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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

ATI drivers for the HD 4000,3000, 2000

There is a new driver, dated 20/1/2013, on the ATI driver support page.. http://support.amd.com/us/gpudownload/windows/Legacy/Pages/legacy-radeonaiw-vista64.aspx I wish that I had a snapshot of the driver page when Windows 8 appeared. It was obvious that...

Published Wed, Jan 23 2013 8:18 by Mike Hall

Filed under: Windows 7, Windows 8, Device drivers
Windows 8 file options - Copy and Move..

Now, I know that it is possible to drag and drop files across open folders, but it can be awkward and messy, especially on smaller screens like the type found on laptops and Netbooks. So, early versions of Windows had functions within the right click...

Published Wed, Jan 2 2013 10:59 by Mike Hall

Filed under: Utilities, General, Windows 7, Windows 8
Ménage à trois .. Which side are you on?

Linux and Mac supporters can stand down. It’s not that you don’t count, even if you actually don’t, so don’t take offence. Windows is now pitching against Windows. In one corner is Windows XP, stable and fast but not slick and...

Published Thu, Dec 6 2012 21:21 by Mike Hall

Filed under: General, Windows 7, Windows 8, Windows XP
Somebody has left the building..

Steve Sinofsky is no longer an employee of Microsoft. Apart from being there for two decades, his greatest claim to fame was Windows 7 which was delivered on time and working. Take up was huge, and it has been an unmitigated success. Until recently, it...

Published Fri, Nov 16 2012 19:02 by Mike Hall

Filed under: Windows 7, Windows 8
Can’t wait for Windows 8?

You should be so lucky. I have it but can’t get it to run particularly well. I hooked up the Windows 8 drive today, and I knew it was 8 because that is how many minutes elapsed before it was usable. I uninstalled Start8 and installed Classic Shell in...

Published Sat, Oct 13 2012 22:07 by Mike Hall

Filed under: Windows 7, Windows 8
Remember the Vista/XP problems?

I do and only too well. If both were installed on the same machine, shadow copies and restore points would disappear daily. It is what forced me to go to Vista full time and dump XP. This time, the decision is not so clear cut because moving entirely...

Published Wed, Oct 10 2012 10:38 by Mike Hall

Filed under: Windows 7, Windows 8
Windows 7 and 8 do NOT like to co-exist..

All hard drives checkout as ok, and Windows 7 runs flawlessly, boots flawlessly, and does everything else flawlessly UNTIL Windows 8 is introduced to the system. Even when I had Windows 8 in VirtualBox, it still played up a bit but only affected itself...

Published Tue, Oct 9 2012 9:25 by Mike Hall

Filed under: Windows 7, Windows 8
Is the PC really dead?

I was listening to a local radio show a couple of days ago where there was a discussion about the use of smart phones and tablets/iPads. Some didn’t know that email sources can be turned OFF, say from a work account such that they did not become a menace...

Published Sun, Sep 2 2012 17:19 by Mike Hall

Filed under: Windows 7, Windows 8, PC
Windows 8 - back on the shelf..

Everything is back to normal, as in Windows 7 normal. I kept working with Windows 8 for some three hours after I posted the previous blog post, but I still couldn’t justify the losses and the awkwardness. They said that anything which would run...

Published Sat, Aug 18 2012 14:40 by Mike Hall

Filed under: Windows 7, Windows 8
Windows 8-balled?

OK.. Stuff that still works.. All of the internal hardware Existing peripheral devices Networx Winpatrol Stuff that doesn’t work or is a pain All of my stress reducer games The traditional Windows games which are now only accessible via the UI formerly...

Published Fri, Aug 17 2012 19:29 by Mike Hall

Filed under: compatibility, Windows 7, Windows 8
Windows Gadgets are bad.. allegedly

A while ago, Microsoft removed many of the gadgets from Gadget Gallery because it wanted to encourage the writing of APPS in readiness for Windows 8. Now we are told that gadgets are bad and always have been…two sources of many.. http://nakedsecurity...

