Portable Apps On USB - Wave Of The Future?

Portable Apps are a new class of software that is filling a necessary gap. What is a Portable App? It's a software program that can run off a USB device, often without any interaction of the operating system of the computer. Some still require a little help, depending on the nature of the application, but many can run with or without a specific OS present (like Windows).

Laptops and smart phones are great portable devices, but they can't match a flash drive the size of a pack of gum. As long as there's going to be a computer to hook into where you're going, portable apps can run any of your favorite software. And with the proper security installed, you can insure your data is safe.

What kind of software is available in Portable Apps? Just about everything any user could want. You have complete office suites (compatible with Microsoft Office), graphics software, utilities for data recovery, virus protection, spyware search and destroy, and even hard drive rescue software. All run right from a USB device, whether it's a full size hard drive or smaller Flash Drive.

Most of these portable apps come in small footprints too. My collection uses less than 40 megabytes and can do just about anything I could on a full size computer. I have bigger data files than many of these applications. Even a small 256 megabyte flash drive can easily hold everything you need.

Who thought up the idea to run applications off of a USB device without using the Operating System? The software developers themselves. They tweaked and adjusted the applications to run without any interaction with any operating system to expand their markets. Some applications do need some operating system due to the nature of the software, like the office applications. But most of the utilities don't need any help from the OS.

I've even seen someone rig Windows XP to run from a USB, why I'm not sure but I guess he had his reasons. You definitely can boot from a USB device if your computer allows that type of booting (some older units don't have the bios or internal software to permit boot from USB devices). Bootable USB devices can be a little tricky to setup but it's really not much different than booting from a disk or CD.

If you want to boot from USB devices, you will need to create the boot files on the USB device and make sure that your computer allows booting from a USB device. This comes in very handy when you are trying to recover data, fix hard drives, remove a nasty root virus, or test hardware on any computer.

Even with the Portable Apps that need an operating system, you can carry more than one version to allow you to use any popular OS like Windows, Linux, Leopard, or what ever. I've also seen where a knowledgeable technician can break down the installation of many applications and create a portable version. But you need to consider the software licensing when doing that type operation. Some software vendors do not allow it. You also need to make sure any registry entries are removed when the application shuts down.

One of the factors that motivated this development of Portable Apps is that the software vendors and users really don't care what Operating System they use. The software vendors don't want to be tied to any OS and the users want the freedom of choice. These two factors will not go away any time soon and the market will dictate the last word.

If you're a road warrior or a person on the go, these Portable Apps could make your life a little easier. The flexibility, wide variety, convenience, and mobility are all attractive features.

Want to learn more about Portable Apps? See our Special Collection, Click here for more info: Portable Apps - USB Style

Tools For Your Computer and Mobile Phone Life

Searching the web for some software I have locate a website with many interesting things. Tools and staff that many of us searching for a long time. Tools for our website, mobile phones, computer desktop, game guides and other useful staff.

Some of them are Game Wallpapers, Bluetooth hack 2008, World of Warcraft strategy guides, Skin and theme for phpBB3, Proxy for anonymous web surfing or to bypass firewall at schools and libraries. Another thing that I found is ring tones from the iphone.

Also the site has a section for wallpapers with tones of high quality game wallpaper from PC, PS2 and XBOX games

How to Double Mozilla Firefox Speed

Now here are some Tips & Tricks that can help you double the speed of Firefox.

1. Type about:config in the address bar and then press Enter.

2. In the filter search bar type network.http.pipelining Be sure the value field is set true,if not double-click to set true. HTTP is the application-layer protocol that most web pages are transferred with. In HTTP 1.1, multiple requests can be sent before any responses are received. This is known as pipelining. Pipelining reduces page loading times, but not all servers support it.

3. Go back to the filter search bar and type network.http.pipelining.maxrequests Double-click this option and set its value to 8.

4. In the filter search bar and type network.http.proxy.pipelining Once opened doubleclick on it and set it to true.

5. In IPv6-capable DNS servers, an IPv4 address may be returned when an IPv6 address is requested. It is possible for Mozilla to recover from this misinformation, but a significant delay is introduced.

Type network.dns.disableIPv6 in the filter search bar and set this option to true by double clicking on it.

