- Home - - Download - - FAQ - - Internet Safety - - Internet Tools - - Links - - News - - Virus Information - - E-Mail -
This is the place to look for answers to frequently asked questions about Windows 95/98.
If you do not see the answer to your question here, please send an e-mail outlining your question or problem. We will try to respond promptly to your enquiry. Please note that the e-mail response service is only available to Bits & Bytes Computer Services' customers. Others may be asked to pay a fee.
Internet
Can I change the Startup and Shutdown Screens?
Can I delete a file without it going into the Recycle Bin?
Can I make my own Icons?
Can I move my Taskbar?
Can I re-start windows without shutting down the computer?
Cannot find a file in Windows Explorer
Cannot go to Command Prompt Only at boot-up
How can I stop my CD from automatically starting when I put it in the CD tray?
How can I tell if my hard drive is getting full?
How do I change the volume?
How do I check my systems hardware settings?
How do I keep my files organized?
How do I move several files at once?
How do I start my computer in safe mode?
How do I uninstall a program?
How do I use long file names in DOS?
I have hundreds of files in my Windows/Temp directory
I saved a file on my hard drive and now I cannot find it
My hard drive starts up every so often
My system is frozen
Re-Installing Windows 95
Scan Disk runs when I start my computer
What are shortcut keys?
What is the "StartUp" entry on my list of program files for?
When I try to open a file Windows uses a different application than the one I want to use
How to customize the Startup and Shutdown screens
The startup and shutdown screens are standard bitmaps sized to 320 x 400. You can use any graphics or paint program that can save files in BMP format. Remember to make sure that the size of your image is saved at 320 x 400 pixels. Save the image you have designed as your "wait" screen as logow.sys and save the image you have designed for your "it is now safe to shutdown" screens as logos.sys and copy them to your
windows directory. Your image for the "startup screen" should be saved as logo.sys and copied to the root directory of C: drive.
There are a couple of ways of accomplishing this. You can configure your recycle bin so that files are not placed in the bin. To do this right click on the recycle bin on the desktop and then click on Properties. Select the "do not move files to the Recycle Bin" check box and then files will no longer be placed in the recycle bin. Caution is advised however because if this check box is selected, you will be
unable to recover any files that you delete.
The second method is used when you only want a specific file (or files) from going to the recycle bin. Highlight the file(s) you wish to delete and then tap the keyboard "shift" key twice and hold the "shift" key down while pressing the "delete" key.
You can use any graphic or paint program capable of saving files in BMP format. The only limitation is that icons are restricted 16 colours so make sure that your image looks clear after it has been reduced to 16 colours. After the file has been saved simply rename the file with an ICO extension.
By right clicking on the task bar you can set the task bar properties such as "always on top" (default) or "auto hide" in which case the task bar will drop below the screen until you drag the mouse pointer down to the bottom and it will re-appear. You can also "grab" the upper edge of the task bar and drag it upward to enlarge its size. To move the task bar simply place the mouse pointer on a blank area of the task
bar and left click and drag the bar to either side of the screen or top or bottom edge.
Sometimes you may find it necessary to re-start windows and you don't wish to go through the extra time involved in re-booting your system. To do this, click on Start/Shut Down and then select the "restart" option. Then hold down the keyboard "shift" key while clicking on "Yes".
By default, windows "hides" certain files on your computer. For the most part these hidden files are system critical and deleting or moving them may render your system inoperable. If it is necessary for you to see all the files in a folder/directory, in the explorer window select View/Options. Then select the "View" tab and you can select the option for "show all files."
If you hit F8 while Windows is starting up you get a menu of bootup options, one of which is "Command Prompt Only." Selecting this option only results in windows starting in any event. Check your "Autoexec.bat" in the root directory of your C: drive. Right clcik on the file and select "edit". Make sure that there is not a line there that is a command to start Windows. If this is the case, either delete the offending
line or add "rem" (without the quotation marks) to the beginning of the line and resave the file.
By default, windows automatically starts a music cd when it is placed in the cd tray. Also most programs on CD now have an autostart feature which starts the install routine for the user. To prevent CD's from auto-starting, simply hold down the "shift" key while closing the CD tray. Keep the "shift" key depressed while the CD player initialises and it will prevent the autostart feature from running.
Double click on "My Computer" on the desktop, and then right click on C: drive and select "properties." Windows will report on the amount of space used and available both in byte count and graphically. The blue represents used space. It is important to note that windows requires a large amount of free space for its working environment. If you have very little free space and your system is running slow it is time to
upgrade the hard drive or delete some files that you no longer need or use. How much free space should you have? A good rule of thumb is 10% of the hard drive size for drives 1 gigabyte or larger. (20% for smaller drives.) Another rule of thumb that some people use is 2-3 times the amount of RAM that you have installed on your system.
