37. Is it a hack by any means…??

Defenitely Not!
What we have discussed so far are not hacks by any means.
They are just ‘tweaks’. Tweaking is done to customize the system according to user
preferences by over riding the default settings. Tweaking will improve the system
performance by many folds, provided that it is done in the right way. Most of the
tweaks and tricks are performed in the following 3 areas.

1. Start> Run > Regedit
2. Start > Run> Msconfig
3. Start > Run> gpedit.msc

It is difficult for a newbie to understand the various keys and sub-keys in the registry and a wrong move can have catastrophic effects. The second one is way too simple and the options are limited. So I recommend the third area ☺. Group Policy Editor or gpedit.msc is a nice place for the newbies to learn and try their own tricks. The main advantage is its simplicity. Just click on the + signs to dive deep into it. Explanations are given along with each entry. Read the explanation and decide on the settings that needs to be set.
Nothing much, you just need to enable or disable a setting. Isn’t it a simple thing to do?? And trust me, it can even create wonders!! So go ahead and try it now itself. Good luck.

36.Banning Programs from “Most Frequently Used” list

Take a look at this for it is very interesting. If any of the following words or phrases is included in the program's shortcut name, the program will be excluded from the list: Documentation, Help, Install, More Info, Readme, Read me, Read First, Setup, Support, and What's New. Additionally, the following executables are excluded from the list: Setup.exe,Install.exe, Isuninst.exe, Unwise.exe, Unwise32.exe, St5unst.exe, Rundll32.exe,Explorer.exe, Icwconn1.exe, Inoculan.exe, Mobsync.exe, Navwnt.exe, Realmon.exe, and Sndvol32.exe.

Run the Registry Editor and go to HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Applications. Underneath this
key, you'll find a series of subkeys, each representing an application. The primary purpose of these su-keys is to determine whether the program appears on the Open With dialog box that appears whenever you try to open an unknown file type. But you can also add a value to any of the subkeys which will ban programs from appearing on the Most Frequently Used Programs List.

Look for a subkey that is the executable name of the application you want to ban from the list; for example, visio.exe for the Visio business illustration program. Once you find the application's subkey, create a new String value for that subkey, named NoStartPage. Leave the value blank. Exit the Registry. You might have to reboot for the setting to take effect and the program to be banned from the list.

35. DMA Mode for CD-ROMs

Like Windows 2000, Windows XP still fails to set the DMA mode correctly for the
IDE device designated as the slaves on the primary IDE and secondary IDE channels.
Most CD- ROMS are capable of supporting DMA mode, but the default in XP is still
PIO. Setting it to DMA won't make your CD-ROM faster, but it will consume less
CPU cycles.
Here's how: Open the Device Manager. One way to do that is to right
click on "My Computer", select the Hardware tab, and Select Device Manager.

Expand "IDE ATA/ATAPI Controllers" and double-click on "Primary IDE Channel".Under the "Advanced Settings" tab, check the "Device 1" setting. More than likely,
your current transfer mode is set to PIO.
Set it to "DMA if available". Repeat the step for the "Secondary IDE Channel" if you have devices attached to it. Reboot.

34. Delete INDEX.DAT (Faster Browsing)

First of all open up the command prompt. For that go Start -> Run -> cmd. Now press CTRL + ALT + DELETE to bring up the task manager. In the task manager, go toprocesses and click on explorer.exe. End the “explorer.exe” task. All the windowswill be closed down. Don’t panic. You can still see the command prompt. In thecommand prompt type the following command exactly as it is:
Del "C:\Documents and Settings\\Local Settings\TemporaryInternet Files\Content.IE5\index.dat"
Note is the name that you use to log in to your windows. Somelog in as “administrator” while some with another name eg: Sandeep. Whatever it is,type that name. This will also help in fixing all the issues related to browserperformance, especially the ones that cause browser to hang frequently.

33. Speed up IE Start Up

This tweak tells Internet Explorer to simply 'run', without loading any webpages. Ifyou use a 'blank' page, that is still a page, and slows access. Notice the 'about:blank' inthe address bar. The blank html page must still be loaded. To load IE with 'nothing' [nothing is different than blank]
1. Right-click on any shortcut you have to IE[You should create a shortcut out of your desktop IE icon, and delete the original icon]
2. Click Properties
3. Add -nohome [with a space before the dash] after the endquotes in the Target field.
4. Click OK

32. Cleaning Recent Docs Menu and the RUN

The Recent Docs menu can be easily disabled by editing the Registry. To do this go tothe following Key:
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\ Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\Explorer.
Now in the right pane, create a new DWORD valueby the name: NoRecentDocsMenu and set it's value to 1. Restart Explorer to save thechanges. You can also clear the RUN MRU history. All the listings are stored in thekey:HKEY_USERS\.Default\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\ Explorer\ RunMRU. You can delete individual listings or the entire listing. To delete Historyof Find listings go to: HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\ Microsoft \ Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Doc Find Spec MRUand delete.