Sarasota PC Monitor

Review Chairmans Industry Comments (6/06)

The Computer Buffet

by Herb Goldstein, Review Editor

E-mail comments, suggestions, etc. to Herb Goldstein at: revieweditor@spcug.org

VIDEO PROFESSOR SCAM For those of you who have asked me about the frequently advertised computer learning lessons from Video Professor, I refer you to www.clariondeveloper.com/videoprofessorscam. You will see some very unsettling information about the product.

VOICE MAIL COMPRESSOR allows you to record and send voice email messages to anyone with an email address. Voice Mail Compressor generates compressed .wav files reducing the size by 10 to 16 times. The recipient doesn’t need any special software to listen to messages; they simply click on the file and listen in their default audio player. The app also supports file compression as GSM or MP3 files. www.lagolento.com/ 

CLONE CLEANER LITE HCC is an easy-to-use program designed to find out and remove duplicate files with same name, same size, same content on your local or network computers. With HCC you can easily reclaim disk space wasted by all the extra unnecessary file copies and keep your files well organized. Unique smart marking feature enable you to keep files in particular locations and guarantee that their duplicates will be removed from elsewhere. www.clonecleaner.com/index.html 

.DUPLICATE FILE FINDER, file location and sorting tool. Searches files for duplicates based on criteria like size, location, contents, date, extension and more. Works with hard drives and removable media. Color coded results. Protect specific files from deletion. Output results as text, html and csv. Preview image files as thumbnails for easy comparison. Auto delete duplicates. Date range searches and saved queries help speed search process

JARTE is a compact word processor—small enough to put on a USB keychain drive—that’s completely free of charge. Jarte’s small size doesn’t keep it from offering some well-selected features. For instance, WordWeb integration offers dictionary and thesaurus word look-up on the fly. Firefox fans will like its tabbed document windows www.jarte.com/ 

HP PHOTOSMART ESSENTIAL helps you get great prints without having to buy anything new. With this fast, free download, you’ll not only save time and money, but you’ll also get the power to create professional-looking prints in a snap. Designed to streamline the most frequently performed photo software tasks, it’s a quick and easy solution for organizing, fixing, printing, and sharing photos. Featuring a mere two clicks to printing lab-quality photos and one touch auto fix, it’s surprisingly simple for the novice and convenient for experienced user. Optional plug-ins allow you to do more with your photos. Version 1.9 (formerly Image Zone Express) now features new sharing options: upload, share, order prints and photo gifts at Snapfish.com or let Photosmart Essential auto downsize your photos perfectly for home printing and automatically send them in your default e-mail program. Also includes more borderless home photo album templates. www.hp.com

CCLEANER.Somewhere under the layers of software detritus, your PC is vigorous and eager to work. CCleaner claims to search through several programs and remove useless files. Many cleaners scrub out just your browser cache or your temporary files folder, but CCleaner was developed to go several steps further. It cleans temporary files from a number of applications, including Adobe Acrobat, eMule, eTrust EZ Antivirus, Firefox, Google Toolbar, Kazaa, Nero, Netscape, Office XP, OpenOffice, Opera WinAce, Windows Media Player, WinRAR, and WinZip. An advanced Registry scanner removes old and unused entries, including file extensions, ActiveX Controls, uninstallers, shared DLLs, fonts, help files, application paths, icons, and invalid shortcuts. www.ccleaner.com/ 

FREERAM XP PROincludes automatic memory monitoring and optimization; advanced tray support; fast, threaded freeing with a stop option; multiple system-metric monitors; a simple and attractive GUI; memory reporting and diagnostic logging; and real-time memory information. FreeRAM XP Pro’s AutoFree feature intelligently scales how much RAM is freed with your current system status, thus optimizing RAM without slowing down your computer. Additionally, FreeRAM XP Pro’s unique Global Memory Compression technology frees memory instantly in a way that is completely unlike other memory managers. FreeRAM XP Pro has been designed to be easy to use yet highly customizable by computer novices and experts alike. www.yourwaresolutions.com 