Most speakers today have volume control knobs right on the speaker. Another method is to use your system volume control. Single clicking on the speaker icon on your task bar will bring up the volume control and you can grab the slider with the mouse pointer and increase or decrease the volume. Double clicking on the speaker icon will bring up the full range of sound controls including left and right balance.
Your hardware system settings can be found in the Contol Panel. You can access the control panel in one of three ways. You can select Start/Settings/Control Panel, or you can double click on "My Computer" and then double click on "Control Panel", or you can double click on Control Panel in Windows Explorer. Which ever method you use, select "System" by double clicking on the icon in the control panel. Then select the
"Device Manager" tab. All of your systems hardware is listed together with detailed information on the resources and drivers that each is using. Note: If one of your devices has an exclamation mark on a yellow diamond, that indicates that the device is either not working or is not configured properly, or that the drivers have not been properly installed.
Think of your hard drive as a filing cabinet. Then think of how you would arrange the file folders in that cabinet. When creating directory (folder) names, think of a name that first means something to you and secondly has some relationship to what you are going to put in that directory or folder.
For example, let us suppose that you do a lot of scanning of pictures. You may want to consider having a directory just for those pictures. So give the directory a name like "pictures", or "images" or "graphics." As you build up your library of scanned pictures you may wish to create sub-directories to classify your pictures such as "family", "nature", "vacation" and so on.
If you edit your pictures for different applications you may wish to further classify them by file type such as .TIF, .GIF, .JPG etc. Whichever system you select, stick with it and rigidly store the file in the correct directory. Hint: Most applications are more flexible when you select "File/Save As" rather than "File/Save." In the latter, the file is usually saved in the applications default directory.
A further idea is to watch carefully where the application is going to be stored when you install it. A lot of programs now that are written for windows, insist on placing themselves in a sub-directory of "Program Files." You can usually over-ride this during the installation process and install it somewhere else. I have seen some pretty weird directory names that I am sure to forget a few weeks later. So over-ride
the suggestion and give the directory a name that you will remember and place the directory in the root of your hard drive so that you can easily see it in windows explorer. (explorer only shows the first level of the directory tree by default.)
Sometimes it is necessary for you to move several files to new folders and so forth. To move all files together, or to move a group of files that are together in a folder, first select the first file you want to move with the left mouse button. Then, while holding down the "shift" key select the last file in the group. You can now place the mouse pointer in any portion of the highlighted selection and drag them to
their new location. If you wish to move several files in the same folder but not together, select the first file you wish to move and then hold the "Ctrl" key down while you select other files. You can even change your mind and clicking on a hoghlighted file will de-select it. Once you have highlighted all the files you wish, place the mouse pointer in any highlighted area and drag the files to their new location.
Warning! you should not move program and application files from their "home" directory unless you have a particular reason for doing so. Moving files may render the application inoperable. This is particularly true of any files that are in the "windows" directory or windows sub-directories.
If windows does not start up properly and you have to re-start the system it will usually suggest "Safe Mode" automatically. If it does not, or there is another reason that you want to start windows in "Safe Mode", during the boot cycle pressing F8 will bring up the "Start Up Menu" and you can select "Safe Mode."
Uninstalling programs and applications incorrectly is a leading cause of windows problems where windows is looking for files that no longer exist on the system. If a system critical file has been deleted your computer may not even start. In the days of DOS, most programs kept their files together in their directory structure. Uninstalling these programs usually meant just deleting the files and directories. Windows
programs however are much more sophisticated and in most cases share common files with other programs on your system. Deleting files and/or directories willy nilly can render other applications inoperable.
There are three ways to uninstall programs from your system. The first method is to see if the application you are using has its own uninstall program. If it does then that is the best method to use, after all it knows where it put all the files.
The second method is to go to the "Add/Remove Programs" icon in the Control Panel (Start/Settings/Control Panel). Most programs and applications designed for windows will be "registered" here. Double click on the icon and the first tab will be "Install/Uninstall." Look down the list to see if the application you wish to remove is listed. If it is, then highlight the program's name and click on the "Add/Remove"
button.
Caution: In both of these methods, the uninstall routine may prompt you to confirm deletion of a certain file (usually these files fall in the shared category.) If the listed file is in the windows directory or windows sub-directory such as windows/system, my advice is to leave it alone. Better to have a file on your system that is no longer required than deleting a file that is also used by other programs and
applications.
Only if neither of the first two options exist should you contemplate simply deleting the files and directories from your system. To play it safe, make use of the recycle bin. After using this method, re-start your system and make sure that all is normal. If it is, then you can empty the recycle bin.
Finally while on this topic, there are several uninstall programs available on the market that keep a record of program installations and they keep track of shared files. These programs are ideal for uninstalling applications safely.
