5. Quick Access to Control Panel
A
lot of the clicking and scrounging in this article takes place in Control
Panel, a window that provides links to many settings that affect the way
Vista looks, sounds, and behaves. It's a hodge-podge of modern web-like
pages and older, pre-Vista tabbed dialog windows. Some of the dialog
windows date back more than a decade to Windows 95, and are still
present merely because Microsoft presumably doesn't want to invest the
resources to update or replace all their settings.
As
a result, it can be hard to find specific settings in Control Panel,
and time-consuming to repeatedly return to dialogs to change certain
settings. Fortunately, there are a few tricks that will help you find
and change settings faster.
First, open Control Panel, and click the Classic View
link on the left to show a complete list of all the top-level Control
Panel pages and windows. Next, click the little path arrow to the right
of the Control Panel text in the address bar, as shown in Figure 3. As you can see, this list is considerably shorter than the one in the main window.
Why?
Because clicking the path arrows shows only the web-style Control Panel
pages, not the older tabbed dialog windows. It seems as though
Microsoft made an effort to convert Control Panel to the new,
easier-to-use format, but didn't get around to finishing the job; it's
estimated that only about 60% of the conversion was completed in time
for the release of Windows Vista. Ultimately, this is more or less
inconsequential, but once you understand the makeup of the program,
it'll be a lot easier to navigate.
5.1. Search in Control Panel
Control Panel has a brand-new Search feature, and it actually works. Just click the Control Panel Home link on the left (in Classic View, search only looks through icon captions), and then type a word into the Search box on the upper right to find matching settings (see Figure 4). Then, just click a link in the search results to jump to the window with that setting.
Control
Panel's Search feature is slick, but not as comprehensive as Windows
Explorer's Search tool. In other words, your search is conducted against
a pre-programmed index of common settings referring only to Vista's own
settings. This means that advanced settings like "Icon Spacing" and any settings in third-party Control Panel
windows, such as QuickTime window (present if you've installed Apple
iTunes) won't show up in search results.
5.2. Shortcuts to Control Panel pages
Many
windows are buried several levels deep in Vista's Control Panel, so it
can be a bit of a pain to make your way around the program. If you find
yourself returning to the same spot often, there are several ways to
make shortcuts and save yourself some time in the future.
The easiest way to make a shortcut is with drag-drop. If you're using the Control Panel Home
(category) view, drag any link onto the desktop to make a shortcut, but
don't be surprised if the shortcut doesn't take you as far as you
wanted to go. For instance, drag the Change desktop background link, and you'll get a shortcut to the Appearance and Personalization page only.
You can get a little more control in the Classic View of Control Panel; just drag an icon to the desktop to make a shortcut.
But
if you want to get to a specific page or tab more directly, you can use
any of the available command-line alternatives to open Control Panel
pages and windows from shortcuts, the Start menu, or even from the Start → Run dialog. For example, you can open the Advanced
tab in the Advanced System Properties window with this old-school
syntax (around since the days of Windows 3.x in the 1980s, if you can
believe it):
control.exe sysdm.cpl, 3
Or, you can use this new standalone executable to accomplish the same thing:
SystemPropertiesAdvanced.exe
For a complete list of these shortcuts, see Table 1.
Table 1. Command line access to Control Panel pages and tools
|
Control Panel
|
Command line
|
|---|
|
Add Hardware Wizard
|
hdwwiz.cpl
|
|
Administrative Tools
|
control admintools
|
|
Advanced System Properties → Advanced tab
|
SystemPropertiesAdvanced.exe
|
|
Advanced System Properties → Computer Name tab
|
sysdm.cpl or SystemPropertiesComputerName.exe
|
|
Advanced System Properties → Advanced tab → Performance Options → Data Execution Prevention tab
|
SystemPropertiesDataExecutionPrevention.exe
|
|
Advanced System Properties → Hardware tab
|
SystemPropertiesHardware.exe
|
|
Advanced System Properties → Advanced tab → Performance Options
|
SystemPropertiesPerformance.exe
|
|
Advanced System Properties → System Protection tab
|
SystemPropertiesProtection.exe
|
|
Advanced System Properties → Remote tab
|
SystemPropertiesRemote.exe
|
|
AutoPlay
|
control /name Microsoft.AutoPlay
|
|
Backup and Restore Center
|
control /name Microsoft.BackupAndRestoreCenter
|
|
