Windows XP Hacks, 2nd Edition

Preface

Windows XP marks the biggest change to the Windows OS since the advent of Windows 95. It combines the stability of the NT/2000 operating system with the user-friendliness and hardware support of the consumer Windows line—and it does so literally because those two operating systems have been combined for the first time in XP. Although there are two versions of XP—Home Edition and Professional Edition—the differences between them are relatively minor and have to do primarily with security and administrator tools. Under the hood, they’re the same OS.

XP marks several other changes as well. DOS is no longer a part of the underlying OS, although it’s still available as a command prompt. Multimedia and graphics have been built into the operating system more directly than before and are no longer treated as an afterthought. And cosmetically, XP has been given a makeover, in both the way it looks (rounded windows and almost cartoonish at times) and the way it works.

All this is good news for would-be operating-system hackers. Because of the operating system’s greater stability, those who work under the hood of XP can concentrate on actually getting work done and making the OS more effective, rather than trying to fix its shortcomings. Because of the richer interface and greater support for graphics and multimedia, you can more easily change the way the operating system works and looks. And because the OS offers a variety of tools for recovering from errors, you can hack to your heart’s content without worrying that you’ll damage the OS beyond recognition.

This collection is based on the hands-on, real-world experience of those who in many cases have been using PCs well before any version of Windows even existed. They have wrestled with each new version of Windows as it was released, and found ways to take advantage of every nook and cranny of the operating system. When XP came out, they applied that hard-earned knowledge to it as well, and came up with ways to take advantage of the myriad new features of the operating system.

The results are 120 hacks that are useful, frequently entertaining, and will save you countless hours at the keyboard. Whether you want to speed up your PC, customize XP’s interface, hack your wired and wireless network, get more out of the Web, make better use of email, use the Registry to bend the operating system to your will, or use XP for countless other useful tasks, you’ll find what you’re looking for here. And each hack doesn’t just show you how to do something; it also teaches why it works. Each hack is a starting point, rather than an ending point, so that you can apply the knowledge you’ve gained to create new hacks of your own. Try it out—who knows, in the next edition of this book, you might get a hack of your own published.

This second edition has been significantly updated from the first edition of the book. It takes into account all the changes made by Service Pack 2 (SP2), and adds a good deal of new material, such as using the open source browser Firefox, the Google Desktop, Microsoft’s own MSN Desktop Search, and Gmail. It’s also beefed up its coverage of wireless technologies and Internet security, including killing spyware.

How to Use This Book

You can read this book from cover to cover if you like, but each hack stands on its own, so feel free to browse and jump to the different sections that interest you most. If there’s a prerequisite you need to know about, a cross-reference will guide you to the right hack. If you’re not familiar with the Registry yet, or you want a refresher, you might want to spend some time in Chapter 9 to get a good grounding.

How This Book Is Organized

This book is not a mere tips-and-tricks compendium that tells you where to click, where to drag, and what commands to type. It takes advantage of XP’s flexibility and new features, recognizes that there are specific tasks you want to accomplish with the operating system, and offers you bite-size pieces of functionality that you can put to use in a few minutes. It also shows how you can expand on their usefulness yourself. To give you this kind of help, the book is organized into 13 chapters.

Chapter 1, Startup and Shutdown

With XP, startup and shutdown can mean much more than turning on your PC or selecting Shut Down from the Start menu. With hacks in this chapter, you can change the picture that appears on the startup screen, speed up the sometimes endless startup and shutdown processes, hack the Registry to control many different aspects of startup and shutdown, customize multiboot options, and much more.

Chapter 2, The User Interface

XP lets you change the way it looks and works more than any other version of Windows, and this chapter shows how to do it. Want a speedy, stripped-down version of the OS? It’s in here. Want to build your own themes and find thousands more online? It’s in here as well. So are hacks for controlling the Control Panel, Start menu, and taskbar; creating transparent windows; and building your own cursors and icons. It also shows you how to make your PC look and work like a Mac, and how to give Linux a try without having to actually install any software. The hacks don’t stop there, so interface hackers might want to head here first.

Chapter 3, Windows Explorer

Windows Explorer provides a basic window into XP and lets you manage files and folders, among other tasks. When hacked, it does much more as well. This chapter shows how to customize folder icons and balloon tips, improve the context menu, find files fast by mastering the indexing service’s query language, get more disk space by using NTFS compression, keep your PC secure with encryption, and more.

Chapter 4, The Web

You probably spend a significant portion of your computing life on the Web, so why not make the most of it? Want to find information fast, straight from your browser, without having to head off to sites like Google? This chapter teaches you how to do it. You can also kill pop ups, stop spyware, surf anonymously without a trace, and speed up file downloads. If you host your own web site, you’ll find out secrets of using the built-in Internet Information Services (IIS) web server. The chapter also shows you how to hack the free browser Firefox, which some people consider the best browser on the planet. In addition, it teaches you how to surf the Internet ad-free and shows you how you can literally Google your desktop by using Google technology to search through your email and files. There are many more hacks here as well.

