Manager. If you are in the desktop, press the TAB key repeatedly until My Computer is selected. Then press the CONTEXT MENU key, which is between the left Ctrl key and the Windows Key. This opens up the context menu for the My Computer. Now select Properties from this menu. Now you see the System Properties window. This has several tabs, one of which is the Device Manager. Press Ctrl+TAB repeatedly to move to Device Manager. Now you see all the devices listed. Press TAB to move to them. To open up any particular device, press the RIGHT ARROW and to shrink it up press LEFT ARROW. To open up the properties of any particular device, press ALT+ENTER or the CONTEXT MENU key. DMA: Direct Memory Access (DMA) technology enables high-speed transfers from hard disk and reduces the load on the CPU in making correct data reads and writes. Make sure this option is checked in the Disk Drive Properties. Otherwise, your disk operations will be slow. Ports: If you have a 56 kbps modem, then set its port speed to 1,15,200. This can be done from the Communication Port Properties Modem: Most Indian modems use American-made chipsets, they do not dial tones on Indian telephone lines. So, set the modem to blind dial by choosing the Do not wait for dial tone setting or using the modem initializing string ATX3. Refer your modem manual for the list of AT commands you can use with your modem. Saving Memory and Increasing Speed In Windows 9x/Me, the system cache setting is not always optimised. A software called Cacheman will do this for you. In Windows 2000/XP, try changing the I/O lock page size. To do this, you can use Xteq Systems X-Setup. Choose the appropriate setting under System » Memory. Clear the startup programs: Startup programs get loaded along with Windows. This causes a delay before the desktop becomes active. Most of these programs do nothing but hog precious memory. See if you can use the programs' settings to prevent them loading with Windows. If that is not possible, use Mike Lin's Startup Control Panel to do that. After you install this program, you can access it from the Control Panel. RAM: A PC might start running faster simply by adding an extra module of RAM. See if this works for you. If you think you have more than adequate ram but the PC seems sluggish, then use RamBooster to proactively free up unused RAM at regular intervals. Task Manager: Task Manager (taskmgr.exe) in Windows 2000/XP will list of programs in memory. For detailed information, use TaskInfo. These programs are useful if you are trying to weed out unwanted programs that get loaded on to the memory. Increasing the Performance of Individual Programs: You can increase the speed of a program, by setting the process priority of the program to either High or Realtime in Task Manager. Do not go overboard on this or your system will become unresponsive. Active Desktop: Unless you run stock market price tickers on your desktop, deactivate Active Desktop to save memory. If you have enabled Active Desktop just to enable a GIF or JPEG file as the background, then convert the file to a BMP file and set that as the wallpaper without Active Desktop. Plain Desktop: Remove the desktop background image and set it None. This will save some memory. Screen Resolution: Set your screen resolution to 15 bit or 16 bit for both speed and saving memory. Set a higher level only when playing games and other such special programs that require higher resolutions. Clean the Desktop: Remove all unwanted icons from the desktop and shortcuts from the desktop and the quick launch bar. If you have shortcuts for CD drives, windows will check for their contents every time it loads up and cause a delay before the Desktop becomes active. Remove sound events: If you remove the desktop theme sounds, your operations will get faster. To do so, go to Control Panel » Sounds and Multimedia » Schemes and then choose No Sounds. Windows Explorer Keyboard and mouse shortcuts: Open any folder and press F3. This will bring up the Find Files dialog box for that folder. Press Start+TAB key combination just once. Now, pressing TAB repeatedly will allow you to jump between various areas of the desktop, such as the desktop proper, taskbar, system tray, quicklaunch toolbar, and Start button. When you drag a file with the right mouse button, you will be presented with an option to move or copy the file when you drop it elsewhere. If you drag a file from some location and hover it over a folder that is minimized on the desktop without dropping it, then that folder will spring open allowing you to drop the file there. If you drag a shortcut and place it over the Start button without dropping it, then the Start menu will spring open and you can navigate to your special program groups and drop it there. Sometimes, when you have many programs open and you use the Alt+TAB combination to switch to another program, it does not switch. In this situation, press the Start button twice. Press Alt+F4, to close a program. If no program is open, then it functions like a Shutdown command. Pressing Alt+Enter after selecting an item will bring up its properties box. Pressing Start+Pause will bring up the System Properties of your computer. Add Extra the Send To Menu Options: Open the SendTo folder create shortcuts to the programs and folders that you commonly use. My suggestion is to have shortcuts for the Desktop, My Documents, IrfanView, and Subhash VCDPlayer. When you use the Send To menu option on a file, it will be opened by the relevant program or copied to the relevant folder. Adding Extra Context Menu Options: Usually, a certain file type can be opened with many programs. However, the file type's right-click menu may have option for just one or two programs. So, why not add some new options for other programs? Here is how you create a context menu option for the MP3 file type so that their files can be opened by Subhash VCDPlayer. Go to Folder Options. Click on File Types tab. From the list under Registered File Types, search for and select MP3 Format Sound. Now click on Advanced. In the Edit File Type window, click on New. In the New Action window, enter Open with Subhash VCDPlayer in the text box under Action and "C:Program FilesSubhash VCDPlayer" "%1" (including the quotation marks) in the Application used to perform action. Here, the ampersand symbol '&' is placed before the 'S' in Subhash VCDPlayer so that 's' becomes the hot key in the context menu. Use the Edit button to modify any existing settings. Exercise caution with the choice of the program. If the program and the file type are incompatible, results can be unpredictable. See screenshot. Resize Explorer Columns: Press Ctrl+Plus to resize columns to best fit the contents. Do not use this trick in the Temporary Internet Files folder though; super-bad news if you frequent this folder to manually pick out files. Folder Options: Customizing the Windows Explorer is done via the Folder Options. To access this, In Windows Me/2000: From the menu, choose Tools » Folder Options. In Windows 9x: From the menu, choose View » Folder Options To move between the different tabs, press the Ctrl+TAB key combination or just use the mouse. Setting the default view: There are five types of views available Large Icons Small Icons List Details Thumbnails You can have the same view for all Explorer windows. Open any folder and choose the type of view that you want from the toolbar. If you were to choose the Details view, then adjust the column sizes. Then, go to Folder Options and in the View tab, click on the Like Current Folder. Single-Click To Run Applications: Normally, to select a file you single-click and to run you double-click. You can change this to hover for select and single-click to run. Go to Folder Options. Here, in the Click items as follows section, check the Single-click to open an item and Underline items only when I point at them. Expanding and Collapsing Folder Tree Branches: On the folder pane, you can expand a branch by pressing the * (asterisk) key. To collapse a branch, press the - (minus) key. Customized Links Toolbar: The Links toolbar has shortcuts to several Internet sites that you will never visit. Why not replace them with shortcuts to folders or files in your hard disk or your own choice of Internet sites? Display the Favorites menu, right click on Links, and select Open. In the Links folder that opens, remove the shortcuts that Microsoft has provided and create some shortcuts to your own files and folders in your hard disk or network. Open Links in the Same Window: When you click on a folder shortcut in the Links toolbar, a new Explorer window is opened. To open the folder in the same window, right click on the shortcut and select Open from the context menu. Removing the Links toolbar: If you want to remove toolbar from showing up at all, then right click on the Links toolbar, and click on the Links option in the context menu. Favorites: Rather than having links to Internet websites alone, you can also have links to folder in your disk drives or network in the Favorites menu. Just open these folders and select the Add to Favorites from the Favorites menu. Now, you do not have to dig deep into My Computer or My Network Places. Just selecting the location from the Favorites menu will take you to the folder. Using Favorites in Other Programs: The above tip can come to good use not just in Explorer windows, but also in other programs such as Word or Excel when you want to open or save files. Just click on the Favorites icon on the left of the Open or Save As dialog boxes. Customising the Toolbar: In Windows Me/2000/XP, you can customise the toolbar with your own choice of buttons. For this, right click on the toolbar and select Customize from the context menu. Suggested toolbar buttons: My suggestion for buttons for the customized toolbar is Back Forward Separator Refresh Separator Cut Copy Paste Separator Copy To Move To Separator Delete Separator Undo Separator Properties Folder Options Views Separator Up Browsing Opera is one of the lightest and fastest browsers available. It was also the first one to provide tabbed browsing. It has numerous customisable features and is a treat to use. Internet Explorer (IE) has the biggest share among Internet browsers and is the most standards-compliant one. Hence, many websites prefer to work with IE and some of them will not even work with other browsers. As an unfortunate result of its popularity, IE is also a favourite target for hackers, spyware and viruses. IE then becomes a security hole in your computer. So many people have migrated to other browsers like Mozilla Firefox. Firefox has been developed to closely resemble IE and has support for tabbed browsing. But because it lacks support for ActiveX controls and VBScript, it has largely escaped many browser-based attacks. If you like Firefox, feel free to use it in place of IE but remember that Firefox by itself is not an inherently safe product. New Firefox vulnerabilities are being discovered and as the new browsers gains in popularity, it will suffer the same fate as IE. ... You can send messages to computer running the Messenger service (Windows 2000/XP) by using the command net send message from the MS-DOS prompt. To send a message to yourself, type net send 127.0.0.1 hello in the Run dialog box. Internet Explorer IE loads up pretty fast because parts of it is loaded by Windows. Disable the Links toolbar to provide more space for webpages. Close the History/Search pane for the same reason. Customize the toolbar via View » Toolbars » Customize. My suggestion for toolbar buttons includes Back Forward Separator Stop Separator Refresh Media Separator Search Favorites History Separator Edit Separator Full Screen Blank home page: Set your home page to a blank one so that it loads up faster. This is done via Tools » Internet Options » General » Use Blank. When your browser is infected with spyware, you will find that no matter how many times you set the home page, it always changes to something else. Use anti-spyware software like Ad-Aware to root out such annoyances. Offline browsing: You do not have to be online to revisit a webpage. You can access it from the browser cache. Select Work Offline from the File menu. Open the History pane by pressing Ctrl+H or clicking the History toolbar button and select the page from the list. You check the latest version on the Net however by clicking on the Refresh toolbar button or pressing the F5 key. Search Pane: The search pane (press F3) is a feature of Internet Explorer that allows you to use MSN Search to search the Internet. When you install the Yahoo! toolbar, it will modify IE so that Yahoo! Search is used inside their search pane. However, you are still limited to using just one search engine. So, I created a search pane tweak called Search Heaven, which will allow you to access all popular search engines plus other resources like dictionaries and thesaruses from the search pane. See a demo here. Context Menu Extensions For IE: IE allows you to copy the address of a link with just two clicks. But to copy the address of an image on a webpage, you have make at least 5 clicks. To make things like this more easier, you can create your own context menu extensions. For this, some new keys will have to be added to the registry. These keys will refer to Javascript or VBScript functions placed in some special HTML files. For a sample, download the cmes.zip. Extract the HTM files to C:. Extract the Install CMES.reg and double click on it. The keys will be merged into the registry. Your IE context menu will have new options - "Copy All Hyperlink Address" (default), "Copy All Image Addresses" (default), "Copy Image Address" (on images), "Set Text Size To Medium" (on selected text), "Copy HTML Code" (on selected text), "Open Frame In New Window" (default), "Highlight Text" (on selected text) and "Open Link In Same Window" (on hyperlink). Computer Security: Some websites carry misleading ads and wrong tactics to sell computer security products. Do not download or install these software. Be careful about installing ActiveX controls. The only ActiveX controls or plugins that ordinary people can safely install are that of Macromedia Flash, Real Player, QuickTime and Windows Media Player. All others like Gator or Bonzi are likely to be spyware of some sort. Many spware products are released along with dialers, screensavers, and programs like MP3 Dancer. They are almost impossible to uninstall. Even if you run their uninstall programs, they will continue to hide in your computer without your knowledge. So, be careful about installing software. Paranoia 1: IE's autocomplete feature may throw up some web addresses at the address bar, which you may not want others to see. So, clear the history. This is done by Internet Options » Clear History. If otherwise you want to selectively remove history items, then delete the appropriate folders inside the History folder. In Windows 9x/Me, the History folder is inside the Windows folder. In Windows 2000/XP, it will be inside the Documents and Settings«User name»Local Settings folder. A list of web addresses that you have typed in the Address bar is saved in the registry. Run regedit.exe, do a search for "TypedURLs" keys and delete any values you find on the right-side pane. Paranoia 2: Deleting the files in the Temporary Internet Files folder can remove only part of your tracks. Cookies stored by websites usually remain in this folder with their full web address. So, that is a security violation. To remove them, choose Internet Options » Temporary Internet Folder » Delete Cookies. Paranoia 3: There is a file named index.dat inside the the Temporary Internet Files or the Temporary Internet FilesContent.IE5 folder. This contains a list URLs you have visited. If you delete this file, Windows will automatically generate an empty index.dat. However, this file can refuse to go away easily. If this is the case, then go close all windows, start Task Manager (taskmgr.exe) and end the last remaining explorer process. Your taskbar and desktop will disapear but this is okay. Now, go to the File » New Task (Run...) menu option. Type cmd to start an MS-DOS window. Use the cd command to navigate to the folder containing the index.dat file and give the del command to delete the file. Type exit to close the command prompt window. Now, switch back to Task Manager, go the File » New Task (Run...) menu option and type explorer to get back your desktop and taksbar. Paranoia 4: When the Autocomplete feature is enabled, all your personal information including passwords are stored on the computer, which is available for others to misuse. So, when you are done with browsing at your office or an Internet cafe, follow the above three steps and clear the saved data by choosing Internet Options » Content » AutoComplete » Clear Forms and Clear Passwords. Sometimes, the Internet Options menu option might be disabled in your office or web cafe. So, delete the HKEY_CURRENT_USERSoftwareMicrosoftInternet ExplorerIntelliForms key from the registry. If you want to steal or backup passwords, export this key and import it on a different machine or installation. You will also have to copy the {username}.pwl file and cookies to the new machine/installation. Sometimes, there are ActiveX programs that sit silently recording everything. You can check them out at Internet Options » Temporary Internet Files » Settings » View Objects. This will open the Downloaded Program Files folder in the windows folder. By right-clicking the contents, you can either remove them or check out their properties. Paranoia 5: In many Internet cafes, some people leave keylogger software installed on the PCs. These record everything that is typed on the keyboard, including your usernames and passwords. So, when you visit a Internet browsing centre, run Task Manager and kill all suspicious-looking programs you find. Some sophisticated keyloggers do not even appear in the Task Manager. To be safe, do not type the characters in the your password in the usual order. Jumble