AddictiveTips » windows7

Disable Install Updates And Shutdown Option In Windows 7/Vista

Aun — Sat, 19 Sep 2009 01:35:28 +0000

If any updates have been downloaded and are available for your Windows operating system then you see the Install Updates and Shut Down popup notification option before shutting down the computer, but what if you don’t need this option even if the updates are available. Below I have explained the step by step process to disable this setting, it involves some small changes in the Windows Registry.

Editor’s Notes: I don’t recommend disabling this option since keeping Windows up-to-date is the best way to secure the computer. This can only come useful to those professional users who have full control over their computer and don’t want to install specific updates at the moment.

First of all click Start, type gpedit.msc and then press Enter.

The Local Group Policy Editor will be opened, now navigate to User Configuration > Administrative Templates > Windows Components in the left side pane and choose the Windows Update option.

Now locate and double click the option Do not display “Install Updates and Shut Down” option in Shut Down Windows dialog box in the main window. A new dialogue box will be displayed, here choose the Enable option and that’s it, now the Install Updates and Shutdown option will not appear as a choice in the shutdown window dialogue box.

Enjoy!

Windows 7 Power Efficiency Report For Laptops & Netbooks

Aun — Tue, 15 Sep 2009 02:29:43 +0000

If you own a Laptop then you should be conscious about its battery’s power consumption. There is no need for any third party tools to get a report of the power efficiency of your battery, Windows 7 has a built in utility (powercfg) to get the report of the system’s power efficiency. It is a hidden built-in command line tool that will examine your laptop’s energy consumption and make recommendations on how to improve it.

First of all run command prompt in the Administrator mode by clicking the Start Orb, then type cmd, and right click it then choose the Run as Administrator option.

Now the command prompt window will be opened, here type the following command to generate the report about your power efficiency. This report is in the html format so you can view it in any Web browser.

powercfg –energy –output Energy_Report.html

Where powercfg is the name of the utility, energy means it will generate the report about your laptop’s power consumption, and output specifies the name of the file to which the output will be written.

The report displays the test statistics relevant to the power consumption of your battery, it also offers you some suggestions on how to improve your battery timing. Enjoy!

How To Convert/Export PowerPoint 2010 Presentation To Video

Aun — Mon, 14 Sep 2009 05:07:27 +0000

You may often find yourself in situations where you need to convert a PowerPoint presentation to Video, for instance it may be the case that you need to upload a presentation as a movie to YouTube or any other service. The advantage of converting presentation into video format is that viewers won’t require PowerPoint to view it since it could be played in any media player. Microsoft PowerPoint 2010 includes a built in tool which lets you convert PowerPoint presentations to video.

First of all launch PowerPoint 2010 and click the office button, then click the Share button and choose the Create a Video option.

Now set the effects for the output video, you may choose between High Quality, Medium Quality or Low Quality. You can enable/disable the settings for record timing and narrations from the Don’t Use Recorded Timings and Narrations option. Then select the time which should be spent on each slide from the Second to spend on each slide option.

And finally, once done with all these settings, hit the Create Video button, and it will ask you to choose the location to save this video file.

Now you can watch the video in WMV format only. Sadly other popular formats such as, AVI And Mp4 formats aren’t supported but you can convert the video using free converters which are widely available.

Enjoy!

Image File Format Converter

Aun — Sun, 23 Aug 2009 21:14:58 +0000

The Image Format Converter application has been developed for quick conversion of image files like jpg, bmp, gif, to other types like png, tiff, icon, bmp, gif, jpg, psd, etc. This tool is not limited to just format conversion, as it also offers very useful image editing options like rotating, resizing, merging, filtering, etc. It uses advanced algorithms for better image editing and conversion.

In order to open a new image go to File > Load option, and you may convert an already opened image to another format from File > Save option. The image can be zoomed by selecting the zoom level from the Zoom option. Images can be resized from the Resize option, in this case specify the new width and length of the image.

You may modify the brightness, contrast, colors etc of an image from the Filter menu.

Download Image Format Converter

There are several tools available which perform image conversion and editing, but the Image Format Converter is very simple and easy to use tool which any amateur may use to perform image conversion and editing. It works on all versions of Windows. If you are looking for a way to batch convert image files, then you can read about it here. 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!

