January 2012 - Mike's Window

Mike's Window

A commonly held 'view.. '

"Well, it worked in Windows 95!"

MVP Award years

2005 - 2006 - 2007

2008 - 2009 - 2010

2011 - 2012 - 2013

The original MVP logo

My Favourite Utilities

Speedfan is a great hardware monitor which can automatically control fan speeds, warn when temperatures are rising in the case, and do a SMART scan of your hard drives. A 'must have'.. http://www.almico.com/speedfan.php

Piriform Speccy tells you what is inside the box and with great accuracy.. http://www.piriform.com/speccy

Networx shows download/upload bandwidth used.. http://www.softperfect.com/products/networx/

Piriform Recuva is probably the best file recovery utility around and is free too.. http://www.piriform.com/recuva

Treesize shows you what you have got, where it is, and how much space it is all using.. http://www.jam-software.com/freeware/index.shtml

Windows 8 alternative start menus.. Classic Shell.. http://classicshell.sourceforge.net/

Stardock Start8.. http://www.stardock.com/products/start8/

EaseUS Partition Manager is the best free utility of its type.. http://www.partition-tool.com/download.htm

YoWindow, a weather utility which appears to work with the Windows 8 desktop.. http://yowindow.com/

My Favourite Gadgets - Windows 7 and Vista only..

Gas Buddy.. http://www.londongasprices.com/VistaGadget.aspx

NetMeter.. http://addgadget.com/

Network Monitor.. http://samwtucker.com/

Asst'd gadgets.. http://gallery.djinngo.com/gallery/index.html

Weather fun.. http://yowindow.com/

Syndication

Blog Archive List

Sort by: Most Recent | Most Viewed | Most Commented

Laptop cooling

The user of the Toshiba L500 laptop on the home network recently reported that it was getting a little hot for laptop use. Needless to say, it did not take too long to ascertain that the single cooling fan had ceased to turn, Airflow through the exhaust...

Published Mon, Jan 30 2012 12:38 by Mike Hall

Filed under: Hardware, Cooling
Apple on the block..

I see that Apple are being criticised for getting products made overseas by what we see as slave labour. As bad as it seems for Chinese workers on the electronics production lines, it is probably a better life than they would otherwise get. I know that...

Published Fri, Jan 27 2012 14:25 by Mike Hall
Consumer preview?

This is what the next release of Windows 8 is being called. Uh-oh.. does this mean that Windows 8 is pretty much already written in stone just as Windows 7 was at the ‘beta’ stage? More than a few hardened beta testers were not happy to receive “we may...

Published Tue, Jan 24 2012 20:59 by Mike Hall
The best anti-virus..

.. is the one that can be installed and forgotten about thereafter. For home users, Microsoft Security Essentials is best and this is why.. Of all anti-virus programs that I have tried, it is the least invasive. It can be like this because it works in...

Published Mon, Jan 23 2012 11:16 by Mike Hall

Filed under: Security, Windows 7, My Opinion
Readying for Windows 8 Beta.

While I was looking into the kernel power error, I did some work on tidying the cables inside, essentially to free up a SATA power cable for the drive that will hold the Windows 8 beta. I have a Seagate 160gb SATA drive which has been pushed through tests...

Published Sat, Jan 21 2012 21:39 by Mike Hall

Filed under: Hardware, Humour, Windows 8
Kernel power error revisited

All within the space of around three hours.. Yes, it happened again.. This time, I cleaned out all of the fans and closed the covers.. And again it happened.. So this time I removed the filter between the case and the power supply.. And again it happened...

Published Tue, Jan 17 2012 13:10 by Mike Hall

Filed under: Hardware, general tip, Performance, Annoyances
CES..

I read somewhere that CES may not exist come 2015. Microsoft are making their last performance right now. Apple isn’t there. Others will follow. There is always a lot of hype for these shows, but does anybody care other than your local friendly technophobe...

Published Sat, Jan 14 2012 9:13 by Mike Hall

Filed under: Other stuff, My Opinion
An article on touchscreens..

It brings up some interesting points: http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9223361/The_hidden_dangers_of_touchscreens?taxonomyId=15&pageNumber=1 I wouldn’t say that they were ‘hidden’ dangers though. maybe some just not completely obvious. What...

Published Wed, Jan 11 2012 18:04 by Mike Hall

Filed under: Hardware, General, My Opinion
Warranties..

If you haven’t already heard, Seagate and Western Digital have reduced the warranty period somewhat. It will affect home users most. Seagate are keeping ‘mission critical’ enterprise drives as they are but hybrids and Constellation 2’s will reduce from...

Published Mon, Jan 9 2012 13:29 by Mike Hall
Caring for a notebook/netbook..

OK, so Santa gave you a new notebook or netbook for Christmas. Cute, eh.. It will not be cute for long if you don’t care for it properly. Cleaning the outside case and the keyboard area. Either buy a kit form your local computer store, or put together...

Published Sat, Jan 7 2012 18:00 by Mike Hall

Filed under: general tip, My Opinion
Groove GFS Stub Execution Hook..

I can find out very little about what this is. I do know that it installs along with Microsoft Office. I now know that if it is removed from Start-up, it will send my machine into spasm. CPU activity stays at around 65% and will not go down. A ‘system...

Published Fri, Jan 6 2012 14:08 by Mike Hall

Filed under: Office, Performance, Annoyances
FrontPage and the dreaded FPSE’s - You can finally leave them behind..

Microsoft’s FrontPage in it’s various guises has been a godsend for many people. It has enabled wannabe website owners to create something reasonably meaningful without having to learn the conventions of HTML, PNP or any of the other obscure conventions...

Published Thu, Jan 5 2012 11:18 by Mike Hall

Filed under: Expression Web, FrontPage, Websites
It’s 2012..

Coming this year.. The end of the world, according to the Mayan calendar.. More touchy, swipey junk in the form of smartphones, tablets etc.. Windows 8 beta, and the end of the Microsoft Windows desktop operating systems as we have known and loved/hated...

Published Sun, Jan 1 2012 10:50 by Mike Hall

Filed under: General, Lifecycle

January 2012 - Mike's Window

A commonly held 'view.. '

MVP Award years

The original MVP logo

My Favourite Utilities

My Favourite Gadgets - Windows 7 and Vista only..

Links

Syndication

Recent Posts

Tags

Archives

Blog Archive List

Laptop cooling

Apple on the block..

Consumer preview?

The best anti-virus..

Readying for Windows 8 Beta.

Kernel power error revisited

CES..

An article on touchscreens..

Warranties..

Caring for a notebook/netbook..

Groove GFS Stub Execution Hook..

FrontPage and the dreaded FPSE’s - You can finally leave them behind..

It’s 2012..