Recently in Windows Vista Category

I can remember my enthusiasm for early versions of Windows XP Media Center Edition and the promise of an integrated home theater experience built into Windows. One of the best things Microsoft did with Windows Vista was to include that Media Center experience as part of Vista, not just as a special version of the OS. The thing I didn't like about old versions of Media Center was the need for bulky desktop systems that took up tons of space and needed a permanent home in my home theater. What Microsoft did in making Windows Media Center available on most consumer systems was allow me to have a highly portable home theater experience from something like the 1.73 kilogram (3.81lbs) HP dv2.

HP sent me a dv2 to test out. I was initially interested only in the portability coupled with enough power to get work done. What I found instead was a machine that just might be the ultimate portable Windows Media Center system.

So what makes the dv2 the ultimate ultra-portable home theater PC?

Every time I launch my browser the window is off-screen. I can't move it because I can't see it. How can I get my browser window back on my screen?"

Having a window open off of your screen can be infuriating if you don't know how to fix it. I once had my email program launching off-screen and thought it might drive me nuts. Fortunately, there's an easy solution to get your window back on screen with a couple of quick keyboard commands.

"I just bought a new notebook computer. Can I move all the programs from my desktop PC to my notebook without needing to reinstall?"

The short answer to your question is, yes. Most of the time you can move programs from your old computer to your new computer. In some cases, when you move applications between two comptuers, installation will be required because of the way that particular application works. At the very least you will reduce the number of programs you need to re-install. The trick to making this work is you need to purchase some additional software to move programs between two computers.

"How do I convert BMP to JPG?"

There are at least 1000 solutions for converting BMP files to JPG. Some of the options provide more control over conversion of BMP files to JPG. Some image converters work slightly better than others. Some image file converting software is easier to use than others. I'll start with the image editor included on your computer and then suggest some alternatives.

"How can I install Windows 7 from the .iso download from Microsoft?"

The Windows 7 .ISO file is basically a DVD in the format of a file on your hard drive. If you downloaded the Windows 7 .ISO, you need to burn it to DVD before you can install it on your computer. Once you have the DVD, you can simply boot from your newly created Windows 7 disk and follow the steps for the installation.

Burn a ISO to DVD

One of my favorite ISO burning solutions is ImgBurn. It's free and keeps things simple. After installing ImgBurn, simply choose the option to Write image file to disc. Browse to the location of the Windows 7 .ISO file on your hard drive. With your blank DVD in your DVD burner, burn Windows 7 to the DVD.

Install Windows 7

Once you have a DVD burned, simply reboot your computer, boot from the DVD and follow the instructions to install Windows 7.

"I bought a 64-bit computer with Windows XP 32-bit installed. Now I want to upgrade from 32-bit Windows XP to 64-bit Vista. I have tons of applications on here and I'd rather not wipe my hard drive and start over. Is it possible to do the upgrade or do I need to do a clean install of Windows Vista 64?"

Under most circumstances, this is the type of upgrade I'd never do. Too many potential headaches are likely going from Windows XP to Windows Vista in general. Switching to 64-bit compounds the possible problems. xyHD.tv has a straightforward tutorial on upgrading XP 32-but to Vista-64, with the catch that you probably want to install Vista 32 before you go all the way. Most important part of the process - backup your files before you begin. A good rule of thumb in any operating system install, but especially important when you're attempting something like this. Follow the steps to upgrade from 32-bit Windows XP to Vista 64-bit at xyHD.tv.

I'm always trying to eek out a few extra minutes from my laptop battery at airports, airplanes, coffee shops, and the other random places I go where power isn't readily available. A few quick tweaks will generally yield as much as an extra hour of battery life.

1) Adjust Your Power Plan - most laptops have 3 basic power plans: High Performance, Power Saver, and something either called Balanced or the brand name's recommended settings. When you're on battery power only, switching to Power Saver slows down your processor and typically dims your screen, automatically reducing the draw on your laptop battery.

2) Turn off WiFi - WiFi is one of the biggest drains on your battery. If you're surfing you need it, but if you're just typing something, listening to music, editing photos, or any of the other offline activities you might do with a computer, you can get an extra 30 minutes simply by turning off your WiFi until you need it.

