Computer Tips and Tricks

How To Increase Your Internet Speed By 20%

2010-01-29T06:59:00.000-08:00

If you use Windows XP Professional then it is possible to squeeze an extra 20% out of your internet connection. By default Windows XP Pro holds back 20% of your Internet speed for various services like windows update and spyware checks.
If you want to tap into this locked speed then make the following changes:
1. Go to Start-> Run-> and type gpedit.msc
2. Expand the Administrative Templates branch
3. Expand the Network tab
4. Highlight QoS Packet Scheduler
5. Click on Limit Reservable Bandwidth

and check the enabled box
6. Then Change the Bandwidth limit % to 0 %

apply and restart your PC. After rebooting you should see a noticeable improvement in your net speed.

How to Double Firefox Speed

2010-01-29T06:53:00.000-08:00

Firefox in my opinion the best browser ever made until now. It includes:
-improved tabbed browsing
-pop up blocking
-integrated Goggle search
-enhanced privacy controls
-built-in phishing protection
-online spell checking
-lots of themes, interfaces, and extensions/addons Mozilla Firefox officially supports:
-Microsoft Windows
-Linux
-Mac OS X

Unofficial Support:
-Free BSD
-OS/2
-Solaris
-SkyOS
-BeOS
-XP Professional x64 Edition
Now here are some Tips&Tricks that can help you double the speed of Firefox.
1. Type about:config in the address bar and then press Enter.

2. In the filter search bar type network.http.pipelining. Be sure the value field is set true,if not double-click to set true.

HTTP is the application-layer protocol that most web pages are transferred with. In HTTP 1.1, multiple requests can be sent before any responses are received. This is known as pipelining. Pipelining reduces page loading times, but not all servers support it.
3. Go back to the filter search bar and type network.http.pipelining.maxrequests. Double-click this option and set its value to 8.

4. In the filter search bar and type network.http.proxy.pipelining. Once opened double-click on it and set it to true.

5. In IPv6-capable DNS servers, an IPv4 address may be returned when an IPv6 address is requested. It is possible for Mozilla to recover from this misinformation, but a significant delay is introduced.
Type network.dns.disableIPv6 in the filter search bar and set this option to true by double clicking on it.

6. CONTENT INTERRUPT PARSING
This preference controls if the application will interrupt parsing a page to respond to UI events. It does not exist by default.
Right-click (Apple users ctrl-click) anywhere in the about:config window, select New and then Boolean from the pop-up menu. Then:

A. Enter content.interrupt.parsing in the New boolean value pop-up window and click OK

B. When prompted to choose the value for the new boolean, select true and click OK.

7. Rather than wait until a page has completely downloaded to display it to the user, Mozilla applications will regularly render what has been received to that point. This option controls the maximum amount of time the application will be unresponsive while rendering pages.
Right-click (Apple users ctrl-click) anywhere in the about:config window, select New and then Integer from the pop-up menu.

A. Enter content.max.tokenizing.time in the New integer value pop-up window and click OK

B. You will be prompted to enter a value. Enter 2250000 and click OK.

8. CONTENT NOTIFY INTERVAL
This option sets the minimum amount of time to wait between reflows. Right-click (Apple users ctrl-click) anywhere in the about:config window, select New and then Integer from the pop-up menu.

A. Type content.notify.interval in the New integer value pop-up window and click OK.

B. You will be prompted to enter a value. Enter 750000 and click OK.

9. CONTENT NOTIFY ONTIMER
A. This option sets if to reflow pages at an interval any higher than that specified by content.notify.interval. Right-click (Apple users ctrl-click) anywhere in the about:config window and select New and then Boolean from the pop-up menu.

B. Type content.notify.ontimer in the New boolean value pop-up window and click OK.

C. You will be prompted to choose the value for the new boolean. Select true and click OK.

10. Notify Backoffcount
This option controls the maximum number of times the content will do timer-based reflows. After this number has been reached, the page will only reflow once it is finished downloading. Right-click (Apple users ctrl-click) anywhere in the about:config window and select New and then Integer from the pop-up menu.

