by Tom Lassiter
Thankfulness Abounds
The Thanksgiving month of November has rolled around again. And boy do we have reasons to be thankful! Memphis/Windows 97/Windows 98 finally rolled out only a year late. PC prices continue to fall; with PCs under $1000 that I would have paid double that for only a couple of years ago. The Feds are finally taking a look at some of the hardball marketing practices that have served to line the giants pockets while hampering user flexibility. PC CPU speeds are rapidly climbing to the heavens. Internet speeds are creeping upward at a snail’s pace so the telcos can maximize their already bloated profits – but then I didn’t say we could be thankful for everything! But on the whole – life is good these days in the PC world. While we are in such a rosy mood, let’s take a gander at more Win 95 tips and tricks:
Viewing the Printer Queue
While printing a series of documents you may wish to see which one is next to print or even cancel the printing of one of them. DOUBLE-CLICK on the PRINTER ICON on the TASKBAR and you will see the queue of documents. Select menu options as desired.
Backwards Up the Folder Tree
As you are viewing files in either My Computer or Windows Explorer, pressing BACKSPACE will take you from the folder you have open back up to its parent folder in the tree.
Find the Meaning of Toolbar Buttons
To learn what any toolbar button is for, you can rest your mouse pointer on the button for a few seconds. A description will appear.
Windows 95 Resource Kit is on Your CD
The Windows 95 Resource Kit contains all manner of details on the inner workings of Win 95. To access the Windows 95 Resource Kit, which is on the Win95 installation CD-ROM, put the installation CD in your drive, browse to the D:\admin\reskit\ helpfile folder (where D: is your CD-ROM Drive), and double click on WIN95RK.HLP. This will access the resource kit.
Universal ‘Select All” Keyboard Shortcut
To select all files in a folder, or all text in a document, etc., press Ctrl+A
Use of TAB vs. ENTER Keys
In Win95 dialog boxes, the TAB key moves between fields in the dialog box and the ENTER key executes the default button in the dialog box - usually the OK button. The default button can always be identified by its extra shadow border on the bottom and right sides. It is set by the software developer as what he/she expects most users to want to select in exiting the dialog box. It is found throughout Win95 applications.
In your C:\Windows\Help folder, look at the .AVI files. They are for the Win95 introductory tutorial. By deleting them, you could have as much as 7MB of space. Unless you are using Windows 95 for the first time, you don’t need them.
Changing File Type for Applications
Each application works with a default file type so that when you elect to open a file it knows what application to use for the process. To change the default application of a file type, simply select the file, hold down SHIFT, and click the right mouse button. Select OPEN WITH and choose the program you want to use for this file type. Select “Always use this program to open this type of file” at the bottom of the dialog box.
Make Win95 Plug and Play Do your Dirty Work
Do you sometimes get into one of those situations when your sound card, modem, gamepads, or any other hardware stops functioning no matter how hard you try to make it work for you? Well, here’s one of those tips that will help you get out of those jams. Just go to START, SETTINGS, CONTROL PANEL, SYSTEMS, DEVICE MANAGER and then remove any of those devices that are not functioning correctly. Now restart your computer. After a few moments, Windows 95’s plug and play capabilities will identify your non-functioning device and reactivate it again, making it function again like normal.
Change Modem Settings
to Increase Speed
The default setting for your Win 95 modem’s COM port is 9600. To speed this up, RIGHT-CLICK on MY COMPUTER, CLICK on PROPERTIES, and DEVICE MANAGER. Locate the COM port to which your modem is connected and CLICK on PROPERTIES then PORT SETTINGS. Increase the setting to its maximum, 115000 or at least one level higher than your modem’s rating. Set Flow Control to HARDWARE. CLICK the ADVANCED button and maximize both the receive and transmit buffers. Turn on the FIFO buffer and CLICK on OK all the way back out. Reboot the system to make active.
Change PC’s Role if Over 32MB of RAM
If your PC has over 32MB of RAM you need to notify Win95 to give it a proper role so that its upper memory use will be enhanced.
Just go to START, SETTINGS, CONTROL PANEL, SYSTEMS, PERFORMANCE TAB, and FILE SYSTEM BUTTON. Select the NETWORK SERVER role.
Print Out Your System Information
If you ever have a computer problem—and who doesn’t?— a copy of your system information could come in mighty handy. RIGHT-CLICK on MY COMPUTER, CLICK PROPERTIES, DEVICE MANAGER TAB, and the PRINT button. CLICK the “All devices and system summary” button and then on OK. You will get a very detailed print- out of your PCs system information.
By the way, don’t worry about saving leftover turkey this month. You’ll have plenty again come the end of next month. Until then – gobble, gobble! (and pass the cranberry sauce).
Tom Lassiter is a member of the HAL-PC Board of Directors. He may be contacted at jamesl@hal-pc.org
E-mail me at webmaster@hal-pc.org with any comments you have and tell me what you want to see here.