Tweak Indexing Options for more Performance

The indexing service in Windows Vista is responsible for making those search boxes all over the operating system lightening fast. By default Windows automatically indexes all files in your user profile folders, start menu and any files you have setup for offline access. If you have a lot of files in these locations and the files change often you can be putting a heavy load on the indexing service. For maximum performance when using Windows Vista I recommend disabling indexing for all other locations other than the Start Menu. This will lessen the background work that Windows Vista has to do. It will also slow down your searches of other locations but that is the price you must pay for this performance benefit.

Follow these steps to tweak the indexing locations:

Click on the Start Button and key in Indexing Options and hit Enter. Indexing Options will now load.


Hit the Modify button.
Next, click on Show all locations.
Scroll through the tree-view and uncheck any folders you do not want to be indexed. When you are finished, click OK.
If you want to change advanced indexing settings such as what file types are indexed click on the Advanced button. Otherwise hit Close.
Make XP computers show up in Vista's Network Map

The new Network Map in Windows Vista allows you to easily create a map of all computers on your network and see how they are connected. This works by using the Link Layer Topology Discovery (LLTD) protocol that is only part of Windows Vista.

To help users of mixed environments of both Windows Vista and Windows XP, Microsoft has released the Link Layer Topology Discovery Responder for Windows XP. This will make your Windows XP computers show up in the Network Map in Windows Vista.

This package contains the Link Layer Topology Discovery (LLTD) responder. The network map on a computer running Windows Vista shows a graphical view of the computers and devices on your network and how they are connected by using the LLTD protocol. The LLTD responder must be installed on a computer running Windows XP before it can be detected and appear on the network map. After you install this item, you may have to restart your computer.

Enable Vista Glass on Intel GMA 950 Graphics Cards

1. First, I had to open up device manager. Click on the start menu and type in devmgmt.msc and Enter to load it up.

2. Once there, expand the Display Adapters section and right click on each device and select Uninstall.

3. Reboot the computer.

4. When it restarts, it should install a generic video driver so your screen will still work.

5. Go back into Device Manager, expand the Display Adapters section again and then right click on the device and select Update Driver.

6. This time select Browse My Computer for Driver and then Let me pick it from a list.

7. Go the the intel section and select the Intel® Lakeport Graphics Controller.

8. Hit OK and install the new driver. Restart your computer.

9. Once you have rebooted, right click on your desktop and select Personalize again.

10. Click on Windows Colors and Appearance.

11. Click on Open classic appearance properties for more color options.

12. In the Color Scheme box, select Windows Vista Aero.

13. Hit OK and glass will now load.

Play DivX files in Windows Vista Media Center

If you've been interested in getting various non-Microsoft third party media codecs (along with video subtitles) working in Vista Media Center, you now have a configurable MCE plug-in which leverages the open-source FFDShow (Microsoft DirectShow compatible) decoder. FFDShow supports MPEG-4 video formats like DivX, Xvid, H.264 and allows users to playback MP3, AAC, Dolby AC3, and OGG Vorbis audio files. Additionally, Media Control for Windows Vista MCE has the capability to set video bookmarks, switch the subtitle language during playback, and provide 3-speed fast forward and rewind.

Requirements:

• Windows Vista with Media Center
• FFDShow – version 881or greater
• Haali media splitter (not mandatory, but required to switch between MKV/OGM streams)

Price:

• Free – PayPal donations are being accepted

Windows Vista Speech Recognition Step by Step Guide

Windows Vista™'s speech recognition is state of the art. Using speech recognition in the operating system, you can dictate emails and documents, and use your voice to control your favorite programs and navigate Web sites. Windows Vista Speech Recognition enables you to create documents quickly, and helps you to work with reduced risk of repetitive stress injuries. The Windows Vista speech recognition experience has an innovative design that places you in control and enables you to become proficient at using speech recognition faster than ever before.

What is Speech Recognition

Speech Recognition technology allows you to control your computer by speaking. When you talk, the software will intelligently decide whether to convert your voice into text, such as to allow you to dictate documents and e-mails, or whether you have given a command that requires it to take an action.

What’s new in Windows Vista Speech Recognition?

Windows Vista Speech Recognition focuses not only on providing world class accuracy, but on providing the most usable end-to-end speech recognition experience. It addresses key issues that currently frustrate or confuse users of existing products. Windows Vista Speech Recognition provides an efficient, enjoyable way to get your tasks done with speech, including:

•	A reduced learning curve, with a focus on making the system "just work."
•	Redesigned user interfaces provide a simple but efficient experience so you can dictate and edit text, and correct any mistakes.
•	An interactive tutorial that teaches you how to use Speech Recognition while the computer learns your voice.
•	Significant improvements to accuracy with speech technology that learns as you use it.
•	Control of your computer with new interfaces that let you use applications in a way that places you in control.
•	Improved clarification and interpretation. When you give a command that can be interpreted multiple ways, the system will prompt you to clarify what you meant to do.

Who should use Speech Recognition

This guide is targeted at the following audiences:

•	IT planners and HR departments providing assistive technology solutions for the employees who have repetitive stress injury, mobility impairments, or vision limitations
•	IT planners for education departments
•	Early adopters

Speech Recognition is intended to address the needs of information workers, particularly those who primarily use e-mail applications, word processing applications, and web browsers.

The following users will have less successful experiences with Windows Vista Speech Recognition:

•	Users in an environment where talking to the computer would have a negative effect on others, such as in an open plan office.
•	Users who often work with text that is not grammatical (programmers, spreadsheet users, computer administrators).
•	Users who need a tightly integrated screen-reader and speech-recognition solution.

Benefits of Speech Recognition

With Speech Recognition, you can:

•	Dramatically reduce the use of the keyboard and mouse by performing tasks with speech.
•	Create documents efficiently by talking to your computer.
•	Control your computer using your voice, including starting or switching applications and selecting menus and buttons.

Key scenarios for Speech Recognition

This guide discusses the simple scenario of dictating a document and giving voice commands.

The Speech Tutorial which is included as part of Windows Vista contains more scenarios that you may wish to try.

Prerequisites

To complete this task, ensure that you meet the following requirements:

•	Use a high-quality microphone. Examples include: • A USB headset microphone • An array microphone
•	Complete the speech recognition interactive tutorial. This lets the computer begin learning to recognize your voice accurately. Completing the tutorial also ensures that you learn the voice commands needed to perform tasks by voice.

