Recent Posts

5626

General Software Discussion / Re: General brainstorming for Note-taking software

« Last post by Darwin on May 22, 2007, 04:40 PM »

Thanks Aram, that helps. I'll pass for now - I'm trying to cut down on the software that I have installed AND on my software purchases. Fortunately, Surfulater is reasonably priced to begin with, so if I decide that I need it in the future I won't be regretting not jumping at it today.

5627

Post New Requests Here / Re: Alarm When Power Cord Falls Out of Notebook

« Last post by Darwin on May 22, 2007, 04:36 PM »

I should have been more explicit - I was suggesting that the functionality that is built into my Gateway (and nitemonkey's brother's Compaq - it occurs to me that this might be an Intel vs. AMD thing, or a Centrino thing? as my wife's Compaq is an Athlon 64+) would be a great way to accomplish what Kruskal is after. I *think* that this must be a BIOS setting or an OS feature and not a software install and in my world it's always nice to accomplish these things without having to resort to installing anything.

I'm a complete dimwit when it comes to coding so I may be right out to lunch on this....

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Post New Requests Here / Re: Alarm When Power Cord Falls Out of Notebook

« Last post by Darwin on May 22, 2007, 12:36 PM »

My Gateway (actually re-badged Samsung) Centrino notebook dims the screen to 25% when the AC cord is removed and restores it to 100% when AC is reconnected. However, I don't know how this is accomplished, as there is nothing in my Power options under the Control Panel to control it. At any rate, this is a very effective notifier and I quite miss it when I play around on my wife's Compaq, non-Centrino, notebook.

5629

General Software Discussion / Re: General brainstorming for Note-taking software

« Last post by Darwin on May 22, 2007, 11:47 AM »

I already run TexNotes Pro (though haven't used it in ages - it's a candidate for an uninstall... but I haven't been able to bring myself to do it yet), Check&Get, NetSnippets Professional, Evernote 2... is there any reason for me to try Surfulater? I wonder if doing so would allow me to replace two or more of the apps that I already run? Knowing me though, it would just get added to the mix and nothing would be removed!

5630

General Software Discussion / Re: PC Diagnotic Software?

« Last post by Darwin on May 22, 2007, 11:43 AM »

Hi Tom,

Thanks for noting that - I did follow Carol's advice sometime back and it worked to a degree. However, three things solved the problem (enough that I'm satisfied, anyway):

1. I disabled ZoneAlarm Pro and Winpatrol 2007 Plus from starting with windows - I am on a home network behind a hardware firewall so at home just have the XP firewall enabled when I'm here. I'll disable it and turn on ZA whenever I am offsite (it's a notebook).
2. I replaced my 80 GB 5400 rpm drive with a 120 GB 5400 rpm drive. I *think* this sped things up because the 80 GB drive was down to 3 GB free on the Windows (C:\) partition and about 5 GB on the My Documents (E:\) partition. I could have deleted a lot of stuff (and in fact had done so quite recently), but with storage being so cheap these days - I only paid $87 CDN. for the new drive - why bother?
3. I uninstalled a lot of junk that I don't use much OR, if I didn't want to uninstall an app, I simply created a DirectAccess abbreviation for it and disabled it from starting with windows. I've gone from having over 70 processes running after a boot to 48 and things are much brisker now.

The real difference came with disabling ZA and WP though... I don't need WP monitoring my startup folder all the time (it scanned my startup folder and the registry on each startup and would peg my processor at over 70% while it did so - it didn't USED to do this, so I'm hoping a later build will fix it. However, I don't miss having it run in the background and am happy to open it every so often to check things out).

Anyway, thanks again.

Best,

Mike

5631

General Software Discussion / Re: Web Mail Recommendation?

« Last post by Darwin on May 22, 2007, 10:02 AM »

Just to interject - my Yahoo account (and I also have GMail and MSN accounts, too) now has limitless storage. I'm just waiting for someone to release something like GMail Drive that will let me take advantage of this (because there's no way I'll ever use 2.8 GB of storage just for e-mail let alone an infinite amount - he says in 2007... in 1994 I thought a 120MB notebook harddrive was HUGE and impossible to fill).

