XP SP2 Easter Eggs

5) CTRL-ALT-B gives you Ballmer's Top 11 reasons why being bald is sexier than being as rich as Bill

4) SHIFT-CTRL-ALT-F1-F11-SCROLL LOCK-CAPS LOCK: Nothing happens, but it feels good

3) Right-clicking on IE's Home Page icon while pressing SHIFT-F9 starts an IM session with the Homeland Security guy who's monitoring you

2) Any instance of "Linux" is automatically replaced by "M1CR0S0FT RUL3Z!!1!"1) CTRL-ALT-~ in IE invokes the "Doom 3" interface. Beware the terrible Penguin-From-Hell with the face of Linus in the final battle

Thanks to Larry Anderson, Erik Dauplaise, Steven Grafing, Ken Graham, Matt Land, Steve Matheson, Ed Palmateer, John Patrick, Tom Obright and Bob Vandenberg for their excellent submissions. Unfortunately, we couldn't list all the entries for this edition because many were just too long. So we've created special "best of the rest" awards.

The crowning achievement of Google has nothing to do with searching. It's all about who has the most entries. Who cares what avoirdupois means? What's more important is how many times it shows up in the Google index compared with a related word opponent, like measure. Sadly, avoirdupois loses this fight, 31,700 instances to 21,200,000. But who wants to see spelling bee battles? Here are some meaningful Google Fights, compliments of Googlefight (www.googlefight.com).

• Excel vs. VisiCalc: The winner is Excel! 14,800,000 to 27,900 results. Curses, foiled again, Mr. Bricklin!

• Explorer Sucks vs. Firefox Sucks: The winner is Explorer Sucks! 138,000 to 64,700 results. It's always better to suck less.• 802.11b vs. 802.11g: The winner is 802.11b! 2,750,000 to 1,920,000 results. Everyone knows that people don't count past the letter "e."

• Special chain-link death match: Fear vs. Uncertainty vs. Doubt: The winner is Fear! 18,300,000 to 14,300,000 to 5,470,000 results. We feel so much better ...

What would you do if you found an old, plastic cow at a local Wal-Mart parking lot flea market in Wiesbaden, Germany? If you answered "Leave it where it is," you're not Stan "The Man" Maynard, who took up the obvious challenge of morphing this polymer bovine into a computer. All he needed was a little ingenuity--and a 20-GB 2.5-inch hard drive, 256-Mbps DIMM, a slot-load CD-R/RW DVD combo drive, a 44-pin to 40-pin IDE adapter for the CD drive, a laptop to standard IDE adapter for the hard drive, a Mini ITX mother board, a 12V power brick and a PW120 200-watt snap-in power supply. Find out how Stan did it. And thanks to the folks at Mini-ITX.com, who host Stan's project.

Stephen Petitt: You push the power button on your pc, and everything works! Steve Matheson: Mention this service pack and get $50 off Longhorn! (Offer expires 2005/31/04)

Steve Matheson: Attempting to remove the security center results in pop up message: "Resistance Is Futile! You Will Be Assimilated!"

Ken Graham: Press CTRL-ALT-Tilde in Explorer to invoke the DOOM3 interface. Explore nightmare levels in your folders. Experience the thrill of shooting Scott McNealy Imps and Larry Ellison Hell Knights. But beware the terrible cyborg Penguin-From-Hell with the face of Linus in the final battle.

Steven Grafing: Windows XP Logoff Sound.wav is now 10 seconds of Steve Ballmer power-belching.

Steven Grafing: Start > Run > "calvin". Voila - Bill Gates urinating on the Sun logo. Steven Grafing: Add LimeWire to the firewall exception list and you'll hear John Ashcroft's voice saying "Oh no you di-int..."

Erik Dauplaise: 1. Typing CTL-Q-C-A-T turns your CueCat into a lethal weapon
2. Typing "Linux Sucks" into a help search windows shows the penguin being squashed by a flying window.
3. Holding down the CTL-ALT-ESC-Num Lock-TAB-Shift-right Shift-Enter keys launches a 32 bit version of Pong.
4. Typing www.microsoftsucks.com into IE disables your access to the Internet.
5. Leaving the computer on for 5 years without touching the keyboard or mouse runs an OS that doesn't crash.

