Personalization Settings in Windows 7

Personalization Settings in Windows 7: Video

This video shows you how to change the Personalization settings in Windows 7.

Personalization Settings in Windows 7: Overview

It is easy to change the look and feel of Windows 7 by changing its Personalization settings. Changing these settings lets you set the background of the desktop, screen savers, sound schemes and more. To do this, right-click anywhere on your desktop (except on an icon or shortcut) and select “Personalize” from the menu that appears. That will open a window that allows you to change the display properties of the monitor.

You can click the “Window Color” hyperlink (“Window Color and Appearance” hyperlink in Windows Vista) to select a color scheme to use for Windows. If your PC is capable of enabling transparency, then you can check the “Enable transparency” hyperlink to enable transparent window display in Windows. You can also use the “Color intensity:” slider to set the intensity of color selected. When you are finished, you can click the “Save Changes” button (“OK” button in Windows Vista) to apply the changes to the color scheme.

You can click the “Desktop Background” hyperlink to display a window where you can select a background image or video for your Windows desktop. You can select a choice from the “Picture location” drop-down (“Location” drop-down in Windows Vista) to select from the video or pictures shown. Alternatively, you can also click the “Browse…” button to open a “Browse” window where you can navigate to the video file or image that you want to use as the background. You can then select it, and click the “Open” button to use the selected image or video clip as your Windows background. At the bottom of the window, you can select the desired option to choose how to position the picture or video. When done, click the “Save Changes” button (“OK” button in Windows Vista) to apply the background.

You can click the “Screen Saver” hyperlink to open the “Screen Saver Settings” window. A screen saver is an animated graphic created so that the desktop image displayed on a computer screen will not burn into the monitor permanently due to constant, unchanging display onscreen. Use the “Screen saver” drop-down to pick the screen saver you want and then click the “Preview” button to see how it looks. Hit the “Esc” button on your keyboard, or move your mouse, to stop the preview and return to the “Screen Saver” tab.

To adjust the currently selected screen saver, click the “Settings…” button. Depending on the screen saver selected, the options of what you can change (if any) will be different. Make any selections you would like in the settings dialog box and then click “OK” to return to the “Screen Saver” tab. In the “Wait:” box, you can set the number of minutes that the computer is inactive before the “Screen saver” starts. If you check the check box “On resume, display logon screen,” Windows requires the user’s login password to return to the desktop after activating the screen saver.

After using the “Personalize” dialog box, to then close the window, click the “X” in the upper-right corner of the window.