Have you ever admired the family photo or Space Shuttle photo plastered across a co-worker's monitor desktop? The Display icon ”one of the most important programs on your PC ”is your ticket to such interior decoration stunts, and many others. This icon opens into a window (see Figure 9-6) whose controls are then divided into five tabs: Themes, Desktop, Screen Saver, Appearance, and Settings. Figure 9-6. Lower right: Here's a tool chest filled with everything you need to change the look of your desktop. In addition to redecorating the desktop, you can even redo the design scheme used for the windows you open as you work. Middle: The Desktop tab lets you choose a picture to plaster onto your desktop backdrop. Upper left: Some screen savers are animated; they move, grow, or appear with fade-in effects. The My Pictures Slideshow shown here, for example, offers an endless slide show.NOTE Here's a quick way to open the Display program: Right-click any blank spot on the desktop and choose Properties from the shortcut menu. 9.7.1 Themes TabPast versions of Windows let you change the background picture for your desktop, but that's kid stuff. This tab, new to Windows XP, lets you radically change the look and emotional tenor of your entire PC with a single click (see Figure 9-6, lower right). Each of the themes listed here comes with a color scheme, font selection for your menus and dialog boxes, pictures for use as desktop icons, sounds, cursor shapes , and a desktop picture. (These special desktop pictures, by the way, are bonus backdrops that aren't listed in the Desktop tab, described next .) Now you know why it's so easy for people who don't care for the new, blue Windows XP graphic-design look to switch back to the old design ”since each look is nothing more than a Theme. NOTE Choosing "More themes online" from the Theme drop-down list does indeed take you to a Microsoft Web page where you can download additional themes ”as well as additional screen savers, games , and so on. But these aren't free. In fact, they're part of the $40 Microsoft Plus pack. (Operators are standing by.) It's easy enough to design a new Theme of your own, however. Just use the other tabs in this program to set up the desired appearance of your PC screen, complete with your choice of desktop background, menu and window fonts, icons, and so on, exactly as described in the following pages. (Visit the Mouse and Sound programs in the Control Panel, too, to select cursor shapes and beep sounds.) Then return to the Themes tab and click the Save As button. Finally, give your new theme a name , so that you can call it up whenever you like. 9.7.2 Desktop TabYour desktop's background surface doesn't have to show a sunlit hillside forever. You can very easily decorate it with a picture, pattern, or solid color. 9.7.2.1 Applying wallpaperWallpaper, in Windows lingo, is a picture that you can "hang" on your screen backdrop. Click one of the names in the Background list box (Figure 9-6, middle) to see how it looks on the miniature monitor in the dialog box. You'll quickly discover that Windows XP is blessed with some of the most spectacular full-screen photos ever amassed, including close-ups of flowers, the moon, spacey-looking ripples, Stonehenge, and several desert shots that some photographer must have sweat a lot to capture. NOTE Not everything in the Background list box is a photo, however. Many of them are repeating patterns. Choosing one of these leaves a bit more memory in the PC pot for use by your programs. If nothing in the list excites you, use one of your own graphic files as wallpaper, such as a scanned photo of your family or your family dog. Then click the Browse button to find the file you want. You can use any graphics file with one of these extensions: .bmp, .gif, .jpg, .jpeg, .png, .dib, .htm, or .html. If the graphic is a small picture, you can specify how you want Windows to handle it by choosing one of these commands from the Position drop-down list:
After selecting a backdrop you like, click OK to apply it and close the dialog box. Or, to preview the wallpaper on your desktop, click the Apply button, leaving the dialog box open so that you can make another choice if the first one looks hideous. To remove wallpaper, return to the Display Properties dialog box and select (None) at the top of the Background list box. Whatever color you've chosen in the Color drop-down menu reappears on your desktop in place of the wallpaper. 9.7.2.2 Solid colorsTo change the color of your desktop without actually putting a picture there, click (None) in the Background list box, and then choose the color you want from the Color drop-down menu. 9.7.3 The "Customize Desktop" ButtonClicking the Customize Desktop button at the bottom of the Display Properties dialog box takes you into an absolutely enormous world of additional options, including the famous Active Desktop feature that turns your entire desktop into a Web browser.
The first thing you see after clicking the Customize Desktop button is the General tab. 9.7.3.1 General tabA better name for this tab might have been "Desktop icons," since all of its options pertain to the icons that sit, or don't sit, on your desktop.
