Tài liệu PC World.Top.Windows.Tips docx

If you don’t see the Filmstrip option in the View menu, choose View•Customize This Folder, click the Customize tab, select Photo Album in the drop-down list at the top, and click OK.. —M

Using Windows

> > S P E C I A L B O N U S C O L L E C T I O N < <

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I L L U S T R A T I O N S B Y A L E X G R O S S

call it the clark kent syndrome: Hidden beneath

Windows’ mild-mannered exterior lurks an operating

system that’s more powerful than a locomotive.

Unleashing Windows’ superpowers lets you work

smarter, whether you use XP or one of its predecessors.

Windows’ many configuration options allow you to

over-come the limitations of its one-size-fits-all interface and

transform the operating system to fit your work style.

These tips will help you get the look you want and the

power you need to manage files, pump up performance,

and customize Windows to your liking.

WINDOWS SECRETS

I N S I D E

70 File Management Muscle

71 Ten Quick Changes—No Phone Booth Required

72 Powerful Features Without the Upgrade

73 Speeding-Bullet Performance

74 Fixes for XP’s Super-Annoyances

78 The Mighty Morphin’ OS

80 Up, Upload, and Away

smart tips that unleash Windows’ hidden powers—whether you’ve upgraded to XP

or not By Scott Dunn

under ‘Folder pictures’ select Choose Pic-ture Select the picture you want to show

in the thumbnail (see the following bonus

tip), and click Open If the preview image

is to your liking, click OK If not, click Choose Picture again to find another pic-ture, or select Restore Default to remove

the picture from the folder thumbnail

Bonus tip:You needn’t scroll through a list of file names to find the image file you want to show in the thumbnail Instead, set the Browse dialog box (which appears

when you select Choose Picture) to show thumbnails Click the View icon to the far

right of the ‘Look in’ drop-down menu,

and choose Thumbnails If your view is

too crowded, drag any edge of the dialog box to make it bigger Unfortunately, Windows forgets these settings the next time you open the dialog box

The Sort You See When you choose

View•Details in Explorer, you can sort the

information you see by clicking a column heading (Name, Type, Size, or the

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the quality of the file with each rotation

If you don’t see the Filmstrip option in

the View menu, choose View•Customize This Folder, click the Customize tab, select Photo Album in the drop-down list at the top, and click OK.

A New Thumbnails ViewThe Thumb-nails view in XP has a new twist If a

fold-er contains images saved in a common Web format, such as gif, png, or jpg, XP will create an icon for the folder that dis-plays up to four of the images it contains, providing a glimpse of its contents To show a single image, right-click the folder

icon, choose Properties, and click the Cus-tomize tab Or open the folder, right-click

an empty area of the window, and choose

Customize This Folder (Alternatively, you can choose Customize This Folder on the View menu.) Click the Customize tab, and

XP

play or hide (see FIGURE 1) Not all

cate-gories appear in this context menu, but if you don’t see one that you want, select

More… at the bottom of the menu to open

the Choose Details dialog box

Bonus tip:To customize the information that Explorer displays for a Word or Excel document, right-click the file in Explorer

and choose Properties (or

<Alt>–double-click the file icon) Click the Summary tab

and add to or modify the information

list-ed there You can use the Custom tab to introduce even more information, but not all of the categories available for filling will be visible in Explorer’s Details view

Unkludge Your ColumnsOnce you’ve added categories to your folders’ Details view, you may have to scroll back and forth to see all the headings Follow these steps to get a grip on your columns:

•Drag the column heads left or right to rearrange their order

•Drag a column head’s right boundary left

or right to change the column size

•Double-click a column head’s right boundary to resize the column to the length of the longest item in the column

•With the document pane selected, hold

down <Ctrl> as you press <NumPad Plus>

(the plus sign on the numeric keypad) to resize all columns at once

To enable these tips to work, you may have to remove categories In Windows

9x you hide categories by dragging the

column head’s right border to the left until the column disappears Drag right

or press <Ctrl>-<NumPad Plus> to restore it.

A Tile of a ViewIf you are a fan of the Large Icons view offered in previous ver-sions of Windows Explorer, you’ll love Tiles, the gigantic icons in Windows XP

To see the icons, choose View•Tiles

(No-XP

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tice that the Large Icons view has become simply ‘Icons’ in XP’s Explorer.) Tiles seem to be part of the Microsoft effort to simplify XP to the level of the most unsophisticated computerphobe, but they’re not without redeeming quali-ties For example, to the right of each tile

is a brief summary of file information specific to that file type Some of this information isn’t visible by default in Details view (see “Give Me the Details,”

above) Tiles view works best if your fold-ers contain only a few items or if you want

to give files distinctive icons to make them easy to recognize It’s especially good for folders that you store icon (.ico) and

cur-sor (.cur) files in (see FIGURE 2).

Get Your Thumbnails in a Row For fold-ers that contain only a small number of graphics files, Windows XP offers Film-strip view, which, despite its name, has

nothing to do with video Choose View•

Filmstrip to display a preview of the

select-ed file at the top of the right Explorer pane, along with thumbnails of the other files in the folder in a strip running along the bottom of the right pane

Below the previewed image are slide-show forward and backward buttons, and two buttons that rotate the image left and right Be forewarned: The rotation but-tons actually open and save the file

per-manently in its rotated state (see FIGURE

3) This is less important if you’re using

an uncompressed format such as bmp (bitmap) or a loss-less compression for-mat such as gif But rotating jpg or other files with “lossy” compression will reduce

XP

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FILE MANAGEMENT MUSCLE

OU DON’T NEED X-RAY VISIONto see what’s inside a Windows file without opening it And XP adds even more tools and techniques for identifying files and determining their contents You still have to spend time arranging your files, but

knowing all of Windows’ tricks will make the chore less, well, chorelike.

Give Me the DetailsIf you

pre-fer Details view in your Explorer or folder

windows (choose View•Details), you may

not be getting all you want These days,

many file formats store lots of data

be-yond the default Name, Size, Type, and

Date Modified information available in

earlier versions of Windows For example,

MP3 music files can include an album

title, artist’s name, track duration, and

much more Word, Excel, and other

Mi-crosoft Office files contain such

informa-tion as the title, author, and subject

Much of this information can be viewed

in Explorer and in folder windows

with-out your having to open the files or their

Properties dialog boxes To arrange to get

all the details, select View•Choose Details

(in Windows XP) or View•Choose Columns

(in Windows Me and 2000) Check the

items appropriate for the files you keep in

the current folder, and click OK For

cus-tomizing on the fly, right-click any of the

column headings above the file list and

then choose a category you want to

dis-XP

2K

ME

FIGURE 3: ROTATING A PHOTO permanently saves the picture file in the rotated form.

