Robert Dangle

A: You can turn off the splash screen or exchange the corporate splash screen to get something more pleasing than a Microsoft or hardware vendor logo. Microsoft's Tweak UI utility for Windows makes turning off the screen easy. Select StartòSettingsòControl Panel, and double-click Tweak UI. Click the Boot tab, uncheck Display splash screen while booting, and click OK.

If you don't have Tweak UI, then you can edit msdos.sys. Select StartòProgramsò MS-DOS Prompt. In the MS-DOS window, type attrib ûr ûs ûh c:\msdos.sys (use hyphens for the dashes and make sure to leave a space in front of each one), and then press <Enter>. Next, type notepad c:\msdos.sys. After you press <Enter>, msdos.sys will come up in Notepad. If the line 'Logo=1' is there, change it to Logo=0. If it isn't there, add the line Logo=0 just below the line that reads '[Options]'. Save the file and close Notepad. In the DOS window, type attrib +r +s +h c:\msdos.sys (the same as the first command, only with plus signs instead of hyphens), and press <Enter>. Close the window.

Changing the logo is harder. In Explorer, go to C:\. Select ViewòFolder Options (or ViewòOptions); on the View tab, select Show all files, and click OK. Look for a file called logo.sys; if it's there, rename it something like oldlogo. sys. Go to the graphic program of your choice and create or load the file you want to replace the old logo with. The new file should be a .bmp image file with 256 colors and sized 640 by 400 pixels.

Resize the image to 320 by 400 (Windows' boot process stretches the file horizontally from 320 to 640). If you're using Windows' Paint, select ImageòStretch/Skew; in the Stretch section, for Horizontal, enter 50%, and click OK. When you save the file, name it C:\logo.sys. Now, the next time you boot up, you will see the image of your choice.