Tips from 0025 to 0050: |
26. Further speedup
broadband cable Internet connection It seems that Windows XP installs two separate
versions of the NIC card. One you do not normally see in any properties.
Remember the "netcap/?" command above showing two different
adapters? The LAN one is the one you see. The invisible one slows everything
down and its like your running two separate cards together, sharing
a connection among two cards. This method breaks This"bond"
and allows the NIC to run unhindered. |
27. Avoid download
of file attachments that may have virus infections |
28. Heard of Atomic
Clocks? or NIST ? Here is a tip on accurately setting your computer
clock Also you can add many more time servers directly into registry because by default all that you can see is two time servers in the drop down list. List of many other time servers is available at http://www.eecis.udel.edu/~mills/ntp/. To add any other time servers, get details about the server and then navigate to [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\DateTime\Servers] and adding them into the list. IMPORTANT DISCLAIMER: Before doing anything with registry, It is very important that you take a backup of registry by exporting it. Remember even a minor mistake in registry could render your system unusable or will cause it to stop or crash. XPTOOLS is not responsible for any such damage that may occur directly or indirectly as a result of your applying these changes. Don't try it if you are not sure. Use at your own risk. |
29.
Do you know there are two different command shell environments in XP ?
which one is better ? In Microsoft Windows XP Pro ( I think this must be true for HOME Edition, but don't quote on me), There is not one but two different command shell environment. One is the old one COMMAND.COM and other one is CMD.EXE. Both would do the job but they do it somewhat differently at a lower level. Which one is better ? I have noticed that CMD.EXE is much better in executing your commands. And this is true. CMD.EXE is the new command shell environment. that is better by design.So if you want to try out even your very old DOS apps, try it first in CMD.EXE. There is a very good chance that it will work and will work better than in your old shell. |
30. Ever wondered how
come you get into those HTML error pages ? Want to customize them ? http_400.htm, http_404.htm, http_406.htm, http_410.htm, http_500.htm, http_501.htm, http_gen.htm, servbusy.htm, syntax.htm, navcancl.htm, offcancl.htm, policyerror.htm, policylooking.htm, policynone.htm, policysyntaxerror.htm, privacypolicy.dlg, preview.dlg, printerr.htm, printnf.htm, printnof.htm, printunk.htm, wcee.htm, ietext.bmp, ietext256.bmp, world.bmp, world256.gif, ie.gif, ie256.gif, orgfav.dlg, about.dlg, analyze.dlg, bidifind.dlg, docppg.ppg, error.dlg, find.dlg, findic.dlg, ieerror.dlg, imageppg.ppg, orgfav.dlg, and pstemplate.dlg If you need to customize these messages, write
an error message that you want to see as displayed and store it somewhere
on your harddisk, open registry by going to START-RUN and entering REGEDIT
and navigate to Navigate to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Internet
Explorer\AboutURLs and changing entries associated with various keys
and provide complete path name to your own custom html file. |
31. If you have
a lot of RAM, do you really need swap file? IMPORTANT DISCLAIMER: Before doing anything with registry, It is very important that you take a backup of registry by exporting it. Remember even a minor mistake in registry could render your system unusable or will cause it to stop or crash. XPTOOLS is not responsible for any such damage that may occur directly or indirectly as a result of your applying these changes. Don't try it if you are not sure. Use at your own risk. |
32. How
to boost XP speed by by changing real time clock priority? I read about this trick the other day over Internet. Open Registry by going to START-RUN and typing REGEDIT. Navigate to [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\PriorityControl]. If you see an entry by the name IRQ8Priority set it to a value "IRQ8Priority"=dword:00000001 if you don't then click on the right pane and add a new dword entry with given name.. IRQ8 is typically reserved for real time clock in most of the computers. Make sure thats the case (by going to device manager -> system devices -> system COMS/realtime clock -> properties -> resources tab , if it is set to another number try adding an entry with that number N as IRQNPriority) . Generally realtime clock priority boosting helps most but you are free to try others as well. IMPORTANT DISCLAIMER: Before doing anything with registry, It is very important that you take a backup of registry by exporting it. Remember even a minor mistake in registry could render your system unusable or will cause it to stop or crash. XPTOOLS is not responsible for any such damage that may occur directly or indirectly as a result of your applying these changes. Don't try it if you are not sure. Use at your own risk. |
