AddictiveTips » win7

Measure Your LAN Speed/Bandwidth With LAN Speed Test

Aun — Mon, 24 Aug 2009 22:20:23 +0000

If you are looking for a tool to check network speed, then try the useful Local Area Network speed tester, LAN Speed Test, it is an easy-to-use portable utility which helps you accurately measure the LAN speed.

Its working mechanism is very simple, it writes a file to a particular folder (you will specify this file and folder along with the file size as well), then clears the windows file cache and reads the file back then clears the cache again, deletes the file, and displays the results. It is a very light-weight application as when running, it consumes even less than 1 MB of memory.

Just download it from the link mentioned at the end of the post and run the executable file. Then specify the location for the write file and click the Start button in order to initiate the LAN speed test. Once completed, you will get useful speed statistics about your network.

Download LAN Speed Test

According to the developer’s web site, it works on windows 98SE, Windows ME, Windows 2000, Windows 2003, Windows XP & Windows Vista, but we tested it successfully on Windows 7 as well. Enjoy!

Maintain And Optimize Your Windows With Perfect Utilities

Aun — Sat, 22 Aug 2009 13:20:43 +0000

Perfect Utilities helps you keep your system running smoothly and improves the overall performance. It is basically system utilities suite which contains many easy-to-use tools to help you optimize your computer and fix problems like slow speed, blue screen, deadlock errors, etc, thus it plays an important role in maintaining the system stability and security. It combines more than 20 system tools and has a very user-friendly interface.

Update: As the commenter points out below, the latest version(i.e 3.0) of this tool contains spyware/malware. So which optimizer should you use? You can try out Advanced SystemCare and Comodo System Cleaner. Also you have a look at Complete System TuneUp.

The set of tools are divided into categories, you can click on any of the category button in the left side menu and the related tools will be listed in the main window. The commonly used and most popular tools in this suit are Junk File Cleaner, Registry Cleaner, Disk Cleaner, Memory Optimizer, System Information, Registry Backup Tool, File Encryption Tool, Safe Uninstaller, Duplicate File Finder, File Shredder, File Recovery Tool, and Disk Defragment Tool.

Download Perfect utilities Tools

Now there is no need to install so many applications, just install Perfect Utilities and perform you daily life system maintenance operations with its available tools. It works Windows XP, Windows Server 2003/2008, Windows Vista, and Windows 7. Enjoy!

How To Enable/Disable Windows 7 System Protection

Aun — Thu, 20 Aug 2009 22:16:22 +0000

System Protection creates and saves information about your computer’s system files and settings on a regular basis, it basically creates system restore points so that you may restore your system back to an old state in case of any disaster or unwanted circumstance. To enable/disable Windows 7 System Protection, please go through the following steps.

First of all right click the Computer icon on your desktop and choose the Properties option, a new dialogue box will be displayed, here you will click the System protection option which is located in the left side menu bar.

Now, in the System Properties dialogue box, choose the disk on which you want to enable the function of System Protection. Just as an example, I have chosen D drive, click the Configure button to proceed further.

Select the option Restore system settings and previous versions of file and then click Apply, you can also limit the maximum disk space used by this feature in the Max usage option. To disable it, check Turn Off System Protection.

Click OK and the system protection feature will be enabled/disabled on the particular drive, if you want to read about system restore points then you can find some useful information here. Enjoy!

Monitor Hard Disk With DiskLight.NET

Aun — Thu, 20 Aug 2009 03:32:55 +0000

In order to achieve better performance, it is very important that you should keep an eye on the performance of your hard disk. DiskLight.NET is a small user friendly tool which tells you how busy your hard drive is by mimicking the activity of your hard drive LED light. It is a very light-weight tool and does not consume much resources(less than 1 MB of memory). It just stays in the system tray and regularly updates the status information of your hard drive.

We often look at the hard disk LED light to tell if the hard disk is busy or not, but what if your PC or Laptop is out of sight? In this way it is difficult to tell if the hard disk is busy of not. If the hard disk is under high usage, the icon in the system tray will turn red otherwise it will remain grey. Apart from mimicking the hard disk LED light, it also displays disk usage in percentage and some other important parameters like Read Bytes, Write Bytes, and Disk Queue.

