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Optimize Windows
Me/2000/XP p.70

jse Email Tricks
lock Spam p. 40

Format Excel
Like A Pro p. 30

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August 2004 Vol. 2 Iss.
$7.99 U.S. $9.99 Canada

IBM ThinkPad X Series

GO with IBM Think Express Program

IBM ThinkExpress models are designed, configured

and priced with small to medium-size businesses in mind.

CNET Editors Choice Award, March, 2004
IBM ThinkPad X40

"Availability: All oflers subject to availability. IBM reserves the right to alter product offerings and specifications at any time, without notice. IBM is not responsible for photographic or typographic errors. Pricing:
does not include tax or shipping and is subject to change without notice. Reseller prices may vary. Warranty: For a copy of applicable product warranties, write to: Warranty Information, P.O. Box 12195, RTP, NC
27709. Attn: Dept JDJA/B203 IBM makes no representation or warranty regarding third-party products or services Footnotes: (1) Mobile Processor: Power management reduces processor speed when in battery
mode. (2) Wireless 11a, 11b and 11g: based on IEEE 80211a, 802.11 band 802.1 1g respectively. An adapter with 11a/b, 1 1 b/g or 11 a/b/g can communicate on either or any of these listed formats respectively; the
actual connection will be based on the access point to which it connects. (3) Included software: may differ from its retail version (il available) and may not include user manuals or all program functionaJity License
agreements may apply (4) Hard drive: GB - billion bytes. Accessible capacity is less: up to 4GB is service partition. (5) Memory: For PCs without a separate video card, memory supports both system and video.
Accessible system memory is up to 64MB less than the amount stated, depending on video mode. (6) Limited warranty: Support unrelated to a warranty issue may be subject to additional charges. (7) ServicePac
services: are available for machines normally used for business, professional or trade purposes, rather than personal, family or household purposes. Service period begins with the equipment date of purchase. Service

IBM recommends Microsoft 9 Windows 9 XP Professional for Business.

^^^

centrino"

MOBILE
TECHNOLOGY

Protect your data against accidents
when you're on the road. Accidents definitely do

happen. Especially when you're working wirelessly. Which is why you should have an
IBM ThinkPad* notebook with Intel" Centrino"" Mobile Technology. Select ThinkPad
notebooks are the only PCs designed to sense a fall and, within 500 milliseconds,
park the hard drive's read/write head. Kind of like an airbag for your data. To view a
demo, visit ibm.com/shop/m444. You'll see why select IBM ThinkPad notebooks
with Intel Centrino Mobile Technology give wireless users the confidence to tackle
almost anything — networking, presentations, even the occasional meeting
with the pavement And QO frOITI "Oh, #@*a|" tO

"phew" in less than a second.

Klutz-proof wireless. Only on a ThinkPad.
1 866 426-0064 ibm.com/shop/m444

NEW! IBM ThinkPad R51

Ultimate Value

Distinctive IBM Innovations:

• IBM Active Protection System -
Helps protect your hard-drive from falls

System Features:

• Intel Centrino™ Mobile Technology

• Intel Pentium' M Processor 1 50GHz

• Intel PRO/Wireless Network Connection 802.11 b/g'

• Microsoft Windows XP Professional 5

• 14.1 " XGA TFT display (1 024x768)
•256MB DDR SDRAM 5

• 20GB hard drive"

• Ultrabay™ Enhanced CD-RW/DVD-ROM combo

• IBM UltraConnect™ Antenna for increased
signal strength :>

• 1-yr system/battery limited warranty 5

NavCode 28832XU-M419

THINK EXPRESS MODEL PRICED AT:

$1,299"

ServicePac'"' Service Upgrade: 7
3-yr Depot Repair #30L9192 $132

IBM ThinkPad X40

Our thinnest and lightest

Distinctive IBM Innovations:

• IBM Active Protection System -
Helps protect your hard-drive from falls

• NEW! IBM Rescue and Recovery™ with Rapid
Restore™ - One-button recovery and restore solution

System Features:

• Intel Centrino Mobile Technology

• Intel Pentium M Processor ULV 1GHz

• Intel PRO/Wireless Network Connection 802.11b

• Microsoft Windows XP Professional
•12.1" XGA TFT display (1024x768)
•256MB DDR SDRAM

• 20GB hard drive

• Integrated Gigabit Ethernet and modem

• Legendary IBM full-size keyboard' 5

• Only .94" thin""

• 2.7-lb travel weight'

• 1-yr system/battery limited warranty-'

NavCode 23861 CU-M419

THINK EXPRESS MODEL PRICED AT:

$1,499

levels are response-lime objectives and are not guarantees. Calls must ba received by 5pm local time in order to qualify lor Next Business Day service. If the machine problem turns out to be a Customer Replaceable
Unri (CP.ll) IBM will express ship the par: to you foi quick replacement. Onsite 24x7x2-houi service is not available in all locations For ThinkPad notebooks requiring I CD or otbe component replacement. IBM may
choose to perform service at the depot repair center. (8) Full-size keyboard: As defined by ISO/I EC 15412 (10| Travel weight: includes battery and optional travel bezel instead of standard optical drive in Ultrabay
bay, if applicable; weight may vary due to vendor components, manufacturing process and options. (11| Thinness: may vary at certain points on the system. (12) Wireless capability: requires compatible wireless-
enabled options, sold separately. Trademarks: The following are trademarks or registered trademarks of IBM Corporation: IBM. the IBM logo, Rapid Restore. Rescue and Recovery, ThinkPad Ultrabay, UltraConnect
and UltraNav. Microsoft and Windows are registered trademarks of Microsoft Corporation. Intel, Intel Inside, Intel Inside logo. Intel Centrino. Intel Centrino logo, Intel SpeedStep and Pentium are trademarks or registered
trademarks of Intel Corporation or its subsidiaries in the United Slates and other countries. Other company, product and service names may be trademarks or service marks of other companies. ©2004 IBM Corporation.
All rights reserved. Visit www.ibm.com/pc/ssleconifiutiiig periodically for the latest information on safe and effective computing.

Take a look at our latest models. And get something nice to shout about.

Why IBM ThinkPad Notebooks?

To make IBM ThinkPad*' notebooks
even more valuable, each one
featured here comes with all the
following ThinkVantage™ Technologies:

IBM Active Protection System:

Butterfingers unite! IBM ThinkPad
notebooks now include airbag like
technology to help protect your hard
drive from some damage caused by
drops and jolts (select models).

NEW! Rescue and Recovery
with Rapid Restore:

Lost your data because of a software
crash or virus? Recover previously
saved data in minutes with our
one-button solution.

Access Connections:

Switch between wired and wireless

connections

Embedded Security
Subsystem 2.0: 1
Hackers and thieves, beware. Our
combined hardware and software
solution is designed to protect user
data and keep it private.

Access IBM:

Get the help you need, when you
need it. One button on your ThinkPad
notebook brings you a world of
resources and assistance.

NEW! IBM ThinkPad R51

System Features:

• Intel- Centrino 1 '' Mobile Technology

• Intel Pentium" M Processor 1.5DGHz !

• Intel PFIO/Wireless Network Connection 802 .1 1b/g'

• Microsoft Windows XP Professional' 1

• 15" SXGA+ TFT display (1400x1050)
•256MB DDR SDRAM 5

• 40GB hard drive 6

• Integrated Ethernet and modem

• IBM Ultrabay" Enhanced CD-RW/
DVD-ROM combo

• IBM UltraConnect'" Antenna for
increased signal strength 11

• 1-yr system/battery limited warranty

NavCode 1836BDU-M419

THINK EXPRESS MODEL

PRICED AT:

$1,499

With Microsoft Office Small Business
Edition 2003: 1; 31,739

NEW! IBM ThinkPad T42

System Features:

• Intel Centrino Mobile Technology

• Intel Pentium M Processor 1. 50GHz

* Intel PRO/Wireless Network Connection
802.1 1b/g

• Microsoft Windows XP Professional
•14.1 XGATFT display (1024x768)

• 32MB ATI Mobility RADEON 7500
•256MB DDR SDRAM

•30GB hard drive

• Integrated Gigabit Ethernet and modem

• IBM Ultrabay Slim DVD-ROM

• IBM UltraConnect Antenna
for increased signal strength

• Only 1" thin,™ 4.5-lb travel weight"

• 1-yr system/battery limited warranty 7

NavCode 237BDTU-M41 9
THINK EXPRESS MODEL
PRICED AT:

$1,629

With Microsoft Office Small Business
Edition 2003: $1,869

ServicePac Service Upgrade:

3-yr Depot Repair #30L9192 $132

NEW! IBM ThinkPad T42

System Features:

• Intel Centrino Mobile Technology

• Intel Pentium M Processor 735 (1.70GHz,
4D0MHz FSB)

• Intel PRO/Wireless Network Connection
802.1 1b/g

• Microsoft Windows XP Professional

• 15" SXGA+ TFT display (1400x1050)
■512MB DDR SDRAM

• 64MB ATI Mobility RADE0M 9600 graphics
•60GB hard drive (7200 RPM)

• Integrated Gigabit Ethernet and modem

• IBM Ultrabay Slim CD-RW/DVD-ROM combo

• IBM UltraConnect Antenna
for increased signal strength

• 3-yr system/1 -yr battery limited warranty'

NavCode 2379DXU-M41 9

THINK EXPRESS MODEL
PRICED AT:

$2,529

With Microsoft Office Small Business
Edition 2003: $2,769

ServicePac Service Upgrade:

4-yr Onsite Repair/9x5/Next Business Day

Response #69P9198 $299

IBM ThinkPad X40

System Features:

• Intel Centrino Mobile Technology

• Intel Pentium M Processor ULV 1GHz

• Intel PRO/Wireless Network Connection

802.11b

• Microsoft Windows XP Professional

• 12.1" XGATFT display (1024x768)

• Intel Extreme Graphics 2

• 256MB DDR SDRAM

• 20GB hard drive

• Integrated Gigabit Ethernet and modem

• Legendary IBM full-size keyboard' 2

• Only .94" thin

• 2.7-lb travel weight

• 1-yr system/battery limited warranty 7

NavCode 23861CU-M419

THINK EXPRESS MODEL

PRICED AT:

$1,499

With Microsoft Office Small Business
Edition 2003: $1 ,739

ServicePac 3 Service Upgrade:' 1

2-yr Onsite Repair/9x5/Next Business Day

Response #30L9189 $197

IBM ThinkPad X40

Distinctive IBM Innovations:

• Longest standard battery life of any
leading-brand notebook"

System Features:

• Intel Centrino Mobile Technology

■ Intel Pentium M Processor LV 1.203Hz

■ Intel PRO/Wireless Network Connection
802.11b

• Microsoft Windows XP Professional
•12.1" XGATFT display (1024x768}

• Intel Extreme Graphics 2
•256MB DDR SDRAM
•40GB hard drive

• Integrated Gigabit Ethernet and modem

• Legendary IBM full-size keyboard

• 7.5-hr Li-Ion battery"

• 1-yr system/battery limited warranty'

NavCode 23866GU-M419
THINK EXPRESS MODEL

$1,749

ServicePac Service Upgrade

3-yr Onsite Repair/9x5/Next Business Day

Response #30L9195 $243

IBM ThinkPad X40 Solution Pack

System Features:

• Intel Centrino Mobile Technology

• Intel Pentium M Processor ULV 1 GHz

• Intel PRO/Wireless Network Connection
802.11b

• Microsoft Windows XP Professional
•1 2.1" XGATFT display (1024x768)
•256MB DDR SDRAM

• 20GB hard drive

• Only .94" thin

• 2.7-lb travel weight

• 1-yr system/battery limited warranty'
Accessories Included:

•ThinkPad X4 UltraBase™ Dock

• IBM Ultrabay Slim CD-RW/DVD-ROM combo

NavCode 23861ZU-M419

THINK EXPRESS MODEL
PRICED AT:

$1,799

ServicePac Service Upgrade:

3-yr Onsite Repair/9x5/Next Business Day

Response #30L9195 $243

IBM ThinkPad X40 Solution Pack

Distinctive IBM Innovations:

• Longest standard battery life of any
leading-brand notebook

System Features:

• Intel Centrino Mobile Technology

■ Intel Pentium M Processor LV 1 .20GHz

• Intel PRO/Wireless Network Connection 802.11b

• Microsoft Windows XP Professional
•12.1 "XGATFT display (1024x768)
•256MB DDR SDRAM

•40GB hard drive

• Integrated Gigabit Ethernet and modem

• 7.5-hr Li-Ion battery

• 3-yr system/1 -yr battery limited warranty'
Accessories Included:

• ThinkPad X4 UltraBase Dock

• IBM Ultrabay Slim CD-RW/DVD-ROM combo

NavCode 23826UU-M419
THINK EXPRESS MODEL
PRICED AT:

$2,199

ServicePac Service Upgrade:

5-yr Onsite Repair/9x5/Next Business Day

Response #69P9200 $449

NavCode' 1 Get the latest pricing and information fast.
Use NavCode on the phone or on the Web.

* Availability: All offers subject to availability. IBM reserves the right to alter product offerings and specifications -at any time, without notice. IBM is not responsible for photographic or typographic errors. Pricing: does not
include tax or shipping and is subject to change without notice. Reseller prices may vary, Warranty: For a copy of applicable product warranties, write to: Warranty Information, P.O. Box 12195, RTP, NC 27709, Attn: Dept
JDJA/B2Q3. IBM makes no representation or warranty regarding third-party products or services. Footnotes: (1) Embedded security system: requires software download. (2) Mobile Processors: Power management reduces
processor speed when in battery mode. {3) Wireless 11a, 11b and 11 p,: based on IEEE 802.11a, 802.11b and 802.1 1 g, respectively. An adapter with lla/b. 1 1 b/g or 1 1 a/b/g can communicate on either or any of these listed
formats respectively; the actual connection will be based on the access point to which it connects, (4) Included software: may differ from its retail version (if available) and may not include user manuals or all program
functionality, License agreements may apply. (5) Memory: For PCs without a separate video card, memory supports both system and video. Accessible system memory is up to 64MB less than the amount stated, depending
on video mode. (6) Hard drive: GB = billion bytes. Accessible capacity is less: up to 4GB is service partition. (7) Limited warranty: Support unrelated to a warranty issue may be subject Id additional cbarges. (8) Microsoft
Office XP: Certain Microsoft software product(s) included with this computer may use technological measures for copy protection IN SUCH EVENT, YOU WILL MOT BE ABLE TO USE THE PRODUCT IF YOU DO NOT FULLY
COMPLY WITH THE PRODUCT ACTIVATION PROCEDURES. Product activation procedures and Microsoft's privacy policy will be detailed during initial launch of the product, or upon certain reinstallations of the software
product(s) or reconfigurations of the computer, and may be completed by Internet or telephone (toll charges may apply). (9) Travel weight: includes battery and optional travel bezel instead of standard optical drive in

(Monitor not included}

Why IBM ThinkCentre PCs?

Only IBM offers these features to
protect you, connect you, and keep
you working. Each ThinkCentre™
desktop featured here can give
you the efficiency, productivity and
edge you need with the following
ThinkVanlage Technologies:

IBM Rapid Restore Ultra:
Lost your data because of a software
crash or virus? Recover previously
saved data in minutes with our
one-button solution.

Access IBM:

Get the help you need, when you need
it. One button on your ThinkCentre
desktop brings you a world of
resources and assistance.

ImageUltra™ Builder:

Need to roll out new systems? Image
and copy your operating system
across your network in a flash.
(Order separately)

IBM ThinkCentre A50p

System Features:

• Intel' 1 Pentium' 1 4 Processor 520 with
HT Technology

• Processor speed 2. 80GHz

• 800MHz FSB

• Microsoft Windows XP Professional
•256MB DDR PC2700 5

• 40GB hard drive • CD-RW

• Integrated 10/100 Ethernet

• Norton Antivirus" 1 ' with 90 days of virus
definition updates

• Lotus SmartSuite"'' Millennium license

• 1-yr parts/1-yr limited onsite service
limited warranty"

NavCode843398U-M419
THINK EXPRESS MODEL
PRICED AT:

(Monitor not included)

IBM ThinkCentre A50

Distinctive IBM Innovations:

• The smallest IBM desktop without
compromise: 62% smaller than a
standard IBM desktop

System Features:

• Intel Pentium 4 Processor 520 with
HT Technology

• Processor speed 2. 80GHz

• 800MHz FSB

• Microsoft Windows XP Professional
•256MB DDR PC2700

•40GB hard drive 'CD-ROM
•Integrated 10/100 Ethernet

• Norton Antivirus with 90 days of virus
definition updates

• Lotus SmartSuite Millennium license

• 3-yr parts/1-yr limited onsite service
limited warranty"

NavCode841933U-M419

THINK EXPRESS MODEL
PRICED AT:

$749

ServicePac Service Upgrade:

4-yr Onsite Repair/9x5/Next Business Day

Response #69P9158 $198

IBM ThinkCentre A50p

System Features:

• Intel Pentium 4 Processor 520 with
HT Technology

• Processor speed 2.80GHz

• 800MHz FSB

• Microsoft Windows XP Professional

• 256MB DDR PC2700
■40GB hard drive -CD-RW

• Norton Antivirus with 90 days of virus

definition updates

•Integrated 10/100 Ethernet

• Lotus SmartSuite Millennium license

• 3-yr parts/1 -yr limited onsite service
limited warranty"

$699

NavCode843298U-M419
THINK EXPRESS MODEL
PRICED AT

$799

(Monitor not included)

IBM ThinkCentre S50

Distinctive IBM Innovations:

•The smallest IBM desktop without
compromise: 62% smaller than a
standard IBM desktop

System Features:

• Intel Pentium 4 Processor 520 with
HT Technology

• Processor speed 2.80GHz

• 800MHz FSB

• Microsoft Windows XP Professional
•512MB DDR PC2700

•40GB hard drive 'CD-ROM

• Norton Antivirus with 90 days of virus
definition updates

•Gigabit Ethernet-integrated

• 3-yr limited warranty with limited
onsite service"

NavCodeB18336U-M419

$1,079

With Microsoft Office Small Business
Edition 2003:31,319

ServicePac Service Upgrade:
4-yr 0nsite/9x5/4-hr Response
#69P9162 $250

IBM ThinkCentre M50

System Features:

• Intel Pentium 4 Processor 520 with
HT Technology

• Processor speed 2.80GHz

• 800MHz FSB

• Microsoft Windows XP Professional
•512MB DDR PC2700

• 40GB hard drive • CD-ROM

• Intel Extreme Graphics 2
•Gigabit Ethernet-integrated

• 3-yr limited warranty with limited
onsite service"

NavCoda B187EJU-M419

$1,049

With Microsoft Office Small Business
Edition 2003: $1, 288
ServicePac Service Upgrade:
3-yr 0nsite/9x5/4-hr Response
#41L2734 $129

MOBILE
TECHNOLOGY

IBM recommends Microsoft"
Windows 8 XP Professional
for Business.

IBM ThinkExpress Program:

We've designed and priced many
of our products specifically for
small and medium businesses.
And best of all, they're available
direct from IBM or through select
IBM Business Partners.

IBM ThinkPad Accessories

Belkin Components Universal Motebook

Travel Surge Protector

#22P7127 $20

Targus Deluxe Mobile Essentials Kit

#22P7437 $60

ThinkPad Premiere Leather Carrying Case"

#10K0209 $99

ThinkPad 72W AC/DC Combo Adapter
#22P9010 $99

ThinkPad Port Replicator II
#74P6733 $179

IBM ThinkCentre Accessories

IBM 128MB USB 2.0 High-Speed
Memory Key
#22P9229 $59

Lexmark X5270 All-in-One Printer
#22P8808 $140

IBM ThinkVision" L170 17" Flat Panel
Monitor with system purchase
#W9SPAB0 $449

1 866 426-0064 ibm.com/shop/m444

Ultrabay bay, if applicable: weight may vary due to vendor components, manufacturing process and options. (10) Thinness: may vary at certain points on the system. (11) ServicePac services: are available tor machines
normally used for business, professional or trade purposes, rather than personal, family or household purposes. Service period begins with the equipment date of purchase. Service levels are response-time objectives and
are not guarantees. If the machine problem turns out to be a Customer Replaceable Unit (CRU), IBM wil express ship the part to you for quick replacement. Onsite 24x7x2-hour service is not available in all locations. For
ThinkPad notebooks requiring LCD or other component replacement, IBM may choose to perform service at the depot repair center. Calls must be received by 5pm local time in order to qualify tor Next Business Day Service,
(12) Full-size keyboard: As defined by ISO/IEC 15412. (13) Battery Ilia: Based on manufacturers published figures or CNET com results for the top 5 vendors in 2003 notebook sales based on IDC data, as of 1/29/2004
(14) Systems with limited onsite service: are designed to be repaired during the applicable warranty period primarily with customer-replaceable parts provided by IBM, IBM will only send a technician onsite to perform a
repair if (a) remote telephone diagnosis and/or customer part replacement are unable to resolve the problem, or (b) the part is one of the few designated by IBM for onsite replacement. For a list of onsite replaceable parts,
contact IBM. Support unrelated to a warranty issue may be subject to additional charges. (15) Certain IBM logo products: are not manufactured, warranted or supported by IBM; IBM logos and trademarks used under license
Contact IBM for details (16) Wireless capahility: requires compatible wireless-enabled options, sold separately (17) Battery: These model numbers achieved the Zitt Davis Media, Inc.'s Business Winstone £ 2002
BatteryMark™ Version 1 ,0 Battery Rundown Time of at least the time shown. This test was performed without independent verification by the VeriTest testing division of Lionbridge Technologies, Inc. ("VeriTesf ') or Zifl Davis
Media, Inc.: neither Ziff Davis Media Inc., norVeriTest makes any representations or warranties as to disss Issl results, Winstone is a registered trademark and BatteryMark sa trademark of Ziff Davis Publishing Holdings
Inc., in the U.S. and other countries. A description of the environment under which the test was performed isavailableatibm.com/pc/ww/thinkpad/hatterylife. Battery life (and recharge times) will vary based on many factors
including screen brightness, applications, features, power management, battery conditioning and other customer preferences. Trademarks: The following are trademarks or registered trademarks of IBM Corporation: IBM,
the IBM logo, ImageUltra, Lotus, NavCode, Rapid Restore, Rescue and Recovery, SmartSuite, ThinkCentre, ThinkPad, ThinkVanlage, ThinkVision, UltraConnect, UltraBase, Ultrabay and UltraNav. Microsoft and Windows are
registered trademarks of Microsoft Corporation. Intel, Intel Inside, Intel Inside logo, Intel Centrino, Intel Centring logo, Intel SpeedStep and Pentium are trademarks or registered trademarks of Intel Corporation or its
subsidiaries in the United States and other countries. Other company, product and service names may be trademarks or service marks of other companies. © 2004 IBM Corporation. All rights reserved.
Visit wim.ibm.cam/pc/salecomptflmg periodically for the latest information on safe and effective computing.

Table Of Contents: Volume 2 • Issue 8 • August 2004

Cover Story

Shareware

For Windows

If you're on a budget and don't have just the right software for the tasks at hand, or if
you're simply looking for inexpensive ways to boost your Windows PC, check out this
month's feature articles. We take a look at nine top shareware categories, including
backup programs, compression utilities, shareware cleaners, email clients, browser man-
agers, and Windows customization software.

46 Hit, Download & Run

The Wonderful World Of Shareware

50 Back Up Your Data

Keep Your Data Safe With A Better Backup Program

52 CleanUp Time

Make A File-Cleaning Program Do Your Dirty Work For You

54 Zip It

Put Your Files On A Diet

56 Streamline Your Registry

These Programs Can Safely Clean Your System's Database

58 Mail Call

Shareware Email Programs Expand Your Range Of Options

60 Browser Managers

Cover Your Tracks & Protect Your Privacy

62 Keep Your Information Safe

Password Proliferation Protection Pays

64 Customize It

Creative Screensavers Leave A Lasting Impression

66 Time Is Money

Beef Up Your System Clock

Microsoft and Windows are either registered trademarks or trademarks of Microsoft Corp. in the United
States and/or other countries. PC Today is not published in conjunction with Microsoft, and it has not been
endorsed or sponsored by Microsoft. The use of the Microsoft and Windows trademarks in this publication
does not represent participation in, or endorsement of, this publication by Microsoft.

Sandhills
Publishing-

copyright 2004 by Sandhills Publishing Company. PC Today is a registered trademark of Sandhills Publishing
Company. All rights reserved. Reproduction of material appearing in PC Today is strictly prohibited without
written permission. Printed in the U.S.A. CST # 123482788RT0001. PC Today (ISSN 1040-6484) is published
monthly for $29 per year by Sandhills Publishing Company, 131 West Grand Drive, P.O. Box 85380, Lincoln,
NE 68501-5380. Subscriber Services: (800) 733-3809. Periodicals postage pending at Lincoln, NE.
POSTMASTER: Send address changes to PC Today, P.O. Box 85380, Lincoln, NE 68501-5380.

News, Views & Expert Advice

Check out this section for the latest in operating system news,
the scoop about recent Windows updates, and professional opin-
ions from our expert columnists.

OS Wire

The Latest Operating System News

Update Tracker

Your Guide To Windows
Updates

Scot's Take

Us Users Should Stick
Together

Windows Warfare

Batten Down All The
Hatches, Not Just A Few

IT Corner

The Albini Theory

Roadside Assistance

Rehab, Not Retirement

This Old Desktop

What's Your Type?

Ux/dii'lS

r Ft2ick.8i

Windows Boot Camp

Whether you're new to Windows or are in the mood for a
refresher course, this section is the perfect place to start for
information about using Windows and Microsoft Office.

26 Entry Level Windows

Windows Explorer

30 Start-To-Finish Guide

Format An Excel
Spreadsheet

34 Crib Sheet

Excel Formulas

Experts Only

Whether you're a battle-scarred PC veteran or a less experi-
enced user looking to expand your horizons, this section has
some practical advice that can help.

36 Advanced Guide

Clipboard & ClipBook Viewers

40 Outside The Box

Email Tricks: How To Use Email To Get Rid Of Spam

Tips & Tweaks

This department is your one-stop shop for productivity,
system optimization, Web browsing, security, networking,
mobile computing, and all sorts of other tips and tweaks.

Work Smarter

Tips For Increasing Productivity

Optimization Central

Tips & Tweaks For Improving Windows

Surf Better

Tips For Navigating The Internet

Security & Networking

Tips For Making Safe Connections

PC Yesterday

Tips For Maintaining Windows
3.x/95 Systems

Portable Windows

Tips For Using Notebooks &
Pocket PCs

□cdcd

i n ii i

Previews & Reviews

Whether you're on the lookout for new hardware or you're
just curious about what's coming to computer store shelves
near you, take a look at our previews of imminent items.
Right after that check out our latest software reviews, in-
cluding this month's head-to-head challenge.

82 The Hardware Scene

A Look At New & Upcoming Arrivals

Financial Solutions

A Comparison Of Intuit Quicken 2004 Premier &
Microsoft Money 2004 Premium

Software Reviews

Flexigen Software

Actual Doc Professional 2.0
Caelo Software NEO 3.0
Rampell Software

ViewRemote 2.17

e . j. Microsoft

jj Money2004

Premium

After Five

It's 5:01 and the workday is done. If you're ready to get more entertainment value out
of your PC, this section is just for you.

100 Your Turn

Windows Media Player 9 Series Premium Services

105

Play Hard

A Look Ac What's New In PC Gaming

Last Bytes

Every latte needs some froth. To top off this issue, here's our monthly blend of fun
facts, statistics, and trivia.

108 Last Bytes

Correction

In the "Mail Merge" article on page 24 of the June 2004 PC Today, we incorrectly asserted
that there's no easy way to import Hotmail and MSN contact information into Outlook
Express. In fact, after you follow the steps outlined in the article to access Hotmail and MSN
mail through Outlook Express, you can import contact information by clicking Tools, Address
Book, and then selecting Synchronize Now from the Address Book Tools menu.

Web Services

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webhelp@pctoday.com

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customer-service@pctoday.com

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by Jennifer Farwell

Longhorn Stampede Continues; OS Goes Modular

After months of relative quiet (and con-
siderable industry speculation) in late
2003 and early 2004 regarding Longhorn (the
upcoming release of Windows), Microsoft
continues to issue additional indicators re-
lating to its future. In May, Microsoft released
Longhorn Build 4074 (an updated, prerelease
version for testing) to WinHEC attendees, the
yearly Windows Hardware Engineering
Conference. At the same time, Microsoft
posted the build online and made it available
for download to MSDN Universal customers.

Microsoft earlier this year confirmed it
would release the Longhorn desktop edition
in mid-2006 even if it had to trim the feature
set. More recently, Microsoft announced its
roadmap for the Longhorn Server edition,
which the company says will debut in 2007.
The company plans to release the first beta
of Longhorn Server in early 2005, with the
second beta release coming in 2006.

Of potentially greater interest than Long-
horn Server's release date, however, is an an-
nouncement regarding its modularity. With
the release of the server OS, Microsoft plans
to let users customize their boxes with self-
contained modules rather than offering set,

off-the-shelf models. (Microsoft currently of-
fers four server editions: Web, Standard,
Enterprise, and Data-
center.) Components will
be grouped together by
roles (the job the server
performs). Expected roles
include Domain Name
Server, File Server,
Virtual Server, Branch

Server, and others.

Longhorn's desktop edition may also be
modular, Microsoft says, but PC manufac-
turers rather than consumers will make the
call regarding each computer's role.

Even with the added focus on Longhorn,
Microsoft did not forgot to address its other
server products. The company announced it
would debut an update to Windows Server,
code-named R2, in 2005 and release a second
service pack for Windows Server 2003 in 2006.
(The first service pack for Windows Server
ships this year.) Additionally, Microsoft offi-
cially pushed the release of Blackcomb, the
successor to Longhorn Server, to 2010 or later.
Microsoft originally planned to release
Blackcomb as early as 2008. 1

Pocket PC Heads For Space

Microsoft's Windows Mobile
Software for Pocket PC and
the HP iPAQ on which it runs got a
boost recently when NASA selected
the devices for the Expedition 9 as-
tronaut and cosmonaut crew to use
while aboard the International Space
Station. NASA subjected the iPAQ
h5550 models to rigorous flight certi-
fication testing, made minor requests
for modifications (HP made the ad-
justments), and pronounced the

units ready for flight.

Astronaut Edward M. (Mike)
Fincke and other astronauts on
the International Space Station
will use iPAQ Pocket PCs as
both productivity and
entertainment devices.

The crew can use the iPAQ Pocket
PCs as combined productivity tools
and entertainment devices. Using the
Pocket PCs, the crew can check email
and calendars, listen to music, and
view photos from Earth. Ground
support crew at NASA's Johnson
Space Center and Russia's Star City
Space Center will also use iPAQ
Pocket PCs for crew training and
evaluation. Future plans for the de-
vices include outfitting them with
barcode scanners and NASA-devel-
oped software so crew members can
use them to inventory equipment on
the International Space Station. I

Gates Proclaims Death Of The Floppy

Microsoft Chairman and Chief
Software Architect Bill Gates
recently announced that the floppy
diskette drive has reached the end of its
lifetime. Gates was demonstrating the
potential of key chain-sized USB (Uni-
versal Serial

conference when he made the pronounce-
ment. "In some ways, I think this is the
first time I can say that the floppy disk is
dead. You know, we enjoyed the floppy
disk, it was nice, it got smaller and
smaller, but because of compatibility rea-
sons, it sort of got stuck at the 1.44MB
Bus) drives, level, and carrying them around, and

often called having that big physical slot in machines,

Memory that became a real burden."

Keys, at a Gates was referring to the industry

standard 1.44MB
Microsoft Chairman and Chief Software diskette drive
Architect Bill Gates recently proclaimed which users
that the 1 .44MB floppy disk is dead. affectionately call

floppies. Ironically, the true floppy — a
5.25-inch flexible, removable diskette —
has been defunct for more than a
decade, replaced in 1981 by the rigid
model that today's PCs read. Apple first
caused a commotion in 1998 when it re-
leased a diskette-less PC, thereby pro-
claiming the demise of the medium for
its customers. In 1999, Dell followed
suit, stating it would no longer include
diskette drives in default PC configura-
tions. Nevertheless, Gates' proclamation
may be premature. According to HP, it
will include them in its computers as
long as customers ask for them. I

8 August 2004 / www.pctoday.com

ews, Views &C Expert Advice

Sun Sets On Wireless Horizon For Microsoft

Although Microsoft is solidly behind
the adoption of wireless (Wi-Fi)
technology for its desktop and mobile
PCs, the company has discontinued
most of its wireless hardware line. That
line included base stations, notebook
cards, and USB (Universal Serial Bus)
and PCI (Peripheral Component
Interconnect) devices for desktops.

However, the company is not
pulling its products from store
shelves. Instead, it is letting vendors
sell current stock and has agreed to
support the products for a two-year
warranty period. Consequently, you
may be able to purchase what is basi-
cally a defunct product throughout
the remainder of 2004.

The official line from Microsoft is
that the company entered the Wi-Fi

market with plans to improve the tech-
nology's security and performance.
Having accomplished that goal,
Microsoft is withdrawing from devel-
opment. However, critics suggest the
withdrawal has more to do with lack-
luster sales than altruism.

Microsoft entered the wireless hard-
ware market in September 2002.
According to industry reports,
Microsoft made early gains in market
share but was losing momentum due to
its sluggish adoption of the current gen-
eration protocol, 802. llg. Microsoft in-
troduced a USB version of its 802.11g
device in February 2004 but had gener-
ally lagged behind its competitors in re-
leasing 802.11g products. Experts say
802. llg is poised to become the stan-
dard for wireless home networking. I

Internet Advertising To Soar As PVRs Take Control

With the release of Windows XP
MCE (Media Center Edition),
which incorporates PVR (personal
video recorder) capabilities, television
advertisers have gained yet another
adversary. Advertisements are al-
ready facing obliteration by PVR ser-
vices such as TiVo, and WinXP MCE
will only add fuel to their growing
funeral pyre.

According to media analysis firm
Forrester Research, 63% of national
advertisers plan to
cut spending on
television commer-
cials by 20% or
more over the next
five years as PVR
penetration in-
creases. The report
indicates that usage
of PVR devices will
increase tenfold (up
from 3 million this
year to 30 million)
by that time.
Advertisers plan to
reduce spending on all
fronts, including national
and local ads on cable stations and

networks. These advertisers say the
TV industry must provide new,
meaningful ways to measure an ad's
reach if they hope to retain their
placements.

Of the advertisers interviewed,
75% say they will boost budgets for
Internet advertising, including banner
ads and rich-media efforts. Another
53% say they will invest in search
engine marketing. I

Will Windows XP Media
Center Edition kill the
PVR star? Gateway's
Media Center 61 OXL is
one of the most recent
systems to use that OS.

Current & Upcoming OSes

2000

Windows 2000

March 2000

Professional

Windows Me

December 2000

2001

Windows XP

October 2001

2002

WinXP Media Center

November 2002

Edition

2003

WinXP Tablet PC

February 2003

Edition

WinXP Media Center

October 2003

Edition 2004

WinXP Service Pack 2

December 2003

Beta

2004

Windows Longhorn

May 2004

WinHEC 2004 Build 4074

Bill Gates Proclaims

May 2004

Diskette Dead

WinXP SP2

July 2004

2005

Longhorn Desktop

Mid-2005*

and Server Beta

2006

Longhorn Desktop

Mid-2006*

Longhorn Server Beta 2

Mid-2006*

Windows 98/Me

June 2006

Extended Support Ends

WinXP Home

December 2006

Extended Support Ends

2007

Win2000 Professional

March 2007

Extended Support Ends

Longhorn Server

2007*

2008

WinXP Professional

December 2008

Edition Extended

Support Ends

WinXP Tablet PC

December 2008

Extended Support Ends

Windows Longhorn

2008 or 2009

Server Update and

Service Pack Release

2010+

Windows Blackcomb

*Estimated

PC Today / August 20(

ews, Views & Expert Advice

Windows CE-Based Foreign Language Translator Wins Military Excellence Award

On Sept. 10, 2001, when Army Lt. Col.
James Bass saw a demonstration of
Phraselator, a handheld foreign-language
translator, he immediately recognized the
device's potential to save time for soldiers
in the field. The following day when ter-
rorists attacked the World Trade Center
and the Pentagon, Bass, who was the pro-
ject manager for the
Phraselator tests, also
realized that it could
save lives. Bass con-
vinced the Pentagon
to fast-track the field
implementation of the
device. By March
2002, the improved
Phraselator was ready
for duty.

Now, the U.S.
DARPA (Defense
Advanced Research
Projects Agency)
has recognized the
contribution of the
Phraselator by
awarding its developer,
VoxTec, the SBIR (Small Business
Innovation Research) Award. VoxTec, a di-
vision of Marine Acoustics, developed the
Phraselator in response to a call from
DARPA to develop a medical translator for

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the military. VoxTec suggested down-
sizing the design, which was originally the
size of a notebook, to fit in a soldier's palm.

The first Phraselator, the Model 1100,
was 4x6 inches and weighed 20 ounces.
To use the device, English-speaking oper-
ators spoke or touch-selected any of the
3,500 available phrases. Phraselator in-
stantly translated the phrases into one of
30 languages, returning the results on-
screen or via audio. If the response
• was vocal, soldiers could connect
Phraselator to a bullhorn to ask a
group of people important ques-
tions about humanitarian needs,
infrastructure problems, safety
threats, and other critical issues.

The Phraselator has proved to be a
powerful tool for the U.S. military
serving in Afghanistan and Iraq.

Top right photo courtesy of Applied
Data Systems.

The Phraselator, which is
now available to the public,
runs on the Windows CE.NET
4.2 OS. Windows Embedded
Partner Applied Data Systems worked
with VoxTec to develop the WinCE chip
that powers Phraselator. The newest ver-
sion, the P2, is approximately the same
size as the 1100 yet has a phrase library

of 15,000 commonplace phrases, which it
can translate into 53 languages. The cur-
rent military version has a library of
20,000 phrases (which include special-
ized military modules that deal with
such threats as weapons of mass destruc-
tion and land mines) that it can translate
into 55 languages. I

EA Thinks Inside The Xbox

EA (Electronic Arts) apparently
agrees with Microsoft that the Xbox
Live online gaming service has a bright
future. The company is committed to
producing more than a dozen more Xbox
Live titles over the next year, including
Madden NFL 2005, Tiger Woods PGA
TOUR 2005, NASCAR 2005: Chase For
The Cup, GoldenEye: Rogue Agent, and
Need For Speed Underground 2. EA re-
leased its first Xbox Live title, NCAA
Football 2005, last month.

Under the terms of its agreement with
Microsoft, EA will not only offer the titles,
but it also will expand its EA online com-
munity by enabling existing Xbox Live
friends to use the EA Messenger service for
inter-gamer communication. According to

Microsoft, more than a million people in 24
countries have subscribed to the Xbox Live
service since its inception less than two
years ago. Gaining support from EA, the
world's leading interactive game devel-
oper, is an important step for Microsoft in
its quest to compete in the online gaming
market. EA, which is an Xbox developer,
was the major hold-out among game devel-
opers when Microsoft launched Xbox Live.
In a separate announcement, Microsoft
says it will introduce a new Xbox Live of-
fering, Xbox Live Arcade, this fall. Xbox
Live Arcade will offer a variety of board
and puzzle games in addition to older ar-
cade titles, such as DigDug and Pole
Position, to Xbox Live players for approx-
imately $10 each. I

Microsoft's agreement with EA (Electronic
Arts) means Xbox Live gamers will be able to
play popular titles such as Tiger Woods PGA
TOUR 2005.

10 August 2004 / www.pctoday.com

ews, Views & Expert Advice

V,.

PCs Of The Future?

For years, Microsoft has offered visions
of a PC-enabled future where we in-
teract with life via computers. This year
will be no exception. The Redmond-based
software giant has teamed with hardware
vendor HP to produce new prototype PCs
and PC concepts designed to streamline
our home, office, and mobile environ-
ments. In each case, HP is developing
the hardware for a PC that showcases
Microsoft's operating, communications,
and collaborative technologies.

The Windows home. Microsoft's
Windows Home Concept is the latest iter-
ation of its vision of integrated home com-
puting. Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates has
previously predicted that appliance and
lighting management (such as the ability
to turn on lights or start the coffeemaker
from your PC) will be integral capabilities
for the home PC of the future. However,
this year's model focuses on entertain-
ment and communication, more inter-
esting and potentially more lucrative
features that appeal to the entire family.

WHC incorporates three PC styles
(desktop, set-top, and tablet) running
Windows XP MCE (Media Center
Edition) in a networked, remote control-
driven environment. The tablet PCs are
touchscreen-enabled, fully mobile units
that you can dock in the system or use on
a standalone basis. For demonstration
purposes, the Windows Home Concept
also includes a 50-inch plasma high-reso-
lution display with high-definition TV
capabilities. In the proto-
type, each PC
station has an
auxiliary screen
with an over-
sized, two-line,
alphanumeric
display to pro-
vide "at-a-glance" infor-
mation such as message
alerts. At least one of the
stations also acts as a
Communication Dock,
where family members can charge their
docked tablet PCs and use them to in-
teract with the system or display impor-
tant data for family viewing.

The entire setup has wired and wire-
less connectivity to facilitate streaming
media, VoIP (Voice over IP [Internet
Protocol], or Internet calling), and other
high-bandwidth options, as well as a mi-
crophone and voice-command button to
enable speech-based system navigation.
With either a short spoken command,
family members can schedule recordings,
create and distribute customized song
playlists, send messages, make phone
calls, and more.

The Windows Home
Concept is still a few
years from general avail-
ability. In the interim the
technology community will
probably be placing bets on its via-
bility. Several industry experts have
predicted that the tablet PC concept
is a dead horse, largely because the device
is as expensive as a notebook PC, yet a
tablet PC lacks the functionality of a
notebook. It will be interesting to see if
Microsoft succeeds in repositioning the
tablet PC as a touchscreen multimedia
device and rides it across the finish line.
At the office. Another PC prototype
Microsoft and HP are touting is Troy, an
outgrowth of their Athens concept home
PC that debuted in 2003. HP listened to
criticisms about Athens, which con-
sumers said placed too many controls on
the keyboard, and moved them instead to
a console located between the keyboard
and the display. The console provides
one-touch access
to controls such
as a volume knob
and media ac-
cess buttons, a
docking station

The Windows Home Concept includes
a Wall Dock that family members can
use to dock and charge their mobile
tablet PCs and receive updates from
the family network at the same time.

for a handheld unit such as a Pocket PC,
and an alert light to notify you of in-
coming messages.

