Tutorials

How to Customize the Vista Bubbles Screen Saver Settings By default the Bubbles screen saver has no options to set in the Screen Saver Settings window. However, you can customize the Bubbles screen saver settings through the registry instead. This will show you how to.The default location of the Aurora screen saver file is at C:\Windows\System32\Bubbles.scr.You will just need to play with the settings and adjust the Value Data (step 8) until you get the desired affect from the selected DWORD Value Name (step 5). EXAMPLE: Bubbles Screen Saver with black background To Restore the Default Bubbles Settings Using a REG File Download 1. Click on the Download button below to download the file below. Restore_Default_Bubbles.reg...

How to Fix Recent Programs Not Being Remembered in Vista When you logon to your user account, the Frequently Used Programs list in the Start menu may get reset with the factory default listing. This will leave the list empty and not have your recent programs remembered. This happens if the StartMenuInit registry value is not set correctly in the registry. During the first logon to a user account, Vista is supposed to set the StartMenuInit value automatically. If this fails for some reason, then Vista resets the Frequently Used programs list with the default programs list automatically at every logon, and pops up the Start menu automatically.Recent Items - Shows list of your recently used files on the right side of the Start menu...

How to Restore the Missing "New Contact" and "New Contact Group" Button in Vista Contacts Folder This will show you how to restore the missing New Contact and New Contact Group toolbar buttons in the C:\Users\(user name)\Contacts folder window.If the New Contact or New Contact Group button does not work, then double check to make sure that Windows Contacts is set as the default program with all of it's associations set to it as well. EXAMPLE: C:\Users\(user name)\Contacts Folder Window NOTE: The New Contact and New Contact Group toolbar buttons are boxed in red below. Here's How: 1. In Windows Explorer, navigate to the C:\Users\(user name)\Contacts folder. 2. Right click on a empty space in the main middle pane of the window and...

How to Restore or Remove the Security Tab in Vista This will show you how to restore or remove the Security tab in the Properties window of all folders, files, shortcuts, and drives for all users on the computer. The Security tab is not available on file and folder properties in Windows Vista Home Premium, Vista Home Basic, and Vista Starter editions. The Security tab also is not available if you are using the FAT or FAT32 file system. If the Security tab is removed, users will not be able to change the security settings or view a list of all users that have access to folders, files, shortcuts, and drives. EXAMPLE: Security tab Before and After removed from Properties Through Local Group Policy Editor 1. Open the all users, specific...

How to Display a Log on Screen Title and Text Message in Vista and Windows 7 This will allow you to display whatever Title and or Text Message you want displayed before the log on screen appears in Vista and Windows 7. This can be helpful for listing policies or logon procedures for example. EXAMPLE: Logon Title and Text Message Screen NOTE: The Text message can fill the entire space between the lines. When you click OK , you will be taken to the logon screen. Through Local Security Policy 1. Open the Local Security Policy editor. 2. In the left pane, click on Local Policies and Security Options. (See screenshot below) 3. For a Message Title A) In the right pane, right click on Interactive logon: Message title for users...

How to Disable or Enable a User Account in Vista This will show you how to hide (disable) or unhide a user account from being accessed or seen in Vista. For example, from the Logon screens, Parental Controls, UAC, User Accounts, etc...An administrator account will still be able to navigate to and access the contents of the C:\Users\(user-name) folder of a disabled user account using Windows Explorer. Do not disable your only administrator account. Always leave one enabled so that you are able to make changes to Vista or other users. If you did this by mistake, then boot into Safe Mode and enable your Administrator account. Disable and Hide User Account in Local Users and Groups 1. Open the Local Users and Groups manager. 2. In the...

How to See the Wireless Keys that Windows has Stored The BBCODE in this needs a lot of fixing, but I wanted to submit it then work on it at a later date. The screenshots are also wrong for the x64 option - I'll fix those later Some AVs are detecting this as malicious - this is because it's trying to access saved passwords. You may have to allow this file in your AV in order to use this. When you join a protected wireless network, Windows will store the key to allow a connection to be automatically made next time you log on to the computer. This information is stored in an encrypted format in the following locations: XP: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\WZCSVC\Parameters\Interfaces\[Interface Guid] Vista...

