Game: Party like 1995 with the Browser Version of Hover...

Microsoft has released a browser version of a 1995 game it created called Hover.  Its not GTA, but it will remind you of driving a bumper car through a maze trying to collect flags before your opponent.  The real purpose of this game is to showcase the power of Internet Explorer 11 (it also runs in other browsers).

To play the game, go to: http://hover.ie/.

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Windows 8: Stupid PC Tricks - Lock Screen Shortcut

Note: "Stupid PC Tricks" are a series of user tips that I think are interesting, but unfortunately they're not all that useful.
In any organization its important to lock your computer when you leave it, this will prevent someone from abusing your network security access.  By pressing the WinKey + L on the keyboard you can lock the computer screen.  With this tip you can create a shortcut icon

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Microsoft Announces the Surface 2 and Surface Pro 2

Today Microsoft announced the Surface 2 and Surface Pro 2, it's new Window 8.1.tablet.  The new Surface 2 is based on Windows 8 RT, and Surface Pro 2 based on Windows 8 Professional.






New features of the devices include:

A new fingerprint resistant magnesium-based case.
Faster processor:

Surface 2: 1.7 GHz quad-core Tegra 4 ARM chip. (w/ 2GB of RAM)

Internal storage: From 32GB or 64GB

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Windows 8: Map Folders To Drive Letters

If you regularly work with specific folders, and are tired of typing their path (e.g. C:\Windows\System32\Drivers or anything else) its possible to assign it a drive letter.  There's an old DOS command called SUBST (example: SUBST X: C:\{pathname}\foldername}) that can associate a drive letter with a specific folder path.

For example, to assign T: to C:\Windows\System32\Drivers, at the command

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Windows 8: Booting From a VHD

Since Windows 7, the OS has supported the ability boot the comptuer from a VHD (Virtual Hard Disk) or ISO file.   The VHD files were originally created for Microsoft's Virtual Machine (VM) technologies like Hyper-V.

Create or mount an existing VHD, and place it in an easy to find location such as C:\VHD.  For this example purposes the VHD file will be called C:\VHD\VHDTEST.VHD

For information

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Windows 8: Built-in Command Line Network Utilities

Below is a list of command line network utilities that come with Windows that are used for troubleshooting network problems. The problem with these utilities is that they're not very intuitive until you learn to understand what you're looking at.

For example, the PING command is for checking if a remote computer or device is network accessible (note: this can be block by the device's firewall).

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Windows 8: Prevent Windows Update's Automatic Rebooting

It's annoying if the computer is left on at night with unsaved work on it, then come back to it in the morning and find that it was rebooted.

When new patches are downloaded and installed on the computer by Windows Update (if its enabled) this feature will automatically reboot the system. So if there's any unsaved work, it will be lost.

To prevent Windows Update from performing this action,

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Windows 8: Stupid PC Tricks - Show Desktop

Note: "Stupid PC Tricks" are a series of user tips that I think are interesting, but unfortunately they're not all that useful.
Since Windows XP, you could press the WinKey + D on the keyboard to show the desktop.  Before that you had a shortcut that used to come with Windows that you could launch with your mouse.

Below are instructions on how to recreate the shortcut icon.

Open NOTEPAD.EXE,

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Windows 8: Create a Pseudo Start Menu in the Taskbar

One of the first things people notice in Windows 8 is the omission of the Start menu from the desktop. There are several 3rd party replacements for this feature available on the Internet.

Personally, I like to limit the installation of any extra software installed on my system (this is my preference).

If you find this annoying, but don't want to install a 3rd party replacement. You can create

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Windows 8: How to install Windows Media Center (or an Alternative)

One feature (or really lack there of) in Windows 8 users might find annoying is the inability to playback DVDs or Blu-ray discs under the new OS.  In Windows 7 this used to be an included feature depending on the edition of the OS you had installed.

