Sometimes when you put in a music CD or a thumb drive Windows will pop up a Autoplay dialogue that is full of entries for programs which you may not use or may not even have installed. To clean them up you will need to install a free program form Microsoft called TweakUI [http://www.download.com/Tweak-UI/3000-2341_4-10002117.html?hhTest=1].

1.Run this program

2. Click the plus sign next to “My Computer”

3. Click the plus sign next to “AutoPlay”

4. Select “Handlers”

5. You’ll see a “Delete” button, but it doesn’t seem to work; instead, click the listing you want to get rid of and click the “Edit” button.

6. Uncheck all the drives listed under the “Supported Media” category.

7. Click the “Ok” button to save your changes and close TweakUI, and you should see your simplified AutoPlay dislogue the next time you pop in a CD or thumb drive.

TweakUI, however, doesn’t run in Windows Vista.

Enabling Autorun

1. In Windows, click Start,
and then choose Run.

2. Enter D: \autorun.exe (where D: is your CD-ROM drive)                                                                                           (NB: There is a space between : and \)

Turning off Autorun

Option (A)

1. Click My Computer

2. Select the CD drive

3. Right click on the drive and select ‘Properties’

4. Select the ‘Autoplay’ tab

5. Select the ‘Take no action’ option from the ‘Select an action to perform’ menu and click ‘Apply’

Option (B)

1. Open the Registry Editor by clicking on ‘Start/Run’

2. Type ‘regedit’ and click ‘OK’

3. Navigate to the branch ‘HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\Cdrom’.

4. Now double-click on the ‘Autorun’ value in the right pane and set its value to 0.

5. In case the option is not already defined, you can create it by selecting ‘Edit|New|DWORD Value’. Name it ‘Autorun’.

6. For the changes to take effect, you will have to log out and log back in.

Caveat here: After you have made these registry changes, Windows will no longer be notified when you insert the CD.

To do this you must know how to set up  the other computer and you also need to know the name of your incoming mail server (e.g. “pop.yourispname”), your outgoing mail server (e.g. “smtp.yourispname”), your user name (sometimes called the account name) and your password. IMPORTANT: If you’re borrowing a friend’s computer, be sure to back up that computer’s address book before copying your own to it.

You can find all these info by going into Outlook/Outlook Express, then go to Tools/Accounts… and double-click on the name of the mail connection (eg pop.yourispname). Click on the Servers tab. You’ll now be able to see the server names and your account name. Your password is usually saved and input automatically and will be overstruck by a row of dots.

From Outlook/Outlook Express, go to Tools/Accounts… and click on Add/Mail… Depending on the version of Windows you’re using, you’ll either get the usual Account window, or a Wizard that will prompt you for the server and account information.

Start > Right-click on My Computer > Advanced tab > Performance Settings > Select “Adjust for best performance”.

By doing so, Windows will do away with the graphical effects. However, if you still want to retain certain effects, select the “Custom” instead and check the boxes from the list of effects available below. All of these, though, can be canceled with the “Let Windows choose what’s best for my computer” option.

You can make your Windows XP run faster by taking away the fancy graphics. Right-click anywhere on your Windows desktop, and from the pop-up menu, click Properties. Click the Themes tab, and choose Windows Classic from the drop-down list.