Fear not, help is on the way.

Since the early days of Office 2003, Microsoft has been offering a free download of an application called Word Viewer that allows users to open documents created with Microsoft Word on Windows-based computers that don’t have Office installed.

The caveat here is that you have to download to different installers.  The first one installs Word Viewer 2003 and the second installs the Office Compatibility Pack.  This second download is what allows Word Viewer to open documents created with Word 2007.

In this walkthrough, I’ve created a test.docx file and sent it to a bare bones Windows XP installation.  Let’s have a look at how I was able to view it.

For starters, here is what happens when I try to open test.docx without having any viewer installed:

Doesn’t really give you a warm and friendly feeling, does it?  No worries, open up a web browser and download the Word Viewer from the Microsoft Download Center.

After the download completes, click the Run button or double-click the downloaded file.  In Windows XP you will see the following warning:

Click Run and then follow through the wizard.  I used the default settings for this example.

Eventually you should see the “Installation Complete” prompt.

After clicking the Ok button, Word Viewer will launch and attempt to open a document.

If you want to save yourself some time and energy, you can grab the Microsoft Office Compatibility Pack from the Microsoft Download Center and install it before launching the Word Viewer for the first time.  If you don’t want to be proactive, Word Viewer will prompt you to download it when you try to open your first .docx file.

Clicking Ok will open up a browser and take you to the download page.

Just like the first install, this one is very straight forward.  After skipping past the security warning, follow the on-screen prompts for a swift installation.

Once you complete this installation, open Word Viewer again.  Notice anything different?

The icon is now displayed as the Microsoft Word document icon.

Here is a side by side comparison of the file open in Word 2007 (on the left) and Word Viewer (on the right).

Looks perfect to me!

Even though the icon updated when opening a file from Word Viewer, the icon on my desktop didn’t update until I rebooted the system.  It’s also good to note that you can now just double-click a .docx (or .doc) file and Word Viewer will automatically open it.

What viewer do you use for .docx files?

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Calibre is a “one stop solution to all your ebook needs”. The site wasn’t lying. This handy application is a free, open-source, cross-platform (Windows, Linux, OS X) ebook library that offers incredible value and useful features.

In this walkthrough, we’ll look at installing Calibre in Windows and check out some of the basic features.

As I mentioned, Calibre comes in many flavours including Windows, Linux, and OS X.  With that kind of selection, it’s appealing to a broad range of users.  Visit their download site to get your copy and get started.

As with many installations on Windows Vista, the UAC will prompt you to make sure you actually want to install the software that has started installing.  Click Run and continue to the installation wizard.

The wizard for Calibre is very straight-forward and much like many of the other applications I’ve shown you, I chose to use mainly the default settings. The only thing that I changed is the install location. I have a second drive in my main system that I install all of the applications to. This makes it easier for recovery if I have to reinstall the operating system. Simply follow the prompts to navigate through the wizard.

Once you click Finish on the final screen, Calibre will prompt you for a location for your ebook library.  This is not the location where the books are, but rather the location for the database of information that Calibre will store. Your Documents folder (or My Documents) will suffice.

Once the storage directory is selected, Calibre opens up to the main window.  At this point there is nothing in the library, so you’ll need to go ahead and add some ebooks.  Click the little arrow next to the Add books icon on the toolbar.  In the dropdown, select the most appriate option.  I chose to add books from directories, including sub-directories.

After selecting the way you want to add ebooks, you will br prompted so select the location where the ebooks that you wish to add are located.  After selecting the folder, Calibre will begin sifting through the files in the directory (and sub-directories) searching for ebooks.

Just a small note, I did have one ebook that Calibre could not read.  Every time it attempted to read it, the whole app would hang.  Eventually I removed the offending publication, but I have no idea why it wouldn’t process. If this happens to you, simply open the task manager and terminate the application, then start it up again.

For this example, I only added a small handful of my ebooks.  All of them were in .PDF format and all of them were missing some meta data.  In the image below you can see that all of the authors are Unknown.  That’s ok though, you can add the meta data to the ebook if you have that sort of ambition.

Clicking on an ebook and clicking the View toolbar icon will open the ebook in it’s native viewer.  In my case it was Adobe Reader.

There are no shortage of features in this ebook library management application. For example, you can click on the arrow icon in the lower right corner of the window and your library will switch to a graphical selection window. Sadly, none of my ebooks had a cover graphic with them, however I did notice that you could attach one to it in the meta data editor.

There is an option to fetch the title image from the Internet, however the ISBN appears to be needed to make that work. I didn’t have much luck with it. Even though I had the ISBN, I was prompted for a username and password for a site called LibraryThing.com and I don’t happen to have an account. Registration is apparently free though, so go ahead and give it a try.

Maybe a future release will be improved so that it automatically pulls the image from a web service much like iTunes or Windows Media Player does for album art.

I mentioned the ability to edit the meta data for an ebook and it couldn’t be easier. Check out the screenshot below. Here you can see all of the fields that you can edit. Things like Title, Author, Publisher, and ISBN are all fields that you can update.

You can also give the book a rating out of 5 stars and add tags to it. The tags can be quite handy if you use the tag searcher to locate certain types of books. Best of all, you can fetch the information from the Internet based on the ISBN or the title/author.

There is also an option to bulk edit the data on multiple books. This saves valuable time when updating collections with similar attributes.

Another one of the features that I really liked about Calibre is the extensibility that the program offers. From the Preferences window, you can select Plugins and you’ll be given the option of viewing your current set of plugins, customizing them, or adding new ones.

As you can see, Calibre is an action-packed, open-source freeware application that is a must have for anyone with an ebook collection. It doesn’t matter if you have 5 books, or 500 books, Calibre can simplify the management of that library and free up some valuable time.

If you use a different free ebook manager, let us know in the comments.  We’d love to compare!

