Don't mess with codecs: If you're tired of installing and updating audio and video codecs to extend your player's capabilities, make VLC your main media player. Easily the most compatible media player available, VLC can handle a multitude of file and streaming formats designed for iTunes, Winamp, Windows Media Player, and more.
Prevent stream stutter: Though many factors outside your control could interrupt your video stream (especially if you're streaming from another user's PC rather than from a dedicated service such as Netflix or YouTube), one tweak that may help is to increase the size of your system's read buffer. This adjustment will make the stream take longer to start, but it can also smooth out some hiccups by introducing a little more latency.
In VLC, open the Open Network Stream menu, check Show more options, and bump up the number in the Caching field. In Windows Media Player, choose Options from the Organize menu, click the Performance tab, and manually adjust the ‘Buffering settings'.
Accelerate or slow down podcasts: If you want to play back your audiobooks and podcasts in Windows Media Player at a different speed from the one they were set to play at, you can arrange it instantly via a few keyboard shortcuts. Press Ctrl-Shift-G to make a podcast play faster, press Ctrl-Shift-S to slow it down, and press Ctrl-Shift-N to reset it to normal.
Automate photo uploads: Depending on which photo management software and online photo services you prefer, you may be able to upload new pictures automatically.
LiveUpload to Facebook can publish from Windows Live Gallery, while Picasa can post anything you put in a Picasa Web Album on the Picasa Website. If you favor Flickr, try Foldr Monitr, which can watch a specific folder for newly added images and post them to your Flickr account.
(For more on automating your media collection, see "Automate Your PC's Media Library.")
Tag photos from Windows: If you have a lot of photos on your PC, you'll probably want to organize them with a photo gallery app (such as Windows Live Photo Gallery or Picasa). But if you don't want to deal with an extra application, you can use Windows 7's built-in metadata support to maintain order among your photos by means of descriptive tags ("Kids" or "Vacation," for example).
Just select the pictures in Windows Explorer, click Show More Details... at the bottom of the open window, click Tags, and type the tags you want to use (separate multiple tags with semicolons). Once you've tagged your photos, you can search for them by placing "tag:" in front of your search string.
Sunday, July 11, 2010
Must-have on a browser
Here are some useful tips to improve your web experience on any browser. Enjoy and share comments.
Capture a full-page screenshot: Ever need to snag a screenshot of an entire Web page? Three utilities designed for specific browsers -- Screengrab for Firefox, IE Screenshot, and Talon for Google Chrome -- are perfectly suited to the task.
Try IE-in-a-tab: Even if you typically don't use Internet Explorer, you should have a copy of it handy for special situations. You might need to see how your site works in IE, for instance, or a site you use might not support other browsers. For maximum convenience, IE Tab for Firefox and IE Tab for Chrome let you keep the Microsoft browser in a tab so you don't have to juggle multiple browsers at once.
Bring back the bookmark: If you got out of the habit of using the humble bookmark because synchronizing different sets of bookmarks was too much of a hassle, install Xmarks. It lets you sync your bookmarks across different PCs and across different browsers.
Verify sites' trustworthiness: The Internet can be a dangerous place, but the Web of Trust browser add-on promises to make your excursions there a little safer by telling you how the sites you visit rate in terms of privacy policy, vendor reliability, and child safety.
Save eight keystrokes from every URL: You no longer need to type "www." or ".com" in most URLs. Instead, merely type the unique part of the domain name that you want to visit -- say, pcworld -- into your browser's navigation bar, and press Ctrl-Enter. Your browser will automatically fill in the "www." and ".com" parts of the address.
Middle-click to open a link in a new tab: Middle-clicking a link (that is, clicking it with the scrollwheel) will cause it to open in a new tab. Middle-clicking a folder containing multiple bookmarks will cause all of them to open in new tabs.
Improve a site's printer friendliness: At most Websites, the "printer-friendly" versions of the content are pretty awful. So head over to PrintWhatYouLike.com, and pick exactly which page elements you want to keep in your hard copy.
Capture a full-page screenshot: Ever need to snag a screenshot of an entire Web page? Three utilities designed for specific browsers -- Screengrab for Firefox, IE Screenshot, and Talon for Google Chrome -- are perfectly suited to the task.
