Windows 95 Registry Back Up the Registry If you plan to mess with the Registry, make sure you have a good backup first. Fortunately, the Win95 CD comes with a free Registry backup utility. Create a folder on your hard disk called Registry Backup, select and copy CFGBACK.EXE (and its help file) from the OTHER\MISC\CFGBACK\ folder of the Win95 CD, then paste it into the new folder. Create a shortcut to the file from your Start menu or Desktop for easy access. Change BMP Icons to Thumbnail View Open the Registry Editor (Start/Run and type REGEDIT in the Run box). Drill down (by clicking on the plus signs) into HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Paint.Picture\DefaultIcon. Double-click on the word "Default" in the right pane. Copy the contents and paste them into a file (or write the contents down on paper) just in case you want to reverse what you are about to do. Now replace the value with %1 (a percent sign and the number one). Click on OK and close the Registry Editor. After rebooting your system, you'll notice that the icons of BMP files are now thumbnails of the images in the files. Stop Zooming! Win95 windows "zoom" open and closed. You can speed things up by turning this off. Launch the Registry Editor and drill down into HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Control Panel\Desktop\WindowMetrics. Right- click on the white space in the right pane and select New/String Value. Type in MinAnimate as the new value and press the Enter key. Now double-click on the new MinAnimate and add 0 as the value. Click on OK and restart your computer. Whenever you want to restore window zooming, replace the 0 value with the number 1. Speed Up Start Menus While we're speeding things up, let's make the Start menu cascade a bit faster. Launch the Registry Editor and drill down to HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Control Panel\Desktop. Right-click on the white space in the right pane and select New\String Value. Type in MenuShowDelay as the new value and press the Enter key. Double-click on MenuShowDelay and type in a number from one to 10. The lower the number, the faster the menus will cascade. Click on OK and restart. Lock Your Icons In Place Here's how to make Win95 remember your Desktop settings, even if someone comes along and changes everything. First, set up everything the way you want it. Next, select Run from the Start menu, type in REGEDIT and press the Enter key. In the Registry Editor, find HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\ CurrentVersion\Policies\Explorer. Right-click in the right pane and select New/DWORD. Rename the value NoSaveSettings and press the Enter key. Right-click on the new NoSaveSettings item and select Modify. Enter the number 1 in the Value data box. Click on OK and Exit. Now, whenever you restart Windows, your settings will return to their current state. Here's a Refreshing Tip! Win95 doesn't refresh your view of files and folders as often as you might like. Here's how to make it refresh constantly (make sure you back up your system before editing the Registry). Launch the Registry Editor, click on the plus sign next to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE, then on the plus sign next to System, then CurrentControlSet. Select Control, then Update. In the right pane, right-click on UpdateMode and select Modify. Select the 01 and change it to 00. Click on OK, exit the Registry Editor and restart. Kill the Recycle Bin If you don't use the Recycle Bin, you can kill it. Launch the Registry Editor. Click on the plus signs to drill down the following path: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\ CurrentVersion\explorer\Desktop\NameSpace. Click on each of the strings of characters in this folder until you see "Recycle Bin" in the right pane. Press the Delete key, then say good-bye to the Recycle Bin. The Name of the Bin Here's how to change Recycle Bin's name. Launch the Registry Editor by selecting Run from the Start menu. Type REGEDIT in the Run dialog and click on the OK button. Drill down the following path: HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\CLSID\ {645FF040-5081-101B-9F08-00AA002F954E} and change Default value from Recycle Bin to the name of your choice.