OK. This next collection is a mashup of various items. Mostly new utility finds as well as few tips/tricks.
Probably something in here to play with for a while.
Microsoft Security Essentials 4.0 Released - Quietly…and related curiosities
I noticed last week that I had some out-of-cycle updates waiting. Curious, I checked on them and found that one was a new version of MSE. Most all of the changes are “under-the-hood” items, although there are a few GUI tweaks you might catch if you look close enough. If you use MSE and haven’t gotten an update for it yet, I recommend you manually apply it.
- Microsoft released Security Essentials 4.0: Free protection from malware and viruses - Caschys Blog (G-Translated page)
- Microsoft released Security Essential 4.0 - Born and Windows IT Blog (G-Translated page)
- Microsoft releases Security Essentials 4 - BetaNews blog
- Version 4.0 of Microsoft Security Essentials released - The H Security blog - Most all of the info about what “changed” in this new version I learned from this post.
- Extending Microsoft Standalone System Sweeper - TinyApps blog. Original post showing how one could extend some functionality to the base MS Standalone Sweeper tool to off-line boot and clean a system of virus/malware. As TinyApps bloggist updated the post, it is now Windows Defender Offline and is more restricted so those tips don’t work in WDO. however…I then found this post,
- How the Windows Defender Offline Beta Tool works - Anything about IT - In which Alex Verboon goes in detail about how one downloads and builds a WDO tool for USB/CD usage. It’s an in-depth post and very good for some under-the-hood understanding of the creation process. That was followed by..
- How to add drivers to the Windows Defender Offline Tool - Anything about IT - Alex Verboon’s follow-up post details how you can add custom drivers or other bits to it.
- What is Windows Defender Offline? - Download link at Microsoft for the Windows Defender Offline tool. I like how it allows you options to create a USB-booting version, a CD-booting version, or a ISO file (for you IODD/Zalman drive users!).
- Microsoft Standalone System Sweeper Beta - Microsoft Connect site for the retired product.
Utilities
Image Writer in Launchpad - Neat tool to write images to USB or memory sticks - Cool project by Michael Casadevall. Read this important announcement as well: Version 0.6 release is back - with a warning.
Image Resizer for Windows - CodePlex project. I’ve posted this utility before but for some reason never got around to installing on my own Windows system at home. Egads! Realized it when I had to resize some pics to send to my brother and wanted to tell him about it for quick-resizing work.
Known Folders Browser 1.0 (for Vista and Beyond) - Kenny Kerr - Super neat tool to show virtualized folders and linking to the actual paths going on behind the scenes. A must-have tool under Vista/Win7. Spotted at ToolTip: Known Folders Browser - Anything about IT blog.
The above tool reminded me of the similar tool (and beloved) SpecialFoldersView over at NirSoft. Take your pick. Both it and Known Folders Browser come in x32/x64 flavors.
Portable WinCDEmu - Not really “portable” but once you run it and do your business, you can then uninstall the driver from within the application. I prefer ImDisk Virtual Disk Driver and Pismo File Mount Audit Package supplemented with SlySoft Virtual CloneDrive on my system. You may also want to check out OSFMount (based on ImDisk), Gizmo Drive, or MagicISO for some more full-featured ISO mounting apps. Spotted over at ToolTip: Portable WinCDEmu - Anything about IT blog.
Fixing Remote Desktop Annoyances - What the.....? blog - a collection of clever tweaks for you power Remote Desktop junkies.
JunctionMaster (or MoveAndLink) - Clever and powerful tool to create NFTS Junctions on your system. Really neat and handy tool as long as you manage to keep your real and virtual link relations straight! Spotted via this JunctionMaster: Move A Folder Without Changing Its Path (Hard Link) post at Addictive Tips blog. Similar (though it doesn’t let you create them) NTFSLinksView utility over at NirSoft. Sysinternals’ Junction tool is a CLI tool to let you view existing ones and create them. Junction Link Magic is another freeware GUI tool. Check out Link Shell Extension as well. Finally there is ntfs link over at elsdoerfer.name for one more tool.
Tips of Note
Windows and boot disks larger than 2TB - Awesome roundup of tips and tricks at TinyApps blog. With large-storage (1TB+) getting more and more common at the consumer level, dealing with prepping these drives for maximum compatibility and usage can be challenging. Thanks TinyApps bloggist! Your awesomeness remains supreme!
Disconnect USB Devices Without Using Safely Remove Hardware Option - AddictiveTIps blog. For those of you who prefer the “snatch-n-go” technique this may be beneficial. See also USB Safely Remove v5.1 (not free), EjectUSB (via freewaregenius/Softpedia), or USB Disk Ejector Free (via Softpedia). For more feature-rich USB removal support there is my new favorite, Dev Eject (beta version 1.0.23 released 4/25/12).
Windows Prefers Wired Connections - Clint Huffman's Windows Performance Blog - I really-did already know this but it was a nicely composed reminder.
Cheers.
--Claus V.
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