If any of you out there like to use the thumbnail view, especially for browsing through photos and images, it can become a bit of a drain on your system. If you are not satisfied with the size and quality of Thumbnails you can change it. To alter the thumbnail size and quality, you need to edit the following registry keys..
Open the registry and navigate to :
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\ Software\ Microsoft \ Windows\ CurrentVersion\ Explorer
Create a new DWORD value called ThumbnailSize, and set the value between 32 and 256.
And/or create another DWORD value called ThumbnailQuality, and set the value between 50 and 100.
Key Details :
USER Key: [HKEY_CURRENT_USER\ Software\ Microsoft \ Windows\ CurrentVersion\ Explorer]
Value Name: ThumbnailSize
Data Type: REG_DWORD (DWORD Value)
Data Value: 32 – 256
USER Key: [HKEY_CURRENT_USER\ Software\ Microsoft \ Windows\ CurrentVersion\ Explorer]
Value Name: ThumbnailQuality
Data Type: REG_DWORD (DWORD Value)
Data Value: 50 – 100
That is it and now you can have you own thumbnail size with your required quality. By this you can even make thumbnails in XP look bigger and better.