Dictating a document overview

One of the most common scenarios with Speech Recognition is dictating a document, which involves the following:

•	Opening your word processing application
•	Dictating the body of the document
•	Saving the document

Steps for dictating a document

Complete the Speech Tutorial

1.	In the Start Menu, choose All Programs, Accessories, Accessibility. Select the Speech Recognition option
2.	Proceed through the initial set up screens to configure your microphone. The Speech tutorial will then be launched
3.	Complete the Speech tutorial

Create, dictate, and save a document

1.	Say "Start Listening."
2.	Say "Open WordPad."
3.	Say "This is a test of speech recognition period." Note Remember to pronounce punctuation.
4.	To correct mistakes, say "correct" and the word that the computer typed by mistake, and then pick the correct word from the list offered by Speech Recognition, repeat the correct word again. For example, if the computer misrecognized "speech" as "peach," say "correct peach," and then choose the right word from the list, or say the word "speech" again.
5.	To save the document, say "File", then say "Save As."
6.	Say "Test document."
7.	Say "Save."

Known issues

Dictation

You might encounter the following issues when you use Speech Recognition.

•	Speech Recognition dictation will work in a limited set of applications that support a technology called the Text Services Framework. This set of applications includes: • Microsoft Word and Outlook • Virtually all applications that are part of Windows Vista
•	Dictation will not work in many applications. These include, but are not limited to: • Microsoft PowerPoint • Excel • WordPerfect • Eudora • Lotus Notes

Poor recognition of voice commands

If you are having difficulty completing a task by voice, the most likely cause is that the computer is accurately recognizing your voice, but you are saying the wrong command..

Refer to the Speech Reference Card to learn which commands are available. To access the Speech Reference Card, right click the microphone control bar.

Logging bugs and feedback

To log bugs, use the instructions on the Microsoft Beta Web site (http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=46992). We are also interested in feature requests and general feedback about Speech Recognition.

You may request additional support for Speech Recognition by sending emails directly to the Speech Recognition team at listen@microsoft.com.

Command-Line Tool in Windows Vista

Perhaps this is ironic for someone who has a heavy focus on beautiful client interfaces, but I've always been a bit of a command-line junkie. Maybe it's a fetish, maybe it's just a legacy of the early DOS, VAX/VMS and UNIX systems that I used in my formative years, but I've always rather liked the uncluttered "get stuff done" experience of a shell.

One particularly common motivation for me to drop back to the Windows Vista command shell is to copy files. For years, robocopy has been an essential part of the Microsoft engineer's toolkit. When I was back in the UK, it was about the only sane way to copy large file structures over the WAN from Redmond, but even now, it's one of the most trusted and useful tools in my toolbox - the first thing I copy over onto a fresh installation to help manage everything that will follow.

Robocopy has been around as an independent tool for a little while (primarily in the Windows Resource Kits), but finally in Windows Vista, someone has seen fit to give the little tool the recognition it deserves, and as a result it now sits on a high pedestal in the \windows\system32 directory on every Windows Vista installation.

Why is robocopy so cool? Well, for starters, it's hard to find a more flexible, configurable tool - with over 80 switches, the chances are it can handle any batch or synchronous copy you have in mind.

Secondly, it's just very robust. If a network link goes down halfway through a lengthy copy, most tools bail out, but robocopy just patiently waits, retrying x times with a y second interval (of course, x and y are configurable). Better still, it can be configured to pick up where the file transfer left off, so you don't have to go all the way back to the start if the network fails 99% of the way through a 2GB file.

Finally, it's perfectly optimized for mirroring large file shares on a slow WAN link. It only copies files that have changed, which is perfect for the occasions when you want to pull down a daily build where only 30% of the files have changed since the last occasion. You can set it to monitor a source and keep the destination updated with changes on a repeated schedule. Lastly, you can even throttle the traffic down by tweaking the inter-packet gap, so that a network link isn't monopolized by the copy process.

I use robocopy for copying new daily builds down from a central server, for backing up my personal and work files to shared locations, and simply for moving files around from partition to partition. Even as I write this, there's a robocopy window mirroring my entire data partition to a removable USB hard drive so that I can transfer my data from one laptop to another.

If you're not running Windows Vista already (shame on you!), you can download robocopy as part of the Windows Server 2003 Resource Kit Tools (where there's also a user manual in Word format for the tool). If you're not a command-line junkie, there's a GUI wrapper available from GotDotNet, although it doesn't really provide much more than a shell for the switches. Start with the /mir and /z switches to get a sense of the power of the tool (but be careful with /mir since it will delete as well as copy files to bring the destination folder in sync with the source folder). Run robocopy /? to see the full set of parameters available. Good luck!

by Tim Sneath

Why Vista Uses All you Memory

Windows Vista has a radically different approach to memory management. Check out the "Physical Memory, Free" column in my Task Manager:

At the time this screenshot was taken, this machine had a few instances of IE7 running, plus one remote desktop. I'm hardly doing anything at all, yet I only have 6 megabytes of free physical memory.

Now compare with this screenshot of Windows XP's Task Manager under similar low-load conditions:

Under "Physical Memory, Available" I have approximately 1.5 gigabytes of free physical memory, as you'd expect.

So what's going on here? Why is Vista using so much memory when I'm doing so very little?

To answer that question, you have to consider what your computer's physical memory (RAM) is for. Just as a hypothetical, let's say you wanted to create a new text file:

1. You double-click on the notepad icon.
2. The Notepad executable loads from disk into memory.
3. Notepad executes.
4. Notepad allocates free memory to store your text document.

So Notepad clearly needs a little memory for itself: enough to execute, and to store the contents of the text document it's displaying. But that's maybe a couple megabytes, at most. If even that. What about the other 2,046 megabytes of system memory?

You have to stop thinking of system memory as a resource and start thinking of it as a a cache. Just like the level 1 and level 2 cache on your CPU, system memory is yet another type of high-speed cache that sits between your computer and the disk drive.

And the most important rule of cache design is that empty cache memory is wasted cache memory. Empty cache isn't doing you any good. It's expensive, high-speed memory sucking down power for zero benefit. The primary mission in the life of every cache is to populate itself as quickly as possible with the data that's most likely to be needed-- and to consistently deliver a high "hit rate" of needed data retrieved from the cache. Otherwise you're going straight to the hard drive, mister, and if you have to ask how much going to the hard drive will cost you in performance, you can't afford it.

Diomidis Spinellis published an excellent breakdown of the cache performance ratios in a typical PC circa January 2006:

	Nominal	Worst case	Sustained		Productivity
Component	size	latency	throughput	$1 buys	(Bytes read / s / $)
			(MB/s)		Worst case	Best case
L1 D cache	64 KB	1.4ns	19022	10.7 KB	7.91·1012	2.19·1014
L2 cache	512 KB	9.7ns	5519	12.8 KB	1.35·1012	7.61·1013
DDR RAM	256 MB	28.5ns	2541	9.48 MB	3.48·1014	2.65·1016
Hard drive	250 GB	25.6ms	67	2.91 GB	1.22·1011	2.17·1017

In summary, here's how much faster each cache memory type in your computer is than the hard drive:

System memory	37x faster
CPU Level 2 cache	82x faster
CPU Level 1 cache	283x faster

Those figures explain why I only have 6 megabytes of "free" memory in Windows Vista. Vista is trying its darndest to pre-emptively populate every byte of system memory with what it thinks I might need next. It's running a low-priority background task that harvests previously accessed data from the disk and plops it into unused system memory. They even have a fancy marketing name for it-- SuperFetch:

In previous versions of Windows, system responsiveness could be uneven. You may have experienced sluggish behavior after booting your machine, after performing a fast user switch, or even after lunch. Although too many carbohydrates might slow you down after lunch, your computer slows down for different reasons. When you're not actively using your computer, background tasks— including automatic backup and antivirus software scans— take this opportunity to run when they will least disturb you. These background tasks can take space in system memory that your applications were using. After you start to use your PC again, it can take some time to reload your data into memory, slowing down performance.

