Many people download 60 day trial versions of software, use them for the trial period and then decide not to buy the fully fledged product. These programs take up space on your computer and clog up your system. It’s best to get rid of programs like these if you know you’ll never use them.

To uninstall a program from Windows 7, click Start > Control Panel > Programs (Uninstall a program).

The Programs and Features window that opens up displays a list of programs that currently exist on your system. It’s a useful panel that tells you who published the program and when it was installed on your computer. An even more useful nugget of information, especially given that your task is to find programs you haven’t used in a while, is “last used date”. Unfortunately, though you are able to add this column to the panel, it doesn’t work! For those morbidly curious to see how to add a seemingly useful column that doesn’t actually work, do the following: right click on one of the column headings and select More.

Make sure that the “Last Used On” box is checked and click OK. You can then see this useless column displayed in the window.

Uninstalling A Program

When you find a program that you want to remove from your system, click on it to select it and then click Uninstall at the top.

You will usually see a confirmation window displayed that requires you to confirm that you really do want to uninstall the program. Sometimes these confirmation windows include checks to make sure that you don’t have certain other programs open that prevent the uninstall from being performed. For example, when I try to uninstall Adobe Flash CS5, I get the an error message telling me that I need to close down Internet Explorer and Firefox in order for the uninstall to continue. If you get error messages like these, close down the offending programs and continue with the uninstall.

Some programs take longer than others to uninstall. Adobe Flash takes an absolute age! Once the program has been uninstalled, it will no longer appear in the program list. Sometimes a reboot of your computer is necessary to complete the uninstall.

Fortunately for us, Windows 7 automatically creates system restore points (or checkpoints as they are known) once a day. On top of that, it also saves a restore point every time you successfully start Windows.

A system restore point contains Registry entries and copies of certain critical programs includingkey system files and drivers. It’s a “snapshot” of crucial system settings and programs. Reverting back to a restore point will replace your undesirable current settings and programs with older versions that date back to when the restore point was saved.

Windows 7 can usually detect when you’re about to do something significant to your system (for example, installing a new network card) and will create a restore point automatically. Alas, it can’t always tell.

But if you suspect that what you’re about to do to your PC endangers it, you can always save a restore point manually yourself.

Creating A Restore Point

It’s a good idea to wait until your system is running well and problem free before you create a restore point. When it is, do follow these steps:

1. Make sure that you’re using an administrator account.
2. Click the Start button, right click on Computer and select Properties. On the left, click on System Protection.

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Then, click on the Create button.

In the next window, name the restore point. You should use a meaningful description that gives you an idea about what you are currently doing. You can then identify which restore point you need if anything goes belly up. Click Create.

A confirmation message will be displayed after the restore point has been created.

If anything goes wrong, you can now roll back to this checkpoint. Let’s look at the process of rolling back your computer to a restore point.

Rolling Back To A Restore Point

If you make a change to your system and things go wrong, you might want to roll back to the last point in time that your system was functioning properly . To roll back to a system restore point, click Start > All Programs > Accessories > System Tools > System Restore. System Restore presents a list of recent available restore points.

It’s a good idea to check what will be affected when you roll back to a particular restore point, so select it and then click Scan for affected programs. System Restore tells you which programs and drivers have system entries that will be amended and which programs will be deleted if you select that specific restore point. If you’re happy with the changes that willl take place on restoring to this checkpoint, click Next. You’ll then need to confirm the restore and click Finish to start the proceedings.

Note that system restore doesn’t change any of your data files, such as Excel spreadsheets and Word documents, etc. It just reverts to previous states of system files and system settings.

Characterised by translucent window borders, the Aero theme is quite resource intensive. Should you find yourself using a computer that doesn’t have the gumption, you’ll probably suffer from very poor performance. In this case, you might consider changing your Windows theme to somthing a little less… resource hungy. Microsoft are known for their self congratulatory acronyoms for products, so it’ll be no surprise to you to learn that Aero stands for Authentic, Energetic, Reflective and Open. If it was called AeroBS, then I’d take note.

Aero In Windows 7

The Aero theme in Windows 7 has a few new features:

• Taskbar Previews – hovering over a taskbar icon displays the thumbnail of that program. Hovering over the thumbnail shows a preview of that program in full view. If you have several instances of the application open (think about multiple internet browser sessions, or multiple Word documents), then they all appear for you to select one from. Marginally useful.
• Aero Peek – makes all your open windows fade from view when you hover over the Show desktop icon in the taskbar.  You can then look through those open windows to see the icons, gadgets and other elements on your desktop. When you move your mouse away from the Show desktop icon, the windows solidify again. Useless.
• Aero Shake – dragging a window vigorously from side to side minimises all other windows. Shaking the window again restores them. Absolute ********.
• Aero Snap – a new way to resize open windows, simply by dragging them to the edges of your screen. Depending on where you drag a window, you can make it expand vertically, take up the entire screen, or appear side-by-side with another window. Useless.