Backup and Restore Center → Backup Status and Configuration
|
sdclt.exe
|
|
BitLocker Drive Encryption
|
control /name Microsoft.BitLockerDriveEncryption
|
|
Bluetooth Devices
|
bthprops.cpl
|
|
Date and Time
|
timedate.cpl or control date/time
|
|
Display Settings
|
desk.cpl
|
|
Default Programs
|
control /name Microsoft.DefaultPrograms
|
|
Device Manager
|
devmgmt.msc
|
|
Disk Manager
|
diskmgmt.msc
|
|
Ease of Access Center
|
access.cpl or Utilman.exe
|
|
Folder Options
|
control folders
|
|
Fonts
|
control fonts
|
|
Game Controllers
|
joy.cpl
|
|
Indexing Options
|
control /name Microsoft.IndexingOptions
|
|
Internet Options
|
inetcpl.cpl
|
|
Keyboard Properties
|
control keyboard
|
|
Mouse Properties
|
main.cpl or control mouse
|
|
Network and Sharing Center
|
control /name Microsoft.NetworkandSharingCenter
|
|
Network Connections
|
ncpa.cpl or control netconnections
|
|
Offline Files
|
control /name Microsoft.OfflineFiles
|
|
Parental Controls
|
control /name Microsoft.ParentalControls
|
|
Pen and Input Devices
|
TabletPC.cpl
|
|
People Near Me
|
collab.cpl or p2phost.exe
|
|
Performance Information and Tools
|
control /name Microsoft.PerformanceInformationandTools
|
|
Personalization
|
control desktop
|
|
Personalization → Window Color and Appearance → Classic Appearance Settings
|
control color
|
|
Phone and Modem Options
|
telephon.cpl or control telephony
|
|
Power Options
|
powercfg.cpl
|
|
Printers
|
control printers
|
|
Problem Reports and Solutions
|
wercon.exe
|
|
Programs and Features
|
appwiz.cpl
|
|
Programs and Features → Turn Windows features on or off
|
OptionalFeatures.exe
|
|
Regional and Language Options
|
intl.cpl or control international
|
|
Scanners and Cameras
|
sticpl.cpl
|
|
Secure Online Key Backup
|
control /name Microsoft.SecureKeyBackup
|
|
Security Center
|
wscui.cpl
|
|
Sound
|
mmsys.cpl
|
|
Speech Recognition Options
|
control /name Microsoft.SpeechRecognitionOptions
|
|
Sync Center
|
mobsync.exe
|
|
System
|
control /name Microsoft.System
|
|
Tablet PC Settings
|
control /name Microsoft.TabletPCSettings
|
|
Task Scheduler
|
control schedtasks
|
|
Text to Speech
|
sapi.cpl or control speech
|
|
User Accounts
|
nusrmgr.cpl or Netplwiz.exe or control userpasswords
|
|
User Accounts (advanced)
|
control userpasswords2
|
|
Volume Mixer
|
SndVol.exe
|
|
Welcome Center
|
control.exe /name Microsoft.WelcomeCenter
|
|
Windows Defender
|
MsAsCui.exe
|
|
Windows Firewall
|
Firewall.cpl or FirewallControlPanel.exe
|
|
Windows Firewall Settings
|
FirewallSettings.exe
|
|
Windows Sidebar Properties
|
control.exe /name Microsoft.WindowsSidebarProperties
|
|
Windows SideShow
|
control.exe /name Microsoft.WindowsSideshow
|
|
Windows Update
|
control.exe /name Microsoft.WindowsUpdate
|
5.3. Cascading Control Panel menu
Another way to get to a specific Control Panel page quickly is to add a menu with all its contents to the Start menu:
In Control Panel, open Taskbar and Start Menu and then choose the Start Menu tab.
Click the currently enabled Customize button.
If you're using the modern, two-column Start menu (Start menu in the last window), find the Control Panel branch, and then select the Display as a menu option.
If you're using the Classic Start menu, turn on the Expand control panel option in the Advanced Start menu options list.
Either way, click OK when you're done.
Now,
instead of a single menu item in the Start menu, all the Control Panel
icons are listed individually. To open the standalone Control Panel
folder window from this interface, simply right-click Control Panel and select Open.
5.4. Unwanted icons and the Green Ribbon of Death
Does
it take an inordinately long time to show Control Panel in Classic
View? If you upgraded your PC from a previous version of Windows,
there's a bug in Vista that can cause the Green Ribbon of Death . This bug, incidentally, is related to a specific "legacy" feature that lets you hide certain Control Panel icons; see the "Hide Unwanted Control Panel Icons" sidebar, next, for details.
You
can hide certain types of icons in Control Panel's Classic View with a
quick Registry hack. Just open the Registry Editor , and expand the branches to HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Control Panel\don't load.
Then, create a new string value for each icon you want to hide. For the name, type the filename of the .cpl file responsible for the icon . Then, double-click the new value, type No for its data, and click OK.
Refresh the Control Panel window by pressing the F5 key to see the change.
Now,
there's a bug in Windows Vista that can crash Control Panel—or at least
cause it to take a long time to load all its icons—if there's an errant
entry in the don't load Registry key. If you're seeing the Green Ribbon of Death whenever you open Control Panel, delete all the values in the don't load key and then try again.
