Find your missing drivers with Driver Access

A PC owner usually encounters trouble with device drivers from time to time. When I installed this video encoding software, I wasn’t able to run it because it says my graphics card driver needs to be updated.

The problem with updating drivers is the search especially for old devices such as printers, scanners and modems. It is difficult looking for drivers in a manufacturer’s site more so if you are looking for a China-made device driver.

Fortunately, there are simpler ways out there to update your drivers. Driver Access is one of them. You don’t have to go searching far and wide online just to look for a specific driver. They have a software that will scan your system and look for outdated drivers and can also update them for you automatically. Sites such as PCWorld, Tucows and Cnet certifies that DriverAccess is free from virus and spyware.

Check out their site at DriverAccess.com for more info.

Find your stolen laptop with Prey

Laptops are getting more common each day and this means that laptop theft cases are steadily increasing. So what can an owner do if his laptop gets stolen? Pray that the thieves will simply format the data. But that’s not the case at all as thieves will often mine your hard disk for sensitive data that they can use. This is the window of opportunity you can take to track down your laptop if you use Prey.

Prey is a lightweight application to help you find your stolen laptop. It stays hidden and silent in your system and will send regular reports to a web control panel that only you have access to. Hopefully, the thief will leave the WiFi on so every time your laptop detects and connects to a WiFi, it will send information such as screenshot of the desktop, a picture of the thief if your lappy has a webcam, active connections, etc. Think of it like installing an approved backdoor or trojan to your own system that only you can control.

Best thing about Prey is that it’s free and will work with any OS.

Check out PreyProject.com for more information.

Speed up your PC, clean your registry

I often get asked by my relatives to look at their computer when it’s performing really slow. They would ask if they should replace it because it’s already old but I told them that it’s not the case always. What they need to do is to remove all those junk software installed over the years that are not being used any more.

One of the problems with uninstalling software is that sometimes, they still leave a footprint in your system’s registry. It may be a bit small but over time these footprints will grow and will eventually affect your computer’s performance. Not a lot people know how to use the registry editor and if you’re not careful you may alter or delete stuff that would make things worse. I accidentally deleted the Microsoft portion of the registry before and that messed up my machine. Hehehe.

A nice tool to have for cases like these is a registry cleaner. These applications scan your PC for orphaned items in the registry or registers that are not needed anymore and clean them for you. You will still have control over what it will delete or you can leave it up to the software to decide.

A clean registry is one of the signs of a healthy computer.

Gorillacam is the best camera app for the iPhone

So you got a new iPhone for Christmas and you enjoy using its camera to take candid photos of your drunk friends and upload it in Facebook right?

Well if you like using your iPhone as a camera then you might want to install the Gorillacam app. This app will truly maximize your phone camera with loads of features brought to you by the fun-loving makers of the Gorillapods.

What I like about the app is allowing your iPhone to auto-save your photos so that you won’t miss another shot while manually saving them. Another nice thing is the integrated sharing feature allowing you to upload your photos without using another app.

The best thing about this app is that it’s FREE!! Get it from the iTunes App Store now.

Know your hardware specs with Speccy

If you’re planning to upgrade your PC or sell it then you might find the need to know its specs first. Sure you’ve built it 4 years ago but do you still remember what video card you had installed?

Speccy from Piriform is a free Windows download that allows you quickly get the hardware information of your PC. No need to use a combination of device manager, system and display properties.

It would attract even the non-power users with its summary view or the power users who wants to know how much slot they have available for RAM or other detailed information about their motherboard and things like that. Speccy can also get real-time information about your PC, from bus speed, temperature and DRAM frequency among other things.

You might not need it today but keep Speccy in mind for future reference.

Fastest web browser for Windows 7

With the release of Windows 7, a lot of people have already migrated to the new and “faster” OS from Microsoft. With the new OS comes new architecture and it’s time again to see which browser works well with Windows 7.

Fortunately, Lifehacker already did the test using the popular browsers including the beta versions. If you’re interested in reading the whole test, head over to Lifehacker.

What struck me the most is how Firefox leads the pack when it comes to memory usage. I always encounter system stuttering when there are more tabs loaded on my Firefox 3.5.

