Tips and Tricks, January, 2004

Hope you enjoyed your holidays and are ready to get back to some serious business.

Create a Boot Disk for Windows XP

Recently at a computer show, one of the visitors to the PCC table asked Bill how he could install Windows XP on a notebook computer he had been given. Normally, you would just use the CD and boot from it to do the installation-provided the computer has been set up to allow booting from the CD-ROM drive. In this case, he couldn't figure out how to get into setup on the notebook computer and it wouldn't boot from the CD-ROM drive.

The solution is to create floppy disks to do the setup. If you search Windows XP, you won't find a way to create the floppy disks as you could in Windows 98. All is not lost-you can download a utility from Microsoft to create setup disks to install Windows XP. There are two versions, one for the Home edition and one for the Professional edition. Unfortunately the web address is so long and involved that I can't include it, but it you go to www.microsoft.com and search for "boot disk," you will get the location of the two utilities.

By the way, it takes six floppies to create the set up disks.

These tips were inspired by tips in WinXP News, an email newsletter I receive about once a week. To check it out for yourself, go to www.winxpnews.com. They also have other newsletters.

How to Speed up XP Startup

I don't know about you, but I am pretty impatient when I turn on my computer and wait for it to boot up the operating system. I tried this tip and it made some difference, although not a huge difference. Remember to back up your registry before you try this-you may even want to set a system restore point.

Click Start, Run. Type regedit in the dialog box to open the Registry Editor.

Find HKEY LOCAL MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Session Manager\Memory Management\PrefetchParameters. You will see the parameters in the right pane of the window. In the right pane, right click EnablePrefetcher and select Modify. Under Value data, change the value from 3 (the default) to 5.

Reboot and see if it makes a difference. You might time the system prior to the change and after to see if it does make a difference. I'd be interested in knowing your results.

File Associations

One advantage of Windows is the ability to double-click on a file and have it open in the application that will allow you to work on the file. The problem is that sometimes the application associated with the file is not really the one you want to use on a regular basis. You could go to a folder, select "Tools," then "Folder Options," then "File Types," find the file type and edit the file association by finding the program you want to use to work on the file. Here's another way.

Right click on the file you want to open. A menu will pop up (the context menu). Select "Open With" from the menu. A list of applications that could be used with the file will display. To change the file association permanently, select Choose Program, the last entry on the menu. Find the application you want to use and check the box that says "Always." Click OK to finish and you've done it. Now when you double-click on the file, it will open in the application you've chosen.

Rename a series of files

We take a lot of digital photos. The camera provides file names of its own that are not very descriptive-actually they're not at all descriptive. I would like to rename the photos to relate them to an event or a place. I could rename each one individually, but there is an easier way. Highlight all the files you want to rename. Remember that you can select them by holding down the Ctrl key as you click on the ones you want or select adjacent files by clicking the first in the group and then while holding down the Shift key, click on the last in the group. Right click on the highlighted files (here's that context menu again). Select Rename from the menu, the type the new name, say "Puerto Vallarta." The files will be renamed with consecutive numbers added in parentheses.

Sort Your Start Menu

As you add programs to your system, you may have observed that the names get appended to the end of the list of programs on your start menu. This can make it difficult to find what you're looking for. If you click on the Start button, then on "All Programs," the menu will open as usual. Then right-click on any folder or icon (there it is again). Click on "Sort by Name" and your programs will be sorted. Note that the folders are grouped separately from the file names, but at least you only have to look in two groups now.