Windows7 Tips and Tricks ~ Part3: Unveil some Win7 secrets (Wallpaper, Toolbar, Pinup & Many more)

So far we have discussed about several Hacks and Tips related to Windows 7 including many Manual registry and Group Policy Tweaks and Some Mass Registry hacks done automatically by several software. Today we shall discuss about some cool but HIDDEN features of Windows 7. Of course to help your understand what we are talking about we are including the sub-headings of the post in this introduction section…

  1. Hidden Regional Wallpaper for you [Total 30 hidden wallpapers]
  2. Enable the toolbar under Explorer
  3. Pinup program shortcuts under Taskbar icons
  4. Do more with Windows 7 calculator
  5. Track back your action with Problem Steps Recorder
  6. Reveal your Hidden and Empty Disk Drives
So Here we start…

Some cool Regional Wallpapers for you:

Enable All these 30 Hidden Wallpapers on your Win7Windows 7 comes up with some good looking Regional Wallpapers. But the problem is that it gets installed depending upon the location of yours! So if you live in Australia then you will be able to enjoy some cool looking walpaper related to your continent! Well but there is still a way out for us to enjoy several hidden regional wallpapers (30 Hidden wallpapers discovered so far!!). Here is what you need to do!

  • Open up My Computer > C:\ drive and type in “Globalization” on the search bar. This should give you some result similar to this Open up the specific Result
  • Now open up the C:\$WINDOWS.~Q\DATA\Windows under the search.
  • Simply Browse through the folder MCT and you have all the Wallpapers at your hand.

You can copy all the Wallpaers from each Wallpaper directory to your Picture Library and can use them as your desktop wallpaper.

Where the Toolbar has gone in Explorer Windows?

Lets show these toolbars up!Have you ever wondered where is that “File | Edit | View | Tools | Help” Toolbar under explorer Windows? If so then the answer is simple! Its still there, But hidden. There are 2 ways of showing them up

  1. Permanent Way ~ Through Folder Option:
    • Goto Start Menu > Control Panel > Appearance and Personalization > Folder Option show-toolbar1
    • Open it and switch to the View Tab and simply select the “Always Show Menus” Tick box and hit OK show-toolbar2
  2. Temporary but short way ~ This is my favorite, you will find out why!
    • Simply go to the folder or anywhere you wish to have the Toolbar.
    • Hit “Alt” from you keyboard and the toolbar will come with a cool fade in animation!

I think most of you will like the second Process! Well atleast we do! (Me and some of my friends!)

Pin up your mostly used Program shortcuts to StartMenu directly from taskbar:

This is one of the most useful feature of Windows 7 but many are unaware of this. Here is the basic concept

  • Whenever you open something with some program then Windows 7 automatically stores the data in the Recent Section of that program. When you open up the program then you can see a Recent list by simply right clicking the program icon from taskbar. For example, below given is a screenshot of Mozilla Firefox. pin-taskbar1
  • Now as you keep on opening other files through the program the Recent List keeps on removing the older items. So if some item is important for you then you might need to open it up from its location which can be irratating sometime!!

Well but not with windows 7! It comes up with an option to Pin the program in the list FOREVER. It is quite simple

  • Right Click the icon on the Taskbar and as obvious you will see a list of Recently opened items.
  • Move your mouse to the right of the item and you will see a small pin icon! Click on it and your item is pinned in the list! Have a look at the picture below pin-taskbar2

Do more with your All-in-one Windows 7 Calculator:

windows7-calCHave you noticed the new calculator yet! If not then its the big time to do it! Unlike Windows XP or Windows Vista, Windows 7 now comes up with a brand new calculator with better interface for

  • Programming
  • Statistics
  • Scientific
  • and of course the old good basic calculator

So if you work under statistical purpose or need to have your Scientific calculator ready at your hand or even need some hifty programming CalC then Windows 7 is proud to be able to do all these for you! Enjoy~~

Track back your Actions with Problem Step Recorder:

As obvious the main reason behind the public release of Windows 7 was indeed BugFixing. So, Microsoft has taken care of this with a program called Problem Steps Recorder. Well but in your Machine (Yes! Your own, very own Machine!) its not only MS who can track you back, you can do this also. Just do the following steps

  • Open up Start Menu and Type psr.exe on the search bar. You should see a result similar to this psr-1
  • Click on the psr file and the program will pop-up. psr-2

Simply clicking on the Start Record button will start recording your Mouse Clicks and also take screen Captures regularly! You can then send this as a feedback to the MS team [Well if you want!]

Reveal all your Hidden and Empty Disk Drives:

Unlike any other build of Windows, Win7 by default hides all the empty removable drives on My Computer. Means, if you insert a Card-Reader in your USB drive then until and unless you are inserting a memory card inside it the drive won’t be shown on the My Computer Window. You can also disable this settings by following these steps

  • Goto the Folder Option through Control Panel by the same steps mentioned before { Start Menu > Control Panel > Appearance and Personalization > Folder Option }
  • Open Folder Option and switch to View Tab. Simply Deselect the Hide empty drives…[as shown in the picture below] and you are set to view all the hidden drives! Enable Hidden drives

Thats it for now! In future we shall obviously come up with latest tips and tricks as we discover them up! Also you will surely notice some good changes in our blog very soon! Stay with us! Keep commenting and enjoying!

~~The End~~
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1 Comment

  1. alan

    The reveal empty driver folders in computer folder does not appear to work in Windows 7. I went through the steps and it did appear briefly as empty folder but subsequently did not appear again.Any suggestions ? Also tried it on Vista same result!

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