If you're running Windows 8 standard edition you will have to rely on a 3rd party software.  For DVDs, you can download and run VLC [free], or some

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Windows 8: Creating a Master Control Panel

You can create what I like to call the "Master Control Panel" (it is also known as GodMode).  I think the secondary term over emphasizes the real utility of this window.  Basically it displays all control panels, troubleshooting tips and more in one window.

It’s a hidden feature that remains available in previous versions of Windows OS (I know this trick works on Windows 7, I am not sure if it

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Windows 8: Stupid PC Tricks - Windows Switcher

Note: "Stupid PC Tricks" are a series of user tips that I think are interesting, but unfortunately they're not all that useful.
You have always been able to press ALT-TAB to switch between applications.  Way back in Windows 95 and later, there was a shortcut in the Quick Launch bar that could activate the Windows Task Switcher.

Below are instructions on how to recreate the shortcut icon.

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Windows 8: Boot Configuration Utilities

Back in the days of Windows NT there was a BOOT.INI file that was used for controlling which OS Windows would load and what start-up options would be used.

In Windows Vista, Microsoft replaced the older BOOT.INI file with a new architecture called the Boot Configuration Data (BCD) store.

The only time you really want to modify the BCD store is if you want to change the Windows startup options

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Windows 8: Reset vs. Refreshing Windows

In the past when the operating system was giving you problems (e.g. corrupted system files, malware, bad drivers, etc.) you had two choices. Find the original installation disk to try to repair the OS or format the hard drive and do a clean install.

Windows 8 now makes it easy for you to repair a broken operating system by returning it to its original state.  By going to the Setting menu, click

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Windows 8: Creating an All Applications Folder

I will admit right off this feature is not pretty, but if you like to explore all the different aspects of your system you might find this one interesting.  This tip involves creating an applications folder on the desktop that gives you quick access to all the programs installed on your computer (both native Windows 8 and desktop applications)


Open the File Explorer, then navigate to the

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Windows 8: The Best and Quickest Way Shutdown (Restart or Hibernate) Windows

I have to admit when I first started using Windows 8 and tried to shut it down for the first time I was a little frustrated. Even after I learned how to properly shutdown the system, I wasn't really happy with any method I found, until I came up with the solution below.


Utilizing a built-in feature of the Windows application shortcut you can execute any of these operations with shortcut keys.

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Internet Explorer 10: Built-in Security and Privacy Features

The web browser is the number one attack surface criminals are using to infect your computer or steal private information.  None of the security and privacy technologies built into any browser are perfect, and will keep you safe at all times.  The bad guys are updating their tools and exploits all the time to try to circumvent these protections.

Internet criminals use weaknesses in a browser or

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Software: Controlling Your PC with Hand Gesture

A company called eyeSight offers software that allows you to control your PC using hand gestures without the use of special hardware (such as the LeapMotion). The eyeSight software utilizes the camera that that is attached to your PC or already built into your laptop.




Note: I have not used this product, so I am not aware of its true advantages or limitations. This information is provided

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Windows 8: Disabling the Lock Screen

In Windows 8 the lock screen is enabled by default. For some people this is an annoyance rather then a feature. If you want to disable this feature and display the Start screen automatically when you turn on the computer, follow the instructions below:
Open the Start screen, or press WinKey+R to open the Run command dialog 
Type "netplwiz.exe" press enter, or launch the app when it is displayed.

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Windows 8: Advanced Windows Calculator Tricks (Advanced Functions)

The Windows Calculator is one of those features that has been around for a long, long time.  For the most part it gets unnoticed until you need to do some basic calculations.  



To quickly bring up the calculator, from the Start screen type CALC and select the calculator icon, or from the Run... command (WinKey + R) type: CALC.EXE.



When you first start-up calculator it will look like it

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Video: The Inbox (Internet Scams in Real Life) [Comedy]

What Internet scams could look like in real life.  Remember: be careful what you click.

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Windows 8 vs. Windows To Go, What You Need to Know?

