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

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Vista's 1st Birthday..

The Delivery From the point where I knew that Vista RTM was on its way, I had a nerve wracking time in MS Connect. I had already downloaded Office 2007 earlier in the day, and was now pacing the floor, continually stopping at the screen to see if Vista...

Published Wed, Nov 21 2007 12:58 by Mike Hall

Filed under: Vista, XP, drivers, Hardware, software, compatibility, SP1, Windows
EMERGENCY, EMERGENCY.. MACHINE DOWN!!!.. BREAK OUT THE BACKUPS..

Prologue Wait up. I hear voices in the wind. ".... I didn't know how to work the program... nobody told me I had to do it... I didn't have any blank CD/DVDs... my friend who is a computer expert told me that it was unnecessary.. I never read...

Published Sat, Nov 24 2007 11:37 by Mike Hall

Filed under: Vista, XP, Hardware, software, general tip, Windows, System Recovery
Office 2007 SP1..

... is now ready for download. You can also get Visio 2007 and Project 2007 service packs too. Office 2007 SP1 may require a reboot, presumably dependant upon version is installed, but Visio and project do not. http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/downloads...

Published Tue, Dec 11 2007 16:51 by Mike Hall

Filed under: Office, software, SP1
Wireless Networking Part 2c..

The good news is that D-Link Inc have every intention of releasing a Vista driver for the venerable DWL G132 USB LAN adapter............................ eventually. I would have posted the part of the e-mail I received that discloses this information...

Published Tue, Feb 20 2007 8:49 by Mike Hall

Filed under: Vista, networks, drivers
Windows Live Messenger 8.1 (beta)

Vista users seem to be experiencing problems with Windows Live Messenger 8.1. From what I can gather, it is attributable to two things; DEP and Adobe Flash. So, what to do next.. Mary Jo Foley of ZDNet has this on her website.. The Microsoft-suggested...

Published Fri, Mar 2 2007 7:16 by Mike Hall

Filed under: Vista
The Operating System War - A Conflict Without End..

Which OS do you use? Do you use it out of choice or because it came pre-installed? If it wasn't pre-installed, would you have the general know how and technical ability to install your own OS? Some of you would make it work but, for many, the 'out...

Published Sun, Apr 27 2008 14:37 by Mike Hall

Filed under: Windows, General, Linux
Mosaic changed your life..

.. even if you were not a computer user back in 1993/4. It was the first browser to incorporate pictures into a browser view. The picture above shows the 'Windows' version which did not come available until 1994, being released for the Mac and...

Published Thu, Feb 28 2008 11:44 by Mike Hall

Filed under: IE7, networks, Political, General
Need for Speed - Vista vs XP

I now have conclusive proof that Vista is 'apparently' every bit as fast as XP.. For all of these tests, I followed exactly the same procedures each time. The installations are on individual drives in the same machine, not set up as dual boot...

Published Mon, Mar 3 2008 10:14 by Mike Hall

Filed under: Vista, XP, Windows, General
Do you need Vista?

A good question, and the answer is a resounding 'YES'. Increased security is a must these days. Forget the older operating systems. Windows 3.1 and 95 are no longer relevant. Most home users of these operating systems never connected to the outside world...

Published Sun, Mar 18 2007 8:13 by Mike Hall

Filed under: Vista, XP, Hardware, software, compatibility
Clean and learn..

Remember 'First Aid', 'RegClean', or 'CleanSweep', 'Norton System Doctor', or 'Nuts n Bolts'? If you were a Windows 9x tinkerer, you might. The idea behind them was to aid the computer user in case of problems,...

Published Wed, Dec 26 2007 23:36 by Mike Hall

Filed under: Vista, XP, general tip, Windows, Utilities, System Recovery
Defragmenting without the tears..

For those of you who are suffering withdrawal since the Vista backroom boys took away the visual part of defragmentation, you can come out now. The nice people at Diskeeper Corporation have just what you need, and prices start from only $29.95 for the...

Published Thu, Feb 7 2008 15:47 by Mike Hall

Filed under: Vista, XP, software, Windows, Utilities
Ultimate Defrag.. Ultimate fun..