33. Reduce
IO and increase turnaround which means faster computer ! I read about this trick the other day over Internet. Open Registry by going to START-RUN and typing REGEDIT. Navigate to [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Session Manager\Memory Management\IoPageLockLimit. Depending upon how much RAM you have, you can increase your diskcache size by entering a higher value in IoPageLockLimit. Typically your computer won't come optimized for diskcache and you can set to a value which works best for you by trial and error.Rule of thumb is to have a ratio of 1 or 2 for every 64K chuck. But try out various different values as each case would be a little different IMPORTANT DISCLAIMER: Before doing anything with registry, It is very important that you take a backup of registry by exporting it. Remember even a minor mistake in registry could render your system unusable or will cause it to stop or crash. XPTOOLS is not responsible for any such damage that may occur directly or indirectly as a result of your applying these changes. Don't try it if you are not sure. Use at your own risk. |
34. Correctly set your
level 2 cache and improve performance !! Do not change the SecondLevelDataCache entry
(from Microsoft
technet article) (from Microsoft knowledge base item Q183063)This
is not related to the hardware; it is only useful for computers with
direct-mapped L2 caches. Pentium II and later processors do not have
direct- mapped L2 caches. SecondLevelDataCache can increase performance
by approximately 2 percent in certain cases for older computers with
ample memory (more than 64 MB) by scattering physical pages better in
the address space so there are not so many L2 cache collisions. Setting
SecondLevelDataCache to 256 KB rather than 2 MB (when the computer has
a 2 MB L2 cache) would probably have about a 0.4 percent performance
penalty. (From
an arstechnica
article) One of the most infamous
NT tweaks since the introduction of NT4 has got to be the "L2 cache"
tweak, a lone registry entry which stipulates the amount of L2 cache
(or secondary cache) that the OS will make use of. Well, as with many
things in life, the effects of this tweak are not so black and white.
If you're using a processor that implements a direct-mapped L2 cache
design (like Pentium I's), then this registry adjustment is indeed for
you. However, if you own any Intel processor post-PI, or any modern
AMD processor (K6-2 and newer), then your processor is using a set-associative
L2 cache design, and thus you need not specify your L2 cache size. Let
me explain. |
35. Do you
know you can have Virtual Desktops (like in Linux) with PowerToys ? If you have powertoys installed on Windows XP Its available for free at Microsoft website, visit my downloads webpage address) It is very easy to enable Microsoft Virtual Desktop Feature. Simply right click on the Start Panel Bar also called TaskBar, Click on Tool Bar and select Desktop manager. You would see a set of 5 icons placed on the right portion of the TAskBar. Click on number 1 to 4 to go to any of the desktops. Now you have have four different Active Desktops. IMPORTANT NOTE: You may see a little degradation in performance but for desktop work it is negligible. |
36. How
to login as administrator if you don't see it available
? Unless and until you have run into issues and fixing XP (underwhich case you have to go to Safe Mode to login as Administrator), you can get to administrator screen by simply pressing CTRL+ALT+DELETE twice at the main screen. |
37. How to avoid password
entry at start up ? I have received some criticism for asking users
to set their password length to 0 and I agree to some of the potential
security risks. Here is one better way to do it. Open Registry by going
to START-RUN and typing REGEDIT. Navigate to [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\CrashControl]
Before doing anything with registry, It is very important that you take a backup of registry by exporting it. Remember even a minor mistake in registry could render your system unusable or will cause it to stop or crash. XPTOOLS is not responsible for any such damage that may occur directly or indirectly as a result of your applying these changes. Don't try it if you are not sure. Use at your own risk. |
38. How to stop new
programs installed balloon from coming up? |
39. How to improve
on shutdown time ? Close apps automatically & quickly at shutdown IMPORTANT DISCLAIMER: Before doing anything with registry, It is very important that you take a backup of registry by exporting it. Remember even a minor mistake in registry could render your system unusable or will cause it to stop or crash. XPTOOLS is not responsible for any such damage that may occur directly or indirectly as a result of your applying these changes. Don't try it if you are not sure. Use at your own risk. |
40. Speedup boot up
