PCTips Box

There has been large number of special folders in windows and we keep accessing these folders from different locations. When I say Special Folders, I mean folders like My documents , Startup , Temporary Internet Files etc.

We cannot access all these special folders are scattered over the operating system drive and some times they are so deep in terms of the directory structure which a normal user cannot remember easily.

But a cool freeware called Special Folders View makes it possible to list all these special folders in one go.

As shown in the image above, Special Folders View displays the list of all the special folders in which you just need to double click over a special folder path entry to open it in windows explorer. (more…)

The prospect of moving old files and settings to a new PC can be daunting and lost productivity that may occur can be stressful too. Yet, as you will see in the steps that follow, Windows Vista Ultimate greatly simplifies the process of transferring files and settings to a new Windows Vista-enabled PC.

Choosing the Right Transfer Method

This scenario assumes you are transferring files and settings from an old PC running either Windows XP Professional, Windows XP Home, Windows 2000 or Windows Vista to a new computer with Windows Vista installed. You can migrate files and settings using any of the following options:

• Network connection
• Removable media (such as a USB flash drive or external hard disk)
• CD or DVD
• USB Easy Transfer cable

Note that both computers must support the transfer method you choose. (more…)

Probably Windows 98 users remember that in the Start menu there was a possibility to see your recently open documents (as far as I remember, the list displayed the last 15 documents you opened). In Windows XP, this option is gone. Sometimes I found it useful, because I never remember the names I give to files, or the place I save them.

Windows XP has this information in memory, but it does not display it by default anymore. Here’s how to get access to the recent documents list:

1. Open Windows Explorer (if you don’t know how, use the shortcut keys combination “Window” + “E”)
2. Click on Local Disc (C:) (more…)

I am naturally wary of any program that claims to be able to speed up Windows and solve performance problems. They rarely do any good and in some cases can make things even worse. I’m not about to change my mind since no single program can hope to cover the near infinite range of problems on a well-used PC and until now I have used a variety of tools and utilities to address specific issues, but now many of them – plus some new ones – have been gathered together in one place, in an excellent free application called Glary Utilities.

It covers five different aspects of your PC’s operation: Clean Up and Repair, Optimise and Improve, Privacy and Security, Files and Folders and System Tools, and each one leads to a collection of individual tools. (more…)

Copying files between folders, drives or PCs can be painfully slow with Windows file transfer service. If you regularly move big files around you may want to give Copy Handler a try as it can move files up to 6-7 times faster.

Copy Handler program is a small tool designed for copy/move files and folders between different storage medias (hard disks, floppy disks, local networks, CD-ROMs and many other).
Advantages of the program: (more…)

Microangelo, the famous icon tool company, has released an updated version of their On Display application that allows users to easily change and replace the default system icons in Windows Vista. With Microangelo On Display you can:

Customize Windows icons quickly and easily. Just right-click on the icon and select “Appearance” from the popup menu. One elegant dialog allows you to change icons just about anywhere on your computer.

Use On Display to change icons displayed by Windows Vista, XP and Windows 2000. If you can’t change an icon with On Display, it probably can’t be done. Folder, shortcut, shell and system icons, On Display can change icons in more places than any other tool available. (more…)

As some of you will already know, Windows XP keeps a record of all files on the hard disk to try and improve searching speed. The only downside to all of this is that your PC will have to be indexing all of the files, so if you don’t use search very much you can disable this feature: (more…)

Windows Vista works in the background to automatically index all the files in the Start Menu, user profile folders and files setup for offline access by default. If you have many files in these locations and the files change often, the indexing service may slow down your system’s performance. Unlike Windows XP, Vista now allows you to easily tweak the indexing service following the steps below. It is recommended that you disable indexing for the other locations other than the Start Menu for maximum performance. Bear in mind that while this tweak speeds up your overall system performance, it will also slow you down when searching for files in those locations. (more…)

There are endless ways to secure data stored on your PC but here is a really simple little trick that hides a folder and its contents by making it completely invisible. It works best on sub folders (i.e. folders within a folder). To make a folder vanish you need to do two things, give it a name using a non-printing/displaying character then replace the standard folder icon with a blank one. (more…)

Manually cleaning out the Temp folder in Window Vista is often a necessary maintenance step when the Windows Vista Disk Cleanup utility fails to completely clean out the Temp folder.

Removing temporary files is a quick and easy task that can help save disk space and keep your PC clean of file clutter. Just follow the step by step directions below to manually clean out the Temp folder: (more…)