Since it is still under development, it currently shows the overall disk usage of C drive which is usually the operating system drive. According to the developer, the future releases will have the ability to monitor multiple drives and report which process is actually causing a problem.

Download DiskLight.NET

It has been only tested on Windows XP, Windows Vista, and Windows 7. Enjoy!

Connection Monitoring – Monitor Incoming And Outgoing Network Connections

Aun — Thu, 20 Aug 2009 02:26:41 +0000

The analysis of your network traffic is vital, ConnectionMonitoring is a small portable tool which observes all the incoming and outgoing network traffic. It was born out of the author’s frustration to find a monitoring tool for his small home network without paying hundreds of bucks. This tool is basically designed for small networks only but can be used on medium sized networks too. Since it is a portable tool, all you need to do is run the executable file and it will start monitoring your incoming and out going internet traffic instantly.

This is ideally designed for computers that are part of a local network or are accessible over the internet, you may use it to keep track of all inbound and outbound socket connections. It shows information in the tabular format and displays your computer’s address, the protocol being used for the incoming/outgoing traffic, and the status of the connection(status may be listen, established, or timeout).

As you can see from the screenshot above, it has no buttons to control the operation. It automatically updates itself in real-time and is suitable for those people who are looking to live monitor their network.

Download ConnectionMonitoring

It works on all versions of Windows including the latest Windows 7. Enjoy!

How To Increase Icon Spacing In Windows 7

Aun — Thu, 20 Aug 2009 01:29:28 +0000

Are you looking for a way to adjust the spacing between the icons on your windows 7 desktop? In Windows 7 now it is possible to increase the space between the icons. Simply go through the following easy steps to increase or decrease the icon spacing.

First of all, right-click on the desktop, and select Personalize in the drop-down menu. The Personalization dialogue box will be displayed, here choose the Window Color option.

Now click the Advanced Appearance Settings option in the next dialogue box.

Choose Icon Spacing (Horizontal or Vertical) in the Item drop down menu.

Enter the new icon spacing size.

Click Apply to complete the configuration and that is all. Enjoy!

Scott’s Gmail Alert – A Handy Gmail Notifier

Aun — Mon, 17 Aug 2009 23:57:15 +0000

Now there is no need to keep your Gmail account or Google talk logged in all the time, Scott’s Gmail Alert is a handy tool that provides an alert whenever you receive a new email in your Gmail account. This tool stays in the system tray and once you receive an email, it opens a small notification window and by clicking the window you are taken to your Gmail account. It can monitor up to five Gmail accounts and each account can be configured to have its own color. It is very easy to send the emails directly from the Gmail Alert tool without having to login to the respective Gmail account and you may add signatures for the out going emails.

It has some rich set of features, such as, it shows the unread messages count after a particular interval, gives sound alerts for the new messages, pauses messages on screen for easier reading, sends quick emails in response to messages, etc. Upon the first launch it lets you configure your Gmail account, the first account is called the Primary account, additional accounts may be configured from the Account 2, Account 3 buttons and the alert color and alert text can be set up from Alert color and Text color buttons respectively, once done with the settings click OK and it will start monitoring your account(s) for new emails.

Alert settings can be done from the Alerts tab, Options tab lets you set common preferences, and the sound settings can be changed from the Sounds tab. You can check for its new available updated version by clicking the Updates button.

Download Scott’s Gmail Alert

It is compatible with almost all web browsers and all versions of Microsoft Windows, including the latest Windows 7. For Ubuntu users, checkgmail does the same job, Enjoy!

Setting Up Menu Delay Time in Windows 7

Aun — Mon, 17 Aug 2009 23:51:09 +0000

If the menus in your windows 7 are taking more time to pop up, then its very simple to reduce this delay. The following steps will show how we can change the amount of time it takes for a menu in Windows 7 to pop, fade, or slide open when you run the mouse pointer over it. Please note that this setting will only affect the user account that you are currently logged on into.

Open the Registry Editor by clicking Start, then type regedit and press Enter.

Now navigate to HKEY_CURRENT_USER > Control Panel > Desktop and locate the MenuShowDelay option on the main window, right click it and choose Modify.