sequence by defragmenting all key boot files IMPORTANT DISCLAIMER: Before doing anything with registry, It is very important that you take a backup of registry by exporting it. Remember even a minor mistake in registry could render your system unusable or will cause it to stop or crash. XPTOOLS is not responsible for any such damage that may occur directly or indirectly as a result of your applying these changes. Don't try it if you are not sure. Use at your own risk. |
41. Create your own
customized legal notice at Windows Startup IMPORTANT DISCLAIMER: Before doing anything with registry, It is very important that you take a backup of registry by exporting it. Remember even a minor mistake in registry could render your system unusable or will cause it to stop or crash. XPTOOLS is not responsible for any such damage that may occur directly or indirectly as a result of your applying these changes. Don't try it if you are not sure. Use at your own risk. |
42. One
more way to fine tune Internet. Explorer load time If you do this little trick, application load time may improve significantly. Right Click on shortcut to Internet. Explorer in taskbar ( If you do not see it right click on taskbar,click toolbar and select quicklaunch) , click on properties and under shortcut tab look for Target field. It should say some thing like "C:\Program Files\Internet. Explorer\IEXPLORE.EXE". This is typical default. I am suggesting you to put " -nohome" without quotes at the end of this string with one space in between. It should read like this "C:\Program Files\Internet. Explorer\IEXPLORE.EXE" -nohome. Doing this would help load the application quickly as time would not be wasted in connecting to home page again and again. This is good for normal use as well. |
43. Customize Internet.
Explorer Title bar |
44. Are
you a MP3 fan ? Add ability to rip MP3 songs in Windows Media Player 8
I am not that great a fan of MP3 but do appreciate its power. If you have a truckload of CDs that you would like to listen to but do not want to carry all of them at the same time, you can rip them into MP3. Yes it can be done technically and that too from Windows Media Player even though make sure you have legally on right side of fence, meaning you own the CD that you would rip MP3 from. That said here is the little tweak in registry. Open Registry by going to START-RUN and typing REGEDIT. Navigate to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\MediaPlayerSettings\MP3Encoding] and adding following entries "LowRate"=dword:0000dac0 "MediumRate"=dword:0000fa00 "MediumHighRate"=dword:0001f400 "HighRate"=dword:0002ee00 which corresponds to 56, 64, 128 and 192 Kbps. Following table would help with other settings as well: 320 Kbps = dword:0004e200 IMPORTANT DISCLAIMER: Before doing anything with registry, It is very important that you take a backup of registry by exporting it. Remember even a minor mistake in registry could render your system unusable or will cause it to stop or crash. XPTOOLS is not responsible for any such damage that may occur directly or indirectly as a result of your applying these changes. Don't try it if you are not sure. Use at your own risk. Also all of your acts must conform to the law of the land. |
45. Enable
write caching on disk and improve disk performance I have enable write caching on my disk. This has a significant boost in computer performance Now you may ask why. Write Cache is nothing else but concept of delayed write. As we all know I/O activities are generally slow and hence if they are synchronous can significantly reduce the system performance Hence if system performance has to be improved we have to reduce I/O activities. Now practically we can not ask you to change your habits (meaning start typing like a superman or robot etc.) but we can have a solution. I can regulate the diskwrite at regular intervals. All that we need to write in between the interval would get stored in a write buffer which would be written to the disk at regular intervals or whenever it gets full. This is smart concept with one drawback. There is a chance that you may loose some data in case of critical power loss or system failure but this is not an issue to me or to most of the users. It only is an issue for Mission Critical Business Servers. Any to enable write cache on your disk, go to DEVICE MANAGER. Then select hard disk in the disk drives and right click and select properties. Go to policies tab and select checkbox which say "Enable write caching on the disk". Close out everything and you are done. |
46. MFT (Master File
Table) manipulations to improve disk performance IMPORTANT DISCLAIMER: Before doing anything with registry, It is very important that you take a backup of registry by exporting it. Remember even a minor mistake in registry could render your system unusable or will cause it to stop or crash. XPTOOLS is not responsible for any such damage that may occur directly or indirectly as a result of your applying these changes. Don't try it if you are not sure. Use at your own risk. |