26 Awesome Windows 7 Themes

Nakodari — Mon, 17 Aug 2009 22:32:25 +0000

Windows 7 is the first ever operating system from Microsoft that has been developed largely by keeping user feedback in mind. It is much more faster and better looking than Vista. If you are one of those users looking to upgrade or buy Windows 7, then you should definitely look out for some custom made themes. Today we present you 26 delighting and refreshing themes created by users of DeviantArt.

Note: If you like these themes, you will also like Windows 7 Wallpapers. Visit the HomePage to find useful freeware and tips on Windows 7.

You will find the installation details along with other information on the respective developer’s page. I am sure that you will enjoy them all.

Windows 7 Skull Visual Style by ~TheDarkenedPoet

Woodstock Windows 7 Theme by ~Markus-Deviant

Windows 7 RED Theme by ~XBMCG33K

ThaImpact VS for Windows 7 RC by ~DjabyTown

Underoath Theme for Windows 7 by ~bobmat4

Windows7 Black Transparent by ~pegass

Aerosnap 7 Theme by ~Freak180

OnlyBlack Windows 7 RC theme by ~tonev

AeroLighting For Windows 7 by ~neodesktop

Warsaw- Windows 7 Theme by ~G0DLIKE

Lumens for Windows 7 by ~alkhan

Desk 09 with New Windows 7 OS by ~Dr-Bee

Alternative for Windows 7 RC by ~oliver182

SiCo for Windows 7 RC by ~alkhan

Aero Diamond for Windows 7 x64 by ~alkhan

Heart Windows 7 Theme by ~soffl

Theme For Winodws 7 by ~Arturik1988

Windows 7 OSX by ~Black-Energy

Clean Green Windows 7 Theme by ~J-MGraphics650

Seven Aero Shine Blue For 7RC by ~molinarosp

Trans-7 Themepack by ~Crusader1080

SevenMaxClearLiveFinal For 7RC by ~molinarosp

Windows 7 Simple Black Glass by ~feliipetaumaturgo

Natural by ~phS2

Waterbomb and Windows 7 by ~Adrenalize81

Windows 7 with Classic Theme by ~RainingSkies

So which one do you plan to install? Let us know in the comments. Enjoy!

Update: Downloading them is easy! Click the theme that you like and it will take you the designer’s page from where you can download it. The download link will be found on the left sidebar of the designer’s page.

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!

YouDown – Batch Download HD YouTube Videos

Nakodari — Sun, 16 Aug 2009 16:21:28 +0000

There are so many YouTube downloaders out there that I have lost faith in all of them. Luckily I came across YouDown, a newly released simple yet versatile downloader that can download multiple YouTube videos instantly. Unlike other so called YouTube Downloaders that will do their best to spam the users in one way or other, this tool does nothing of that kind.

Just run the program, add as many YouTube video URLs as you want, select the quality and destination where you want the videos to be saved, and click Go. Sit back, grab a coffee, and relax while it will handle all downloads for you. There are three options to choose from – Low Quality, High Quality, and High Definition. The later makes full use of YouTube HD feature, which in other words mean, complete High Definition videos for your desktop viewing pleasure.

When you click Go, it will first process the videos(check if the video exists) and then begin downloading them one by one.

If I were to give it a rating, it would win full marks from my side. It is now my default batch YouTube Downloader.

Download YouDown

It works on Windows 7, Windows Vista, and Windows XP. Further requirements is that you must have Windows Installer 3.1 and .NET Framework 3.0 SP1 installed(which will be present in most computers that are up-to-date). For more, also check out Download Any Flash Video With Orbit Downloader. Enjoy!

Power Search – Find Files Inside Archives

Nakodari — Sun, 16 Aug 2009 10:15:29 +0000

Power Search is a recently launched search utility that allows users to find for any files inside archive files quickly. Unlike Windows default search, it searches in both file systems and archives. You can add multiple files names, wildcards, and directories. There are two additional search options given – Include all files in search and Include directories in search.

The supported formats are, ZIP, CAB, TAR, RAR, ARJ, ACE, ZOO, LZH, ARC and CAB. You can choose which archive you want to search in, to search in all archives you will need to check all formats. When done, hit Search Now to begin the search operation.