A dialogue box will be displayed and from here the value of this parameter can be changed. Enter the new value for this parameter, this value is set in milliseconds and the default value is 400 milliseconds.

Please note that the value must be between 0 to 4000. The lower the number, the faster the response time. If you enter 0, then there will be no delay, however it is never recommended to set its value to 0. Enjoy!

MS Office, AutoCAD, PDF, PSD & TIFF Viewer And Printer

Aun — Mon, 17 Aug 2009 07:15:29 +0000

Ms Office AutoCad Pdf Psd Tiff Viewer is newly released tool that lets user view and print MS Office, AutoCad, PDF, PhotoShop and Tiff files without installing any of these software. It supports all formats of MS Office, including doc, docx, ppt, pptx, xml, xmlx, and more. Sounds awesome, right?

Various different options like Print, Flip Horizontal, Flip vertical, Flip both, Zoom In, Zoom Out, etc are given in the Control Panel. You can navigate to any particular page from Go Page option and can move to next, previous, first and last page of the document by clicking the respective buttons which are available in the control panel. There is also an option to change the background of a particular page. If you want to convert documents to different formats, then you will need to install the Document Convert Toolkit add-on(which is not free) by clicking File > Document Convert Toolkit.

Download Ms Office AutoCad Pdf Psd Tiff Viewer

It supports Windows 2000, Windows XP, Windows Server 2003 and Windows Vista. We tested it successfully on Windows 7 as well by opening MS Office 2010 documents. Enjoy!

BMPreVIEW- Free Large BMP Image Viewer

Aun — Mon, 17 Aug 2009 07:03:21 +0000

BMPreVIEW is a free user-friendly application for the fast preview of large images in the BMP format. It acts as a large BMP-image previewer for Windows which provides additional options like adding contrast, smoothing filter, region zooming, saving to file, coping to clipboard, keyboard shortcuts for all operations, and command line support.

What makes it useful is that you can scale individual fragments of the image and also it supports 24, 8 bit indexed palette with 256 colors and 1 bit monochrome image. It is very lightweight tool taking a little less than 1MB in system memory.

It does not have any menu or icon bar so you can launch different options by simply right-clicking on main window. You can use Next Image and Previous Image option to navigate through your BMP image collection, you can increase or decrease contrast by simply right-clicking on the main window and choosing Filters > Increase Contrast or Decrease Contrast. You can enable/disable the options like auto contrast, antialiasing, and optimize RAM Usage from Options.

Download BMPreVIEW

It works on all versions of Windows. Enjoy!

Disable User Installed Gadgets In Windows 7

Aun — Mon, 17 Aug 2009 06:53:10 +0000

Windows 7 offers a variety of useful gadgets but user can install additional gadgets as well. By default, the user installed gadgets are enabled in Windows 7 but you can easily change the settings and can prevent all users from being able to install a gadget too. You will need to make a little change in the group policies, go through the following simple steps to achieve this.

Launch the Local Group Policy Editor by clicking Start, typing gpedit.msc and pressing Enter, once it is launched, browse to User Configuration > Administrative Templates > Windows Components > Desktop Gadgets.

Locate the Turn Off user-installed desktop gadgets option in the right pan and double click it. Another dialogue box will be displayed, choose Enable option from here.

Windows 7 will now run without user installed gadgets, this setting will be applied after you log off and log back in or simply restart your computer. Enjoy!

Enable DLL Rule Collection in Windows 7 AppLocker

Aun — Fri, 14 Aug 2009 23:33:05 +0000

The AppLocker tool allows you to restrict the programs you can run in Microsoft Windows, we have already covered one aspect of this topic here. To sum it up in a nutshell, through the Applocker you specify the rules on your running applications. Now if you want to use the DLL Rule Collection, then you will need to enable them as they are disabled by default.

Click Start, type secpol.msc and press Enter, the Local Security Policy box will be displayed.

Now, expand the Application Control Policies in the left box and right click the AppLocker, then choose the Properties option.

Choose the Advanced tab, and then check the Enable DLL Rule Collection option.

Click Apply to complete the configuration, please note that you should enable DLL rule collection only if you are going to implement them properly otherwise they can effect your system’s performance. Enjoy!

