How to Speed Up Thumbnail Display on Your Taskbar

One of the significant improvements on Windows 7 is that you can view thumbnails that show all the open Windows once you put the mouse pointer over any icon on the machine’s taskbar. You can also view open Windows for any program and application that runs on your machine that has an icon on the task bar.

Once you point your mouse on an icon for any active program or application located on the task bar, there is a slight delay before the thumbnails appear especially if there are lots of Windows that are open within the certain program.

If you get annoyed by this you can actually try speeding up the response time so that the thumbnails appear right away when you point on an icon. This tweak or more often referred to as a “Registry hack” is quite simple and easy to execute. Here’s how:

1. Open the Registry Editor by clicking on the “Start” button, then type “regedit” on the start menu search box.
2. Press the “Enter” key.
3. Look for HKEY_CURRENT_USER\ControlPanel\Mouse
4. Double-click on “MouseHoverTime” — The default time value setting that you can will see is 400 which means 400 milliseconds.
5. Input a new value that is lower than the default which is 400, 150 would be a good value.
6. After you input the desired speed, click “OK” and exit the Registry Editor.
7. The system will prompt you to restart your computer. Do it so to save all changes and have everything to take effect.

It is important that you make sure you are editing the right value on the registry. If you don’t know the dos and don’ts in Windows Registry, it is recommended that you seek the help of someone who is technically inclined and well-adept with it.

Important Note

Don’t forget to create a System Restore Point before doing a registry hack or doing some major editing on your machine’s registry.

If you are not confident enough that you can execute this step in the right way and if you do not know how to create a restore point, it is always recommended that you would just leave everything as it is to avoid major operating system problems that can damage your machine’s hardware and operating system in the long run.