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Though manufactured by different companies, GPU-Z from TechPowerUp does look a lot like the aforementioned CPU-Z. The interface is eerily similar and the name is a perfect match. On the positive side, these two Windows applications bring incredible value at a price that can’t be beat – free! The pair complement each other as incredible tools to have on your belt.

Let me take you on a tour of this powerful graphics card information utility.

Also in line with CPU-Z, this product doesn’t come with an installer. You simply download GPU-Z from the TechPowerUp website, save it to a folder and run it. At the time this article was published, the current version was 0.3.2

Vista users may experience a warning from the UAC security system, which asks if you are sure you want to run the file. No worries, click Run and wait for the application to load. You should see a splash screen while the information about your graphics card is collected.

Now the fun begins. The main window is divided into three tabs. There is the Graphics Card tab, the Sensors tab, and the Validation tab.

The Graphics Card tab is the default tab that loads when the application starts. It also contains the most information about your graphics card. Everything you ever wanted to know, and more, is displayed here.

As you can see in the image below, this tab tells you which graphics card you are using, the GPU, BIOS Version, Bus Interface, Memory Type and Size, Clock Frequencies, and much more. It has everything but the kitchen sink.

This information is great for anyone looking to upgrade their video card, or overclockers looking to get more performance out of their current setup. If you are running multiple video cards, the drop-down list at the bottom lets you select the card that you want to see the details for.

Moving right along in our tour, the next tab is the Sensors tab. There is no shocker here, this tab displays sensor data coming back from your video card.  Another great tool for overclockers, you can monitor things like Clock Speeds, GPU Temperature, PCB Temperature, and Fan Speeds.

There is also an option to log the data to a file and another to continue monitoring while GPU-Z is in the background. I like the last feature because it lets me monitor the change in my graphics card temperatures when I am in full screen gaming mode.

The last tab is labelled Validation, and it allows you to submit your information to the GPU-Z website. I couldn’t find any information as to the purpose of this feature, however it does let you share the details on the web and track changes to your graphics setup.

GPU-Z is another one of those lightweight, must-have tools that just about any user can make use of.  It really goes a long way to help you understand your graphics card.  You don’t have to take my word for it though, try it out for yourself!

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The information that it collects is quite detailed and is focused around you CPU, mainboard, memory and general system info about Windows and DirectX.

Throughout the rest of the post, I’m going to walk you through getting CPU-Z and harnessing it’s awesome power on your own PC.

To get started, head on over to the CPU-Z home page and download the latest version of the software (at the time this article was written, the current version was 1.50). The package comes as a zip file, so you’ll need to unzip it.  In situations like this, I tend to just create a folder on my desktop and extract the files from the zip archive into that folder.

This program doesn’t have a fancy installer because it doesn’t install itself into your system.  You simply extract the zip contents to a folder and run it from there.  When you don’t want CPU-Z any more, you just delete the folder.

Once you have the folder set up and you are ready to go, start CPU-Z by double-clicking on the cpuz.exe file.

You should see the following image on your screen while the program is loading.

Once loaded, the information is readily accessible in and easy to navigate format.  The window is laid out as a series of tabs that sort information into logical categories.  The tabs are labelled CPU, Cache, Mainboard, Memory, SPD, and About.  This can be seen in the image below.

Selecting each tab will open up a world of information, including some things that you never even wanted to know.  Try not to be overwhelmed by the data and focus in on what you want to see.

For example, on the CPU tab the average user will be interested in the Name of the CPU, Specification,  Instructions, Core Speed, Bus Speed, and Level 2 Cache size. Power users will likely be interested in the rest of the information for various purposes.

The Cache tab elaborates on the cache information from the CPU tab. I’ve never had a lot of use for this data, but it’s here and you never know when it might come in handy.

On the Mainboard tab, you will find a lot of information that is useful when upgrading or replacing components.  This covers things like the motherboard manufacturer, chipset, BIOS, and graphics interface.  From the screenshot below, we can see that I am using an nForce4 based motherboard that supports x16 PCI-Express.

What that means is that my video card is PCI-E based and not AGP. This is important to know if I was upgrading the video card.  Unfortunately for this example, CPU-Z was unable to detect my motherboard manufacturer.  This a rare occurrence and I have only ever seen the problem with this particular board.

The Memory tab is also very useful because most people that upgrade their computers add more memory. In the image above, you can see that I have 2 GB of memory in this system (2048 MB). The memory is DDR (as opposed to DDR2 or DDR3), and that it is running in dual channel mode. Most of the other info on this tab is for advanced users. I find it particularly helpful when overclocking.

To complete a memory upgrade, you would probably need a little bit more information. The SPD tab has the rest of it. This tab shows information about the memory stick in each specific slot on the motherboard. You can see the size of the chip, they type of RAM, and the frequency that it’s operating at. There’s also a timing table to show details based on the configuration.

Last, but not least, is the About tab. This tab gives details about the software and also some details about your system.  For example you can see the Windows version, Service Pack installed and DirectX version. From this tab you can also dump the data into an HTML file.

This application should be in everyone’s PC toolbox.  The data it provides is invaluable and the ease of use makes CPU-Z simple for anyone to operate.

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Kill allows you to end the process behind an application simply by clicking on the application Window.  Think of it like having the power to terminate in the tip of your finger.  When you load up Kill and left click on a window, Windows attempts to close it as though you had simply clicked the close button.  This will cause the program to close in its normal way, often prompting you to save your work.

Holding CTRL while you click the application triggers the more dangerous end-process that would normally be done through the Task Manager.  This immediately kills the underlying process and forcing the application to terminate.  No prompts this time.  Here’s a demo of Kill in action.

They say that a picture is worth a thousand words.  In this case, six pictures will tell the story of how to use this amazing little utility.  For my example, I’m going to kill calc.exe, the calculator application that comes with Windows.

Start by downloading Kill from DonationCoder.com.  The current version is 1.0 and the total download is 205KB.

Here you see that Calculator is open and to the left of the program is my desktop icon for kill.exe.  Start the Kill utility by simply double-clicking it.

