Daily Bits

Software

Microsoft and Sony Announce Virtual World on Consoles

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At the Tokyo Game Show, Microsoft and Sony announced that later this year they would be each unveiling virtual worlds accessible via gaming consoles. While the Sony Playstation 3 would have a “Home”, Microsoft would have a “Xbox Experience” that would let users interact virtually.

Virtual worlds have been growing in prominence the few years. They have been more popular in the gaming community where group tasks and competing among fellow players has been popular ever since network gaming came into picture. Linden Labs took the concept forward to have a virtual environment with even its separate currency.

Virtual worlds logically fit well into the progression of content online. From text, video and audio, the next iteration is to put the very user online. Its an interesting twist on the concept of advertising as well. Now the Avatars themselves will ‘ad-property’.

Microsoft’s and Sony’s move in this direction could well be to expand beyond making the consoles just about games to make the devices a solution for complete entertainment. Google also had entered this space a few months back with the announcement of ‘Lively’. Since then there has not been much news on it but the search giant does have an eye on the advertising market around gaming.

Virtual Worlds also have lot of potential in the business domain. Benefits include cost savings in transportation and also the much desired bliss of working from home but virtually in office. Of course there are all the applications that virtual worlds can be put to in medicine, engineering etc but the real killer one is yet to take the world by storm.

Vista Owners Mass Downgrading to Windows XP

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I am really not sure how Microsoft is still trying to argue with people, defending that Vista is a very good operating system, and that it is only problem is a bad reputation. They even tried to do a “blind taste test” with Vista, making users experiment it without knowing that it was Vista. Pathetic!

Anyway to confirm the fact that Windows Vista sucks (period!), there is an article on The Register claiming that around one third of all Windows Vista equipped machines have been downgraded to Windows XP (some by the PC manufacturers directly…).

Vista’s death march picked up some pace yesterday, after a metrics researcher revealed that nearly 35 per cent of PCs built to run the Windows operating system have been downgraded to XP.

In a survey of more than 3,000 computers, performance testing software developer Devil Mountain Software estimated that more than one in three new machines had either been downgraded by vendors such as Dell, or by customers once they bought the PC.

One third is a really big number, especially if you consider that downgrading an operating system is not a trivial task, and most users would think twice before going through that.

Windows fans, let’s hope that Windows 7 will hit the target. Or give Ubuntu a try, as I have been recommending for a while.

This is Why I Hate PCs that Come with Windows

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I have been running Linux both on my desktop and on my laptop for a couple of years already, and it just works. Recently I decided to sell my laptop to get on a better one, though, so I figured I would need to load a fresh Windows install on it (after all the probability of finding another Linux user to buy it is pretty low).

So I just loaded the OEM Windows copy, installed it, and once I was done BAM! All those bad memories came back suddenly. How much preinstalled crap do they manage to put on those things?

i hate windows

I know that this is not Microsoft’s fault. PC manufacturers are bloating the installs to make some money from the software vendors. I find this annoying nonetheless. And if you think there is not enough crap on that install, just consider that it came both with Norton AntiVirus and Norton Internet Security 🙂 .

The Worst PC Disasters and Their Solution

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I just came across a very useful article on TechRadar, titled The worst PC disasters (and how to survive them). Quoting the article:

You might have spent big money on a great PC, installed only the finest software and spent years learning how to manage it all properly, but the First Rule of Computing still applies: things will go wrong eventually.

Hardware will fail, you’ll delete the wrong file or find your system doesn’t boot, and that’s it – you’re facing a major PC disaster. And if you’re panicked into the wrong actions, then the situation can rapidly become worse.

Here are the problems that they are covering:

  • My hard drive has died!
  • Windows won’t start!
  • Um, I’ve forgotten my Windows password
  • Now my PC has a virus…
  • I’ve accidentally deleted my files
  • Somebody stole my PC
  • My Internet connection doesn’t work
  • My PC keeps locking up and I have to restart it
  • I’m getting errors on my DVDs

The Best Free Services and Software on the Web

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InfoWorld has an interesting list with the best free services and software on the web. They are divided into several categories, including productivity, file sharing, security, video and audio, system utilities and more. Below you will find some of my favorite tools that made it to the list:

7 Tips to Keep Windows XP Fast and Responsive

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Windows XP is a landmark in Microsoft’s history. After a couple of unstable releases, Windows XP ironed out all the creases. Even today, Windows XP is more stable and considered a better OS than Vista by many.

No matter how stable, any (Windows) operating system requires proper care, optimization and tuning to keep it quick and responsive over long periods. Temporary files, crumbs of partially (un)installed programs, cached files and similar add to the bloat and make Windows XP slower over extended usage.

However, following a few simple tips, we can keep XP squeaky-clean and fast – just what you want. Follow these easy tips:

1. Install only necessary apps.
Installing every application you come across, trying them out for a few days and then uninstalling them is a bad idea. Install only the important applications, and then stay with it – do not uninstall. The reason is that more often than not, applications leave various files (temporary, shared etc.) even after uninstalling them. Over time, multiple install/uninstalls can lead to an unhealthy system with unnecessary bloat (and hence slowdown).

2. Install a good anti-virus, anti-spyware and firewall.
Though the chances of being infected with malware is limited if you access only legitimate sites and downloads, it is still better to be on the safe side. Installing an anti-spyware is important, because spyware can simultaneously slow down your system and use internet bandwidth. Refer to my 8 Freeware for Windows post for good software.

3. Defragment your harddrive.
Defragmenting hard drive is commonplace, and is advisable. However, the default defragmentation app on Windows defragmentation is very slow, so using a third-party tool is a good idea. PowerDefragmenter accomplishes this task effectively. See a how-to by Shankar.

4. Use multiple partitions cleverly.
Using multiple partitions can improve data seek times significantly. Create partitions for operating system, program files (and use this partition as the location for all app installs), documents and media. Try to keep the partitions small in size, except for the media partition.

If you have more than one hard drive, use one of them for OS, and the other for other files (media, programs, My Documents etc.). This improves performance, and also increases the longevity of the hard drive on which the OS is located, since the data access is made for OS only. You can check the eHow page about hard disk partitions.

5. Optimize page-file usage.
Windows controls the page-file usage by default, but performance can be improved by setting the limits manually. Go to Control Panel > System > Advanced, and click the settings button under Performance. In the Performance dialog box, click the Advanced tab. Click on the Change button under Virtual Memory. In the dialog box that comes up, click ‘Custom’ and set the value at 1.5 times that of your system RAM. For example, if your computer has 1GB RAM, enter 1536 (remember, 1 GB=1024 MB).

6. Control startup applications:
Startup items can plague your computer with slower startup times. The best way to improve boot times is to disable unnecessary startup programs. Unlike other tweaks mentioned in this post, this tweak will be different for everyone. Common apps to disable include Skype, Yahoo Messenger, iTunes etc. However, ensure that you do not disable antivirus, anti-spyware and firewall applications.

Not sure how to do this? Check this TweakXP article.

7. Ditch Internet Explorer.
Internet Explorer renders pages poorly and gets a lot of flaming for it. However, an even more important aspect is security. Windows and Internet Explorer are tightly integrated. This means that any vulnerability in the browser can make the OS also vulnerable. Spyware attacks, phishing etc. are commonplace on IE. IE 7 is better in terms of security, but still has creases to iron out. A better idea would be to get a third-party browser – Firefox or Opera.