4. Disable the pointless lock screen
Microsoft's click-wasting lock screen was clearly created
with the corrupt influence of big orthopedics, as it's designed to induce more
expensive cases of carpal tunnel syndrome. By default, each time you boot or
wake up your PC, you're presented with a screen that shows the time and, if you
haven't turned them off, promotional messages that encourage you to do things
like play
Candy Crush.
You then have to click before being asked to enter your
password or PIN. Why bother? Using the Registry, you can disable the lock
screen and have the password box be the first thing you see.
In Regedit, navigate to
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Windows and then create a key
called Personalization under it (if it doesn't already exist). In the
Personalization key, add a DWORD (32-bit) value called NoLockScreen and set its
value to 1.
5. Get rid of the Settings home screen
Windows Settings used to drop you directly into the System tab, where there are important sub-menus for Display, Sound, Notifications, Power, and more. However, in recent builds, it takes you to this showy and unnecessary home screen and then makes you navigate from there.
If you want clicking on Settings to take you directly to the
system tab, you can modify the Registry to make it so.
In Regedit, navigate to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\Explorer. Then create a string value called SettingsPageVisibility. Open that value and set it to hide:home.
Once you’ve rebooted your computer, opening Settings will
take you straight to the System tab.
6. Turn on verbose mode
When you go to start, shut down, or restart Windows, you
don’t get a ton of detail showing you what’s going on. However, there’s a
Registry tweak called verbose mode that shows you exactly what your PC is doing
during these processes.
This can be useful, because if your computer stalls while it’s doing something like opening the local session manager or shutting down the Update Orchestrator service, then you know what to fix. It’s also just a lot more fun to watch.
To enable Verbose Mode, start by navigating to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\System in Regedit. Then create a DWORD (32-bit) value called verbosestatus. Open that DWORD and set it to 1.
7. Set menu delay to 0
By default, Windows 11 waits 400 milliseconds to show expanded menus like the ones you get when you right click and select the New menu (in new or classic context menu). But why wait? That's 400 milliseconds you'll never have again!
You can use a registry setting to lower this delay to 0
milliseconds and have the flyout menus appear any time you scroll past an
expandable menu item.
To change your menu delay, open Regedit and navigate to
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Control Panel\Desktop. Then open MenuShowDelay and set it to
0. If you want some delay, you can set it to 100, 200, or 300 milliseconds.