If you are using Vista, the following warning will likely be displayed.  Click Run to allow the Kill program to continue.  Once loaded, your mouse cursor will change and you should now see a skull and crossbones next to it.

Now click on the window of the application that you want to end.  In this case I’ll click on the Calculator window.

And voila!  The program ends.

Again, this is great for applications that have frozen up and just won’t respond to the conventional mouse clicks to close it.  I really love that this utility is no fuss, no mess – meaning that it doesn’t install itself into your system.  You simply run it when you need it.

If by chance you activate it accidently, you can get your cursor back to normal by pressing the ESC key.

As an additional tip, the author recommends placing Kill in your Quick Launch bar for easy access.

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For those not familiar, Hulu is a popular video playback site from NBC that streams many mainstream television shows right to your browser.  The biggest problem with the site is that it blocks access for users outside the continental United States.  Hulu isn’t the only site in the world that does this either.  Many sites restrict access based on the IP Address that you are currently connected with.

This is where Hotspot Shield comes to the rescue.  Hotspot Shield is a free software download that allows you to use the internet anonymously – for both Windows and Mac computers.  It works by providing you with a different IP address than you would normally get, allowing you to bypass country-type restrictions. 

Here’s a look at just how easy it is to use.

Start by downloading the installer from the Hotspot Shield web site.  The installation uses the standard wizard-type interface and I only identified two noteworthy items during the install.  The first is that you should uncheck the box that says “Include the Hotspot Shield Community Toolbar”.  Unless you are one of those people that loves adding more toolbars to your browser, this will provide you with very little additional value. 

The second item I noted was that during the install you will see one or more Windows Security prompts that let you know that Windows can’t verify the publisher of the driver software it is installing.  To complete the installation, click “Install this driver software anyway”.

Once the wizard completes, a browser window will open up taking you to the “Invite a Friend!” page.  You are in no way obligated to do this.  In fact, you can probably just close that browser window and continue.

You should now see a little green shield in your system tray that looks like: 

It’s possible that it will be red depending on the current connection state (green is connected, red is disconnected).  If the shield is red, you can right-click on the icon and the pop-up menu will give you the option to connect.  The menu also allows you to look at the configuration properties and disconnect the Hotspot Shield.

Clicking on Properties in the menu will open a browser window and load the status page.  This page shows the current state of the shield and the current IP Address being assigned.  From here you can also disconnect the shield, or click on Show Config for more options and information.  The extended config screen shows you how much data has moved in and out since Hotspot Shield last connected and the date and time of the last connection.

So you are now good to go.  Reloading the Hulu.com site produces more favorable results than last time.  The message about “our video library can only be streamed within the United States” will be replaced by a message that tells you that advertising can’t be loaded.  Amusingly enough, they offer a link to get support if you can’t see the ads.

After 30 seconds, the ad message is removed and the video playback begins.  The only downside to Hotspot Shield is that it forces an advertisement across the top of the web pages you load while connected.  I can deal with that though, simply scroll the page down.  :)

Well, there you have it.  Hotspot Shield does a good job at helping you avoid country discrimination, but it has some other great benefits as well.  If you are prone to using public networks (e.g. hotels, coffee shops both wired and wireless) then you can use this utility to help keep your data safe and secure.

The software essentially creates a VPN (virtual private network) between your computer and the AnchorFree Internet gateway.  The tunnel created prevents hackers and would-be snoops from viewing your emails, instant messages, credit card information and anything else you happen to transmit. 

What other tools do you use to make your Internet use more secure and anonymous?

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In a previous post I talked about a great disk usage analysis tool called TreeSize Free that visually summarized how your disk was being used.  Free Disk Analyzer performs a similar task, however it also has some added features and some better graphics.

In this walkthrough I’ll show you what Free Disk Analyzer is all about and we’ll look at some comparison shots with TreeSize Free.

Installation

Start by downloading the installation package for Free Disk Analyzer from the ExtenSoft web site.  Like most of the applications that we review, the installer for Free Disk Analyzer is very easy to use.  Just walk through the steps using the installation wizard and you will be up and running in less than a minute.

You can install Free Disk Analyzer in a number of languages including English, French, Dutch, German, and Russian.

Usage

After completing the installation and launching the Free Disk Analyzer, you will be presented with a similar window as I’ve shown below.  This shot gives a nice and quick breakdown of disk usage by volume.

To kick start or update the analysis, click on Analyze in the menu bar.  Once selected, “Analysis in progress…” will display in the status bar at the bottom.

By double-clicking on a volume, or by using the tree in the left-most pane, you can drill down into specific areas of storage.  In the following example, you can see a comparison of my D: drive using Free Disk Analyzer and TreeSize Free.  The numbers are slightly off, but I would say they are close enough to each other to be accurate.  As expected, both applications give similar results, however Free Disk Analyzer (on the left) really shines from a GUI standpoint.

The next comparison shows a drill-down into the storage folder, which is the biggest consumer of storage space on that drive.  Once again, Free Disk Analyzer really shines from a graphical display standpoint.  However both applications are accurate and will get the job done.

Clicking on the Largest Files tab, at the bottom of the window, will bring back a listing of the files that are consuming the most space for the folder and sub-folders you selected.  Looking at Program Files, you can see that my Assassin’s Creed and Unreal Tournament 3 folders are the biggest consumers of hard drive space. Yikes!

Checking out the Largest Folders tab will get you a breakdown of sub-folder sizes.  As expected from the previous shot, my two game directories are the biggest culprits for space waste.

Final Thoughts

As you can see, the functionality of Free Disk Analyzer is basically what you would expect from any application claiming to analyze space consumption.  What this program excels at is really in the presentation.

If style is your thing, then I strongly encourage you to get a copy of this app today! You won’t be disappointed.

Do you have another favorite disk usage analysis tool?  Let us know in the comments, we’d love to hear about it!

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There is a powerful little plug-in that you can download for Windows Media Player that will show you the lyrics of the song as it plays.  Now don’t get too excited, this has been done before, but not with the incredible simplicity of Lyrics Plugin.