ADOBE READER 7.0.7This software lets you view and print Adobe PDF files on a variety of hardware and operating system platforms. Adobe Reader provides a host of features that enable you to submit PDF forms created with fillable form fields to such applications as Adobe Acrobat 7.0 Professional and Adobe Form Designer. Read and organize high-fidelity e-books. Activate search and accessibility capabilities built into your PDF files, and display Adobe Photoshop Album slide shows and electronic cards. Version 7.0.7 offers enhanced performance with faster loading and zooming, expanded device compatibility, and extended application support for files attached to PDF documents. www.adobe.com

PROCESS LIBRARY QUICK ACCESS INFOBARDeep in the recesses of any computer, mysterious processes run silently in the background. Process Library Quick Access Info Bar help you identify them. Armed with information, you can protect your PC from resource hogs, privacy-violating spyware, and Trojans that give hackers carte blanche on your system. This Windows Task Manager plug-in provides you process information and advice from ProcessLibrary .com, a free online knowledge Web site that’s home to over 9000 process definitions. To access ProcessLibrary .com from Windows Task Manager, click the icon that appears next to processes in the Process tab. Each icon links to ProcessLibrary.com’s defininition, which details the exact nature and purpose of every known process. www.processlibrary.com/ 

ENABLING AUDIBLE CAPS LOCK WARNING It’s easy to hit the Caps Lock key by mistake and find yourself typing in capital letters. Worse, if you don’t know Caps Lock is on, your password may be rejected for no apparent (to you) reason. You can use the built-in ToggleKeys feature to sound an audible warning when you hit Caps Lock, Num Lock or Scroll Lock. Here’s how: In Control Panel, click Accessibility Options. >Click the Keyboard tab. >Check the Use ToggleKeys checkbox. >Click OK.

BLUE FROG ACTIVELY FIGHTS SPAM and makes spammers leave you alone. Blue Frog automatically posts complaints on the sites advertised by the spam you receive. Report your spam from any desktop e-mail client or let Blue Frog report Gmail, Hotmail, and Yahoo spam directly from the Firefox browser. Filtering spam is not enough. Blue Frog protects your e-mail accounts or your entire mail domain by making spammers remove you from their mailing lists. Version 1.8 may include unspecified updates, enhancements, or bug fixes. www.bluesecurity.com

ESSENTIALPIM FREE combines several functions—calendar, contact manager, to-do list, and notes manager—into one interface. This program performs the functions you’d expect, plus some bonuses like color-coding, drag-and-drop functions, and integrated Microsoft Outlook or Outlook Express data importing. The to-do list allows you to sort and prioritize by category, priority, and completion status. Adjustable program views and several printout options help you keep the data you need at hand. Everything can be password-protected and encrypted with AES 128-bit encryption. www.essentialpim.com/?r=products 

FOXIT READERAdobe Reader isn’t your only option for viewing PDF files. FoxIt Reader is a free utility that includes some tools that Adobe lacks, including a “typewriter” tool that lets you type text over any PDF, not just files that have been set with form fields. FoxIt launches very quickly (in about one second) and it requires no installation—you just run the executable file. It allows you open, view, print, and change the page layout in PDF files. www.foxitsoftware.com/pdf/rd_intro.php 

. OPENOFFICE.ORG. Want to use Microsoft Office applications without using Microsoft Office? OpenOffice.org is a free, multiplatform productivity suite being developed as an open-source application and project. It is available for numerous operating systems and supports many common file formats, as well as languages. Its files are interchangeable with those of Microsoft Office applications. www.openoffice.org/ 

FILE LOCKER will protect your files so they can not be used by other people. It uses three levels of security including 128-bit encryption and Locking. It can lock a single file or millions of files at a time. With true “Point, Select, Lock”, its never been easier to maintain your privacy than with File Locker 5.5. Version 5.5 features File Protection so your most important files will never go missing as well as Secure Delete—to destroy all traces of your deleted files. www.file-locker.com 

