Here is a nifty little tip that was submitted by one of our readers. When you open the System applet (you can find it in the Control Panel), you will see some specific information listed on the General tab such as the type of computer and the registered owner. However, you can edit the information to also have your specific information displayed. For example, if you sell computers, you can have your company information displayed to remind your customers how to access your support information.

Once you perform the steps outlined below, not only will you have your own company information listed but a support information button will also be available from the System Properties window. Users can click the button to get specific support information about your company, such as the URL they should visit to find support. So here is what you have to do:

Open Notepad and create a text file called oeminfo.ini. If you are running Windows NT/2000, save the file in the c:\WINNT\System32 directory. If you are running Windows XP, save the file in the c:\Windows\System32 directory. Add the following information to the text file you just create:

[General]
Manufacturer=Your Company Name
Model=Model of Computer
SupportURL=http://supportWeb site
LocalFile=c:\localhelpfile\file.htm

[Support Information]
Line1=support information users should know
Line2=who users should contact for support
Line3=Phone number users should call
Line4=fourth line

The support information will appear when users click the Support Information button. You can create as many lines as you need by incrementing the number for each new line required.

To take this one step further, you can even have your company logo displayed by creating a 172×172 pixel bitmap image. Name the image oemlogo.bmp and save it in your system directory. Now when you open the System properties applet, your company information should appear.