Here are the overall scores based the speed and memory usage of the browsers tested on a Windows 7 system (higher the better):

• Google Chrome 4.0.223.11: 23
• Firefox 3.6 beta 1: 21
• Google Chrome 2 (stable): 19
• Firefox 3.5.4: 17
• Safari 4.03: 17
• Opera 10.01: 16
• Internet Explorer 8.0.7600: 13

The lightweight Google Chrome is still the best among the bunch when it comes to speed and memory usage. Trailing the list is the “supposed-to-be” improved version of IE 8.

I am still a Firefox user mainly because of its AdBlock plugin. But I’m still longing for a built-in incognito or private browsing mode for it.

[Lifehacker]

How to download your Flickr and Facebook photos easily

If you want to download full albums of your photos in Flickr or Facebook, you will learn that it’s very troublesome to click each image and save it one by one.

You can download Fotobounce, a free app that can easily pull images and albums off your Flickr and Facebook account along with their tags and descriptions.

If you don’t have a desktop photo organizer yet, Fotobounce is a great app for that too. It has an easy drag and drop interface that supports tagging and face recognition. No need to individually tag each photo if you want and you can browse by tags. Uploading them back to your Flickr or Facebook account is a breeze as well.

Spruce up your Windows 7 with these new official themes

More people are switching to Windows 7 now that it is released. This includes those who purchased new desktop PC’s and laptops which already comes with Windows 7.

With the early success of Windows 7, Microsoft unleashed new themes that you can download for free to supplement the already gorgeous default themes and wallpapers it has.

I personally like the country themes (even if Philippines is not included) and the Zune characters.

Where to get Standalone SWF Player

One time while working on a Flash project with a team, I found myself not having installed Flash on my PC. I need to view the output SWF file that they come up with but the only way for me to open the file is through a browser.

I would drag the SWF file into my browser but it will display everything (including things outside the canvas) at maximum size so it’s really ugly. On PC’s with Flash installed, they can open the SWF into a standalone player.

So where can I get that player to play SWF videos separately? Google search pointing to Adobe points to Flash player and a Shockwave player but both don’t really work.

What is needed is the Flash Player Projector and this can be found in this Macromedia link. Here’s for Macintosh. Just download and store it somewhere. No need to install but set your SWF files to be opened by the projector every time.

Backup your license keys with LicenseCrawler

One of the major thing people miss out when they have to reformat their PC is to backup or store the serial keys of the software they have installed. This is important if most of your applications are downloaded.

LicenseCrawler is a small and simple freeware program that goes through your Windows registry and retrieve serial numbers and product keys. Beats looking in different folders where you stored a particular serial number or going through e-mails.

Just save the output in a text file and you’re ready to reformat. Be sure you also backup the list that LicenseCrawler churned out before you format your drive.

Mac OS X Snow Leopard out on August 28

It’s just two days away Max users and you can get your hands on the latest update for the Mac OS X. Snow Leopard is simply a maintenance upgrade with no bells and whistles attached and will cost you $29.

So how will Snow Leopard benefit your system? Everything’s under the hood so expect overall performance improvement and smaller footprint that will free up a lot of your precious disk space. It will now also offer support for Microsoft Exchange.

Still, I’m hoping that they’d give it at a much lower price considering that the changes improves the system which what should be the case in the first place.

Microsoft Word will be dropped from the market?

I’ve been using Microsoft Word since high school and I couldn’t imagine a world without that familiar word processing software.

It might just happen as Microsoft is fighting a court ruling that could force MS Word off the market. It seems that Microsoft involved itself on patent infringement issues for Word’s use of XML against Canadian software company i4i.

Microsoft filed an emergency motion with the court asking the judge for a stay on that ruling while they remove the functionality from Word. The court gave them 60 days to comply but Microsoft said that the change required on the software could take months.

If Microsoft can’t fix this thing by October 10 and the court denied a stay of the ruling, say goodbye to MS Word.

i4i was awarded $200 million in damages earlier this year for the same patent case.

[CNET News]

Microsoft considers offering Windows 7 in thumb drives

Windows 7 on a thumb drive? Yes please! Microsoft is still considering whether they will push through with it though.

With the massive appeal netbooks are garnering these days, it would be a good move for Microsoft to also offer their latest OS, Windows 7, on a thumb drive.

It’s been tested already that Windows 7 runs well in netbooks but the only way to upgrade the usual Windows XP it comes with is through an external optical drive, external hard disk, or download the installer in a separate partition and run it from there.

