Clear Temporary Internet Files when Exiting Internet Explorer
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Internet
Settings\Cache\Persistent
This REG_DWORD key when set to 0x00000000 (0) will clear your Temporary Internet
Files folder when you exit Internet Explorer. This value set to 0x00000001 (1) will not
clear it.

Disable Balloon Tips
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Adva
nced\ EnableBalloonTips
(Windows XP)
This DWORD value set to 0 will disable the balloon tips. The value of 1 will enable the
tips.

Delete Page File When You Shut Down Windows
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CURRENTCONTROLSET\CONTROL\SESSI
ONMANAGER\MEMORYMANAGEMENT\ClearPageFileAtShutdown
This value set to 1 will clear the paging file when a computer is shut down

Disable Low Disk Warnings in Windows XP
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Adva
nced\NoLowDiskSpaceChecks
Settings this to 1 will stop the OS from checking for disk space, which will also turn of
the Low Disk Space balloons.

Reinstalling Internet Explorer 6.0
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Active Setup\Installed
Components\{89820200-ECBD-11cf-8B85-00AA005B4383}\IsInstalled.
This DWORD should be set to 0 to trick Windows into thinking that IE 6 isn’t installed

Reinstall Outlook Express 6.0
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Active Setup\Installed
Components\{44BBA840-CC51-11CF-AAFA-00AA00B6015C}\IsInstalled.
This DWORD should be set to 0 to trick Windows into thinking that OE 6 isn’t installed

Find BIOS Information in the Registry
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\HARDWARE\DESCRIPTION\System\SystemBiosDate
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\HARDWARE\DESCRIPTION\System\SystemBiosVersion
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\HARDWARE\DESCRIPTION\System\VideoBiosDate
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\HARDWARE\DESCRIPTION\System\VideoBiosVersion
Some information about your BIOS may be in the keys above. Do not change these
values. They are for reference only.

Display the local Administrator account on the Windows XP Welcome
screen?
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows
NT\CurrentVersion\Winlogon\SpecialAccounts\UserList\Administrator
This DWORD value should be set to 1 to show the account. Set it to 0 to hide the account

Edit registry to read all e-mail as plain text
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\10.0\Outlook\Options\Mail\Read
AsPlain
Set this DWORD value to 1 will force Outlook XP SP1 to read all email as Plain Text.

Right-click to encrypt
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\
Explorer\Advanced\EncryptionContextMenu
Setting this DWORD value to 1 will allow you to encrypt a file when you right-click on
it.

Load Balancing Your Network Cards
HKEY_Local_Machine\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\NetBT\Parameters\
RandomAdapter
Set this value to 1 to enable load balancing if you have more than 1 network card.

Keep Dial-up Connections Running When You Log Off
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\
CurrentVersion\Winlogon\KeepRASConnections
Setting this STRING value to 1 will keep an active dial-up connection connected when a
user logs off.

Disabling the file access timestamp

Every time you access a file, or a program on the system accesses a file, the file system keeps
track of when it was accessed. This feature can be useful if you are interested in finding out
when a file was last read. Sometimes a program might find this information useful. For example,
the Defragmenting application could use the access timestamps; it would be able to decide
what the most frequently accessed files are and would then be able to put them on a fast part of
the disk.
So, disabling the file access timestamp would obviously not be beneficial to the
Defragmenting app. But the loss would not be a big one. Usually, when you defragment your
drive, you will want the entire application files placed together on a disk for optimal speed.
Defragmenting based solely on access timestamp will not give you a sizeable performance
increase.
For systems that have many (several thousand) files and folders, disabling the access timestamp
will give you a noticeable performance increase. Every time you open a file, the system has to
write to the file and update its access timestamp. According to Microsoft, disabling the file
access timestamp will help most systems with more than 70,000 folders. Nevertheless, based on
my experiences and the experiences of others that have used this tip, it can still help users that
have a fraction of that number.

The process for disabling the file access timestamp is quite easy. All that is required is one
quick change in the System Registry.To do so, follow these steps:
1. Click the Start button and select Run. Then type regedit in the textbox and click OK.
2. This will start up the Registry Editor and will allow you to edit the file system settings.
Once the Registry Editor has loaded, navigate to the file system settings by expanding
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE, SYSTEM, CurrentControlSet, Control, and then
FileSystem.
3. Depending on your system, you may see an entry called NtfsDisableLastAccessUpdate.
If your system has this entry already listed, skip to the next step. If you do not see
this entry, don’t worry; just create it by right-clicking and selecting New and then
DWORD Value, as shown in Figure 10-1. Key in NtfsDisableLastAccessUpdate for
the name.
4. Now, modify the DWORD value. Right-click the name of the entry and select Modify.
Then type a 1 in the box to disable the last access update feature.
5. Then click OK and restart your computer. The changes will be in effect.
FIGURE 10-1: Registry Editor adding a new DWORD value.