"Windows To Go" is a new feature included in Windows 8 Enterprise edition that allows for the creation of a   "portable bootable Windows workspace" on a USB flash drive.  This workspace is designed to store your OS, applications, and data on a single device that can be easily moved between computers.

Since these drives are fully self contained, no data is written to the host computer.  This

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Windows 8: Ultimate Windows Command Line Reference (Updated)

Are you looking for an updated high-level up-to-date reference of all the built-in command line tools and utilities that are available in the current version of Windows?  Check out the following article, its almost everything any Windows power-user or systems administrator will need to know about the built-in command line tools and utilities.

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Windows 8: Naming a Tile Group

In the new Windows 8 Start menu, you may have figured out that you can arrange icons into what are called Tile Groups. Which is exactly what the name says, a group of icons that are arranged together for a specific purpose (e.g. Office applications, Image Editing, etc.).If you're wondering how to name these tile groups there is a little trick that you have to know. Follow the instructions below

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Windows 8: Administrator Command Prompt Shortcut

If you do a lot of troubleshooting or system diagnostics you will end up working in the administrator command prompt often. Most people might right-click the Command Prompt shortcut icon and then select the Run as administrator option.

Other tricks for starting the command prompt in administrator mode include, from the Run... command or the Start screen you can type CMD and press Ctrl + Shift +

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Windows 8: Windows Keyboard Shortcuts for the Taskbar

Below are Windows keyboard shortcuts for the taskbar that work in Windows 8 desktop mode (this tip is backwards compatible with Windows 7).  These shortcuts allow you to access items pinned to the taskbar or any desktop application that is currently running that has its icon in this area.

WinKey + (Number): Windows automatically assigns keyboard shortcuts to programs in the taskbar on the

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Video: Get To Know Windows 8

Video description: "New to Windows 8? This video has all you need to get up to speed."

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Video: Windows 8 Leap Motion in Action

I have been following Leap Motion for what feels like forever.  I wonder if it has the potential to help Windows 8 really take off.

Using Windows 8 is okay when using it with a mouse, but its even better with a touchscreen.  With a Leap Motion type of device you have the possibility of having a user interface like 'Minority Report'.

Although, I am prepared to be underwhelmed, but I would

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Windows 8: Charm Keyboard Shortcuts

Native Windows 8 applications don't have the traditional drop-down menus (such as File, Edit, etc.) like older desktop applications. Windows 8 apps use the "charms" side menu and the application bar (swipe up from the bottom on a touch screen or press the WinKey+Z) for these features.The charm menus can be accessed sliding your finger to the left from the right-side of the touchscreen display,

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Article: Which browser is safest? The answer may surprise you

Below is an article that I found this morning: "Web browsers are one of the main ways that malware finds its way onto your machine. Tests carried out by NSS Labs looked at the five major players, Chrome, Firefox, Safari, Opera and Internet Explorer to see which offers the best protection against more than 700 examples of real-world malware.

And the safest is... (Drum roll and a long, reality

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Windows 8: Built-In Applications

Windows 8 comes with several new built-in applications that provide access to a variety of different types of content (news, sports, and weather) and services (email, storage, and more).  The following is an excerpt from the article: "Windows 8 comes with the following built-in touch-optimized applications out-of-the box (meaning that they're installed by default). These apps can perform several

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Windows 8: New Features of the OS

As I stated in a previous post, I am working on a series of articles about Windows 8.  This is my second article in the series that briefly explains most of the major new features of the operating system.
Below is an excerpt from the article: 

"Secure Boot: This is one of the more controversial features of the new operating system especially for Linux users who dual boot their system. This

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Windows 8: Introduction to the New OS

I am going to be doing a series of articles on Windows 8, and this is my first article that explains how to use the new Windows operating system. This article focuses on providing a brief background of the product and an explanation of the two different platforms and versions of Windows that are available.