The simplicity of the name alone creates the ultimate summary for this add-on.  The completely free Lyrics Plugin holds a stamp of approval with a 4.5 star rating and over 150,000 downloads.

Installation

The installation for this plug-in is, as expected, incredibly easy.  Start by visiting the wmplugins.com download site and clicking the lyricsplugin.exe link.  Once downloaded, run the installation and follow the onscreen prompts.  I chose the default configuration.

Once complete, Lyrics Plugin will prompt you to determine if you want to start Windows Media Player.  You probably want to click Yes since you probably want to try the plugin you just installed.  :)

Usage

After Windows Media Player finishes loading, select a song from your library.  You might need to click on the Now Playing tab to see the lyrics.  I tried over a dozen songs and the lyrics for all of them were found.  If you happen to find a song that the lyrics can’t be found for, Lyrics Plugin will offer you a Google link to help you with finding the lyrics online.

Here are two samples that I used.  If you are wondering why they are blurred, it’s because I don’t have permission from the artists to reproduce their work.  I think you can tell from the images though that the content is there.

Try it for yourself, you won’t be disappointed.  Do you have any recommendations for lyrics plug-ins for other media players?  Let us know in the comments!

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With my wife being an amateur photographer, I’m often exposed to the trials and tribulations that come with digital photography.  Once such dilemma is the fact that pictures taken with today’s digital cameras are often incredibly large in size.

For example, I took a picture of my monitor the other day and the actual file was 2.81 MB with a resolution of 3008 x 2000 pixels.  The truth is, I’ve seen her produce much bigger pictures than that!  It needed to be about 500 pixels wide

When I took that picture, I also took about 100 more in the same session.  Imagine how quickly the post grew in size when I started writing an article using these images.  They had to be resized, but there were 100 of them and that would take forever.  Enter Bulk Image Resizer from MariusSoft for Windows.

Bulk Image Resizer is a little freeware application that does precisely what the name describes – it resizes batches of images quickly and effectively.  Offering support for JPEG, JPG, BMP, GIF, TIF, TIFF, and PNG, the Bulk Image Reizer will satisfy the average user need

Getting Started

To get started with this exceptional tool, download the zip file from the MariusSoft website.  Once the download completes, extract the installation file from the archive and install the app.  There are no special tricks, it uses a very straight-forward install wizard.

After the installation completes, launch the Bulk Image Resizer from your Windows Start menu.  Click the Add button to select the images that you want to add to the batch.  Since I had an entire directory of files to resize, I simply went to the folder and selected everything.

I left the Resize Mode set to width, since I only knew how wide the pictures could be.  The tool automatically keeps the aspect ratio, so that your pictures maintain the shape they started with.  Next I set the dimensions to 500 pixels wide.  After that, I selected an output directory and finally clicked the Convert button to get started.

It literally took only a few seconds and all 73 pictures were processed.  As you can see in the following comparison, the folder of resized pictures shrunk considerably in size compared to the originals.  Going from 174 MB down to 20.6 MB is fairly significant.

The images looked great and were a perfect fit for my article.  There was one downside though.  All of the pictures lost some of the metadata that was once associated with them.  If you compare the next set of pictures, you can see a lot of information about my Nikon digital SLR camera.  However, all of the camera specific data was lost after the conversion.

Final Thoughts

In all fairness, the information wasn’t relevant to the article, so losing it wasn’t the end of the world.  I also archived the originals.  If I ever need to get at that metadata, I have a copy stored away.

I would highly recommend this lightweight and easy to use photo processing tool to just about anyone who has a need for it.  The interface is very intuitive and easy to navigate.  Updating your pictures in a hurry has become easier than ever – thanks to the Bulk Image Resizer.

What other software do you use to resize your images?

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In this tutorial, I’m going to walk you through setting up CCleaner to automatically run on a schedule in Windows Vista so that you can simply set it and forget it.

Configure Your Options

Making sure that you have set the correct options inside of CCleaner is very important if you plan to automate it. For example, what if you decide to run it every night and you have it set to clean out your recent documents or cookies. That could become very frustrating in a very short time.

Start by opening CCleaner and selecting the options you want in the Windows Cleaner section that opens by default. I can’t tell you what settings to use because everyone will have different needs. All I can tell you is that you need to think about each option carefully and consider that possible outcomes.

The next piece that you’ll want to look at is the Advanced Options. Click on the Options button in the lower left corner of the window, then click Advanced. Make sure that Save all settings to INI file is checked.

Create the Scheduled Task

Open up the Start menu in Windows, then go to All Programs –> Accessories –> System Tools –> Task Scheduler. If Windows prompts you to tell you that it needs your permission to continue, simply click the Continue button.

Once the task schedule window is open, click on Create Basic Task. A new wizard will open to help you through the process.  Give your task a meaningful name and description. I chose “System Cleanup” for the name and “This task launches CCleaner to perform a system cleanup on a regular basis.” Click Next.

The Task Trigger window is where you determine what causes the task to run. In our case, we want a time period to be the trigger. I personally find weekly to be sufficient, but you can choose daily or monthly depending on your individual needs. After you select your trigger, click Next.

Now the scheduler needs you to get a little more granular by selecting the day of the week and the time that the task will run.  This choice is very important. For example, if you turn your PC off at night, then you don’t want to run the task in the middle of the night. You also don’t want the task to run when you are likely to be in the middle of using the computer. Once you decide on the finer details, click Next.

Now it’s time to tell the scheduler just exactly what you want it to do. It defaults to Start a program, so just click Next. Click the Browse button and locate the CCleaner.exe program file. The default location is:

C:Program FilesCCleanerCCleaner.exe

In the Add arguments section, add the /AUTO switch. This tells CCleaner to run automatically without waiting for user input.  Click Next to get to the Summary screen. Check the box next to Open the Properties Dialog for this task when I click Finish and click the Finish button.

