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If you need to find diskettes to start a recalcitrant
computer, BootDisk.Com
is the place! You will also find a huge assortment of freeware and
shareware, including our favorite Ad-Aware and Spybot adware killers.
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Annoyances.Org
has a forum for discussing Windows issues. There is a ton of information
to be found here. |
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Spyware Info is terrific resource for malware issues. They keep track of current trends and offer software to help resolve problems.
Beware careful when downloading free software. Try to verify that you are getting the real thing. We have found what appear to be bogus versions of the good software that this site offers. |
T.C.P
Welcome to "The Converter's Paradise" |
The
Converter's Paradise is the ultimate resource for file conversions.
Convert graphics format, create a self-executing program file from
a text file, and more.
Some of the converters are DOS-based but they should run in a command
window.
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Test your computer ports. Remove vulnerabilities from
Windows XP crackers. Learn about security problems. Steve
Gibson's Website offers a wealth of information and free utilities.
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The File
Farm is an incredible resource, from Internet.Com. Cream
of the crop files from the farm. Be advised, however, that there
is now quite a bit of commercial material here, complete with "marketing".
File Farm may link you to Jumbo.Com.
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The Windows
Users Group Network is a collection of shareware utilities for
Windows, hosted on Microsoft's site. There are some excellent resources
here, but beware of the pop-up ads. |
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WinDrivers
is a membership site featuring drivers for Windows. There is also
quite a bit of commercial material here. |
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You probably have
never had to find a driver for a sound card or network card, right?
OK, so you have. Well, The
Driver Forum is a place where you can post requests for information
and receive helpful replies from total strangers.
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DriverGuide.Com
has an excellent search engine and there is a forum for requesting
drivers. You may donate drivers from your collection to the site.
Membership is required but free.
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Download freeware, demo programs, and more from Download.Com,
a site created by C-Net. You will also find a collection of drivers
and utilities. |
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ZDNet
is from Ziff Davis is the publisher of PC Mazagine. Here you will
find product comparisons and evaluations, utilities, drivers, hints,
troubleshooting aids, and much more. Many of the Ziff Davis writers
have a column on ZDNet. PC Magazine releases several new free utilties
each month. |
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PC
Magazine is an excellent resource filled with reviews, discussions
of new trends, product comparisons, answers to technical questions,
and much more. This magazine has its roots in Popular Electronics,
which ran from the 1950's through the late 1970s. You can read more
about the history of Popular
Electronics on our special page.
The legendary PC Magazine free utilities have been around since
the early DOS days. You can download them from the Internet.
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IrfanView
is touted as a super file viewer. It displays and edits images,
it creates slide shows, and it does a host of other things. You can resize pictures on the fly when you print them. It also
has plug-ins to work with a number of other products, including
audio players.
It is small, it works exactly as advertised, it doesn't try to sell you anything, and
it is free. Of course, the author won't turn down a donation but
he doesn't demand it. Irfan Skiljan, who lives in Jajce, Bosnia,
is the author of this amazing program.
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Top
Shareware offers shareware and some commercial products that you
can try before you buy. They have a nice selection of ad blockers
and privacy filters. What is a lttle concerning is that they also
market a product that allows capturing keystrokes from the computers
of other people. |
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SmartLine's
NT Utility page offers a number of commercial and free programs.
Some of the free include Active Port Monitor; Active Shut-Down,
allows shutting off or rebooting; Active CPU, shows CPU usage; and
CPU Screen Saver, shows CPU activity while screen is idle.
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HotScripts
features a collection of script for a variety of uses. Some are free,
some are shareware, and some are more commercial. There are reviews
and you can rate the scripts. |
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The Internet is magic, right? Just type in a name and you get a
Web page. Well, it isn't magic and it is very complicated. Men
and Mice does an excellent job of trying to make the process
of resolving Website addresses to their IP addresses, so you can
feast your eyes on those pages or listen to that music.
Their DNS glossary
has more information that you will never want to know!
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| BART - Bootable Antivirus & Recovery Tools - can jump start a dead PC and burn files from its hard disk to CDs. This professional grade product runs $300 and up per copy, but it could be just the ticket if you have a computer repair business. |
| Agnitum offers software to protect against trojans, plus a personal firewll. |
| Diamond CS offers anti-worm and anti-trojan software. |
| DSLWebServer can help you set up a small server at home. |
Firewall / Router issues
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Help with various PC and Mac problems:
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| John Matarese at at WCPO in Cincinnati, Ohio, USA, writes articles on software and other handy solutions to problems. |
| Look up Websites by name or IP address. If you know what NSLookup is, you'll love Zone Edit. |
| OldVersion provides older versions of software. This is terrific for people who do NOT want the latest and greatest, much of which now comes with spyware and adware. |
| Protect
your system from advertising robots. Our section on advertising and
privacy has a collection of programs you will like, including Ad Aware.
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| Rootkit Revealer will help discover a "rootkit" on your computer. See our section on modern threats for information on rootkits. |
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TechyNetwork.Com is a membership with forums and resources for the computer geek.
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| Walter
Mossberg writes a column for the Wall Street Journal that often
features software solutions and reviews. There is an archive
of older articles that is very useful. |
| WinXPNews offers some excellent information about using and fixing WIndows XP. |
| World
Time Server will synchronize your PC with an atomic clock. Their
Atomic Clock utility is free and it works well. |
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Useful Tip: The Real Player suite of programs cannot be
removed completely with the Windows uninstaller. Instead, run the
removal utility, which is in the Setup folder for Real Player. The
program name begins with a dot and it may be one of these:
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C:\Program Files\Real\RealPlayer\Setup\.g2cln.exe |
.g2cln.exe - (dot)g2cln.exe |
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C:\Program Files\Real\RealPlayer\Setup\.r1pclean.exe |
.r1pclean.exe - (dot)r1pclean.exe |
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