PHOTOMEISTERhelps you to process, edit, and publish photos from your digital camera. Import your photos from your digital camera or local folder and easily edit them to remove red eye, make color or other adjustments and, rotate them more. You can then choose from a variety of options to further process your images - they can be published as a HTML photo gallery or printed, or even packaged for email delivery. You can also create screensavers from your image collection, create PDF files or Palm albums, and more. PhotoMeister can also burn your image collections or album creations directly to CD-ROM without the need for any additional burning software. The program comes with an easy to use interface and step-by-step wizards for every task. Additional features include batch processing, Web publishing support, custom templates, album search, and more. www.photomeister.com/

EUSING FREE REGISTRY CLEANER is a free registry repair software that allows you to safely clean and repair registry problems with a few simple mouse clicks.The Windows Registry is a crucial part of your PC’s operation system. Problems with the Windows Registry are a common cause of Windows crashes and error messages.Registry problems can occur for many reasons, including references left behind after uninstallation; incorrect removal of software; missing or corrupt hardware drivers; or orphaned start-up programs.This will significantly increase the Registry size and slow down your computer, because Windows will need more time to load, search, and read data from the Registry. Eusing Free Registry Cleaner will scans your Windows registry for invalid or obsolete information and provide a list of the errors found.After fixing the invalid entries, your system will be more stable and run faster.For maximum safety, Eusing Free Registry Cleaner will make a backup of the repaired entries.You will be able to restore any changes made using the software by choosing Restore registry backup.Eusing Software products are free of spyware and adware. www.eusing.com/free_registry_cleaner/registry_cleaner.htm 

FASTSTONE IMAGE VIEWER If you want your images to look the best they can—but you don’t have a professional photographer’s budget—check out FastStone Image Viewer. This freebie lets you browse and view your images in a Windows-Explorer-like interface. FastStone image viewer supports all major image formats, including BMP, GIF, ICO, JPEG, JPEG2000, PCX, PNG, PSD, TAF, TIF, and WMF. It includes EXIF metadata support as well. You can crop, resize, flip, rotate, and adjust colors on your images and compare them side by side. You can also convert your images from one format to another; in fact, you can even convert or resize your photos in batches. If you need to take a closer look without resizing, use the Full Screen image viewer to zoom in and size things up with the clear magnifier. Once you’re done, you can apply over 150 transitional effects in a slideshow. www.faststone.org/ 

iCOLORFOLDER v1.4.1. Have you ever found yourself looking at your screen, trying to figure out which little yellow folder your important documents are in? Why is it that almost every folder has to be yellow? Why not blue? Why not green? Well, download iColorFolder and you can pick what color you want your folders to be. Here is what the author of the program has to say about it: “With iColorFolder, give some color to Windows XP folders. With just a right-click, colorize your folders, and discover a new intuitive way to classify your files. A quick view is now enough to identify the folder you are looking for!” There are several different folder styles and colors to choose from. If you have a folder filled with important material, you can make that folder red. If you have a folder for all your money issues, then make that folder green. Till you try it, you won’t imagine how much easier this makes things. Want to see it in action? A few screenshots are available via the iColorFolder Web site. So give sorting your folders by colors a chance. http://icolorfolder.sourceforge.net/download_icolorfolder_page.htm 

K-LITE CODEC PACK (FULL) V2.71 K-Lite Codec Pack (Full) includes 99% of all the audio and video codecs you will ever need. Just install this pack, and you will be able to play just about any media file out there. It includes DivX, Xvid, x264, MPEG 1/2,MP3, Monkey‘s Audio, Media Player Classic, On2 V6/V7, and many others. The installer lets you choose which codecs to install, or you can use the default profile which installs all of them. K-Lite Codec Pack also provides access to configuration options for each codec whenever available. www.snapfilespro.com/gnomeapp.php?id=109900 

