July 2006 - Posts
I have a Palm handheld but I require some kind of mobile Internet access. I instantly ordered a HP IPAQ hx2000 which seems to be a very cool stuff. The product comes with all the required software, manuals and a getting started guide. It ships with Microsoft Pocket PC Operating System which ultimately contains pocket versions of Word, Excel, PowerPoint and also Internet Explorer and Messenger. The product instantly connects to the Internet.
I used a DLINK wireless router and a high speed broadband connection and I was able to connect to the Internet very easily. The whole browsing experience was very smooth. Moreover, the product comes with a free 128 MB SD card which you can use to increase the amount of RAM on the IPAQ
PROS - Small Size, Good applications
CONS - Too heavy, Weak Battery
I purchased PALM handheld m130 for my personal use. I found that it contains good number of applications. Moreover, the CD which ships with the device contains additional third party softwares which you can install on the handheld. The device syncs very well with PC. The product comes with the required manuals and driver CD's to help you get start with it.
A big disadvantage with this product is that its battery life doesn't exist too longer even after a full charge. It has to be charged every 30 minutes or so. I also resetted the device several times. You cannot connect to the Internet using the handheld and I feel that if you invest certain amount of cash then you can buy a good pocket PC with all features. But the handheld will be useful if you plan to use it for short term and hobby purposes.
PRONS - Compact samll sharp lens, fits on monitors top
CONS - None
I found that logitech web camera is an excellent product for home users. They cab use the camera along with Yahoo and MSN messengers.It can also be used with NewMeeting software of Microsoft. The product is USB compatible and it will stand firm on monitors top. The camera doesn't captures those snaps surrounded with dark light.
You should ensure the availability of adequate lighting on your room. The product comes with driver CD's and manuals. I didn't found any drawbacks with this product. But I found that the pictures are little dark even they are captured with good lighting.
Printing is an essential task in our day today computing life and a good printer is a must. I've had tested several other printers before checking HP Printer. I must say that HP DeskJet 3325 prints with perfection. I purchased the printer 2 years back along with my new PC and I am still using it without changing the catridge.
However, catridge life depends upon how often you undertakes printing activity. The printer ships with a driver CD and manuals and it works smoothly with Windows XP Professional. I faced occassional paper jamming problems but I resolved them easily by contacting HP live support and performing the task as per their directions.
PROS: Leight Weight
CONS: No USB Port Available
Canon Scanner is a great way to capture paper images. The product ships with the required driver CD's and manuals. The CD comes with cool applications for scanning pictures. The scanner connects to a parallel port.
One of the main disadvantages of this scanner is that it takes too much time to scan a picture. It also consumes lot of system resources thereby making the PC slower. The PC becomes slow during the scanning process. The scanned pictures can be easily reshaped according to your needs. Overall, canon scanner is a perfect way to digitize your pictures.
PROS - Easy to use, Message Archive feature, Photo Embedding
CONS - None Noted
If you are looking for a messaging software then look no further and download Yahoo messenger. It is simple to use. The download process is little tricky as you have to connect to the net for about 20-30 minutes in order to properly install the software. Once you have downloaded the product you can use it by using a yahoo login and password. Your current yahoo e-mail username and password will be sufficient. I found that the signup time will take not les than 5 seconds during morning time and 20 seconds during evening.
An interesting feature of Yahoo Messenger is that you can store the messages by activating its message archive feature. This is not enabled by default. I think it will be due to privacy reasons. I instantly enabled this feature as I don't have to copy down important points during a chat conversation.
I can just access them at another day when required. Another interesting feature to note is that the product ships with around 100 cool emotions. You can also add audibles and IM Environments to your conversation. Overall, Yahoo Messenger is an excellent messaging system developed for hobbyists and customers.
PROS - Ability to voice chat, Messenger Enabled
CONS - No much features for messenger, less emoticons
This product is really cool becuase of its ability to simultaneously chat and phone over Internet. You can speak with your friends, customers using a shype ID. The installation process took less than 5 minutes.
After installation you have to signup for a ID. It is rather a simple process. I very much liked its phone feature as I could speak with my friends without a phone call. Also the cost involved with Internet Telephony is comparitively less than traditional phone. The voice was very smooth using a cable broadband connectivity and was without any interruptions. I hope developers will add more features in the future versions of this wonderful product.