6. CONTENT INTERRUPT PARSING

This preference controls if the application will interrupt parsing a page to respond to UI events. It does not exist by default. Right-click (Apple users ctrl-click) anywhere in the about:config window, select New and then Boolean from the pop-up menu. Then:

A. Enter content.interrupt.parsing in the New boolean value pop-up window and click OK

B. When prompted to choose the value for the new boolean, select true and click OK.

7. Rather than wait until a page has completely downloaded to display it to the user, Mozilla applications will regularly render what has been received to that point. This option controls the maximum amount of time the application will be unresponsive while rendering pages. Right-click (Apple users ctrl-click) anywhere in the about:config window, select New and then Integer from the pop-up menu.

A. Enter content.max.tokenizing.time in the New integer value pop-up window and click OK

B. You will be prompted to enter a value. Enter 2250000 and click OK.

8. CONTENT NOTIFY INTERVAL

This option sets the minimum amount of time to wait between reflows. Right-click (Apple users ctrl-click) anywhere in the about:config window, select New and then Integer from the pop-up menu.

A. Type content.notify.interval in the New integer value pop-up window and click OK.

B. You will be prompted to enter a value. Enter 750000 and click OK.

9. CONTENT NOTIFY ONTIMER

A. This option sets if to reflow pages at an interval any higher than that specified by content.notify.interval. Right-click (Apple users ctrl-click) anywhere in the about:config window and select New and then Boolean from the pop-up menu.

B. Type content.notify.ontimer in the New boolean value pop-up window and click OK.

C. You will be prompted to choose the value for the new boolean. Select true and click OK.

10. Notify Backoffcount

This option controls the maximum number of times the content will do timer-based reflows. After this number has been reached, the page will only reflow once it is finished downloading. Right-click (Apple users ctrl-click) anywhere in the about:config window and select New and then Integer from the pop-up menu.

A. Enter content.notify.backoffcount in the New integer value pop-up window and click OK.

B. You will be prompted to enter a value. Enter 5 and click OK.

11. CONTENT SWITCH THRESHOLD

You can interact with a loading page when content.interrupt.parsing is set to true. When a page is loading, the application has two modes: a high frequency interrupt mode and a low frequency interrupt mode. The first one interrupts the parser more frequently to allow for greater UI responsiveness during page load.

The low frequency interrupt mode interrupts the parser less frequently to allow for quicker page load. The application enters high frequency interrupt mode when you move the mouse or type on the keyboard and switch back to low frequency mode when you had no activity for a certain amount of time. This preference controls that amount of time. Right-click (Apple users ctrl-click) anywhere in the about:config window and select New and then Integer from the pop-up menu.

A. Enter content.switch.threshold in the New integer value pop-up window and click OK.

B. You will be prompted to enter a value. Enter 750000 and click OK.

12. NGLAYOUT INITIALPAINT DELAY

Mozilla applications render web pages incrementally, they display what's been received

of a page before the entire page has been downloaded. Since the start of a web page

normally doesn't have much useful information to display, Mozilla applications will wait

a short interval before first rendering a page. This preference controls that interval. Rightclick (Apple users ctrl-click) anywhere in the about:config window and select New and then Integer from the pop-up menu.

A. Enter nglayout.initialpaint.delay in the New integer value pop-up window and click OK.

B. You will be prompted to enter a value. Enter 0 and click OK.

A small sample of what you can find at http://www.worldalley.com

James Morris has worked in the computer industry for over 20 years. He has provided end-user support, training, and network administration services in arenas as diverse as the service bureau, communication, manufacturing, and consulting industries. Author's website : http://www.worldalley.com

Tape - Still The Best For Backup And Archiving

Tape is one of the real old die hards in the world of data storage and archiving. (Remember those shots of the Apollo mission when the fate of the astronauts was in the hands of those whirling spools of magnetic tape in mission control?) But with the introduction in recent decades of a slew of more modern media - optical discs, memory cards, and zip drives, for example, does plain old tape still have a role to play?

If you're a traditionalist, you'll be pleased to learn that the answer is an (almost) unqualified 'yes'. Tape's enduring popularity is due to the range of advantages it offers.

For one thing, using magnetic tape for backup is extremely cost effective. You can backup your entire server on one mid-range tape which costs around $20. Plus, magnetic tape can be re-used. So you can copy new information onto tapes from earlier backups. As your data grows and changes, you are always making new copies and are not overwhelmed with countless spools or reels of tape.

