Tips & Tricks Win98
Speed up your Modem
Even if your modem is
apparently working well, the baud rate of your COM Port might not allow you to
reach top-speed. To improve your port's speed:
1. Click Start > Settings
> Control Panel > System.
2. Click the Device Manager
tab, and click on the "+" sign next to Ports (COM & LPT).
3. Select the port your modem
uses, click Properties, then click the Port Settings tab and set the Bits per
second to 115200 bps. That way you won't have a sort of filter on the Port.
Trace the route
A great utility included with
Windows 98 is a program called Trace Route. Open a DOS window and type tracert
<location name>. The location name can be any IP address or Internet
domain like tracert www.chip-india.com.
The program will then trace
the route from your Internet service provider to that location, and show you
every server along the way. This could be useful for when you can't connect to
a site - it will show you if some server is down along the way
Redialing
Dial-Up Networking provides
for automatic redial.
1. Open Dial-Up Networking.
2. Select your connection.
3. From the menu select
Connections > Settings.
4. Enable Redial, select the
number of times to redial and Click OK
Speed-up your Connecting time
To Speed-up the time it takes
for Dial Up Networking to establish a connection with your ISP:
1. Open Dial-Up Networking.
2. Right-click your
connection and choose Properties.
3. On the Server Types Tab,
under Advanced Options, make sure that the check-box for Log on to network is
unchecked.
4. Under Allowed network
protocols select only TCP/IP and uncheck NetBEUI & IPX/SPX
Stay Connected
If you get disconnected
frequently, try this extra modem setting:
1. Open Control Panel >
Modems.
2. From Modems select
Properties, select the Connection Tab and click the Advanced button.
3. In the Extra settings
dialogue box, enter ATS10=250.
Icon spacing and Resizing
Changing icon size &
spacing is handy if you have a desktop clustered with dozens of icons.
1. Right-click on the Desktop
Choose Properties from the context menu. On the Appearance tab look in the
Item list box.
2. Once you find Icon you can
choose the size from the Size box.
3. Similarly, locate Icon
Spacing (Horizontal) and Icon Spacing (Vertical) and you can choose different
values for each.
4. Once you are satisfied,
click OK to exit the dialog box.
5. Press F5 to refresh the
Desktop.
Select your Monitor
Windows 98 might not always
detect your Monitor accurately. This affects display and refresh rates. To
select your monitor manually:
1. Right-click on the
Desktop.
2. Choose Properties from the
context menu. On the Settings tab press the Advanced button. Select the
Monitor tab. If your monitor is not listed (correctly) here, click on Change.
3. Select your Monitor from
the list, or if you have a driver disk for your monitor, select have Disk.
4. Click Apply, and follow
any other instructions on screen.
Change the Refresh rate of
your Graphics Adapter
Refresh rate of your monitor
determines how fast the screen is updated. Generally, the higher refresh rate
the monitor can support, the better. Optimum refresh rates can be set manually
for flicker-free display, if Windows hasn’t already configured it.
Right-click on the Desktop,
click on Properties and open Settings > Advanced > Adapter. Depending on
your graphics card and monitor, you will get different choices for the refresh
rate. Click on Apply after setting the appropriate refresh rate. Click through
the warning messages to change the refresh rate. If, for some reason the
display becomes garbled, don’t do anything ? Windows will restore the
original refresh rate.
Adding items to Send To
Send To is an option
available when you right click any file in Windows. It can greatly simplify
file management, especially routine tasks.
1. Browse to the \Windows\SendTo
Folder using Windows Explorer.
2. Right-click an empty space
on the window and click on New > Shortcut.
3. In the Create Shortcut
window, enter the source of the program or the directory
(e.g. C:\My Documents\) in the Command line box.
4. Click Next and Finish to
create the shortcut.
You can use the Send To
feature not only for copying or moving files, but also for quickly opening
files with programs they are not associated with. For example, you could
create a shortcut to Notepad and send any ASCII text file (like .HTM files) to
Notepad. Similarly, you could use a shortcut to an image viewing program to
quickly view images.
Opening files with multiple
programs
To be able to open a file
with more than one program, do the following:
1. Select Start > Settings
> Folder Options > File Types.
2. Locate the file type you
want to work with and double click it.
3. In the Edit File Type
dialog that opens, you will see a box marked Actions. This is where Windows 98
stores the various actions that can be implemented on a particular file type.
