However, you may decide later to upgrade to a higher version of Windows 7, like the Ultimate edition. You can read my previous post on 6 reasons to upgrade to Windows 7 Ultimate.

So if you have decided to make the move from Starter to Home Premium, Home Premium to Professional, or Professional to Ultimate, how do you go about doing it?

Also, note that you can upgrade from Starter to Ultimate, there is no need to go in order. You can currently upgrade a 32-bit version to another 32-bit version and same for 64-bit, but you cannot upgrade from a 32-bit OS to 64-bit.

One other major thing to note is that once you upgrade, you can’t go back to your previous edition without doing a full reinstall. This really should not be a big issue, but it’s good just to know.

Upgrade Windows 7 using Windows Anytime Upgrade

Click on Start, then type in anytime upgrade into the search box and click on Windows Anytime Upgrade to get started.

Now just follow the instructions to upgrade to a new edition of Windows 7. First, click on Go online to choose the edition of Windows 7 that is best for you.

In the same dialog, you’ll get a list of the different versions along with a nice table of features for each. This is also a great way to compare the different versions of Windows 7 and actually see what the differences are.

You can also click on the tabs across the top to see the features of each version separately. Once you buy a new version and have an upgrade key, click on Enter an upgrade key.

And that’s pretty much it! After you enter your key, Microsoft will confirm it and all the new features of the higher edition will be available immediately! No need to download anything or install any extra software. Enjoy!

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Windows 7 – How to use Windows Anytime Upgrade

System recovery options can help you repair Windows if a serious error occurs, such as corruption of the OS. To use system recovery options, you’ll need a Windows installation disc or access to the recovery options provided by your computer manufacturer. If you don’t have either of those choices, you can create a system repair disc to access system recovery options.

To start making system repair discs, go to the Control Panel then click the Backup and Restore icon. In the Backup and Restore window, click the Create a system repair disc link at the left side.

It will ask that you put a recordable disc in your disc drive – put a blank CD disc (don’t use a blank DVD or Blu-ray disc since it will only take less than 200MB of space).  If you are prompted for an administrator password or confirmation, type the password or provide confirmation.  Click the Create disc button to burn the disc.

The burning process is quick and uses up about 140+MB of files.

Now you have a ready to use disc to let you access system recovery options if you boot from it later on.  To use the disc, insert the system repair disc into your CD or DVD drive. Then restart your computer using the computer’s power button.

If prompted, press any key to start the computer from the system repair disc. If your computer isn’t configured to start from a CD or DVD, check the information that came with your computer. You might need to change your computer’s BIOS settings. It will boot up the recovery disc then will guide you to the rest of the process.

Ben Carigtan shows you how it’s done.

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How to Create a System Repair Disc in Windows 7

Well, it all depends on what version on Windows 7 you have! You can either have a pre-installed copy that came with your computer, you can buy a retail version, or you can buy a Family Pack.

Here’s the lowdown on the whole licensing thing. Firstly, it doesn’t matter which edition of Windows 7 you have, Ultimate, Home Premium, Starter, etc. The number of computers you can install the OS on is the same.

Here is the official text from the End User License Agreement for Windows 7:

INSTALLATION AND USE RIGHTS.

a.  One Copy per Computer. You may install one copy of the software on one computer. That computer is the “licensed computer.”

b.  Licensed Computer. You may use the software on up to two processors on the licensed computer at one time. Unless otherwise provided in these license terms, you may not use the software on any other computer.

c.  Number of Users. Unless otherwise provided in these license terms, only one user may use the software at a time.

d.  Alternative Versions. The software may include more than one version, such as 32-bit and 64-bit. You may install and use only one version at one time.

So that pretty much states how many computers you can install Windows 7 on! ONE! Now if you have the Family Pack, you can clean install or upgrade up to 3 PCs.

Note that in Windows 7, you can also uninstall Windows 7 from one PC and install it on another.