FIGURE 2: TILES VIEW IS the best choice for folders used to store icons and cursors.

FIGURE 1: GET MORE FROM Details view by

right-clicking and choosing your categories.

10 QUICK CHANGES—NO PHONE BOOTH REQUIRED

X P D E FA U LT S E T T I N G S

ONLY THE WIZARDS of Redmond would create two versions of the same operating system, and then hide the best features of both by default

and make nuking the ones you don’t want difficult Here’s how to turn on the good and turn off the bad —Michael Cahlin

FEATURE

Quick Launch Toolbar

My Recent Documents

Volume Icon

Clock

Show File Name Extensions

Search for Hidden Files Windows XP Style

ClearType

Passport

Word-Balloon Tips

Where or what it is/what it does

Next to the Start button/launches applications with a single click.

On the Start menu/lists the 15 documents opened most recently.

In the system tray next to the clock/

adjusts your PC’s volume.

In the system tray/shows the current time.

In Explorer and folder windows/shows file-type extensions (.exe, gif, and the like).

In Explorer and folder windows/includes hidden files in search results.

The new interface/adds brighter colors and bigger buttons.

‘More’ option in Desktop Properties/

manages font-smoothing for LCD monitors.

Pop-up message/provides access to Microsoft service.

Pop-up messages/obscure screen with tool tips for apps supporting XP themes.

Default Pro/Home

On/off

On/off

Off/off

On/on

Off/off

Off/off

On/on

Off/off

On/on

On/on

Activate/deactivate

Right-click the taskbar, select Properties, choose the Taskbar tab, and check or uncheck Show Quick Launch Click OK.

Right-click the taskbar, select Properties, choose the Start Menu tab, click Customize, select the Advanced tab, and under Recent documents, check or uncheck List my most recently open documents Click OK twice.

Click Start•Control Panel In Category View, choose Sounds, Speech, and Audio Devices and click Sounds and Audio Devices In Classic View, double-click Sounds and Audio Devices Select the Volume tab, and in the Device volume area, check Place volume icon on the taskbar.

Right-click the taskbar, select Properties, choose the Taskbar tab, and check or uncheck Show the clock.

Launch Windows Explorer, click Tools, and select Folder Options Choose the View tab, and under ‘Advanced settings’ uncheck Hide Extensions for Known File Types Click Apply to All Folders at the top of the dialog box, choose Yes, and then click OK.

Launch Windows Explorer, click Tools, and select Folder Options Choose the View tab and under ‘Advanced settings’, check Show hidden files and folders Click Apply to All Folders at the top of the dialog box, choose Yes, and click OK Right-click the desktop and choose Properties Click the Appearance tab, and in the ‘Windows and buttons’ drop-down list, select Windows Classic style Click OK.

Right-click the desktop and choose Properties Click the Appearance tab, select the Effects button, and check Use the following method to smooth edges of screen fonts Click the drop-down arrow and select ClearType Click OK twice.

The first five times you connect to the Web, XP pesters you to sign up for a Passport account; then it gives up If you just can’t wait for it to disable itself, click the Passport message; when the Net Messenger window appears, click the

Cancel button.

Download and install XP’s PowerToys (available at find.pcworld.com/20442) Once it is installed, click Start•All Programs•Powertoys for Windows XP•TweakUI for Windows XP Highlight Taskbar in the left pane, and in the Settings area, uncheck Enable balloon tips Click OK (Note: You can’t get rid of the Activation balloon until XP is activated.)

SPEEDING-BULLET PERFORMANCE

CCOMMODATING A MULTITUDE OF OPEN(and resource-hungry) applications at the same time is the PC equivalent

of leaping tall buildings in a single bound You can give any version of Windows an infusion of pep by tweaking its default settings Use these tips to make your system a kryptonite-free zone.

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Tone Down the Effects Your system’s performance may be bogged down by excessive visual effects To get a perkier Windows 98, 2000, or Me, right-click the

desktop, choose Properties, and click the Effects tab Begin unchecking items in the

Visual Effects box at the bottom of the dia-log box until you find the right balance of speed and attractiveness for you

If Windows XP becomes sluggish, turn off some of the visual fireworks that may

be taxing your screen updates via the

Per-formance Options dialog box Open Con-trol Panel, and if you’re using the default Category view, click the Performance and Maintenance link Under ‘Pick a task’, choose Adjust visual effects If you’re using

the Classic view of Control Panel,

double-click the System icon (Alternatively, you can right-click My Computer in Explorer and choose Properties.) Click the Advanced tab, and select the first Settings button

(under Performance)

The Visual Effects tab lists check boxes for turning individual effects on for more razzle-dazzle or off for better

perfor-mance (see FIGURE 5) The preset options

at the top of the dialog box simplify

mat-ters: If Let Windows choose what’s best for

my computer isn’t already selected, choose

it and click OK twice Try this setting for a

while, and if you’re not satisfied, return to

the dialog box and click Adjust for best per-formance, which unchecks all the visual

options If you miss some of the excite-ment, open this dialog box again and ex-periment by turning individual effects on one by one until you find a good balance between sizzle and steak

Lightning MenusSometimes Windows seems like an endless series of menu op-tions: right-click menus, the Start menu

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application By default, Windows doesn’t show these menus at their maximum speed One way to change this is by edit-ing the Windows Registry; but it’s much easier to install Tweak UI, the free Micro-soft Control Panel icon that allows you to customize many arcane aspects of

dows Depending on the version of Win-dows you’re using, you may be able to download Tweak UI by itself or as part of

a larger set of free utilities called Micro-soft PowerToys Go to find.pcworld.com/

20441 to download Tweak UI 1.33 for

Windows 9x, Me, and NT/2000, and visit

find.pcworld.com/20442 for your free copy of PowerToys for Windows XP

Downloading and installing Tweak UI

on older versions of Windows is tricky First decompress (unzip) the download file, and then locate a file called tweakui inf (If your system is set to hide file

extensions, choose Tools•Folder Options in

Explorer, and under the View tab uncheck

Hide extensions for known file types.)

