Windows 10 What happened to the Start Folder?

[MikeHawthorne]

Hi

Windows always had a start folder, that you could just place a link to a program in, and when you booted it would start the program when Windows started.
I just noticed (obviously I haven't use this function for a long time) that there isn't a start folder anymore.

Is there a way to create one?

What do you do if you want to make a program start along with Windows?

Mike

 

[Neemobeer]

The quickest way to get there is open the run box [windows key + r] and type "shell:common startup" the quotes are optional

 

[Axel PC]

Sweet this is something definitely to remember.

 

[MikeHawthorne]

Hi

Thanks that works great.

I suppose that not many people do this anymore, I remember when I'd have several programs in there.

But like I said, it's obvious that I haven't had to do that in a long time.
I remember when I used to write batch files to do things.

Once I knew a friend was coming over and that we were going to be working on the computer.
I don't remember how it worked exactly anymore but there was a text to speech app that talked in this really computery voice.

I wrote a batch file that when the computer booted made the voice say, "Hi Michael, how are you today?" "Oh, I see that Phil is here too! What a bummer!"

This was in the very early days of computing and it really cracked him up, he made me reboot the computer so that he could hear it again.

This prompted me to do it with the new technology just a few minutes ago, the new tech sounds pretty hard to tell from a human voice.

I had to add an image to make it a video, I don't know anyway to share sound files?
Seems like there should be a place to share sound files just as you do videos.



Sounds a lot better than the old computer generated voice files.

Mike

 

[Neemobeer]

There are actually a bunch of the shell: shortcuts. They're called shell commands

 

[MikeHawthorne]

If I wanted to set my computer to play the sound file above at boot, how would I do it?

It is a .wav file, and when I run it now, it opens Windows Media Player.

I'd like it to just play it without opening another interface.

I used to be able to do that by setting the file as the Windows Start Sound, but it won't let you modify the Windows Start sound anymore.

I have a lot of other custom sounds, for instance when I empty the Trash Bin, my computer in Lucy's voice says "Enough of this trash" or for Question she says "What's up with that!", but I haven't been able to put in a start greeting as I used to do.

Mike

 

[Neemobeer]

You could create a scheduled task that plays the audio file on login and under settings have the task stop after a time period.

 

[MikeHawthorne]

I'll check that out.

 

[Josephur]

You can also use Power Shell:

powershell -c (New-Object Media.SoundPlayer "C:\Windows\Media\notify.wav").PlaySync();

 

[davehc]

You can still change the sound, Mike,but it only can be done if you disable the fast boot.

 

[MikeHawthorne]

Thanks for the information that's another option I can look into.

This is kind of a thing for me, for a long time even back in the early days (I started with Windows 3.1) I messed around with the sounds.
I have a complete set of Windows sounds all done in the Lucy voice by Acapella, it is the most realistic computer generated voice that I've come across and it's been fun coming up with verbal responses to all the Windows notifications.

One of my favorites is Lucy saying "Enough of this trash" when I empty my trash bin, but I have them for everything from "You've got new mail Mike, can you believe that?", to her saying "Stop That!" when it blocks a popup.

It always entertains visitors who haven't had to sit through the whole thing before.

It gives my computer a personality of its own.
I change them or have different versions of them so that I can swap them out from time to time for a change.

But I always had some kind of greeting when my computer started. I was bummed out when I discovered that I couldn't do that in what ever version of Windows started not letting you change the start sound, I think it was when Windows 8 came onboard.

I know that it's kind of crazy to keep working on this, but what else have I got to do, I'll be 80 in about 6 weeks?

This weekend I'm going to look at all these options and see if I can get back to having me computer greet me with some sarcastic comment when I start it.

I miss being insulted by my computer every morning. LOL

Mike

 

[MikeHawthorne]

Hi

I went to try disabling Fast Boot, Under power options and It won't let me uncheck any of the options?

Never mind I just saw the change settings that are unavailable.

Mike

 

[MikeHawthorne]

Hi

Ok I turned off Fast Startup and shut down and restarted, didn't notice that it was any slower.
But when I tried to change the Windows Start Sound the box to Browse, and Test the sound were still greyed out?

I was hoping this was a simple answer.

Mike

 

[davehc]

Me Too! I have found, over a couple of years, that whilst things are running nicely in Windows 10, as soon as there is a hiccup, it is never simple.