PROS - Catches and Fixes all viruses Instantly, Automatic Update of Definitions via web
CONS - Expires after one year of use (even in paid version)
Norton AntiVirus is an excellent virus removal tool. The package ships with a CD and a manual. The installation process will take less than 5-10 minute on a Pentium 4 system. You can easily update the virus definitions with a single click of a button. One problem which I noticed is that the update process is little slower than other antivirus systems.
The main disadvantage of this product is that it expires after 1 year of installation even if you purchase it by paying cash. I had paid for it and now it expired and hence I cannot use it again. You have to pay a yearly subscription fees which I feel is of not much worth when there are free antivirus packages available on the market.
PROS - Easy to use, Beautiful Skins
CONS - Too small Controls and buttons
WinAmp is a music player software. It is free and comes in different flavours. The product can be easily downloaded and installed within 5 minutes. One of the interesting point to note is that a set of songs from a particular folder can be added to the playlist and the songs will be automatically played one by one.
WinAmp should be invisible on the taskbar and should appear as an icon on the right side when minimized as done in other softwares. I hope this will be implementd in the next version of WinAmp.
I would prefer a software which minimizes to the TskBar upon clicking the Minimize button.
PROS - Light weight, Easy to use
CONS - Annoying Popups
I would highly recommend WinZip if you ask me for a file compression software. It's lightweight and easy to use. I downloaded the software within 5 minutes using a broadband connection and completed the installation within another 2 minutes.
The usage of this product is self explanatory although it comes with help files. The product also shows a Tip at the beginning of the product loading is a useful feature. You need to right click a folder and chhose add to zip. That's it. You can attach the compresses ZIP files through email but the only point to note is that your receipient require a stable internet connection to download the file. Otherwise, they can't be able to open or extract the files.
I found that the product gives disturbing popups at the end of the trial period. Even though its interface is pretty good and nice, I am still searching for a new ZIP tool. I hope I will get it soon.
PROS - Easy to use and learn, MSDN library included
CONS - Takes too much time for installation, consumes huge disk space
Developers are always on a look out for new development products from Microsoft. One such cool product is Visual Studio .NET 2003. It's named as Enterprise Atchitect because it includes more features than Standard and Professional editions. It comes in a had box with the required CD's, manuals and a getting started kit. It also comes with MSDN Library.
The installation process took around 45 minutes on a P4 machine with 512 MB RAM. You can pick your option during the course of its installation. For example, I didn't installed Visual C++ .NET by unchecking the box. Visual Studio .NET 2003 also comes with templates for Crystal Reports.
The advantages of this development tool is that you can develop robust Windows and Web applications using Microsoft's .NET Framework. It ships with tons of new controls and samples. You can also install the samples during the installation process.
The disadvantage of VS.NET 2003 is that it consumes lot of disk space. So you cannot install this in old computers.
Overall, VS.NET 2003 is a mush have tool for every serious .NET developer.
PROS - Easy to use, Very useful for developers and administrators
CONS - NONE
Windows XP professional is an extension to the Windows XP home edition. It completely removes the disadvantages of home edition by providing us with Interent Information Server (IIS). It also supports ASP and ASP.NET pages. ASP is available by default and ASP.NET will be available if you install Microsoft .NET Framework. You can install Visual Studio .NET and develop cool applications.
The whole installation process took around 1 hour. It depends upon your processor speed and RAM. The more the RAM the better the performance of XP professional. The OS automatically detects any new hardware.
You should bear in mind to update the OS by visiting Windows Update soon after the installation of the OS.
You can also install Windows XP SP2 on your system instead of installing the patches from the Windows Update.
The product ships with manuals which you can go through if you have any doubts.
Overall, Windows XP professional is an operating system meant for developers and experienced users.
PROS - Easy to use and learn
CONS - Not useful for developers
Windows XP home is an operating system designed and developed for home computing users. The product ships with a manual and the required CD's. The installation process depends upon your processor speed. I installed it on my toshiba laptop within 30 minutes.
Windows XP is a cool product. It's interface is different from its previous counterparts. The start menu looks great and the speed is very good as compared to Windows 98.
The internet can be connected within minutes. It automatically detects any new hardware without any problems. You can create users very easily from the new control panel.
