How to Obtain Microsoft Windows Updates

Obtaining updates for your Windows OS at regular intervals from Microsoft is a must to keep your Windows computer up-to-date and running smoothly.

Microsoft updates for your Windows system in general includes updates for your operating system, software and hardware, third-party device drivers and also bug fixes to help protect your computer frommalicious software and denial-of-service (DoS) attacks.

There are two ways to obtain Microsoft Windows updates:

1. Directly from the Microsoft Download Center, where you can choose your desired updated versions from the list of new and popular downloads.

1. By using Automatic Update feature in Windows. This is the recommended option of the two because by turning ON the automatic updates feature, Windows automatically searches and delivers all the critical and security updates to your computer and you never need to visit update web site to scan for updates. All you have to do is keep a check on an icon that appears in the notification area at the far right of your taskbar every time new updates are available for your system.

Here is how to turn ON Automatic Updates and help protect your Windows PC

1. Click Start ► Run… then type control and click OK to open Control Panel.
   

1. If your are viewing Control Panel in Classic View, click System and head on to Automatic Updates tab under system Properties windows and change settings for automatic updates.
   

   » Instead, if you are under control panel category view, click Performance and Maintenance ► click System, and then click the Automatic Updates tab to choose the update option you want. Update option Automatic is recommended as it automatically downloads and installs updates at your chosen time.

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Tips on How to Speed Up Your Computer

Computers are the most used innovation that has come up so far. It connects the bridges on people and allows us to have communication with our loved ones that are far from us. However, using our computers often can cause problems and eventually slow them down when we don’t take action on fixing them.

Listed here are tips on how to speed up computer:

• Remember to free up your disk space using disk clean-up or disk defragmenters. Unnecessary files like temporary internet files can slow down your computer so get rid of them, empty your recycle bins frequently, and make sure that your important files are placed on the external hard drive.

• Scan for viruses and worms, spyware and adware. Always check for these nasty programs because they make your computer work slowly more than anything. You need to purchase PC fixer software that can remove these programs.

• Clean up your desktop. If your desktop is flooded with files your computer will eventually function slowly.

• Uninstall unused programs. Your computer might have lots of unused programs installed on it; uninstall them because once a program is installed, it makes a connection between the program and the operating system which also make your system run slower even if you do not use them.

• Do not start up programs automatically when turning on your computer. Make sure that you close programs you do not use that open when you start up your computer.

• Defragment your hard drive. Defragmenting your hard drive places all of your information for each file in one place which will result to a faster computer experience.

These tips on how to speed up my PC might be able to solve your problems on your slow running computers. Following these tips are a big help on your troublesome computer systems.

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How-to Remove System Tool 2011 Virus Easily

Aias: System Tool 2011
Damage Level: Medium
Systems Affected: Windows 9x, 2000, XP, Vista, Windows 7

Image Credit – Life StreamsYou may have tried for hours trying to remove this virus just like I did in vain but finally here I found a very simple method to remove this malicious software made to look like a legitimate anti-virus program.Screen Shot Image:

1. All you have to do is enter the serial key to register “System Tool” and follow the rest of the steps.
   The key is WNDS-S0DF5-GS5E0-FG14S-2DF8G

1. After inputting this key wait for little and you PC will restart automatically and all is okay again.

1. Then you can go ahead and delete icon from desktop and remove the software from program.

Share with all your friends. Its useful…!
Thank you.

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Windows Vista tweaks to speed up your system.

Default settings that Windows Vista comes with are more meant for hardware of future than hardware of today. If you are looking for your vista to run faster and perform better, it is essential that you optimize your Vista settings. Read on to find out 4 powerful Windows Vista tweaks to speed up your system.

• Tweak 1 ► Get Rid of Unnecessary Programs from System Start Up

One of the most powerful vista tweaks is to remove all unnecessary programs from the start up menu. Start up should only contain those bare minimum programs which are really necessary to be started up when your program boots. If there are some programs which are not that essential, but still need to be there in start-up, you can reschedule them to a lower priority & attach them to one of the multi-processes.

• Tweak 2 ► Turn off TCP Auto Tuning and Remote Differential Compression

Vista uses these to augment the gigabyte network. However, these end up being too much of an overhead for normal networking. The networking speed is enhanced by up to 30 percent when you disable these options.