HP and Microsoft intend Troy for col-
laborative computing, where users in-
teract with each other in real-time and
exchange information on an ongoing
basis. It could potentially be valuable to
corporations, not only as a workstation
solution for individual users, but also as
a central docking
station in satellite
offices. Numerous
mobile employees
could use a single
Troy unit to
dock

The Hermes con-
cept notebook from HP
and Microsoft features a removable
display that has its own power supply.

their handhelds at different times to re-
ceive company information, participate
in remote conferences, and exchange
data with other users or their office PCs.
According to HP and Microsoft, Athens
and Troy are concepts whose designs
the companies will incorporate into
other future products rather than manu-
facture them in their current states.

Going mobile. The third component in
HP and Microsoft's concept PC trifecta is
Hermes, a mobile computing solution
aptly named after the Greek god of travel
and communication. The HP Hermes con-
cept PC has no connection to Micro-Star
International's Hermes PC, the Hermes
Linux solution, or any of several technolo-
gies called Hermes. Rather, it is a super-
thin notebook cousin to Troy that offers
office-collaboration capabilities. For ex-
ample, you can separate the display from
the notebook and place it elsewhere for
easy group viewing.

Additionally, Hermes features a small
pop-out display hidden under the HP
label that you can employ to launch
multimedia presentations staged on the
main display. According to HP, designs
that evolve from Hermes will also have
a pop-out video camera, valuable for re-
mote conferencing, and a pop-out
earbud for VoIP calls. I

PC Today / August 2004 11

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Jews, Views & Expert Advice

^ I

Windows ^

}rjc\i\ r^

Your Guide To Windows Updates

by Rachel Derowitsch

We knew something was horribly
wrong when our PC kept shut-
ting down and restarting without
warning just a few minutes after we
turned it on. It didn't matter what pro-
gram we were attempting to run; some
indiscriminating intruder was having its
way with the system.

Our only clue to the nature of the
trouble was a system shutdown message
that told us an executable file named
Isass.exe in our C:\WINNT\SYSTEM 32
folder "terminated unexpectedly."

The mystery cleared itself up immedi-
ately as soon as we visited the Windows
Update Web site and saw the message,
prominently displayed on the home
page, about the Sasser Worm. Thank-
fully, we were able to stay online long
enough to download the tool to remove
this nasty little worm. And in just a few
moments, our problem was resolved.

Our encounter with one of the Sasser
Worm variants illustrates well how the
Windows Update Catalog can work for
you. (Read our evaluation of the Sasser

Worm update below.) It works even better
when you use the site frequently because
many updates are meant to fix problems
before they become a problem to you.

Windows XP

835732 Security Up-
date For Windows XP
(2.6MB). This critical up-
date corrects a large number of recently
discovered vulnerabilities in WinXP. Not
every vulnerability described in the ac-
companying Knowledge Base article ap-
plies to WinXP, but 10 of them do.

Many of the vulnerabilities involve po-
tential buffer overruns, specifically in
LSASS (Local Security Authority Sub-
system Service); the PCT (Private Com-
munications Transport) protocol for SSL
(Secure Sockets Layer)-enabled systems;
the Windows logon process; Windows
Metafile and Enhanced Metafile image
rendering; and in H.323, a protocol used
with NetMeeting. All of these buffer
overrun vulnerabilities could allow a po-
tential attacker to gain control over the

victim's system. This update also corrects
the flawed way in which the Help And
Support Center attempts to validate data
input and a DoS (denial of service) vul-
nerability in the Microsoft ASN.l (Ab-
stract Syntax Notation One) library.

For WinXP users, this update, which
can be uninstalled, replaces the update re-
leased with security bulletin MS04-007.

837001 Security Update For Win-
dows XP (2.8MB). The Microsoft Jet
Database Engine is the power behind
Microsoft Access, the database manage-
ment program included in some ver-
sions of Microsoft Office and sold as
a standalone product. It also helps
run Microsoft Visual Basic and some
non-Microsoft programs.

Version 4 of Jet contains a buffer
overrun vulnerability. If someone sent a
specially coded request to a system run-
ning Jet, he could cause a buffer overrun
where data meant for one buffer over-
flows into a buffer it shouldn't be in, cor-
rupting the data. The result is that the
attacker could gain as much control over
the system as the person logged on to it
has; if the victim has full privileges, the
attacker could do such things as install
software, manipulate data, and create
accounts on the affected system.

This update, which Microsoft labels
"important," changes the way Jet handles
requests to the database. In addition, it
contains all the previous updates in-
cluded in Jet 4.0 SP8 (Service Pack 8).
Therefore, if you have not installed SP8,
you won't need to if you download and
install this update.

Windows 2000/XP

841720 Sasser (A-D) Worm Removal
Tool (109KB). Even if you're a cautious
person, chances are good that your com-
puter has tangled with the Sasser Worm.
This one isn't spread via email but instead
takes advantage of a flaw in Windows.

Anyone who installed update 835732
(see below) and has a firewall is likely
immune from the Sasser Worm. If that
doesn't describe you, at least you can in-
stall the Sasser Worm Removal Tool.
This is the second removal tool
Microsoft released. The first version re-
moved Sasser. A and Sasser. B; the

14 August 2004 / www.pctoday.com

ews, Views & Expert Advice

h c ■ . B - » vte

Microsoft went the extra mile on its
Windows Update Web site to warn users of
the existence of the Sasser Worm and the
worm removal tool.

second removes those two plus Sasser.C
and Sasser.D.

This removal tool should quickly rid
your system of the Sasser Worm, regard-
less of the variant. However, it alone
won't protect you from getting the
worm again. So install update 835732
and make sure your firewall and /or an-
tivirus program is up-to-date. If you
have a current antivirus program in-
stalled, it also should be able to remove
the Sasser Worm from your system.

Windows 98/Me

Root Certificates Up-
date (204KB). You may

not be aware that your
system contains a list of
trusted root certificates.
(To view this list, open
Internet Explorer and
click Tools, Internet
Options, Content, and Certificates.)
Certificates are electronic identifiers and
are often used with private keys to pro-
tect your personal information and verify
your identity to Web sites and those to
whom you send email messages. Web
sites also use root certificates to verify
their identity to users.

This recommended download,
which you cannot uninstall, updates
the list of root certificates that are ac-
cepted as part of Microsoft's Root
Certificate Program. (This update is a
more recent version of the one we re-
viewed in the April issue of PC Today,
page 11.) They come from certificate
authorities such as VeriSign and
Thawte. After you install the update, it

will broaden your ability to enjoy
secure Web browsing and use of
encrypted email.

All Systems

831167 Critical Update For Internet
Explorer 6 SP1 (378KB). Sometimes
when we correct a problem we create
another. Case in point is the story be-
hind this update.

In the May's "Windows Update"
(page 12), we told you about update
832894, the Cumulative Security Update
For Internet Explorer. This download
corrected three newly discovered vul-
nerabilities, as well as dealt with older
issues. However, if you installed either
this update or the hotfix 821814, you
may have unwittingly created another
problem for yourself.

Both 832894 and 821814 altered the
way in which a computer interacts with
a Web server when the server resets the
connection established between the
two. Sometimes everything works as it
should; however, with either of these
updates installed, you may see an
HTTP 500 (Internal Server Error) Web
page when trying to access Web
servers protected with either SSL or
TLS (Transport Layer Security) 3.0 con-
figured in a certain way. SSL and TLS
are both protocols that ensure privacy
and security for data transmissions
over the Internet.

So, while it's possible you may not
encounter an error due to the previous
updates, this new update will ensure
that is the case.

837009 Cumulative Security Update
For Outlook Express (size varies). It's
not uncommon for Windows users to
bypass the default Outlook Express and
opt for another email program. How-
ever, even if you are using a different
email application, you are still at risk
from a new vulnerability discovered in
Outlook Express (versions 5.5 SP2, 6,
and 6 SP1 for 32-bit and 64-bit com-
puters) if one of those versions is in-
stalled on your system.

The flaw involves the manner in
which Outlook Express handles
MHTML (MIME Encapsulation Of
Aggregate HTML) URLs. MHTML is

an Internet standard that sets the para-
meters for the MIME (Multipurpose
Internet Mail Extensions) structure
used to transmit HTML data in email
messages. An attacker could exploit
this vulnerability either by enticing a
user to click a link on a specially de-
signed Web site or to view a specially
created HTML email. Then, he could
execute HTML code on the victim's
system, specifically in the Local
Machine security zone. (Click Tools,
Internet Options, and Security while in
IE to manage your security zones.) This
would allow the attacker to have the
same privileges on the system as the
user has.

This critical update, which can be
uninstalled if necessary, replaces pre-
vious cumulative security updates for
Outlook Express.

Update For Windows Media Player 9
Series (size varies). You may have no-
ticed sluggish performance when using
WMP 9 Series to copy media files to a
portable device. As you add items to the

As Window Media Player 9's Media Library fills
up, you may encounter sluggish performance
when copying files to a portable device.

Media Library (which contains your
music and audio files, favorite playlists,
radio stations, and more), the time it
takes to copy files to the other device
may increase, as well.

Not all users will experience this
problem, so Microsoft suggests that you
download and apply this hotfix only if
this problem is serious for you.
Microsoft intends to release another
hotfix in the future that will be for all
WMP 9 users.

This recommended update is for
Win98SE/Me/XP. per

PC Today / August 2004 15

Scot's Take

Commentary by Scot Finnie

Scot Finnie is the editor of
SecurityPipeline.com, editor at
TechWeb.com, and author of
Scot's Newsletter. He has
served as managing editor for
Windows Magazine and
editor for several other

Us Users Should
Stick Together

What Do You Do
When Your PC Acts Up?

Catch up with Scot at his
newsletter Web site
(www.scotsnewsletter.com) or
send him feedback at
scoWpctoday.com.

Sooner or later every-
one runs into a tough-
nut problem with his
PC hardware, operating
system, or applications.
The fact is, most of us
have had this happen
many times. If you're the
kind of person who keeps track
of such things instead of trying
your best to ignore them, you've
probably come to the conclusion that
there's something wrong with PCs most of
the time. And some small percentage of
those problems turns out to be serious.

What you're supposed to do when your com-
puter gets in trouble and what actually works are
often two very different things. Why? Technical
support is one of the costliest operations for soft-
ware and hardware companies. Most computer
companies don't offer anywhere near ideal levels of
support. You count yourself lucky if you get a
problem solved; never mind how long you
had to wait on hold, how many calls it
took to get the deed done, or how
many times you were told by
one company that some other
company's products were the
cause of the problem.

In over 20 years of everyday
Desktop PC use, my process of
troubleshooting PC issues has
evolved to the point where I
can rapidly diagnose and
solve most computer miscues.

And you don't have to be a computer magazine writer
to attain those skills: Millions of other people are at
that level or on their way to it. But that doesn't mean
that I've never met a problem that was tough to fix.

Norton Antivirus Automatic
LiveUpdate Doesn't

My last long-term computer problem stumped me
for upward of two years. On three different produc-
tion computers using multiple recent versions of
Norton Antivirus, Symantec's Automatic Live-
Update feature, designed to automatically check for,
download, and install the latest antivirus defini-
tions, would mysteriously stop working. It always
worked manually. But the routine Symantec uses to
check for an Internet connection, called NetDetect,
failed to operate properly. NetDetect is scheduled to
run every few minutes using the Windows Task
Scheduler applet. Because NetDetect has to succeed
before Automatic LiveUpdate goes to work, the ma-
chines with this problem weren't able to check for
updates. Worse, there was no error message or indi-
cation that Automatic LiveUpdate wasn't working.

Even though this is a simple computer problem
at its core, it is profound in that it leaves computers
unprotected against the latest
viruses, unless the Automatic
LiveUpdate runs manually. I
was at least aware that I was
unprotected, but I wonder
how many people out there
are not. Symantec's tech
support people were unable
to truly fix the problem the
first time I called them in
late 2002. They fixed it tem-
porarily by deleting the
NetDetect Task Scheduler item and then
reinstating the service with Norton Anti-
Virus' Options settings. I was able to repeat that
later, but by the time Norton Antivirus 2004 came
around, the problem returned so quickly that I
stopped "fixing" it and just focused on remem-
bering to run LiveUpdate manually.

A Microsoft patch for Task Scheduler
eventually fixed the problem, but this re-
quired a call to Microsoft tech support.
Symantec contacted me about this patch
and procured it for me. That's special
treatment few us receive, of course.
Symantec has also identified other steps
you should first try if you have this
problem. For more information on all
possible fixes to this problem, including
links to Symantec knowledge base arti-
cles on the subject, please see this Scot's
Newsletter article: www.scotsnewsletter
.com/56.htm#mstspatch. Also, check out
this Scot's Newsletter Forums thread:
forums.scotsnewsletter.com/index.php?
act=ST&f=10&t=6786&hl.

Help Yourself

After I wrote the April 26 newsletter
article referenced above, I received mes-
sages from several subscribers thanking
me for the information because it solved
the same problem on their PCs. Shared
knowledge is the key to solving problems
like this. One of the things I've noticed
after a decade of writing Web columns
and email newsletters (both of which con-
nect directly to my mailbox via a pub-
lished email address) is that millions of
computer users battle problems alone,
when very often there are thousands of
other people who've faced the same
issue, and some of them have worked
through to the solution.

Few of us can repair a blown head
gasket or replace a worn strut on our au-
tomobiles. But if you could do that,
saving hundreds of dollars in the
process, you might be tempted. It's actu-
ally easier to do it yourself with a com-
puter, and it's also a lot less messy. Each
time you succeed it gets easier to ad-
dress the next problem. The first thing to
do is answer a few questions. Just what
problem do you have? What are the spe-
cific symptoms? What software and
hardware products are directly in-
volved? The next step is to eliminate
variables. Is there anything you can try

that might eliminate possible causes?
For example, if you're having trouble
printing, does the prob-lem happen
when you're printing in two different
applications or only a specific one? If
you have second printer available to
you, does the problem happen with both
printers? If you have two computers,
does the problem happen with both?
Being specific about what's wrong and
taking the time to eliminate variables
can save a lot of time.

Tip: Most computer woes boil down
to some sort of conflict between software
or hardware products. Ask yourself:
When did the problem start? And what
changes were made to your computer
(such as hardware or software up-
grades) right before the trouble began?

After you narrow your problem to a
few products, identify the product ved-
nors and rate them in terms of which is
most likely to have caused a problem.
Start your research with the most likely
vendor's tech support Web site. If
there's a search tool there, try to con-
dense the problem to two or three words
and search for them. If that doesn't turn
up the answer, call the company and
calmly describe your problem. For some
problems, you may have to try more
than one vendor.

Together We're Stronger

When company tech support doesn't
have the answer, take matters into your
own hands to find the fix. It's not un-
common for smart users to have figured
out solutions to problems long before
the tech support departments.

Use Google (www.google.com) to
search the entire Web for your problem.
Force yourself to check out at least
the first 50 results. (Sometimes there's
a gem waiting there, but you may
have to dig for it.) Beyond Google, your
goal should be to open a channel with ex-
perienced computer users who may have
licked the same problem. Here are some of
the resources you should try to connect to:

• A computer user group in your area

• Product-specific Usenet newsgroups

• Problem/solution or product-oriented

Web-based forums

• Problem/solution or product-oriented

email newsletters

• Product-specific or computer help Web

sites

• Subscribe to PC Today and other com-

puter magazines

• An expert friend or acquaintance who

may know about the best tech help re-
sources

• A reputable computer repair shop

With newsgroups, forums, and (to a
lesser extent) newsletters, you have the
chance to work interactively. Post a de-
tailed description of your problem in a
newsgroup or forum. Or email the de-
scription to a newsletter author, but
don't be disappointed if you don't get a
response. The best way to get a dialog
going with someone who can actually
help connect you to a solution is to do
your homework and find a newsgroup,
forum, or newsletter author whose
focus is closely related to your problem.

Let me add one more wrinkle: Those
of us who unearth or figure out solu-
tions to tough problems should make it
a point to get the word out. Send it to a
newsletter author who publishes reader
mail, post it in a Web forum or news-
group, send it to a company's tech sup-
port department, or write a letter to the
editor of PC Today. Working together to
solve problems, we're much more pro-
ductive and far more satisfied with our
PCs than we are apart.

Program note: I've talked about an
upcoming in-depth review of Windows
XP Service Pack 2 for the last couple of
issues. Microsoft has delayed the re-
lease of the ambitious service pack
until "sometime later this summer." As
a result, we're awaiting the arrival of a
late release candidate before we
schedule that review. We will do no re-
view before its time. But rest assured,
we will do that review. I

PC Today / August 2004 17

Windows Warfare

Commentary by Christian Perry

Christian Perry is a long-time
contributor to Smart
Computing magazine and its
sister publications, the Smart
Computing Learning Series (no
longer in print) and the Smart
Computing Reference Series.
Please send your feedback to
christian@pctoday.com.

Batten Down

All The Hatches,

Not Just A Few

After a rash of recent
neighborhood break-
ins, Tony decides to ditch his
house's old wooden doors
for new steel-clad ver-
sions, secure them with
double-cylinder deadbolts, and
reinforce his double-hung win-
dows with nails. Convinced his house
is now nothing short of a residential
fortress, Tony leaves for vacation, only to
return a week later to a burglarized home.
Despite his efforts to secure it, he forgot about the
fragile basement windows that couldn't deter a
squirrel, let alone a crafty thief. Lesson learned.

Proactive Protection

Just as burglars can easily identify several points of
entry into a house, crackers can list plenty of ways to
penetrate a computer, but some aren't always as ob-
vious as others. You know that viruses can easily infect
your computer by masquerading as safe email attach-
ments and that unprotected network ports can invite
hoards of rogue travelers from cyberspace. In turn, you
regularly update your antivirus utility with the latest
virus definitions and keep your firewall running every
second you're online. You also know that Windows is
vulnerable to security problems, so you instruct the op-
erating system to automatically notify you when new
critical updates are available. (After all, it seems that
someone discovers a new Windows security problem
just about every month.) So now that you covered all
the security bases, you can merrily traverse the Internet
without fear of crackers rifling through your data and
taking what they want. Right? Wrong.

Computer security doesn't end with antivirus up-
dates, Windows updates, and efficient firewall opera-
tion. Just as the vulnerable basement windows on

Tony's house, PCs have their own Achilles' heels, and
they're right under your eyes. Everyday programs and
utilities such as Nullsoft's Winamp (www.winamp
.com), Adobe Acrobat Reader (www.adobe.com), and
others might seem pretty safe to the average user, but
to crackers, they represent vast plains of devious
opportunity. Despite the headlines that seem to tell a
different story, Windows isn't the only program sus-
ceptible to security leaks. Crackers regularly target pro-
grams of all shapes, sizes, prices, and uses, scouring
their code for any weaknesses that can allow access into
the computers of unsuspecting users.

Extension Vulnerabilities

For example, UK-based NGSSoftware (www.ngssoft
ware.com) recently exposed a buffer overflow vulnera-
bility inherent to outdated versions of Acrobat Reader.
Although other utilities are available that allow you
to read PDF (Portable Document Format) files, most
people use the free Acrobat Reader, which means
crackers have a nice big pool of users to attack. Because
a buffer overflow could allow crackers complete access
to all the information on your computer, it's considered
one of the most severe attacks around. What's worse,

it's not difficult at all for crackers to set the
trap in motion. The vulnerability lies in
Acrobat Reader's ability to handle XFDF
(XML [Extensible Markup Language]
Forms Data Format), so you only need to
click a malicious XFDF email attachment
or visit a Web site hosting a malicious
XFDF file.

NGSSoftware also revealed a security
hole in that free, friendly, wildly popular
media player, Winamp. By coaxing users
to visit a malicious Web site, crackers can
take advantage of a problem spawned by
Winamp's handling of XM (Fasttracker II)
media files. If Winamp is configured as
the default player for XM files, crackers
can launch a customized Web page that
allows them to overtake the Winamp
connection to the page and run mali-
cious code on the victim's computer. The
Winamp problem isn't avoidable by
simply dodging files with an .XM exten-
sion because Winamp can test media files
it doesn't recognize by extension and run
them when they are recognized.

Let's imagine for a moment you never
use Acrobat Reader or Winamp, in which
case I'd kindly ask that you give my best
to your relatives on Mars. But what about
WinZip? CNET's Download.com reports
a whopping 116.7 million downloads of
the compression utility, so if you don't
use it, someone you know definitely does.
Unfortunately, outdated versions include
a security hole that could compromise
your data. If you use a version of WinZip
ranging between 6.1 and 8.1 to handle any
type of MIME (Multipurpose Internet
Mail Extension), you could be vulnerable
to a buffer overflow attack. Examples of
MIME-encoded data files are those with
extensions such as .MIM, .UUE, .UU (both
UUE and UU are Uuencode extensions),
.B64, .BHX, .HQX (both BHX and HQX
are BinHex extensions), and .XXE.

Make The Best Of A
Bad Situation

This isn't the first time exploits sur-
faced in these programs, and it probably

won't be the last. Buffer overflow scares
infiltrated the Winamp community sev-
eral times over the past few years, and the
exploits don't always target the same area
or technology within the same program.
Acrobat Reader has a similarly dark his-
tory; in fact, any program that can connect
to the Internet can contain potentially
dangerous holes that crackers will find
sooner than later. Most software devel-
opers try their best to tighten their pro-
gram code before releasing their software
to avoid security breaches, but as long as
humans develop software, software users
will occasionally suffer as a result of
human error and sloppiness.

Nonetheless, software exploits aren't
always the direct fault of programmers
and other software developers. Where
error and sloppiness aren't issues, the un-
known remains an intriguing area for
crackers, as shown by exploits that some-
times appear in parts of programs that no
one ever imagined they could appear in in
the first place.

When you buy a house, it's your re-
sponsibility to secure it. Even if you install
a state-of-the-art, motion-detecting alarm
system, you still must operate it to a de-
gree and watch for potential problems
with the technology. The same require-
ments befall you as a PC user. Not only
should you employ the usual antivirus
and firewall protection, but you should
also shore up other potential hazards be-
cause there's little use in locking your
front door if someone can just as easily
jump in through a basement window.

As time-consuming and confusing as
comprehensive system security sounds,
it's really not that much of a burden. As a
general rule, check for program updates
or new versions of your programs regu-
larly. This applies also to installed pro-
grams you don't use. This may sound
nonsensical, but consider this: You never
really seem to read PDF files, so you don't
update your copy of Acrobat Reader you
installed ages ago. You're tooling a-
long on the Web one evening and click an

interesting link, and suddenly the Acrobat
Reader splash screen emerges on your
screen, followed by a document that
opens in the utility itself. Although you
might not purposely open certain pro-
grams, you never know when a file you
access will try to open one of them for
you. Further, the less popular a program,
the less likely you'll hear about a new ex-
ploit that targets the program, which is
even more reason to check for updates. In
a sense, Windows spoils us by automati-
cally alerting us when updates are avail-
able, but few other programs include
similarly effective automatic features.

To help stay on top of updates, create a
shortcut folder in your browser that in-
cludes links to update Web pages for all
your software. Once every month, check
those links to see if updates or new ver-
sions are available, and if they are, down-
load and install them. You can also check
the options in the programs themselves to
see if they'll automatically check for up-
dates each time you start the program or
at an interval you select. After you down-
load and install updates, check the pro-
gram to make sure it's actually updated.
For example, in Acrobat Reader click the
Help menu, click About Adobe Reader,
and check that the version number on the
splash screen matches the version number
of the update you downloaded.

It's Not Always Black & White

Keeping your programs updated
not only ensures a secure environment,
but it also deters other errors and an-
noyances. As computers and networks
increasingly intermingle, we'll see a
continued blurring of the line between
security and performance because we
tackled that pesky "slow PC" problem
years ago. In the future, we might not
measure a PC's superiority by its speed
as much by its ability to fend off net-
work-based attacks. In essence, by se-
curing all of your PC's entry points now,
you're already one step into the security-
focused mindset of tomorrow. I

PC Today / August 2004 19

IT Corner

Commentary by Serdar Yegulalp

Serdar
Yegulalp

runs the
Windows
2000 Power
Users Web site (www
. win2kpowerusers.com) and au-
thors the weekly Windows 2000
Power Users Newsletter. Serdar
was a regular contributor to Win-
dows Magazine and served as

Winmag.com. Serdar's most re-
cent book is "Windows Server
Undocumented Solutions:
Beyond The Knowledge Base. "
You can email your feedback to
serdar@pctoday.com.

The Albini Theory

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m !innimiiwn*,TnwwKJl«iTjiii

i i\ 1 n ui rfinaiAri t mtr

Back in the '90s, recording engineer Steve Albini
wrote a widely circulated essay titled "The
Problem with Music." What he wrote then applies, in
retrospect, to computers as much as it does to music.

In the essay, Albini lambasted (among many other
things) DAT (digital audio tape) as having done terrible
damage to the music we all have to listen to. Because
DAT machines are relatively inexpensive and easy to
use compared to the big multitrack machines used in
most recording studios, anyone with an interest in
recording tends to pick one up. And few studios today
lack a DAT deck. This, Albini argued, "make[s] it pos-
sible for morons to make a living" using them, and the
results (ruined album masters, terrible-sounding pro-
duction, and so on) speak for themselves. He went on
to say that tape machines (and much of recording gear)
should be deliberately left cumbersome, expensive, and
difficult to use in order to keep the riffraff out.

Call it the Albini Theory. Keep technology hard to
work with so that the people who do use it will have at
least some level of competence, and they won't make
irresponsible mistakes.

This isn't the predominant opinion, though. For
years, the way Microsoft and Apple have chosen to do
things in the PC world has been the guiding philos-
ophy: Keep things outwardly simple, direct, and easy

to understand, and people will eagerly jump on board.
Not all of them will rise to the level of experts, but by
keeping the initial learning curve high you'll avoid
scaring off many people who might otherwise be-
come experts.

These two philosophies (Keep It Simple and Keep It
Difficult, or keep the learning curve high) are at war
today, although it's a very quiet war. Still, the shots
being fired and the shells landing are having an impact,
however small, in the way we use our PCs.

Not Really All That Simple

On the one hand we have Windows, which would
outwardly seem to fall in the Keep It Simple camp. For
expert users it feels like the exact opposite. Windows'
GUI (Graphical User Interface) and controls make it
easy to get to things (provided you know where they
are), but with each successive edition of Windows,
Microsoft makes less of the system available to users.

In many ways, Microsoft is moving toward a posi-
tion where users will never be treated like experts. In
the Windows versions available today, Microsoft has
installed enough roadblocks that it's only possible for
users to perform certain not-terribly-uncommon things
with Windows by hacking it, sometimes in sanction-
able ways (Registry changes) and sometimes not

20 August 2004 / www.pctoday.c

(replacing core system components with
hacked versions).

At the extreme opposite end of the
spectrum is Linux, which is totally open
and malleable. That said, Linux has a
steep learning curve, even for distribu-
tions that have user-friendly setup and
configuration routines. If you don't know
what you're doing, you really can mess
things up — but the majority of Linux
users resent being condescended to by
having things locked away from them.
They would rather learn the hard way,
make their own mistakes, and achieve
their own rewards. Gentoo Linux, one of
my favorite distributions, is my favorite
precisely for this reason. When it is in-
stalled, you must compile everything —
kernel, support tools, the whole tamale-
and-enchilada — from scratch. Yes, it
requires a great investment of effort just
to get things up and running, but once
you do, it's yours. You can compile every-
thing to spec, leaving in everything you
need and nothing you don't.

With Windows, though, sometimes
making the simplest of changes requires
breaking the rules.

For Safety's Sake?

On a less esoteric level, there is the
problem of how this philosophy affects
Windows security. As I write this, the
Sasser worm is tearing up hundreds of
thousands of Windows-based computers
across the Internet. Part of the problem is
that it exploits Microsoft's own System
Restore technology, which was designed
to prevent corruption of system compo-
nents when they're tampered with. The
only way to get rid of the worm is to turn
System Restore off first, which seems to
me to defeat the purpose. (Many common
Trojan horses deposit executables directly
into the system directory and get away
with it. They're not overwriting or re-
placing anything half the time, so no
alarm bells sound.)

Microsoft claims that many of the tech-
nological improvements it puts into
Windows are designed to make the OS

safer. What's most annoying is that obfus-
cations such as the use of digital signa-
tures on system components don't seem
to have made Windows any safer.
Obfuscation, in this case, seems to be
counterproductive. Not only has it made
Windows no more secure, it has made it
harder to repair when system compo-
nents are hidden and attempts to modify
them are prohibited.

Naturally, Linux users despise this sort
of thing. They want to see everything
right now, and heaven forbid anyone
should prevent them from changing any-
thing. System File Protection? Not on my
machine, sir! If they want to substitute in
hand-hacked DLLs (dynamic-link library)
files for the real thing, they don't want to
have to trick the machine into doing it.

It's a laudable sentiment, and I share
it myself. Even though I'm a longtime
Windows user (I've had Windows on
one or another of my computers since
Windows 3.0 came out, and many of my
favorite applications are Windows-only),
my feelings about it have been closer
to those of a Linux user in many ways.
When I sit down to do my work in
Windows, I want to be able to accomplish
everything with a minimum of fuss. I
want to plug in my hardware and have it
work without messing with anything. I
want to run the applications I'm familiar
with. And I want to be able to find every-
thing without too much trouble. But if I
want to customize or modify Windows to
better suit my needs, I shouldn't be arbi-
trarily blocked from doing so.

Unfortunately, there's growing senti-
ment among technology companies to
preemptively treat the user like a crim-
inal. There's invidious copy protection
that renders software all but unusable
even to its legitimate users (Product
Activation, anyone?), and the general
feeling that the consumer doesn't — or
shouldn't — care about tinkering with
what they bought. Tell that to the guys
who spend bundles of money to trick out
their cars far beyond factory spec. They
have no intention of stopping just because

someone waggles their fingers and in-
vokes the specter of a voided warranty.

In retrospect, Albini's words almost
seem rational. Maybe there is such a thing
as keeping things too simple. Maybe it's
better for users, in the long run, to learn
more earlier on so they don't shoot them-
selves in the foot. Maybe it'll mean fewer
computer users, but the ones that exist
will be better educated.

Seeking A Happy Medium

The problem is I can't make myself be-
lieve that. Computers (and by extension,
the Internet) have put an amazing amount
of power into the hands of ordinary folks
in great part because manufacturers have
made computers much more accessible
over the years. To suddenly turn around
and say, "No, you're too stupid to use
them!" smacks of the worst sort of elitism.

Because I have a foot in both camps
(wanting to both Keep It Simple and Keep
It Difficult) my feelings are strongly
divided. Yes, we need to be able to make
expert-level hacks to our systems, if only
because it's a moral imperative. You
never know when things will go so wrong
that they require divine intervention. To
assume that your PC (and your operating
system) will always know what to do in
the event of a crisis, even the vast majority
of crises, is hubris. Sometimes you have to
trust the user to do the right thing. I'd
like to see Microsoft have one place in
Windows where you could go to manu-
ally turn off all those annoying prohibi-
tions, including System File Protection,
and make it something that couldn't be
tripped through a script or some other un-
derhanded mechanism. At the same time,
the PC needs to be functional. Sometimes
you just want to turn it on and work.

In my mind there should be no reason
why the two philosophies should be at
odds. Albini was writing about music
production, but not everyone enters a
recording studio. The majority of us, how-
ever, have to deal with a computer in
some way. Having it both easy and acces-
sible shouldn't be a contradiction. I

PC Today / August 2004 21

Roadside Assistance

Commentary by Dave Methvin

Rehab, Not
Retirement

technology officer of PC
Pitstop, a free site that
automatically diagnoses
and fixes common PC
problems. Contact Dave at
dave@pctoday.com

A lot of perfectly service-
able PCs are put out to
pasture, often because
people think they are too
slow or not worth repairing.
Sure, an old Pentium II
won't play the latest games
at lightning speed, but it still
offers a great way to cruise
the Web or do basic word
processing. Often, all a
middle-aged PC needs is a good
cleaning and perhaps a few simple
hardware upgrades. Even if you're
buying a new PC, your old one can still be
useful as a second PC for someone else in the
family. An older PC is great as a starter system
for kids, and it's a lot safer
(in every sense of the word)
than letting them play with
your cutting-edge system.

If you don't have an older
PC ready for rehab, you may
be able to pick up a PC for
$20 or so at a local garage or
yard sale. You might even
find it useful to buy two or
three old clunker PCs so
you'll have some spare parts
in case something is broken.
Try to get the original instal-
lation CDs and licenses for
Windows and the other soft-
ware that came with the
system. Microsoft was planning to drop support for
Windows 98/Me this year, but now they've been
given a reprieve through 2006. That means you'll be
able to get patches and updates for important security
issues, which is essential if you plan to hook a PC to
the Internet nowadays.

To keep hassles to a minimum, avoid a truly pre-
historic computer such as a 486 or a Pentium. My

starting point for rehabbing would be Pentium II,
preferably one that is running at 400MHz. It's old
enough to be very affordable, but not so old that
hardware upgrades or replacements are hard to find.
You can even run Windows XP on that kind of
system, and it works very well as long as you have
256MB or more memory installed.

A Clean Start

The first thing to do when rehabbing a PC is to
vacuum out the inside of the case to remove as much
dust as possible. Some people use a compressed air can
to remove the dust, but I don't like that approach be-
cause it may push the dust deeper into CD drives,
heatsinks, and other components. When you're
dusting, make sure to get as much gunk as possible out
of heatsinks, where it often seems to collect. A heatsink
covered in fuzz won't do a
very good job of cooling.
Next, see if you can get
the system to start up. In the
hardware department, the
most common reasons for
failures are the moving parts:
cooling fans and drives.
When the power supply fan
fails, it often takes the power
supply with it. Power sup-
plies can be had for less than
$30, so it's no big financial
strain if you have to replace
one. The best way to ap-
proach hardware problems
is to have two systems and
swap parts until you get it working. If you can get
through the BIOS (Basic Input/Output System) startup
check and the system at least starts to boot, then you're
usually in good shape hardware-wise.

If the disk drive isn't working, put your ear close
to the drive. If you don't hear it spinning, the drive
may be suffering from a problem called stiction that
often occurs if it's been sitting unused for a while. Try

tapping the center of the drive gently with
the handle (not the tip) of a screwdriver;
this may give the drive the oomph it
needs to get started again. If not, swap a
drive from another system or buy one; I
got a refurbished 80GB Seagate drive re-
cently for $30 at CompUSA (www.comp
usa.com). Older systems may not be
able to recognize drives larger than
about 30GB without a BIOS upgrade —
one that you may not be able to get — so
don't spend extra for a large drive you
can't use. The Seagate drive I used had
a special jumper to restrict it to 30GB so
that older systems could recognize it.

Fix The Software

With the hardware up to speed, the
next step is to fix the software. It's a rare
system nowadays that doesn't have some
sort of serious software configuration
problem, whether it's an accumulation
of junk files, viruses and spyware infesta-
tion, or the need for a good defragging.
I've covered these maladies in previous
columns; they can take some time to
do but usually don't require any really
special skills.

Wherever possible, reformat the drive
and do a clean install of software. That
guarantees you're starting with a setup
that's free of spyware and viruses. If you

This old Pentium II system was rescued
from the junk heap and then enhanced
with some artistic case cutouts, interior
lighting, and a new paint job.

Utilities Of The Month
Eraser & Autoclave

rhinking of donating or throwing
away an old PC? If you have per-
sonal information on it — and most
people do — you could be setting
yourself up for identity theft. I like
two free tools that let you delete
sensitive information from your PC.
Eraser (www.heidi.ie/eraser) re-
moves all sorts of files that may
contain personal information. It
does more than just delete the files;
it overwrites them several times so
that the data can't be recovered by
an unerase utility. If you want to be
absolutely sure that all your per-
sonal data is toasted, Autoclave v0.3
(staff.washington.edu/jdlarios
/autoclave/) will completely erase
all data from the drive. Both work
very well, so be extra sure you have
copies of any data that you want to
keep or it's gone for good. For infor-
mation on cleaning up your
Internet browser history, check
out the "Browser Managers" article
on page 60. I

have the original software CDs, you can
install whatever came with the system.
Often that is the best choice for brand-
name systems because you may need spe-
cial hardware drivers. You can upgrade
the OS to Windows XP Home Edition if
you currently have Win98/98SE/Me, but
that will set you back another $100 or so.
After your initial software setup, im-
mediately go to the Windows Update
Web site and make sure you have in-
stalled every critical update. (For this
month's updates, check out "Windows
Update Tracker" on page 14.) Failing to
do this will leave you open to all sorts of
attacks. Also, uninstall any of the ancient
promotional versions of software that
came on the CD. The version of McAfee

or Norton antivirus software that is on a
1999 PC isn't going to do any good in
2004. Instead, you should install up-to-
date versions of a good spyware and
virus solution. If you like free, trust-
worthy software (and who doesn't?), I
recommend AVG Antivirus Free Edition
(www.grisoft.com), SpywareBlaster
(www.javacoolsoftware.com), and Ad-
aware (www.lavasoftusa.com). This trio
will do a good job of keeping you safe
from the bad software that's out there.

Finger & Eye Enhancements

Want to make an old computer feel like
new? Buy a new mouse and keyboard.
The old ones are probably a mess, espe-
cially if food has gotten anywhere near
them. There are some very nice mouse-
and-keyboard packages available for less
than $50 today, and basic models cost as
little as $10. For hooking up to an older
PC, make sure they support the older
PS/2 (Personal System /2)-style connec-
tions. Even when an older PC has USB
(Universal Serial Bus) ports, it may not
be able to reliably use a USB keyboard.

Another great upgrade for an old com-
puter is the display. An old blurry CRT
(cathode-ray tube) monitor can be real
torture to your eyes. A 17-inch CRT can
be had for less than $100 nowadays. If
you want to really splurge, get a crisp 15-
inch LCD display; they cost about $300.
When shopping, just make sure your old
video card supports the screen resolution.
The great thing about upgrading this way
is that if you decide to upgrade your PC
later, you can use the new components
on the new PC.

Even if there are several parts you
end up replacing, you'll probably spend
less than $150 to rehab an old computer.
In the process, you'll learn a lot about
how computers work and be much more
confident that you can fix problems
when they happen in the future. That
will save you money on service down
the road. I

PC Today / August 2004 23

This Old Desktop

Commentary by Alfred Poor

What's Your Type?

■ n the dark, old DOS days,

have ques
windows 3.x/95/?o, o
have a favorite tip, utili,
resource that you'd like
share, send a message i
Alfred afalfred@pctoday.coi
Due to the volume of mail tl

to answer all messages, but
does his best.

you were pretty limited in
how your printed documents
came out. Printers had only a
few BMP (bit-mapped) fonts,
and they were not much to
write home about (or with,
for that matter). There were
some programs that let you
print text and graphics in the
same document, but you
were essentially creating a
picture, and these took for-
ever to print. This was also a
great way to go through expen-
sive printer ribbons in a hurry.
The Apple LaserWriter was a break-
through product, in that it let users down-
load outline fonts that could be scaled to any
size when printing. The printer used a language
called PostScript and required a faster processor and
more memory than the Macs (and rare PCs) that con-
nected to it. HP then advanced the personal printer rev-
olution with an affordable LaserJet printer that could
accept downloaded BMP fonts and had slots for car-
tridges that had fonts in ROM for instant access.

Tried & True

The real progress didn't start until Windows 3.1 ar-
rived on the scene, however, with support for a new
type of outline font called TrueType. TrueType fonts let
the computer create any sized letters as needed and
send them to the printer. Windows can either send the
characters as BMPs — essentially little pictures of each
letter — or, if the printer's controller accepts down-
loaded fonts, Windows will download the fonts in the
required size so you don't need to send the information
repeatedly in order to print the same character.

Starting with Win3.1, Microsoft included 14 different
fonts, as shown in the Font column of Table 1. There
were normal, italic, bold, and bold italic files for the
Arial, Courier, and Times New Roman type fonts, as
well as individual files for the Symbol and Wingding
fonts. Win3.1 has both FOT (Font) and TTF (TrueType
Font) files; Win95 and later only have TTF.

Note that the FOT files were only required in and in-
cluded with Win3.1; Windows 95 and later only require
the single TTF file for each font.

Font

File names

Arial

Arial.fot, Arial.ttf

Arial Bold

Arialbd.fot, Arialbd.ttf

Arial Bold Italic

Arialbi.fot, Arialbi.ttf

Arial Italic

Ariali.fot, Ariali.ttf

Courier

Cour.fot, Cour.ttf

Courier Bold

Courbd.fot, Courbd.ttf

Courier Bold Italic

Courbi.fot, Courbi.ttf

Courier Italic

Couri.fot, Couri.ttf

Times New Roman

Times. fot, Times.ttf

Times New Roman Bold

Timesbd.fot, Timesbd.ttf

Times New Roman

Timesbi.fot, Timesbi.ttf

Bold Italic

Times New Roman Italic

Timessi.fot, Timesi.ttf

Symbol

Symbol.fot, Symbol.ttf

Wingding

Wingding.fot,

Wingding.ttf

Table 1: These are the TrueType font files included with
Win3.1/95 — pretty basic compared to today's standards.

Keep Track Of Your Fonts

If there isn't a separate file for the typeface with bold
or italic attributes, Windows can create text with these

FnnlilK TrueType Funis;
I I Ishow Only TrueType Fonls in Applications

Make sure that you have TrueType fonts enabled in
Windows 3.1 if you want to use them.

attributes on the fly. The results are not as
precise as if they were carefully crafted
but are good enough for most purposes.
As a result, you don't really need to know
whether there is more than one file for a
given typeface.

Win3.1 requires two files for every font:
one with an .FOT extension and one with
a .TTF extension. The TTF file contains the
data for the font, and the FOT file points
to that file's location. All you need is the
TTF file to install a new font; Windows
creates the FOT file as part of the installa-
tion process. All font files are stored in the
C:\WINDOWS\SYSTEM folder.