them up. Use your mouse to position the cursor so that the characters are in their proper positions. Few keyloggers are smart enough to detect mouse clicks. Try this demo. The password is "lkBg(tts)2" but we do not type it in that order. Dialer: When you click on a link, IE starts the dialer program, which can be very annoying. So, disable this via Internet Options » Connection » Never dial a connection. When you want dial a connection, go to the Dial-Up Networking. Savings on Telephone Bills: You can make optimum use of your online time by opening the links in new windows rather than in just a single window. Take for example your Yahoo! Inbox. Right click on each message and open new windows. By the time, you finish reading the web page in one window, all the other windows would have downloaded their messages. Downloading Recalcitrant Files: Download managers can download files faster by using more than one connection to the download server. However, they may not be able to catch the URL of some files. In such cases, open the source code of the web page via View » Source and do a search for the download file. Usually, the full url of the file will be found here. Copy this and paste it in the download manager. Some websites prevents you from right-clicking so that you are unable to save images from their website. But you can look inside the Temporary Internet Files folder and you will find that the image has been already downloaded there. All you need to do is maka a copy. IE Toolbars & Desktop Tickers: Add the Google Toolbar to IE. With this toolbar, you will get to the results without having to visit Google's home page first. If you have to keep in touch with the latest news, then get the Reuters Desktop Ticker. Reuters is the world's leading news provider and almost every newspaper and TV station in the world gets feeds from it. Once connected to the Net, headlines flash across the ticker and you can click on the headlines to read the news stories in a browser window. ESCAPE: Many people do not know this. If a page is being downloaded and you want to stop it, then pressing the Escape key will do that. Also, pressing Backspace key will take you to the previous page. Saving web pages: IE allows saving a web page in a single file along with it images and other embedded content. To do this, choose Save As from the File menu. In the Save as type, choose Web Archive, single file (*.mht). Sometimes, MHT files may not show anything even though its thumbnail does show something. If you disable Javascript, you will be able to see the saved content. Outlook Express Outlook Express is a free e-mail client that comes bundled with IE. OE has a lot of GUI clutter and you can reduct this. Go to View » Layout and uncheck Contact, Outlook Bar, and View Bar in the Window Layout Properties window. This is chosen by selecting Layout from the View menu. Customize the toolbar from Window Layout Properties. My suggestion for buttons is Send/Recv Separator Create Mail Separator Reply Separator Delete Separator Copy To Separator Preview Separator Offline The New Message window has a separate set of toolbar buttons. Customize this with Send Separator Undo Separator Spelling Separator Attachment Separator Insert Signature Separator Offline Messages that are already in the various folders have a different toolbar. Customize this with Reply Separator Previous Separator Next Separator The columns that are viewed inside a folder can be customized via View » Columns. My suggestion for columns is Size Attachment Mark for Offline Sent From To Subject The Outbox has a different set of columns so modify that separately. Implementing Spam Filters For POP Accounts: Create two folders in your mail client - Filtered Inbox and Spam. Create the following four Message Rules in Outlook Express (Tools » Message Rules » Mail). Use your old messages as a guide while picking the words for your filters. Check the Spam folder once in a while for any false-positives. If you find any spam among the flagged messages in the Filtered Inbox, then update the filters in the third rule with new words. Mail Rule #1: Mail From Known Contacts Where the From line contains 'friendname' or 'contact@emailaddress.com' Move it to the Filtered Inbox folder and Stop processing more rules Mail Rule #2: Mail Not Addressed To Me Where the To or CC line does not contain 'your@emailaddress.com' Move it to the Spam folder and Stop processing more rules Mail Rule #3: Word filters on From, To, & Subject lines Where the From line contains 'debt' or 'enlargement' or 'teens' or 'viagra' or Where the Subject line contains 'debt' or 'enlargement' or 'teens' or 'viagra' or Where the To line contains 'debt' or 'enlargement' or 'teens' or 'viagra' Move it to the Spam folder and Stop processing more rules Mail Rule #4: Suspect Mail For all messages Move it to the Filtered Inbox folder and Flag it and Stop processing more rules Integrating HotMAIL: You can integrate your HotMAIL account with Outlook Express. Just go about as you would do with adding a POP account. After you enter your HotMAIL address, OE will automatically identify it as a HotMAIL account and pre-fill the E-mail Server Names details. Click Next enter the userid and password. When you are done, OE will ask if you want to download folders for that account. Here, choose Yes. After the folders have been downloaded, you can use it like you would use a POP mail account except that you will not be able to use the Message Rules (available under the Tools menu) on this account. Protecting Your E-mail Address: Junk mail seems inevitable but there are a few things you can do about it. Do not give your office e-mail address or personal POP address to any website or service. Just to make sure your contacts use your e-mail address responsibly, add the following to your e-mail signature (Tools » Options » Signatures). E-MAIL BEST PRACTICES When you send a joke to many contacts, put all e-mail addresses in the bcc (blind carbon copy) box. (None of the recipients will know who the other recipients were.) If you do have to forward a joke, delete all names and e-mail addresses from the message before sending it. Respect others' privacy. Never send a mail asking the recipient to forward it to everyone he/she knows. (Chain mail accumulate many e-mail addresses over time & spammers thank the Lord when they receive one.) Never send virus warnings to anyone. (It may be a hoax and your contacts may end up damaging their machine or losing useful data. Making regular updates to the OS, firewall, anti-virus, anti-spyware and other software is enough.) Never use another person's e-mail address without his/her permission on any website. (Spammers harvest e-mail addresses by providing some free service.) Handling Bulk Mailers: Use an e-mail address from a free e-mail provider like Hotmail or Gmail. They have better junk mail filters than you can possibly create on your own. If you want to stay one step ahead of junk mailers, then use disposable email addresses provided by Yahoo! Mail's AddressGuard service. If a website requires that you provide an e-mail address before you can use their services, then use temporary e-mail addresses provided by Mailinator.com. After you add your HotMAIL account to Outlook Express, right click on individual folders and select Synchronization Settings » Headers Only. This will ensure that only the message headers are downloaded when you send/receive message. After identifying useful message, you can double-click them and have their entire content downloaded. Now, you can choose to delete other messages that you think are junk without having to download them. It is very easy to forge the the From addresses of e-mail messages. Almost all bulk messages have forged From addresses. So, there is no point in complaining to the owners of the domain used in the From address. You need to look at the message headers (select the message, right-click, select Properties » Details) to identify the ISP used by the bulk mailer. Check the screenshot for an example. The Received: header identifies the ISP used by the spammer as rr.com (Road Runner). To complain to an ISP, you need to "abuse@" to the ISP's domain name. In this case, the e-mail address to use will be "abuse@rr.com." In your message, add a copy mail headers of the junk message you had received. Without the mail headers, the ISP will not be able to take any action on the culprit. Archiving E-mail Messages: Your e-mail messages are kept in a message store folder. The store folder's location can be found by going to Options » Maintenance » Store Folder. Copy the location of the store folder and paste it in the address bar of Explorer. Make a backup of this folder at regular intervals. When you want to move your old messages to another PC or a different installation of Windows, simply import messages (File » Import » Microsoft Outlook Express 6 » Import mail from an OE6 store directory » Browse) from the backup of your original message folder. Options: To change the various settings of OE, choose Options in the Tools menu. If you have a dial-up account, then under the General tab, uncheck all the check boxes. Under the Send tab, uncheck the Send messages immediately. Under the Compose tab, under Font Settings choose the Verdana 9pt font or anything else that you might fancy. Under the Signatures tab, create different signatures for different accounts or one for all accounts. If you are in India, then setting the dictionary to English (United Kingdom) in the Language section of the Spelling tab will prevent conflicts with American spelling. Blind Carbon Copy (bcc): Not many people know how to send e-mail messages using bcc (blind carbon copy). Choose View » All headers in the New Message window. Xteq X-Setup Xteq X-Setup is a great utility to tweak your system. It has different settings for Win 9x/Me/NT/2000. To create a DOS box with current folder as its default directory, go to Appearance » Explorer » Context Menu » Context Menu Options and check on Enable 'DOS Prompt here' command for directories. To hide certain drives, go to Appearance » Explorer » Options » Hide drives. For settings on shortcuts, go to Appearance » Explorer » Shortcuts. To set up your own customized OEM logo on the Device Manager, go to Appearance » OEM information. Set the outer portions of the BMP file to the color of the 3D object (in your color scheme) before that. See screenshot. To speed up your modem, choose the port in Hardware » Modem » COM Port Speed. To prevent others from changing the screensaver or background, go to Appearance » Control Panel » Other Settings » Visible Pages in 'Display'. Miscellaneous With faxing software, if you cannot locate the recommended initialization string for your particular modem, try fax class 1 in combination with the generic initialization string: AT&F&C1&D2&K3S7=55 If this doesn’t work, try fax class 2 in combination with the generic initialization string: AT&F&C1&D2&K4S7=55 Windows 9x/Me might sometimes throw up error message that some system file has gone corrupt. You can restore things using System File Checker from Start » Programs » Accessories » System Tools » System Information » Tools. To show the correct speed with which your modem connects to the ISP, enter the initialization string ATW2 Of all antivirus programs, AVG Antivirus is the best and the lightest. It is better than Norton or McAfee. Run your antivirus program's complete checkup every week. Also, defrag your hard disk every week. Use Disk Cleanup every now and then to clear your hard disk of junk files. When Windows throws up a lot of errors and refuses to stop them even after a reinstall, a clean install of Windows is in order. This process can be done more safely and easily if your data files reside in a drive other than the one where Windows sits on. This way you don't have to do time-consuming backups. So, after the first time you install Windows, follow these steps. Your My Documents would typically be in C:My Documents or C:Documents and Settings%username%My Documents. If you have space on drive D, why not keep your documents in it? If anything goes wrong with your C drive, your documents will be safe in the D drive. For this, right-click on your My Documents and select Properties » Move. Now, select a folder in the D drive. Now, your My Documents will be available from this folder. Change the store folder of your Outlook Express email messages as mentioned above, to a folder in another drive. It also helps to backup email account settings too. Select Tools » Accounts » Mail. Select the email account and click on Export. This will create a file with the extension .iaf. Whenever you want to re-create the email account, click on the Import button and select this .iaf file. Most people format their Windows drive before doing a clean install. This is not necessary. If you have more than one OS, it will delete the boot files of the other OSs too. Just delete the Program Files folder and the Windows folder from MS-DOS or from another OS and go ahead with the install. After that is done, import your email messages from the folder you had created previously. Now, delete any files in that folder. Next, change the message store back to that folder. Also, change the My Documents back to the folder you had created earlier. Use a download manager to manage your downloads. Second-generation download managers allow for the files to be downloaded in pieces simultaneously by more than one thread, and combine them together after download is over. If you keep a lot of programs installed, your program menu can get very long. So, divide them into sections such as Multimedia, Internet, System Tools, Utilities, etc., by creating appropriately named folders inside the c:windowsStart MenuPrograms folder and making appropriate choices during installation. Quicklaunch Toolbar: Keep the Show Desktop icon in it. If you had deleted it for some reason, then do a search for *.scf in the drive and if you find the Show Desktop.scf file, copy it to the Quicklaunch folder. If you do not find it, then create a new folder. Open Notepad and type the following [Shell] Command=2 IconFile=explorer.exe,3 [Taskbar] Command=ToggleDesktop Choose Save as from the File menu. In the dialog box, change Save as type to All files. Give the filename as Show Desktop.scf. Make sure you save it in the folder you had created just then. Now, right click the taskbar and choose Toolbar»New Toolbar. Here choose the folder where you had put the Show Desktop.scf file. Keep shortcuts in your Quicklaunch bar for your drives. Create a shortcut with the target as c:windowsrundll32.exe user.exe,exitwindows. Clicking on this icon will shut down Windows in a snap. However, this command works for Windows 9x/Me only. For Windows NT/2000/XP, you need something more sophisticated. I suggest you download Wizmo (Windows Gizmo - 37 KB). Create shortcuts to this small program using appropriate parameters for logoff, shutdown, restart, hibernate, reboot, and several other functions. Explore and try to find new ways of doing things. Lock Folder Without Any Softwares U can lock any folder without any softwares. Using the codes given below u can redirect the folder to control panel, internet explorer etc., by renaming the files by pasting the code for example if u have a folder in d: which is named as "HELL" then rename it to Control Panel.{21EC2020-3AEA-1069-A2DD-08002B30309D}. thats all ur folder will redirect to control panel. Control Panel.{21EC2020-3AEA-1069-A2DD-08002B30309D} Internet Explorer.{FBF23B42-E3F0-101B-8488-00AA003E56F8} Recycle Bin.{645FF040-5081-101B-9F08-00AA002F954E} My Computer.{20D04FE0-3AEA-1069-A2D8-08002B30309D} My Documents.{ECF03A32-103D-11d2-854D-006008059367} Fonts.{BD84B380-8CA2-1069-AB1D-08000948F534} to unlock the folder Go to Start>RUN>CMD If the folder is in d: then go to that drive then type dir/x then the folder is shown as for example with control panel it shows as contro~1.{21 rename this folder to any name using command "ren control~1.{21 myfolder" without quote ok that it all over..... U can lock and unlock the folder Activate a Screen Saver Screen savers were originally intended to prevent monitor burn-in, which could occur if a single image was displayed most of the time. Over time, that image would essentially become etched into the display, making the monitor harder to use. Monitor technology has improved over the years, and screen savers have become more a form of entertainment than a way to avoid burn-in. Screen savers can be used to display your favorite photos or other images you'd like to see. Sometimes you might want to immediately start your screen saver like you would any other program, without waiting several minutes for it to start automatically. To add a shortcut to your desktop that you can double-click to instantly start your screen saver 1. Click the Start button, and then click Search. 2. In the Search Results window, click All files and folders. 3.In the All or part of the file name box, type *.scr. Then, click Search 4. You will see a list of screen savers in the search results. Pick the screen saver you want. You can preview it by double-clicking it. To add a shortcut to your desktop, right-click the file, click Send To, and then click Desktop Now you can instantly start your screen saver by double-clicking the icon on your desktop. 19 secrets of Windows XP 1. It boasts how long it can stay up. Whereas previous versions of Windows were coy about how long they went between boots, XP is positively proud of its stamina. Go to the Command Prompt in the Accessories menu from the All Programs start button option, and then type 'systeminfo'. The computer will produce a lot of useful info, including the uptime. If you want to keep these, type 'systeminfo > info.txt'. This creates a file called info.txt you can look at later with Notepad. (Professional Edition only). 