Archive for Vista
Scan Your Computer for Running Processes & Remove Them
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There are many programs (both free and fee-based), out there that will scan your computer and let you know what is running on your computer. The first one we’re looking at today is free and is called Process Scanner, by Uniblu. I like this program because it not only tells me what is running on my computer, it also gives me a link to where I can actually research what a particular process is.
When the report is complete, you can see the results at the top of the page with these categories:
- All processes
- Security
- Network
- Performance
- Autostart
Yikes – I had 99 processes running on my computer. For each process listed, you can click the hyperlink to either assess a threat or get more information on resources being used. I went ahead and clicked for a ‘threat assessment’ on my Evernote program (a great tool I blogged about earlier). Instead of giving me a report, it took me to another Uniblu website for a free spyware scan – not really what I was expecting. Since the site was verified by everyone and their dog, I went ahead and downloaded and ran that program that looked for spyware in my cookies, registry and files. It said my system was clean – with only 4 tracking cookies. I found that if I wanted to remove the cookies, I would have to purchase the spyware cleaner service—which I declined.![clip_image001[4]](http://extremevirtualsupport.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2009/02/clip-image0014.jpg "clip_image001[4]")
As I mentioned, the helpful thing about this program is that you can actually go and research in their directory exactly what a process and then decide if you could remove it from the list of things that start when your computer boots. This part is free. This feature is available without having to run a scan.
Microsoft Free Tool
Microsoft offers a free tool that will do the same thing. Download and run Process Monitor to get a report of what’s running on your computer. The website also has links to other Microsoft utilities that might be of interest. Reading through the information on Process Monitor, I couldn’t really tell if they give a way to remove processes or not. I find a lot of the Microsoft KB verbiage seems to be written in programmer-speak, as I sometimes have difficulty understanding it.
Operating System Tools
If you have Vista, you can take a quick look at and end or disable processes running on your computer. To access, go to Control Panel>Performance Information & Tools>Manage Start Up Programs. There are many reports and tools that can be used here to see what’s going on inside your computer. Here’s a great article from CNET that gives the step by step.
CCleaner – Another Alternative
I use this free program about twice a month to clean up and optimize my system. Below is a list of what it can do
Cleans the following
Internet Explorer
Temporary files, history, cookies, Autocomplete form history, index.dat.
Firefox
Temporary files, history, cookies, download history, form history.
Google Chrome
Temporary files, history, cookies, download history, form history.
Opera
Temporary files, history, cookies.
Safari
Temporary files, history, cookies, form history.
Windows
Recycle Bin, Recent Documents, Temporary files and Log files.
Registry cleaner
Advanced features to remove unused and old entries, including File Extensions, ActiveX Controls, ClassIDs, ProgIDs, Uninstallers, Shared DLLs, Fonts, Help Files, Application Paths, Icons, Invalid Shortcuts and more… also comes with a comprehensive backup feature.
Third-party applications
Removes temp files and recent file lists (MRUs) from many apps including Media Player, eMule, Kazaa, Google Toolbar, Netscape, Microsoft Office, Nero, Adobe Acrobat, WinRAR, WinAce, WinZip and many more…
100% Spyware FREE
This software does NOT contain any Spyware, Adware or Viruses.
Conclusion
Give one or several of these programs a try. I’m using CCleaner regularly and I need to delve into the tools already on my computer from Microsoft to cull the list of start-up programs I have. If you don’t want to do a reformat of your computer right now, this should help clean things up and make them faster.
Two Vista Tips To Enhance Your Productivity
Posted by: | CommentsWhat can your operating system do for you? If you have Vista, there are quite a few handy, time saving things it can help you with. It’s just having the time to discover all of them. So, here are two of my top tips that hopefully you will remember or give it a try right away. I find doing something myself a couple times reinforces things and I’ll remember it.
Instant Search Feature
This little feature is my absolute favorite! Instead of taking time to go to start>all programs and begin searching amongst all the programs on your computer, just type in what you’re looking for right after you click the start button. This works for finding & starting up both programs and finding documents or even a particular email.
Find Recently Edited Documents
Do you have days where you just can’t remember where you saved a file you worked on recently? Oh yes, I have a folder system set up that works pretty well for me, but there are some times that a document gets mis-filed or something odd happens and then I’m trying to locate it quickly! Vista has a nifty feature that will quickly find all the documents you’ve worked on yesterday, earlier in the week, last week, and so on.
Here’s how:
Open the Documents folder (or whatever folder you want to search), click the little down-arrow next to the Date modified column header. A little box will pop up. Then choose ‘stack by date modified’ and all your documents from the previous day will be lined up for you to see or open. There are other choices as well. You can click ‘group’, and your documents, pictures, etc. will all be grouped by date and you can scroll down the list to see how productive you’ve been! Another useful feature is the calendar that pops up when you click on the down-arrow. If you know the date you worked on an important document, use the forward/backward arrow to quickly scroll to the date you need, click on it and documents from only that date will appear. What a potential life-saver that could be!
There are many books written about Vista and I’ve thumbed through a couple of them. While looking around on the internet, I found this site by Korough Ghazi called TweakGuides. He has a free e-book download that contains Vista tips written in plain English. You might want to check that out here.
Vista Tips – Save Time
Posted by: | CommentsThe Vista OS has grown on me and now feels almost as comfortable as my favorite flannel shirt (yes, I l
ike flannel). When I first started using it a year ago, it seemed like I was ignoring the new and cool features and trying to make the experience feel more like XP. So, this week, I wanted to talk about some things I’ve found helpful and hope you will too.
Modify Your Start Menu
Have the applications you use most appear when you click the ‘start’ button. I like the Vista way of simply scrolling down the list of applications, much less annoying than XP’s cascading windows that collapse just when you’re ready to click! Choose the app you want to pin, then right-click on the icon and select ‘pin to start menu’. To remove, just right-click on the icon and select ‘remove’.
Now, the top two icons on the Start Menu are reserved for Email and your favorite Internet Browser. Mine happens to be Outlook and Firefox. Of course, IE is the default here, so if you want to change that here’s how to do it. Right-click the start button, choose Properties, and then click the Customize button in the Start Menu Properties dialog box. In the Customize Start Menu dialog box, pick the web browser and e-mail app you wish and you’re through.
Keyboard Shortcut for Accessing Start Menu
I like using the keyboard rather than the mouse, so I’m always looking for keyboard shortcuts. Here’s one for accessing your Start Menu without the mouse:
Press your Windows key, or the Ctrl+Esc keyboard shortcut to open the Menu. Then, press the Up Arrow key once to get to the All Programs. From there, you can expand All Programs by hitting Enter, or the Right Arrow key. Then, use your arrow keys to navigate up and down and use Enter to select your program. To close a sub-menu, press the Left Arrow key, or Esc.
Search
Maybe everyone knows about this, but it’s one of my absolute favorites for Vista. I have quite a long list of applications and instead of scrolling around and finding the one I want, I just hit the Start button and type in the name of the program I want and it quickly appears. This is a wonderful time saver. You can also use this feature to find documents, pictures, whatever. If you want to see all the excel documents on your computer, hit the Start button and type in *.xls. It will return not only the excel files in your folders, but excel files in your email as well. You can also save your searches for using later.
