In windows 8 operating system the most amazing change that one could see is its new Metro Start Screen with live widgets and app shortcuts. This is specially designed for touch screen users which makes the interface more easy to use. Still I find it more responsive and easier to use with a keyboard and mouse.

I came across many people who still feel that traditional desktop is better than the new Metro Start Screen. The people who were dedicated to use the previous versions of Windows (XP, Vista) would not find the metro based screen easy to use. So if you want to skip the metro screen and directly want to go to the desktop, then yes you can do this.

Thus, in order to do this, you will need to follow these steps:

• Open notepad (right-click the desktop and select New -> Text Document) on your system and type the following command as it is shown in the screenshot below-

[Shell]

Command=2

iconFile=Explorer.exe,3

[Taskbar]

Command=ToggleDesktop

• Save the file as ‘start.scf’ (you can choose a different name but the file should be in .scf format)

• Now go to Windows auto start folder (C:\Users\username\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs\Startup) and move the start.scf file to that folder. Don’t forget to enable “Hidden Items” (see screenshot below) to see the auto start folder.

• This will add a shortcut similar to the “Show Desktop” that was there in the Taskbar in earlier versions of Windows.

This is the easiest solution for this problem. However, Windows task scheduler can also be used to load the file. If you want to learn this in detail, you can visit this link. After following the above steps, the next time when you will start your system, you will be greeted by desktop instead of the Start Menu.

(Note: After using this trick, depending upon the configuration of your system, you may see a glimpse of Metro Start Screen for a moment)