2. You can delete files immediately, without having them move to the Recycle Bin first. Go to the Start menu, select Run... and type ' gpedit.msc'; then select User Configuration, Administrative Templates, Windows Components, Windows Explorer and find the Do not move deleted files to the Recycle Bin setting. Set it. Poking around in gpedit will reveal a great many interface and system options, but take care -- some may stop your computer behaving as you wish. (Professional Edition only). 3. You can lock your XP workstation with two clicks of the mouse. Create a new shortcut on your desktop using a right mouse click, and enter 'rundll32.exe user32.dll,LockWorkStation' in the location field. Give the shortcut a name you like. That's it -- just double click on it and your computer will be locked. And if that's not easy enough, Windows key + L will do the same. 4. XP hides some system software you might want to remove, such as Windows Messenger, but you can tickle it and make it disgorge everything. Using Notepad or Edit, edit the text file /windows/inf/sysoc.inf, search for the word 'hide' and remove it. You can then go to the Add or Remove Programs in the Control Panel, select Add/Remove Windows Components and there will be your prey, exposed and vulnerable. 5. For those skilled in the art of DOS batch files, XP has a number of interesting new commands. These include 'eventcreate' and 'eventtriggers' for creating and watching system events, 'typeperf' for monitoring performance of various subsystems, and 'schtasks' for handling scheduled tasks. As usual, typing the command name followed by /? will give a list of options -- they're all far too baroque to go into here. 6. XP has IP version 6 support -- the next generation of IP. Unfortunately this is more than your ISP has, so you can only experiment with this on your LAN. Type 'ipv6 install' into Run... (it's OK, it won't ruin your existing network setup) and then 'ipv6 /?' at the command line to find out more. If you don't know what IPv6 is, don't worry and don't bother. 7. You can at last get rid of tasks on the computer from the command line by using 'taskkill /pid' and the task number, or just 'tskill' and the process number. Find that out by typing 'tasklist', which will also tell you a lot about what's going on in your system. 8. XP will treat Zip files like folders, which is nice if you've got a fast machine. On slower machines, you can make XP leave zip files well alone by typing 'regsvr32 /u zipfldr.dll' at the command line. If you change your mind later, you can put things back as they were by typing 'regsvr32 zipfldr.dll'. 9. XP has ClearType -- Microsoft's anti-aliasing font display technology -- but doesn't have it enabled by default. It's well worth trying, especially if you were there for DOS and all those years of staring at a screen have given you the eyes of an astigmatic bat. To enable ClearType, right click on the desktop, select Properties, Appearance, Effects, select ClearType from the second drop-down menu and enable the selection. Expect best results on laptop displays. If you want to use ClearType on the Welcome login screen as well, set the registry entry HKEY_USERS/.DEFAULT/Control Panel/Desktop/FontSmoothingType to 2. 10. You can use Remote Assistance to help a friend who's using network address translation (NAT) on a home network, but not automatically. Get your pal to email you a Remote Assistance invitation and edit the file. Under the RCTICKET attribute will be a NAT IP address, like 192.168.1.10. Replace this with your chum's real IP address -- they can find this out by going to Code: www.whatismyip.com-- and get them to make sure that they've got port 3389 open on their firewall and forwarded to the errant computer. 11. You can run a program as a different user without logging out and back in again. Right click the icon, select Run As... and enter the user name and password you want to use. This only applies for that run. The trick is particularly useful if you need to have administrative permissions to install a program, which many require. Note that you can have some fun by running programs multiple times on the same system as different users, but this can have unforeseen effects. 12. Windows XP can be very insistent about you checking for auto updates, registering a Passport, using Windows Messenger and so on. After a while, the nagging goes away, but if you feel you might slip the bonds of sanity before that point, run Regedit, go to HKEY_CURRENT_USER/Software/Microsoft/Windows/Current Version/Explorer/Advanced and create a DWORD value called EnableBalloonTips with a value of 0. 13. You can start up without needing to enter a user name or password. Select Run... from the start menu and type 'control userpasswords2', which will open the user accounts application. On the Users tab, clear the box for Users Must Enter A User Name And Password To Use This Computer, and click on OK. An Automatically Log On dialog box will appear; enter the user name and password for the account you want to use. 14. Internet Explorer 6 will automatically delete temporary files, but only if you tell it to. Start the browser, select Tools / Internet Options... and Advanced, go down to the Security area and check the box to Empty Temporary Internet Files folder when browser is closed. 15. XP comes with a free Network Activity Light, just in case you can't see the LEDs twinkle on your network card. Right click on My Network Places on the desktop, then select Properties. Right click on the description for your LAN or dial-up connection, select Properties, then check the Show icon in notification area when connected box. You'll now see a tiny network icon on the right of your task bar that glimmers nicely during network traffic. 16. The Start Menu can be leisurely when it decides to appear, but you can speed things along by changing the registry entry HKEY_CURRENT_USER/Control Panel/Desktop/MenuShowDelay from the default 400 to something a little snappier. Like 0. 17. You can rename loads of files at once in Windows Explorer. Highlight a set of files in a window, then right click on one and rename it. All the other files will be renamed to that name, with individual numbers in brackets to distinguish them. Also, in a folder you can arrange icons in alphabetised groups by View, Arrange Icon By... Show In Groups. 18. Windows Media Player will display the cover art for albums as it plays the tracks -- if it found the picture on the Internet when you copied the tracks from the CD. If it didn't, or if you have lots of pre-WMP music files, you can put your own copy of the cover art in the same directory as the tracks. Just call it folder.jpg and Windows Media Player will pick it up and display it. 19. Windows key + Break brings up the System Properties dialogue box; Windows key + D brings up the desktop; Windows key + Tab moves through the taskbar buttons. Tips to Change Text in Clock You can add your anything you like that consists of 8 characters or less. This will replace the AM or PM next to the system time. But you cannot do this if you are using any of our software during the trial period; it will corrupt the trial license. 1. Open RegEdit 2. Go to HKEY_CURRENT_USERControl PanelInternational 3. Add two new String values, "s1159" and "s2359" 4. Right click the new value name and modify. Enter anything you like up to 8 characters. Posted by Master Key at 9:07 AM 0 comments Labels: Tips to Change Text in Clock Step by step procedure to install XP Tip: If possible, print this document before starting Setup. Some steps might require you to shut down the computer, and it will be helpful to have a printed copy of this information. This document will help you to install Microsoft Windows XP Professional or Windows XP Home Edition. This document also provides answers to other setup-related questions. Click a link to go directly to that section: Prepare for Setup Upgrade to Windows XP Perform a new installation of Windows XP Transfer files and settings from another computer Partition and format a hard drive Perform other Setup-related tasks Troubleshoot Setup Create boot disks Configure a computer to boot from CD Set up a multiboot system Repair or recover a system Find a Microsoft Knowledge Base article Additional resources Installation overview This release of Windows XP includes Service Pack 2 (SP2) for Windows XP. If you uninstall this release of Windows XP, SP2 is automatically uninstalled too. Your computer will be running the operating system that it was running before you installed Windows XP, or it will not be running an operating system. You cannot uninstall SP2 only. Important You can install Windows XP Home Edition with Service Pack 2 or Windows XP Professional with Service Pack 2 on computers that are running the following operating systems: - Microsoft Windows 98 - Windows 98 Second Edition - Windows NT 4.0 Workstation - Windows Millennium Edition - Windows 2000 Professional -Windows XP Home Edition - Windows XP Professional If you want to upgrade Microsoft Windows 95 to Windows XP Home Edition or Windows XP Professional, you must first uninstall Windows 95, and then perform a new installation. If you are installing Windows XP on an older computer, it’s a good idea to check with your computer manufacturer to see whether a BIOS upgrade is available before you proceed. Prepare for Setup There are four important steps you should take before you start Setup: 1. Run an upgrade report – it only takes a few minutes to check system compatibility. 2. Disable virus protection software – if you do not do this, installation might fail. 3. Back up your files either by using the Backup Wizard that is built into Windows, or by using another backup program. 4. Decide which type of Setup you want – an upgrade or a new installation. Doing these four steps before starting Setup can save you time in the long run. Run an upgrade report An upgrade report tells you how your hardware and software will work with Windows XP. The upgrade report is a quick and easy program that you can run using the Windows XP CD. Here's how: 1. Insert the Windows XP CD into your CD-ROM drive. 2. When the Welcome menu appears, click Check system compatibility. 3. Then click Check my system automatically. You can also find information about your computer's devices (such as printers, scanners, and so on) at the device manufacturer's Web site, in the Windows Catalog, and on the Microsoft Hardware Compatibility List (HCL): Text version of the HCL (for all operating systems) (https://winqual.microsoft.com/download/default.asp) Text version of the HCL (for Windows XP only) (https://winqual.microsoft.com/download/display.asp?FileName=hcl/WinXPHCLx86.txt) The Windows Catalog (http://www.microsoft.com/windows/catalog/) You can get to all of the above from Windows Hardware and Driver Central (http://www.microsoft.com/whdc/hcl/default.mspx) What do you do if something is incompatible with Windows XP? You can upgrade either the hardware or software in question, find a similar but compatible program or device, or you can remove the program or device and stop using it. To upgrade, contact the manufacturer. To find compatible programs and devices, check the Windows Catalog (http://www.microsoft.com/windows/catalog/). To remove a program, go to Control Panel and open Add or Remove Programs. Disable virus protection (antivirus) software Virus protection software sometimes interferes with Setup, so make sure that you disable it before you begin installing Windows XP. For instructions about how to do this, refer to the documentation for your virus protection software. After setting up Windows XP, remember to enable the virus protection program. In some cases you will need an updated version of the software, which you might be able to download from the software manufacturer's Web site. Back up your files Back up any files that you want to preserve, just in case something goes awry. Depending on how many files you have, you can copy them to a floppy disk, removable drive, or CD, or to a network folder if you have a network. You can copy the files directly or use the Backup Wizard included with most versions of Windows. This wizard is located in the AccessoriesSystem Tools folder on the Start menu. Note: You cannot restore a backup in Windows XP that you created by using the Msbackup tool in Windows 95, Windows 98, or Windows Millennium Edition. For more information about this issue, see Microsoft Knowledge Base article 305381, "Cannot Restore Backups That You Create in Windows 95, Windows 98, or Windows Me with the Windows XP NTBackup Tool." Decide which type of Setup you want There are basically three different types of Setup: an upgrade, a new installation (also known as a clean installation or a full installation), and a multiboot installation. Hint: we highly recommend the first one! Upgrade. This is the easiest method of installing Windows XP. We recommend you use this method if you are running a previous version of Windows. When you upgrade, you replace the existing operating system with Windows XP, but your data and most user settings should not be affected. (It's always a good idea to back up your files before starting, just in case.) You can upgrade from Windows 98, Windows 98 Second Edition, Windows Millennium Edition, Windows NT Workstation 4 (Service Pack 6), or Windows 2000 Professional. Note: Windows 2000 can only be upgraded to Windows XP Professional. See Microsoft Knowledge Base article 292607 for supported upgrade paths. Also see Microsoft Knowledge Base article 316941 for an overview of the Windows XP Setup process. Tip: To find a Microsoft Knowledge Base article, go to Microsoft Help and Support (http://support.microsoft.com), type the article number in the Search the Knowledge Base box, and press ENTER. New installation. Also known as a full installation or a clean installation, this method requires a little more work than an upgrade. A new installation can install Windows XP on another drive or partition without disturbing an existing installation, or you can choose to wipe out everything on your hard drive so that you "start from scratch." You should definitely back up your files before doing a new installation! As part of a new installation, you can also partition and format your hard drive. It's best to do this as part of Setup, rather than doing it in advance (as you might have done with previous versions of Windows). We'll get to that. Multiboot installation. The hardest of all three, this method is a variation of the new installation process that lets you run more than one operating system on your computer. For example, you can have both Windows XP and Windows 98 installed. To switch from one to the other, you restart the computer and choose an operating system from a menu that appears when the computer starts. Sounds cool, but don't attempt this unless you are an advanced computer user. Upgrade to Windows XP Note: Before installing Windows XP, you should disable your virus protection (antivirus) software, and you might want to run the Windows Memory Diagnostic tool to test your computer's random access memory (RAM). To use the Windows Memory Diagnostic tool, follow the instructions on the Windows Memory Diagnostic (http://oca.microsoft.com/en/windiag.asp) Web site. Be sure to enable your virus protection software after installing Windows XP. When you upgrade to Windows XP, you install Windows to the same folder where your current version of Windows is located, updating the earlier version. Here's how: 1. Start your computer. Also, make sure you have your product key handy. 2. Insert the Windows XP CD into your computer's CD-ROM or DVD-ROM drive. 3. On the menu that appears, click Install Windows XP. 4. On the Welcome to Windows Setup page, click Upgrade (recommended) (if it is not already selected), and then click Next. (You should click Next on each screen from here on.) 5. On the License Agreement page, read the agreement, and follow the instructions to accept or reject the agreement. 6. On the Your Product Key page, type the 25-character product key in the appropriate boxes. 7. On the Get Updated Setup Files page, select the option that you want. Hint: It's a really good idea to select Yes and get the updated files, but you can only do this if you're able to connect to the Internet. Note: Some of the problems addressed in the troubleshooting section of this document are prevented by getting the updated Setup files. 8. During this phase of Setup, the computer will restart several times, and you'll see screens telling you about new features in Windows XP. This part of Setup takes a while. It's a good time to go have a cup of coffee or take a break. 9. Finally, the computer restarts one last time and Windows XP starts. Do not forget to enable your virus protection software after Setup is finished. Perform a new installation of Windows XP If your computer does not have an operating system currently installed or you have decided to install Windows from scratch, you can perform what is known as a new installation (also known as a clean installation, or a full installation). This process is more complicated and takes longer than an upgrade (about 20 steps as opposed to 9 for an upgrade). To perform an upgrade, refer to the section titled "Upgrade to Windows XP." Note: Before installing Windows XP, you should disable you virus protection (antivirus) software, and you might want to run the Windows Memory Diagnostic tool to test your computer's random access memory (RAM). To use the Windows Memory Diagnostic tool, follow the instructions on the Windows Memory Diagnostic (http://oca.microsoft.com/en/windiag.asp) Web site. Be sure to enable your virus protection software after installing Windows XP. CAUTION: You can choose to delete everything that currently exists on the hard drive during a new installation, so be sure to back up any data you want to keep before you begin (make sure that the backup data is not stored on the drive you are going to delete). Here's how to perform a new installation of Windows XP: 1. Insert the Windows XP CD into the CD-ROM drive. Note: Make sure the computer can boot from a CD. If it can't, then follow the procedures in the section titled "Configure a computer to boot from CD" or see the "How do I install Windows from the command prompt?" section under "Perform other Setup-related tasks." 