Meet Your New Vista Toolbox

After posting ‘Meet Your New Mac Toolbox,’ I had several people ask “Hey, how about a clean-up and repair suite for Vista, preferably free and ‘one-click’ easy to use?” Well, I think I found just the ticket in a piece of freeware entitled Glary Utilities which offers numerous powerful and easy-to-use system tools and utilities to fix, speed up, maintain and protect your PC.

Glary Utilities allows you to clean common system junk files, as well as invalid registry entries and Internet traces. You can manage and delete browser add-ons, analyze disk space usage and find duplicate files. You can also view and manage installed shell extensions, encrypt your files from unauthorized access and use, split large files into smaller manageable files and then rejoin them. Furthermore, Glary Utilities includes the options to optimize memory, find, fix, or remove broken Windows shortcuts, manage the programs that start at Windows startup and uninstall software. Other features include secure file deletion, an Empty Folder finder and more.

Clean Up & Repair

• Disk Cleaner
  • Removes junk data from your disks and recovers disk space.
• Registry Cleaner
  • Scans and cleans up your registry to improve your system’s performance.
• Shortcuts Fixer
  • Corrects the errors in your startmenu & desktop shortcuts.
• Uninstall Manager
  • Uninstalls programs completely that you don’t need any more.

Optimize & Improve

 

• Startup Manager
  • Manages programs which run automatically on startup.
• Memory Optimizer
  • Monitors and optimizes free memory in the background.
• Context Menu Manager
  • Manages the context-menu entries for files, folders and drives.

Privacy & Security

 

• Tracks Eraser
  • Erases all the traces,evidences,cookies,internet history and more.
• File Shredder
  • Erases files permanently so that no one can recover them.
• Internet Explorer Assistant
  • Manages Internet Explorer Add-ons and restores hijacked settings.
• File Encrypter and Decrypter
  • Protects your files from unauthorized access and use.

Files & Folders

 

• Disk Analysis
  • Shows you the disk space usage of your files and folders.
• Duplicate Files Finder
  • Searches for space-wasting and error producing duplicate files.
• Empty Folders Finder
  • Finds and removes empty folders in your windows.
• File Splitter and Joiner
  • Splits large files into smaller manageable files, and then rejoin them.

System Tools

 

• Process Manager
  • Monitors programs that run on your PC and stop spyware and Trojans.
• Windows Standard Tools
  • Provides direct access to the useful windows default functions.

As you can see, this is one powerful little piece of freeware. I have found that by pairing the freeware version of Glary Utilities (a pro version is available) with the venerable CCleaner, I get a free solution that compares pretty well to my favorite shareware utility suite – Macecraft’s JV16 PowerTools 2007.

Safer, Faster Surfing With OpenDNS

Question: I have noticed that load times when viewing a web site at work are much faster than what I experience on my home broadband connection. How can I improve the performance of my personal connection to more closely match what I get at my office?

Answer: At IOStream, we deploy our own DNS and WINS caching servers for all clients on the network, thus speeding access to computers, peripherals, or resources located on the Internet as well as the LAN. Furthermore, we utilize Microsoft’s Internet Security and Acceleration Server to filter and secure our network environment from internally- and externally-originating Internet-based threats. Obviously, this configuration is overkill for the typical home or SOHO (Small Office/Home Office) setup. So what is the answer for the target audience of this blog post? OpenDNS. To quote:

“OpenDNS is a safer, faster, smarter and more reliable way to navigate the Internet. Our service is free and requires nothing to download.

OpenDNS is safer

OpenDNS protects you from phishing – bad websites trying to steal your personal information. When you try to go to a phishing site, we let you know. We also let you optionally block adult sites as a category, or individual websites of any type. These services help you better protect those on your network from websites they shouldn’t be visiting.

OpenDNS is faster

You use DNS every time you use the Internet. The speed of your DNS service determines how quickly websites load for you. That’s why you want your DNS service to be blazing. OpenDNS is so fast because we run some of the largest DNS caches around and do it on our own high-performance network.