9.7.3.2 Web tabYou use the Web tab to turn on Active Desktop, a feature that presents information from the Web directly on your desktop, live and self-updating. If you want to keep an eye on an approaching tornado , the stock market, or a live Webcast, this is the feature for you. Of course, receiving live, continuous Internet information requires a live, continuous Internet connection. It's great if you have a cable modem or DSL line, for example, but less practical if you dial the Internet using a modem. Once the Web tab is in front of you, turn on a checkbox in the Web Pages list box (such as "My Current Home Page"). These checkboxes represent the various Web pages you'd like to see plastered across your desktop. To add to this list, click the New button, type the URL (Web address), and click OK. You can add any kind of Web information to your Active Desktop. Frequently updated pages like stock tickers are popular, but you can also use Web pages that don't change much. In fact, by clicking New and then the Visit Gallery button, you can check out the Microsoft Web site, which offers an array of newsy, constantly updating Active Desktop elements ”such as sports, weather, or travel news ”that have been specially designed for desktop use. That is, they aren't actually Web pages, but blurbs that appear in their own little boxes on your living desktop. And if you click the Browse button in the New Desktop Item dialog box, you can choose a graphics file or HTML (Web page document) on your hard drive for displaying on the desktop. NOTE Here's something to tuck away for future Web-browsing sessions. Whenever you stumble onto a Web page that might make a good Active Desktop display, right-click its page ”right there in Internet Explorer ”and choose Set as Desktop Item from the shortcut menu. You've just added a new option without fiddling around in the Display program. No matter how you select your desktop Web material, however, the process always ends with an "Add item to Active Desktop" confirmation box. It identifies both the name and the URL (Web address) of the page you've selected. It also contains a Customize button, which lets you specify how often you want your PC to update the Web page information with fresh data from the Internet. (Later, you can always adjust the schedule using the Properties button on the Web tab of the Desktop tab of the Display program in the Control Panel.) When you click OK, a strange thing happens: Your entire desktop becomes a Web browser. Here's what you can do now:
NOTE The usual Internet Explorer menu bar doesn't appear when your desktop is a browser. Therefore, you won't find standard commands like Back, Forward, Add to Favorites, and so on. But if you right-click the desktop, a special shortcut menu appears that contains all of these important Web-browsing commands. To turn off a particular Active Desktop window, choose Close from its drop-down menu (shown in Figure 9-8). You can also turn it off in the Display program, of course. 9.7.4 Screen Saver TabYou don't technically need a screen saver to protect your monitor from burn-in. Today's energy-efficient monitors wouldn't burn an image into the screen unless you left them on continuously, unused, for at least two years , according to the people who actually design and build them. No, screen savers are mostly about entertainment, pure and simple ”and Windows XP's built-in screen saver is certainly entertaining. The idea is simple: A few minutes after you leave your computer, whatever work you were doing is hidden behind the screen saver; passers-by can't see what's on the screen. To exit the screen saver, move the mouse, click a mouse button, or press a key. NOTE Moving the mouse is the best way to get rid of a screen saver. A mouse click or a key press could trigger an action you didn't intend ”such as clicking some button in one of your programs or typing the letter whose key you pressed. 9.7.4.1 Choosing a screen saverTo choose a Windows XP screen saver, use the Screen Saver drop-down list. A miniature preview appears in the preview monitor on the dialog box (see Figure 9-6, top). NOTE If you have graphics files in the Start Documents My Pictures folder, select the My Pictures Slideshow. Windows XP puts on a slide show that features your My Pictures images one at a time, bringing each to the screen with a special effect (flying in from the side, fading in, and so on). You can also click the Browse button to choose a different folder full of pictures. To see a full-screen preview, click the Preview button. The screen saver display fills your screen and remains there until you move your mouse, click a mouse button, or press a key. The Wait box determines how long the screen saver waits before kicking in, following the last time you moved the mouse or typed. Click the Settings button to play with the chosen screen saver module's look and behavior. For example, you may be able to change its colors, texture, or animation style. At the bottom of this tab, click the Power button to open the Power Options Properties dialog box described later in this chapter. 9.7.5 Appearance TabWindows XP includes a number of schemes : predesigned accent -color sets that affect the look of all the windows you open. (Don't confuse schemes with Themes , of which schemes are just one portion.) These color-coordinated design schemes affect the colors of your window edges, title bars, window fonts, desktop background, and so on. They also control both the size of your desktop icons and the font used for their names (as shown in Figure 9-9), and even the fonts used in your menus. Figure 9-9. Left: For the full arsenal of design-scheme controls, choose "Windows Classic style," as shown here, before clicking the Advanced button. Right: As you click parts of the view pane, the Item list identifies what you clicked (such as Desktop, Scrollbar, and so on). Then use the drop-down lists to choose colors and type sizes for the chosen interface element.The factory setting, called "Windows XP style," creates the sunlit blue look of window title bars, the new rounded shape of OK and Cancel buttons, and so on. By choosing "Windows Classic style" from the "Windows and buttons" drop-down list (Figure 9-9, left), you return your PC to the visual look of Windows Me/Windows 2000. The top half of the dialog box provides a preview of the effect.