Then, there's magnetic tape's long archival stability. Tape is no longer stored on open reels but in hardy cartridge formats which include DLT and LTO. However, the fact remains that tape is a contact medium. So the resulting abrasion will ultimately wear the tape out. Nonetheless, the lifespan of tape compares favourably with other media. And consider this. Drop a tape on the floor from a few feet up, and then do the same with a disk. Which one is more likely to work well afterwards? I think you know the answer. The fact is that any medium can fail. In fact, recent research has revealed that the shelf life of optical media such as DVDs is far less than originally thought. In fact, well under a decade.

What's more, though tape is seen as an old technology, innovation has been going on. For example, the introduction of WORM (Write-Once-Read-Many) tape has provided additional security for data that is being stored for legal and compliance purposes.

Of course tape has its own foibles which need to be handled with care. For one thing, it is a thin plastic medium and so need to be stored in the right environment free from corrosive elements. A dedicated archival room is essential for effective storage.

And with regard to data recovery (http://www.altirium.com/data-recovery.html), you have to remember the following. Essentially, any data that has been overwritten is gone forever. A tape drive will not let you get to older data beyond the overwritten portion. However for tapes damaged by the elements, the scenario is more promising. Ultimately, though, the key to the recovery of tape data is an understanding the data that has been recovered, so the most powerful data recovery tool is the brain.

At the end of the day, every medium has it good and bad points. But magnetic tape's combination of economy, hardiness and re usability give it the edge you need to handle all your data backup needs. Tape for backup (http://www.altirium.com/tape-recovery.html) and archiving has already clicked up a half-century of solid use and looks set to be with us for another 50 years at least.

Mark Sear has been working in the field of Data Recovery since 1984 and later formed Altirium, a company which offers tape recovery and data conversion services for tape, disk and all other computer storage media.

Can your hard drive survive a trial by fire?

When data recovery companies boast of being able to retrieve data from all kinds of damage, they had better be sure that they can back up their claims. The reason: people like PC Magazine executive editor, Jeremy Kaplan, will test their reputations by subjecting hard drives to assorted dangers, such as campfires.

Having successfully barbecued his Western Digital hard drive to little more than a cinder, Kaplan posted it to a recovery company of great repute. If he hoped to stump the company and demonstrate the consequences of unsubstantiated advertising, he was sorely disappointed. Despite the melted circuitry and IDE interface, missing IDE pins, damaged head, and platters buried beneath dust and ash, 100% of the data was recovered.

The supposed challenge slotted perfectly into a routine day for the recovery specialists. In fact, they consider information retrieval from drives damaged by fire to be one of the easier aspects of their job. Some of their more challenging retrievals have involved working on a disk that had been at the bottom of a lake for three months, and piecing together a laptop drive that had been viciously attacked by a pair of pliers. Bullet holes and wine spills are all in a day’s work for this recovery company.

Some hard drive manufacturers have taken the technology of data drives to new safety levels by making them fireproof, water-proof, and able to withstand the shock of a building collapsing.

The drives are guaranteed for the exposure of fires up to 538 degrees Celsius for a period of one hour with the use of the company’s patent pending FloSafe Vents. A fire-resistant insulation formulation and a steel hard drive outer casing bolster the vents’ fire resistance.

Protection from floods, water splashing, and other water related disasters comes in the form of a waterproofing compound that surrounds the hard drive in an impenetrable environment. The safety of hard drives has been successfully tested in both salt and fresh water for a period of 30 days.

In addition to being fire and water resistant, the drives have been designed to withstand the collapse of a three-storey building. The drive is placed inside a specially constructed steel box and 75lbs of one-inch thick fire resistant and crush resistant insulation. The entire box is protected by Hard Drive Shock Absorber Strips.

In addition to protecting your data from natural disasters, the drive provides security from e-vandals and viruses, and a stealth storage feature that enables you to hide particularly valuable information.

The ability to protect, save and recover data has improved exponentially over the last year or so. Hazards that would previously have resulted in irreparable damage and data loss can now be faced with near impunity. If your hard drives are still vulnerable to fire, water, and the occasional building collapse, you should ask yourself why. The current data and protection technologies are designed to offer welcome peace of mind.

Recommended sites:

http://www.klsecurity.com/fireproof-hard-drive.htm

http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,1911134,00.asp

Sandra wrote this article for the online marketers MVI Data Recovery data recovery one of the most successful data recovery companies in the UK today.

