Skip Logon screen in Windows XP

Windows security updates are undeniably a good thing, but they can be pesky at times. One of the oddities is that after a couple of the patches your computer will no longer go straight to the desktop at bootup, but will display the Logon screen. This can be especially annoying since most machines have only one user account on them. These are the few steps it takes to have Windows XP skip the logon screen and booting straight to your desktop.

1. Click Start -> Run
2. Type or copy-paste: control userpasswords2
The window shown below should appear.

3. DO NOT UNCHECK ! the box that says "Users must enter a user name and password to use this computer". You have to highlight the default user account first, and then uncheck the box.

Windows will autoboot to whatever account is highlighted when you uncheck the box. On the picture above, I have selected my account, drow.

4. After you have selected your account and unchecked the box, click OK.

5. Dialog window "Automatically Log On" will pop up. Don't enter a password and click OK.

Windows XP now knows what account you want as the default and it will automatically load that account.

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Disabling logon screen after Windows XP resumes from standby or hibernation

1. Click Start, Settings, and Control Panel
2. Double click Power Options
3. Under Advanced tab uncheck the "Prompt for password when computer resumes from standby" option.
4. Click Apply and then OK.

Hibernate shortcut

The first step to making a Hibernate shortcut is to make sure you have Hibernate turned on.

Go to the Control panel then choose Power options, and select the Hibernate tab. Make sure Enable hibernation is checked.

Now to actually make the shortcut right click your desktop and choose New -> Shortcut. Next, type or copy paste this case-sensitive command into the dialog box:

rundll32.exe PowrProf.dll, SetSuspendState

Click Next. Give the shortcut a name and click Finish.
From now on all you need to do to enter Hibernation is double click the shortcut.

If you do not like the default icon, you can change it by:
- right click on the icon
- choose "Properties"
- click "Change Icon"
- put the following value in the "Look for icons in this file" field:
%SystemRoot%\system32\SHELL32.dll
- click "Ok"
- choose desired icon
- click "Apply"


Nice addition to this is installing (you don't even have to install it, just keep it running) a nice program called Hot Key Plus 1.01 by Brian Apps ( home page ) and set, for example, Windows key + H to activate your shortcut that you saved wherever you wanted.