Windows XP tips and tricks

About the Windows Control Panel

The follow are some common Control Panel Applets. They are located in the windowssystem32 directory.
If you find yourself using any of these frequently, then you can simply make shortcuts to them on your desktop. Just go to control panel and right click on which one you want and choose shortcut.

You can also type these into the run window. (startmenu>run>then type) Or you can go to the control panel and click on what you want. If you can’t find control panel in the start menu type it in the run window. It will come up.

appwiz.cpl	Add/Remove Programs
desk.cpl	Display Properties
firewall.cpl	Firewall Settings
inetcpl.cpl	Internet Options
mmsys.cpl	Sound and Audio
ncpa.cpl	Network Connections
nusrmgr.cpl	User Accounts
powercfg.cpl	Power Options
sysdm.cpl	System Properties
wscui.cpl	Security Center
wuaucpl.cpl	Automatic Updates Configuration

Viewing Installed Drivers

First you need a command prompt so you can type commands.

Go to Start menu>Choose run>Then type cmd

This will give you a command prompt.

Then type driverquery

This will give you a list of drivers installed on your computer.

If you want to export the list to a CSV file to open in Excel, type driverquery  /v  /fo  csv  > drivers.csv (Just copy and paste this as it has to be exact)

How to find Your System Root Directory.

This procedure is useful when Windows has been installed in a drive other than C:, which is the default.

1. Click the Start button and select Run.
2. Then type cmd and click ok.
3. Windows will open up a Dos command window.
4. Now type set system and press enter.
5. Look for the line that contains SystemRoot, this is where your system directory is. In the picture below it is C:windows

Bringing Up the Shutdown Dialog Box

1. Create a new txt file somewhere on your system, open it and put in this one line:
   (new ActiveXObject(“Shell.Application”)).ShutdownWindows();
2. Save and Close the file. Change the extension to js and your got it.
3. You can make a shortcut to that file to make it easy to shut down your system.

My Favorite Keyboard Shortcuts

Here are some of the keyboard shortcuts I use more than once a day. I could not live without them!

1. Press the Windows key and D to bring up the desktop.
2. Press the Windows key and E to bring up the my computer.
3. Press Windows key and Pause Break to bring up Windows System Properties.
4. Press CTRL key and C to copy something after you have selected it and made it blue.
5. Press CTRL key and V to paste it after you have clicked on the position where you want it top go.

How to Print more than one document at a time

Did you know you can Print more than one document at a time. All you have to do is select them all together and right click on them and choose print. Try doing this with two Microsoft word documents and see how you go.

Getting Screenshots

If you need to get a screen shot, and you do not have a screen capture program, try this:

• Hit the Print Screen key. This copies a bitmap of the full screen into the Windows clipboard. Start up a graphics editor and paste it in.  I just go to the windows paint program and press on paste…Then I save it as a .jpg so I can edit it in my favorite picture editor. (easier to use than the paint program.)
• Alt + Print Screen will capture only the active window.