If you're going to use TrueType fonts
in Win3.1, make sure that they are en-
abled by starting the Control Panel and
running the Fonts applet. Click the True-
Type button and make sure there is a
check mark by Enable TrueType. To add a
new font, choose the Add button on the
Fonts application window. Then browse
to the file for the font and choose OK.

Win95 makes the situation easier: It has
a new C:\WINDOWS\FONTS subdirec-
tory for this purpose. To install a new
font, all you have to do is copy the TTF
file to the Fonts subdirectory.

Too Much Of A Good Thing

It is convenient to have a number of
different typefaces to choose from when
designing a document, but there is a price
to pay.

In Win3.x, each installed font takes up
system resources, and running low on
system resources can lead to error mes-
sages and system crashes. Having too
many fonts also can make the boot
process take significantly longer. Win95 is

a bit more tolerant of installed
fonts, but there are still limits.
All fonts get installed under a
single Registry key, which has
a limit of 64KB. Depending on
the length of the font name and
its location, you are probably

limited to about 1,000 fonts.

The best approach, how-
ever, is to just limit yourself to a couple
dozen fonts that you use on a regular
basis. For the rest of your fonts, get a font
manager utility so that you can archive
font files easily and restore them to your
system either singly or in groups. This
will help improve your system stability
and performance.

Notepad Limits

Notepad is one of the most useful utili-
ties ever bundled with any version of
Windows. It is only a simple text editor,
but that's what makes it so useful. Unlike
word processors, there's no way you can
junk up a file with different fonts or ef-
fects, such as bold or underline. So if you
want to write or change a file and just use
unformatted characters, Notepad is
the tool for you.

The program has its limits,
however. All the data is held in
memory and does not get
spooled to disk, so you cannot
open very large files. I experi-
mented on my two test bench
systems and discovered the fol-
lowing: I managed to create a file
containing 38.85KB using Win95
before I got the error message
that the file was too large. I was
surprised to find that Win3.11's
appetite was larger; it opened
the same file without complaint, and I
added to it until it reached 48.68KB be-
fore the error message.

I expect that your "mileage" may vary
as the available resources play a role in
how much text Notepad can hold at once.
Should you ever have to view or edit a file
that is too large for your installation of

Notepad, use WordPad instead. It doesn't
have the same size limitations, and you
can save the contents as a plain text file
when you're finished making changes.

A Fresh Look At File Manager

Ever notice that if you have a Windows
Explorer window for a folder, and you
add a file to that folder, the file appears at
the bottom of the list no matter how the
list is sorted? You have to press the F5 key
in order to refresh the display. Well, the
Win3.x File Manager does that one better
(or worse, depending on your point of
view) because in some cases, the new file
won't appear at all until you refresh
the window.

The new file will appear on the File
Manager list if the change is made in
one of two ways: by a Windows pro-
gram that makes the appropriate calls
or a DOS program running under
Windows in enhanced mode with
System.ini containing the line File
SysChange=YES. DOS programs run-
ning in real or standard mode will not
update the File Manager screen, and

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Windows 95 shows the contents of the Fonts folder
differently than it does for other folders.

you'll have to press the F5 key to make
it appear.

Note also that changes, such as move,
copy, or delete, in the File Manager Search
window under Win3.0/3.0a may not ap-
pear in the File Manager screen. This was
fixed starting with Win3.1. I

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Windows Explorer

Picture this: You need to access a
Microsoft Word document you
started working on the other day. Which
are you most likely to do: 1) Click the
Start button on your computer's Desktop,
select Documents (or, if you're using
Windows XP, select My Recent Docu-
ments), and hope the document you need
is still in the list of recently accessed files.
2) Use Windows Explorer to locate and
organize your documents.

If you (or someone you know) is more
likely to choose the first option, this ar-
ticle will help take the mystery out of
finding and managing files and other
documents on your PC. By learning the
ins and outs of Windows Explorer (the
file management utility in every Win-
dows version since Windows 95), you'll
be able to find the files you need
quickly, organize them in ways that
make sense to you, and make better
sense out of how your computer works
with programs and files.

Files, Files Everywhere

Before we start tackling questions
about how Windows Explorer helps you
manage files, let's take a very quick look
at what files actually are. Like books, files
are basically collections of data that come
in various sizes. Word documents, Excel

spreadsheets, and email messages are all
files. Your Windows operating system
is actually a collection of system files
(important files that are often inacces-
sible, even through Windows Explorer,
and essential to your computer's smooth
operation). And programs themselves
are files.

As a library houses books, your com-
puter's hard drive (main storage device
inside your PC, almost always called
the C: drive) contains files. Of course, in a
library you don't usually find books
lying around on the floor, but rather
categorized on shelves. Similarly, in a
hard drive, files are systematically
stored within folders.
Now that you have en-
dured Files 101, it's time
for the questions. Keep in
mind that the answers
below work or Windows
9x/Me/2000/XP unless
otherwise indicated.

How do I open
Windows Explorer?

There are two basic
ways to launch Windows
Explorer, so choose the
method that works best
for you:

j«

• Win9x/Me: Click Start, Programs,
and Windows Explorer.

• Win2000: Click Start, Programs,
Accessories, and Windows Explorer.

• WinXP: Click Start, All Programs,
Accessories, and Windows Explorer.

• All versions: Right-click the Start
button and select Explore.

There are some other starting points
for accessing Windows Explorer, as well,
which you might already use. If you
double-click the My Computer icon on
your Desktop, a window opens with
icons for all of the drives (hard drives, as
well as floppy, CD, DVD, network, and

Tools Help

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If you know how to find your way around the My Computer
window, you already know a lot about Windows Explorer.

26 August 2004 / www.pctoday.com

other drives depending on how your
computer is set up) and for the Control
Panel. There are also links to folders such
as My Documents. If you know how to
move around within these folders, you
already know how to navigate through
Windows Explorer.

In WinXP, clicking Start and selecting
My Documents, My Pictures, or My Music
takes you directly to the associated folders
within Windows Explorer. All of these
access methods are just that: different
ways of entering Windows Explorer.

..General; View File Types Offline Files

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menu to customize Windows Explorer's
appearance and change how it behaves.

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You can apply the view [such as Details or Tiles] that

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Automatically search for network folders and printers

Display file size information in folder tips

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Sensitive system files are hidden from
view in Windows Explorer. In Windows
XP, you can change folder options to
view those files.

How do I move around
within Windows Explorer?

Navigating Windows Explorer
requires a lot of mouse clicking.
When you launch Windows Ex-
plorer, you'll see menus at the
top, a Folders pane on the left,
and a larger pane on the right. In
the Folders pane, there are
folders organized in a tree struc-
ture or tree directory (folders
and subfolders arranged hier-
archically). The contents of
whatever folder you currently
have selected will appear in the
right pane.

In the Folder pane, a plus sign
(+) to the left of a folder indicates that it
includes subfolders; you can click the
plus sign to see what's inside. You can
then click the minus sign (-) to close the
folder and stop viewing its contents. You
can also double-click any folder within
Windows Explorer (whether it be in the
left pane or the right) to open and close it.

If you get lost navigating Windows
Explorer, a couple of buttons on the
Standard Buttons bar can help you out.
Click the Back button to return to the last
folder you viewed; keep clicking it to
go back even further. Or, to move up a
level within the tree structure, click the
Up button.

How do I open files and pro-
grams using Windows Explorer?

To open a file, such as a Word docu-
ment or digital photo, locate the file and
either double-click it or select it and
click Open in the File menu. You can do
the same thing with an application file
(executable file that launches a program;
Winword.exe, for example, launches
Word), but it's usually easier to launch a
program by clicking Start, Programs (All
Programs in WinXP), and the icon for
the appropriate program.

How do I create new folders to
help organize my files?

First navigate to find the location
where you want to create the new
folder. You can then either click the File
menu and select New and Folder or

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In Windows Me/2000/XP, you can select different
viewing options using the View button. The
Thumbnails view shown here lets you see images.

right-click an empty area in the right
pane and select New and Folder. This
creates a folder aptly named New
Folder. Type the name you want the
folder to have and press ENTER. If you
want to rename the new folder, either
select Rename from the File menu or
right-click the folder and select Rename,
type the new name, and press ENTER.

How do I move and copy
folders and files from one
location to another?

When you move (or cut and paste) a
file or folder, you're actually removing it
from its current location and putting it
somewhere else. When you copy (or copy
and paste) a file or folder, you're putting a
copy of it somewhere else; the original file
remains in its current location. There are
numerous ways to move an item (more
than those we mention below), so choose
the method you're comfortable with:

• Select the item. Select Cut from the Edit
menu. Navigate to find the location
where you want to move the item and
make sure that location (either a drive
or folder) is selected in the Folders
pane. Select Paste from the Edit menu.

• Right-click the item and select Cut.
Navigate to find the location where
you want to move the item. Right-
click an empty area in the right pane
and select Paste.

• With the tree directory open in the
Folders pane so you can view the cur-
rent folder and the folder to which you

PC Today / August 2004 27

indows Boot Cami

want to move an item, press
and hold the SHIFT key while
you drag and drop the item
(click it and hold the mouse
button down to move it from
one location to another) to
its destination.

Similarly, there are numerous
ways to copy an item.

• Select the item. Select Copy
from the Edit menu. Navigate
to find the location where
you want to copy the item
and make sure that location
(either a drive or folder) is
selected in the Folders pane.
Next, select Paste from the
Edit menu.

• Right-click the item and
select Copy. Navigate to find
the location where you want
to move the item. Right-click
an empty area in the right
pane and select Paste.

• With the Folders pane open
so you can view the current
folder and the folder to which
you want to copy the item,
press and hold the CTRL key
while you drag and drop the
item to its destination.

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Date Modified
4/21/2004 11:47 AM
1/7/2004 10:42 AM
5/12/2004 10 25 AM
2/11/2004 11 40 AM
5/12/200410 22 AM
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How do I use
Windows Explorer to
find specific files?

Windows Explorer's search
feature lets you locate specific
files and folders on the hard drive. The
steps for using the feature, however,
differ from one Windows version to the
next. If you know the name of the file
you're looking for, use the following
steps in Win9x:

1. Open the Tools menu and select Find
and Folders Or Files. This opens the
Find: All Files dialog box.

2. On the Name & Location tab, type the
name of the file you're looking for in
the Name field. If you only know part
of the name, that will work, as long as
you spell it correctly. You don't have to
include the file extension (characters
[usually three] that following the period

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pen this kind of file

The File Types tab in Windows Explorer's Folder Options lets you
designate what programs automatically open certain file types.

2. In the Search For Files Or
Folders Named field, type
the name of the file you're
looking for. It doesn't have to
be the complete file name,
but the portion you type
must be spelled correctly.

3. If you know the general loca-
tion of the file, use the Look
In drop-down menu and
select the appropriate folder
or drive.

4. Click Search Now and, when
the results display in the
right pane, double-click the
file to access it.

WinXP users should follow
these steps:

1. Click the Search button. This
replaces the Folder pane
on the left with the Search
Companion pane.

2. Click the All Files And
Folders link.

3. In the All Or Part Of The File
Name field, type the name
of the file you're looking
for. What you enter must be
spelled correctly.

4. If you know the general loca-
tion of the file, use the Look
In drop-down menu to desig-
nate the appropriate folder
or drive.

5. Click Search and, when the
results display, double-click
the file to open it.

at the end of a file name and indicate
what type of program created the file).

3. If you know the general location of
the file (for instance, you know it's
stored in a subfolder within the My
Documents folder), click the Browse
button and select the appropriate
folder or drive.

4. Click Find Now and, when the results
display, double-click the file to access it.

If you're using Win2000/Me, follow
these steps:
1. Click the Search button. This replaces

the Folders pane on the left with the

Search pane.

How do I find a file if I don't
remember what its name is?

If you know what type of file you're
looking for (say, an Excel spreadsheet)
and you know the file extension (in the
case of the Excel spreadsheet, it's .XLS),
you can search for that file type and then
select the correct file. Follow the steps in
the previous answer with one exception:
Instead of typing the file name, type an
asterisk (*) and period followed by the
file extension (following our spreadsheet
example, you would type *.xls). pct

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New Thinking, New Style

indows Boot Cami

Start-To-Finish Guide:

Format An
Excel Document

You're well on your way to becoming
a Microsoft Excel expert. You can
enter data effortlessly, cruise around any
worksheet with ease, and create formulas
that recalculate information in a flash.

Although you can efficiently develop
fact-filled, practical, no-nonsense work-
sheets, they lack, well, pizzazz. They
convey the information you need, but
they definitely don't dazzle your audi-
ence. Besides, you realize that well-for-
matted worksheets are not only more
interesting, but they also can communi-
cate information more effectively, draw-
ing attention to key points while down-
playing the less important stuff.

In this article we'll guide you through
various techniques, from basic to elabo-
rate, that you can use to format your Excel

worksheets. When you're finished, you'll
know which formatting tool to pull from
Excel's toolbox for any occasion.

You'll gain the most from this tutorial
by actually trying your hand at each
method, so go ahead and settle in at your
computer for a bit of Excel experimenting.

Up & Running

Excel provides various ways to for-
mat: with the Format menu, keyboard
shortcuts, or toolbar buttons. This mul-
tiple-method approach lets you choose
which way matches your work style best.

However, before you can pick a way
to format your worksheet, you must first
select the cells, a step commonly known
as the "select before you affect" prin-
ciple. For example, if you want to make

the text in cell Al bold, you must select
the cell before clicking the Bold button.

Of course, applying formatting cell-by-
cell can quickly become laborious, espe-
cially if you intend to use the same
formatting for a range of cells. A more ef-
ficient method is to select the entire range
first, and then format it. There are various
ways to select a range: To select a con-
tiguous group of cells, you can click a cell
in the corner of the range, press and hold
the SHIFT key, and click in the opposite
corner before releasing the SHIFT key.
Alternatively, you can click a cell, hold it,
and drag the cursor over the range.

To select a noncontiguous range, press
and hold the CTRL key and click the cells
that you want to select. You can also select
an entire row or column; to do so, click
the gray row or column heading (such as
"10" or "A"). If you want to select mul-
tiple columns or rows, click and drag your
cursor over the appropriate headings.
Finally, you can select an entire worksheet
by clicking the gray Select All button,
which is the blank gray box located in the
upper-left corner of the worksheet.

Now that you know some methods
for selecting cells and ranges, you're
ready to apply formatting to them.

Format Text & Characters

One of the best places to locate com-
monly used formatting commands is the
Formatting toolbar. Besides the fact that

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formats to align decimal points in a column,

Excel includes basic formatting f
numbers via buttons on the Formatting
toolbar. If you want fancier numerical
formatting, take a look at the options in
the Format Cells dialog box.

30 August 2004 / www.pctoday.com

it's handy, the Formatting toolbar
buttons are easy-to-use: To identify a
toolbar button's name, rest your mouse
pointer over the button until a ScreenTip
with the name appears. After you locate
the button you want, click it to apply
formatting to selected cells.

Let's take a quick tour of the most-
used buttons on the Formatting toolbar,
using Excel 2002 as an example. First,
you can modify the typeface used for se-
lected cells by clicking the Font button's

drop-down arrow, just as you would in
Microsoft Word. You can also change
the font size and bold, italicize, or un-
derline your text. (If you prefer to use
the keyboard for these common for-
mats, press CTRL-B for bold, CTRL-U
for underline, and CTRL-I for italic.) To
change the text's color, click the Font
Color button's drop-down arrow and
click the color you want.

Finally, if you don't like the way
Excel aligns cell data (right-aligned for
numbers; left-aligned for text) you can
quickly change it by clicking the Align
Left, Center, or Align Right buttons.

Numerical Formatting

You can also format numeric data
using specific numerical formats. Ap-
plying number formatting doesn't change
the underlying value; it simply makes the
worksheet more readable. For example,
you can click the Currency Style button to
format a number using a dollar sign ($)
and two decimal places (plus a comma, if
necessary); choosing the Comma Style
button does the same, without the dollar
sign. Excel includes these common for-
mats as Formatting toolbar buttons, so
they are easy to find.

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Advanced PowerPoint

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Advanced Excel

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14,000

16,000

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20,500

27,000

33,500

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31,900
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36,700
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For some features, such as Borders and Fill Color, you can "tear off" the associated palette
to make accessing the buttons easier.

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If these basic number formats don't fit
the bill, you'll need to dig a little deeper.
To do so, you can open the Format Cells
dialog box by choosing Cells from the
Format menu or by simply pressing
CTRL-1. In the Format Cells dialog box,
click the Number tab. The Category list
includes various types of formatting you
can apply to numbers. Click an option on
the list (such as Number, Currency, or
Accounting) and choose associated op-
tions listed in the dialog box. If you're not
sure how the options you choose will ap-
pear, take a look at the Sample box. When
you're finished, click OK.

Make It Fit

As you work with your Excel data,
you'll probably soon discover that the
preset sizes for columns and rows aren't
exactly one size fits all. Instead, typing
lengthy text in a cell is sometimes unset-
tling because entries that extend beyond
the default column width flow into the
adjacent cell or may instead appear
chopped off. Here's what's happening:
A column displays about nine charac-
ters, but it can actually contain as many
as 256. If you type a text label longer
than the default width, Excels truncates
the display of the extra letters if they
can't flow into the adjacent cell (al-
though they're still part of the cell's con-
tents); entries that are too long display
as pound signs (###). Keep in mind that
the underlying value is still held in the
cell; you just can't view it.

Fortunately, you can resize a column
so that the cell's contents are fully
displayed. To do this, rest the mouse
pointer over the right border of the
column heading until it appears as a
double-headed, horizontal arrow bi-
sected by a vertical line. (This can be a bit
tricky, so move the mouse slowly over
the border and don't give up.) Drag the
border left or right, releasing the mouse
when the column is the correct width.

You can also quickly resize a column
to fit the widest entry in the entire
column. To do this, double-click the
right border of the heading. If you find
yourself moving the mouse between
clicks, you may prefer to instead click a

PC Today / August 2004 31

indows Boot Cami

column heading (which selects the
entire column) and then choose Format,
Column, and AutoFit Selection.

For even greater efficiency, you can re-
size several adjacent columns at once. To
do this, click the first column heading in
your selection, press and hold the SHIFT
key, and then click the last column
heading. With the columns selected,
choose Format, Column, and Width. In
the Column Width dialog box, type a new
width and then choose OK. Alternatively,
you can select all the columns you want to
resize and double-click the right border
of any selected column heading. You can
change the height of a row to accom-
modate the tallest character in much
the same way: double-click the bottom
border of the row heading.

Finally, instead of resizing columns,
you can arrange text in a cell so that it
wraps to multiple lines within the cell.
To do this, choose Format, Cells, and
click the Alignment tab. Check the Wrap
Text box and click OK. Alternatively,
you can check the Shrink To Fit box in
the Format Cells dialog box. This tem-
porarily reduces the size of the typeface
so that it fits in the cell. However, the
text size itself isn't actually changed; if
you later increase the column width
the text will automatically resize to fit
within the larger column.

Add Borders & Shading

Another way to emphasize worksheet
information (such as a heading) is to sur-
round it with a border. To do this, select
the cells and click the arrow next to the
Borders button. Click the type of border
you want on the Borders palette.

You can also use options on the
Borders palette to add a single or double
border underline below a column of
numbers: just select the cell and then
click the appropriate button on the
Borders palette

If you plan to apply the same border
several times in sequence, you can "tear
off" the Borders palette from the
Formatting toolbar. This keeps it handy
on-screen so that you don't have to keep
clicking the Borders arrow. To do this,
open the Borders palette. Move your

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11,000

12,000

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13,500

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10 Intermediate Excel

8,000

9,500

7,800

8,000

33,300

11 Advanced Excel

8,600

9,800

9,700

9,800

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You can rotate the text for headings or other text that you want to emphasize. Rotating
labels also helps them fit in a smaller space.

pointer to the top of the displayed
palette and drag it into the worksheet
area before releasing the mouse.
When you finish using the palette,
clear it by clicking its close button
(the X in the upper-right corner).

To apply shading, select the range
and then click the Fill Color button's
drop-down arrow. Choose a color
from the Fill Color palette. If you
want more specific choices for
shading (or borders) you can press
CRTL-1 to open the Format Cells
dialog box. Choose options on the
Border or Patterns pages of the
dialog box.

Rotate Text

Another option for displaying text
more attractively (and squishing it into
a smaller area) is to rotate text to a spe-
cific angle. For example, you can dis-
play headings at a 45-degree angle.

To rotate text, select the cells; then
open the Format Cells dialog box. Click
the Alignment tab. Type the number of
degrees that you want to rotate text in
the Degrees box. Alternatively, drag the
Red block in the Orientation box to vi-
sually indicate the rotation you want.
When you're finished, click OK.

Tired of formatting everything individually?
Use Excel's AutoFormat feature to apply
predesigned formatting to a range.

AutoFormat

Rather than individually applying
fonts, borders, shading, and other for-
matting to a range, you can use Excel's
AutoFormat feature. AutoFormat in-
cludes a professionally designed set of
formatting instructions. First, select the
range and then choose Format and
AutoFormat. Click a format from the list
in the AutoFormat box to preview it in
the Sample area. When you find the type
of formatting that you want, click OK.

If you want to remove an AutoFormat
from a range, select the cells and choose
Format and AutoFormat. Click None at

32 August 2004 / www.pctoday.com

Windows Boot Camp "« ~*JZ2

the bottom of the list.
Alternatively, you can
clear an AutoFormat (or
any formatting, for that
matter) while still leaving
the cell contents in place
by choosing Edit, Clear,
and Formats.

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Copy Formats

You can use Excel's
Format Painter feature to
efficiently copy formatting
from one cell or range to
another. This is helpful be-
cause you can develop the
look you want by combining various
formats and copy it to other worksheet
areas. First, select a cell with the for-
matting that you want to copy. Click
the Format Painter button on the
Formatting toolbar and drag over the
range you want to format before re-
leasing the mouse. When you release
the mouse, the Format Painter is turned
off. However, you can keep the Format
Painter active so that you can apply the
formatting to several ranges. To do this,
select the sample cell and then double-
click the Format Painter button. When
you're finished painting the format, click
the button again, which turns it off.

As an alternative to using the Format
Painter, you can use the Paste Special
command to copy formats from one
range to another. This is especially help-
ful if you want to apply formats from one
worksheet to another. First, select the cell
with the formatting you want to copy
and then click the Copy button (or choose
Edit and Copy). Select the range to which
you want to apply the formatting and
choose Edit and Paste Special. In the
Paste Special dialog box, choose the
Formats radio button. Finally, click OK.

Conditional Formatting

You can format cells based on their
content, a spiffy feature that Excel refers
to as Conditional Formatting. This helps
you visually identify data that ad-
heres to specific criteria. For example,
Conditional Formatting can help you
mark all items over budget in red or
those that exceed sales projections in

You can copy formatting
from one range to an-
other by using the Format
Painter button or the
Paste Special command.

bold. If the underlying
value later changes, Excel
will automatically re-
format the cells to display
the appropriate format-
ting. You can apply Con-
ditional Formatting to a
constant or to the results
of a formula; however,
we'll use the easiest sce-
nario for this tutorial,
which is using constants.

Let's assume that you
want to flag all cells in
red that have values

■aia

Cell Value Is -J | greater than

-1 I2000

Preview of format to use
when condition is true:

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Add» | Delete... |

| Cancel |

Conditional Formatting helps you visually identify
cells with specified values by formatting them
differently, such as showing budgetary items that
exceed $2,000 in red.

exceeding $2,000. First, select the range
to which you want to apply the for-
matting and then choose Conditional
Formatting from the Format menu. In
the Conditional Formatting dialog box,
make sure Condition 1 shows as Cell
Value Is, indicating a constant value.
Next, choose the comparison operator
(in this case you'll choose Greater Than).
In the third text box, type a value for
the condition (such as 2000). Click the
Format button and set the type of for-
matting in the Format Cells dialog box
that you want Excel to apply if the con-
dition is true. For example, to show cells
with values greater than 2000, you can
click the Color drop-down arrow and
then choose the color red. Click OK. If
you want Excel to examine multiple sets
of criteria, you add more conditions by
clicking the Add button. When you're
finished setting criteria, choose OK in all
open dialog boxes.

Add Flair & Style

As you work more and more with
Excel, you'll probably find that you like a
certain combination of formatting, such as
a font style and color that displays your

company's or favorite sports team's colors.
Luckily, you can save your custom-de-
signed formatting as a style and then use it
whenever you want in a workbook.

To develop a custom style, first
format a range using all the attributes
you want to include in the style. For ex-
ample, you can format a range using a
12-point Arial font, a border, and gray
shading. Select the range and then
choose Format and Style to open the
Style dialog box. The Style Name drop-
down menu includes a preset name for
the style, but you of course can change
it. Click OK.

After you create a style, you can
apply it to other worksheet ranges.
Select the range to which you want
to apply the style, and then choose
Format and Style. Choose the style
you want from the Style Name list.

Finally, you can modify the style.

In the Style dialog box, choose the

style on the Style Name list. Click

Modify and set options in the Format

Cells dialog box. When you're finished,

choose OK in all open dialog boxes.

And Finally, Add Interest

After all the technicalities of format-
ting your Excel sheet, you deserve to
add some fun and interest to it. If you
want to quickly add an eye-catching vi-
sual to a worksheet, you can add a photo
or other graphic to the background.
Keep in mind that this can increase the
worksheet's file size (and is potentially
distracting), but when tastefully done, it
can add interest and zing.

To add a background graphic to a
worksheet, choose Format, Sheet, and
Background. In the Sheet Background
dialog box, navigate to the folder where
your photos and other graphics are
stored and double-click the file you
want to use for the background.

With these formatting tools firmly in
hand, you should be able to make sure
that any worksheet is interesting, read-
able, and well-dressed. These tips will
both increase your productivity and set
your Excel sheet apart from the crowd, per

by Linda Bird

PCToday / August 2004 33

'indows Boot Cami

Excel
Formulas

Excel is jam-packed full of functions —
more than 360 of them. To help you
get up and running with them, we've de-
veloped the crib notes for using Excel.
Here we've included some of the most
useful functions Excel offers to users.

Before diving into them, however, we
want to mention that almost all Excel
functions are set up in a similar way: the
equal sign (=), so Excel knows that the
entry is a function; the func-
tion's name; and finally the
variable portion of the function
(the argument), which is usu-
ally placed within parenthesis.
Arguments are constants, such
as a number, a range, or even
another function. Excel is also
relatively picky about the
syntax you use to develop the
function, so make sure you
type each portion of the for-
mula correctly.

f] File Edit |

a at am

cell where you want to display the total
and click the button. Excel places a
moving border around the cells that it
assumes you want to add. To use the
indicated cells in the formula, click the
Enter button on the Formula Bar
(shown by a green check mark) or
press the ENTER key.

You can also preselect the cells and
click the AutoSum button.

highest sales for the month), you would
type =MAX(A1:A10); to find the smallest
value (such as the lowest sales), type
=MIN(A1:A10).

You can also find the number of cells in
a range that include values by tapping into
the COUNT function. COUNT finds the
number of nonblank cells in a range. For
example, assuming all the cells in Al
through A10 contained values,
typing =COUNT(A1:A10) re-
sults in the number 10.

X -J f* =SUM(B1Q:B15)

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Bonus Percentage:

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i Lonnie Jones

2 Rebecca Jilson

3 Lauren Smith

4 Jill Adkins

5 Jason Black

7.5%

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$12,398.17 |

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$738.09

$1,881.24

$1,325.70

$929.88

$839.53

$1,085.37

SUM It Up

You can't work very long in
Excel without using SUM. This
function simply totals the values from a
range or a set of constants. Here's an ex-
ample: Imagine that you want to add up
the values in cells Al through A10. To do
so, you type =SUM(A1:A10) in the cell
where you want to display the total (such
as All). If you later change a value in one
of the referenced cells (such as Al), Excel
automatically recalculates the total.

Finally, if you have adjacent cells
that you want to add, consider using
Excel's AutoSum button, located on the
Standard toolbar. To use it, click the

When you click the AutoSum button, Excel looks in the colum
above (or the row to the left of) the selected cell to determine
which values to use. To confirm the selection, press ENTER.

Find The AVERAGE,
MAX, MIN, COUNT

Besides SUM, Excel includes other
common functions that help you quickly
determine the average, highest, or lowest
value for a range of cells: AVERAGE,
MAX, and MIN. You set up these func-
tions in much the same way as you do
SUM. For example, if you want to find the
average values in cells Al through A10,
you would type =AVERAGE(A1:A10).
Likewise, if you want to quickly find the
highest value in a range (such as the

Get A Handle
On TIME & DATE

Time is tough for most of us
to manage. However, Excel
can help you get a good
handle on time and date calcu-
lations via the DATE and
TIME functions. These help
you calculate and analyze in-
formation related to the pass-
ing of time. For example, you
can use DATE to find how
many days an account is past
due, when a new employee is eligible for
benefits, or how many months you spent
on a project.

The syntax for the function is
=DATE(year,month,day). For example,
you can type Jan. 1, 2004 as =DATE
(2004,1,1). The real power behind the
DATE function is that you can use it to
perform such calculations as the span be-
tween two dates. This is because Excel as-
signs a serial number for each date. For
example, imagine that you want to find
out the exact number of days that you've

34 August 2004 / www.pctoday.com

indows Boot Cam

been alive. Use the DATE function to
type the current date in cell CI and
your birthday in cell C2. In C3, type
=C1-C2. (Make sure this cell is for-
matted as Number.) Excel calculates
the span between the starting and
ending dates and displays the number
of days that you've been around.

The TIME function, while not as
widely used as DATE, is useful when
you want to perform calculations be-
tween specific times. This helps you
determine how long it takes to pro-
duce something or to complete a pro-
ject. The syntax is =TIME(hour,minute
,second). It works best to use the military
(24-hour) system, with 1 p.m. entered as
13, 2 p.m. as 14, and so on. For example,
you can type =TIME(16,20,0) for 4:20 pm.
You can then ask Excel to calculate
elapsed time.

Money Matters: PMT

Excel includes a host of financial func-
tions that help you manage your money.
One of the most useful is PMT, which you
can use to quickly analyze monthly pay-
ments for principle and interest on a loan.
Is it better to finance that new car for four
years with a 10% loan or five years at 8%?
How much will a 15-year mortgage save
on interest compared with a 30-year mort-
gage? With the PMT function, you can
evaluate each scenario side-by-side.

To use PTM, you need to know the in-
terest rate, number of payment periods,
and principle for the function. The func-
tion is set up as =PMT(interest rate,
number of periods, principle). You must
also assume that the interest rate and
number of payments are constant over the
life of the loan and make sure to use the
same units (either month or year) for the
interest rate and payment period.

Here's how it works. Imagine that
you're buying a new home and want to
find out the monthly payments. You're fi-
nancing $200,000 for 30 years at a steep
10% interest rate. The formula,
=PMT(. 1/12,30*12,200000), yields a
monthly payment of $1,755.14. However,
if you were instead able to get an interest
rate of 6%, you would set up the function
as =PMT(.06/12,30*12,200000). As a re-

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>Jet Internet Sales

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Bonus Percentage:

7.5%

Employee

Total Sales for Month

Bonus Amount

10 Ann Stegall

$9,841.26

$738.09

11 Lonnie Jones

$25,083.18

$1,881.24

12 Rebecca Jilson

$17,675.99

$1,325.70

Lauren Smith

$12,398.17

$929.86

Jill Adkins

11,193.74

$839.53

Jason Black

14,471.63

$-1,085.37
$6,799.80
$1,133.30

Total (Using SUM)

$90,663.97

Average (Using AVERAGE)

$15,110.66

Highest (Using MAX)

$25,083.13

$1,881.24

is Lowest (Using MIN)

$9,841.26

$738.09

Excel makes it easy to find the sum, average,
highest, and lowest values in a range.

suit, your monthly payment would drop
to $1,199.10 — a real savings.

More Money Matters:
Future Value

monthly payments into a 10-year col-
lege account, you would type 12*10.
Finally, type the payment amount.
You designate this amount as a nega-
tive number since it represents cash
you pay out.

If you plan to deposit $100 a
month in a college account that pays
10% annual interest, type =FV
(.1/12,12*10,-100), yielding a value in
10 years of $20,484.50. After you've
set up the function, you can play
around with "what if" scenarios:
What if the interest rate is only 8%?
What if I deposit $150 a month in-
stead of $100?

Untapped Resouces

Many people think that Excel is
merely a program to keep track of

Excel's FV (Future Value)
function is a great tool to find
out how much an investment
will be worth in the future, given
certain conditions. If you know
the interest rate, number of pay-
ments, and amount of each pay-
ment, you can project how much
money you'll have after a given
amount of time. To use the func-
tion, you'll have to assume that
these elements (including in-
terest rate) remain constant for
the term. Because of this, the
function is useful but can't ac-
count for all the "real world"
scenarios, such as variable in-
terest rates and inflation.

The correct structure for this
function is =FV(interest rate,
number of payments, amount of each
payment), with each argument sepa-
rated by commas. For example, if you
assume that your investment will grow
at an average rate of 10% per year, type
.1. For monthly payments, you also
need to divide the interest by 12 (so
type /12 after, making this argument
.1/12). Next, type the total number of
deposits that you plan to make into the
fund. Additionally, if you divided the
interest rate by 12, you must also mul-
tiply the number of payment years by
12. For example, if you're making

dH §ay

Mortgage Amount (Using PMT)

Financing $200,000

Excel's PMT function helps you quickly analyze
monthly payments for different interest rates,
principle amounts, and terms.

various everyday details, such as num-
bers, lists, and monthly payments.
However, if you delve a little deeper into
it, you'll discover a powerful calculator
that you can use to quickly evaluate aver-
ages, lapsed time, mortgage payments,
and the future value of your banking
portfolio. Excel is surprisingly sophisti-
cated, and, with a little practice, surpris-
ingly efficient and easy-to-use. Spend
some time with Excel to discover the func-
tions that can make your life easier, rcr

by Linda Bird

PCToday / August 2004 35

-Hxperts Only

Advanced Guide:

Clipboard &
ClipBook Viewers

Keep Track Of What's In The Windows Clipboard

The Windows Clipboard is a mar-
velous little system component that
almost any application ever written for
Windows can use. If an application's
Edit menu has Cut, Copy, and Paste op-
tions, then the Clipboard is in the back-
ground, just waiting to do its thing.

Sometimes, the Clipboard does its job a
little too well. You may paste an item into
a document, only to find that it's not what
you expected. This happens not because
the Clipboard malfunctioned, but because
you've forgotten the last item you copied,
something that's all too easy to do.

Fortunately, it's not necessary to rely
on your memory to keep track of what's
in the Clipboard. Windows includes a

Clipboard viewing utility called Clip-
board Viewer in Windows 98/Me and
ClipBook Viewer in Windows 2000/XP. If
you've ever taken a quick peek at this
viewer, you may think all it does is let
you view the contents of the Clipboard,
but it's capable of much more.

Install & Use Clipboard
Viewer In Win98/Me

Clipboard Viewer is not
part of the default Win98/Me
installation. To find out
whether it's installed on your
system, click Start, Programs,
Accessories, and System
Tools. If Clipboard Viewer
isn't listed under Sys-
tem Tools, you can in
stall it in a matter
of minutes.
Click Start, Set-
tings, and Control Pan-
el. Double-click Add/
Remove Programs. Select the
Windows Setup tab, scroll
down the list of components,
and select System Tools. Click
the Details button. In the list
of System Tools Components,
put a check mark next to Clipboard
Viewer and click OK. Follow the on-
screen instructions to complete the instal-
lation. You may need your Windows
installation CD.

You can then open Clipboard Viewer
by clicking Start, Programs, Accessories,
System Tools, and Clipboard Viewer.

Use Clipboard Viewer. Clipboard
Viewer allows you to view the contents

of the Clipboard, save the contents of the
Clipboard to a file (especially useful be-
cause the Clipboard saves not only text
but also formatting), view previously
saved Clipboard files, and view the con-
tents of the Clipboard in various formats.

When you launch Clipboard Viewer, it
displays the current contents of the
Clipboard. (If you haven't yet used a Cut,
Copy, or Paste command, Clipboard
Viewer will display a blank image until
you do.)

Clipboard Viewer's display updates
whenever new information is sent to the
Clipboard. You can resize the Clipboard
Viewer window and position it in an out-
of-the-way area of your display. When
you cut, copy, and paste within or be-
tween documents, you can use Clipboard
Viewer to keep track of what's in the
Clipboard and avoid any surprises.

Save and use the Clipboard's con-
tents. Information stored in the Clip-
board is transient in nature. New
information replaces it when you issue
another cut or copy command, and it
disappears when you exit Windows or
shut down your computer.

You can use Clipboard Viewer to save
the contents of the Clipboard for later use.
Click File and Save As and select a target
location to store the Clipboard file. Give
the file a descriptive name and click OK.

To open a saved Clipboard file, click
File and Open. Navigate to the target
file, which will have a .CLP (Clipboard)
extension. Select the file and click OK. A
dialog box will appear, asking if you
want to clear the current contents of the
Clipboard. Click Yes to replace the con-
tents of the Clipboard with the informa-
tion from the saved file. You can then
use the Paste command in an applica-
tion to paste the information into an
open document.

Use ClipBook Viewer In
Win2000/XP

To open the Viewer in either Win2000
or WinXP, click Start and Run. Type
clipbrd in the Open field and click OK.

Win2000's ClipBook Viewer includes
the basic features of Win98/Me's Clip-
board Viewer plus a number of other ca-
pabilities, turning a simple tool into a

36 August 2004 / www.pctoday.com

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File Edit Security View Window Help

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You can display Local ClipBook pages as a table of
contents, which can make it easier to find a specific item.

File Edit Security View Window Help

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Windows 2000's ClipBook Viewer has a large main
window that contains two child windows, the Clipboard
and the Local ClipBook.

You can connect to other shared
ClipBooks. Here, a connection is
being made to the ClipBook stored
on the computer Rosco-2000P.

fairly robust one. You can save multiple
Clipboards to a single Local ClipBook.
Each saved Clipboard image becomes a
page in the Local ClipBook with its own
unique name. You can restore a ClipBook
page to the Clipboard and use it in any
application that supports the Clipboard.
You can share ClipBook pages with col-
leagues if they have ClipBook Viewer in-
stalled. You can also control the way
ClipBook pages are shared.

WinXP's ClipBook Viewer has the
same interface as Win2000's ClipBook

Viewer, but because of a
problem with the WinXP im-
plementation, none of the
advanced features, including
Local ClipBook, are cur-
rently available.

Win2000's ClipBook
Viewer

When you open ClipBook
Viewer in Win2000, you'll see
a single window that con-
tains menus and a toolbar.
Within the main window are
two child windows, Clip-
board and Local ClipBook.
The Clipboard window dis-
plays the current contents of
the Clipboard, and the Lo-
cal ClipBook window dis-
plays the contents of the
Local ClipBook. Additional
windows may display, de-
pending on how you use
ClipBook Viewer.

You can use the Window
menu to manage the child
windows. You can configure
these windows to cascade so each title
bar is visible. You can tile the windows
horizontally or vertically. Or you can
display each child window as a col-
lapsed window and arrange the col-
lapsed windows as small title bar icons
along the bottom of the main window.
You can use the Window menu to re-
fresh the contents of the child windows.
Local ClipBook in Win2000. Each
Clipboard you save is stored as a page in
the Local ClipBook. Each page has its own
name, making it easy to find a specific
image, text, or other content.

The Local ClipBook can display pages
in three different ways: as a table of con-
tents, where pages are displayed in a list
by page name; as thumbnails, where each
page is displayed as a small icon; and as a
full page, where the selected page dis-
plays full-sized in the ClipBook window.

After selecting the Local ClipBook
window, you can use the View menu or
the toolbar buttons to control ClipBook
Viewer display options.

Save and use the Clipboard's con-
tents. In both Win2000 and WinXP, you

can use ClipBook Viewer to save the
contents of the Clipboard to a file for
later use. Click File and Save As and se-
lect a target location to store the file.
Give the file a descriptive name and
click OK.

Saving Clipboard items to a file en-
sures you won't lose them, but this
method doesn't offer a way to easily
access or manipulate collections of
saved Clipboard files. In Win2000,
the Local ClipBook feature provides
more flexibility.

Save the Clipboard's contents to the
ClipBook in Win2000 by clicking once
within the Local ClipBook window to
highlight it, or click Window and Local
ClipBook. Next, click Edit and Paste. The
Paste dialog box will open and ask you
to name the page. Type a page name and
click OK.

Click within the Clipboard window
to highlight it or click Window and
Clipboard. Next, click File and Open.
Navigate to the target file, which will
have a .CLP file extension. Select the
file and click OK. A dialog box will ap-
pear, asking if you want to clear the
current contents of the Clipboard. Click
Yes. You can then paste the contents
of the saved file into a currently
open document.

Use and share Local ClipBook pages.
You can copy a ClipBook page back to
the Clipboard and use the information in
any application that supports the
Clipboard. Click once within the Local
ClipBook window to highlight it or click
Window and Local ClipBook. Select the
ClipBook page you want to copy. You
can browse a list of pages by clicking
View and Table Of Contents or by
clicking the Table Of Contents button on
the toolbar. You can also browse thumb-
nails of ClipBook pages, which may be a
better choice if you're looking for an
image or if your page names aren't as
descriptive as they could be. Click View
and Thumbnails or click the Thumbnails
button on the toolbar.

If you want to be sure you've selected
the right Clipboard page, you can use
Full Page view for a closer look. Click
View and Full Page or click the Full Page
button on the toolbar. You can also

PC Today / August 2004 37

Jlxperts Only

double-click the page's name or the
thumbnail image to switch to Full
Page view.

After you locate the ClipBook
page, click once on the page name,
the page thumbnail, or the full-
page view to select it and click Edit
and Copy. This will copy the
selected ClipBook page to the
Clipboard, replacing any current
information. You can then paste
the contents of the Clipboard into
an open document.

You can share Local ClipBook
pages with colleagues who have
ClipBook Viewer installed, which
is a handy way to ensure consis-
tency in collaborative documents.

