Fix Windows Vista Errors

You will notice in Vista (also in XP) that whenever you make a shortcut the word ’shortcut’ appears in the icon, like this;

There is an easy registry hack you can perform that will take off the word ’shortcut’ on all new shortcuts you make, just do this;

• Navigate to this location
  • HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer
• Find the key called link
• Change the value from 1e 00 00 00 to 00 00 00 00
• Reboot your PC
• Done

This is a very easy tweak to perform but can be very handy if you want to quickly open a web page or a page in explorer.

To add an address bar to your taskbar just do this;

• Right click in your taskbar
• Go to toolbars
• Click on address
• You will see an address bar now in your taskbar

You can now just add a url into the bar and the page will open up in your browser, or alternatively you can navigate to a page in explorer from here.

What does that title mean? Basically I’m going to explain here how to add a link to your control panel on the right click menu from your desktop, it is just another handy shortcut to the control panel.

You need to do a registry edit here so backup your registry;

• Open regedit
• Navigate to this location
  • HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Directory\Background\shell
• Create a new key here called Control Panel
• In the Control Panel key create a new key called command
• Modify the default value in the command key and put this;
  • rundll32.exe shell32.dll,Control_RunDLL

You will now be able to see the shortcut if you right click your desktop. If you need to get rid of the shortcut for any reason just go and delete the Control Panel key.

There are so many types of tweaks you can perform on your computer that will speed it up, and some are more unknown than others.

Here are a few of these type of tweaks, they don’t involve RAM or drivers but every small tweak you make can improve the overall performance of your PC.

Remove Unwanted Fonts

Believe it or not, the more fonts you have installed the slower your computer will perform. It may not be a drastic slowness but everything help, so you should go through and delete any unwanted fonts.

Note: Windows uses many fonts for menu bars etc. so don’t go deleting all your fonts, just ones you know are useless.

• Open control panel
• Click appearance and personalization
• Open fonts
• Find the fonts you want to delete, right click and delete
• Done

Disable System Sounds

I didn’t believe this at first, but turning off your system sounds can make a slight improvement of your PC’s performance.

• Open control panel
• Click hardware and sound
• Open sound
• Select the sounds tab
• Under sound scheme in the drop down select no sounds
• Apply and OK

I was playing around with some settings in Vista today trying to find anything ‘new’ to tell you guys about, I didn’t have too long so I didn’t find the ultimate tweak but I did find 2 useful shortcut tweaks.

They both involve the start menu;

Add Run Command to Your Start Menu

• Right click in your task bar
• Select properties
• Click the start menu tab
• Click customize
• Scroll down and check run command
• Click ok
• Your run command will now be in your start menu

Add a Regedit Shortcut to Your Start Menu

• If you are like me and love regedit then you will love this tweak
• Click on your start menu and type regedit
• On the regedit.exe program right click
• Select pin to start menu now reopen your start menu and you will see the shortcut

Here are a couple of tweaks you can perform that should increase the speed of your hard drive, just take note of some of the warnings before you perform these tweaks.

Low Disk Space Warning

• You need to disable your Low Disk Space Warning
• Open regedit
• Navigate to this location
  • HKEY_CURRENT_USER/Software/Microsoft/Windows/CurrentVersion/Policies/Explorer
• Select a new DWORD and call it NoLowDiskSpaceChecks
• Set the value to 1
• Done

Enable Advanced Performance

• Open your control panel
• Click system and maintenance
• Click device manager
• Expand disk drives
• Double click on your drive
• Select the policies tab
• Check enable advanced performance
• Click OK, done

I have written a few posts before about editing your task bar so I was suprized when I found out I had not said anything about resizing it.

This is a quick tweak you can perform that will make your task bar larger, enabling you to access more shortcuts etc from your task bar.

• Right click in your task bar
• Uncheck lock the task bar
• Use your mouse and at the top of the task bar drag the bar up to your desired height
• Now lock the task bar again
• Done

All of Windows Vista’s drives use the newer NTFS partition system rather than the old FAT32 system, but what you might not know is that Vista still supports the ancient (DOS, early windows) 8.3 file-name convention.

If you still run old DOS programs then you need to keep this feature active, but if you don’t you should disable this feature and speed up your file access.

To disable your 8.3 file-name convention just follow this;

• Open regedit
• Navigate to this location
  • HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\FileSystem
• Find this key
  • NtfsDisable8dot3NameCreation
• Change the value from 0 to 1
• OK

If you are running a public machine or many people use your PC you may want to stop anyone from accessing the control panel where they could change settings etc.

I know of people who have had trouble in the past with ‘idiots’ changing all sorts of settings on the computers at places like libraries and were rather happy when I gave them this tweak.

To restrict control panel access just do this registry edit (remember to backup first);

• Open regedit
• Navigate to these locations
  • HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\Explorer
  • HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\ Policies\Explorer
• Create a new DWORD value
  • NoControlPanel
• Set the value to 0
• Close regedit
• Reboot
• You should find the control panel can no longer be accessed

You will notice in your start menu under ‘all programs’ that any newly installed or upgraded software will be highlighted, now this just indicates the new programs but you can stop it highlighting.

Just copy these points;

• Right click in your task bar
• Select properties
• Select the start menu tab
• Click customize
• Uncheck highlight newly installed programs
• Click OK and apply
• Done