Operating Systems: File Systems

Sam Harnett

Operating Systems: File Systems

File systems are an integral part of any operating systems with the capacity for long term storage. There are two distinct parts of a file system, the mechanism for storing files and the directory structure into which they are organised. In mordern operating systems where it is possibe for several user to access the same files simultaneously it has also become necessary for such features as access control and different forms of file protection to be implemented .

A file is a collection of binary data. A file could represent a program, a document or in some cases part of the file system itself. In modern computing it is quite common for their to be several different storage devices attached to the same computer. A common data structure such as a file system allows the computer to access many different storage devices in the same way, for example, when you look at the contents of a hard drive or a cd you view it through the same interface even though they are completely different mediums with data mapped on them in completely different ways. Files can have very different data structures within them but can all be accessed by the same methods built into the file system. The arrangment of data within the file is then decided by the program creating it. The file systems also stores a number of attributes for the files within it.

All files have a name by which they can be accessed by the user. In most modern file systems the name consists of of three parts, its unique name, a period and an extension. For example the file 'bob.jpg' is uniquely identified by the first word 'bob', the extension jpg indicates that it is a jpeg image file. The file extension allows the operating system to decide what to do with the file if someone tries to open it. The operating system maintains a list of file extension associations. Should a user try to access 'bob.jpg' then it would most likely be opened in whatever the systems default image viewer is.

The system also stores the location of a file. In some file systems files can only be stored as one contigious block. This has simplifies storage and access to the file as the system then only needs to know where the file begins on the disk and how large it is. It does however lead to complications if the file is to be extended or removed as there may not be enough space available to fit the larger version of the file. Most modern file systems overcome this problem by using linked file allocation. This allows the file to be stored in any number of segments. The file system then has to store where every block of the file is and how large they are. This greatly simplifies file space allocation but is slower than contigious allocation as it is possible for the file to be spread out all over the disk. Modern oparating systems overome this flaw by providing a disk defragmenter. This is a utility that rearranges all the files on the disk so that thay are all in contigious blocks.

Information about the files protection is also integrated into the file system. Protection can range from the simple systems implemented in the FAT system of early windows where files could be marked as read-only or hidden to the more secure systems implemented in NTFS where the file system administrator can set up separate read and write access rights for different users or user groups. Although file protection adds a great deal of complexity and potential difficulties it is essential in an enviroment where many different computers or user can have access to the same drives via a network or time shared system such as raptor.

Some file systems also store data about which user created a file and at what time they created it. Although this is not essential to the running of the file system it is useful to the users of the system.

In order for a file system to function properly they need a number of defined operations for creating, opening and editing a file. Almost all file systems provide the same basic set of methods for manipulating files.

A file system must be able to create a file. To do this there must be enough space left on the drive to fit the file. There must also be no other file in the directory it is to be placed with the same name. Once the file is created the system will make a record of all the attributes noted above.

Once a file has been created we may need to edit it. This may be simply appending some data to the end of it or removing or replacing data already stored within it. When doing this the system keeps a write pointer marking where the next write oparation to the file should take place.

In order for a file to be useful it must of course be readable. To do this all you need to know the name and path of the file. From this the file system can ascertain where on the drive the file is stored. While reading a file the system keeps a read pointer. This stores which part of the drive is to be read next.

In some cases it is not possible to simply read all of the file into memory. File systems also allow you to reposition the read pointer within a file. To perform this operation the system needs to know how far into the file you want the read pointer to jump. An example of where this would be useful is a database system. When a query is made on the database it is obviously ineficient to read the whole file up to the point where the reuired data is, instead the application managing the database would determine where in the file the required bit of data is and jump to it. This operation is often known as a file seek.

File systems also allow you to delete files. To do this it needs to know the name and path of the file. To delete a file the systems simply removes its entry from the directory structure and adds all the space it previously occupied to the free space list (or whatever other free space management system it uses).

These are the most basic operations required by a file system to function properly. They are present in all modern computer file systems but the way they function may vary. For example, to perform the delete file operation in a modern file system like NTFS that has file protection built into it would be more complicated than the same operation in an older file system like FAT. Both systems would first check to see whether the file was in use before continuing, NTFS would then have to check whether the user currently deleting the file has permission to do so. Some file systems also allow multiple people to open the same file simultaneously and have to decide whether users have permission to write a file back to the disk if other users currently have it open. If two users have read and write permission to file should one be allowed to overwrite it while the other still has it open? Or if one user has read-write permission and another only has read permission on a file should the user with write permission be allowed to overwrite it if theres no chance of the other user also trying to do so?

