Is there an easy way to take my Favorites with me?

QUESTION:
I use the web a lot and I have many Favorites marked in IE so I don't have to type the URLs every time. I love that but I sometimes travel and use other computers, like at my daughter's house. Is there a good way to carry my Favorites with me to use on those other computers?

ANSWER:
One answer is to copy them to a flash memory card or USB thumb drive, but that's not the most convenient way to do it. What if you forget or lose the small device? The easiest solution is to use a tool such as Bookmark Sync that will copy them to a central server hosted by SyncIt. Then you can view them from any Internet-connected computer or even share them with other users if you want. It works with just about any Windows operating system and best of all, it's free. You can download it at
http://www.wxpnews.com/LL10M5/081209-BookmarkSync

The Windows install service could not be accessed.

It sounds as if something happened that damaged or corrupted the installer service files. The installer service is used, as its name implies, to install programs. Try re-registering the service. Here's how:

1. Be sure you're logged on with an administrative account.
2. Click Start Run.
3. In the Open box, type cmd. Click OK.
4. In the command window, at the prompt, type msiexec.exe /unregister and press ENTER.
5. Type msiexec /regserver and press ENTER. Next, you need to give the SYSTEM account full control permissions to the registry hive HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT. Back up the registry first.
6. Open your registry editor and navigate to the following key: HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT
7. Click Edit Permissions
8. In the Group Or User Names list, check to see whether SYSTEM is listed. If not, click Add.
9. Ensure that the "From this location" box shows the local computer name.
10. Type system in the "Enter the object names to select" field, click "Check Names," then click OK.
11. In the "Group or User Names" list, click SYSTEM.
12. Check the Full Control check box under Allow.
13. Click Apply, then OK.
14. Close the registry editor and restart the computer.

How to change IE Security Zone settings in IE 7

To protect against an IE 7 Zero-Day attack, you can set the security zone settings for Internet and Local Intranet to "high." To do so, follow these steps:

1. Click Tools and select Internet Options.
2. Click the Security tab, and click Internet in the zones box at the top.
3. Move the slider to the "high" position.
4. Click the Apply button
5. Click Local Intranet in the zones box at the top.
6. Move the slider to the "high" position.
7. Click Apply and OK.

How to Disable Active Scripting in IE 7

Another way to protect your computer from attack through IE is to disable Active Scripting. Here's how:

1. Click Tools and select Internet Options.
2. Click the Security tab, and again, click Internet in the zones box.
3. Click the Custom Level button.
4. In the dialog box, scroll down to the Scripting section. Under Active Scripting, click the Disable option button.
5. Click OK.

How to create a shortcut to manage network connections

Vista's "bread crumb" address bar in Explorer allows you to create shortcuts that are otherwise difficult to create. For example, let's say you want to make a shortcut that opens the "Network Connections" window (which normally takes several clicks to get to). Here's how:

Click Start | Control Panel, open the Network and Sharing Center.
In the left pane, click "Manage network connections."
Now in the address bar that shows the path, right click and select Copy Address.
Right click on the desktop (or in the folder where you want to make the shortcut) and choose Paste Shortcut.

Now you have a one-click way to open up your network connections to manage them. You can do this with any window that displays a path address in the "bread crumb" bar.

How do I find out how many connections I have to my XP computer?

QUESTION:I have a home network with several computers (my desktop, laptop, wife's laptop, son's desktop and daughter's laptop) and I use my old XP machine as a file server, but sometimes I get a message that "no more connections can be made to this remote computer because there are already as many connections as the computer can accept." Exactly how many connections can we have at a time and how do I find out how many connections there are at a particular time and what they are? Thanks. - Joseph R.

ANSWER:Windows XP Home allows five simultaneous inbound connections for file and printer sharing and XP Pro allows ten.To view the connections, click Start Run and type cmd to open the command window, then type netstat -an to show the current active connections.You can decrease the timeout period to cause unused connections to disconnect more quickly (default is 15 minutes) by configuring the autodisconnect time. To do this, type the following at the command prompt:net config server /autodisconnect:5Replace the "5" with the number of minutes you want to pass before a client automatically disconnects.

