Cool Windows XP tips & tricks Cool blog full of useful how-to's and tutorials about windows XP. Statistics Unique Visitors: Total Unique Visitors: Outgoing: Total Outgoing: 0 0 46 59

Articles from Cool Windows XP tips & tricks

Folder Types on Windows XP 2008-05-04 13:45:25 There are different types of folders, each one best for its type of contents. There are separate image folders that serve as an album, music that have an alphabetical playlist and document folders which display a table of the documents within. The tools and options on the left sidebar are also different for each type of folder. Your XP looks at what types of files there are in a folder and turns the folder into what it thinks is best for the content, but sometimes it can make mistakes. To specify which type you want the folder to be, right-click it, select properties and choose the customize tab. Select the type you want from the list of templates. If you want to simplify visual navigation, press the change icon button in the same window and choose a suitable icon for the type of folder it is. More Cool Windows XP tips & tricks HERE! ...

How to bypass website block 2008-04-27 05:04:15 Have you’re favorite sites been blocked at your school or work network? I will show you a few easy methods how you can still access them. 1) Go to Xroxy proxy list (or http://www.samair.ru/proxy/) and get yourself one proxy (preferably in a country close to you) and copy the IP.  (Note! This works for Mozilla Firefox only!) Go to Tools -> Options -> Advanced -> Network -> Settings and set it to “manual proxy configuration”. Copy the IP in the first slot and after that copy the port number. (Note! Not all of them work perfectly so you might have to a few of them until you get a good one!) 2) The second method works like that that you just enter the url of the website you want to visit to this site, http://www.prxy.info/ . A bit easier but you have to surf trough the proxy site (for blocked sites). ...

How to make an invisible desktop folder 2008-04-26 11:04:50 This is for all you people that have stuff to hide… good stuff..  ahem.. back to the tutorial - an invisible desktop folder. So you basically need a folder with a blank icon and no name. Here is how to create one: 1. Create a new folder. This doesn’t work with a used or renamed folder. 2. Right-click the folder and choose rename. Press 0160 on the num pad while holding down the Alt key. The name should disappear and be replaced with a blank space. 3. Right click the folder, choose Properties, select the Customize tab and choose Change icon. Select a blank icon space. ...

Blocking websites 2008-04-24 12:00:27 Want to bully your friends by blocking their favorite websites or just want to hide some web pages from your children? Here’s how you can block certain websites on your home computer: Step 1: Click the Start button and select Run. Type the following text in that Run box: notepad c:WINDOWSsystem32driversetchosts Step 2: You will see a new notepad window on your screen containing some cryptic information. Don’t panic. Just go to the last line of the file, hit the enter key and type the following (for example): 127.0.0.1 myspace.com Save the file and exit. That’s it. None of the above sites will now open on your computer. You can block as many websites as you like with the above technique. If you want to remove the ban later, open the same file as mentioned in Step 1 and delete the above lines. ...

How to shut down in 5 seconds or less 2008-04-24 10:10:03 The normal shutdown can be very time consuming, especially if you have programs or background services open. To shut down a lot faster, save all your open documents and open the Task Manager by pressing Ctrl + Alt + Delete. Press Shut Down from the menu and choose Turn Off. You can also choose log off, restart, standby, etc. to perform the tasks faster than usual. ...

Top 5 Windows XP system tools 2008-04-24 09:17:33 Your XP, just like any other, will tend to become sluggish over time. To help itself, it has several built-in tools and programs that you can use. I’ll show you the 5 most useful ones. The Local Group Policy Editor Such a pity this tool only exists on Windows XP Professional, as this lets you customize just about everything on your PC. To open it, go to Start > Run, and type gpedit.msc The Group Policy Editor is much easier to use than the registry, and pretty much anyone can understand it. You need to have a Windows XP Professional computer and admin privileges to use it though. Read More.. 2. Disk Defragmenter This useful tool lets you fix any fragmented drives on your pc. Defragmenting helps avoid file corruption and speeds up accessing files on the hard drive. To defragment a drive, go to Start > All Programs >Accessories > System Tools > Disk Defragmenter. Choose the hard drive you want and press Defragment. Depending on how fragmented the drive is, this ...

Mozilla Firefox wastes room 2008-04-22 10:44:28 Many people who use Mozilla Firefox might have noticed that you have a large part of the web page covered with toolbars. I’ll show you how to get more room in your internet browser. The most commonly used (but actually, a pretty pointless thing) is the favorites toolbar which you can simply remove by clicking View -> Toolbars -> Bookmarks Toolbar (Note: If you have a newer computer, you probably have a widescreen monitor which is of no use when surfing in the web, so you can simply go to View -> Sidebar -> Bookmarks and move them to the side of your browser!) Now that you have a bit more room, the next thing to do is to make the buttons a bit smaller. To do that, go to View -> Toolbars -> Customize and activate the option “small icons”. I also removed the menu bar which you can remove by going View -> Toolbars -> Mainmenu Toolbar. If you still want make make some things smaller, remove some buttons, etc. I suggest you to download UI Twea ...

