A major annoyance in the newly (or yet to be) released Windows Vista is the shutdown procedure. In Windows Vista, we took a step back by having to click thrice in order to shutdown the computer (as compared to 2 clicks in Windows XP).

1) Click on Start

2) Click on the arrow

3) Click on shutdown.

The misleading power button on the start menu is actually configured by default to put the computer in standby mode instead of shutting it down fully. However, not all is lost. The power button can also be configured (albeit in a complicated fashion) to shut the computer instead of putting it to sleep.

To achieve this, click on 'Start/Control Panel/System and Maintenance/Power Options' and click on 'Change  plan settings' for the power plan that is currently selected. In the next dialog box, click on 'Change advanced power settings' and in the next dialog box, expand 'Power buttons and lid' and expand 'Start menu power button' and select 'Shutdown' from the drop-down list.

Whew !! finally its done. Why couldn't this be made easier is beyond me.

I finally got dasblog installed on my hosted servers (thanks to the fine folks here) and decided to blog full-time in the new year. Ofcourse, this depends on the course load from my faculty and other stuff that I am involved in. My blog would focus more around technology and specifically Windows Vista. Watch more coming this way.

On the other hand, Nvidia finally released RTM drivers for the GeForce line of video cards. Myself, alongwith a few other power-users had some difficulty installing the US English version of the drivers due to some glitch in compiling the installer by Nvidia. The international verison, however, installed smoothly at the cost of a bigger download. Download the drivers here:

• http://www.nvidia.com/object/winvista_x86_97.46.html (Windows Vista x86 version)
• http://www.nvidia.com/object/winvista_x64_97.46.html (Windows Vista x64 version)

Hello World !