How To Schedule System Shutdown With Shutdown Agent

Aun — Thu, 13 Aug 2009 22:18:10 +0000

Are you in need of a good tool which can shutdown, restart, or logout your system according to a schedule? If yes, then your search should end now. You can try a free and user-friendly software, Shutdown Agent which lets you schedule the shutdown, restart, suspend, hibernate, and logout events for your computer. It resides in the system tray for easier and faster access.

Choose the action you want to perform from the Action drop down menu, you can choose between Shutdown, Restart, Logoff, Suspend, and Hibernate. Choose the time to run this action from either the In or the At options. Check/Uncheck the options Force processes to terminate and Icon blink before execution as per your requirements. You can hide the timer by clicking the Hide Timer button and you can enable the timer by clicking the Enable Timer button.

Download Shutdown Agent

According to the developer’s official site, it is compatible with Microsoft Windows XP, Windows 2000, Windows 2000 Server and Vista, we successfully tested it on Windows 7 as well. Enjoy!

How To Update Device Drivers In Windows 7

Aun — Tue, 11 Aug 2009 08:18:45 +0000

Just like software, the device drivers are updated by their manufacturers. These updates are made to remove any bugs or to add some additional functionality to the hardware. Thus in this way the manufacturers try to improve the performance of the devices. It is always recommended that you should update your drivers regularly so that your system devices can work flawlessly. Here are the steps which you should follow to update your device drivers in Windows 7.

Note: This is a very basic post targeting towards those users who are upgrading from Windows XP to Windows 7.

Click Start, type devmgmt.msc and press Enter.

Device Manager will be opened, and list of all devices will be displayed, now right click on the device and choose Update driver software in the context menu. Alternative way to open Device Manager is to right-click Computers, click Manage, and then select Device Manager from the left sidebar.

Now, select Search automatically for updated driver software if you don’t have offline copy of the driver(in this case it will search for the driver’s updates from the internet), or you can use the drivers you backed up on your computer by clicking on Browse my computer for driver software.

Thats all. Enjoy!

How To Enable/Disable Aero Snap In Windows 7

Aun — Tue, 11 Aug 2009 08:07:52 +0000

Aero Snap allows users to minimize, maximize, or resize program windows by dragging and dropping them to the screen corners. If you don’t like the Aero Snap feature in Windows 7 or you feel it to be boring or unnecessary, just go through the following steps to disable it.

Click Start > Control Panel to open the Windows 7 Control Panel, now from the View by drop down box, choose Large icons.

Now choose Ease of Access Center.

Click Make it easier to focus on tasks link located in almost the bottom of the Ease of Access Center.

Check Prevent windows from being automatically arranged when moved to the edge of the screen to disable the Aero Snap feature. You can uncheck it to enable it again.

Click Apply to finish the configuration, if you want to read some more about Aero Snap feature, go here. Enjoy!

WebRipper – A Free Powerful Image, Video, And Music Ripper

Aun — Mon, 10 Aug 2009 05:06:41 +0000

WebRipper is a powerful ripping tool which is used to find and extract images and media files from any specified website. With this tool downloading large number of images, videos, music, or documents from any website becomes a breeze. It is flexible, you can specify the target URL to rip the images or you can use the integrated web search function to find images based on your keywords. It also lets you set certain filters on your search items and thus in this way gives you more control over your search.

It has a very cool, user-friendly interface where you can easily start the search from Job Management > New > Targeted rip job or Image search job option or you can also create a new job from Create a new job option located in the icon bar. In Targeted rip job, you specify the website address and it rips all images, videos, documents, etc from the specified address while in the Image search job, you specify the keyword and it searches for whole internet against that particular keyword.

Now lets start a new targeted rip job, first of all specify the website URL and click Add Address.

Click Next and then choose what you want to search. You can choose between image, sound,video, document, and other.

Click Next and follow the further simple steps, it will start searching for the specified item (images, videos, documents, etc whatever you have specified to search) from the provided web URL. It also displays the preview of the ripped items, while downloading.

Download WebRipper

It offers you full control over your rip jobs, you can pause and start them whenever you want. It works on Windows 2000, Windows XP, Windows Vista, and Windows 7. Enjoy!