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Mini-Reviews by Members / Re: List of disc catalogers

« Last post by Darwin on May 21, 2007, 11:16 PM »

Do you already have the GiveawayoftheDay version of AFO?

5633

Mini-Reviews by Members / Re: PhotoFiltre - excellent raster graphics editing tool

« Last post by Darwin on May 21, 2007, 11:09 PM »

Er, um... dunno! If you'd like to send me a sample file I can try to open it, or I can contact the author and ask him. My gut tells me that this will probably be an issue with the Studio version as well.

5634

Mini-Reviews by Members / Re: PhotoFiltre - excellent raster graphics editing tool

« Last post by Darwin on May 21, 2007, 04:27 PM »

Hi all,

Just an update, Antonio (the force behind PhotoFiltre) has just released version 9 with the following improvements (from the News sections of his site):

- Show EXIF base information for the format Raw (menu File > Image properties)
- Improvement of the filter Gradient (more directions)
- Improvement of the Copyright module (vertical center display)
- New deformation Ellipse
- All transformations (rotation, distort, ...) use a bicubic interpolation
- Improvement of the Deformation brush tool (more precise)
- Deformation tools have a real time preview
- The functions Offset, Replace color, Replace color range, Indexed colors,
  Stroke and fill and Custom filter have a direct preview option
- The Transparent color button is active for layers (contextuel)
- Supports DNG format
- Drawin tools can use true size cursors
- Improvement of the filter Emboss (dialog box)
- Improvement of the Clone stamp tool (clone from other image or layer)
- The texture module can load external texture files
- New Perspective correction module
- New Horizon correction module
- Improvement of the filter Radial blur
- Improvement of the filter Motion blur (dialog box)
- Improvement of the filter Radial masque (dialog box)
- New filter Circular blur
- The drawing tools can draw on transparent area of a layer
- Improvement of the Erase tool (Invert mode for Alpha channel)
- Show active layer bounds
- The functions Progressive contour and Contour 3D auto select the layer
- Possibility to add layers in RGBA mode (transparent background)
- Improvement of the image explorer (scan textures and multiline display)
- Some source code improvment and bugs fixing
- New logo

5635

Post New Requests Here / Re: Global Text Replacement

« Last post by Darwin on May 21, 2007, 01:11 PM »

Vincent - did you look at VGrep? I ask only because I decided to re-download it and take a look. It's got a very simple interface and does all that you require! I'm impressed - set up a folder with a large number of copied text files and then had it replace text within them all and it worked like a charm. Won't work with Office files, for example, but anything with plain text works...

5636

Living Room / Re: UK pc con (sorry, i mean repair) man captured for TV show

« Last post by Darwin on May 21, 2007, 12:40 PM »

Yup - I agree with mouser. People are increasingly worried about getting ripped off (with good reason, evidently) so best to be upfront and acknowledge the potential. I'd advise customers to write down the part make/model/part number, etc of the components in their tower. Perhaps you could generate an inventory sheet for them to fill out with you when you first open up the computer. Of course, this is probably OTT, but after watching the YouTube video, it's something that I, as a potential customer, would do on my own anyway (but then I have no problem opening up a computer case and mucking tinkering on my own (just pulled all three of the household notebooks to pieces to clear out a year's worth of dust, lint, feathers (cushions on the couch), and hair - also found the magentic tip from a Magnadoodle pen in my wife's notebook, that can't have been doing anything any good!). Even so, this strikes me as a good way for you to be open with people and to allay any fears that they might have after viewing the "House of Horrors" episode.

PS Disappointing that Mike Quigley is likely continuing to con people. He's a scoundrel and not to be trusted (hopefully this thread will come up if any potential customer is savvy enough to google his name!).

