By default, there’s a half-second or so delay between the time you move the mouse over a menu item and the time the menu is opened.

If you reduce this value, your menus will open much more quickly.
There’s another feature that is incidentally affected by this setting. In all
releases of Microsoft Windows since Windows 95, all menus “follow” the
mouse, which allows you to navigate through menus without having to click
repeatedly. The problem with this design is that it can be very difficult to
navigate menus unless you’re able to hold your mouse or other pointing
device very steadily. Even the smallest unintentional move in the wrong
direction can cause the menu you’re using to disappear. This can be even
more annoying to those with more sensitive pointing devices, such as touch
pads, pens, and other digitizers. This behavior can be completely disabled
by increasing the menu open delay to a sufficiently large value:

1. Open the Registry Editor.

2. Expand the branches to HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Control Panel\Desktop.

3. Double-click the MenuShowDelay value. If it’s not there, go to Edit ➝ New
➝ String Value and type MenuShowDelay for the name of the new value.

4. The numeric value you enter here is the number of milliseconds (thousandths
of a second) Windows will wait before opening a menu. The default is 400 (a little less than half a second). Enter 0 (zero) here to eliminate the delay completely, or a very large value (65534 is the maximum)
to disable the automatic opening of menus.

5. Click OK and close the Registry Editor when you’re finished. You may
have to log out and then log back in for this change to take effect. By default, there’s a half-second or so delay between
the time you move the mouse over a menu item and the time the menu is
opened. If you reduce this value, your menus will open much more quickly.
There’s another feature that is incidentally affected by this setting. In all
releases of Microsoft Windows since Windows 95, all menus “follow” the
mouse, which allows you to navigate through menus without having to click
repeatedly. The problem with this design is that it can be very difficult to
navigate menus unless you’re able to hold your mouse or other pointing
device very steadily. Even the smallest unintentional move in the wrong
direction can cause the menu you’re using to disappear. This can be even
more annoying to those with more sensitive pointing devices, such as touch
pads, pens, and other digitizers. This behavior can be completely disabled
by increasing the menu open delay to a sufficiently large value:
1. Open the Registry Editor (described in Chapter 3).
2. Expand the branches to HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Control Panel\Desktop.
3. Double-click the MenuShowDelay value. If it’s not there, go to Edit ➝ New
➝ String Value and type MenuShowDelay for the name of the new value.
4. The numeric value you enter here is the number of milliseconds (thousandths
of a second) Windows will wait before opening a menu. The
default is 400 (a little less than half a second). Enter 0 (zero) here to eliminate
the delay completely, or a very large value (65534 is the maximum)
to disable the automatic opening of menus.
5. Click OK and close the Registry Editor when you’re finished. You may
have to log out and then log back in for this change to take effect. By default, there’s a half-second or so delay between
the time you move the mouse over a menu item and the time the menu is
opened. If you reduce this value, your menus will open much more quickly.
There’s another feature that is incidentally affected by this setting. In all
releases of Microsoft Windows since Windows 95, all menus “follow” the
mouse, which allows you to navigate through menus without having to click
repeatedly. The problem with this design is that it can be very difficult to
navigate menus unless you’re able to hold your mouse or other pointing
device very steadily. Even the smallest unintentional move in the wrong
direction can cause the menu you’re using to disappear. This can be even
more annoying to those with more sensitive pointing devices, such as touch
pads, pens, and other digitizers. This behavior can be completely disabled
by increasing the menu open delay to a sufficiently large value:
1. Open the Registry Editor (described in Chapter 3).
2. Expand the branches to HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Control Panel\Desktop.
3. Double-click the MenuShowDelay value. If it’s not there, go to Edit ➝ New
➝ String Value and type MenuShowDelay for the name of the new value.
4. The numeric value you enter here is the number of milliseconds (thousandths
of a second) Windows will wait before opening a menu. The
default is 400 (a little less than half a second). Enter 0 (zero) here to eliminate
the delay completely, or a very large value (65534 is the maximum)
to disable the automatic opening of menus.
5. Click OK and close the Registry Editor when you’re finished. You may
have to log out and then log back in for this change to take effect.By default, there’s a half-second or so delay between
