Microsoft Vista and its associated sidebars were not very popular with many users. It quickly faded from existence and was replaced with the much more successful Windows 7. It contains helpful tools called Windows 7 gadgets. Let’s discuss some of the more effective and useful ones to consider using. System monitor gadgets can be very useful to have on your desktop. They provide the ability to monitor your computer’s resources at all times. It can alert you to usage spikes which can affect performance. These spikes are normally not a problem but they can sometimes be indicative of a problem...

The latest smartphones to hit the market are made by Windows. These Windows 7 Phones are far superior to other likewise phones because they offer so much right up front on their home screen. Other phones make you click an application or go into a program in order to see the latest news, updates and/or other information. Here are a few more reasons as to what makes the new Windows 7 phones so great. On the front screen or home page when you first turn your Windows 7 phone on, you will right then and there get all the information that you want. You can customize your front screen to display the...

In the past most of us have used fancy 3rd party tools for our multimedia needs within Windows. Isn’t it about time we actually used the tools that already come with our operating system? Windows 7 has many multimedia enhancements and today we are going to talk about using the Windows 7 DVD Maker. With the Windows 7 DVD Maker we can make professional looking DVDs from our home movie clips. To get started go to Start > Programs > Windows DVD Maker. Then click on add items. Browse your video library and select the clips you would like to work with. Once you add them to the DVD Maker you can...

What if you are working away on your computer and suddenly your aunt calls and says that her computer has a virus and wants you to wave your magic wand, through the telephone line and make it all better? Well, you would probably do the same thing I did and start walking her through the steps to download and run some virus scan and malware protection software. I even went as far as running the scan on my system too, so that I could actually walk her through each step. Imagine the terror in my eyes when something in the process made my computer crash, hang, and refuse to boot. Fortunately, there is...

I was going to call this post, Productivity or Fascism? I spent years working for a company that had all games turned off by default and I only had access to the Company Intranet. This company had successfully removed any remote possibility of enjoying work while using their computers. Windows 7 has the most bells and whistles of any desktop operating system, yet in order to push the powerful business capabilities of Windows 7, games have been turned off by default. Take heart my fellow drones, the games can easily be turned back on. Couple this with a high-speed processor and broadband, and Windows 7...

This is the last article in my series on virtualization using Windows 7. With Windows 7 Professional and Ultimate, you have the option of running XP mode. Based on virtualization technology using Windows Virtual PC you can have a virtual XP environment to run your legacy applications. Why is XP mode only available with the Ultimate and Professional versions of Windows 7? Because Windows 7 already has a built in compatibility feature which should enable most home users to automatically run their older applications. XP mode is designed specifically for legacy business applications, which usually have...