Microsoft has yesterday released the release candidate version of the upcoming Windows Home Server 2011 (WHS 2011) for testers. The product which was codenamed “Vail” during its development was previously in the news because of Microsoft’s surprise and controversial move to not to include the popular Driver Extender (DE) feature in WHS 2011. For starters, Drive Extender was a handy feature in WHS which allowed the users to merge hard drives into a storage pool that made it easy to manage all the drives. Microsoft has decided to drop this feature apparently because it thinks that the drives coming these days are big enough (storage wise) and the users may not go for the drive pooling via Drive Extender. The another limitation in WHS 2011 is that the maximum size of a partition can only be 2TB. To makeup for these limitations, Microsoft has added few new features like Move Folder Wizard which makes you to move data from one drive to another and the other being Shadow Copy which allows you to quickly return to a previous version of existing files.
2011 is already a month old and we are into the beautiful month of February. The first thing that comes to the minds of most people when they think about the February is the valentines day. As with Microsoft, the practice of releasing some new free themes for all seasons and important occasions continues and Microsoft has already released a new “Lovebirds” theme for Windows 7 keeping the upcoming 14th February’s valentines day. Lovebirds theme has five beautiful high resolution desktop backgrounds filled with the valentines colors (pink & purple) decorated with flowers, birds, etc.
And by the way, you must also check out the Lacey Hearts Valentines Windows 7 theme (released last year) which still looks great and suits your valentine mood.
Searching the internet is fun and it would more fun if it could be made easily accessible. We all by default use browsers to search (through the address bar, search box or using the search engine website) the internet. But the modern gadgets like Android phones, tablets and others are coming up with more quicker ways to search right from their home screens. In fact, you will find a Google search box on the homepage of most Android devices. Wouldn’t it be good if we have such quick access to any search engine like Google from our desktop? Of course we have few third party applications like Google Desktop to serve the purpose. If you are on Windows 7, you don’t even need any special software to achieve this. Windows 7’s Start Menu has integrated the web search feature right in it. Let’s see in detail, how to enable and search the internet directly from the Start Menu in Windows 7.
>> Method –1: Using The Registry Editor
This method works on all the different editions of Windows 7 as we make use of the Registry Editor that’s key ingredient of all the different editions of Windows 7.
1. Type “regedit” in the Start Menu and open the regedit.exe from the results under the “Programs” section.
2. Navigate to the following path in the registry editor:
3. Right-click on the right-hand side pane and choose New > DWORD (32-bit) value and name it as “AddSearchInternetLinkInStartMenu”.
4. Now double-click on the DWORD and edit the “Value data” filed to “1” and click OK.
Now either log off from your user account and long back in or just restart the “explorer.exe” process from the Task Manager.
You can now search for anything in the Start Menu and you will see the “Search the Internet” option below the “See more results” link. Clicking on it would open your default browser (Firefox in my case) and search the web using your default address bar search engine for your browser (Google in my case).
To rollback or undo this change, just change the Value data back to “0” or completely delete the DWORD in the step 4.
>> Method- II : Using The Local Group Policy Editor
Local Group Policy Editor (GPEdit, as it is also known as) is not available in the Hone editions of Windows 7. So if you have Windows 7 Professional, Enterprise or Ultimate editions, you can go ahead with this tweak.
1. Type “gpedit” in the Start Menu search and open the “gpedit” from the results under the ‘Programs’ section.
2. Local Group Policy Editor window will open up.
Scroll down to “User Configuration > Administrative Templates > Start Menu and Taskbar” and find “Add Search Internet link to Start Menu” entry in the list.
3. Double-click on it to change the settings. Change the value to “Enabled” and click “OK” button at the bottom to save the settings and close the window.
That’s it. As said in the earlier method, either log off and log back into your Windows user account or restart the explorer.exe process from the Task Manager to effect the change. Now you will find a link in the Start Menu itself to search the internet for your keyword/query as shown in the screenshot.
Microsoft Security Essentials is easily one of the top free antivirus / anti-malware products available for Windows. If you are already using Microsoft Security Essentials, you might be aware that the program regularly checks for updates at least once in 24 hours. No problems with this setting as long as you are connected to internet and your PC is on most of the time. But at times you miss out on updates when your computer or laptops is not switched on or in sleeping mode or experiencing some internet connections issues. If your computer is not able to download updates when the regular MSE update check happens, the next update check will only happen after 24 hours. In such cases, the best thing to do is to check for updates manually. But you might also want to tweak the settings so that the program checks for updates more often.
Follow the steps to learn how to do it using task scheduler:
1. Type “task scheduler” in the Start Menu and open the “Task Scheduler” from the results under the Programs section.
2. In the Task Scheduler, click on the “Create Task…” link on the right-hand side pane.
3. Give the task a name under the “General” tab, then click on the “Actions” tab. Click on the “New..” button under the Actions tab.