Crash Dumps - Analyse Bugcheck and Process Dumps How to Analyse Bugcheck and Process Crash Dumps Download the debugger package that matches YOUR machine's architecture http://www.microsoft.com/whdc/devtoo...g/default.mspx In other words, if you're running 32-bit Vista, install the 32-bit version of the "Debugging Tools for Windows", irrespective of whether you intend to debug 32-bit or 64-bit code. Likewise for x64 - download and install the x64 package, and you'll still be able to debug 32-bit crashes. Few home and small business users would be running Itaniums, so don't accidentally grab the IA-64 build. "IA-64" (Itanium) is a vastly different architecture to "x64" (AMD64, a.k.a. EM64T when sold by Intel). Override the default...

How to Hide or Show Hidden Files and Folders in Vista A hidden file or folder is just like any other file or folder except that it is hidden from normal view. When you have them set to show, they show as transparent to indicate that they are a hidden file or folder. Protected System files are also hidden to help prevent you from accidentally altering them. These are set to be hidden by default in Vista.It is best to not touch the system files unless you know what you are doing. Doing so can result in having to reinstall Vista. EXAMPLE: A Hidden and Normal Folder How to Hide or Unhide a File and Folder in Vista 1. Right click on the file or folder and click on Properties. 2. Click the General tab. (See screenshot below) 3. To Hide...

How to Make Vista Require a User Name and Password at Logon This will change the logon procedure in Vista to require all users to type in their user name and password instead of selecting their user icon and typing in just their password to logon their user account. This is like the old classic Windows logon screen.For the user name, you would type your account's User name, or to logon to a domain, you would type Domain Name (Computer Name)/User name instead. If you have no password, then just leave the field empty. You can press TAB or SHIFT+TAB to move between the User name and Password fields if you entered something incorrectly. See the example screenshot below.EXAMPLE: User Name and Password Logon Screen NOTE: See the NOTE box at...

How to Disable Sync Center Mobsync.exe in Vista We all at some stage have asked the question ‘What the hell is mobsync and how do i disable it?’ and been left scratching your head, especially if your the proud owner of Windows Vista. Well to be straight with you it annoys me when people give definite answers on how to disable the feature when clearly its not the same as XP, Speculation has lead people to believe its a networking tool for your Internet connection, well almost right but not quite. Then that its windows media player, again its almost there but not quite and finally that its an Microsoft tool for reporting which is a bit stupid to be honest … Thankfully there is a simpler explanation to the question and an even simpler...

How to Fix Windows Vista Help and Support If when you try to open Help and Support in Vista and you get a error message and Help will not open properly, or you get a message that WinHlp32.exe is no longer supported, then this will show you how to fix these common errors and others for Help and Support. To Fix This "Help" Error MessageFor more information, see: Windows Help and Support: KB917607 Article The Windows Help (WinHlp32.exe) program is no longer included in Windows 1. Go to this site: Microsoft Download Center: Windows Help program (WinHlp32.exe) for Windows Vista 2. Click Continue at the site above to download and install the patch. NOTE: If you get the error 80070422, the macro error code 1037, or the patch above...

How to Fix 0x8007000D Error when Editing MP3 Metadata Here's the error you will commonly see: As you can see, Windows isn't allowing you to edit the ID3 tag of the file. This is due to the ID3 tags of the files being v2.4, which is unsupported by both Windows Explorer and Windows Media Player. They support v2.3 and below, so all we need to do to fix this is to convert the ID3 tags to v2.3, here's how: Download and install ID3-TagIT: ID3-TagIT Using the navigation pane on the left, find the folder containing the files you want to fix. Select all of the files that need fixing and click Extended Functions > Transfer/Convert TAGs or press F7. Select Convert TAG Ver. 2.4 to Ver. 2.3 and click OK. Accept any warning given about...