Different file systems also support different access methods. The simplest method of accessing information in a file is sequential access. This is where the information in a file is accessed from the beginning one record at a time. To change the position in a file it can be rewound or forwarded a number of records or reset to the beginning of the file. This access method is based on file storage systems for tape drive but works as well on sequential access devices (like mordern DAT tape drives) as it does on random-access ones (like hard drives). Although this method is very simple in its operation and ideally suited for certain tasks such as playing media it is very inneficient for more complex tasks such as database management. A more modern approach that better facilitates reading tasks that arent likely to be sequential is direct access. direct access allows records to be read or written over in any order the application requires. This method of allowing any part of the file to be read in any order is better suited to modern hard drives as they too allow any part of the drive to be read in any order with little reduction in transfer rate. Direct access is better suited to to most applications than sequential access as it is designed around the most common storage medium in use today as opposed to one that isnt used very much anymore except for large offline back-ups. Given the way direct access works it is also possible to build other access methods on top of direct access such as sequential access or creating an index of all the records of the file speeding to speed up finding data in a file.

On top of storing and managing files on a drive the file system also maintains a system of directories in which the files are referenced. Modern hard drives store hundreds of gigabytes. The file system helps organise this data by dividing it up into directories. A directory can contain files or more directories. Like files there are several basic operation that a file system needs to a be able to perform on its directory structure to function properly.

It needs to be able to create a file. This is also covered by the overview of peration on a file but as well as creating the file it needs to be added to the directory structure.

When a file is deleted the space taken up by the file needs to be marked as free space. The file itself also needs to be removed from the directory structure.

Files may need to be renamed. This requires an alteration to the directory structure but the file itself remains un-changed.

List a directory. In order to use the disk properly the user will require to know whats in all the diretories stored on it. On top of this the user needs to be able to browse through the directories on the hard drive.

Since the first directory structures were designed they have gone through several large evolutions. Before directory structures were applied to file systems all files were stored on the same level. This is basically a system with one directory in which all the files are kept. The next advancement on this which would be considered the first directory structure is the two level directory. In this There is a singe list of directories which are all on the same level. The files are then stored in these directories. This allows different users and applications to store there files separately. After this came the first directory structures as we know them today, directory trees. Tree structure directories improves on two level directories by allowing directories as well as files to be stored in directories. All modern file systems use tree structore directories, but many have additional features such as security built on top of them.

Protection can be implemented in many ways. Some file systems allow you to have password protected directories. In this system. The file system wont allow you to access a directory before it is given a username and password for it. Others extend this system by given different users or groups access permissions. The operating system requires the user to log in before using the computer and then restrict their access to areas they dont have permission for. The system used by the computer science department for storage space and coursework submission on raptor is a good example of this. In a file system like NTFS all type of storage space, network access and use of device such as printers can be controlled in this way. Other types of access control can also be implemented outside of the file system. For example applications such as win zip allow you to password protect files.

There are many different file systems currently available to us on many different platforms and depending on the type of application and size of drive different situations suit different file system. If you were to design a file system for a tape backup system then a sequential access method would be better suited than a direct access method given the constraints of the hardware. Also if you had a small hard drive on a home computer then there would be no real advantage of using a more complex file system with features such as protection as it isn't likely to be needed. If i were to design a file system for a 10 gigabyte drive i would use linked allocation over contigious to make the most efficient use the drive space and limit the time needed to maintain the drive. I would also design a direct access method over a sequential access one to make the most use of the strengths of the hardware. The directory structure would be tree based to allow better organisation of information on the drive and would allow for acyclic directories to make it easier for several users to work on the same project. It would also have a file protection system that allowed for different access rights for different groups of users and password protection on directories and individual files.Several file systems that already implement the features ive decribed above as ideal for a 10gig hard drive are currently available, these include NTFS for the Windows NT and XP operating systems and ext2 which is used in linux.