Select a page, click File, and click
Share. There are two optional
choices in the Share ClipBook Page di-
alog box. The first, Start Application On
Connect, launches the application that
originally created the data in the
ClipBook page. This ensures that when-
ever individuals link to the data, they
get the most up-to-date copy. It also en-
sures that they can use embedded appli-
cation controls to manipulate the copied
data. The second option, Run Min-
imized, minimizes the application after
it launches. These options are only used
if an individual will link to the data
rather than copy it into an application.
Make your selection and click OK.

Access a shared ClipBook page.
When other individuals share ClipBook
pages, you can access them by con-
necting to the computer that contains the
shared pages. Click File and Connect or
click the Connect button in the toolbar.
A list of available computers will dis-
play in the Select Computer dialog box.
Select the target computer and click OK.
Provide your username and password, if
required, and click OK.

A new window, called ClipBook On
WComputer Name (where Computer
Name represents the name of the com-
puter you connected to), will open
within the main ClipBook Viewer
window. You can treat this new window
like any other Local ClipBook window.
You can copy items from this window to
your Clipboard and use them in any ap-

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Displays the data in the default format.

Clipboard/ClipBook Viewer can display a Clipboard or
ClipBook page in any format that was included in the
original Clipboard item.

ClipBook Page: Install notes
Owner; Administrators

Name:

Type ol Access: [Read

\ A: ■:.■■",.-.■

Read and Link
Change

Special...

Each ClipBook page has its own set of
permissions. You can specify which individuals
can access a page, as well as what they can do
with the page, such as edit the contents.

plication that supports the Clipboard.
However, you are subject to any restric-
tions imposed by the owner of the infor-
mation. For example, you may not be
able to change the contents of pages or
link to pages.

Security: Permissions, Audit, and
Owner. Local ClipBook pages include
security settings that allow you to con-
trol who can access the information and
how they can use it. To set security for a
Local ClipBook page, highlight the page
and click Security and Permissions, or
you can click the Permissions button in
the Sharing dialog box after you select
a page.

The Permissions dialog box includes a
list of accounts, such as Administrator,
Everyone, Guest, and Power User, and a

level of access for each account.
Select an account from the Name
list and select the appropriate ac-
cess type from the drop-down
menu. Available access types in-
clude No Access, Read, Read And
Link, Change, Full Control, and
Special. If you select Special, you
can customize the access options
from a list of all access types.

To add other accounts to the list,
click Add. Select an account from the
Names list and click Add. When
you're finished adding, click OK.
Select the appropriate access type for
each account and click OK.

In addition to setting permissions,
you can audit whoever is accessing
your shared ClipBook pages and
what they're doing with the pages.
You must log in with an administrator ac-
count to use this function.

Select the page you want to audit and
click Security and Auditing. The ClipBook
Page Auditing dialog box will display a
list of accounts. The list will be blank until
you populate it with the accounts you
want to track. Click the Add button to
open the Add Users And Groups dialog
box. Select an account and click Add.
Repeat for any other accounts you want to
audit and click OK. The ClipBook Page
Auditing dialog box will display again,
but this time it lists the accounts you
added. Select an account and choose the
events you want to audit. You can mon-
itor successful or failed attempts in the
following categories: Read, Delete,
Change Permissions, and Change Audit
Types. Click OK when you're finished.

Each ClipBook page has an owner,
which is the account that was in use
when the page was created. The Owner
has the inherent right to control the se-
curity configuration of the page. To find
out who owns a page, select it and click
Security and Owner. The Owner dialog
box displays the owner of the page. You
can take over ownership rights if the
Owner gave you the rights to change
ownership or if you are a member of the
administrator group. To take ownership,
click the Take Ownership button. You
can then change security settings for the
page as you see fit.

38 August 2004 / www.pctoday.com

■ixpe

ClipBook Viewer In WinXP

Unfortunately, as we noted above,
ClipBook Viewer is quite limited in
WinXP. When you open ClipBook
Viewer in WinXP, the current contents
of the Clipboard will display in the
Clipboard window, which may be min-
imized at the bottom of the main
window. Click the Maximize button to
view the Clipboard window.

You can also resize the ClipBook
Viewer window and position it in an
out-of-the-way area of your display.
When you're busy cutting, copying,
and pasting images, you can use
ClipBook Viewer to keep track of
what's in the Clipboard.

Save the Clipboard's contents just as
you would in Win2000.

Use saved Clipboard files (WinXP).
To open a saved Clipboard file, click
File and Open. Navigate to the target
file, which will have a .CLP file exten-
sion. Select the file and click OK. A di-
alog box will appear, asking if you
want to clear the current contents of
the Clipboard. Click Yes. You can then
paste the contents of the saved file into
a currently open document.

Clipboard Formats In All
Windows Versions

The Clipboard may store a single
piece of information in multiple for-
mats to ensure that different applica-
tions can use the data. Both the
Clipboard and ClipBook Viewers rec-
ognize the format of the data in the
Clipboard and automatically use the
proper format to display the data.

The Viewer's Display menu lists all
available formats for the current con-
tents of the Clipboard. You can change
the way data displays by selecting a
different format. Changing the format
doesn't change the actual data, only the
way it displays in the Viewer. Click
Display and select a format from the
list. (Only formats included in the cur-
rent contents of the Clipboard are
available for selection.)

To return to the original format, click
Display and Auto (in Win98/Me) or
click View and Default Format (in
Win2000/WinXP).

Third-Party Clipboard Utilities

Both the Clipboard and ClipBook
Viewers offer a number of useful fea-
tures, particularly in Win2000, but you
don't need to limit yourself to the built-
in viewer. You can have most features,
and quite a few additional ones, by using
a third-party Clipboard viewing utility.

Many third-party utilities can auto-
matically save anything you copy to the
Clipboard. Some include rules and fil-
ters that automatically categorize items,
making it easy to organize the informa-
tion. Other features may include image
manipulation tools, file compression
tools, and the ability to convert between
various formats.

Here are a few possibilities.

AccelClip 2.0 ($25.90; Flexigen
Software; www.flexigensoft.com).
AccelClip stores anything you put into
the Clipboard in predefined or user-de-
fined collections. Information stored in a
collection is displayed in a Windows
Explorer-style format. AccelClip supports

"««■

Clipboard Viewer (in Windows 98/Me) uses
a single window to display the current
contents of the Clipboard.

more than 40 text and graphics file for-
mats and lets you edit the contents of the
Clipboard. There is a 30-day shareware
trial available, as well.

Clip Boost ($14.95; Nexus Concepts;
www.nexusconcepts.com). Clip Boost
records items you copy to the Clipboard.
You can view saved clips by name, pre-
view items before using them, or email
them to a colleague. Clip Boost resides
in the System Tray so it's always readily
available. You can also download a free
30-day trial to test it.

ClipMagic 3.01 ($29.99 for the
Standard Edition; MJT Net Ltd;

www.clipmagic.com). ClipMagic can
store and categorize saved Clipboard
items. You can define rules and filters to
automate the management of these
items and use the search and replace fea-
tures to edit stored items. A free trial
version is also available.

ClipManager 5.11 Lite ($19.95; HE
Systems; www.hesystems.com). Clip-
Manager Lite is an Internet information
manager, as well as a Clipboard utility. It

li*l

File name:
Mountain Mist.clp

Folders:

C:\My Documents'^ Clips

F~t My Documents

tf3 My Clips

You can save the contents of the Clipboard
to a CLP file for future use.

can store Web pages and email messages
for offline browsing, complete with the
original formatting. It can save and auto-
categorize any information you send to
the Clipboard and publish saved infor-
mation to a Web page or e-magazine. A
30-day trial is also available.

Yankee Clipper X ($14.95; Joe Le-
Vasseur and Konrad Krupa; www
.yankee-clipper.net/index.html).
Yankee Clipper can automatically cate-
gorize or ignore Clipboard entries from
specific applications. You can sort and
search saved clippings or email them to
colleagues. Yankee Clipper can float on
top of open applications, so it's always
available. There is a very nice 90-day
trial period, also.

Get The Most Out Of Your
Clipboard

The built-in Clipboard and ClipBook
Viewers may seem to do everything you
need, but it's worth trying out a few
third-party Clipboard tools, if only to be
sure you're not overlooking something
useful or fun. Take advantage of the free
trials so you can check them out before
parting with your hard-earned cash, rcr

by Tom Nelson and Mary
O'Connor

PC Today / August 2004 39

-Hxperts Only

Outside
Email

The Box:
Tricks

How To Use Email To Get Rid Of Spam

Spam! Everybody gets it, nobody
likes it. Call it what you want (unso-
licited bulk email (UBE), junk email, or
just spam (but any way you look at it it's
irritating, time consuming, and offensive.
Antispam service MessageLabs reported
that during the month of April 2004, 67%
of all received worldwide email was
spam, and in the United States the per-
centage was highest at 83%.

So how do you reduce it and keep
from getting more of it? While there's
no foolproof way to avoid or stop spam
except for unplugging your computer,
there are ways to reduce the amount
you do get. Keep in mind there's al-
ways a balance between accessibility
and privacy.

In this article we'll look at how spam-
mers get your name and how to reduce
incoming spam. We can only scratch the
surface in the field, and we've provided

some resources at the end that you can
use for further research.

Why Spam?

If you look at the mountains of col-
lege degree offers, weight
loss plans, money-making
schemes, body enhancing
drugs, patches, and po-
tions, you have to ask,
"Why?" Nobody would
believe the fantastic claims,
much less buy most of the
junk that's pushed through
spam, right? Wrong. Spam-
mers buy or gather lists of
names and send out thou-
sands, if not millions, of
emails. The spam, which
costs the spammer little or
nothing to send, actually
finds its way to a small

percentage of buyers. One of the first
spammers arrested under the Can Spam
Act was selling 100 orders a week of a
bogus weight loss elixir. He said he
made over $100,000 in his first six
months in business. Not a bad return for
sending out free email. Once someone
buys, his name is escalated to a "live
one" or "sucker" list, and his name is
then more valuable. The spammer can
then resell the name to someone else as a
qualified buyer. While it's beyond our
scope to analyze the psychology of why
people buy from spammers, as long as
they do, spamming will continue.

How Spammers Get Your Name

You've got a brand new email ad-
dress and within what seems like min-
utes, you have spam. How does this
happen? There are dozens if not hun-
dreds of ways spammers get your name.
However, in general, spammers get your
name in two ways: you give it to them,
wittingly or not, or they take it.

No such thing as a free lunch.
Although nobody in their right mind
would give their name to a spammer,
people do it all the time. When you enter
a contest, download software, or send an
e-card, although it appears to be free
you are actually paying with your email
address. Vendors collect email ad-
dresses, compile lists, and sell them to
spammers. It's an advertising business
model. This is the sole income for sites
with free services. A friend recently
signed up to send an innocent "congrat-

Mosc people open email inboxes in the morning to a sight
such as this, with more than 30 pieces of spam received in a
three-hour period.

40 August 2004 / www.pctoday.com

ulations on your baby"
e-card, and within
hours, both she and the
new mom's inbox were
packed with spam.

Tell a friend. We've
all found cartoons or
pictures on the Web we
want to share with
others. Many Web sites
make this easy to do
with a Click Here To
Tell A Friend link. Such
links ask for your
friend's email address
and usually for your
own, as well. The Web
site just got two new
email addresses. If you
want to share a picture
or cartoon on a site,
copy and paste the ad-
dress into a separate email so your
friend can visit the site.

Registration. Another Web site ploy for
gathering names is the registration gim-
mick. News sites are famous for this, re-
quiring a "free" registration to access
online content. Reputable news sites will
display a privacy policy that usually de-
scribes what is done with your name,
email address, and any other data you
provide. Some will tell you that they share
your name with partners or third parties
it's assumed you would be interested in.

Agreeing to opt-in. Some sites will
give you the option to not share your
name when you sign up for free ser-
vices. The default is almost always to
allow sharing, and you have to actually
click multiple options on the form to opt
out of various services. Another
"gotcha": If you forget to complete a re-
quired field, such as phone number or
age, the site redisplays the form and
asks for the additional input. What also
happens is that the sharing option sec-
tion is filled in again, so you have to opt-
out again; the vendor is betting you
won't bother checking to opt-out again.

Free email forwarding. We all switch
our email address from time to time, and
it's always a hassle to tell all our friends
about it. Services such as BigFoot offer
permanent addresses to migrant Internet

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Aladdin SpamCatcher, like many
antispam plug-ins, integrates
with Outlook and offers nu-
merous options that help train
the filters to work better.

users. BigFoot gives you
an address such as
myaddy@bigfoot.com
and forwards messages
sent to that address to
your current real ad-
dress. Opt-in adver-
tising pays for this
freebie service. BigFoot
claims you'll only re-
ceive a few emails in the
categories you choose,
but it isn't long before
the address is spread
around for any spam-
mer to see. In addition,
as with other common
email domains, spam-
mers may generate
random email addresses
with common names
such as joesmith@big-
foot.com and get spam to you that way.

End user license agreements. Free
software is another way spammers get
your name. A popular notebook security
product's EULA (end user license agree-
ment) spells out that you must agree to
accept unsolicited of-
fers and other email
from the company to
use the software, for-
ever. Most people
never read EULAs
and this is one they
should.

"Don't spam me"
options. One of the
provisions of the Can
Spam Act is that
spammers are sup-
posed to offer recipi-
ents a way to remove
their name from the
list. Unfortunately, it
doesn't work.

Spammers have
long been using this
idea to confirm live
email recipients and probably won't stop
anytime soon. If you click the "Remove
Me" link, you're almost guaranteeing
you'll get an increase in spam. While
some spammers may honor your request,
don't count on it.

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"' ';'"] Type In- *■-:-.■■> r to reter to Ihi

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Server".

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Munging an email address involves
inserting something a human can see
and remove, but automated email
address harvesters can't (such as our
[removethisfirst] tag).

Confirming email addresses without
knowing it. Spammers also generate
random email names in common do-
mains, such as aol.com, to find live email
addresses. While a lot of these random
names end up in the bit bucket, many
find recipients. The spammer can then
find out which attempts reached live
email addresses by using HTML and im-
ages in the email. When you view an
HTML page, any image on the page
must be downloaded from a server. By
using special coding on images (both
visible and invisible "Web bugs") the
spammer can confirm an address by en-
coding a name in an image request.

For example, a user with the email ad-
dress georgesmith@yahoo.com receives an
HTML email that he opens. His email
client then requests a picture with the
name spammer.com/pixl.george.smith-
yahoo.jpg. The spammer's server then just
strips off the email address and returns the
picture. George sees the image, shrugs,
and deletes it, never knowing he has just
been tagged a real, live email recipient. To
avoid this ploy, you can either use text-
only email or turn off the feature that au-
tomatically displays
images. Outlook 2003
has Image Download
turned off by default,
but you can still view
images on a case-by-
case basis depending
on whether you trust
the source.

Additionally, if
you decide not to turn
off images or force
text, you should be
aware that previewing
a message in Outlook
is the same as opening
it. In most versions,
you can turn off pre-
view by clicking the
View menu and dese-
lecting the reading
pane or preview pane, depending on your
Outlook or Outlook Express version. If
you can't find the control, go to Help and
search for the keyword "preview."

"Do not spam" scams. A particularly
nasty scam seen recently is the National

PC Today / August 2004 41

-Hxperts Only

Do Not Spam Registry. Modeled
after the National Do Not Call
Registry Web page (www.donot-
call.gov), this look-alike site takes
names and promises to remove
people's names from spam lists.
Unfortunately, the National Do
Not Spam Registry didn't exist,
and the names were just sold to
spammers.

Yet another service offered to
stop spam for a fee. This was es-
pecially rotten since the service
collected a fee to send your name
to the "remove me" links (men-
tioned above) on every piece of
spam collected. Yet again, users
were guaranteed to get more
spam. The government shut
down the National Do Not Spam
Registry, but the fee-based ser-
vice was not doing anything il-
legal, just stupid.

The Web is full of free offers
and services, and address-gath-
ering sites will often make it
seem like your privacy is pro-
tected. Unfortunately opt-outs,
privacy policies, and EULAs are
often only as good as the bits
they are written with. A pre-
mium email forwarding service
offers a free service in exchange
for users accepting a "few" unso-
licited emails a week from "se-
lected" vendors in categories you
choose. We found that the cate-
gories and the limits were mean-
ingless as we got an avalanche of
spam, none of which was in the category
we choose.

Email Techniques To Stop Spam

Spammers don't wait until you give
them your name, they just take it. This is
one of the most common ways people
lose their privacy. Posting a message on a
newsgroup, signing a guest book, or
putting a mail-to address on your Web
site are all invitations to spamming. Using
techniques similar to search engines, they
create programs or bots that crawl Web
sites looking for email address pattern
strings such as someone@something.com.
If your email address is in text on a Web

SMailinator

be .anyone.

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The Mailinator offers Web-based email viewing and randomly
named throwaway email addresses you can use until they
accumulate too much spam.

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Google and other sites offer ways to remove your name,
address, and phone number from the directory.

page, it's fair game. The bots are auto-
mated and will often just randomly select
a range of IP (Internet Protocol) ad-
dresses, and visit the sites residing there.
It's a simple task for them to download
every page on a site and scan for email
addresses. As it collects addresses, the
program may filter for duplicates, or
other things such as munging (more
about that in a moment), and build a list.
Since it's all automated, a single PC could
scan thousands of sites a day and easily
build a formidable list in a short time.

Mung your name. It's not possible to
stop these bots from scanning the
Internet looking for addresses, but it is

possible to slow them down or
prevent them from gathering
yours. One time-tested way is to
mung, or "mash until no good,"
your email name. This is most
often used when posting to news-
groups and involves changing
the email address with a string of
characters that a human reader
can detect but a spam bot can't.
For example, if you have an email
address like billsmith@yahoo
.com (sorry, Bill, if you exist) you
can change it to billsmith@ya[no-
spam-here]hoo.com. A human
reader will see the [no-spam-
here] portion and remove it to
make a complete address. A bot,
on the other hand, will attempt to
send mail to that address, and it
will be returned.

A rule of thumb is to mung the
right (domain) side of the ad-
dress, not the left (username);
doing it this way causes less
stress for your email domain
provider. With the munged do-
main, the address doesn't re-
solve, and messages sent to it are
returned to the spammer. But
with a munged username and a
real domain, messages will be
forwarded to your ISP or email
server. If you have your own do-
main server, it probably forwards
all unrecognized usernames to a
single master or default account,

so you get the spam anyway.

Keep your antivirus software
current. The latest worms and viruses
have both sent spam and fed email ad-
dresses to spammers, so it's important to
keep your antivirus utilities up-to-date.
Viruses such as Bobax or Sobig can turn
infected machines into spam-spewing
zombies. They also scan each victim's
address book and files for email ad-
dresses, send copies of themselves to
those recipients, and often send the ac-
quired address lists back to the attacker.
One especially rich source for address
harvesting is email with lots of recipient
addresses (like forwarded jokes and in-
spirational messages). Using the BCC
option when you send to more than one

42 August 2004 / www.pctoday.com

■ixpe

Resources

| | ere are some of the
1 1 best resources avail-

provides permission-

filters spam at the

based email service.

server level.

able for information

• MailBlocks (www

• Only My Email

about using email to

.mailblocks.com) fea-

(www.onlymyemail

halt spam.

tures challenge-

.com/services) also

Disposable & Keyed
Email Addresses

response email ser-
vices with white lists
(lists of permitted

offers email accounts.
• Spam i h i lator (www
.spamihilator.com)

• Dodgeit (www

email senders).

makes freeware

.dodgeit.com) also

• Qurb (www.qurb

antispam filters

offers news feed

.com) offers an

and plug-ins.

options.

Outlook plug-in for

• Spam Motel (www
.spammotel.com)

challenge-response
email service.

Antispam
Organizations

provides disposable

• SpamBully (www

• CAUCE (Coalition

email addresses that

.spambully.com) vows

Against Unsolicited

let you track who's

to "end your

Commercial Email;

selling your name.

spam nightmare."

www.cauce.org) is an

• Spamex (www.spamex
.com) also offers

Filtering Services

all-volunteer antispam
organization.

tracking.

• Cloudmark (www

• MSExchange.org Anti

• Spamgourmet (www

.cloudmark.com)

Spam Section

.spamgourmet.com)

provides a commu-

(antispam

offers disposable email

nity-based spam filter.

.msexchange .org)

with forwarding.

• Earthlink spamBlocker

provides antispam

• ZoEmail (www

( www.earth 1 i n k.net

news for those using

.zoemail.com) uses

/spamblocker) offers an

Microsoft Exchange.

keyed addresses so

Outlook plug-in and

• SpamAbuse.org

you can let through

filters spam at the

(www.spamabuse.org)

people you know,

server level.

offers news and tools

block those you don't.

• Mail Frontier (www

for fighting spam.

and see who's selling

.mailfrontier.com)

• Spamhaus Project

your email address.

provides filtering

(www.spam haus.org)

Challenge-Response
Services

services for Desktop
and enterprise
users alike.

tracks spam and
provides news and
protection.

• ChoiceMail

• MailZapper (www

(www.digiportal.com)

.mailzapper.com)

recipient will keep those endless lists of
email addresses from being propagated
(also a privacy risk). If you have one
friend you want to send to, copy and
paste the joke into a new message.

Use disposable addresses. There are
times when you need to sign up for
something that requires a real email ad-
dress, such as a trial software license
key. For these you need to have a real
email account that a machine can read.
For this, you can use a throwaway email
address. There are two types of throw-

away accounts. The first is one usually a
receive-only account that often just posts
new messages to an accessible place.
Tesee services, such as Mailina-
tor (www.mailinator.com), Jetable
(www.jetable.org), and Dodgit
(www.dodgeit.com), let you create a re-
ceive-only email address to give out,
and posts all messages sent to that ad-
dress on a Web page. The advantage is
that you can check your mail on the site,
and there's no connection to your real
email address. Dodgit offers mail as an

XML RSS feed you can subscribe to au-
tomatically receive mail. When it gets
saturated with spam, just unsubscribe.

The other type of disposable address
forwards messages to your permanent
email address. There are both paid and
free services in this category. Free ser-
vices, such as GishPuppy (www.gish-
puppy.com) and KasMail (www
.kasmail.com), require you to register. In
exchange, you agree to accept email of-
fers and news from them, so with these
services you may be jumping from the
frying pan into the fire. If you try one of
them, read the fine print first. They may,
as is the case with KasMail, never delete
your information. Another option is to
use free services such as Yahoo!,
Hotmail, or Google's upcoming Gmail.
When that account gets saturated, cancel
it and open a new one.

Track spam. If you have your own
domain, you can create your own throw-
away email addresses. As we mentioned
earlier, many email servers forward any
unknown users to the master account.
Whenever you sign up for a newsletter,
or free service, you can use a unique
name, and it all gets forwarded to the
master account. If you use a name such
as nytimes@yourdomain.com you can
see if someone sold your address.

Remove your name from public di-
rectories. Another way spammers can
get your email (or even your phone
number) is from public directories such
as Yahoo! People Search (www. people
.yahoo.com) or Google (www. google
.com). Most of these services will let you
remove your name from their database,
but you have to ask.

With most of these directories, you'll
have to search your name for the exact
listing before you can remove your
name.

Further Reading

There is much more spam-blocking
information than we could fit in this ar-
ticle. Check out the possibilities in the
"Resources" sidebar for some additional
antispam options, pct

by Jay Munro

PC Today / August 2004 43

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r o d

Cover Story:

hareware For Windows

\\[l

1 * 1 m

ibleOfConten

Back Up Your Data
CleanUp Time
Zip It

50
52

Streamline Your Registry
Email Clients

56
58

Browser Managers
Protect Yourself

60
62

Customize It

Time Is Money

hareware is software you can try before you buy. It's also an inexpensive way for software developers to market and dis-
tribute their products. Almost all types of software are available as shareware. In our feature section this month, we focus on
shareware system utilities and tools. These products are designed to enhance your Windows O!
Typically, you download shareware from the Internet to your Windows Desktop or to a folder on your PC's hard drive. To inst
shareware, close all other applications, double-click the download file, and follow the on-screen instructions. Most shareware has a
trial period that ranges from 15 to 45 days, and you agree to purchase the product after the trial period if you decide to keep it.

Depending on the product, some functions may not be operational during the trial period. Generally, a nag screen reminds you
of the number of days remaining in the trial period and tells you how to purchase the shareware. Typical shareware prices range
from $15 to $45. By contrast, some products, known as freeware, have no cost at all.

There are a number of ways to find shareware. Many shareware developers create their own Web sites, and our reviews include this
information when applicable. By downloading directly from the shareware author's site, you can learn about the product directly from its
source. However, unless you have access to an independent review or recommendation, you are also placing your trust in the developer.

Some developers may bundle viruses and
spyware (software that secretly tracks
your movements on the Internet) with
the shareware.

An alternative to developer-sponsored
sites, shareware portal sites serve up large
collections of products. On these sites,
you can often learn about shareware by
reading user opinions, user ratings, and
independent reviews. Many shareware
portals screen products for viruses, func-
tionality, and reliability. For faster down-
loads, the portals also offer mirror sites,
which are duplicates of the source site.
When you select a mirror site close to you,
downloads are usually faster compared
to a distant site.

Our Recommendations

To help you learn more about share-
ware portals, we examined four of them.
We came away with three sites we recom-
mend and one we don't recommend. Most
of the products included in our shareware
reviews should be available from one or
more of our recommended sites.

Recommended:
CNET's Download.com
(www.download.com)

Probably the most well-known share-
ware distributor, Download.com handles
millions of downloads every week. The
site's software section features hundreds

of product categories that are organized
in levels that make it easy to find what
you're looking for.

An extensive user-rating system lets
you peruse the opinions of others who
have tried the products. Each product's
information page gives you the total
number of user comments and the
percentage of thumbs up and thumbs
down votes.

In addition to browsing for products,
you can use Download.com's basic and
advanced search capabilities. When the
site displays a list of products that match
what you are browsing or searching for,
you can click on a column heading to
reorganize the product list.

46 August 2004 / www.pctoday.com

over Stc

Shareware For Windows

also pay a processing fee to pub-
lish programs on the site. Before
a product is available to site visi-
tors, the Download.com staff
screens it for viruses, inappro-
priate content, and stability.
Other shareware Web sites,
such as Shareware.com
(www.shareware.com)
and MSN Downloads
(tech.msn.com
/downloads), also use
Download.com as a re-
source. These sites dis-
tribute software from
Download.com, but

they have a different

look and Web interface.

Downloading shareware
from Download.com is quick
and easy. From a product's in-
formation page, you can view
the estimated download time
by selecting your Internet con-
nection type. Click the Download
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If you
would like to
know about the
products other com-
puter users are down-
loading, you can view Download.com's
list of most popular titles and its share-
ware Hall Of Fame. Download.com also
compiles a list of top-rated products and
recent additions to the site.

Download.com does not use pop-up
ads to generate income. The site does use
banner ads and sponsor ads, but they
don't get in the way. Software authors

get the
download process
underway. For a faster
download, Download.com links to the
CNET Secure Relay network. The network
taps into other computers to find the fast-
est download for your PC and requires
you to install a plug-in, which it provides.

Recommended:

MajorGeeks.com

(www.majorgeeks.com)

Unlike many shareware portals,
MajorGeeks.com is not associated with
a large Internet-based conglomerate.

CNET's Download.com is one of the most well-known
sites for distribution of shareware. In addition to soft-
ware, you can find music and games.

A couple of guys who go by the names
Tim and Jim produce the site and dis-
tribute shareware with a relaxed, con-
versational tone. What's more, the site
features a clean interface that is easy
to navigate.

MajorGeeks.com organizes its share-
ware inventory into about 30 categories.
Within each category, you can sort prod-
ucts by name, date issued, type of li-
cense, OS, and popularity. The search
feature offers a full text search and
comes with tips on how to effectively
structure your query. You can also sort
the search results.

The site does not compile user ratings,
but the site owners do screen all programs
for usability. This does not necessarily in-
dicate that MajorGeeks.com recommends
all of the products on its site. It does mean
that the shareware should be functional,
virus-free, and reliable.

To download software, the product
information pages offer several sites to
choose from, including MajorGeeks.com
and the author's Web site. Unfortu-
nately, there is not much information to

PC Today / August 2004 47

^over Stc

Shareware For Windows

help you decide which download
site is best based on your location
or connection speed. If the down-
load seems slow, cancel it and try
another download location.

MajorGeeks.com does not use
pop-up ads to generate income.
It does include a few banner ads,
mostly for products unrelated to the
shareware on the site. In addition,
some product descriptions include
highlighted words that are in fact
sponsored links to other Web sites.
Thankfully, MajorGeeks.com in-
forms you of this by displaying
a bubble tip when you move the
pointer over the link.

> B 1 « <p~* -A''—- •— ® \@- m h •

— I I I I ■ >

I NoKDooh SecniKv

,■/< rooks com- No o-eek, no glory "

#' ASUS PC Probe 2.22.09 [ J Mh I Freeware I Win All]
Monitors vital information on Asus motherOoards

4? UltraMon 2.5 I : : M : :r Mm 124 35 I w.r, aii|
Got the most out of your multi-monitor system.

tl GFI Network Server Monitor 5.5 Beta 1 3 8 Mb
: : ; - rtfel xpr2W2DTJ3] W

Monitor your neryvork & severs for failures and fixtnem
automatically

The MajorCeeks.com shareware Web site offers a bit of
humor with its download service. This independent site
features a clean, easy-to-use interface.

Recommended: Tucows
(www.tucows.com)

Featuring its five-cow rating
system, Tucows offers more
than 40,000 software titles. Each
product is independently tested
and reviewed by the Tucows staff.

Tucows presents a variety of
ways to find shareware. From
the home page, you can select
your OS (Windows, Mac, Linux,
Mobile/PDA) and results appear
in a corresponding page that
lists the most popular categories,
the most popular programs in
each category, and the most re-
cent additions. If you click a cat-
egory from this page, numerous
subcategories display in order of
popularity. If this list seems over-
whelming, click the main categories at
the top of the page to display products
grouped by application type.

The search feature is always available
in the upper right of the Tucows Web
pages, and it includes an advanced
search option. Because you cannot sort
the search results, it's best to use the
advanced option to narrow the field as
much as possible.

For fast downloads, Tucows offers
more than 1,000 mirror sites. When you
click a download link, Tucows prompts
you to choose a mirror site if you have not
already done so.

Tucows does not pester you with pop-
up ads, but it does have some banner ads.

The staff at Tucows reviews all of the thousands of shareware
products offered on the site. Only the best products receive
the coveted five-cow rating.

And the site is not quite as easy to navi-
gate as some of the other sites we re-
viewed, but it offers nice features.

Not Recommended: WinSite
(www.winsite.com)

Our main complaint with WinSite is
its pop-up ads. The pop-ups display as
you search for software, and WinSite
also uses numerous third-party cookies
that track your movements.

Like the other sites we reviewed,
WinSite lets you browse for products. It
offers a well-organized Browse WinSite
page with links for you to find new prod-
ucts, hot products, and the most popular
products. You can also view shareware
according to OS and type of application.

WinSite also includes basic and ad-
vanced search features. The site lists
products in order of the date posted
on WinSite. Unfortunately, you
cannot manipulate the sort order.

WinSite's home page is rather
cluttered with understated links
to the Browse WinSite and Search
WinSite features. By contrast, the
product information pages in-
clude a lot of detail, such as the
product's system requirements,
file size, and developer.

In addition, WinSite includes a
user rating system that lets users
rate products on a scale of 1 (awful)
to 10 (excellent). Compared to
Download.com, WinSite's user
ratings are not as extensive and
lack the ability to view only nega-
tive or only positive comments.

The most unpleasant feature of
WinSite is the download function.
When we attempted to download
a product, WinSite placed a large
pop-up advertisement on-screen.
The X to close the ad window was
actually a link to a third-party site.
When the download page finally
did display, another 10 seconds
passed before the download
began. You can skip the download
process altogether by paying $9.95
plus shipping and WinSite will
burn a CD with your selections.

WinSite screens its shareware
library for viruses and basic us-
ability. It also lets you register to receive
bi-monthly notices about new products of
interest to you. Despite these and other
positives, WinSite's pop-up ads and third-
party cookies overshadow its usefulness.

Try It, You'll Like It

Without a doubt, shareware is one of
the best values on the Internet today.
Read our shareware reviews in the fol-
lowing pages to learn more about some
great system utilities and tools, and don't
hesitate to take advantage of the "try
before you buy" philosophy, pct

by Carmen Carmack

48 August 2004 / www.pctoday.com

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Cover Story

Your Data

Keep Your Data Safe With A Better Backup Program

KcitinSS AJSystems.com Eazy Backup

Interface:

Mill

III

Performance:

Mill

III

Features:

Mill

III

Documentation:

Mill

OVERALL:

Mill

III

If you're like most computer users,
you know that you should back up
the data on your hard drive on a reg-
ular basis, but chances are that you
don't always follow that rule. Although
there may be a multitude of reasons why
you don't back up data regularly, one
thing is for sure: Microsoft doesn't make it
easy. Of course, every version of the
Windows OS does indeed come with a
backup utility, but it's usually limited in
capability and often it's not even easily ac-
cessible. Furthermore, each version uses a
different format so backup files aren't
even compatible among all versions.

Fortunately, there are a lot of alterna-
tives. We'll take a look at four popular
shareware utilities for backing up your
hard drive.

AJSystems.com Eazy Backup

15-day free trial; $49.95
AJSystems.com
sales@ajsystems.com
www.ajsystems.com
File size: 6.5MB

If you want a quick backup solution
that is easy to use and doesn't have a lot
of extra bells and whistles, then Eazy
Backup is for you. As soon as you install
the program, with its wizard-driven

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Check the Application Group (s) you would like to include in this backup.

Load Phot Job

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AJSystems.com Eazy Backup provides a list
of preconfigured backup sets, which makes
using the program simple.

interface, Eazy Backup is ready to go to
work. You really don't need to configure
anything because the program comes pre-
configured backups called backup sets.
You'll also discover preconfigured
backup sets for many of the popular ap-
plications containing data you should reg-
ularly back up, such as Money, Quicken,
QuickBooks, or ACT. And of course,
you can create customized backup sets if
you need to.

Eazy Backup can back up to any hard
drive, network drive, and most common
removable media. In order to back up di-
rectly to CD or DVD, you must have
third-party burning software installed.
This applies to Windows XP, as well, be-
cause Eazy Backup is not compatible with
WinXP's built-in burning software.

You can set backup reminders or
schedule unattended backups. Eazy
Backup also ncludes a Live Update feature
that lets you retrieve the latest version.

Restoring an entire backup set or an
individual file is a very straightforward
operation; just click the Restore button
and follow the wizard's instructions.

Centered Systems Second Copy

30-day free trial; $29.95
Centered Systems
www.centered.com
File Size: 1MB

Wouldn't it be nice if your system were
intelligent enough to automatically back
up your important data all by itself? You
can make this a reality with a little help
from Second Copy. Unlike a standard
backup utility that runs a scheduled daily
or weekly backup, Second Copy runs con-
tinuously in the background and moni-
tors the selected folders on your hard
drive. The program automatically backs
up any new or changed files at customiz-
able intervals, which range from every
few minutes to once a week.

Second Copy is basically a "set it and
forget it" type of backup utility in that
once you install and configure it, you
never have to worry about backing up
your data again. In fact, you probably
won't mess with the program at all unless
you want to change the backup settings.

Second Copy calls its backup sets pro-
files, and there are a number of ways you
can create a profile including dragging a
folder and dropping it on the main
window. The Express Setup uses a basic
set of options while the Custom Setup lets

Ratings

Centered Systems
Second Copy

Interface:

Performance:

Features:

Documentation:

OVERALL:

1 1 1 1 1 1 1
1 1 1 1 1 1 1
1 1 1 1 1 1 1

mini
1 1 1 1 1 1 1

50 August 2004 / www.pctoday.com

you specify indi-
vidual files, set compression op-
tions, and enable password protection.
You can even choose from several types of
copy operations that range from a simple
copy to a more complex operation that
deletes obsolete files from the destination.

Second Copy can back up to a hard
drive, a network drive, and any remov-
able media including CD or DVD as
long as you have third-party burning
software installed.

RD Technologies Backup2004 Pro

30-day free trial; $65
RD Technologies
support@backup2004.com
www.backup2004.com
File size: 9.5MB

If you consider yourself a power user
or are looking for a professional backup
utility for a small to medium-sized busi-
ness, then you owe it to yourself to take a
serious look at Backup2004 Pro. This full-
featured backup utility will give any com-
mercial backup utility a run for its money.
Although Backup2004 Pro doesn't sup-
port backing up to tape, it can back up to
a hard drive, a network drive, and to most
common removable media including CD
and DVD. And best of all, it comes with
its own burning software that supports
multispanning to CD or DVD, so you can
put large backups seamlessly on multiple
discs. In addition, Backup2004 Pro can
upload backup files to an FTP or HTTP
server for off site storage.

Creating backup sets is a snap in
Backup2004 Pro. You can use the Backup
Set Wizard or perform the task manually
in the familiar Windows Explorer-like
interface. This interface makes it easy to
select the files you want to back up,

In Backup2004Pro, the Windows Explorer-
like interface lets you easily select files you
want to back up and the location in which
you want to save the data.

choose the backup destination, as well as
configure a whole slew of other options.
When it comes time to restore the en-
tire backup set or a single file, this task
is just as easy. To make quick work of
locating and restoring individual files,
Backup2004 Pro's Catalog provides you
with a detailed view complete with mul-
tiple sorting options.

ZipBackup

30-day free trial; $29.95
ZipBackup

help@zipbackup.com
www.zipbackup.com
File size: 1.4MB

ZipBackup provides a nice interface for
backing up your data to standard zipped
files. This simple utility doesn't have a lot
of high-powered features, but the ones
that it does provide are more than suffi-
cient for the task.

Ratines

Backup2004 Pro

Interface:

MINIM 9

Performance:

Features:

Documentation:

OVERALL:

llllllllll 9.5

hareware For Windows

ZipBackup can back up to a
hard drive, a network drive, or
any removable media. However, in
order to back up directly to CD or
DVD, you must have third-party
burning software installed because
ZipBackup cannot integrate with Win-
dows XP's built-in CD-burning feature.

You can use ZipBackup's default
wizard-based interface to back up data or
you can use the more traditional Win-
dows Explorer-like interface to manually
configure the backup. ZipBackup inte-
grates with Windows' built-in Task
Scheduler, so you can easily schedule
when backups occur. You can also use the
program to perform full, incremental, and
differential backups. After a backup is
complete, you can view the detailed
report of the operation. The report not
only provides a list of the backed up files,
but it also includes elapsed time and com-
pression information, as well as details on
any errors that might occur.

Restoring files you backed up using
ZipBackup is easy. Not only can you per-
form the restore operation from within
either of ZipBackup's interfaces, but you
also can use any compression utility, such
as WinZip or WinXP's built-in Com-
pressed Folders feature, to extract and
restore files. The fact that you can use a
compression utility to restore files really
makes ZipBackup extremely versatile in
that the backups that it creates can be
used to easily restore and transport files
to any computer.

You're Not Stuck

As you can see, you're not stuck with
Microsoft's backup program. Using any
one of the programs we looked at, you
can easily perform regular backups and
keep your data safe, pct

by Greg Shultz

Ratings

Zip Backup

Interface: 9

Performance: 9

Features: 9

Documentation: 8

OVERALL: lllllllll 9

PC Today / August 2004 51

Make A File-Cleaning Program Do Your Dirty Work For You

Every time you go online, you load
a bunch of junk on your hard
drive. The culprits are temporary
Internet files and cookies, items that Web
sites place on your hard drive to enhance
your interaction and speed up reloading
the pages you revisit. And they're only
part of the clutter on your computer.

If your hard drive is getting clogged up,
you need the help of a file-cleaning pro-
gram. A number of these are available on
the Web in the form of shareware. Here's
our rundown of some of them.

R-Wipe & Clean 3.0

15-day trial; $28.99
R-tools Technology
(905) 780-0600
www.r-tt.com
File size: 1.31MB

R-Wipe & Clean 3.0 is a good option for
anyone who has never used a file-cleaning
program. It sports an easy-to-navigate in-
terface; if you're comfortable clicking your
way around Windows Explorer, then
you'll handle R-Wipe with no problems.
In fact, you can use R-Wipe without
opening the program. Just right-click an
item you want to delete and choose Delete
And Wipe! from the pop-up menu.

Ratings

R-Wipe & Clean 3.0

Interface:

Performance:

Features:

Documentation:

OVERALL:

MINIM

IIIMIMI

IMIIMM

IIIMIMI

8.5
8.5
9
8.5

Is—
Ma— .

dS£S

jj Temporary Internet Filei

You'll find five file-wiping methods in R-Wipe
&c Clean, which remove files beyond recovery.

Once you open R-Wipe, you can pick
folders to erase from three categories ap-
pearing in the Tree View menu: Internet,
System, and Application Recent Files. You
can also clean up unused space on your
drives and Wipe Lists. You can clean
these lists manually or schedule a Wipe
List as part of a larger task that will run at
intervals (from hourly to monthly) and at
scheduled times (at startup, for instance).

By default, the TreeView menu lists
such commonly targeted cleaning spots
as cookies, temporary files, and files
in the Recycle Bin, plus less-common
items, such as invalid Desktop shortcuts.
Unfortunately, the file size of the items
listed in each category is not shown.
Still, TreeView gives you a good idea of
just how much junk you can accumulate
over time.

That brings us to erasing methods. R-
Wipe offers five methods for wiping files
and disks. The default method for files,
DoD 5220.22M (3), is a secure but slow
method developed for the Department of
Defense. It took more than an hour for it
to wipe away all our temporary Internet

files. The more secure method you select,
the more slowly it works.

R-Wipe works with Internet Explorer,
Netscape, Mozilla, and other browsers. It
runs on Windows 98 and newer systems
and requires 3.1MB free hard drive space.

EasyCleaner 1 .0

10-day trial; $19.95
Trio Software
info@easycleaner.tk
www.easycleaner.tk
File size: 591 KB

Normally, we're drawn to programs
that bill themselves as "easy." In the case
of EasyCleaner 1.0, however, this program
may be too easy — as in, too lightweight.

The main interface offers seven cate-
gories of files you can delete with the click
of a button. We like the fact that the
number of files and folders in each cate-
gory is listed, as well as the amount of
space that you can free up.