Browse the MpCmdRun.exe (Microsoft Essentials command line client) file. Usually it sits inside the Microsoft Security Client > Antimalware folder. In my case this where I found it:
It may vary depending upon your Windows version and the location where you chose to install it. Now select the file and add a “-SignatureUpdate’ to the program path so that it looks like
Tip: You may also specify the “-SignatureUpdate” in the arguments field instead of embedding it in the program path.
Click OK once you are done.
4. Then go to “Triggers” tab, under the settings tab, select “Daily” and then set the values for “Repeat task every” field (like 5 hours or 6 hours etc.) and click OK.
5. Now go back to the “General” tab and click on the “Change User or Group..” under the Security Options. Type “SYSTEM” as the object name and click OK.
Now we have set the task to run on “System” user account
That is it! You are done with configuring the update checks settings for the Microsoft Security Essentials.
Maintaining is a Windows PC isn’t a cakewalk. You often need to take time to remove all the clutter from your Hard drive in order to make the Windows run more smoother and efficient. PC experts often advise that you should do such maintenance tasks in a regular manner to get the most out of your current operating system.
In this post, we are going to talk about the Windows log files. Windows log files keep a record of various activities of your PC. These include list of errors/exceptions, internet browsing history etc. Even though they don’t create a problem but with time these logs grow bigger in size and thus reducing the amount of free space on your hard disk. Most of these logs are not essential and you can safely delete them manually or using clean up utilities. Windows 7 has inbuilt utility “Disk Cleanup” to delete these log files. You can also make use of third party programs like “CCleaner’ to perform the same task. However, even after performing clean ups, there would still be some traces of these log files left on your disk. In such cases deleting the log files manually would be a better option. Let’s see how to delete the Windows 7 log files manually.
>> Go to your Windows folder (usually at C:\ Windows, that’s where all the logs are stored!, where ‘C’ is the Windows installation drive) in the windows explorer and type “*.log” in the search box at the top right corner of your window and hit enter. The results comprise of all the log files stored in the “Windows” folder. Delete the all the log files by selecting them.
>> This can also be done using a command prompt. Type cmd in the Start Menu search box and use CTRL + SHIFT + Enter to open the command prompt with elevated rights (administrator mode).
By default, command prompt would start from “C:\Windows\system32”. We need to go one folder down to C:\Windows. For this type “cd..” hit and press enter.
Now that we are in the “Windows” folder, we are just one command away from deleting all the log files. Type
Del *.log /a /s /q /f
in the command prompt and press enter. Now all the Windows log files will be deleted in few minutes.
In the command, “a” stands for selecting all the log files,
“s” for deleting all the files inside sub folders
“q” for skipping the Yes/No prompts before deleting the files
Well I have a HP Pavilion dv-5000 series notebook PC. There has been a problem since I had upgraded from Windows XP to Windows 7. The problem is that, my Media Card Reader is not working. I have been trying to find the driver but all in vain, until today.
I have downloaded the driver from HP Website, where they have given the driver is meant for Windows Vista. Well I have tested it in Windows 7 Ultimate and it works perfectly fine.
The problem I faced looked like this:
There it is seen that, in Computer Properties->Device Manager->Other Devices, The Mass Storage Controller Driver is missing. The Automatic Driver update eventually fails.
The Solution steps are as follows:
1. Download the Texas Instruments Media Card Driver from the link given below:
When you are installing Windows 7 or Windows Server 2008 R2 on an advanced 512-byte emulation (512e) format disk drive that is configured to emulate like a RAID disk will most likely encounter the following error:
Windows Setup could not configure Windows on this computer’s hardware.
Microsoft has now addressed this issue in a dedicated KB article, suggesting a possible resolution.
According to Microsoft, the issue can be fixed with either of the two methods mentioned here. Follow these suggested solutions before installing the Windows 7 or Windows Server 2008 R2.
>> Method-1: Downloading The Appropriate Drivers For Hard Disk
Download the latest drivers for your hard disk drive (32-bit or 64-bit) from the Intel website and copy them to a flash drive or burn onto a CD or DVD and then use the media during the Windows 7 or Windows Server 2008 R2 setup phase.
>> Method-2: Changing The BIOS Settings
Warning: Working with BIOS settings could lead to a serious problem with your computer if you apply incorrect settings. Use this option at your own risk.
Open the BIOS settings by pressing the appropriate key just after your turn on the computer, and under the SATA Configuration (hard drive setting) to either AHCI or IDE. That is it, you don’t need to install the driver that you got through the method-1.
What do you do to remove your plugged in USB device like flash drive? You need to move your mouse to the system tray and locate the small USB icon “Safely Remove Hardware and Eject Media” (in case of Windows 7 and Vista) and click on it and confirm that you want to remove or stop a particular USB device.