Best Regards,

Sam Harnett MSc mBCS

Pixeko Studio �" Web Developers in Kent

I'm a degree educated computer professional and a web design hobbyist

A Basic Tutorial on how to secure your computer from Internet threats for Beginners

Once you are connected to the Internet, there are many Internet threats such as viruses, trojans, spywares, hackers that may damage, slow down or steal information from your PC.

The following points will provide some insights on how you can better protect your computer against common Internet threats. It is written in simple non-technical terms so that beginners or non-technical personnel are able to understand. Every security safeguard a computer user takes will reduce the number of people skilled enough to break into their computer using various attack methods.

(1) One of the common Internet threats is virus attacks. What is a virus ?

Viruses are computer programs which has these characteristics:

1. The program is able to self-replicate.

2. The program is able to activate itself. In addition, viruses spread by infecting files.

Here is my encounter with viruses:

"Back when I was administering multiple office networks across the region, I have seen some viruses such as "Netsky" attacking the computer networks and they come in by the thousands (20,000 in a night to be precise !).

Fortunately, I had an anti-virus program that was blocking these virus onslaught from entering into the Computer Data Centre which holds the company critical operations and data storage. The unsung hero (The anti-virus) did it's job well and not a single virus came through the company network. Unfortunately, the server that runs the anti-virus had a hardware failure due to the extremely high traffic of cleaning these viruses.

I had to immediately get ready a standby server to take over the anti-virus job and later installed a clustered anti-virus solution for high availability. This meant an anti-virus software is the absolutely the first protection that a computer cannot do without".

So how to get protection and are there FREE Anti-Virus ?

The ANSWER is yes. One of the popular Anti-Virus is AVG Free Edition Anti-Virus.

(2) Another form of Internet threat is Spyware.

Spyware programs are able to retrieve various types of personal information and can also by itself install additional software, pointing your web to other web sites that may have viruses. Furthermore, multiple spywares can cause your computer to slow down as it takes up your CPU, Memory and Disk space. Your network performance may also suffer as spyware redirect unwanted network traffic.

Traditionally an Anti-Virus is adequate to protect a PC but now it is essential to also include Anti-spyware program to counter this threat. Anti-spyware programs are to monitor your PC for spyware while giving you a peace of mind while going about your on-line activity.

There are also FREE and popular Anti-Spyware programs such as Spybot Search and Destroy and Lavasoft Adware Personal.

(3) Trojans

These are computer programs that can hide themselves behind an innocent looking e-mail attachment (e.g. a tempting computer game). Once the attachment is executed, the trojan will install itself into the computer and it can now start doing damage to your computer.

Some trojans has spyware, which is software that keeps track of Internet usage statistics and it will send these information back to the creator.

Most anti-virus comes with trojan removal. However, nowadays it is better to equip your PC with a personal firewall. It will help you to block unwanted applications/virus from trying to penetrate your PC.

The above represent the basic defense against Internet threats. Of course there many more measures to minimize these threats. If you require more information and step by step guide to install the above security software, please refer to the website listed below.

Gabriel Ng is the author of http://www.comsectutorial.com This site is setup to provide information, recommendation on hacking prevention, controls to minimise security threats from viruses, trojans, spywares, hacking based real life experience while conducting security assessment and penetration tests. There is a beginner section that guides new Internet users step by step to install the security defenses. http://www.comsectutorial.com/virus.html

Cold Weather Tips For The Laptop

The cool breeze and the tiny rain of snow during the winter season may be a delight to a lot of cold-loving people; it is definitely not a thrill but quite a chill for laptops. Electronic notebooks or more popularly laptops have been made to work in the regularly safe temperature which ranges from 10 to 35 degrees in Celcius or 50 to 95 degrees Fahrenheit. If you should get a shiver, you can always go to the fireplace and get warmed up in front of the warm logs. However, your laptop could not afford to do the same so here are a few tips that can guide you in keeping your notebook safe and warm.

If you live in one of the world's cold regions, it may be best that you purchase for yourself a ruggedized laptop that can sustain cold weather for longer periods of time. These kinds of laptops may be a little expensive but it will be well worth it as they can be counted on even under extreme cold weather conditions. The ruggedized laptops had been duly tested and have passed the MIL-STD-810F standards. If you cannot afford a ruggedized laptop, the second option may be to invest in laptop warmers which by their names have been purposely designed to keep your laptop warm.