file management Don’t like it? Simply choose the command again to turn it off

Compress in a Jiffy The ability to compress bitmap images and other large files before e-mailing or archiving them is

a welcome new feature of Windows Me

and XP To compress, or zip, a file or

fold-er, right-click in a folder or on the desktop

and choose New•Compressed (zipped)

Fold-er Drag files to this folder to compress

them in the zip file If most of the files are in a single folder, just select the files

or subfolders, right-click the selection,

and choose Send To•Compressed (zipped) Folder Windows will create a new

com-pressed folder named after the first file you selected and will include all the

select-ed files and/or subfolders To add files to

or remove them from the compressed folder, drag and drop them as you would any folder Naturally, you can rename the compressed folder by highlighting it, clicking it again (slowly, so as not to open it), and entering the new name, or by

right-clicking and choosing Rename.

In Windows Me, you may need to in-stall the compression option from your Windows Me CD Pop the CD into the drive, and open Control Panel

Double-click Add/Remove Programs, Double-click the Win-dows Setup tab, select System Tools, and click Details Check Compressed Folders, click OK as many times as needed, and

follow the on-screen prompts

Decompress in a Flash You can decompress files by dragging them out of the compressed folder and dropping them where you like But if you’re decom-pressing all the files in a compressed

fold-er in Windows XP, simply right-click and drag the folder to the desired location and

then choose Extract Here.

To put the decompressed files into a new folder, either right-drag the files as explained above (XP only), or right-drag the compressed folder to the new folder

and choose Extract to launch the Extract

Wizard (in Me) or the Extraction Wizard (in XP) Using the wizard is faster than

right-dragging Just press <Enter> once (in

Me) or twice (in XP), wait for

decompres-sion to finish, and press <Enter> again.

XP ME

XP ME

to figure it out for yourself In Windows

XP, the possible sort criteria listed on the

‘Arrange Icons by’ menu change accord-ing to your settaccord-ings in the Choose Details dialog box, so be sure to read the tip “Give

Me the Details,” page 70

Sort It Yourself To arrange a folder’s

items manually, choose any view except

List or Details, and then drag and drop items (or groups of items that you select

by <Ctrl>-clicking them) to get the

arrange-ment you prefer To keep your files in nice, neat rows and columns, click the

View menu or right-click inside the folder and choose Arrange Icons by•Auto Arrange

(provided that it isn’t already checked)

Get With the Group There are many new ways to view a folder’s contents in

XP

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XP, the most useful of which may be the

‘Show in Groups’ option on the ‘Arrange

Icons by’ submenu Choose View•Arrange Icons by, or right-click inside a folder and select Arrange Icons by•Show in Groups.

Windows will arrange the icons in logical groupings based on your chosen sort order For example, if the files are sorted

by name, the groups will be the letters of the alphabet If you sort by date, you’ll get groups with names such as ‘Yesterday’,

‘Last week’, ‘Last month’, and ‘Earlier this year’ Sorting by size will yield groups named ‘Tiny’, ‘Medium’, ‘Large’, and the like It’s no substitute for having a good file-storage system, but distributing large numbers of folders and files into these (somewhat) meaningful bins simplifies

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like) to list files by that criterion Click the

column heading again to reverse the

order Windows Me and 2000 add a tiny

arrow to the column that currently sets

the sort order: An up arrow indicates

ascending order; a down arrow,

descend-ing order Windows XP goes this one

bet-ter by highlighting the column head or

the entire column that controls the sort,

making it even easier to spot the

prevail-ing arrangement at a glance

The Folder Sort To sort your file and

folder icons in Explorer views other than

Details, right-click inside the folder and

choose Arrange Icons by—or choose View•

Arrange Icons by—and then select a sort

criterion Unfortunately, the only way to

tell how the items are currently sorted is

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W I N 9 X T R I C K S

WHAT’S SO GOOD ABOUT WINDOWS XP?

The stability and reliability it brings to

Win-dows 9x and Me machines that crash

regu-larly If you want the best that XP has to

offer, there’s no alternative to buying the

OS and, if necessary, upgrading your

hard-ware But that doesn’t

mean your old 9x PC

can’t learn any new

tricks These tips will

give you some of the

upgrade effect,

with-out the upgrade price.

Cosmetics The

pre-mier desktop theme utility is Desktop

Architect, a fabulous piece of freeware that

transforms your desktop icons, pointers,

colors, and wallpaper with ease, although

it can’t change title bars or the taskbar.

Download it at find.pcworld.com/21161 If

you’d like to try for a quasi-XP look, locate

a free XP theme from a theme site such as

www.themedoctor.com

Browsing You can get Internet Explorer

6, which comes with Windows XP, as a free

download from Microsoft ( www.microsoft.

com/windows/ie ) This browser gives you

some control over your private

informa-tion, and it features automatic image resiz-ing, a floating image toolbar, and a media bar for playing music and video files from within the browser IE 6 has the colorful new XP icons, too, so you’ll be browsing in the latest fashion More important, it’s free.

Multimedia Unlike Internet Explorer 6, the new Windows Media Player 8 works only with Windows XP—but don’t despair The

earli-er Windows Media

Play-er 7.x, available at find.

pcworld.com/21221 , has many of version 8’s best features It lets you apply different skins, manage your digital audio and video files, rip CDs to your hard disk (though not

in MP3 format), listen to Internet radio sta-tions, transfer audio files to portable de-vices, and burn audio CDs And yes, it’s free.

If you don’t like Windows Media Player, try

a third-party media player, such as Real-One or MusicMatch (you can download these players at find.pcworld.com/12283 ).

Frequently Used Apps Besides having obvious visual differences, the new XP Start menu can track up to 30 of your most

frequently used applications and put them

on the left side of the Start menu for easy access (see “Rework Your Frequent Apps List,” page 78) Though previous Windows versions lack this feature, you can achieve the same effect—and more—with ANsoft’s

$20 RunIt shareware utility RunIt’s pop-up menus display up to 50 of your most fre-quently or recently used applications on each menu Or have your system display a Favorites menu that shows the programs

or documents of your choice RunIt does not alter the Start menu, but you can launch its menus—and a more sophisticated version of the Windows Run dialog box—

from an icon in the taskbar tray (the area near the clock), via a keyboard shortcut, or with a tiny floating toolbar (see FIGURE 4).