Unfortunately, there's no way to open
each category from within the program to
view the contents, nor is there any way to
tell what kind of file-erasing method, if
any, the program uses. In addition to re-
moving the contents of the seven cate-
gories listed, EasyCleaner can scan your

Ratings

EasyCleaner 1.0

Interface:

Performance:

Features:

Documentation:

OVERALL:

llllll

lllllll

Mill

52 August 2004 / www.pctoday.com

hard drive andj
find junk files,
which you
can then del-
ete. In just a
few seconds, it
scanned the more
than 95,000 files on our hard drive
and found 10 to delete. However, we
couldn't find a way to use EasyCleaner to
delete files that we chose.

EasyCleaner installs on Windows 95
and newer systems and requires about
600KB free hard drive space.

EusY^lvniiiT

Settings | Help |

Filters | Cleaning |

| F„e 5 Folders 8k*l

B _J Sweep Temporary Internet Files

51455

532.65 MB

EQSweeplnternet cooties

599

157.33 KB

E .2] Sweep Slart menu Docirmenls

153

128.52 KB

E _J Sweep Temporary Windows die

176

20.33 MB

_J Sweep Interne! History

0.22 KB

□ .1) Sweep Other temporary files

(USE FILTER]

E_ISweepRecjcleBin

28.42 MB

Info

Fil,,

Fold.,

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EasyCleaner works quickly and is indeed easy
to use, but it doesn't offer many extras.

System Sweeper 1 .1 .7

Unlimited trial, partial version; $22

TKSoftware

info@tksoftware.biz

www.tksoftware.biz

File size: 591 KB

The main interface for System Sweeper
may seem a bit sparse at first, but there's a
lot more than meets the eye. It offers four
main views — Folder, File, Ignored Items,
and Drives. The first two list six folder
types and 31 junk-file types that the pro-
gram will look for when you conduct a
search for garbage. You can easily modify
all four lists and request System Sweeper
to search multiple drives at the same time.
After you conduct a search, you can view
the results in the Found Items view. Each

unk item
is listed by
name, along
with its path,
size, and last
modification
date. You can sort
this list by any of
those four characteris-
tics. By default, all items
in this view are checked.
However, you can uncheck any item you
don't want to take action on or remove it
from the list.

Once you've verified this list, you can
perform several different actions on the
checked items. You can permanently

Ratines

System Sweeper 1.1.7

Interface:

MINIM 9

Performance:

Features:

6.5

Documentation:

OVERALL:

7.5

delete them, send them to the Recycle Bin,
or place them in a compressed file.

System Sweeper doesn't offer methods
of file wiping, just file deletion. However,
the program is easy-to-use and provides
flexibility when setting up a search. You'll
need Win98 or later and at least 3MB free
hard drive space to use System Sweeper.

Clean Machine 3.0

30-use, partial version; $33
J.C. Software Development
jcsdev@ntlworld.com
homepage.ntlworld.com/jcsdev
File size: 3.15MB

Before you attempt to do anything
in Clean Machine, make sure you read
through the program's Help section.
This application sports so many config-
urable tools that you won't get nearly
enough out of Clean Machine until you
learn how they all work.

The main interface lists 47 default
items you can clean. Some have more
configuring options, and some involve
riskier areas of disk cleaning, such as in

over Stc

Shareware For Windows

the Registry. You can clean all the
checked areas at once or just ones that
you highlight.

One of these 47 items is called
Unnecessary Files, and it's a good
example of how configurable Clean
Machine is. When you right-click this
item, you open a window that lists
more than 100 file types, many of
them application-specific. You can se-
lect any or all of these, plus add more.
Furthermore, you can set Clean Mach-
ine to find files that are dated within a
time frame you determine.

Another great feature is the Plug-ins
Manager, through which you can access
more than 150 plug-ins that come with
the program. You can use these to clean
application-specific areas of your hard

Ratines

Clean Machine 3.0

Interface:

lllllll 8.5

Performance:

Features:

Documentation:

8.5

OVERALL:

IIIMIMI 8.5

drive, such as Adobe Acrobat and
ZoneAlarm. In addition to the plug-ins,
Clean Machine includes a tool for cre-
ating others.

Clean Machine is the most expensive
of the applications we looked at, but all
its configurable features are worth the
price. It requires Win98 or later and at
least 5MB free hard drive space.

Be Choosy

After you've played around with a
few file-cleaning programs, you'll know
if you need one that comes loaded with
many tools or if a streamlined model
will do. Regardless of what you pick, be
careful and be choosy in getting rid of
your files. All of these programs do a
good job of leaving alone essential
items, such as system files. However,
occasionally you may delete something,
such as a cookie that stores your login
information for a Web site, that you
wish you hadn't, per

by Rachel Derowitsch

PC Today / August 2004 53

Put Your Files On A Diet

Hard drives are a lot like closets:
No matter how large manufac-
turers make them, we'll find a
way to keep filling them up with digital
photos, digital music, 3D games, and an
assortment of other files and programs
that we absolutely must have.

There's a limit to how many belongings
you can stuff into a closet. There's also a
limit to what you can fit onto a hard drive
or removable media (such as CDs), but
with the help of an archiving utility, you
can squeeze in more files than you might
expect. A number of shareware archiving
applications are available. Most of these
programs offer a wide variety of features
and options, yet are relatively easy to
use. Here are a few to consider.

Archive XP 2004 v11

30-day trial; $29.99
Cyberspace Headquarters
www.cyberspacehq.com
File size: 4.2MB

With five different compression appli-
cations and support for more than 45
compression and archiving formats,
Archive XP may seem a little intimidating
at first glance. But the program integrates
so well into Windows that, for all prac-
tical purposes, it is difficult to say where
Windows ends and Archive XP begins.

You can create an archive using con-
text-sensitive pop-up menus that provide
one-click archiving options, or you can
use Archive XP's Compression and
Extraction Wizards to walk you through

Ratines

Archive XP 2004 v11

Interface:

Performance:

Features:

Documentation:

OVERALL:

the process. The Archive XP Lite applica-
tion uses a simple interface that makes it
easy for beginners to create and edit
archives. The Archive XP Studio applica-
tion gives power users access to all avail-
able compression and archiving options.

After you create an archive, you can
use a Windows Explorer or My Com-
puter window to view or work with
items in the archive as if it were a typical
folder on your computer. Just find the
archive wherever you saved it and open
it as usual. If you want to add or remove
files, you can use traditional Windows
functions, such as drag and drop or copy
and paste, or you can use the Archive
XP wizards.

Archive XP is easy to use, but setting up
some of the advanced options can be cum-
bersome. In some cases, you're expected to
know what an option means (such as set-
ting the dictionary size) or to understand
the choices and ramifications (such as se-
lecting a compression algorithm).

Configuration information is stored in
what Archive XP calls Archive Profiles.
You can create multiple Profiles: One for
compression settings, one for decom-
pression settings, one for right-click
menus, and one for encryption. How-
ever, there's no easy way to determine
which Archive Profile is in use at any
given point. This means you could
create a password-protected archive
without realizing it or use settings that
might not be compatible with other com-
pression programs.

BitZipper 4.0

30-day trial; $24.95
Bitberry Software
www.bitzipper.com
File size: 2.1MB

BitZipper is a basic archiving tool
with a lot going for it. It includes a
wizard-based interface, which walks
you through the process of com-
pressing or decompressing archives,
and an advanced interface called
BitZipper Classic, which is similar to
Windows Explorer.

Integration with Windows is limited
to entries in right-click, context-sensitive
pop-up menus that provide access to
most common archiving functions.

BitZipper can decompress 18 com-
pression formats without the use of
third-party plug-ins or separate com-
pression engines. It can create archives
in eight compression formats and seven
SFX (self-extracting archive) formats.

BitZipper also includes a backup tool
(accessible when you start the wizard)
that is integrated into the application. You
can configure multiple backup sets, each
specifying a list of source files to back up,
a destination for the backup, and the type
of compression to use during backup.
This tool is handy for manual backups,
but BitZipper doesn't include a way to au-
tomate the backup function.

If you don't purchase BitZipper, the
program will continue to function after
the trial period as a free decompression
program for ZIP files, the most common
Windows compression format.

WinZip 9.0

21-day trial; $29
WinZip Computing
www.winzip.com
File size: 2.2MB

WinZip has long been the dominant
archiving utility for Windows, but it
shows no sign of resting on its laurels.

54 August 2004 / www.pctoday.com

Cover Story:

are For Windows

Version 9 adds support for archives
larger than 4GB in size.

WinZip supports three levels of en-
cryption to ensure private archives re-
main private: 128 AES (Advanced
Encryption Standard), 256 AES, and the
older Zip 2.0, which you can use to
create archives that are accessible with
any archiving utility that supports the
Zip 2.0 encryption format. (And many
do support it.)

WinZip has two basic user inter-
faces, in addition to being integra-
ted into Windows Explorer and the
Desktop via context-sensitive pop-up
menus. (The right-click menus allow
you to select files or folders you want
to be zipped into an archive, extract
existing archives, or create an archive
and send it via email.) The wizard in-
terface, of course, walks you through
the process of creating or extracting
archives. The Classic interface is where
most users spend the bulk of their
time. It displays the files contained in
an archive, plus a toolbar and menus.
It also provides access to all WinZip
features and options, including the
ability to create SFXs and test archives

Ratines

WinZip 9.0

Interface:

Performance:

Features:

Documentation:

OVERALL:

for errors. WinZip supports drag-and-
drop technology, allowing you to
quickly and easily drag files or folders
to an open WinZip window or over the
WinZip Desktop icon to create an
archive, add items to an archive, or ex-
tract an archive.

With the addition of a separate appli-
cation called WinZip Command Line
Support Add-On (available free from
WinZip Computing if you buy the
WinZip license), you can access WinZip

from the command line or create scripts
to automate WinZip tasks.

PKZip v8 For Windows

30-day trial; $29.95
PKWARE
www.pkzip.com
File size: 8.04MB

Version 8 of PKZip for Windows, re-
cently released, adds the ability to create
archives in JAR (JavaARchive), TAR,
GZIP, Uuencoded, and XXEncoded for-
mats. It can also create archives in ZIP
and BZIP2 formats. PKZip can extract
archives from a large number of formats,
including MIME (Multipurpose Internet
Mail Extensions), CAB, HQX (com-
pressed BinHex), JAR, and TAR. If you
use PKZip in a business environment, a
separate administration module is

RcltJ ngS PKZip v8 For Windows

Interface: 8

Performance: 8

Features: 9

Documentation: 8

OVERALL: MINIMI 8.5

available for locking down PKZip's
configuration to ensure that the proper
compression and encryption options are
always used.

Other new features include en-
hanced encryption options that allow
you to encrypt files that are already
part of an archive and the ability to en-
crypt file names, as well as file con-
tents. This prevents you from viewing
the file names within an archive until
you provide the proper password.

The Classic interface features a
single window with all of the files in an
archive listed in a flat file format. The
Explorer interface is modeled after
Windows Explorer. Both interfaces pro-
vide access to all features and options.

PKZip also adds entries to right-
click, context-sensitive pop-up menus,
so you can easily access basic func-
tions from the Desktop or from
Windows Explorer.

The only downside to PKZip is that
you have to submit your email address
to download the trial version. In doing
this, PKWARE is authorized to send
you "periodic follow up emails," all of
which you may opt out of by following
directions in the email. Still, the email
address, plus the added hassle of
having to check a verification email for
the download link, makes the process
quite tedious at first.

Test Drive Before You Decide

Take these programs for a spin and
compare them against your current
program (if any) before making a deci-
sion. You can even download all of
them and test them against each other:
Each will uncompress files compressed
by another application. If you only
need to work with files that have been
zipped for downloading from the
Internet, BitZipper is a good choice. Its
ZIP decompression utility is free and
works well. If you want to create
archives, or work with multiple archive
types, one of the other applications is a
better choice, pct

by Tom Nelson
and Mary O'Connor

PC Today / August 2004 55

Registry

These Programs Can Safely Clean Your System's Database

If there's one area of your computer
that you probably don't work with
much, it's the Registry — and for good
reason. The Windows Registry is the data-
base that contains all the essential informa-
tion about your operating system and
software. Tinkering with the Registry
could cause all sorts of problems if you
don't know what you're doing.

That's why it's best for most users to
rely on the help of Registry cleaners,
programs that scan the database for
problems and propose solutions for
those problems. Here's how we judged
several of these programs.

CleanMyPC Registry Cleaner 2.1 7

15-day trial; $29.95
CleanMyPC Software
www.registry-cleaner.net
File size: 1.09MB

CleanMyPC couldn't be any easier to
use. The most important tools and fea-
tures are accessible from the main inter-
face under Registry Cleaner. Here you'll
find the Scan & Clean tool. It lists nine
areas, such as COM/ActiveX Entries and
Shared DLLs (dynamic-link library files),
which the program will check for errors.
In addition, you'll get a brief description
of each category. After you run a scan,
the program lists the number of errors
found in each category, and you can click
View Details for a further description.

We found a handy feature on the View
Details screen: a RegEdit button. When
you click this, it opens the Windows
Registry Editor and automatically takes

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CleanMyPC offers several ways to deal with
the problems it finds in your Registry.

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ErBim&reil] jer.'&

Before you can run an initial scan in Registry
Healer, the program will walk you through
System Restore, a wizard for setting a
restoration point for your Registry.

you to the location in the Registry where
the highlighted problem is located. This
may prove helpful for users who want to
learn more about their Registry but don't
feel comfortable yet manually editing it
themselves. (However, as always, exer-
cise much caution when in the Registry.)

CleanMyPC fixes the problems you've
selected with the click of a button. With
the trial version, however, you can fix
only two problems in each category.

The Registry Cleaner section contains
three other key features: Backup & Restore,
Startup Organizer, and Internet Explorer
(IE) BHO Organizer. (BHO stands for
Browser Helper Object.) With Backup &
Restore, you can create backup files of your
Registry and then restore one if you need to
undo changes to your Registry. The Startup
Organizer lists all the applications that start
when you launch Windows. This tool lets
you disable any of your choosing. And the
BHO Organizer lists all the add-ons for IE.
Some on this list may be legitimate, such as
the ones we had from Norton Antivirus
and Adobe Acrobat. But others may be
spyware or adware. CleanMyPC desig-
nates each add-on as safe, unknown, or
dangerous, depending on the information
contained in its database.

CleanMyPC runs on Windows 95 and
newer and requires 10MB of free hard
drive space.

Ratines

CleanMyPC Software

Interface:

Performance:

Features

Documentation:

OVERALL:

10
8.5
8
lllllllll 9

Registry Healer 4.2

30-day trial; $19.95
KsL Software
www.fixregistry.com
File size: 900KB

The folks who created Registry Healer
take seriously the need to back up your

56 August 2004 / www.pctoday.com

over Stc

Shareware For Windows

Registry before making changes to it.
In fact, before you can initially scan your
Registry for problems, Registry Healer
will launch System Restore or your
Backup Wizard, depending on your OS.

After the restore point is created,
Registry Healer will continue automati-
cally with its scan. It hunts for problems
in eight categories of the Registry, in-
cluding invalid paths and fonts, obsolete
Start menu items, and unused software
entries. If you want to exclude any of
these categories before you start the
scan, click Show The Advanced Settings
Dialog from the Advanced menu. In ad-
dition to customizing the scan list, you
can add or exclude paths where Registry
Healer searches for corrections to any
problems it finds during a scan. You can
find this option in the left pane; expand
the Paths To Search For Connection
folder for more options.

To start the Registry scan, click the red
arrow in the top toolbar of the main
page. The Advanced Settings window
will open, where you can select what
type of things you want the scanner to
search for. (You can disable this option
by removing the check mark next to
Show This Dialog Before The Scan.) Click
OK to start. Our first scan uncovered al-
most 300 problems. In phase two of the
process, Registry Healer hunted for and
found possible corrections to those prob-
lems; we were impressed with how
quickly it conducted this phase.

With the Registry Healer trial version,
you can correct only 14 problems with
each scan. It's easy to select or deselect
which entries you want to correct. For
each problem, Registry Healer lists the
best possible solution, whether that's
deleting the invalid entry or fixing the
problem with the suggested correction.
Before you make corrections, you can save
and print a list of the scan results, and you
can open the Registry from within
Registry Healer to view the problem area.

Registry Healer comes with an Easy
Mode and Expert Mode, but there's not

much "%v
difference
between the
two. To use
program, you'll need
at least Win95 and 1MB
free hard drive space.

Ratines

RegistryHealer 4.2

Interface:

mini 8.5

Performance:

Features:

Documentation:

9.5

OVERALL:

MINIMI 9

Registry Mechanic 2.1

Unlimited trial, partial version; $19.95
WinGuides Software
www.winguides.com
File size: 2.35MB

Like a good auto mechanic who fixes
what his customers couldn't begin to fix,
Registry Mechanic is ideal for users who
have no desire to mess with their Registry.

The section tree on the main interface
lists 12 areas in the My Computer folder
that Registry Mechanic will scan for errors.
The sections include Software Locations,
Device Drivers, Startup Programs, Virtual

You can configure Registry Mechanic to
perform a scan of your Registry when you
start your system.

Devices, and Add/Remove Programs, and
you can tweak this list by selecting and de-
selecting the sections.

When you complete the scan, Registry
Mechanic displays a new screen with a list
of sections in which errors were found.
Click a section, and you'll see the part of
the Registry containing the problem and
the correction Registry Mechanic suggests.

With the trial version, you're limited
to viewing and correcting problems
found in just the first six areas of the sec-
tion tree. To fix a problem, select the area
and click the Repair button. The program
will prompt you to save a backup copy
of your Registry before repairs are at-
tempted. You'll be able to access all
backup copies under the program's
Backup button on the main interface.

Registry Mechanic offers a few options
in its main scan-and-fix tool. For instance,
you can have the program perform an
automated scan whenever you start
Windows, and you can automatically re-
pair all found errors or just the ones you
choose. To access these options, click the
Settings button next to Configuration on
the main Registry Mechanic screen.

You'll need at least Win95 and
5MB of free hard drive space to use
Registry Mechanic.

Ratines

Interface:

Performance:

Features

Documentation:

OVERALL:

lllllll

MIIIIMI

MIMIIII

lllllll

llllllll

8.5

Smooth Running

No matter how you use your com-
puter, make cleaning your Registry a
regular part of your system mainte-
nance. It's particularly important for
anyone who installs and removes a lot of
applications, which does as much as
anything to clog up your Registry. With
one of these programs installed and
used regularly, your system will run
more smoothly, pct

by Rachel Derowitsch

PC Today / August 2004 57

Shareware Email Programs Expand Your Range Of Options

For millions of PC users, Win-
dows' free email client, Outlook
Express, is a suitable solution for
sending and retrieving email. Outlook
Express is easy to use, and it provides
an interface that many computer users
have become familiar with over the
years. In recent releases, Microsoft has
also increased Outlook Express' feature
set and enhanced its security as com-
pared to earlier incarnations.

Nevertheless, you may be pining
for options, such as fanciful emoticons,
better security, or an easy way to
check Web-based email accounts, all of
which are not standard features of
Outlook Express. You can use third-
party add-ons, or you can upgrade
your email client to one that perfectly
suits your needs. There are several
excellent email clients out there, each
of which has strengths in certain areas.
Eudora is probably the best-known,
but at a cost of $49.95, it is also the
most expensive.

Know Your Options

Fortunately, you don't have to spend
$50 to upgrade your email capabilities.
By choosing one of the lesser-known
email clients we review in this article, you
can reduce your outlay to less than $30 —
or nothing at all if you don't mind a few
ads or promotional pitches.

Boda Foxmail 5

Freeware
Boda

fox.foxmail.com.cn/english.htm
File size: 3.8MB

Because Foxmail is free, it is not tech-
nically shareware, but its value is such
that we had to include it. As a free
product, support is nonexistent, but
with more than 8 million satisfied users
worldwide and dozens of good reviews,
we are confident recommending it.

Foxmail has a pleasant, easy-to-com-
prehend interface and sports a variety of
features. Foxmail lets you leave retrieved
email messages on the server (on a per
account basis), a mighty handy option
when you want to check your work email
on the road or at home and still have
those messages waiting for you at work
the next day.

Ratines

Boda Foxmail 5

Interface:

MINIM 9

Performance:

Features:

Documentation:

OVERALL:

IMIIMM 9

It also lets you set up different mes-
sage-retrieval schedules for each account
and create custom, multilevel email rules
that you can apply globally or on a mes-
sage-by-message basis. You can even
create rules that automatically delete mail
directly from the server.) The program
supports multiple email servers for a
single account, a feature we did not find
elsewhere. It also supports MSN Hotmail
(www.hotmail.com) accounts, so you
can download your Hotmail messages
straight to your Foxmail account.

Foxmail also offers robust security fea-
tures. You can check, retrieve, and delete

email at the server level, and you can
password protect your accounts. You can
toggle between HTML and plain-text
views of your email (by clicking the mag-
nifying glass icon in the top right of the
preview pane). For handling junk mail,
Foxmail offers three types of filtering:
custom (user-created) rule; Bayes
method (which "learns" how to identify
spam based on words in the email mes-
sages you accept or reject); and list-based
(White List and Black List), which lets
you identify senders to accept or reject.

Foxmail comes with a variety of email
templates containing backgrounds, built-
in salutations, and more, or you can
choose to create your own templates. The
program can also import your contacts
from a variety of sources. Unfortunately,
Foxmail can import messages only from
Outlook-native or text files. Consequently,
users of other email clients will need to ex-
port their messages to text format before
they can import them.

IncrediMail Xe

No trial period; $29.95 to upgrade to Premium

IncrediMail

www.incredimail.com

File size: 6MB

With this program you can add
emoticons, animated GIF (Graphics
Interchange Format) graphics, sounds,
handwritten signatures, and more
to your email messages. If the default
options do not offer enough variety,
IncrediMail's online gallery provides
a rich assortment of graphics and spe-
cial effects.

58 August 2004 / www.pctoday.com

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Shareware For Windows

IncrediMail
is also quite user-
friendly, borrowing
much of the Outlook Express
interface. It can create your email
accounts automatically by harvesting
information from your old email pro-
grams, making account setup a breeze. It
can also import your existing Outlook
Express or Eudora contacts or messages.
As a bonus, IncrediMail supports AOL

Ratines

IncrediMail Xe

Interface:

Performance:

Features:

Documentation:

OVERALL:

accounts, although it cannot import
AOL contacts.

When mail arrives, the IncrediMail
notifier of your choice will alert you. You
can also opt to have your email messages
delivered in 3D; the message can fly into
the window from above or from the side,
for example. We found this feature to be
annoying rather than fun.

IncrediMail is not without account se-
curity and management features. You can
block senders, bounce (return as undeliv-
erable) messages, create basic message
rules, and instruct the program not to exe-
cute scripts or show external images. You
can also instruct IncrediMail, on a per-ac-
count basis, to leave retrieved messages
on the server.

IncrediMail Xe is free; small ads will
appear in the upper right of your display,
and you will find a few links to Web sites
(notably IncrediDate, IncrediMail's online
dating service) on your Desktop. If you
upgrade to IncrediMail Premium, you'll
rid yourself of the ads and gain a few
extra features. One of these is the ability to
bounce, delete, or open email messages
directly on your server, an important fea-
ture if security is a concern. (With the
basic version, you can view email headers

on the server but you cannot process
them in any way.)

Rose City Software Courier 3.5

30-day free trial; $29.95 to purchase
Rose City Software (Infinisource)
support@infinisource.com
www.rosecitysoftware.com
File size: 4MB

If you want security and stout account
management features and don't need
built-in animations, emoticons, or other
frippery, Courier is for you. During setup
you can decide whether to accept HTML
email messages and whether or not any
scripts can run within them. (Malicious
scripts inside HTML emails are a little-
recognized but prevalent source of infec-
tion.) You can also decide how Courier
will handle attachments, including
whether to save them to your hard drive
automatically. Should any nasty worms
make it through, they won't be able to use
you as their launch pad because Courier
encrypts your Address Book to protect it
against unauthorized usage.

Furthermore, during operation you can
design an array of filters that determine
where messages go, and you can use
Courier's JunkYard Filter feature to give
you powerful filtering control over spam.

Courier's account security and man-
agement features are equally powerful.
During setup, you can password protect
each mailbox. You can then lock the
mailbox when you leave your computer.
Courier will continue to check the account
for email, but users without the password
will not be able to read or send email from
that account.

Additionally, you can create an icon on
your Desktop for each email account

(handy if you have kids or people who
are not email savvy), and you can set up
different email-checking intervals for each
account. You can also instruct Courier, on
a per-account basis, to remove retrieved
email messages from the server or leave
them there.

Other helpful Courier features include
a means to archive email messages with a
single mouse click, the ability to create
and edit an Auto-Response message with
ease, the option to have Courier create an
email backup on exit, and the ability to
import messages and contacts from a va-
riety of mail clients (including Outlook
Express). One aspect of Courier we found

Ratings

Rose City Software
Courier 3.5

Interface: 8

Performance: 1

Features: 10

Documentation: 8

OVERALL: lllllllll 9

cumbersome was that it opens on a
per-mailbox basis. If you have multiple
mailboxes, you must open each one in-
dividually and then toggle between dif-
ferent windows to manage them.

Communication Central

Of the programs we reviewed, Courier
and Foxmail are on par; Courier offers
more account management options, but
Foxmail leads the pack on spam filtering
and server integration. IncrediMail lags
slightly behind in both areas, but its appeal
to multimedia enthusiasts is undeniable.
The key to choosing one is deciding which
feature set is most appealing. We also eval-
uated several other email clients, notably
WikMail (www.wikmail.com), The Bat
(www.ritlabs.com), and the freeware
program Pegasus Mail (www.pmail
.com). The first two we eliminated based
on program shortcomings. The third, how-
ever, we avoided because of its optimiza-
tion for a networked or mail server
environment (which makes its interface
confusing). If you are an advanced user, es-
pecially one with a network, you may also
want to give Pegasus Mail a trial run. per

by Jennifer Farwell

PC Today / August 2004 59

Browser

Managers

Cover Your Tracks & Protect Your Privacy

If you think you're anonymous when
you're surfing the Internet, you're in
for a rude surprise. Your computer
and Web browser maintain a detailed his-
tory of your browsing habits.

If you want to protect your privacy at
home or at work, consider third-party
browser and Windows security utilities,
such as the ones described below. With
one of these tools installed, you can rest
assured that your private files have been
put through the digital equivalent of a
crosscut paper shredder.

WinSettings 7.0

20-day trial; $49.95
FileStream
www.filestream.com
File size: 1.3MB

WinSettings 7.0 operates as a System
Tray utility, providing easy access to its
many functions at all times. The heart of
WinSettings is its ability to clean up and
remove stored data that could compro-
mise your privacy. Your Web browsing
habits are top priority. You can configure
WinSettings to clear out your History
folder, remove URLs of sites you've
visited, delete cookies, and dump your
Internet cache files. WinSettings can
also clear AutoComplete forms, Auto-
Complete passwords, Run history, Find
Files (Search) history, and Find Com-
puters history. It includes a pop-up
blocker to prevent pop-up windows from
intruding while you're browsing the Web.
WinSettings can remove all personal
data via menu selections available from

Ratines

WinSettings 7.0

Interface:

Performance:

Features:

Documentation:

OVERALL:

its System Tray icon. You can also con-
figure WinSettings to remove personal
data on a preset schedule, such as at
startup, at shutdown, or hourly.

WinSettings is very good at eliminating
browser data, but it's a bit of an over-
achiever. There is no simple way to selec-
tively prevent cookies and URLs from
being removed. This can get in the way of
easy access to sites you visit frequently.

WinSettings moonlights as a general-
purpose utility for accessing and ad-
justing many Windows settings, such as
file associations and wallpaper and
screen saver selections. It also includes a
screen capture utility.

Window Washer 5.5

30-day trial; $39.95
Webroot Software
www.webroot.com
File size: 2.5MB

Window Washer is another System
Tray utility. You can double-click its
icon to access Window Washer's config-
uration interface or right-click the icon
to access specific functions (such as per-
forming a wash) from a pop-up menu.
Considering how comprehensive its
Internet and Windows system cleaning

process is, Window Washer provides a
remarkably easy-to-use interface.

Window Washer's main job is to re-
move personal data that's collected during
routine use of your computer or browser.
It supports Internet Explorer, Netscape,
and AOL. It can also detect many common
browser plug-ins and ensure they're sub-
jected to the cleanup process.

Window Washer can clean up or re-
move your browser's history, cache files,
AutoComplete forms, cookies, Index.dat
files, temporary Internet files, and
Download folder memory. You can con-
figure the items you want to remove, as
well as set exceptions, such as retaining
cookies for sites you visit often. You can
also set up a schedule for performing a
wash at specific times, such as at startup
or shutdown, at browser shutdown, or
hourly, daily, weekly, or monthly.

Simply deleting browser and Win-
dows files isn't enough to ensure secu-
rity. You must overwrite the files, and
the space they occupy on your hard
drive, with new data to ensure you
can't recover the information. Window
Washer calls this process adding bleach
to the wash. You can specify the para-
meters for a Bleach Cycle, including the

Ratines

Window Washer 5.5

Interface:

Performance:

Features:

Documentation:

OVERALL:

60 August 2004 / www.pctoday.com

over Stc

Shareware For Windows

type of data that you'll use to overwrite
the original data and the number of
times or passes to overwrite the data.

You can also select specific security
methods sanctioned by various agencies
for cleaning hard drives, including DoD
(Department Of Defense) 5220. 22M,
NSA (National Security Agency), or the
Gutmann 35-pass algorithm, a method
developed by Peter Gutmann from the
Department Of Computer Science at the
University Of Auckland in New Zealand.

Anti Tracks 3.05

15-day trial; $29.95
Right Utilities
www.rightutilities.com
File size: 2.4MB

Ratines

Anti Tracks 3.05

Interface:

Performance:

Features:

Documentation:

OVERALL:

Sporting a user interface that looks
remarkably like a Windows XP
Desktop window, Anti Tracks makes it
easy to cover your trail. It can remove
the most important information col-
lected while browsing, including
Address bar history (Location bar in
Netscape Navigator), cookies, cache
files, History links, Index.dat files,
search histories, and AutoComplete
data. Erasing browser information isn't
an all-or-nothing proposition. You can
exclude cookies or URLs for your fa-
vorite Web sites. In addition to sup-
porting Internet Explorer, Netscape,
AOL, MSN, and Opera, Anti Tracks

can clean up data from most common
browser plug-ins.

Anti Tracks also looks after your
Windows environment and can clean
out your Recent Document history,
Windows Temp files, Run history,
Search Files history, Search Computers
history, login history, network cache,
Telnet history, Windows Registry
streams and fragments, swap files, and
more. It also supports Outlook Express
mail and news file cleanup.

You can select DoD 5220. 22-M,
Gutmann, or NSA file-shredding stan-
dards to ensure that folks can't recover
the data. You can also use a custom se-
cure erase process that lets you select the
number of times to overwrite a file and
the type of data to use. You can clean up
data manually, at preset intervals, or at
startup or shutdown.

CyberScrub Professional Edition 3.5

15-day trial; $49.95
CyberScrub
www.cyberscrub.com
File size: 3.1MB

CyberScrub Pro has a long list of fea-
tures that make it an effective tool for se-
curely erasing privacy-related data, but
its user interface is a hodgepodge of
wizards, windows, and tabbed lists and
is not intuitive or beginner-friendly.

CyberScrub can erase data via a
number of user-selected methods. You
can also choose progressively higher se-
curity levels, including NAVSO (Navy

Ratings

CyberScrub Professional
Fdition 3.S

Interface: 6

Performance: 6

Features: 9

Documentation: 7

OVERALL: 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 7

Staff Office Publication) P-5239-26, DoD
5220. 22-M, the Gutmann 35-pass algo-
rithm, and B. Schneier's 7-pass algo-
rithm, invented by internationally
recognized security expert and Coun-
terpane Chief Technology Officer Bruce
Schneier. You can add new erasure
methods or edit existing ones to meet
your needs.

A wizard interface lets you select
Windows and browser data you want
to remove and specify cookies you
don't. CyberScrub can clean up IE,
AOL, Netscape, Opera, and MSN, re-
moving AutoComplete history, cache
files, Address bar (Location bar in
Netscape Navigator) history, URL his-
tory, and Favorite lists. CyberScrub can
also remove or clear Windows data,
including application logs, clipboard
data, dialog history, Index.dat files,
search/find history, Windows Media
Player history, Recent Document his-
tory, Recycle Bin contents, Run history,
and swap files, as well as any addi-
tional files you specify. It can clean up
after 16 popular peer-to-peer applica-
tions and most messaging clients.

CyberScrub offers some of the best
available secure erase capabilities, but
most of its functions are strictly
manual. It has no scheduling capability
and no ability to automatically perform
a cleanup after an event, such as
startup or shutdown.

Use It Or You Won't Lose It

The browser security managers in our
roundup do a good job of keeping data
confidential. All are capable of using se-
cure erase procedures that meet or ex-
ceed many government standards, with
CyberScrub providing the highest level
of security. But data security programs
are a lot like backup programs: They
only work if you use them. If you don't
think you'll remember to routinely
perform a cleanup on a manual basis,
choose a program that lets you schedule
cleanups or perform them automatically
when you exit your browser or shut
down Windows, rer

by Tom Nelson and Mary
O'Connor

PC Today / August 2004 61

Protect

We all do it: use the same pass-
word for several (or all) of our
logins. We know it's wrong
and even dangerous, but the thought of
keeping track of every password for every
Web site and every application is just too
much to bear. However, there is plenty of
help available in the form of password
manager programs. Here we'll outline a
few of them. See the comparison chart in
the sidebar for a quick overview of the
main features of each program.

Tray Safe v2.0

21-day trial; $19.95 to $24.95
F-Croup

www.fgroupsoft.com/Traysafe/Download.ritml
File size: 763KB

Tray Safe has several templates ready to
accept password and logon information
for your applications and online accounts.
It also allows you to create templates to
store exactly the information you want for

Yourself

Password

Proliferation

Protection

Pays

Tray Safe can accommodate nearly any kind
of sensitive information because of its
flexible data setup tools.

a particular purpose, such as for credit
card information. For people who need to
create lots of online accounts, Tray Safe not
only will create a secure password, but it
will also generate a random username.

To start an application or access a Web
site, click its entry in Tray Safe's list. You
can type the username and password by
simply clicking inside the respective

Feature Comparison Chart

Although you'll probably never find the perfect password manager, you should
test several to see which most closely meets your needs. All of these have a
generous trial period, so you can expose them to as many scenarios as you can
think of. Here is a brief comparison of all the applications we've reviewed.

Online account login
Local program login
URL or program start
Modifiable autofill macro
Autofill

Password generator
Data file encryption
Revision tracking & history

Tray
Safe
v2.0

Password
Manager
XP

Password

Manager

Secure

Password

Manager

yes

Ratines

Tray Safe v2.0

Interface:

Performance:

Features:

Documentation:

OVERALL:

boxes. This is not a fully automated
login, but it is still very simple and con-
venient. Tray Safe can handle a wide va-
riety of information and store it securely.

Password Manager XP

30- day trial; $24.95
CP-Lab.com

www.cp-lab.com/download.html
File size: 331 KB

Password Manager XP integrates with
Microsoft Internet Explorer by attaching
a pop-up window that makes your pass-
word list available for logging in to Web
sites. You need to fill in the username,
but right-clicking the password field
opens a menu that lets you auto-create a
new password, save a password you've
already entered, or paste the password

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General Encryption

The folowing encryption algorithm
database;

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03DES

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0Tea

Two-fish

[ OK | [ Cance, '

Password Manager XP can encrypt
your data file using several types of
encryption technology to keep your
password information safe.

62 August 2004 / www.pctoday.com

over Stc

Shareware For Windows

RatingS Password Manager XP

Interface: 7

Performance: 7

Features: 7

Documentation: 8

OVERALL: 7

from your password file. The ability to
conveniently generate and save pass-
words is a big help if you visit lots of sites
that require you to create an account and
you don't want to use the same password
for multiple sites. The password program
also allows you to get to your passwords
when you use different machines con-
nected to the same network.

My Password Manager

30-day trial; $19.95
Animabilis Software
www.mypasswordmanager.com/index.htm
File size: 600KB

Ratines

My Password Manager

Interface:

iiiiii

Performance:

MINI

Features:

Documentation

OVERALL:

IIIIII

My Password Manager is everything
its title claims: a password manager. It
has an adequate password generator,
and you can safely store your login in-
formation in encrypted files. It's also
possible to launch the Web page or
local program associated with the pass-
word. But because there is no autofill
macro, you will need to manually copy
or paste your username and password
into the site's login screen. The program
does a good job at its functions, but to
be really useful, it should include an
autofill function.

Secure "^k^" *

Password Manager

35-day trial; $18.95
SecureKit.com
www.securekit.com/index.htm
File size: 1.3MB

Secure Password Manager has the best
user interface of the programs reviewed
here. It has a simple design and interface,
making it easy to use. There's plenty
of flexibility in setting up multiple

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Secure Password Manager allows multiple
users to store their own information securely.

KcltinSS Secure Password Manager

Interface:

Performance:

Features:

Documentation:

OVERALL:

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password files, and the program sup-
ports multiple users, which makes it
great to use on shared computers. It's
easy to modify the auto-complete macro,
which makes the program very flexible,
and you can apply a password sequence
to nearly any online or local application.
However, you can't start a program by
clicking its password file, as you can with
many other password managers. With
Secure Password Manager, you start your
Web site or program and press the plus
sign (+) on your keyboard. When your
password list is shown, select the one you

want to use and click Autofill to apply
your username and password.

Advanced Password Manager

30-day trial; $24.95
Rays Lab
www.rayslab.com
File size: 1.08MB

Advanced Password Manager allows
you to create multiple password files
and password protect them. You can
use the program to store login informa-
tion for your online accounts, bank
account numbers, and credit card infor-
mation. This is true, and it may be
a safe place to house that kind of infor-
mation, but rather than have special-
ized templates for each kind of

Ixcltl jlSS Advanced Password Manager

Interface: 6

Performance: 6

Features: 5

Documentation: 5

OVERALL: IIIIII 5.5

information, you end up putting infor-
mation in fields of the Internet tem-
plate. Once you have your username
and passwords set up, clicking Ad-
vanced Password Manager's icon in the
System Tray displays them so you can
select which set to use to automatically
fill in the login information. It's quick
and simple, but the program is not as
flexible as some in this roundup.

■ Safety First

It's often hard enough to come up
with a crack-proof password (with all
sorts of characters), let alone re-
member it. And with so many pass-
word-protected applications online
and on your PC, it really is best to
create different passwords for each.
Rather than write each one down or
try to remember them, invest a little in
a password and information manager
to prevent a potential disaster and pro-
mote safe computing, rcr

by Scott Koegler

PC Today / August 2004 63

~ Cover Story:

Customize

Creative Screen Savers Leave A Lasting Impression

Years ago, screen savers were a
must to prevent stagnant images
from burning into monitors.
Technological improvements have less-
ened the likelihood of this happening, but
by now most computer users habitually
use screen savers anyway. In fact, they're
one of the easiest and least-expensive
ways to make a personal statement
through your PC.

You can settle for the screen savers that
come with your version of Windows. Or
you can download and test a host of
shareware screen savers from the Web,
starting with the ones we found here.

American Pictures 1.0

Unlimited trial, partial version; $15.95

Altix Soft

info@altixsoft.com

www.altixsoft.com

File size: 4.88MB

Ratines

American Pictures 1.0

Interface:

Performance:

9.5

Features:

Documentation:

7.5

OVERALL:

7.5

Does your mind wander off to places
and cities where you'd rather be? The
makers of American Pictures know the
answer is likely "Yes". So when you want
to hit the road to see this great country
but can't, this screen saver can give you
snapshots of America's varied beauty.

The concept is excellent, but the execu-
tion suffers in places. To be fair, the trial

version of this slideshow screen saver
shows only 10 of the 33 images in the re-
tail version. Accompanying these photos
are a few soundtracks, including music
from "Men In Black" and "Pulp Fiction."
Not the patriotic fare we expected, but at
least the music is one of several features
you can tweak if necessary.

We like the special effects that transi-
tion from one photo to the next. Plus, you
can display all the photos in black-and-
white for a classic look. You can also set
your favorite image from the slideshow as
your wallpaper with a double-click of
your mouse.

American Pictures is a new program
from Altix Soft, still in its first version. We
expect future versions will improve, espe-
cially with crisper photos. And based on
what we've seen in other screen savers
from Altix (check out Autumn Blues, for
example), we know the company is ca-
pable of that. To use American Pictures,
you'll need Windows 95 or newer.

Aquatica 3D 2.0

Unlimited trial, partial version; $29.99
Primetime Multimedia
info@clubaquatica.com
www.clubaquatica.com
File size: 5.9MB

Be prepared for a drop in your produc-
tivity if Aquatica 3D is your next screen
saver. It is so well stocked with customiz-
able features that you might have trouble
taking your eyes and ears off this mes-
merizing screen saver.

The trial version of Aquatica 3D
doesn't do the program justice because

the retail version comes with thousands of
features you can't access if you're just
trying it out. However, at the Web site
you can view almost 10,500 items in the
object library, which paying customers
can download and integrate into their
water scenes. In addition, those who pur-
chase Aquatica 3D receive at no cost
Aquatica Scenery Maker, a program that
provides more premade settings plus
items to help you create your own scenes.

Ratines

Aquatica 3D 2.0

Interface:

llllllllll 9.5

Performance:

Features:

9.5

Documentation:

OVERALL:

MINIMI 75

The Settings interface in Aquatica 3D
gives you a command center from which
you can access all the tools and features.
You also can select sounds and control the
volume level of the program, plus import
music files to play when Aquatica 3D
launches. Perhaps the most unique fea-
ture is Internet Messaging: If you create a
message channel for other Aquatica 3D
customers, you can send them messages
that will appear on their screen saver.

Eye-catching as it is, Aquatica 3D is
definitely a try-before-you-buy program.
We didn't find it 100% reliable, but given
how stripped-down the trial version is,
that might explain its somewhat faulty
performance for us. Right now, Aquatica
3D is available for just Windows
2000/XP users.

