When a computer starts up and boots into Windows, there are a bundle of other programs that load up with it. Some of them are needed, but others are unnecessary and do little more than slow down a computer.

When I am told that a computer is running slow, the first thing I do is look in the locations that call these programs to load, and I cull the programs that are not necessary. There are numerous locations (registry, startup folders and win.ini) where these programs are called from, so the process can take quite a while.

Startup Manager is a free utility that shows you each of these locations in a single, easy to use interface. Just check out the screenshot of it. This is certainly a no nonsense program.

Startup Manager shows you what is going to be loaded at startup. All you need to do is untick the items that you no longer want to be part of your daily life.

The startup programs should probably be checked every 6 or so months to keep your computer running lean. The list can expand very quickly, often without the users knowledge. Using this utility can save a lot of time. It is one of those useful programs to keep on a USB disk, so that you can load it up quickly in the case a friend is in need.

Get your copy of Startup Manager for free from StartupManager.org.

For the last 10 years I have been using Winamp as my default music player. It is not as light weight as it once was, but it is still holds its place as being one of the best music players available. Not only is it intuitive, its plugin support and visualisations are unparallelled.

I needed to make some playlists for an upcoming party. I was using music from many different locations. I would eventually need to copy the files in the playlist to a single folder on a different computer, so they could be easily transported. It would have been a huge hassle to copy files individually from their current locations to the one location. I figured there was bound to be a plugin that would let me automate this process, so I proceeded to make the playlists.

It turns out that copying all the files from a playlist into a single folder is not as easy as I initially thought. Certain forums recommend using the Disk Writer plugin that comes standard with Winamp. The problem with this is that the files get converted to wav, and then with the right codecs, they get converted back to MP3. This is very time consuming and the quality of the track is likely to be reduced.

I eventually came across a plugin that does the job wonderfully. SendTo lets you choose a folder that the files will be copied to, and then proceeds copying the files no matter where they were originally located. This includes network drives. The copying process is as quick as a normal file transfer.

The final result is a folder with all the MP3 files that were in the selected playlist. It is now easy to transfer this folder to another computer.

There is nothing flashy about this plugin. It was designed specifically to do this task, and this task only. Saying that, it does it well. Get a copy of SendTo plugin for free from Winamp.com.

Wireless time is a utility that lets you schedule when the Bluetooth, Wifi, Audio or GSM is active on your Windows Mobile device. This utility can be used to automatically turn off your phone during weekly meetings, or enable a Bluetooth sync via ActiveSync at a set time.

The interface looks a little challenging at first, but once you change the language to English, it is much easier to navigate. There is a grid showing each hour of the day, with icons for GSM, Bluetooth, Wifi and Sound next to each hour. All you need to do is enable or disable each component, telling WirelessTime when you want things turned on or off. You can edit this screen for “all days”, or each day individually. There is even profile support. 

I was happy to find this as I can now put my phone in “flight mode” overnight, to ensure my clock radio doesn’t make weird static noises while I sleep. The phone turns itself back on in the morning and enables Bluetooth and Wifi to allow any required synchronisation to occur.

I was searching for a utility that would do this same task a while back, but didn’t come across anything. I think this is a good little find. If you use any scheduler that does the same thing as Wireless Time, I would love to hear about it in the comments.

WirelessTime is available for free from FreewarePPC.com.

If you work in a large company, and you are tired of waiting for IT support, this article is for you.

I thought it would be worthwhile to make a very simple guide which you can use to do some of your own fault finding. Why not see if the problem is something you can fix yourself quickly.

This may save you a call to the help desk, or at the very least, assist the help desk staff to support you in a more efficient way.

This guide is aimed at people who turn on their computer in the morning and expect everything to work as it did the day before, and every other day before that. If the computer is not working as it normally does, this guide will hopefully get you up and running. I have tried to make this guide as non technical as possible.

Topics covered in this article include:

• Unable to log in
• Unable to access the Internet and Email
• Unable to print
• Mouse and/or keyboard not working
• Turning on your computer to find a blank screen
• Calling the Help desk

Each of the above topics will only take a minute or two to check. This is surely much quicker than spending 5 minutes to the help desk, and even longer if you need to wait for a technician to come out.

Read the rest of this article »

Firewalls are used to keep computer nasties such as malware, spyware and trojans from invading our computers. Comodo Firewall is a free firewall solution that will allows you to control what data can be transferred to and from your computer.

If a program is trying to download information you have not “allowed”, Comodo Firewall will alert you, and let you decide if you want the transfer to continue.

Comodo Firewall not only presents well, but it is also quite easy to use. Using this firewall gives you complete control over what data is allowed to be transferred over your network. It also shows you in depth information about which programs are accessing the network, and how much data is being transferred through these programs.

From all the reviews I have read on it, Comodo Firewall is a solid competitor to many commercial products. My own experience has found the same results. Comodo is one very powerful and effective firewall.

You probably already have Windows Firewall running on your computer, but from what I have seen of it, Windows Firewall is a tiny program with an on/off switch, and not much else. The only thing it sometimes does well, is complicate networking. It’s better than nothing, but you can have so much more control and security with Comodo Firewall

Download your copy for free from comodo.com.