The hidden administrator account in Vista

Do you was familiar with prior versions of Windows are curious what happened to the built-in Administrator account that was always created by default. Does this account still exist, and how can you access it?
In earlier versions of Windows, the built-in administrator account is enabled by default. In Vista, it's disabled. This is a better security practice. However, there are times when you might need to enable it (for instance, if you inadvertently removed administrative privileges from all user accounts and now can't perform administrative tasks). Here's how to enable it:

-Click Start and type cmd in the Search box to find the cmd.exe program.
-Right click cmd.exe and click Run As Administrator.
-At the command prompt, type net users administrator /active:yes
-Press Enter
-Log off and now you can log back on with the Administrator account. When first activated, it will not have a password.
-You should assign the Administrator account a password and/or deactivate it when you've finished using it. To deactivate it, repeat the steps above but type net users administrator /active:no

Windows Vista Top 10 Tips and Triks

1)..Explore the new Windows Vista start menu.
Looking for specific applications, Web sites, and e-mails is faster than ever with the streamlined Windows Vista start menu. To find a specific application or file, click the Windows key on the keyboard (or open the start menu)
and enter the file name in the Instant Search field. As you type, Windows Vista dynamically searches filenames, metadata, and the full text of all files and displays the choices by file type. For example, type “out” to find
Microsoft® Outlook®.

2)..Discover the new search explorer.
Try filtering by type using the search pane and selecting Documents. Next choose to see your files in another way, via the new stack view. Select the author column header control drop down menu, and choose the option to Stack by author. Explore all the documents by a particular author by double clicking on an author’s stack. Now, save that search as a new search folder. Choose the option Save Search found on the top command bar and name and save your search folder. In the future, to re-run it, simply select the Searches folder link on the left side navigation pane, and double click on your search
folder.

3)..Experience the enhanced user interface.
If your PC supports the Windows® Aero™ user experience, open multiple files and see how easy it is to locate the right open window using the breakthrough Windows Flip
(simply ALT+TAB) or Flip 3D (Windows key+TAB).

4)..Browse multiple Web sites.
Tabbed browsing in Internet Explorer® 7 enables a single Internet Explorer window to run with the convenience of multiple pages. Open a new page by clicking the empty
tab on the toolbar or by right-clicking any hyperlink and choosing New Tab. Tabs can also be right-clicked to refresh individual pages or refresh pages as a group. You
can close either individual tabs or an entire group, and you can save tabs as one favorite group. With the Quick Tabs feature, the icon just to the right of the Favorites icon, thumbnail images of all open tabs can be seen in a single view helping you manage multiple open tabs.

5)..Print picture perfect Web content.
Most Web sites are simply not formatted to fit cleanly on a standard piece of paper. With the new shrink to fit printing feature found in Internet Explorer 7 Web sites will no longer get cut off when sent to the printer.

6)..Collaborate with a co-worker.
Want an easy way to share files and applications with a colleague or customer—even when you may not be part of the same network? Windows Meeting Space is a new
experience in Windows Vista that enables you to start an impromptu collaboration session with other Windows Vista users. Simply open Windows Meeting Space and
start a session. Windows Vista will automatically detect other Windows Vista users that are on the same sub-net infrastructure or close enough for you to create an
ad hoc (direct PC-to-PC connection) wireless connection. Once you have invited them and they have accepted, you can share documents by simply dragging a document
to the Handouts area on the bottom right which instantly replicates that file across the other meeting participants’ machines. Dragging the file to the presentation area on the left side starts application sharing, enabling the other participants to watch as you present that file. If someone has a good edit for your file, you can make that edit in real time, or pass control of the application directly to that participant for them to make that edit for you.

7)..Share a folder or file directly from your PC.
Windows Vista improves on the Windows network folder sharing experience first introduced with Windows XP by giving you more flexibility in what you can share with other people and improving the setup process. With Windows Vista you can now share folders and individual files with any other user on the same corporate network. From any explorer, select a file or folder and on the command bar
choose the option to Share. Enter the name of another user on the same network, and give them appropriate rights of access—reader, co-owner, etc. To help close the
loop, Windows Vista can even automatically compose an e-mail to the individuals with which you have shared the content. The auto-generated e-mail contains a hyperlink
to the shared content, enabling the recipient to instantly be taken to the shared content.