I’m sure netbook owners will be more open to upgrade to Windows 7 if they can easily upgrade their existing OS without shelling out for additional devices and the thumb drive is a good solution.

Microsoft tries again with a new antivirus software

Who has Microsoft Defender but thinks it’s a waste of space and memory resource? Apparently, a lot of people did and as a result, Microsoft discontinued the program last year as it prepares for its replacement.

Microsoft Security Essentials is a free antivirus as Microsoft takes another stab at the antivirus industry. It’s available now although in the beta stage still.

Unfortunately, it reached the maximum 75,000 beta testers and it’s not accepting downloads at the moment. So if you’re interested in giving it a go, better check back at a later time.

No worries, I probably wouldn’t use an antivirus created by Microsoft anyway. Why not make Windows less vulnerable to virus in the first place instead of creating an antivirus?

Where to find serial numbers for your software

Ssshh. I know this is illegal but if you’re the type of person who’s into doing things illegally like downloading or buying pirated software, you might find a need for these sites.

Here’s a couple of sites where you can find serial numbers for that downloaded software of yours to remove the trial limit. Or if you lost the box or case your CD comes with and you need to reinstall, try searching for a serial number here.

1. Serialz.to has been around for ages and I’m not sure if they’re still updated with new softwares. However, it is still a nice place to check for old serial numbers.
2. Serialbay is now the default choice for people who needs serial number for their new softwares including Windows and Microsoft Office licenses. Head here first.

That’s it for now. Use these sites at your own discretion.

Personalize your Firefox browser with Personas

If you’re into putting up your own style or personality to your applications, you might want to check out Mozilla Labs’ Personas. That is if you’re also using Firefox as your web browser.

Change the dull and boring gray color of your Firefox with a style that fits your mood. Download and install Personas which is a lightweight plugin for Firefox that allows you to easily switch between styles. You can even design your own and upload it to the site for others to use.

Windows XP gets a new lease in life

Well it seems that Microsoft are bringing back Windows XP for purchase… at least for those buying Hewlett-Packard PC’s. This means you could still have Windows XP as your OS for HP machines till April 30, 2010.

Microsoft retired XP from sales almost 2 years ago (June 2008) and now they’re bringing it back? Take note that technical support for the Windows XP will cease this April 14, however, extended support will continue till 2014. What this means is that security patches and critical fixes will still be available but no more feature upgrades.

Hmm, maybe the rise of the netbook market that cannot adequately run Vista forced the hand of Microsoft. I wonder if other manufacturers such as Dell and Acer will follow suit.

[Apple Insider]

Should you upgrade to Internet Explorer 8

With the release of the latest version of Internet Explorer, most people expect that IE 8 users would jump up. But unlike the success of people upgrading from Firefox 2 to Firefox 3, IE users are downgrading from IE 8 to IE 7.

There are lots of people are complaining of compatibility issues with IE 8’s implementation of “standards”. Web designs are breaking up and some web applications and codes forces the browser to crash. Uggh, more headaches for web designers and developers.

So should you upgrade to IE 8? I would suggest holding off for now until they fixed their issues. Or simply continue using Firefox or Chrome or Safari. 

Avira or AVG?

I’ve been using AVG on my desktop for ages and I never encountered any problems virus infecting my PC. No slowdowns, trojans, corrupted files, etc. I don’t know if it’s because I’m just too careful with my machine or AVG did a really good job.

I’ve been seeing a lot of comments about AVG being sub-par on its virus detection so I’m on the lookout for a different anti-virus to install on my new laptop. Avira recently updated its version to 9 and they already included the anti-spyware and anti-adware support on their FREE version.

Anybody out there have experience with Avira? Or should I stick with my AVG? This is not a paid post by the way and comments are greatly appreciated.

Gmail gives you another reason to dump IE

Still can’t bring yourself into downloading and installing a different web browser other than that pre-installed Internet Explorer?

Well if you’re using Gmail a lot then better make the switch to Firefox 3 or Google Chrome. Google recommends those two browsers instead of IE7 when accessing Gmail since it will give you quite a boost in speed reporting it to be twice as fast.

But if you still can’t let go of your trusty IE, don’t fret as IE8 which is reportedly much faster is just around the corner.