4. To add an entry, click
New. In the New Action dialog box, type the name of the action in the Action
box. Use the Browse button to find the Application that you want to open the
file with.
5. The action that is set as
default would be carried out when you double click the file. Other actions
will be available on right-clicking the file.
Associations in a jiffy
To associate files of a
certain type with a different program, hold down the Shift key while
right-clicking on a file of that type and click on Open With... from the
context menu. Select the program you want to open files of this type with and
enable Always use this program to open this type of file. Henceforth, the file
will always open with this program when double-clicked.
Adding a File Type to the
'New' Menu
When you right-click on the
desktop or in Windows Explorer, the New menu lists many options of registered
file types. Clicking on any of these creates a blank file of that type. You
can add more items to the New menu.
1. In the program that
creates the file type you wish to add, create a blank document with any
preferences you wish to use and save it.
2. Copy this file to
\Windows\ShellNew ? this is a hidden folder.
3. Start the Registry Editor.
4. Open HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT and
locate the extension for the file type you wish to add to the New menu.
5. Right-click and click on
New > Key from the context menu. Name it ShellNew.
6. Within this key, create a
String Value and name it FileName.
7. Double-click the string
and modify it to be the filename of the blank template you created, including
the extension.
8. Exit the registry editor
and restart Windows.
Cascading menus on clicking
Start
Cascading menus of folders
like Control Panel or My Computer could be very handy to have at start up.
Here’s how to get them there.
Right click the Start button
and click on Explore. Create a new folder and type the following string, all
on one line, replacing the words New Folder with this new line. You must type
the period, the curly braces, all four hyphens, and the hexadecimal numbers
exactly as shown.
Control
Panel.{21EC2020-3AEA-1069-A2DD-08002B30309D}
Briefcase.{85BBD920-42A0-1069-A2E4-08002B30309D}
Dial Up
Networking.{992CFFA0-F557-101A-88EC-00DD010CCC48}
Fonts.{BD84B380-8CA2-1069-AB1D-08000948F534}
Inbox.{00020D75-0000-0000-C000-000000000046}
Internet
Cache.{7BD29E00-76C1-11CF-9DD0-00A0C9034933}
Network
Neighborhood.{208D2C60-3AEA-1069-A2D7-08002B30309D}
My
Computer.{20D04FE0-3AEA-1069-A2D8-08002B30309D}
Printers.{2227A280-3AEA-1069-A2DE-08002B30309D}
Recycle
Bin.{645FF040-5081-101B-9F08-00AA002F954E}
Subscriptions.{F5175861-2688-11d0-9C5E-00AA00A45957}
URL
History.{FF393560-C2A7-11CF-BFF4-444553540000}
Back to old ways
In Windows 98, when a menu is
too tall to fit on your screen, you will see a scroll arrow at the bottom,
allowing you to scroll further down. In Windows 95, a second menu would appear
next to the first, where the entries which would otherwise not fit on your
screen would be displayed. For Windows 95 like behaviour in Windows 98:
1. Start the Registry Editor.
2. Navigate to
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\explorer\Advanced.
3. Right-click an open area
in the right pane and select New > String Value.
4. Name it
StartMenuScrollPrograms.
5. Double-click this entry
and add the value false.
6. Exit the registry editor.
To restore Windows 98
behavior, simply change the value of StartMenuScrollPrograms to true.
Window and Menu Animations
One of the desktop
enhancements built into Windows 98 is the animation displayed when you
minimise and maximise windows or when displaying menus. Disabling this makes
navigating Windows a lot faster.
Open the Desktop Properties
dialog by right-clicking any blank area of the desktop and clicking on
Properties. Disable Animate windows, menus and lists from the Effects tab.
F8 free start-ups
Instead of hastily clicking
on F8 at StartUp to display the start up menu, you can configure it to open
automatically.
1. Use Explorer and locate
Msdos.sys in the root directory ? it is a hidden file.
2. Maintain a copy of the
Msdos.sys file in case of an error.
3. Open a command prompt
window and strip the file’s attributes by typing
attrib –h –s c:\msdos.sys
4. Edit the file in Notepad.
Under the [Options] section, type:
BootMenu=1
BootMenuDefault=1
BootMenuDelay=x
where x is the delay in
seconds. Default value for x is 30.