SuperFetch understands which applications you use most, and preloads these applications into memory, so your system is more responsive. SuperFetch uses an intelligent prioritization scheme that understands which applications you use most often, and can even differentiate which applications you are likely to use at different times (for example, on the weekend versus during the week), so that your computer is ready to do what you want it to do. Windows Vista can also prioritize your applications over background tasks, so that when you return to your machine after leaving it idle, it's still responsive.

This isn't a new concept, of course. But Vista treats system memory like a cache much more aggressively and effectively than any other version of Windows. As alluded to in the above lunch anecdote-- and as you can see from the Task Manager screenshot above-- Windows XP has no qualms whatsoever about leaving upwards of a gigabyte of system memory empty. From a caching perspective, this is unfathomable. Vista tries its damndest to fill that empty system memory cache as soon as it can.

Although I am a total believer in the system-memory-as-cache religion, SuperFetch can still have some undesirable side effects. I first noticed that something was up when I fired up Battlefield 2 under Vista and joined a multiplayer game. Battlefield 2 is something of a memory hog; the game regularly uses a gigabyte of memory on large 64-player multiplayer maps. During the first few minutes of gameplay, I noticed that the system was a little sluggish, and the drive was running constantly. This was very unusual and totally unlike the behavior under Windows XP. Once the map is loaded and you join the game, the entire game is in memory. What could possibly be loading from disk at that point? Well, SuperFetch saw a ton of memory freed to make room for the game, and dutifully went about filling the leftover free memory on a low-priority background disk thread. Normally, this would be no big deal, but even a low-priority background disk thread is pretty noticeable when you're playing a twitch shooter online with 63 other people at a resolution of 1600x1200.

I'm perfectly fine letting SuperFetch have its way with my system memory. The question shouldn't be "Why does Vista use all my memory?", but "Why the heck did previous versions of Windows use my memory so ineffectively?" I don't know. Maybe the rules were different before 2 gigabytes was a mainstream memory configuration.

The less free memory I have, the better; every byte of memory should be actively working on my behalf at all times. However, I do wish there was a way to tell SuperFetch to ixnay on the oadinglay when I'm gaming.

by Jeff Atwood

Windows Vista Firewall with Advanced Security

When you think of Windows Firewall, you probably think of the half-baked attempt at a Firewall that was present in XP SP2. You may also still think of it as inferior to many of the free Firewall solutions available because Windows Firewall doesn't support Outbound filtering.

Well, think again - Windows Firewall has been reborn and a lot of work has gone into making it a notable security feature of Vista. Not only does it now have Inbound and Outbound filtering, it also has the concept of Network Profiles, Computer Connection Security rules, Monitoring, and a awesome new UI which will give you FAR more control of the Firewall - "Windows Firewall with Advanced Security".

Windows Firewall with Advanced Security is a new and enhanced version of Windows Firewall. It's a stateful host-based firewall that allows or blocks network traffic according to its configuration and the applications that are currently running to provide a level of protection from malicious users and programs on a network. The new Windows Firewall includes enhancements for better protection and more advanced configuration.

Don't worry, for the non-techy the old XP SP2 UI is still available by running "firewallsettings.exe" (though it has also received a few notable improvements), and there is even a new overview UI for the Firewall which you can see by running "Firewall.cpl" (or by accessing it through control panel. These UI's are more suited to the non-techy user who only needs to see their firewall status (on/off, etc) or wants to enable/disable pre-defined rule groups such as "Remote Desktop". They can also use this UI to quickly add very-basic Firewall rules.

For the more tech-savy user, there is the Windows Firewall with Advanced Security UI. It is an MMC snap-in, which you can access by running "mmc.exe" and then adding it, or by directly running "wf.msc". The first thing that you will notice is that this UI gives you FAR more detail about your Firewall status and rules than ever before. Most notably, you will also see a sections for Inbound and Outbound rules, which is a first for Windows Firewall.

Some of the new features include:

• Computer Connection Security (CCS) Rules - Connection security rules force a bilateral authentication between systems before a connection can be established.


• Monitoring - Monitoring is extremely useful if you want to see exactly which Firewall rules are being enforced at any given time.


• Windows Service Hardening - Prevent attackers from exploiting Windows Services. Any abnormalities that are detected will be blocked.


• Inbound/Outbound Filtering - Outbound traffic, as well as inbound traffic, can be filtered.


• Granular Rules - More granular rules can be configure for inbound and outbound filtering.


• Firewall Profiles - Rules can be created for different profiles. Firewall profiles include: private, public and domain. So for example, you can have a different set of Firewall rules active when you are in a less secure network environment such as at airport or starbucks.


• Authenticated Bypass Rules - Rules can be bypassed for specific computers that have been authenticated.


• Active Directory support - The firewall can filter based on Active Directory account information.


• IPv6 - Provides support for IPv6.

There is really too much to go into in this small article, so I just recommend that you explore the new Windows Firewall and see for yourself what an improvement it is. You can also read a lot more about Windows Firewall with Advanced Security here.

If you want to start scripting the Windows Firewall with Advanced Security from a command line, you will want to look into the new netsh context "netsh advfirewall" which understands the new network profiles and features.

Windows Vista Reliability Monitor

This is the first in a small series of articles covering a few of the more useful features of Windows Vista that you may not be familiar with (or even know about). There are are some nice little tools tucked away in Vista, and the first one that I will discuss is the Reliability Monitor.

Here's the scenario - you notice that your PC has been getting slower and some of your applications have begun to crash ocassionally. You want to know what's changed on your system to make it less reliable, but you don't have hours to spend investigating logs, process information, registry settings, application installation logs, etc.

Wouldn't it be great if there was a tool that could show you graphically when your system reliabilty began to decrease, and give you a clue as to what may have caused it? Well, now there is - Reliability Monitor.

In the past Windows has provided tools to allow you to monitor the performance characteristics of your computer in real time, and Vista continues to provide such features...but with a new Realiability Monitor tool which is incredibly useful. On the day you install Windows Vista, your system is given the highest possible reliability rating (10) and then over time whenever there is a problem (i.e. application crashes, or hardware fails, etc) your PC's reliability rating decreases. If you have a few days with no problems at all, your reliability rating is likely to slowly increase.