I performed a search on my drive and it found all files that were in my blog’s ZIP and RAR archives. The overall operation was quite fast, no wonder the author named it Power Search.

Download Power Search (The original site was on geocities which has been shut down, so we have hosted the file at AT)

It works on all versions of Windows including the latest Windows 7. For more, also check out TheSearchMan. 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!

Attach Any File To An Existing PDF Document With PDF Bundle

Aun — Fri, 14 Aug 2009 05:22:35 +0000

PDF Bundle is a free portable tool which lets you attach any file to a PDF document quickly. You can also attach other documents inside PDF, such as, Microsoft Word, Excel, Visio, or Publisher documents. It does not require any installation, just download it from the link mentioned in the end of the post and run the executable file.

To attach any file to a PDF document, specify the Source PDF, the File to attach, the page at which you want to attach (Attach to page), Attachment Title and Attachment Author. Once you have filled all the required fields, click Bundle Now and your specified file will be attached to the source PDF file.

Download PDF Bundle

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

Get Extra Layer Of Internet Security & Protection In Windows 7

Nakodari — Wed, 12 Aug 2009 14:22:10 +0000

Even though Microsoft is working on Security Essentials, Windows 7 does not have a default antivirus. You will obviously find Windows Firewall, but it will only protect your computer from basic threats. So what will you do to better protect your newly installed Windows 7? If you are like me, who loves simplicity and ease-of-use, then Comodo Internet Security would be the best choice.

Installation takes a little while, just make sure you have unchecked all junk toolbar checkboxes. A restart is required before you are able to fully utilize Internet Security and Antivirus. One of the first thing you will need to do is update the virus definitions and also perform a full system scan, just to make sure that your system is virus-free.

You can see the summary from the main window, on the bottom-right sidebar you will find all network traffic activities. On the middle-right sidebar you will find summary of which applications are active and which one are waiting for your approval. If you are on the network, then you will have to first approve the network connection before being able to share files over it.

What makes it great is that it is fully compatible with Windows Action Center, which means that it integrates just fine. As you can see in the screenshot below, it asks me to update the Antivirus reports.

You will find five different tabs on the main window – Summary, Antivirus, Firewall, Defense+, and Miscellaneous. In the Antivirus tab you will find some common tasks, such as, Run Scan, Schedule Scan, Quarantined Items, and many other settings.

In Firewall tab you will find all options related to Firewall, such as, View Events, Trusted Applications, Define Blocked App, Add Port, Manage Network Zones, and much more.

You will find more useful options in Defense+ and Miscellaneous, check the screenshots below of each one of them. Did I mention that you can also protect/block any files?

One thing that I likes most is that you can enable Parental controls which gives user full control and at the same time better secures your computer.

If you want to disable or change the configuration of Antivirus, Firewall, or Defense+, you can do so directly from the system tray.

Download Comodo Internet Security

According to the website, it works on Windows XP and Windows Vista, but we were able to successful test it on Windows 7 x64. Enjoy!

Is My System Capable Of Running Windows 7 XP Mode?

Aun — Fri, 07 Aug 2009 22:30:35 +0000

Windows 7 XP Mode provides you with the option to run some of Windows XP’s productivity applications on your Windows 7 computer. These are the same applications that worked on Windows XP but did not work on Windows Vista. SecurAble is a free portable tool that answers one of the most frequently asked question,”Is my system capable of running Windows 7 XP mode?”. It analyzes the processor to determine the presence of all the required modules to run the XP Mode.

Simply run the executable file and it will show the result after complete analysis.

Please note that the minimum requirements to run XP Mode are, a 1 GHz 32-bit / 64-bit processor, 1.25 GB of RAM, and 15 GB hard disk space per virtual Windows environment. Now, the rule of thumb is that If there’s a “Yes” in the Hardware Virtualization section, then your CPU will support the XP Mode feature of Windows 7, else you will have to upgrade the system. You can also click on any of the displayed factors to get more details about it.

Download SecurAble

This tool has been developed for Windows 7 only. 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!