How (and why) to re-register the Netshell.dll file

If you try to right click a network connection in the Network Connections folder and select Properties, and you get an error message that says "an unexpected error occurred," that's not very helpful. The most common cause is damaged registry settings that prevent you from viewing the network connection's properties. Here's what you need to do to repair it:
Click Start Run/li>
In the Open box, type: regsvr32 %systemroot% \system32 \ netshell.dll/li>
Click OK in the dialog box If this doesn't resolve the problem, try this:
Repeat step 1 above
In the Open box, type: regsvr32 %systemroot% \ system32 \ ole32.dll
Click OK in the dialog box
Reboot the computer

Can I change the Logon Screen wallpaper in Vista?

Can I change the Logon Screen wallpaper in Vista?

QUESTION: Is there a way to change the wallpaper on the logon screen where you type in your password in Vista? The default is sort of blah and I'd love to be able to have a custom wallpaper.

ANSWER:As a matter of fact, you can switch out the blue and green "aura" wallpaper of the logon screen for something more personalized. As with many things in life, there's a hard way and there's an easy way. The easy way is to use the free utility from Stardock that you can download at
http://www.vistanews.com/XQBLAG/081106-LogonStudio

What happened to the built-in Administrator account and can I get it back?

As a matter of fact, there is a built-in Administrator account in Vista; it's just disabled by default - usually. If you upgrade an XP machine that has no administrative accounts other than the built-in Administrator, and the machine is part of a workgroup (not a domain), then you'll still have the Administrator account in the new Vista installation. But if you've installed Vista clean, or it came preinstalled on a new computer, the Administrator account is nowhere to be found. Here's how to enable it:

1. First log on with your own administrative account
2. Click Start and in the Search field, type mmc.exe, then hit ENTER
3. Click Continue at the UAC prompt to open the MMC console
4. Click File Add/Remove Snap-in
5. In the "Available Snap-ins" field on the left, scroll down and select Local Users and Groups, then click the Add button
6. In the Choose Target Machine dialog box, select Local Computer and click Finish
7. Click OK
8. Expand the Local Users and Groups node in the left pane and click the Users folder
9. In the right pane, right click Administrator and click Properties
10. On the General tab, uncheck "Account is disabled."
11. Click OK

Now you can use the built-in admin account!

How to customize desktop icon size quickly and easily

How to customize desktop icon size quickly and easilyYou probably already know that you can change the size of the desktop icons in Vista the same way you did in XP, but it's a tedious process: right click the desktop, select Personalize, click Window Color and Appearance, click "Open classic appearance properties for more color options," click the Advanced button, choose Icon in the drop down box, and input a larger or smaller number in the Size field to increase or decrease the icon size. Ugh.Vista gives you a much easier way to do it:
Click the desktop.
Hold down the CTRL key.
Use your mouse's scroll wheel to shrink or grow the icons. You can scroll through 28 sizes, from tiny to huge. Cool!

Will the onscreen keyboard defeat key loggers?