Once you have a few days/weeks worth of data, you can begin to see the reliability of your system charted graphically on a timeline, showing you exactly when your computer had problems. Why is this useful? Let's think of a scenario - how many times have your friends/family told you that they were having computer issues but that they can't remember changing anything on their system or doing anything that could have caused the problems? :) Sound familiar? Well, now you can use the reliability monitor to see exactly when their system reliability began to decrease, and what applications were installed around the same time! If you see that on January 30th the system performance went down, and by some coincidence, January 30th was also the day that someone installed 'eviltrojan.exe' - then you know what the problem is :)

Reliability Monitor is a MMC snap-in, so there are a few ways which you can get to it in Vista. The easy way is by opening the start menu and typing 'reliability' then pressing Enter. You can also get to it by running "perfmon.msc" (either from a run prompt, or from a command prompt) and then going to the 'Reliability Monitor' node. The application requires administrator privileges to run, so you may be asked to elevate when you run it.

I encourage you to experiement with this tool, and keep an eye on it if you are running Vista. This is one of the most useful new features in my opinion and not many people seem to know about it - so please tell your friends ;)

Don't attempt to crack Vista's Activation

ast couple of days there's been a big fuss about a relatively easy way to crack Vista's activation. I waited a bit before posting about it here, but after reading Robert McLaw's article in which he really explains nicely what it's all about, I decided it's time to write about it.

For a full explanation on how this crack works, check out Adrian's explanation on ZDNet.

Here is what Robert had to say which explains why you shouldn't use this method to activate your illegal copy of Vista. I could not have said it better:

Here's the problem with this, folks. Previous Windows cracks have used leaked corporate activations keys to unlock Windows, which only really hurts Microsoft. This method actively steals a valid Product Key from Microsoft customers, because most keys can only be activated once. Think about that for a second. What if your mom just got home from laying down $150 for Windows Vista Home Premium, only to get it home and install it, and find out that their key has already been activated. Now, Microsoft doesn't get hurt, because the key has been paid for. But now your mom is branded a pirate, and has to go through a giant hassle to get a new legitimate key.

Please, don't be an a$$hole [and] use this method of activating Vista. It's one thing if your target is Microsoft, it's quite another if your target is an unsuspecting consumer who shelled out their hard-earned money to upgrade their home computing experience. And Microsoft, I hope you can shut this one down, for your customers' sakes.

So guys, you heard it - please do not be an a$$ :)

If you really just HAVE to have Vista running more than 30 days which comes as a trial without the activation, use the known method and LEGALLY extend this time limit to up to 120 DAYS! I mentioned it here so read on.

Nice message Robert! Thanks!

Via: Windows-Now.com

Windows Media Player Problem in Firefox on Vista

Missing plugin

A version of Windows Media Player is included with most Windows installations and the WMP plugin files needed for certain webpage content are normally included. In some cases the plugin files may be missing, however, and Windows Vista installations do not include the WMP plugin files [1]). Users may receive a message similar to Unknown plugin (application/x-mplayer2) or may be incorrectly directed to reinstall the WMP program, which is not a solution since reinstalling or updating Windows Media Player does not add the missing plugins [2]). To check for the WMP plugin, type about:plugins into the location bar. There should be an entry for Windows Media Player Plug-in Dynamic Link Library (File name: npdsplay.dll) and two entries for Microsoft® DRM (File name: npdrmv2.dll and File name: npwmsdrm.dll). If you do not see these files, follow these steps:

1. If some or all of the files are missing, you can download the individual files from dlldump.com and place them in the Windows Media Player directory (usually C:\Program Files\Windows Media Player):
   • npdsplay.dll: http://www.dlldump.com/download-dll-files_new.php/dllfiles/N/npdsplay.dll/3.0.2.629/
   • npwmsdrm.dll: http://www.dlldump.com/download-dll-files_new.php/dllfiles/N/npwmsdrm.dll/9.00.00.3250/
   • npdrmv2.dll: http://www.dlldump.com/download-dll-files_new.php/dllfiles/N/npdrmv2.dll/9.00.00.32508/
2. Reopen your browser and see if the WMP plugin is now working. If it isn't, follow these additional steps (Windows Vista users, go to the last step):
3. A Windows Media Player Plug-in for Netscape Navigator installer (not supported on Windows Vista) can be downloaded here and should resolve the issue [3] but the included files are older versions. After running the installer, copy the more recent versions of npdsplay.dll, npdrmv2.dll and npwmsdrm.dll from dlldump.com to the Windows Media Player directory, if they were replaced by older versions.
4. If the Windows Media Player plugin still does not work, copy the npdsplay.dll, npdrmv2.dll and npwmsdrm.dll files to the installation directory plugins folder; for example, to the C:\Program Files\Mozilla Firefox\plugins folder in Firefox.

Alternative solution

Instead of restoring the missing WMP plugin, an add-on such as the MediaPlayerConnectivity Firefox extension can be installed to launch embedded media on a webpage in an external player [4] (a version for SeaMonkey is also available).

Testing WMP plugin

You can test the WMP plugin using these test pages:

• Broadband
• Narrowband (dialup)

If the above pages are unavailable, the Testing plugins article links to other audio video and embedded sound test pages that include WMP plugin tests.

Troubleshooting WMP plugin

Video is invisible or disappears when you click a control

• When the player is active, right-click on it and select 'Options...'
• At the bottom of the window should be a 'Video Acceleration' option. Change it from full to half by moving the slider.

Firefox crashes on exit if the WMP plugin has been used (Windows 2000)

• Double-click on the 'My Computer' icon on the desktop, then double-click on 'Control Panel'.
• Double-click on the Java icon to bring up the Java control panel.
• Click on the 'Update' tab, and then the 'Update Now' button.

WMP6 used even though WMP9 or later is installed

If the player controls look like they are from an older version of Windows Media Player:

• Right-click this link and save it to your desktop: http://plugindoc.mozdev.org/resources/wmp9.reg
• When it has downloaded, double-click it. A pop-up will ask if you want to add the information in it to the registry - click Yes.

If the above registry patch doesn't help then reinstalling a downloaded version of Windows Media Player, such as WMP10 or WMP11 for Windows XP, is reported to fix the problem [5] (details here).

"Cannot create DirectShow Player"

This could be a symptom of this problem. Failing that, try reinstalling WMP and installing the latest version of DirectX. Windows XP users with WMP 9 can try upgrading to WMP 10, and WMP 10 users can also try rolling back to WMP 9. Booting Windows in Safe Mode, deleting WMP, then reinstalling WMP may solve it.

Nothing happens when pressing Play

The players in the test links here have the status bar - it tells you what the player is doing. This is not always the case. Sometimes when you hit play on a player without a status bar, it seems like nothing happens - in fact, the player is probably just downloading enough of the file to start playing it (buffering) and if you give it a moment, it will start.

