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Vista SP2 Sound Problems

Music, Operating System, Windows Trick, Windows Vista | Posted by Admin February 16th, 2010

PC Tips for Vista SP2 Sound Problems

Microsoft is making it easy for users running Windows Vista Service Pack 2, but also SP1, to resolve sound problems affecting the operating system after the deployment of a service pack. In this manner, the Redmond company is acknowledging that Vista users can run into issues related to sound once they upgrade their platform either to SP1 or to SP2. Fortunately enough, the software giant provides users with an automated solution for eventual sound problems via KB948481. Microsoft is essentially providing a Fix It button and associated solution that will help users troubleshoot any sound issues introduced with the installation of a new service pack.

“After you install a Windows Vista service pack, you may experience one or more of the following problems with sound: no sound is produced when you play audio files or run programs that have an audio component. The speaker symbol next to the clock in the notification area may display the following message: No Audio Output Device is installed. The Sound Controller in Device Manager displays a yellow exclamation point. The sound quality changes. For example, if you previously had surround sound, you may now have stereo sound,” Microsoft explained.

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Vista SP2 HD Audio Controller

Music, Operating System, Windows Trick, Windows Vista | Posted by Admin January 26th, 2010

PC Tips for Vista SP2 HD Audio Controller

With the advent of Windows Vista, Microsoft praised the boost in energy consumption efficiency in comparison with Windows XP. Still, there are exceptions to every rule. And while Vista indeed uses less energy over XP, users of the operating system can still experience excessive power use. One such example involves Vista SP2 and earlier during sleep or hibernation, and the HD audio controller, the Redmond-based company explained. The software giant has noted that there are two scenarios in which Vista SP2 sucks more power than it should.

“If you put the computer to sleep or into hibernation when it is running on AC power, the high definition (HD) audio controller continues to use power. Additionally, even after the computer transitions to DC power while the computer is asleep or in hibernation, the HD audio controller still uses power. This behavior persists even though you disable the ‘Allow this device to wake the computer’ option in the HD audio controller properties,” Microsoft explained.

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Vista to XP Copying Performance Slower

Performance, Windows Trick, Windows Vista, Windows XP | Posted by Admin January 19th, 2010

PC Tips for Vista to XP Copying Performance being Slower

One of the issues that plagued Windows Vista when the operating system was launched in January 2007 was the slow copying speeds delivered. Over two years later, and after SP1 resolved the initial issues, Microsoft informed users that there were additional problems impacting performance. In this regard, the Redmond company noted that, while copying a file from Windows Vista or Windows Server 2008 to a down-level system, such as Windows XP or Windows Server 2003, in the context in which Intel I/OAT was enabled, users would notice that the performance was significantly slower compared to when the feature was disabled.

“Consider the following scenario: you have a computer that is running Windows Vista or Windows Server 2008. Intel I/O Acceleration Technology (I/OAT) is enabled on the computer. You copy files to this computer from another computer that is running a down-level operating system, such as Windows XP and Windows Server 2003. In this scenario, the file copying is significantly slower than when Intel I/O Acceleration Technology is disabled,” the Microsoft noted.

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How to make Windows Vista boot faster 2

Operating System, Performance, Windows Trick, Windows Vista | Posted by Admin January 12th, 2010

If you have more than one operating system installed on your PC for example, you may have both Windows Vista and Windows 7 beta installed – your computer displays a menu asking you which operating system you want to load. If you don’t select an operating system within 30 seconds, it automatically loads your default operating system.

You can cut the amount of time your computer waits for your input before loading Windows Vista by going back to Msconfig and selecting the Boot tab. Where it says Timeout, change the number to a lower setting, but give yourself enough time to actually make your choice. If you only have Windows Vista installed on your machine, you don’t need to complete this step.

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How to make Windows Vista boot faster

Operating System, Performance, Windows Trick, Windows Vista | Posted by Admin January 5th, 2010

PC Tips for making Windows Vista boot faster

The time it takes for your computer to start up and run has been massively improved under Windows Vista. One of the reasons older versions of Windows, such as Windows 95 and Windows 98, took so long to boot up was because those versions of Windows were running on top of another operating system MSDOS.

With Windows Vista this is no longer the case, so start-up times are a lot faster. If you have a brand new computer or a fresh installation of Windows Vista, it will take no time at all for your PC to start up, so you can begin using your favourite programs at once. Unfortunately, after a while, with the more programs you install and the more files you have on your PC, you may begin to notice that your computer takes longer and longer to start up. Before you know it, you’ll be able to get up, make a cup of tea and drink it while waiting for Windows Vista to load. When things get this bad, you know you have to do something about it.

We recently asked visitors to the pctipsbox.com website how long it took for their PCs to start. The results varied from less than a minute to over ten!

There are plenty of factors that could make your PC startup grind to a halt, so there are plenty of tweaks to try to get your PC starting up in a flash. It’s all very well listing these tweaks, but do they work?