Art-Impressionism 1 .1

7-day trial; $19.95
Always Great Software
i nfo@alwaysgreat.com
www.alwaysgreat.com
File size: 4.8MB

Bring a little class to your Desktop with
the works from some of the greatest
Impressionistic artists. Here you can stroll
through a museum-quality collection of

64 August 2004 / www.pctoday.com

over Stc

Shareware For Windows

KStingS Art-Impressionism 1.1

Interface: 9.5

Performance: 10

Features: 8

Documentation: 9

OVERALL: MINIMI 9

paintings from renowned artists such as
Monet, Renoir, Cassatt, Degas, Cezanne,
and Seurat. In all, the Art-Impressionism
screen saver contains 57 prints, including
Monet's "Water Lilies," Renoir's "Dance at
Le Moulin de la Galette," and Cezanne's
"Houses in Provence."

You can change a few aspects about the
screen saver. For instance, you can en-
large the images to fit the screen. You also
can modify the font, font size, and place-
ment of the captions detailing the artist's
name, painting title, and date, plus
change the transitions between images.

If Always Great Software releases an-
other version of Art-Impressionism in the
future, the only improvements it could
make would be to add a classical music
soundtrack and a wallpaper feature.

Always Great Software delivers what it
promises for Win95 and newer users and
at reasonable prices.

Mandala3D1.3

9-day trial; S 14.95
7art-screensavers
info@7art-screensavers.com
www.7art-screensavers.com
File size: 1.25MB

7art-screensavers offers a wide range of
screen savers, so it was difficult to choose
one to preview. But Mandala 3D caught
our eye because it's somewhat reminis-
cent of the Flying Objects type of screen

savers that come with Windows. This,
however, is much more robust.

You can't add to or create anything
new to integrate into this 3D screen saver,
but its Settings dialog box does give you
control over numerous fine points of the
graphics. For instance, you can choose
from among five rotating figures — cone,
cube, cylinder, pyramid, and sphere — and
adjust colors, rotating speeds, and surface
types. In addition, you can make the fig-
ures translucent and turn on a morphing
feature. The default setting puts many of

Ratines

Mandala 3D 1.3

Interface:

Performance:

Features:

Documentation:

OVERALL:

7.5

the features in a random mode, which
was one of our favorite settings.

You may not buy into the philosophy
behind the Ambient Light portion, but the
quirky notions on which the program was
written don't detract from this vivid, cap-
tivating screen saver. Mandala 3D runs
on Win95 and up.

ABF Slide Show Screen Saver 1.1

30-day trial; $14.95
ABF-SOFT.COM
info@abf-soft.com
www.abfsoft.com
File size: 891 KB

After shopping around for good
screen savers, you may come to the con-
clusion that you'd just as soon make
your own, especially if you want to
create a slideshow.

If that's the case, you're in luck. ABF
Slide Show Screen Saver is a super
program that makes creating your own
screen saver a snap. ABF integrates
right into Windows. After installation,

Ratings

ABF Slide Show
Screen Saver 1.1

Interface: 8

Performance: 9.5

Features: 7.5

Documentation: 9

OVERALL: MIIIIMI 8.5

right-click your Desktop, choose Proper-
ties, and click the Screen Saver tab in the
Display Properties dialog box. Select ABF
from the drop-down menu, click Settings,
and the program's simple interface opens.

Most of the work in creating your own
slideshow screen saver occurs as you
gather all the image files you want to in-
clude into one or two folders. Once
you've done that, just choose a few fea-
tures from the ABF Slide Show Screen
Saver Setup dialog box: choose your back-
ground from the Background Color drop-
down menu; the time between images
from the Interval (Seconds) drop-down
menu; and transition effects from Slide
Show Effect drop-down menu. ABF offers
a generous selection of effects, so select
Random to take advantage of all of them.

ABF works on Windows 98 and newer
systems. It lacks tools for adding sound
effects or a soundtrack, but otherwise, it's
a nifty program.

Happy Hunting

Our brief reviews can't begin to encom-
pass the broad range of screen savers
available online. There are numerous reli-
able shareware Web sites out there (such
as CNET's Download.com), and many
product sites feature links to download
trial versions of their software; browse
through search results to find more.
However, as with any download, make
sure the site is reliable and trustworthy
before you click that hyperlink. Enjoy the
ones that we've found for you and cus-
tomize your PC to express your individu-
ality and showcase your personality, per

by Rachel Derowitsch

PC Today / August 2004 65

Cover Story:

Time Is

Beef Up Your System Clock

Your time is important, so don't
settle for the basic Windows
clock in your System Tray. There
is a plethora of shareware clock utilities
that augment your system clock with
useful time-management tools.

Do You Have The Time?

The products we reviewed include
clock, alarm, and stopwatch functions. It's
the add-on features that set them apart.
For example, some clock utilities display
the time in multiple time zones, and
others offer advanced time-tracking fea-
tures. Try these products based on the
features that are meaningful to you.

12Ghosts 12-ShowTime

30-day trial; $29.95 to purchase
12Ghosts Software
(888)238-3153
www.12ghosts.com
File size: 3210KB

One of more than 30 different utilities
available in the 12Ghosts SuperGee
PowerTools suite, the 12-ShowTime clock
utility automatically replaces the clock in

RcltingS 12Ghosts12-ShowTime

Interface:
General usability:
Feature set
Documentation:
OVERALL:

MINIM

MIMI

llllllll

MIMI

lllllll

8
6
8
6
7

your System Tray. The 12-ShowTime
clock offers more information than the
standard Windows clock and can include

the day, date, and current time in a variety
of formats.

In addition to the System Tray clock,
you can configure a separate clock win-
dow. The clock window offers an optional
picture of the moon and its current phase.
You can choose to activate the System
Tray clock, the clock window, or both.

Standard features include an alarm, a
chime that sounds at specific time inter-
vals, and a stopwatch with lap and
countdown timer capabilities. A World
Times window displays the time in 12
preconfigured locations. To simplify
customizing its contents, 12-ShowTime
incorporates a list of well-known cities
and corresponding time zones.

Most of the features in 12-ShowTime
are easy to use and intuitive, with useful
information provided on the program's
screens and in the Help file. The pro-
gram's online help is a brief Web page
that contains information for getting you
started using 12-ShowTime and the other
utilities in the suite.

Spring Creek Software Virtual
Stopwatch 3.0

14-day trial; $15 to purchase
Spring Creek Software
sales@springcreeksoftware.com
www.springcreeksoftware.com
File size; 1300KB

Virtual Stopwatch is a clock utility that
features a powerful logging tool that lets
you track the amount of time you spend
on projects and tasks. What's more, you
can add billing rates, print customizable
log reports, and export log data.

Ratines

Spring Creek Software
Virtual Stopwatch 3.0

Interface:
General usability.
Feature set
Documentation:
OVERALL:

Mill
lllllll
lllllll
MIMI

5
5
7
7
6

The program also can display a clock, a
stopwatch, or a countdown timer. You
can add buttons to log in and out of the
tracking feature, change the display
colors, choose the date and time format,
and select the font type and size. Unfor-
tunately, some of our selections caused
the interface's display window to truncate
the date and time.

The program offers standard alarm fea-
tures, a chime that plays at specified inter-
vals, and a lap timer. The application does
not display a clock on your System Tray
or on the Windows Taskbar. However, it
does place an icon on the System Tray for
one-click access to the program.

Virtual Stopwatch comes with online
help that includes a table of contents and
index. The help information is current
and provides thorough descriptions of
how to use the program and its configura-
tion screens.

Make Your Clock Work For You

Your time is valuable. As the prod-
ucts in this article illustrate, shareware
clocks enhance the basic Windows clock
and can help you be more productive.
Why not try one and find out how it can
work for you? per

by Carmen Carmack

66 August 2004 / www.pctoday.com

JE»

ighten Up.

nsn't so long ago that if you wanted to bring
data with you, your hardware had to come
Well, that's all in the past now thanks to
lew SanDisk Cruzer™ Mini. At under half
unce, the Cruzer Mini goes anywhere, and
up to 256MB of flash memory, it takes a lot
it. Hi-speed USB 2.0 compliant, SanDisk's
:er Mini lets you transfer data faster than
before. And at less than 8mm thick, all
eds is a single USB slot. Just drag, drop,
go. It's all about convenience - no extra
ware, no worries.

/hether you're installing utilities or updating
drivers for the umpteenth time, you can
your files with you wherever you go - and
won't even need your dolly.

more infor...„*
zer Mini, visit www.sandisk.com/smart

aiDisk^

SanDisk and the SanDisk logo are registered trademarks and Cruzer is a trademark of
SanDisk Corporation. Other brands and products are trademarks of their respective holders.
©2004 SanDisk Corporation. All rights reserved.

1 ips & Tweaks

Work Smarter

Tips For Increasing Productivity

Get More Done In Less Time

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# Windows

Find The Desktop (Windows 98/Me/2000/XP).

Accessing the Desktop can be tedious when it's
hidden under a gaggle of open windows. Windows
offers at least two ways to get to the Desktop. Click
the Show Desktop icon in the Quick Launch section of
the Taskbar to hide all open windows. Click the icon
again to return all windows to their former locations.

If you're dragging an item from a window or an
area of the Desktop and you need to see the rest of
the Desktop, drag the item to an open area of the
Taskbar and let the pointer hover over the area for a
few seconds. All open win-
dows will be minimized to
the Taskbar, giving you an
unobstructed view of the
Desktop. To bring the win-
dows back, click the Show
Desktop icon.

Add Folders To The
Taskbar (Win98/Me/2000/
XP). Adding Desktop short-
cuts to your favorite folders
is one way to access them
quickly. But if the Desktop is
hidden by open windows or
numerous icons and shortcuts,
you may not be able to find
your folder shortcuts easily.

To prevent this, add your folders to the Taskbar.
Right-click a blank area of the Taskbar and select
Toolbars and New Toolbar from the pop-up menu.
Navigate to the target folder, click it, and then click
OK. In Win2000/XP, the folder will appear as a toolbar
on the Taskbar. The toolbar will contain a single entry
with the folder's name and a set of double arrows.
Click the double arrows to display a pop-up menu of
the folder's contents.

In Win98/Me, the names of the folder items may be
scattered across the Taskbar. To clean up the mess, lo-
cate and click the vertical divider to the left of the
folder name and drag it as far as possible to the right.
This produces a single folder name with double ar-
rows on the end. Click the double arrows to display a
pop-up menu of the folder's contents.

/ " I f | £ | Rb
VS 3 /b % % <-

AutoCorrect.. Shortcut Key. Shortcut lay: 2265, Alt+X

If you frequently use certain symbols, you can
add them to the AutoCorrect tool in Office and
quickly insert them into Office documents.

Get To Explorer Faster (Win98/Me/2000/XP).

Windows Explorer offers a quick and easy way to access
and move around your computer's file system. With
Explorer's multipane display and hierarchical file tree,
you'll always know exactly where you are. You can
launch Explorer through the Start menu, but there's a
faster way: Click a folder or drive icon (that you've al-
ready placed on your Desktop) to select it, hold down the
SHIFT key, and double-click the icon. This method also
works for any icon that normally has an Explore option
in the right-click pop-up menu, such as My Computer,
My Documents, and Network Neighborhood.

Shorten A Search (Win98/
Me/2000/XP). When you're
looking for an item on your
computer, and you know
which folder it resides in, you
can restrict your search to that
specific folder and speed up
the search process. Right-click
the target folder and select
Find (in Win98) or Search (in
WinMe/2000/XP) from the
pop-up menu. This will open
the Find/Search window,
with the folder listed in the
Look In field.

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from; Unicode (hex)

# Microsoft Office

Zoom Around A Document (Office 97/2000/XP/
2003). You can use your mouse's scroll wheel to enlarge
or reduce the text and image size within a document.
Hold down the CTRL key on your keyboard and move
the scroll wheel forward to zoom in or back to zoom out.
Use AutoCorrect To Add Symbols (Office 97/
2000/XP/2003). The AutoCorrect tool in Office can cor-
rect common spelling mistakes. You can also use it to
insert common symbols. For example, type (c) to gen-
erate the copyright symbol (©); type (r) to generate the
registered symbol (®); or type (tm) to generate the
trademark symbol (™). If this tip doesn't work for you,
it's likely that AutoCorrect is turned off. To make the
feature active, select AutoCorrect from the Tools menu,
check the Replace Text As You Type checkbox, and
click OK.

68 August 2004 / www.pctoday.com

1 ips & Tweaks

To add other symbols, click Insert and Symbol. Click
a symbol once in the scrollable list to select it and click
AutoCorrect. In the Replace Text As You Type section,
the symbol you selected should appear in the With
field. Enter a sequence of
characters in the Replace field
that you want AutoCorrect to
recognize as the signal to gen-
erate this symbol. Click Add
and click OK.

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9 Microsoft Word

Keep Documents A Menu
Away (Word 97/2000/2002/
2003). Word maintains a short
list of recently used files, but
the list is a revolving door.
When you open a new docu-
ment, the oldest document on
the list may be dropped, so you
can never be sure a specific
document is there.

For fast access to frequently
used documents, add a Work
entry to the File menu. The

Work list is static; adding a document won't bump an ex-
isting document off the list.

Click Tools and Customize. Click the Commands tab
and select Built-in Menus from the list of categories. In
the list of commands, click and hold the Work entry, drag
it to the location of your choice on the File menu (the
menu will expand), and click Close.

When you open a document that you want to add to
the Work list, click File, Work, and Add To Work Menu.
To remove a document from the Work menu, press
CTRL-ALT- - and select the document from the Work
menu. This removes the document from the menu but
does not affect the original document.

Open The Last Document You Worked On (Word
97/2000/2002/2003). You can create a Desktop shortcut
that will launch Word and load the document you were
working on the last time you used the program.

Locate Winword.exe, which is usually found at
C:\PROGRAM FILESXMICROSOFT OFFICEXOF-
FICE11 in Word 2003 or at C:\PROGRAM FILESXMI-
CROSOFT OFF/CEXOFFICE in other versions of Word
(where MICROSOFT OFFICE is the Office version).
Right-click and hold the Winword.exe file and drag it
to the Desktop. Release the mouse button and select
Create Shortcut Here from the pop-up menu. Right-
click the new WinWord shortcut and select Properties
from the pop-up menu. Add a space after the last
character in the Target field, type /mfilel, and click
Apply. Click the General tab, rename the shortcut to

If you often enter the same information in Excel,
such as a product list, you can enter the informa-
tion into a Custom List. To enter the list into a
worksheet, type the name of one of the list entries.
The number of list entries you add to the work-
sheet will depend on the number of cells you select.

something more descriptive (such as "Word Recent"),
and click OK. Whenever you want to open the last docu-
ment you worked on in Word, double-click this shortcut.

Microsoft Excel
Expand Charts (Excel 2003).

Excel 2003 features a new List
command, which lets you select
a column of data to be a list.
Lists have special properties, in-
cluding the ability to self-ex-
pand to encompass new data.

To create a list, select one or
more cells in a column. With
the cursor within the selected
cells, right-click and select
Create List from the pop-up
menu. A dialog box will ap-
pear, displaying the cells that
make up the current list. Click
OK to create the list.

The selected cells will dis-
play with a border around
them. One cell will contain an
asterisk (*), indicating the end
of the list. If you select this cell and enter data, the list
will expand by one cell to include the new data. The
cell with the asterisk will move down by one cell. Any
chart you create that references this list will automati-
cally update with the new information.

Custom Lists (Excel 97/2000/2002/2003). If you fre-
quently enter the same information into Excel work-
sheets, such as a list of products, you can cut down on
some of the typing by creating a custom list.

Click Tools and Options and select the Custom Lists
tab. Select New List and enter the list items, one entry
per line. When you're done, click Add and OK.

To enter a custom list into a worksheet, select a cell
and type an item from the list. Expand the cell selection
to match the number of items you want to include from
the list.

• Microsoft Outlook

Sort It All Out (Outlook 97/2000/2002/2003). You can

sort information in Outlook by clicking a column
head, such as Subject. To sort by multiple columns,
such as From, Received, and Subject, select column
headers in the order you want to sort the information.
Hold down the SHIFT key after you select the first
column or the next selection replaces, rather than
adds to, the sort criteria. I

by Tom Nelson and Mary O'Connor

PC Today / August 2004 69

1 ips & Tweaks

Optimization Central

Tips & Tweaks
For Improving Windows

No-Cost Ways To Boost Performance

Customize Start menu —

• Start Up Where You Left Off
(Windows XP)

WinXP's Hibernation mode allows you to shut down
your computer and later return, almost
instantly, to the state it was in before
you turned it off.

For some reason known only to
Microsoft, Hibernation isn't listed as an
option when you select Start and Turn
Off Computer. To force the Hibernation
option to appear, press and hold the
SHIFT key when the Turn Off Computer
screen displays. When it appears, click
Hibernation, and everything currently
in your computer's memory will be
written to your hard drive before your
computer shuts down. When you restart
your computer, the data is restored to
your computer's memory, and you'll be
back in business.

To remove records of
recently accessed
documents, program^
Web site Sj dick Clear.

Start Menu Settings

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□ Disomy Logoff

You can hunt around the
Control Panel folder to locate
the Administrative Tools in
Windows 2000/XP, or you can
add them back to the Start
menu, for easy access.

# Ditch The Animation &

Speed Up Searches (WinXP)

You'd think Microsoft would have learned a lesson
about animated helpers after the disdain many users
have shown for Clippy, the animated paper clip helper
in Microsoft Office. Instead, Microsoft put the same
kind of animated helper in WinXP's Search function.

If delaying a search to watch a cartoon character per-
form seems like a bad idea to you, you can ditch it by
clicking Start and Search and selecting Change
Preferences from the left window pane. Next, select
Without An Animated Screen Character. You will see
the character one last time as it walks off into the
proverbial sunset, but after that you can speed your
way through searches without any on-screen company.

# Prevent The Indexing Service From
Hogging CPU Power (Win2000/XP)

The Indexing Service can speed up local file searches by
maintaining a list of files stored on your local hard drive.

But because it runs in the background, the Indexing
Service steals processing power.

To determine whether the Indexing Service is
slowing you down, open the Task
Manager by pressing CTRL-ALT-DEL.
Select the Processes tab and double-click
the CPU column to sort currently run-
ning processes by CPU use, with the
heaviest users listed first. The Indexing
Service goes by the name Cidaemon.exe.
If it appears at or near the top of the list
and is consuming more than 70% of
your CPU power, you may want to turn
it off. If so, select Cidaemon.exe from
the list and click End Process. This will
shut down the Indexing Service for now,
but it may restart the next time you boot
your computer.

To disable the Indexing Service per-
manently, click Start and Run. In the
Run dialog box, type services. msc and

press ENTER or click OK. In the

Service window, scroll down and right-click the
Indexing Service entry. Select Properties from the
pop-up menu. Click Disabled from the Startup Type
drop-down and click OK.

• Switch Quickly Between Applications
(Win98/Me/2000/XP)

You can assign hotkeys to the applications you use
most often and then switch between applications with a
keystroke or two.

To add a hotkey for an application, click Start, click
Programs or All Programs (depending on your
Windows version), right-click the application, and se-
lect Properties from the pop-up menu. (If your applica-
tion icon is already on the Start menu, just right-click it
and select Properties.) Select the Shortcut tab. To assign
a hotkey, click once in the Shortcut Key field, type the
key combination you want to use, and click OK. Be sure
to select a key combination that Windows (or another

70 August 2004 / www.pctoday.com

1 ips & Tweaks

application) doesn't already use. For example, try
SHIFT-ALT-1 or SHIFT-ALT-2.

• Turn Off Special Effects (WinXP)

WinXP uses a large amount of CPU time to handle
system events, including the many WinXP GUI (graph-
ical user interface) effects. You can select the visual effects
you want to enable and fine-tune WinXP to suit your
computer's performance or your personal preference.

Click Start, right-click My Computer, and select
Properties from the pop-up menu. In the System
Properties dialog box, click the Advanced tab. In the
Performance section, click Settings. In the Performance
Options dialog box, click the Visual Effects tab to view
a list of visual effects that you can enable or disable.
There are four additional options to choose from. If you
click the radio button for Let Windows Choose What's
Best For My Computer, WinXP will at-
tempt to decide which GUI effects to
use. If you click the radio button for
Adjust For Best Appearance, all GUI
effects will be active. With Adjust For
Best Performance all GUI effects are
disabled. Finally, select Custom to pick
and choose the effects you want to en-
able or disable. Make your selections,
click OK, and click OK again.

• Restart Faster
(Win95/98/Me)

Installing an application or making

changes to Windows often requires

restarting your computer. After you

select Restart from the Shut Down

Windows dialog box, hold down the

SHIFT key and click Yes in the Shut

Down Windows dialog box. This will force Windows

to perform a warm restart, which is fairly quick,

rather than a complete shutdown and restart.

• Turn Your Computer Into A Network
Server (Win98/Me)

Win98/Me configure the file and directory cache
size to match a computer's intended use. By default,
Windows assumes a computer is a Desktop computer
and sets aside a small amount of system memory for the
file and directory cache. If you have more than 64MB
RAM, you can change your computer's role to that of a
Network Server. Windows increases the file and direc-
tory cache, which will boost file system performance and
add a little zip to your Windows experience.

Right-click the My Computer icon on the Desktop
and select Properties from the pop-up menu. Click the
Performance tab and click File System. In the File

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Apply

You can add a shortcut key (a
specific key combination) that
will allow you to quickly launch
an application or switch between
open applications.

System Properties window, select the Hard Disk tab. In
the drop-down menu for Typical Role Of This
Computer, select Network Server. Click OK and restart
your computer.

• Skip The Screen Saver
(Win98/Me/2000/XP)

Some screen savers use a fair amount of processor time
that a background process could better use. If you use
your computer as a server, or you share devices con-
nected to your computer (such as a printer or a net-
work connection), you should disable the screen saver.

Right-click an empty area of the Desktop and select
Properties from the pop-up menu. Select the Screen Saver
tab and choose None as the Screen Saver.

If you use Win2000/XP, and you want to turn off
your display after a period of unuse, click Power, select
a time delay from the Turn Off Monitor
drop-down menu, and click OK.

• Speed Up Access To
Administrator Tools
(Win2000/XP)

The Administrator tools in Win2000/ XP
are relegated to the Control Panel folder.
You can restore the tools to the Start
menu for easier access.

In Win2000, click Start, Settings, and
Taskbar & Start Menu and select the
Advanced tab. In the Start Menu Setting
list, put a check mark next to Display
Administrative Tools and click OK.

In WinXP, click Start and Control
Panel. Select the Appearance And
Themes category and click Taskbar
And Start Menu. Click the Start Menu

tab and click Customize. Select the Advanced tab.

Scroll down the Start Menu Items list to System

Administrative Tools. Select the display option you

want to use and click OK.

• Don't Be Afraid To Read The Directions

Many individuals hate reading manuals or referring
to Help files, and we're no exception. But reading the di-
rections now can sometimes save you a lot of trouble
later. The tips and tweaks above cover a number of OSes,
and some automatically edit the Windows Registry,
which can be risky. Be sure to back up the Registry, or the
Registry key you plan to edit, before making any
changes. For more information about backing up and
restoring the Registry, launch the Registry Editor and
select Help from the application menu. I

by Tom Nelson and Mary O'Connor

PC Today / August 2004 71

1 ips & Tweaks

Surf Better

Tips For Navigating The Internet

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Every visit to the page
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■■■•■■:.

# Customize Web Content Updates

Internet Explorer maintains a cache of Web content in the

Temporary Internet Files folder on

your hard drive. Loading content from

your hard drive is faster than having to

retrieve the information from the

Internet, which means faster browsing.

However, some of the content within

the folder may not be current because a

lot of Web content changes on a daily

or even hourly basis.

You can configure how often IE
checks for updated information stored
in the cache. In IE, open the Tools
menu and select Internet Options.
Next, select the General tab and click
the Settings button in the Temporary
Internet Files section. In the Settings di-
alog box, you can select how often IE
should check for newer versions of
stored Web pages.

Select the Every Visit To The Page
option, and IE updates the Web page's
content each time you visit the page;
however, you may experience a de-
crease in performance when browsing
previously viewed Web pages. Choose
Every Time You Start Internet Ex-
plorer, and IE will check for updates
when you access a previously viewed
Web page. IE will not check for up-
dates during the same session. Select
the Automatically radio button, and IE
checks for updates automatically.
Select the Never option, and your
browsing performance will be en-
hanced, but you risk viewing outdated
Web content. You can update pages manually, however,
by pressing the F5 key to refresh the Web page.

# Organize Your Favorites

When you come across a Web site you know you'll visit
again, you can add the URL to your Favorites list in IE so
you can quickly access the site later on. You can also or-
ganize your Favorites list through the Organize Favorites
dialog box. Open the Favorites menu and select Organize

Favorites. The options within the Organize Favorites

dialog box let you create, rename, and delete folders and

links. You can also move existing links

from your Favorites List from one

folder to another.

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Current location: C:\Documentc and

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Amount of disk space to user

156

Customize Web
Content Updates

In the Settings dialog box, you
can customize how often
Internet Explorer will check for
updates for stored Web pages.

Organize Your Favorites

Using the Organize Favorites
dialog box, you can organize
your list of favorite URLs.

• ICS and Non-Windows XP
Clients

So you are sharing an Internet connec-
tion among multiple PCs. Once you en-
abled ICS (Internet Connection
Sharing) on your PC, you must con-
figure the remaining computers to be
ICS clients. The process is slightly dif-
ferent if you have workstations run-
ning pre-WinXP platforms. When
you use the Network Setup Wizard to
enable ICS on a computer running
WinXP, you'll have the option of cre-
ating a Network Setup Disk. For com-
puters running Windows 98/98 SE/
Me, you can use the Network Setup
Wizard to configure ICS. To run the
wizard on these platforms, you will
need the Network Setup Disk you cre-
ated when enabling ICS on the host
computer or you can run the wizard
directly from the WinXP CD. To run
the wizard using the floppy diskette,
insert it into the floppy drive and
double-click Netsetup.exe. To start
the wizard from the WinXP CD, insert
the CD in the optical drive, click the
option to perform additional tasks,
and click Set Up Home Or Small Office
With Networking.

• Turn Off Automatic Image Resizing

Are you tired of scrolling up and down a page just to
view a picture that runs off a Web page? Then use the
Automatic Image Resizing tool. IE 6's Automatic Image
Resizing tool automatically adjusts the size of pictures to
fit within your browser so you don't have to scroll up or
down the display to view an entire image. When you
want to resize an image, roll your pointer over the lower-
right corner of the image, and the Automatic Image

72 August 2004 / www.pctoday.com

1 ips & Tweaks

Resizing icon appears. Click the icon to make the image
fit in your browser window without having to scroll or
return the image to its original size.

The downside of Automatic Image Resizing is that it
may reduce the quality of certain images. You can dis-
able Automatic Image Resizing, if you choose. Open the
Tools menu in IE 6 and select Internet Options. Under
the Advanced tab, deselect the Enable Automatic Image
Resizing checkbox and click OK. When you disable
Automatic Image Resizing, images will appear in their
original format on-screen, and you cannot resize them.

A Forgotten Content Advisor Password

You can restrict access to restricted Web sites using IE's
Content Advisor feature. By creating a Supervisor
Password, only users who know the password can access
restricted Web sites. However, what happens if you
forget the password? The workaround for this is to delete
the following Registry key: HKEY_LOCAL_MA-
CHINE\SOFTWARE\MICROSOFT\WINDOWS\CUR-
RENTVERSION\POLICIES\RATINGS. After you delete
this key, you can open IE and disable the Content
Advisor. When you are prompted for the Supervisor
Password, leave it blank and click
OK. You can then re-enable the
Content Advisor feature and create a
new Supervisor Password.

• Share A Web Page

Have you ever visited a Web site
containing information that you
want to share with a friend, your
family, or your co-workers? In IE,
you can send the page or a link to the
page via email to someone else. Open
the File menu, select Send, and click
Page By E-mail or Link By E-mail. IE
launches the email program it is con-
figured to use. The email message
you send will contain the informa-
tion you've chosen. All you need to
do is address the email and click the
Send button.

General Security Privacy Content Connections Programs Advanced

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_ Enable Install On Demand [Internet Explorer]

Enable Install On Demand [Other]

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• Shortcuts To Your Favorite Web Pages

Do you have a favorite Web page that you visit regu-
larly? You can add the page to your Favorites list and
quickly access that page whenever you want. To do so,
navigate to your favorite Web page, open the Favorites
menu, and select Add To Favorites. In the Add Favorite
dialog box, select the folder in which you want to
create the link and click OK.

You could also create a shortcut to your favorite
Web page on your Desktop. Open the File menu, select
Send, and click Shortcut To Desktop. The next time you
want to access the site, you can just double-click the
shortcut on your Desktop.

• Keep Your Favorites List Clutter-Free

Your Favorites list is used to keep track of and pro-
vide quick access to your favorite Web pages. After
awhile though, your Favorites list can begin to look
a little cluttered depending on the number of links
you have created. You could clean up the list by going
through it one item at a time, or you could tweak IE
to make it appear a little less cluttered. Open the
Tools menu in IE and click Internet Options. Under
the Advanced tab, select the Enable
Personalized Favorites Menu
checkbox and click OK. IE will hide
the links on your Favorites list that
you have not used recently. You
can still access these links, but
you'll need to click the arrow at the
bottom the Favorites menu.

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Keep Your Favorites List Clutter-Free

If your Favorites list is looking full,
you can configure IE to hide the links
you have not used recently.

• Improve Web Printouts

Have you ever printed a Web page from within IE only
to find that the Web page is too large and some of the text
runs off the page? Next time, try printing the Web page
in Landscape mode. Open the File menu in IE and select
Page Setup. Select the Landscape radio button in the
Orientation area of the Page Setup dialog box. Using the
Landscape setting gives you more horizontal room on a
piece of paper when printing the Web page.

• Navigate IE Using Your
Keyboard

When navigating IE, some people
use their mouse while others prefer
to use their keyboard. Using your
keyboard is sometimes faster than
using your mouse. The Forward and
Back buttons are the most frequently
used buttons in IE for moving
between Web pages. Moving for-
ward or backward using your key-
board is just as easy. Use the ALT-Right arrow key
combination to move forward in IE and use the
ALT-Left arrow key combination to move to the pre-
vious Web page. I

by Chris Pirillo

Chris Pirillo is the founder ofLockergnome.com. He writes a
monthly column for CPU magazine (www.cpumag.com).

PC Today / August 2004 73

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1 ips & Tweaks

Security & Networking

Tips For Making Safe Connections

Internet Connection Firewall
(Windows XP)

Internet Connection Firewall is software that you can
use to set restrictions on the information that trans-
fers between your home or small-office network.

If your network uses ICS (Internet Connection
Sharing) to provide Internet access to multiple
computers, it is a good idea to turn on Internet
Connection Firewall on the shared Internet
connection. However, you can turn on Internet
Connection Sharing and Internet Connection Fire-
wall separately.

Internet Connection Firewall can also protect a
single computer that you have connected to the
Internet. If this computer is connected to the
Internet with a cable modem, a DSL (Digital
Subscriber Line) modem, or a dial-up modem,
Internet Connection Firewall protects your Internet
connection. Do not turn on Internet Connection
Firewall for VPN (virtual private network) connec-
tions because Internet Connection Firewall inter-
feres with file sharing and other
VPN functions.

How Secure Is Your
Internet Connection?

Whenever you have an open
line between the computers on
your network and the Internet,
you are putting your network at
risk. If you have just one com-
puter connected to the Internet,
make sure you disable file and
printer sharing on your system.
This may seem like overkill, but
with a combination of Network
Firewalls, your privacy should
remain intact.

Not to worry, there is an alternative to this
extreme idea. Consider installing a network pro-
tocol, such as IPX/SPX (Internetwork Packet
Exchange/Sequenced Packet Exchange), that is not
used on the Internet. You can then disable file and
printer sharing on the TCP/IP (Transmission
Control Protocol /Internet Protocol) and enable file
and printer sharing using IPX/SPX.

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For a secure home or small-office network, it is
recommended that you configure your network to
take advantage of WinXP Internet Connection
Sharing and Internet Connection Firewall or to use a
residential gateway.

ShieldsUP! Time To Probe
For Security Leaks

You can now check to see how well you have pro-
tected your system. A utility named ShieldsUP! will
evaluate your system for security weaknesses.

You can access this utility from the Gibson
Research Corporation Web site (www.grc.com). The
site will probe your system and let you know of any
security holes. This is a great starting point because it
will scan your system and report any security issues
and how to resolve them.

Once you have entered the GRC Web site, click
the ShieldsUP! link to view the network security
utilities they supply. Scroll through the page and
click the link Shields Up. To begin the scan, click the
Proceed button.

Web Sites Extracting
Personal Information

ShieldsUP! Time To Probe For Security Leaks
To scan your system, click each button in the
ShieldsUP! Services table. Once the report is
complete, it will outline any security holes
and recommendations to fix the problem.

How much information can
someone learn about you and
your surfing habits? You
would be surprised at what in-
formation others can find
about you or other users on
your network. Firewalls only
defend PC ports that allow file
sharing; they don't hide your
browsing habits.

To see what information

you're giving away, check

Privacy. net's analysis page
(www.privacy.net/analyze), which lists the infor-
mation that can be collected by Web sites as you
surf the Internet.

The report includes the following information:
Cookies that have been stored on your system from
the current Web site

The name of the originating Web page, if a link
was used

PC Today / August 2004 75

1 ips & Tweaks

Browser configuration infor-
mation

Whether JavaScript, VBScript,
or JAVA is enabled
Traceroute details indicating
the number of hops before the
Web page was loaded

Wireless Network
Security

Unless your wireless LAN
(local-area network) is self-
contained (a small network in
a meeting room without In-
ternet connections, for example), the access point
is connected to the corporate network. You may
want to be cautious about this type of setup be-
cause it can easily serve as a bridge for wireless
clients, letting them enable their connections to
your local wired network. You could think of it as
a bridge from untrusted to trusted. There is no
need to consider all wireless users in your organi-
zation untrustworthy; more so, it's the unwanted
connections you want to avoid.

You can use 802. llx where you can or you can
choose to set up a VPN where you can't use 802. llx.
If you do this, an intruder may be able to make a
connection to the access point but will not be able to
access your network. The only way the intruder
could access the corporate network would be to
supply appropriate credentials to either the VPN or
the RADIUS (Remote Authentication Dial-In User
Service) server.

You may also consider setting up a firewall. Just re-
member that placement is important here. If a single
firewall is available, you don't want to put the firewall
between the access point and users attempting to con-
nect to it. Instead, you want the firewall
between the access point and your in-
ternal network.

Web Sites Extracting Personal Information
This is an example of the list that appears
after the privacy scan is complete.

Disable Simple File Sharing

Windows XP Home Edition and XP
Professional workstations that are not
part of a domain use a network access
model called Simple File Sharing.
Simple File Sharing allows all at-
tempts to log on to the computer from
across the network to use the Guest
account, which prevents them from
using a local Administrator account
that wasn't configured with a pass-
word. This means that if you're

( /MHyl^KMii J I

connected to the Internet and
don't use a secure firewall,
your files contained within
those shares are available to
just about anybody.

To disable Simple File Shar-
ing on WinXP Pro, follow these
steps:

1) Open the My Computer
window

2) From the Tools menu,
select Folder Options

3) Select the View tab

4) Scroll through Advance
Settings and remove the check from the Use Simple
File Sharing checkbox

5) Click Apply

Unfortunately, WinXP Home doesn't let you dis-
able Simple File Sharing and is unable to join a do-
main, so the best you can do is to make sure you set
your shared folders to Read Only, hide the file
shares by placing a dollar sign after the folder name,
or, if you're using NTFS, use the Make Private op-
tion in the folder properties. For WinXP Pro work-
stations that are part of a domain or that have
Simple File Sharing disabled, use the NT security
model that requires all users to authenticate before
granting access to shared folders.

User Passwords For All

WinXP Pro and WinXP Home let users utilize blank
passwords to log in to their local workstations.
However, in WinXP Pro you cannot log on to a com-
puter remotely over the network using blank pass-
words. Obviously, using blank passwords is a bad
idea if you are worried about security. Make sure
you assign passwords to all accounts,
especially the Administrator account
and any accounts with Administrator
privileges. All user accounts in WinXP
Home have administrative privileges
and no passwords by default. You'll
want to patch up this security "hole" as
soon as possible.

i «™-w~. i

Disable Simple File Sharing
You can disable Simple
File Sharing in Windows
XP Professional.

by Chris Pirillo

Chris Pirillo is the founder of

Lockergnome.com. He writes a monthly

column for CPU magazine

(www.cpumag.com).

76 August 2004 / www.pctoday.com

1 ips & Tweaks

PC Yesterday

Tips For Maintaining Windows 3.x/95 Systems

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A Patch In Time
(Win95)
Microsoft main-
tains a Windows
95 Update site
where you can
download and in-
stall all available
system updates.

A Patch In Time (Win95)

Many computer users assume that
Win95 became obsolete in the
minds of Microsoft developers
with the release of Windows 98.
Actually, Microsoft released crit-
ical updates and patches for
Win95 throughout 1999 and 2000.
However, because Win95 does not
have a Windows Update utility,
you must install updates manually. Visit the
Microsoft Windows 95 Update site (www. micro
soft.com/windows95/downloads) for a complete list
of critical updates, service packs, and other fixes.
Download and install any you don't think you have.
Make sure you install critical updates and service in
chronological order — oldest to newest by date.

• A Tisket; A Taskbar (Win3.1)

Pining for Win95 features on your Win 3.1 machine?
Download Logical Sky's TaskTool (www.logi
calsky.com), a shareware ($24.95 to purchase)
product that adds a Win95-style Taskbar to your
Win3.1 Desktop.

1 Create Your Own
File Associations (Win3.1)

In Win3.1 you can create custom file extensions, such
as JaneDoe.rpt for a report in Word (the extension
would normally be JaneDoe.doc). This feature gives
you more flexibility over your eight-letter file names.
Unfortunately, Win3.1 will not know which programs
to use to open those odd file extensions unless you
force the OS to associate the file correctly. In File
Manager, select File and click Associate. In the
Associate dialog box under Files With Extension,
enter the file extension you created. Scroll the list until
you locate the application that created the file and
click OK. (Don't use file extensions that are already in
use, such as .DOC, JPG, or .EXE.)

• Get Help Online (Win95)

Microsoft may not support Win95 anymore, but it
still makes an Online User's Guide available for the
OS. To access the guide, connect to the Internet and
then open it from within the Win95 Help utility.

From the Start menu, click Help. Under the Find tab,
type overview. The list of topics under Click A
Topic, Then Click Display represents the subjects in
the Online User's Guide. Click one and click Display
to view the information.

Make Program Manager Behave (Win3.1)

If you alter Program Manager by moving icons
around or opening and closing program group win-
dows, Win3.1 may save those changes and apply
them to the Program Manager interface when you
restart your PC. That's fine if you intend to reorga-
nize Program Manager's elements, but it's a pain if
you only want to rearrange those elements tem-
porarily. Fortunately, you can assign permanent
settings to Program Manager. Rearrange Program
Manager to suit your tastes and click Options.
Confirm that you have selected the Save Settings
On Exit checkbox. Restart your PC. Return to
Options in Program Manager and deselect the Save
Settings On Exit checkbox. If you later want to
change the layout, rearrange Program Manager and
repeat the procedure.

Prepare for Emergencies (Win95)

Win95 comes with a recovery tool, the ERU
(Emergency Recovery Utility). The ERU will create an
emergency boot diskette that contains your current
system configuration. Should Win95 refuse to start
normally, you can boot using the EBD and restore
your settings to the state they were in when you
made the floppy diskette. The ERU utility, Eru.exe, is
located on the Win95 Setup CD-ROM in the
OTHER/MISC/ERU folder. For help running the
ERU, visit Microsoft Knowledge Base (support.micro
soft.com) article 139437.

Protect Your Data (Win3.1)

Win3.1 did not come with the disk defragmentation,
error-checking, or backup utilities that Microsoft
bundled with Win95. Nevertheless, Microsoft did
not leave Win3.1 users in the cold. DOS 6, upon
which Win3.1 resides, comes with Defrag, ScanDisk,
and Backup; early versions of their Win95 counter-
parts. To run any of these utilities in Win3.1, exit
Windows. At the DOS (C:) prompt, type cd\dos and

PC Today / August 2004 77

1 ips & Tweaks

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Pump Up Performance
(Win3.1)

By minimizing the number
of program groups and
icons in Program
Manager, and by only
keeping one window open
at a time, you can reduce
consumption of precious
system resources.

press ENTER. Type the name of the utility (such as
scandisk for ScanDisk) and press ENTER. If DOS
does not execute the command, the utility may re-
side in the Windows directory. Type cd .. and press
ENTER. Type cd\windows and press ENTER. Type
the command and press ENTER. Always run Backup
first, followed by ScanDisk and then Defrag.

1 Pump Up Performance (Win3.1)

Because Win3.1 often
runs on older machines
with limited resources,
system performance can
be a real challenge. Im-
prove the performance of
your Win3.1 machine by
turning off unnecessary
visual extras and sticking
to the basics.
First, turn off Win3.1's wall-
paper. From Control Panel, double-
click the Desktop icon to open the
Desktop dialog box. Select None in
the Wallpaper File drop-down
menu. (You can choose a pattern
from the Pattern drop-down list if
you want to add a little spice to
your Desktop.) Next, select one of
Win3.1's built-in screen savers
rather than a fancy third-party
model. Better yet, skip the screen saver and turn
your monitor off when you are away from your PC.
Finally, whittle Program Manager's icons and
groups to the bare minimum (using the Move and
Delete commands on Program Manager's File
menu). In addition, always close windows and pro-
grams you are not using during operation.

Smooth Sailing On

The Internet (Win3.1/95)

The versions of Internet Explorer that Microsoft origi-
nally developed for use with Win3.1/95 are woefully
inadequate in the areas of Internet security and
privacy. You can no longer download any updated
version of IE that runs on Win3.1/95. Fortunately,
Netscape and Opera offer versions of their browsers
thatrunonWin3.1/95.

