Address Book
One of the little known aspects of Windows is its excellent address book. To open the Address Book, click Start, All Programs, Accessories, and Address Book. Address Book's forms allow you to enter personal and business information. There also is space for extensive notes. 

Backup
WinXP Professional installs a Backup & Restore utility by default. You can find it in the Start menu by selecting All Programs, Accessories, and System Tools. Of note, WinXP Home Edition does not install this Backup Utility by default, nor can you install it by using the Add or Remove Programs applet in the Control Panel. However, there are several options for backing up data. One is to back up everything, everyday on your computer. This option offers a high level of security but it is very expensive for the home user. Therefore, it’s a better option for business users. Another is to have one full back up and then only back up any changes. Although this option provides a high level of security, restoring backed up files can be a confusing exercise. Lastly, back up only your files. If you don’t have a magnetic tape, zip drive, or other large storage memory devices, then just save your important files, e-mail, pictures, documents, databases, bookmarks, etc., to floppy disks or rewriteable CDs. Applications and operating system files can always be restored from CDs or disks. The best backup method in the long run is “to save as you go.” Instead of waiting until a document is complete or a project is finished, go ahead and save data at every opportunity. The more often you back up information, the less risk to your work in the event of a power outage or some other problem. 

Balloon Tips
You can disable balloon tips by editing the Registry; however, don’t attempt this trick unless you have the required computer skills. In the Registry locate HKEY-CURRENT_USER\Software\ Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Advanced. Create a new EWORD value called EnableBalloonTips, and give it a value of 0. Set the value to 1 to turn them back on.

Computer Name
If someone other than you set up and named your computer or you simply want to select a different name to display on the WinXP login screen, click Start, Control Panel, Performance And Maintenance, and System. In the System Properties dialog box, select the Computer Name tab. Delete the name that’s currently in the Computer Description box, type a new name to replace it, and finish by clicking OK.

Cartoon Dog/Puppy
If you tire of seeing the cartoon dog/puppy jumping around when using the “Find” feature, there’s a button “Preferences” on the “Search” screen that will get rid of the animation. You can also go to Microsoft and get a copy of TweakUI. It will let you remove the dog plus change other troubling behaviors.  

Crashes
Users who use a Universal Serial Bus (USB) mouse and have XP’s “USB selective suspend” option enabled have experienced crashes. This problem can be resolved by disabling the selective suspend option. For instructions on this procedure go to PCWorld. Microsoft (MS) has released a “hotfix” for the problem, too, but advises one to install it only if you can’t live without the suspend option. To get the hotfix, contact MS’s tech support at 1-800-936-5700.

Custom drive names 
If you have several hard drives in your computer and want to name them instead of using the drive letters in Windows Explorer, open it and right-click the drive letter. From the menu, select Properties. On the General tab in WinXP or the Label text box in Win98, put in the new name and click OK.

Disk Cleanup
When you run Disk Cleanup, which is found in the Windows System Tools folder, be sure to open the More Options tab. It contains additional options for cleaning up Windows components or installed programs. For example, you can use the Windows Components option to create free space by removing optional features, such as fax services, that you do not use. You can also use the Installed Programs option to free more disk space by removing unused programs. Clicking the Clean Up button starts the Change or Remove Programs option in the Add/Remove Programs tool. Finally, under the System Restore, you can remove all but the most recent restore point on your system.

Dr. Watson
All Windows versions have the Dr. Watson utility. It captures a snapshot of your computer system when a program crashes. The idea is that someone could look at the data and figure out what's wrong with it. However, you usually have to tell Dr. Watson to get to work. In Win98/Me, click Start, Programs, Accessories, System Tools, and System Information. On the Tools menu, click Dr. Watson. That will put an icon in your taskbar. Dr. Watson generates information about your system, much of which is incomprehensible to most of us, but technicians will probably find it informative. To look at it, double click the icon. On the View menu, click Advanced View. You will find several tabs with detailed information. If a program crashes, the Details tab will have all the pertinent data. Otherwise, that tab will be missing from view. Dr. Watson is in WinXP, too, but it's just harder to find there. Click Start, Run, enter Drwtsn32.exe in the box, and click OK. There's no need to start Dr. Watson manually in XP. It works automatically when an error occurs with your system.