How to Disable Pinned Taskbar Programs in Windows 7

Aun — Wed, 05 Aug 2009 21:33:26 +0000

Windows Vista lets you pin programs to the Start menu for easy access, but Windows 7 provides you freedom to pin programs anywhere on the Taskbar. So once you have pinned the programs to the Taskbar, its very easy to open them since it requires a single click. No doubt it is very convenient and fast to launch your applications with it, but Windows 7 gives you more control over your system. If you don’t want this feature, you can easily disable it.

In order to disable the Pinned task bar Programs in Windows 7, click Start and type gpedit.msc and press Enter. The Local Group Policy Editor dialogue box will be opened.

Now go to User Configuration > Administrative Templates > Start Menu and Taskbar and right-click Remove pinned programs from the taskbar option in the main window and choose Edit.

Now choose Enabled on the displayed dialogue box and click Apply.

Thats all, once you enable this setting, the Pinned Program’s list will be removed from the task bar and it will not allow users to pin applications any more. 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 Tweaker

Aun — Mon, 03 Aug 2009 12:24:40 +0000

Ultimate Windows Tweaker is a free utility which offers a very user-friendly interface to tweak your Windows 7. It basically works on Windows 7 and Windows Vista. It automatically detects that whether you are running Windows Vista or Windows7 and offers tweak options accordingly. It lets you easily tweak various settings related to System Performance, User Accounts & UAC, System Security, Network Security, Internet Explorer, etc.

You don’t need to install it, just download it from the link mentioned in the end of the post, unzip the download folder, and run Ultimate Windows Tweaker. Thats all, on the left sidebar you will see different categories, click any option here and you will see its tweaking options on the main window.

The very first option, System Information provides you useful information about your system. Personalization tab lets you customize Windows Explorer, Start Menu and Task bar.

User Accounts & UAC lets you customize User Access Control settings and you can also tweak your welcome screen from here.

System Performance lets you decide the waiting time for the services to end at system shutdown, optimize services, and tweak your menu options.

Its very easy to tweak your Security Settings and you can tweak your network settings from Network Tweaks. Sometime you need to tweak Internet Explorer browser, you can achieve it from Internet Explorer option. Additional Tweaks lets you tweak context menu for files and folder, Drives and some other additional system settings. You can also restore the default setting from the Restore Default button.

Download Ultimate Windows Tweaker

To put into the nutshell, it makes your system faster, more stable, and more secure with just a few mouse clicks. Enjoy!

Weekly Archive Roundup #12 – Windows 7 Tips (Part 2)

Nakodari — Sun, 02 Aug 2009 15:06:58 +0000

This week we will cover some more Windows 7 tips. In case you missed the last part, check it out here.

It doesn’t end here, watch out for more interesting roundup next week. To see all previous roundups, go here. Enjoy!

Create PDF Document From Microsoft Word 2010 In Windows 7

Nakodari — Sat, 01 Aug 2009 15:00:08 +0000

Do you want to create a PDF document in Windows 7 or in other words, do you want to convert Microsoft Word, Excel, PowerPoint, or any other document into a PDF file? Here is the trick, follow the step-by-step guide below to see how I convert PDF documents from MS Word 2010 easily.

Note: For demonstration purpose I have converted a Word 2010 document into PDF format. You can convert any type of document into PDF format once you install the software properly.

Update: You don’t have to use this method if you only want to convert Office documents. By default MS Office have save option to save a document in PDF format. So why did I use this method? Because it allows you to create a PDF file from any document, it could be wordpad, a 3rd party text editing tool, notepad, or any other test editing software.

First grab the CutePDF Writer from the link given at the end of this post, install it along with PS2PDF Converter such as Ghostscript(download link given on developer’s website). Once installation is complete, load up any document and,

In MS Office Documents: Hit Office Button, select Print, choose CutePDF Writer from the list of printers and hit Print button.

In other documents: Go to File > Print, choose CutePDF Writer from the list of printers and hit Print button.

In the next step, you will be asked the location where you want to save the document, choose any location and hit Save.

Now simply open the newly created PDF document and you will see all your content there in the same original format.