Win95 can run the latest version of the speedy yet
powerful, combined browser/email client Opera
(Opera 7.23). It can also run any version of Netscape
up to version 6.2. Opera is available as freeware and it
includes banner ads; a fee of $29.25 will eliminate the
banners and gives you technical support. By the time

this article prints, Opera 7.5 may also be available.
Netscape is a popular combined browser/email
client. It requires more hard drive space and memory
than Opera. Download Opera from www.opera.com.
To download Netscape, visit channels. netscape
.com/ns/browsers/default.jsp and click the Product
Archive link on the left.

Win3.1 users must use programs built for 16-bit
technology, which makes it difficult to find good soft-
ware. Opera still makes available Opera 3.62, which is
compatible with Win3.1 and is better than early ver-
sions of IE (although it lacks the feature set of Opera
7.23). To download Opera 3.62, go to arc. opera
xom/pub/opera/win/362/english and click the
ow362el6.exe link. Additionally, Netscape 4.08 runs
on Win3.1; use the download information above to
locate this version.

Supercharge Windows (Win95)

If you haven't installed Microsoft's PowerToys for
Win95, you should. PowerToys are a collection of
utilities that expand the features of Win95. They
include Desktop Menu, which lets you open Desktop
items from your Taskbar; FlexiCD, which gives you
the option of playing audio CDs from the Taskbar;
and the granddaddy of them all, Tweak UI. Tweak
UI is a powerful customization tool that lets you
adjust a variety of Win95 settings including those
for your mouse, browser, and Desktop. You can
download PowerToys from Win-
dows 95's Update site (www. micro
soft.com/windows95/downloads);
click the link under the Power And
Kernal Toys heading.

However, Microsoft released an
update to Tweak UI (version 1.33),
which you should install instead of
the version that comes with the Win95
PowerToys. Download Tweak UI 1.33
at www.microsoft.com/ntworksta
tion/downloads/PowerToys/Net
working/NTTweakUI.asp. Micro-
soft recommends that you not use
PowerToys if you have Win95 0SR1
(original equipment manufacturer
Service Release 1) installed; however,
most users experience no problems. If
you run into trouble, you can uninstall
PowerToys using the Add/Remove
Programs utility in Control Panel. I

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Supercharge Windows
(Win95)

The Tweak UI PowerToy
lets you customize a va-
riety of settings relating
to system security,
Internet browsing, the
Desktop, and more.

by Jennifer Farwell

78 August 2004 / www.pctoday.com

J. ips & Tweaks //

Portable Windows

Tips For Using Notebooks & Pocket PCs

Make WAVs With Sound
Recordings (Pocket PC)

The Notes feature of most Pocket PC devices supports
recording voice memos, music, or any other sound de-
tectible by a microphone. By default, these audio files
are stored as WAV files. Unfortunately, synching
audio notes with Microsoft Outlook results in the files
being converted to a proprietary format on the PC,
rendering the audio files unusable
to other audio applications. If re-
taining the audible memos as sound
files is your goal, dock the Pocket
PC and copy the files from the de-
vice to a location on your PC using
Windows Explorer.

To play music on your Pocket PC,
drag your audio files to your PC's
Desktop and use Windows Media
Player to copy them.

Better Audio Through
Settings (Pocket PC)

Improve the quality of Notes
recordings by choosing the appro-
priate microphone sensitivity. De-
pending on your version of
Windows Mobile (2002 or 2003), your directions will
be different. Choose Start and Settings, tap the System
tab, and then tap Audio (or Microphone in 2003). By
default, the microphone is set to Normal (or
Conference: Near Range Recording). For voice
recording where you talk directly into the device,
switch to Short Range Recording (or Interview: Close
Range Recording). Conference Recording is ideal for
recording a group of people or picking up audio from
someone talking at a podium. Tap OK to apply your
changes.

File Access Frustration (Pocket PC)

Simply copying Word and Excel documents from
your hard drive to a flash card doesn't guarantee
you access to the files from a Pocket PC. Portable
applications look for files in a folder named My
Documents. Every Pocket PC has a My Documents
folder as part of the device file system. Pocket Office
applications don't offer the option to create new
folders from the Save Document As menu option.
Create a new folder by tapping Start, Programs, and
File Explorer and choosing New Folder from the
Edit menu. Avoid adding further subfolders beyond

one layer deep, as the applications will not recog-
nize them. For file organization, go one layer deep
and create subfolders within My Documents, such
as MY DOCUMENTSXWord Docs or MY DOCU-
MENTSXClient Name.

Windows Media Madness
(Windows XP/Pocket PC)

Windows Media Player for Pocket
PC does not play back WAV files.
In fact, WMP for Pocket PC won't
play anything but WMA (Windows
Media Audio) and WMV (Win-
dows Media Video) files. However,
you can get around this problem.
Find the file on your PC by using
Windows Explorer, drag the WAV
file to the Desktop, and open the
file in Windows Media Player.
Choose Copy To CD Or Device
from the left menu, select the
Pocket PC and a location where
you'd like to copy the file, and click Copy. You can
then access these files by tapping Playlist in WMP.

Free Up Memory (Pocket PC)

Closing Pocket PC apps by clicking the X in the corner
doesn't actually shut them down. Too many open
apps can tie up all available program memory on
your Pocket PC. To truly shut down an application,
open the Memory setting (under the System tab), click
the Running Programs list, select a program, and tap
Stop. (Tap Stop All to shut down all the programs, but
beware that this also includes programs such as
ActiveSync and File Explorer.) You can also stop the
active program if you select it, expand the on-screen
keyboard, tap the virtual CTRL key, and then tap the
virtual Q key.

A Case Of The Capital Letters (Pocket PC)

If you tap the SHIFT key on the virtual keyboard to
make a letter capital, you add an extra movement
for each letter. Instead of shifting, tap and hold the
letter you want capped and slide the stylus toward
the top of the screen. This feature works with any
Pocket PC application supporting text entry.

PC Today / August 2004 79

1 ips & Tweaks

" : -v:- -'.-J--' -; Hint

^Settings

When Smaller Is Better
(WinXP/Pocket PC)

Windows Media Player for Pocket PC
supports playback of WMV files. To
conserve space and convert files to a
format more suited for portable play-
back, open the video file in Windows
Movie Maker. From the File menu,
choose Save Movie File. Select My
Computer and click Next. Name the
output file and click Next. On the
Movie Setting page, click the Show
More Choices hyperlink, click the radio
button next to Other Settings, choose
Video For Pocket PC (Full Screen

218Kbps) from the drop-down menu,

and click Next to start saving. The

video is saved at 320 x 240 resolution, reducing the file

size by 85%.

Forget What Your Mother Taught
You About Sharing (WinXP)

Traveling with a notebook computer is both a conve-
nience and a curse. Any open net-
work shares on your notebook also
travel with you. In most cases, other
travelers are far too busy with their
own lives to know your My Doc-
uments folder is wide open to the
world, but it only takes once to have
pictures of the kids or a multimillion
dollar contract fall into the wrong
hands. Before you leave home, turn
off all sharing on your system. It
won't keep everyone out, but it
helps keep people honest.

;*^3:13 ©

\*/\ Prompt if device unused |l hour
for '

(g) Simple 4 digit password

Q Strong alphanumeric password

Password: 1234

button next to either Simple 4 Digit
Password or Strong Alphanumeric
Password. In most cases, a simple
four-digit pin, such as the one you use
with your ATM card, will keep the ca-
sual criminal at bay. For stronger pro-
tection, use a combination of numbers,
letters, and special characters to create
something more challenging. Tap the
ENTR key to set the password.

Choose a four-digit password
to protect your Pocket PC and
tap the ENTR key to enable it.

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.:-.

Remember That
Password (WinXP)

Far too many notebook users set their computer to au-
tomatically log in on bootup. Anyone who turns it on
gains instant access to all files and folders on the
system. Password-protect it instead, at least when
you're on the road; the few seconds it takes to type in
a password may be the difference between privacy
and identity theft.

Speaking Of Passwords . . . (Pocket PC)

Setting the password for your Pocket PC is always a
smart idea. Tap Start and Settings and tap the
Password icon on the Personal tab. Place a check mark
next to Prompt If Device Unused, select an amount of
time from the drop-down menu, and click the radio

Use the Backup And Restore Wizard
to make copies of all of your
important data on your notebook
computer before you leave home.

Back Up Before
You Go (WinXP)

Sometimes bad things happen to good
notebooks. You drop the trusty

portable while trying to insert it back

in its case after clearing the airport se-
curity checkpoint. Next time you boot up, the hard
drive makes a horrid grinding sound and the screen
goes black. Prepare for catastrophic data loss by
backing up your data before you leave home. WinXP
includes a tool for backing up data to recordable
CDs, DVDs, or external hard drives. To access it, click

Start, All Programs, Accessories,
System Tools, and Back-up. The
Backup Or Restore Wizard will
walk you through the steps to keep
your data safe.

I Make The Wireless
Connection (Pocket PC)

Many wireless connections require a
MAC (message authentication code)
before a device can connect to the
network. This requires a network
admin to enter the MAC address of
your Pocket PC into the wireless

router's database of accepted de-
vices. Most wireless routing devices make the ac-
cepted devices list available via the administration
Web interface under the heading MAC Filters. Finding
the MAC address for a particular Pocket PC varies by
device manufacturer. For HP devices, tap Start,
Settings, and Asset Viewer. Expand Wireless LAN
(local-area network), and MAC address appears at the
bottom of the list. Toshiba locates this information in
their Wireless LAN utility. ViewSonic and Dell locate
network card information on the Properties page for
the adapter, located at Start, Settings, Connections, and
Network Adapters.

by Jake Ludington

80 August 2004 / www.pctoday.com

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reviews & Reviews

Hardware Previews

A Look At New & Upcoming Arrivals

by Carmen Carmack

If you are looking for new storage solutions
or the latest in notebook computers, this
month's edition offers a number of inter-
esting options. We also feature new printers,
a server designed for small businesses, two
new Palm Zire PDAs, and a number of other
fun new products.

Antec Aria Computer Case

Antec, a computer case and compo-
nent maker, recently introduced
the Antec Aria Case to its LifeStyle se-
ries of products. The case provides the
infrastructure for a custom system. You
build the system by adding the mother-
board, hard drives, optical drives, ex-
pansion cards, and other components
that meet your computing needs.

Unlike most cube-style cases, the Aria
comes with four full-sized PCI (Periph-
eral Component Interconnect) expan-
sion card slots and the ability to accept a
microATX motherboard. It includes one
external 5.25-inch drive bay, three in-
ternal 3.5-inch drive bays, a flip-up

drive cage, and removable side panels
for convenient access to the internal
drive cage and components. To assist
with noise absorption, the case's side
panels use a multilayer design.

Measuring 7.9 x 10.6 x 13.2 inches
(HxWxD) and weighing 10 pounds, the
Aria's cube shape is compact and
portable. For power and cooling, the
Aria uses a 300-watt power supply
and a low-speed 120mm fan. The
power supply features a universal
input that accepts line voltages from
100V to 240V AC. In addition to the fan
for cooling, Antec adds a PCI slot-
mounted 80mm blower.

The Aria's exterior has a silver and
black finish, illuminated by blue LEDs
(light-emitting diodes). Built-in ports and
connections on the front include two USB
(Universal Serial Bus) 2.0 ports, two audio
jacks, and a FireWire port. •

Aria Computer Case

$129

Antec

(800) 222-6832; (510) 770-1200

www.antec-inc.com

Brother DCP-8040

Brother positions its new DCP-8040
copier and printer as a solution for
busy offices and time-pressed profes-
sionals. The unit features digital copying,
laser printing, and color scanning in a
form factor that fits on a desktop, poten-
tially saving trips to the copy room or to
a commercial copy center.

For copying, the DCP-8040 features a
50-page ADF (automatic document
feeder) and a maximum
copy speed of 21

DCP-8040

$399.99

Brother

(800) 276-7746

www.brother.com

copies per minute. Its legal-size docu-
ment glass handles books and magazines.
For reductions and enlargements, the
DCP-8040 can adjust the document size
from 25% to 400% in 1% increments. It
prints as many as 99 copies at one time,
and the maximum copy resolution is
600dpi. If you need scanning capabilities,
the DCP-8040 also serves as a flatbed
color scanner with an optical resolution
of 600x2,400 dpi.

The DCP-8040 connects to your PC
with USB (Universal Serial Bus) 2.0 or
parallel ports (cable not included). An
Ethernet network card ($199) is optional.
As a laser printer, the DCP-8040 has a
maximum print speed of 21ppm and
a maximum print resolution of 2,400 x
600 dpi. It emulates multiple printer

languages, including PCL (Printer
Control Language) 6 and BR-Script 3 (a
PostScript Level 3 equivalent). Standard
printer memory is 32MB, which is ex-
pandable to 160MB.

For paper handling, the DCP-8040
comes with a 250-page paper tray that ac-
commodates letter or legal-sized paper,
and it has a single-sheet manual bypass
for envelopes and other media such as la-
bels and cardstock. You can purchase an
additional 250-sheet paper tray for $199.

The unit measures 18.8 x 21.3 x 17.8
inches (HxWxD) and weighs 36.6
pounds. The standard toner cartridge
($65) yields a maximum of 3,500 pages at
5% coverage, and you can purchase a
high-yield cartridge ($89) that produces
6,700 pages. If you need automatic du-
plex capability, Brother offers the DCP-
8045D ($499.99). This duplex version of
the DCP-8040 also includes a 50-page
multipurpose paper tray. •

82 August 2004 / www.pctoday.com

reviews & Reviews

Gateway 9115

The Gateway 9115 series server is an
entry-level rack-mountable server
housed in a slim chassis. With its 1U form
factor, the 9115 occupies a single space
when mounted in a standard 19-inch rack.
Despite its entry-level position, the server
includes advanced features, including
dual-port SATA (Serial Advanced Tech-
nology Attachment) controller, integrated
RAID (redundant array of independent
disks) 0/1, and room for optional SCSI
(Small Computer System Interface) drives.

9115

$899

Gateway

(888) 888-0494

www.gateway.com

The server's standard configuration in-
cludes a 2.6GHz Intel Celeron Processor
with 128KB L2 cache. It has 1GB of
SDRAM (synchronous dynamic RAM)
consisting of two 512MB modules, an
80GB SATA hard drive, an integrated
8MB PCI (Peripheral Component Inter-
connect) graphics card, a Gigabit Ethernet
port, and a 10/100 Ethernet port.
Additional ports include three USB
(Universal Serial Bus) 2.0 ports, a VGA
(Video Graphics Array) port, and a DB9
serial port. The unit runs off a single 250-
watt power supply.

The 9115 server's base price of $899
does not include OS software. Gateway
offers numerous editions of Windows
Server 2003 and Windows Small
Business Server 2003 ranging in price
from $369 to $3,295. You can also
purchase Symantec Antivirus Small
Business software, and Gateway's
System Manager 3.0 software is in-
cluded. The Gateway software provides

server management features such
as remote access, system alerts, and
event logging.

To handle as much as 4GB of 400MHz
DDR (double-data rate) ECC (Error-
Correcting Code) memory, the server
comes with four DIMM (dual in-line
memory module) memory slots. There are
two hard drive expansion bays, a 1.44MB
floppy diskette drive, and a 24X CD-ROM
drive. As with most 1U chassis servers,
the 9115 has only one PCI expansion slot
for additional PCI components.

Additional options and upgrades in-
clude a 2.8GHz or 3.2GHz Intel Pentium 4
Processor, a 56Kbps (kilobits per second)
PCI modem, and an additional Gigabit
Ethernet PCI card. With capacities of
80GB, 160GB, or 250GB, you can also add
a second or larger SATA hard drive for in-
creased storage.

Gateway includes a standard 104-key
keyboard, a PS/2 mouse, and a mouse
pad with the 9115 server. The server also
comes with a one-year onsite, next-busi-
ness-day warranty and 24/7 support. For
$149 you can upgrade to a three-year war-
ranty and three years of support. •

IBM ThinkPad T42 & T42p

IBM's new ThinkPad T42 and T42p
notebooks offer an optional 15-inch dis-
play — a first for the ThinkPad T product
line. The new models offer a number of
other optional features, including 802.11
a/b/g wireless connectivity and the new
Pentium M 735, 745, or 755 processor.

The T42 comes with your choice of a
14.1-inch or a 15-inch display. For the
hard drive, you can choose capacities of
30GB, 40GB, or 80GB. Memory options
include 256MB, 512 MB, or 1GB, and
memory is expandable to as much as
2GB. For an optical drive, the T42 offers
a CD-RW/DVD drive, an 8X DVD drive,
or a multiburner DVD-R drive. The
T42's 6-cell lithium-ion battery powers
the notebook for as many as five hours.
The 15-inch model measures 10.6 x 13 x
1.4 inches (HxWxD) and weighs 5.7
pounds with an optical drive.

The higher-end T42p also offers a
14.1-inch or a 15-inch display. It has a
60GB hard drive and memory options of
512MB or 1GB, expandable to 2GB. For
an optical drive, you can select a CD-
RW /DVD combo drive or a multiburner
DVD-R drive. The T42p includes a 9-cell
lithium-ion battery that provides a max-
imum of 5.7 hours or power. The 15-inch
model measures 10.6 x 13 x 1.4 inches
(HxWxD) and weighs 5.9 pounds with
an optical drive.

All models come standard with
Windows XP Professional Edition. For
ports and connections, IBM includes two
USB (Universal Serial Bus) 2.0 ports, an S-
Video (Super- Video) out port, an Infrared
port, a dock/port replicator, an external
display connector, an internal modem,
two Type II or one Type III PC card slots,
and a Gigabit Ethernet connection. The

T42p also comes standard with a wireless
Bluetooth connection, which is optional
on the T42. For audio, both models have
an external microphone jack and a head-
phone/line-out jack.

IBM backs the T42 and T42p note-
books with a three-year hardware war-
ranty and a one-year battery warranty.
The company also offers the IBM Rescue
And Recovery With Rapid Restore soft-
ware for diagnosing system issues.

ThinkPad
T42andT42p

$1599 (T42);

$3409 (T42p)

IBM
(800) 426-4968
www.ibm.com

PC Today / August 2004 83

reviews & Reviews

Iomega Floppy Plus
7-In-l Card Reader

A convenient solution for consumers
who need an external floppy drive
and multiple media card reader,
Iomega's new Floppy Plus 7-in-l Card
Reader is compact and portable. The
device weighs 12 ounces and measures
1 x 4.25 x 5.5 inches (HxWxD). Because
your PC's USB (Universal Serial Bus)
port powers the Floppy Plus 7-in-l
Card Reader, the device does not re-
quire an AC adapter or electrical outlet
to operate.

The device's USB 2.0 port transfers
data at the standard rate of 12Mbps
(megabits per second), and it is also
compatible with the USB 1.1 standard.
The exterior of the device is a two-tone
silver and gray. It features a green LED
(light-emitting diode) to indicate floppy

diskette drive activity and an amber
LED to signal card-reader activity.

The unit's two front-loading media
slots accept a variety of card types. The
slot on the left side is compatible with
Microdrive and CF (Compact Flash)
Type I and II media. The slot on the
right side of the reader accepts SM
(Smart Media), Memory Stick, Memory
Stick Pro, MMC (MultiMedia Card), and
SD (Secure Digital) media. The larger
third slot, which is located below the
dual media slots, is for floppy disks.

System requirements for the Floppy
Plus 7-in-l Card Reader include a
Pentium II or III processor (or equivalent),
256MB of memory, a USB 1.1 or USB 2.0
connection, Windows 98/2000/Me/
XP, and a CD-ROM drive for software

installation. Because the card reader is
hot-swappable, you can connect it directly
to your PC or notebook without shutting
down your system or rebooting.

The unit's software bundle includes
Adobe Photoshop Album SE for man-
aging digital photos. Iomega ships
the drive with a USB 2.0 cable, a
Quick Start Guide, and software on CD
and backs the device with a one-year
warranty. •

Floppy Plus 7-ln-1 Card Reader

$59.95

Iomega

(888) 446-6342

www.iomega.com

Iomega REV Drive

With its new REV drive product
line, Iomega hopes to provide a
solution for systems that would other-
wise use a tape backup method. Ac-
cording to Iomega, REV drives offer
much faster transfer times, are easier to
use, and cost less compared to tape
drives. The REV drives also offer the

REV Drive

$379 (internal); $399 (external)

Iomega

(888) 446-6342

www.iomega.com

advantages of random access to data
and drag-and-drop file transfer.

The REV drive comes in an external
USB (Universal Serial Bus) 2.0 version and
an internal ATAPI (Advanced Tech-
nology Attachment Packet Interface) ver-
sion. For storage, Iomega has introduced
removable REV disks, which have a
capacity of 35GB each. The capacity in-
creases to 90GB if you use 2.6:1 compres-
sion to store data on the disk. Iomega
prices the REV disks, which are about the
size of a business card, at $59.99 for a
single disk and $199.95 for a package of
four. The disks offer an estimated shelf
life of more than 30 years and an esti-
mated rewrite rate of more than 1 million.

Iomega bundles its Automatic Backup
Pro software with the REV drives. The
software automatically backs up specific
files, manages multiple backups on
different drives, and performs scheduled
backups. The software also features

compression, file encryption, and support
for the Windows Server OS. Iomega also
includes a special edition of Symantec
Norton Ghost software for duplicating the
contents of your system's hard drive.

OS requirements for the REV drives in-
clude Windows 2000 Server/Profe-
ssional/Advanced, Windows Server 2003,
and Windows XP Home or Professional.
Minimum hardware requirements in-
clude a 333MHz Pentium II processor, a
4X CD-ROM drive, a USB 1.1 or 2.0 con-
nection, and 100MB of hard drive space
for software installation. The external
drive measures 1.42 x 4.33 x 6.14 inches
(HxWxD) and weighs about 14 ounces.
The internal drive measures 1 x 3.99 x 5.74
inches (HxWxD) and weighs 15 ounces.

Both drives ship with a complemen-
tary REV disk, software on CD, and
documentation. The external drive adds
a USB cable and power supply. With
the internal drive, you also receive an
ATAPI/IDE (Integrated Drive Elec-
tronics) data cable and rail-mounting
hardware. Iomega offers a one-year war-
ranty for the REV drives and a five-year
warranty for REV disks.

84 August 2004 / www.pctoday.com

reviews & Reviews

iRiver iFP-800 Series Flash
Music Players

Designed to accompany you while
you work out, the new 800 series of
iFP flash MP3 players from iRiver are
ready for active lifestyles. Small and
lightweight, the players weigh just 1.4
ounces (without battery), measure 1.07 x
3.48 x 1.42 inches (HxWxD), and come
with a sport armband.

The iFP-800 series players include a
line-in connector for recording audio di-
rectly from a CD player or other digital
source without a PC. They also have a
1.1 USB (Universal Serial Bus) connector
for transferring MP3 files from your PC
to the device. The players support the
MP3, OGG, WMA (Windows Media
Audio), ASF (Advanced Streaming
Format) music formats, and you can use
them to store data and other file types.

The included iRiver Music Manager
software facilitates copying music and
other files from your PC to the player.

There are four models of the player
with differing flash memory capacities:
128MB (iFP-880), 256MB (iFP-890),

iFP-800 Series Flash Music Players

Starting at $1 29

iRiver America

(800) 399-1799; (408) 635-8000

www.iriveramerica.com

512MB (iFP-895), and 1GB (iFP-8
Each player uses a single AA battery for
power, which powers the device for as
many as 40 hours. To get your music
library started, iRiver includes preloaded
music files from the eMusic (www
.emusic.com) MP3 subscription service.

In addition to recording from a dig-
ital audio source, the players feature a
built-in microphone for voice recording
and an FM stereo tuner. The FM tuner
lets you preset your favorite stations,
and it includes an autoscan feature.
The players can also record while in
FM stereo mode.

A backlit LCD (liquid-crystal display)
helps you navigate and operate the
players. The devices support as many as
500 levels of folders and 1,500 music
files. You can delete files and folders di-
rectly from the players and create your
own playlists. To control how files play,
you can use the multiple repeat, shuffle,
and 10-second intro modes. There are
also sleep timer and alarm features. •

Lexar Media
JumpDrive 2.0 Pro 80X

Digital media maker Lexar Media
recently introduced four new
USB (Universal Serial Bus) flash drives
to its existing product line of Jump-
Drive products. The JumpDrive 2.0 Pro
80X series of drives feature a minimum
sustained read and write speed of
12MBps (megabytes per second) when
connected to a USB 2.0 port on a note-
book or desktop PC. In addition, the
drives are backward compatible with
USB 1.1 ports but at slower read and
write speeds.

Compared to its other JumpDrive
2.0 Pro products, the new drives are
much faster. For example, the Jump-
Drive 2.0 Pro drive has a maximum
sustained read speed of 6MBps and a
maximum sustained write speed of
4.5MBps. When transferring 200MB of
data, the JumpDrive 2.0 Pro 80X se-
ries takes less than 17 seconds, the

JumpDrive 2.0 Pro 80X

$89.99 to $349.99

Lexar Media

(800) 789-9418; (510) 413-1200

www.lexarmedia.com

JumpDrive 2.0 Pro series takes less
than 50 seconds, and a floppy disk re-
quires more than 3,750 seconds.

The new JumpDrive 2.0 Pro 80X
flash drives come in three different
capacities and price points: 256MB
($89.99), 512MB ($189.99), and 1GB
($349.99). According to Lexar, the
256MB drive is equivalent to 176
floppy diskettes and can hold more
than 200 high-resolution digital photos
or four CDs' worth of MP3 music files.

System requirements for the Jump-
Drive 2.0 Pro 80X flash drives include
Windows 98 SE/2000/Me/XP, Mac OS
X, Mac OS 8.6 or higher, and a USB 1.1
or 2.0 port (a 2.0 port is required for
high-speed transfer). With the exception
of Win98 SE, you do not need to install
drivers or additional software to use the
JumpDrive 2.0 Pro 80X drives, and you
can use them interchangeably with dif-
ferent OSes.

Lexar backs the JumpDrive 2.0 Pro
80X line with a one-year warranty. The
company also offers telephone, email,
and online support.

PC Today / August 2004 85

reviews & Reviews

MPC Computers TransPort
X3000 Notebook

The MPC Computers TransPort X3000
notebook combines the drives, ports,
and connections needed for compati-
bility with older systems with the newest
security features necessary for mobile
computing. MPC Computers designed
the TransPort X3000 specifically to meet
the demands of government workers.

For compatibility with legacy systems
and to promote ease of use, the X3000
notebook has a separate hard drive, op-
tical drive, and floppy drive. You can use
all three drives at the same time, unlike
most notebook computers on the market
today. MPC Computers also includes a
serial port, a parallel port, two Type II
PCMCIA (Personal Computer Memory
Card International Association) slots, and
two USB (Universal Serial Bus) 2.0 ports.

Security features include a built-in finger-
print scanner, an integrated smart card
reader, and a removable hard drive.

The TransPort X3000 features a Gigabit
Ethernet connection, wireless 802.11b/g
connectivity, and an internal modem. The
base model has a 14.1-inch XGA (Ex-
tended Graphics Array) display, an Intel
Pentium M 1.5GHz processor running
Windows XP Professional edition, 128MB
of memory, a 20GB hard drive, a 64MB
ATI MOBILITY RADEON 9700 graphics
card, a 20X CD-ROM drive, and an op-
tical mini mouse.

Upgrade options include a 6-in-l
media reader, a combo CD/DVD or
DVD+RW drive, as much as 2GB of
memory, a 40/60/80GB hard drive, an
128MB ATI MOBILITY RADEON 9700

TransPort X3000 Notebook

$2,000

MPC Computers

(888) 224-4247; (208) 893-3434

www.mpccorp.com

Image courtesy of MPC Computers

graphics card, and a 15-inch SXGA+
(Super Extended Graphics Array).

The TransPort X3000 ships with a 9-cell
lithium-ion battery that powers the note-
book for approximately four hours. MPC
Computers' standard service and support
includes three years of repair and replace-
ment service.

palmOne Zire

PalmOne's new Zire 31 and Zire 72
handhelds are designed to meet
your PDA and multimedia needs. Both
models come with a color screen, MP3
file support, and photo display capa-
bility. The Zire 72 adds more multimedia
features with a built-in digital camera
and support for audio/video capture.
The new handhelds run Palm OS v5.2.8
and come with a rechargeable battery.

The Zire 31 is a value-priced hand-
held that features a 200MHz Intel
processor and an SDIO (Secure Digital

Input/Output) expansion slot. It comes
with 16MB of total memory, with 14MB
available for storage. Small and light-
weight, the Zire 31 has a screen size of
160 x 160 pixels, overall dimensions of
4.4 x 2.9 x 0.6 inches (HxWxD), and a
weight of 4.1 ounces. Ports and connec-
tors include a 3.5mm stereo headphone
jack, an IR (infrared) port, and a mini-
USB (Universal Serial Bus) HotSync
port. The SDIO expansion slot is com-
patible with MMC (MultiMedia Card),
SD (Secure Digital), and SDIO cards.

Zire

$149 (Zire 31); $299 (Zire 72)

palmOne

(800) 881-7256; (408) 503-7000

www.palmone.com

The Zire 72 features an integrated
1.2MP (megapixel) camera. The camera
uses a CMOS (complementary metal-
oxide semiconductor) sensor and has 2X
digital zoom. It can capture video clips
at 320 x 240 or 160 x 120 resolution at a
maximum rate of 15fps (frames per
second). With its larger 320 x 320 screen
and additional features, the Zire 72
weighs in at 4.8 ounces and measures 4.6
x 2.95 x 0.67 inches (HxWxD). Ports and
connectors for the Zire 72 include a
Bluetooth wireless port, a 3.5mm stereo
headphone jack, an IR port, a mini-USB
port, and an SDIO expansion slot.

In addition to the Palm Desktop, bun-
dled software for the Zire 31 and Zire 72
include an Organizer Suite that syncs to
Microsoft Outlook, Data Viz Documents
To Go, Palm Reader for eBooks, and
Graffiti 2 writing software. The Zire 72
also adds Adobe Acrobat Reader.

The handhelds ship with a power
adapter, HotSync cable, and soft-
ware on CD. The Zire 31 comes with a
90-day warranty and 90 days of tele-
phone support, and the Zire 72 has a
one-year warranty and 90 days of tele-
phone support.

86 August 2004 / www.pctoday.com

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Logitech

reviews & Reviews

Samsung CLP-550 & CLP-550N

With the new CLP-550 and CLP-
550N models, Samsung is beefing
up its line of color laser printers. Like
their predecessor, the CLP-500, these new
models feature automatic duplex capa-
bility. However, the new models add
wired and wireless networking options to
the product line.

For wired networking, the CLP-550 has
an optional 10/100 Ethernet interface, and
the CLP-550N comes with the Ethernet in-
terface preinstalled. In addition, both
models feature an optional wireless
802.11b LAN (local-area network) inter-
face for wireless printing. Samsung
includes a parallel port and a USB
(Universal Serial Bus) 2.0 port for con-
necting the printers directly to a PC.

Both printers have a maximum color
print speed of 5ppm and a maximum
black-and-white print speed of 21ppm.

Maximum resolution is 1,200dpi, and the
printers feature PostScript 3 and PCL-5Ce
(Printer Control Language-5Ce) printer
emulation. The time to print the first page
is 24 seconds for color documents and 15
seconds for monochrome documents. The
CLP-550 comes with 64MB of memory

CLP-550 & CLP-550N

$799 (CLP-550); $899 (CLP-550N)

Samsung

(800) 726-7864; (201) 229-4000

www.samsungusa.com

standard and a maximum memory ca-
pacity of 320MB. The CLP-550N has
128MB of memory standard, with a
384MB maximum.

For paper input, the printers have a
250-sheet cassette tray and a 100-sheet
multipurpose tray. For additional paper
capacity, you can purchase a 500-sheet
cassette tray. The paper output tray has a
250-sheet capacity.

Consumables include black toner
with a capacity of 7,000 pages at 5%
coverage and CMY (Cyan/Magenta/
Yellow) color toner with a capacity of
5,000 pages at 5% coverage. Samsung
ships the printers with starter versions
of the black toner and color toner, with
capacities of 2,000 pages and 1,500
pages, respectively.

The printers measure 15.9 x 20.1 x
18.5 inches (HxWxD) and weigh 77.2
pounds with the toner and drum in-
stalled. Samsung offers a one-year on-
site service warranty for the CLP-550
and CLP-550N printers.

Sony ProData

With a per-disc capacity of nearly
33 CDs, Sony designed its new
ProData Drives for high-storage de-
mand applications such as document
and medical imaging, email archiving,
multimedia and graphic design pro-
jects, and audio/video editing. The
drives use blue laser technology to
read and write data to specially de-
signed Sony optical discs.

The ProData drives come in three
models: an internal SCSI (Small Com-
puter System Interface) drive, an ex-
ternal SCSI drive, and an external USB
(Universal Serial Bus) 2.0 drive. The in-
ternal SCSI model measures 1.62 x 5.74
x 7.99 inches (HxWxD) and weighs 2.6
pounds. The external models measure
2.28 x 7.83 x 12 inches (HxWxD) and
weigh 9.9 pounds. The drives have a
read speed of UMBps (megabytes per
second) and a write speed of 9MBps. To
minimize processor usage, the drives in-
corporate a 16MB cache.

Priced at $45 each, Sony offers
ProData discs in rewriteable and write-
once options. Both types of discs hold
as much as 23.3GB of data, and they are
encased in a resin cartridge for protec-
tion from dust, fingerprints, and other
damage. ProData discs are the same

than 50 years and support for as many
as 10,000 rewrites.

Sony bundles the drives with
Software Architect's Disk Drive TuneUp
software for disc formatting and
DataSaver Personal Backup software to
handle backup operations. The ProData
drives come with a ProData rewriteable
disc, a power supply (external models),
software on CD, documentation, and a
one-year warranty. •

size as a standard DVD, but the
ProData disc has an extremely thin ex-
terior layer to promote recording.
Sony's testing indicates that the discs
have an estimated life span of more

ProData

$2,995 (internal); $3,299 (external)

Sony Electronics

(800) 352-7669; (239) 768-7676

www.sonyburners.com

88 August 2004 / www.pctoday.com

reviews & Reviews

Sony VAIO A Series Notebook

VAIO A Series notebooks feature
large 15- or 17-inch displays and
optional AV Entertainment Docks for
integration with other audio and
video devices.

The base VAIO Series A note-
book system requires a 1.5GHz Intel
Pentium Processor running Windows
XP Home. It comes standard with
256MB of memory in one slot. Ad-
ditional memory options are avail-
able, up to a maximum of 2GB. Other
standard features include a 40GB
hard drive, a 15-inch XGA (Extended
Graphics Array) display, and a CD-
RW/DVD drive. Upgrades include a
larger hard drive, a 17-inch WXGA
(Wide Extended Graphics Array) dis-
play, and a DVD+RW drive.

For wired connectivity, the notebook
has a Gigabit Ethernet connection and

an internal modem. Wireless 802.11b/g
connectivity is optional. The notebooks
include an i.LINK (FireWire) port,
three USB (Universal Serial Bus) 2.0
ports, a Type II/Type I card slot, and a
Memory Stick Media slot. For audio
and video support, the notebooks come
with built-in stereo speakers, a head-
phone jack, an external microphone
jack, and an A/V minijack. The 15-inch
model measure 1.7 x 13.5 x 10.9 inches
(HxWxD) and weighs 7.1 pounds,
while thel7-inch model measures 1.8 x
16 x 11 inches (HxWxD) and weighs
8.6 pounds.

With the VAIO Series of notebooks,
Sony offers an optional AV Entertain-
ment Dock ($350) for additional audio
and video capabilities. The company
also adds a TV tuner, personal video
recorder, a high-end digital audio ampli-

VAIO A Series Notebook

$1,499

Sony Electronics

(866) 530-2963; (239) 768-7676

www.sonystyle.com

fier, and Sony speakers to the notebooks.
In addition, the dock includes four more
USB 2.0 ports, a monitor port, a printer
port, an Ethernet port, a DVI (Digital
Video Interface)-D port, and S- Video
(Super- Video) in/out ports.

Tripp Lite INTERNET350U
UPS System

A low-profile UPS (uninterruptible
power supply) device, Tripp Lite's
INTERNET350U UPS System protects
your system from blackouts, brownouts,
and power surges. The compact unit
accommodates AC electrical lines
and dataline connections, and its typical

INTERNET350U UPS System

$39.99

(773)869-1111

www.tripplite.com

applications include home office
PCs, network workstations, and audio/
video equipment.

The INTERNET350U offers eight
widely spaced outlets. Four of the out-
lets include battery support to tem-
porarily keep systems running during a
power outage. With an entry-level PC
system, the battery backup can provide
power for a maximum of 15 minutes
during a blackout. The remaining four
outlets include surge suppression for
devices that do not require battery sup-
port, such as printers.

To protect modems, fax machines, or
cordless phones that share a phone line
connection, the INTERNET350U comes
with a single line TEL/DSL (tele-
phone/Digital Subscriber Line) connec-
tion with a line splitter. The line protects
two connected devices from power
surges. The UPS measures 4 x 12 x 7

inches (HxWxD) and weighs 10.7
pounds. For wall-mount support, the
case includes mounting flanges.

The battery has a typical lifespan of
three to six years, and the device features
an access door so you can replace the bat-
tery yourself. The unit switches to battery
power if the line voltage decreases to 98
volts or less. At high voltages, the unit
switches to battery power if the line
voltage increases to 103 volts or higher.
An alarm beeps to alert you when the bat-
tery backup is in use.

For surge suppression, the INTER-
NET350U has an instantaneous response
time. The unit's surge suppression rating
is 1170 joules, and it is UL 1778 certified.
For additional protection, Tripp Lite in-
cludes its PowerAlert softwarethat lets
you monitor the unit's power status and
enables unattended system shutdown.

The INTERNET350U system comes
with a USB (Universal Serial Bus) cable
to connect to a PC for unattended shut-
downs, a telephone cable, software
on CD, and a users manual. Tripp
Lite backs the device with a two-
year warranty. •

PC Today / August 2004 89

reviews & Reviews

Financial
Solutions

A Comparison Of Intuit Quicken 2004 Premier &
Microsoft Money 2004 Premium

In a complicated world where you are
likely to have multiple bank accounts,
credit accounts, investments, and pos-
sibly income sources, it can be difficult
to keep track of your personal finances.
When tax time rolls around, or when
you need to evaluate your budget allo-
cations or investment performance,
you may find yourself awash in a sea of
receipts, account statements, and other
necessary documents.

To help consumers track their fi-
nances, software companies develop
specialized programs that can perform
this arduous task. Originally, financial
software offered basic expense tracking,
bank statement reconciling, and little
more. However, as competition has
grown more intense, developers have
added an array of features to their soft-
ware offerings. Now, the two industry-
leading programs, Intuit Quicken and
Microsoft Money, can pay your bills,
update your bank account data auto-
matically, track stock portfolios, and
make recommendations about asset allo-
cation, helping you budget for major
purchases, and more.

If you're ready to start keeping tabs on
your financial picture, or if you are cur-
rently using an older financial software
package but thinking of upgrading, you
should take a close look at Intuit Quicken
and Microsoft Money to see which is
right for you. In this article we'll compare
them side-by-side to help you do just
that. Both programs come in several ver-
sions. Here, we'll evaluate the top-of-
the-line consumer models, Quicken 2004
Premier and Money 2004 Premium,
because each offers a lot of bang for a rea-
sonable number of bucks. However, in
case you do not need the comprehensive

tracking capabilities these souped-up
models provide, we have also included
information on the Standard and Deluxe
versions of each product.

Intuit Quicken 2004 Premier

With more than 20 years of produc-
tion under its belt, Quicken has a small
army of fans, many of which have been
using the software for years. Interest-
ingly enough, some of these fans com-
plain that instead of being the latest,
greatest version of Quicken, the 2004
edition is not worth the upgrade.
Among the users we queried and the
comments we found posted online,
overall satisfaction with this product
was lower than with previous versions
of Quicken or with Money 2004.

We did not test Quicken 2004 against
Quicken 2003, so we cannot confirm or
deny this assertion. We found Quicken
to be more user friendly and intuitive
than Money 2004, but with odd idiosyn-
crasies that could only be described as
oversights. If you are a current Quicken
2003 user, evaluate our review carefully
before you decide whether to jump to
the next level.

Getting started. Installation of Quick-
en 2004 Premier is quick and easy: It
takes about five minutes for the Setup
Wizard to run the installation. If you
select the Custom option, you can cus-
tomize the location of the program on
the hard drive and its shortcuts on your
Desktop and in the Programs menu.
Quicken also asks if you are new to the
program or an experienced hand and
uses this information to customize the
program for you.

Account setup (Quicken Guided
Setup) takes a good bit more time if you

Quicken 2004 Premier

$89.95 ($79.95 if ordered online)

Intuit

(650) 944-6000

www.quicken.com

Ratines

Interface:

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MINIMI

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OVERALL:

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do it right; allow at least 45 minutes
to several hours depending on how
complex your finances are. This phase in
Quicken takes longer than in Microsoft
Money for good reason: Quicken asks
for more financial detail up front. It also
asks several helpful questions (such as
whether you are married, a homeown-
er, or a rental property owner), which
allows it to customize the program on
your behalf. And, like Microsoft Money,
the program asks you to provide a list
of financial goals. These goals help
Quicken customize program operation
for you.

One potentially valuable timesaver is
Quicken's ability to download account
information during setup. When you
create an account, Quicken will ask for
the issuing bank name and, if it can
locate an online resource, for your user-
name and password. Quicken will then
connect to the Internet and attempt to re-
trieve the information. Quicken works
with more than 2,000 banks, so there is a
decent chance yours supports Quicken.
Nevertheless, in our tests Quicken could

90 August 2004 / www.pctoday.com

reviews & Reviews

NEW FOR

2004

o •> a Microsoft

| Money2004

Premium

FREE

»HOSO«

Money 2004 Premium

$79.95 ($59.95 with rebate through

Dec. 31, 2004)

Microsoft

(425) 882-8080

www.microsoft.com/money

Ratines

Interface:
Performance:
Feature sec
Documentation:
OVERALL:

iiini

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not find a match for several major credit
card banks that offer online information.
Additionally, it was unable to execute a
successful download for the matches it
found. (It did provide a helpful phone
number for follow-up.) If you bank or
have credit cards from many smaller
banks, see if they support Quicken
before you make plans to use this feature.