Chapter 5, Networking

XP was built for networking, and this chapter shows you how to take full advantage of it. Tweak your DNS settings for faster Internet access, make your home network run better, use command-line tools for trouble-free network operations, or get the most out of using the Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) for making inexpensive phone calls. This chapter helps you get the most out of XP’s powerful, built-in ability to connect.

Chapter 6, Email

Email is both the greatest productivity-booster and the greatest time-waster known to humankind. This chapter ensures that you’ll stop wasting time and get more out of email. Slam spam, open blocked file attachments in Outlook and Outlook Express, get better email software, and retrieve web-based email using a normal email client. And you’ll learn many ways to get more out of Google’s email service, Gmail. There’s all that and more here.

Chapter 7, Wireless

It’s an unwired world, and XP is at the center of it. XP was built with wireless in mind, includes built-in wireless discovery of networks, and because of that, makes it easy to set up home and corporate wireless networks, as well as connect to hotspots when people travel with their laptops or PDAs. So, in this chapter, you’ll find out about wireless hacking—everything from war driving to finding wireless networks, protecting your home wireless network, using wireless encryption, solving hotspot woes, and more.

Chapter 8, Security

From the moment you turn on your PC and connect to the Internet or a network, you’re in danger. Snoopers and intruders can try to get into your system; crackers might try to install Trojans to take control of your computer or turn it into a zombie and use it to launch attacks against other PCs or web sites. The hacks in this chapter, though, will show you how you can use the Internet and networks, and still be safe. You’ll learn how to hide files and folders using encryption, how to test your PC’s vulnerabilities, how to use firewalls to harden your PC against attacks, how to punch holes through firewalls, and more.

Chapter 9, The Registry

If you’re going to hack XP, you’ll need to use the Registry. It’s that simple. This chapter goes beyond merely teaching you how to use the Registry and how it’s organized (although it covers that in detail). It also shows you how to hack the Registry itself—for example, by offering hacks on how to use .reg files to edit the Registry safely, and how to track and restore Registry changes.

Chapter 10, Applications

XP comes with a basic suite of built-in utilities, with the emphasis on basic. But you can hack these basic utilities so that they’re much more useful powerhouses. Store multiple clips on the Clipboard, extend your real estate with virtual desktops, build a better backup strategy, take better screenshots, or use a universal instant messenger. In addition to utilities, an operating system needs applications to do much of its work. So, this chapter shows you how to hack them as well. Have older Windows applications that have a hard time running under XP? This chapter shows you how to make sure they run. You can also use command-line shortcuts to customize how each application runs, open and create Microsoft documents without Microsoft Office, and more.

Chapter 11, Graphics and Multimedia

In XP, Windows gets serious about multimedia and graphics for the first time. In this chapter, you’ll see how to get the most out of them, with hacks for saving streaming audio to your PC, making videos with Movie Maker, sharing music without the spyware, and converting images easily. Music lovers will find several ways to hack iTunes and how to take advantage of the new music format Ogg Vorbis.

Chapter 12, System Performance

No matter how fast your PC is, it’s not fast enough. This chapter shows you ways to hack XP to juice up its performance. Get the most out of your RAM, use the Performance Console to speed up system performance, and use a variety of Registry hacks to make XP run. For those who have upgraded to SP2, or are considering it, you’ll also see how to combat SP2 upgrade woes.

Chapter 13, Hardware

By itself, an operating system can’t do a thing; it needs hardware to run on. In this chapter, you’ll see how to use XP to hack your hardware. Remap your keyboard, set up a direct cable connection between PCs for a quick-and-dirty network, uncover “hidden hardware” with the Device Manager, and get better resolution on your laptop and your LCD screen. And yes, there are more hacks here as well.

Conventions Used in This Book

This book uses the following typographical conventions:

Italic

Used to indicate new terms, URLs, filenames, file extensions, directories, and folders.

Constant width

Used to show code examples, verbatim searches and commands, the contents of files, and the output from commands.

Constant width bold

Used in examples and tables to show commands or other text that should be typed literally.

Constant width italic

Used in examples, tables, and commands to show text that should be replaced with user-supplied values.

Pay special attention to notes set apart from the text with the following icons:

Tip

This icon indicates a tip, suggestion, or general note. It contains useful supplementary information or an observation about the topic at hand.

Warning

This icon indicates a warning or note of caution.

The thermometer icons, found next to each hack, indicate the relative complexity of the hack:

beginner

moderate

expert

Using Code Examples

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