A. Enter content.notify.backoffcount in the New integer value pop-up window and click OK.

B. You will be prompted to enter a value. Enter 5 and click OK.

11. CONTENT SWITCH THRESHOLD
You can interact with a loading page when content.interrupt.parsing is set to true. When a page is loading, the application has two modes: a high frequency interrupt mode and a low frequency interrupt mode. The first one interrupts the parser more frequently to allow for greater UI responsiveness during page load.
The low frequency interrupt mode interrupts the parser less frequently to allow for quicker page load. The application enters high frequency interrupt mode when you move the mouse or type on the keyboard and switch back to low frequency mode when you had no activity for a certain amount of time. This preference controls that amount of time. Right-click (Apple users ctrl-click) anywhere in the about:config window and select New and then Integer from the pop-up menu.

A. Enter content.switch.threshold in the New integer value pop-up window and click OK.

B. You will be prompted to enter a value. Enter 750000 and click OK.

12. NGLAYOUT INITIALPAINT DELAY
Mozilla applications render web pages incrementally, they display what’s been received of a page before the entire page has been downloaded. Since the start of a web page normally doesn’t have much useful information to display, Mozilla applications will wait a short interval before first rendering a page. This preference controls that interval. Right-click (Apple users ctrl-click) anywhere in the about:config window and select New and then Integer from the pop-up menu.

A. Enter nglayout.initialpaint.delay in the New integer value pop-up window and click OK.

B. You will be prompted to enter a value. Enter 0 and click OK.

How to access the sharing data offline?

2010-01-29T06:36:00.001-08:00

Access the shared data offline allows you to keep using your shared files, folders and software programs when disconnected from the data server. When you reconnect to your data server, all files will be synchronized to the files on the network.

There are two types of configurations required to set the access shared folders offline available, one for data server and other for client computer.

Configuration on Data Server

First locate the folders that you would like to share or make new folders then share these folders so they can be accessible to any one on the network.

Now right click on that folder and click on the option "Sharing and security".

A small dialog box will appear with the title "data properties". Under the "Sharing" tab, select the check box "Share this folder on the network" under the "Network sharing and security".

Now set the share level permissions that you want to give the users on every folder. Enable cache of share folders by click on cache button (by default it will be enabled).

Configuration on Client Computer

On the client computer, first open My Computer then click on Tools.

In Tools menu bar, click on Folder Options, a window will appear with the title Folder Options.

Under the Offline File tab, check the option Enable Offline File. Here you can choose the synchronization process "Synchronize all offline files when logging on", "Synchronize all offline files before logging off" and others.

Click on Apply button to save the settings and then Ok button to close this window.

Now sitting on the client computer, try to access the shared folder from the data server.

First Right click on the shared folder and Click on Make available offline.

To synchronizing the offline work from client computer to data server, again open My Computer then click on Tools. Click on Synchronize then click on synchronizing button.

After that down to data server and then try to access share folders by give the UNC (Universal Naming Convention) path of data server. But it will be accessible weather the server is down or up.

Top 10 Tips to protect yourself against computer viruses

2010-01-29T06:34:00.000-08:00

When your computer gets infected with a virus it can be a devastating experience. A virus can consume your precious computer files and even damage your computer hardware. Is this worth ignoring? I don't think so! Anything you can do to avoid a computer virus has to be a good thing and is well worth spending your time on. We all know prevention is better than a cure so I am going to share my top 10 tips on how to protect yourself against computer viruses.