Visit find.pcworld.com/20581 to download

a trial version of the program.

Photo Opportunities Windows XP’s

high-ly touted photo-editing tools still rehigh-ly on the venerable Paint program If you’d prefer something full-featured, try a third-party program such as Ulead’s Photo Explorer 6 freeware for managing and editing photos (available at find.pcworld.com/22541 ), which has several tools that XP doesn’t.

POWERFUL FEATURES WITHOUT THE UPGRADE

FIGURE 5: TURN OFF THE fireworks for snappier on-screen performance.

FIGURE 4: GET MENUS OF recently used, frequently used, or favorite apps (and more) with RunIt.

task, but you should log off from the addi-tional accounts as soon as the task is com-plete Fast user switching is not an option for Windows XP computers that are con-nected to a network domain

Lose Some ColorThe more colors your system displays, the more memory and processing power it expends to manage those colors If you use an older

comput-er system and you’ve already tried dis-abling some visual effects (as described in

“Tone Down the Effects,” page 73), you may get the performance boost you’re looking for by setting your graphics sys-tem to 16-bit ‘high color’ rather than 32-bit ‘true color’ (in Windows XP these set-tings are labeled ‘Medium’ and ‘Highest’, respectively) Right-click the desktop,

select Properties, and click the Settings tab.

If your system is currently set to display 32-bit color, choose the option for 16-bit

color and click OK; then follow any

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screen instructions that appear (these vary depending on the graphics system)

Memory Gain Many people find that the best way to boost Windows’ perfor-mance is by adding RAM This is espe-cially true of machines running in the 300- to 500-MHz range Make sure that your PC has at least 128MB of RAM— and preferably 256MB or more As of this writing, a 128MB memory upgrade costs about $40, but memory is a commodity, and prices can change rapidly

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Right-click the tweakui.inf file and choose

Install If you’re installing Windows XP

PowerToys, the installation process is

much more conventional

Launch Tweak UI by double-clicking its

icon in Control Panel Click the Mouse

tab Under ‘Menu speed’, drag the slider

all the way to the Fast end (see FIGURE 6).

Click OK and, with any luck, your menus

will be a wee bit more sprightly

Slow Down User SwitchesUnlike

previ-ous Windows versions, Windows XP lets

you switch from one user account to

another without logging off or shutting

down any programs This feature is

con-venient, but it increases the memory

demands on your system For better

per-formance, choose Start•Log Off to log off

completely before switching to another

profile You can still allow multiple

ac-counts to run simultaneously when you

or another user needs to perform a quick

XP

X P T W E A K S

WHAT’S A SUPERHERO without flaws?

These tips help undo some of XP’s worst.

Annihilate Annoying Animations To

dump XP’s Search ’toon, open any folder,

press <F3>to start a search, and at the

bot-tom of the Search Companion pane on the

left, click Change Preferences At the top

of the pane, click Without an animated

screen character (see FIGURE 7) Either

continue with a search or close the window.

Wipe out Windows Messenger A

nag-ging balloon from the tray area of the

taskbar urges you to launch Windows

Mes-senger and sign up for Microsoft’s Net

Passport program To pop it once and for all,

choose Start•Run, type regedit, and click

OK Navigate to HKEY_CURRENT_USER\

Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVer-sion\Run With the Run folder (called a ’key‘

in Registry-ese) selected on the left, choose

the MSMSGS icon on the right and press

<Delete> Click Yes to confirm, and exit the

Registry Editor The icon will disappear from

the tray the next time you log on.

Ungroup Your Buttons XP groups simi-lar applications under a single button in the taskbar, forcing you to choose the item from

a pop-up menu If you would prefer separate buttons for each open

appli-cation, right-click the

task-bar, choose Properties, un-check Group similar taskbar

buttons, and click OK.

Bypass the Password Prompt You might not need

to enter a password each time you deactivate your screen saver The fix is easy:

Right-click the desktop and

choose Properties Click the

Screen Saver tab, uncheck

the box labeled On resume,

password protect or On resume, display Welcome screen (depending on your log-on

configuration), and click OK.

Remember Open Folders In previous versions of Windows, folders and Explorer windows you had open when you logged off

would open again the next time you logged

on Not so in Windows XP If you miss this

feature, choose Tools•Folder Options in any window, click the View tab, scroll to the end

of the Advanced settings

list, check Restore

previ-ous folder windows at logon, and click OK.

Pulverize Personalized Menus In Windows XP’s Classic Start menu (see

“A Classic Look,” page 78), the ’personalized‘ menus rearrange menu items and hide many en-tries until you click the double-arrow symbol to display the entire listing.

To get rid of this irksome convention,

sim-ply right-click the Start button and choose

Properties Click the Customize button,

and scroll to the bottom of the Advanced

Start menu options Uncheck Use

Person-alized Menus, and click OK twice.

FIXES FOR XP’S SUPER-ANNOYANCES

FIGURE 6: SLUGGISH MENUS? TWEAK UI will help you speed them up in no time.

FIGURE 7: SEND ROVER PACKING to unclutter the view in XP’s search tool.

the Advanced tab In the scrolling list

labeled ‘Start menu items’, you can hide

or reveal Search, My Music, and other items, or you can make Control Panel, My Computer, Network

Connections, My Documents, and re-lated items appear as icons, as a cascading menu, or not at all

(see FIGURE 8) Just

make your choices

and click OK twice.

Start Menu

Stick-’emsThe applications that appear on the left side of Windows XP’s new Start menu (above All Programs) are those you launch most often You may also have an icon for Internet access, an-other for e-mail, and an-others above the list

of frequently used applications Microsoft calls that grouping the ‘pinned items list’

Icons for these applications don’t disap-pear when you stop using the programs

or when you use them less frequently To make an application or document appear

on the pinned items list, open Explorer to the folder where the application is

locat-ed and right-click the application’s exe file (it’s most likely in a directory for that application within Program Files) Or right-click any shortcut to the application

in Explorer, on the desktop, or on the Start menu or one of its submenus; and

choose Pin to Start menu (see FIGURE 9).