Disable Indexing Service

The Windows Indexing Service is a service that is designed to index all of the files on your
computer into a database. Your computer can then search through all of your files faster. The
idea behind the service is great; it will drastically cut down on the amount of time that is
needed to search your hard drive. Although this is a great benefit, you have to consider the
downside of this feature. In order to create a database of files, the service has to continuously
monitor the files on your computer and import basic file details into its database when new
files are found. The monitoring is not always done in real time, but at times you will notice it
running. The most common symptom of this service working is when you are reading something
on your computer and all of a sudden your hard drive starts making a lot of noise as if it
is working really hard. That is because it is working hard to update the Indexing Service’s
database.
Just like any other service that starts up when the system does, the Indexing Service takes up
memory—quite a bit of memory compared to other services. In fact, the service takes up
exactly 4364KB of memory when the service first starts up on your computer. Eventually, about
30 seconds after the service has started, the amount of memory used decreases to 306KB. This
looks good, but after you use your computer for a little while, the memory usage will start to
creep up again. On average, the service takes up about 1316KB of memory.
When the service is idle on your computer, it is just taking up memory. Also, it is running at
the lowest CPU priority, so you can be sure that it won’t interfere with other applications very
much at all.
Personally, I rarely use the Search feature of Windows XP and would much rather disable the
Indexing Service and take the performance hit the one time every few months that I actually
do need to search for a file. In return, I get more free memory space that can be used for more
useful services and applications. Follow these steps if you rarely search for files and would like
some more free memory:
1. Click the Start Menu and select Run. Then key in services.msc in the box and click
OK.
2. This will start up the Services snap-in control, where you can manage all of the services
on the system. Look for the Indexing Service on the list, right-click it, and select
Properties, as shown in Figure 10-8.
3. Once you see Indexing Service Properties, click the Stop button, if the service is already
running. Then, click the Startup Type drop-down box and select Disabled, as shown in
Figure 10-9.
4. Click the OK button and you are finished!
Now you don’t have to worry about the Indexing Service using any more of your memory.

Increasing network browsing speed

Does your computer slow down when you browse your local area network and connect to other
computers that are sharing data? One of the most common causes of this slowdown is a feature
of Windows Explorer that looks for scheduled tasks on remote computers. This effort can take
some time on some computers and can really slow down your browsing. The window with
which you are browsing the network may appear to freeze momentarily, as the system is waiting
for a response from the remote computer.
Although this problem is a complex one, the solution is very simple. Instead of having to wait
for the remote scheduled tasks, which is useless information to anyone who is not a system
administrator remotely configuring scheduled tasks, you can disable this feature.
In order to do this, you will have to hack the System Registry and delete a reference to a key so
that this feature will not be loaded.To do this, follow these steps:
1. Open up the Registry Editor by clicking the Start Menu and selecting Run. Then type
regedit in the text box and click the OK button.
2. Once the Registry Editor has loaded, expand the HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE key.
3. Next, expand Software and then Microsoft.
4. Locate Windows and expand that as well.
5. You will want to be editing the main system files, so expand CurrentVersion.
6. Because this feature is a feature of the Windows component known as Explorer, expand
the Explorer key.
7. Next, you will want to modify the remote computer settings, so expand the
RemoteComputer key and then expand the NameSpace key to show all of the features
that are enabled when you browse to a remote computer.
8. In the NameSpace folder you will find two entries. One is “{2227A280-3AEA-1069-
A2DE-08002B30309D}” which tells Explorer to show printers shared on the remote
machine. The other, “{D6277990-4C6A-11CF-8D87-00AA0060F5BF},” tells Explorer
to show remote scheduled tasks. This is the one that you should delete. This can be done
by right-clicking the name of the key and selecting Delete.
If you have no use for viewing remote shared printers and are really only interested in shared
files, consider deleting the printers key, “{2227A280-3AEA-1069-A2DE-08002B30309D}”, as
well. This will also boost your browsing speed.
Once you have deleted the key, you just need to restart and the changes will be in effect. Now
your network computer browsing will be without needless delays.

Converting a File System to NTFS

You can convert a FAT or FAT32 volume to NTFS using the Convert program that comes with Windows
XP. Once you do, however, there’s no way back. Which is to say, there is no “unconvert,” nor is there
any program to convert NTFS volumes to other file systems. So be sure you want to do this first.
Caution Even though Convert can change a FAT or FAT32 volume without destroying
data, you should back up the volume before you convert. You just never know
when things might go wrong.
When you are sure you want to convert, follow these steps:
1. Close all open windows on your desktop.
2. Click the Start button and choose All Programs then Accessories neax click on Command Prompt.
3. Type the command below, replacing driveletter with the drive letter of the volume you want to
convert (for instance, c: or d:):
convert driveletter: /fs:ntfs
4. Press the Enter key and then follow any instructions that appear on-screen.
5. When you want to close the command-prompt window, type exit and press Enter.
If some open program or other activity prevents the program from converting the volume immediately,
you’ll be given the option to have it run the next time you start your computer.

Removing entries from Add/Remove that remain after uninstalling

If you uninstall a program and the entry remains in the Add/remove programs listing you can remove it from the list by doing the below. This works with Windows 98/Me/2000/XP
Go to Start/Run/Regedit
Go To HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\MICROSOFT\WINDOWS\CURRENTVERSION\UNINSTALL.
You will find your add/remove list here, Next right-click on the orphaned entry to delete it from your add/remove list.

Remove shared documents folder from My Computer

Open registry editor by going to START>RUN and type regedit and press enter.
Once in registry, navigate to key HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\My Computer\NameSpace\DelegateFolders The subkey you want is named {59031a47-3f72-44a7-89c5-5595fe6b30ee} If you delete this key, you have effectively removed the my shared documents folder.
Or
Create a new DWORD value, or modify the existing value, called "NoSharedDocuments" and set it according to the value data below.
Value Name: NoSharedDocuments
Data Type: REG_DWORD (DWORD Value)
Value Data: (0 = default, 1 = enable restriction)