Glenn

Set the following key under HKEY_CURRENT_USER > Control Panel > Desktop > WindowMetrics to: Name: IconTitleWrap Type: REG_SZ Data value : 1 to wrap the icon title to allow the spacing to close up. Either the value is set incorrectly or the key may be missing.

See the Beginner's Guide (pinned topic at top of this forum) Issues > Restoring Issues Backup.

It'll probably depend on how they engineer it. It's not likely to be the same technology as a 1GB USB stick. This article explains some of the issues Flash memory drive defragmentation: Does it make sense? ... and it turns out there is a limited situation in which it may make sense (see the part about ReadyBoost). EDIT: Correct that last statement ... It may explain why some people think it speeds things up but, since you can't control which files wind up in the fast part of a 2-speed chip, I don't see the benefit.

On their machine, go to WhatIsMyIP

The Dimension 4600 is just a general model designation. The actual configurations could vary quite a bit with respect to processor, memory, hard drive, etc. Right now, I'm working from a D4600 with P4 2.8GHz, 1GB RAM, 160GB SATA drive, running Win XP SP2 and, although it's technically obsolete, I don't really notice it being any slower than the newer machines I use. Mind you, I wiped it completely to get rid of all the Dell "free" junk and loaded just what I wanted.

If you haven't already done so, you could try Tools > Internet Options > Advanced > Reset Internet Explorer Settings. It means you'll have to redo all your customizations but it does give you a truly clean starting point. If you have add-ons, they are not removed, just disabled and can be enabled using Manage Add-ons.

If you mean a USB connected hard drive, I've repeatedly defragged 5 such (4 different brands) with no problem and it does speed them up [EDIT] marginally. USB transfer speed still seems to be the main limitation. If you mean a USB flash drive, there's no point. The files are distributed over the chip to even out wear. Access speed is limited by this feature not the physical distribution.

How did you open the programs that did not add to the MRU list? Some applications, e.g., Word, will not be added to the list if you double click a file to open the associated application. You have to open the application directly using Start > All Programs > ... (Oddly, Excel doesn't have this quirk.) Some applications seem to require several uses before being added. Some applications are excluded and will never be added automatically . You have to manually add them to the pinned list.

Belkin products are generally good quality. I considered them as well but at the time (3 years ago) not many stores in my area carried them. APC (American Power Conversion) are still the most popular in my area and pricing is very competitive. Whichever brand you pick, check the APC website first. They offer a lot of useful info and I found their online selection tool useful for determining how much battery I needed with my hardware. Don't rely on the "up to XX minutes" in the store advertising for either brand. That's often overly optimistic.

I use an APC Back-UPS ES500. Inexpensive (often on sale), about 15 minutes on battery for a single workstation, auto-shutdown software included.

It appeared to be down last night (GMT - 6:00). I could connect but got a blank page (0 byte HTML).

While your browser is open, the image is in Temporary Internet Files. Open that folder, sort by Internet Address or Type to narrow down the search. The address bar on the browser http://www.flickr.com/photos/miss_laura/370547975 made this one easy. The hibiscus was 370547975_073d1911fd[1].jpg Copy the desired file(s) to a safe folder and you're done.

With respect to the "crawling": How? ... on startup? ... opening apps? ... operations within an app? With respect to System Restore: How does it not work? Are the restore points missing? Do you get an error message? With respect to Word/Excel: In Windows Explorer, click Tools > Options > File Types. Scroll down to DOC then click Advanced. Is Open bold? If not, select then click Set Default. Select Open then click Edit. Do the settings look like this screenshot? Also check XLS.

Based on your stated uses, you probably don't need these but some applications (e.g., Paint.NET, Roxio EMC, etc.) require .NET Framework to run. Unless you're really short on drive space, I'd leave it alone. At work: Are you the owner? If not, maybe you shouldn't be messing with the software. Is it possible that the POS system requires .NET Framework and Windows Presentation Foundation and/or Workflow Foundation?

The icons are normally stored in Temporary Internet Files which CCleaner empties. Move the desired icons to another folder, e.g., a subfolder under My Pictures. Then right click the desktop shortcut, Properties > Web Document > Change Icon > Browse to the aforesaid folder, select the desired .ico file.

Do you mean Recuva? If so, you might get faster help if you post in the Recuva Discussion forum. Also, which version of Recuva? Which OS and viewer are you using? Is your problem with just the recovered files or all jpg files? EDIT: If the problem is with recovered files, how much time passed between deletion and recovery? It's possible the sectors they occupied were partially overwritten and the files may be corrupted.

Don't skimp, get 2GB. You're not running both Norton and McAfee are you? My newest (Vista Ultimate) machine came with McAfee 3-month. It seemed to bog things down quite a bit. Norton 2007 is actually not too bad compared to previous versions. Unfortunately, that appears to be normal for Vista. My newest machine has hardware specs that are way superior to my XP machines but takes way longer to start up and shut down. Fast forward to throwing your machine into the nearest river ... same end result without all the pain and agony in between.

Yes ... then go to the Applications tab > New Task and run explorer.exe Yes It has never happened to me in several years whether using CCleaner or manually editing the registry on machines without CCleaner. It should, just as after any crash.

Don't you just love how intuitively obvious the Windows user interface is? An Arrange Icons By setting overrides System Advanced Performance Settings which control the appearance of icon labels Glenn (the evil twin)

Is the message "Restoration Incomplete - Your computer cannot be restored to: <date> <restore point label> - No changes have been made to your computer."? If so, it means the attempt did not succeed in making any changes, not that there weren't any changes since the restore point was created. The message usually means a corrupt restore point but it can also mean that one or more registry keys is locked to prevent change. Do you have any security (anti-virus/anti-spyware) that protects registry keys on startup? If so, try disabling it before running restore. Alternatively, something like Sysinternals Process Monitor may show if something is locking the registry.

Right click Desktop > Arrange Icons By and see if Lock Web Items on Desktop is enabled. If it is, disable it, then do as before ... disable and then enable Use drop shadows for icon labels.

Control Panel > System > Advanced > Performance > Settings > ENABLE Use drop shadows for icon labels

I seem to recall you Aussies getting a little upset when Canadian athletes showed up for an event in their "Roots" brand team uniforms.

Do you have the same write speed settings in both?

The simplest way to defrag the registry and paging files, is to use PageDefrag There are better registry defrag programs and you could defrag the paging files by simply disabling and enabling it using Control Panel > System > Advanced > Performance Settings > Advanced > Virtual Memory > Change, but I suggest PageDefrag since it does both simply and you don't have to install it.