To pin a shortcut to a document or folder

XP

to this list, drag the icon for the document

or folder to the Start menu button

Bonus tip:You can put Internet

Explor-er, MSN ExplorExplor-er, Hotmail, or Outlook Express on the pinned items list by

right-clicking the Start button, choosing Prop-erties, clicking the Customize button, and

making the appropriate selections in the

‘Show on Start menu’ panel The Internet and e-mail options available here vary from system to system, however

Rework Your Frequent Apps ListTo alter the list of applications XP shows on the

Start menu, right-click the Start button, choose Properties, and click Customize.

Under Programs in the resulting dialog box, type a number between 0 and 30 (or

select a number with the arrow keys) This might increase the Start menu’s height

To start over, simply

click Clear List.

A Classic LookAs the list of frequently used applications on Windows XP’s Start menu changes, you may lose the ability

to jump to an item

by pressing the first letter in its name To revert to the Classic Start menu,

right-click the Start button, choose Properties, select Classic Start menu, and click OK

Gimme Back My IconsThe Windows XP desktop has but a single icon: Recycle Bin (If you installed XP over your old ver-sion of Windows, your old icons remain

on the desktop.) If you miss the default desktop icons of Windows past, you can have them back in a trice Right-click the

desktop and choose Properties, click the Desktop tab, and click the Customize Desk-top button Under DeskDesk-top Icons, check

the box for each icon that you want on your desktop (My Documents, My Com-puter, My Network Places, and/or

Inter-net Explorer); then click OK twice

Tidy Up Your Desktop Windows XP also helps you keep your desktop spiffy

XP XP

XP XP

78

Begin With the Start MenuYou can

cus-tomize the Start menu to add and remove

programs, folders, documents, and other

items In Windows Me, 2000, or XP with

the Classic Start menu, right-click the

taskbar and choose Properties In XP, click

the Start Menu tab and then click

Cus-tomize In Windows 2000 and Me, click

the Advanced tab In all versions, look for

the scrolling list of check boxes at the

bot-tom of the dialog box The Administrative

Tools menu can appear on the

Start•Pro-grams menu (XP and Windows 2000)

You can hide the Run command (XP and

Me) or make the Favorites menu go away

Check boxes that begin with the word

‘Expand’ let you create cascading menus

out of such otherwise-static Start menu

items as Control Panel, Network &

Dial-Up Connections, My Documents, and My

Printers (depending on your version of

Windows) When you’re done, click OK

as many times as needed

To alter Windows XP’s newfangled

Start menu, right-click the Start button

and choose Properties Click Customize

under the Start Menu tab and select

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FIGURE 8: MENU? ICON? NOTHING? You choose

by configuring the right side of the Start menu.

FIGURE 9: ICONS STAY STUCK on the Start menu with the Pin feature.

THE MIGHTY MORPHIN’ OS

O IF WINDOWS REALLY IS MORE POWERFULthan a locomotive, why does it look more like Jimmy Olsen than like the Man of Steel? From title bar to taskbar, the default Windows interface conceals more useful quick-change options than an

old-fashioned telephone booth And XP’s new Luna look takes this

secre-tiveness to new levels At least the dumbing down is undoable These

steps give Windows more looks than there are streetlights in Metropolis.

The Desktop Cleanup Wizard locates and

offers to clean off desktop shortcuts you

haven’t used lately

Right-click the desktop and choose

Properties Click first the Desktop tab and

then the Customize Desktop button Under

Desktop Cleanup, select Clean Desktop

Now In the Desktop Cleanup Wizard,

click Next The Wizard dialog box lists the

desktop shortcuts that you haven’t used in

the last 60 days Uncheck the ones you

want to keep on the desktop, and click

Next Click Finish to acknowledge the

final list of shortcuts to be swept away

Windows puts them in a desktop folder

called (appropriately) Unused Desktop

Shortcuts If you ever want to retrieve a

shortcut, just drag it out of this folder If

you’re the forgetful type, check Run

Desk-top Cleanup Wizard every 60 days to have

the software prompt you Unfortunately,

the wizard works only on shortcuts—not

on folders, applications, or documents

Drop Anchor on Media PlayerWhen you

apply a skin to Windows Media Player 7

or later (choose View•Taskbar•Skin

Choos-er), a small Anchor Window appears in

the lower right corner that reverts to full

mode when you double-click its center

button But you can switch modes simply

by pressing <Ctrl>-1 (full mode) or <Ctrl>-2

(compact or skin mode) To drop Anchor,

choose Tools•Options, click the Player tab,

uncheck When in compact mode, always

display anchor window (version 7) or

Dis-play anchor window when in skin mode

(ver-sion 8), and click OK Alternatively, with

Media Player 8, click inside the Anchor

Window and choose Hide Anchor Window

from the pop-up menu (see FIGURE 10).

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UP, UPLOAD, AND AWAY

HOUGH IT MAY SOMETIMES SEEMthat not even the Flash could safely speed up your Internet link or network connec-tion, Windows might actually come to your rescue If some evil genius has taken over your computer’s link to the outside world, see

if these Windows tweaks reopen your lines of communication.

FIGURE 10: BANISH MEDIA Player’s Anchor

Window by clicking a quick menu command.

Windows XP’s firewall monitors only incoming traffic, not outgoing traffic, so

it won’t help you discover a Trojan horse, spyware, or any other uninvited program transmitting information about you or your PC That’s why it still makes sense

to get a third-party firewall such as Zone-Labs’ free ZoneAlarm (which you can download at find.pcworld.com/21241)

Firewall Conflicts Software firewalls sometimes block Windows XP from shar-ing files and printers across a local net-work If each PC on the network connects

to the Internet through a network hub that itself is connected to a DSL or cable modem, Microsoft recommends that you either provide each system with Internet access via a residential gateway installed between your modem and the network hub, or that you connect your modem directly to the computer running Win-dows XP and use XP’s Internet Connec-tion Sharing to give other computers on the network Internet access To enable Internet Connection Sharing, open the Network Setup Wizard as described in “A Wizard to the Rescue,” below

A Wizard to the RescueSetting up a home or small-office network may re-quire that you dig through multiple dia-log boxes and decipher arcane network protocols Why bother? Windows’ Net-work Setup Wizard can do most of the work for you Perhaps the quickest way to

launch the wizard is to choose Start•Run,

type netconn (in Windows Me) or netsetup (in XP), and press <Enter> Then simply

follow the instructions on your screen

Scott Dunn is a contributing editor for PC

World He lives in Seattle Michael Cahlin is a

Los Angeles–based freelance writer.

