Oct 23, 2009

Look for more things with better search option

The starter pack of Windows 7 makes it easier for small notebook PCs to use the operating system as it takes less time to boot, involves less clicking, and less hassle connecting to networks.

This edition combines the latest in reliability and responsiveness with the familiarity and compatibility of Windows. Although in previous Microsoft OS, Windows Search has a familiar user interface for instant finding of files and e-mail messages located on your PC.

Windows 7 Home premium edition makes it easy to establish a home network and share all your favorite photos, videos, and music. With the help of Window 7 or windows xp 7 you can even watch, pause, rewind, and record TV.

With Windows 7 Professional edition, you can run many Windows XP productivity programs in Windows XP Mode and recover data easily with automatic backups to your home or business network. With Windows 7 you can also connect to company networks easily and with more security.

The Ultimate version of Windows 7 combines remarkable ease-of-use with the entertainment features of Windows 7 Home Premium and the business capabilities of Professional. And for enhanced security, you can encrypt your data with BitLocker and BitLocker To Go. You can also work in any of 35 languages with this edition of Windows 7. These are the features that give you a definite edge over earlier versions of Microsoft OS. I also think that the view your active networks section now looks much nicer and easier to understand.

Another interesting feature in Windows 7 is Reliability Monitor that allows you to know any future problem in advance. We often come across problems which might have been solved if known earlier. But how to know what our system is lacking?

Reliability monitor

Windows 7 Reliability Monitor offers a solution. It demonstrates how well is your system by measuring the hardware and software performance of your computer. The tool calculates the stability index of your system and specifies results in the range from 1-10 and thus from the results, you can get an overview of the overall performance of your system.

This feature was present in Windows Vista by the name of Reliability and Performance monitor but it has been renamed and further enhanced in Windows 7.

You can access this feature by following these steps:

STEP 1. Go to Windows 7 Action Center by clicking the Action Center icon in the system tray and and then choose Open Action Center.

STEP 2. Expand the Maintenance category, and click the View reliability history option.

STEP 3. Windows 7 will generate the reports in a graphical format and will display the stability of your system in the form of a graph. From here, you will be able to get an idea about how well your system is performing.

Any failure will be marked down in the graph, which can provide the complete information. Hence, an easy way to know any abnormality in the system.

Oct 20, 2009

ReadyBoost: A way to speed up Windows 7

Microsoft has included an enhanced version of ReadyBoost on Windows 7, a new feature that speeds up your computer even in a low memory situation by using flash memory, in its latest operating system Windows 7, scheduled to be launched on October 22.

ReadyBoost, which also comes with Vista, make use of a USB flash drive or card as memory and it works with most of the flash storage devices.

In Windows 7, it can handle more flash memory and even multiple devices up to eight, for a maximum 256GB of additional memory. When you plug a ReadyBoost-compatible storage device into your system, the AutoPlay dialog box offers you the option to speed up your computer using ReadyBoost. If you select this option, you can choose how much memory on the device to use for this purpose.

When you set up a device to work with ReadyBoost, Windows shows you the space recommended for an optimal performance. For ReadyBoost to effectively speed up your computer, the flash drive or memory card should have at least 1GB of available space. If enough space is not available for ReadyBoost, you’ll see a message asking you to free some space on the device if you want to use it to speed up your system. You can enable or disable ReadyBoost for a specific flash drive or other removable storage device.

Follow the given guidelines to enable this feature in Windows 7 :

STEP1: Connect a flash drive or flash memory card into your computer.

STEP2: Click Speed up my system, in the Autoplay dialog box, under General options.

STEP3: In the Properties dialog box, click the ReadyBoost tab, and then do one of the following:

To turn ReadyBoost off, click Do not use this device.

To use the maximum available space on the flash drive or memory card for ReadyBoost, click Dedicate this device to ReadyBoost. Windows will leave any files already stored on the device, but it will use the rest to boost your system speed.

To use less than the maximum available space on the device for ReadyBoost, click Use this device, and then move the slider to choose the amount of available space on the device you want to use.

STEP4: Click OK.

Oct 19, 2009

Automate Administration with PowerShell


Windows PowerShell 2.0, a useful feature in Microsoft’s latest operating system, Windows 7, is a great boon to IT professionals yearning for a elevated management of  computers in enterprises.

PowerShell 2.0 is built on the Microsoft .Net Framework and is especially designed for system administration providing great help to IT professionals to automate the administration of Windows operating system. The command tools in Windows PowerShell, named cmdlets, allows you to manage computers in enterprise.

Microsoft latest Windows 7 version also helps you to access data stores and supports Windows Management Instrumentation classes. The tool is designed to easily permit the addition of new features. Your own cmdlets, providers, functions and scripts can be added which enables you to use Windows technologies such as Active Directory Domain Services, Windows BitLocker Drive Encryption, the DHCP Server service, Group policy, etc.


IT professionals and developers might be most interested in these improved features in Windows 7 as it helps them to manage Windows at the command line. Developers can also use it to build script language

In a nutshell, following are the changes included in Windows 7 PowerShell:

1. More than 100 new cmdlets are included in Windows PowerShell.

2. Interactive session can be created with single computer and as many as computer can be run with the single command. A session can be established with it which allows you to receive remote commands from multiple computers.

3. With Windows PowerShell background jobs, you can continue to work on your session as the commands run in the background. Background jobs can be run on a local as well as on the remote computer.

4. With debugger, you can debug functions and scripts. Breakpoint can be set and removed with it and you can also check the values of the variables.

5. Modules in Windows PowerShell allows you to function as independent entity. Module package containing your cmdlets, providers, scripts, functions and other files can be distributed to the other users.