2. Restart the computer. 3. When the message to Press any key to boot from CD… is displayed, quickly press any key (for example, the SPACEBAR). Setup begins. Note: Pay close attention here, because it's very easy to miss this message. If your current operating system starts, you'll know that you missed the opportunity to boot from CD. Restart your computer and try again. 4. After Setup starts, several messages will flash across the bottom of the screen. These messages are only important under special circumstances, such as installing a particular hardware access layer (HAL), or loading a small computer system interface (SCSI) driver. Most people can ignore them. For more information about this subject, see Microsoft Knowledge Base articles 295116 and 220845. 5. Next, a screen appears that offers the following three options: Set up Windows XP, Repair a Windows XP installation, or Quit Setup. Press ENTER to select the first option. 6. The End User License Agreement appears next. Read the license agreement and follow the instructions to accept or reject the agreement. If your Windows CD is an upgrade CD, after accepting the agreement, you will be prompted to insert the CD of your previous operating system to verify that the previous version qualifies for upgrade to Windows XP. Important! If you use a recovery CD from an original equipment manufacturer (also called an OEM), it is possible that the CD will not be accepted. If you delete the partition information or format the drive and the OEM recovery CD is not accepted as valid media, you must use the OEM recovery CD to restore your previous version of Windows. For details about restoring your system using the OEM recovery media, please contact your computer manufacturer. 7. If a screen appears showing an existing installation of Windows XP, press ESC to continue installing a fresh copy of Windows XP. 8. At the next screen, you have the option of repartitioning your drive. It's a good idea to repartition if you want to merge several smaller partitions into one large one, or if you want to create several smaller partitions so that you can set up a multiboot configuration. If you want to repartition, follow the instructions to delete existing partitions, if needed, and then select unpartitioned space and press ENTER to proceed. CAUTION: Deleting a partition will remove all data stored on that partition. Before you continue, make sure you have backed up everything you want to keep. 9. Select the formatting method you would like to use, and then press ENTER. NTFS offers both enhanced formatting capabilities and security technologies. If you need to access drives or DOS files (such as from a DOS-based boot disk) using Windows Millennium Edition or earlier versions of Windows, you might need to select FAT32 instead. Select either format method (quick or slow). 10. Setup will format the drive, copy initial Setup files, and restart the computer. Note: After the computer restarts, you will again receive the message Press any key to boot from CD but you should ignore it so that you do not interrupt the current installation process. 11. After another restart, the next part of Setup will begin. 12. On the Regional and Language Options page, follow the instructions to add language support or change language settings, if desired. 13. On the Personalize Your Software page, type your name and the name of your company or organization (if applicable). 14. On the Your Product Key page, type the 25-character product key that came with your copy of Windows XP. 15. On the Computer Name and Administrator Password page, make up a computer name (if your network administrator gave you a name to use, type that). Then make up a password for the Administrator account on your computer. Type it once, and then confirm it by typing it again. Important: Be sure to remember the Administrator password. You'll need this password when you want to make changes to your system in the future. 16. On the Date and Time Settings page, make any changes that are necessary. 17. On the Networking Settings page, if it appears, select Typical settings (unless you plan to manually configure your networking components). 18. On the Workgroup or Computer Domain page, click Next. If you want to add your computer to a domain, select the second option and fill in the domain name. (If you do this, you will be prompted for a user name and password.) Note: Connecting to a domain is only possible in Windows XP Professional, not in Windows XP Home Edition. 19. Next, while Setup copies files to your computer and completes a few other tasks, you'll see a series of screens that tell you about new features in Windows XP. 20. Finally, your computer will restart. Again, ignore the message to press any key. After Setup completes, eject the CD from the CD-ROM drive. Do not forget to enable your virus protection software after Setup is finished. Transfer files and settings from another computer Did you ever wish that you could easily transfer your files and settings from an old computer to a new one? The Files and Settings Transfer Wizard available in Windows XP can assist you in doing this. This wizard helps take the pain out of upgrading to a new computer. Here's how to use this wizard: On your new computer: 1. Click Start, and then click Files and Settings Transfer Wizard. 2. On the Welcome page of the wizard, click Next. 3. On the Which computer is this? page, select New computer. 4. On the Do you have a Windows XP CD? page, select I will use the wizard from the Windows XP CD, unless you don't have a Windows XP CD. If that is the case, you will need to make a Wizard Disk so that you can run the wizard on your old computer. Select the first option and follow the instructions to make the Wizard Disk. 5. Now go to your old computer (or the computer that you're transferring files and settings from). On your old computer: 1. If you don't have a Windows XP CD, insert the Wizard Disk that you created into the floppy drive. Click Start, click Run, and then click Browse. Browse to your floppy drive and then double-click the MigWiz.exe file. In the Run dialog box, click OK. If you do have a Windows XP CD, insert it into the CD-ROM drive of the computer you want to copy files and settings from and wait for the startup menu to appear. If the menu does not appear automatically, click Start, click Run, and then click Browse. Browse to your CD-ROM drive and then double-click the Setup.exe file. In the Run dialog box, click OK. Click Perform additional tasks, and then click Transfer files and settings. 2. On the Welcome page of the Files and Settings Transfer Wizard, click Next. 3. On the Which computer is this? page, select Old computer. 4. On the Select a transfer method page, choose a method that will work for both computers. For example, you can place the files and settings on a network drive that both computers have access to, or you can use a removable drive. Whatever method you choose, both computers must be able to use it. 5. On the What do you want to transfer? page, select one of the three options. Depending on the type of transfer method you choose, some options are better than others here. For instance, if you plan to transfer more than just a few files and settings, choose a method other than floppy disks (since those have the lowest storage capacity). If you decide to change your transfer method, you can always click Back. On this page, you can also select a check box that lets you choose a custom list of files and settings to be transferred. This option is for advanced users. 6. At this point, you might see a message telling you to install certain programs on your new computer before continuing. This step is not required, but those programs might not work correctly without doing this. 7. The wizard now collects the files and settings you requested and prepares to transfer them to the new computer. Insert a disk or removable drive when prompted, if you are using one of those methods. 8. On the Completing the Collection Phase page, click Finish. Then go to your new computer, taking along any disk or CD you have used. On your new computer: 1. Click Start, and then click Files and Settings Transfer Wizard. 2. On the Welcome page, click Next. 3. On the Which computer is this? page, select New computer. 4. If you placed your files and settings on a disk or CD, insert it now. On the Where are the files and settings? page, tell the wizard where to find the files and settings. The wizard transfers the files and settings to the new computer. 5. On the Completing the Files and Settings Transfer Wizard page, read any messages about the status of your transfer, and then click Finish. 6. You might see a message telling you that you need to log off before the new settings will appear on your new computer. You can just log off and log back on. There is no need to restart the computer. That's it! The transferred files and settings should now be on your new computer. Partition and format a hard drive If there are no partitions on your hard drive, you will need to create a partition and format it. Alternatively, it's a good idea to repartition your hard drive if you want to merge several smaller partitions into one large one, or if you want to create several smaller partitions so that you can set up a multiboot configuration. If you want to partition or format your hard drive, we recommend that you use the disk partitioning and formatting tools that are built into Windows XP Setup. These tools allow you to delete existing partitions and to create one or more new partitions. IMPORTANT: If you follow these steps on a hard disk that is not empty, all of the data stored on that hard disk will be permanently deleted. To use the disk partitioning and formatting tools in Windows XP Setup: 1. Insert the Windows XP CD into your CD/DVD drive (or insert the first Windows XP Setup boot disk into the floppy disk drive), and then restart the computer. Note: To start your computer from the Windows XP CD (or from the Setup boot disk), your computer must be configured to start from the CD/DVD drive (or the floppy disk drive). In some cases, you might have to modify your computer's BIOS settings to do this. For more information, see "Configure a computer to boot from CD." 2. If you are starting the computer from the Windows XP CD, press a key to boot from CD when you are prompted to do so. If you are starting from the Windows XP Setup boot disks, insert each of the additional disks when prompted, and then press ENTER to continue after inserting each disk. 3. At the Welcome to Setup page, press ENTER to continue. 4. On the License Agreement page, read the agreement, and then follow the instructions for accepting or rejecting the agreement. 5. If an existing Windows XP installation is detected, you will be prompted to repair it. Press ESC (do not repair). 6. All existing partitions and unpartitioned spaces are listed for each physical hard disk. Use the arrow keys to select the partition or unpartitioned space where you want to create a new partition, and then press D to delete an existing partition or press C to create a new partition using unpartitioned space. If you press D to delete an existing partition, you must then press L (or press ENTER, and then press L if it is the System partition) to confirm that you want to delete the partition. Repeat this process for each of the existing partitions that you want to use for the new partition. When all the partitions are deleted, select the resulting unpartitioned space and press C to create a new partition. Note: If you want to create a partition where one or more partitions already exist, you must first delete the existing partition or partitions and then create the new partition. 7. Type the size (in megabytes, or MB) that you want to use for the new partition, and then press ENTER, or just press ENTER to create the partition using the maximum size. 8. If you want to create additional partitions, repeat steps 6 and 7. 9. If you want to install Windows XP, use the arrow keys to select the partition you want to install it on, and then press ENTER. If you do not want to format the partition and install Windows XP, press F3 two times to quit Setup, and then do not continue with the following steps. In this case, you must use another program to format the partition. 10. Select the format option that you want to use for the partition, and then press ENTER. The options are: o Format the partition by using the NTFS file system (Quick) o Format the partition by using the FAT file system (Quick) o Format the partition by using the NTFS file system o Format the partition by using the FAT file system o Leave the current file system intact (no changes) For most configurations, NTFS is a good choice for security and flexibility. If you plan to install a multiboot configuration and access data on the drive using older operating systems such as Windows 95, Windows 98, or Windows Millennium Edition, however, select FAT. When you format a volume, files are removed from the volume and the hard disk is scanned for bad sectors. The majority of the time required to format a volume is devoted to scanning the disk. If you choose the Quick format option, files are removed from the partition, but the disk is not scanned for bad sectors. You should only use this option if your hard disk has been previously formatted and you are sure that your hard disk is not damaged. Note: During Windows XP Setup, the option to leave the current file system intact is not available if the selected partition is a new partition. For partitions up to 2 gigabytes (GB) in size, Setup uses the FAT (also known as FAT16) file system. For partitions greater than 2 GB but less than 32 GB, Setup uses the FAT32 file system. For partitions greater than 32 GB, Setup uses NTFS. Note: If you deleted and created a new System partition but you are installing Windows XP on another partition, you will be prompted to select a file system for both the System and Boot partitions at this point. 11. After Setup formats the partition, follow the on-screen instructions to continue Setup. After Setup is complete, you can use the Disk Management tools in Windows XP to create or format additional partitions. Perform other Setup-related tasks How do I install Windows from the command prompt? If your computer will not boot from a CD, you can still use the Windows XP Setup floppy disks to start Setup. During Setup, you will be prompted to insert the Windows XP CD. For more information, see "Create boot disks." Otherwise, you can use a Windows 98 or Windows Millennium Edition Startup disk to start the computer, and then run Winnt.exe from the i386 folder of your Windows XP CD. 1. The Smartdrv.exe tool will speed up the process of copying files from the CD to your hard drive. To use the Smartdrv.exe tool, make sure the Smartdrv.exe file is present on the startup disk. If you do not have Smartdrv.exe, file copying will take much longer but it can still be done successfully. Verify that the following entries exist in the following files on your startup disk; add the entries if they do not already exist: In Autoexec.bat, add this line: smartdrv.exe In Config.sys, add this line: device=himem.sys Note: For information about modifying the Config.sys and Autoexec.bat files, see Microsoft Knowledge Base article 232558. 2. Insert the startup disk into your computer's floppy drive, and restart the computer. 3. When the DOS prompt appears (it looks like this: C:>), type the following lines, pressing ENTER after each one. Substitute the drive letter of your CD-ROM drive for the letter D, if yours is different. D: cd i386 winnt When Setup begins, follow the prompts on your screen. How do I set the default operating system (when multiple systems are installed)? If you have more than one operating system installed, you can select the operating system that you want to use as the default: 1. In Windows XP, right-click My Computer, and then click Properties. 2. On the Advanced tab, under Startup and Recovery, click Settings. 3. Under System startup, in the Default operating system list, click the operating system that you want to start when you turn on or restart your computer. 4. Select the Time to display list of operating systems check box, and then select the number of seconds for which you want the list displayed before the default operating system starts. Warning: The boot options file (Boot.ini) controls the number and order of operating systems on your computer. To manually edit this file, click Edit on the Startup and Recovery tab. Use caution when modifying the boot options file. Doing so incorrectly might make your computer unusable. For more information, see Microsoft Knowledge Base article 289022. How do I uninstall Windows XP? If you need to uninstall Windows XP and return to the operating system from which you originally upgraded, follow these instructions. Note: If you performed a new installation instead of upgrading, you cannot uninstall Windows XP. In this case, you need to perform a new installation of your previous operating system. Important Notes: If enough space is available, the Windows XP uninstallation files are automatically saved during the upgrade process. If space is not available, the files are not saved. If the files were not saved, you cannot use the uninstallation process that is described in this section. Any programs that were installed prior to the Windows XP upgrade will be preserved. However, any programs that were installed after the Windows XP upgrade will not be available after you uninstall Windows XP. You might need to reinstall these programs. To be able to successfully uninstall Windows XP SP2, you must have upgraded from Windows 98, Windows 98 Second Edition, or Windows Millennium Edition. If you upgraded from Windows XP, Windows 2000, Windows NT 4.0, or Windows 95, you cannot uninstall Windows XP SP2. If you converted your hard disk to the NTFS file system, you cannot revert back to an operating system that is incompatible with NTFS (for example, you cannot revert back to Windows 98 or Windows Millennium Edition). To uninstall Windows XP: 1. Restart your computer in Safe Mode. To do so, restart your computer and press F8 while Windows is starting. 