Illegal operation in Windows Media Player plugin

Illegal Operation in Plugin
Windows Media Player Plug-in Dynamic Link Library
The plugin performed an illegal operation. You are strongly advised to restart Navigator.

This can be caused by having JavaScript disabled. To enable JavaScript:

• Firefox: Click "Tools → Options → Content (or Web Features) → Enable JavaScript".
• Mozilla Suite: Click "Edit → Preferences → Advanced → Scripts & Plug-ins → Enable JavaScript for → Navigator"

Make sure that any extensions you might have that can block JavaScript are not blocking the site in question or are disabled. These include NoScript[6] and Adblock Plus.

Windows XP Home N or Windows XP Professional N

Because of a recent decision by the European Commission, Microsoft have been required to offer these new European versions of Windows XP Home/Pro in addition to the standard verisons, with Windows Media Player and all built-in media playback abilities removed - including the Windows Media Player plugin. The N stands for 'Not with Windows Media Player'. Because of the scope of the changes, you cannot simply install Windows Media Player to get full functionality back. Microsoft have released an update to convert Windows XP N to regular Windows XP (by restoring all the missing files). Users of Windows XP Home/Pro N will need to install this update to run the Windows Media Player plugin. This update is also avaliable on Windows Update. This cannot be undone. After installing this update, the only way to revert back to Windows XP N will be to re-install Windows.

Player appears, player status bar says 'Ready', no error messages, but nothing happens when you click Play

Internet Explorer needs to be able to connect to the internet for the Windows Media Player plugin to work:

• Make sure that Internet Explorer is not set to Work Offline mode: To check if IE is in 'Work Offline' mode, open IE and open the File menu. There would be a tick by the 'Work Offline' option. Click it to take IE off Work Offline mode.
• Make sure that Internet Explorer's proxy settings are correct
• Make sure that IE and WMP are not blocked by your firewall.

This can also be caused by DSL/cable providers using Network Address Translation (NAT) not forwarding UDP packets properly. The solution is to disable UDP in Windows Media Player:

• In WMP, click Tools > Options
• Select the 'Network' tab
• Deselect 'UDP'

It has also been reported that reinstalling/upgrading/downgrading Windows Media Player can solve this.

Crashes or missing WMP controls while trying to play embedded WMV files

Your browser may crash or, if the video does play, the WMP controls (play/pause/stop) or right-click options may be missing [7]. This can happen when the VLC Media Player is installed and its own browser plug-in takes precedence over the WMP plug-in, causing a conflict. Remove the VLC plug-in file npvlc.dll from the Mozilla Suite or Firefox installation directory plugins folder so that embedded WMV files can play properly.

Player does not appear, but audio (sometimes) still plays - all plugin files are listed in about:plugins

If the Adblock extension is installed, the OBJ-TABS setting may hide the WMP plug-in. If you find this happens to you, disable Obj-Tabs in your Adblock options. If that doesn't work, try redownloading the plugin files from dlldump.com as described in the previous section and placing them in your browser's plugins folder. The VLC Media Player plug-in has also been known to do this - try removing the VLC plug-in (see above).

Another problem where file may play audio but the video will play only on the Primary monitor even though both would otherwise have the same view. (Windows control panel, Display, Advanced, Displays)

Firefox 1.5.0.5

Firefox 1.5.0.5 has a bug that interferes with the Windows Media Player plug-in (fixed in Firefox 1.5.0.6).

Windows XP Media Center Edition

Windows XP Media Center Edition does not come with the Windows Media Player plugins so you will need to add them (see Missing plugin, above). If these solutions don't work, the update for Windows XP N (XP with no media playback ability (see Windows XP Home N or Windows XP Professional N, above) is reported to to add back the missing files and settings that allow Windows XP Media Center Edition to support the WMP plugins [8]. Warning: this update cannot be uninstalled. The only way to undo it is to re-install Windows, so attempt at your own risk. The update is here.

ActiveX plugin

Some sites may be coded specifically for the WMP ActiveX control, an Internet Explorer plug-in technology that does not normally run on Mozilla Suite or Firefox. The Mozilla ActiveX Plugin by Adam Lock adds ActiveX support to Mozilla Suite and Firefox. The ActiveX plug-in is currently only available for Firefox 1.5 and below. Don't even try installing it in Firefox 2.0; it won't work.

Warnings:

• If you use the Adblock extension, you need to disable the Obj-Tabs setting. Otherwise, the ActiveX plugin will run almost any ActiveX control regardless of how it is configured. Potential fixes are being discussed in Bug 340852 and may be included in furture Mozilla browser releases.
• For some versions of the ActiveX plugin, the Flash plugin will not load unless it was already loaded after you install the ActiveX plugin. You will need to reload the plugins by typing about:plugins into your Location Bar upon starting Firefox.
• If you later update your browser, the ActiveX plugin will likely remain installed and it may not be compatible with the new browser version. You should uninstall the ActiveX plugin before upgrading your browser, unless it is known to work with the next version.

Security Info

ActiveX support is considered to be one of Internet Explorer's larger security flaws. This is because IE can automatically download, install and run ActiveX controls without informing the user. ActiveX controls, unlike plug-ins, have all the same permissions as any Windows program so they have full access to Windows, giving a virus disguised as an ActiveX control a lot of damaging power. The ActiveX plugins are capable of downloading and running any control[9], but the Firefox versions come preconfigured not to download controls, and to only use the Windows Media Player controls - bypassing the security issues. The ActiveX plugins for Mozilla Suite do not - they will download missing controls.

Installing ActiveX plugin

The ActiveX plugin can be downloaded and installed from this page.

Important: Each version of the ActiveX plugin is only compatible with a small number of browser versions. If installed in an incompatible browser, the ActiveX plugin will not function properly and you may experience conflicts with the Flash plugin.

• Firefox 1.5.0.x: Install the plug-in for Firefox 1.5.
• All other releases: Install the plug-in for your specific version of Firefox.

After installation, restart Firefox.

SeaMonkey 1.0 release

SeaMonkey 1.0 users can install the Firefox 1.5 version of the plugin, which seems to work [10].

Mozilla Suite and other Firefox builds

• Install the Mozilla ActiveX Plug-in and then exit the browser.
• Download the browser.xpi file from Netscape's ftp site. Do not click on the link. Instead, right-click it and select "Save Link As..." Rename it to browser.zip, open the ZIP file, and extract the npmozax.dll file to the plugins folder of your Mozilla Suite or Firefox Installation directory. The file will be located within the ZIP file under the ZIP's plugin folder. [11]
• It it also recommended that you edit activex.js and replace it with the text below to enable only Windows Media Player to run unless you need to run other ActiveX controls. The activex.js file is located in your installation directory \defaults\pref folder.

pref("general.useragent.vendorComment", "ax");
pref("security.xpconnect.activex.global.hosting_flags", 9);
pref("security.classID.allowByDefault", false);
pref("capability.policy.default.ClassID.CID6BF52A52-394A-11D3-B153-00C04F79FAA6", "AllAccess");
pref("capability.policy.default.ClassID.CID22D6F312-B0F6-11D0-94AB-0080C74C7E95", "AllAccess");

Testing ActiveX plugin

Once you have installed WMP and ActiveX, you can test it on this site. If you can play both the audio and video players, the ActiveX plugin is installed and working.