Published Sun, Jul 15 2012 9:00 by Mike Hall

Filed under: Windows 7, Windows 8, Gadgets
Benchmarks.. 7 vs 8

It isn’t all about raw speed, and the boot up time for Windows 8 is faster to Metro, but still takes a little time to set up the desktop if that is where you are going.. http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0%2c2817%2c2406668%2c00.asp It still doesn’t alter...

Published Wed, Jul 11 2012 17:51 by Mike Hall

Filed under: Windows 7, Windows 8
Windows 8 RTM..

Some good news for those who have to run the latest, if not always greatest, operating system… http://windowsteamblog.com/windows/b/bloggingwindows/archive/2012/07/02/upgrade-to-windows-8-pro-for-39-99.aspx Microsoft really wants to push Windows 8, and...

Published Mon, Jul 2 2012 18:03 by Mike Hall

Filed under: Windows 7, Windows 8
CHKDSK errors again..

Windows 8 RP has to go because it is not safe for me to boot into it. Until Windows 8 RTM appears, I will remove it and try again on a brand new SATA when the time comes. I may even save my cash and wipe out C, replacing it with Windows 8. I don’t care...

Published Tue, Jun 26 2012 22:23 by Mike Hall

Filed under: Windows 7, Windows 8
No desktop start menu.. Absolutely no desktop start menu..

.. is still a major issue for many people. Almost every reply in forums and e-zine articles about Windows 8 centres on the lack of a desktop Start, and the response of some that we need to get a life is reducing fast. Some article writers tell us that...

Published Mon, Jun 11 2012 12:26 by Mike Hall

Filed under: Windows 7, Windows 8
Windows 8.. Who will want it?

Paul Thurrott doesn’t think that business users will.. http://www.winsupersite.com/article/windows8/microsoft-windows-8-businesses-143238 And he suspects that Microsoft know this already. You can read his reasoning in the link above. My older clients...

Published Sat, Jun 2 2012 21:46 by Mike Hall

Filed under: Windows 7, Windows 8
Windows 8 RP - WARNINGS x 2

Warning #1 - Straight from the MSDN download section.. “Important: If you decide to go back to your previous operating system, you'll need to reinstall it from the recovery or installation media that came with your PC, which is typically...

Published Fri, Jun 1 2012 12:28 by Mike Hall

Filed under: Windows 7, Windows 8, Defragmenters
Pssssttt..

There is a Quick launch toolbar on Windows 8 but keep it quiet in case MS take it out as they did the hack to dump the Metro-o-o-o interface. Between this and Vi-Start or Start-X, Windows 8 might approach being a desktop OS after all. Vi-Start and Start...

Published Fri, May 4 2012 0:04 by Mike Hall

Filed under: Windows 7, My Opinion, Windows 8
Windows 7 vs. Windows 8

There will be a mini-deluge of comparisons in a bid to make Windows 8 look better, and the most popular topic will be speed. This is the boot time result from Adrian Kingsley-Hughes’ tests recently.. taken from here.. http://www.zdnet.com/blog/hardware...

Published Fri, Apr 27 2012 10:33 by Mike Hall

Filed under: Windows 7, Windows 8
Free Skydrive upgrade..

I was an early adopter, well maybe just an early subscriber, but this offer is too good to miss.. A free upgrade from the original 7gb storage to 25gb.. http://vasudevg.blogspot.ca/2012/04/how-to-upgrade-existing-skydrive.html?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium...

Published Tue, Apr 24 2012 6:56 by Mike Hall

Filed under: Windows 7, Windows 8, Skydrive

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Browse by Tags

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

ATI drivers for the HD 4000,3000, 2000

Windows 8 file options - Copy and Move..

Ménage à trois .. Which side are you on?

Somebody has left the building..

Can’t wait for Windows 8?

Remember the Vista/XP problems?

Windows 7 and 8 do NOT like to co-exist..

Is the PC really dead?

Windows 8 - back on the shelf..

Windows 8-balled?

Windows Gadgets are bad.. allegedly

Benchmarks.. 7 vs 8

Windows 8 RTM..

CHKDSK errors again..

No desktop start menu.. Absolutely no desktop start menu..

Windows 8.. Who will want it?

Windows 8 RP - WARNINGS x 2

Pssssttt..

Windows 7 vs. Windows 8

Free Skydrive upgrade..