• Tweak 3 ► Defrag Your Hard Disk

Over time, application and files become scattered in different places on your system’s hard disk, affecting the system’s performance greatly. When you defrag your disk, it brings all these scattered pieces together, thus, improving the Windows system’s speed. You can run the disk defragmenter from
Start ► Menu Programs ► Accessories ► System Tools ► Disk Defragmenter.

• Tweak 4 ► Disable the “System Restore” Feature

It was with Windows XP that this feature was first introduced. Windows Vista enhanced it further with introducing additional document versioning. Though it does sound very good and useful, it does have a great impact on the resources. If you think your system is already not running as it should be, you surely won’t want additional duplicates on your system further downgrading your system’s performance. Thus, another of effective vista tweaks would be to disable this feature.

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Why You Should Use A Random PIN

There’s safety in numbers – but only if your PIN isn’t your birthday or one of 100 commonly used examples. In fact, according to research by Cambridge University, using your birthday means that there’s an 8.9% chance a stranger could guess your PIN in three attempts.

This means that if everyone was to use their birthday as a PIN (and, thankfully, only around 7% of us do), thieves would be able to get into our accounts once every 11 tries.

The results showed that 84% of PINs for iPhone’s and banks used random or “pseudo-random” numbers. This is the safest type of PIN available, so if you’re issued a random PIN, you should really keep it.

For the non-random PINs, 23% of us use dates – with 29% using their own birthday. Romantically, 26% use their partner’s or a family member’s birthday. 9% use a pattern on the keypad and 5% use a numeric pattern such as repeated numbers.

The problem for the 29% that use their own birthday is that their bank card is usually found in their wallet, alongside information that reveals their date of birthday (such as a driver’s license). In fact, 99% of survey respondents reported keeping their bank card in their wallets along with a card that revealed their birthday.

This means, to quote Cambridge, “if an attacker knows the cardholder’s date of birth and guesses optimally, the chance of being successful is nearly 9%.” That’s pretty high!

Luckily, for the majority of us that use the randomly-generated PIN the bank issued, there’s only a 0.03% chance that the attacker will be able to guess our pin in three attempts. Phew.

I think there’s one oversight here, however – what if your random PIN is accidentally the same as one of the most-common PINs, like 1234? Then you’re back in the high-risk area of having your PIN guessed.

The guys at Cambridge suggest banks could use the following PIN blacklist to prevent the use of these predictable numbers. Until this practice is wide-spread, however, I suggest that you read the list below, and if you PIN is in it, change it!

0000, 0101-0103, 0110, 0111, 0123, 0202, 0303, 0404, 0505, 0606, 0707, 0808, 0909, 1010, 1101-1103, 1110-1112, 1123, 1201-1203, 1210-1212, 1234, 1956-2015, 2222, 2229, 2580, 3333, 4444, 5252, 5683, 6666, 7465, 7667.

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How to Create a Backup for Outlook Express Account Settings?

Your entire internet emails are now can be found in one single location – the Outlook Express. This desktop mail program retrieves and saves all your mail messages. After you have setup your email account and provided all the credentials, Outlook Express keeps checking your account periodically.

This program downloads your mail messages from your account and helps you to view them from the Outlook. What will you do if you plan to change your computer system? In that case it will be wise to keep a backup of the settings and your accounts. Email backupservice providers are the best guide to take the assistance from.

Setting up Outlook Express Information

Step 1 : First of all make one backup folder in your PC. Browse the location you wish to save your folder and choose New, then Folder and finally naming it as Outlook Backup.
Step 2: Go to the Outlook Express folder either from Start or any other type of shortcut you have for accessing this folder.
Step 3: Click on Tools > select Accounts.
Step 4: Click on Mail tab and you will get an entire list. Then choosing the account setup you wish to create a backup for, click on Export.
Step 5: Go to the box of Save In and after finding your created folder, click on Save.
Step 6: When you are done with the entire process, click on Close.

If there is any issue with any of the st

How to fix the problem of a Bluetooth-enabled Dell Travel Mouse?

The increasing popularity of the laptops has also increased the number of peripheral devices. The travel mouse is one of the devices that come in the line of the peripheral devices.  Are you fascinated with a small mouse? Then the travel mouse is the right choice for you. It is a small mouse offering you the ease of transport.

If you are thinking travel mouse from Dell, you can go for the Bluetooth travel mouse with the help of which you can connect your PC wirelessly to your Dell mouse. Enjoy wireless connectivity with your Dell Bluetooth mouse.

The Dell support professionals can help you when you face any problem with your Bluetooth mouse. Following certain troubleshooting methods you can resolve the problem with your Dell Bluetooth mouse and obtain its normal functioning.