Uninstalling ActiveX plugin

• Close all instances of your browser.
• Go to the installation directory.
• Go into the plugins folder and delete the file npmozax.dll.
• Go back to the installation folder, and then go into the components folder, and delete the files nsIMozAxPlugin.xpt and nsAxSecurityPolicy.js.
• Go back to the installation folder, and then go into the \defaults\pref folder and delete the file activex.js.

Keyboard shortcuts in Windows Vista

If you're like me, you like to use the keyboard for most, if not all, of your OS navigation tasks. It's merely a personal preference, but I'd much rather use a keystroke sequence than have to remove a hand from the keyboard (I use my right hand for mousing), move the mouse, and return it. It just seems faster to me -- and maybe it allows me to rely less on hand-eye coordination, which, admittedly, is less sharp now that I have much less time to spend gaming :(

Here are just a couple keyboard shortcuts that I've learned of from colleagues or come across on my own:

Ctrl+Esc	Opens the Start menu
Windows Logo	Opens the Start menu
Ctrl+Alt+Delete	Then - Displays the Windows Security window
	Now – Displays LogOn screen including Lock Computer, Switch User, LogOff, Change a Password and Task Manager
Print Screen	Copies the full screen image to the Windows Clipboard
Alt+Print Screen	Copies the selected window's image to the Windows Clipboard
Alt+Double-Click	Displays property sheet for the selected item
Alt+Enter	Displays property sheet for the selected object
Shift	Hold when loading disk to prevent AutoPlay application
Shift+F10	Same as right-click
Shift+Right-Click	Shows alternative commands for the selected object

I now find myself using many of these more and more often, especially given my inclination toward using the keyboard instead of the mouse whenever possible.

One of the great things about Windows Vista is the context-sensitivity applied to many actions. For example, think of how the Slide Show command appears in a window's toolbar when viewing a window containing photos; or, how right-clicking a photo displays rotation options in the resulting menu. In the case of the shortcuts above, notice that when you Shift+Right-Click an .XLSX spreadsheet or .DOCX document, the Open as Read-Only option appears, which is not the case when doing the same to a .PPTX slide deck. And for all of these file types, the Copy as Path option is displayed upon Shift+Right-Click, which can be very handy if you're looking for the fully-qualified path to the document -- say, in the case of creating a hyperlink to it.

There are surely more shortcuts that I've yet to discover. What are some of the keyboard or other shortcuts you rely on regularly in Windows Vista? Share your tips in the Comments section and give us a chance to learn from one another!

Readyboost on Motherboard

Another way to utilize ReadyBoost is to buy a motherboard with flash memory installed. The first of these are already on the market, introduced by ASUS a week before Vista's official birthday on January 29, 2007.

New motherboards from ASUS include flash memory on the board that can be allocated as a ReadyBoost cache.

There are four models in the series: a Plus and a Premium model each for the Intel Core 2 Quad and the AMD Athlon 64 FX processors. All include several Vista-specific features, but most important in the current context is their ASAP ("ASUS Accelerated Propeller") feature which is, essentially, a 512MB flash drive soldered to the board. The flash is recognized by Vista as an external drive, and can be used for whatever you'd use a flash drive for, including, of course, ReadyBoost.

ReadyDrive: Bringing The Boost To Hard Drives
ReadyDrive does for hard drives and flash memory more or less what ReadyBoost does for system memory and flash drives. This new feature of Vista takes advantage of equally new hybrid hard drive technology that combines conventional rotating storage with flash memory.

All hard disks have some RAM built into them as a cache, but it's there just to buffer reads and writes, and it's volatile -- its contents evaporate when the drive powers down. Adding nonvolatile flash to the drive does something entirely different from buffering I/O. It means that, in effect, the drive can be on even when it's off. This can save not only time but battery power, if the PC running Vista happens to be a laptop (and increasingly, they are -- laptop sales have equaled or bettered desktops in recent years).

That's why the first hybrid hard drives just beginning to reach the market are 2.5-inch laptop drives. Samsung announced early in March that it had begun shipping samples of its first H-HHD, and Seagate is expected to follow suit any day.

Samsung's FlashON hybrid hard drives combine rotating storage with 256MB of flash memory to enhance the speed of laptops running Vista. (Click image to enlarge.)

The Samsung drives in the 2.5-inch FlashON series will combine 80, 120, or 160 gigabytes of rotating storage with 256MB of flash memory. Seagate's first drives will be in the same configuration -- 2.5-inch drives with 256MB of flash, and the company has said it will produce drives with larger flash buffers of 512MB and 1GB in the second half of 2007.

That 256MB of flash will be shared among several separate cache functions, according to Ruston Panabaker of Microsoft's Windows Hardware Innovation Group, who gave a presentation on ReadyDrive at last year's Windows Hardware Engineering Conference (WinHEC 2006):

• About 10MB of it will be devoted to caching the hard drive's firmware.

• The next 32MB will be used as a write cache. Laptop drives spin down to save power, and a write cache in flash means that writes can be accumulated and the disk left off longer.

• Another 32MB will be available for caching data and program code that supports hardware features and Vista's new Windows HotStart function. (HotStart ties a program function to a hardware button so that users can do things like run a media player, or browse and play files from the hard disk, or open an e-mail program with one click, whether the laptop is on, sleeping, in hibernation, or off.)

• Whatever flash memory is left is set up as a ReadyBoost that SuperFetch will use to cache code pages while it works to maintain optimal memory content, and to accelerate the boot and resume processes.

This not only improves the laptop's performance, according to Panabaker, but it can save 4 to 12 percent of the machine's battery by allowing the hard drive to power down while the flash cache stays on to serve cached code to the CPU and aggregate writes to the disk.

ReadyBoot: A Flash Booster Rocket For Boot-Ups
ReadyBoot may be a little too much like ReadyBoost to be clearly differentiated, but maybe that's the point. After every boot-up, the ReadyBoost service does an analysis of the files read during the last five boots, then builds a list of the files it predicts will be used in the next boot in what order, and their locations on disk. When the PC boots up, the ReadyBoost service creates a compressed cache of those files. That serves the right files in the optimal order to boot the machine faster.

If the computer is equipped with an H-HHD, ReadyDrive can accelerate the boot process even more. When a shut-down or hibernation is initiated, ReadyDrive loads data required early in the boot process to the H-HHD's flash cache. When the disk is powered on again, even though it won't spin up for 2 to 4 seconds, data can start flowing from the flash memory almost immediately.