XP ME XP



One Explorer Is PlentyIf you’re happy with Internet Explorer or another

brows-er, and satisfied with your current e-mail and Internet service provider, you can save more than 13MB of hard drive space

by deleting MSN Explorer Windows Help says MSN Explorer is ‘software that makes it easy to get more from the Web.’

Maybe, but it’s just a browser more

tight-ly integrated with Windows Media Player and Microsoft’s own MSN Web services

To drop this duplicate browser like a hot potato, open Control Panel, launch

Add or Remove Programs, and on the left side of the dialog box, click Add/Remove Windows Components Scroll through the

list of Windows components and uncheck

MSN Explorer Read the warning and click Yes if you don’t rely on MSN for your Internet connection Click Next and

fol-low the remaining on-screen prompts

Get Behind a FirewallWhenever your computer is connected to the Internet or a local network, it’s vulnerable to unautho-rized intrusions and other attacks Your

first line of defense is a personal firewall,

software or hardware that blocks access from outside and may even thwart hostile applications known as Trojan horses

Windows XP’s firewall has to be turned

on manually Right-click My Network Places in Explorer or on the desktop, and choose Properties In the Network

Con-nection window, highlight your

connec-tion in the right pane and click Change set-tings of this connection in the left pane

under Network Tasks (Or right-click your

connection and choose Properties.) In the Properties dialog box, click the Advanced tab, check Protect my computer and network

by limiting or preventing access to this com-puter from the Internet, and click OK.

XP XP

the Documents submenu from Windows Me’s Start menu, follow the Registry edit

steps described above for Windows 9x.

Removing other built-in Start menu items from Windows 2000 requires the Group Policy administrative utility To

launch the utility, click Start•Run, type

gputil.msc , and press <Enter> Navigate in

the left pane to User Configuration•Admin-istrative Templates•Start Menu & Taskbar.

To delete Help from the Start menu,

dou-ble-click Remove Help menu from Start

Menu in the right pane (see FIGURE 3).

Select Enabled and click OK You’ll still be

able to reach the same help information from any folder window by using its Help

menu or by pressing <F1> Likewise, to get

rid of the Documents menu,

double-click Remove Documents menu from Start Menu, select Enabled, and click OK.

If you disable too many menu items, you may regret it For example, removing the Shut Down command from the Start menu also disables the Shut Down button when you press

<Ctrl>-<Alt>-<Delete> And when you remove the Search submenu, you also disable the keyboard shortcuts and context-menu options that let you search from within Explorer and folder windows So don’t dis-able these items unless you’re happy using other software that can replace these functions

Windows XP makes it easy to remove many built-in Start menu items—good news, since this operating system also adds a lot of junk to

the Start menu Right-click the Start but-ton, choose Properties, click Customize, and select the Advanced tab Under ‘Start menu items’, you can select Don’t display this item for Control Panel, My

Comput-er, My Documents, My Music, My Pic-tures, Network Connections, and System

Administrative Tools (see FIGURE 4).

Uncheck Favorites menu, Help and Sup-port, My Network Places, Printers and Faxes, Run command, and Search to eliminate

these menu items To remove the My

Recent Documents menu, uncheck List

my most recently opened documents in the

‘Recent documents’ section at the bottom

of the Customize Start Menu dialog box

When you’re done, click OK twice

Short-cuts you’ve created to these items in other folders or menus will still work, as will the keyboard shortcuts for opening them

DOCUMENTS MENU, TAKE 2

t h e o c t o b e r 2001 Win-dows Tips described ways to

access recently used docu-ments beyond the measly 15 on the Start• Documents menu (see find.pcworld com/16000) But you can make your own menu of recent shortcuts and add to it as you wish, and retain the shortcuts for as long as you like All you need is a

free-ware program and a few command lines typed in Notepad and saved as a batch file

Preliminary steps: Before making your batch file, create a menu that will show

your recent shortcuts Right-click the Start button, choose Open, right-click an empty area of the folder, and select New•Folder.

This folder will be your new Documents

menu, so give it a name, such as More

Docs , and press <Enter>.

Tsahi Chitin’s TDel freeware replace-ment for DOS’s Delete command lets you delete old shortcuts based on their cre-ation date Go to find.pcworld.com/15968

to download TDel, then unzip the file and follow the installation instructions The program’s automatic installation option won’t work in Windows 2000, but don’t let that bother you Just copy tdel.exe to any convenient location and double-click

it to finish the installation

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148 INTERNET TIPS

One in-box for many e-mail accounts;

domain registration alternatives; at home (page) with IE’s Favorites.

154 HARDWARE TIPS

Help your PC keep its cool no matter the weather Will ‘AGP 3’ spell faster graphics? Not necessarily

tray; hide Windows Me’s logo

FIGURE 1: ADD A FEW SETTINGS to the Windows Reg-istry to make some built-in Start menu items disappear.

FIGURE 2: REMOVE FAVORITES, Logoff, and Run from your Start menu in Windows Me.

144

i f y o u r e g u l a r l y scroll through dozens of items on your Start menu every time you open a program, maybe you should

think about putting the menu on a diet

Two prime candidates for deletion from

the Start menu are your Favorites and

Documents menus Chances are you only

access your Favorites menu from your

browser or folder windows And you

won’t need the Documents menu if you

create a custom recent-documents menu

by following the steps in the next tip,

“Documents Menu, Take 2.”

Before you begin trimming the Start menu, put your other shortcut menus into logical groups and delete unneces-sary menu items Go to find.pcworld

com/15920for Steve Bass’s suggestions

on organizing a messy Windows desktop

Windows 9x doesn’t offer an easy way

to remove its built-in menu items, but you can delete some of them by editing the Windows Registry Messing with

Reg-istry settings is risky, however, so be sure

to back up your system.dat and user.dat Registry files before beginning After

cre-ating your backup, choose Start•Run, type

regedit , and press <Enter> to open the

Reg-istry Editor Navigate through the tree on the left until you come to HKEY_CUR- RENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Win-dows\CurrentVersion\Policies\Explorer

Select the Explorer icon in the left pane, then add the settings in the right pane that turn off the Windows menu items

For example, to make the Documents menu disappear from the Start menu, right-click the right pane and choose

New•DWORD Value Type

NoRecentDocs-Menuto name the new binary value, and

press <Enter> Double-click the new entry,

type 1 in the Value data box, and click OK

To remove the Log Off command, add

a DWORD Value icon called NoLogOff,

and to delete the Favorites menu, create a

DWORD Value icon named

NoFavorites-Menu Double-click each icon you create,

type 1, and click OK (see FIGURE 1) After

removing the menu items, close the Reg-istry Editor and, if necessary, log off and log back on to see the changes To restore

a deleted menu item, open the Registry Editor and delete the icon you created or

double-click it and change its value to 0.

