System tray icons

[Guest]

Hello,

I looked for an answer before I posted this.

I have just purchased my first 19in moniter and after a bit of playing
around, I have the desktop as I want it for now.

My question, in the notification/system tray area, how do I make the icons
larger, can I do this?

The same question goes for any icons I drag to the task/quick launch bar,
can I make them larger, can I make the task bar wider, ( not longer or double
row ), or will this happen anyway with having larger icons in the task and
system tray area?.

 

[Andrew Murray]

Hello,

I looked for an answer before I posted this.

I have just purchased my first 19in moniter and after a bit of playing
around, I have the desktop as I want it for now.

My question, in the notification/system tray area, how do I make the icons
larger, can I do this?

The same question goes for any icons I drag to the task/quick launch bar,
can I make them larger, can I make the task bar wider, ( not longer or
double
row ), or will this happen anyway with having larger icons in the task and
system tray area?.

I don't know what you mean by making the task bar wider (as opposed to
longer or higher), since it spans the width of the screen any way.

I don't believe you can make the icons on the systray bigger, unless you use
one of the Windows themes with the larger text/icons or something? You may
need a third-party theme program for this (or TweakUI from PowerToys
utilities possibly).

If you want to hide the sys tray icons, right click the start button, go to
properties, click Task Bar tab, check the box "Hide Inactive Icons" - click
Customise.... to change the options. This gives you more space on the task
bar for application window/buttons (if that's what you mean by "making the
taskbar wider").

You can also group the application windows buttons together: check "Group
Similar Tasbar Buttons" under taskbar properties/options. This gives you
further room. If you need more room, then remove the Quicklaunch toolbar
and any others (like the "language" toolbar).

One other thing, to make things appear larger, perhaps youjust need to
reduce your display resolution (right click desktop, properties, settings.
Slide the slider bar back to for example 1024 x768 or 800x600 (which might
appear too big on a 19" monitor).

Note, changing the display resolution makes *everything* bigger, not just
the systray icons.

I hope this helps, but if not please post back explaining further what you
need.

 

[Jim Byrd]

Hi Sandal - I assume you're on XP since you posted in this group.

Control Panel|Display|Appearance|Advanced then select Caption Buttons from
the dropdown and set the icon size you want. A setting of 29 or 30 seems to
work pretty well for me at 1280 x 1024, but YMMV.

--
Regards, Jim Byrd, MVP, DTS, ASVOP
My Blog, Defending Your Machine,
http://defendingyourmachine.blogspot.com/



In Sandal <[email protected]> typed:
|| Hello Andrew,
||
|| Thank you for your reply.
||
|| What I meant was the blue task bar is to thin, I wanted to know if I
|| could make it thicker/higher?, sorry for my eairler discription.
||
|| I understood your answers on screen resolution, I can alter settings
|| just fine but my new moniter, a Hanns.G model, is happiest running
|| at 1280 x 1024 at 75mh.
|| --
|| Sandal
||
||
|| "Andrew Murray" wrote:
||
|||
||| |||| Hello,
||||
|||| I looked for an answer before I posted this.
||||
|||| I have just purchased my first 19in moniter and after a bit of
|||| playing around, I have the desktop as I want it for now.
||||
|||| My question, in the notification/system tray area, how do I make
|||| the icons larger, can I do this?
||||
|||| The same question goes for any icons I drag to the task/quick
|||| launch bar, can I make them larger, can I make the task bar wider,
|||| ( not longer or double
|||| row ), or will this happen anyway with having larger icons in the
|||| task and system tray area?.
||||
|||| --
|||| Sandal
|||
||| I don't know what you mean by making the task bar wider (as opposed
||| to longer or higher), since it spans the width of the screen any
||| way.
|||
||| I don't believe you can make the icons on the systray bigger,
||| unless you use one of the Windows themes with the larger text/icons
||| or something? You may need a third-party theme program for this
||| (or TweakUI from PowerToys utilities possibly).
|||
||| If you want to hide the sys tray icons, right click the start
||| button, go to properties, click Task Bar tab, check the box "Hide
||| Inactive Icons" - click Customise.... to change the options. This
||| gives you more space on the task bar for application window/buttons
||| (if that's what you mean by "making the taskbar wider").
|||
||| You can also group the application windows buttons together: check
||| "Group Similar Tasbar Buttons" under taskbar properties/options.
||| This gives you further room. If you need more room, then remove
||| the Quicklaunch toolbar and any others (like the "language"
||| toolbar).
|||
||| One other thing, to make things appear larger, perhaps youjust need
||| to reduce your display resolution (right click desktop, properties,
||| settings. Slide the slider bar back to for example 1024 x768 or
||| 800x600 (which might appear too big on a 19" monitor).
|||
||| Note, changing the display resolution makes *everything* bigger,
||| not just the systray icons.
|||
||| I hope this helps, but if not please post back explaining further
||| what you need.

 

[Guest]

Hello Jim,

Thank you for your reply.

Gosh, I'm not doing well with my discriptions, you are indeed correct, it is
Windows XP Home I'm running.

Your reply helped to resolve another issue I had about spacing of icons and
caption buttons, thank you.

It hasn't however resolved my question of the blue task bar at bottom of
screen, it is to thin, I would like to make it higher/thicker, is there away
of doing this?

 

[gls858]

Hello Jim,

Thank you for your reply.

Gosh, I'm not doing well with my discriptions, you are indeed correct, it is
Windows XP Home I'm running.

Your reply helped to resolve another issue I had about spacing of icons and
caption buttons, thank you.

It hasn't however resolved my question of the blue task bar at bottom of
screen, it is to thin, I would like to make it higher/thicker, is there away
of doing this?

I'm going to make a guess here. Put your cursor on the top portion of the
bar. It will turn into a black double ended arrow. Now hold down your left
mouse button and drag it to the desired height.

gls858

 

[gls858]

Hello gls858,

Thank you for your reply.

That was the first thing I tried before I posted my question, getting the
double ended arrow can be a bit of a hit and miss affair, so I tried again
anyway.

You would have thought it would have been that easy but no, thank you none
the less.

Make sure it's not locked. Right click on the start button and select the
Taskbar tab. Look for the option to lock taskbar and make sure it's not
checked.

gls858

 

[gls858]

Hello gls58,

Thank you for your last reply.

Success this time, the task bar was indeed locked, I'll see how I get on
with the new sized task bar.

Again thank you for your efforts and everyone elses, it's much appricated.

Glad to help. Thanks for posting back

gls858

 

[Alan Moorman]

Hello Andrew,

Thank you for your reply.

What I meant was the blue task bar is to thin, I wanted to know if I could
make it thicker/higher?, sorry for my eairler discription.

I understood your answers on screen resolution, I can alter settings just
fine but my new moniter, a Hanns.G model, is happiest running at 1280 x
1024 at 75mh.

Just position the cursor at the edge of the task bar -- the
edge between the bar and the rest of the desktop. It will
become a two-headed arrow, and you can drag the bar so it
gets thicker or thinner in width.

Alan