5. Save the file.
6. Again, open a command
prompt window and reset the file’s attributes by typing
attrib +h +s c:\msdos.sys
Arrow-free Shortcuts
Shortcut icons have a small
curved arrow in the lower-left corner. To remove the arrow, follow these
instructions:
1. Start the Registry Editor.
2. Locate the keys
HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\lnkfile and HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\piffile.
3. Delete the value
IsShortcut under both these keys.
4. Close the Registry Editor
and restart Windows.
You can also do this using
TweakUI.
Automatic Logon
You can have Windows log on
automatically every time you start Windows.
1. Open the Registry Editor.
2. Navigate to
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Winlogon
3. Add the following String
values.
AutoAdminLogon
DefaultPassword
DefaultUserName
4. Double-click each of them
to enter their respective data. Set the value of AutoAdminLogon to 1. Enter
your user name and password in the DefaultUserName and DefaultPassword items
respectively.
You can also do this using
TweakUI.
Instant Shut Down or Restart
To shut down or restart
Windows with one mouse click:
1. Right-click the Desktop
and select New > Shortcut.
2. In the Command line box
type:
C:\WINDOWS\rundll.exe
user.exe,ExitWindows (for shut down)
C:\WINDOWS\rundll.exe
user.exe,ExitWindowsExec (for restart)
3. Click Next, name it
appropriately and click on Finish to create the shortcut.
Be careful, clicking on the
shortcuts will not ask for any confirmation before shutting down.
Reclaim CD-ROM Cache
If you do not use the CD-ROM
drive very often, you could very well reclaim some precious memory. This could
be especially useful for low-end computers.
1. Right click on My Computer
and click on Properties.
2. Click File System from the
Performance tab.
3. From the CD-ROM tab, you
can configure the amount of cache that is assigned to the drive. Adjust the
slider according to your needs. The minimum amount is 64KB and the maximum is
1238KB.
4. Changing the Optimise
access pattern for drop-down selection also affects the amount of memory used
(maximum for Quad-speed or higher and minimum for No read-ahead).
A clean Run
To remove unwanted items from
the Run menu:
1. Start the Registry Editor.
2. Open HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\RunMRU.
3. Delete the entries that
you do not want on the Run menu.
4. Close the Registry Editor
and Restart Windows.
Note: Do not delete the
(Default) or MRUList values.
Permanently delete files
To permanently Delete files
without moving them to the Recycle Bin, hold down the Shift key while pressing
Delete. To stop using recycle bin altogether, right-click the Recycle Bin and
click on Properties. On the Global Tab, select Do not move files to the
Recycle Bin. If you enable Configure drives independently, you can set this up
for the drives you want to.
Dummy entries in Add/Remove
Programs list
Sometimes, even after
programs are uninstalled, or due to the files being deleted instead of a
uninstalled, the entry in the Add/Remove Programs list does not get deleted.
To remove it from the list:
1. Start the Registry Editor.
2. Open HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Uninstall.
3. Delete the program entry
here.
You can also use TweakUI to
do this.
Windows 98 Easter Egg
1. Right-click an empty space
on your Desktop, and select New > Shortcut from the context menu.
2. In the Command line field,
type the following line, exactly as it appears:
"C:\WINDOWS\Application
Data\Microsoft\WELCOME\WELDATA.EXE" You_are_a_real_rascal
3. Click Next and then
Finish.
4. Edit the Properties for
this shortcut. Change the Run field to Minimized. Also, make sure that the
Start in field shows “C:\WINDOWS\Application Data\Microsoft\WELCOME”.
5. Double-click the shortcut
and enjoy the Easter Egg.
Preview Media Files
Internet Explorer 4 and allow
previewing media files (wav, mid, avi, mov, mpg) in Windows Explorer. Using
Windows Explorer, navigate to \Windows\Web, and open Folder.htt in Notepad.
Look for wantMedia = false and replace this with wantMedia = true. You should
now be able to preview media files in folders that are viewed as a web page.
Optimising the Windows 98
Registry
Windows 98 compresses the
registry by default at restart if it finds that there is more than 500KB of
empty space in the registry. This is controlled by the line Optimize=1 in the
Scanreg.ini file in the \Windows directory.
To compress the registry
manually:
1. Restart in MS-DOS mode.
2. At the MS-DOS prompt, type
scanreg/backup. This will backup your registry.