5637

Mini-Reviews by Members / Re: List of disc catalogers

« Last post by Darwin on May 21, 2007, 10:56 AM »

Thanks Tom! I was up late last night recovering data from her computer (work related, so very important) that had accidentally been deleted. Very romantic way to spend the Sunday evening before a holiday Monday (Victoria Day here in BC)...

Anyway, took the opportunity to put AFO through its paces and was impressed. Well worth a look for anyone trying to choose a cataloguer. My usage was fairly superficial but I was impressed at how quickly it catalogued a 1.5GB on a thumbdrive and how small the resulting catalgue is (333KB - WhereIsIt? has the same thumbdrive catalogued but as part of a catalogue that includes 25GB on a 32GB USB drive - catalogue is a hair over 7MB). It doesn't *seem* as feature rich/tweakable as WhereIsIt? but as noted my usage thus far has been fairly superficial. The interface/features/options/functionality feels very similar to Broken Cross Disk Manager, which I trialled before buying WhereIsIt? and quite liked.

5638

Living Room / Re: UK pc con (sorry, i mean repair) man captured for TV show

« Last post by Darwin on May 21, 2007, 10:25 AM »

Will he be prosecuted at all, or would that require a substantial number of his victims to come forward and work together? A$$hole deserves bankruptcy and prison time.

5639

General Software Discussion / Re: DirMS and Buzzsaw

« Last post by Darwin on May 20, 2007, 05:39 PM »

I've been using buzzsaw for years--long enough that I couldn't tell you whether or not it makes a difference. I'd have to remove it to find out, I suppose

This highlights a "feature" of this category of application: it's almost impossible after a couple of weeks of use to tell whether there is any benefit to running them. I've been running either Diskkeeper or PerfectDisk on my three machines for years and can't even tell if one offers any advantage over the other... Such is life. I *feel* better knowing that I have an industrial grade disk defragmenter chugging away in the background 

5640

What's the Best? / Re: What's the best Journal (Diary) software?

« Last post by Darwin on May 20, 2007, 05:35 PM »

Armando wrote:

I guess I just love EverNote. 
Simple, free, yet very powerful.

and:

Also, too many apps for different, yet not that different, tasks, makes my life much more complicated

Here, here on both points quoted. I love Evernote as well. It's one of those apps that I barely think about anymore, and I see that as a good thing because it means that it fits so seamlessly into my Windows/Office installations and workflow that I don't notice that it's there. Every so often I go looking for something and am blown away at how easy it is...

WRT the second point about needless duplication: I am a software addict. I have five applications for every task that you can imagine. My brain tells me that this is counter-productive (and every once in a blue moon this leads me to uninstall on the order of 100 applications) but my heart yearns for choice and variety (and leads me to gradually re-install the bulk of those apps over time, along with "new finds")! We need a 12 step programme:

My name is Mike and I am a software addict.

5641

General Software Discussion / Re: What is the currently best Desktop Search software?

« Last post by Darwin on May 20, 2007, 05:27 PM »

(edit : tried to make my English more English)

Gulp! I had no idea that English is not your first language... We native English speakers are a spoiled lot - we can communicate with most of the planet in our own language yet few of us need to/bother to learn another language.

As for X1 - your suggestion is tempting - however, the combination of Archivarius (and its speed) and using DOpus 9 to view documents with Stellent viewers accomplishes everything that I need (albeit with the additional need to have two programmes open instead of one. However, if I run with two or more indexers I'd be in much the same boat). Anyway, I'm watching X1 closely and might switch back in the future.

5642

General Software Discussion / Re: What is the currently best Desktop Search software?

« Last post by Darwin on May 20, 2007, 03:55 PM »

Armando - I really miss X1 for this reason, but find that the length of time it takes to open up and then to preview hits on my searches render it almost unusable. This problem got worse with each build that I tried and was compounded in the PIA factor by the issue that I note above WRT setting a notebook to standby or hibernate with Outlook 2003 minimized to tray. The latter problem seems to hold regardless of hardware while the former isn't really an issue on my wife's newer notebook (AMD Athlon 64 3500+ with a gig of RAM and dedicated graphics memory).

