When I’ve got a long running application (like installation app) on my ThinkPad X61 I usually close the lid and go out to do something else. A friend of mine noticed me doing this and was surprised that closing lid did not cause Windows to go to the sleep mode. I told him that this is something that can be configured by user and is actually a very nice feature in Windows.
Follow the following steps to configure this on your laptop:
Windows 7
- Open the Control Panel
- Navigate to the Hardware and Sound category
- Click on the Power Options item
- On the left side of the window click on the menu item named Choose what closing the lid does
or just click on the Start button and type the word lid and the search results will contain item named Choose what closing the lid does
You will be presented with the following options:
You can control the functionality of various buttons (power and sleep) and the lid here depending whether your laptop is plugged in to the power source or it is running on battery.
I personally set it the way that when my laptop is plugged in and I close the lid it should continue working (Do nothing option). This is very useful especially when you connect your laptop to external projector/monitor (I also have wireless keyboard and mouse connected to it).
The same can be accomplished in Windows XP and also Windows Vista. In Windows XP the setting window is different but you can do it in Power Options item in the Control Panel.
Hope this was helpful for you.
Here’s another quick and very useful tip to keep in mind about Windows 7. When you press on Windows key (
) and tap P you will be presented with the following list of available options:
You can click on a desired option with your mouse and it will be immediately applied. Alternatively you can keep pressing the Windows key and tapping the P key again. Each key press will select the next available option thus you can scroll through all listed items (pressing on Tab will have the same result). To scroll through this list backwards hold the Windows Key and Shift key at the same time and use Tab to move back. You can always use the Arrow keys to move forward and backwards as well.
This new feature provides a very convenient and quick way to switch display to external monitor/projector. In case you haven’t connected any external monitors to your PC (or it’s not turned on) you will be see the following message:
Another very nice feature that I like is once you’ve connected your PC/notebook to external monitor/projector and configured this setting – next time your computer starts, Windows 7 will automatically switch your display to connected device.
I’m using this quite often when I want to watch movie on bigger monitor.
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Recently I’ve purchased the HP 22-inch Widescreen LCD Monitor
and I absolutely love it.
I’ve plugged it to my ThinkPad X61
and the process of connecting was very simple and straightforward.
To set up the appearance of your displays perform the following steps:
- Right click on mouse on any empty area of the desktop
- From the menu list choose the Screen Resolution option (see below)
Alternatively you can navigate to Control Panel –> Appearance and Personalization –> Adjust Screen Resolution.
Ether way you will end up in the following window.
Display
List all available and detected monitors
Resolution
Provides you with a very cool slider to adjust preferred screen resolution. It also shows the recommended and optimal settings for your monitors.
Orientation
You can choose between Landscape and Portrait (and Flipped version for each one).
Multiple displays
You can duplicate, extend or choose to display only on one specific monitor.
I’ve decided to extend my desktop on both monitors. The main desktop area (with the taskbar) will be shown on the big monitor and the rest will be extended to the laptop screen. However I’ve tried to find out how to specify the location of the monitors relatively to each other – whether my laptop located on the right or the left side of the big monitor. This is important and convenient way to use mouse when you move windows to the secondary extended monitor – it feels more natural. For example, if your laptop is on the right side of your monitor so it will be more natural to move window to your right side and vice versa.
Windows 7 let’s you adjust this option and even more !
At the window above, you can drag any monitor and drop at the exact location relatively to another one. Not only you can set the sides of both displays (which one is at right or left side) but also the vertical position of each one. For example, my laptop is located a little bit below the main monitor so I’ve used the above window to let Windows know its approximate location. I guess this setting is used later when you move windows to the extended area and it will be shown in a more accurate and precise way.
I’ve been using Windows 7 since it’s early release and I’m very pleased to see all these improvements and features.
