Windows 98 Tips Page 6



*1.   YANK THE PLUG ON SHUTDOWN LOCK-UPS--PART 1 OF 2 

A reader, S., offers the following tip (also documented by Microsoft): 

"Some hardware devices are not compatible with the way that 98 just
 'yanks the plug' when it shuts down your system and may cause a system
 lock-up, forcing you to do a cold boot. One work-around for this problem
 is to disable the fast shutdown mode. 

Select Start, Run, type 

msconfig 

and click OK. On the General tab, click the Advanced button, select
 Disable Fast Shutdown, and click OK twice. Restart your system, and
 the next time you shut down, your troubles may be solved. I have found
 that by disabling the fast shutdown, you really don't lose much speed
 at all--not even half a second. Hope this helps some of you out there." 


*2.    YANK THE PLUG ON SHUTDOWN LOCK-UPS--PART 2 OF 2 

In our last tip, we suggested that if you're experiencing system lock-ups
 at shutdown, one thing you may want to try is disabling Windows 98's fast
 shutdown feature (this feature isn't compatible with some hardware
 devices): Select Start, Run type 

msconfig 

and click OK; click the Advanced button, select Disable Fast Shutdown,
 click OK twice, and restart your system. According to Microsoft, another
 common cause of these shutdown lock-ups is a damaged Exit Windows sound
 file. To determine whether or not this file is causing the problem,
 disable it. 

Inside the Control Panel, double-click Sounds to open the Sounds Properties
 dialog box. In the list under Events, select Exit Windows. Click the down
 arrow under Sound, select None, then click OK. (Alternatively, you could
 turn your sound scheme off altogether by selecting No Sounds in the list
 of Schemes.) 

Now try shutting down Windows 98. If the problem is gone, leave the Exit
 Windows sound disabled, or use the Sounds dialog box to select a new
 sound. (A third option is to try reinstalling the sound that was causing
 the problem.) 


*3.   TAB-ULATIN' RHYTHMS 

When you're in a dialog box that includes multiple tabs of information,
 how do you move from one to the next? By clicking the one you want. Of
 course, anyone knows that. But did you also know that there's a
 mouse-free way? Press Ctrl-Tab to rotate to the next tab (to the right)
 in the box. If you prefer the other direction, press Ctrl-Shift-Tab to
 move back one tab. Who knew? 


*4.   BLAME IT ON THE MANAGEMENT 

Have you noticed that when you leave your system for a while--say,
 15 minutes or longer--your screen goes black? (How could you not
 notice?) This isn't some new low-budget screen saver. It's just Power
 Management doing its job. By default, the feature powers off your
 monitor after 15 minutes of inactivity. Press any key or move the
 mouse, and your monitor comes to life again (after what can seem
 like a long delay). 

Of course, if you find this feature a hindrance, you may wish to turn
 it off altogether or increase the delay time before the monitor powers
 off. Open the Control Panel (select Start, Settings, Control Panel),
 and double-click Power Management. To prevent the monitor from powering
 off altogether, click the down arrow next to Turn Off Monitor and
 select Never. To increase the delay, select a new time in this same
 list. Either way, click OK, and the new setting will be applied to
 the current power scheme. 

(Tip: Use the Turn Off Hard Disk list to adjust the delay before which
 Windows 98 powers off your hard drive.) 


*5.   

You probably know you can add toolbars to your taskbar in Win98 or IE4.
 Just right-click on the taskbar and check off the toolbars you want
 (such as Links, Quick Launch or Address). But you don't have to include
 their titles if you're tight for space. Right-click on the toolbar title
 you want to hide and uncheck Show Title on the Context menu. Bring it
 back by right-clicking on the toolbar's "gripper" tab and selecting
 Show Title. If you're using IE 4.0, you might need to hold down the
 Shift key as you right-click to access the Show Title item.


*6.   IT'S A BIRD, IT'S A PLANE... NO, IT'S A PLUG 

In our last tip, we introduced Windows 98's Power Management features,
 a set of controls that powers off your monitor and/or hard drive after
 a certain period of inactivity. To access these controls, open the
 Control Panel (select Start, Settings, Control Panel) and double-click
 Power Management. 

If you find your work habits changing from one day to the next, you may
 wish to set up a couple of different power schemes, and then use the one
 that's most appropriate. To create a scheme, one at a time, select a
 period of inactivity next to Turn Off Monitor and Turn Off Hard Disk.
 At the top of the dialog box, click Save As, type a name for the scheme,
 and click OK. Repeat these steps for each scheme you'd like to create.
 From now on, you can select each of these schemes by name in the Power
 Schemes list. 

(Tip: For quick power scheme switching, click the Advanced tab and select
 Show Power Meter on Taskbar. Click your Taskbar's new plug icon and
 select your scheme of choice in the resulting menu.) 


*7.   Here's how to make IE launch in a full screen every time.
 Right-click on the IE icon in the Quick Launch toolbar (or on any
 shortcut for IE) and select Properties. Under the Shortcut tab, select
 Maximize from the Run menu. Note: You can't do this by right-clicking
 on the IE icon Win9x places on your Desktop.


*8.   HAVE ADDRESS BAR, WILL TRAVEL 

You may already know that you can get to the Internet by typing a Web
 address on the Address bar of any Explorer window. But did you also
 know that with a little tweaking, the Taskbar will perform the same
 function? Just add the Address toolbar to the Taskbar. 

Right-click a blank area on the Taskbar, select Toolbars, and in the
 pop-out menu, select Address. Presto--there's your Address bar. You now
 have Internet access on screen at all times. No open windows necessary! 

(Tip: As with any toolbar, to resize the Address bar, hold your mouse
 pointer over the vertical bar at the toolbar's left edge, and when the
 pointer changes to a double-pointed arrow, click and drag in either
 direction.) 


*9.   LOCAL YOKELS 

In our last tip, we pointed out that you can go from an Explorer window
 to a Web page by typing its URL in the Address bar. Windows 98 goes the
 other way, too. Let's say you're browsing the Internet in an IE 4.x
 window and you suddenly need to locate a document on your hard drive.
 Pull down the Go menu, select My Computer, and instantly, you're local.
 Navigate your way to the folder you need, as you would inside any other
 Explorer window. 

(Tip: To jump directly to a folder other than My Computer, type the
 folder's path on IE 4.x's Address bar, then press Enter.) 


*10.   BACK AND FORWARD--THEY'RE NOT JUST FOR URLS ANYMORE 

As you're surfing the Web in your favorite browser window, how do you get
 back to a page you were viewing previously? You press the Back button,
 right? And then, to go forward to the page where you started, you use
 the Forward button. As you may have noticed, these buttons--Back and
 Forward--appear in every Explorer window. Point being, if you've
 navigated your way through folders inside that window, you can go back
 the way you came (and forward again) without all that double-clicking. 

For example, suppose you started in the Windows folder, pressed the Up
 One Level icon to jump up to your hard drive, and then navigated your
 way to the Program Files\Internet Mail and News\[username]\Mail folder.
 Now, you want to go back to the Windows folder. Just click the down
 arrow on the Back button, select the Windows folder, and you're there.
 Forgot to do something in the Mail folder? Click the down arrow next to
 the Forward button and select Mail. Cool, eh? 