Below is an excerpt from the article: "If you're a new user to Windows 8, one of the

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Deal: Get a Free Month of Hulu Plus

Hulu Plus gives you more access to popular movies and TV shows on Hulu. For a limited-time, the site is offering a one month free trial of the Hulu Plus service to new customers.  Normally the free trial is only for one week.

It's important to note a credit card is required to complete the sign up, and according to the site the offer is only available for a few more days.

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Article: Integrate a custom Shutdown menu into the Windows 8 Desktop context menu

I found this tip on another site, and I thought it was too cool not to share. This article discusses how to create a custom context menu for shutting down (restarting, hibernating, etc.) your computer. Its also a pretty good introduction to creating your own customized context menus for other tasks.

Note: This requires modifying the registry, so this tip is not for those who don't know what

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Software: Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 5 (Free Beta Download)

Are you a photographer that uses Adobe Photoshop Lightroom?  If you work with RAW image files (uncompressed image files that contain all the color data from the camera's CCD sensor) this tool is a must have.

Its also one of the best photo management suites available.  It provides great tools for managing your images, and making corrections or other adjustments to your photographs.

Adobe is

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Windows 8: Microsoft Movie Maker

Do you have some videos from your smartphone or from another device that you would like to edit into one continuous video?  Maybe you want to add titles, video effects or a sound track to a movie that you created.

Microsoft Movie Maker (download) is an easy to use application that allows you to import create or edit picture slide shows and videos.  You can move things around, speed it up or slow

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Windows 8: Remote Server Administration Tools (RSAT)

If you manage Windows servers in a small lab or a large data center, then you need the Remote Server Administration Tools for Windows 8 (download). This tool enables system administrators to manage roles and features that are installed on remote computers that are running Windows Server 2012, 2008 R2, and 2008 (all versions).

NOTE: In this release of Remote Server Administration Tools all the

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Article: Choose the right password manager to protect your accounts

One of the first rules to securing your accounts today is having a unique password for all of them.  With so many unique credentials it's next to impossible for the average person to remember them. This is why a good password manager is so important, it allows you to safely store and retrieve these electronic credentials.

I have been meaning to write an article about password managers. I

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Browsers: Identify Resource-Hogging Add-ons

Extensions and add-ons, can both enhance and cripple your browser. The right ones can extend the functionality of the browser, but too many bog it down.

To help identify resource-hogging extensions Mozilla Firefox and Google Chrome include built-in utilities for troubleshooting these add-ons.

Depending on the browser you're using, type the following command into the address bar:

Mozilla

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Windows 8: File History

Have you ever accidentally deleted or over-written a file that contained important information?  Windows 8 has a feature called "File History" that automatically saves older versions of your files so that they can be restore later.

Unfortunately, this feature is not enabled by default.  To turn it on you have to open the System and Security control panel.  This feature does require a second

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Internet: How fast is your ISP (Netflix ISP Speed Index)

Have you ever wondered how fast your ISP really is compared to others? Check out Netflix's ISP Speed Index to find out.

There probably are other sites that offer this information (to be honest I didn't really care to check), but Netflix is one of the few sources I think can give impartial and accurate information.

So if you want to see how well your current ISP rates compared to others.  Or,

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Windows 8: Downloading the Windows 8 ISO File

Windows 8 was the first version of Windows that I upgraded and I didn't preform a clean install.  I utilized Microsoft's online upgrade offer that allowed you to install the upgraded version of the OS over the Internet.

The only problem with this option was I didn't get a copy of the media. I at least wanted a copy of the ISO file (a file that contains a image of the CD or DVD that can be

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Article: Leap Motion Controller starts shipping May 13th, hits Best Buy on the 19th

Excerpt from article: "If you were still thinking that the Leap Motion Controller was going to turn into vaporware, it looks like you were wrong. Just less than a year after the company first made waves with its tiny gesture recognizing box, a finished product is getting ready to ship." (read the rest of the article)

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Removing Viruses (and other types of malware)

To put it simply
getting hit by malware (e.g. viruses, Trojan horses, worms, etc.) sucks.  Sometimes it can be caused by doing something simple or not very obvious or other times it can be caused by doing something dumb.  As the old cliche goes, "There is no use crying over
spilt milk because it only makes it sour for the cat".

