MaximumPC 2008 03

30 MAXIMUMPC | MAR 08 | http://www.maximumpc.com

Build a B utton (or Tw o)

Put your Restart and Shut Down buttons

in plain sight—because you can

Forget about mucking around in the Start menu

and instead create desktop shortcuts for shut-

ting down and restarting your system. Right-

click your desktop and select New > Shortcut.

In the pop-up window, type shutdown –s

–t 00 to create a shutdown shortcut and

shutdown –r –t 00 to create one for

restarting. Give your new shortcuts custom

icons (see page 24) and then drag them to the

Quick Launch bar for even easier access.

GET FASTER BOOTS

Remove the OS Logo and Improve Boot Times

Until instant-on technology makes a breakthrough in home computing, we’re left

to our own devices to reduce system boot times. One surefi re way to save a few

seconds is by disabling the boot logo. Open the Start menu, select Run, and type

msconfi g. Under the Boot.ini tab, check the /NoGuiBoot box and apply the change.

HIDE AND SEEK

Move Off-Screen Windows Back into View

It’s a shame that SLI and CrossFire still don’t support gaming on multimonitor setups,

and to add insult to injury, there’s always at least one open window that gets stuck out

of view when in single-monitor mode. You

might be tempted to reboot or even uninstall/

reinstall the offending application, but you

needn’t resort to such drastic measures.

Instead, right-click the application in the task-

bar, select Move, and then use your arrow

keys to bring the window back into view.

NEVER FORGET

Enhance the Clipboard with

Ditto

Download Ditto ( http://sourceforge.net/projects/

ditto-cp/ ) and take Windows’s clipboard to new

heights. Ditto retains up to 500 copied entries,

including images, and stores the information on

your hard drive, so you won’t be thwarted by a

power outage or system reboot. Stay productive

by exporting saved entries and transferring them

to another computer, paste HTML as plain text,

perform keyword searches, and apply hotkey

shortcuts to the fi rst 10 items.

SIZE UP THE SITUATION

Resize Windows to Specific Dimensions

Sizer (free, http://www.bri-

anapps.net/sizer.html )

displays the dimen-

sions of any open

window while resizing,

making it an invaluable

tool for web developers

and anyone interested

in grabbing screen

captures. Manually

resize a window to any

resolution, or right-click

and select a preset

dimension, including

any custom dimen-

sions you create.

WINDOWS TIPS