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Windows 95 is pretty awesome, but it can always be made better! Here are a few tweaks, tips, and tricks I've discovered in my time with it. None of these tweaks will break your operating system, and most are needed to use the icons I've made over the years, and most recently. New to Windows 95 is the ability to change system icons, not just icons for "shortcuts" to games and other programs.



ENABLE HIGH-COLOR ICONS
• To enable high-color icons in Windows 95
Open regedit, go to
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Control Panel\Desktop\WindowMetrics
Add the string "Shell Icon BPP", and set its value to 16.
Log off, and back on, and all icons with color depths greater than 16 colors, will now display in higher color depths.

CHANGE THE SYSTEM ICONS
To modify system icons, you will need to edit values in the Windows registry,
to tell Windows to look in a different location for the icons for system items
such as My Computer, the Control Panel, and more. Here are the paths for the
specific items:

MY COMPUTER
HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\CLSID\{20D04FE0-3AEA-1069-A2D8-08002B30309D}\DefaultIcon

NETWORK NEIGHBORHOOD
HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\CLSID\{208D2C60-3AEA-1069-A2D7-08002B30309D}\DefaultIcon

RECYCLE BIN
HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\CLSID\{645FF040-5081-101B-9F08-00AA002F954E}\DefaultIcon
**NOTICE: after changing the filename for the icon, suffix the path with ,0
Example: c:\windows\icons\Recycle E.ico,0
This prevents an issue which stops the Recycle Bin's image from updating
after deleting files or emptying the recycle bin.

CONTROL PANEL
HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\CLSID\{21EC2020-3AEA-1069-A2DD-08002B30309D}\DefaultIcon

PRINTERS
HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\CLSID\{2227A280-AAEA-1069-A2DE-08002B30309D}\DefaultIcon

INBOX
HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\CLSID\{00020D75-0000-0000-C000-000000000046}\DefaultIcon

SCHEDULED TASKS
HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\CLSID\{D6277990-4C6A-11CF-8D87-00AA0060F5BF}\DefaultIcon

DIAL-UP NETWORKING
HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\CLSID\{992CFFA0-F557-101A-88EC-00DD010CCC48}\DefaultIcon

DIRECTORY FOLDER
Create the following registry key
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Shell Icons
In this key, add two string values as such:

NAME: 3
DATA: X:\path\to\closed-folder.ICO

NAME: 4
DATA: X:\path\to\open-folder.ICO

Next, go to
HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Directory\DefaultIcon
Change the path of this icon to your preferred default for the window titlebar
icon when you're viewing a directory.
Also go to
HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Folder\DefaultIcon
and do the same.

In each of the DefaultIcon folders will be a string value, depicted as a torn
piece of paper with "ab" written on it in red. Double-click this string icon,
and in the text box that appears, type the path and filename of the icon you
wish to use, for example,
c:\windows\icons\computer.ico
The case is not sensitive, and you don't use quotation marks. Once this has
been done, you can see the results by going to the desktop or My Computer and
pressing the F5 key to refresh the screen or window. Your new icons will
appear instead of the default Windows 95 icons for the items changed.

CHANGE THE DRIVE ICONS
To modify drive icons (floppy, hard disk, CDROM, Zip, MO, and tape), navigate
to
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer
Next, right-click on the Explorer folder and click "New Key". This will create
a new folder, which you will name DriveIcons. Now right click on the DriveIcons
folder, and click "New Key". Name the new folder the letter of the drive you
wish to modify. For instance, if you want to change your floppy drive's icon,
you would likely make a key called A. Now right click on the drive letter key
folder, and click "New Key" once more. This new key will be named DefaultIcon.
Inside the DefaultIcon folder will be a string value, depicted as a torn piece
of paper with "ab" written on it in red. Double-click this string icon, and in
the text box that appears, type the path and filename of the icon you wish to
use, for example,
c:\windows\icons\fdd.ico
The case is not sensitive, and you don't use quotation marks. Once this has been
done, you can see the results by going to My Computer and pressing the F5 key
to refresh the window. Your new icon will appear instead of the default Windows
95 icon for the drive. You can do this with any drive letter, but you will need
to manually change the icons if you re-order your drives.

CHANGE THE MAPPED NETWORK DRIVE STATUS ICONS
If you haven't done so already...
Create the following registry key
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Shell Icons
In this key, add two string values as such:

NAME: 9
DATA: X:\path\to\HDD Net On.ICO

NAME: 10
DATA: X:\path\to\HDD Net Off.ICO

Once this has been done, you can see the results by going to the desktop or My
Computer and pressing the F5 key to refresh the screen or window. Your new icons
will appear instead of the default Windows 95 icons for the items changed. If
this does not work, the TweakUI tool for Windows will allow you to rebuild your
icon cache in its Repair tab, and this will refresh your icons.

SHRINK/RESTORE THE VOLUME CONTROLS
• To reduce the screen space that the sound balance and volume controls menu (double click on the speaker in the system tray) takes up, while the sound controls menu is active, press CTRL+SHIFT+S. To restore the original size, press this key combination again.

CAPTURE AN IMAGE OF ONLY THE CURRENTLY ACTIVE WINDOW
• If you only wish to capture the current application and not the rest of the screen with the PRINT SCREEN key, hold ALT and press PRINT SCREEN to capture an image of only the currently active window into the clipboard.

START MENU WITH NO WINDOWS KEY
• Pressing CTRL and ESC simultaneously will have the effect of pressing the Windows key, allowing you to use the Start menu without needing to buy a new keyboard.

TAB THROUGH OPEN WINDOWS IN REVERSE
• You already know that you can hold ALT and press TAB repeatedly to advance through open windows, releasting the keys to select the one you wish to use, but you can also cycle through open windows in reverse by holding SHIFT along with ALT, and pressing TAB. Very handy if you have many open windows or programs.

CHOOSE WHICH PROGRAM TO OPEN A FILE WITH
• Instead of re-defining the default program for a file type semi-permanently, you can also hold the left SHIFT key, then right click on a file. A new menu item, "Open with..." will appear, allowing you to select a different program to use once, or to make the new default.

ENABLE IMAGE THUMBNAILS IN EXPLORER WINDOWS
• Warning: This is processor-intensive, but may be reverted if you decide you do not like it.
Open regedit, go to
HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Paint.Picture\DefaultIcon
Click on (Default) and change its value from
C:\WINDOWS\SYSTEM\cool.dll,41
to %1
Log off, and back on, and all bitmap icons will be thumbnails of the image.



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7800

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