Ready? Boost!
ReadyBoost isn't a magic bullet for Vista performance. There is no substitute for system memory, so if you're going to run Vista, load up on as much as your machine will hold or you can afford, depending on which limit you hit first. But if you've got a machine with a limited amount of system RAM -- an older PC or a laptop -- flash memory and the ReadyBoost technology that's in every copy of Vista can make a difference. An "Enhanced for ReadyBoost" flash drive or card can give you an immediate shot in the arm -- and, when they get here, hybrid hard drives could help as well.

Those technologies aren't the end of the line, by any means. As Panabaker pointed out, with ReadyBoost there's a direct relationship between flash memory performance and Vista performance gains -- and the performance of flash memory interfaces has been doubling every year. As Vista is adopted by more and more PC users, the result will undoubtedly mean more flash in our future.

Putting ReadyBoost To Work

Testing, like the thorough review of ReadyBoost done by Tom's Hardware Guide, proves there's no substitute for system RAM. But, particularly on PCs with minimal system memory (around 512MB or so) nothing helps more than plugging in a ReadyBoost-compatible flash drive.

Setting up a flash device for ReadyBoost is simple: In the device Properties, set the amount of space to set aside as a cache, and select "Use this device." (Click image to enlarge.)

Setting up ReadyBoost on a PC is about as hard as feeding a hamburger to a hungry dog. The most important thing to remember is to get your fingers out of the way. All you need is a flash device fast enough to support ReadyBoost (more on that later). Plug the flash drive into a USB port, or the memory card into an appropriate slot, and Vista will open an Autoplay window inviting you to "Speed up my system using Windows ReadyBoost." All you have to do is accept the suggested size for the cache.

Once the cache file (it's named ReadyBoost.sfcache) is configured on the device, it will be used by Vista whenever it's available. This mean if you need to use the device for something else and remove it from the PC, you can do it without causing a problem -- just remember to click on the "Safely Remove Hardware" applet in the system tray. You can even delete the cache file (simply go back into the device's properties and select "Do not use this device") and then reconfigure it again later on.

Picking A Flash Device For ReadyBoost
You can use just about any kind of flash device that you can insert directly into your PC. That includes USB flash drives, Secure Digital cards, CompactFlash cards, and Memory Stick cards. You can't use cards inserted into external USB readers, or anything on a USB 1.0 or USB 1.1 port.

To work with ReadyBoost, a flash device has to have more than 256MB with 230MB of free space. It must also be faster than the average flash drive has been in the past -- it must perform random 4K reads at 2.5 megabytes per second or faster, and perform random 512K writes at 1.7MB or faster. You can use devices as large as 32GB for ReadyBoost and format it as either FAT or NTFS, but Vista will use a maximum of 4GB for the cache file because of compatibility with FAT32 file format restrictions. ("Enhanced for ReadyBoost" devices have to meet a higher standard: 5MB per second for random 4K reads and 3 MB for random 512K writes.)

If a flash device is too slow for ReadyBoost you'll see this message. Vista will retest a device each time you connect it unless you instruct it otherwise. (Click image to enlarge.)

Flash device makers have rushed "Enhanced for ReadyBoost" devices to market, but it's still early days for ReadyBoost compatibility. If you've got a device you'd like to try, Vista will let you know pretty quickly whether it's ReadyBoost-ready or not: Just plug it in and check the ReadyBoost pane in its Properties listing. If the device is not compatible, Vista hands out three kinds of gentle rejection: You'll be told the device is "plugged into an unsupported interface" (meaning something about it is probably USB 1.x), or that the device "must be greater than 256MB" (as with other things in life, size does matter), or you'll see the message below, which indicates it's just plain too slow:

There may be some work-arounds for slow drives. Vista will retest devices that fail the speed test, but once a device passes, it's good forever. One blogger claims to have squeeked a marginal flash drive past the test by formatting it as NTFS and compressing it. But you use slow devices at your peril.

Not all compatible devices are marked as such, and if you're looking to buy a flash drive to use as a ReadyBoost device and want to know whether it's compatible, a British Web designer has started a community-driven Web site to capture information and opinions on which ones are and which ones aren't.

ReadyBoost: Better Windows Vista Performance In A Flash

In all of the commotion over the introduction of Vista and since, one thing is obvious: Vista needs speed more than Mars needs women. Early reports from Vista users can make it sound like they're dealing with two different products: a Good Vista and a Bad Vista. Some users talk about how fast it is, how quickly it boots up, while other complain about how slow it feels.

The key seems to be that Vista's performance is extremely hardware-dependent. Running Vista on a 2GHz processor, 2GB of RAM and a 256MB video card can be a very pleasant experience. But Trying to run Vista on a marginal hardware set-up can be an exercise in frustration. Getting good performance out of Microsoft's Windows Vista requires more of everything -- more system memory, a faster CPU, more hard-disk space, and much more graphics processing power.

Of all these, system memory is the most important, because it impacts the performance of the others. For example, the graphics subsystem might borrow system memory, which in turn diminishes memory available for caching data and program code pages, which could force the processor to wait . . . and wait . . . for data to be read off the hard drive.

Vista does what it can to optimize this digital choreography. Caching technology, in particular, has been pushed beyond anything available in previous versions of Windows. A new memory-management technology called SuperFetch works like a combination of fortune teller and inventory clerk to predict the data the CPU will ask for next, and make sure it's on the system memory shelves, where it can be delivered to the CPU fastest.

"Ready" For Vista
But software optimization can only do so much, and Vista also includes technology to support some relatively new hardware solutions for improving its performance. The names of some of these functionalities were in flux during Vista's long development process, but with the OS finally shipping, the list has settled on a common family name: "Ready." It has three main members:

• ReadyBoost uses flash memory in external devices -- USB drives and memory cards, for example -- to supplement system memory with a special cache that takes advantage of flash devices' very quick random read times to boost system performance.

• ReadyDrive takes advantage of new hybrid hard disk drives (abbreviated H-HHD) that combine conventional rotating disk storage with flash memory. Vista treats the flash and disk as one memory space, so that it can be used for caching frequently-needed data, for ReadyBoot data, or as a disk-write cache when the disk is spun down, in order to save battery power.

• ReadyBoot uses the ReadyBoost services to tackle one particular problem -- speeding up the processes of booting the system and recovering from hibernation. It keeps track of the files most often needed when the system boots and builds a temporary cache -- sort of a "Boot-Up's Greatest Hits" -- when the system starts. It can use flash wherever it finds it in either external flash devices or H-HHDs.

ReadyBoost and ReadyDrive are matched to new kinds of hardware products. In addition to H-HHDs, flash drives marked "Enhanced for ReadyBoost" are making their way to the market, fast flash memory cards popular for digital cameras are finding new uses, and embedded flash memory is even appearing on special "Enhanced for Vista" motherboards.