The first thing that I recommend is to research and become knowledgeable about viruses. How can you protect your computer from viruses if you don't even know what they are. Here are some previous tutorials I have written about viruses. See What is a Virus and how do I know if I have one? and What's the difference between a virus, spyware, Malware, and adware?
Arm yourself with the best Antivirus software to suit your needs. Not everyone can get away with using free antivirus software because it depends what you do on your computer. It depends on factors such as if you download files or not, if you open email attachments, and if you surf suspicious websites. See my reviews for the best Virus Removal Software. Lets face it, if you do not have protection against viruses installed on your computer, you will without a doubt, get a virus within the first hour of surfing the internet. It is that easy.
Having a great Antivirus program installed on your computer to protect you against viruses is great, however if you do not regularly update the virus definitions, then the program is useless. New viruses are produced daily and this is why we constantly have to update the viruses definitions and stay ahead of the bad guys.
When surfing the internet avoid websites that contain illegal software downloads, sexual references, free screensavers, cracks or serials, etc. I am sure you get the picture. If you go near these sites you are immediately asking for trouble.
Always update Windows. These updates contain security updates that will help in your fight against viruses. If you do not perform regular Windows updates you are leaving your computer in a vulnerable state.
Be careful when opening emails. There are obvious emails that you know you shouldn't open, however what about the ones you get from people you know? What if your friend has a virus and it is spreading itself through emails? An email cannot be important enough to risk getting a virus. Delete the email and send a fresh email to your friend asking them if they actually did send you the email.

If you are really serious about protecting your computer you can change your email settings and receive text emails only. You can also disable the ability to open email attachments. Virus travel in HTML enabled emails and file attachments. They cannot travel in text email messages.
Do not use peer to peer (p2p) file sharing programs. These include programs such as Limewire, Bearshare, Gnutella, Morpheus, Torrents, etc. These program let you download files from other computer users connected to their program network. You have no way of knowing what you are actually downloading until it is on your computer. Even if you share files from a cd from a friend, it may have a virus.
Do not download files from websites. Again, there is no way of knowing what you are downloading. The file can appear to be named like the file you want, however it could be anything. Most of the time, this is how a virus is unleashed, it usually seems like a harmless, familiar object.
Make sure you have a firewall enabled on your computer. Windows comes with an inbuilt firewall or you can use a third party firewall program like Zone Alarm. Either way, make sure the firewall is on...To check the Windows Firewall go to the security settings in your control panel.

If you are careful and are serious about protecting your computer from invading viruses, it is possible to stay safe. My top 10 tips will help you keep your computer running smoothly, and virus free.

Absolutely Free || Unlimited Lifetime Use Software

2010-01-07T07:04:00.000-08:00

Buying licensed software such as anti-viruses, firewall, anti-spyware, graphic editing, network troubleshooters etc. for personal use can be costly. Anyone, specially with limited income resources and working online on his/her PC badly needs basic free software for day to day tasks.

Buying such different category licensed software, each designed for separate task, can easily cost one a total of few hundred dollars! In this post, I am going to let you know some free resources where you can get no cost licensed software for unlimited personal usage – no trials, no demo and no shareware – where the software stops working after sometime and then you have to pay. Am I joking? On one hand, I am telling you that the software cost a lot and then I am writing that there are free alternatives to these costly software. No! I am not joking but I am not claiming that these free personal licensed software will do everything that paid software will do. But, yet you can manage to do most of the things compared to the paid software. It’s also better to have some free software that does most of the needed stuff rather than not having any at all. Right?

The sites that I am telling here gives you free software in different categories for personal usage are based on the concept of open source software. These software are built under General Public License (GPL) and do not cost a cent to you. How do Open Source Software companies make money is a different topic but it’s clear that no one does anything for free. Some open source developers charge money for giving support for their software, some make money through advertising, donations and so on.

But, if you need software for basic day-to-day use for doing various tasks on computer, and don’t have complicated needs, then open source software is definitely right for you.

