Hacking Windows

Create a recovery CD/DVD for Windows Vista on Compaq PCs

BeHE — Sat, 27 Oct 2007 18:46:55 +0000

After setting up your computer for the first time, be sure to create a set of recovery discs of the full factory image. The recovery discs are used to start up (boot) the computer and recover the operating system and software to factory settings in case of system instability or failure. While the steps listed here are for a Compaq PC with Windows Vista, different manufacturers have slightly different instructions and these will give you a general overview of the process.

http://www.wikihow.com/Create-Recovery-Discs-for-Windows-Vista

This post released under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike licence.

32-bit system tray and desktop icons in Windows 2000

BeHE — Fri, 10 Aug 2007 16:13:20 +0000

Windows 2000 suffers from the unfortunate limitation of having only 256-colour icons and 16-bit tray icons.

The following downloads will patch your operating system to run 32-bit icons.

Windows 2000 Revolutions Pack (142 Kb)
WARNING: breaks Sony Vegas 7.0
Win2000TrayPatch (13 Kb)
Requires Microsoft .NET Framework 2.0

Implementing improvements from Windows ME to Windows 98 SE

BeHE — Fri, 10 Aug 2007 15:11:35 +0000

You can take a copy of Windows ME and add many of its improvements to Windows 98 Second Edition, by following the instructions at the following website:

http://www.mdgx.com/98-5.htm#KRM9S

Repairing scratched CDs/DVDs with a banana

BeHE — Wed, 08 Aug 2007 19:13:05 +0000

Alternate video websites: Red Balcony, YouTube, Photobucket

Enable/disable animated windows

BeHE — Wed, 08 Aug 2007 18:33:08 +0000

If you want to enable or disable animated windows (the “exploding” effect when you maximise, the “zooming titlebar” effect when you minimise), then there are 2 ways to do this: The Completely Manual Way (harder) and The Semi-Automatic Way (easier).

The Completely Manual Way

Go to Start > Run.
In the box, type regedit.
If this doesn’t work, type regedt32.
Navigate to HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Control Panel\Desktop\WindowMetrics, or if you have only one user account, HKEY_USERS\.Default\Control Panel\Desktop\WindowMetrics.
Create a new String value, named MinAnimate
Double-click the new value and change it to 0 (turns the window animation off), or 1 (turns the window animation on).
Close Registry Editor, and reboot your computer.

The Semi-Automatic Way

Download the following two files: aniwin_disable.reg, aniwin_enable.reg.
Open the directory where you downloaded the files.
To disable window animations, double-click aniwin_disable.reg and click Yes at the prompt.
To enable window animations, double-click aniwin_enable.reg and click Yes at the prompt.

Compatibility mode tab on Windows 2000

BeHE — Sun, 05 Aug 2007 16:50:57 +0000

If you want to enable the Compatibility mode tab on programs in Windows 2000, just like you have on Windows XP/Server 2003, then follow the instructions below.

Go to Start > Run…
Type cmd.exe in the box and press ENTER on the keyboard.
Type regsvr32 %windir%\apppatch\slayerui.dll in the black window that opens.
Press ENTER and click OK on the dialogue box that follows.

To remove the Compatibility tab:

Go to Start > Run…
Type cmd.exe in the box and press ENTER on the keyboard.
Type regsvr32 /u %windir%\apppatch\slayerui.dll in the black window that opens.
Press ENTER and click OK on the dialogue box that follows.

Speeding up xDSL/Cable broadband in Windows 2000/XP/2003

BeHE — Sun, 05 Aug 2007 13:34:14 +0000

If you have cable or xDSL broadband, then you can drastically speed up your connection with the following instructions.

There are three methods to this solution: The Completely Manual Way (hardest), The Semi-Automatic Way (easy), The Fully Automatic Way (easiest)

The Completely Manual Way

Go to Start > Run
Type regedit.exe in the box and press ENTER.
Navigate to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\Tcpip\Parameters
Create a new DWORD value SackOpts with value 1
Create a new DWORD value TcpWindowSize with value 5ae4c
Create a new DWORD value Tcp1323Opts with value 3
Create a new DWORD value DefaultTTL with value 40
Create a new DWORD value EnablePMTUBHDetect with value 0
Create a new DWORD value EnablePMTUDiscovery with value 1
Create a new DWORD value GlobalMaxTcpWindowSize with value 5ae4c
Close Registry Editor and reboot your computer.

The Semi-Automatic Way

Copy the following into a text editor (e.g. Notepad) and save as “netspeedup.reg” (with quotes).

REGEDIT4

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\Tcpip\Parameters]
"SackOpts"=dword:00000001
"TcpWindowSize"=dword:0005ae4c
"Tcp1323Opts"=dword:00000003
"DefaultTTL"=dword:00000040
"EnablePMTUBHDetect"=dword:00000000
"EnablePMTUDiscovery"=dword:00000001
"GlobalMaxTcpWindowSize"=dword:0005ae4c

Double-click the file in Windows Explorer and click Yes at the prompt.

The Fully Automatic Way

Download the file: dslcable_speedup.reg (scanned for viruses using ClamWin on 2007-08-05), and open it, clicking Yes at the prompt. Reboot your computer.

External links

TCP/IP and NBT configuration parameters for Windows XP