Managing pictures with Media Center in Windows Vista

I have not been keeping well since last evening. I have been suffering from an acute headache. Sadly, I have not been able to write anything today. I thought I will post a video instead. This video gives an introduction to managing images in Windows Vista. Watch and Benefit from it.

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December 30, 2007 | Filed Under Software, Tips n Tricks, Videos | 2 Comments

Quick tips for creating Dual-Boot PC for Vista or XP

I have been wanting to share a few tips on creating dual boot for Windows Vista, for sometime now. So here goes:

Backup your files
Creating a new partition on your hard drive
Adjusting your BIOS boot settings
Booting to windows Vista DVD
Installing Vista in the new partition
Finally, choosing Windows version you want to boot.

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December 25, 2007 | Filed Under Software, Tips n Tricks | Leave a Comment

Quick Fixes for Windows-Part 3

I have been paying for the net connection but my router isn’t up-to-date.

Quick Fix: First you need to check whether your router supports technologies for faster connections. I would suggest you going for Microsoft’s Internet Connectivity Evaluation Tool. This tool can help you in checking your router properties. If there’s a corporate firewall, then you may not see accurate results. When you test, it can interrupt connections which are running, so it would be better if you check when you have your internet connection inactive.

After the results are displayed, if you come to a conclusion that your system doesn’t support technology for fast connections, then you may have to go for a new router.

Internet explorer looks unusable for browsing web.

Quick Fix: First reset IE’s options to its original state. Toolbar configurations, list of favorites and others will be unaffected and browser add-ons will be disabled. Cookies, browsing history and other settings will be set back to their default values. Follow the points closely. Open IE (internet Explorer). Now on the toolbar choose Tools->Internet Options. Select Advanced tab, click Reset. Confirm it by clicking Reset again and then Close and OK two times. When you are done, restart IE and watch the changes.

Programs can protect data by checking PC’s disks for fixing problems. Sadly, I rarely take time to use the tools.

Quick Fix: Planning a task to handle this on its own at regular intervals can take only a few minutes. First, check your disk manually. Go to Start, then Run (or you can use shortcut by pressing Windows-R) command line opens. Now type cmd.exe /c echo y|chkdsk c: /f /x, then press Enter. ‘Cmd.exe’ is the command processor, which opens a command-prompt window in Windows.

The ‘/c’ switch tells command prompt to run the commands that follow, including the chkdsk utility. It will examine your drive for errors. (You can change ‘/c’ to /k if you want the command-prompt window to remain open so that you can see any screen messages that may appear.) Here, we will check the C: drive with the fix (/f) function and then tell to lock the disk (/x) if necessary while the scan takes place. (The drive letter and switches may differ; type chkdsk /? at a command prompt to see all your choices.) If you’re checking Windows drive, the command will not work if Windows is running but will plan a check for the next time when you restart the system. This is where the ‘echo y|’ portion comes in: it sends a “yes” answer to approve this option.

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December 5, 2007 | Filed Under Software, Tips n Tricks | Leave a Comment

Quick Fixes for Windows-Part 2

Moving on, we shall see the second part today. Let’s find solution for the following problems.

Vista Saves data but doesn’t recover.

Quick Fix: Vista’s Enterprise, Business Editions come with Shadow copies which let to recover file’s older version. Vista’s Home Basic and Home Premium do not have this feature but saves data, wasting disk space. To stop this waste, put all the documents on a drive other than Windows disk. Now click start and then click SystemPropertiesProtection, and then press Enter. You may see a list of disks, see for the disk that contains personal data and uncheck it. Then turn off System Protection. When you are done, click OK to close System Properties. One thing to be remembered here is that when you have data on a separate partition it will speed up backups by allowing copying files rather than programs.

Trojan horse or other malware must not be able to take over the computer, but logging in as a standard user can also be restrictive

Quick Fix: By logging in as an administrator, applications can be launched with limited privileges. Follow the points closely. Download Microsoft’s free PsTools Utility collection. After completion, unzip the downloaded contents and store it in a folder. Now you have to move that folder to a place where you usually store your applications. The tools downloaded contain a tool called PsExec.

Now to create a shortcut that opens Internet Explorer 7 you have to right-drag its shortcut to a new location. Choose copy here. Now right click the copied shortcut and then select Properties. With shortcut tab active, try clicking the beginning of the Target box and type the path to PsExec before the command line. Type space followed by a hyphen, a letter 1, again space, a hyphen, then letter d ( -1 –d)

Type another space. The ‘-l’ switch will reduce the program privilege, while the ‘-d’ switch will cause the command-prompt window to close once the application is launched. Once the process is done, you should see the text in target box like this, “C:\Program Files\PsTools\ psexec.exe” -l -d “C:\Program Files\Internet Explorer\iexplore.exe” or depending on your path. Now click Change Icon, then OK. Keep specifying the path to the original file and click OK till all dialog boxes close.

Repeat these steps whenever you need the shortcut to run with few privileges.

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December 3, 2007 | Filed Under Software, Tips n Tricks | Leave a Comment

Quick Fixes for Windows-Part 1

I am beginning a series starting today on Quick Fixes for Windows XP and Vista. Today we will start off with Part 1.

After years of purification and millions using it, Windows still remains as enigmatic, buggy and a failure prone. Each new edition Of Windows adds little more catchy features, but at the same time have loads of drawbacks. Vista’s new features seem to be more misfortune than worth and the prior XP doesn’t seem to have good time as age passes.

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December 2, 2007 | Filed Under Software, Tips n Tricks | Leave a Comment