Or, from Microsoft themselves, on Windows 7 shortcuts:

Keyboard shortcuts are combinations of two or more keys that, when pressed, can be used to perform a task that would typically require a mouse or other pointing device. Keyboard shortcuts can make it easier to interact with your computer, saving you time and effort as you work with Windows and other programs.

You’ll find that a lot of keyboard shortcuts available in WIndows 7 also work in other programs too.

The best way to learn the keyboard shortcuts is to look at reference material that displays them all, and then mark the ones that you often use and are likely to use in the next few days. You can write these out to make a smaller list that’s easier to read. Then every time you perform an action that has a shortcut, refer to it from your list to remind you of what the shortcut is until you can remember unaided.

As well as using this structure approach to learning the shortcuts, you can also use and learn them “on the fly”. If a letter is underlined in a menu, that usually means that pressing the Alt key in combination with the underlined key will have the same effect as clicking that menu item.

There are lots of keyboard shortcuts available for you to use in Windows 7, but there follows a simplified list of the ones you are most likely to use from day to day. Here is the definitive list of Windows 7 shortcuts, in case you have trouble sleeping. The shortcuts that perform actions on windows perform them on the active window.

You can actually change the way your cursor looks for each individual task that Windows performs, and you can also choose a preset combination of mouse pointer styles.

To make these changes, click Start > Control Panel.

The default view for the control panel looks like the image below, which doesn’t help us much:

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To get a better view of the control panel, click the View by: selector in the top right of the panel, and select Large icons. Find the Mouse icon and click on it.

When the Mouse Properties window opens, click on the Pointers tab.

Windows 7 provides a number of preset Schemes for mouse pointer styles that you can choose from. They consist of different combinations of images that display for the cursor when you perform different tasks. Alternatively, you can choose your own image for each task in the Customize section of the window. Simply click on a particular task, for example, Busy, and click Browse. The browse window opens in the Cursors folder by default, where you can select from all the mouse pointer styles that ship with Windows 7.

If you’ve downloaded and saved new custom mouse pointer styles, you can use those too. Mouse pointer files have the .ani or .cur file extension. Before you use a custom mouse pointer, you will have to unblock it by right clicking on the file, then select Properties > General tab > Unblock. You will only see the Unblock button if you downloaded the mouse pointer. Pointer styles that came with Windows 7 are already unblocked, so if you don’t see the button, you don’t need to worry.

Once unblocked, select the file and click open. That style will then be used for the cursor whenever Windows is performing that particular task in the future.

If you change your mind and want to revert back to the original mouse pointer style, just make sure the correct task is selected and then click Use Default. When you are happy with your changes, click OK.

If you’ve made lots of changes to your mouse pointers, you can save this combination as a new scheme by clicking Save As and then naming the scheme.

Backup And Restore In Windows 7

Backup and Restore is the central hub for most data recovery activities. To get to Backup and Restore, click Start and then type “backup” into the search box.

Click Backup and Restore. The Backup and Restore control panel opens:

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Another way to find the Backup and Restore function is to go there directly by clicking Start > All Programs > Maintenance > Backup and Restore.

The data on your computer refers to things like documents, images and spreadsheets. Data does not include programs. To backup your data, click Set up backup from the Backup and Restore panel. The Set up backup wizard opens:

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Obviously, it makes sense to backup to an external drive, not your internal one, as if your hard drive crashes you won’t be able to restore from it! Select the location you want to backup to and then click Next.

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In this panel you can select the first option to let Windows Backup choose what data gets saved. This will incude data files saved in libraries, on the desktop, and in any folders found in your user folder. (Windows Backup will also create a system image if you choose this option, and then automatically make periodic backups on a schedule going forward.)

If, instead, you choose the option make your own selections and click Next, you will then see a panel like this:

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This expandable view of your file system allows you to select precisely what libraries and folders you want to save. This panel also allows you to create a system image.

When you click Next, the Review your backup screen appears for you to confirm your selections. In addition to making this confirmation, you can also choose a schedule for future backups to run. Click on Change schedule and you’ll see that following panel:

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As you can see, you can control how often (daily, weekly or monthly) your backup runs, and also what day and what time it runs. Once happy with the settings, click Save settings and run backup. All your options will be saved and the backup will start.

“A running program isn’t compatible with certain visual elements of Windows. Click here for more information.”

