This is a departure from the norm, but I thought this would be an interesting tidbit for many of our readers. Have you ever wondered how the character in so many of Nintendo’s games came to be named Mario? Well, wonder no longer. For those of who just want the answer: [...] Nintendo borrowed Mario’s name and Italian heritage from a real man. That man’s...

This is the tag line for the aptly named free utility: SIW – System Information for Windows. As you can probably guess, the functionality is in line with the name: SIW is an advanced System Information for Windows tool that gathers detailed information about your system properties and settings and displays it in an extremely comprehensible manner. SIW can...

For those of you who like to brainstorm on the computer, you can’t beat the flexibility offered by mind mapping software. For this task, the software package XMind looks pretty impressive. XMind is an award winning open source program which, in addition to the expected package of features, offers quite a bit of sharing and collaboration ability (some...

Windows 7 introduced the incredibly useful Aero Snap function, but for those of you using Windows Vista and XP you can add this functionality with the freeware utility, AeroSnap. AeroSnap is a simple but powerful application that allows you to resize, arrange or maximize your desktop windows with just drag’n'drop. Simple drag a window to a side of your...

One of the really great new functions of Windows 7 is the Aero Snap feature which allows you to easily align multiple windows on your screen by dragging them to the side. While this works great if you only have a single monitor, if you have multiple monitors the Aero Snap does not work in the area between the two screens. However, this is easily overcome by a...

I’ve been seeing a about memory optimizers recently which make promises to clean up excessive amounts of RAM that Windows and some programs use. Much like “RAM doubling” programs which made the rounds during the Windows 95/98 days, virtually all of these programs are merely a ruse: Memory boosters, optimizers, and washers — whatever the...

You may know that today is Earth Day. As someone who is personally a big believer and participant in reducing the footprint we have on our planet I feel obligated to post something on this subject. So I am reaching out to our readers to ask that tonight, if you don’t already, turn off your computer when you are done using it. It is a myth that turning your...

For those of you into MMO’s and/or strategy games, you may want to take a look at the new offering from EA: Lord of Ultima. Lord of Ultima is an online strategy game where you build your own unique city and play with thousands of other players. Join now and rule a mighty empire which you can access from wherever and whenever you want. All you need to enter...

I am continually amazed by the power of “swiss army knife” command line tools which do lots of functions. Among the best I have found is Nirsoft’s NirCmd. I had a request the other day to convert a large amount of images (approximately 1,000) to PNG format. These images were collections from different sources and were in a mixture of GIF, JPG...

For those of you who remember and enjoyed the simple (but addictive) game Lemmings, a game you should give a look to is Pingus. If you haven’t played Lemmings, the concept is simple: The player takes command in the game of a bunch of small animals and has to guide them around in levels. Since the animals walk on their own, the player can only influence...