2. Log on using the Administrator account. 3. Click Start, click Control Panel, and then double-click Add or Remove Programs. 4. In the list of installed programs, double-click Uninstall Windows XP. Important: If Uninstall Windows XP is not in the list of installed programs, you must manually reinstall the original operating system. If this is the case, be sure to back up all of your critical data before you proceed. If you have upgraded to Windows XP from Windows 98 or Windows Millennium Edition, it might be possible to manually uninstall Windows XP if the Undo folder is still available. For more information, see Microsoft Knowledge Base article 312569. 5. When you receive the "Are you sure you want to uninstall Windows XP and restore your previous operating system?" message, click Yes to start the Windows XP uninstallation process. 6. After the Windows XP uninstallation process is finished, your computer will shut down and then restart using the previously installed operating system. How do I remove Windows XP from one computer and install it on another? Follow the instructions above for uninstalling Windows XP. Then, use the Windows XP CD to install Windows XP on the new computer. For more information, see Microsoft Knowledge Base article 303661 and read the topic about activation failures when moving Windows XP to another computer. How do I deal with activation problems? If you are prompted to activate your installation of Windows XP, defer activation until you have completed planned upgrades or changes to your computer's fixed hardware and related device drivers. Otherwise, you may need to reactivate after making such changes. Fixed hardware/drivers include the first instance of devices such as video, network (excluding modems), SCSI, hard drives, CD-ROM/DVD, and system memory. USB or other removable devices (such as cameras and printers) do not affect activation. If you uninstall Windows XP from one computer (Computer A) and then install it on a second computer (Computer B), the following can occur: If fewer than 120 days have passed since the first installation of Windows XP on Computer A, you cannot activate Windows on Computer B over the Internet. Instead, when you are prompted to activate, you must call the phone number listed in the Activation Wizard, explain that you uninstalled and then reinstalled to a different computer, and be given a valid product key. If it has been more than 120 days since the first installation of Windows XP on Computer A, activation on Computer B should work normally. For more information about troubleshooting activation problems, see Microsoft Knowledge Base articles 293764, 293764, 312295, 314935, and 318702. Troubleshoot Setup Did you run into problems during Setup? Unfortunately, it does sometimes happen. Some problems can be solved by using the information in this section. Important: If you have virus protection software installed on your computer, disable it. Virus protection software can cause problems during setup. Be sure to enable your virus protection software after installing Windows XP. You can use the following troubleshooting steps if you have problems when you are upgrading to Windows XP from Windows 98, Windows 98 Second Edition, or Windows Millennium Edition. General troubleshooting If you encounter problems while running Setup, exit Setup and run the Upgrade Advisor from the Windows XP CD. Here's how: 1. Insert the Windows XP CD into your CD-ROM drive. 2. When the Welcome menu appears, click Check system compatibility. 3. Then click Check my system automatically. Upgrade Advisor will check for hardware and software incompatibilities. These are often the cause of Setup problems. Remove or uninstall the incompatible hardware or software, and then run Setup again. If Upgrade Advisor does not find the problem, you can also clean boot your computer and run Setup again. Clean-boot troubleshooting is simply a way of removing variables that could cause problems. To perform clean boot troubleshooting in Windows Millennium Edition: 1. Click Start, click Run, in the Open box, type msconfig and then click OK. 2. On the General tab, click Selective startup. 3. Clear all the check boxes under Selective startup. 4. On the Startup tab, select the *StateMgr check box (Windows Millennium Edition only), and then click OK. 5. When you are prompted to restart your computer, click Yes. 6. After the computer restarts, click Start, click Run, in the Open box, type msconfig, and then click OK. Important: Look closely at the General tab to make sure that the check boxes under Selective startup are clear. Proceed to the next step if none of the check boxes are selected. If you see a disabled or gray check box, your computer is not truly clean-booted and you might need assistance from the manufacturer of the program that is affecting Msconfig. 7. After you verify that your computer is clean-booted, try running Windows XP Setup again. For more information, see Microsoft Knowledge Base article 267288. To return from a clean boot state 1. Click Start, click Run, in the Open box, type msconfig, and then click OK. 2. On the General tab, click Normal startup, and then click OK. 3. Click Yes when you are prompted to restart your computer. To perform clean boot troubleshooting in Windows 98: For information about performing a clean boot for troubleshooting purposes in Windows 98, see Microsoft Knowledge Base article 192926. File copy error during Setup Suppose Setup stops when copying files, and you see a message like this: Setup cannot copy the file . Press X to retry, Y to abort. Here are some possible causes and solutions for this problem: Your Windows XP CD is scratched, smudged, or dirty. Clean the CD with a soft cloth, insert it into the CD drive, and then click OK. Your CD drive is not working properly or the CD might be vibrating too much for the laser to accurately read the data. For more information about this problem, consult your hardware documentation, or contact the CD drive manufacturer. If you are using multiple CD drives, your computer might be trying to locate files on the wrong drive. If your hardware has a feature to disable CD drives that are not being used, disable the CD drives that you are not using. Note: To disable a device in Windows 95, right-click My Computer, click Properties, open Device Manager, and then clear Original Configuration (Current). In Windows 98 and Windows Millennium Edition, select the Disable in this hardware profile check box in Device Manager. If required, re-enable the device after upgrading to Windows XP. For more information, see Microsoft Knowledge Base article 283658. There is a virus on your computer. Run a virus-scanning program to check your system and identify needed repairs. Note: If you experience problems during installation, you can use the Windows Memory Diagnostic tool to test your computer's random access memory (RAM). This tool helps determine whether installation problems are caused by failing hardware, such as RAM or the memory system of the motherboard. To use the tool, follow the instructions on the Windows Memory Diagnostic (http://oca.microsoft.com/en/windiag.asp) Web site. For information about several more technical issues that might be causing the problem, see Microsoft Knowledge Base article 310064: How to Troubleshoot Windows XP Problems During Installation. If you can rule out all of the causes listed above, and you continue to receive the error message, copy the i386 folder from the CD drive to your local hard disk, and then try to run Setup from your hard disk. Here's how: 1. The Smartdrv.exe tool will speed up the process of copying files from the CD to your hard drive. To use the Smartdrv.exe tool, make sure the Smartdrv.exe file is present on the startup disk. If you don't have Smartdrv.exe, file copying will take much longer but it can still be done successfully. Verify that the following entries exist in the following files on your startup disk; add the entries if they do not already exist: In Autoexec.bat, add this line: smartdrv.exe In Config.sys, add this line: device=himem.sys Note: For information about modifying the Config.sys and Autoexec.bat files, see Microsoft Knowledge Base article 232558. 2. Insert the startup disk into your computer's floppy drive, and restart the computer. 3. When the DOS prompt appears (it looks like this: C:>), type the following lines, pressing ENTER after each one. Substitute the drive letter of your CD-ROM drive for the letter D, if yours is different. D: cd i386 winnt When Setup begins, follow the prompts on your screen. Note: There is no option to boot to a command prompt on the initial startup menu in Windows Millennium Edition. However, you can boot to a startup floppy disk and then type C: and press ENTER to access the hard drive, as long as the startup disk uses the same file system as the hard disk. Your computer hangs or stops responding and displays a black screen When you try to upgrade to Windows XP, your computer might stop responding (hang) and a black screen might be displayed. This is usually caused by hardware or software that is incompatible with Windows XP. Note: Before beginning Setup, you should compare your system's hardware to the Hardware Compatibility List (HCL). You can also find information about each of your computer's devices (such as printers, scanners, and so on) at the device manufacturer's Web site, in the Windows Catalog: Text version of the HCL (for all operating systems) (https://winqual.microsoft.com/download/default.asp) Text version of the HCL (for Windows XP only) (https://winqual.microsoft.com/download/display.asp?FileName=hcl/WinXPHCLx86.txt) The Windows Catalog (http://www.microsoft.com/windows/catalog/) You can get to all of the above from Windows Hardware and Driver Central (http://www.microsoft.com/whdc/hcl/default.mspx) If your computer stops responding and displays a black screen during Setup, follow these steps: 1. Wait at the black screen for 10 minutes to make sure that the computer does not continue with the Setup procedure. Watch the hard drive indicator to see if there is any disk activity. Setup might resolve the problem on its own. 2. Restart the computer to see if it stops again at the same place during Setup. Occasionally, Setup will proceed farther than the last time it stopped responding. If this occurs, restart your computer several times so that Setup will finish. 3. If steps 1 and 2 don't work, to revert back to Windows 98 or Windows Millennium Edition, restart the computer and choose the option to Cancel Windows XP Setup. If canceling Windows XP Setup is not an option when you restart your computer, see step 5. 4. After you revert back to Windows 98 or Windows Millennium Edition, uninstall all virus protection programs, uninstall all boot manager programs (such as GoBack), and then perform a clean boot of your computer. 5. If the upgrade fails again, there might be a hardware incompatibility issue. You can try to disable ACPI functionality. To do this, when your computer restarts, watch for an option to press F6 to install SCSI drivers. On this screen, press F7 (not F6). 6. If Setup continues to stop responding, disable any unnecessary hardware. Remove any USB devices, remove or disable network cards, sound cards, and serial cards, and then restart Setup. 7. If you continue to receive this error message, you might need to flash (update) the BIOS on the motherboard. Please refer to the manufacturer of your computer or to the motherboard Web site for information about how to flash the BIOS. Warning: Do not attempt to flash the BIOS unless you are an advanced user. Doing this incorrectly can make your computer unusable. 8. If a BIOS update does not resolve the issue, or if you are unable to obtain an updated BIOS version for the computer, you might want to install Windows XP with a Standard PC Hardware Abstraction Layer (HAL). To do so, press F7 (not F6) when you are prompted to press F6 after Setup restarts the computer for the first time. For more information about how to force the Standard PC HAL, see Microsoft Knowledge Base article 299340: How to Force a HAL During Windows XP Setup. You receive an error message or Stop message during Setup If you receive one of the following error messages during Setup, refer to the appropriate Microsoft Knowledge Base article: 311562: 'An Unexpected Error (768) Occurred at Line 5118@ind:XpClientBootSetupSetup.c' Error Message During Windows XP Setup 311564: 'Stop 0x0000000A Irql_Not_Less_or_Equal' Error Message During Windows XP Upgrade 311442: Error Message: Setup Cannot Continue. Please Contact Microsoft Technical Support. (Error: 3E6h) Troubleshooting other errors: Note: If you experience problems during installation, you can use the Windows Memory Diagnostic tool to test your computer's random access memory (RAM). This tool helps determine whether installation problems are caused by failing hardware, such as RAM or the memory system of the motherboard. To use the tool, follow the instructions on the Windows Memory Diagnostic (http://oca.microsoft.com/en/windiag.asp) Web site. Problem Solution A program or a device doesn't work after upgrading to Windows XP. First, try reinstalling the program or device. If that doesn't solve the problem, check with the manufacturer for a newer version of the software or hardware that is designed to work with Windows XP. If this is an older program, search Windows Help and Support for the word "compatibility" to see instructions for running the Program Compatibility Wizard. Message: Incomplete file copy Refer to the file copy troubleshooting section in Microsoft Knowledge Base article 310064. Message: NTLDR is missing If you choose to update files at the beginning of Setup, this will be fixed automatically. See Microsoft Knowledge Base article 322069. For troubleshooting this error, see Microsoft Knowledge Base article 314057. Message: Error 127 or error code fffffdf0 in catroot2 folder Rename the WindowsSystemCatroot2 folder and run Setup again. See Microsoft Knowledge Base article 307153. This has been fixed in Dynamic Update 1.3. Run Setup again and download the updated Setup files when prompted. Message: "File not found: ASMS" For troubleshooting tips, see Microsoft Knowledge Base article 311755. Setup hangs during "finalizing settings" phase. This error is usually caused by virus protection software. Cancel Setup, disable your virus protection software, and then start Setup again. (Or, if you choose to update files at the beginning of Setup, this will be fixed automatically.) Create boot disks A boot disk is a floppy disk or set of disks that lets you start the computer without using Windows. It can be useful to have this when doing certain types of troubleshooting and when performing a new installation of Windows. You can download a program to create the six Windows XP Setup boot floppy disks that contain the files and drivers required to access the CD-ROM drive and begin the Setup process. To do this, go to Obtaining Windows XP Setup Boot Disks (http://support.microsoft.com:80/support/kb/articles/q310/9/94.asp). However, rather than creating boot disks, we recommend that you boot your computer from the Windows XP CD to start Setup. If your computer is not already able to do this (most newer computers are), refer to the section titled "Configure a computer to boot from CD" for more information. If your computer does not support booting from CD, you can download a file that will help you create boot disks. See the list at the end of this section for download locations. Creating the Setup boot disks 1. When you download the Setup disks, the download contains only one large program file. When you run the downloaded file, it extracts the files to individual floppy disks. You receive the following prompt: This program creates the Setup boot disks for Microsoft Windows XP. To create these disks, you need to provide 6 blank, formatted, high-density disks. Please specify the floppy drive to copy the images to. 2. Type the drive letter for the floppy disk drive (this is typically drive A). After you type the floppy disk drive letter, you see the following prompt: Insert one of these disks into drive :. This disk will become the Windows XP Setup Boot Disk. Press any key when you are ready. 3. When you press a key, the downloaded file starts extracting and copying the files. Continue inserting the blank disks as you are prompted to do so until all six disks are created. If the process is interrupted, you must run the downloaded program file again to create all six disks. 4. Label each disk with the number that is specified by the program. You must use the disks in the correct order during the Setup process. 