10 Daily Things

If you are planning to get your hands dirty with the new Windows 7 Pre-beta build, beware that it will automatically expire after a trial period of 30 days.

Unless you attended the PDC 2008 and got an activation key, there is no method to activate Windows 7 forever yet but what we can do is extend the trial time period from 30 to 90 days which is way enough as we shall soon have Windows 7 Beta in our hands in almost less than 2 months.

This is the same hack used by most users to reset the activation expiry date twice in Windows Vista Pre-Beta and luckily it works for Windows 7 too.

Here is what you need to do.

1. Download Windows 7 Pre-beta and burn the ISO to a DVD.
2. Install Windows 7 Pre-beta using the DVD and while installation make sure to not put any activation key.
3. Once the installation is complete, open Command Prompt.
4. Type any of the following three commands.
sysprep /generalize or slmgr.vbs -rearm or rundll32 slc.dll,SLReArmWindows
5. Hit Enter
6. Reboot Windows 7 and enjoy another 30 days of free trial.

Note: This method only works twice so make sure to use it only when your 30 day trial period is about to expire.

Free, open-source application Vistumbler scans wireless networks within range of your Wi-Fi antenna, tracks signal strength over time, and handles pretty much everything else that other apps of this kind do.

What sets Vistumbler apart from the rest is its support for GPS and live Google Earth tracking, which plots hotspots on a map. The whole thing is really cool. Still, Vistumbler is an excellent tool even without without the GPS to Google Earth mapping.

Vistumbler is free download, Windows Vista only.

Download Vistumbler >>>

What are the main requirements of a burning software? It should obviously support all operations that a user would need. It should also be fast, resource friendly. Free would be nice as well. Lots of different CD burning software programs are available these days on the Internet, from CD Burner XP over Deepburner to IMGBurn. Most of them handle the basic burning operations just fine but many are unfortunately making them more complex than they should be. Others use to many resources, have an irritating user interface or crash to often to make them the burning software of choice.

Ashampoo Burning Studio Free is an old version of the burning software of Ashampoo which has been released to the public. Everyone can download and use it without having to register or pay money for it. It starts up reasonably fast without splash screens and long loading times. All operations are selectable from the main menu. Some operations are further divided, the Burn Files and Folders category contains options to burn a new disk or update an existing one.

Burning Studio Free supports CD, DVD and Blu-Ray disks. Here is what you can do with the burning software:

• Burn files to disk
• Burn or rip music.
• Burn movies
• Copy a disk
• Create or burn disk images
• Erase rewritable disks
• Backup or restore files

The list is pretty comprehensive. The most popular image formats (img, iso, cue/bin) are supported by Burning Studio Free which should be sufficient for most users.

Most impressive is the responsive interface which is much faster than that of Nero and similar applications.

If you are looking for a fast, responsive and high-quality burning software that does not cost a dime you should take a closer look at Ashampoo Burning Software Free. It might exactly be what you are looking for.

Download Ashampoo Burning Studio >>>

System Explorer gives you detailed informations about Processes, Startups, Explorer, IE Addons, Uninstallers, Windows, Services, Drivers, Connections and Opened Files. Action History for monitoring processes activities. Making of Registry & Files snapshots for easy comparing of system changes. Result of comparation is displayed in tree view and text list. Can be used for analysation of product installers/uninstallers (like Total Uninstall). Performance graphs for monitoring usage of system resources in time. Easy check of suspicious files via VirusTotal. Easy search details about file/process via online databases.

Download System Explorer >>>

Free media file converter FormatFactory is a handy all-in-one utility for taking one kind of audio, video, or picture file and converting it to another. The interface is a dead-simple drag-and-drop affair, and it’s meant for running batches of files through converters-FLVs to Windows Media, MPEGs to iPod-friendly video, DVDs to DivX files, etc. You won’t get a lot of options for quality control, compression rate, or other tweaks, but for some folks, that’s really a benefit. FormatFactory is a free download for Windows systems only.

Download Format Factory >>>