3. Now type scanreg /opt.
4. Scanreg will compress the
registry.
Preview Images
You can preview your Image
files by viewing the folder they are in as "Web View". From the
Windows Explorer menu, select View > as Web page. A better way to preview
images is as thumbnails instead of icons. To enable this view in Windows
Explorer, right-click the folder you want to preview and click on Properties.
Check the box against Enable thumbnail view and click Ok to exit the dialog
box. Now, from the View menu, select Thumbnails.
A clean registry
A computer's registry
accumulates a lot of corrupted, unused, and unnecessary registry keys,
especially if keys are not removed when you uninstall a program. As a result,
you may begin to experience problems and your machine might function slower
than expected.
The latest version of
Microsoft's RegClean could delete a lot of such registry junk. You can
download this from ftp://ftp.microsoft.com/Softlib/MSLFILES/REGCLEAN.EXE.
System Configuration
A very useful tool included
with Win98 is the System Configuration Utility. Select Start > Run and type
msconfig in the Open box to launch the application. The System Configuration
Utility makes fiddling with programs to launch at Startup or editing
autoexec.bat, config.sys etc. a lot easier. The System Configuration Utility
also allows you to create a backup of your system files ? it would be a good
idea to use this before you begin making changes. Be careful with what you
enable or disable. Do not touch anything that you may not understand.
Optimising the Swap File
With most resource hungry
applications today, the RAM is not enough to hold all its data. Windows uses a
portion of the hard disk as RAM, constantly swapping data between the RAM and
the hard disk as required. The speed of your hard disk is nearly 1000 times
slower than that of your main memory. Inefficient use of the swap file could
considerably slow down your system to a very great extent.
One of the best ways to speed
up the swap file usage is to create a permanent swap file. In a permanent swap
file, the file used for swapping information has a fixed size and location on
your hard disk. When a temporary swap file is used, the location and size of
the file is determined by the application being used and is not predictable.
Also, since a temporary swap file is constantly written to and is not fixed in
size, it would be highly fragmented across the partition that holds it.
A better option is to create
the swap file on a dedicated partition on your hard disk. By doing this, the
swap file will never be fragmented since that partition is only being utilised
by the swap file itself. You can configure the swap file size and location
from Control Panel > System > Performance > Virtual Memory. The size
of the swap file should be around 2.5 times the amount of RAM on the system.
Direct Memory Access
The advantage of using Direct
Memory Access (DMA) with IDE CD-ROM and disk drives is that it lowers CPU
usage during I/O transfers. This drastically improves performance when using
these devices.
Ensure that your drive
supports DMA before making these changes, otherwise it could lead to
unpredictable results. To use DMA:
1. Open Control Panel >
System > Device Manager.
2. Click the + sign next to
the Disk drives entry.
3. Select the drive you want
to enable DMA for and click Properties.
4. On the Settings tab, there
should be a DMA check box. You can enable this to enable DMS for the drive.
Note: If there is no check
box (or it is greyed out), your motherboard chipset does not support the
feature. If the check box is not checked after you restart your system, your
hard disk probably has been automatically disabled again because the hard disk
may not support DMA. If you are unable to restart Windows after the change is
applied, boot to Safe Mode and disable DMA from here.
Improve Removable Disk Drive
Performance
Windows 98 gives you the
option to use write-behind caching to improve the performance of removable
disk drives.
1. Open Control Panel >
System > Performance and click on File System.
2. Check the Enable
write-behind caching on all removable disk drives check box under the
Removable Disk tab and click OK.
Note: If this results in a
problem with disk operations, uncheck the Enable write-behind caching on all
removable disk drives check box.
Change the Typical role of
your computer
If you have 24MB or more RAM,
you can optimise performance by selecting Network server as the typical role
of your computer.
1. Open Control Panel >
System > Performance > File System.
2. On the Hard Disk Tab,
select Network Server as Typical role of this computer.
The setting you use controls
the size of various internal data structures used by the 32-bit file access
driver (VFAT).
When you use the Mobile Or
Docking System setting, VFAT allocates memory to record the 16 most recently
accessed folders and the 337 most recently accessed files. This consumes
approximately 4KB of memory.
