We’ve got some big ol’ updates for the Cool Tools section.  The folks at Piriform have been cranking out some cool stuff, and they just keep making them better and better.  Best of all they are all free.  They have several tools that help keep Windows happy, a system cleaning and fixing tool, a defrag tool and a system information too.  Check out a brief description of each one below, and be sure to follow the links to the sites for each tool to get all the details.  Be sure to check all of the Cool Tools that we have posted as well as all the good articles in the Library.

Cool tools from Piriform:

• CCleaner – This is a great tool for finding files that can be safely removed in order free up space on your hard drive.  It also has a great registry cleaner, a tool for managing program startup when your machine starts, an interface to uninstalling software and more.  This is a great system maintenance tool.
• Defraggler – This tool is one of, if not the best defrag tool for Windows.  This tool is not the fastest, but that’s OK because it’s very thorough.  It takes time to do it right, and do it right it does from my experience.
• Speccy – I superb system info tool.  No install necessary, just run and collect data.

In all, these free tools rival the commercial alternatives and any tech should add them to his or her kit.  Check ‘em out.

I thought I would post some info and updates about my journey with Windows 7. Recently my primary/system hard drive in my Alienware box died. When I got the box it came with Vista and I hated it, it looked pretty but functioned awful, I had nothing but problems with it. After a while I couldn’t take it anymore and wiped that puppy slick and “upgraded” to Windows XP. Staring at a dead hard drive and a looming fresh install, I decided to give Windows 7 a shot. I had played with it some in a virtual machine and it seemed to do OK enough in the small amounts I had gotten to test it, so I figured what the heck I’d try it out for real.

I gotta say … and I never thought I’d be saying this … I am liking it so far. Don’t get me wrong, it has it’s quirks, and it still has that dreaded UAC stuff to deal with, plus older software that I can’t run anymore, but all in all it has been pretty stable and I am pleased. I hate to admit it, but I really do believe I have seen a performance improvement since installing it the Mothership. I am going to stick with it and see if I can get everything dialed in just like I like it, and I’ll make sure I keep you posted along the way and share any good tricks and tidbits I come across. Stay tuned! Thanks.

Here’s another application tidbit that I ran across and just have to share.  If you are like lots of other folk in that you manage or contribute to any number of blogs out there in cyberspace, and although the majority of your writing and editing time is spent at the PC, you’d love to have the option of firing up your iPhone and tapping out a blog post right there on the spot if the desire so moved you.  Now, unfortunately, this post isn’t going to help people that don’t have or use an iPhone, at least not today.  I would expect though, that the app I am going to talk about will get ported to other platforms, especially popular ones (read: droid/googleOS).

OK, for those iPhone users though, there is an app that so far seems to rise above the rest of the crowd.  It’s called iBlogger and in my time with it has been quick, nimble, easy to setup and use and generally makes blogging from my iPhone an almost effortless experience.  The app supports many different blogging platforms, here is a short list that covers the major ones: Blogger, Expression Engine, MovableType, SquareSpace, TypePad, WordPress.  They claim that more are being added all the time, so if your favorite isn’t listed now, you might see it before too long.

Some of the other features that I like are, for example, I can setup multiple blogs and easily post to different ones, you are not locked in.  You can upload pictures pretty easily too, either taken on the spot or from the Camera Roll.  It seems that there is a limit of one pic per post as of this writing, but again I bet that gets fixed soon.  To sum it up, this is a nice little blogging app, and from what I have read and comparing it to other apps that I have tried that supposedly do the same thing, it is light years ahead of the competition.  It’s not free though, so that could be a drawback for some folk.  When I purchased it recently it was going for $9.99 and so far it has been well worth it.

Now, there is one last tidbit I want to share.  This is for anyone that already has this app, or is planning on getting this app.  There is one thing that would happen when I made a post that really annoyed me, and that was when the application would insert an unwanted advert link at the bottom of the post.  You know what I mean, one of those “Posted by iBlogger blah blah blah” links that took people back to their home page.  Now, I don’t mind supporting an app, when I find something good I want to share it with people like I am doing with this post.  But I don’t want a link like that at the end of each and every post, especially when I didn’t know it was going to do it in the first place.

So now I want to share with you how to make the application not do that.  It’s actually really easy to do, but it wasn’t that easy to find, so I want to make sure all of you know about it right up front.  It’s an option setting like it should be, but it’s not an option you get to from inside the application.  Go to the main Settings section for the iPhone itself, and scroll down till you see a link to iBlogger settings.  Click on it and you will see only two options, one for editing the footer and one for turning off the insertion of said footer.  It’s just that easy!

*Note: No compensation or consideration of any kind was received by Solarum for this post/review.

There is a website out there that I ran across a while back, and I just have to share it with you. Now, I am sure that some of you folks know about this site already, but just in case someone stops by that hasn’t seen this before, you really ought to check it out. It’s a website called ‘Bits du Jour’ which means ‘Bit of the Day’ to the rest of us. What this really means or represents to the visitors of this site is daily deals and discounts of software products. Each day they post a sale or maybe better called a deal on a particular software package for 24 hours, and let me tell you, some of these deals are quite good. It’s not uncommon to see 50% off or more on some really nice software. I know that I have picked up several things that either I didn’t know about or probably wouldn’t have shelled out for until I saw them on this site and at a nice discounted price. You ought to check it out, and do so quite often so you don’t miss anything. One nice feature that they have is that they have a list of what is coming in the future, so you can see if there is anything that you want to look out for. In addition, you can mark items that you want to be notified about when they come up for sale so you can make sure you don’t miss any. That’s pretty cool. OK, enough banter from me, go check out the site now!

*Note: No compensation or consideration of any kind was received by Solarum for this post/review.

Links referenced in this article:

http://www.bitsdujour.com/

This isn’t a review specifically, but I wanted to post some thoughts on the sequel to the smash hit Left 4 Dead, aptly named Left 4 Dead 2.  At first glance, this game seems like a mod more than a true sequel.  The four main characters are new and different, and there are some new zombies to fight.  Don’t forget the addition of some wicked cool new weapons that allow for some more, shall we say, resourceful play.  However, aside from the new eyecandy, it seems about the same.  I am not sure what is in there that classifies this as a whole new release, except that since the first one was so popular, this one was sure to make Valve some money.

Now don’t get me wrong, I am not one of these moonbats that is boycotting the game and/or the company because they released the sequel so soon.  Far from it, and yes I bought the sequel, that’s how I can have some input on it, I have access to the demo.  It’s a free country and Valve has every bit the right to release a quick sequel, just as these people who are upset have not to buy it.  I guess I was hoping for a little more out of a so-called sequel.  Now, to be fair, this *is* the demo I am playing and not the full release, so I know there are lots of things that I haven’t seen yet that may fill it on out and make me change that sentiment.  Even so, either way it’s a way fun game (both of them) and I am sure I will get plenty of enjoyment out of it.  Come to think of it, I have gotten more enjoyment out of the first Left 4 Dead than I have out of a lot of the games I have purchased over the years.  It’s not hard to find a game that looks good, reads good on the ‘net, but is a real clunker once you shell out $50 for it.

OK, I’ll report back more when I have it, stay tuned!