The one caveat that is pretty neat is the fact that you can install one more copy of Windows 7 on the same licensed machine in a virtual machine. However, it has to be on the same computer. Here is the official text:

d.  Use with Virtualization Technologies. Instead of using the software directly on the licensed computer, you may install and use the software within only one virtual (or otherwise emulated) hardware system on the licensed computer. When used in a virtualized environment, content protected by digital rights management technology, BitLocker or any full volume disk drive encryption technology may not be as secure as protected content not in a virtualized environment. You should comply with all domestic and international laws that apply to such protected content.

So that means you can install VirtualBox or Virtual PC and pop in your Windows 7 DVD and install another copy there for free! This is the only part of the license agreement that is different than previous versions of Windows and it’s a welcome change!

If you want to read the end user license agreements yourself, you can actually find them all the Microsoft website here:

http://www.microsoft.com/about/legal/useterms/default.aspx

If you have any other questions about installing Windows 7 and licensing, post a comment here and I’ll try to help. Enjoy!

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How many computers can you install Windows 7 on?

So how can you run this report? Well, first you need to make sure you run it when your computer is idle and you have exited all programs. Now start an elevated command prompt in Windows 7.

You can do this by clicking on Start, then typing command prompt into the search box and right-clicking on Command Prompt and choosing Run As Administrator.

Now type the following command at the prompt:

powercfg –energy

Now your computer will be evaluated over 60 seconds. At the end, you’ll see a message indicating how many errors were found, warnings, and just informational notes.

Now type in the following command to view the HTML report that was generated:

energy-report.html

You will now see a report that looks like this in Internet Explorer:

All the items in pink are Errors, all the items in yellow are Warnings, and white is just informational. You should go through all of the errors and warnings and try to rectify as many issues as you can.

This is an excellent report that is only available in Windows 7 which can significantly extend your battery lifetime if you fix all the problems. If you don’t understand something in the report, you can check out the official documentation from Microsoft no evaluating system energy efficiency.

So if you are having power problems in Windows 7 or poor battery life, make sure to run the power efficiency report first! Enjoy!

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How to Run a Power Efficiency Report in Windows 7

The first thing you should try if you having Internet problems is to try and connect from both a wireless and wired connection. You first want to try and narrow down the problem to Windows 7, to your network setup, or to your Internet provider.

Here are some possible solutions you can try that will hopefully get your Internet connection up and running in Windows 7.

Method 1 – Turn Off Firewall/Anti-Virus Programs

One common reason why this problem occurs in new installations of Windows 7 is because of a third-party firewall or anti-virus program. Just to make sure it’s not that, go ahead and uninstall any of these types of programs.

You might be wondering why it would matter, especially if you have the same program running on another computer like XP or Vista. The problem could be that if the firewall or anti-virus program is not compatible with Windows 7, it can accidentally block connections to the Internet.

Method 2 – Install Drivers in Emulation Mode

So if you didn’t buy a new computer and are instead installing Windows 7 on a slightly older machine, you problem could be because of incompatible drivers.

You can fix this in two ways. First, try going to the computer manufactures website and download the latest drivers for your wireless card. Install it and see if the problem is fixed.

If not, it might mean you need to install the driver in compatible mode. You can do this by right-clicking on the executable file, choosing Properties, clicking on the Compatibility tab and checking the box that says “Run this program in compatibility mode for:” and then choose the OS.

Again, make sure to run the driver setup program in this compatible mode to see if that fixes the problem.

Method 3 – Disable Protected Mode

The other reason you may not be able to connect is because of IE 8, which now ships with Windows 7. Some people have reported that the security settings are set such that they cannot connect to any website at all!

You can test this by going to Tools, then Internet Options, and clicking on the Security tab. Click on Internet and move the slide bar all the way to the bottom (lowest security).

Once you move the slider all the way down, click OK. Then close IE 8 and open it again. Try connecting to the Internet. If it doesn’t work, try unchecking the Enable Protected Mode option. Make sure to restart IE again.

