Windows Secrets

‘Illegitimis non carborundum’ applies to tablet

Kathleen Atkins — Thu, 02 May 2013 15:50:30 +0000

When you visit the Lounge, you’re apt to find the information you’re searching for, such as how to deal with a possibly flaky Nexus 7.

You might also run into aphorisms coined by British intelligence personnel during the Second World War — such as “Don’t let the [expletive deleted] grind you down.” How brilliant of computer operating systems and hardware to give the phrase a perfect new context.

The following links are this week’s most interesting Lounge threads, including several new questions for which you might have answers:

Office Applications
General Productivity	Customize Quick Access buttons
Word Processing	Display negative numbers as (xxx) in table
Spreadsheets	Formula mystery
Databases	Deleting tables in Access 2013
Presentation Apps	Capturing screenshot of PowerPoint ribbon
Visual Basic for Apps	Compiling VBA
Microsoft Outlook	Outlook 2007: How to set “send from diff email” as default?
Non-Outlook E-mail	Windows Live Mail quits installation on Win7
Windows
General Windows	Don’t want Windows Photo Viewer
Windows 8	Windows 8.1 build 9374 has Start button, but …
Windows 7	Net send replacement needed
	Windows 7 partition and VMware
	Where are background color settings?
Windows Vista	Sound fading in and out
Windows XP	Reinstalled XP, but IE dead
Windows Servers	Repercussions of client hardware swap
Internet/Connectivity
Internet Explorer	Java stays disabled in IE 9/Win7
Third-Party Browsers	Unable to install Firefox
Networking	Internet access shuts down after three hours
Software Development
Web Design & Development	Moving printed newsletter to website
Other Technologies
Non-Microsoft OSes	What to do with a £180 piece of Junk? Nexus 7
Security & Scams	ZoneAlarm free installation
Maintenance	Recommend heat monitor?
Hardware	4TB disk problem
Graphics/Multimedia	Problem downloading videos in RealPlayer
Other Applications	Secunia PSI flags Acrobat Standard 9: Security risk?

starred posts: particularly useful

If you’re not already a Lounge member, use the quick registration form to sign up for free. The ability to post comments and take advantage of other Lounge features is available only to registered members.

If you’re already registered, you can jump right in to today’s discussions in the Lounge.

If you want to write Windows 8 apps

Laura Forbes — Thu, 02 May 2013 15:40:21 +0000

It’s not just Windows 8 users who need to get up to speed on the new OS: so do software developers.

If you’re ambitious to write applications for Windows 8, Getting Started with Windows 8 Apps by Ben Dewey is good preparation for the challenging changes in the development approach that Windows Runtime (WinRT) represents.

This month, all Windows Secrets subscribers can download an excerpt: Chapter 1, “Windows 8: A Quick Tour.” It starts with a concise summary of Windows 8′s new tile/touch interface and then briefly discusses the coding differences inherent in the new OS. This peek at Windows 8′s components might even interest users of the new OS who have no plans to code up a Win8 application.

If you want to download this free excerpt, simply visit your preferences page and save any changes; a download link will appear.

Info on the printed book: United States

Here comes the sun: Beach-blanket Seattle

Kathleen Atkins — Thu, 02 May 2013 15:30:22 +0000

By Kathleen Atkins

We at Windows Secrets are not born-and-bred natives of Seattle, but we know our city. So we can attest to the truthfulness of this sly video.

And we confess to reacting to sun in Seattle the same way the native-born do: we rush out of our houses with at least one of our 10 pairs of sunglasses — as well as our hats, blankets, cameras, and unreasonable joy — to climb or bask on our favorite rocks. The sun makes us do it. Play the video

What’s a Bitcoin and why would you want one?

Woody Leonhard — Thu, 02 May 2013 15:20:09 +0000

You might have heard in recent weeks about Bitcoin millionaires — people who raked in vast sums of real money riding this relatively new form of currency.

Bitcoins offer both a fascinating, new approach to money and many potential pitfalls. Here’s what you should know about this online phenomenon.

The history of money is fascinating. Ancient humans traded salt for fish, wheat for beer, and camels for wives. Around 9,000 BC, give or take a millennium or three, people started using an intermediary object — something they might not need but could exchange. For example, I’ll take one bag of rice for my duck; I’ll give you a half-bag of rice for that small clay pot or a whole bag for that big pot.

In Asia, cowry shells (considerably easier to carry than bags of rice, no doubt) were used long ago for bartering. But as trade expanded around the world, more sophisticated forms of “currency” were needed: bronze-cast knives in China, silver bars of set weights in Mesopotamia, gold bars in Egypt.

Around 700 to 500 BC, the first coins appeared — typically, stamped bits of naturally occurring silver/gold metal called electrum. Minted coins followed, their value dictated by the weight and fineness of gold or silver used. Coins from Athens, Persia, and China circulated all over the world.

Around the 11th century, paper money appeared alongside coins in China. In Europe, the first paper money was a sort of IOU used to document loans in gold. The IOUs gradually formalized into official banknotes.

In the 17th century, European governments (and much of the world soon after) moved into the business of issuing paper money, backed by deposits of gold and silver.

Skipping over centuries of hyperinflation, bank runs, and the end of the gold standard, we arrive at the monetary system in use today.

With the exception of cash and trade, every monetary transaction we make today goes through the same basic cycle: you offer to buy something with a credit card or check, a central record-keeping organization verifies whether you have sufficient funds or credit, the purchase is approved, and the transaction is posted to your account.

All forms of electronic money work the same way. You put through a charge using a credit card online, or you receive or send money via PayPal, or you tap your stored-value card or phone to make a payment. As long as you have enough money or credit, you’re good. The system works because the currency used remains relatively stable.

Establishing an entirely different kind of money

Bitcoins are currency, but they’re unlike anything most of us use today. They’re a blend of new technology, old-style bartering, and free-market thinking. Although completely electronic, a Bitcoin’s value is set by the open market — not by any government entity.