9.7.5.1 You, the interior designerThe real fun, however, awaits when you choose "Windows Classic style" (Figure 9-9, left) and then click the Advanced button. Now you find yourself in a dialog box that lets you change every single aspect of this scheme independently (Figure 9-9, right). NOTE Microsoft put a lot of work into the new look of XP, and doesn't want people diluting it with their own random changes. "If you want the XP look," the company is saying, "it's all or nothing." The bottom line: If "Windows XP style" is selected in the "Windows and buttons" list (Figure 9-9, left), the changes you make in the Advanced box (Figure 9-9, right) generally have no effect whatsoever. Proceed with your interior decoration crusade in either of two ways:
If you create an attractive combination of colors and type sizes, remember that you can preserve it for future generations. Click OK to return to the Appearance tab, click the Themes tab, and then click Save As. You'll be asked to name your creation. Thereafter, you'll see its name listed alongside the "official" Microsoft themes. 9.7.5.2 EffectsEffects is the other button on the Appearance Tab. It takes you to a dialog box that lets you control what Microsoft calls special effects in Windows XP. These aren't exactly the kind of special effects they make at Industrial Light and Magic for use in Star Wars movies. On the contrary, they're so subtle, they're practically invisible. Nevertheless, they exist ”sometimes slowing down your PC in the process ”and you can control them in this dialog box. Here's what you'll find:
9.7.6 Settings TabThe Settings tab (Figure 9-11) is where you can ensure that Windows XP is getting the most out of your video hardware. Figure 9-11. All desktop screens today, and even most laptop screens, can make the screen picture larger or smaller, thus accommodating different kinds of work. Conducting this magnification or reduction entails switching among different resolutions (the number of dots that compose the screen).9.7.6.1 Screen resolutionThe "Screen resolution" slider snaps to the various possible resolution settings that your monitor's software driver makes available: 800 x 600, 1024 x 768, and so on. When using a low-resolution setting, such as 640 x 480, the size of the pixels (dots) that comprise your screen image increase, thus enlarging the picture ”but showing a smaller slice of the page. This setting is ideal, for example, when playing a small movie so that it fills more of the screen. At higher resolutions (such as 800 x 600 or 1024 x 768), the pixels decrease, reducing the size of your windows and icons, but showing more overall area. Use this kind of setting when you want to see as much screen area as possible: when working on two-page spreads in a page-layout program, for example. 9.7.6.2 Color qualityToday's monitors offer different color depth settings, each of which permits the screen to display a different number of colors simultaneously . This drop-down list varies by video driver, but generally offers settings such as Medium (16-bit), which was called High Color in previous versions of Windows; High (24-bit), once known as True Color; and Highest (32-bit). In the early days of computing, higher color settings required a sacrifice in speed. Today, however, there's very little downside to leaving your screen at its highest setting. Photos, in particular, look best when you set your monitor to higher quality settings.
The Low (8-bit) option ”if you even have it ”makes photos look blotchy. It displays only 256 colors on the screen, and is therefore useful only for certain computer games that, having been designed to run on ancient PCs, require the lower color setting. (In any case, you shouldn't set your whole system to 256 colors just to run these older games. Instead, you should use the new compatibility mode described in Figure 4-5.) 9.7.6.3 Multiple monitorsBy installing two or more graphics cards, or one graphics card with multiple connections, you can hook up two or more monitors to your PC simultaneously, creating a gigantic virtual desktop. As you work, you can move icons or toolbars from one monitor to another, or stretch windows across multiple screens. This setup also enables you to keep an eye on Web activity on one monitor while you edit data on another. It's a glorious arrangement, even if it does make the occasional family member think you've gone off the deep end with your PC obsession . When you have multiple monitors attached, the controls on the Settings tab change; it now displays individual icons for each monitor. By dragging them around, you can arrange the icons in this dialog box to reflect the way Windows "thinks" of them: beside one another, or stacked vertically, for example. That is, you can indicate which edge of your primary monitor permits your cursor to travel beyond the glass and onto the next monitor. One monitor is considered the primary monitor. This is the screen that will display your opening Windows XP screen, the Login dialog box (if you use one), and so on. When configuring the monitor settings, be sure to assign your primary monitor to monitor icon #1. NOTE Don't have the cash for three more monitors? Then try the next best thing: a software version, courtesy of PowerToys for Windows XP, Microsoft's free goody bag of extra features (available from http://www.missingmanuals.com). PowerToys includes Virtual Desktop Manager, a new taskbar toolbar that gives you four side-by-side virtual monitors. Each screenful can have its own background picture and holds its own set of open programs and windows. You can switch from one desktop to the next by pressing a keystroke of your choice, or by clicking the 1, 2, 3, or 4 buttons on the Desktop Manager toolbar. 9.7.6.4 Advanced settingsIf you click the Advanced button on the Settings tab, you're offered a collection of technical settings for your particular monitor model. Depending on your video driver, there may be tab controls here that adjust the refresh rate to eliminate flicker, install an updated adapter or monitor driver, and so on. In general, you'll rarely need to adjust these controls ”except on the advice of a consultant or help-line technician. |