Speed up the Start Menu

The default speed of the Start Menu is pretty slow, but you can fix that by editing a
Registry Key. Fire up the Registry Editor and navigate to the following key:
HKEY_CURRENT_USER \ Control Panel \ Desktop\Menu Show Delay
By default, the value is 400. Change this to a smaller value, such as 0, to speed it up.
If this doesn't work for some reason, then you might try the following: Navigate to
Display Properties then Appearance then Advanced and turn off the option titled
Show menu shadow. You will get much better overall performance.

Turn of CD Auto Play

• Open My Computer
• Right click on your CD ROM and choose Properties
• Click on the Auto Play tab
• In the drop down box you can choose the Action for each choice shown in the drop down box
  Or
1. Go to Start->Run->gpedit.msc
2. Computer Config -> Administrative Template -> System
3. Double click Turn off Autoplay
4. Enable it.

Remove shortcut arrow from desktop icons

Here's how you can remove those shortcut arrows from your desktop icons in Windows XP.
1. Start regedit.
2. Navigate to HKEY_CLASSES_ROOTlnkfile
3. Delete the IsShortcut registry value.
You may need to restart Windows XP.

Close Multiple Windows : Note works in all versions of Windows

If you just opened a number of separate, related windows (a folder inside a folder,
and so on), there's an easier way to close them all than one-at-a-time. Hold down
the Shift key as you click the X caption button in the upper-right corner of the last
window opened. Doing so closes that window and all windows that came before it.

Disable error reporting

• Open Control Panel
• Click on Performance and Maintenance.
• Click on System.
• Then click on the Advanced tab
• Click on the error-reporting button on the bottom of the windows.
• Select Disable error reporting.
• Click OK
• Click OK

WinXP Clear Page file on shutdown

Go to Control panel Administrative tools, local security policy. then go to local policies
---> security options. Then change the option for "Shutdown: Clear Virtual Memory Pagefile"

Win XP Won’t Completely Shutdown

• Go to Control Panel, then go to Power Options.
• Click on the APM Tab, then check the "Enable Advanced Power Management support."
• Shut down your PC. It should now successfully complete the Shut Down process.

Enable / Disable Firewall

Open Control Panel and double click on Network Connections. In the new box that
appears right click on the Connection and click on the Advanced tab. Check or
unchecked the box according to your desire.

Turn Off System Recovery

Right click on My Computer and choose Properties. Click on the System Restore tab
and check the box Turn off System Restore. (This will increase Windows performance
& save disk space)