Like cash, Bitcoin transactions are untraceable. If you want to transfer significant amounts of money through traditional channels, it takes either suitcases of cash or at least one intermediary bank — along with all the required paper trails and fees. Not so with Bitcoins. Using some cryptographic magic and extreme redundancy, the Bitcoin network requires no central bank, no list of Bitcoin holders, nothing that can trace a person to a specific transaction. If that sounds like an ideal setup for money launderers, drug dealers, and/or fugitive prime ministers, you’re on the way to understanding the early attraction of Bitcoins.

About four years ago, Bitcoins came to prominence as the preferred currency on the Silk Road website. As reported by the Guardian and other sources, the majority of sales on Silk Road involved drugs. Bitcoins made those transactions untraceable.

Today, Bitcoins are undoubtedly used for less sordid transactions. But their fluctuating value also gives them a commodity- or stock-like aspect. Through 2012, a single Bitcoin’s value grew from U.S. $5 to about $13. This year, a Bitcoin cost $266 on April 10 and then fell to $125 the next day, prompting the crash of the largest online Bitcoin exchange, the Japan-based Mt. Gox (site). When the exchange came back online a day later, Bitcoins hit a low of $65. As I write this, a couple of weeks later, the value’s almost doubled to $120.

Now that’s what I call volatility!

Nobody knows for sure why the Bitcoin market soared, then crashed. One theory places the blame on Cyprus’s banking crisis, where thousands of bank accounts received involuntary “haircuts” by a Cypriot government flailing for cash. Panicked depositors ran for alternatives — among them, Bitcoins. Others speculate that organized crime manipulated the market to buy low and sell high. (On April 24, Mt. Gox was also hit by a massive distributed-denial-of-service attack.)

Steve Forbes, no stranger to the subject of money and finance, put it succinctly in his op-ed article, “Bitcoin: Whatever it is, it’s not money!” He states that the Bitcoin is too volatile to be “money” in any traditional sense of the term. “It has no fixed value. It trades like a stock or commodity.”

To Bitcoin proponents, that’s precisely the point. Bitcoins are kind of an anarchist’s version of cowry shells — not beholden to any government, bank, political group, or individual trying to corner the market in a specific commodity.

How a distributed-currency system works

As mentioned above, Bitcoins are entirely electronic. At its heart, a Bitcoin is simply a number — like the serial number on a banknote. To use a Bitcoin, you sign in to your Bitcoin wallet, stored either at an online service or in an application on your personal computer or mobile device. The wallet shows your Bitcoin balances; it’s also where you get Bitcoin addresses (essentially separate accounts), which you give to other Bitcoin users when transferring the currency. According to the “How does Bitcoin work?” page, the system is somewhat like a distributed email network.

Bitcoins also work somewhat like a typical online bank transfer but with important differences. For instance, there’s no bank-like clearinghouse for Bitcoin transactions. Nobody has a list of all account numbers and owners. There is, however, an ongoing list of transfers: which accounts transferred how much to which other accounts. The list is public — it’s stored in hundreds of different locations, on hundreds of different computers. (You can see every transaction going by in real time on Clark Moody’s site.) Who owns the accounts is, on the other hand, private.

The technical details of Bitcoin transfers — how Bitcoins change ownership and how the system prevents transferring the same Bitcoin twice — involve public-key cryptography and some fancy computing techniques. Unlike a bank, the Bitcoin network doesn’t keep track of your Bitcoins — only Bitcoin transactions. Which means you’re responsible for protecting your Bitcoin wallet.

When you ask somebody to send money, you have to give them a Bitcoin address — essentially an encrypted public key. The Bitcoin software actually encourages you to generate a new address number for each transaction. If you get money from one person and then send that money to someone else using a different address, it’s basically impossible for anyone other than you to know where the money came from or where it went.

There’s some time delay on the transactions. Typically, it takes 10 minutes for Bitcoin transfers to take effect. The reasons are complex, but they’re associated with preventing double spends — trying to spend the same Bitcoin twice, either intentionally or inadvertently. Since there’s no central repository of accounts and balances, the delay is basically the price you pay for having a whole bunch of computers simultaneously verify the transactions.

If you’re accustomed to bank wire transfers taking an hour, a day, or even a week to complete, 10 minutes doesn’t seem like much of a hardship. And the Bitcoin verification runs 24 hours a day, seven days a week on hundreds of computers, making the system fairly reliable.

Incidentally, the first widely recognized Bitcoin transaction was the purchase of two pizzas. The buyer reportedly paid 10,000 Bitcoins — pricey even at early Bitcoin rates.

Where Bitcoins came from; where they’re going

Bitcoins have a fascinating history. The originator of the concept, who went by the handle “Satoshi Nakamoto,” has never been identified. I say “went” because Satoshi appeared out of the blue in 2008, published a few papers, never made a public appearance, and stopped answering emails in December 2010. However, the importance of Bitcoins doesn’t rest in the person or persons who created it. The creation itself holds the answers to pressing money problems such as making private transactions without resorting to piles of cash.

If you want to keep your Bitcoin transactions private, there are two points of vulnerability to online snoops: when you buy Bitcoins using some other currency, and when you sell your Bitcoins. Once inside the system, you’re anonymous. In other words, when you use Bitcoins only to pay for purchases, there’s no traceable record. (One person recently sold his house with Bitcoins, another sold a Porsche.)

That obviously presents a problem for law enforcement. Because Bitcoins make investigations more difficult, law-enforcement agencies are leaning hard — sometimes with sanctions, sometimes with legislation — on the Bitcoin clearinghouses to provide information about transactions. Mt. Gox’s sign-up page warns that if you try to access your account using the Tor network or public proxy servers (two common means of disguising your location), they might suspend your account and force you to submit anti-money-laundering documents. (A bitcoin.org page, on the other hand, recommends using Tor to hide your PC’s IP address.)