Try IE-in-a-tab: Even if you typically don't use Internet Explorer, you should have a copy of it handy for special situations. You might need to see how your site works in IE, for instance, or a site you use might not support other browsers. For maximum convenience, IE Tab for Firefox and IE Tab for Chrome let you keep the Microsoft browser in a tab so you don't have to juggle multiple browsers at once.
Bring back the bookmark: If you got out of the habit of using the humble bookmark because synchronizing different sets of bookmarks was too much of a hassle, install Xmarks. It lets you sync your bookmarks across different PCs and across different browsers.
Verify sites' trustworthiness: The Internet can be a dangerous place, but the Web of Trust browser add-on promises to make your excursions there a little safer by telling you how the sites you visit rate in terms of privacy policy, vendor reliability, and child safety.
Save eight keystrokes from every URL: You no longer need to type "www." or ".com" in most URLs. Instead, merely type the unique part of the domain name that you want to visit -- say, pcworld -- into your browser's navigation bar, and press Ctrl-Enter. Your browser will automatically fill in the "www." and ".com" parts of the address.
Middle-click to open a link in a new tab: Middle-clicking a link (that is, clicking it with the scrollwheel) will cause it to open in a new tab. Middle-clicking a folder containing multiple bookmarks will cause all of them to open in new tabs.
Improve a site's printer friendliness: At most Websites, the "printer-friendly" versions of the content are pretty awful. So head over to PrintWhatYouLike.com, and pick exactly which page elements you want to keep in your hard copy.
Saturday, July 10, 2010
Safely remove memory cards and Pen Drives without waiting
You're supposed to use the Safely Remove Hardware icon in the system tray before unplugging memory cards and the like -- but waiting for it is such a pain that you'll be itching to pull your memory card without waiting for Safely Remove Hardware to do its thing. The key to making quick removal safe is to ensure that Windows isn't writing to the card without your knowledge; if the operating system behaves itself, you can eject the card whenever you want without corrupting your data.
To adjust your settings, first right-click the memory card in Windows Explorer, choose Properties, click the Hardware tab, select the memory card reader, and choose Properties; then click the Policies tab (you may have to click the ‘Change settings' button before Policies shows up), and choose Optimize for quick removal. Henceforth, you won't need Safely Remove Hardware.
To adjust your settings, first right-click the memory card in Windows Explorer, choose Properties, click the Hardware tab, select the memory card reader, and choose Properties; then click the Policies tab (you may have to click the ‘Change settings' button before Policies shows up), and choose Optimize for quick removal. Henceforth, you won't need Safely Remove Hardware.
Disable touchpad clicking when you type
If your touchpad is set to detect a tapping motion as a mouse click, it can send your cursor flying around your screen whenever your wrist accidentally brushes against the touchpad. Grab Touchfreeze, a free utility that automatically disables your touchpad while you're typing, and you won't have to wonder where your newly typed text ended up.You can download this msi from Google Code.
Link
Enjoy.
Stick to one point of view (Windows7 Trick)
Windows will remember and abide by your View settings for each individual folder -- a level of faithfulness that's annoying if you like to stick with a particular view setting. Open a folder, click the Organize tab, and choose Folder and search options. Select the View tab and click the Apply to folders button at the top. You have a new default folder!
Change Windows Explorer's default folder
Tired of clicking through Windows Explorer to find the one folder you use regularly? You can save precious time and mouse clicks by making Windows Explorer open your favorite folder by default. Right-click the Explorer icon in your taskbar, and then right-click Windows Explorer and select Properties. In the Target field, add a space and a file path at the end of the ‘%windir%\explorer.exe' section, so that the new (longer) path looks like this: ‘%windir%\explorer.exe C:\Users\yourusername\yourfolder'.
Run apps from anywhere
You can launch applications and set parameters from your keyboard, without having to waste time digging through the Start menu to find the one you want to use. Press Windows-R to bring up the Run dialog box.
Launch taskbar apps directly (Windows 7)
Put your most commonly used applications in the taskbar, and you'll use your mouse a lot less. Pressing Windows plus any number key will launch the program in the corresponding taskbar slot (so Windows-1 will open Windows Explorer, Windows-2 will open the app positioned to the right of Explorer, and so on).
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