Jeff Alexander has some great instructions on how to setup a USB flash drive so that you can install Windows 7 from it.
I wonder if the same instructions work for XP and/or Vista…?
Archive for the 'Software Tips' Category
Avery Dennison, the big office supply company, has an excellent service that lets you receive templates for their products by email.
Have you ever bought a package of labels or business cards, and then spent too much time in Word trying to figure out how to lay them out. If you email templates@averydennison.com with the product number in the subject line (nothing else in the subject line, nothing in the body of the message), within a few minutes you’ll receive a template via email.
For instance, the 3 1/2″ Diskette Labels is product 8196. I sent the following message…
… and got this back …
A friend of mine was telling me about an environmentally friendly font, and it sounded like a hoax, but sure enough, there is such a thing. Apparently some people have developed a font that has “holes” in it, and therefore uses less ink. This is supposed to be better for the environment. Appropriately enough, it’s called Ecofont.
From PC Magazine:
We know that Vista takes some getting used to—new translucent interfaces, constant security prompts, and Sidebar gadgets, oh my!—but you can’t live in the shadow of Windows XP for much longer. With a little hand holding, we can make your Vista experience smoother (and more beguiling) than ever. Here are 198 tips and tricks to get the most out of Windows Vista.
From PCWorld.ca:
Is your PC tired and sluggish? Has its get up and go got up and went? If you want a faster system, you could certainly break the bank and buy a new machine. Or you could read this article instead.
We’ve found 50 downloads that will make your PC run more quickly and smoothly, help you use the Internet more effectively, and push Windows to work at optimum speed with the interface you want, not what Microsoft gave you.
PCWorld.ca had an article about how to do things faster on your computer:
22 smarter, more efficient ways to make short work of common tech tasks–from reinstalling Windows to crushing spyware to setting up a Web site.
I used to use AVG on my computer, but then learned about Avira Antivir. There is a free version of this which apparently is the best/most effective free antivirus out there. The only drawback is that every day there is a huge pop-up asking you to buy the full product. I did a quick search and came across a document that explains how to stop the “notify” program from running. I haven’t tried it yet, but I link to it for your reference…
There are lots of free image recovery software titles out there. I couldn’t figure out how companies could still be charging for their products when the free ones are great. Lexar was one of those companies still selling, but for now (I don’t know if it is permanent), they are offering their product for free if you purchase one of their memory cards. However, the link is open to all:
Product Highlights
- Recovers photo, video, and audio files from any brand or type of memory card, using any card reader
- Recovers popular file formats, including JPEG, TIFF, RAW, MP4, AVI, and more
- Redesigned interface and simple recovery process
- Live online chat link to Lexar support engineers
- Includes card reformatting, secure deletion, and overall card health check features
- Works with PC or Mac
From Download Squad:
What could be better than a program that will convert audio, video, and image files from and to just about any format you can think of? How about one that does it all batch-style with minimal clicking? FormatFactory doesn’t care what files you want to swap in what order, just feed it your sources and watch it go to work. Unlike a lot of similar apps, this one doesn’t limit you to only video or audio, or even to one file at a time.Dump in as much as you want of whatever you want, and FormatFactory will do all the heavy lifting. It even supports the iPhone and PSP, and 3GP as well – making it a great way to cram multiformat goodness onto your favorite portable player.
This posting is from almost a month ago, and I finally got around to trying it last night. It’s great! It converted a video for me in just a few seconds. I also tried a WAV to MP3 converstion and it only took a few seconds as well.
None of the download links on the site itself worked, so I did a search for the program and found it easily.
The latest issue of Windows Secrets newsletter had some information about driver update software. Several paid products were mentioned, but RadarSync has a free version. I’ve tried it and it seems to work well enough. There isn’t much to say about it other than it determines what hardware you have, the current driver version, and it then checks to see if there are updated drivers. I ran it on my desktop and laptop, and it did find drivers that were not the most current.
Recent Comments