Today there are approximately 11 million Bitcoins in circulation. The system is designed to let the number of Bitcoins increase at a very slow rate — by 2140, there should be about 21 million Bitcoins in circulation. If you want to learn more about Bitcoins, take a look at the official Bitcoin FAQ.

Bottom line: If you do become a Bitcoins user, keep in mind that the value of your Bitcoins can change rapidly and unpredictably. Whenever someone asks me whether I’d buy Bitcoins right now, my answer is a resounding “Hell no!” It’s an interesting concept — a currency not tied to any country or financial institution — but the recent run-up and decline of Bitcoin pricing give me nosebleeds. Put your savings in Bitcoins, and you might make enough money to retire in the next year. Or you could lose 90 percent of your gamble — er, investment.

Restoring SSDs from non-SSD image backups

Fred Langa — Thu, 02 May 2013 15:15:14 +0000

A reader’s drive-imaging tool fails to restore his solid-state drive’s image backups, leading to wider questions about SSD imaging and restoration.

Plus: Getting rid of cinemanowsvc.exe, making a browser toolbar persistent, and a free tool to bypass some of Win8′s worst annoyances.

SSD can’t be restored from a mechanical drive?

Windows Secrets reader Andy has been making image backups of his hard drives for years. But after upgrading to a solid-state drive (SSD), his backup system is no longer working properly — and he got some strange drive-imaging advice from Symantec tech support.

“Following Fred’s advice, I’ve been doing image backups (and, on rare occasions, a restore) of OS and data partitions for over 10 years.

“I now have a solid-state drive. Unfortunately, I can’t create an image backup of the SSD partition (the source), store it on a mechanical hard drive (the target), and then successfully restore it back to the SSD. I get this same result with either [Norton] Ghost 2003 (my rock for 10 years) or Ghost 15 (the latest version).

“Try as I might, I can’t find a direct answer for this problem, though there’s a lot of dancing around the issue.

“Symantec tech support told me you can’t go from an SSD to a mechanical hard drive because they’re two different types of hard drives.

“Acronis [the manufacturers of the backup software True Image] pointed me toward a knowledge base article, but it doesn’t specifically mention mechanical hard drives [except to list Acronis products that support SSDs and to say that those products detect whether you're restoring to an SSD or mechanical drive].

“Fred, you’ve been preaching image backups for years. What do we do now?”

Wow, a drive-image restoration failure is very alarming, Andy!

Your note touches on three separate issues. There’s the general concept of restoring images to an SSD from a spinning-platter (i.e., non-SSD) drive. Then there are the issues of how Symantec’s and Acronis’s imaging products work — or fail to work — with SSDs.

For a complete answer, I’ll discuss each of these issues in turn.

As I’m sure you know, a disk image is an exact, sector-by-sector map of a drive’s contents. Although disk imaging is usually reliable, I can think of several ways the process can go wrong.

For example, most SSDs have anti-wear routines that prevent data from being written to the same locations on the drive, over and over again. It’s possible that a poorly coded or overly aggressive anti-wear routine could interfere with a drive-image restoration. Instead of allowing the data to be written back to its original location, the anti-wear routine might jumble the restored data, placing it in a new — and incorrect — order on the SSD. That would effectively make the restored data useless.

That shouldn’t happen, of course. A properly designed anti-wear routine should remap data locations in a way that’s totally transparent to the operating system. In fact, an anti-wear routine’s only effect should be to extend the life of your SSD.

That’s the theory. What happens in the real world calls for a bit of research. Here’s how I tested backing up an SSD to a mechanical drive:

I selected one of my SSD-equipped PCs (a Win8 tablet, though the type of PC should be irrelevant) and imaged its drive to a conventional, spinning-platter, external drive. I didn’t use Ghost; instead, I used the standard Windows 7 recovery tools that are also built into Win8. (For more on these tools, see the March 28 LangaList Plus item, “Win8′s built-in, hidden, image/backup tool.”)
Once the SSD image was completely written to the external drive, I booted the PC from a standard Windows system repair disc (more info) I’d made previously.
Using the disc’s Repair environment, I ran a manual format command to wipe out my original SSD setup. (Yes, this made me a little nervous.)
Next, I used the disc’s restore function to pull the SSD’s image from the external drive and write it back to the SSD.
When the restore was done, the system booted and ran normally — not even a hiccup. All my data was in its proper place, and all software operated exactly as before. The restore worked perfectly!

That’s exactly how image restoration is supposed to work. The fact that an SSD was involved had absolutely no effect on the process or the outcome. Whew!

Of course, one successful restore doesn’t mean that all restores on all SSDs will work equally well — especially if different hardware or software is involved. But it does show that there’s no universal or fundamental problem with backing up and restoring an SSD to a mechanical drive.

So why did Andy’s backup/restore fail? I think the problem was with Ghost — or, more specifically, the versions of Ghost Andy used. (And he obviously got bad information when he was told you can’t image one type of drive to another.)

There are different versions of Ghost. According to Symantec tech article 106753, “The latest version of Ghost Solution Suite 2.5.1 (build 2266 and above) [an enterprise edition] has [been] shown to be compatible with solid-state hard drives and therefore should be able to create and restore images of these drives.”

Symantec has pulled the plug on the consumer version — Norton Ghost. According to the Norton Ghost site, the company stopped selling the product on April 30, though support will continue until June 30, 2014.

Symantec doesn’t say why it dumped Norton Ghost. No matter what the reason, Norton Ghost users should be looking for an alternative.

The Acronis issue that Andy mentions is entirely different. Acronis Knowledge Base article 2699 briefly mentions how older backup software might restore an image to an SSD with non-optimal data alignment.

Acronis’s information is correct, as far as it goes. Data alignment is a serious concern on mechanical drives. But as discussed in the Oct. 4, 2012, LangaList Plus article, “Drive alignment and solid-state drives,” data misalignment on SSDs has no real consequence to overall system performance. Practically speaking, it’s not something SSD users need be concerned with.

