Tag: VISTA

Nir Sofer (of NirSoft) makes loads of useful little Windows utilities. One of our favorites, Volumouse, has a new beta available and it offers some nice improvements over its predecessor. To start, Volumouse beta 2 adds support for Windows Vista and Windows 7 per-application volume settings. There's also a new "send hotkeys" feature which lets you use the mouse wheel to fire off custom ...

Homegroups make sharing files and folders easy on Windows 7, but Windows XP and Vista users have to do things a little differently. Fortunately, there are dead-simple ways to share files on both XP and Vista, too. Microsoft offers a very detailed step-by-step guide for those of you looking for an exhaustive walkthrough, but here's the short version for Windows XP users: click Start > ...

This week we're running a series of posts that tackle common Windows networking issues, and some tips and tricks that might speed up or improve your network stability. You can find more tech tips in our Tips index. One small Windows XP feature I used to lean on frequently was "Connect To" -- it provided easy access to a computer's network connections right from the Start Menu. I also like ...

It was really only a question of when, but Windows 7 has finally overtaken Vista in operating system market share. Windows 7 is now closing in on 20% as Vista's presence continues to slide. Vista's lack of popularity aside, Windows 7's rise is still impressive -- especially when you consider the fact that widespread enterprise adoption won't really take off until service pack one is released ...

You know those neat thumbnails that you get when you hover over an icon in the Windows 7 taskbar? Did you ever notice how they're "live" and keep moving when a video is playing in a window that is minimized or otherwise obscured? OnTopReplica is a neat little tool that takes this functionality and lets you put one of those thumbnails anywhere on your screen, and it can be any size. Once you run ...

Remember DreamScene? You might not, since it was a Vista Ultimate Extra and not a whole heck of a lot of people ponied up for the Grand Poobah edition of that particular Windows. DreamScene enabled you to set a video file as your wallpaper -- which is cool, though I found it terribly distracting. A bit too much like trying to work atop a YTMND page for my liking, though maybe I was choosing ...

Just yesterday I wrote about FixWin, a free program which helps fix a number of Windows Vista and Windows 7 errors. It's a lot like Microsoft's web-based FixIt solutions. Today, there's another option and it comes straight from Microsoft. Their new Fix It Center is a program you can download for free which provides automatic fixes for a wide range of bugs and annoyances. Choose the issue you ...

Microsoft's FixIt solutions generally work well, but sometimes they just take way too long to run -- especially on Vista and Windows 7. Some of them also require a little more interaction than I'd prefer: I know where the registry key is to fix that stupid bug where DVD drives disappear from My Computer, I just want a point-and-click way to do it! Fortunately, The Windows Club has a nice ...

Ages ago, a friend of mine introduced me to xpy -- a handy tweaking app for more advanced (and possibly reckless) users of Windows XP. Its developer later crafted a Vista-compatible version called Vispa and has been updating it ever since. Recent builds have added Windows 7 compatibility, and Vispa remains an awesome tweaking app. It's definitely not for casual users, though -- if this means ...

One thing I often forget to do before installing a program I want to test or fiddling with my drivers is creating a System Restore point. System Restore has been part of Windows for ages now, but I still have trouble remembering 1) it's there and 2) sometimes it's pretty handy. To make it easier on myself, I set up a dead-simple restore point creator. Those of you who don't want to bother ...

Looking for some fun, useful gadgets for your Windows 7 or Vista desktop? Sebastian compiled a list for the Windows 7 launch, and the crew at Into Windows have now shared a slick set of 14 which are dressed up (or is that undressed?) in transparent Aero Glass sexiness! The pack includes replacements for many of the common non-transparent gadgets like the Calendar, clock, CPU and bandwidth ...

Like to keep tabs on where your system resources are going in Windows? If you're running Vista or Windows 7, take a look at Auslogics' FileInspect sidebar gadget. It's a handy way to see how much of your RAM or CPU is being used by the programs you have running. The gadget can display 1, 3, 5, or 10 items at a time and you can also tweak the update interval. You'll likely have more than 10 ...

I'm not sure when the last time was that I needed to dig through my start menu. Between the Windows 7 Super Bar and the search box Vista added, there are just easier ways for me to find and launch programs. Still, for some of my customers, friends, and family, the newer menus are just a distraction. They were fine with Windows XP's interface, and they might not want to be bothered learning ...

A number of message boards around the net have been receiving comments from users upgrading from Windows Vista to Windows 7 who have been unable to complete the upgrade install. Once the installer hits 62% complete, it locks up. You can sit and wait as long as you want, but it's not going anywhere. The problem occurs when the Windows IPv6 helper service (which allows automatic IPv6 ...

If you don't know the app, don't let its name fool you. Vista Services Optimizer is capable of more than just tuning your Windows services to squeeze out some extra performance. It also allows you to create different profiles, provides a one-touch gaming mode, can take automatic service state snapshots, and offers painless recovery of Windows default settings. Version 1.2 is also Windows 7 ...