the time you move the mouse over a menu item and the time the menu is
opened. If you reduce this value, your menus will open much more quickly.
There’s another feature that is incidentally affected by this setting. In all
releases of Microsoft Windows since Windows 95, all menus “follow” the
mouse, which allows you to navigate through menus without having to click
repeatedly. The problem with this design is that it can be very difficult to
navigate menus unless you’re able to hold your mouse or other pointing
device very steadily. Even the smallest unintentional move in the wrong
direction can cause the menu you’re using to disappear. This can be even
more annoying to those with more sensitive pointing devices, such as touch
pads, pens, and other digitizers. This behavior can be completely disabled
by increasing the menu open delay to a sufficiently large value:
1. Open the Registry Editor (described in Chapter 3).
2. Expand the branches to HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Control Panel\Desktop.
3. Double-click the MenuShowDelay value. If it’s not there, go to Edit ➝ New
➝ String Value and type MenuShowDelay for the name of the new value.
4. The numeric value you enter here is the number of milliseconds (thousandths
of a second) Windows will wait before opening a menu. The
default is 400 (a little less than half a second). Enter 0 (zero) here to eliminate
the delay completely, or a very large value (65534 is the maximum)
to disable the automatic opening of menus.
5. Click OK and close the Registry Editor when you’re finished. You may
have to log out and then log back in for this change to take effect.By default, there’s a half-second or so delay between
the time you move the mouse over a menu item and the time the menu is
opened. If you reduce this value, your menus will open much more quickly.
There’s another feature that is incidentally affected by this setting. In all
releases of Microsoft Windows since Windows 95, all menus “follow” the
mouse, which allows you to navigate through menus without having to click
repeatedly. The problem with this design is that it can be very difficult to
navigate menus unless you’re able to hold your mouse or other pointing
device very steadily. Even the smallest unintentional move in the wrong
direction can cause the menu you’re using to disappear. This can be even
more annoying to those with more sensitive pointing devices, such as touch
pads, pens, and other digitizers. This behavior can be completely disabled
by increasing the menu open delay to a sufficiently large value:
1. Open the Registry Editor (described in Chapter 3).
2. Expand the branches to HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Control Panel\Desktop.
3. Double-click the MenuShowDelay value. If it’s not there, go to Edit ➝ New
➝ String Value and type MenuShowDelay for the name of the new value.
4. The numeric value you enter here is the number of milliseconds (thousandths
of a second) Windows will wait before opening a menu. The
default is 400 (a little less than half a second). Enter 0 (zero) here to eliminate
the delay completely, or a very large value (65534 is the maximum)
to disable the automatic opening of menus.
5. Click OK and close the Registry Editor when you’re finished. You may
have to log out and then log back in for this change to take effect.By default, there’s a half-second or so delay between
the time you move the mouse over a menu item and the time the menu is
opened. If you reduce this value, your menus will open much more quickly.
There’s another feature that is incidentally affected by this setting. In all
releases of Microsoft Windows since Windows 95, all menus “follow” the
mouse, which allows you to navigate through menus without having to click
repeatedly. The problem with this design is that it can be very difficult to
navigate menus unless you’re able to hold your mouse or other pointing
device very steadily. Even the smallest unintentional move in the wrong
direction can cause the menu you’re using to disappear. This can be even
more annoying to those with more sensitive pointing devices, such as touch
pads, pens, and other digitizers. This behavior can be completely disabled
by increasing the menu open delay to a sufficiently large value:
1. Open the Registry Editor (described in Chapter 3).
2. Expand the branches to HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Control Panel\Desktop.
3. Double-click the MenuShowDelay value. If it’s not there, go to Edit ➝ New
➝ String Value and type MenuShowDelay for the name of the new value.
4. The numeric value you enter here is the number of milliseconds (thousandths
of a second) Windows will wait before opening a menu. The
default is 400 (a little less than half a second). Enter 0 (zero) here to eliminate
the delay completely, or a very large value (65534 is the maximum)
to disable the automatic opening of menus.
5. Click OK and close the Registry Editor when you’re finished. You may
have to log out and then log back in for this change to take effect.