Disable Automatic Termination Of Programs In Windows 7 During Shutdown

Aun — Mon, 10 Aug 2009 05:02:00 +0000

You might have often seen that when you shutdown your Windows, all open applications are also terminated with it. But if you want that you should be asked to save you work before system goes to shutdown, you can easily enable this setting. You will need to make simple changes in the registry configuration.

First of all launch the Group Policy Editor, you can launch it by clicking Start, typing gpedit.msc and pressing Enter.

Now navigate to Computer Configurations > Administrative Templates > System > Shutdown Options.

Now, you will be able to see Turn off automatic termination of applications that block or cancel shutdown option in the main window. Double click it and a dialogue box will be loaded, here you can set the behaviors for this option, choose Enable and click Apply.

Now, your running applications will not be terminated during system shutdown, rather first you will be asked to save you work. Enjoy!

Get Windows 7 Aero Shake & Aero Snap Feature In Windows Vista/XP

Nakodari — Fri, 07 Aug 2009 19:52:41 +0000

Do you know about those awesome Aero Shake and Aero Snap features in Windows 7? Now you can get them on both Windows XP and Vista. For those who don’t know what AeroShake and AeroSnap are, here is a small intro for them.

Aero Shake: Minimizes all other windows, when one active window is shaken.

Aero Snap: You can maximize, minimize, resize window by just dragging-dropping it to the side of the the screen or to the screen corners.

True Transparency is an awesome app that was originally build to bring Windows Vista transparency to Windows XP. You can change different skins just for some eye-candy look. But in the latest version of this app(v.1.1), the developer has added two new awesome features – Aero Shake and Aero Snap.

All you need to do is extract the zip archive and run the main executable file. I ran it in Windows Vista and the experience was rock solid. The best thing is that it doesn’t slow down the system at all. Watch the video below to see the demonstration of these features.

Once running, you can change the options and skins from it’s system tray context-menu.

Download True Transparency

Note it only will only work on Windows XP and Vista, older versions of Windows have not been tested. Enjoy!

Back Up Or Clone Windows 7 With EASEUS Todo Backup

Aun — Fri, 07 Aug 2009 13:00:00 +0000

EASEUS Todo Backup is a free backup utility that saves all the data including your operating system, programs, settings, etc. So you are safe in the case of any unexpected damage or loss. It provides features like backup, restore, and disk-clone, and it proves to be very useful if you want to replace the older hard disk of your computer by a newer larger hard disk without reinstalling the operating system and applications once again.

Installation is quite straight-forward, simply download it and run the installer and follow the on-screen steps. You will need to reboot your system once you have completed the installation. Launch it from the desktop icon or from Start > All Programs > EASEUS Todo Backup.

Now, let see how we can create a backup with it, choose the Backup option and the Backup Wizard will start. At the first step choose the hard drive and the partition to backup.

On the next step, choose the backup image location.

Then you will need to choose the backup option. You will need to select either default or Set the option manually.

Verify your backup settings and click Procced to create the backup image.

Thats all, you will be able to see the progress of the backup from the progress bar.

It will save the backup image on your specified location and you can easily restore it when needed from Restore option of EASEU. Did I forget to mention that you can also clone the whole hard disk by copying the partitions to the new hard disk using this tool? Since there are huge changes that those users who will upgrade to Windows 7 might as well upgrade their hard disk too, this feature will really come handy.

Download EASEU Todo Backup

According to its official web site, it runs on Windows 2000 Professional/XP/Vista and Windows Server, we were able to test it successfully on Windows 7 as well. Enjoy!

Speeding Up Thumbnail Preview For Windows 7 Taskbar

Aun — Fri, 07 Aug 2009 10:35:12 +0000

Windows 7 task bar is also known as the super bar and offers cool features like larger icons, jump lists, pinning option and particularly improved thumbnail preview feature. Taskbar’s thumbnail preview displays a small thumbnail preview of your minimized window or application when the mouse is hovered over it. But usually it takes some time to display the thumbnail, to reduce this time follow the steps below.

You will need to edit some settings in the registry, go to Start, type regedit and then press Enter.

Now, navigate to HKEY_CURRENT_USER > Control Panel > Mouse in the left pan of the Registry Editor and locate the MouseHoverTime key in the main window.