47. Improve
system performance and Reduce MFT fragmentation by disabling DOS 8.3 naming
convention In tip number 46, I briefly mentioned MFT fragmentation. So what is the cause of fragmentation. Well most common cause is too much use. As with anything excessive use causes fragmentation. Activities of add/update/delete to a section of disk would invariable cause it to fragment. So there is no permanent solution as we can not avoid these acts. As such it is a good idea to use disk defragmenter regularly. Contiguous data which results from defragmenting disk, improves system performance considerably. But what I am suggesting you here would prolong intervals between defragmentations resulting in more time for your own productive work. OK! This tip is for those folks would never be using a DOS based program or don't care for connection from DOS based operating systems (example: old games and all things before windows 95). In Windows XP, two file names are created for each file one is the actual name and another one is 8.3 version of that file name for compatibility with DOS based programs. Now this work name in the name of compatibility takes quite a lot of system resources specifically CPU time and disk space.But this is not it, it also increases your MFT utilization and fragmentation. So the solution is to disable it. How to do this ? Open Registry by going to START-RUN and entering REGEDIT and Navigate to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\FileSystem. In right pane, look for key by the name "NtfsDisable8dot3NameCreation" and sets its value to 1. Thats it. You would see improvement in system performance for sure. IMPORTANT DISCLAIMER: Before doing anything with registry, It is very important that you take a backup of registry by exporting it. Remember even a minor mistake in registry could render your system unusable or will cause it to stop or crash. XPTOOLS is not responsible for any such damage that may occur directly or indirectly as a result of your applying these changes. Don't try it if you are not sure. Use at your own risk. |
48. Customize
logon prompt with your own words This tip won't make your computer any faster but may help personalize your computer experience. Open Registry by going to START-RUN and entering REGEDIT and Navigate to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Winlogon. In right pane, look for key by the name "LogonPrompt". Set its value to whatever text you want to see displayed at login screen. IMPORTANT DISCLAIMER: Before doing anything with registry, It is very important that you take a backup of registry by exporting it. Remember even a minor mistake in registry could render your system unusable or will cause it to stop or crash. XPTOOLS is not responsible for any such damage that may occur directly or indirectly as a result of your applying these changes. Don't try it if you are not sure. Use at your own risk. |
49. Where
does Window's ProductId get stored ? There are two places at least where ProductId gets stored. To see the first place, open Registry by going to START-RUN and entering REGEDIT and Navigate to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion. In right pane, look for key by the name "ProductId". This is your Windows Product Id. Alternatively you can navigate to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion and still find same field with the name ProductId. IMPORTANT DISCLAIMER: Before doing anything with registry, It is very important that you take a backup of registry by exporting it. Remember even a minor mistake in registry could render your system unusable or will cause it to stop or crash. XPTOOLS is not responsible for any such damage that may occur directly or indirectly as a result of your applying these changes. Don't try it if you are not sure. Use at your own risk. |
50. Set
the low level hook time-out and stop certain programs from crashing or
becoming unstable One of the things that you can do avoid some programs from becoming unstable is to set a low level hook timeout. There are a few programs which use this low level hook timeout. Setting a low value (in milliseconds) means that if the hooked program does not respond within timeout period, one that has set the hook would not become unstable or go in infinite wait but would kill itself saving windows resources and improving performance. Open Registry by going to START-RUN and entering REGEDIT and Navigate to HKEY_CURRRENT USER\Control Panel\Desktop\LowLevelHooksTimeout and entering a small number in milliseconds. IMPORTANT DISCLAIMER: Before doing anything with registry, It is very important that you take a backup of registry by exporting it. Remember even a minor mistake in registry could render your system unusable or will cause it to stop or crash. XPTOOLS is not responsible for any such damage that may occur directly or indirectly as a result of your applying these changes. Don't try it if you are not sure. Use at your own risk. |