Six essential registry tweaks

[tekniks]

Six essential registry tweaks
The Registry Editor is one of the most powerful tools in Windows XP. You can use it to make all sorts of precise changes to how your computer works, and access settings that there's simply no other way to reach through the Control Panel. You've got to be careful while you're in there - a careless edit can stop your computer working properly - but if you're careful you can add new features and improve your PC's performance. Go to Start > Run, type regedit and click OK to launch it, then try our top six tweaks below.




1. Add Copy To and Move To options to the right-click menu in Windows Explorer.
In the Registry Editor go to HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\AllFilesystemObjects\shellex\Con textMenuHandlers. Right-click ContextMenuHandlers, select New > Key and label it Copy To. Do the same to create a Move To key. Then in the new Copy To and Move To keys change the (Default) string to read: {C2FBB630-2971-11D1-A18C-00C04FD75D13} and {C2FBB631-2971-11D1-A18C00C04FD75D13} respectively.

2. Add a right-click menu option to defragment your hard disk.
Locate HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Drive\shell. Right-click on shell, select New > Key and label it Defrag. Right-click on Defrag, create another new key and call it Command. Modify the Default value in the right pane and change it to DEFRAG.EXE %1.

3. Speed up System Restore
System Restore normally creates restore points automatically every 24 hours, but you can change this frequency by editing the registry. At HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\System Restore, create a DWORD value called RPGlobalInterval. Change the figure - default is 86,400 seconds (24 hours) - to your new frequency.

4. Change the size of image thumbnails

Use this registry edit to change the size of the icons when your folders are in Thumbnail view. Go to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\Curr entVersion\Explorer. Create a DWORD Value called ThumbnailSize with a value between 32 and 96. The higher the number, the larger the thumbnail icon will be.

5. Make the All Programs menu appear on screen faster
Go to HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Control Panel\Desktop, and go to MenuShowDelay. Its value is the time delay in milliseconds. Set a value of zero to ensure that the menu appears as quickly as possible.

6. Print faster by moving the printer directory
When you click on Print in a program, the data you want printed is stored or spooled in a directory on your hard drive before the information is sent to the printer. Your PC's performance and the speed of printing can be affected if this spooling begins to take up a large amount of disk space, so if you have a second hard disk installed you can speed up the process by moving the spool directory to this other disk. In the registry find HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Contro l\Print\Printers. The value of DefaultSpoolDirectory will read C:\WINDOWS\System32\spool\PRINTERS.

Right-click to modify and change this to a new folder location on your second hard disk; this alteration changes the spool directory for all installed printers. If you want this change to be applied to a specific printer, locate HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Contro l\Print\Printers\PRINTER NAME and make the change to the SpoolDirectory value instead.