Posts Tagged ‘change windows’

Change Windows 10 default lock screen image via win registry LockScreenImage key change

Tuesday, September 21st, 2021

fix-lock-screen-missing-change-option-on-windows-10-windows-registry-icon

If you do work for a corporation on a Windows machine that is part of Windows Active Directory domain or a Microsoft 365 environment and your Domain admimistrator after some of the scheduled updates. Has enforced a Windows lock screen image change.
You  might be surprised to have some annoying corporation logo picture shown as a default Lock Screen image on your computer on next reoboot. Perhaps for some people it doesn't matter but for as a person who seriously like customizations, and a valuer of
freedom having an enforced picture logo each time I press CTRL + L (To lock my computer) is really annoying.

The logical question hence was how to reverse my desired image as  a default lock screen to enkoy. Some would enjoy some relaxing picture of a Woods, Cave or whatever Natural place landscape. I personally prefer simplicity so I simply use a simple purely black
background.

To do it you'll have anyways to have some kind of superuser access to the computer. At the company I'm epmloyeed, it is possible to temporary request Administrator access this is done via a software installed on the machine. So once I request it I become
Administratof of machine for 20 minutes. In that time I do used a 'Run as Administartor' command prompt cmd.exe and inside Windows registry do the following Registry change.

The first logical thing to do is to try to manually set the picture via:
 

Settings ->  Lock Screen

But unfortunately as you can see in below screenshot, there was no way to change the LockScreen background image.

Windows-settings-lockscreen-screenshot

In Windows Registry Editor

I had to go to registry path


[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Windows\.]

And from there in create a new "String Value" key
 

"LockScreenImage"


so full registry key path should be equal to:


[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Windows\Personalization\LockScreenImage]"

The value to set is:

C:\Users\a768839\Desktop\var-stuff\background\Desired-background-picture.jpg

windows-registry-change-lock-screen-background-picture-from-registry-screenshot

If you want to set a black background picture for LockScreen like me you can download my black background picture from here.

That's all press CTRL + L  key combination and the black screen background lock screen picture will appear !

Hopefully the Domain admin, would not soon enforce some policty to update the registry keys or return your old registry database from backup if something crashs out with something strange to break just set configuration.

To test whether the setting will stay permanent after the next scheduled Windows PC update of policies enforced by the Active Directory (AD) sysadmin, run manually from CMD.EXE

C:\> gpupdate /force


The command will download latest policies from Windows Domain, try to lock the screen once again with Control + L, if the background picture is still there most likely the Picture change would stay for a long.
If you get again the corporation preset domain background instead,  you're out of luck and will have to follow the same steps every, now and then after a domani policy update.

Enjoy your new smooth LockScreen Image 🙂

 

Windows 7 change windows behavior like XP How to / Make Windows 7 act like XP

Tuesday, January 21st, 2014

If you haven't worked for a while with Windows (since the days when XP was standard modern OS) you might be amazed that Windows like me. You might feel pretty unconfortable to work with Windows 7's "dock style" taskbar – showing application icons instead of buttons.

dock-style-taskbar-windows-7-screenshot

People who are traditionalist like me would definitely prefer to change this stupid behavior to "Windows Classic". Here is how to do it:

1. Right click on any open area on taskbar and choose Properties

properties-on-empty-taskbar-windows-7-screenshot
2. From Taskbar -> Taskbar Buttons choose (Never Combine).

Never Combine – option makes every new Window to show as a separate one instead of Grouping the Windows by application.
In some cases choosing (Combine when TaskBar) is full is nice new option, so you might want to check it out for a while and see if you can get used to it.

never_combine_windows-7-make-windows-look-like-XP-and-2000

3. Make Windows Start menu panel look like Windows 2000 (clear up unnecessary mambo-jumbo design)
I very much like simplicity thus I don't like Microsoft's choise to make Start Menu panel look like a Christmas Tree. To revert back:

On any empty space on the Desktop press Right Mouse button (Choose Personalize); Scroll down and choose (Windows Classic theme)

windows-personalize-screenshot-windows-classics

That will change Windows to look normal again 🙂

windows-start-menu-screenshot

Cheers 🙂

Change Windows 8 Start menu look like in Windows 7 or How to get back good old start menu back in Win 8

Tuesday, July 23rd, 2013

Classic shell add Windows 8 classic start menu

Whether you just installed to try Win 8 or received an office work notebook configured to work with Microsoft Windows 8, you certainly are already annoyed by changed Mobile phone like interface. First time I saw Windows 8 interface I was in shock what kind of mess this interface is. I understand Microsoft's desire to make Windows Mobile ready,  but maybe it was wise idea to allow the user with option to revert back to old Windows XP / Vista /7 interface for the sake of some compitability and user friendliness. Even for young people who already worked with computers this "chopped" interface is surely horrible. I even can't imagine how hard it is for older people to get used to this weird interface.

Windows 8 terrible Graphic interface interface fake Start screenshot
Today in my work place, the husband of our Second Executive, brought to me a relatively new Sony VAIO notebook bought with pre-installed Win 8.
Just like any normal person, he was in shock with Windows 8 weird interface and he asked me to explain him the interface. Well I will immediately after someone explain me the interface 🙂
He so much didn't like Win 8 that he even asked to re-install computer with Windows 7. I'm a lazy person plus I like saving my time. So looked quickly online if it is possible to make Windows 8 interface with Start button similar to older Windows releases. Actually there are plenty of ways to do it via both, Free and paid Software.
I'm a Free Software supporter, so I didn't even considered checking non-free or freeware ones. And I sticked directly to Open Source – Classic Shell.

Windows classic shell start menu screenshot Windows 8

What Classic Shell does is it turns interface of Internet Explorer to look like IE 9, adds a Start Menu button With Programs etc. to left Win corner (of course it doesn't place Windows Start button as this one is patented and forbidden to use in Free Soft).

.

Here is main list of current Classic Shell  features:

  • Highly customizable start menu with multiple styles and skins
  • Start button for Windows 7 and Windows 8
  • Toolbar and status bar for Windows Explorer
  • Caption and status bar for Internet Explorer

Program is in very active development (last beta released is from 2 days ago) meaning it is very popular among Windows users. As of time of writting its stable release is at ver. 3.6.8. It has even translations in in 18 languages including (my native Bulgarian)

There are plenty of things to configure on how Classic Shell behaves;

Settings for classic start-menu windows 8

I was a little bit scared it might break up Win 8 first time I installed it, but installation went quite smoothly and even there was no need for restart for new Win start menu to appear.
Classic Shell, Search option works fine too and is quite fast (dunno if it is due to Windows indexing) or it use some custom acceleration. It has also a number of Skins to choose from to change appearance of Start Menu button.

To sum it up Classic Shell does well what it is meant for, I guess in any future Windows install it will be the first program to install and save myself those terrible Windows 8  UI!