Step 1: You should first check the mouse battery by opening the cover of your Bluetooth Dell mouse. When the batteries get exhausted, you should replace this.

Step 2: There may be some error in setting the connection between your Bluetooth mouse and the PC. Restarting the Pc often solves this problem.

Step 3: One very important thing that you need to check is the Bluetooth connectivity of your PC. If you find any issue with the Bluetooth functionality of your PC, refer to the manual for turning the feature on.

Step 4: Finally, you should reinstall the Bluetooth software, in case your PC has Windows XP. Any problem with the installation of the blue tooth connection will prohibit your mouse from working on its normal way.

Sony’s PlayStation Network: A gateway to Entertainment Haven

If you are looking for the ecstasy of entertainment, PlayStation®Network from Sony is the choice for you. Termed as the ultimate destination for entertainment, Sony’s PlayStation Network is the gateway to the world of entertainment. Enjoy implausible games, blockbuster movies as well as all the exciting TV series and community in one place. Loaded with plenty of exclusives like new games, add-ons and video, PlayStation®Network is truly the powerhouse of entertainment.

Run by Sony Computer Entertainment, PlayStation Network or PSN is an online multiplayer gaming and digital media delivery service. To access the service you need to have the PlayStation 3 and PlayStation Portable video game consoles. All the available services are absolutely free and the user only needs to register for the service. Record shows that there are more than 50 million registered PlayStation Network accounts worldwide as of June 2010.

As mentioned, to access all the alluring features of PlayStation Network registration is mandatory. There are two types of accounts, Master accounts and Sub accounts. With Master accounts you can enjoy full access to all settings, including parental control. The only criterion is that you have to be over the age of 18. Once the Master account is created, then sub accounts can subsequently be created and you can set restrictions for the account.

How can you configure Linksys router for a repeater?

Do you like to connect multiple computer systems to a single network? What can be a better option than using a wireless router? Linksys routers are the first choice of the PC users who wish to connect a number of PCs with the same internet connection. With Linksys routers you can share files among the computers under the same network.

Want to have further wireless signal across the room? If you desire to have wireless signal over different rooms, you have to configure your router with the repeater. Access point and Linksys routers have this feature of configuration in the setup menus. You can know about this router and its configuration from the Linksys support service providers.
Configuring the router with the repeater will extend the signal range farther. How to go about with this configuration? Here it is:

Step 1 : Get access to a computer connected with a Linksys device.
Step 2 : Open a browser and visit the setup page of Linksys device athttp://192.168.1.1
Step 3 : Type in the password and username for Linksys and select ‘Log in’.
Step 4 : Go to ‘Status’ tab and click on ‘Wireless’ link.
Step 5 : In the ‘MAC address’ type in 12 numbers and letters and browse to the Setup tab.
Step 6 : Click on ‘AP Mode’ under Setup heading.
Step 7 : Click on ‘Wireless Repeater’ and type in the MAC address you have previously inserted.
Step 8 : When you are done, click on Save Settings and the configuration of the device is completed.

Partition a USB Flash Drive in Windows XP

One way to Partition a USB Flash Drive from Windows XP and mark it active “bootable”. Windows detects Flash Drives as “Removable Disks” and flash drives are typically shipped formatted as a “Super Floppy” (USB-FDD without a partition table) . The Windows built in format utility cannot create a partition table on Removable Disks. Furthermore, the diskpart utility in Windows XP will not allow you to partition Removable Media, although diskpart does work for partitioning a Flash Drive from Windows Vista/7.

To address the inability to Partition a Flash Drive in Windows XP, you need to use a third party low level partitioning tool such as BOOTICE, created by Pauly. BOOTICE Home Page

Note: I partition my flash drives as USB-HDD (with a partition table), simply because my computers support booting from Flash Drives formatted to be seen as a USB Hard Disk.

One way to Partition a Flash Drive from Windows

1. Download BOOTICE, unzip, and run BOOTICE.EXE
2. Make sure your “USB Flash Drive” is set as the Destination Disk
3. Click Parts Manage
4. Click ReFormat USB Disk
5. Select USB-HDD mode, and click Next
6. Select Format as Fat32, and click OK

You should now have an active “bootable” USB-HDD Fat32 formatted Flash Drive, containing a partition table with a single partition. You should be able to Boot It as a Hard Drive.

