Wednesday, February 1, 2006
Customise Your Backlight Timeout Settings
Posted by Darius Wey in "ARTICLE" @ 09:00 AM
Windows Mobile offers users an easy way to customise backlight timeout settings, but it doesn't offer much choice with regard to preset values. By opening the Backlight applet (Start > Settings > System > Backlight; the exact sequence may vary from device to device), you'll notice a set of options as shown in the image below. You can tweak the timeout settings for battery power and external power, but the fact is, the range of values in the drop-down box is meagre at best. What if you wanted 5 seconds, 15 seconds, 45 seconds, or even 30 minutes?
With a registry editor, you can change all that.
In this guide, I use Resco Explorer 2005. Remember, you're on your own with registry hacks, so proceed at your own risk.
• Navigate to HKEY_CURRENT_USER\ControlPanel\Backlight.
• You'll notice two DWORD entries present: ACTimeout and BatteryTimeout. The former refers to the backlight timeout setting on external power, while the latter refers to the backlight timeout setting on battery power. These two entries are highlighted in the image above.
• Open either of the two entries and modify the value to a number of your choice. It stores the information in seconds, so if you want a timeout setting of 15 seconds, enter 15. If you want a timeout setting of 1.5 minutes, enter 90.
• Save the changes. You won't need to soft-reset your device as the changes will come into effect immediately.
The aforementioned steps should work on most Pocket PCs. If not, your OEM has your device's backlight settings assigned to a different set of registry keys.
With a registry editor, you can change all that.
In this guide, I use Resco Explorer 2005. Remember, you're on your own with registry hacks, so proceed at your own risk.
• Navigate to HKEY_CURRENT_USER\ControlPanel\Backlight.
• You'll notice two DWORD entries present: ACTimeout and BatteryTimeout. The former refers to the backlight timeout setting on external power, while the latter refers to the backlight timeout setting on battery power. These two entries are highlighted in the image above.
• Open either of the two entries and modify the value to a number of your choice. It stores the information in seconds, so if you want a timeout setting of 15 seconds, enter 15. If you want a timeout setting of 1.5 minutes, enter 90.
• Save the changes. You won't need to soft-reset your device as the changes will come into effect immediately.
The aforementioned steps should work on most Pocket PCs. If not, your OEM has your device's backlight settings assigned to a different set of registry keys.