In the Properties window, check the box next to Run with the highest privileges. This is required so that the task can run without prompting you for administrator privileges. Next click on the Conditions tab and check the box next to Wake the computer to run this task. This will bring your computer out of sleep mode in the event that the power saver settings have put it to sleep.  Click Ok to finish the process.

You can try out the task to make sure everything was configured properly by right-clicking on your new task and selecting Run.

If everything is ok, you should see the CCleaner icon appear in your system tray.

You can get more info about CCleaner from the CCleaner website, or from our handy walkthrough.

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Recuva allows you to selectively search for specific files such as pictures, music, videos, and documents or you can search for any deleted files if you are looking for something outside of a specific niche.  This handy walkthrough will show you just how easy it is!

To get started, download the installation file from the Recuva site and use the wizard to guide you through the installation.  The only change that I would suggest would be to uncheck Install Yahoo Toolbar when presented with the option.

Once installed, launch Recuva and select continue if prompted by Vista’s UAC security warning.  This product uses a very easy to follow wizard to help you recover those lost files quickly and easily.

As you can see, Recuva gives you the ability to specialize your search, so that your file is more likely to be recovered quickly.  Once you get to the end of the wizard, you are given the option to do a deep scan.  It’s not recommended on your first pass, but if you have trouble recovering a file you can try the deep scan to improve your results.

After you click Start, Recuva will begin scanning your drive(s) for deleted files.  A progress bar allows you to see how far along the scan is at any given moment.  Once that scan is complete, you will be presented with a listing of files that can be recovered.  I chose to recover a picture, so in my example I am offered thumbnails to make finding my file easier.

All that’s left is to place a checkmark in the checkbox under your file, then click the Recover button in the lower right-corner of the window.  A dialog box will appear asking where you would like to save the recovered files to.  It is highly recommended to select a drive that is different than the drive containing your files.

After one last prompt that tells you the recovery time, your files are in your selected location and ready for use.

This tool is a great asset to have on hand and it could certainly be a life saver one day.  I look forward to the next great product from Piriform to see just how much easier computer management can get.

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This handy addition to your software toolbox offers the ability to download YouTube videos in multiple file formats which include .flv, .avi and .mp4.

One of the nice features of this downloader is that it gives you the option to download in High Definition formats if they are available on the site.  In this short tutorial, I’ll show you how to download a YouTube video with this easy to use software application.

To demo the YouTube Downloader HD product, I decided to download a copy of one of my favorite amateur videos – How to be Ninja.  This comical home video sets out to show you what it takes to be a ninja, which is the ultimate goal of any geek.

You can get started by launching the YouTube Downloader HD application.  As you can seen in the screen capture below, the interface is very straight-forward.  Within the main window, you can select the download type, set the video URL, select a save location, update the application, and control the download process.

The default download type is AVI, and I would recommend that setting for the average user – unless an HD version is available and you require high def resolutions.  Copy the URL of the video you wish to download from the address bar in your browser and paste it into the Video URL field.  The default save location is your documents folder, however I changed mine to my Desktop for the sake of this demo.

Once you have your settings adjusted to your liking, click the Start button, located in the lower right corner of the app.  The options in the window will become disabled and the progress bar will begin to increase.

Eventually, when the download completes, you will get the following prompt and the status bar will indicate that downloading has finished.

That’s all there is to it.  Now you can navigate to your download folder and play the video in your favorite media player software whenever you want.  If you want to check for updates to the application, simply click the Update button located on the right-hand side of the window.

Download your copy today!

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In my system I store backups and archived data to the external drive, mostly items that I don’t plan to access frequently.  That being said, there is no reason why it couldn’t be a little quicker when I am using it.  Windows Vista has a little known tweak that will speed up your external USB hard drives and I’m going to show you how to do it.

The trick to improving the external drive’s performance is in something called Write Caching.  The PC Guide defines write caching as:

Caching reads from the hard disk and caching writes to the hard disk are similar in some ways, but very different in others. They are the same in their overall objective: to decouple the fast PC from the slow mechanics of the hard disk. The key difference is that a write involves a change to the hard disk, while a read does not.

When write caching is enabled, when the system sends a write to the hard disk, the logic circuit records the write in its much faster cache, and then immediately sends back an acknowledgement to the operating system saying, in essence, “all done!” The rest of the system can then proceed on its merry way without having to sit around waiting for the actuator to position and the disk to spin, and so on. This is called write-back caching, because the data is stored in the cache and only “written back” to the platters later on.

Due to the fact that caching tells the operating system that it is done even though it isn’t, there is always the potential for data loss if power is cut.  The screenshots below show the warning that explains the you must use the Safely Remove Hardware feature to disconnect the drive.  Failing to do so could cause data loss.  It is also recommended to have your computer connected to an uninterruptible power supply (UPS) to assist with unexpected power outages.

Now that the education piece is out of the way, here is how to speed up your external USB drives in Windows Vista.

Start by opening the Control Panel, then open Device Manager.  Expand Disk Drives and locate your portable drive.

In my example, I’m using a Western Digital 300 GB external drive.  Double-click the external drive that you want to adjust to access the properties window.

Once open, click on the Policies tab and select the Optimize for performance radio button.  Click Ok to save your changes.  You should see a prompt like the one below advising you to reboot.

The settings won’t actually take effect until you reboot your computer.  Once the reboot is complete you’re done!  Wasn’t that easy?

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I guess that’s why this little application called BackRex Internet Explorer Backup intrigued me so much.  Over the years I have been through many OS rebuilds and changes, each time having to make adjustments to my browser settings to get them just the way I like them.  That includes the manual backup and restore of cookies, favorites, connections settings, and add-ons.  BackRex’s Internet Explorer Backup simplifies that task by automating the process from start to finish.   Here’s a little walkthrough of it’s basic features.

Backing Up Your Settings

To start with, IE Backup is a very easy installation.  Simply download the installer from the BackRex site, and install using the default options.  At the end of the installation, “Run BackRex Internet Explorer Backup” will be checked.  Click Finish to launch the program.