To remove the Favorites and Logoff commands in Windows 2000 and Me,

right-click the taskbar, choose Properties, click the Advanced tab, and in the list of

settings at the bottom of the dialog box,

uncheck either the Display Favorites box or Display Logoff box, or both If you never

use the Start•Run command or prefer to

access it only from your keyboard

(<Win-dows> -<R>), Windows Me lets you uncheck

Display Run as well (see FIGURE 2) When you’re done, click OK Note: To remove

E D I T E D B Y M I C H A E L S L A S K Y A N D D E N N I S O ’ R E I L LY

HERE’S

HERE’S HOW

Take Charge of Your

Runaway Start Menu

S C O T T D U N N

WINDOWS TIPS

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FIGURE 3: HIDE THE HELP MENU and Documents menu

in Windows 2000 by using the Group Policy utility.

er The /days: switch deletes files older than a specified number of days; change

‘3’ to the number of days you prefer

Experiment to find the number of days that works best for you Don’t forget to add the two periods after the number to delete all files older than whatever length you specify The /d- switch keeps the pro-gram from deleting the More Docs folder

if it becomes empty Finally, if you’re

using Windows 2000, replace del with tdel

(and the path to the utility, if needed)

Final steps:In Notepad, choose File•Save

As, navigate to a folder where you store

batch files (the Windows folder will do),

type a name such as “FixMenu.bat” (in

Windows 9x, Me, and XP) or “FixMenu.

cmd”(in Windows 2000) Be sure to in-clude the quotation marks so that Notepad doesn’t add its txt extension

to the file name Click Save and use

Explorer to find the FixMenu file you

just created Choose it and click Edit

•Copy, then navigate to your Start

Menu\Programs\StartUp folder and

choose Edit•Paste Shortcut With the new shortcut selected, choose File•

Properties Click the Program tab (in Windows 9x and Me) or the Shortcut

tab (in Windows 2000 and XP) and

choose Minimized from the Run drop-down list In Windows 9x and Me, make sure Close on exit is checked as well.

If you have problems, come back later and change these settings to keep the DOS window open while you trouble-shoot That will let you read any error

messages Click OK.

Now Windows will update your menu and delete old items automatically when-ever it starts To update the menu within

the current Windows session, choose Fix Menu from the Start menu, or use either

Task Scheduler or the Scheduled Tasks folder to run the batch file more often If you prefer your new menu to the old Doc-uments menu, hide the old one by fol-lowing the steps in “Take Charge of Your Runaway Start Menu” above

Windows XP Professional Edition’s Group Policy utility makes it easy to in-crease the size of the My Recent

Docu-ments menu Choose Start•Run, type

146

Automatic shortcuts:To create the batch

file that will automatically add shortcuts

to this menu, open Notepad or another

text editor, and on the first line, type the

command that will copy files from

Win-dows’ Recent menu to your new folder—

for example, xcopy “c:\windows\recent\*.*”

“c:\windows\Start Menu\More Docs” /d /y

Replace the first path in quotation marks

(“c:\windows\recent\”) with the path to

your Recent folder, and change the

sec-ond path in quotation marks

(“c:\win-dows\Start Menu\More Docs”) to point to

the folder for your new menu The /d

switch copies your newest shortcuts from

the Recent menu to your custom More

Docs menu, while the /y switch

sup-presses prompts to overwrite files The

shortcut updates your custom menu

when you launch it to show all shortcuts

in your Recent folder, not just the last 15

Unlike Windows’ Documents menu,

automatically adding shortcuts to this

menu is easy Add a line to the text file

similar to the one above that copies

spe-cific shortcuts to your More Docs menu

Shortcut removal:Add another line to this

file to keep your menu size manageable

(TDel must be installed for this tip.)

Type del c:\windows\startm~1\moredo~1\

*.* /days:3 /d- and press <Enter> Note

that TDel does not support long file

names, so your paths must use the

abbre-viated form (first 6 letters of a file name,

minus spaces, followed by ~1, in most

cases) Replace the path in this example

gpedit.msc , and press <Enter> to open

Group Policy In the left pane, select User Configuration•Administrative Templates• Windows Components•Windows Explorer Double-click Maximum number of recent documents in the right pane and select Enabled under the Setting tab Increase

the maximum number of recent docu-ments to a number above 15 The menu will show only the 10 most recent files of any file type—for example, 10 doc (Word) files—an improvement, nevertheless

Find more tips at www.pcworld.com/heres_ how Windows Tips pays $50 for published tips and questions Scott Dunn is a con-tributing editor for PC World.

Get the Big Picture With XFilesDialog

RECENT VERSIONS of Windows let you resize your Open, Save, Save As, and other file dialog boxes, and change the list’s view to large icons, small icons, details, and so on But none of your changes will persist, so you’re forced to click here or drag there every time you open a dialog box just to get the view you want The XFilesDialog utility solves this problem, making the file dialog boxes in all applications (except Microsoft Office, which never conforms to Windows stan-dards anyway) look the way you want, complete with your preferred sort order and even a pop-up menu of recently used

documents All for only $15 (I’m in love)! Download a trial version at find.pcworld com/15980 , or from its creator at www xdesksoftware.com/xfilesdialog.html

FIGURE 4: CLEAR OUT XP’S Start menu

with the Customize Start Menu dialog box.



Map or disconnect network drives: To map a network drive to your computer—or to disconnect a drive that’s already there—

right-click either Network Neighborhood (My Network Places in Windows Me) or

My Computer and choose Map Network Drive or Disconnect Network Drive.