5. After you create all six disks, insert the first disk in the floppy disk drive, and then restart the computer. Note that the computer must be configured to boot from the floppy disk drive. Most computers will do this automatically, but in some cases, you might need to modify your computer's BIOS settings to do this. For information about modifying your computer's BIOS settings, refer to the section titled "Configure a computer to boot from CD." 6. When you restart the computer, the Setup process begins. Insert each floppy disk as you are prompted to do so. You will then be prompted for the Windows XP CD to finish Setup. Configure a computer to boot from CD Some computers might automatically offer the option to boot from CD if they detect a bootable CD in the CD-ROM drive. If so, when you start the computer with a bootable CD in the CD-ROM drive, you'll see the message "Press any key to boot from CD." Otherwise, you can set your computer to boot from CD by using the setup program for your computer's BIOS (basic input/output system). Here's how: When you first start the computer, look for a short message telling you which key to press for setup. For example, some computers will have this message: Press DELETE to enter setup. If your computer doesn't give you such a message, try pressing these commonly used keys during startup: - DELETE - F1 - F2 - F3, then F2 - F10 - CTRL+ALT+ESC - CTRL+ALT+S - ESC If graphics appear during startup, pressing ESC often makes the graphics disappear so that you can see the correct key for entering BIOS setup. When you see the message, quickly press the indicated key. You will enter a DOS-like program that consists of one or more screens. You probably won't be able to use the mouse while in this program. BIOS programs vary widely, but look for an option called "Boot order" or something similar. Set the boot order to boot from CD before booting from the hard drive. Some newer laptop computers have a Windows-based utility for configuring the BIOS. If your computer won't boot from a CD, refer to the section titled "Other Setup-related tasks" for information about starting Setup from the command prompt. Set up a multiboot system You can install more than one operating system on your computer and choose which operating system you want to use every time you start your computer. This is called a dual-boot or multiboot configuration. This section explains how to set up Windows XP as a multiboot system with the following operating systems: Windows 2000, Windows NT 4.0, and Windows NT 3.51 Windows 95, Windows 98, and Windows Millennium Edition MS-DOS or Windows 3.x Precautions Before creating a multiboot configuration with Windows XP and another operating system, review the following precautions: Be sure to back up your current system and all data files. Each operating system must be installed on a separate volume. Microsoft does not support installing multiple operating systems on the same volume. If you have only one volume on your computer, you have to reformat and repartition your hard disk to contain multiple volumes before you begin creating a multiboot configuration, unless you are simply installing another copy of Windows XP. Do not install Windows XP on a compressed drive that was not compressed using the NTFS compression utility. Before installing Windows XP, you should disable antivirus software, and you might want to run the Windows Memory Diagnostic tool to test your computer's random access memory (RAM). To use the Windows Memory Diagnostic tool, follow the instructions on the Windows Memory Diagnostic (http://oca.microsoft.com/en/windiag.asp) Web site. Be sure to enable your virus protection software after installing Windows XP. You must use a different computer name for each operating system if the computer is on a Windows 2000 or Windows XP domain. The operating systems should be installed from oldest to newest. If possible, install operating systems in the following order: - MS-DOS - Windows 95, Windows 98 or Windows Millennium Edition Note: You cannot install Windows Millennium Edition over any version of Windows NT, but they can exist together on a single system. It is recommended that you install each to a separate hard disk or partition. If Windows NT is already installed, Windows Millennium Edition Setup will add itself to the Windows NT boot menu to allow you to multiboot between Windows Millennium Edition and Windows NT. For more information, see Microsoft Knowledge Base article 271240. - Windows NT - Windows 2000 - Windows XP (Professional or Home Edition) Partitioning the hard disk and selecting file systems A partition is a logical section of a hard disk. Each partition normally has its own file system. For more information about partitions, see Microsoft Knowledge Base article 313348. You might need to reformat and repartition your hard disk if: 1. You have only one volume but you want to set up a multiboot configuration. You have to install each operating system on a separate volume so that each installation can retain its own files and configuration information. 2. The boot volume is not formatted with the correct file system: 1. If you want to create a multiboot system by using Windows 95, Windows 98 or Windows Millennium Edition along with Microsoft Windows XP, you have to format the boot volume by using FAT because Windows 95, Windows 98 and Windows Millennium Edition do not support the NTFS file system. 2. If you want to install Windows 95 (retail version 4.00.950), your boot volume must be formatted as FAT. Windows 95 (OSR2.1 and above) can have a FAT32 boot volume and dual boot with Windows 2000 and Windows XP. For more information, see Microsoft Knowledge Base article 258662. 3. If you want to create a multiboot system using Windows 95 OSR2, Windows 98, or Windows Millennium Edition with Windows 2000 or Windows XP, you can format the boot volume by using FAT32. Note: If you format a Windows NT 4.0, Windows 2000, or Windows XP volume with any file system other than NTFS, you will lose all NTFS-specific features. This includes Windows XP features such as file system security, Encrypting File System (EFS) settings, disk quotas, and remote storage. Likewise, Windows 95, Windows 98, and Windows Millennium Edition do not recognize an NTFS partition; they will identify it as unknown. Therefore, if you format a Windows 98 or Windows Millennium Edition partition as FAT, and a Windows XP partition as NTFS, any files on the NTFS partition will not be available or visible if you try to access them while running Windows 98 or Windows Millennium Edition. Supported file systems The following table lists the supported file systems for Microsoft operating systems: Operating system Supported file systems MS-DOS FAT Windows 3.1 FAT Windows NT FAT, NTFS Windows 95 FAT Windows 95 OSR2 FAT, FAT32 Windows 98 FAT, FAT32 Windows Millennium Edition FAT, FAT32 Windows 2000 FAT, FAT32, NTFS Windows XP (both Professional and Home Edition) FAT, FAT32, NTFS To create a multiboot system with Windows XP and MS-DOS, Windows 95, Windows 98, or Windows Millennium Edition You cannot install two or more of the following in a multiboot configuration: Windows 95, Windows 98, and Windows Millennium Edition. These combinations work: MS-DOS, Windows 95, and Windows XP MS-DOS, Windows 98 or Windows Millennium Edition, and Windows XP This combination does not work: Windows 95, Windows 98, and Windows Millennium Edition You should install Windows XP only after installing MS-DOS, Windows 95, Windows 98, or Windows Millennium Edition. This will prevent these operating systems from overwriting the Windows XP boot sector and the Windows XP startup files. Note: If you install the operating systems in the wrong order, you will need to use the Recovery Console or run Windows XP Setup again to get Windows XP back. For more information, see Microsoft Knowledge Base article 307654. To create a multiboot system with Windows XP and MS-DOS, Windows 95, Windows 98, or Windows Millennium Edition: 1. Make sure that you have a separate partition or hard disk for each operating system you plan to install, and that each partition or hard disk is formatted with the correct file system. 2. Do one of the following: - If you want a multiboot system with MS-DOS, Windows 95, Windows 98 or Windows Millennium Edition along with Windows XP, first install MS-DOS; followed by Windows 95, Windows 98, or Windows Millennium Edition; and then install Windows XP. - If you want a dual-boot system with only Windows 95, Windows 98 or Windows Millennium Edition, install either Windows 95, Windows 98 or Windows Millennium Edition, and then install Windows XP. 3. Install each operating system according to the standard installation procedure. To create a multiboot system with Windows NT 4.0 and Windows XP Using a multiboot system with both Windows NT 4.0 and Windows XP is not recommended as a long-term solution. The NTFS update in Service Pack 5 (SP5) for Windows NT 4.0 is provided only to help you evaluate and upgrade to Windows XP. To create a multiboot system with Windows NT 4.0 and Windows XP: 1. Make sure that your hard disk is formatted with the correct file system: either FAT32 or NTFS. 2. Install Windows NT 4.0, download Windows NT Service Pack 5 from Microsoft, and install the service pack. Then install Windows XP to a separate volume. 3. Install each operating system according to the standard installation procedure. Note: If you intend to install more than one operating system consisting of some combination of Windows NT 4.0 with either Windows 2000 or Windows XP as the only installed operating systems, you must make sure that you have installed Service Pack 5 or higher for Windows NT 4.0. You can download the latest Windows NT 4.0 Service Pack here: Windows NT 4.0 Service Pack 6a (http://www.microsoft.com/ntserver/nts/downloads/recommended/SP6/allSP6.asp). Windows XP automatically upgrades any NTFS partitions that it finds on your system to the version of NTFS that is used in Windows 2000 and Windows XP. However, Windows NT 4.0 requires Service Pack 5 to read and write files on a volume that is formatted with the version of NTFS used in Windows 2000 and Windows XP. Installing programs on more than one operating system If you have more than one operating system, and you want certain programs or drivers to work on both systems, you must install those items on each system separately. For example, if you want to use Microsoft Word on a computer with both Windows 98 and Windows XP installed, you have to install Microsoft Word two times (once on Windows 98 and once on Windows XP). You can install the program to the same path for different operating systems, as long as the target location uses a file system both operating systems can read. Note: Windows 95 or Windows 98 might reconfigure hardware settings the first time you use them, which might cause configuration problems when you start Windows XP. Specifying the default operating system for startup If you have more than one operating system on your computer, you can set the operating system that you want to use as the default when you start your computer: 1. Click Start, click Control Panel, and then double-click System. 2. On the Advanced tab, under Startup and Recovery, click Settings. 3. Under System startup, in the Default operating system list, click the operating system that you want to start when you turn on your computer. 4. Select the Display list of operating systems for check box, and then type the number of seconds for which you want the list displayed before the default operating system starts. Warning: The boot options file (Boot.ini) controls the number and order of operating systems on your computer. To manually edit this file, click Edit on the Startup and Recovery tab. Use caution when modifying the boot options file. Doing so incorrectly might render your computer unusable. For more information, see Microsoft Knowledge Base article 289022. Troubleshooting problems with multiboot systems These additional troubleshooting ideas might help you resolve your issue without having to call technical support: Errors with Internet Explorer: When you start Microsoft Internet Explorer, the browser might quit and you might receive an error message that is similar to the following: iexplore caused an Invalid Page Fault in module kernel32.dll This error might occur if you install multiple operating systems on a single volume. To resolve this issue, install each operating system on a separate volume. You cannot configure your computer to start both Windows 95 and Windows 98 (or Windows Millennium Edition) You cannot configure a computer to multiboot Windows 95 and Windows 98 (or Windows Millennium Edition) because those platforms use the same boot file. Therefore, multibooting Windows 95, Windows 98 and Windows Millennium Edition at the same time is not supported. The boot menu does not appear upon startup When you start your computer, the boot menu does not appear and you are unable to start Windows XP. This problem might occur if you install Windows 95, Windows 98 or Windows Millennium Edition after you install Windows XP. To resolve this issue, repair or reinstall Windows XP. For more information about multibooting with Windows 2000 and Windows XP, see Multibooting with Windows 2000 and Windows XP (http://www.microsoft.com/windows2000/techinfo/administration/management/mltiboot.asp). Also, see Microsoft Knowledge Base article 205287. Repair or recover a system You can repair or recover your system in several different ways. Instructions for each method are below. Try the methods in this order: 1. Revert to the "Last Known Good" configuration. 2. Start the computer in Safe Mode and try to fix the problem. 3. Use the Windows XP Recovery Console. 4. Use System Restore. 5. Use Automated System Recovery (works for Windows XP Professional only, not Windows XP Home Edition). To use the Last Known Good configuration: If Windows XP will not start, you can restore your system to the Last Known Good configuration – in other words, your most recent settings that worked. Here's how: 1. Start the computer and then press the F8 key when Windows begins to start. The Windows Advanced Options menu appears. 2. Use the arrow keys to select Last Known Good Configuration (your most recent settings that worked), and then press ENTER. 3. If a boot menu appears, use the arrow keys to select Microsoft Windows XP, and then press ENTER. Windows XP restores the computer to the most recent restore point. To use the Windows XP Recovery Console: XP Game Compatibility You want to know if all your favorite games are still going to run under Windows XP. Remember what happened when we tried to run games on our Windows 2000 machines? Sometimes we were a little disappointed. Windows 2000 was made more for corporate applications than "Quake," but true techno-geeks know they don't have to sacrifice death matches for a robust business environment -- at least not anymore. Windows XP has shown an impressive track record of game compatibility. Some of the standard games, such as "Tiger Woods Golf," "NHL 2001," "Max Payne," and "Unreal" on our Windows XP Professional machine were specifically slated for Windows 95 and 98, and were shown not to work in Windows 2000. The installation in XP was as smooth as silk. The games ran quickly and beautifully -- not a problem in sight (except for my bad chip shot -- Tiger was hanging his head in shame). Some less-sophisticated programs may not run as smoothly, older applications such as the Atari 2600 Classic Game Collection, did not appreciate the Windows XP environment. In this case you can use the Application Compatibility Wizard, found in the accessories menu. XP includes integrated compatibility layers to mimic older versions of Windows, so if your program does not work in Windows XP, the compatibility wizard will walk you through the process of getting even your favorite DOS games up and running. Atari Classic Game Collection run very well in the Windows 95 environment, at 256 colors and 640x480 screen resolution. So setting XP to always run Atari application in this environment, and everything was smooth sailing after that. One final tip about compatibility: Don't run the compatibility wizard if your program appears to be running well in the normal environment, as the wizard will give you an error message. In general, XP has great program compatibility, so you can upgrade your operating system without giving up all your old favorites. Speeding Up Your Pentium 2 by 50% We all know that you really shouldn't try to run Windows XP on anything less that about a Pentium 3 of some sort if you are out for speedy operations and amazing reaction times, but for those of us with the good old Pentium 2's who want to see just how well we can run XP, we have to tweak as much as we can where-ever we can. A real killer to the system's performance is Windows Media Player. Although it may look desirable and fancy with it's rounded off edges and 3rd-Dimensional appearance, the truth is, it takes up a large amount of that precious processing power. All of these troubles however, lead to one thing in particular with this 'new-look' over-rated music and video player...the Visualizations. The look-great I'll admit but like a lot of software these days, it has no purpose. If you run the task manager, and click the Performance tab along the top, you'll see that when Windows Media Player is running and nothing else is active, it takes up around 50% of the processors power. Once these visualizations are turned off, it barely takes up 2-3% of the processors power, which leaves much more room for other applications to work efficiently. Here's how to disable the feature: Open Media Player. Make sure the Now Playing tab on the left is selected. Click the View menu along the top. Go down to Now Playing Tools. In the sub-menu that has just 'popped-out', uncheck Show Visualization Reduce 10 Seconds Scandisk Count Down Time During XP Boot To reduce the count down time of Windows XP during boot process ( You see this normally when your computer is not shutdown properly, Electricity failure is one of the major reasons ) , You can use the following method. Start MS Dos Prompt (or Goto Start menu-> Run and here type CMD). Now at command Prompt type the following command CHKNTFS /T:4 Where 4 is the amount of time in seconds to wait before scandisk starts ( You may set it to 0 or 1 so that scandisk instantly starts or whatever you prefer ) For help about this command, You can type the following command at command prompt CHKNTFS /? Note: You can also type the command CHKNTFS /T:4 at run command but in this case you will only see a splash screen of command promt and it will disappear, but your task will be done. When you add drives to your computer, such as an extra hard drive, a CD drive, or a storage device that corresponds to a drive, Windows automatically assigns letters to the drives. However, this assignment might not suit your system; for example, you might have mapped a network drive to the same letter that Windows assigns to a new drive. When you want to change drive letters, follow these steps: Right-click My Computer, and then click Manage. Under Computer Management, click Disk Management. In the right pane, youll see your drives listed. CD-ROM drives are listed at the bottom of the pane. Right-click the drive or device you want to change, and then click Change Drive Letter and Paths. Click Change, click Assign the following drive letter, click the drive letter you want to assign, and then click OK. Tired of that annoying little window that pops up to tell you that new software is installed? If it gets in the way when youre logging off, turn it off completely. To do this: Click Start, right-click at the top of the Start menu where your name is displayed, and then click Properties. In the Taskbar and Start Menu Properties dialog box, on the Start Menu tab, click Customize. Click the Advanced tab, and then clear the Highlight newly installed programs check box. Click OK, and then click OK again. 