Some Games To Waste Your Time

Since we can reset timers of trial games and play as long as we like, it’s time to find some good time wasters :)

Mortimer Beckett and the secrets of Spooky Manor
Search a spine-tingling setting for scattered secrets, broken objects, and the key component of a mysterious machine in this innovative and immersive investigation! Hunt the halls of Spooky Manor for broken objects, return the items to their rightful places, and solve a series of puzzles to get to the bottom of this eerie mystery. download trial





Burger Rush
Help Heidi on her quest to create the perfect burger! Swap and slide burgers, cheese, tomatoes and other essential fixings to fill your customers' mouth-watering orders. Between levels, visit the Burger Shop to get new recipes, upgrade your equipment, or stock up on treats to keep your patrons patient. download






Sources for trial game downloads:
Playfirst, BigFishGames, Reflexive, Oberon

How to Use Trial Softwares Forever

No, i am not talking about cracks or serials. This is (i hope) legal way to do.

Tired of dealing with rogue software, spyware and malware? Spent too many hours removing unsolicited software? Worried about clicking unfamiliar Web links? And dont want to pay for software :)

Answer for this: Sandboxie

Sandboxie is a sandbox-type isolation software for the Microsoft Windows operating system. It creates a "container" in which programs can be safely launched without modifying the host's OS.

Sandboxie runs your programs in an isolated space which prevents them from making permanent changes to other programs and data in your computer.

Ok, how to use it with trial software?

I will try it with a game (1 hour trial), Parking Dash

First create new sandbox.

I named mine as Parking Dash.

Right click on installer and select “run sandboxed”

Install the game.

Play as long as you like (or till key expires). When the key expire, copy save files of the game from sandboxie explorer. Delete the contents of the old sandboxed game.

Install the game again, past your copied save files, continue playing. (Or you can just delete everything except game folder and save folder - , then continue playing).

Keep:

C:\Sandbox\Tahsin\ParkingDash\drive\C\Program Files\Parking Dash

and (save folder)

C:\Sandbox\Tahsin\ParkingDash\user\current\Application Data\PlayFirst\parking-dash

Delete everything else

Note: Sandboxie can be used free of charge for as long as desired, with an option to pay a one-time charge for upgraded features.

Note2: Some software may not be compatible with sandboxie.

Note3:Sandboxie does not run under the 64-bit editions of Windows Vista

Note4: There is also an old trick for trial softwares. Change the system date before installing to some future time.

Slimming down Windows XP

This is a summary of Bold Fortune’s excellent guide.

1. Delete temp files. You can use RegToy Disk Cleaner for this purpose.

2. Disabled Services. You can see which services are running and which programs are using them with System Explorer.

3. Documents and Settings – deletable folders:

Default User/LocalService and NetworkService folders with all of their contents.

C:\Documents and Settings\All Users

C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Application Data\Microsoft\Crypto

C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Application Data\Microsoft\HTML Help

C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Application Data\Microsoft\Media Index

C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Application Data\Microsoft\Media Player

C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Application Data\Microsoft\User Account Pictures\Default Pictures

C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\DRM

If you dont purchase DRM mp3s you can delete this folder. After you delete DRM folder you can also delete these files from C:\WINDOWS\system32:

drmstor.dll, drmupgds.exe, drmv2clt.dll, msnetobj.dll, mssap.dll, WMDRMdev.dll, WMDRMNet.dll, wmdrmsdk.dll

C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Shared Documents (or Documents)\Shared Music

C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Shared Documents (or Documents)\Shared Pictures

C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Shared Documents (or Documents)\Shared Videos

C:\Documents and Settings\USERNAME

C:\Documents and Settings\USERNAME\Application Data\Help

C:\Documents and Settings\USERNAME\Application Data\Identities

C:\Documents and Settings\USERNAME\Application Data\Microsoft\CryptnetUrl

C:\Documents and Settings\USERNAME\Local Settings\Application Data\Microsoft\Windows Media

C:\Documents and Settings\USERNAME\My Documents\My Music

C:\Documents and Settings\USERNAME\My Documents\My Pictures

C:\Documents and Settings\USERNAME\My Documents\My Videos

4. Program Files Folders

C:\Program Files\Internet Explorer\Connection Wizard

Then delete these files from C:\WINDOWS\system32:

icfgnt5.dll....Internet Connection Wizard
icwdial.dll....Internet Connection Wizard Autodialer
icwphbk.dll....Internet Connection Wizard
inetcfg.dll....Internet Connection Wizard Library

C:\Program Files\microsoft frontpage

C:\Program Files\MSN

C:\Program Files\MSN Gaming Zone

C:\Program Files\Netmeeting

Then delete these files from C:\WINDOWS\system32:

ils.dll.........User Location Services Component Module mnmdd.dll.......Application Sharing Display Driver MNMSRVC.EXE.....(NetMeeting Remote Desktop Sharing)msconf.dll......Conferencing Utility Dll msg723.acm......Microsoft G.723.1 CODEC for MSACM
msh261.drv......Microsoft H.261 ICM Driver
msh263.drv......Microsoft H.263 ICM Driver nmevtmsg.dll....NetMeeting Event Logging DLL
nmmkcert.dll....NetMeeting Event Logging DLL

C:\Program Files\Online Services

C:\Program Files\Uninstall Information

C:\Program Files\Windows Media Connect 2 (you can use Windows Media Connect to stream music, movies, and even pictures from your computer throughout a home network.)

