Set sleep time in Windows 7

Wondering how to set the sleep timer in Windows 7?
Heres a quick guide..

1. Open your Control Panel from the start menu.
2. View your control panel with “Large Icons” which can be changed on top right.
3. Choose Power Options in the Control Panel, which should be somewhere in the middle of fourth column.

4. Click Change plan settings next to the Balanced power plan.

5. Adjust all the 6 drop-down menus to where you feel comfortable with your settings and then click Save changes.

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Turn on Military Time in Windows 7

It’s very easy to turn on the military time Windows 7 or even Vista, but the setting isn’t in an obvious place, so you probably did not find it.

To change this setting, we will need to get to the Regional and Language Options screen. The easiest way to do so is just enter intl.cpl into the Start menu search box and hit enter. Otherwise, type region into the Control Panel.

From the Regional and Language Options dialog, click the “Customize this format” button, and then select the Time tab.

Change the time format dropdown as shown:

You’ll notice from the key that the capital letter H means 24 hour time, and a single letter means that it won’t display the leading zero.

Windows 7 Military Time

It’s even easier in Windows 7 – just change the drop-down as shown:

Hit Apply and then OK, thats it your done! Enjoy Windows 7 Military click.

Thanks HowToGeek for the article.

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Remove the Lock Icon from a Folder in Windows 7

If you’ve been playing around with folder sharing or security options, then you might have ended up with an unsightly lock icon on a folder. We’ll show you how to get rid of that icon without over-sharing it.

The lock icon in Windows 7 indicates that the file or folder can only be accessed by you, and not any other user on your computer. If this is desired, then the lock icon is a good way to ensure that those settings are in place. If this isn’t your intention, then it’s an eyesore.

To remove the lock icon, we have to change the security settings on the folder to allow the Users group to, at the very least, read from the folder.

Right-click on the folder with the lock icon and select Properties. Switch to the Security tab, and then press the Edit… button.

A list of groups and users that have access to the folder appears. Missing from the list will be the “Users” group. Click the Add… button.

The next window is a bit confusing, but all you need to do is enter “Users” into the text field near the bottom of the window. Click the Check Names button.

“Users” will change to the location of the Users group on your particular computer. In our case, this is PHOENIX\Users (PHOENIX is the name of our test machine). Click OK.

The Users group should now appear in the list of Groups and Users with access to the folder. You can modify the specific permissions that the Users group has if you’d like – at the minimum, it must have Read access. Click OK.

Keep clicking OK until you’re back at the Explorer window. You should now see that the lock icon is gone from your folder!

It may be a small aesthetic nuance, but having that one folder stick out in a group of other folders is needlessly distracting. Fortunately, the fix is quick and easy, and does not compromise the security of the folder!

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Turn off all balloon notifications

Balloon notifications can be annoying many a times. Good thing is they can be disabled easily in Windows 7. To disable balloon tips in the notification area, follow these Methods:

1. Using GPEdit (Group Policy Editor)

This setting turns off the Balloon notification in the notification area using Group Policy editor.

Open Run Dialogue Box (Win + R) and type gpedit.msc

Navigate to Local Computer policy > User Configuration > Administrative Templates > Start Menu & Taskbar in left hand side pane.

Select Turn off all Balloon notifications setting from right side pane.

Open it and enable it so that no notification balloons will be shown to the user. .

Press OK

2. Using RegEdit (Registry Editor)

Click Start, click Run, type regedit, and then press ENTER.

Navigate to the following subkey:

 HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Advanced

Right-click the right side pane, create a new DWORD value, and then name it EnableBalloonTips.

Double-click EnableBalloonTips, and then give it a value of 0.

Close Registry Editor.

Note: To make changes to this setting effective, you must log off and then log back on.

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User Account pictures in Windows 7

You can find the default pictures of Windows 7 user Account in a hidden folder, path given below. Also you can find Admin & guest account picture here.

• The default Pictures are located in the hidden C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\User Account Pictures\Default Pictures folder.
• The default Standard and administrator account picture is the hidden C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\User Account Pictures\user.bmp file.
• The default Guest account picture is the hidden C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\User Account Pictures\guest.bmp file.

If you wish to change these simply replace them with another file up to 128 x 128 pixels in size to prevent it from being automatically cropped to fit the user picture display box.

