Control Panel:
Control Panel is used to change various hardware as well as software settings.
Control Panel can be opened using:
Start menu
(or)
Search bar
Categories of Settings in Control Panel:
- System and Security
- Network and Internet
- Hardware and Sound
- Programs
- User Accounts
- Appearance
- Clock and Region
- Ease of Access
System and Security Settings: These settings are useful to set or modify different protection related things of system like firewall, backup and restore, windows update and administration.
The important settings for the user, from this category are:
- View system RAM and processor speed
- Disk cleanup and Disk Defragmenter.
Network and Internet: this category is used to setup Internet or Computer Network using Wired or Wireless medium. Today’s o/s are intelligent enough to automatically setup LAN or internet settings, so these settings are not important for a normal user.
Hardware and Sound: Used to setup or alter settings of any Hardware devices attached to the system like keyboard, mouse, printer, camera etc. Nowadays devices are Plug N Play devices with USB and in-built driver support by O/s. Hence, these settings are also not needed for user.
Some interesting settings from this category are mouse, keyboard and sound settings
Programs: Used to install, modify or uninstall application software as well as system utility programs.
User Accounts: used to manage different user accounts in the system to provide personalization and privacy.
User accounts can be two types: Administrator or Standard User
Each user account can be secured with password and customised according to his choice.
Appearance: used to set different visualization settings like desktop wall paper, screen saver, background colors and themes.
Clock and Region: used to setup different input methods and currency, date and time formats
Ease of Access: used to setup different settings for easy access of system by differently abled people like magnifier, on screen keyboard, narrator etc.