James Harrison: Remove the Administrator password from your system, since the operating system has no security anyway. This will make login time much shorter (for everyone).

Nick Nielsen: Attempting to load Open Source software results in a simulated BSOD. Oh, uh, never mind, it's not a simulation...

Ed Palmateer: Simultaneous CNTRL-ALT-DEL & ESC displays parallel Linux universe ... Jason Hicks: Hit Ctrl-Shft S-E-C-U-R-I-T-Y and your system actually becomes secure.

Bob Vandenberg: Hitting ctrl alt S pops up an image of your computer on the monitor, showing the personal perimeter defence screen going up..sorta like the views of the shields going up on the Enterprise in the early movies.

Bob Vandenberg: hitting ctl alt b at the same time give you Ballmers 11 top reasons for why being bald is sexier than being as rich as Bill

Daniel Pastrana: The control, alt & delete keyboard is now F1

Larry Anderson: Press SHIFT, CONTROL, ALT, F1 and F11, SCROLL LOCK and CAPS LOCK at the same time. Nothing will happen, but it feels real good. Ted henderson: XP sp2

Tom Obright: Start the Microsoft Calculator, enter 3.14159, hold the ctrl key down and hit the = button to see Melissa Gates recipe for homebaked apple pi(e)
Using Internet Explorer, rightclick the Home Page icon while holding the Shift and F9 keys down to enter into an Instant Messaging session with the Homeland Security guy monitoring your internet connection.
In Internet Explorer Help type JAVA into the index. Screen briefly shows the message "unknown programming language" before autoforwarding to the Starbucks web site.
Any attempt to associate the file extension .tar with any application automatically launches the "50 ways why Linux is bad" page on the Microsoft Website.
In a tribute to history the Blue Screen of Death is back, but instead of the cryptic "Fatal Exception Error" the error message now begins with the words "Hey, nobody is perfect."

Charles Ashbacher: Hitting an accelerator key combination causes a video of a Steve Balmer rant to play.

Doug Whitaker: Hit Ctrl and click on the Windows Security Center systray shield to start a special Weezer 'Happy Days' music video in which a young Bill Gates wears a black leather jacket, plays the bongos and is very cool.

John Patrick: Any instance of the word "Linux" is automatically replaced by "M1CR0S0FT RUL3Z!!1!" Lance: plug 4 devices into a usb hub then connect the hub to the pc, be entertained by the "dance of the exception faries"

Lance: insert linux cd pres CTL ALT DEL and watch the system majically heal itself

Gary Hoke: Hit the Microsoft key 666 times in a row and the Desktop changes to the "Bill Gates is Satan" theme.

Gary Hoke: After IE crashes click "Cancel" on the Report Error screen and Microsoft Spyware SP2 is installed.

Ray Gauthier: Press Ctrl-Shift-F (to get the French version) and "Internet Connection Firewall" is replaced with "Maginot Line." And we all know how successful THAT was. Robert Kokinda: As of August 17th, its a "stealth" egg.

Ernie Leither: Control-click the 'Start' button to enter 'Fortress' mode. This mode shows a giant padlock locked to the left of the 'Start' button to make you feel safe, but it is only an illusion!

Matt Land: The "Windows public image reliability feature" inserts subliminal pictures into streaming media to maintain positive public image. eg Steven Balmer helping old woman across the street and Bill Gates being hugged by orphans.

Doug Olson: Hit ALT-ESC-ESC in succession while holding the windows key and the OS changes to MACOS X

David G. Miller: brings up the Linux login screen that lets you know how Microsoft finally implemented a secure OS: by running Windows in a VM under Linux. Deen Hubin: Shift+Alt+WinKey+Esc switches you to MacOSX!

Arnold Febre: Typing in 'aquarium screensaver' in the Help and Support search box gives you the cool aquarium screensaver found in XP Plus, but all the fish are dead. However, you can choose three fish you want to see dead from a set of 12 choices as well as their various states of decay (recently deceased and floating, recently deceased and sunken, barely eaten with eyes intact, half eaten with one eye gone, etc...).