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Twenty Windows 7 Keyboard Shortcuts

From Desktop

• Windows Key + Tab = Aero [press Tab to cycle between Windows]
• Windows Key + E = Windows Explorer is launched.
• Windows Key + R = Run Command is launched.
• Windows Key + F = Search (which is there in previous Windows versions too)
• Windows Key + X = Mobility Center
• Windows Key + L = Lock Computer (It is there from the earlier versions as well)
• Windows Key + U = Ease of Access
• Windows Key + P = Projector
• Windows Key + T = Cycle Super Taskbar Items
• Windows Key + S = OneNote Screen Clipping Tool [requires OneNote]
• Windows Key + M = Minimize All Windows
• Windows Key + D = Show/Hide Desktop
• Windows Key + Up = Maximize Current Window
• Windows Key + Down = Restore Down / Minimize Current Windows
• Windows Key + Left = Tile Current Window to the Left
• Windows Key + Right = Tile Current Windows to the Right [Continue pressing the Left and Right keys to rotate the window as well]
• Windows Key + # = Quicklaunch
• Windows Key + = = Magnifier

From Windows Explorer

• Alt + Up = Go up one level
• Alt + Left/ Right = Back/ Forward

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Start Menu Customization In Windows 7

Start Menu in Windows 7 can be customized according to user‟s need. All the items in Start menu can either be set as display link or set as menu. Apart from it there are several more things to configure. Steps are here:
   1. Right click on Start Button or taskbar (Super bar) of Windows 7.
   2. Click on properties. It will pop up Taskbar & start Menu properties.

  3. Select the tab „Start Menu‟. This will bring you Customize & Privacy options. 

  4. Select Customize button there.

  5. You can select the behavior of items in Start Menu. If you want them to behave as link, Menu or Icon. 

  6. Behavior of items like my computer, Downloads etc. can be set. 

  7. Also you can choose default settings if you wish to undo all the changes you have done. 

  8. Click OK to apply the changes.

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Set Ctrl+Alt+Del Options in Windows 7

Ctrl+Alt+Del have been one of the rescue Key combos since the Windows Evaluation. And during succession of Windows it has changed the offers and functionality it provides to user.

In Windows 7 Ctrl+Alt+Del combo gives the following option

• Change Password
• Lock Computer
• Task Manager
• Logoff
• Start task Manager

However restrictions can be made on the above features using Group Policy Editor Setting. This setting may

• Prevent users from locking the system
• Prevent users from changing their Windows password on the Windows Security dialog box (which appears when you press Ctrl+Alt+Del).
• Prevent users from starting Task Manager
• This setting disables or removes all menu items and buttons that log the user off the system.

Steps to disable any of the features:

• Open Run Dialogue Box (Win + R) and type gpedit.msc
• Navigate to Local Computer policy > User Configuration > Administrative Templates > System in left hand side pane.
• Select Ctrl+Alt+Del Options setting
• Select any of the setting you want to enable from right side pane. (Enabling a setting means disabling the feature)
• Open it and enable it.
• Press OK

A Reboot is required for the above setting to take place.

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Rename Admin account in Windows 7

Sometimes in the Computer/Laptop, Windows is installed already with default Username already set. For users who are not satisfied with this and need to change this can do this using Group Policy Editor. :

1. Open Run Dialog Box.

2. Open the Local Security Policy editor using “secpol.msc”.

3. Navigate to the tree Structure In the left pane, in Local Policies, expand it to Security Options.

4. In the right pane, there is a Policy, Accounts: Rename administrator account, Double click over it.

5. Change the name of Admin account to the one you wish to have now.

6. Close the Local Security Policy window, Log off to save the changes.

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Parental Controls in Windows 7

Parental controls in Windows 7 has lot of improvements and gives parents a lot of power to monitor restrict what their children do. Settings which can be maintained includes

• Time Limits for a User
• Game Restriction according to Game rating, content & Title.
• Allow or block specific Programs.
• Web Filtering

Windows 7 Parental Controls is a feature in Windows 7 that can specify which PC games a particular user can play and which programs they can use. You can even specify the times when a particular user is allowed to use the PC. Here you can Control when a computer can be used by that particular account.

Windows Live Family Safety is a free download that works with Windows 7 and gives you tools to manage and monitor what a particular user do on the Web. For example, Web filtering and contact management help you manage whom a particular user can talk to on Windows Live Hotmail, Messenger and Spaces.

When you customize the settings for each of your children, you‟ll even get an activity report that informs you how your children have been using the PC and what Web sites they have visited. And with the ability to view reports or modify settings remotely, you can keep tabs on your kids no matter where you are. Parental controls help you manage what your children can do on your PC.

Games have ratings like

• Early Childhood
• Everyone
• Everyone 10+
• Teen
• Mature
• Adults only

These ratings are used to decide which games a particular user can play.

Also it can be decided which programs a User can use.

Although it won‟t make any much difference, for parents who have Geek Children. So as we say no donut for you this time for few parents.