AVEDESK V1.3 No matter if your desktop is clean or cluttered, chances are you have things on your desktop to help take you through your day. It could be a clock. It might be a list of things to do. Each one of these little things helps make our lives easier. Now I am sure you have heard of desktop widgets before. How about desklets? No matter what you call them, I have a freeware program that will help you get a few more. AveDesk is another program that manages these desktop distractions. Here is what the developer has to say about it: “AveDesk is a program that will give you the possibility to have icons on your desktop which could update themselves. Each icon is in fact a desklet, a little plug-in that can virtually do anything. A desklet can be just a regular shortcut, a mail checker, a calendar, a clock, etc. It depends on the imagination of the desklets programmer.” Some of the features of AveDesk includes: Better support for mini-applications / widgets / desklet; several feature-rich new desklets; hardware accelerated flip and closing effects; new user-interface; big architecture changes; unique library of skinned, alpha-blended controls; new scriptable desklet: AveScripter and MultiMonitor support. The idea, at least, should be familiar to you by now. This is just one more place (and one more program) to get these types of desktop enhancements onto your machine. So, try something different and give AveDesk a chance. http://avedesk.needlemen.com/ 

END OF THE (SUPPORT) LINE FOR WINDOWS 98/ME If you still have computers running Windows 98 or Me, be aware that Microsoft will retire public and technical support for both operating systems in July 2006. That means no more security or other updates, although current support documents will still be available on the Microsoft web site. This may pose a dilemma for some users, who now must decide whether to go ahead and upgrade their 98/Me computers to Windows XP, wait for Vista in early 2007, or just continue to run the unsupported operating systems.

HOUSECALLScan your hard drive for viruses and spyware with this free online tool. You simply choose the drives you want to scan and click on the “Scan” button. HouseCall can check more than 17,000 files in five minutes. Unlike Symantec’s online tool, which only scans for viruses, HouseCall scans and fixes free any infected files. http://housecall.trendmicro.com/ 

EFAX MESSENGERJust when you think fax machines are dead, someone asks you to fax an important document. With eFax Messenger and the eFax service, you can receive your faxes as e-mail attachments. Open the attachment in the viewer, and you’ll see your fax onscreen. The free version lets you send two faxes over the life of your account. If you subscribe to one of the paid services, you can also choose a local or toll-free fax number. One of the paid services, eFax Pro, even promises voice mail in your e-mail. http://www.efax.com/en/efax/twa/page/download 

. FREE NOTES is a user-friendly sticky note manager that allows you to create, edit, date, and customize notes for home or office. www.pw-soft.com/stick-notes/index.html 

PANOPTICON EXPLORER .NET LEARNING EDITIONIf staring at a spreadsheet makes your eyes cross, try looking at your data a different way. Panopticon Explorer .NET converts data into colorful treemaps, graphic representations that can show you the most important information at a glance. You can set the program to represent one metric by size and another by color, and then watch your data convert to a graphical format. A quick look shows you that the items with the strongest color and largest size are the strongest in the qualities you specified. Mouseovers give more specifics. Panopticon Explorer .NET’s highly customizable views let you look at your data in a number of different ways—several colors at once, for instance. If one view doesn’t show what you need to know, you can reassign a color or size to a different metric. You can save the graphics in several formats to add to slides or printouts. This edition is free for individuals and nonprofits. Businesses using Panopticon Explorer .NET must buy a professional license. www.panopticon.com/panopticon/Page?id=41 

. MDCHOICE.COM It provides plenty of medical information, written in clear English. The site is broken down into two categories: consumers and health-care professionals. Some features are available on both. For consumers, illnesses and diseases can be browsed alphabetically. Each one has answers to frequently asked questions. More detailed information is found for selected topics. Cancer, AIDS and children’s health are just some. The professional half provides access to medical databases. Online textbooks and full-text journals make research a snap.

