Joke programs for April 1st: Freeware and nasty Windows pranks
Jokes are the order of the day on April 1st – in real life as well as on the PC. If someone made fun of you in the past year and you’re feeling revenge, find inspiration here. The article presents prank programs that put a grin on the face of pranksters – and some prank victims too – but possibly initially in a state of shock. The photo gallery also reveals some Windows tips for neat nonsense without additional software. It is amusing, for example, to manipulate the registry in such a way that the Revo Uninstaller a program you have selected uses up a lot of memory of 3.99 terabytes.
If a tech-savvy PC user sees this, he or she will surely notice that the existing storage space is actually not sufficient for this. In order to undo the practical joke, there are many tips in the gallery where you can undo the changes.
Download Revo Uninstaller
Download Revo Uninstaller Portable
Some hacks are best only used on test devices where data loss is not an issue. This applies, for example, to activating the secret Windows 10/11 demo mode. Clicking an inconspicuous button five times in the Settings app opens a wizard. Anyone who follows him deletes the files from the PC and takes away the administrator rights from the user account. After that, important on-board resources such as the command line and the registry editor no longer start.
A tad more harmless, but still mean, is preventing shutdowns and PC reboots. On Windows in the Pro edition, a group policy in the group policy editor (gpedit.msc) makes it possible. gpedit.msc is not available with the normal Windows editions, which are usually pre-installed on PCs; it is missing in Windows 7 Home Basic and Home Premium, Windows 10/11 Home and Windows 8.1 Core. However, if your OS edition fits, you will find details on the procedure below.
Windows 8/10/11: Group Policy Editor – interesting tweaks presented
April 1: Joke programs and Windows pranks
Show blue screen – original or fake?
Shock others by causing a real or fake blue screen.
The system freezes, the PC is unusable – and unsaved data in the main memory is lost: blue screens are a nightmare for Windows users. The problem behind it is not always immediately apparent. How about scaring others with a blue screen? You have the choice: either you display a real blue screen, for which there is a PowerShell command. Or you can simulate such a horror PC crash message using the Blue screen screensavers – this screensaver comes from Microsoft.
Download blue screen screen saver
Destroy desktop with hammer, rockets, bugs
With the desktop tools you demolish your own or someone else’s desktop.
The software Desktop games helps you to reduce stress: If the PC is not running as desired, you attack the desktop virtually. April 1st is an occasion to get the joke tool out of the deepest corners of the hard drive or SSD and start it again. If you don’t have the program yet, download it for free.
After the start, use the keys 1 to 8 to switch between various weapons. If you’ve caused enough chaos, just press the escape key to undo the changed screen display.
Download desktop games
Nice pranks, bad pranks
A more harmless fun: display a message to another user when the PC starts up. If you don’t want to manually intervene in the registry, get it Windows tweaker help. With a few clicks, a greeting message – friendly or scary – can be created.
The tweaker also makes it possible to create virtually undeletable folders without using the command line. Attempts to remove the victim via right-click and the context menu command “Delete” fail.
Download windows tweaker
Tweak Windows: The best free tweaking tools for more individuality
Alternatively, to show a message to friends or colleagues for fun, use Windows-R and the command stikynot the Windows Sticky Notes. Your Windows version must not be too new for this: The classic Stikynot is included in Windows 7, Windows 8.1 and Windows 10 1507 and 1511 – but not in Windows 10 from version 1607 (Anniversary Update). Since Windows 10 1607 and Windows 11 it is an app. Stikynot sticky notes stay open while Windows is running, and it restores them on the next boot. Alternatively, you can use a tool like Simple Sticky Notes for current Windows versions.
In order to put a funny message on the screen with system tools, open it with the Run dialog or the Start menu command notebook the editor. Text messages are even simpler to display, implemented via the command line: In higher-quality Windows editions such as Home, type in the console msg Peter Hello – a pop-up window displays the message. Anyone familiar with batch programming will find it easy to use an editor to create a batch file in which msgbox displays a pop-up window with text. Another common April Fool’s joke is configuring a PC to automatically shut down after it boots up – it’s also nasty to replace the task manager with another program (a useless one?). Instructions for such hacks via registry and task scheduler can be found in the gallery above.
Windows 7/8/10/11 Task Scheduler Tutorial – How Your PC Works Automatically
COMPUTER BILD editions and special versions for download
No kidding: full versions for free
Above all, PCs are used as work machines or game consoles: In the photo series above you will find some programs with which you can give your PC new functions. No kidding, some of the programs cost money elsewhere and are free here – some are even exclusive as they were created in the editorial office. The numerous full and special versions bring joy on April 1st and on all other days of the year.
