A Few Windows XP Tips

*Reach Run quickly*
Here's a quicker way to reach the Run dialog box, if you don't want to go
through the Start menu. Just hit the Windows key + R.

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Looking for a better screen font display?*
Enable ClearType, Microsoft's trademark font display technology, for a
drastic improvement in screen font rendering. Right-click anywhere on your
desktop. Now select Properties. Under the Appearance tab, click Effects.
Check the box for Use the following method to smooth edges of screen fonts,
and in the drop-down menu, select ClearType. Press OK, and apply the change.
*
Change your mouse pointer scheme*
Bored of the same old arrow? To change your mouse pointer scheme, in the
Control Panel, select Mouse and go to the Pointers tab. Scroll through the
available schemes, pick one that you like and click Apply.
*
Check that your Windows Firewall is turned on*
To make sure your Windows Firewall hasn't been accidentally disabled, go to
your Control Panel and click Windows Firewall. Make sure the radio button
for On (recommended) is selected. Add exceptions to your Firewall by going
to the Exceptions tab and adding the programs that you think should have
access to the Internet to the list of exceptions.
*
Instantly activate your screensaver*
In XP, you can put a short cut of your favourite screensaver on your desktop
to instantly start your screen saver. Here's how. Go to Start on your
desktop and click on Search. In the help box, click on All files and
folders. and then type in *.scr. Select your screen saver file and right
click. Then select Send To, and then Desktop.

*
Put your Monitor to sleep *
Right click on the desktop and click on Properties. In the dialog box that
appears, click on the Screen Saver tab. Click on Power and in the dialog box
that appears click on the Turn off Monitor list. Select a time to
automatically after which the monitor will be turned off. Click OK twice and
you're set.

*
Using your Windows Key*
Your Windows key can be used to for many short cuts. If you want to open
your Windows Explorer quickly just press your Windows key and E. If you want
to open the Run dialog box, just press the Windows key and R. If you want to
open your search dialog box, press your Windows key and F.

*
Instantly lock your PC*
If you have password protected your Windows, here is a quick way to lock it.
Press the Windows key and L together.*

Change the look of folder icons*
If you don't like the look of the folder icons on your desktop, you can
change them. Right click on the folder, select Properties. Click on the
Customize tab, and under the Folder icons area, click on the Change Icons
button. Select the icon of your choice and select OK.*

Minimize a Window to your taskbar*
If you're tired of using the mouse over and over again to minimize a window,
here's a handy tip. To minimize a window using just the keyboard, press Alt,
Spacebar and N together.*

Display album art in your music folder thumbnails*
If your music files are in WMA format, XP automatically picks up the album
art and displays it, both in the folder thumbnail as well as in the Windows
Media Player display. If your files are in MP3 format, you can download the
album art from the Internet and then customize each folder to display it.
But this takes a lot of time. A faster way around is to save each image as
'folder.jpg' and put it in the correct folder. Once you do this, XP will
pick up that image and use it as the thumbnail for the folder, and also use
the image to display in Windows Media Player while playing songs from the
album.*

How to stop Windows Media Player from accessing your information*
You may be uncomfortable with the idea of Windows Media Player collecting
your information and sending it to various websites. You can stop this. Go
to the Tools menu of Windows Media Player. Select Options and then go to the
Player tab. Look for the check box that says "Allow Internet sites to
uniquely identify your player?" and make sure it is not selected.*

Opening folders with a single click*
If you'd rather not have to double-click everything to open it, here's the
way out. Go to My Computer, and select Options in the Tools menu. Choose
Folder options. In the dialog box that opens, select the check box that says
'Single-click to open an item (point to select)', and click OK.*

Making web pages available offline*
You may occasionally need to refer to a website, and you may not be able to
connect to the Internet at the time. An easy way out of the situation is to
go to the Favourites tab in Internet Explorer, and click Add to Favourites.
In the dialog box that is displayed, select the Make available offline check
box, and press OK.