So again: I assume Andy’s problem is with Norton Ghost. There are good third-party imaging tools that support SSDs, but Vista, Win7, and Win8 all have excellent SSD-compatible imaging tools built in. The May 12, 2011, Top Story, “Build a complete Windows 7 safety net,” has complete information. Although that’s a Win7 article, it also includes information for Vista and XP users. And as mentioned above, Win7′s tools are also included with Win8.

If you’re using Vista, Win7, or Win8, why not use the built-in, known-good imaging tool? You already paid for it!

Ridding a personal computer of cinemanowsvc.exe

Samuel Campbell is trying to take control of the cinemanowsvc executable on his PC.

“I’ve fruitlessly searched for actionable information on cinemanowsvc.exe. It creates a lot of hard-disk activity, according to my process monitor application, What’s my computer doing? Cinemanowsvc.exe seems to be a protected service; I’ve not been able to stop it. Can I run my computer without it?”

That executable is a component of CinemaNow, a media-streaming service apparently now owned by Best Buy. You probably installed the service inadvertently, or it was added as part of a video-codec installation.

CinemaNow can usually be uninstalled via the control panel’s uninstall-software tool. But it might not appear under the Cs (for CinemaNow) — it could be under some other label such as Best Buy or one of the app’s previous owners such as Rovi, BYY, or Roxio. You might also find a standard uninstall link in the Start/All Programs menu — again, possibly under another name. If it’s there, just click the uninstaller link.

You can also root it out manually, Search for and delete any CinemaNow files on your PC. Look in locations such as:

C:\Program Files\Roxio CinemaNow …
C:\Document and Settings\All Users\Application Data\Roxio CinemaNow …
C:\Documents and Settings\%USER%\Application Data\Roxio CinemaNow …

Once your hard drive is free of anything with “cinemanow” in its name, you can then use Windows’ Regedit tool to find and delete all Registry keys referencing/containing the word “cinemanow.” Next, reboot your system, run a registry cleaner (such as CCleaner; site), and reboot again — you should be all set.

More on making a browser toolbar persistent

Dennis Hays sent in his advice for solving the problem contained in the April 3 LangaList Plus item, “Solving problems with browser add-ins.”

“RE: The RoboForm toolbar not being persistent between IE 9 activations.
“I’ve been through this. Before taking any drastic steps such as resetting IE or finding another password application, try the following:

“In IE, select Tools/Internet options/Advanced. In the Browsing section, make sure you have selected Enable Third Party Browser Extensions. That fixed it for me.”

Nice, simple tip, Dennis. Thanks!

Free tool restores the Start button to Win8

Microsoft is, of course, working on the next version of Windows — reportedly code-named Windows Blue. Rumors about what’s changed abound! For example, it might restore the Start button to the Desktop, and it might allow direct booting to the classic Desktop (instead of to the tile-based, touch-oriented Start screen). I, for one, welcome these changes.

In the meantime, I’m using IObit’s free Start Menu 8 (site) to accomplish the same things. It adds a Win7-style Start button and menu to the Win8 desktop; it also has an option to boot directly to the Win8 Desktop. Since installing Start Menu 8, my Win8 productivity has gone up — and my frustrations down.

If you’re using Win8 and find the Start screen more of a hindrance than a help, give Start Menu 8 a spin — at least until Win8.1 is revealed and we see where Microsoft is taking Windows.

Reader Dennis Hays will receive a gift certificate for a book, CD, or DVD of his choice for sending the tip we printed above. Send us your tips via the Windows Secrets contact page.

Apps for building and organizing a music library

Lincoln Spector — Thu, 02 May 2013 15:10:40 +0000

Want to fill in some gaps in your MP3 collection? Or get it better organized so you can see what you have?

Here are two free programs for filling out and bringing some order to your digital-music library.

Perhaps more so than vinyl or cassettes, our digital music collections have become deeply embedded in our daily lives. We download tunes to our PCs from vast music catalogs, create synchronized music libraries on our phones, tablets, and dedicated media players, and take our music everywhere. The typical digital-music library can easily grow to thousands of songs.

But quantity does not equal quality. Our music libraries might be huge, but they undoubtedly lack songs we want and contain songs we don’t. And if we don’t keep on top of tagging and organizing our libraries, we can effectively lose music we already own.

Two free apps can help with the sometimes daunting task of managing our digital music. The new MP3jam lets you download free and (arguably) legal .mp3s pulled from two popular online sites — YouTube and VK. The popular MP3tag helps you edit all the information attached to your .mp3 and .wma files, easing the task of identifying a song or album later on.

Find and download your favorite music

As anyone with an Internet connection knows, YouTube contains a huge repository of videos. But if you think about it, the streaming service also holds a vast catalog of music — all the tunes added to videos, turned into videos, or recorded at live performances. Whatever you’re looking for, there’s a good chance it’s posted on YouTube. (Whether it’s available for permanent download is another question. More on that below.)

MP3jam (site) is neither the first nor the only service that turns streaming YouTube soundtracks into .mp3 files. The website YouTube-mp3.org does it, with remarkable ease. But MP3jam does provide an easy and organized way to download multiple songs and albums.

Moreover, MP3jam doesn’t limit its searches to YouTube; it also looks for music on the European social-networking site, VK.com. (By default, MP3jam checks both sources. You can turn off VK searches, but not YouTube searches.)

Is this sort of thing legal? That question is difficult to answer. The MP3jam site claims it’s legal (of course), but when I asked for an explanation, I received no response. In theory, any song on YouTube is there with its owner’s permission (within the often confusing rules of ownership and fair use). Google, which owns YouTube, does everything it can to smack down copyright infringements.

That said, it’s one thing to view a video with music online, and a very different thing to save a soundtrack for offline listening. Last summer, Google threatened YouTube-mp3.org with a cease-and-desist lawsuit; the site has neither ceased nor desisted. At this point, the legalities are still muddled.