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 and then Run, then type the following: 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. Untold Secrets about Windows Operating System [ Tricks ] This time I have a collection of Tips and Tricks which no body normally knows, the secrets which Microsoft is afraid to tell the people, the information which you will seldom find all gathered up and arranged in a single file. To fully reap this Manual you need to have a basic understanding of the Windows Registry, as almost all the Tricks and Tips involve this file. **************** Important Note: Before you read on, you need to keep one thing in mind. Whenever you make changes to the Windows Registry you need to Refresh it before the changes take place. Simply press F5 to refresh the registry and enable the changes. If this does not work Restart your system **************** Exiting Windows the Cool and Quick Way Normally it takes a hell lot of time just Shutting down Windows, you have to move your mouse to the Start Button, click on it, move it again over Shut Down, click, then move it over the necessary option and click, then move the cursor over the OK button and once again (you guessed it) click.This whole process can be shortened by creating shortcuts on the Desktop which will shut down Windows at the click of a button. Start by creating a new shortcut( right click and select New> Shortcut). Then in the command line box, type (without the quotes.) 'C:windowsrundll.exe user.exe,exitwindowsexec' This Shortcut on clicking will restart Windows immediately without any Warning. To create a Shortcut to Restarting Windows, type the following in the Command Line box: 'c:windowsrundll.exe user.exe,exitwindows' This Shortcut on clicking will shut down Windows immediately without any Warning. Ban Shutdowns : A trick to Play on Lamers This is a neat trick you can play on that lamer that has a huge ego, in this section I teach you, how to disable the Shut Down option in the Shut Down Dialog Box. This trick involves editing the registry, so please make backups. Launch regedit.exe and go to : HKEY_CURRENT_USERSoftwareMicrosoftWindowsCurre ntVersionPoliciesExplorer In the right pane look for the NoClose Key. If it is not already there then create it by right clicking in the right pane and selecting New > String Value.(Name it NoCloseKey ) Now once you see the NoCloseKey in the right pane, right click on it and select Modify. Then Type 1 in the Value Data Box. Doing the above on a Win98 system disables the Shut Down option in the Shut Down Dialog Box. But on a Win95 machine if the value of NoCloseKey is set to 1 then click on the Start > Shut Down button displays the following error message: This operation has been cancelled due to restrictions in effect on this computer. Please contact your system administrator. You can enable the shut down option by changing the value of NoCloseKey to 0 or simply deleting the particular entry i.e. deleting NoCloseKey. Instead of performing the above difficult to remember process, simply save the following with an extension of .reg and add it's contents to the registry by double clicking on it. REGEDIT4 [HKEY_CURRENT_USERSoftwareMicrosoftWindowsCurre ntVersionPoliciesExplorer] "NoClose"="1" Disabling Display of Drives in My Computer This is yet another trick you can play on your geek friend. To disable the display of local or networked drives when you click My Computer go to : HKEY_CURRENT_USERSoftwareMicrosoftWindowsCurre ntVersionPoliciesExplorer Now in the right pane create a new DWORD item and name it NoDrives. Now modify it's value and set it to 3FFFFFF (Hexadecimal) Now press F5 to refresh. When you click on My Computer, no drives will be shown. To enable display of drives in My Computer, simply delete this DWORD item. It's .reg file is as follows: REGEDIT4 [HKEY_CURRENT_USERSoftwareMicrosoftWindowsCurre ntVersionPoliciesExplorer] "NoDrives"=dword:03ffffff Take Over the Screen Saver To activate and deactivate the screen saver whenever you want, goto the following registry key: HKEY_CURRENT_USERSoftwareMicrosoftWindowsCurre ntVersionScreenSavers Now add a new string value and name it Mouse Corners. Edit this new value to -Y-N. Press F5 to refresh the registry. Voila! Now you can activate your screensaver by simply placing the mouse cursor at the top right corner of the screen and if you take the mouse to the bottom left corner of the screen, the screensaver will deactivate. Pop a banner each time Windows Boots To pop a banner which can contain any message you want to display just before a user is going to log on, go to the key: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESOFTWAREMicrosoftWindowsCurr entVersionWinLogon Now create a new string Value in the right pane named LegalNoticeCaption and enter the value that you want to see in the Menu Bar. Now create yet another new string value and name it: LegalNoticeText. Modify it and insert the message you want to display each time Windows boots. This can be effectively used to display the company's private policy each time the user logs on to his NT box. It's .reg file would be: REGEDIT4 [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESOFTWAREMicrosoftWindowsCurr entVersionWinlogon] "LegalNoticeCaption"="Caption here." Delete the Tips of the Day to save 5KB Windows 95 had these tips of the day which appeared on a system running a newly installed Windows OS. These tips of the day are stored in the Windows Registry and consume 5K of space. For those of you who are really concerned about how much free space your hard disk has, I have the perfect trick. To save 5K go to the following key in Regedit: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESoftwareMicrosoftWindowsCurr entVersionExplorerTips Now simply delete these tricks by selecting and pressing the DEL key. Change the Default Locations To change the default drive or path where Windows will look for it's installation files, go to the key: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESoftwareMicrosoftWindowsCurr entVersionSetupSourcePath Now you can edit as you wish. Secure your Desktop Icons and Settings You can save your desktop settings and secure it from your nerdy friend by playing with the registry. Simply launch the Registry Editor go to: HKEY_CURRENT_USERSoftwareMicrosoftWindowsCurre ntVersionPoliciesExplorer In the right pane create a new DWORD Value named NoSaveSettings and modify it's value to 1. Refresh and restart for the settings to get saved. CLSID Folders Explained Don't you just hate those stubborn stupid icons that refuse to leave the desktop, like the Network Neighborhood icon. I am sure you want to know how you can delete them. You may say, that is really simple, simply right click on the concerned icon and select Delete. Well not exactly, you see when you right click on these special folders( see entire list below)neither the rename nor the delete option does not appear. To delete these folders, there are two methods, the first one is using the System Policy Editor(Poledit in the Windows installation CD)and the second is using the Registry. Before we go on, you need to understand what CLSID values are. These folders, like the Control Panel, Inbox, The Microsoft Network, Dial Up Networking etc are system folders. Each system folder has a unique CLSID key or the Class ID which is a 16-byte value which identifies an individual object that points to a corresponding key in the registry. To delete these system Folders from the desktop simply go to the following registry key: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESoftwareMicrosoftWindowsCurr entVersionExplorerDesktopNamespace{xxxxxxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxxxxxxxxxx} To delete an icon simply delete the 16 byte CLSID value within "NameSpace". The following are the CLSID values of the most commonly used icons: My Briefcase:{85BBD920-42AO-1069-A2E4-08002B30309D} Desktop: {00021400-0000-0000-C000-0000000000046} Control Panel:{21EC2020-3AEA-1069-A2DD-08002B30309D} Dial-Up-Networking:{992CFFA0-F557-101A-88EC-00DD01CCC48} Fonts: {BD84B380-8CA2-1069-AB1D-08000948534} Inbox :{00020D76-0000-0000-C000-000000000046} My Computer :{20D04FE0-3AEA-1069-A2D8-08002B30309D} Network Neighborhood:{208D2C60-3AEA-1069-A2D7-O8002B30309D} Printers :{2227A280-3AEA-1069-A2DE-O8002B30309D} Recycle Bin :{645FF040-5081-101B-9F08-00AA002F954E} The Microsoft Network:{00028B00-0000-0000-C000-000000000046} History: {FF393560-C2A7-11CF-BFF4-444553540000} Winzip :{E0D79300-84BE-11CE-9641-444553540000} For example, to delete the Recycle Bin, first note down it's CLSID value, which is: 645FF040-5081-101B-9F08-00AA002F954E. Now go to the Namespace key in the registry and delete the corresponding key. HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESOFTWAREMicrosoftWindowsCurr entVersionexplorerDesktopNameSpace{645FF040-5081-101B-9F08-00AA002F954E} Similarly to delete the History folder, delete the following key: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESOFTWAREMicrosoftWindowsCurr entVersionexplorerDesktopNameSpace{FBF23B42-E3F0-101B-8488-00AA003E56F8} Sometimes, you may need to play a trick on your brother or friend, well this one teaches you how to hide all icons from the Desktop. Go to the following registry key: HKEY_CURRENT_USERSoftwareMicrosoftWindowsCurre ntVersionPoliciesExplorer In the right pane create a new DWORD value by the name: NoDesktop and set its value to: 1. Reboot and you will find no icons on the desktop. Till now you simply learnt how to delete the special system folders by deleting a registry key, but the hack would have been better if there was a way of adding the DELETE and RENAME option to the right click context menus of these special folders. You can actually change the right click context menu of any system folder and add any of the following options: RENAME, DELETE, CUT, COPY, PASTE and lots more. This hack too requires you to know the CLSID value of the system folder whose menu you want to customize. In this section, I have taken up Recycle Bin as the folder whose context menu I am going to edit. Firstly launch the registry editor and open the following registry key: HKEY_CLASSES_ROOTCLSID{645FF040-5081-101B-9F08-00AA002F954E}ShellFolder. In Case you want to edit some other folder like say the FONTS folder, then you will open the following key: HKEY_CLASSES_ROOTCLSID{CLSID VALUE HERE}ShellFolder. In the right pane there will be a DWORD value names attributes. Now consider the following options: To add the Rename option to the menu, change the value of Attributes to 50 01 00 20 To add the Delete option to the menu, change the value of Attributes to 60 01 00 20 3. To add both the Rename & Delete options to the menu, change the value of Attributes to 70,01,00,20 4. Add Copy to the menu, change Attributes to 41 01 00 20 5. Add Cut to the menu, change Attributes to 42 01 00 20 6. Add Copy & Cut to the menu, change Attributes to 43 01 00 20 7. Add Paste to the menu, change Attributes to 44 01 00 20 8. Add Copy & Paste to the menu, change Attributes to 45 01 00 20 9. Add Cut & Paste to the menu, change Attributes to 46 01 00 20 10.Add all Cut, Copy & Paste to the menu, change Attributes to 47 01 00 20 We want to add only the Rename option to the right click context menu of the Recycle Bin, so change the value of attributes to: 50 01 00 20. Press F5 to refresh and then after rebooting you will find that when you right click on the Recycle Bin a RENAME option pops up too. To reset the default Windows options change the value of Attributes back to 40 01 00 20 The Registry File which one can create for the above process would be something like the below: REGEDIT4 [HKEY_CLASSES_ROOTCLSID{645FF040-5081-101B-9F08-00AA002F954E}Shell-Folder] "Attributes"=hex:50,01,00,20 To access say the Modem Properties in the Control Panel Folder, the normal procedure is: Click on Start, Click on Settings> Control Panel and then wait for the Control Panel window to pop up and then ultimately click on the Modems icon. Wouldn't it be lovely if you could shorten the process to: Click on Start> Control Panel>Modems. Yes you can add the Control Panel and also all other Special System Folders directly to the first level Start Menu. Firstly collect the CLSID value of the folder you want to add to the start menu. I want to add Control Panel hence the CLSID value is: 21EC2020-3AEA-1069-A2DD-08002B30309D Now right click on the Start Button and select Open. Now create a new folder and name it: Control Panel.{21EC2020-3AEA-1069-A2DD-08002B30309D} NOTE: Do not forget the period after the 'l' in Panel. Similarly all system folders can be added to the Start Menu.(accept My Briefcase, I think) Deleting System Options from the Start menu You can actually remove the Find and Run options from the start menu by performing a simple registry hack. Again like always Launch the registry editor and scroll down to the below key: HKEY_CURRENT_USERSoftwareMicrosoftWindowsCurre ntVersionPoliciesExplorer Right-click on the right pane and select New, DWORD Value. Name it NoFind.(To remove the RUN option name it NoRun). Double-click the newly create DWORD to edit it's value and enter 1 as its value. This will disable the FIND option of the Start Menu and will also disable the default Shortcut key(F3 for Find.) To restore the Run or find command modify the value of the DWORD to 0 or simply Delete the DWORD value. Fed Up of the boring Old Yellow Folder Icons?[Drive Icons Included] NOTE: This trick hasn't been tried on Win98. You can easily change the boring yellow folder icons to your own personalized icons. Simply create a text file and copy the following lines into it: [.ShellClassInfo] ICONFILE=Drive:PathIcon_name.extension Save this text file by the name, desktop.ini in the folder, whose icon you want to change. Now to prevent this file from getting deleted change it's attributes to Hidden and Read Only by using the ATTRIB command. To change the icon of a drive, create a text file containing the following lines: [Autorun] ICON=Drive:PathIcon_name.extension Save this file in the root of the drive whose icon you want to change and name it autorun.inf For Example, if you want to change the icon of a floppy, SAVE THE icon in a:icon_name.ico One can also create a kewl icon for the Hard Disk and create a text file [autorun.inf] and store it in "c:". Securing NT By default, NT 4.0 displays the last person who logged onto the system. This can be considered to be a security threat, especially in the case of those who choose their password to be same as their Username. To disable this bug which actually is a feature, go to the following key in the registry editor: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESoftwareMicrosoftWindowsNTCu rrentVersionWinlogon Click and select the ReportBookOK item and create a new string value called DontDisplayLastUserName. Modify it and set it's value to 1. As a system administrator, you can ensure that the passwords chosen by the users are not too lame or too easy to guess. NT has this lovely utility called the User Manager which allows the administrator to set the age limit of the password which forces the users to change the password after a certain number of days. You can also set the minimum length of passwords and prevent users to use passwords which already have been used earlier and also enable account lockouts which will deactivate an account after a specified number of failed login attempts. When you log on to Win NT, you should disable Password Caching, this ensures Single NT Domain login and also prevents secondary Windows Logon screen. Simply copy the following lines to a plain text ASCII editor like: Notepad and save it with an extension, .reg ----------------DISABLE.reg----------------- REGEDIT4 [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESOFTWAREMicrosoftWindowsCurr entVersionPoliciesNetwork] "DisablePwdCaching"=dword:00000001 ----------------DISABLE.reg----------------- To Enable Password Caching use the following .reg file: --------------Enable.reg----------------- REGEDIT4 [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESOFTWAREMicrosoftWindowsCurr entVersionPoliciesNetwork] "DisablePwdCaching"=dword:00000000 --------------Enable.reg----------------- Cleaning Recent Docs Menu and the RUN MRU The Recent Docs menu can be easily disabled by editing the Registry. To do this go to the following Key: HKEY_CURRENT_USERSoftwareMicrosoftWindowsCurre ntVersionPoliciesExplorer Now in the right pane, create a new DWORD value by the name: NoRecentDocsMenu and set it's value to 1. Restart Explorer to save the changes. You can also clear the RUN MRU history. All the listings are stored in the key: HKEY_USERS.DefaultSoftwareMicrosoftWindowsCur rentVersionExplorerRunMRU You can delete individual listings or the entire listing. To delete History of Find listings go to: HKEY_CURRENT_USERSoftwareMicrosoftWindowsCurre ntVersionExplorerDoc Find Spec MRU and delete. Customizing the Right Click Context Menu of the Start Menu When you right click on the start menu, only 3 options pop up: Open, Explore, and Find. You can add your own