3) Dim Your Screen - Screen brightness is the second biggest culprit in battery drain. Lower your screen brightness to a point where you can still easily see but is far below maximum. I've found this easily extends my battery life by a minimum of 20 minutes. Setting your screen to turn off when you're not doing anything for extended periods is well worth it. When I do need to render video on battery power, I set this number to 1 minute so that more battery life is dedicated to necessary activities.

4) Go to Sleep - If your computer is inactive, letting Sleep kick in is a great way to save battery life. Most of the time your computer will wake up quickly when you're ready to refocus your attention, but while it's sleeping battery consumption reduces to a trickle. The important thing to remember is not to keep waking your laptop up until you actually need it.

5) Unplug USB Devices - All USB devices draw some power when connected to your computer. Things like your cell phone may even trickle charge drawing additional power from your battery. Keeping USB devices disconnected while you're on battery power reduces the overall drain.

Applying these tips to one of the power settings and then saving the changes makes it easy to switch settings without needing to make individual changes each time you switch between AC power and battery power. If guaranteed power is what you need, get a longer life 12-cell battery or carry a second (charged) battery with you wherever you go.

HP recently produced a video (which I was paid to shoot and edit) on understanding all the power options on your HP notebook. The video readily applies to extending battery life on almost any laptop. If you're curious about how to configure power settings on your laptop, this is a great introduction.

The home theater PC market has been rather dull for several years. Sure you can get a sound card with 7.1 surround sound, but they've generally been noisier than I'd want in my own home theater. You can purchase video cards that output to an HDTV and support HDCP, but the experience hasn't been on par with using home theater components. At Computex 2008, AMD is showing off a couple of new boards from MSI that change the game in important fundamental ways.

First up AMD's 780 chipset supports Blu-ray and other HD video playback through integrated video on the motherboard. Nobody else can currently do this - Intel drops frames. Couple this with the MSI boards integrated component and HDMI out and you've got ease of use in getting the video portion of your PC signal easily to your television, without the nonsense of converting DVI to HDMI. You can of course still add a separate video card, but for normal home theater use it would not be necessary.

The second key thing MSI and AMD have done is create something that grows with your audio needs. 2.1 surround (pre-amp) is included on the sound card with either analog outputs or digital. You can grow that to either 5.1 or 7.1 using an add-on card that easily extends your audio channels (That's the board in the front of the picture). The board seated on the motherboard provides amplified 5.1 surround. Audio uses a D2Audio chip on the motherboard to prevent extraneous noise.

A final component of this system is an ultra-quiet cooling system (pictured below). You're more likely to hear noise from your Blu-ray drive than you are from the fans keeping this entire thing cool. Best of all, I have it on good authority from a source at MSI that all this will be on the market by June 15, 2008 and you should be able to build a system (minus Blu-ray player) for under $1000.

The Windows Quick Launch bar, those little icons to the right of the start button, is over 10 years old. In that time, Microsoft has done little to enhance it's functionality. You can add dozens of Quick Launch items if you want to, but they all require a mouse click to activate. Windows Vista adds a new feature to the Quick Luanch bar — keyboard shortcuts. For the first 10 items (and who really needs more than 10?) you can use the Windows key + the corresponding number key of the sequence to easily launch the application you want without ever taking your fingers from the keyboard.

For instance, in the image below Windows key + 1 launches Outlook, Windows key + 2 launches Firefox, all the way up to Windows key + 9 launching Quicken. If there were a tenth item on the list, Windows key + 0 would launch it.

If you don't use Windows Vista, here's some more Windows key shortcuts to save you time. You can also create your own shortcuts for anything using additional software.

Download Windows Live Photo Gallery

Windows XP may be long in the tooth, but it's certainly not dead yet. If you do only one thing to overhaul the current state of your Windows XP machine, download Windows Live Photo Gallery. This barely exposed update for the baked in Windows photo management tools is one of the most useful upgrades to your Windows user experience. An improved photo import makes this a worthwhile download all on its own. Photo management is upgraded to include views sorted by date and tags (a new tagging tool helps you ID your photos for grouping all pictures of a particular person, event, or location). Simple photo editing for red-eye removal, crops, and adjusting levels handles most common image fixes. If you happen to have a Windows Live Spaces account, there are additional features to publish direct from Windows to your Space or build slideshows for publishing to your Space. Download this free upgrade to the built-in Windows photo management experience and you'll be looking at your images in a whole new way. (The same features also improve Vista) [Windows XP/Vista $0.00]