And so are the moral issues. Is it right to download songs you never bought? I generally think not, but then I’m financially dependent on copyright law, and I’m married to a musician. I am, however, more comfortable with free downloads when replacing worn-out vinyl records and broken cassettes I purchased — or for music not otherwise available in downloadable form.

For instance, I used its search function to look up The Beatles — to my knowledge, the only well-known artists whose recordings are not legally sold in the .mp3 format. MP3jam returned most of their songs, and even whole albums, letting me either listen to them in the MP3jam app or download them (see Figure 1) to my local music folder.

Figure 1. MP3jam's simple interface lets you easily listen to or download popular music.

Not everything MP3jam offers is downloadable. You’ll occasionally click a song and be told “Track is not available.” No explanation.

Warning! Be careful when you install MP3jam. As with a lot of free programs, the installer will also install, by default, other programs you probably won’t want. As you work through the installation wizard, select Custom Installation and uncheck any unwanted extras. Then watch out for other offerings included with the installer.

Once installed, MP3jam is easy to use. You can search for songs, albums, or artists and get a list grouped by album. As already mentioned, you can listen to a song, download it, or both. I found works by well-known artists (The Beatles) and by obscure ones such as Beltain (site). The search results aren’t always complete, but they are extensive.

The music always downloads as .mp3 files, although the bitrate — and with it, the sound quality — varied. Most songs were either an acceptable 192 kilobits per second or a very good 256kbps.

A separate link allows you to download the entire album with one click, but you can do this only once. The next time you try to download an album — any album — a popup asks for money (see Figure 2). For U.S. $10, you can upgrade to a premium MP3jam version that will download all the albums you want. (If there’s a similar maximum number of allowed songs here, I haven’t hit it.)

Figure 2. The second time you try to download an entire album at once, MP3jam will ask for money.

Of course, even without using album support, you can download all of an album’s songs without much difficulty. Since the songs are grouped by album in the search results, all you need do is click the download button for each song.

Unfortunately, whether you download single songs or full albums, the .mp3s lack some album-oriented tags and metadata. You might get cover art, but the art won’t be associated with the songs. And only one song I downloaded contained a track number.

Take more control of your digital-music library

Fortunately, there are answers to MP3jam’s lack of meta tags. One of the best is another free program — Mp3tag (site). Although it’s a bit intimidating at first, this freebie eases the job of making sure that all your tunes can be properly identified.

Figure 3. Mp3tag can be confusing at first, but it lets you quickly manage the metadata attached to your media files.

All music files contain tags, also known as metadata, which describe the content. Typical music tags include title, album title, artist, track number, and possibly even cover art. But though a file might have many tags, there’s no guarantee that the tags contain correct information — or any information at all.

Mp3tag provides an easy way to enter and correct metadata for a single song, all songs in an album, or your entire collection. You can enter this data yourself or pull it from an online source. Despite the name, Mp3tag supports at least 15 different file formats, including .wma, .m4a, and .flac.

For instance, I noted above that MP3jam usually leaves out track numbers. To add them to an album in Mp3tag, select all the tracks in the album, select Tag Sources and a source (freedb, Amazon.com, etc.), and go through the wizard. This process works in most cases, but some albums are just not in any of the source databases.

Figure 4. Mp3tag's Tag Sources lets you pull in metadata from online media databases.

Mp3tag isn’t especially user-friendly — starting with its download page, which offers big Download buttons for other apps. The application has many menus and tiny icons, and some aspects of the UI are a bit tricky. For example, when selecting an audio file with the standard Windows file-open dialog box, you’d typically open its folder (the app still calls them directories) and click on the song. But open its folder in Mp3tag, and you end up with the frightening site of an empty folder. (“What happened to all my songs?!,” you immediately scream.)

Fortunately, the songs are still there. In Mp3tag, you select the song’s folder and then click the Select Folder button. All songs in the folder will then be listed in the Mp3tag window.

But once you get past some of its eccentricities, the program greatly eases the task of organizing music. It can find cover art and attach it to your songs or change all of your titles to proper case. The changes are made to all selected songs; select one song, your entire collection, or anything in between.

You can even change file names across all selected songs. The Tag – Filename option changes the file name to match the contents of your tags. For example, enter the appropriate tag information, and a file named Cover Me.wma becomes Bruce Springsteen Born in the USA – 2 – Cover Me.wma. You can, of course, change the file-naming template, as shown in Figure 5.

Figure 5. You can define how Mp3tag automatically creates file names from tag data.

These two programs can help you both add to your music collection and keep it better organized. How you enjoy your music library after that is up to you.

Utilities for better productivity and security

Michael Lasky — Thu, 02 May 2013 15:00:35 +0000

It’s often the small applications that make the most significant impact on our computing.

A quartet of utilities — one free, the others moderately priced — can make your Windows PC easier and safer to use.

Kicking the Adobe Reader habit for good

Nearly 100MB in size and needing frequent updates for security lapses, Adobe Reader is no longer welcome on my PC. In its place, I use the free Nitro Reader (site), a somewhat slimmer and far more versatile PDF-viewing app. There are many Adobe Reader alternatives to pick from, but Nitro Reader is easily one of the best. Nitro 3 was released in October 2012, and the most recent version, 3.5.2.1, came out in late March.

Nitro Reader is somewhat of a misnomer. Unlike Adobe Reader, the utility includes many PDF-editing and -creation capabilities as well. According to the Nitro site, Reader can create PDFs from over 300 different file formats. I didn’t test all formats, but Reader seamlessly converted common file types such as Excel, PowerPoint, Word, and HTML webpages. In most cases, I simply dragged files onto the Nitro Reader desktop icon. (Unfortunately, dragging files to a Reader taskbar icon does not work.)