programs to this pop up menu( which comes up when we right click on it.) Open Regedit and go to the following registry key: HKEY_CLASSES_ROOTDirectoryShell Right click on the shell and create a new Sub Key (You can create a new SubKey by right clicking on the Shell Key and selecting New > Key.). Type in the name of the application you want to add to the start menu. I want to add Notepad to the Start Menu and hence I name this new sub key, Notepad. Now right click on the new registry key that you just created and create yet another new key named Command. Enter the full path of the application, in this case Notepad in the default value of Command in the right pane. So I Modify the value of the default string value and enter the full pathname of Notepad: c:wndowsnotepad.exe. Now press F5 to refresh. Now if you right click on the Start Button you will find a new addition to the Pop Up Menu called Notepad. Clicking on it will launch Notepad. We can not only add but also remove the existing options in this pop up box. To delete the Find option, go to the following registry key: HKEY_CLASSES_ROOTDirectoryShellFind Delete Find. DO NOT delete Open else you will not be able to open any folders in the Start Menu like Programs, Accessories etc. BMP Thumbnail As Icon You can actually change the default BMP icon to a thumbnail version of the actual BMP file. To do this simply go to HKCUPaint.PictureDefault. In the right pane change the value of default to %1. Please note however that this will slow down the display rate in explorer if there are too many BMP thumbnails to display. You can use other icons too, simply enter the pathname.To restore back to the normal change the vale of default back to: C:Progra~1Access~1MSPAINT.EXE,1. Customizing The Shortcut Arrow All shortcuts have a tiny black arrow attached to it's icon to distinguish from normal files. This arrow can sometimes be pretty annoying and as a Hacker should know how to change each and everything, here goes another trick. Launch the Registry Editor and go to: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESOFTWAREMicrosoftWindowsCurr entVersionexplorerShell Icons. Now, on the right pane is a list of icons ( we found out that on some systems, Windows 98 especially, the right pane is blank. Don't worry, just add the value as required ). Find the value 29. If it isn't there, just add it. The value of this string should be C:Windowssystemshell32.dll, 29 ( which means the 30th icon in shell32.dll - the first one begins with 0 ). Now, we need blank icon to do this. Just create one with white as the whole icon. Go here to learn how to create an icon. Once done just change the value to C:xxx.ico, 0 where "xxx" is the full path of the icon file and "0" is the icon in it. Now for some fun. If the blank icon is a bit boring, change it again. You will find that under shell32.dll there is a gear icon, a shared folder ( the hand ) and much more. Experiment for yourself! Use Perl to Get List or Services Running on your NT box Use the following Perl Script to get a list of Services running on your NT system --------------script.pl----------------- #!c:perbinperl.exe use Win32::Service; my ($key, %service, %status, $part); Win32::Service::GetServices(' ',%services); foreach $key (sort keys %services) { print "Print Namet: $key, $services{$key}n"; Win32::Service::GetStatus( ' ',$services{$key}; %status); foreach $part (keys %status) { print "t$part : $status{$part}n" if($part eq "CurrentState"); } } -------------script.pl------------------- Internet Explorer Tricks and Tips Resizable Full Screen Toolbar The Full Screen option increases the viewable area and makes surfing more enjoyable but sometimes we need the Toolbar but also need to have extra viewing area. Now this hack teaches you how to change the size of the Internet Explorer toolbar. This registry hack is a bit complicated as it involves Binary values, so to make it simple, I have included the following registry file which will enable the resizable option of the Internet Explorer toolbar which was present in the beta version of IE. REGEDIT4 [HKEY_CURRENT_USERSoftwareMicrosoftInternet ExplorerToolbar] "Theater"=hex:0c,00,00,00,4c,00,00,00,74,00,00,00,18,00,00, 00,1b,00,00,00,5c, 00,00,00,01,00,00,00,e0,00,00,00,a0,0f,00,00,05,00 ,00,00,22,00,00,00,26,00, 00,00,02,00,00,00,21,00,00,00,a0,0f,00,00,04,00,00 ,00,01,00,00,00,a0,0f,00, 00,03,00,00,00,08,00,00,00,00,00,00,00 ******************* HACKING TRUTH: Internet Explorer 5 displays the friendly version of HTTP errors like NOT FOUND etc . They are aimed at making things easier for newbies. If you would rather prefer to see the proper error pages for the web server you're using, go to Tools, Internet Options and select the Advanced tab. Then scroll down and uncheck the Show friendly http errors box. ******************* Making the Internet Explorer & the Explorer Toolbars Fancy The Internet Explorer toolbar looks pretty simple. Want to make it fancy and kewl? Why not add a background image to it. To do this kewl hack launch the Windows Registry Editor and go to the following key: HKEY_CURRENT_USERSOFTWAREMicrosoft Internet ExplorerToolbar. Now in the right pane create a new String Value and name it BackBitmap and modify it's value to the path of the Bitmap you want to dress it up with by rightclicking on it and choosing Modify. When you reboot the Internet Explorer and the Windows Explorer toolbars will have a new look. Change Internet Explorer's Caption Don't like the caption of Internet Explorer caption? Want to change it? Open the registry editor and go to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESOFTWAREMicrosoftInternet ExplorerMain. In the right pane create a new String Value names Window Title (Note the space between Window and Title). Right click on this newly created String Value and select Modify. Type in the new caption you want to be displayed. Restart for the settings to take place. Now let's move on to some Outlook Express Tricks. Colorful Background Don't like the boring background colors of Outlook Express? To change it launch the Windows Registry Editor and scroll down to the HKEY_CURRENT_USERSoftwareMicrosoftInternet Mail And News key. On the left pane, click on ColorCycle or select Edit and Modify in the menu. Now change the value to 1. Close and restart. Now, launch Outlook Express and whenever you open up a New Message, hold down ctrl-shift and tap the z key to scroll to change the background color. Repeat the keystroke to cycle through the colors. Internet Explorer 5 Hidden Features Microsoft Internet Explorer 5 has several hidden features which can be controlled using the Windows Registry. Open your registry and scroll down to the following key: HKEY_CURRENT_USERSoftwarePoliciesMicrosoftInte rnet ExplorerRestrictions Create a new DWORD value named x(See complete list of values of x below) and modify it's value to 1 to enable it and to 0 to disable it. NoBrowserClose : Disable the option of closing Internet Explorer. NoBrowserContextMenu : Disable right-click context menu. NoBrowserOptions : Disable the Tools / Internet Options menu. NoBrowserSaveAs : Disable the ability to Save As. NoFavorites : Disable the Favorites. NoFileNew : Disable the File / New command. NoFileOpen : Disable the File / Open command. NoFindFiles : Disable the Find Files command. NoSelectDownloadDir : Disable the option of selecting a download directory. NoTheaterMode : Disable the Full Screen view option. Hacking Secrets Almost all system administrators make certain changes and make the system restricted. System Administrators can hide the RUN option, the FIND command, the entire Control Panel, drives in My Computer like D: A: etc. They can even restrict activities of a hacker my disabling or hiding, even the tiniest options or tools. Most commonly these restrictions are imposed locally and are controlled by the Windows Registry. But sometimes the smart system administrators control the activities of the hacker by imposing restrictions remotely through the main server. Poledit or Policy Editor is a small kewl tool which is being commonly used by system administrators to alter the settings of a system. This utility is not installed by default by Windows. You need to install in manually from the Windows 98 Installation Kit from the Resource Kit folder. user.dat file that we saw earlier. The Policy Editor tool imposes restrictions on the user's system by editing the user.dat file which in turn means that it edits the Windows Registry to change the settings. It can be used to control or restrict access to each and every folder and option you could ever think of. It has the power to even restrict access to individual folders, files, the Control Panel, MS DOS, the drives available etc. Sometimes this software does make life really hard for a Hacker. So how can we remove the restrictions imposed by the Policy Editor? Well read ahead to learn more. You see the Policy Editor is not the only way to restrict a user's activities. As we already know that the Policy Editor edits the Windows Registry(user.dat) file to impose such restrictions. So this in turn would mean that we can directly make changes to the Windows Registry using a .reg file or directly to remove or add restrictions. Launch Regedit and go to the following Registry Key: HKEY_CURRENT_USER/Software/Microsoft/CurrentVersion/Policies Under this key, there will definitely be a key named explorer. Now under this explorer key we can create new DWORD values and modify it's value to 1 in order to impose the restriction. If you want to remove the Restriction, then you can simply delete the respective DWORD values or instead change their values to 0. The following is a list of DWORD values that can be created under the Explorer Key-: NoDeletePrinter: Disables Deletion of already installed Printers NoAddPrinter: Disables Addition of new Printers NoRun : Disables or hides the Run Command NoSetFolders: Removes Folders from the Settings option on Start Menu (Control Panel, Printers, Taskbar) NoSetTaskbar: Removes Taskbar system folder from the Settings option on Start Menu NoFind: Removes the Find Tool (Start >Find) NoDrives: Hides and does not display any Drives in My Computer NoNetHood: Hides or removes the Network Neighborhood icon from the desktop NoDesktop: Hides all items including, file, folders and system folders from the Desktop NoClose: Disables Shutdown and prevents the user from normally shutting down Windows. NoSaveSettings: Means to say, 'Don't save settings on exit' DisableRegistryTools: Disable Registry Editing Tools (If you disable this option, the Windows Registry Editor(regedit.exe) too will not work.) NoRecentDocsHistory: Removes Recent Document system folder from the Start Menu (IE 4 and above) ClearRecentDocsOnExit: Clears the Recent Documents system folder on Exit. Nolnternetlcon: Removes the Internet (system folder) icon from the Desktop Under the same key: HKEY_CURRENT_USER/Software/Microsoft/CurrentVersion/Policies you can create new subkeys other than the already existing Explorer key. Now create a new key and name it System. Under this new key, system we can create the following new DWORD values(1 for enabling the particular option and 0 for disabling the particular option): NODispCPL: Hides Control Panel NoDispBackgroundPage: Hides Background page. NoDispScrsavPage: Hides Screen Saver Page NoDispAppearancePage: Hides Appearance Page NoDispSettingsPage: Hides Settings Page NoSecCPL: Disables Password Control Panel NoPwdPage: Hides Password Change Page NoAdminPaqe: Hides Remote Administration Page NoProfilePage: Hides User Profiles Page NoDevMgrPage: Hides Device Manager Page NoConfigPage: Hides Hardware Profiles Page NoFileSysPage: Hides File System Button NoVirtMemPage: Hides Virtual Memory Button Similarly, if we create a new subkey named Network, we can add the following DWORD values under it(1 for enabling the particular option and 0 for disabling the particular option): NoNetSetupSecurityPage: Hides Network Security Page NoNelSetup: Hides or disables the Network option in the Control Panel NoNetSetupIDPage: Hides the Identification Page NoNetSetupSecurityPage: Hides the Access Control Page NoFileSharingControl: Disables File Sharing Controls NoPrintSharing: Disables Print Sharing Controls Similarly, if we create a new subkey named WinOldApp, we can add the following DWORD values under it(1 for enabling the particular option and 0 for disabling the particular option): Disabled: Disable MS-DOS Prompt NoRealMode: Disable Single-Mode MS-DOS. So you see if you have access to the Windows Registry, then you can easily create new DWORD values and set heir value to 1 for enabling the particular option and 0 for disabling the particular option. But Sometimes, access to the Windows Registry is blocked. So what do you do? Go to the Windows Directory and delete either user.dat or system.dat (These 2 files constitute the Windows Registry.) and reboot. As soon as Windows logs in, it will display a Warning Message informing you about an error in the Windows Registry. Simply ignore this Warning Message and Press CTRL+DEL+ALT to get out of this warning message.(Do not press OK) You will find that all restrictions have been removed. The most kind of restriction found quite commonly is the Specific Folder Restriction, in which users are not allowed access to specific folders, the most common being the Windows folder, or sometimes even access to My Computer is blocked. In effect, you simply cannot seem to access the important kewl files which are needed by you to do remove restrictions. What do you? Well use the RUN command. (START >RUN). But unfortunately a system administrator who is intelligent enough to block access to specific folder, would definitely have blocked access to the RUN command. Again we are stuck. Windows is supposed to be the most User Friendly Operating System on earth. (At least Microsoft Says so.) It gives the User an option to do the same thing in various ways. You see the RUN command is only the most convenient option of launching applications, but not the only way. In Windows you can create shortcuts to almost anything from a file, folder to a Web URL. So say your system administrator has blocked access to the c:windowssystem folder and you need to access it. What do you do? Simply create a Shortcut to it. To do this right click anywhere on the desktop and select New > Shortcut. A new window titled Create Shortcut pops up. Type in the path of the restricted folder you wish to access, in this case c:windowssystem. Click Next, Enter the friendly name of the Shortcut and then click Finish. Now you can access the restricted folder by simply double clicking on the shortcut icon. Well that shows how protected and secure *ahem Windows *ahem is. **************** HACKING TRUTH: Sometimes when you try to delete a file or a folder, Windows displays an error message saying that the file is protected. This simply means that the file is write protected, or in other words the R option is +. Get it? Anyway, you can stop Windows from displaying this error message and straightaway delete this file by changing its attributes to Non Read Only. This can be done by Right Clicking on the file, selecting Properties and then unselecting the Read Only Option. *************** There is yet another way of accessing restricted folders. Use see, DOS has a lovely command known as START. Its general syntax is: START application_path It does do what it seems to do, start applications. So in you have access to DOS then you can type in the START command to get access to the restricted folder. Now mostly access to DOS too would be blocked. So again you can use the shortcut trick to launch, c:command.com or c:windowscommand.com. (Command.com is the file which launches MS DOS). Accessing Restricted Drives. The problem with most system administrators is that they think that the users or Hackers too are stupid. Almost all system administrators use the Registry Trick (Explained Earlier) to hide all drives in My Computer. So in order to unhide or display all drives, simply delete that particular key.(Refer to beginning of Untold Secrets Section.) Some systems have the floppy disk disabled through the BIOS. On those systems if the BIOS is protected, you may need to crack the BIOS password. (For that Refer to the Windows Hacking Chapter). Sometimes making drives readable (Removing R +) and then creating Shortcuts to them also helps us to get access to them. Further Changing your Operating System's Looks by editing .htt files If you have installed Windows Desktop Update and have the view as Web Page option enabled, you can customise the way the folder looks by selecting View > Customise this folder. Here you can change the background and other things about that particular folder. Well that is pretty lame, right? We hackers already know things as lame as that. Read on for some kewl stuff. Well, you could also change the default that is stored in a Hidden HTML Template file (I think so..) which is nothing but a HTML document with a .htt extension. This .htt file is found at: %systemroot%webfolder.htt. The %systemroot% stands for the drive in which Windows is Installed, which is normally C: You can edit these .htt files almost just like you edit normal .HTM or .HTML files. Simply open them in an ASCII editor like Notepad. The following is a list of .htt files on your system which control various folders and which can be edited to customise the way various folders look. controlp.htt Control Panel printers.htt Printers mycomp.htt My Computer safemode.htt Safe Mode All these files are found in the web folder in %systemfolder%. The folder.htt file has a line: 'Here's a good place to add a few lines of your own" which is the place where you can add your own A HREF links. These links would then appear in the folder whose folder.htt file you edited. All this might sound really easy and simple, but you see these .htt files do not contain normal HTML code, instead they contain a mixture of HTML and web bots. Hence they can be difficult for newbies to understand.