Late night topic: What is your favorite software/hardware tweak?

Interesting topic.

I usually end up digging into the register to fix some annoying problem.

I used to be OCD about keeping the registry clean but that's a recipe for screwing something up if you're in there all the time so I finally had to force myself to stop.

Hmmm trying to think of something nifty I've done in the registry recently..

Completely agree. I learned most of what I know through tweaking, breaking, panicking, and fixing. Registries can be awesome to mess with but have become so complex these days that it can be devastating if you mess with the wrong value.

Bleeping Computer has a good article from August with a few good registry "hacks" (I hate that word) including disabling Windows 10 Bing Search and adding the option to open a command window "here" to the context menu.

Do yourself a favor and start transitioning to Linux if you like tweaking things. Most things can be configured with plain text files instead of messing with some convoluted registry.

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adding the option to open a command window "here" to the context menu

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This is a standard feature in most linux file managers.

Seriously, give a KDE distro a shot. You will be amazed at the features and configuration options. Then you can install a dozen other desktop environments and window managers side by side to see what you like.

I've fiddled with linux for the better part of a decade, primarily Ubuntu, Linux Mint Gnome/Debian, KDE, etc). While it has it's purposes (my daughter's laptop is currently running LMDE 4), I just don't have enough time these days to keep messing with it, especially when it comes to drivers for new hardware. I do have it set up to dual boot on my main machine, but I pretty much stick with windows for simplicity sake. Aside from telemetry bs, Windows 10 is much more stable these days.

All that being said, Linux is definitely a tinkerers dream and is highly customizable.

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This pretty much summed it up for me. I think of Linux as more of a hobbyist love/hate relationship than a daily driver. I love troubleshooting something on linux most of the time, but it always seemed to be the times that I needed it just work when it would just shite the bed. Just this past summer, I had to help a buddy compile a custom kernel because very few distros had drivers for his hardware and ultimately it ended up screwing up his MBR. Without heavy heavy investment into one main distro as a competitor to Windows/Mac, linux will always be for the enthusiast.

I guess the bigger theme of my original post was just seeing what other tricks/tweaks people might know about that I haven't come across yet. For instance, I came across a video the other day detailing how to modify the power to my trucks front 12V cigarette lighter from constant power to only operating when the key is in the ignition by moving a single fuse. It doesn't have to be explicitly PC/Linux/Mac related, but just something interesting to dive into.