Drag and Drop Recording
With WinXP you can use drag and drop recording to your CD-R/CD-RWs by clicking Start and My Computer. Right-click the icon for your CD-R or CD-RW drives, and then click Properties. Now choose the Recording tab and put a check in the ‘Enable CD Recording On This Drive’ box. Make sure the write speed is set to ‘Fastest’ and choose whether or not you want the CD to be ejected automatically upon completion of recording. Finally click Apply. Henceforth you can drag files into or out of the CD-R or CD-RW drive folder.

Drive Letters
If you want to partition your hard drive and rename the driver letters, log into WinXP as administrator. Next click Start, Control Panel and double click Administrative Tools and Computer Management. In the left pane, click Disk Management. In the right pane, right click the drive or partition you want to rename and click “Change Drive Letter and Paths.” Click “Change” and then click “Assign the following drive letter.” Now click the down arrow and the drive letter that you want to use and then click OK and Yes when prompted to confirm the drive letter change. Finally Close the open windows. 

Image Sizing
WinXP lets you quickly resize an image without opening a photo editing program. For this tip, open Windows Explorer by right-clicking the Start button and selecting Explore. Now locate the image you want to resize, right-click it, and select Resize Pictures. Next click the radio button next to the desired size, or click the Advanced button and the Custom radio button to specify a particular size. Click OK and now you have a new file with the image saved at the new size. If you prefer to resize the original image without saving it as a new file, click the Advanced button and check the “Resize The Original Pictures” checkbox before clicking OK. Finally click OK.

Maintenance Wizard
Win2000/Me/XP includes a Maintenance Wizard for keeping your operating system in tune. It lets you schedule regular maintenance while your system is idle although your computer must be turned on at the time. Tell it when, and the wizard will automatically defragment the hard drive and scan your disk for errors. Set up your preferences by choosing Start, Programs, Accessories, System Tools, and Maintenance Wizard. If you prefer, run the utilities on the fly by choosing them from the System Tools menu.

Menu Speed
WinXP sometimes sacrifices speed for looks. For example, menus fade in and out of place slowing down the job at hand. To enhance the speed, right-click My Computer, choose Properties, and click the Advanced tab. Now click the Settings button in the Performance area, select “Adjust For Best Performance,” and finish by clicking OK.

Recently Used File List 
Word, Excel, and PowerPoint have a handy feature for retrieving opened files. It's known as the "recently used file list" and located at the bottom of the File menu in each application, as well as in the New Document (or New Workbook or New Presentation) Task Pane. By default, the File menu and the Task Pane let you choose from the four most recently opened documents. To retrieve a recently opened file, just choose its name from the bottom of the File menu or from the top of the Task Pane.  Fortunately, you don't have to live with just four recently used files. You can choose any number up to nine by choosing Tools, Options, and clicking the General tab. In the box next to "Recently used files list," type the number of files you'd like your File menu or Task Pane to display or click the little arrows to increase or decrease the amount. If you don't want recently used files to appear on the File menu or in the Task Pane, uncheck the box. Click OK to lock in your choice. If you've increased the number, open more than four files to notice the change. You can use the Windows Start menu to retrieve recently used files from any Windows application by selecting Start, Documents, then choosing a file from the resulting list.  

WinXP dictates who gets to do what on your computer. The computer's owner gets the Administrator account. Everybody else gets a Limited account. Only the administrator can install programs and hardware, create and change user accounts, install Plug and Play hardware, such as digital cameras and MP3 players, turn off the Guest account, and read everybody else's private files. People with limited accounts can only access installed programs and change their account's picture and password.