Nitro also lets you specify document information, font embedding, page size and orientation, password protection, and initial view settings. It must be one of the few non-Microsoft apps to use the now familiar Microsoft Office–style Ribbon interface. Reader’s ribbon includes its wide array of tasks and tools, right down to a user-customizable, quick-access toolbar for frequently used functions.

One of my favorite Nitro Reader features is QuickSign (see Figure 1), which lets you add a scanned image of your signature. It’s handy for applying my signature to PDF contracts and forms that need a signature. Before Reader, I had to print a contract out, add my signature, and then either fax or rescan the signed document. Signatures can be password-protected so they’re never misused.

Figure 1. Use Nitro's QuickSign to add a signature to documents.

Most free PDF readers offer limited text or image conversion from PDFs. Nitro Reader will quickly convert a PDF file into editable plain text, and its Snapshot tool can capture any on-screen area for reuse as an image or text. Reader can also extract images and save them in BMP, JPG, PNG, and TIF formats.

Some of Reader’s more useful editing tools include Sticky Notes, which I use to add comments — making them visible or hidden. The Type Text tool lets me add text in any font, size, or color available on my PC.

Nitro Reader nicely integrates itself into Windows Explorer, Microsoft Outlook, Web-based email, and most browsers for quick previews of PDFs.

I liked Nitro Reader so much I upgraded to the full — but certainly not free — Nitro Pro 8.5 (more info). At U.S. $119, Nitro Pro is considerably less expensive than the $283 (on Amazon) Adobe Acrobat XI Standard.

With all these features in the free Nitro Reader, why pay for the Pro version? I think an image (Figure 2) of their toolbars sums it up.

Figure 2. Nitro's menus highlight the differences between the free (top) and paid (bottom) versions.

Previous versions of Nitro Pro converted PDFs to Word, Excel, and image files. Version 8.5 adds conversion to PowerPoint.

Whether you use the free or paid version of Nitro depends on your needs. Either way, you’ll have an excellent PDF-management tool.

Encrypting the link between keyboard and app

We all know the first line of defense from malware is keeping it out of our systems. But what we send from our PCs can be dangerous, too. To add another level of security — one that has no noticeable impact on system performance — I use GuardedID ($30; site). It’s an anti-keylogging app that encrypts every keystroke you type and bypasses the data stack where malware keyloggers often hide.

Once GuardedID is installed and you reboot your PC, you see a change in the background color of text fields in apps. This feature (with the silly sci-fi name of CryptoColor) provides a visual cue to indicate that what you’re typing is being encrypted. If a keylogger is hiding on your system, all a hacker will see is random characters — he won’t be able to capture your user names, passwords, text messages, account numbers, etc.

Another indication that GuardedID is active is a “G” icon on the taskbar. The G flashes every time you press a key. That flashing drove me crazy in the beginning, but now I get alarmed if I don’t see it.

GuardedID also adds a toolbar menu to Internet Explorer (see Figure 3) and Firefox, but not Chrome. In IE, you might need to go to Tools/Internet Options/Advanced and make sure Enable third party browser add-ons is checked. Close and restart IE to activate this setting.

Figure 3. GuardedID automatically integrates into browsers and apps.

One problem with GuardedID is its assumption that IE is your default browser. Since I use Firefox, I was caught off guard during the license-activation routine that instructed me to look for its new toolbar in IE. It took some tinkering in GuardedID’s preferences before the toolbar showed up in Firefox.

A complete PC security system requires multiple tools. GuardedID adds protection typically not included with most AV products.

Mixed reviews for a (once?) popular backup app

If you read only the negative reviews of Acronis True Image 2013 on Amazon.com, you’d rightly stay clear of this well-known, backup-and-restore package. Expecting the worst, I installed True Image (more info) on my PC and ran it — and was quite relieved when I got satisfactory results.

Most of the user complaints point at a confusing interface and failed restorations. The interface can be intimidating at first, mostly due to the sheer number of features built into the program. I’m not sure whether it helps or hurts that True Image 2013 comes with a nearly 250-page, PDF-based manual. Fortunately, it provides clear descriptions of each function and how to use it.

I cannot explain reports of faulty restorations. All of mine worked flawlessly. I created a clone image of my hard drive on an external hard drive and devoted another external drive to selective and incremental backups — again, with no problem.

It’s possible that True Image is for more advanced users. One of my favorite features is Try&Decide, which creates a quarantined hard-drive partition. I use it to audition new software and visit websites without fear of malware intrusion. If I decide I like the software, True Image moves it out of protected quarantine. The app becomes a normal Windows installation with the expected entries in the Windows Registry.

Figure 4. True Image's tools go well beyond disk backup and restore.

True Image is also handy for creating a boot disc or bootable USB flash drive (see Figure 5) — with all the necessary hardware drivers needed to get a PC up and running.

Figure 5. Media Builder lets you create bootable discs and flash drives.

Like all software companies, it seems, Acronis has jumped into cloud-storage services. True Image now includes a built-in data-synchronization tool. My pet peeve with most cloud services is glacial data uploads. Data synching with True Image is surprisingly swift. The downside is the $5-per-month or $50-per-year subscription for 250GB of online storage.

If True Image 2013 doesn’t interest you, note that Seagate licensed a light version of an older True Image and renamed it DiscWizard. It’s a free download (site). If you’re looking for a simple, resourceful backup tool, I recommend checking it out.

A small utility saves ink, paper, and money

Think of GreenPrint ($19; site) as your printer’s referee. When printing, select GreenPrint instead of the default printer and you get a page-by-page thumbnail preview that allows you to cherry-pick which pages to print, choose which images to not print, select black-and-white or color, use duplex (two-sided) printing, or save the print job as a PDF (as shown in Figure 6).

I first covered GreenPrint in an Oct. 6, 2011, story. I liked what I saw then, and I’m still using it to save ink and paper (and perhaps a few trees). The latest version — 2.6 — includes a welcomed 64-bit version for Windows XP, Vista, and Win7.