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Windows 7 Calculator to Vista

Operating System, Windows 7, Windows Features, Windows Trick, Windows Vista | Posted by Admin December 28th, 2009

PC Tips for Windows 7 Calculator to Vista

Windows 7 will most likely offer users a pleasant surprise, at least through its redefined interface and the set of redesigned tools it brings. The plain old calculator suffered a beautiful transformation into a more consumer-oriented product capable of serving both more science prone users as well as the average Joe.

As you probably know, the application can be downloaded as a standalone product here, and run from portable devices with no problem at all, as it requires no installation; a double click on the executable will suffice to launch it. It works nicely on Vista but I bet that you’d appreciate complete integration in the operating system so that it would be automatically launched instead of the plain old version of Windows Calculator.

The procedure is actually a matter of gaining full control of the much dreaded, vital file keeper, System32 folder. Normally, you do not have access to modifying the data in it, not even if you run your account in administrator mode or become the administrator by running the command net user administrator /active:Yes in Command Prompt.

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Hack Aero’s Glass Borders for Vista

Operating System, Windows Trick, Windows Vista | Posted by Admin December 21st, 2009

PC Tips for Hacking Aero Glass Border for Vista

The borders around system windows, such as dialog boxes and the Control Panel, are transparent in Windows Vista’s Aero interface. If you’d like, you can make those transparent borders larger or smaller:

  1. Right-click the Desktop and select Personalize.
  2. Click Windows Color and Appearance.
  3. Click “Open classic appearance properties” for more color options.
  4. From the dialog box that appears, make sure that Windows Aero is selected as the color scheme. Click the Advanced button on the right side of the dialog box.
  5. Select “Border Padding” in the Item drop-down box. To change the size of the border, type a new size for the border. (The default is 4.) Click OK, then OK again. The sizes of the borders will now change.

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Encrypted File System In Vista

Operating System, Windows Trick, Windows Vista | Posted by Admin December 14th, 2009

PC Tips for Encrypting File System in Vista

Files that have been protected using EFS are encrypted at the file-system level. The benefit of this is that the files can only be opened by the user with the appropriate private key and certificate. Even if you were to reinstall the operating system, the files would still be inaccessible.

You can encrypt a file using the steps listed below. An important point to remember is that a file can not be both encrypted and compressed. If compression is enabled, it will be disable when encryption is enabled.

  1. Double click the Computer icon on your desktop and locate the file you want to encrypt.
  2. Right click the file and select Properties
  3. From the General tab, click the Advanced button.
  4. Select the Encrypt contents to secure data option.
  5. Click OK.
  6. Click OK to close the file’s properties dialog box.

Once you complete these steps, the contents of the file are encrypted. When you access the file, the contents are automatically decrypted. You can disable encryption on a file by completing the steps outlined above and removing the check beside the Encrypt contents to secure data option.

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Add an elevated Command Prompt for Vista

Operating System, Windows Trick, Windows Vista | Posted by Admin December 7th, 2009

PC Tips for Adding elevated Command Prompt for Vista

Add an elevated Command Prompt Windows power users know that a command prompt (Cmd.exe) is the fastest way to many tasks–much faster than digging through menus and tabbed dialog boxes. In Windows Vista, this is more true than ever, thanks to User Account Control. To get maximum mileage out of the command prompt, add a shortcut to the Start menu and configure it to run as an Administrator. Here’s how:

1. Click Start and type cmd in the Search box. This should produce a list consisting of one entry: the shortcut to the Windows Command Processor, cmd.
2. Right-click the cmd shortcut and choose Pin to Start Menu.
3. Click Start again. Right-click the Command Prompt shortcut you just added to the Start menu and choose Properties.
4. Click the Advanced button and click to select the Run as administrator checkbox.
5. Click OK to save your changes.

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Delete your TEMP files on shutdown

Operating System, Performance, Windows Trick, Windows Vista | Posted by Admin November 28th, 2009

PC Tips for Deleting your TEMP Files on Shutdown

It is really easy to set Windows XP to delete the contents of your Temp folder (or run any other commands) on shutdown. There are numerous reasons why you might want to delete your Temporary files when you shutdown Windows XP. Your Temporary files folder can get extremely large. Take a look at what is in C:\WINDOWS\Temp.
The first step is to install Xecutor. You can download Xecutor from the Xpertdesign homepage.

The second step is to create a batch file that will delete your temporary files on shutdown. To do this open up notepad and type the following line:
del /Q G:\WINDOWS\Temp save your file as tempdelete.bat. Alternatively, you can download my tempdelete.bat file if you prefer.

The third step is to configure Xecutor to run the tempdelete.bat file on shutdown. Open Xecutor, and answer no to the stream of questions
it prompts you with the first time you run it. Next choose the shutdown tab and add tempdelete.bat file. This is shown below:

After you hit OK you will now see tempdelete.bat in the shutdown tab of Xecutor.

Now just close Xecutor and it will run in your system tray. The last step is to drag the Xecutor icon from your desktop into your Startup folder located in Start >> All Programs >> Startup so that Xecutor starts when you start Windows.

You are all set, now when you shutdown Windows, your temporary files will be deleted, as well. You can add other commands the same way (i.e., delete cookies, delete My Documents, etc.).

What other commands do you think would be useful to run at Shutdown? Let us know in the comments.

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