Method 4 – Try Network Troubleshooter

If nothing else is working, you may as well try the built-in Windows 7 Network Diagnostics tool also. To run it, right-click on the Network icon in your system tray and choose Troubleshoot Problems.

It will automatically try to detect what the problem is and give you a possible reason and a solution.

Method 5 – Toggle Automatically Detect Settings option

Another thing you can try is to check or uncheck the Automatically Detect Settings option in IE. You can get there by going to Tools, Internet Options, Connections, LAN Settings.

If it’s checked, uncheck it and vice versa. See if that solves your problem. Also, make sure that the “Use a proxy server” box is unchecked.

Method 6 – Uninstall Network Card

You can also try to uninstall the network card from Device Manager and let Windows 7 re-install it on reboot.

Go to the Control Panel, click on Hardware and Sound, and then open Device Manager. Right-click on your network card and choose Uninstall. If prompted to remove the driver, click Yes.

Then restart Windows and the default Windows 7 driver will be installed, which might get your connection working again.

Method 7 – Enable/Disable Network Card

A simpler solution before uninstalling the network card might be to simply disable and then re-enable the network card.

Go to the Network and Sharing Center and right-click on your network card and choose Disable. Then simply re-enable it and see if this fixes your problem.

Hopefully, one of these methods will get your Internet connection in Windows 7 working again! If not, post a comment here and we’ll try to help!

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Windows 7 Cannot Connect to Internet

In Windows world, the term rootkit is also used to describe the mechanisms and techniques whereby malware, including viruses, spyware, and trojans, attempt to hide their presence from spyware blockers, antivirus, and system management utilities.

A free rootkit revealer from Sysinternals is a very lightweight tool that I use to scan for probable rootkit anomalies.  The tool doesn’t tell you if the anomalies are good or bad.  Some that are hidden from the Windows API are valid like ongoing file downloads.

You should examine all discrepancies and determine the likelihood that they indicate the presence of a rootkit. Unfortunately, there is no definitive way to determine, based on the output, if a rootkit is present, but you should examine all reported discrepancies to ensure that they are explainable.

If you determine that you have a rootkit installed, search the web for removal instructions. If you are unsure as to how to remove a rootkit you should reformat the system’s hard disk and reinstall Windows.

Ben Carigtan shows you how it’s done.

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During first run, you will need to configure and set up Kopete. Select the instant messenger client you want to set up with Kopete then click next. Enter your account credentials with the instant messaging service you have selected and click next.

In the next window check the connect now option and click finish to connect to the instant messaging service you have selected.

After clicking finish, Kopete will run the KDE Wallet System. This stores and encrypts your passwords and other personal information’s. In the next window check yes add supply your password for KDE Wallet and click finish.

After finishing the setup enter your password to your KDE wallet and Kopete will automatically log in to your instant messaging service.

After successfully connecting to your instant messaging service, you can now start you chat conversation with your contacts.

If you are using KDE and not Gnome, Kopete is the better choice than Pidgin.  It uses less memory under the KDE desktop environment.  If you want a native KDE app that can handle multiple messenger connections, this is a great program. My only problem with this program is that it currently don’t support microphone and audio/video conferences.

Ben Carigtan shows you how it’s done.

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Pop-in a blank DVD or CD and it will automatically prompt you with the “burn a disc” window.  The default disc title appears as the current date and you will have two options to choose from – like a USB flash drive or with a CD/DVD player.

The “like a USB flash drive” option is the live file system format and is often more convenient because you can copy selected files immediately and as often as you want, just like you can with a USB stick. Alternatively, Live File System discs can’t be used in all computers or in all CD, DVD, or Blu-ray Disc player.

The “with a CD/DVD player” option is the master burning type which is more compatible with other computers and consumer electronic devices, such as CD players, DVD players, and Blu-ray Disc players. Choose which option is suitable for your need then click next.

To start adding files to the disc, drag the files and folders to the drive.  I usually watch the size of the files I am dragging to the disc to avoid “not enough space” problems during the actual burning process.  If your files are more than 700 MB and less than 4.7GB, get a blank DVD disc.  If you need to burn files more than 4.7Gb, you might need to get a Blu-ray disc which supports up to 50GB of total size.

