They also say that they have held this belief since they launched in 2006 but are not making it an official policy.

I think this is great that they are taking this stance and supporting anti-censorship, but, since they are a US based company, I wonder what will happen if/when the US government decides to start blocking sites.

I still think OpenDNS is a good service and I recommend checking them out if you haven’t already.

Just open a command window and type in netstat –an |find /i “listening”

Here is an interesting video showing that it is possible to upgrade through every major version of windows. The author started by installing MSDOS 5.00 and windows 1.01 on a virtual machine and proceeded to repeatedly upgrade until he reached windows 7.

It is unclear if the virtual hardware was upgraded during the process. I would be surprised if he got windows 1.01 running on newer hardware, or windows 7 running on old hardware.

The bad thing about this is that sometimes people will plug things in to the backup side, not knowing the difference and this significantly shortens the time the battery will last during a power outage. I’ve even had people plug in space heaters on the battery side which overloads the circuitry and ends up killing power to their computer and everything else plugged in. So, here is a little trick I’ve started doing to prevent this.

I’ve been buying the APC BE750G for all the desktop computers, which is a pretty good UPS, over all. One of it’s features is the master / slave outlets so you can have it shut off items plugged in to some ports when you turn your computer off. But, the trick I’m talking about involves the warning sticker they come with covering the backup outlets. The sticker is to warn you to turn it over and connect the battery before you use the backup outlets. Normally you would just connect the battery, then peal the sticker off and throw it away. I just pull back enough to uncover the one or two outlets I need, cut off the excess and leave it in place to cover the other backup outlets. My thinking is that if someone is looking for an outlet they will see the big yellow warning sticker and leave it alone without bothering to read what it actually says. At the very least, it makes it inconvenient to peal it off.

So far, this has kept everyone from plugging things in to the backup outlets, but hasn’t kept them from tripping breakers with the space heaters under their desks.

Dropbox is a service that allows you to synchronize folders and files between two or more computers. Dropbox also store a copy of the folders and files in the cloud on their servers so you can access them from a friends computer that doesn’t have the service installed. They offer a free account with a 2gb size limit and paid accounts if you need more storage.

On the surface, this sounds like a simple, straightforward service, and it is. Dropbox is very easy to set up and use and can quickly make itself an indispensable part of your every day computing. But, once you’re able to automatically sync files between your computers, this opens up many possibilities you may never have thought of.

Here are some of the things that I’ve found very useful about Dropbox.

Moving files from one computer to another. This is one of the obvious uses, but it’s very nice to not need to worry about burning CDs or copying files to a thumb drive just to get a file from one computer to another. You also don’t have to mess with things like network file sharing and firewall settings.

A subset of the previous example is that it’s easy to move files from a PC to a Mac or to a Linux computer without worrying about things like drive format or file systems since Dropbox works on all three platforms.

Keeping a working copies synced up. You can save a document you’re working on in a dropbox folder and be able to work on it from any computer and always know you’re working on the current version. Dropbox will also keep previous versions of documents so you can go back in time if needed.

Automatically starting a torrent download. This is handy for any kind of program that can watch a folder for new files then perform some action on them.

Portable apps. Keep your portable apps stored in your Dropbox instead of a thumb drive. This will also keep the settings synced between computers.

Making large files available to others. When you need to send someone a file that’s too big for email, Dropbox has a feature that lets you share a file or folder with a friend just by sending them a special link. They only get access to the files you specify and not everything in your dropbox.

Online storage as a backup for when you’re at another computer. As stated in the introduction, your files are not only synced between your computers, but an extra copy is stored on their servers in the cloud. This is handy as a backup, or just when you need to access your files from a friend’s computer.

Getting files onto your phone and portable devices. Dropbox apps are available for smartphones like the iPhone and Android phones and portable devices like the iPad.  You can also get documents , PDFs and ebooks onto your iPad using an app like Goodreader.

Store Passwords. You can store your passwords in a program like KeePass to always have your passwords available. KeePass keeps your passwords stored in an encrypted file so there is no worry about anyone getting access to them. You just need to remember one master password and it keeps track of the rest. I used this method for a long time, but have since moved to LastPass which stores passwords in the cloud and integrates with your browser.

Keep your to-do list synced with outlining applications like Noteliner.

There are a lot more uses for Dropbox that I haven’t mentioned here. You can search online and fine several, but I suggest you just start using it and see how it fits in with the way you use your computer.

You can sign up for a free 2gb account to get you started. If you use this link, it will help us both by giving each of us an extra 250mb of space. If you refer your friends and family, you can an extra 250mb for each of them.

