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Stupid Geek Tricks: Shrink the XP Volume Control

If you've just done something in front of a non-geek that surprises them enough to ask "How'd you do that?", you've probably performed a Stupid Geek Trick. Usually these tricks aren't anything complicated, just little known fun tricks that we like to share.

For today's Stupid Geek Trick, we're going to show you how to shrink the XP volume control with a keystroke. And just so I can use my favorite wallpaper, we're talking about the volume control when you double-click on the Volume icon in the tray.

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Once the dialog is up, hit the Ctrl+S key combination…

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And your volume control should shrink down to a mini version! Using the same key combination again will change it back to the big version.

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Note that you can also remove some of the sliders that you might not use by going to Options \ Properties, and then unchecking everything you don't need.

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In case you are wondering, this doesn't work in Vista. Got any more fun geek tricks? Share them in the comments.

The Geek is the founder of How-To Geek and a geek enthusiast. This article was written on 09/29/08 and tagged with: Windows, The Geek Blog

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Comments (9)

  1. sul2005tan

    That is funny tricks ^^ thank you Geek

  2. David

    pretty kool!!!

  3. kbmxpxfan

    Why is this not in the settings? I actually NEED this in order to see all my sliders!

  4. skrollan

    don't know why, but i love this one, volume control looks better right now :)
    ty

  5. Chris

    In Vista, if you want rename multiple files in Explorer without having to resort to mouse + click + f2 each time. When renaming a file, instead of pressing enter when you're done, press tab. Explorer will automatically advance to the next file in the list.

    Not sure if this works on folders, but you can try.

    Cheers!

  6. zmtin

    I like this. Thanks Geek

  7. Vostromo

    If you close the shrunken dialog with CTRL+CLOSE, it will stay that way next time.

  8. Shkumbin

    Thanx CHRIS, that works on folders too.

  9. _AbE_

    It works on windows 2000 too


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