June 27, 2008

Free Up 10 GigaBytes of Disk Space in Windows

There are many areas in Windows Vista and XP that you can delete temporary files and decrease disk usage. Sure you can download free tools that clean up temp and orphan files, but do they really catch everything and guide you in decreasing unnecessary usage of disk space in windows?

If you want do do things right, you do them yourself sometimes. In this tutorial PCWizKid shows you how you can easily free up 10 gigs or more of space on your PC.

There are various ways of saving anywhere from a few hundred MegaBytes to GigaBytes of space. The video walks you through these step by step.


Notes from video:
Places to Delete temp files from:
C:\windows\system32\dllcache\
C:\windows\Temp\
C:\Documents and Settings\Administrator\Local Settings\Temp\

Areas to save disk space
- Turn off or decrease size of disk usage for system restore
If your not using the Windows System Restore feature, then why have it enabled?
If you are using it, perhaps you want to re-evaluate how much disk space its using up (which can be several GigaBytes) for saving checkpoints. If you only want to have 1 or 2 good saved checkpoints to restore from decrease the allocated space for system restore to a few hundred meg.

- Decrease the disk usage size of the recycle bin
The most common area on a users PC in which Windows allocates a chuck of space for itself is the recycle bin. If you rather have files be deleted instantly and not put in the recycle bin or you want to decrease the space it uses to hold deleted files, a simple adjustment of the properties for it will do the trick as specified in PCWizKid's video tutorial.

- Empty or Decrease your Web Browsers disk usage for Cached files
Every web browser has a preferences or options area to adjust the temporary internet files and cache usage. In ths video tutorial we use Internet Explorer as an example on how to save space with an adjustment of the temporary internet files space it uses.

- Disable Hibernation in Windows.
If you dont know what Hibernation is , chances are you arent using it. You might want to disable it to save a few GigaBytes of space that function requires as shown in the video tutorial.
For Vista users you can opena command prompt and type powercfg -H off

-Run the Windows Clean Manager
Windows comes already with a built in cleaner that does simple basic tasks to free up disk space.
To access it click start -> Run -> type cleanmgr -> press OK, as shown in the video tutorial.

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June 24, 2008

Windows Performance Increase - Virtual Memory

This tweak applies to Windows Vista or XP. If you are running many applications, especially large resource hogs that eat huge amount of memory, your system may become unstable or even crash.
You can increase the total amount of memory in your system with a simple virtual memory adjustment of the paging file on your system.

The paging file (Pagefile.sys) is a hidden file on your computer's hard disk that Windows XP uses as if it were random access memory (RAM). The paging file and physical memory make up virtual memory.

According to Microsoft Help and Support "By default, Windows stores the paging file on the boot partition (the partition that contains the operating system and its support files)"

The rule of thumb is to set the virtual memory page file to be 1.5x (times) the physical memory installed roughly. The intent here is to have enough virtual memory so you can multitask and handle opening more programs at once.

For example, if you have a PC with 2 Gigs of Ram, the the paging file size would be aprox 3 Gigs, giving you a total of roughly 5 Gigs.

Although your system my not use it all the key here is to set an adequate amount and limit the page file from growing further than it needs to be. This video tutorial takes you through the steps of quickly setting up this scenario.


Crucial System Scanner


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June 20, 2008

Firefox 3 - Have you made the switch?

Its been several months now I have used Firefox 3 Beta on Ubuntu 8.04. On my windows PC I have Firefox 2.x.

With the latest version now being official I installed Firefox 3 in windows along side version 2.x just incase.

In other words, I choose the custom install option when installing Firefox 3 and installed it into a separate directory on my Windows PC so that it would not overwrite version 2.x . That way I could compare side by side the results , differences and speed. My main concern are the security vulnerabilities and the consumption of memory that Firefox has. Other than that everything else about Firefox is superior to other browsers I have tried in the past.

Below is a walkthrough reviewing my first experience with Firefox 3 Final release.


This is an unbiased look at Firefox, although I must say overall Firefox still is my browser of choice.
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June 17, 2008

Windows Vista Hack - Unlock the Admin Account

PCWizKid's Tech Talk is proud to have been featured in the July 2008 issue of PC World Magazine. This article can be read in the "Here's How" section (page 115) of the magazine.
Although on Microsoft TechNet you will find a few toys and tweaks, the alternative to increasing performance still remains upto you. Meaning hack your way into config settings and manually set things up the way you want in the registry.

Here are is a sought after hack for Windows Vista many dont know about. Be sure to make a System Restore Checkpoint to backup your settings before doing any of these tweaks.

Watch the video tutorial on how to unleash this hidden account.

Unlock the Administrator account

Turning on the Administrator account is straight forward. First, open an elevated command prompt by typing cmd into the Search box on the Start menu, right-clicking the command prompt icon that appears at the top of the Start menu, then selecting Run as administrator.

Then enter this command and press Enter:

Net user administrator /active:yes

From now on, the Administrator account will appear as an option on the Welcome screen, along with any user accounts you may have set up. Use it like any other account. Be aware that it won't have a password yet, so it's a good idea to set a password for it.

If you want to disable the account and hide it, enter this command at an elevated command prompt and press Enter:

Net user administrator /active:no

Tweak Windows Vista even more for free with TweakVI, click the image below for details.
Tweak Vista with TweakVI for Vista

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June 9, 2008

Windows XP TIP - Rename the Recycle Bin

Try to rename the recycle bin in windows. You cant!

But wait, a simple registry tweak, and your all set to rename it to what ever you want!

Watch the tutorial which takes you through the steps.

Notes from video:
- Navigate in the registry to HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT/CLSID/ folder.
- Look for the folder within the brackets that is called {645FF040-5081-101B-9F08-00AA002F954E} then expand it.
- Double-click Shellfolder.
- Change the binary value data from default 40 01 00 20 to 70 01 00 20

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June 6, 2008

Windows Vista Tips Tweaks and Video Tutorials

PCWizKid's Tech Talk has created a variety of Windows Vista and XP Tips and Tweaks in the form of video tutorials. You can scroll through the videos below and pick what you want to watch.



Tweak Windows Vista easily for free with TweakVI, click the image below for details.
Tweak Vista with TweakVI for Vista

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June 3, 2008

Top 2008 Freeware Applications for Windows


PCWizKid's Tech Talk has put together a complete mix of Freeware Applications and Utilities that are top notch for the price. These are rated high overall and have the most downloads in its class.

Oh ya did I mention its free!

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June 2, 2008

Windows Tip - Change the default installation folder


Whenever you install something in Windows it defaults to C:\Program Files , you can change it in the registry so that it defaults to another drive or folder instead.

This tutorial shows you how to modify the default windows value to whatever you want.


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