Figure 6. GreenPrint's tools include a print-savings calculator.

By default GreenPrint automatically prints any page with five or fewer lines. You can override this feature, but I found it handy — particularly when printing webpages. However, depending on how a webpage is formatted, GreenPrint will sometimes preview only the first page. (To circumvent this issue, I had to highlight and copy the entire webpage, drop it into Word, and then print it using GreenPrint.)

Select a single page to view, and GreenPrint has another trick: hold down the Alt key and then use the mouse to highlight a section of text or an image to eliminate from the print job.

Even with Nitro Pro on my PC, I often use GreenPrint for quick PDFs — and, of course, to save some greenbacks while I’m at it.

One way to catch your own mistake: Describe it

Kathleen Atkins — Thu, 25 Apr 2013 15:50:21 +0000

You might not be surprised by the number of times Lounge members figure out what’s wrong with a spreadsheet or database almost all by themselves.

Jacksonmacd provided a case in point when he posted his bewildering DLookup problem (that brought an Access 2003 VBA project to a halt) in the Databases forum. Shortly after he elicited help from his fellow forum members, he wrote back to identify his own error. He’s congratulated, of course. And he succeeds in increasing knowledge generally, as you can see by reading the thread.

The following links are this week’s most interesting Lounge threads, including several new questions for which you might have answers:

Office Applications
General Productivity	Office 2013 now transferable
Word Processing	Importing data from Excel to Word via Mail Merge
Spreadsheets	Exporting from Adobe produces wrong date format
Databases	DLookup failure in Access 2003
Presentation Apps	Capturing screenshot of PowerPoint ribbon
Visual Basic for Apps	DoClick method for wdFieldRef type?
Microsoft Outlook	Outlook 2007 PST files gone after computers left domain
Non-Outlook E-mail	Sorting in Gmail
Other MS Apps	Using Office 365
Windows
General Windows	Question on an update
Windows 8	Workarounds for missing Advanced Appearance Settings dialog box?
Windows 7	Collapsing Explorer command line
	BSOD at boot time, Code=F4/03, no minidump: failing CPU?
	Unable to get Aero features
Windows Vista	Windows Mail problems: Address book (Contacts)
Windows XP	XP shuts down on startup
Internet/Connectivity
Internet Explorer	Java stays disabled in IE 9/Win7
Third-Party Browsers	Looking for safest browser
Networking	LaserJet printer won’t pull IP address
Other Technologies
Security & Scams	ZoneAlarm free installation
Maintenance	EaseUS Todo Backup Free 5.8 problem
Hardware	Function keys differ on laptops/notebooks
Other Applications	Secunia PSI flags Acrobat Standard 9: Security risk?

starred posts: particularly useful

If you’re already registered, you can jump right in to today’s discussions in the Lounge.

The travails of a good-sport fisherman

Kathleen Atkins — Thu, 25 Apr 2013 15:30:18 +0000

Bill Dance’s website calls him a Southern gentleman angler as well as America’s most-loved TV fisherman. Even if you never see his show, you’ll at least appreciate these outtakes for his sense of humor.

It seems that almost all that can bedevil a man in a boat happens to Dance. He’s joined by leaping fish, flying snakes, falling trees, and sound booms; he’s snagged by hooks and upstaged by swimming dogs. He’s a good sport — enjoy his company. Play the video

Tools for creating a bootable flash drive

Fred Langa — Thu, 25 Apr 2013 15:20:54 +0000

Alternative software (and perhaps some hardware juggling) can often resolve problems that interfere with making a USB device bootable.

Plus: Interpreting the results of a deep malware scan, a free tool for alphabetical-order file copying, and another noncompressing backup tool.

When ISO-to-USB drive conversion fails

Reader Bud Lewin ran into an all-too-common snag when trying to create a bootable, USB flash drive. Bud had trouble installing the .iso file for the free Windows Defender Offline (WDO; site) malware tool, but you can have similar difficulties when trying to create any bootable flash device.

“The offline version of Defender sounds like an elegant solution to malware infestations. However, I encountered the same problem on two different Windows 7 computers and three good, working thumb drives: the software tries to format the thumb drive prior to installing the downloaded software. I then get an error indicating the thumb drive can’t be formatted. At that point, the process halts.
What do you think is the problem? (The thumb drives format fine when using Windows File Manager.)”

In theory, you can create a bootable USB flash drive from almost any .iso file designed for bootable floppies, CDs, or DVDs.

But in practice, USB ports, cables, drives, and software are highly variable in build quality — and in how well they adhere to standards. This can lead to unexpected outcomes and lots of frustration.

An example: I have an external drive that prematurely enters sleep mode and becomes unresponsive when connected to a USB 3.0 port on one of my PCs. But the drive works perfectly when attached to the 3.0 port on a different PC. I’ve accounted for all user-configurable factors, so there must be a problem with the hardware or drivers — beyond user control. The two machines’ nominally identical, theoretically “standard” USB 3.0 ports should work the same way, but they don’t.

Another example: My PC won’t recognize my smartphone when I use the USB cable that came with the phone. But the connection works perfectly when I use a (visually identical) USB cable made by another vendor. Again, two seemingly identical USB components; two different results.

“Standards?” Ha!

Because USB failures have many causes — cables, ports, drivers, etc. — it’s best to isolate and change each possible variable, one by one.

In your case, Bud, there are four things to consider: the thumb drive, the software used to make the drive bootable, the PC’s USB port, and the WDO software. (If your setup used a USB cable, there’d be a fifth factor to consider.)

You’ve already tried different USB drives, so that’s probably not the source of the trouble.

As a next step, I suggest you try different ISO-to-flash conversion software. There are numerous such tools available online; here are some sites with free apps:

(Note: Those last two products are multi-OS tools; their interfaces emphasize Linux, but they also work with Windows-based .iso files.)

If those tools don’t help, try one or more of these tools on a different PC — one with a different USB subsystem and ports.

