Disabling the New Program Highlighting in XP

I don’t know about you, but I find this “feature” in XP to be quite annoying.

I know I installed the new program, so why do I have to be told? This might be useful and less annoying if it only showed something I did not specifically install myself like malware, but I know of no way to set it up for that, if someone does let me know.

If you are like me and find this annoying follow the instructions below to turn it off:

  • Right-click the Start button and click “Properties” to open the “Taskbar and Start menu Properties” window.
  • Click the “Customize” button to open the “Customize Start Menu” window and then click the “Advanced” tab.
  • Remove the check in the check-box labelled “Highlight newly installed programs”.
  • Click “OK” to save the changes and exit the “Customize Start Menu” window.
  • Click “OK” again to exit the “Taskbar and Start menu Properties” window.

Of course this is reversible, should you ever want to return to having the balloon pop up and tell you just installed a program that you just installed and highlight it in the start menu.

Retired, grandfather, blogger, participating in creative writing prompt blogs, and love to read.