Firewall Software Compatible with Vista

Free

• PC Tools Firewall Plus from PC Tools (32 Bit)
• Windows Firewall from Microsoft Corporation - Windows Firewall is part of Windows operating system (32 and 64 Bit)

Free and Full Feature Pay Versions

• BitDefender family from SOFTWIN - BitDefender Professional Plus, BitDefender Internet Security (32 Bit)
• Jetico Personal Firewall from Jetico, Inc. *BETA* (32 and 64 Bit)

Pay Versions

• BullGuard family from BullGuard Ltd. - BullGuard Firewall, BullGuard Complete Internet Security (32 and 64 Bit)
• G DATA AntiVirusKit InternetSecurity from G DATA Software AG (32 Bit)
• Kaspersky family from Kaspersky Lab - Kaspersky Internet Security, Kaspersky Anti-Virus (32 and 64 Bit)
• McAfee family from McAfee, Inc. - McAfee Internet Security Suite, McAfee Total Protection, McAfee PC Protection Plus, McAfee VirusScan Plus (32 Bit)
• Norton family from Symantec Corp. - Norton Personal Firewall, Norton Internet Security (32 Bit)
• Panda family from Panda Software - Panda Internet Security, Panda Antivirus + Firewall, Panda Antivirus (32 and 64 Bit)
• PC-cillin Internet Security from Trend Micro Incorporated (32 and 64 Bit)
• Windows Live OneCare from Microsoft Corporation (32 Bit)

Extend Vista Activation period past 180 days

There has been a lot of news about a new technique to extend the activation period of Windows Vista past 180 days. It all started when Brian Livingston posted a story on his site, WindowsSecrets.com, about a registry key that can be modified to allow the slmgr -rearm command to be run more than three times. This allows you to use Windows Vista without having to activate it for longer than 180 days.

Activation has always been more of burden for licensed Windows users than an effective deterrent for piracy. There are already many cracks for Windows Vista that bypass activation completely. The end result is a bad experience for those that legally buy the product.

For me, this is an issue that I am always fighting with. I am constantly building, installing and re-configuring my two computers with multiple vista virtual machines. I don't want to deal with the burden of having to activate my legal copies of Windows Vista every time since none of my workstations seem to last for more than a few months before I reinstall. If I actually activated my Vista Ultimate licenses every time I reinstall I would already have to use the slow phone based system where you have to type in that super long code. Sorry Microsoft, that is a horrible experience that I'm trying to avoid.

Using Brian's registry key and the old 180 day trick, it is possible to setup Task Scheduler to automate these changes to extend the period before you need to activate beyond 180 days. Follow these steps to automate the registry change and activation reset using Task Scheduler:

1. Click on the Start Button, type in Task Manager and hit Enter.
2. When Task Scheduler loads, right click on Task Scheduler Library and select Create Task.
3. Enter in a name for the new task such as "Activation Period Reset". Also, make sure that the user this account is run under is part of the Administrators group and the Run with highest privileges box is checked.
4. Click on the Triggers tab and hit the New button.
5. On the New Trigger tab, select Daily and Recur every 29 days (since activation is required 30 days after a reset) and hit OK.
6. Click on the Actions tab and hit New.
7. Enter in slmgr.vbs in the program/script box.
8. Enter in -rearm in the arguments box and hit OK.
9. Hit OK to save the settings for the new task you created.
10. Now you are ready for the second registry key change that will allow you to run the slmgr.vbs -rearm command more than three times. To do this, right click on the Task Scheduler Library folder again and select Create Task.
11. Enter in a name for the new task such as "Slgmr Reset ". Also, make sure that the user this account is run under is part of the Administrators group and the Run with highest privileges box is checked.
12. Click on the Triggers tab and hit the New button.
13. On the New Trigger tab, select Daily and Recur every 179 days (since slmgr needs to be reset after 180 days) and hit OK.
14. Click on the Actions tab and hit New.
15. Download and save this registry file to your computer.
16. Enter in regedit in the program/script box.
17. Enter in /s "full path to reg file" in the arguments box and hit OK.
18. Hit OK to save the settings for the new task you created.

Your computer is now configured to automatically reset the activation period every 29 days and reset your ability to reset the activation period every 179 days.

3D Cube Virtual Desktop for Vista

Yod'm 3D is a virtual desktop manager that allows you to have 4 different desktops arranged on a 3D cube. Holding down CTRL+SHIFT and using the left or right arrow keys rotate the cube showing the virtual desktops. Alternatively, you can click and drag your mouse to switch desktops.

Video: TweakVista.com demo of Yod'm 3D *

* Because of the capture software I used, the video is very choppy. Normally, the cube spins very smoothly.

Download this free desktop manager from Chris' Soft.

Disable System Restore in Windows Vista

The Windows Vista System Restore feature will make sure that software installations, drivers, and other updates can be rolled back. The only price to this feature is some disk usage. If you want to disable System restore, which is a bad idea, it’s really pretty simple.

Just to make sure you understand… Windows Vista has just been released. There are bugs. Things will crash. Disabling System Restore will keep you from rolling back changes.

So, you’ve read this far. Now let’s disable it. Type system into the start menu search box, and pick the 4th item down, just labeled “System”. (You could also right-click the computer icon and choose properties)

Now click the System protection link:

You’ll see the checkboxes next to your different disks:

Once you uncheck the drive, click the “Turn System Restore Off” button.

Now you’ve got system restore disabled. Living on the edge, eh?

How to Delete a System File in Windows Vista

Warning: Do not delete system files. Bad things will probably ensue.

If you need to delete or overwrite a system file in Windows Vista, you’ll quickly notice that you cannot delete system files, even as administrator. This is because Windows Vista’s system files are owned by the TrustedInstaller service by default, and Windows File Protection will keep them from being overwritten.

Thankfully, there’s a way that you can get around this. You need to take ownership of the files, and then assign yourself rights to delete or modify the file. For this, we’ll use the command line.

Open an administrator command prompt by typing cmd into the start menu search box, and hit the Ctrl+Shift+Enter key combination.

To take ownership of the file, you’ll need to use the takeown command. Here’s an example:

takeown /f C:\Windows\System32\en-US\winload.exe.mui

That will give you ownership of the file, but you still have no rights to delete it. Now you can run the cacls command to give yourself full control rights to the file:

cacls C:\Windows\System32\en-US\winload.exe.mui /G geek:F

Note that my username is geek, so you will substitute your username there.

At this point, you should be able to delete the file. If you still can’t do so, you may need to reboot into Safe Mode and try it again. For the filename in the example, I was able to overwrite it without safe mode, but your mileage may vary.

Disable Power Management on Windows Vista

If you are using a desktop computer, chances are that you don’t want the computer to go to sleep automatically. This is even more the case if you are running Vista in a virtual machine for testing purposes.

Disabling power management is simple and easy. First go to the start menu and click on the Control Panel.

Click on the System and Maintenance link:

Then click on the Power Options link:

Then select High Performance:

This will disable the automatic sleep mode, but will still turn off the display. You can click on Change Plan Settings to disable that as well if you want.