Windows XP Tricks

Windows XP Tricks

I have tested all of these and they work great.

Trick #1: Watch Star Wars

Go to Start, Run, and type “telnet” without the quotes. A console window should appear. Now type in “o” and press enter. New text should appear saying ( to ). This means that it is working. Now type in “Towel.Blinkenlights.nl”. The old stuff on the window should clear away and you will see new stuff. Keep watching and you will see Star Wars!

P.S. I’m not a big fan of Star Wars, but this is cool enough to show you.

Trick #2: Cheat in the Pinball game (Video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MeYuPL9vu5U)

This is rather simple. Open the pinball game and, before the game starts, type “hidden test” without the quotes. If you did it properly, you should be able to drag the ball with your mouse!

Another cheat is to, once the game has begun, press “h”. The high score window should appear with your score being 1,000,000,000!

Trick #3: Cheat in Solitaire

This is also simple. Once you did badly enough to lose the game, before starting a new one, press Shift+Alt+2. You just got an instant win! This also functions if you didn’t lose yet.

Trick #4: Change the Start button text

First, you will need to download Resource Hacker (download here). Save a backup copy of C:\WINDOWS\explorer.exe. Open the Resource Hacker and, on the toolbar, open your backup explorer. Now open up the string table section, and open #38. In String Table 38, change the “start” to whatever you want. Then, click Compile Script and press Ctrl+S to save. Now, close the Resource Hacker and open the Task Manager. Go to the Processes tab and select “explorer.exe”. Now click End Process and click Yes. Your taskbar should disappear. That’s OK. Now go to the Applications tab and click New Task. Now, open the explorer file you hacked, and BINGO!

Trick #5: Hide files inside JPG, WMA, and ICO files (Video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ma01XRzvyQM)

To do this, you must download the 7-Zip setup program (download here). Choose a disguise file and copy it to drive C. Now, make a ZIP archive and save it to drive C as well. Now, click Start, Run, and type in “cmd” for the Command Prompt. Now, type in your commands with this syntax:

cd \

copy /b “Disguise File.jpg” + “Archive.zip” “Hidden Archive.jpg”

And now, Hidden Archive.jpg contains Archive.zip! To view Archive.zip, simply open Hidden Archive.jpg with the 7-Zip file manager.

Trick #6: Find hidden music

To listen to music hidden on the XP operating system, open up your explorer and go to C:\WINDOWS\Media. There will be three music files: flourish, town, and onestop. There is also another song that is located in C:\WINDOWS\system32\oobe\images. That file is called title.wma, which is played when you setup your XP system.

Trick #7: Create a hidden folder

To create a hidden folder, first create a new folder. Then right-click it, select Properties, click on the Customize tab, then click the Change Icon. Now, browse the icons until there is a blank one. Select it, click OK, and click the OK button on the properties window. Your folder should now have an invisible icon. But that's only half the trick. Now, click on the Start button, click Run, and type in "charmap" without the quotes. Make sure the font is on Arial, and select the character that is blank. If you picked the right one, the bar on the bottom should say "U+00A0: No-Break Space". Double click it and then click the copy button. Now right-click your folder and select Rename. Now, just paste the text into the little box to enter the name and press enter!

If you like these tricks and want more, check out the Windows XP segment of our forum now!