You’ll be presented with a new wizard to help you complete your task.  This tool gives you the option to backup, restore, rollback, or create a scheduled backup for your Internet Explorer settings.  The first screen warns you to close any other programs.  I would strongly encourage you to heed that warning.

After clicking Next, you’ll be given the option to select your task.  We’ll look at each of them as we go along.  Start by selecting Backup and clicking Next.

You might note that IE Backup numbers the steps as you walk through the process – this can be quite helpful.  In step 2, IE Backup will notify you of any software it has detected that should be closed before continuing.  I can’t stress enough – shut the programs down.  You’ll ensure a quality backup and no loss of data.

Step 3 gives you the ability to change some of the options.  I chose the default folder to use, but you can set it to whatever works best for you.  I also checked the checkbox next to “Remember this backup folder”.  That way I don’t have to keep setting it each time I run the application.  You can also set a password here, I chose to leave it blank.  If security is important to you – password protect the backup.  It will help keep your personal information just a little bit more safe.

Click Next.  Step 4 is pretty basic.  It shows you what the application is going to backup for you.  It’s just a list though, so feel free to click Next to get the process moving.

Step 5 is where the magic happens.  This screen shows you each item that the application is backing up, allowing you to monitor the progress.  It will look something like this:

It’s that easy!  When this step is finished, you’ll be presented with the following summary window.

Now all you have left to do is click Finish and enjoy your piece of mind.  I would suggest storing your backup, or a copy of it, on disk or offsite.  That will protect you in the event that you have a drive failure.

Scheduled Backup

Backing up your settings is a great idea, but it’s not a one time deal.  IE Backup from BackRex gives you the opportunity to schedule your backups at regular intervals, so that you can simply set it and forget it.  Be warned though, if you are running it on a system that is domain connected, you will be required to provide a domain username and password. If your security policies require you to change your password every xx days, I would encourage you to set yourself a reminder to complete the task manually.  Scheduling with an account that requires password changes may lock out your account when you change it, but fail to update the task.

Setting up the scheduled backup is just as easy as doing the backup itself.  A wizard walks you through the process and makes it very simple to complete.  Starting from the main IE Backup screen, simply select Scheduled Backup and click Next. Step 2 allows you to configure various settings such as storage location, compression, and password protection.  For this walkthrough, I used mainly the default settings.

It is important to note that the option to Close running applications automatically should be considered with care.  Enabling this setting allows IE Backup to close any open programs that it needs to, in order to ensure quality.  That could mean some time or data loss if you’re like me and leave multiple browser tabs and windows open for research purposes.

Step 3 is once again a nice listing of all the items that the application plans to backup for you.  Step 4, the final step, is where you set your schedule.

Pick something them makes sense to you.  In my case, I chose a daily backup because I am a habitual user who adds favorites and changes settings on a daily basis.  The average user might find weekly or monthly to be sufficient.

After clicking Next on the final step of the scheduled backup, you may be prompted for a user account and password like the one shown below.  You may want to refer to my warnings a few paragraphs up, in regards to using domain accounts.

Restore Settings from Backup

The restore process is just as easy as the backup process, in fact it might even be easier.  Starting from the same startup screen, select Restore and click Next.  Step 2 is where you provide the location of your previously saved backup to be recovered from.  The program then skips to Step 4 and provides the familiar listing of the items it plans to recover.  Clicking Next at this point will begin the recovery process.  That’s all there is to it.

I hope you find this tool as handy as I have!

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Enter Defraggler, a powerful and easy-to-use defragmentation tool for your Windows managed hard drives.  This defrag tool really sets itself apart from it’s competitors by being a quality product with the perfect price tag – free.  This tutorial will give you a nice overview of the Defraggler tool, as well as provide you with the necessary knowledge to use it effectively on your home computer.

First off, lets get to the meat and potatoes.  Why do you need to defrag?  Simply put, your Windows file system frequently fragments it’s file system by placing pieces of each file that it writes to disk into the first available spots.

The result is an increase in the time it takes to access a file, because the file can be cut into pieces and spread about the physical disk.  By defragging your disks, files are relocated so that all of the pieces are in the correct order and placed next to one another.  Defragging can easily extend the live or your hard disks and improve system performance.

Install Defraggler

You can get started by downloading and installing the latest edition of Defraggler.  I won’t bore you with the details of the installation, because it is incredibly straight forward.  I strongly encourage you to keep all of the default settings when you install the application, it will make things a whole lot easier.

Launch Defraggler

You can launch Defraggler from the desktop icon or the Start Menu.  Once open, you’ll be presented with the main window, as shown below.

Analyze

As you can see, it’s very straight-forward.  Start by selecting the disk you want to perform maintenance on in the upper portion of the window.  Next, click the Analyze button to have Defraggler assess the current condition of the file system on the selected drive.

This shouldn’t take very long to process.  Once complete, you’ll see a report similar to the following screenshot.

Defrag

You can click the View Files button, if you are interested in seeing which files are actually strewn about the drive.  That step is only for interest sake and has no impact on the defrag process.  To start the process, click on the Defrag button.

Depending on the size of your drive, the amount stored on it, and the amount of time since the last defrag, this process could take a considerable amount of time to complete.  It’s also resource intensive, so don’t start this task while you have a lot of work to do.

Save it for when you might have some downtime and can afford to be away from the computer for an hour or more.  Mine didn’t take very long to complete, only about 15 – 20 minutes.  Here’s a sample of the report you can expect to see once the job is done.

That’s it.  Pretty simple stuff.

You should repeat this process for each drive on your system.  You can even defragment your portable USB drives.  Even though you have done a great service for your PC, you’re not done yet.  Performing a defrag is a great step in the right direction, but to properly manage your system you need to defrag on a regular basis.  Defraggler can help!

Scheduled Maintenance

Clicking on the Settings menu, then Options, will open up the main Options dialog box.  Click the Schedule tab to set up a schedule that works for you.