You can easily get open source programs for anti-viruses, anti-spyware, graphic editors, browsers, firewall, audio recording, video recording, CD and DVD burning, network monitoring, network packet analyzing, remote desktop controlling, word processing, designing spreadsheets, making presentations, Content Management System (CMS), accounting software and many more for free! Also, these software are clean and do not have any hidden trojans, viruses, adware etc., so can download without any fear. It won’t hurt if scan them with your anti-viruses scanning software etc. before installing them

The two sites (there are many though) where you can download absolutely free, no trials, no demo, open source software for life time usage are:

http://www.osalt.com/

http://www.sourceforge.net

You can also do google search for the keyword “open source and category of software” , example “open source photo editor” to get the links for no cost photo editor for your personal usage. One such example of open source photo editor is GIMP, full form GNU Image Manipulation Program.

You can also install open source software at different computers and can distribute it for free to others, Great! Isn’t it?

Hope that this post of mine gives you tips for saving money that you could otherwise have spent on buying paid software. If you have basic software needs, go for open source software, it’s Free! I have used some of these open source software for my basic, no complicated needs on my PC and found them extremely useful.

Did you find this post of any benefit? And, are these open source software of any use Or is it just all hype? What do you say?

Multiple login in yahoo Without Using any Software

2010-01-07T06:59:00.000-08:00

You can login with multiple id's on the same yahoo messenger without any download or patch .
Follow these steps :
1. Go to Start ----> Run . Type regedit, then enter .

2.Navigate to HKEY_CURRENT_USER --------> Software --->yahoo ----->pager---->Test

3.On the right page , right-click and choose new Dword value .

4.Rename it as Plural.

5.Double click and assign a decimal value of 1.

Its done!!
Now close registry and restart yahoo messenger and try Multiple Login

MAKE YOUR MENUS LOAD FASTER

2010-01-07T06:55:00.001-08:00

Go to Start then Run
Type 'Regedit' then click 'Ok'
Find "HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Control Panel\Desktop\"
Select "MenuShowDelay"
Right click and select "Modify'
Reduce the number to around "100"
This is the delay time before a menu is opened. You can set it to "0" but it can make windows really hard to use as menus will open if you just look at them - well move your mouse over them anyway. I tend to go for anywhere between 50-150 depending on my mood.

Convert FAT- NTFS

2010-01-07T06:54:00.000-08:00

To convert a FAT partition to NTFS, perform the following steps.
Click Start, click Programs, and then click Command Prompt. In Windows XP, click Start, click Run, type cmd and then click OK.

At the command prompt, type CONVERT [driveletter]: /FS:NTFS. Convert.exe will attempt to convert the partition to NTFS.

NOTE:=
Although the chance of corruption or data loss during the conversion from FAT to NTFS is minimal, it is best to perform a full backup of the data on the drive that it is to be converted prior to executing the convert command.

My monitor is blinking; how can I solve it?

2010-01-07T02:18:00.001-08:00

Monitor screen blinking is the common problem for the Desktop users. Sometimes it is seen in the Laptop too. So, how to solve the monitor blinking problem? Here, I tried to give a solution. Hope, it will give you the exact solution.

There can have many reasons to causes the monitor to be blinking. But most of the time this problem is occurred due to incorrect resolution settings. The color quality, screen resolution, and refresh rate of your Monitor should be matched each other. Suppose, you have chosen the color quality at 32 bit, but refresh rate is 60 Hertz. Both settings are not well-inter-matched. So your PC’s monitor may still be blinking. Remember; try to set your monitor configuration as high as possible according to your graphics card. But normally who have 128 or 256 AGP, he/she can set his/her monitor screen resolution at 1024*768 , Refresh Rate- 85 Hertz, Color Quality- 32 Bit. If your monitor is blinking, just open the Graphics properties from your desktop by right click in the empty place and go to Monitor Display Settings (If graphics card is enabled in your PC). It also can be found in the Control Panel. Check all of the settings I mentioned above, and apply it. It will take 15 seconds to be reconfigured. Hope this article will assist you to solve your monitor blinking problem. Further if you have any trouble, let me know this. I will try my best to help you.