Show Start Menu Faster

This is just minor and very easy tweak. If you think your start menu don’t show up fast enough when you click, you can remove any delay from menus sliding out.

To do this, you can simply edit registry value.

• First Go to Start menu –>> Run
• Then type regedit, press enter
• Browse to HKEY_CURRENT_USERControl PanelDesktop
• You will see the key, called MenuShowDelay, with the value 400.
• Double click and change the value to 0.

Just like any other registry change to take effect, you need to restart your computer. That’s it! Your start menu will show faster.

How to keep NumLock on for every boot

Every time you boot your computer, you observe that NumLock is off. But from your office or another computer, it boot with always NumLock is on. So you may want to make your computer to boot up with NumLock on too. How to make it?

Go to Registry Editor by

• Click Start Menu–>> Run –>> Type regedit
• And then go to this registry key.
  HKEY_CURRENT_USERControl PanelKeyboard
• -Double click on InitialKeyboardIndicators
• -Type 2

After that you restart your computer and you will see the NumLock as the way you want it.

Source : Microsoft

How to create Desktop icon shortcut

Some of you may accidentally delete Desktop icon shortcut from Quick Launch. Don’t sweat it! You can easily recreate it. Follow these steps.

• 1. Open your Notepad.
• 2. Type the following :

[Shell]
Command=2
IconFile=explorer.exe,3
[Taskbar]
Command=ToggleDesktop

• 3. Save the file as Show Desktop.scf on the desktop.
• 4. After that, just drag and drop to the Quicklaunch bar.

That’s it! It’s easy.

Source : Microsoft

How to delete undeletable files

How many times have we been annoyed by that messages? Oh yeah, there are many alternatives of above such as :

• Cannot delete file: Access is denied
• There has been a sharing violation.
• The source or destination file may be in use.
• The file is in use by another program or user.
• Make sure the disk is not full or write-protected and that the file is not currently in use.

I’ve got two ways to solve this problem.

First way : If you’re not tech buddy, you should go to second way.

• Go to Start menu –>> Run –>> type cmd and press enter (this will open command prompt)
• After that press Ctrl+Alt+Del to bring up task manager
• Go to Process tab, find explorer.exe, then click End Process.
• Your Taskbar will disappear.

• Go back to the Command prompt you just left opened.
• Browse folder or file you want to delete.
• Delete file with del command and remove directory with rmdir command.
• After that, in the task manager, choose File –>> New Task (Run..)
• Then type explorer.exe.
• Your taskbar will appear again.

Second way : I recommend this. This is really easy. Just download and install Unlocker, which is very useful freeware especially for this purpose. After you installed the program, all you have to do is simply right click the folder or file and select Unlocker. You can do Delete, Rename, Move at your finger tips.

Frankly speaking, I really recommend you guys to follow Second way. I intend first method for those of you who just want to know workaround or who don’t wanna install any extra programs.

Microsoft Windows 95 commercial

After I’ve enjoyed Pirates of the Silicon Valley, I was looking for Windows 95 commercial. I thought that commercial would be quite interesting as what I’ve seen Apple commercial for Mac is too self-arrogant and frankly, I feel funny.

Besides the facts that all those data in that movie is accurate or not, I’ve enjoyed the movie and I liked this commercial too.

Sometimes, we should know the history. History made us who we are today.

Hide your Windows from Network Neighborhood

Using computer in public places is unsafe anyway. If your Windows show up in Network Neighborhood or My Network Places, other users in your office LAN or public LAN can access your share files. So, how I can you share your files without showing up in Network Neighborhood?

It’s very simple. Just follow these steps.

Go to Start menu –>> Run
Type cmd, then press Enter
In command prompt, type net config server

If you see “Server hidden” is “No”, that means other users can see your share files in My Network Places. You can change it by typing the following command.

net config server /hidden:yes

So from now on, the only way the other users can access your share files is via your ip address. In DHCP environment, other users wouldn’t know it unless you gave them.