Update:

Lately I have started using Windows Live Sync (now called Windows Live Mesh) for the same purposes listed above. The difference was that Windows live sync allows you to synchronize an unlimited amount of files and didn’t have the size limit of Dropbox. The downside is that Windows live sync didn’t offer any online storage but I didn’t really need it for what I use. Since the recent changeover to Windows live mesh they offer 5gb of online storage and a few other features like remote desktop. I admit that I like Dropbox better since it seems to work better and is a little more user friendly, but you should check out live mesh too.

• Run a defrag (see my article on automating the defrag)
• Run scandisk
• Check for old or unapproved programs to uninstall
• Check for old security settings or other configurations
• Update Windows, Office, drivers, and any other programs that need it
• And, finally, run CCleaner

Piriform just released a new version of CCleaner. Some of the more notable updates include native 64-bit support, a new drive wiper tool, support for newer browsers and web standards, as well as various other cosmetic changes.

Check out the Piriform blog for more information on the update and to download a free copy.

Let me know in the comments what programs you like to use for PC maintenance or if you’ve given the new version of CCleaner a try.

The first book they are going to be going through is The Practice of System and Network Administration. It looks like a very interesting book and I can’t wait to start going through it. They describe it as a “non-technical” technical book because it talks about general concepts and procedures instead of specifics that may change with each software upgrade.

Here are some of the more interesting chapter titles:

-What to do when… (How to handle various situations)

-Climb out of the hole (Managing your backlog of tasks)

-Workstations

-Servers

-Services

I think this book is going to be very useful for me since I’m the only IT person where I work and sometimes that makes it hard to keep up on new administration procedures.

They are going to be discussing it chapter by chapter on their blog, so head over to the Mind of Root blog and check out the discussions.

Let me know in the comments below if you have any similar book recommendations.

Windows ReadyBoost is a technology that was first introduced with Windows Vista then continued in Windows 7. It helps speed up your computer by allowing windows to use it for swap space as well as optimizing system and application startup files on it so they load more quickly. This works better than a hard drive alone because startup and swapping usually involves accessing many small files and flash memory exceeds over hard drives at its random access speed. This also works with your hard drive so that two data stores are being access at the same time to help eliminate bottlenecks and queuing. It is also safe since it is only keeping a copy of the files which are still stored on your hard drive. This means you won’t lose any data or cause any harm to your computer if for some reason it fails or isn’t there when you boot up.

My friend showed me this microSD card reader which was small enough to carry on his keychain and not get in the way. I notice how small it was after the cover was removed, then had the idea of using it as a permanent ReadyBoost drive for my laptop. The key component is an elago Mobile Nano II USB microSD Card Reader.  You also need a microSD or microSDHC card that’s fast enough to use with ReadyBoost. The faster, the better. I’m using this Transcend 8gb Class 6 MicroSDHC card.

Here is the card reader without the cover. See how small it is?

The microSD card sticks in the front of the reader in a slot under the USB connector.

Here is the card in the reader. You can hardly tell it’s there.

Now, just put it in one of your laptop’s USB ports…

…and set up ReadyBoost.

I put it in the side since it gets in the way of the docking station if I use one of the ports on the back. Even so, you can barely even notice it’s there and it never gets in the way.

Microsoft recommends a readyboost drive about twice the size of the physical memory you have. Since I have two gigs of memory in this laptop, I only used about half of this 8gb flash drive leaving 4gb free. You can use this extra space as extra storage, or do what I did.

Stay tuned to an upcoming post about how I used the extra space as a:

Multi-Boot Linux USB Boot Drive

Subscribe to the RSS feed or mailing list to be notified as soon as it’s available.

Questions or comments? let me know if this worked for you or if you have a different solution in the comments below.

Defragging (or defragmenting) is the process of rearranging files on your hard drive so that they take up one contiguous space instead of being spread out in multiple places across the drive. This can speed up system performance since the drive heads don’t have to jump around to read a file and can access it all in one shot. It is a good idea to defragment your hard drive regularly, but it’s tough to remember and if you start it manually while you’re using your computer, then it really slows everything down until it’s done, and may not even run at all while other applications are running. It would be nice to be able to schedule the defragment process to run while you were away from your computer so you never have to think about it.

There are lots of disk defragger tools available for windows for free like Defraggler and MyDefrag, or to buy like Diskeeper. These 3rd party disk defragmenter utilities add a lot of nice features like scheduling and optimization but generally require installing a system services that constantly runs in the background, which just adds extra overhead to your already slow system.

The truth is that the built in windows defragging program does an adequate job, but doesn’t have a way for you to schedule it to run at a specific time. Using the task scheduler, also built in to Windows, you can schedule a defrag to run for free without running any 3rd party software or services. This is already set up in Windows Vista and Windows 7, but if you’re still using Windows XP, you can use these methods to schedule a defrag of your hard drives, automating the process.

Schedule by Hand:

The first method is to manually create a scheduled task by going to “start, all programs, accessories, system tools, then scheduled tasks.” Create a new task to run “c:\windows\system32\defrag.exe C:” under the administrator account.