THE SENSIBLE SORT

if you preferthe Details view in your folder windows, you probably know that this view lets you sort the items in a folder by clicking one of the column heads (Name, Type, Size, or Modified) Unfortunately, clicking the Type head only sorts the files

by the description given to the file by Microsoft or by the application that

creat-ed it, such as ‘GIF Image’ or ‘DAT File’

Some of the descriptions take up way too much space with advertising (for exam-ple, every Office file type begins with

Microsoft) And the file types may not be

grouped in a logical manner

One solution is to manage files using PowerDesk 4, a free Windows Explorer replacement available from Ontrack Data

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International To Windows’ file-sorting options, PowerDesk adds the ability to sort files by their description or by their three-letter extension You can download PowerDesk at find.pcworld.com/13900or from Ontrack itself (www.ontrack.com/

powerdesk) For more information on PowerDesk 4, see “Darn Good Software, Doggone Cheap,” page 149

For even more file-sorting options, edit the descriptions of the file types you use most often For example, if you work with Web graphics, you can change the de-scriptions for bmp, gif, and jpg files from ‘Bitmap Image’, ‘GIF Image’, and

‘JPEG Image’ to Images-BMP, Images-GIF, and Images-JPEG to group all your image

files together when you sort by type

To change your file-type descriptions,

choose View•Options, View•Folder Options,

or Tools•Folder Options (depending on

your version of Windows) in any folder

Click the File Types tab and scroll through

the list of file types to find the one whose description you want to edit Select it and

click Edit or Advanced, depending on your

version of Windows In the Edit File Type dialog box, enter your new description,

click OK, and close the remaining dialog

boxes Repeat these steps for all file types whose descriptions you want to alter

REMAP YOUR KEYBOARD I’M A BIG FAN of IBM ThinkPads, but my one complaint about them

is their lack of a <Windows> key Is there a way to map the <Windows> key onto another key on the ThinkPad’s keyboard?

Kulvir S Bhogal, Fort Worth, Texas

i n w i n d o w s2000 and NT 4, you can change the function of various keys to suit your needs One of the many possible uses of this hidden feature is to add the

convenient <Windows> key to an IBM ThinkPad For more on <Windows> key shortcuts, see “The Windows Key: A Fast Worker” (find.pcworld.com/13901) Re-mapping your keyboard requires that you

be willing to brave that esoteric com-pendium of Windows hardware and soft-ware settings, the Windows Registry And ThinkPad users must also be willing to give up the use of an existing key that will function as their new <Windows> key First, a word of warning: Making care-less changes to the Registry can cause serious problems, up to and including the inability to start Windows If you decide

to sacrifice one of your <Ctrl> or <Alt> keys to get a <Windows> key and if you typically use <Ctrl>-<Alt>-<Delete> to see

the Windows log-on screen (as in Win-dows 2000), a mistake in executing this tip could make it difficult for you to guess what keys to press to return to Windows Consequently, apply this tip with care, and be sure to back up your Registry before you begin To back up in Windows

NT, choose Start•Run, type rdisk, and press <Enter> Click Create Repair Disk and

follow the on-screen prompts; for more

information, click Help For assistance on

backing up your Registry in Windows

2000 and XP, choose Start•Help, click the Index tab, and look for the topic ‘Registry,

Backing Up to Repair Directory’ (in Win-dows 2000) or ‘Back up System State data’ (in Windows XP) In Windows XP, you can set a System Restore point; see

194 INTERNET TIPS

Set your PC’s clock via the Internet;

firewall testing from the inside out;

and a stand-alone Shockwave player.

scan, a backup, and a file clean-up We even describe a simple way for you to automate the process.

206 ANSWER LINE

Retrieve data from bad R and

CD-RW discs; use a network printer to print a list of files in a folder.

FIGURE 1: RIGHT-CLICK MY COMPUTER for fast access to network, system, and other settings.

190

why clickthrough three menus, two windows, and a couple of dialog boxes just to get to a file, folder, or application?

Left-brainers can remember shortcut keys; but

everyone else, think right! Your right

mouse button’s shortcuts take you where

you’re going fast So limber up those

fin-gers and get ready to right-click

Manage multiple windows simultaneously:If

you want to close, tile, minimize,

maxi-mize, or otherwise arrange several

appli-cation windows, don’t fuss with each

indi-vidually Hold down <Ctrl> as you click the

taskbar buttons of the windows you want

to arrange or close Then right-click one

of the depressed buttons and choose the action you want from the menu

Speed up disk maintenance:You can launch Backup (if it’s installed), ScanDisk, Disk Cleanup, or Disk Defragmenter by choos-ing Start•Programs•Accessories•System Tools, but if Windows Explorer is open, it’s faster simply to right-click the drive

you want to work on and choose Proper-ties In the General tab, click Disk Cleanup

to launch that tool for the disk you right-clicked (in Windows 98, 2000, and Me), or

select the Tools tab to open one of

Win-dows’ other system utilities

Click twice for Computer Management: Win-dows 2000 and XP provide fast access to the Computer Management utility To get

there, right-click My Computer and choose

Manage (see FIGURE 1)

Reset your clock: Don’t open the Control Panel to set the date, time, or time zone

Instead, right-click the clock in the

task-bar and choose Adjust Date/Time Better

yet, double-click the clock

Adjust your display the easy way:Control Panel isn’t the fastest route to your dis-play properties, either Just right-click

your desktop and choose Properties Right-click the taskbar and choose Minimize All Windows to expose the desktop, and right-click the taskbar and select Undo Mini-mize All to restore your windows.

Get to System Properties without Control Panel: To access System Properties,

right-click My Computer and choose Properties.

If the My Computer window is already open, right-click the system menu icon in the upper-left corner of the window (near the File menu) to see the same menu, minus the Rename option

A faster trip to Network Neighborhood: The quickest way to reach your network

set-tings is to right-click the Network Neigh-borhood icon on the desktop (My Network Places in Windows Me) and choose Prop-erties As with My Computer, if the

Net-work Neighborhood window is already open, right-click the system menu icon in the upper-left corner of the window (near the File menu) to see the same menu, again without the Rename option

E D I T E D B Y D E N N I S O ’ R E I L LY

HERE’S

HERE’S HOW

Right-Click for Faster

Windows Navigation

S C O T T D U N N

WINDOWS TIPS

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FIGURE 2: CHANGE YOUR keyboard’s scan codes to give notebook keys new functions.