Get More Battery Life
Aerofoil is a small tool that detects whether or not your laptop is plugged in. If you unplug your laptop, it can automatically change your power plan (e.g. from “High Performance” to “Power Saver”), mute your sound, and also disable Aero (the nice effects) and the Sidebar. Once plugged in again, it will automatically unmute your sound and whatever else you chose to disable when unplugged.
I have Auto Mute and Auto Power Plan enabled, the rest are disabled. I’m not too sure if I like having Aero disabled automatically though; I’m going to leave this program running and see if it disrupts my routine (e.g. having my audio automatically unmuted when I plug my laptop in during class and have music blasting).
EDIT: I’m using BatteryCare now. Main thing I need is the automatic switching of power plans (High Performance when plugged in, Power Saver when I’m not.)
Using Custom Visual Styles for Windows
To use the visual style mentioned in my previous post (and others that you find interesting), you’ll need to patch your uxtheme.dll file. There’s a manual process, but there are some tools out there that automate this.
For Vista, I recommend vUXTender.
For XP, I recommend UXTheme Multipatcher. If this doesn’t work, try UXTender.
For 7, there aren’t any patchers out, but there’s UxStyle Core, which installs as a service instead of patching the files.
EDIT: I had problems using UxStyle Core, but I found this fix (need to run both lines separately in Command Prompt):
sc config uxpatch group= “File System”
sc config UnsignedThemes group= UIGroup
Uninstall Windows Live Messenger
I couldn’t find “Windows Live Messenger” in the Add/Remove Programs window (in XP), so I had to search for an alternative solution.
I found one here, where it says to go to Start => Run and paste the following in the textbox: msiexec /x {0AAA9C97-74D4-47CE-B089-0B147EF3553C}
Kon-Boot
http://www.piotrbania.com/all/kon-boot/
Kon-Boot is an prototype piece of software which allows to change contents of a linux kernel (and now Windows kernel also!!!) on the fly (while booting). In the current compilation state it allows to log into a linux system as ‘root’ user without typing the correct password or to elevate privileges from current user to root. For Windows systems it allows to enter any password protected profile without any knowledge of the password.Kon-Boot is an prototype piece of software which allows to change contents of a linux kernel (and now Windows kernel also!!!) on the fly (while booting). In the current compilation state it allows to log into a linux system as ‘root’ user without typing the correct password or to elevate privileges from current user to root. For Windows systems it allows to enter any password protected profile without any knowledge of the password.
I haven’t tested the above, but I have tested another one that works only for Windows systems named “Offline NT Password & Registry Editor”: http://home.eunet.no/pnordahl/ntpasswd/
Update: Tested Kon-Boot and it works 