Will the onscreen keyboard defeat key loggers?QUESTION:Queston [in regard to the "How to enable the onscreen keyboard" article in the October 21 issue of WXPnews]: If we use this function on a private or public PC are we still at risk if a keylogger is installed on the machine? I was thinking about log-in information being copied. - Steve K.ANSWER:That's a good question, and the answer is "it depends." There are different types of key loggers. Some are physical (hardware) devices, called inline loggers, that plug in between the keyboard and the computer like this: http://www.wxpnews.com/LL10M5/081028-KeyloggerBecause it captures to a built in memory chip what you input to the hardware keyboard before that information reaches the PC itself, using the onscreen keyboard would prevent this. There are also wireless keystroke loggers that work by picking up the signals sent by a wireless keyboard. There are even acoustic keyloggers that analyze the sound of your typing (each character on a keyboard makes a slightly different sound). In these cases, too, using an onscreen keyboard would defeat the logger. However, many keyloggers are software programs that run in the background and can record the characters sent from the onscreen keyboard to the application in which you're typing. Web-based onscreen keyboards provide more protection than the onscreen keyboard built into the OS or one installed on the computer as a program, but some keylogging programs may still be able to capture the data.
The best way to prevent key logging is to run detection software. Like other anti-malware programs, the software can use signatures and/or heuristics and behavioral analysis to find and block key loggers. Anti-spyware programs such as CounterSpy and VIPRE detect key loggers. A "poor man's" method of preventing a keylogger from intercepting logon credentials is to copy and paste them into the dialog box or web form instead of typing them. This is especially useful on public computers where you can't install anti-spyware software. Carry a USB flash drive containing a text document with your credentials on it and you can copy and paste from it. Note, though, that there are also spy programs that capture a screenshot instead of logging keystrokes and this would not prevent those from capturing your credentials.

How to configure notification of completed print jobs

How to configure notification of completed print jobsIf you share a printer that's attached to an XP computer with several others on your network, you can configure XP to notify them when the job is finished - either by sending a message to the user, or by sending the message to the computer from which the print job was sent, even if the user who sent it is currently logged onto a different computer. Here's how:
Click Start Printers and Faxes
Click File Server Properties
Click the Advanced tab
Choose "Show informational notifications for local printers" to notify users when a job is printed on a printer attached to the computer. Choose "show informational notifications for network printers" to notify users of the local computer when a job is printed on a remote computer. Choose "Notify when remote documents are printed" to send a message to the user who sent the print job. Choose "notify computer, not user, when remote documents are printed" to send the message to the computer from which the job was sent, rather than to the user.

Can I change or get rid of the vendor logo in System Properties?

Can I change or get rid of the vendor logo in System Properties?QUESTION:This might sound silly, but I have a computer that I bought from HP and I hate having the HP logo on the System Properties page. I'd also love to be able to take out the manufacturer name and model number, but it's the logo I dislike most. Is there any way to remove it, or even better, replace it with a picture of my own? Thanks. - Bill M.ANSWER:Not so silly; I figured after all the updating of parts and changing out of peripherals on my computer, I should have my own name and picture there in the System properties, so I fixed it, with a photo of Tom and myself taken at the last MVP Summit, to look like this: http://www.vistanews.com/XQBLAG/081030-LogoHere's how you do it:
First, create the picture you want to use in place of the logo. It needs to be 120 x 120 pixels, and saved as a bitmap. You can do this in most photo editing programs.
Now, open the registry editor and navigate to the following key: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE \ SOFTWARE \ Microsoft \ Windows \ CurrentVersion \ OEMInformation
In the right pane, double click the value labeled Logo and in the data value box, type in the full path where you saved your picture (for example, C:\ Users \ JoeSmith \ Documents \ Mypic.bmp)
Now the next time you open the System properties window, your photo should be there in place of the vendor logo. You can also change the information in the values labeled Manufacturer, Model, and SupportURL. Note that if you installed a retail version of Vista, these values won't appear in the right pane. In that case, you can create them. Right click in the right pane and select New, then String Value. Name the new value Logo, and proceed as directed above.

How to enable the built-in administrator account in Vista Home Premium

How to enable the built-in administrator account in Vista Home PremiumLast week, we provided instructions for enabling the built in administrator account in Vista, but unfortunately, that method (using the Local Users and Groups MMC snap-in) doesn't work in the Home editions of Vista. Instead, you have to use the command line. Here's how:
Restart your computer and press F8 during startup to invoke the boot menu options
Select Safe Mode with Networking
Log on with an administrative account (such as the one you created when you installed or set up Vista)
Click Start and type cmd in the Run box
At the command prompt, type net user administrator /active
Close the command window This should enable the built-in administrator account.