. GOOGLE CALENDARING Google recently unveiled a beta version of its new Google Calendar service, which lets customers track appointments and other scheduling data, and share them with others. Calendar functionality has long been a feature that Web email providers such as Microsoft and Yahoo have provided, but this marks Google’s first entry into this market. Like competing solutions, Google Calendar is free. However, unlike many Google services, it’s devoid of advertising. Google Calendar offers quick schedule searching in keeping with Google’s central capability. You can also specify calendar searches to include calendars that others have shared with you. In its current form, Google Calendar offers basic functionality: You can add events, which are public or private and can include invitations to other individuals; and you can view your calendar by day, by the next four days, by week, or by month. An agenda view lets you view upcoming events in a list, sorted by date. Google has big plans for its calendaring service and as a public beta, it will be changing in the days ahead. For example, the company plans to add synchronization capabilities so that users can sync with Microsoft Outlook and a variety of smart phone devices. Microsoft is working on several competing calendaring applications and services. Outlook 2007, a component of Office 2007, will include a vastly improved calendar component. Windows Vista, due in early 2007, will include a new application called Windows Calendar, which offers features similar to those of Google Calendar but is available offline. Also, Windows Live Mail includes an online calendar component that is quite similar to Google Calendar. Google Calendar works best with Microsoft Internet Explorer (IE) and Mozilla Firefox and is open to all users. Please visit the Google Web site for more information.

LCD PRICES DROPA string of new LCD factories being built, combined with slow demand for notebook and desktop PC screens, caused LCD prices to fall during the first three months of the year, and the downward trend is expected to continue, vendors and analysts say. Falling prices for LCD screens should help ensure that users find bargains for new monitors, laptops, and LCD TVs this year, since the screen is among the most expensive components in those products. The price declines are also causing vendors to improve picture quality to catch users’ eyes and draw them away from competitors.

ALARMis a digital clock that you can set to display a message and play a sound at a time of your choice. It is meant to be of help when you want to be warned while you are working (and chances are big you are going to forget you have to do this very important thing later on). http://bluefive.pair.com/ 

INTERNET EXPLORER 7 BETA 2The latest beta of Microsoft Internet Explorer 7 is out and available for download. It features many improvements over IE6 and may be worth your download so long as you understand the product is still in beta. The final release is due later this year. So far it looks very promising. I tried it and would have kept it except for a bug that you may or not experience on your own computer. I found that every hyperlink I clicked on brought me into my list of folders in Outlook Express rather than to the appropriate location on the Internet. Consequently I uninstalled IE7 and went automatically back to IE6. Not that it all matters since my default browser is Firefox anyway

ACUBIX PICOBACKUP OUTLOOK EXPRESS EDITION is an easy-to-use backup utility packed with many powerful features to make it extremely simple to backup and restore your Microsoft Outlook Express emails. PicoBackup automatically detects all Microsoft Outlook Express email accounts on your PC and lets you select which one to backup. When restoring an Outlook Express backup, you will be provided with options on where to restore to. You can restore to the original account, to a different account or to any folder you specify. You can easily view the contents of your Outlook Express backups and selectively extract files from the backup. If you have been using Microsoft Outlook Express for communications, chances are, you would have saved up many emails containing important bits of information. Have you given any thought to what a major headache it would be if you lost all the information that you have accumulated over time ? PicoBackup Outlook Express Edition makes it extremely easy to backup your Outlook Express emails. It will show you a list of all users on your computer using Outlook Express. You can then select which accounts you wish to backup and PicoBackup does the rest. You do not have to worry where the data files are stored and which files need to be backup. We do the hard work for you. Download PicoBackup Outlook Express Edition Now (It’s Free!). www.picobackup.com/pboe/index.html 

TECH SUPPORT BOMBS OUT.Only 55 percent of consumers who contacted free manufacturer's tech support had their problem solved, according to the latest Computer Tech Support Survey from the Consumer Reports National Research Center. Along with the tech support survey results and ratings, the June issue of Consumer Reports also includes the latest Ratings of desktop and laptop computers, and a step-by-step guide to easy PC fixes. Consumer Reports surveyed more than 20,000 subscribers with computer trouble and asked how they solved problems with and without manufacturer's help. Consumer Reports survey respondents noted that most manufacturers provided dismal free tech support with two exceptions: Apple's support for desktops and laptops and IBM (Lenovo) for laptops. Apple solved 76 percent of survey respondents' problems, and IBM (Lenovo) solved 64 percent.