When you use the Desktop
Computer setting, VFAT allocates memory to record the 32 most recently
accessed folders and the 677 most recently accessed files. This consumes
approximately 8KB of memory.
When you use the Network
Server setting, VFAT allocates memory to record the 64 most recently accessed
folders and the 2729 most recently accessed files. This consumes approximately
16KB of memory.
MS Office memory hoggers
A typical installation of MS
Office installs Find Fast, an indexing utility that loads at startup. This
hogs system resources by regularly indexing the entire hard disk(s). You can
improve performance of your computer by removing Find Fast from your StartUp
folder. To reclaim the space used by the Find Fast index, open Control Panel
> Find Fast, select your hard drive(s) and from the Index menu, click on
Delete Index. When you've deleted your Index, click on Close and Stop from the
Index menu.
Another item installed in the
StartUp folder is named Microsoft Office. This does nothing apart from loading
all MS Office libraries at startup to speed up launching of any Office
applications. Since this is not necessary, you can delete this shortcut, too.
Restart only Windows
When restarting Windows, you
don’t always need to go through the BIOS initialisation and POST. Instead of
simply clicking on Restart from the Shut Down Windows dialog box, hold down
the Shift key as you click on Ok. This will restart only Windows. This is
particularly useful when you change some registry entries or a few system
settings.
Stop Automatic Dialling
Many Internet applications or
software are often set to automatically dial up and connect. To stop automatic
dialling, open Control Panel > Internet Options. Under the Connections tab,
enable Never dial a connection.
Automatic maintenance
The Windows Maintenance
Wizard can automate a lot of the routine system maintenance tasks. To open
this wizard, choose Start > Programs > Accessories > System Tools
> Maintenance Wizard. It sets up the Task Scheduler to regularly run
Scandisk, Disk Defragmenter and Disk Cleanup.
Using two monitors
You can install two display
adapters (AGP or PCI) and connect them to two monitors to increase screen
display area. First, install a single display adapter with its drivers. Shut
down Windows, install the second card and start the machine. When you turn on
your system, Windows will recognise the new video card and the attached
monitor and install drivers for both. You'll then be prompted to restart your
system. You'll see both your video cards in the Device Manager tree once the
drivers are installed.
If everything is functioning
correctly, as Windows is loading, you'll see a message that reads "If you
can read this..." on the second monitor. Once Windows loads, right-click
on the desktop and click on Properties and then the Settings tab. You'll now
see two monitors in the middle of the page. Click on the second monitor icon.
When you do so, a message box prompts you to enable the second monitor. To
continue, click Yes.
Make sure that the monitor
icons correctly represent your actual monitor's physical positions. The icons'
positions control how you drag icons and windows from one monitor to the
other. Right-click on the first monitor icon and select the Identify command
from the shortcut menu. If the monitor icons are in the wrong positions,
simply click on one of them and drag it to the correct position.
After you're finished, click
Apply.
Customise the Start menu
You can customise the start
menu to show only certain items.
Open the Registry Editor and
navigate to HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\Explorer.
To remove the Run command,
create a new DWORD value and name it NoRun. Double-click it and change it’s
value to 1.
To remove the Documents
folder, create a new DWORD value and name it NoRecentDocsMenu. Double-click it
and change it’s value to 1.
To remove the Favorites
folder, create a new DWORD value and name it NoFavoritesMenu. Double-click it
and change it’s value to 1.
To remove the Log Off …
command, create a new DWORD value and name it NoLogOff. Double-click it and
change it’s value to 1.
Restart Windows once you are
finished.
Clean Desktop
To hide all the icons on your
Desktop, open the Registry Editor and navigate to HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\Current
Version\Policies\Explorer. Add a DWORD value and name it NoDesktop. Change it’s
value to 1. Close the Registry Editor and restart Windows.
Bitmaps as icons
You can preview bitmaps (.BMP
files) as icons in Explorer instead of the default icon of the application it
is associated with. Open the Registry Editor and navigate to HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Paint.Picture\DefaultIcon.
Double-click the Default string and change it’s value to ‘%1’ (without
double-quotes). Close the Registry Editor and restart Windows.
Tool Tips
To disable ToolTips in
Windows, open the Registry Editor and navigate to HKEY_USERS\.DEFAULT\Control
Panel\Desktop. Double-click UserPreferencemask and change its value to 3E 00
00 00. Close the Registry Editor and restart Windows.