Remember what mom always told you and stay out of the cold. As much as possible get shelter away from the snow so it is a big no-no to spend so much time outside while you are carrying your laptop even if it is placed on a bag as it could still accumulate moisture and anything wet could do a lot of damage. After being out from the cold, let your laptop breathe in and out before turning it on. Give it time to adjust to the room temperature first. This goes the same if you open your laptop outdoors, outside but out of the snow of course. Mug or pocket warmers do not work their charm on laptops but could actually backfire for you. These things were not specifically made to warm up laptops so do not use them as such.

Placing your laptop on the trunk of your car is a bad idea even if it is ensconced in a well insulated and padded laptop case because the cool air could very well manage to freeze it. This stays true with the use of heating pads as well. The laptop will warm on its own so give it time. When this happens, the laptop will surely be damaged and it follows that you will lose all your saved information and data. If you think it may be a good idea to use the laptop even if it is inside the laptop bag, think again. This is not recommended as air could not circulate very well in the little room offered by the laptop bag and as a result heat will build up. And do not suppose that you can make up homemade devices that can help keep your laptop warm. Your creativity may be a cause of damage so it would be better to go for those devices that have been tested and have passed known and established standards.

James Brown writes about Best Buy online coupons, Newegg.com coupon codes and Geeks.com bargains

5 Things You Should Look For When Choosing Among Many Windows XP Registry Cleaners

There are a lot of Windows XP registry cleaners available for download on the internet. While some of these Windows XP registry cleaners are free. Some or not.

Which one of the Windows XP registry cleaners should you get?

Here are 5 things you should look for to help you to come up to a decision.

Requisite No. 1: Can You Create Backups For Your Registry With These Windows XP Registry Cleaners?

You should be able to create a backup of the registry before Windows XP registry cleaners start scanning and repairing of the said registry. The majority of PC users don’t know how to manually back up their registry so these Windows XP registry cleaners should create that backup for you automatically when you start scanning and repairing.

This is very crucial.

There is none of the many Windows XP registry cleaners that has a 100% safety guarantee when it comes to avoiding deletion of files by accident which are vital to the operating system.

That’s why having a backup registry will give you safety if a unfortunate deletion happens.

Requisite No. 2: Can These Windows XP Registry Cleaners Find, And Fix, All The Known Problems That Plague Registries?

There are so many potential problems for the registries that you can’t think of. Windows XP registry cleaners should obtain comprehensive databases that will cover all, if not most of these dangers.

Because the primary purpose of Windows XP registry cleaners is to clean the registry.

Requisite No. 3: Are These Windows XP Registry Cleaners Updated Regularly by Their Publishers?

It is important for Windows XP registry cleaners to have outstanding developmental support. Registries get bogged down by excess files from software installations, downloads, and even some websites browsed. New files that get deposited on the registry come up every day.

Updates should be released regularly so that the users can make their Windows XP registry cleaners manageable with the changing times.

Requisite No. 4: Are These Windows XP Registry Cleaners Free From Bugs That Can Jeopardize Your System?

As we said earlier none of the many Windows XP registry cleaners can claim that they are 100% safe registry fixes. At most, these reg cleaners can claim that every step has been taken to ensure that none among the known essential Windows files in the registry will be flagged and deleted.

The Windows XP registry cleaners you will consider should be able to make the latter guarantee, that none of the known essential Windows files in the registry will be flagged and deleted.

Requisite No. 5: Is excellent Customer/User Support Given By These Windows XP Registry Cleaners?

While most of Windows XP registry cleaners have user-friendly interfaces, some of them may be quite confusing for newly users. And the complications of registry cleaning may not be clear to these users.

That’s why it is important that Windows XP registry cleaners should have help desks to assist users with their questions.

Mehmet Onatli is a computer technology enthusiast and an expert in computer performance optimization. His site is about Windows XP registry Cleaners and gives you effective tips and information on how to maintain your registry.

How To Calculate Data Transfer And Bandwidth Requirements

Calculating your data transfer needs, the associated bandwidth and its effects it will have on hosting your web site can be anything from easy; but it is one of those calculations that you'll need to do at some point if you want to make sure that you won't be stung with unexpected costs.

There are various problems associated with calculating your data transfer and bandwidth requirements. How do you account for cached pages and images? What size unit does the host use for their calculations, and how can your bandwidth limit affect the quality of your hosting?