Double click it, you will see that its default value is set to 400, change it to any value below 400, but make sure that it should not be less than 100. Since these numbers represent delay time, the lesser the better, so setting it to 150 will give you faster preview then 350.

Click OK and thats all, the task bar’s thumbnail preview will load faster then before. Enjoy!

How To Use Windows 7 Aero Peek Feature

Aun — Thu, 06 Aug 2009 11:24:07 +0000

Aero Peek is one of the most promising features of Windows 7 and it lets you peek at the different application you’ve started. It is also used to view the desktop without minimizing all the open windows or applications. You will definitely find it useful when you just want to have a quick look at the desktop and you don’t want to minimize all the open windows. If you have experience of using Microsoft’s Windows Vista, then you might have noticed that when you move the mouse over a tab of a window in the task bar, a thumbnail is displayed to show you the contents. This feature has been enhanced in Windows 7, it not only shows the thumbnails larger but every thumbnail also includes close button, you can directly close any application or window from here.

Its very easy to activate Aero Peek, simply press Windows Key + spacebar and thats all, now when you will point your mouse to the extreme right hand side of the task bar you can find the show Aero Peek button.

Now to preview or peek, take your mouse over any open file or open window’s icon in the task bar and the thumbnail will pop up.

It not only adds a cool look to your desktop but also offers you more control over it. Enjoy!

Backup And Restore Your Browser Settings With FavBackup

Aun — Wed, 05 Aug 2009 21:27:08 +0000

If you are looking for some good tool to backup your browser settings then your search should end with the FavBackup utility. It is a free backup and restore utility which lets you backup and restore your browser’s settings quickly. It supports almost all popular browsers like IE, Firefox, Opera, Safari, and Chrome. The interesting fact is that from now on you won’t need a separate backup utility for each browser.

It is very straight-forward tool, since it is portable, no installation is required, just download and run it. Choose your browser and desired action (Backup, Backup (safe), Restore, Restore (safe), Convert) in the main window.

Click Next and choose what you want to backup and the backup location.

It will backup the settings according to your selected options, click Finish to complete the backup process.

Thats all, you can also restore your previous browser settings without any hassle. Enjoy!

How To Access Hidden Windows 7 Themes

Aun — Mon, 03 Aug 2009 12:29:40 +0000

Windows 7 offers very eye-candy themes by default, you can view the list of available themes by right clicking the Windows 7 desktop and choosing the Personalize option. You can also download many attractive themes, but there are some hidden themes in Windows 7 as well. Basically these hidden themes are provided for regional countries such as Australia, Canada, Great Britain, United States and South Africa. Lets see how we can enable it.

First of all open the folder option and uncheck the option Hide protected operating system file (Recommended) under View tab.

Click Apply and now browse to C:\Windows\Globalization\MCT, here you will be able to see the respective folder of the every regional theme.

AU = Australia

CA = Canada

GB = Great Britain

US = United States

ZA = South Africa

Go into any of the theme folder and double click the theme to apply it, here is how MCT-AU looks on my windows 7 desktop.

Thats all, if you want to download any other attractive themes for Windows 7 you can check them out from the official link. Enjoy!

Windows 7 Introduces Federation Search Feature

Aun — Sat, 01 Aug 2009 09:01:57 +0000

Microsoft’s Windows Vista introduced the Enhanced Desktop Search feature which is used to locate files, emails and other items on your computer. Windows 7 has also included this along with another useful feature called Federation Search which lets you search remote repositories such as Flickr, YouTube, and various other websites through the native Windows search interface. Now, you can also search for items in the remote repositories from your computer. It is based on OpenSearch and the RSS format.

There is a very simple mechanism for enabling the remote searches, you need to install search connectors for the remote repositories. Once you have installed the search connectors, whenever you will do any search, it will also look for the results in the remote sites as well. You can find many search connectors for sites like Google, You tube, Flickr, etc. For demonstration, purpose I downloaded and installed the search connector for flickr . Now, I am able to search flicker from my desktop.

Isn’t it a nice edition to Windows 7? Enjoy!