How to View the Mozilla Firefox Cache Hello all, Today I am going to be showing you how to view the cache stored in Mozilla Firefox. I had to work out how to do this because I accidentally deleted a photo off my Facebook page and I didn't have an offline copy stored, luckily it was still in my cache! If you have cleared your cache in Firefox or using any other utility such as CCleaner then this will not work This also works for Windows 7 The Firefox cache files are stored in the following directory: %USERPROFILE%\AppData\Local\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles In this folder you will find another folder which consists of random characters followed by a .default suffix. For example, my folder is called: ks4fe3ma.default Inside this folder...

How to Remove Bitlocker and Repair Boot Manager First you will need the vista installation disk so you will be able to repair your boot manager. In the vista disk managment tool mark C: as active(or whatever is the default partition) start>right click Computer>click Manage>click Disk Management>right click select Drive (C), and click "mark partition as active" Restart your computer. Boot up the vista install disk. When the language selection screen comes up click next. Click the repair link. SATA Hard-Drives will need to have the driver loaded from the Drive Selection Screen Select the c: partition. Click next. Click repair boot manager. When it has finished restart your computer. This repair step for unknown reason may...

How to Extract a Windows Update This tutorial will show you how to extract a Windows Update file to release the contents, using both the manual and automatic methods. You might consider doing this if you are a technical expert trying to find a replacement for a corrupt file. Extracting the contents of the update already identified to be the one containing the correct version of the file in question is often the most efficient way of sourcing this replacement.This process is intended for advanced users only.It is imperative that you do not use any 3rd Party tool to extract Windows Update .cab files, such as 7-Zip or Win-Zip, as these tools incompletely extract such archives. However, due to different formatting in service packs, these...

How to Enable or Disable the Receive Window Auto Tuning Level in Vista The TCP receive window size (RWIN) is the amount of data that a TCP receiver (your computer) allows a TCP sender (other internet or local network computer) to send before having to wait for an acknowledgement. After the connection is established, the receive window size is advertised in each TCP segment. Advertising that maximum amount of data that the sender can send is a receiver-side flow control mechanism that prevents the sender from sending data that the receiver cannot handle. A sending host can only send at a maximum the amount of data advertised by the receiver before waiting for an acknowledgment and a receive window size update. Auto Tuning adjusts the...

How to Increase Hard Drive Performance in Vista This will show you how to increase the hard drive performance by enabling Advanced Performance, disabling NTFS from creating 8.3 versions of file names, and defragging on a regular schedule.You can follow all the steps below, or just pick the ones you would like to do. Enable Advanced Performance for Hard DriveThis option enables extremely aggressive write caching that will speed up the hard drive's performance, but it can also cause you to lose data in the drive's cache if you lose power suddenly. It is not recommended for laptops that run on battery power all the time. While this is fine for the normal home desktop, it may not be a good idea if you have unreliable power.This may not be...

How to Restore or Remove the "Compatibilty" Tab in Vista This will show you how to restore or remove the Compatibility tab in the Properties window of all folders, files, shortcuts, and drives for all users on the computer. By default, the Compatibility tab is displayed in Properties.If the methods below do not help in restoring the Compatibility tab, then run the sfc /scannow command to repair the C:\Windows\System32\wer.dll and C:\Windows\System32\faultrep.dll files. EXAMPLE: Compatibility tab Before and After removed from Properties Through Local Group Policy Editor 1. Open the Local Group Policy Editor. 2. In the left pane, click on Computer Configuration, Administrative Templates, Windows Components, and Application...

How to Customize the Send To Context Menu in Vista, Windows 7, and Windows 8 This tutorial will show you how to add or delete shortcuts from the "Send To" context menu in Vista, Windows 7, and Windows 8. The items for the Send To context menu are located in the hidden system folder below. C:\Users\(user-name)\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\SendTo To remove or show drive letters in the Send To context menu, see: How to Remove or Show Drive Letters in the Vista and Windows 7 Send To Context Menu . Drives in the Send To menu can cause it to open slowly or hang for a bit if the hard drives have to spin up first before accessing them. EXAMPLE: Send To Context Menu with added Notepad Here's How: 1. Do step 2 or 3 below for how...