A balloon reminder will show that you have a bunch of files waiting to be burned to a disc.  Click this balloon or the disc drive to begin the burning process.

Click the Burn to disc button to start burning.

It will prompt for the disc title and recording speed – I usually set the recording speed to the lowest speed to ensure the maximum quality of the burned data.

If your disc’s capacity is less than the total amount of space that you need to burn, delete a file or files to meet the capacity limit then click choose “try again to burn disc now”:

It will then start to burn the disc.  Do not eject the disc or turn off your computer while this is ongoing, otherwise you will corrupt the burning process.  In my Samsung drive, it takes about 18 minutes to burn a DVD-R in 4X speed.

I hope this guide helps you burn data discs easily in Windows 7.  It is not as robust as the commercial disc burning apps like Nero Burning ROM but for quick and basic disc burning, this does the job well.

Ben Carigtan shows you how it’s done.

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Windows 7 – How to burn CDs, DVDs, and Blu-ray discs

You can also quickly bring up another program to the front by moving your mouse over the thumbnail preview in the taskbar. Aero Shake is a nifty feature that lets you shake a window and automatically have all other open windows minimized. Shake it again and all the windows come back.

Lastly Aero Snap lets you quickly resize windows by dragging them to the edges of your computer screen. Depending on where you drag it, you can make the window full screen, expand vertically, or appear side-by-side with another window.

If Aero is not working properly on your Windows 7 machine, you can use the Aero Troubleshooter to try and fix the problem.

First, click on the Start button and then type in aero. Now click on the Find and fix problems with transparency and other visual effects link.

A new wizard dialog will open. Make sure you click Advanced to fix any problems automatically.

Either the problem will be fixed or not. If not, you will get a list of items that are possible problems.

If you want to see more details about the problem, you can click on View detailed information. This will give you a list of potential issues that were checked and which ones are causing problems.

Note that in order to use Aero in Windows 7, you first have to complete the following requirements:

1. Make sure that you are not using Windows Home Basic since Aero is not supported in Home Basic.
2. You have to first rate your computer using Windows Experience Index.
3. Either you have to have DirectX 9.0 or later installed or WDDM 1.0 or later installed.

If your video card does not support Aero, then the troubleshooter will tell you. Enjoy!

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Windows 7 – How to Troubleshoot Problems with Aero Peek and Aero Shake

You can calibrate your display in Windows 7 using the Display Color Calibration wizard. You can get to this by going to Control Panel, clicking on Appearance and Personalization and then clicking on the Display header. Then click Calibrate color in the left menu:

You’ll get the wizard which will first tell you to reset your monitor to the default settings. You can set your display to the factory default settings by bringing up the on-screen menu and choosing reset to default.

If you can’t reset your monitor to default settings with one swipe, you might have to go through each setting and manually change them. Here is what you should change it to:

• Color Mode – sRGB
• Color Temperature – D65 or 6500
• Gamma – 2.2

The first calibration test is to adjust the brightness of the monitor so that you can see how dark colors and shadows appear on the desktop:

Note that you should be able to distinguish between the dark shirt and the suit while barely being able to see the X. After you are done, click Next.

Now you will adjust the contrast for the display in a similar manner. Note that you have to use the controls on the monitor to adjust these settings.

Next you can adjust the red, green and blue color balance for your display. You will use these controls to remove any color that is cast from the gray bars.

That’s it! Now you can click Previous calibration to quickly see what your display looked like before you used the tool. Click Current calibration to see the new display after the changes. This is an easy way to quickly see the difference between the two settings.

You can also turn on ClearType Tuner to make sure the fonts appear clean and sharp. You can read my previous post on how to adjust font rendering in Windows 7. After that, just click Finish to save your changes. Enjoy!