Select the drive that you want to schedule maintenance for via the Drive dropdown list.  A good place to start is Local Disk (C:).  Next place a checkmark in the checkbox labelled Schedule defragmentation for chosen volume.  This will activate the lower options, allowing you to specify an interval.  This part is personal preference, but I prefer to defrag my drives on a weekly basis.  For most users, this will be acceptable.

Now you just have to pick a starting date and time.  Do yourself a favor and select a time when the system will not be in high demand from it’s user(s).  If you have more than one drive, repeat the process by selecting a different drive from the dropdown list and follow the steps you followed for the first drive.

As you can see in the pictures below, I staggered the days that my drives are defragmented, mainly because of the resource requirements to get the job done.

Just click Ok and your system will do the rest.

There are some advanced components that come with Defraggler and one of them is to check the drive for errors.  You can access this utility via the Action menu.

Checking for errors can take a significant amount of time.  In fact, I’ve seen it take a couple of hours to actually finish, so don’t start this task unless you have plenty of time to kill.

Summary

Defraggler is an important addition to your PC toolkit.  The benefits of learning to use this tool will definitely be seen through extended hard drive life and improved file access performance.  It’s easy to use, free to download, and you can set it and forget it.

If you run into any problems, Piriform provides a great support forum that represents a community of help resources.

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I found a great little application that does the great big job of creating visuals of your hard drive consumption.  It’s called TreeSize Free, and it was developed by JAM Software.  In this short tutorial, I’ll walk you through some of the basic functions.

Naturally, the first step is to download the software and install it on your PC.  There is nothing out of the ordinary with this install.  In fact, you can leave all of the parameters at their default settings.  Once you have completed the installation and launched TreeSize Free, you should see a window similar to the one below.

You might want to give it a few minutes to completely analyze your hard disk.  On a 40 GB hard disk, the application completed a scan in about 75 seconds.

Taking a closer look, you can see the simplicity designed into this handy little tool.  There are plenty of options for changing how you see the data.  In the image above, the drive space consumption is shown in MB.  Clicking on the % icon in the tool bar will allow you to see the same information, however this time it will be represented as a percentage of the whole.  I personally found this format to be more informative.

Visualizing the state of a different drive is a very easy task.  Simply select Scan from the menu, then select the drive you want to analyze.  Once again, depending on the size of your drive, it may take a few minutes to complete the scan.

As you can see in the above screen capture, 73% of the drive space used on my d: drive is located in a folder called Storage.  My virtual machines also take up an additional 14% of that utilized drive space, while Program Files consumes another 12%.  I have a couple of options here.  I could use the Programs and Features tool in my Windows Vista Control Panel to remove any unnecessary programs, that would reduce the size of the Program Files folder.

It’s painfully obvious that the biggest offender of consumed space is a folder called Storage.  Clicking on the [+] sign, next to the Storage folder, gives a further breakdown of the space consumption.

Low and behold, the Downloads folder is the culprit!  This is a folder where I temporarily store downloads before they get moved to my network storage or a portable USB drive.  It looks as though I haven’t cleaned up that folder in a while.

TreeSize Free is clearly a very useful and powerful tool to assist you with hard disk space management.  It will help you get right down to the roots of understanding where your storage has gone.  I would highly recommend this freeware tool to anyone with hard drives to manage.

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As it turns out, there is a great application out there just for the Windows home user.  It’s called EASEUS Partition Manager, and you should download it today!

In this short tutorial, I’m going to increase the size of the C: drive on my Windows Vista PC.

Important Note: Please backup your data before attempting to make changes to the partitions on your computer.  There is always the potential for lost data – so take the time to ensure you have a good backup.  If you need some help getting that started, check out this post on Backing up Your Windows Data the Simple Way – with Cobian Backup.

As you can see in the image below, My C: drive is about 40 GB, with only 5 GB of free space available.  My D: drive is a second partition on the same physical drive as my C: drive.  Under that you’ll notice I have 10 GB of Unallocated space.  This is space that was never assigned to anything.  I’m going to expand my C: drive to include this space – for a grand total of 50 GB.

The real trick in resizing the first partition on a multi-partition drive is in allocating the space in precisely the right location.  In this example, all of the unallocated free space is at the end of the D: drive, which means I’ll have to move it to the beginning of the D: drive, so that I can eventually add it to C: drive.  First, I’ll select the D: drive and click on the Resize/Move button.  A new window opens up and lets you enter the new settings that you would like to use.

To move the unallocated space from the end to the beginning, simply copy the size from the Space After box and paste it into the Space Before box.  The former will automatically reset to zero.

Now you can click Ok.  It’s probably best to note that no changes have actually been made at this time.  All that has been done is simply a list of changes has been added to a queue.  Changes only take complete effect after a reboot.

Now, we still haven’t allocated any space to C: yet, we’ve only re-arranged D: drive.  This time, select the C: drive and click the Resize/Move button.  Once again we are presented with the change window.

As you can see, the unallocated space is now at the end of the C: drive.  This time, drag the little arrow on the right-hand side of the yellow bar all the way to the right.  This will stretch the D: partition to the end, and leave you with no unallocated space after.

This essentially completes all of the configuration required to resize the partition.  Click Ok.  You should be back at the main window again.  If you are ready to complete the change, click the Apply button on the lower left-hand side of the window.  Like any good piece of software, EaseUs Partition Manager will prompt you several times to make sure you want to continue.

Before you click Yes to both of these, please make sure that you have backed up your important data.  Resizing a partition can be dangerous and there is always a risk of failure.  If you have confirmed that you have a recent backup, click Yes and get ready to kill some time.

The operation as described above took almost four hours to complete.  I wasn’t expecting it to take that long, so it actually seemed much longer as I watched the clock waiting for the work to finish.  Here is a screenshot of what you can expect after the reboot.

After the four hour waiting period, Windows booted back up as normal and the new sizing was in effect.

