Some Cool applications to monitor your gadgets in Vista.

The new sidebar in Windows Vista provides many opportunities to present the user with information. For those of you that like to monitor your system performance, the sidebar is the perfect place to run various performance monitoring gadgets. Windows Vista ships with a simple CPU and Memory usage gadget, however, there are many more gadgets out there that are much more useful and help you monitor almost every aspect of Windows.

1. Wireless Signal and IP Address Gadget

This gadget displays your wireless network information such as it's status, signal strength and security. This gadget also displays your internal IP and gives you a direct link to your router's / wireless gateway's web based control panel.

2. Battery Meter Gadget

Monitor the battery level of your laptop with this gadget. This gadget provides a much more accurate level reading than the tiny system tray icon.

3. Multi-Meter Gadget

Info shown: - Cpu usage % ( 2 cores ) - Ram Usage % - Ram info ( Total, used, left size) - Status bars animated above 90% - 100 Skins + background selection

4. Uptime Gadget

This gadget allows you to see how much time has passed since you last restarted your computer.

5. Free Space Gadget

This gadget monitors your PC's drives and shows you the available space for those you've selected

Got a Vista-powered notebook? Need a free Wi-Fi Internet connection while you're out and about? Just drop into the Genius Bar at your local Apple Mac store!

In order to demonstrate all the features of Macs, Apple has, in a number of its stores an open WiFi connection and LAN connections on their desktops. Any PC user with a notebook can drop by; take care of their business and leave - as you can see Derek doing in the picture.

It’s a wonder that other PC users haven't already set up camp in Apple stores. But now that the trend is starting, it won't be long before Apple stores are packed with hordes of PC users connecting to the glorious and free Apple Wi-Fi network.

Just look at this PC user, Derek, who very calmly and confidently set up his Vista laptop in the Apple Mac store. He checked his mail, caught up with the news, and even played Final Fantasy XI.

Or, if the thought of actually walking into an Apple store makes you sick then it is possible to get a very strong signal just outside the store. It may be a bit uncomfortable if there aren’t any benches or tables nearby.

What is the world coming to when any average PC user can just walk into the Apple store, plop down their laptop and connect to the network. Perhaps Apple should start checking the operating system of computers before allowing them to connect to its Wi-Fi network.

This is enough to make any Apple fan sick. Someone make it stop!

Source Blorge

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) -- Microsoft has sold nearly 40 million Windows Vista licenses in the first 100 days that the latest version of the operating system has been available, Chairman Bill Gates said Tuesday.

Gates said an accelerating consumer shift to digital lifestyles had helped make the operating system the fastest selling in history, and that premium editions have accounted for 78 percent of Vista sales.

Windows operating systems run on more than 95 percent of the world's computers and represent the Redmond, Washington-based company's biggest profit driver.

Vista, which Microsoft introduced on Jan. 30, also marks the first major operating system upgrade in more than five years from the world's biggest software maker.

During a speech in Los Angeles, Gates said the company named its next-generation Windows Server software -- formerly known as "Longhorn" -- Windows Server 2008.

Windows Server is the server operating system equivalent to the Vista PC operating system, with an emphasis on many of the same features, such as better security.

Via

NOTE: Be sure to unplug all un-necessary USB devices (everything except mouse/keyboard) before attempting any of these steps, as crazy as it sounds many people can not get the Vista install CD to recognize their Windows install to repair it unless USB devices are unplugged. Don’t ask me why. Now you’ve unplugged them haven’t you? You better have. Great, lets go.

Go ahead and get out that Vista Boot disk that you have, insert it into your CD drive and then turn on your computer. Hold down “F12″ while booting to open up your “Boot To” menu prompt. Select “CD-ROM” and then continue by pressing enter. Now depending on several random factors Vista could take almost a full 10 minutes to get to the point where it shows its install screen. But seeing as tutorials work outside the constraints of time, let’s just assume you are already there. First you will see a screen that has some time/region info on it, go ahead and click the next button. Now instead of clicking the big shiny button in the middle, go ahead and click down at the bottom left hand side that says, “Repair your computer”. Now you should see an old Windows 95 stylistic menu and a list of all the operating systems the install disk detects. If your list is empty, try waiting a few moments or removing all but your master hard-drive. And if that fails, just go ahead and hit next anyway. Now highlight your Vista OS and click Next. Now it should start up automatic recovery at this point and most problems can be fixed through this method. But if startup recovery cannot fix the problem go ahead and click on the “Command Prompt” option from the System Recovery Options.

Trick: If you know what your problem is, but just can’t get into an explorer view to delete the files or change a setting, such as compressing your bootmgr ;), at the command prompt just type in “notepad” without prompts and then select File>Open and now you will be in a simple explorer and can make changes as necessary. Back to the original solutions.

Now that you are in the command prompt, type the following commands, pressing enter after each line. NOTE: step 5 could take around 2-3 hours depending on how big your hard drive is.

1. bootrec /fixmbr
2. bootrec /rebuildbcd
3. bootrec /fixboot
4. bootrec /scanos
5. chkdsk /r

Now you should be able to reboot your computer and have everything start up normally. If not, feel free to email me using my contact page and I will try to help you out as best as I can.

Labels: vista boot, vista setup