Ten Very Useful Tips & Tricks for Windows Vista

1. Easy File Access:

Windows Vista provides a very cool feature to access your frequently used files. This feature allows you to access files like taskbar. Try these steps:

• Create a new folder and copy all the files you want to this folder.
• Drag this folder to the extreme right of the screen and then release.
• The folder will be docked to the right side of the screen.
• You can set the options like auto-hide by right clicking the docked folder.
• To remove the dock ,right click and select ‘close toolbar’ and hit OK.

2. Change Power Button Settings:

The default function of the power button in the Start menu is to Sleep the PC. If you want to change this setting to ShutDown follow these simple steps:

• Go to Control Panel and then to ‘Power Options’ Window.
• Click the ‘Change Plan Settings’ and then go to ‘Change Advanced Power Settings’
• Expand the ‘Power button and lid’ setting and then expand ‘power button action’ and ‘Start menu power button’ options.
• Click ‘Setting’ and from the drop-down select ‘Shutdown’ and then hit OK, Done.

3. Set Time Limits:

Sometimes you have to leave your PC to an unknown person or a child. To avoid the misuse of your computer you can set the time limits in which the other person could use the computer. To do this, follow these steps:

• Go to Control Panel and click ‘User Acoounts’
• Click ‘Parental Controls’ and select the appropriate account.
• Click on ‘Enforce current settings’ and then click ‘ Time Limits ‘.
• Set the time limits in the table as required and click OK to finish.

4. Disable SuperFetch :

Super Fetch is a new feature in Vista that preloads frequently used applications. It may not be required by gamers and tweakers. The performance can increase depending the system configuration. To disable Super Fetch:

• Click Start and type “services.msc” in the search box.
• Find out SuperFetch in the right pane and double-click on it.
• From the ‘Start Up’ type Drop-down, Select the Disabled option and hit OK.

5. Restrict use of Applications:

You can download any number of free applications from the internet, while some are safe but some may harm your computer especially when they are in wrong hands. Follow these steps to restrict their use:

• Go to Control Panel and click ‘User Accounts’
• Click ‘Parental Controls’ and select the appropriate account.
• Click on ‘Enforce current settings’ and then click ‘ Allow and Block specific programs’.
• Then Click ‘Use only the programs that I allow’ and select the application you want to block.
• Click OK to finish.

6. Add Encryption utility to Context-Menu

Windows Vista comes with a built in encryption utility. To make encryption, decryption easy you can add this feature to the context-menu. Follow these steps :

• Click ‘Start’ and type ‘regedit’.
• Navigate to ‘HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Advanced‘.
• Right-click on the right pane and select ‘New | DWORD 32 bit Value‘.
• Name the new key as ‘EncryptionContextMenu’.
• Once the key is created, double-click it and enter the integer ‘1′ in the ‘Value data‘ field.
• Close the registry editor. Now whenever you right click a file, you’ll find the ‘Encrypt’ option in the context menu.

7. Speed Up Windows Vista’s Aero:

Windows Vista has a lot of eye candy features but they also turn down the speed. To increase the speed you can turn the features that you don’t want. Follow these steps:

• Click Start and type ‘SystemPropertiesPerformance‘ and hit Enter
• Under the visual effects tab untick the effects that you don’t wish to see.
• Click OK to apply the settings

8. Control Applications that auto start on startup

There are many applications that start on the Windows Startup but all of them are not necessary. Follow these steps to remove the unwanted applications from the startup:

• Click Start and type ‘msconfig‘ and press Enter.
• Click on the Startup tab in the System Configuration Window.
• Uncheck the applications that you want to exclude from the Start Up.
• Click Ok to finish.

9. Turn On Remote Desktop

Windows Vista Remote Desktop feature allows you to access your PC from any other computer. By default this feature is disabled. To turn on this feature :

• Right-Click on Computer and select Properties.
• In the left pane of the Window, select Remote Settings
• Select ‘Allow Remote Assistance connections to this computer‘. Click OK to save the changes.

10. Reduce Partition Size

In the previous versions of windows it was not possible to reduce the size of the partition of the drive once done. But Vista allows you to shrink the volume of the partition in an easy way. To do this

• Right-click Computer and select Manage
• In the left pane, select Disk Management.
• Right-Click the disk partition whose volume you want to reduce.
• Select Shrink Volume and then Enter the amount of space you want to reduce in the partition and hit Shrink.