Along with many good new features, the Windows 7 beta also includes a nasty bug. Its version of Windows Media Player 12 will automatically add missing metadata, including album art, and this can overwrite the first few seconds of the file. Oops. Installing an update may fix this (see http://support.microsoft.com/kb/961367) but it would be a very good idea to back up your MP3 files, too.

2. Fix the taskbar

The new Windows 7 taskbar acts as one big quick launch toolbar that can hold whatever program shortcuts you like (just right-click one and select Pin To Taskbar). And that’s fine, except it does consume a little more screen real estate than we’d like. Shrink it to a more manageable size by right-clicking the Start orb, then Properties > Taskbar > Use small icons.

If you’ve no problem with the taskbar size, but find the way it combines icons to be confusing, then right-click the Start orb, click Properties > Taskbar and set “Taskbar buttons” to “Combine when taskbar is full” for a more familiar XP and Vista-style look.

3. Keyboard shortcuts

Windows 7 supports several useful new keyboard shortcuts.

Alt+P
Display/ hide the Explorer preview pane

Windows Logo+G
Display gadgets in front of other windows

Windows Logo++ (plus key)
Zoom in, where appropriate

Windows Logo+- (minus key)
Zoom out, where appropriate

Windows Logo+Up
Maximise the current window

Windows Logo+Down
Minimise the current window

Windows Logo+Left
Snap to the left hand side of the screen

Windows Logo+Right
Snap to the right hand side of the screen

Windows Logo+Home
Minimise/ restore everything except the current window

4. Customise UAC

Windows Vista’s User Account Control was a good idea in practice, but poor implementation put many people off – it raised far too many alerts. Fortunately Windows 7 displays less warnings by default, and lets you further fine-tune UAC to suit your preferred balance between security and a pop-up free life (Start > Control Panel > Change User Account Control Settings).

5. Burn images
Windows 7 finally introduces a feature that other operating systems have had for years – the ability to burn ISO images to CDs or DVDs. And it couldn’t be much easier to use. Just double-click the ISO image, choose the drive with the blank disc, click Burn and watch as your disc is created.

6. Speedy video access
Want faster access to your Videos folder? Windows 7 now lets you add it to the Start menu. Just right-click the Start orb, click Properties > Start Menu > Customize, and set the Videos option to “Display as a link”. If you’ve a TV tuner that works with Windows 7 then you’ll appreciate the new option to display the Recorded TV folder on the Start menu, too.

1. Open Command prompt by running as administrator. To do this, right click on the command prompt and select “Run as Administrator”.

2. In the command prompt type the command- net user administrator /active:yes. If you want to set a password for administrator account type Net user administrator password, where password is the password you want to set for this account.

Once the command is executed successfully, log off and log in back to see the administrator account in place. If you need to disable in back, type the command- net user administrator /active:no and the administrator account will be disabled.

Alternatively you can also enable or disable the administrator account from the Local Policy. Click on the start menu and type secpol.msc in the search bar and click enter. This opens the Local Security Policy. Navigate to Local Policies-> Security Options and here you can see an entry Accounts: Administrator account. Double click the entry to enable or disable.

VirtualBox is a free and open source virtualization program. Essentially, it is like having a complete and separate computer within your computer. You can install any operating system on it, including Windows 7. The latest version of VirtualBox (2.1.2) has support for Windows 7, which makes it very easy and convenient to install.

First, you’ll want to download VirtualBox and install it.  VirtualBox is available for multiple platforms: Windows, OS X, Linux, and Solaris. During the installation on a Windows system, you may receive a warning that untested software is being installed. Be sure to click continue when those boxes appear, as essential components for VirtualBox to function properly are being installed.

You’ll also need to download the Windows 7 beta. It is a large file, so it may take quite a while to download depending on your connection. The file you will download is a CD disk image. Fortunately, since you’re going to use it on a virtual machine, you won’t have to actually burn it to a CD to use it.

Once you have VirtualBox installed and you have the Windows 7 beta CD image, you’re ready to create your virtual machine.  Launch VirtualBox and create a new machine. Be sure to select Windows 7 as your operating system.

Click Next. On the following screen you will select how much memory you would like the virtual machine to have. I believe the minimum requirement for Windows 7 is 1GB of RAM, so be sure to set it to at least 1024MB.

Click Next.  On the following screen you will create a new virtual drive for the system.  I would recommend using the default option of a Dynamically expanding storage. This way you won’t use any more disk space (on your main system) than necessary. Since you’re using a dynamically expanding drive, the size of the disk is somewhat arbitrary. You just want to be sure not to make it too small, so set it to 100GB to be safe.

Once you’re done creating the virtual machine, you’ll need to configure it to use the Windows 7 disk image you downloaded. Select your virtual machine, click Settings, and navigate to the CD/DVD-ROM section. Check the Mount CD/DVD Drive checkbox and click the ISO Image File radio button. Then click the folder icon and then browse to where you saved your ISO image and select it.

If you have a multi-core processor, there’s an option you’ll want to enable to speed things up on the virtual machine.  Go to the General section and on the Advanced tab enable the Enable VT-x/AMD-V checkbox. This allows VirtualBox to take advantage of machine virtualization capabilities of your processor, and improves the performance of the virtual machine.

You may also want to add sound to the virtual machine as well. Go to the Audio tab, and click the Enable Audio checkbox and select Windows DirectSound for the Host Audio Driver. Once you have the machine configured, click the Start button to turn on the virtual machine.

You should see the Windows 7 installation begin. Just follow all the prompts and install Windows. If you need to get back to your main computer at any time, the hotkey to release control of the virtual machine is the Ctrl key on the right side of your keyboard.

Once you’ve installed Windows 7, you can install the guest additions. The guest additions will provide better video and audio support to the virtual machine. The guest additions also allow you to better integrate the virtual machine with your main system.

To install the guest additions, press the right Ctrl key on your keyboard, go to the Devices menu and select Install Guest Additions…

During the guest additions installation, when prompted if you would like to install drivers, click the Install button. Once you’ve installed the guest additions, reboot the virtual machine. Upon rebooting, all of the virtual devices should be working.

Now that you have the guest additions installed, you will be able to share the clipboard, access to files on the main system, and move the cursor seamlessly in and out of the virtual machine. You can press the Right Ctrl-F and see the virtual machine full screen. What a pretty fish!

Have you tried Windows 7 with other free virtualization programs? If so, let us know which ones and what sort of hacks were required to get it to work.

Original Post: MakeUseOf

Right-click on Desktop and select “Personalize“. Now click on “Get more themes online” link:

It’ll open following a webpage in your browser:

Windows 7 Beta: Personalize your PC

You can directly open the above site in your browser.

You’ll see lots of themes available on that page:

Click on any theme which you want to download. It’ll download a .themepack file. Double-click on the file and Windows will automatically install and apply it.

PS: The site is new and there will be lots of updates in coming days. So keep visiting the site.

Original Post: ASKVG.com