auto start etc

[Peter Kirk]

Hi there

a couple of quick questions:

(1) when I boot up XP, there are some applications that start automatically:
how do I remove some of these applications from this "auto start"?

(2) how do I change the desktop so I can move icons to any position? At the
moment there is some sort of "snap to" grid, so icons can only be placed at
specific locations - I'm guessing at something like 50 pixels from each
other. (So basically I want the grid to be the same size as the screen
resolution, and not at 50x50 or whatever it is set to at the moment).


Thanks
Peter

 

[Guest]

For first. Start -> Run. Type msconfig and click Startup tab. Here you can
uncheck the startup programs.

Second, it seems autoarrange option is turned on. Right click Empty area on
the desktop, click Arrange icons and uncheck Autoarrange.

To change the spacing, right click Desktop again and select Properties.
Click Appearence, Click Advanced button. Here you should find Horizontal and
vertical spacing for icons.

 

[Thorsten Matzner]

(1) when I boot up XP, there are some applications that start automatically:
how do I remove some of these applications from this "auto start"?

See "How to Modify the List of Programs that Run When You Start
Windows XP" (http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=314488).

(2) how do I change the desktop so I can move icons to any position? At the
moment there is some sort of "snap to" grid, so icons can only be placed at
specific locations - I'm guessing at something like 50 pixels from each
other. (So basically I want the grid to be the same size as the screen
resolution, and not at 50x50 or whatever it is set to at the moment).

Right-click the Desktop > Arrange Icons by > Auto Arrange: turn this
off.

 

[Li'l Roberto]

Hi there
a couple of quick questions:
(1) when I boot up XP, there are some applications that start
automatically: how do I remove some of these applications from this "auto
start"?

(2) how do I change the desktop so I can move icons to any position? At
the moment there is some sort of "snap to" grid, so icons can only be
placed at specific locations - I'm guessing at something like 50 pixels
from each other. (So basically I want the grid to be the same size as the
screen resolution, and not at 50x50 or whatever it is set to at the
moment).


Thanks
Peter

[1]. start > run> msconfig > start-up tab, uncheck anything you don't
want to start, or [better] look through each individual program's
settings/options and see if you can prevent them from running at
start-up.

[2]. R/Click Desktop > Arrange Icons By > Align to Grid

rgds
Li'l Roberto

 

[Rock]

Hi there

a couple of quick questions:

(1) when I boot up XP, there are some applications that start automatically:
how do I remove some of these applications from this "auto start"?

(2) how do I change the desktop so I can move icons to any position? At the
moment there is some sort of "snap to" grid, so icons can only be placed at
specific locations - I'm guessing at something like 50 pixels from each
other. (So basically I want the grid to be the same size as the screen
resolution, and not at 50x50 or whatever it is set to at the moment).


Thanks
Peter

For the first issue the first step should be to check in the options for
the program you don't want to start and see if there is a setting to
tell it not to run at startup. The next step is to remove any entries
you don't want from the two startup folders:

C:\Documents and Settings\<username>\Start Menu\Programs\Startup
C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Start Menu\Programs\Startup

For anything else uncheck their entries in the startup tab of msconfig:
Start | Run | Msconfig | Ok


Another option is to remove the reference to them from one of these keys
in the registry:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\RunOnce
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\RunOnce

Make sure you have a backup of the registry using a program like ERUNT,
http://home.t-online.de/home/lars.hederer/erunt/ before making any
changes to the registry.