Tweak Windows XP Settings with TweakUI / Windows XP

Since I previously wrote a post on how to tweak Windows Vista, I thought I’d throw in some power toys for Windows XP users. Windows XP isn’t going away anytime soon, so if you’re still not ready to customize it the way you want, take a minute and read through this article.

One of the best programs for tweaking Windows XP is Microsoft’s TweakUI PowerToy utility. Using this nifty little program, you can tweak many Windows settings quickly and easily.

You can adjust many settings, from how items are grouped in the taskbar to disabling or removing annoying desktop shortcut icon arrows.

Here’s a quick overview of some of the other settings you can configure:

Number of tweaks for Alt + Tab . dialogs

This if very useful if you are like me and always have about 20 windows open in your taskbar. Even grouping the taskbar, finding the program you’re looking for can become a pain. Using this you can increase the number of programs displayed when Alt+Tab is pressed.

Change line number

Reduce the quality of thumbnails in Explorer to increase performance

Disable / Customize Arrows Icons Shortcuts

Customize location for location bar

The location bar is what shows up on the left side of the Open and Save Files from Word, Excel, etc dialog boxes. The usual options are Desktop, My Documents, My Computer, and My Network Places. , but you can add your own custom locations using this option.

Hide a Control Panel Applet/Extension

You can hide Control Panel items so that they are not visible when you go to the Control Panel dialog box.

However, this does not uninstall it or prevent others from opening it through the command prompt. Only useful if you want to hide it from users who don’t know what they’re doing.

Automatically log in to Windows as any user

This will allow you to sign in to Windows automatically, even if your computer is on a domain. In addition, passwords are stored in an encrypted format.

Mange security and access control for administrative functions

You can also control access to many Administration tasks using TweakUI. For example, you can control who can manage file and printer shares, manage disks, manage shares, and more.

Repair Windows files

Finally, you can use TweakUI to repair Windows in case something breaks. You can rebuild icons, fix fonts, My Music, My Pictures, my videos folder and more.

Overall, a very handy utility that Microsoft offers for free. Must be something built into the Control Panel, but now you’ll have to download it!