8)..Create an XPS Document.
XPS documents are a new archiving format perfect for preserving content and for securely sharing information in an application independent way. To create an XPS
document, open any document in virtually any application, and select the print option. In the printer selection menu, choose Microsoft XPS Document Writer, and save the file. Double click on the file, which should open it in the
XPS Viewer, which is hosted by Internet Explorer 7. The XPS document is a pixel-perfect rendition of the original source material.

9)..Speed up your PC’s performance.
Windows Vista introduces a new concept for adding additional performance to a running system. Windows ReadyBoost™ lets people use flash memory on a USB
2.0 drive, SD Card, Compact Flash, or other memory form factor to provide additional memory cache—memory that the computer can access much more quickly than it can
access data on the hard drive. Insert a USB 2.0 memory drive with at least 512 MB capacity. When prompted, click use this device to speed up my computer.

10)..Recover a previous version of a document.
Windows Vista introduces a new feature: Previous Versions. This allows you to “roll back” the clock to an earlier version of a file that you may have accidentally
saved over or edited. In the Documents Explorer, open a document, edit it, save it, and then close it. While selecting the document, choose the Previous Versions option on the command bar, which will bring up a list of previously
saved versions of the individual file. Choose a previous version and Windows Vista will restore your file to that version. Careful: all edits since that version will be lost.

Original tips:microsoft.com

Small and Cool tip In Windows Vista

On your desktop of other windows (non Vista), Typically when you want to switch applications, you would use ALT + TAB or the WIN (short for Windows Key) + Tab. In Windows Vista, ALT + TAB gives you a graphical user view of all your running applications and you must toggle through it. The WIN+ Tab gives you a 3D effect of the screens you toggle through.

I hope that useful..

Configure DEP before you sleep, Vista tip again

DEP is Data Execution Prevention, these A new security feature in Windows Vista. DEP will monitor Windows services and programs and protect harmful code from executing or running in system memory locations reserved for Windows and other programs. Once DEP realizes an attack is in progress, it will shut the program or service automatically and notify you.

By default, DEP will only protect Windows and not other programs. You will have greater security protection by enabling DEP on all programs and services. If you have a program or service that doesn’t play nicely with DEP, you can turn DEP off for that particular service.

These steps to turn DEP on for all Windows programs and services:

1. Click the Start orb and type Control Panel.
2. Click System and Maintenance | System | Advanced System Settings.
3. UAC will prompt you to continue and choose the Advanced tab.
4. Under Performance Options, click Settings.
5. Choose the Data Execution Prevention tab.
6. Tick the Turn on DEP for all programs and services except those I select as shown in Figure 1.

I hope that useful..

Deleting the Undeletable

As many of us move forward from Windows XP or prior beta versions of Windows Vista to the final RTM version, I thought this little tip might be in order.
You may be aware that Windows Vista includes a number of different ways to upgrade a computer, from a straight in-place upgrade (insert CD, run setup and choose upgrade) to Windows Easy Transfer, which allows you to copy settings, programs and data from an old setup a fresh shiny new OS environment. In doing this, it's not unusual to find some folders that can't be accessed, even by an administrator, because their ACLs were set for accounts with SIDs that applied to an old partition.
How do you take it back? -> The secret lies in two command-line utilities, one ancient, the other completely revised for this release. Respectively, these are takeown (which takes ownership of a file or directory) and icacls (which sets new ACLs on that directory). I created a small batch command on my system called itsmine.cmd, as follows:

takeown /f %1 /r /d y
icacls %1 /grant administrators:F /t

From an elevated command prompt, you can run a command such as itsmine D:\hard_to_delete and this will reset ownership and ACLs on the hard_to_delete directory such that a command like rd /s D:\hard_to_delete should work