95isalive - Windows 95 Tricks and Tweaks

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95 Is Alive

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Tricks & Tweaks

There are many and I'm going to start with just a couple of my favorites and see how it goes from there.
These are also Windows 98 compatible.
Suggestions are welcome, as this page will always be open for updates.

Trivia
When in development Windows 95 was code named "Chicago" and was originally going to be called Windows 4. It was changed to Windows 95 and released in "beta" version in August of 1994.. This explains the "Chicago" found in Windows 95 inf files.
Windows 98 was code named "Memphis."

Young folks, don't try anything on your Parent's computer without permission.

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Go get it Image	Find your CD with Keyfinder from Magical Jelly Bean Software Lost your CD key for your Windows disk? This little free utility will dig it out and print it for you. It will run right from the desktop in normal Windows or Safe Mode.
Go get it Image	Back up your drivers with Windriversbackup from Jermar software This is one of the slickest utilities I've seen yet. It lists all of the drivers and their associated files used by your machine, and then backs them up into a folder by making copies. It sure makes reinstalling Windows a whole lot easier. Best of all, it's free.
Go get it Image	Inventory your hardware and Software with Belarc Advisor A great free utility that inventories your computer. Gives you a list of hardware and programs installed, Checks for the proper software updates and more. It displays the results in an Internet Explorer window.
Image Visit	Install Media Player 7.1 in Windows 95 or NT Microsoft says it can't be done. Well, it can and here's a screenshot to prove it. No it is not a composite image. Clicking Visit will take you to a web page with the instructions. Thanks to Lee for the e-mail with the updated link information.
View IP	Don't get taken in by these two "Scams" There are a couple of simple web tricks that some "less than honest" web sites use to try to get you to buy software to "protect" your computer when it doesn't need protecting. The first is the popup that tells you your IP address is showing. Well it better be, or else the web site server won't know where to find your computer to send the info back.!!! Click View IP to see your IP address. The second trick is a website that shows you your hard drive contents. Nobody but you can see it so don't be alarmed. What it does is exactly the same as if you typed C:\ in your address bar and clicked Go. It only works from a web site on older versions of Internet Explorer.
Image	Free up memory by making sure unused Dll files are "unloaded" A little registry tweak to make sure the computer's memory is cleared when files are no longer required. The entry should already be in the registry, but for some reason it is sometimes forgotten. Run regedit and go to: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\explorer and make sure it contains a Key value, AlwaysUnloadDLL with the Default value set to 1. If not right click explorer and then click new key. Then rename the new key to AlwaysUnloadDLL then right click Default, click modify and set the value at 1.
Image	Make a Start Menu folder with frequently used system tools I use regedit and sysedit and others so often that I got tired of clicking Start, Run and typing the name of the program I wanted to use. So I made a Start Menu folder named system and put shortcuts to the exe files in it. Now it only takes two clicks to launch any one of them.
Image	Stop the desktop from refreshing so often Have you ever noticed that when you close a window that the computer hesitates while windows "refreshes" all of the Desktop Icons. This is because the ShellIconCache file has reached it's limit of 500 entries. To stop this run Regedit and open the key: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\explorer and create a new string value. Name it Max Cached Icons and then set the value to 2000.
Image	Quick Spell Check. Working on or editing a large Word or Office text document and have a word that doesn't look quite right but running spell check will take so long you can take a coffee break? To run a quick spell check, just highlight the word, sentence or paragraph you want to check and click the spell check button. Only the highlighted text will be checked. I know this works in Outlook and FrontPage, so I'm sure it will work in all "Office" products.
Image	Prevent Accidentally running a batch file When some programs or windows upgrades are installed they create a .bat file which is used to restore old files during an uninstall. Accidentally double clicking a file with a .bat extension will cause the old files to be restored and can render a program or upgrade unusable. To prevent this, run regedit and open the Key: HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\batfile\shell and change the value of Default to Edit, by right clicking Default and clicking Modify. The change will take effect the next time you start the computer. These files can still be run if needed by right clicking them and clicking run.