OpenDNS is smarter

The address bar is how you navigate the Internet. We make your address bar more intelligent. With OpenDNS, you can create shortcuts that let you type something easy-to-remember into your address bar and leap straight where you want to go. And we’ll correct your common spelling mistakes, on the fly. That means when you are typing fast and type yahoo.cmo instead of yahoo.com, you still get there.

OpenDNS is more reliable

Little is more frustrating than intermittent Internet outages. When your DNS service isn’t working, you can’t access the Internet. When you start using OpenDNS, your days of dealing with DNS-related downtime will be over. We know reliability is important, and we stand behind ours.”

The OpenDNS site maintains this page with links to configuration instructions for all devices and operating systems. Also, this PC Magazine review of the OpenDNS service provides even more in-depth information regarding this service.

Defragment A Single File Or Directory

I am often asked what I do to insure that I get clean, reliable ‘burns’ of data to optical media. Of course I rattle off the obligatory “[a] Use a good quality media like Taiyo Yuden or Ritek RiData (My favorite cost/performance brand which I purchase from Meritline.Com or Supermediastore.Com) and [b] burn your data at one-half the rated speed of the media (e.g. 8x on 16x rated media),” but I also add a third preparatory measure of defragmenting the file or directory of files to be burned. Now, the obvious question that arises is “So I have to defragment my entire disk every time I want to burn music, video, or data files?” No you do not, thanks to a couple of great, free, stand-alone utilities for the Windows platform.

The solution I have employed for the last several years has actually been composed of two small utilities that function as one piece of software. I start out with Contig, part of the indispensable Sysinternals Suite by Mark Russinovich. Quote “Contig is a single-file defragmenter that attempts to make files contiguous on disk. Its perfect for quickly optimizing files that are continuously becoming fragmented, or that you want to ensure are in as few fragments as possible.”

To add a GUI (graphical user interface) to Contig, I employ eXcessive Software’s Power Defragmenter GUI. Once installed, you simply launch Power Defragmenter GUI which calls Contig. The user simply selects which file(s) or directory(ies) they wish to defragment, click [OK] and the job is done.

I recently discovered a new utility that replicates the functionality of my existing solution, but rolls it up into a single executable. The program is the aptly named ‘WinContig:’

“WinContig is an easy-to-use stand-alone defragmentation tool that doesn’t create any installation directories or Registry entries on your computer. Its purpose is to quick defrag files without the need to defrag the whole disk. Its defragmentation and analysis engine is based on the standard Microsoft defragmentation API. In addition, WinContig allows you to group files into profiles, and also it accepts a number of optional command-line switches that you can use to control how the program operates.”

After testing WinContig, I have found it a worthy addition to my Windows utility toolbox. Both Contig and WinContig have feature sets that can be valuable in different circumstances and, so, I have taken the unusual step of keeping both programs installed on my system. Be sure to use the previously mentioned ZipInstaller to make installation, testing and (if required) uninstallation of any or all of these applications a snap.

UPDATE: If you are  a Raxco PerfectDisk user, note that PerfectDisk does offer single file as well as whole-disk defragmentation.

Install Zip Files Automatically with ZipInstaller

I was recently asked if there was an automated method by which one could install all the little stand-alone tools and utilities we recommend to our Windows OS end users. I once utilized WSH (Windows Scripting Host) to automate the procedure of extracting an executable from an archive, copying it to the ‘Program Files’ directory, and then creating a shortcut in the Windows Start Menu. However, a few years ago I stumbled across a great little utility that has become a staple of my Windows toolkit. The program is called ZipInstaller and is one of many terrific little Windows utilities available by developer Nir Sofer at the NirSoft web site. To quote Mr. Sofer:

“The ZipInstaller utility installs and uninstalls applications and utilities that do not provide an internal installation program. It automatically extracts all files from the Zip file, copies them to the destination folder you select, creates shortcuts in the start menu and in your desktop, and adds an uninstall module to allow you to automatically remove the software in the future.” Click HERE for a screenshot.

This utility was originally developed to install the utilities in NirSoft Web site, but I find it particularly useful when installing packages like the Sysinternals Suite.