C:\Program Files\WindowsUpdate

C:\Program Files\xerox

5. Windows Folders.

C:\WINDOWS\$NtUninstallKBxxxxxx$

C:\WINDOWS\Config

C:\WINDOWS\Connection Wizard

C:\WINDOWS\Downloaded Installations

C:\WINDOWS\Help

C:\WINDOWS\java (the Sun Java installation will create its own folders and subfolders it will need.)

C:\WINDOWS\mui

C:\WINDOWS\Offline Web Pages

C:\WINDOWS\OPTIONS

C:\WINDOWS\PeerNet

C:\WINDOWS\PIF

C:\WINDOWS\Profiles

C:\WINDOWS\pss

C:\WINDOWS\RegisteredPackages

C:\WINDOWS\repair

6. System 32 Folders

C:\WINDOWS\system32\3com_dmi

*C:\WINDOWS\system32\config*

You can delete files in this folders except:

AppEvent.Evt
default
default.LOG
SAM
SAM.LOG
SecEvent.Evt
SECURITY
SECURITY.LOG
software
software.LOG
SysEvent.Evt
system
system.LOG

C:\WINDOWS\system32\dhcp

C:\WINDOWS\system32\dllcache

RegToy – File Renamer

Renaming a couple of files is not a problem; select the file to be renamed click F2 and you are good to go, but when it comes renaming dozens of files, it becomes really burdensome. That's where comes RegToy FileRenamer for our help. It's a small but powerful program with lots of features.

RegToy FileRenamer is an advanced renamer tool for Windows. Some of its capabilities:

Batch file rename, full name, name without extension, rename just the extension, replace some characters, case renaming (all in lower case, upper case, random case, sentence case, tOOgLE case), substring (at beginning, at ending, at position; lenght), remove (at beginning, at ending, at position; lenght), reverse.

If you have multiple files needed renaming this is just the tool you need.
RegToy - Disk Cleaner
Batch file to replace file extensions
How to quickly replace the file extensions of several files

RegToy - Disk Cleaner

Free Windows maintenance tool RegToy is a free suite of utilities : tweaking, window manager, shell context menu extension, disk cleaner, file renamer, file spliter, memory cleaner, registry cleaner, registry backup, screen capture, services manager, shutdown scheduler, startup manager, wallpaper changer, and more.
How to use Disk Cleaner utility:

 
1. Find and clean unnecessary files. Select the drive(s) or folder(s) you want to clean and click scan. After it finishes scanning it will list the files, you can either select the ones you want to delete one by one or you can select them all by clicking “select all”.
2. Find empty folders. Some programs will leave empty folders even if you uninstall them. This option will scan your drives for empty folders and afterwards will list them for you to delete them selectively or all.
3. Find duplicate files. You may download same file twice to different folders. This option will list every duplicate file for you and afterwards you may delete the second file.
4. Find broken shortcuts. Some programs will leave shortcuts even you uninstall them. This option will find them for you to clean.

Fixing iTunes Installation Errors

If you encounter error messages while installing iTunes with/or Quicktime such as “"the installer encountered errors before…" here is a solution for you:
Open iTunes installation file with an archiver program such as 7zip. (File / Open Inside, choose iTunes.exe)


Extract two files from the iTunesSetup file; QuickTime.msi and iTunes.msi, and save them in a local folder.

Open a command prompt window (Win + R -> cmd), navigate to that folder, and run the following command:




”Quicktime.msi /passive“

After you completed installing quicktime, open command prompt again, navigate to the folder where  iTunes.msi is and run
“iTunes.msi /passive”
command.

That also will save your time from uninstalling AppleSoftwareUpdate, AppleMobileDeviceSupport, Bonjour and MobileMe.

Update: You can get the latest itunes only installer from here.

Related posts:
How to Save Streaming Real Audio Files 

MP3 Tagging – The Easy Way 
Winamp Installation Problem

MP3 Tagging – The Easy Way

I have over 4000 mp3s on my hard disk. And I don't like burning mp3s to DVD with missing tags.
Most of my mp3s come from offline satellite download and they came named similar as below:
193.251.135.116_08C9A07485__66477.mp3
You have to rename them one by one according to their tags. This is the easy part since most of the media players can consolidate your library automatically.

