Have you wondered if ur Anti-virus Software is really working??? Here is a safe way to test it, and u dont need a real virus simple to test it. However some of you might know this already but still im posting for the sake of those who dont know.Open NOTEPAD, copy the text below and paste it in NOTEPAD. Save as

EICAR.COMX50!P%@AP[4\PZX54(P^)7CC)7}$EICAR-STANDARD-ANTIVIRUS-TEST-FILE!$H+H*

Your Antivirus software may recognize the file as virus and Quarantine/Delete it as soon as u finish saving it. The file EICAR.COM is completely safe, its not a virus. It is a standard test file file devoloped by the EUROPEAN INSTITUTE FOR COMPUTER ANTI-VIRUS RESEARCH (EICAR). All Anti-virus software are programmed to detect this file as possible virus. Therefore u can test ur Anti-virus with this file without about getting ur computer infected.

IMPROVE XP SHUTDOWN SPEED

This tweak reduces the time XP waits before automatically closing any running programs when you give it the command to shutdown.
Go to Start then select Run
Type 'Regedit' and click ok
Find 'HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Control Panel\Desktop\'
Select 'WaitToKillAppTimeout'
Right click and select 'Modify'
Change the value to '1000'
Click 'OK'
Now select 'HungAppTimeout'
Right click and select 'Modify'
Change the value to '1000'
Click 'OK'
Now find 'HKEY_USERS\.DEFAULT\Control Panel\Desktop'
Select 'WaitToKillAppTimeout'
Right click and select 'Modify'
Change the value to '1000'
Click 'OK'
Now find 'HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\'
Select 'WaitToKillServiceTimeout'
Right click and select 'Modify'
Change the value to '1000'
Click 'OK'

How To Reinstall Windows Without Losing Anything

How To Reinstall Windows Without Losing Anything -----------

You can use this method as often as you like when you need to repair something that had gotten corrupted and you don't want to do a clean install.

This is better than doing a windows repair install from the cd because doing that can cause changes to settings and even make it so you can't get updates anymore from microsoft update site because of the 'silent install' they did a year or so ago (unless you rereg some dll files).

1- Start WindowsXP
2- Go to the location of your source files
3- Run WINNT32 /unattend
For example, D:\I386\winnt32 /unattend ( copy & paste this command into the RUN box, then press ENTER ) Your computer will do the rest.

OR

]Start > All Programs > Accessories > Command Prompt.
Copy & paste > D:\I386\winnt32 /unattend (notice the space between 32 and / )
Press Enter.
If you have i386 on your drive, you can replace D: ( if D: is your cd drive ) with the location of it. (be sure it's the full i386 though)

D: is the driver letter where your windows XP Cd is
if D:\I386\winnt32 /unattend doesn't work then try : d:\winnt32 /unattend.

Hidden themes in Windows 7

On a Windows 7 install with United States regional settings only the United States theme is shown but there are actually four more themes which are hidden from user.Accessing all these themes is easy but first you have to find them.The trick is to navigate to the C:\Windows\Globalization\MCT directory. The MCT directory within the Globalization directory is super hidden so it will not display even if show hidden files and folders is enabled. Just click on the address bar of any folder and manually type in or copy and paste in C:\Windows\Globalization\MCT and hit Enter.There’s open the directory:
Once you have reached the MCT folder you will see five directories as listed below:

* 1) MCT-AU
* 2) MCT-CA
* 3) MCT-GB
* 4) MCT-US
* 5) MCT-ZA

To use all these theme for each region just navigate into each MCT-Region directory and enter the Theme sub-directory and double click the theme file.And the theme will get loaded on your system.