How do you make tooltips appear for longer?

OK-Cancel-Apply

Hi guys,

When somebody on After Hours expressed a frustration they were having with tooltips (that they disappear too quickly, not allowing them enough time to read the first few lines of a thread without opening it) I was sure I had heard of a way to increase the time. So after lots of googling I found a registry setting that supposedly affected this:

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\
CurrentVersion\Explorer\TrayNotify
Value Name: BalloonTip
Data Type: REG_DWORD
Value Data: 0x00000003 (3)

This does not work!

I tried a few other registry settings, but none of those worked either.

Does anybody know the real way to increase the tooltip display time in Windows XP?

Note: I've googled the living hell out of this, buy have had no luck.

Soundman

I always found that just placing the mouse cursor over it held the balloon there for longer.

Gadgetman496

There is a Registry entry to do this
Kelly's Korner has the quick fix

It's item number 7 in this LINK

Just download item #7 & run the file (Allow when requested)

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OK-Cancel-Apply

That's the same reg entry I posted, gadgetman, and I can't get it to work

The value in the downloadable reg entry is 'a', which is 10 in decimal - that should mean 10 seconds, but it's still stuck on default (5 seconds I think).

astrofool

Now, if Firefox could fix the new line bug for tooltips, all would be good

Gadgetman496

OK-Cancel-Apply wrote: »

That's the same reg entry I posted, gadgetman, and I can't get it to work

The value in the downloadable reg entry is 'a', which is 10 in decimal - that should mean 10 seconds, but it's still stuck on default (5 seconds I think).

Have you restarted since you applied the tweak?

I know I read an articles somewhere & it was Kelly herself talking about this issue. She was adamant that people didn't confuse Balloon Tips with Tool Tips as they were two totally different animals altogether.

At this stage I'm not even sure myself what the difference is

Can you give an example of one of the items you were trying to extend the delay time on?

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OK-Cancel-Apply

Yeah I restarted.

Well, I always thought tooltips were those little squares that popped up every time you hover the mouse over, say, the clock (and it would show you the date). I thought the terms tooltip and balloon tip were interchangable.

Guess I was changing the wrong thing! So is there any way to alter tooltips then?

Gadgetman496

I'm not 100% sure but I thing the registry referrs to that as "InfoTip"

Have a look at this location in the Reg & see if that is what you're after.

I know you can change the delay on the start button Msg in here

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Advanced


I know you can enable or disable them using this entry:

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Advanced
Data Type: REG_DWORD [Dword Value] // Value Name: ShowInfoTip
Modify/Create the Value Name [ShowInfoTip] according to the Value Data listed below.
Value Data: [0 - ShowInfoTip Disabled / 1 - ShowInfoTip Enabled]


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