Windows Tips and tricks

http://www.stealthcomputer.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2009/10/Windows-7-XP-mode.jpg

Using your windows key


Most of you must have this windows key on your computer . On a windows computer this is a very important shortcut key. In combination with other keys this key forms a very important shortcut which can be used to performe some important tasks shown below:



Windows key combinationCommand / Acction
+ E Open windows explorer
+ R Opens Run Dialog box
+ L Locks your computer/workstation
+ D Shows Desktop (it works like minimize all. If you press + D again it will restore back all the windows) this is quiet a useful key.
+ M Select application starting with M on your desktop. (Generally My Computer)
+ U Shows windows utility manager. (Not so useful command)
+ F Opens Find window
+ H Opens drawing pad
+ V Speech recognition software
+ TabCycle throught Applications on your taskbar
+Shift+ Tab Reverse Cycle throught Applications on your taskbar
+ break Show system property dialog box

Thanks Nilashis for liking my post. But i could really do with some more replies. It motivates me to write more... newayz.. here is more coming..

Most of the times when we are typing some stuff we hate to have to use mouse. it is really good if we had some keyboard shortcuts to do the work we want .. well, in fact we do have many shortcuts. I will start with how we can start may applications just by bringing up the run dialog box. Below i have listed some applications and their commands...





Pressing “ + R” will bring the run window. Type in the following commands and hit enter to bring the respective application.

The commands mentioned here are generic commands and should work for windows 98 and above although I have only tested them on Windows XP.

Command to typeApplication that will open
notepadNotepad
winword Microsoft word document
excel Microsoft excel document
msaccess Microsoft Access
powerpnt Microsoft Power Point
mspaint Paint
iexplore Internet Explorer
firefox Fire Fox
calc Calculator
outlook Microsoft Outlook
control Control panel
desktop Opens your desktop as a folder
explorer Opens windows explorer
cmd Command prompt


[/glow]




Commands mentioned below are some advanced commands which open up utilities to configure windows.

Command to typeApplication that will open
services.msc Microsoft Service Console
msconfig System configuration utility
regedit Registry Editor
certmgr.msc Certificate Manager
mmc Microsoft Management console

[/glow]


The applications mentioned below opens for office 2003.

Command to typeApplication that will open
infopath Microsoft Office Infopath 2003
mspub Microsoft Publisher 2003
ois         Microsoft Office Picture Manager
[/glow]


Now some interesting stuff......

Command to typeApplication that will open
. (Single Dot) Your user folder.
.. (Two Dots) A level higher than your user folder (generally Document and setting folder)
…(Three Dots )Two level higher than your user folder (generally My computer)



Some tips to make your computer faster


1)
Probably most of us are using windows XP as operating system on our computers. XP is know for its better graphics display over its predecessors. But this graphics display comes at a cost of CPU performance. So if you are not so awed by the looks of XP or want a change it for whatsoever reason here is what you can do:

 i) On "My Computer" icon right click and go to "Properties".
ii)Â In the "Sysetm Properties" dialog click on Advance tab.
iii) In the "Advance" tab, inside the performance section there is a "Settings" button. Click it.
iv) In the "Visual Effects" tab, there are various radio buttons. Click on "Adjust for best performance" radio button.
v) Click on "Apply".

Doing this will give your desktop a more traditional look and feel but you will observe some increase in your PC's performance. Personally i love this look and feel more than the XP default look and feel.




2)
Most of us have multiple partition hard disk. When partitioning a hard disk do we ever think the amount we assign to each partition? Well I am not about to go into the details of partitioning but whenever you partition a hard disk remember to give at least 20 GB of space to your system drive (Drive where your OS is installed, typically C:). Keep as much free space on your system drive as possible.

Windows uses a process called as "paging" to allocate runtime memory (also called as virtual memory) to programs. This happens because our RAMs are not always sufficient to handle all theapplication process. Due to this a filled called "pagefile.sys" is created on your system drive. So keep as much space on your system drive as possible. Also regularly defragment your system drive. this will improve the access to the sytsem files by the OS improving the performance of your computer.




3)
Improving your startup.

Whenever you start your windows, many programs are scheduled to start with it automatically. There are many ways to do this, E.g. put the program shortcut manually in Start --> Programs --> Start up or put the program entry in Autoexe.bat file or create a registry entry in the startup section. Well, even though these can be scheduled to start differently, there is a single way to view them: "msconfig" the configuration utility.

Click on Start --> Run.
In the Run dialog type "msconfig" and hit enter.
System Configuration utility dialog box comes up.

The last tab in this dialog box is a startup tab will all the programs schedule to startup start when windows start. Most of these utilities are not requied in our day to day work. Some of them are even viruses or worms or trogans. So remove the programs that you think are not required during startup. To do this uncheck the box against the startup item and click apply.

Now probably the question in your mind is how to decide which items to uncheck and which items to keep untouched??? We have an excellent guide for this. http://www.sysinfo.org/startuplist.php . Here you will find most of the startup program and what to do with them.

Unwanted startup programs not only slows your startup but also runs as a background process clogging your valuable CPU resource time.


Using your windows key


Most of you must have this windows key on your computer . On a windows computer this is a very important shortcut key. In combination with other keys this key forms a very important shortcut which can be used to performe some important tasks shown below:



Windows key combinationCommand / Acction
+ E Open windows explorer
+ R Opens Run Dialog box
+ L Locks your computer/workstation
+ D Shows Desktop (it works like minimize all. If you press + D again it will restore back all the windows) this is quiet a useful key.
+ M Select application starting with M on your desktop. (Generally My Computer)
+ U Shows windows utility manager. (Not so useful command)
+ F Opens Find window
+ H Opens drawing pad
+ V Speech recognition software
+ TabCycle throught Applications on your taskbar
+Shift+ Tab Reverse Cycle throught Applications on your taskbar
+ break Show system property dialog box




No comments:

Post a Comment