6. It supports new event infrastructure and transaction.

7. The messages and text can be displayed to users in multiple languages, with script internalization.

8. For enhanced user experience, not only help at the command line but also new online parameters are included in Get-Help cmdlet which opens updated version of each help topic.

Oct 17, 2009

Troubleshooting Windows 7 Shutdown Problems


Making an improvement over Windows XP, Window 7 allows a user to get rid of system restarts.
A reflection on Windows 7 features will tell us that if the operating system Windows 7 fails due to driver error and your system restarts, you can follow these steps to resolve the issue.
Just click the "Start" button after selecting "Control Panel". After that, click "System and Security", and then "System". In the left pane, select "Advanced system settings". If the User Account Control dialog box appears, click "Yes". The "System Properties" multi-tabbed dialog box appears. Click the "Advanced" tab. Underneath "Startup and Recovery", click the "Settings" button. After that in Windows 7 the "Startup and Recovery" dialog box appears. Underneath "System failure", uncheck "Automatically restart". Click "OK" on the dialog boxes to close them.
Meanwhile, in Windows 7, you can also set Process Priorities to boost your system. You will have to determine which processes should get the most attention in your Windows 7 system.
If your main program or process running too slow on your Windows 7 version, you can raise the priority of it.
You can open Task Manager by pressing Ctrl+Shift+Esc together on keyboard. The multi-tabbed "Windows Task Manager" should appear. Make sure the "Applications" tab is selected. If the process you need to change is linked to an application, right-click it and choose "Go to Process" from the pop-up menu that appears.
Otherwise, click the "Processes tab" to find a process you need to change. Right-click a process and select "Set Priority". If you cannot find the process that needs its priority changed, click the "Show processes from all users" button. You may have to confirm your action via User Account Control.
From here you can select from the following possible priorities (highest to lowest): Realtime, High, Above Normal, Below Normal, Normal, and Low.

If you are sure you want to change the process priority, click the "Change priority" button when prompted.
You cannot change priorities permanently, next time you reboot your computer default priority will be there. Save all open files before trying this trick.

Oct 16, 2009

Make changes in Account Picture in windows 7

Microsoft’s Windows 7 release will be a boon for users as now they will be allowed to change the picture that appears on the Start Menu and Welcome screen in Windows 7.
While using Windows 7 you must have noticed a picture that appears when you click the Start menu or access the Welcome screen. A picture represents your account. You can replace this default picture with your favorite one.
You can follow these steps to perform this task. Click the Start button and then click on your account image to open the "User Accounts" Control Panel. When the "User Accounts" Control Panel opens, click "Change your picture" and then choose the one you like from the gallery and set as a default picture for your account.
After that you will have to click the "Change Picture" button, and then close the "User Accounts" Control Panel.
Taking up another issue, you can use setup to show the computer name on your Windows 7 taskbar.
You usually check computer name manually by right-clicking on My Computer and choosing Properties. But in Windows 7 release you can display it on Taskbar.
You just have to create a new folder in Document folder with the same name as your computer name. You can find your computer name by right-clicking on My Computer and choosing Properties. Right-click on an empty area in the taskbar and choose Toolbars, then click on New Toolbar. Now you want to browse to the location of the folder you just created. Choose that folder and click the Select Folder button.
Thats all. Now your computer name will appear on the Windows 7 taskbar.
Another Windows 7 update is that you can also get an effective package from Dr. Web CuireIt against all virus and spyware in Windows 7
When you update your system with Windows 7, then you need a comprehensive package because your existing antivirus will lose the compatibility.
Dr. Web comes with a most efficient Anti-Virus called Dr. Web CuireIt. Its extensive scanner and virus will scan the complete system even without installation. You can get it from the website link http://www.freedrweb.com, absolutely free. You can combine this package with Windows 7 install package. First, open the website with the above link. Press the button of "Download." Save the file on your desktop. Double click on the file and run the set up. Follow the prompt and at the end accept the Agreement form. Click on "Finish" after the process is complete.
You can run this program anytime, to scan your startup files and main memory. Depending upon the area you want to scan you can run this program under complete scan or custom scan. Press "Scanning" after selecting. After scanning the incurable files are moved to the quarantine directory.

Oct 12, 2009

Windows 7 Goes for a Faster Upgrade

After being criticized for what many users is described as a less-than-smooth upgrade to Windows Vista, the Microsoft team is working hard to ensure a smooth transition for your operating system Windows 7.

Windows ChartUpgrade performance matrix.

Enlarge this image

As part of the effort, Chris Hernandez, Microsoft recently published in the time that 7 must have to update multiple Windows users. Mr. Hernandez writes that "one of the key targets for Windows 7, in general, must be better than Vista" and that according to his evidence, "even in the most extreme case, upgrading to Windows 7 is significantly faster that the upgrade to Vista. "

Exactly how much faster? Mr. Hernandez goes on to say that the time needed to upgrade to Windows 7 "is faster or more within a 5% threshold when updating Vista Service Pack 1." In practical terms, this means that "clean, high hardware end "users must wait for the update times of 30 to 35 minutes, while" super users "- defined as those with mid-range high-end software - it may be necessary to set aside a maximum of 1,220 minutes for the windows 7 update.

Of course, the experience of updating each individual can - and probably - varies, but if you're interested in getting a reliable estimate, check out the chart above to track your time.

How To Get Windows 7 Help

There are just under 10 days to go until million users by end of a hot pack through the post that contains the Windows 7 pre-order, or will be deployed to your local electronics store to pick up a copy of Windows 7 on launch day.

Although Windows 7, in my opinion one of Microsoft's best of all programs, with many users running Windows 7 and with many different PC configurations, will not be many users out there who need help from Windows 7. If you are one of the users where to go? If not registered, then you should try the Windows 7 Forum.