5643

General Software Discussion / Re: Lightweight alternatives to FeedDemon

« Last post by Darwin on May 20, 2007, 03:47 PM »

I'm still with Feeddemon 2 - the resource utilization doesn't seem like a big deal to me when assessed relative to its functionality. As noted above, I tend to open it up, read all of the feeds that have been updated since the last time I had it open, and close it again... I've tried a number of alternatives, including GreatNews, and keep coming back to Feeddemon.

5644

General Software Discussion / Re: Software for planning wood bookcases/cabinets/tables etc?

« Last post by Darwin on May 20, 2007, 03:44 PM »

Being into overkill in everything that I do (multiple file managers and file comparison/synchronizing apps on my system for example), I'd go for doubling the shelves AND adding the middle support. My gut is telling me two things: it's time for lunch and doubling the shelves won't be enough to stave off "shelf bow".

Just my two-bits...

5645

Mini-Reviews by Members / Re: List of disc catalogers

« Last post by Darwin on May 20, 2007, 01:12 PM »

I still haven't tried it... I think I may move it over to my wife's computer so that she can start cataloguing her thumb drives and CD's. God! I'm a romantic SOB, aren't I? Well, aren't I? Anyone...

5646

Mini-Reviews by Members / Re: XYplorer File Manager

« Last post by Darwin on May 20, 2007, 01:06 PM »

Weird - once it loads successfully navigating around it goes smoothly. There's a wealth of information there!

5647

Found Deals and Discounts / Re: AccelMan - windows explorer replacement for free by GAOTD

« Last post by Darwin on May 20, 2007, 11:23 AM »

Still playing around with AccelMan. It's growing on me. I've just discovered three points from perusing the help file: GOTD licensees get a 50% discount on upgrades to the next release (I presume this also applies to other FlexigenSoft products that were given away - AccelClip and AccelDoc) which reduces the price to $14.95, a purchased licence entitles you to upgrades and support for an unlimited time (sounds to me like this means lifetime of the product) and finally you can run it from a thumbdrive. I might just spring for an AccelMan licence to support development.

Incidentally, I've had a couple of e-mail exchanges with the author providing him with suggestions (make it a true dual pane manager for a start - he's interested in trying to make this a feature in an upcoming release) and bug reports and his responses have been quick and courteous (and helpful!).

Ultimately, this isn't going to unseat my favourite File Managers (DOpus 9 and XYplorer) but it does take a very different, and interesting, approach.

PS Although a 50% discount is offered, I can't find any way to take advantage of it (I still haven't decided if I want to - but wanted to follow the process through to see how/if it works... I'll e-mail the author.

5648

Mini-Reviews by Members / Re: XYplorer File Manager

« Last post by Darwin on May 20, 2007, 10:59 AM »

Yeah - I hadn't been aware of the beta club (thanks for sending me off for a look) and am amazed that there's a new build with bug fixes available pretty much daily.

BTW the xywiki looks interesting as well, but it loads excrutiatingly slowly (I've had to hit reload three times when it was stuck at between 95 and 100%).

5649

What's the Best? / Re: cd burning

« Last post by Darwin on May 20, 2007, 10:38 AM »

they give it away on magazine disks to, thats how i got my copy

This is what I miss about living in the UK (and the good old days in Canada) - cover disks are damned near extinct in Canada. In fact, in the smallish town that I live in, computer magazines are pretty sparse too - PC Mag, PC World, CPU, Smart Computing. There are a heck of a lot more gaming magazines now.

EDIT: fixed quote

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General Software Discussion / Re: What is the currently best Desktop Search software?

« Last post by Darwin on May 20, 2007, 10:23 AM »

Dang - the archived pst files is a deal breaker for me, too. My wife still uses X1 (as noted above, I've gone with Archivarius) and she needs to have her archived pst's available to her as well. One hopes that they realize that this is a bit of a stupid limitation and remove it. Might warrant a posting on the forum.