Be Careful

Not all data transfer limits are created equally; units of measurements can vary between hosts and if they don't make it clear be sure to ask them how many bytes per kilobyte they used when drawing up their comparison tables.

Caching and it's Effects on Data Transfer

Many ISPs use proxy servers to help speed up Internet access for their customers. The idea is that these servers keep a copy of your page on the proxy server (for a certain amount of time), and update their copy as you change your page. The effect of this is that while your page may have only be downloaded from your server once, it may have been seen by a number of people.

If you have static pages that rarely change, then caching can go some way to reducing your hosting bill. Clever use of meta tags can tell the browser not to bother reloading the page from the server if it is available on the users computer or a proxy server. Since these revisited pages do not have to be reloaded from your server, a single page request in your logs could equate to several-hundred page views for that page (particularly if you were paid a visit from a large proxy server used by some of the bigger ISPs).

Dynamic pages are not so suited to caching, but if the dynamic elements of pages are not visitor or time sensitive, then caching can be used to some degree to keep that data transfer bill down; for example, a page using the date may only need to be built by the server once each day. In the case of building dynamic pages, caching can also be used to reduce the server load by storing results of database queries in the server cache.

Bandwidth and the Quality of Hosting

When looking for a suitable host, be sure to check out the amount of bandwidth that will be available to your site. Even a site that does not require a great deal of data transfer per month could run slow if you are hosting on a shared server; particularly if you are on the same server as a more popular or bandwidth intensive site.

The more sites hosted on a server, the more likely they are to compete with each other for available resources; including bandwidth. This is why you may notice a slow down in server response times during busy periods, or a sudden peak in traffic at a busier site on a server you are sharing.

Redundancy Matters

How much bandwidth is left unused at any time to allow for sudden peaks in traffic is known as redundant bandwidth. The more redundant bandwidth a particular server has, the better it is likely to cope with sudden peaks in traffic; which can make all the difference between a pitiful and a successful site advertising campaign.

If your site is consistently slow and busy (particularly at set times during the day), then it could certainly benefit from having more bandwidth. The chances are your host does not have enough redundant bandwidth to deal with normal demand; they may need to upgrade their bandwidth capacity or simply review their bandwidth management strategy.

Ideally any host you are considering should have connections to the backbone with at least two service providers and at least 25% redundancy in all its connections. The higher the number of connections, service providers and percentage of redundancy, the better it will cope when things get busy or are unavailable.

Bursting the Bandwidth Barrier

By looking for a plan that allows for burstable bandwidth, you will be going some way to prevent slowdown experienced by your visitors during peak traffic periods. All burstable bandwidth means is that you can use more bandwidth than your hosting plan would normally allow, should you need to; which is extremely handy should the flow of traffic coming and going from your server suddenly peak. Note that the additional bandwidth available to you will depend on the level of the redundant bandwidth in the backbone connections your site has access to.

Hosts that offer burstable bandwidth with your package will let you make use of some (or all) of the redundant bandwidth to help your site cope with the traffic. It would be worth pointing out that it should only be used as a short term solution; since if you are consistently utilizing more bandwidth than your hosting package allows, you really ought to upgrade.

Serving Large Files and Multimedia

If you hadn't guessed already, bandwidth availability can go a long way to determining both the quantity and quality of site downloads; whether they be large archives or multimedia presentations. As access to the server becomes more difficult, the number of packets lost increases. For small files, such as web pages and images, this isn't such a problem; packet loss is (statistically) less likely to occur on small files. On the other hand, larger files are more likely to loose data during transfer since there are more opportunities for packets to become lost. These lost packets can adversely affect the quality of the download. Files can become corrupted; streaming media gets jitterier the more data is lost.

If you intend to host downloads or multimedia files on your site, it is worth shopping around for a host with plenty of bandwidth, data transfer and a good level of redundancy in its connections to the backbone. Having a server that can support resume if serving large files is useful for saving unnecessary data transfer.

Your bandwidth and data transfer costs will make up the bulk of your hosting bill. While burstable bandwidth may be a luxury you could afford to do without, it is always a good idea to get as much bandwidth and redundancy as your budget will allow.

Michael is the owner of FreedomFire Communications....including DS3-Bandwidth.com. Michael also authors Broadband Nation where you're always welcome to drop in and catch up on the latest BroadBand news, tips, insights, and ramblings for the masses.