But even though it is simple, it is often tiresome as you need to expand the arrow in the tray and locate the small icon (Windows 7). This where you wish you had a shortcut at some other easily accessible place. A desktop shortcut for this “Safely Remove Hardware” dialog would be much more handy. If you are like me, get to know how to create a Safely Remove Hardware shortcut in Windows 7 and Vista by following these steps.
1. Right-click on your desktop, choose New > Shortcut.
2. In the next window, paste the following code in the “location of the item”
Click the “Next” button to continue to the next step.
3. Give the shortcut a meaningful name and click the “Finish” button to complete the setup.
4. The new shortcut icon appears on your desktop.
If you have plugged in the USB flash drive, double-click on the shortcut icon to see if it works. It should open the Safely Remove Hardware window, showing you the list of currently plugged in devices (USB and non-USB as well).
Select the particular device that you want to unplug or remove and click the “Stop” button to stop the device.
The advantage with this kind of shortcut trick is that you can choose to have a shortcut key setup for even more quicker access.
To assign a shortcut for the Safely Remove Hardware shortcut, just right-click on the shortcut and choose a unique keyboard key combination to assign as hotkey.
Windows system beep sounds turn up when your perform some invalid action (ex: pressing a wrong key or clicking or choosing a invalid button on window etc.) or when some error dialog appears. The beep sound also appears when you are using volume control.
(Click the Play button to listen to the sound; requires QuickTime Player plugin)
While the use of such beep sounds can be dated back to olden days when computers didn’t have sound cards but just built-in speakers producing various beep sounds to notify the troubleshooters help diagnosing the issues. Well, the times have changed, even though the desktops and laptops ship with internal speakers producing beep sounds, they are hardly useful when you are using advanced operating systems like Windows 7 as we have more sophisticated diagnosing mechanism to troubleshoot the OS issues. Too many beeps, you would easily get annoyed. Follow these steps to disable the system beep sounds in Windows 7.
This can be done in either of the two ways:
>> Method-1:
1. Type “device manager” in the Start Menu search box and open the Device Manager from the results under “Control Panel” items.
Alternatively, press Windows key + R to open the Run command. Type “devmgmt.msc” and hit enter to open the Device Manager.
2. From the Device Manager window, choose “Show Hidden Devices” under “View” menu.
3. Scroll down the list until you find “Non-Plug and Play Drivers” and click on it to expand.
4. Right-click on the Beep item and choose Properties.
Warning: Do not click “Uninstall” as the option will completely remove the beep sounds from your Windows 7, you might find it hard to reinstall the same again.
5. In the Beep Properties, click on the Driver tab
From the Start up type, choose “Disabled” from the list.
Click OK to apply and save the settings. You need to restart the system for the changes to take effect. To enable the beep sounds again, just choose “System” from the list in the step-5.
>> Method-2:
We can also achieve our desired result from the Control Panel, let’s see how to do it.
1. Open the Control Panel and click on the Hardware and Sound item link from the list.
2. Click on the Change system sounds link under the “Sound”.
3. Under the Sounds tab, scroll down to find “Default Beep”
Choose “None” from the list under Sounds and click OK to save the settings.
You are done! But please not note that these are the settings for current sound scheme for your Windows 7. In future if you change the settings, the default beep sound may be enabled again automatically. Hence we suggest you to use method-1 if you completely want to disable the internal speakers system beep sound.
Is your Windows starting up too slow even after performing the suggested optimizations? Wonder what more you can do to save on your computer’s boot up time? Consider delaying the non-essential services so that they can be run once the system has completed the booting and has enough free time to load these services. Windows services are the ones that are needed by various programs installed on your PC. Even though some of the services need to run along with the Windows boot, some may be delayed to start so as to reduce the high activity during the start-up. Delaying the Windows services was introduced for the first time in Windows Vista and is now available in Windows 7 as well. By default Windows automatically sets some services like Windows update, Google update (if installed), Windows Font cache etc. to start delayed.
But you might want to consider delaying other third party services to boot your Windows even faster. Take the following screenshot for instance, you don’t need to run the “Apache web server service” along with boot, you can safely delay it so that your Windows gets loaded a touch quicker.
>> To see all the services installed on your Windows, type “services.msc” in the Start Menu search and open the services.msc from the results.
Alternatively press Windows button + R to open the RUN command and type services.msc and hit enter to open the Services window.
>> To see all the services which are already set to “Delayed Start”, first click on the “Startup Type” column and then click “Status” column. All the delayed services will be shown as “Automatic (Delayed Start)” next to them under the Startup Type.
>> To delay start of any service (for instance Apache2.2 in this case), just right-click on the service and choose “Properties”
>> In the Properties window, choose “Automatic (Delayed Start)” from the drop down menu under Startup Type filed.
Click “OK” to apply the settings and close the properties window. Now the startup of the selected service would be delayed. You can safely set “manual” and “disabled” services to delayed startup, however you should be careful while handling important services like Windows related services which are set to start automatically by default .