Customize your desktop 2008-04-22 08:14:36 Have you ever wondered how to make your desktop look as cool as this? Although Microsoft could have made the customizing a bit simpler, we can still do it pretty easily. * Desktop First of all you should get yourself a proper wallpaper. In my opinion the best site to search for them is Deviantart . * Startbar Tired of the ugly appearance of Windows XP? Well, a good solution is to download UxTheme Multi-Patcher and search for some new themes for your PC. * Icons So you’ve got yourself the following things and you’re searching for new icons for your folders, to add a little bit more beauty to your desktop. You can get whole packs of icons from Deviantart. If you want to use them,  right click on a folder choose properties ->  the customize tab -> change icon. Browse and select the icons you downloaded. Another thing that you can do, is to change all the icons of your computer at once. For that, download IconTweaker and google yourself some new icon packs. That&rsqu ...

How to install 3rd party screensavers 2008-04-21 11:24:48 Third party screensavers are screensavers that are not installed by default or are not from Microsoft. Most of them use flash to operate and are often not up-to-date, so they search for the wrong version of it. An error message: Could find the file f”lash.ocx” is typically displayed when this occurs. The new version of flash has the filename flash9e.ocx and you need to create a copy of it, named flash.ocx to fix this problem. To do this: 1. Go to C:WINDOWSsystem32MacromedFlash 2. Look for flash9e.ocx and copy it 3. Paste into the same folder and name the copy flash.ocx. More Cool Windows XP tips & tricks HERE! ...

How to make your desktop icons transparent 2008-04-20 12:28:13 It’s up to you to decide which way you like them, but I personally find the default icons that have the awful blue drop shadow very annoying, as it looks like they are all selected. To remove the drop shadow: 1. Go to: Start > Control panel > Performance and Maintenance > Adjust Visual Effects 2. Uncheck the box for use drop shadows for icon labels on the desktop which is right near the bottom. ...

How to hack into an administrator account on XP! 2008-04-17 01:46:00 As far as I know, this only works with Windows XP Media Center Edition, but you can try on a normal XP as well.. Start the computer and press F8 repeatedly while booting. Choose start in safe mode from the menu that appears. Log in as Administator Now you can install programs or even give your own account admin privileges! To do this, go to Control Panel > User accounts > User accounts and click on your icon. Click change the account type and choose Administrator. If you want to get into a specific account, go back to the User accounts menu and remove the password for the account you want. Just reboot for the changes to take effect. That’s all there is to it. Happy hacking! More Cool Windows XP tips & tricks ...

How to restore your computer to a previous point 2008-04-12 10:35:29 Restoring your system is very useful if you manage to get your pc completely messed up. To access the system restore program, go to Start > All Programs > Accessories > System Tools > System Restore. In the window that opens, select Restore my computer to an earlier time and press Next. Select a restore point before the time you messed up your computer and continue. Now it asks you to save any work that is not saved and close any programs that are open. Press Next to begin the restore. Your computer will restart and start up as it was at the time of the restoration point you selected. Note: you won’t lose any files you’ve created, but any programs installed after the chosen restoration point will be uninstalled. You can always undo the restoration if something goes missing. If your pc is so messed up that it won’t even let you log in, you have to start it in safe mode by repeatedly pressing F8 while its starting up and choosing Start in Safe Mode. You h ...

April Fools’ Day threats 2008-04-01 13:28:00 Its fun to make a prank virus, but getting the real thing is not so great. April Fools’ Day is a good opportunity for hackers to spread viruses, as people will open suspicious e-mails more readily, thinking they’re jokes. You should avoid any emails whose sender you are not familiar with, and remember: if something looks malicious, it probably is. Here are a few latest threats from Symatec.com: 1. Multiple sites affected in IFRAME attackMany popular sites have been affected by IFRAME injection attacks. Ensure that antivirus software is up to date and that all Windows updates are installed. More… 2. Exploit targeting MS08-014 flaw releasedA public exploit for an Excel vulnerability has surfaced. Malicious Excel files may circulate via email, instant messaging and file sharing. The issue was patched in the MS08-014 bulletin — ensure that Excel updates are installed. Use caution when handling email. More… More at symatec threat explorer. So keep a cle ...

How to make fake virus and error messages! 2008-03-31 22:15:00 Disclaimer: This a harmless joke. I take no responsibility, whatsoever, for the consequences. There are several kinds of fake virus messages you can make. I will discuss 4 of them: 1. Fake error message This one is by far, the easiest and all you have to do is to make a new text document with notepad, type msg * YOUR MESSAGE and save as anything.bat. As always, make sure that you select All files instead of Text Document. 2. Forced shutdown.This will display a custom error message and start a countdown which will shut down the computer. Right-click your desktop and create a new shortcut.Paste the following code into the Location box in the Create Shortcut menu:shutdown -s -t 30 -c “Your message here”Replace 30 with the length of the countdown you want (in seconds) and place your custom error message between the quotes. Click next and name the shortcut to something the victim would be likely to click on such as “Internet explorer” or “My Documents&rdquo ...

How to move the cursor with your head 2008-03-31 11:16:00 This is probably one of the coolest things I’ve posted here so far. With any cheap webcam and a free piece of software from IBM, you can move your cursor, click, type text with an on-screen keyboard and much more - just by moving your head. What you need:1. a head (duh)2. a webcam3. Head tracking pointer by IBMThe download is easy, just fill out the form to create an IBM id and press download. You also need to extract the zip folder to any comfortable location. How to use:The program itself is very smart and will discover any webcams connected.To start, connect your webcam and open the head tracker. It needs quite a lot of light to work well, but not too much, or it won’t tell your nose apart from the rest of your over-lighted face. Tilt your head left and right 3 times and look straight at the center of the screen to let it find your nose position, which it will use to determine where you’re looking at. You can repeat this at any time, if it starts tracking incor ...