One of the best way to take full advantage of your solid state drive (SSD) is to use the performance-maintaining TRIM command. Technology blog GHacks shows us how to make sure TRIM is enabled in Windows 7.While using something like Intel’s previously mentioned Toolbox application to TRIM your drive is extremely useful, you need to make sure Windows 7 has enabled it first. And, while Windows is designed to automatically detect most SSDs, sometimes it doesn’t work as intended. If you find the performance of your SSD is degrading (or just want to make sure TRIM is properly enabled), run Command Prompt as an administrator and type:

- fsutil behavior query DisableDeleteNotify

It will give you one of two results, either a 0 or a 1. A zero indicates that TRIM is enabled correctly, a one means that it is not. If you have a TRIM-compatible SSD, but find that Windows 7 hasn’t enabled the command, you can easily do so by running this command:

- fsutil behavior set disablenotify 0

Note that TRIM is only supported in Windows 7, so if you have an SSD but are running an older version of Windows, it’s probably a good idea to upgrade.

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f it seems like the desktop shortcuts on your Windows 7 keep disappearing, you’re not hallucinating. Windows 7 automatically deletes broken and network shortcuts if there are too many. Here’s how to stop Windows from throwing these (often still useful) shortcuts away.If you have four or more “broken” desktop shortcuts (which includes shortcuts to disconnected network locations and shell folders), System Maintenance in Windows 7 will delete the shortcuts in its weekly maintenance. While Microsoft suggests keeping the number of these type of desktop shortcuts to four or less, or as an alternative, turning off System Maintenance altogether, it may not always be practical to do so.

Technology blog gHacks demonstrates how to fix the problem with a script that lets you take ownership quickly. Make sure to back up all important files before doing something like this.After installing the script, users should right-click and take ownership of C:\Windows\diagnostics\scheduled\Maintenance\TS_BrokenShortcuts.ps1. After that, the user must run Command Prompt:

Open an elevated command line prompt. You do that by clicking on the Start orb, All Programs, then Accessories. Right-click the Command Prompt link and select to Run As Administrator.

Now issue the following command to grant the active user full rights of the file. Make sure you replace USERNAME with the name of the active user.

icacls c:\windows\diagnostics\scheduled\maintenance\TS_BrokenShortcuts.ps1 /grant USERNAME:F

Now you can edit the file normally in a text editor like Notepad. Open it and locate the line (line 11)

[string]$list = ""

Delete everything below that is below that line up to (line 22)

return $list

The lines that are deleted are:

Get-ChildItem -Path $path -filter *.lnk | Foreach-Object {
$fullPath = ConvertTo-WQLPath $_.FullName
$wmiLinkFile = Get-WmiObject -query "SELECT Name,Target,AccessMask FROM Win32_ShortcutFile WHERE Name = '$fullPath'"

if(-not(Test-ValidLink $wmiLinkFile) -and (Test-Delete $wmiLinkFile))
{
$list = AttachTo-List $list $wmiLinkFile.Name
}
}

As always, proceed at your own risk when tackling these sorts of low-level system tweaks, but if this is an annoyance you’ve been dealing with, it might be worth a try. In addition, a similar procedure can prevent Windows from cleaning up unused desktop shortcuts, but after this tweak Windows should no longer delete these “broken” shortcuts

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Not every application has jumped into the Windows Vista/7 era, and portable applications can be confusing to both of Mircrosoft’s newer operating systems. Prevent Windows from asking, every single time, if your program “installed correctly” with a quick system tweak.

Photo by SpeechRoom.com.

If you run a good number of portable applications, or have to install a good number of oldie-but-goodie apps, you’re probably familiar with a Windows dialog that pops up after installation finishes, suggesting that “This program might not have installed correctly,” then asking for you to confirm whether that’s true. It’s an extension of the Program Compatibility Assistant Service, which watches executables as they run and checks to see if they’re trying to pull off operations in an older fashion.

That’s fine to have happen when you’re occasionally installed older apps, but if you get sick of getting the pop-up window every time you run a portable application or any other app, the gHacks blog points out a fix—but it ’s one you should only use if you don’t plan on dealing with any older Windows apps any time soon. Head to Windows’ Services configuration (type services.msc into your start menu), then look for Program Compatibility Assistant Service and double-click it. Stop the service, change it from Manual to Disabled, and hit OK.

It’s fairly easy to bring the compatibility helper back—just head to Services again and switch it back to a Manual service. The helper can be actually helpful, but it it’s help to headache ratio is a bit too low for your tastes, this is an easy means of nixing it.

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