What is important here are two things, first of all CutePDF Writer is not a new tool at all. It works on all previous versions of Windows including both 32-bit and 64-bit versions of OS. Secondly, it surprisingly also works on any text editor in Windows 7 which actually helps in creating PDF documents from different text documents, such as TXT, RTF, and many others.

Download CutePDF Writer

Enjoy!

Windows 7 Software Backwards Compatibility

Nakodari — Sat, 01 Aug 2009 13:54:44 +0000

You have seen lots of Windows 7 posts from me recently, that is because Windows 7 is the first OS in Microsoft’s history that has been developed largely based on user feedback, which makes it further interesting for everyone to try it out. Since it lacks a few build-in tools, I am doing my best to test out 3rd party tools that I believe are suitable for working in Windows 7.

So what is backward compatibility? In the most simplest form, it means that every software that works on Windows 7 will also work on Windows Vista, Windows XP, and so on. So when we review a software on Windows 7, you can also try it out on Vista or XP. Except for few software that are developed exclusively for Windows 7, such as, EnhanceMySe7en and Win 7 Codec Pack.

So next time you read a Windows 7 post, make sure you try out the software on older versions of Windows too. Enjoy!

Windows 7 CD/DVD Data Recovery Tool

Nakodari — Sat, 01 Aug 2009 13:29:06 +0000

If you have switched over to Windows 7 and are looking for a good data recovery tool to recover files from a corrupt CD or DVD, look no further. Roadkil’s Unstoppable Copier is a free data recovery tool that can recover almost all files present in your corrupt disk. It uses a special build-in algorithm to search for different pieces of data and then stitch them together, which results in partial recovery of the file.

Note: This tool can also be used to recover files from any external drive, usb drive, server, etc.

In many cases when the disk becomes corrupt, most files can still be recovered in it’s full form. Just launch this tool, select the disk/device that you want to recover, choose the destination where you would like to save all recovered data, and hit Copy.

You can choose which files should be displayed – copied files, skipped files, or/and corrupt files. The full details of the copy process can be seen below the progress bar, where you will find important information such as, number of corrupt files copied, skipped files, transfer rate, etc.

You can use the Batch mode function to perform daily backup, according to the developer, “The program supports command line parameters which allow the application to be run from schedulers or scripts so it can be fully integrated into daily server tasks.”

You can choose to power off the computer when data recovery task is complete or choose to copy newer files only from the Options tab. Apart form it you can also move the slider between Best Data Recovery and Fastest Data Recovery depending on your needs and choose loads of other options.

Overall, it is quite a good data recovery tool that can recover data from a corrupt disk, server, external drives, and many other locations.

Download Roadkil’s Unstoppable Copier

It works on Windows 7 and all previous versions of Windows. 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 Registry Cleaner

Nakodari — Fri, 31 Jul 2009 18:42:11 +0000

Windows registry can become clogged after heavy activities and Windows 7 registry is no different. You will find registry keys left by uninstalled programs, trail applications, and badly programmed software. Once your registry gets filled with junk/useless keys, it directly effects your system performance. So which utility would you use to clean up Windows 7 registry? I have found Auslogic Registry Cleaner to be the best.

It is a simple yet straightforward registry cleaner that does the job just like it should be done. All you have to do is to run the tool and follow some basic steps before it starts cleaning and fixing your registry. On the welcome screen you will be given the choice of either running a quick registry scan or an advanced scan.

If you select advance registry scan, in the next step select the category that you would like to scan. In this way you will have complete control on what you are scanning and fixing.

Click Next and it will start scanning your registry right away.

Once the scan is complete, you will be shown the list of errors found in the registry, you can uncheck those which you don’t want to fix and check those which you would like to fix. Before you fix the error make sure that ‘Backup registry keys before removing’ option is checked.

If you want to manually check each and every key in which the problem was found, double-click a category and you will be shown the keys in a new window. Here you can uncheck the keys that you don’t want to fix. When all is done, click OK.

When it is done cleaning and fixing all your registry keys, you will be shown the final window where you can view the performance gain before and after the registry were cleaned. To view full report, click ‘Display Report’ button.

Note that this utility works on all versions of Windows. While other registry cleaning tools are working to make their software compatible with Windows 7, Auslogics Registry Cleaner already works great on this latest OS.

Download Auslogics Registry Cleaner

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!

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