All PC Tips

To remove the Recycle Bin from you desktop, follow these steps: 1. Click on the Start button and select Run 2. Type in 'regedit' and press OK 3. Look for this string: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Desktop\Namespace 4. Click on the 'Namespace' string in the left pane 5. Delete the 'Recycle Bin' string in the right pane. 6. Close regedit and reboot your computer

One way to run a chkdsk (this is like Scandisk that was with Win9X), is to 1. Double click on My Computer 2. Right click on the drive you want to check 3. Select Properties 4. Click on the Tools tab 5. Click on the Check Now button 6. Check to Automatically fix file system errors - This is the same as running chkdsk /f 7. If you want to Scan for and attempt recovery of bad sectors, check that box - This is the same as running chkdsk /R. It can also add a lot of time to the scan 8. Reboot if necessary You can also run chkdsk from the command line with will give you more options. The following switches are available: /F - fix any errors /R - identifies bad sectors /V - with FAT32, displays a verbose output With NTFS Volumes: /I - Performs simpler check (stage 2) /C - Skips the checking of cycles within folder structures /X - Forces the volume to dismount if necessary. Intended for server administrators and should be avoided for normal use.

If you share your computer with other people in your house and they have a habit of uninstalling programs from the Add/Remove list, or you don't want them seeing what is installed on your computer, you can take out any program from the list without actually uninstalling it. Just follow these steps.   1. Click on your Start button, select Run and type in regedit   2. Look for this key:      HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\ CurrentVersion\Uninstall   3. Look for the program you want to hide under the Uninstall      subkey and highlight it (If you see all numbers and      letters, highlight that key and look in the right pane      for the programs name)   4. Select Export from the File menu and select a name and      location for the .reg file that will be created   5. Now delete the program under the Uninstall subkey If you ever decide to u...

If you want to remove those irritating arrows from your desktop shortcut icons and not change their properties, follow these steps: 1. Right-click on an empty space on the Desktop 2. Select 'Properties' 3. Click on the 'Appearance' tab 4. Select 'Item' then Scroll for 'Icon' 5. Change the default size of 32 to 30 6. Click 'Apply'

1. Take a moment to defrag To improve performance in applications, including booting, is to make sure the drive is defragged. When a drive is fragmented, chunks of each file are scattered so in order to read them, the hdd's read/write head has to jump all over the platters wich takes time. By defragging, your files are arranged in sequential order. Use any defragmentation utility like Diskeeper. 2. Clean the rest of the startup folders To find which apps are loading every startup, click Start, Run then type MSCONFIG, then click the startup tab. Every item in this tab checked runs every time you boot, so cleaning the list will shave your boot time especially on systems with tons of apps. Anything having to do with your display, antivirus or spyware utilities can stay. If you dont know something, it is better to leave it be. If you are sure it is junk, delete it. 3. Prefetch (For Windows XP only) Whenever you run a program or open a file, Windows will add bits of the file...

As the Windows XP operating system begins to load, the Ntldr program refers to the Boot.ini file to determine where the operating system files reside and which options to enable as the operating system continues to load. So if there's a problem rooted in the Boot.ini file, it can render Windows XP incapable of booting correctly. If you suspect that Windows XP won't boot because Boot.ini has been corrupted, you can use the special Recovery Console version of the Bootcfg tool to fix it. Of course, you must first boot the system with the Windows XP CD and access the Recovery Console! To use the Bootcfg tool, from the Recovery Console command prompt, type Bootcfg /parameter Where /parameter is one of the required parameters listed in the table below. Parameter And Description /Add Scans the disk for all Windows installations and allows you to add any new ones to the Boot.ini file. /Scan Scans the disk for all Windows installations. /List Lists each entry in the Boot...

There is a way to keep people who use your PC from viewing your files: You can make every folder under My Documents private--meaning only you can access these folders and their contents. Anyone else is denied access. To make your My Documents folder private: 1. Right-click My Documents and then click Properties. 2. Click the Sharing tab and select the Do Not Share This Folder checkbox. 3. Click OK. Now all your folders and files are private. If you don't need this much privacy, you don't have to protect everything. You can simply follow the steps above to make individual folders private instead.

1. Log on to the computer as an administrator. Note: You must be logged on to the computer as either an administrator or a member of the Administrators group to complete this procedure. 2. Click Start, and then click Control Panel. 3. In Control Panel, double-click Add or Remove Programs. 4. Click Add/Remove Windows Components. The Windows Components Wizard starts and the Windows Components screen appears. The components that are available are: - Accessories and Utilities - Fax Service - Indexing Service - Internet Explorer - Internet Information Services (IIS) - Management and Monitoring Tools - Message Queuing - MSN Explorer - Networking Services - Other Network File and Print Services - Update Root Certificates Note: Internet Information Services (IIS) and Message Queuing are not included in Windows XP Home Edition. They are available only in Windows XP Professional. 5. You can either click to select or click to clear each check box to add or remove a co...