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Windows 7 Color Calibrate – How to Calibrate your Monitor

In Windows 7, when you perform a backup of your computer, the backup software will create a virtual hard disk file (VHD). If you have used Virtual PC 2007 before, you’ll know what I’m talking about.

You can also read my previous post on how to convert your PC into a virtual machine easily. Once you have a VHD file of your PC, you can load it up in Windows 7 and access the data just as if it was another drive on your computer.

Note that you can also use that VHD file to restore your entire computer to a previous state, but what if you just need some files or folders from a backup? Mounting a VHD backup in Windows 7 makes it really easy to copy data back and forth from the virtual machine.

To mount a VHD in Windows 7, you have to open Computer Management by clicking on Start and typing in compmgmt.msc in the search box. You can also go to Control Panel, then System and Security, then click on Administrative Tools and then click on Computer Management.

Now click on Disk Management on the left hand menu and wait for the list of drives and partitions to show up. Next, right-click on Disk Management and choose Attach VHD.

In the dialog box, go ahead and click Browse and navigate to the location of the VHD file that you want to mount. Then click OK.

Once it has finished mounting, you will see it display as another Basic disk that is colored a light blue. At anytime, you can right-click on that disk and choose Detach VHD to un-mount the machine.

That’s pretty much it! It’s really easy and works very well in Windows 7! If you created a virtual machine (VHD) file from another program like Virtual PC or something else, it will mount in Windows 7. Enjoy!

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How to Mount a Virtual Hard Disk in Windows 7

By default, Windows 7 enables ClearType, which is software technology that is supposed to help improve the readability of text on LCDs and flat panel monitors.

To tune or adjust the way fonts render on Windows 7, click on the Start orb, then type in cttune.exe. This is the ClearType Text Tuner.

You’ll first be asked whether you or not want to keep ClearType enabled or not. Here is what the different looks like with ClearType on and off.

Can you tell which one is using ClearType? The above paragraph has ClearType turned on and the lower paragraph has it turned off. As you can see, the bottom paragraph looks a bit more fuzzy.

You can uncheck ClearType, however, if you do not want any kind of font smoothing. When you click Next, you’ll walk through four screen with several versions of the same text.

You are supposed to choose the text sample that looks the best to you. Keep clicking next and choosing the best looking text from all the different samples. This should definitely help make text on Windows 7 look much better and to your liking.

Note that if the text is still looking fuzzy or stretched, you may have to adjust the your monitor resolution. You can change the resolution in Windows 7 by going to the Control Panel and clicking on Appearance and Personalization.

Then click on the Adjust screen resolution link below the Display heading:

Now choose a different resolution from the drop down menu. When you choose a new resolution, click the Apply button afterwards instead of OK. The screen will switch to the new resolution for a few seconds and then ask you if you want to leave it at that or change it back.

If you are still having problems with text display properly in Widows 7, leave a comment here and I will try to help!

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How to Adjust the Font Rendering in Windows 7

Unfortunately, there are certain DVD drives that have issues with Windows 7. The DVD drives will stop functioning altogether. Luckily, there are a few ways to fix the problem so that you can continue using the same DVD drive with Windows 7.

A couple of the models that are known to be effected include:

• Sony BC-5100S DVD
• Sony BC-5600S DVD
• TSST TS-L633B DVD+/-RW

If you are having this issue, you can do two things to try and fix it.

Method 1 – Update the firmware

The easiest fix for this problem is to try and upgrade the firmware for the DVD drive. Get the model # for the drive and then go to the manufacturer’s website and download the latest firmware.

Method 2 – Disable Adaptive Link Power Management

Windows 7 has this new features called ALPM (Adaptive Link Power Management) that basically puts hardware to sleep after 100 ms of idle time so that less power is used.

It’s a really great power-savings feature, however, it does not work well with some devices, including DVD and CD drives.