Still no dice? At this point, you might have to abandon WDO and try a different .iso-based malware scanner, such as those discussed in the April 11 Top Story, “A dozen tools for removing almost any malware.” Choose a different ISO file and work through the preceding steps again.

If your PC has an optical drive, you might also consider giving up on the flash drive option. Make a bootable CD or DVD instead. Bootable CD/DVD tech has been around long enough that it almost always works.

But if you must use bootable flash media, you’ll need to experiment with various combinations of USB drives, conversion tools, PC ports, and .iso files until you hit the right combination. With persistence and luck, the USB gods should eventually smile upon you.

Good luck!

Deep scan reports malware — but is it real?

Robert was understandably concerned when a deep scan by an anti-malware tool found suspicious files.

“This past week, I felt like something was stealing CPU cycles from my PC. So I ran a complete scan with Microsoft Security Essentials (which I do every Friday). No problems detected. I then ran ESET Online Scanner, which reported 16 threats.
“Are these threats legitimate? And if so, how could MSE have missed 16 threats?”

Robert included a copy of his ESET report, which included multiple items such as these:

C:\Program Files (x86)\Uniblue\RegistryBooster\rbmonitor.exe
C:\Users\Robert\…NeroInstallFiles\… askToolbar\Toolbar.exe
C:\Users\Robert\AppData\Local\Temp\7938A16.tmp

ESET is highly regarded in part because it’s extremely thorough. You’ll rarely go wrong following its advice — or allowing it to delete or quarantine files it flags as suspicious.

Your ESET report shows that the majority of the flagged items fall into three categories. The largest group is related to the Uniblue Registry Booster. I assume you must have installed this app or allowed it to be installed at some point.

I’m not sure what ESET was detecting as malware in Registry Booster. It could be something in the software itself or in unrelated bits of malware that arrived along with Registry Booster. But either way, why take a chance?

(Registry Booster gets a low, 2.5-star (out of 5) user rating at CNET (although it also received an Excellent editor’s rating) and earned just 40 votes at MajorGeeks. There are many other Registry tools available with higher ratings and larger user bases. If you feel you really need a Registry cleaner, I suggest you uninstall what’s left of Registry Booster and find a replacement tool that doesn’t trigger malware warnings.)

Another cluster of ESET items involves the Ask Toolbar, which looks like it arrived with your copy of a Nero CD/DVD burning tool. Most likely, an “Install Ask Toolbar?” query was buried in a dialog box during installation of Nero. The Ask toolbar is not malware, but it is typically unwanted.

Most of the remaining ESET detections are files in your temp folders. These are likely to be minor annoyances at worst — they’re transient items that will be flushed automatically from time to time and can be removed on demand with any decent cleanup tool such as CCleaner (free and pro; site).

Although none of these items appears to be an all-hands-on-deck malware threat, you’re probably better off with that stuff off your system anyway.

You asked how MSE could have missed 16 threats. Keep in mind that MSE’s primary mission is blocking severe and immediate malware infestations. It’s probably not going to raise red flags for the types of software listed above.

More importantly, MSE is not going to override your decisions. If you click past security warnings raised by Windows, your browser, and/or MSE itself (in effect, you tell Windows, “Yes, I want to install this app”), MSE will let the app install — even if it contains malware. You can see a real-life instance of this in the April 7, 2011, Top Story.

Because a few suspicious apps did make it onto your system, you might want to go a little slower when you’re installing software; be sure to read every part of every dialog box, and don’t allow things such as extra toolbars to be installed.

You might also want to try a different full-time, anti-malware tool. Use an application that will block malware, even if you unintentionally click “Yes,” giving it permission to install. A web search on the term anti-malware will turn up dozens of options.

But remember: No tool is perfect. Keep doing periodic scans with standalone tools, just as you did this time. That way, you’ll be sure your PC is clean!

Seeks alphabetical-order copy command

John Knight’s audiobook chapters are getting scrambled out of order when he copies them. The same thing can happen when you copy MP3s or any group of files.

“Fred, I copy my audio books from CDs to USB sticks so I can listen to them through the sound system in my car. I discovered long ago that I couldn’t use the Windows copy command to transfer audio files because it seems to copy them in random order.
I discovered a utility called XXCOPY [free for personal use; site] that will allow me to copy the files in alphabetical order. It works great, and I’m happy to have it. However, it can be run only as a command line from a DOS box.

“I wonder if you know whether there’s a way to get Windows to copy a group of files or directories in alphabetical order? Surely I’m not the only one that has this problem!”

There’s a free, point-and-click, graphical-interface tool that might help. As noted on its download page, CopyInOrder does one thing: “This is a program for copying files and folders in alphabetical order.”

There are other tricks and workarounds, too, that enthusiasts have developed for copying and playing audiobook chapters, MP3s, or other media files in a specific order. For example, see the AnandTech forum thread, “Tell Windows the order in which to copy files?,” or the MurrayMoffatt.com article, “Sort MP3 files on MP3 player.”

It’s likely the free tool will be just what you’re looking for!

Another free, noncompressing backup tool

David Parker offers this suggestion.

“In [the April 3 LangaList Plus item], ‘Software that backs up but doesn’t compress data,’ Fred gave a couple of good suggestions. Here’s another one. FreeFileSync is an open-source program that does exactly what’s needed: sync files on different devices.

It’s extremely flexible, can be run manually or automatically as a batch job, and lets you see in detail what will be done before it runs. It’s also been fast and 100 percent reliable for me. If it sounds like I’m gushing over it, it’s because I was burned by a previous, paid synching program that I used for a long time. This one is free and works much better.”

FreeFileSync looks great — fast, functional, zero cost, and open-source. It’s available from many major download libraries as well as its SourceForge home page.

Thanks, David!

Reader David Parker will receive a gift certificate for a book, CD, or DVD of his choice for sending the tip we printed above. Send us your tips via the Windows Secrets contact page.