* You can consolidate your music library with Windows Media Player by going to options and then enabling the rename and rearrange music using media information.

Main problem is with files without tags or with incorrect tags. This is where MusicBrainz Picard comes to rescue. By matching acoustic fingerprint of your files with its database, it correctly identifies and tags your mp3s. You can also set it to rename your files too in the process.
How to use it:
First adjust the program to your needs.
I enabled embedding cover images to tags and renaming file names.
Under 'View' enable 'File Browser'.
Select a folder which your files reside. Drag the folder under to the Unmatched Files in the center. You can drag the entire folder or choose files individually.

The tagger will read the metadata from each of the files and unless they have been tagged before, the files will be deposited into the "Unmatched files" folder. Files that have been tagged before and contain the MusicBrainz track identifier will be opened up as releases in the right-hand pane.
Once the tagger finishes processing the files, press the "Cluster" button (white square with 'clusters' on them). This will cause the tagger to attempt to group the files into album clusters by examining the metadata read from the files and clustering files that appear to belong to the same album. Files that are not matched into album clusters will remain in the "Unmatched files" folder. In future the tagger will automatically cluster the files when it has finished reading the metadata from the files.
If your existing files do not have an album tag, click on unmatched files to select all remaining files then click scan. All the matching tags will be shown on right pane. You only have to select the matching files and click save.
How to tags files with picard
Advanced tutorial
Musicbrainz server currently has info of 7138615 tracks.
You can also use album art plugin to add album arts in tags.
As an alternative you can also use Winamp for identifying your music files, it has a auto-tag feature which uses Gracenote database to find track information. You can access it by right clicking on any track / send to / auto tag.

How To Solve Common PDF Problems

How to remove restrictions:
Software: Freeware PDF Unlocker

Freeware PDF Unlocker is a freeware program that will remove the password and restrictions on any PDF file that you can read. Most commonly used to remove restrictions such as No printing or copy & paste functions. Uses a simple drag and drop method.

Online: Free PDF Unlock Online Utility

A free online utility that allows you to upload a PDF, once uploaded, a version of the PDF without printing or copying/pasting restrictions is displayed in a new browser window.

How to convert to/from pdf files:
Online: Pdf to text, Documents and images (total 68 file types) to pdf, Webpage to pdf, Zamzar (web conversion service), RRS to pdf
Software: Omniformat (suppoted files)
How to create/edit pdf files:
Online: Google Docs (It allows you to save your files as pdf), PDFHammer (edit PDF files online)
Software: Cute PDF Writer, OpenOffice
Pdf Readers:
Online: Pdfmenot
Software: Foxit, Sumatra

Everything Portable

If you like carrying your favourite software on usb drive here are some populer portable softwares for you:

Portable Browsers:

Opera, Google Chrome, Firefox, OperaTor: for anonymous brwosing.

Office Applications:

OpenOffice, Jarte Word processor (opens docx files, exports to pdf, Sumatra PDF, GNUCash, Sunbird, Thunderbird, Notepad++

Photo editing:

Artweaver, GIMP, Imagine

Chat/IM:

TorChat, Miranda, Pidgin, Windows Live Messanger

RSS/Feed Reader:

FeedDemon, NFReader, GreatNews, FeedReader

Web Editor:

Nvu

Media Players:

VLC, MPlayer, CoolPlayer+, Winamp

Utilities:

ClamWin Antivirus, InfraRecorder CD/DVD burner, 7Zip, KeePass

Sources to find portable programs:

PortableApps.com
Portable Freeware

Mloovi – Get Foreign Language Blog Feeds in Your Language

Mloovi uses Google Translate service to translate web feeds into your preffered language (which gogle translate supports). That way you can subscribe to any(almost) foreign neews feed and read it in your feed reader with your language choice.

You can also use mloovi on your blog to expand your readership.

FileHippo Update Checker

Sometime ago i recommend SUMo for software update checking. Today i found another program: FileHippo Update Checker.

When you install 149kb weighted program it checks your installed softwares instantly and shows their updates (even betas).

You just have to click the green arrow to download the new versions.

Clear Past Items from the Notification Area

Some programs put references in taskbar. Their references will stay in taskbar history even if you uninstall them.

When you open Taskbar  Properties to customize, there are two sections: Current Items and Past  Items.

How do you clear the Past Items?

 

Open regedit from start /run (Win + R)

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\TrayNotify

Delete the IconStreams and PastIconsStream values from the  registry key.

Then open Task Manager, click the Processes tab, click Explorer.exe, and then click End Process. In Task Manager, click File, click New Task, type explorer, and then click OK.

Taskbar history cleared.