Find related artists in visual

We all have our favorite musicians. But sometimes, our favorite singer release new album once in three years or more. We want to listen music quite similar. We have to look for related artists from online store such as Amazon.

I have found this very interesting website, Music Map, that let us search similar artist to your favorite one. They will return the search in the draft map. The closer the artist name to your favorite (which is in center), the higher probability that you’ll like that artist too. See the following screenshot that I search for Eminem alike.

Obviously, for my instinct, I know that 50 cent, DMX, D12, Nelly, Dr. Dre and 2Pac are rapper, I don’t think there’s any reason Celine Dion should be related to Eminem. I mean I’ve never heard of her rapping. Okay, nothing is perfect.

Even though, it’s not sure bullet proof, it’s enjoyable.

Internet Search

I know internet search become one of daily routines in our life. All people use major four search engines such as Google, Yahoo, MSN (Windows Live) and Ask. Actually, most people search internet in that order. First they try Google, after that Yahoo, after that MSN (Windows Live) and then Ask. We all know that Google is the king of the king in search engines market. But wouldn’t it be nice your search terms to search simultaneously on all four major search engines.

You should try Dogpile. It will search your keywords in all four and then return you with results and even where that result come from.

For examples, my search for bridge to nova returns at No. 9 and only from Google (Yeah, that’s why I said they are the king).

You should try it too. It’s really fun to see which one return what. By the way, if you wanna know more about Google search, don’t forget to check out my Google search tips article.

Microsoft BlueScreen Screen Saver

Microsoft has been famous and criticized for their BlueScreen of Death(BSOD). Most people of Windows 95, 98 era scariest nightmare is they saw BSOD.

But since Windows XP, Microsoft has greatly improved their OS and at Vista, I have been using for six months, I have never seen BSOD again.

As BSOD become a thing in the past, now Microsoft even made fun of it by releasing BlueScreen Screensaver. First time I know Microsoft has a sense of humor.

What’s this screensaver?

Bluescreen cycles between different Blue Screens and simulated boots every 15 seconds or so. Virtually all the information shown on Bluescreen’s BSOD and system start screen is obtained from your system configuration – its accuracy will fool even advanced NT developers. For example, the NT build number, processor revision, loaded drivers and addresses, disk drive characteristics, and memory size are all taken from the system Bluescreen is running on.

Use Bluescreen to amaze your friends and scare your enemies!

Command Prompt Options most people don’t know

If you haven’t known it before, I know you’re wondering are there any options exist in command prompt or not? Well, they do exist. To access,

First Start Menu –>> Run –>> Type cmd and press enter.

Command Prompt Configurable Options

After that left click on the top corner of command prompt dialog box as below :

Click on Defaults and you will see the following dialog box.

Let me explain you about the Edit Options. There are three Edit Options available : QuickEdit Mode, Insert Mode and AutoComplete mode.

QuickEdit Mode : If you select this one, you can copy the text in the Command Prompt window with your left mouse button, and then right-click to paste either at the command prompt or in a text file.

Insert Mode : This mode is same function as keyboard key insert. If you select this mode, you can insert text at the point of the cursor, if you don’t select this option, the text will be override.

AutoComplete Mode : This option is available from the Windows XP and later version only. It allows you to quickly complete available commands when you type Tab or if you don’t type anything and just start pressing tab , it will cycle through the available items in the current working directory.

You can select and unselect that mode as you desire.

List of Commands you typed

Most of you may probably know that you can get to the last few commands you typed by pressing the up arrow key. Well, I believe only a few of you know that you can view and select command you typed earlier by pressing F7 key to bring the following dialog box.

These command prompt options exist as early as Windows 95 (maybe even Windows 3.1 but who cares?). Most people are not aware that these options even exist. By knowing these things, you can brag your friends or speed up your work.

Reference : Microsoft