Windows 7 PDF Reader & Printer

Nakodari — Fri, 31 Jul 2009 14:03:00 +0000

PDF being the most popular format for sharing documents is continuing to get more and more famous. Sadly, Microsoft has not added native support for PDF documents in Windows 7. The only way for users to read or print PDF document is to find a good 3rd party tool.

If you are looking to install a PDF reader for Windows 7, meet Sumatra PDF Viewer. It is absolutely light-weight(only 1.4MB in size), fast, and easy-to-use PDF viewer. Just install the tool, make it default, and start reading any PDF document. It supports all PDF versions, including the latest 1.7. You can also download the portable version of this tool and carry it on your USB drive.

It includes all basic features such as, zoom, search, page navigation, rotation, and bookmarks. You can also adjust various options by heading over to Settings. Print option is also available just like any other reader.

So why use this tool in Windows 7 instead of some other advanced tool? If you want a simple light-weight PDF reader or printer, then nothing beats Samatra Viewer because of it’s extremely light footprint. It is so quick in opening PDF documents that you would feel as if it is part of Windows 7.

Download Sumatra PDF Viewer

For more articles related to PDF file, go here. Enjoy!

Deskcretary – Clean Up Your Windows 7 Desktop

Aun — Fri, 31 Jul 2009 11:53:39 +0000

So many people have the habit to place their files on their computer’s desktop, also many of us usually save their downloads on their desktop. If you continue this old practice, your desktop becomes a real mess and you are even unable to find any files from it. Worst of all it also it becomes very time consuming for you to clean up your desktop manually. Don’t fret yet, Deskcretary will help you out.

Update: We would highly recommend checking out Zum as well. It can clean up your desktop by launching programs from a simple app.

It is a free desktop cleanup application that lets you schedule the desktop clean up process(you may run it manually as well). It cleans up the desktop and keeps your files in archived format, it also offers enhanced searching and browsing of the archived files based on file type and date archived. It lets you revert back to your old desktop if due to any reason your archiving process is not successful. When you launch it for the first time, it will let you configure the settings for the desktop cleanup. Let me show you all of the configuration processes step by step. Here is the welcome screen of Deskcretery, click Next to proceed to the next step of the configuration.

The next step is the Execution List, here you will click the Add Files button to add files which you don’t want to be archived by Deskcretery.

Click Next and it will take you to the Archiving step, here you will make the settings regarding how files will be archived. In this step you will see two options – The Folder options which let you set the behavior for folder archiving and the Duplicate File Action which lets you decide what to do in case of duplicate files.

Click Next and you will be on Restoration step, here you will make necessary settings regarding the restoration process.

Click Next, and here you are on the most important step, set the time and frequency that it should follow to automatically archive your desktop, choose Never if you are going to perform desktop clean up operation manually.

Click Next, confirm your settings and thats all. Now you are finished making the configurations and it will be taking care of your messed up desktop.

Here is what happened when I ran it to clean up my desktop, it moved all the files on my desktop to an archived folder(created by Deskcretery) on the desktop.

It will be launched automatically as per the configurations that you made earlier. You will find all your files and programs neatly organized under each category.

If you don’t want to schedule the regular clean ups rather you just want to manually cleanup your desktop every now and then, you may do so by simply clicking the Archive Desktop option. Also in the case of any issue, you can also restore the desktop files back by using Restoration option.

Download Deskcretary (Since the official website is dead, we have hosted the app at AddictiveTips).

Now there is no need to manually clean up your desktop, just install and configure it and it will take care of the rest. Apart from Windows 7, it also works on Windows Vista. Enjoy!

Quickly Send VoiceMail Using JDVoiceMail In Windows 7

Aun — Fri, 31 Jul 2009 11:40:44 +0000

Do you find it boring to type long emails, just like me? Now give JDVoiceMail a try. It is a free tool which lets you send voice messages to anyone’s email addresses. It records your voice message in the compressed .wav or.mp3 format and send as an attachment in the email. It is a very light-weight and easy-to-use tool, and best of all there is no special software needed on the end of receiver to listen to your message, he/she can simply listen to it in Window Media Player or any other audio player.

It has very user-friendly interface, you can launch it and start recording your voice message by clicking the Rec button. Once you are done with the message, click the Stop to complete the recording. You can listen your recorded message by clicking the Play button.