All you can do
is try to clean up what you can.  Modern malware

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Getting an "Access is denied." error when connecting to a share

Are you encountering a situation where you're getting an "Access is denied" error when connecting to a share on a machines in a workgroup.  For example, if you used following command:



net use * \\computername\d$ /user:computername\username password



Then you get the following error: 

System error 5 has occurred.

Access is denied.



Try running the following command (requires the

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Troubleshooting Network Share Problems

Are you having a problem connecting to a Windows network share (e.g. \\computer_name\share_name) or the default administrator shares (e.g. \\computer_name\c$)?  This happens to computers on networks that are connected to a domain controller or local workgroup.

In my own personal experience has been that local workgroups are more unreliable then domain controller connected shares.  Below are 

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Article: LibreOffice 4.0 arrives -- get it NOW!

LibraOffice is an offshoot of the OpenOffice open source project that split-off from the original project because of issues that they had with it (more information).

If you're looking for a free open source multi-platform office suite, this is one of the better ones.  I never found it as powerful as Microsoft Office, but if you're looking for a free office suite of tools this is the one I like

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Adobe issues emergency Flash update for attacks on Windows, Mac users |

Ars Technica reports: "Adobe Systems has released a patch for two Flash player vulnerabilities that are being actively exploited online to surreptitiously install malware, one in attacks that target users of Apple's Macintosh platform.

While Flash versions for OS X and Windows are the only ones reported to be under attack, Thursday's unscheduled release is available for Linux and Android devices

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Trick: Turning a browser into a notepad

I am not sure how often you can use this, but its still is a cool trick. By placing the following line (data:text/html, ) of code into the address bar it will turn your browser window into a notepad.

I have tested this in the latest releases of Google Chrome and Mozilla Firefox and it worked fine.  It does not work in Internet Explorer, I have tested both versions 9 and 10

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Article: Firefox to block content based on Java, Reader, and Silverlight

Ars Technica reports: "Mozilla engineers plan to disable Java, Adobe Reader, and Microsoft Silverlight capabilities in their flagship Firefox browser in a move aimed at improving security and performance. By default, Firefox will load content based on all three plugins only after users click an icon that explicitly permits it. The feature, known as click to play, was introduced late last year.

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Video: Surface Windows 8 Pro Overview

Learn more about Surface Windows 8 Pro.

http://www.facebook.com/Surface
http://twitter.com/surface/
http://www.microsoft.com/Surface

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Article: Windows 8 Pro upgrade pricing will jump from $40 to $200 on Feb. 1

VentureBeat reports: "Microsoft’s Windows 8 operating system is about to become a lot more expensive. An upgrade of Windows 8 Pro will go from costing $40 in a promotional offer to a much more expensive $200 at the beginning of February.  Microsoft offered up an upgrade to Windows 8 Pro for $40 to try to get consumers more interested in the OS. It claims 60 million licenses of Windows 8 have been

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Article: Kingston's HyperX Predator Flash Drive Is the Easiest Way To Misplace a Terabyte Of Data

Gizmodo has an article about a one terabyte flash drive that is available from Kingston, here is excerpt from it: "Last year at CES Victorinox surprised everyone with a one terabyte flash drive that the company estimated would sell for almost $3,000. It sounded too good to be true, and given there's been no sign of it since last January, it apparently was. So can Kingston fill the void left in

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Video: Hands On With The Lenovo Helix - CES 2013

First product that I have seen from CES 2013 that looks interesting (so far). I have been a big fan of the Lenovo Yoga since CES 2012. Now it's going to be tough for me to decide which one I want more, its a toss up between the Microsoft Surface Pro or the Lenovo Helix.

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