Just to recap, EASEUS is a freeware partition manager for Windows.  Most versions of Windows are supported, however 64-bit Vista is not.  Don’t forget to get your copy from their download site.

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You can run Cobian Backup as either an application or a Windows service.  In this tutorial we will examine installing the program as a service, which will be fitting for most common installations.

Installing Cobian Backup

Installation couldn’t be any easier.  The default settings are preset to allow for optimal installation on most systems.  Start by downloading the installation package, then begin the install process by clicking Run.  The first screen that pops up is a language selector.  I chose English, however you might prefer one of the many other available languages such as Czech, Danish, Espanol, French, German, Hungarian, Italian, Korean, Russian, Taiwanese and many more!

When you get to the screen to select the installation type, make sure that you chose a type that auto-starts.  As you can see, I selected the default which is “as a service“.  With this setting I can basically forget about the whole backup process because it will run in the background without requiring user intervention.

When you get to the welcome screen, click Done and then open up the application interface to configure your first backup job.  You should also see a new icon in your system tray that looks like a little red mushroom.

Scheduling a Backup Task

On the Task menu at the top of the window, select New Task.  Next, give your task a name.  I called this one “My Documents”, since my goal is to backup my user documents.  I left all the other settings on the General tab at their defaults.

Now you are ready to add some files to be backed up. Click on the Files tab on the left-hand side, then click the Add button in the Source section. A small dropdown menu will appear. I chose directory, again because I plan to back up my entire documents directory.

You’re presented with a standard windows directory selection dialog box. Browse to the directory you want to backup, then click Ok. Next click the Add button in the Destination section to choose a place to store your backups. I chose C:\backups\, however you can put them anywhere that makes sense to you.

A good rule of thumb is to store your backups on a different drive than the files you are backing up. This way if the hard drive fails, you have a much greater chance of recovery. If you do backup to the same drive, you might consider burning the backups to disk periodically.

In most cases you’ll want this to be a recurring task that runs on a scheduled basis. Click on the Schedule tab and select the frequency that you would like your files backed up. This part is a personal choice, so choose what makes the most sense for you. I chose weekly because I don’t make changes to my documents very often and this will use less disk space than a daily backup.

The last change that we will make to the new task is on the Archive tab. Here you can choose whether or not to compress your backup and/or add encryption to secure it. Turning on either of these options will slow down the backup process a little bit. I opted for Zip compression and no encryption. Click the OK button when you are finished.

That’s it!  Now all you have to do is sit back and wait for the time to pass until your scheduled task starts.  You can also sleep a little better knowing that your data is safe and sound.

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In this tutorial I’ll walk you through the basics of performing a PC tune-up.

Install CCleaner

Installing CCleaner is as easy as downloading the installer and walking through the wizard. There are no hard questions or complicated configuration steps. In fact, the only change I made to the default configuration was to remove the checkmark next to “Add CCLeaner Yahoo! Toolbar and use CCleaner from your browser“. The entire installation process takes only minutes to complete and the package is spyware and malware free.

Click to enlarge

Configure CCleaner

Once you have CCleaner installed, launch the application via the start menu or desktop icons. Click the Options tab on the left-hand side, then click on Settings. At the bottom of the window, you can select the Secure file deletion radio button, then select the level of protection that you require. Simple Overwrite will suffice for the average user. If you happen to be worried about someone being able to recover the files that CCleaner deleted, then you can pick a higher level of security. The Gutman option will make recovery of such files next to impossible.

Click to enlarge

Running the Cleaner

Now that your settings are configured, you can start the cleaning process by clicking the Cleaner tab, also located on the left-hand side. The default selections here will most likely get you the results you are looking for. Click Analyze and give CCleaner a couple of minutes to complete an assessment on your computer. The tool will scan through the selected locations looking for files that are deemed a candidate for deletion.

After 147 seconds, my scan revealed that I could remove 197.8MB of garbage files. Underneath the analysis summary, you can find a listing of the specific files that will be deleted if you choose to continue. All that’s left is to click the Run Cleaner button and wait for the magic to happen. If you selected a high level of secure file deletion, you should expect the process to take a number of minutes to complete. To clear out some additional files, wait for the cleaning to complete, then select the Applications tab and run it again.

This should speed up your computer a little bit and the free space you created is definitely an added bonus.

Click to enlarge

Cleaning the Registry

One of the best uses for this tool is the Registry cleaner. Due to the number of applications that store information inside the Registry, it’s quite easy for the issues to pile up. This can lead to system slow downs or errors. CCleaner has you covered. Just select the Registry tab on the left hand side and click the Scan for Issues button. After a few minutes you should see a complete list of the problems that were found. Click Fix selected issues to initiate the Registry clean-up.

I strongly encourage you click Yes when prompted to backup your registry. Save the backup file to a location that you will remember. The default location is your Documents folder, which is as good a place as any. The Registry is a very fragile thing and having a backup will ensure that you can recover from any potential problems. Don’t get too scared though, I have used CCleaner on dozens of computers and haven’t had any incidents.

Now you can finish the Registry cleanup by clicking the Fix All Selected Issues button. Once completed, click the close button and give yourself a pat on the back. You just tuned up your computer and you did a pretty good job of it too!

Additional Tools

CCleaner comes with some additional tools to help you keep your PC in tip-top shape. Selecting the Tools tab on the left-hand side opens up the Uninstall and Startup management tools. Uninstall is basically the same as Add and Remove Programs in the Windows Control Panel.  The extra bonus is that you can also delete entries for applications that were previously removed, but still show up in the program listing.

The startup manager allows you to disable or delete registry startup keys. Simply select the program that you no longer want to run on startup and either delete or disable it. If you are a novice user, I would recommend disabling such entries, that way if you make a mistake you can enable the program again at a later date.

One last tip – if you don’t know what the program is, don’t disable it because you might need it. If you have concerns about a particular program, try Googling the name of it and you will likely find some information on its purpose.

Useful Resources

• CCleaner Feature Listing
• Help and Support
• Discussion Forum

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