Everyone knows it is unsightly to have tons of icons and documents on your desktop, yet somehow it always seems to happen to everyone (with the exception of the extremely disciplined). If this is a problem you have, a tool which can help get this under control is Fences. Fences is a nifty free tool which allows you to create a small “fenced in” area...

"You shouldn’t complain about something if it’s free." I don’t agree with that statement when it comes to web browsers, because is required software in order to use the web. Note that I said web and not internet. Traditional email requires no browser nor does instant messaging. Also bear in mind that it was messaging that existed...

I love rechargeable batteries and use them for everything I can. Traditionally, however, the big complaint on these batteries is they do not hold their charge as long as their disposable alkaline counterparts. While this used to be true, the newer hybrid nickel-metal hydride (Ni-MH) rechargeables make this a thing of the past. From this article which covers the...

I suppose you could call me an ICQ "fanboy" of sorts because I find an endearing quality to that instant messenger client and service. I also understand that when it comes to instant messaging, most people use Windows Live Messenger – and that is not just a USA-only thing by the way. People the world over use Windows Live as their preferred means...

In all the years I’ve been using the internet, there is always some boob out there who utters something so unbelievably ridiculous that it just boggles the mind. At least one to two major flub-ups happen once per year. Well, we’ve got our first for 2010. Such an event happened very recently. It involved a Twitter post where somebody that had a...

With the Window XP/Vista firewall, opening a particular port (i.e. 80 for HTTP, 1433 for SQL, etc.) was very straightforward. With Windows 7, however, the process is totally different and, initially, not very intuitive. So if you have the need to open a particular port on Windows 7, just follow these steps:Open the Windows 7 Firewall. Click the option for...

As a writer/journalist I try in my best effort to write content that makes grammatical sense. It is true I do break the traditional rules by using fragments, run-on sentences (like this one), shortening words for creative effect (ex: "Good ol’ IBM), starting sentences with and or but, and so on – but with blogging that’s acceptable because...

Whenever you visit a web page, there is loads of information available on it from various sources. Is the site known to be malicious? What is the Google Page Rank? Is it safe for kids? All of this information and loads more is available instantly via the LinkExtend Firefox add-on. LinkExtend provides meta-site-ratings for computer safety, child safety, company...

Many people out there like iTunes, but own a music player which isn’t an iPod. If you fall into this category, then you might be interested in iTunes Agent. iTunes Agent is a tiny application which rests in your system tray, constantly looking for devices being connected to your system. If a device it recognizes is connected it enables you to manage it via...

I have posted about several tools in the past which allow you to monitor the bandwidth usage on your computer. While these work great for individual machines, what if you want to monitor your entire network? While you could install a bandwidth monitor on each computer and add up the numbers, the easist way is to just view the bandwidth totals on your router...

It’s the little things that matter in life, and this obviously includes your PC. The Dell Studio XPS is a fantastic PC, no question. The two models offered currently are the XPS 8100 and the XPS 9000. The base 8100 model (no monitor included) is $649. And what you get, said honestly, is a very fast machine. The specs include an Intel Core i5-650 3.20GHz...

I have seen this posted on several sites today so I am going to join the club to make sure none of our readers miss this deal. Today (Jan. 14, 2010) only, you can download the full licensed copy of Glary Utilities Pro for free. If you are not familiar with Glary Utilities, it is a popular all-in-one suite for system maintenance and protection. The suite is...

This is a follow-up to this article. The "god mode" shortcut linked there does work in 32-bit Windows 7 environments but for 64-bit it may be slightly problematic depending on system configuration. The video below shows how to create Windows 7 Control Panel shortcuts by using more of a manual method, but it is 100% guaranteed to...

In order to load programs faster, Windows (XP+) has a feature called Prefetch which caches system files you most commonly use. If are you ever curious as to what is loaded by the prefetch function, check out WinPrefetchView. The main window of WinPrefetchView contains 2 panes: The upper pane displays the list of all Prefetch files in your system. When you select...

Viewing email in a threaded view is something that’s largely overlooked, but does in fact make your email much easier to manage. It’s more or less been around since the first GUI-based email clients, is easily accessible and you can turn it off or on at whim. Gmail uses a threaded view by default, and users of that system think it’s a godsend....

In Firefox I use the built in password manager with a master password set for protection. For whatever reason, however, some sites will not allow me to save my password information. One example that I deal with is Paypal which stores the user name, but never the password. A fix for this is explained here. By running the javascript on the problem page prior to...

Notes: This issue seems to be particular to XP and not Vista or 7. In addition, it is not guaranteed to work as they may be other apps interrupting your Hibernate/Stand By process – but – there’s a good chance it will work. Java, the thing we all love to hate, is in many cases a necessary evil for specific web sites and apps like the OpenOffice...

A neat tool that Google makes available is Google Trends which shows you historical statistics on search terms. Wikipedia has a good explanation: Google Trends [...] shows how often a particular search-term is entered relative to the total search-volume across various regions of the world, and in various languages. Basically, you can see how popular a particular...

Most of you out there have an email address that is a total of at least 16 characters long if you include the @, the dot and the TLD (com/net/org/etc.) Being that mobile internet is rapidly becoming more common, a super-short email address can come in handy because it takes much less time to type on a cell phone or smartphone, and furthermore won’t...

Building on a tip I posted a couple of weeks ago about opening non-zip files using 7-Zip, a practical use for this can be when you want to run a program that does not offer a portable version without installing. By opening the setup EXE file using 7-Zip, you can extract the files the installer copies to your system and then run the program like a portable...