Image	Prevent accidental Registry changes Your computer is full of files with the .reg extension. Some of these files are created for backup purposes when programs are installed so that if you uninstall a program it can restore the old registry settings. However, if you accidentally double click a file with a .reg extension, the regedit program will automatically write ( merge ) the contents to the Registry which can cause a program to not function. To prevent this, run regedit and open the key: HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\regfile\shell and change the value of Default to Edit by right clicking Default and clicking Modify. This will make it open in Notepad when double clicked. The change will take effect the next time you start the computer. The Merge function will still work when you right click such a file.
Image	Make a Startup Disk One of the easiest things to do, and one that a lot of folks ignore, is making a Start Up disk to use when your computer malfunctions and won't load windows. Go to Control Panel, Add Remove Programs and click the Startup Disk tab. It could very well "Save" your computer.
Image	Windows Compression Agent You might find a program named Compression agent in the System section of the Start, Programs, Accessories. Or it might pop up and offer to increase your disk space when the hard drive starts getting full. In my humble opinion DO NOT USE IT, as it is well noted for rendering a system unusable. Just get rid of some junk files instead
Bitmap Jpeg/Gif	Place an image or a letterhead in a printed letter Ever want to include an image in a printed letter or create a nice letterhead but figured you needed an expensive "office" or printing program to do it. It can be done using a Bitmap image with Paint and WordPad. For JPEG and GIF images use Internet Explorer and WordPad. Click the image type on the left for a little "how to" tour. Just remember, your letter must be saved with the rtf or rich text format file extension, which is an option when you click Save or Save as.
Image	Use Msinfo to check out your computer Installing some of the Microsoft Office programs also installs a little known utility named Msinfo onto your computer. It will show you everything that is going on in your computer. If there it is named Msinfo32.exe and lives in the Program Files, Common Files, Microsoft Shared, MsInfo folder. ( Note: there is an msinfo.inf file in your Windows install files, it is not the same ) I could never find a download site, so I have compiled the necessary files in an install file named msinfo.exe. You can download it by clicking here: msinfo.exe Then double click to start the install program.
Image	Use your CD player and the Sound Recorder to make your own sounds Have a favorite artist or a favorite passage from a song. Use your CD player and the little sound recorder that's part of Windows Multimedia to record wave files and use them for your mail notification, or other Windows "Event" sounds. Or if you have a microphone, record you own voice or that of "someone special." Use the sound recorder, and when done editing your "sound file" click File and then Save as, give it a name and save the file in the Windows Media folder. Open Sounds on the Control Panel, select the event and then Browse to and select the file you just made. You can also use the "Say It" text to speech converter shown on the Fun Stuff page to make your wave files. Note: to install Sound Recorder, go to Control Panel, Add/Remove Programs, Windows Setup, Multimedia, and check the Sound Recorder box. You can also "Browse" to sound files in other programs but I usually copy them to the media file. ( Sound Recorder will not work if Media Player is being used at the same time )
Download Image	Use the tools scanreg and scanreg/restore from 98 in Windows 95 The automatic registry backup and restore tool set from Win98 will work in 95. Thanks to an e-mail from Carol J, I've installed and use them. Clicking Image will open a text page of instructions that you can copy and paste to a Notepad file so you can save it to your C: drive and read it in DOS if need be. Also, since it's becoming impossible to find the files on the web, I have created an install file that will install Scanreg on your Windows 95 computer. It will start working the next time you start your machine. Just click Download, save it to your desktop and double click Scanregsetup.exe to run the install. Instructions on reading files with the DOS Edit command are on the Windows Repair page.
Image	Show the Control Panel items on the start menu If you're in the control panel as much as I am, you probably get tired of having to click five or six times to get where you want. This trick adds a Control Panel folder to the Start Menu, that will pop open when the mouse pointer is on it and show a list of all of the control panel items. One click and whatever feature or function you want is opened. Right click Start, and click Explore which will open the Start Menu folder, right click in the right hand panel and click New and then Folder. Right click your "New Folder" and click rename. Clear the name field and copy and paste ALL of the following in the name space and press enter. ( Note: When you press enter everything but Control Panel will disappear. ) Control Panel.{21EC2020-3AEA-1069-A2DD-08002B30309D}