Running certain programs will cause the informational message The Color Scheme Has Been Changed To Windows 7 Basic to be displayed. Aero themes were introduced in Windows Vista and incorporate an advanced GUI (Grapical User Interface) that makes window borders look transparent (among other things). If you see this message when you start a particular program, it means that that program is not designed to be used with the Aero effect as it doesn’t recognise the advanced GUI utilised in it when it’s active.

Note that this is not a problem with Windows 7. It is a problem with the program you just opened.

If the fact that your program changes the Windows Color scheme turns out to be a problem, you don’t have too many options. If you are using an old version of the program, a newer version might be compatible with the Aero theme: download it and try it. Is it possible to live with the Windows 7 Basic color scheme? I run an old version of Adobe Fireworks (from when it was owned vy Macromedia!), which insists on changing my color scheme to Windows 7 Basic, and I can cope with that. It also changes the way that Windows 7 behaves. For example, when hovering over multiple sessions of the same program, Windows won’t display the small thumbnail image of each session as it should. Instead, it will display a very basic “drop down” selector to choose a session, as shown by the image below:

When I open Firworks, the screen actually goes blank momentarily, and this also happens when I close Fireworks and Windows 7 returns to the aero theme.

You could let the Recycle Bin just accumulate everything you delete. The only problem with doing this is that as you delete more and more items, the space your Recycle Bin takes up will grow. So that you don’t run out of space to store new files, every now and then it’s a good idea to have a purge and empty that bin!

Empty The Recycle Bin

Emptying the Recycle Bin is so easy that cretins can do it. If you know some cretins, ask them over and set them a test! If you don’t have any at your disposal, you’ll have to do it yourself: get to your desktop by clicking the Show desktop icon.

Next, locate the Recycle Bin on your desktop (see the image above if you’ve forgotten what it looks like) and right click on it. Select Empty Recycle Bin if you know what’s good for you.

You’ll then see a window that asks you to confirm your actions. If you click “Yes” then you will permanently delete everything in your Recycle Bin, and there will be no bringing them back. But of course, you know this, otherwise you wouldn’t have attempted to delete the damn things in the first place!

Just click “yes”.

• My Documents has been replaced by the Documents library.
• Similarly, there are now libraries for Pictures, Music and Videos.
• The whole look and feel has changed – see the image below of a typical Explorer window

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You might notice that the menu bar that we have seen in previous versions of Windows Explorer is hidden. To view it temporarily, press th Alt key, and to have it permanently displayed, click Organise > Layout > Menu Bar.

Note the search box in the top right and also the enhanced address bar. Using the search box is pretty easy: just start typing and Explorer will search the current folder for what you type.Results start appearing immediately.

You can see the address bar come into its own, the deeper you explore the library hierarchy:

The biggest change in the address bar is that it is divided into drop-down menu nodes along the navigation path,
making it easier to move through the shell hierarchy. This interface is referred to as the breadcrumb bar.

To see the address bar in the old style, simply click a blank area of the enhanced address bar. To return to the enhanced address bar, click on the current library.

Opening Windows Explorer

There are two main ways that you will open Windows Explorer. The quick way is by clicking on the Windows Explorer icon in the taskbar.

Alternatively, you can access Windows Explorer the old fashioned way: right click on the Start button and select Open Windows Explorer.

You can change the amount of information that Windows Explorer shows to you. The quickest way of doing this is to Change your view. The Change your view options are found to the right of the toolbar.

If you click on the More Options down arrow you will see a list of options:

These options change the size of the icons that represent your files and folders and increase or reduce the amount of information they give you.

Another way of getting more information out of Windows Explorer is to display the Preview Pane. To display the Preview Pane, click on Organise > Layout > Preview Pane.

This is a great way to get a snapshot of the contents of things like Word documents. The only problem is that the preview does take up a sizeable area of the window.

Then, right click in an area of the desktop where there are no icons and select Personalise. At the bottom, click on Desktop Background.

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This takes you to a panel where you can choose the picture that gets displayed as your background.

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Here, you can use the Picture Location dropdown list to choose the category of picture. They get displayed in the preview panel below. If you want to select a completely different picture to display, click on the browse button and navigate to an image on your hard drive.

When you find the folder where your picture is, select it and click OK. All the pictures that exist in that folder will be displayed in the preview panel. Here you can select the picture you want by clicking on it. You can select more than one picture by holding down the Ctrl key when you click additional pictures.

How do several pictures get displayed as your desktop background? At the bottom of the window are options where you can tell Windows to keep changing the desktop background image periodically.

When you’ve finished making your changes, click Save changes.