How to Change Dock Icons on a Mac

There are many reasons to change the icons that appear in the Dock on our Mac, and it’s easy enough to do, leaving you no reason to have to stick with the ones that are automatically attached to files and folders. If you want the dock icons to be something more personal to you, to all match a particular theme, or just have a change of pace, you only need to change the actual icon for that particular app or folder. It’s that easy,Free Icon Sets are found all over the web. The particular one I’m using for this piece was found at Icon Drawer. Initiate the download as you would with any other download, making sure you follow the usage rules laid out on the site. I want to change my Pictures Folder icon to being black and blue like the logos surrounding it. It’s not even clear looking at this which one it is. Currently it’s the top one shown here and showing the contents of the folder. I’m going to both change the icon, and change this setting so that it shows the icon, and not the contents. The first thing I need to do is select the new file that contains the new logo. Instead of opening it, though, I go to the FIle Menu and pull up “Get Info,” or press Command-I. From the resulting pop-up, select the tiny icon in the upper left corner and go to the Edit menu and pull up on “Copy,” or press Command-C. If I clicked on the folder in the dock, it would open it. Instead, I find the application on my hard drive and “Get Info” the same way I did to copy the new logo. This time after I select that small icon in the upper left, I go to the Edit menu and “Paste,” or press Command-P. To get the change to be reflected in the dock, I need to drag the folder out of the dock and replace it with the changed folder. I still see the contents of the folder, though, and that’s because it’s saved as a Stack and not a Folder. To change this, right click on the folder, and change it from Stack to Folder. It should be noted that not all dock icons can be changed in this manner. The icons that ship with the Mac OS, such as iTunes, Mail, etc., are set so that you can’t simply copy and paste it away. You will need a program such as CandyBar to do that. However, that application comes with a $29 pricetag.

Get a Beautiful Desktop with Windows Themes

Many PC users like to spruce up their Windows desktop with various background pictures. The popularity of Rhiannon’s series on wallpapers attests to the interest in adding something to the plain desktop. With Windows themes, you can do even more than decorate the desktop. Themes are a combination of wallpapers, sounds, windows colors, and screensavers. There are many free themes available on the Internet and Microsoft itself provides a number of interesting selections.

A variety of Windows 7 themes can be downloaded at this Microsoft page. There are themes for a number of subjects, including animals, holidays, landscapes, movies, and nature. New themes are added periodically. Windows XP themes are still available at this separate Microsoft page.

Installing and changing to new themes in Windows 7

Installing a new theme is quite simple. After downloading the file, simply double-click it. This will add the theme to the selection of themes that are available on your system but will not activate it. Changing to a new theme can be done several ways. (Before making any system changes, always create a system restore point.)

An easy method for switching themes is the following:

1. Right-click an empty spot on the desktop
2. Choose “Personalize” from the context menu
3. The Personalization dialog will open and a selection of available themes will be shown
4. Find a theme that you like from the assorted selections and click on it
5. The new theme will appear

If you do not like a theme, click on another selection or revert to your original by clicking on it (step 3 and 4 above). If necessary, you can roll back to the system restore point you made at the beginning.

Another route to the Personalization dialog is this:

1. Enter “theme” (without quotes) in the Start-Search bar
2. Select “Change the theme” from the Control Panel list
3. The procedure is then the same as steps 3-5 above

Security warning

There are many Windows themes offered on the Internet. Unfortunately, malware writers have often used free themes as Trojan horses. Be sure to check carefully any themes you download and only use known reliable sources.

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Adding a great DNS server in Ubuntu

Almost everyone tried at one point to access a site on-line but got an error from the browser saying that the address is unreachable. The problem is complex but one of the solution could be to add some dns servers to resolve the domain properly.

Adding a Dns server might resolve the problem if your ISP provider doesn’t update their dns cache accordingly.OpenDNS is the best free alternative. All you have to do is add 2 new Dns to your network settings and the problem might be resolved.

You need 2 ips:

208.67.222.222 208.67.220.220

Add them to this file : resolv.conf

sudo vi /etc/resolv.conf

The second step will be to save the settings permanently.You can accomplish this in the following way :

sudo gedit /etc/dhcp3/dhclient.conf

Now change the line that starts with prepand :

prepend domain-name-servers 208.67.222.222,208.67.220.220;

Your all set. If dns was the problem then your sites should work with no problem.

Update :

Forget OpenDNS , It is a free service with a twist : it will hijack firefox and queries made from it will redirect to opendns search engine. The principle is the same but use a good free DNS service close to you.