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New Autoplay Autorun options in Windows 7

Whenever an external device is plugged in Windows it showed an Autorun options for choosing what happens when you insert it.
It can be configured at Control Panel > Autoplay

 In order to help prevent malware from spreading using the Autorun mechanism, the Windows 7 engineering team made two important changes to the product:
Windows 7: Tips & Tricks
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1. AutoPlay will no longer support the Autorun functionality for non-optical removable media. In other words, AutoPlay will still work for CD/DVDs but it will no longer work for USB drives.

 

 Before the change (left) after the change (right)
2. A dialog change was done to clarify that the program being executed is running from external media.

Before the change (left) after the change (right)
Some smart USB flash drives can pose as a CD/DVD drive instead of standard ones. In this specific scenario, the operating system will treat the USB drive as if it is a CD/DVD because the type of the device is determined at the hardware level.

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Find out How Healthy Your Battery is on Your Laptop

Windows 7 has a feature through which we can find out exactly how much battery you are actually getting from your Laptop battery, i.e. its efficiency, maximum charge potential.

It‟s a well-known fact that as the age of lithium battery increases its charging capacity decreases and it won‟t charge to its full potential as when it‟s new. We can find out exactly how much the battery of laptop is giving now. We can use the powercfg -energy to find out how health your battery is.

1. Open elevated command prompt by typing "cmd" in your start menu & opening it with administrator privileges.

2. Type “powercfg –energy” into the command prompt & press Enter.

3. The command enables tracing for 60 seconds & would collect all the data after observing the system behavior.

4. After analysis it would generate a report.

5. The energy report is generated in HTML format in the directory shown in the command prompt.

Cmd Prompt Address\energy-report.html by default.

6. In the HTML file, scroll to the end till you get information like this:

This shows the battery ID, Manufacturer name, Chemistry, Design capacity and most importantly the last full charge.

So as above screenshot my Dell Studio 15 battery has design capacity of 5200 and now it‟s giving max full charge of 3565 that counts its efficiency to around 70% it has degraded around 30% in 6 months.

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Customize Windows 7 Power Button Action

The “Shut Down” button in Windows 7 can be customized with another action, if you use shut down action very rarely, but you more often restart it or put it on hibernate.

To change the action of shutdown button, Right click the Start Button, go to Properties and choose the „Power Boot Action” to do whatever you want, from the given options. It will give you a drop down list amongst following option to select from.

• Switch user
• Log off
• Lock
• Restart
• Sleep
• Hibernate
• Shutdown

Now the button at Start Menu would change and perform the action as selected.

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Display Multiple Clocks in System Tray

Many users need to keep track of time in multiple time zones, there‟s a nice feature in Windows 7 to help users keep track of time in Multiple Time zones. The feature is multiple clocks in your system tray. This feature can display up to 3 clocks in your taskbar from 3 different Time Zones.

Click on the Clock in System tray

Next, click on the „Change date and time settings‟ to open Date and Time Window.

Click on the tab for Additional Clocks.

Here you can add up to two additional clocks .Enter time Zone and Clock Display name.

Check the „Show this clock‟ box to enable the clock.

Click OK.

Hover over the clock and it would show you Time in text for all 3 Time Zones (including the one your Local one).

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Check Windows Version

Windows Version tells the exact Build of OS and service Pack you are using. You can simply check it by using Winver Command. Open Run Dialog box by using Win+R and type “Winver” there without quotes. This will bring a Windows which has OS details such as Windows details.

Alternatively you can also use the Command prompt to find the information. Type “Winver” in command prompt. It would display all details in command prompt.

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Assign Keyboard Shortcuts for Programs

Application can be assigned a shortcut key in Windows 7. The application would launch when the combo of keys is pressed which you entered as the Shortcut Key for that application.
To create Shortcut key for any application in Windows 7:
1. Right-click the program icon and select Properties.
2. Select the Shortcut tab
3. Click in Shortcut key textbox
4. Enter the keyboard shortcut for that program.
5. Press OK to exit.
6. Use the Keyboard shortcut combo to launch the application.

Like the way i have used a combo of keys Ctrl+Alt+C to launch calculator application other applications can also be launched using Shortcut keys.

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Access Jump Lists with the Left Mouse Button

Jump Lists are a new feature in Windows 7 that shows recently used files for a particular application or related tasks to an application. Jumplists can be accessed by right clicking an application icon in Windows 7 taskbar.
Although it can be accessed by left clicking an application icon and while holding the mouse click dragging the icon upwards. i.e. Right click and drag the application icon upwards to access jumplists in Windows 7 using Left Mouse button.

The more you drag icon upwards the lesser transparency of Jumplist becomes. In above screenshot, case 1 shows when Jumplist invoked through right click and application icon is not dragged much upwards while case 2 shows solid Jumplist when application icon is dragged upwards completely.

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