Image	Shut down from the Desktop Put a stop sign on the desktop and double click it to shut down instead having to click start, shut down, yep I really want to shut down etc,etc. By the time I'm done it's time to start up again! It shows in and works from Deskmenu too. Right click the Desktop, select New, then Shortcut and then copy and paste the following into the command line box: C:\WINDOWS\RUNDLL32.EXE user.exe,exitwindows Then click next, clear the field and name it Stop and click finish. Next, right click the new shortcut and click properties, click shortcut and then click Change icon. Click Browse, change the file type list to "all files" and go to Windows\System and click on vga.drv and there's your stop sign. Click once to highlight it and click ok. Found the command line on the net, posted by Deerslayer. Note: The command line might be different for NT, 2K and XP There are also some neat icons in windows\moricons.dll and windows\system\pifmgr.dll, and several .exe files contain icons
Image	View miniature Bitmaps By default the icon that shows for bitmap images is the Paint icon. Therefore, when you're "exploring" you have to click on each file to open Paint and view the image. This modification changes the icon to a miniature view of the actual bitmap. It requires a minor registry modification so view the Registry page first. Click Start, Run and type in regedit and click ok. In the panel that opens click the plus sign by HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT, scroll way down and click the plus by Paint.Picture. Click once on DefaultIcon and in the right panel, right click on (Default) and then click modify. Clear the data in the box that opens and type in: %1 and click ok. Close regedit and the next time you start your computer the change will take effect. I believe this one came from the site: Windows Registry Guide.
Image	Make Windows stop asking for its Installation Disk If the Windows directory on your computer has a folder named Options which should contain a folder called CABS. If the CABS folder contains a set of CAB ( cabinet ) files, these are a copy of the install files from your CD. Click Start, Run and type regedit and click ok. In the panel that opens click the plus signs by HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE, SOFTWARE, Microsoft, Windows, Current Version, and scroll down to and click once on Setup. In the right panel find and right click on SourcePath, click Modify and in the panel that opens clear the value and type in: C:\Windows\Options\CABS\ Click OK and close regedit and after you've restarted your computer, the next time you modify windows or install software it will not ask for the install disk. ( Mine says Win95B because that's where my files are. The subject of a trick to be added later. )
Image	Move the install/backup files out of Windows Normally Windows installs the backup files into Windows\Options\CABS which is great if you've installed the above trick to stop Windows from asking for the install disk. The drawback is that if the Windows directory ever becomes contaminated or the "young one" tosses Windows into the Recycle Bin you've not only lost Windows, but also the ability to re-install/repair Windows. ( to be covered in the repair section ) Simply cut and paste or drag the CABS folder onto the root or C: drive and rename it Win95. You'll need to modify the above trick to point to the new location.
Image	View files from a different perspective Included in Windows 95 is a leftover from Windows 3.1 called Winfile. To use it click Start, run and type in winfile and click Ok. A totally different version of file manager opens, and displays the files on your hard drive from a different point of view, which includes exact file size and a listing of the file attributes. The other drives are accessible for file copying etc, and when Windows Explorer has failed, Winfile will "sometimes" still work.
Image	Find a "lost" control panel You right click on the desktop and nothing happens or try to open a control panel and it doesn't work. Windows control panels have the .cpl file extension, so to find them use the find files or folders feature and type in *.cpl and click find now. A list will appear and they can be opened by right clicking on the one you want and then clicking "Open with control panel."
Image	Use Msconfig from Windows 98 for changing settings Msconfig from Windows 98 will work in all versions of Windows 95. It can be run from the desktop, but should be placed in the Windows\System folder and the two help files should go in the Windows\Help folder. It lets you edit the files normally opened with System Editor, ( sysedit ) and also remove entries from the Run key in the registry without having to use the Registry Editor ( regedit ). You will have to use a search engine to find a download site. Type in msconfig.exe
Go get it Image	Make the text box for Desktop icons transparent Have a nice image as your desktop wallpaper but it's covered by the little text boxes under the icons? A free utility called Disappear by Integrated Electronic Systems, that can be found in the software section at Annoyances will make it transparent. Be sure to download the vb40032.dll file and place it in the Windows\System folder. The dll file is also found at Annoyances.
Go get it Image	Update your defrag program file and save some time Ian posted this tweak on a forum I visit, and Carol J. found the original download site for me. I downloaded it and ran it as a trial right from the desktop and darn near fell out of the chair. It is the defrag.exe from Windows ME and it works in Windows 95. It has some selectable options and was done so fast I didn't have time to "refresh" the beverage of the hour. Needless to say it's installed. Thanks Ian and CJ. Thanks to Jay, here's a new download site.