Then, schedule it to run once a week or on whatever schedule you like.

Schedule via Command Line:

An alternate method is to use the schtasks command in a DOS command prompt to set the scheduled task. This is useful if you want to include it in a batch file for a startup script or push it through a domain group policy (GPO).

Here is an example of how to use schtasks to configure defrag.exe to run every Wednesday at 1:00 am under the local system account.

schtasks /create /TN Defrag /SC WEEKLY /MO 1 /D WED /ST 01:00:00 /RU SYSTEM /TR “c:\windows\system32\defrag.exe C:”

You will end up with a scheduled task that looks like this:

I use a remote system management tool called VNCScan and you can use the command line version of this to push the scheduled tasks to remote computers on your network.

Let me know how this worked for you or any questions or comments in the comments section below.

Update:

I’ve noticed some users are turning off their computers at night, so the defrag job never runs. For them I configured it to run at lunch time, but only if the computer has been idle for 10 minutes. You can see the settings below. It checks to see if their computer has been idle for 10 minutes and if not, retries for 60 minutes. I have also configured it to only defrag for an hour max so it won’t interfere with their work when the come back. I think if their computers are being defragged every week, it shouldn’t take more than an hour anyway.

These alerts can also be configured to perform an action like shutting down the computer or putting it to sleep or in hibernation mode. But, since the UPS can only connect to one server, what do you do if you have two or more servers plugged in to it? That’s where the instructions you are about to read come in. With a little bit of batch file Kung Fu and a small, free utility, it can be a very easy task.

First you’re going to need to download PsTools from SysInternals (now owned by Microsoft), extract the PsShutdown.exe executable and save it in a folder where you’re going to put everything else. I just used C:\shutdown for this. In case you haven’t figured it out yet, all of the magic will run from the server connected directly to the UPS.

You will also need a text file with the names of the servers you want to shutdown (not including the server plugged in to the UPS). Name it ServList.txt and save it in the same folder you created in the last step. It should have the names or IP addresses of each server, one on each line like this:

Next you will need the batch file which actually does the dirty work. Here are the contents so you can copy and paste into a file called shut.bat and, again, save it in the same folder as everything else.

REM variable "ServList" is the path to the list of servers
SET ServList=c:\shutdown\ServList.txt

REM variable "LogFile" is the path to the list of servers
SET LogFile=c:\shutdown\LogFile.txt

psshutdown.exe -t 10 -c @%ServList% -m "System Shutting down" 2>&1 | findstr . >>"%LogFile%"

Her is a quick overview of what the batch script is doing. The first and second commands set variables that contain the paths to the list of servers and the logfile where we will output the results. Just edit those lines as needed depending on where you stored the files. The last line actually runs the psshutdown application with the correct switches (options) needed. These options are:

-t 10

Sets the countdown delay to 10 seconds.

-c

Allows any logged in users to abort the shutdown process.

@%ServList%

Tells it to use the list of servers we created earlier.

-m "System Shutting down"

Sends a message to the console in case someone is logged in.

2>&1 | findstr . >> "%LogFile%"

Pipes any output messages from psshutdown to the findstr command which then pipes them to the logfile for troubleshooting. If you want to get fancy, you could add additional timestamps or other information, but I find the built in windows system logs are detailed enough.

After you have all the files compiled, your shutdown folder should look like this (the logfile.txt file will be created the first time you run the script):

At this point, you can go ahead and test out the script to see if it works. Just remember that you will need to be logged in as a user with administrator rights on the remote machines and also don’t run it on any production servers unless it’s after hours. Also remember that if you are running it on remote servers, you will need someone there or some other mechanism to turn them back on!

Now to configure the automated part. From the control panel open the power options and go to the UPS tab. You should already have the UPS set up and see something like this:

Click on the Configure button to get to the UPS configuration screen. Here, you can set the amount of time the server will run on battery before triggering the critical alarm. This time you allow will depend on the type and number of servers plugged in and the size of the UPS. In my case I can run for almost an hour before the battery dies, but there is no reason to run the batteries dry and I figure if the power is out for more than 15 minutes, it’s probably going to be out for a while, so I may as well start shutting everything down.

The next field is where you tell it to run the shutdown batch file which is going to tell the other servers to shut down. After it’s done with that, the last thing it does is shut its self down.

When you configure the critical alarm to run a program it actually creates a scheduled task. This is finally where you point the task to the batch file and configure the credentials to run it as. In my case, the servers are all members of an active directory domain so I ran it as the domain administrator, which has administrator access on each system. You could also create a special user account for this task, or if the computers aren’t members of a domain, just create an account on each machine with the same user name and password and local administrator permissions.

And that’s all there is to it. Just save all the windows you have open and you’re ready to go.

Let me know if you found this tutorial helpful or if you have any other suggestions or methods that worked for you

Thanks for reading.