What can be more fun than watching a 'Roomba' in action, windshield wipers clearing rain, clothes swishing around in a front loading wash machine or dryer. Ask your pet dog or cat. As members of the genus 'Homo Sapiens', we are above this...

Published Thu, Sep 11 2008 11:31 by Mike Hall

Filed under: Vista, XP, Windows, Utilities
Et Tu, AVG?

Version 8.0 Is NOT compatible with SpywareBlaster or Spybot 'immunize' features. The AVG people are well aware of this and sent this e-mail to a user in response to problems encountered, suggesting the following actions.. Dear Sir/Madam, According...

Published Fri, May 9 2008 10:09 by Mike Hall

Filed under: Vista, XP, Spyware, compatibility, Windows, Utilities, General
Setting Up An e-mail Account..

.. with your Internet Service Provider is easy. All you have to do is call ISP support, and a 'technician' will walk you through the process. Whether you are using Windows Mail, Outlook Express, Outlook, Thunderbird, Entourage or whatever, calling...

Published Sun, May 11 2008 9:40 by Mike Hall

Filed under: Vista, XP, Windows, General, Mail
Security Update for OS Microsoft Windows?

Yet another feeble attempt to mess up my computer. In this e-mail, the creator/sender has not even tried to make it look like an official Microsoft message. These boys are getting lazy.. :-) The reference in the e-mail text below is to this helpful update...

Published Sun, Oct 12 2008 13:31 by Mike Hall

Filed under: Vista, XP, Windows, General, Security
Why is Windows the #1 operating system on the PC platform?

If you answer 'because Microsoft forces the manufacturers to make us have it', you are wrong. Microsoft Windows was a natural progression out of MS-DOS which IBM elected to have after something of a snub by Digital Research many years ago. It...

Published Thu, Oct 23 2008 14:26 by Mike Hall

Filed under: Windows, General
Ultramon.. Dual Screen Functionality..

Some you lose.. One of the most annoying events in a computer users life is losing features when upgrading to the latest and greatest OS. When I moved up to Vista from XP, my Canon scanner still retained full support because Canon were good enough to...

Published Sun, Oct 26 2008 16:15 by Mike Hall

Filed under: Vista, XP, Windows, Review, Utilities, General
Spammers, you are wasting your time..

I am not in the market for a fake Rolex watch. I have a perfectly good 20 year old Casio digital watch good for depths of 200 metres, thanks very much, and it keeps perfect time. Replacement batteries and straps have cost me more than the original watch...

Published Tue, Aug 26 2008 13:54 by Mike Hall

Filed under: General, Security
Wi-Fi Security - Queen to WPA.. Checkmate..

In the beginning, nobody really cared Then we heard that wireless Internet and networks could be intercepted So we all set up WEP encryption Last year, WEP Wi-Fi encryption was cracked in under a minute So we all moved to WPA encryption This year, WPA...

Published Fri, Nov 7 2008 13:52 by Mike Hall

Filed under: Windows, General, Security
64bit + Canon Lide 30 + Vuescan 8.5

It works, and I should be really pleased, and I was until I clicked on ‘Purchase now’. There are two versions of Vuescan: standard or professional. Pricing is essentially half the price of a new scanner, or almost full price of a new scanner. To offset...

Published Wed, Mar 25 2009 11:25 by Mike Hall

Filed under: Hardware, Windows

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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

Vista's 1st Birthday..

EMERGENCY, EMERGENCY.. MACHINE DOWN!!!.. BREAK OUT THE BACKUPS..

Office 2007 SP1..

Wireless Networking Part 2c..

Windows Live Messenger 8.1 (beta)

The Operating System War - A Conflict Without End..

Mosaic changed your life..

Need for Speed - Vista vs XP

Do you need Vista?

Clean and learn..

Defragmenting without the tears..

Ultimate Defrag.. Ultimate fun..

Et Tu, AVG?

Setting Up An e-mail Account..

Security Update for OS Microsoft Windows?

Why is Windows the #1 operating system on the PC platform?

Ultramon.. Dual Screen Functionality..

Spammers, you are wasting your time..

Wi-Fi Security - Queen to WPA.. Checkmate..

64bit + Canon Lide 30 + Vuescan 8.5