Sometimes it is necessary to reference files with long names in a DOS application, for example in your autoexec.bat or config.sys file. DOS used the file naming convention of 8.3 whereas windows 95/98 supports long file names. In DOS a long file name is truncated to 6 characters followed by a tilde (~) and a number. i.e. A file called "general application.app" would be truncated in DOS to "genera~1.app. If you needed
DOS to use this file it would look for "genera~1.app" on your system and it would be unsuccessful as the file is really called "general application.app" and that is how it is stored on your hard drive. To get around this, when referencing files with long names in DOS, place the entire file name inside double quotations ("long file name").
Windows and windows applications create temporary files which are accessed by the application when in use. Ideally the application will remove these files when no longer needed and during windows shut-down. More often than not the files are left behind usually in the "windows/temp" directory. If you do not shut your system down properly, windows and other applications do not get a chance to clean up after themselves.
Eventually you will end up with hundreds of files just wasting space on your hard drive. The default file suffix is .TMP which lets you know that it is a temporary file. You can recover valuable hard drive space by keeping the temp directory clear. A rule of thumb is that you can safely delete any file ending with .TMP if it does not have the current date. A current date may indicate that the file is currently
in use by windows or windows application.
Of course the first rule of a neat and tidy hard drive is to have a regimented file and directory structure. (see the question on file/directory organisation) The second rule is to pay attention to where the application you are using is storing its user files when you use the "Save" or "Save As" command. If through oversight this did not happen all is not lost. Simply go
to Start/Find/Files or Folders on the start menu. This will bring up a dialogue window. Type in the first few characters of the file name (you do remember what you called it, don't you?) in the "named" and make sure C: drive (or other drive letter where you routinely save files) is showing in the "look in" window. Then click on the "find now" button. The dialogue will list all files matching your search criteria and
you can access the file directly from the dialogue window. Don't forget you can use wild cards ( * and ? ) to help you locate the file.
Why does my hard drive start working for no apparent reason?
Windows uses a swap file called win386.swp located in the windows directory to store temporary files and resources essential to its working environment. Periodically it has to update the swap file or exchange information from it.
Sometimes, and for a variety of reasons, a system will lock up and will not respond to either mouse or keyboard. When this happens, press the three keys "ctrl, alt, delete" together at the same time. In most instances a dialogue box will pop up showing all the applications currently running in windows. Look in the box for a program which shows [not responding] next to its name. Highlight that application and click on
"End Task." Sometimes you may have to repeat the process two or three times. This should release the offending program and allow windows to continue.
Occasionally windows will freeze so bad that you cannot call up the dialogue box and you will have no choice but to turn off your system, wait a few seconds and then re-start your computer.
If it is a frequent occurrence try to make a note of what you were doing at the time, what applications you have open and so on. Once you have narrowed the cause down, it is a lot easier to look for solutions. Visit the vendors web-site to see if the problem has been reported previously and what the proposed solution is.
This is something that should rarely be required in normal circumstance. However if you find it necessary to start anew and re-format your hard drive and so forth, make sure you have all the tools at hand before starting. The first thing you will need is a "Start Up" disk with the necessary drivers for your CD-Rom. Test the start up disk to make sure that your system will boot up from it and you can access the
CD-Rom and read from the CD. The next thing you will need is the original microsoft windows CD-Rom and the licence. The licence contains the number which you will be asked for during the installation process. Once you have all three items you can proceed. Insert the Windows Cd and at the dos prompt type d: (where d: is the drive letter of your CD)and press enter. Then at the prompt type cd\win95 and press enter. Then
type setup and press enter.
If you have an upgrade version of windows, you will be prompted to prove eligibility for the upgrade product. At the prompt insert the first disk of your earlier version of windows.
If windows is not shut down properly it does not have a chance to perform file clean up, and applications may not have closed their files properly which lead to disaster. Windows will automatically run scan disk to check all files if it detects that it was not properly shut down. To avoid this from happening always shut down windows using the Start/Shut Down routine.
Shortcut or Hot keys are keyboard combinations to perform windows functions in the absence of a mouse. There are several key combinations for a variety of windows tasks. Go to Start/Help for a complete list of key combinations.>BR>
If you have a favorite program that you always want running whenever you start windows, you would place an entry here using the Start/Settings/Taskbar dialogue and clicking on "Add." Examples of programs that you may want to start automatically every time you start windows are a fax program, system maintenance tools, scheduling/reminder software and so forth.
Typically windows "associates" certain applications with certain file types that it encounters. If you wish to use an application other than the one currently associated with a particular file, hold the "Shift" key down while right clicking on the file name. You can now select "Open With" from the dialogue pop-up to select the application you want to use.
- Home - - Download - - FAQ - - Internet Safety - - Internet Tools - - Links - - News - - Virus Information - - E-Mail -
Last Updated:
January 26, 2002
Best viewed at 800 x 600 resolution