In order to get the drive to work, you have to disable ALPM. You can do this by opening a command prompt (Start, Run, CMD) and typing in the following commands:

• powercfg.exe -setacvalueindex 8c5e7fda-e8bf-4a96-9a85-a6e23a8c635c 0012ee47-9041-4b5d-9b77-535fba8b1442 DAB60367-53FE-4fbc-825E-521D069D2456 0
• powercfg.exe -setdcvalueindex 8c5e7fda-e8bf-4a96-9a85-a6e23a8c635c 0012ee47-9041-4b5d-9b77-535fba8b1442 DAB60367-53FE-4fbc-825E-521D069D2456 0
• powercfg.exe -setacvalueindex 381b4222-f694-41f0-9685-ff5bb260df2e 0012ee47-9041-4b5d-9b77-535fba8b1442 DAB60367-53FE-4fbc-825E-521D069D2456 0
• powercfg.exe -setdcvalueindex 381b4222-f694-41f0-9685-ff5bb260df2e 0012ee47-9041-4b5d-9b77-535fba8b1442 DAB60367-53FE-4fbc-825E-521D069D2456 0
• powercfg.exe -setacvalueindex a1841308-3541-4fab-bc81-f71556f20b4a 0012ee47-9041-4b5d-9b77-535fba8b1442 DAB60367-53FE-4fbc-825E-521D069D2456 0
• powercfg.exe -setdcvalueindex a1841308-3541-4fab-bc81-f71556f20b4a 0012ee47-9041-4b5d-9b77-535fba8b1442 DAB60367-53FE-4fbc-825E-521D069D2456 0

Make sure you press Enter after each command. Not the prettiest solution out there, but it’ll get your drive back up and running! Enjoy!

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Cannot Access Your DVD Drive After Installing Windows 7?

These recordings are then saved as archived web pages (.mht) files that you can then send to Microsoft or your friends for technical support. It’s really a very convenient way to quickly show someone the problem you are having with your Windows 7 machine.

To use Problem Steps Recorder, click on Start and type in psr.exe in the search box. Then click on psr.exe in the Programs lists.

To start a new recording, simply click on the Start Record button. From now until you click Stop Record, all of the items that you click on will be recorded. The program will automatically add detailed descriptions of exactly what you are doing, but you can click Add Comment to add your own comments also.

After you click Stop Record, you’ll be asked to save your file as a zip file. To view the file, extract the zip file and you should see one folder with one file in it called Problem_date_number.mht.

Double-click on it and it will open the file in Internet Explorer. You can now see screenshots of all your clicks. Note that the program takes a screenshot of the entire desktop, but highlights in green the section you clicked on.

Also, note that anything you type will not be recorded, so if what you are typing is important to recreating the problem, then you can simply use the Add Comment option.

Overall, it’s a pretty cool feature and one that makes troubleshooting Windows 7 problems a lot easier than Windows XP and Vista. Enjoy!

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Use Problem Steps Recorder to get Tech Support for Windows 7

Connectify is the name of the app and it’s currently in beta testing, though you can download and use it.

What’s neat about this application is that it actually created a full-fledged WiFi Access Point on your Windows 7 machine, not just an ad hoc type of network.

Also, the software-based wireless router uses WPA2-Personal (AES) encryption, so your security namely depends on the passphrase that you decide to choose when setting up the new wireless network.

Basically, after you install it, you should see a new Connectify icon running in the Notification area. If not, you can click on the up arrow and then drag the Connectify icon to the main notification area.

Click on the icon and choose the Internet connection you would like to share. It can be a wireless or wired connection. Then you choose a name for your new network and choose a strong password.

In order for other people to connect, they will need to know the passphrase. This is exactly how a normal wireless router works also.

Next, you press the Internet Sharing button to turn your wireless network on and viola! Now anyone or any device with a wireless card can join the wireless network!

Image Source: Lifehacker

Overall it’s a really simple application to use, but it also very useful, especially if you are stuck somewhere that only has a wired connection and you have several people who need to connect.

Connectify only runs on Windows 7, but any computer running Windows XP or Vista can connect to the newly created wireless network. Enjoy!

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Windows 7 – Share Internet connection with other computers