It's help system is also good compared to Windows 98. So also the search facility. Windows XP home ships with all the eseential tools and applications to get start with. Tools such as Scan Disk, Disk Defragmenter, System restore are very useful. It also comes with Piant, WordPad and the popular NotePad.
The big disadvatage of Windows XP home is that it cannot be used for developing softwares and .NET applications. It does not support .NET completely.
Hence, Windows XP home can be used only for non developmental tasks.
Office XP is an excellent product which can be used for the purpose of office automation. It ships with all the essential applications such as Microsoft Word (For writing/editing documents), Microsoft Excel (For Mathematical Calculations), PowerPoint (For creating Presentations), Access (Database tool), FrontPage (For WebPage creation).
Word XP is packed with all the features for creating/editing documents. Various book authors, publishers are taking advantage of its comments feature to track editing and reviews.
FrontPage XP doesn't ships with the support for creating ASP.NET pages. I hope the next version of Office will ship with the support for developing ASP.NET pages. From my point of view, FrontPage is a cool and lightweight product for WebPage creation. Developers can make use of all the features included with the HTML in FrontPage.
Powerpoint XP is an excellent presentation product. You can create presentations for any purpose. You can spice up your presentations by adding effects, sounds and much more. The product ships with a manual with which you can learn Microsoft Office XP if you are a beginner.
I would like to say that the product disappeared so quickly and Office 2003 was released within 1 year of the release of this product. Sadly, Office XP didn't created any interest among users.
Microsoft has posted information regarding Imagine Cup winners. The participants demonstrated their products live to Bill Gates.
http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/events/imaginecup/gallery.mspx
I was in search for a good antivirus software ever since the expiry of my Norton AntiVirus edition. I've heard of AVG and decided to try this antivirus first. The download took only 10-15 minutes with a cable broadband connection. You will have to run an update after its installation and it will not take less than 10 minutes. It comes with various tools such as Resident Shield, E-mail Scanner, Scheduler and much more. It automatically installs any updates depending upon the schedule you've given. I was previously using Norton and it slowed down my System very much. With AVG, my system runs faster and moreover scanning system runs in the background. It also detected few viruses while I was downloading e-mails few days back. I can't imagine a day without AVG anti virus. I'm planning to install this on my laptop as well because of its excellent performance.
I would highly recommend this anti virus for all users and a million thanks for the developers.
I just received an email that I've won the 5'th prize at Community-Credit.com. I've won a Mock-U-Rapper toy. I think the site is doing a great job in promoting the contributions of people worldwide.
Keep it up - Community-Credit.com
PROS - Easy to download, install. Removes and cleans all kinds of spywares
CONS - The product will expire after certain time
Actually, I was fed up with lot of third party firewalls. They didn't removed all spywares from my system thus causing lot of problems. PopUpwindows will frequently appear thus disturbing work. It was at this time Microsoft released its antispyware tool and I must say that this tool really rocks. It instantly removed all spywares (around 30) from my system within 15 minutes. Moreover, you can schedule the tool to run during specific time every day. The tool will perform an automatic update whenever it detects new definition of spyware. I highly recommned this tool to everybody and I hope that this will be a number one product and will surely beat others in spyware tools marketplace.
Even though the product is now expired and available as Windows Defender, I still use the product which I installed one year back and it checks each and every spywares.
PROS - Easy installation, Free version available
CONS - None
Nowadays firewalls are a must for every PC. There are around dozen threats being reported everyday and it is important for you to protect yourselves from intruders and hackers. Windows firewall which ships with Windows are not much effective. AZone alarm is an excellent alternative. I didn't experience any trouble during the installtion of the product and the process was smooth. A wizard will help you to configure the software. You can even checkout the professional version for 15 days or you can choose free version. An interesting point to note is that free version doesn't include all the features of pro version but is is sufficient for hoem users. Pro version can be opted by administrators. You can allow access to programs by using its built-in feature. There are different kinds of access levels which you will see from the configuration screen. I very much liked its logging utility. It shows the logs of each and every attack on your system. Overall, this product is a must have for every serious interent user. Last but not the elast, prevention is beetr than cure and hence install a reliable firewall such as Zone Alarm and guard yourselves against hackers.