Now, its very easy to send it as an email, you even don’t need to open your email client software. Just click the Send button and it will open your default email client software itself and you will see your recorded file attached in a new message. You simply need to type the email address of receiver and hit the Enter.

Thats all, now you can send voice message to anyone who has an email address.

Download JDVoiceMail

It works on all Windows operating system, but since the developer did not test it on Windows 7 yet, we gave it a try and it worked seamlessly without any problems. Enjoy!

How To Rotate Windows 7 Logon Background Screen

Aun — Thu, 30 Jul 2009 10:20:57 +0000

Microsoft’s Windows Vista and XP have no support for changing the default logon screen, but in Windows 7 you can use the Logon Screen Rotator tool to rotate the logon screen during every logon. Now, there is no need to play with the registry settings, you can easily change the logon screen of your Windows in a couple of clicks only. Once you have installed the application, you will be able to select up to 10 images which you would like to use as your logon screen backgrounds and then those images are rotated each time you logon giving a cooler look to your Window 7.

Now, simply add your images to it, click choose button and browse to add the image, once you have added your desired images then you will need to do a little configuration regarding how these images should be displayed instead of the default logon screen. You will need to select an option under Change, you can either change the logon screen for Every Logon or Every Day. If you select Now the logon screen will change now. Current Screen option displays the current logon screen.

Once you are done with the settings, click the Enable and Exit button or if you want to revert back to the Windows default settings then click the Revert to Windows 7 default logon screen button.

Download Logon Screen Rotator

Overall it is a very simple tool, just add your favorite images and the app will take care of the rest. You will see a new logon screen on every start up. Enjoy!

Launch Startup Programs And Processes One By One With OoLauncher

Nakodari — Wed, 29 Jul 2009 15:21:09 +0000

Want to speed up the startup of your Windows 7, Vista, or XP operating system? The best way is to delay the launching of certain startup programs and processes, re-arrange the order in which these programs and processes are loaded, and control which startup program or process are loaded at what time. So how would you do that?

Enter Oolauncher. It is a free portable application launching management utility for Windows. Don’t be confused, it is not an application launcher like JetStart, SliderDock, and LaunchBar Commander. Instead it controls how the startup programs in Windows are launched.

Update: Most users are facing problem with this tool and calm that it removes all the startup programs. I have contacted the developer of this app and he has the following reply(solution), “The problem you pointed out is not a bug. Oolauncher is designed to launch applications from its own database. So after imported the startup programs, the removal is necessary to avoid starting application twice, one by Oolauncher and another by windows. Users can restore programs to its ‘original location’ by click the ‘Restore’ button on the Oolauncher dialog.” I hope it helps.

So what can users do with this utility, exactly? You can define after how many seconds a program/process will launch during startup, control how the program window should be displayed(normal, minimized, maximized, hidden, or unchanged), define the priority of each application/process, and choose the Original Location of each program/process(options shown in screenshot below).

Apart from these usual features, you can also move the order of the programs/processes and force show the window style after a defined number of seconds. In other words you can also call it a startup manager program since it allows you to add/delete any program or process both quickly and easily.

Another reason why this utility is worth it is because instead of launching all the startup programs at once, it launches them one by one thus saving the memory usage and resulting in a faster startup of Windows.

Download Oolauncher

It works on Windows XP, Windows Vista, and Windows 7 only. Enjoy!

Add Mac Look To Your Windows 7/Vista Desktop With Nexus Dock

Aun — Wed, 29 Jul 2009 12:08:41 +0000

Nexus Dock is a free dock application that gives fast access to your most frequently used applications. It provides you features like multi-dock system, live icon reflections, magnification, document thumbnails, and keyboard navigation, along with complete customization. When installed, it looks more like a Mac dock.

Once you have downloaded the app from the link given at the bottom of this post, double click its installer to initiate the installation process, Click Next to proceed to next step.

Choose the installation folder and click Next.

You will be able to monitor the installation process with the help of progress bar as shown in the following screenshot.

That all, it will not take more than couple of minutes to complete the installation. Once installation is over, you will be able to see its fancy dock window on your Windows 7 or Vista desktop as shown in the following screenshot.

Adding additional item is a piece-of-cake, just drag and drop the items to add to it. Enjoy!

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