- To launch a control panel from the command line, go to %windir%\system32, dir *.cpl, find the one that looks like the one you need (takes some practice and trial/error) and run 'control x.cpl' where x is the name of the control panel. For instance 'control appwiz.cpl' will launch the Add/Remove Programs control panel.
- If you need to run Internet Explorer as an administrator/PU (be careful, this is the easy way to get viruses and spyware), shut down all windows of it, then launch %ProgramFiles%\Internet Explorer\iexplore.exe. I heavily recommend shutting all windows down again once you're done doing whatever you needed the higher access for.
- If you want to run Task Manager as an admin (to shut down a rogue process or something), run 'taskmgr.exe'.
- To install most software, put in the CD/DVD and exit out of the installer that comes up by default. Inside your command window go to that drive (d: or e: or whatever it is) and most have 'autorun.exe' that you can run to get the same UI with administrator rights. If not there's often a 'setup.exe'.
The next version of Windows (Windows Vista) will make all of this a lot easier, until then this actually works very well and I've been pleasantly surprised how easy it is to deal with. I just don't have virus or spyware problems on any of my machines, and I credit this approach as 95% or more of the reason.