Other survey highlights:

JV16 Power Tools 2006 Here’s a powerhouse rebirth of an old friend. JV16 was for many years one of computerdom’s favorite freeware utilities. It was essentially a registry cleaner that allowed you to get rid of all the elements of an uninstalled program that usually hide hidden in the nooks and crannies of the registry. It was not only free and popular, but was noted for doing a remarkably quick and efficient job. JV16 has been reborn under the banner of Macecraft (macecraft.com), is no longer freeware and is now a powerhouse collection of 23 utilities:

  1. Software Manager- Uninstalls software and all its traces.
  2. Startup Manager- Allows you to control what apps automatically startup with Windows.
  3.  Registry Manager- Allows you to remove registered shell extensions and registered file types.
  4. Registry Cleaner- Cleans obsolete registry entries and effects necessary registry repairs.
  5. Registry Finder- A registry search tool.
  6. Registry Find and Replace. Search for and replace registry items.
  7. Registry Monitor- Takes snapshots of the registry to allow rollback in case of errors or problems.
  8. Registry Compactor- Reduces registry size by restructuring it from scratch.
  9. Registry Information- Displays registry size and contents.
  10. File Finder- Find any file anywhere on your computer.
  11. File Cleaner- Find and eliminate useless and unnecessary files to restore hard drive space.
  12. File Organizer- Rearrange similar files into their own directories.
  13. Duplicate File Finder. Search for duplicate files.
  14. File Tool- Modify and edit selected files.
  15. Directory Finder- Search for and organize specific types of directories.
  16. Directory Tool- Allows you to modify the directories you have searched for and found.
  17. Disk Wiper- Permanently erase the contents of a directory, an entire hard drive, or free space.
  18. Start Menu Fixer- Fix broken shortcuts in your start menu and desktop.
  19. History and MRU Cleaner- Cleans history and most recently used file list.
  20. History Manager- Cleans Firefox history.
  21. Cookie Manager- Cleans unwanted cookies from your browser.
  22. Privacy Protector- Remove unwanted history or cookie items at startup.
  23. 23. Automation Tool- Allows you to run any of JV16’s tools automatically either currently or at startup.

As you can see, JV16 offers a wide variety of utilities from which you can select. A healthy portion of its tools are aimed directly at the registry. Therein lies both its greatest strength and drawbacks. JV 16 is not a tool for novices. When you are making changes to the registry you need to be darned well sure of what you are doing. Errors in that area could cause you very significant problems. I recommend this software for competent intermediate or advanced users only. Users in these categories will find JV16 a powerful, useful and very competent utility. Macecraft offers JV16 for free trial prior to purchase at $29.95 giving you adequate opportunity to give it a good free test drive. Just exercise caution and good judgment in making registry changes.

Return to Herb Goldstein's Index

Return to Columnist's Index

Copyright 2006. This article is from the June 2006 issue of the Sarasota PC Monitor, the official monthly publication of the Sarasota Personal Computer Users Group, Inc., P.O. Box 15889, Sarasota, FL 34277-1889. Permission to reprint is granted only to other non-profit computer user groups, provided proper credit is given to the author and our publication. We would appreciate receiving a copy of the publication the reprint appears in, please send to above address, Attn: Editor. For further information about our group, email: admin@spcug.org/ Web: http://www.spcug.org/

The Sarasota Personal Computer Users Group, Inc. has 1,100+ members and was established in 1982. We are members of the Assoc. of PC User Groups (APCUG), the Florida Assoc. of PC Users Groups, Inc., and we are members of the America Online Ambassador Program.

See http://www.spcug.org for all reviews from the Sarasota PC Monitor, go to the Newsletter Section.