If Quicken cannot perform a down-
load, it asks you to provide all balances
(bank, credit card, and so on) as of your
last statement. This makes sense if you
will be able to download monthly up-
dates. However, if an account does not
offer online download to Quicken, you
will need to manually enter all transac-
tions since the statement to bring the
balances up-to-date. To avoid this extra
step, use your current balance rather
than that of the previous statement for
any accounts you input manually.

Daily operations. Ongoing operation
in Quicken is straightforward, and the
Windows XP-style interface is easy to

interpret. The program offers three
main information categories: Cash Flow
Center (ongoing income and expenses),
Investing Center, and Property & Debt.
Within each category you can view a
summary of or detailed information on
each account, run user-customizable
reports, and execute transactions. A pane
on the left side of the main display pro-
vides links to the summary and detail
displays for each group; tabbed options
on each group's display afford access to
reports, analyses, and other tools.

One shortcoming puzzled us: Quick-
en does not integrate its categories as
well as it could, which is surprising
given Quicken's intuitive approach. For
example, during setup, Quicken helped
us establish a liability account for
our monthly mortgage. That liability
appears in the Property & Debt category,
where we can view a detailed picture
of how much interest we pay, how the
equity builds up, and other important
data. However, Quicken did not offer
to transfer that payment data to our
Scheduled Transactions List, even
though we provided the information
Quicken would need to do so. If
Quicken could have done this, it would
have saved us the trouble of setting up
the account twice.

Another example of this lack of inte-
gration appeared in the Budget Wizard.
Quicken doesn't automatically pick up
recurring income and bills that you
have entered elsewhere in order to
create your budget. Rather, you must
enter the amounts and
payees/payors all over
again. It will scan previous
transactions for income
and expense data, but that
capability is of no use if
you are just starting out
with the program.

Nevertheless, Quicken
had several helpful fea-
tures we really liked. In the
Property & Debt Center,
you can create a Home
Inventory that lists all the
items in your home (useful
for insurance purposes),
as well as an Emergency

Records file (crucial in the event of a fire,
flood, or other catastrophic occurrence).
When you are setting up your paycheck,
you can set up automatic posting but ask
Quicken to prompt you before entering.
This feature is useful if your paycheck
amount fluctuates and you don't want to
have an incorrect amount entered into
the check register.

The Reports tool is another user-
friendly feature, letting you customize
your reports or make quick selections
from the Easy Answer option. With Easy
Answer, you enjoy one-click access to
the most commonly used reports along
with a brief description of each to help
you select the right one for your needs.

When trouble calls. One of the
biggest drawbacks to Quicken, in our
opinion, is its product support. Online
assistance is available in the form of
a Knowledge Base and limited chat ca-
pabilities. However, if you want tele-
phone support, plan to plunk out $1.95 a
minute or as much as the $49.95 per-call
maximum. (Support is free if your ques-
tion relates to installation, registration,
data conversion, a code patch, or a
product defect.) Additionally, support is
only available Monday through Friday
between the hours of 5 a.m. and 5 p.m.
(PST). The sole upside is that the call
is toll-free.

The support restrictions are unfortu-
nate because users report several defects
in Quicken 2004. The most prevalent
complaint is that Quicken is prone
to crashing during online download

During setup, Money 2004 Premium asks for basic account
information but doesn't offer to download it as Quicken does.

PC Today / August 2004 91

reviews &C Reviews

sessions or that it does not always
download information accurately.
To be fair to Quicken, automatic
online updating is a service still in
its infancy, and a user's bank may
be equally or even more to blame
than Quicken for download errors.
Nevertheless, no matter who is at
fault, corruption of data stores
during download is a problem we
would all like to avoid.

To manage this limitation,
make frequent backups of your
Quicken information and keep
multiple backups because incor-
rect information downloads are not
always apparent immediately. (To alter
your backup settings, select Preferences
from the Edit menu.) As a safeguard,
double-check downloads against your

&*l

statements for accuracy. (This is still
much faster than inputting them by
hand). You can even have Quicken per-
form updates only in your presence if
this helps you to track the downloads.

Money 2004 Premium's main
interface resembles a Web site
portal and is equally customizable.

Microsoft Money 2004
Premium

Microsoft Money has been
around for more than a decade.
Nevertheless, its first few editions
were so anemic that no one took
the product seriously. Since that
time, however, Money has made
bold strides — helped in part by tie-
ins with Microsoft's MSN Money Web
site, its news portal MSNBC, and other
finance-related titans such as Experian
(the credit monitoring service). With the
release of the 2004 edition, there is no

Which Is The Best?

In our overall rankings, Intuit Quicken 2004 Premier and Microsoft Money 2004 Premium tied. This is
due not to the fact that they are very similar but rather to each product's standout performance in dif-
ferent areas. It's important to analyze these differences carefully, especially if there is no clear winner in
terms of online support from your banks.

Backup Intuit Quicken 2004 Premier

Quicken lets you decide how many different backups (nine at the maximum) you want to maintain, but you
must manually change the location before each backup. Quicken lets you back up to CD from the backup
interface, but only after you configure your CD as a hard drive. (You can also back up to CD manually by
burning the backup file.)

Microsoft Money 2004 Premium

With Microsoft, you must also change the name or location of the backup manually, but you must do so from
the Options window (separate from the Backup interface). It also offers to back up to 1.44MB floppy diskette —
worthless option with large data files. However, Windows XP users can back up to CD automatically (they'll be
prompted that CD files are waiting to be written and must complete the process manually). Others must back
up to CD manually.

The Verdict

Tie; neither program has as comprehensive a backup feature as we would like.

Data Collection Intuit Quicken 2004 Premier

Offers extensive reporting and graphing with customization. Lets you record home inventories, emergency phone
numbers, and more.

Microsoft Money 2004 Premium

Extensive reporting and graphing with customization. Learning feature monitors transactions and can create new
bills based on them. Budget Wizard can generate budgets based on past transactions and current input. (Quicken
supports past transactions only. You must enter current data manually.)

The Verdict

Tie; depends on user preference. Property holders will prefer Quicken; younger budget conscious users will like
Money's Budget Wizard.

92 August 2004 / www.pctoday.com

reviews & Reviews

doubt that Money is a real con-
tender for Quicken's crown.

Setting up Money. The setup
process in Money is quick (less than
10 minutes) and easy. Money does
not require a CD Key — no fumbling
around to find that long string of
numbers you usually expect with a
Microsoft installation.

We found only one aspect of
the installation confusing. When
you first insert the CD, the Setup
Wizard scans for antivirus and fire-
wall software. If it finds any, it
prompts you to click a link for more in-
formation. Unfortunately, that link
doesn't provide any useful information.
It only gives details on errors unrelated
to the problem at hand. Do yourself a
favor and turn off your antivirus and

.mmnmamm

Money 2004 Premium can generate
a budget for you based on income
and expense information you

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provided during setup.

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Money 2004 icon (as opposed to the
MSN Money icon) to open Money.
The program will prompt you to ac-
cept the license agreement and then
establish your accounts.

To help you with account set-
up, Money provides an efficient,

firewall programs before you start the
installation and you can avoid this
problem entirely.

During installation, Setup places two
icons on your Desktop, unless you instruct
it otherwise. Double-click the Microsoft

helpful Setup Assistant. It took
us 45 minutes to run through the Set-
up Assistant and establish what we
consider a typical setup: three bank
accounts, eight credit cards, and stan-
dard household expenses such as a
mortgage, utilities, and child care.

Interface Intuit Quicken 2004 Premier

Interface is simple and better organized (more items grouped under a single heading). Lets you customize Tool Bar and
Account Bar to display or hide various items.

Microsoft Money 2004 Premium

Interface is very extensive, but Money supports customization of main interface (Home Page) to streamline operations.

The Verdict

Novice users will probably prefer Quicken, but financial wizards will love Money's extensive feature set and comprehensive interface.

Notification Intuit Quicken 2004 Premier

Lets you set up alerts for investments, taxes, overspending, and more from a single, handy Alert interface. Includes insur-
ance alert to remind you to check your coverage.

Microsoft Money 2004 Premium

Offers customizable FYI Adviser that provides alerts similar to those featured in Quicken (no insurance alert). Plus, uses
MSN Alerts to send investment and cash flow alerts to your cell phone, email account, or Desktop.

The Verdict

Money wins thanks to communications edge gained with MSN Alerts.

Security Intuit Quicken 2004 Premier

Quicken lets you password-protect files and transactions but does not password-protect the entire program by default.
No plan for restoring passwords that are lost or forgotten once they are set.

Microsoft Money 2004 Premium

Money password-protects the program, letting you use your Microsoft Passport.

The Verdict

Money is the winner thanks to the enhanced encryption Microsoft Passport offers. Additionally, you can reset Passport
passwords if you lose or forget them.

Support Intuit Quicken 2004 Premier

Fee-based for many questions; free for installation, product flaws, and other categories. Quicken's automatic online up-
date feature expires after one year of use, requiring customer upgrade.

Microsoft Money 2004 Premium

Free phone support, online updates, and remote synchronization for three years (or until Sept. 1, 2007, whichever comes first).

The Verdict

Advantage goes to Money for more extensive support and longer online update period.

PC Today / August 2004 93

reviews & Reviews

The Setup Assistant offers to let you
use your Microsoft Passport as your
logon identity. This is an excellent idea
for several reasons. With a Passport-
based account, you gain better encryp-
tion, access to MSN Money's Bill Pay
feature, remote access to your accounts
from any computer, automatic Web
updates to your information, and finally,
the ability to get a new password if you
forget your existing one. (If you forget a

standard Money password, you have to
reinstall Money, which means you lose
all your account information.)

Daily operation. The main Money
display, My Money, is well-organized
and reasonably easy to decipher. How-
ever, with nine different views, such
as Portfolio, Cash Flow, and Bills &
Deposits, the interface is more complex
than Quicken's. The display resembles
the landing page of many portal sites

Tod Of The Line: Is The Product Worth The Price?

Intuit Quicken and
Microsoft Money come
in multiple consumer ver-
sions (plus small business
editions we won't discuss
here). Can you buy a less
feature-rich edition, save a
few dollars, and be just as
happy? Depending on your
requirements, the answer
may be yes.

Microsoft Money

Money has Standard
($29.95), Deluxe ($59.95),
and Premium ($79.95) edi-
tions, all of which perform
basic balancing, online up-
dating (with a supported ac-
count), and spending
analysis. The Deluxe and
Premium editions let you
track investments, minimize
and track tax liability, and
perform long-term financial
planning (including retire-
ment or purchase planning).
Each version also includes
a variety of free services,
which is where the real ben-
efit of the Premium edition
becomes evident.

With the Deluxe version,
Microsoft provides more
than $170 in free services,
including a year of MSN Bill
Pay, tax filing through H&R
Block, a year of credit moni-
toring from Experian, and a

personal financial consul-
tation with an American
Express planner. The
Premium edition includes
a year's subscription to
GainsKeeper (a $50 value),
an investment optimization
service that helps you opti-
mize your investments and
minimize your tax liabilities.
In addition, the Premium
edition gives you an extra
year of MSN Bill Pay (a value
of more than $70). Even
more importantly for users
who hate to upgrade their
software, with Premium you
gain an extra year of online
support, as well as third-
party online bill pay, auto-
mated transaction and
stock quote download, and
synchronization through
MSN Money Plus or MSN
Money for remote or hand-
held access.

If you just want help bal-
ancing your accounts or set-
ting a budget, then stick
with Money's Standard edi-
tion. (Money Standard is
the least expensive option
all around for basic financial
tracking.) If you plan to
start investing or making
long-term plans, Money
Deluxe is the minimum
amount of support you
should purchase. However,

given that the Premium edi-
tion offers an extra $120 in
services in addition to an
extra year of online support,
for just $20 additional, we
cannot imagine why anyone
interested in Money Deluxe
would not step up to the
Premium edition.

Intuit Quicken

Quicken does not offer a
Standard edition; the basic
offering is Quicken 2004
Deluxe ($59.95). At $89.95,
Quicken 2004 Premier is
the top-of-the-line offering.
The choice between the
two is simple: Premier
helps optimize your invest-
ments and minimize your
capital gains outlay and
Deluxe does not.

If you are not an in-
vestor, have your assets
permanently allocated in
long-term holdings, oral-
ready pay for the services
of an investment planner,
then you probably will
not need Quicken 2004
Premier. Nevertheless, if
you are interested in the
stock market and want
to learn about market
dynamics for future appli-
cations, you'll appreciate
the power you gain with
Quicken 2004 Premier. I

(including MSN), with options orga-
nized in neat columns and numerous
logically named buttons and menus
arrayed across the top of the screen.

The buttons correspond with the dif-
ferent views Money offers. If there is
more than one available view for a partic-
ular button, clicking a button transports
you to the list of view options. A pane on
the left side of the display provides a
helpful task list that changes depending
on the button you select. Click the
Portfolio button, for example, and the
task list will include options such as
Add An Investment and Analyze My
Portfolio. Click the Cash Flow button
and the task list will change to such
options as Try Cash Flow Scenarios
and Review Budget.

Money's tools are myriad. The pro-
gram gives you quick access to stock
quotes, news, tax analysis tools, and
other helpers. Unfortunately, with
some of Money's tools, Microsoft
stopped just short of providing a total
solution. For example, the Purchase
Wizard will tell you how much you
need to save, each month, to make a
purchase by a certain date. It will
remind you not to forget the interest
you will earn while you are saving,
but it won't calculate that interest into
the savings plan.

Another example is the 401(k)
Manager. Even though consumers
can, and frequently do, take out loans
against their 401 (k)s, and Microsoft
even recommends a 401(k) loan as
a useful way to borrow money, the
401(k) Manager provides no way to
record such a loan.

These shortcomings are really just
minor annoyances. Once you find your
way around the program and accept
its limitations, Money can be a very
powerful tool. An added bonus with
Money is the array of free services (a
value of more than $350) you can use.
With the purchase of Money Premium
2004, you enjoy a year of free credit
monitoring through Experian, two
years of MSN Bill Pay, free online tax
filing with H&R Block, and a year of
free access to GainsKeeper (a portfolio
optimization service). To sign up for

94 August 2004 / www.pctoday.com

reviews & Reviews

these bonuses, select Services Center from
the Services menu rather than clicking the
ads that appear on-screen, which may
take you to sign-up windows that do not
reflect the free offers.

When trouble arises. Some Money
users have reported a few serious flaws
beyond the petty problems we mention
above. We did not experience any of
them during our tests, but that does not
necessarily mean Microsoft has elimi-
nated them. All these problems, should
you experience them, are manageable if
you use care.

First, users report that Money some-
times posts automatic payments and de-
posits to the wrong accounts. To be safe,
we recommend you periodically check to
ensure Money is assigning your debits
and credits accurately. Users have also
reported that Money does not always
transfer year-end data accurately to the
next year. When you close out the year,
look over your data carefully. Even more
dangerous is Money's tendency to crash.
Some advanced users experienced
crashes as often as once a week, and their
data file sometimes became corrupted.

For this reason, it's important to use
Money's automatic backup feature. It's a

If you get into a jam, Microsoft
offers extensive online assistance
and support (visit the Microsoft
Money 2004 Community page at
www.microsoft.com/money
/community), one year of unlim-
ited Web-based email support,
and a year of unlimited online
phone support. Unfortunately,
the (425) 637-9308 phone number
is not toll-free, so you can rack
up a hefty phone bill if the sup-
port session is lengthy. If you
think the problem will require
extensive assistance, you can
use the (800) 936-5700 toll-free
support line at a charge of $35
per incident.

i. Woteano

'J. J>b0JtYIXI

What do you want to get out of Quicken?

Quicken 2004 Premier and Money 2004 Premium
let you establish financial goals and then customize
program operation based on those goals. Quicken's
goals interface is seen here.

Quicken 2004 Premier's main interface is simpler
than Money 2004 Premium's and resembles a task
management program rather than a Web site.

good idea to let Money automatically
back up the data file to the hard drive
and to change the location every few
sessions to ensure you have more than
one backup. To adjust your backup set-
tings (and make numerous other cus-
tomizations to Money), select Options
from the Tools menu.

The Real Deal

In the "Top Of The Line"
sidebar, we outline for you
which program performs better
in key areas. We did not detail
major operations, such as the
programs' ability to track cash,
organize investments, or plan
for the future, because the two
are equally powerful and com-
prehensive in their approaches
to major financial opera-
tions. Instead, we at-
tempted to zero in on

the auxiliary features

that might make a difference to
some users.

If there are a few features that
are especially important to you,
it may be worth deciding based
on these features alone. How-
ever, for many users the choice
of which program to use will de-
pend, not on the feature sets, but
on which program their accounts
support. Check with your bro-
kerage firms, banks, lenders, and
credit card companies to see
which, if any, support statement down-
loads into either file format.

Ask, not only about automatic down-
loads, but also about manual downloads
(where you log on and save the informa-
tion into an importable file). Quicken
2004 and Money 2004 can each download
and update your account information

i& *> »a --a

E E

®l!|uj S0|3

Quicken 2004 Premier's property tools, such as Home
Inventory and the Mortgage Calculator, will appeal to
owners of personal and investment real estate.

automatically, but users have reported
problems with the performance of both
products in this area. Manual down-
load and subsequent importation of
account statements is less convenient
than automatic download but still much
faster than manual input. It is also the
safest method if you want to avoid file or
data corruption.

If you find that an equal number of
your financial institutions support both
programs, make your decision based on
features. If there is a clear winner, how-
ever, we strongly urge you to consider
that product. With the busy lives most of
us lead, users who find themselves sad-
dled with large manual input sessions
will likely soon abandon their financial
tracking programs entirely, pct

by Jennifer Farwell

PC Today / August 2004 95

reviews & Reviews

Hexigen Software

ActualDoc

Professional 2.0

ActualDoc Professional, a program
for managing your recently ac-
cessed documents, is one of those pro-
grams you don't know you need, or at
least want, until you've tried it. But once
you've tried ActualDoc Professional,
you'll see it's a vast improvement over
what Windows offers.

Access Recent Files In Windows

If you're running Windows XP, for ex-
ample, you may not know about its My
Recent Documents feature because it does
not appear in the Start menu by default.
The My Recent Documents feature gives

How To . . .

Run ActualDoc In
Secure Mode

ActualDoc Pro can run in Usual
Mode or Secure Mode; you
choose the mode as soon as you
install the program. If you choose
Usual Mode but later want to switch,
you can activate Secure Mode by
clicking Options, selecting Prefer-
ences, and clicking Security Mode. In
Secure Mode, only users who know
the password you pick will be able to
see the Recent Documents list in
ActualDoc. In addition, this setting
will clear the recent documents list
in the Start Menu.

At any time you can change the
password or disable the password-
protection feature. To do this, click
Options, select Preferences, click
Security, and then type in a new
password or deselect the Turn On
Password Protection checkbox. I

you fast access to the 15 most recently
used files, including Word documents,
graphics files, and music files. You can
add this feature to your Start menu by
right-clicking the menu and choosing
Properties. Under the Start Menu tab in
the Taskbar And Start Menu Properties
dialog box, select the Start Menu radio
button and click the Customize button.
Under the Advanced tab, select the List
My Most Recently Opened Documents
checkbox and click OK.

If you're using an older version of
Windows, you're probably familiar with
the Documents menu because it appears
in the Start Menu by default. Like
WinXP's My Recent Documents, the
Documents menu gives you access to the
files you accessed most recently.

What A View

Now that you're up to speed with
how Windows handles recent docu-
ments, we'll explain how ActualDoc Pro-
fessional helps you handle them.

By default, the main interface lists the
100 most recently used files in the Recent
Documents menu. The entry for each file
includes its name, size, date of last use,
type, and path. The program lists files by
date starting with the most recent, but
you can change this setting.

To customize this interface, you can
use the Date and Type filters. The Date
filter lets you display files based on
a chosen time parameter (such as a spe-
cific week or month). This is a handy way
to find a file you can't name but recall
working on. Similarly, the Type filter
limits the Recent Documents list to files
of just one type. You also can use this tool
to eliminate types of files completely
from ActualDoc.

You can also use the Categories tool
to alter how files appear. This tool lets
you view files according to headings
such as Web Documents, Drawings and
Images, Last Search Results, and MS
Office Documents, among others.

Take Action

Now that you know there are many
options for viewing recent files, what
can you do with these files?

Using the Preview tool, you can auto-
matically view the contents of a file just
by highlighting it. This tool is part of the
Viewer; in fact, ActualDoc has viewers for
text, HTML, and graphics files, and you
can customize the tools in each of the
viewers. Together these viewers support
more than 40 file types, so you can add
text, insert an item, or resize a graphic

If you prefer to bypass the Viewer and
open the file with the appropriate applica-
tion, click Open or double-click the file
name. The Explore Document command
opens a Windows Explorer-like interface
that lets you see where the highlighted
file is stored in relation to other contents
of your computer. You can also explore
your drives and open any file you choose.

Another key tool is the Search function.
With it you can hunt for files by name or
content and search files listed in Actual-
Doc or on your drives. By default the
search results will appear under Recent
Documents and Last Search Results, pct

by Rachel Derowitsch

ActualDoc Professional 2.0

$19.95

Flexigen Software

sales@flexigensoft.com

www.flexigensoft.com

Ratines

Interface:
Performance:
Feature set:
Documentation:
OVERALL:

MINIMI

MINIM

NIIIIMI

Illlllll

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8.5

96 August 2004 / www.pctoday.com

reviews & Reviews

Caelo Software
NEO3.0

Email t
Simpliftt

neo

11 afflSo^'

NEO 3.0

$39.95; $20 for upgrade
Caelo Software
(604) 269-9006
www.emai lorgan izer.com

Spending any length of time away
from your desk and busy inbox can
lead to an avalanche of email. Then it
takes you a long time to sort through your
email and determine what's worthy of
saving, answering, deleting, or passing
on. Microsoft Outlook, for all its features,
doesn't do much to assist with these tasks.
Enter NEO (Nelson Email Organizer)
3.0, a Microsoft Outlook add-on that takes
the heavy lifting out of email. NEO orga-
nizes new and old messages and makes it
simple to search and track email.

Come Hither Features

NEO lets you easily search for and
retrieve any email message, as well as
manage your incoming email more effec-
tively. While plain-old Outlook just plops
new messages in your inbox for you to

Ratines

Interface:
Performance:
Feature sec
Documentation:
OVERALL:

MINIM

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sort manually, NEO automatically sorts
messages using specific criteria and
copies messages to as many categories as
necessary. For example, a friend sent us a
message with a WordPerfect attachment.
NEO simultaneously filed the message in
the Today folder under the Date tab, in
the WPD folder under the Attachment
tab, and in our friend's folder under the
Correspondent tab.

You will notice new email messages
first in the Active Mail folder, which is a
nice inbox replacement. Active Mail keeps
all new messages in a single folder until
you decide whether to reply to them,
remove them, or pass them on. Unlike
Outlook, after you reply, remove, or for-
ward a message, you don't need to file it
away yourself. NEO handles this task.

Tabs along the top of the NEO inter-
face let you quickly select categories for
viewing your messages. Using the Corre-
spondents tab, for example, you can
search for messages based on who sent
the message or to whom you addressed
the message. If a message is sent to mul-
tiple recipients, NEO will place the mes-
sage in the folder for each recipient. You
will find subscriptions to your various
mailing lists under the Bulk Mail tab.
And you can customize the Hot tab to
hold folders that contain messages from
or addressed to important or frequent
correspondents or subscriptions.

Outlook Maneuvers

Outlook offers more than an email
client, including a Calendar, Journal, and
Task Manager. Although you can access
these other features easily using NEO, it is
an email-centric tool, designed to enhance
Outlook's messaging functionality only.

NEO opens in a separate window, and
its simple design and interface make it
easy to maneuver. From within NEO you
can watch email arrive in the Active Mail

window or compose new messages as if
you were actually using Outlook. You can
access your Calendar, Tasks, and other
Outlook folders from a central menu.

Minor Flaws

NEO doesn't work with Outlook
Express, but then, neither does much else.
Caelo Software only offers online support,
so although you won't waste precious
minutes on hold, you won't get an imme-
diate answer to your troubles either.

It also takes some time initially to set
up NEO to meet your needs. You may
have to use the program for a while.
Learn to use NEO and you'll not only
stay on top of your inbox, you'll discover
email is more useful than you could
have imagined, rcr

by Anne Steyer Phelps

How To

Locate A Specific
Email Message

The Correspondent and
Attachment tabs are two areas
we think everyone should be familiar
with. How many times have you
wasted time searching your inbox or
sent mail for a message with an at-
tachment that you know you sent
(or received) recently? With NEO,
you can search through the Corre-
spondent folder or the Attachment
folder. For example, to view all mes-
sages with attachments, whether you
were the sender or the recipient, click
the Attachment tab and choose the
file type (such as DOC [Microsoft
Word Document] or JPEG [Joint
Photographic Experts Croup]). NEO
then offers up every message that in-
cluded an attachment with that file
type. If you can't remember the exact
file type but you know the name of
the person who sent it, you can click
the Correspondent tab and scroll
down to the name. Click the person's
name, and NEO reveals all of his mes-
sages in the main window. Scroll to
find the email you are looking for. I

PC Today / August 2004 97

reviews & Reviews

Rampell Software
ViewRemote 2.17

For years, Web surfers
have worried about on-
line security. They worry
that someone might be
monitoring the sites they
view or stealing their per-
sonal identity from pass-
word-protected sites. In
short, they worry about
a faceless "Big Brother"
watching their every move.
Although that kind of
monitoring is clearly an in-
vasion of privacy, a dif-
ferent kind of monitoring,
done for different reasons,
is sometimes necessary.
ViewRemote 2.17 can help you keep
an eye on your computer, even if you
happen to be halfway around the world.

A Watchful Eye

The concept behind ViewRemote is a
simple one because it lets you easily keep
track of all the activity on any computer
on which you installed the program.
ViewRemote creates detailed logs and
captures screen shots of everything that is
done on the computer. You can then view
the logs either on the monitored PC or on
a remote computer by logging on to the
ViewRemote Web site and accessing your
user page.

This means, for example, that as a
parent you can keep on eye on the family
PC while you're at work or on the road
and your kids are at home. Or, if you

ViewRemote 2.17
$69.95

Rampell Software

(617)395-7695

www.viewremote.com

Ratings

Interface:

Performance:

Features:

Documentation:

OVERALL:

MINIMI
MIMMIII
lllllllll
1 1 1 1 1 1 1

lllllllll

8.5

9.5

8.5

are an employer, you can
monitor an employee's
computer even when you
are out of the office.

When installing the
program, you need to se-
lect a password and a
login name. You will use
the password to access the
program on the computer
where you have installed
the program. You will use
the password and the
login name together to
access your user page on
the ViewRemote Web site.
Beyond picking your
login name and password, you don't
need to do much to get the program
rolling. One key option you have at
setup is to run the program in Hidden
Mode. If you choose Hidden Mode,
ViewRemote will not appear on the Start
menu, but you can use an activation
hotkey to access the program. In either
mode, ViewRemote will begin to mon-
itor the PC as soon as the computer is
turned on.

ViewRemote's interface is bare bones
because it runs in the background. The
interface does offer a few options for
modifying how the program works. You
change where ViewRemote stores the logs
it creates. You also can determine after
how many days the program will delete
logs. Another important feature, found
under Web Options, is the frequency at
which the program sends logs and/or
screen shots to your ViewRemote user
page. Similarly, you can set the program
to send logs and screen shots to another
email address.

Remote Control

With your login name and password,
you have remote monitoring capabilities

through your user page at the View-
Remote Web site. We found accessing
our page a cinch, and we were impressed
with how detailed the logs were. Also,
we could launch an automatic scroll-
through of the screen shots with just a
click of a button, and we could call up
single screen shots individually.

The logs are somewhat garbled in
places, but that's partly because View-
Remote keeps track of every keystroke.
Some of the garbled look, however, is due
to the program itself; a kink the makers of
ViewRemote need to work out.

The logs keep track of almost every-
thing someone views or accesses on the
computer: names of Web sites he visits,
emails and documents he writes, pro-
grams he accesses, files he prints, even
the number of times he opens the Start
menu. About the only thing you can't see
with ViewRemote is the content of an
email message.

ViewRemote 2.17 works on Windows
98 and later. The retail price includes six
months free online use and upgrades.
Beyond that, you'll need to pay $9.99
every six months to maintain access to the
ViewRemote login site, pct

by Rachel Derowitsch

How To . . .

Send Logs Via Email

You don't have to monitor a PC
using the ViewRemote Web site.
You can instead choose to have the
program send the logs to you in an
email. To set up this option, click
E-mail Options on the main interface
and select the Send Logs Via E-mail
checkbox. Next, enter the email ad-
dress you want the logs sent to and
specify how frequently it should send
the logs. You also have the option to
receive an attached screen shot of the
computer's activities.

By default, the ViewRemote Web
site will send the logs, so anyone using
the monitored computer won't have
a clue about what's going on. I

98 August 2004 / www.pctoday.com

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Double the dose.

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Double the data path from 32- to 64-bit and you more than double the thrill factor. Uninterrupted,
ear-splitting, streaming audio and rich, razor sharp video make your pad a launching pad. What's more,
you get all the power you need to edit, mix, and model your own digital creations with memory to spare.
Prepare to blow minds. Get a dose of the AMD Athlon 64 FX edge at www.amd.com/amdathlon64fx

»—

Your Turn

Windows Media Player 9 Series Premium Services

A certain fruit-flavored music service gets
most of the attention surrounding
downloadable premium media content. A
vast number of alternatives exist for seekers
of both video and audio entertainment. The
majority of premium content delivery ser-
vices rely on Windows Media Player 9
Series, with its integrated DRM (digital
rights management) to provide users with a
controlled media delivery experience.

WMP 9 Series includes a Premium Ser-
vices section, offering quick access to a
select group of pay-for-play multimedia ser-
vices. To access it, click Premium Services in
the left pane of the WMP 9 Series interface.
Even this collection barely scratches the sur-
face of the broader market. Numerous other
premium services also deliver the WMP 9
Series experience outside of the WMP.

To accurately illustrate the available pre-
mium media options, we'll first discuss the
four services (CinemaNow, MusicNow,

provides an
integrated music
shopping experience.

CinemaNow
delivers movies
on demand through
Windows Media
Player.

Napster, and NFL Highlight Machine) inte-
grated with WMP, focusing on both the con-
tent offered and quality of delivery. This
comprehensive coverage identifies what
each service provides in terms of features,
usability, how well integration with WMP is
established, and what extra components are
required for some of the services. Once the
bundled services are outlined, we ex-
pand beyond the player to cover notable
premium services (Buy.com/BuyMusic,
MLB. TV, and MusicMatch) available outside
the confines of the Windows Media Player,
presenting a broad picture of the assortment
of content available.

CinemaNow

As the name of this service implies,
movies on demand is the primary focus. To
access CinemaNow directly from WMP,
click the arrow next to the Premium Services
button on the left side of the player and
choose Subscribe from the list of op-
tions. Click CinemaNow to browse
the service directly in the player.
Registration with a credit card is re-
quired to use the service.

Purchase options are slightly con-
fusing, mainly due to the number of
options. Most major studio releases
fall under the pay-per-view category
with rates of either $2.99 or $3.99 for
unlimited viewing in a 24-hour pe-
riod. Some movies are available for
purchased download, with unlimited
viewing on the computer used to
make the purchase. Premium and
Premium Plus subscription options provide
access to a subset of all CinemaNow content
for either a monthly or annual fee. The
Premium service is $9.95 per month or
$49.95 annually, while the Premium Plus
service costs $29.95 per month or $99.95 an-
nually. The most obvious difference between
the two subscription levels is the inclusion
of adult content and Mr. Bill cartoons in the
Premium Plus version.

100 August 2004 / www.pctoday.com

Af,

ter Five ;f >**?-
— t? 1 f

Pay-per-view movies are available
for download during the 24-hour pur-
chase period, with a claim of being able
to watch the movies in as little as 30 sec-
onds from the start of the download.
However, the fastest download-to-
watch time achieved during testing was
closer to 30 minutes using a standard
DSL (Digital Subscriber Line) connec-
tion. Streaming video takes consider-
ably less time, with a buffer of only a
few minutes required for uninterrupted
viewing throughout the stream. Tl or
faster connections may experience
better connection times. We definitely
don't recommend this service for dial-
up users.

CinemaNow is only slightly inte-
grated with Windows Media Player.
Browsing the site functions well
within the player, but the service
never adds itself to the Premium
Services list, requiring the user to
pass through the Subscribe page each
time before reaching CinemaNow
within the player window. Choosing
either Download or Stream once you
select a movie launches an Internet
Explorer window, taking focus away
from the player. Streaming movies
play back in this window, which is
expandable to full screen. Down-
loads are stored in a user-specified
directory, launching in the player
when the download is complete.

File sizes for downloads are con-
sistently large, requiring over 700MB
of space for a two-hour movie. You
must license the movies each time
they are played, which slows initial
play time by a few seconds but is not
inconvenient enough to make the
service unbearable. Burning movie
files to DVD for archival storage
works, but you can only play them
back on the same PC on which you
downloaded them.

Image and sound quality of videos
is on par with cable television. You
can use your PC with Video Out to
dispatch the signal to a TV, which
provides an experience good enough
to pass for standard cable or satellite
television. Using a Media Center
Edition installation of Windows XP

Napster radio
offers a customiz-
able streaming
experience for
premium
subscribers.

The Napster inter-
face offers one of the
most user-friendly
shopping experi-
ences available.

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makes CinemaNow just like a tradi-
tional pay-per-view service. All
movies tested during this review
output content in 4:3 full screen.
(CinemaNow doesn't indicate if 16:9
widescreen content is available.)
Downloading requires installation of
an ActiveX control, which takes vir-
tually no time to prepare.

For frequent movie watchers, a
service such as Netflix (www.net
flix.com) probably makes more sense
at this point because the selection of
movies is lacking, and movies are
only available via pay-per-view for a
few months in most cases. (Check out
Nexflix's Web site for subscription
options and pricing.) While stream-
ing is more instantaneous than a
DVD rental service, the lack of con-
tent hurts the subscription model.
The catalog of Premium and Premium
Plus titles is decent, if viewing tastes
run toward low-budget and the

obscure, although you could easily find
a worse place to spend the $6 per
month for an annual subscription to the
Premium version.

MusicNow

Best Buy stores launched Mu-
sicNow with the idea that selling
portable players could translate into
sales of music downloads through
cross-promotion. This is a great idea in
theory. We first tried the MusicNow
service thanks to an offer of 10 free
tracks attached to the front of a Rio
Karma (www.rioaudio.com) MP3
player package. While MusicNow still
maintains the Best Buy brand, it is
now part of Circuit City.

Like most other music download
services, MusicNow offers individual
songs for 99 cents. Full albums vary
in price depending on size, although
the most common pricing is either
$9.99 or $13.99. A block of songs

PC Today / August 2004 101

fter Five

£)

combined around a common theme,
known as a TrackPak, is available at
various prices depending on the
number of songs in the bundle.

Subscriptions are available for
$4.95 or $9.95 per month. The $4.95
plan is a monthly subscription to
commercial-free streaming radio
channels. With the $9.95
subscription, customiz- „^^^=
able playlists of the songs
you purchase and full-
length track previews
are available.

After purchasing a track,
you are limited to down-
loading a song one time to
one PC unless customer
service intervenes. (You
can burn them to a CD up
to 10 times.) You can
transfer tracks from the PC
to a portable device mul-
tiple times, but attempting
to play them back on an-
other PC prompts you to
purchase them again. This
doesn't sit well when your
primary PC loses a hard
drive after downloading
the songs, requiring you
to download all tracks
again, only to discover
you can't do it twice
without digging through
the Help file and con-
tacting customer service.

The MusicNow service
is easy to browse. It's the
only service in the Win-
dows Media Player 9
Series Premium Services with full in-
tegration into the player and no
standalone player or outside compo-
nents. A 2.2MB download is required
for the plug-in to function properly.
Occasionally, an application called
WMP 9 Importer, which is associated
with the MusicNow store, gets hung
up, in which case you're forced to
restart Windows Media Player.

You can also browse the music li-
brary from a Web browser; however,
integration into the Windows Media
Player makes the store much more

intuitive. The selection of albums is
very representative of the music cat-
alog available at former parent com-
pany Best Buy. For users seeking a
diverse catalog of older music,
MusicNow in Windows Media Play-
er 9 Series beats all the other services
hands down.

»'

Welcome Back

the NHL HIGHLIGHT MACHINE

k here to MANAGE YOUR ACCOUNT

Highlight Machine provides minimal access to content
through the Windows Media Player.

Qnapsler

Sync /Restore

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computer will not be

Select Type | Artist

Track | Album/Source

Ll-= 1

□ 45 Cypress Hill

What's Your Number? [Ex. . . Till Death Do Us Part

□ 45 Cypres Hill

Ganja Bus [Explicit Album . . , Till Death Do Us Part

D 45 Cypress Hill

Till Death Do Us Part [Expl... Till Death Do Us Part

D 45 Cypress Hill

Money [Explicit Album Ver... Till Death Do Us Part

D 45 Cypress Hill

Never Know [Explicit Albu, , , Till Death Do Us Part

D 45 Cypress Hill

Till Death Comes [Explicit . . . Till Death Do Us Part

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| iyfiCf 1 restore sc-loctc-d

Napster provides quick access to restoring music down-
loads from accidental deletion or upgrades to the OS.

Napster

The name Napster remains the
most well-known when it comes to
music downloading. The brand is
now legit, serving up 99-cent down-
loads instead of sharing files between
college dorm rooms across the
country. As part of the Roxio um-
brella of applications, Napster is
quite possibly the most user-friendly
of the music services.

Napster is available in two for-
mats. It plugs directly into Windows
Media Player 9: Click Napster from

the Premium Services window. A se-
ries of steps leads you through instal-
lation and creates an integrated
shopping and listening environment
within WMP 9 Series. You can also
download Napster directly from the
Web and install a separate applica-
tion interface, which looks exactly
like the plug-in, without
wrapping WMP around it.
(The standalone Napster
download is 10.7MB.)

Napster downloads are
99 cents for individual
tracks or $9.95 for most al-
bums. Some albums are in-
explicably more expensive.
Discounts on downloads
are available when Track
Packs are purchased. These
are essentially gift certifi-
cates offering discounts
when prepurchasing 15,
25, or 50 songs. The 50-
song Track Pack prices
individual tracks at 80
cents each.

In addition to down-
loading songs, Napster
also offers a premium
radio service with more
than 50 different commer-
cial-free broadcasts cov-
ering a variety of genres.
Premium users may also
create their own custom
streaming playlists from
500,000+ songs in the
Napster library. Radio sta-
tions offer the unique
ability to scroll through
the playlist and jump ahead to the
songs you like.

Purchasing music is almost too
easy. To create an account, you need
a credit card, which is automatically
charged when songs are selected.
Clicking a Buy Album button initi-
ates file downloading almost instan-
taneously, which might be too easy
for children to accidentally run up
large, unwanted, unknown pur-
chases on their parents' credit cards.
This feature is outstanding because
the purchase is virtually invisible,

102 August 2004 / www.pctoday.com

Af,

ter Five

but the invisibility is a double-
edged sword.

DRM is just as invisible as
the purchasing. Licenses are
acquired in the background,
giving users all the rights they
are entitled to without making
things complicated. Burning
music to CDs, downloading to
multiple machines, and transfer-
ring music to a portable device
seems to work without cum-
bering the user with "you can't
do that"-type warnings. When
rights violations, such as im-
porting songs into Windows
Movie Maker, are attempted, the
appropriate warning is issued.

Other Napster features are equally
intuitive and efficient. Browsing songs
using the Search function is quicker
than any of the other services we
tested. The WMP 9 Series-integrated
version seems to lag slightly com-
pared to the standalone Napster but
not enough to ignore the advantages
of having quick access to visualiza-
tions, plug-ins, and other player en-
hancements. A messaging feature lets
users share playlists with or send
album recommendations to other
Napster users or anyone with an email
address. Message boards could be
useful but instead are overwhelmed
with mindless discussions of who the
message board in-crowd is.

Napster isn't without its faults.
Music gets automatically dumped di-
rectly into the My Music folder
(or another folder you specify
when you install the applica-
tion) instead of creating a sub-
folder for individual artists and
albums, which is the default be-
havior of Windows Media Play-
er. This annoyance is redeemed
slightly by including the album
art in the download.

NHL Highlight Machine

Hockey fans corner the mar-
ket on player-integrated sports
content. NHL Highlight Ma-
chine, a service of NHL.com via
MSN Sports, provides full access

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■— ^ and download service as an alternative
to Windows Media Player.

to NHL highlight reels, including
press conferences and game high-
lights, for $4.95 per month or $29.95
for the entire hockey season. The ser-
vice lets users create Watch Lists of
players, making it easy to track spe-
cific game and team highlights
without having to wade through un-
wanted information. CinemaNow,
curiously, provides the support for
this service.

Subscribing through the player
adds a plug-in to the Premium Ser-
vices tab, offering the least integra-
tion of the four available services.
After installing Highlight Machine,
clicking the NHL Video or NHL
Highlight Machine links launches an
external browser window. Videos are
available at 56Kbps (kilobits per
second) or 300Kbps bit rates, typically

displaying content at 320 x 240
with low-quality audio. Stream-
ing video buffers quickly, pro-
viding rapid access to content,
but the quality leaves much to
be desired.

In addition to configurable
video highlights, a Highlight
Machine subscription entitles
subscribers to discounts on
other NHL.com services. Home
Videos is a hockey video rental
service, featuring a variety of
hockey movies for $2.95 (or
$1.95 for Highlight Machine
subscribers). NHL All Access of-
fers behind-the-scenes content
featuring locker room antics, general
manager interviews, and other
hockey happenings for the same
rates. During the off-season, keep
hockey mania alive by watching his-
toric games, again at the same rates.

Basically, Highlight machine is a
glorified discount pass, providing
a small discount on any of the pre-
mium video services available from
NHL.com. Die-hard fans will prob-
ably find this subscription a valuable
asset; casual fans or hockey haters
won't find much value here, how-
ever. Starting with the sixth movie
viewed in a month, you are ahead of
the nonsubscriber by $1 for every
video watched.

Multimedia Partners

CinemaNow, MusicNow, and Nap-
ster could appeal to any computer
user who enjoys digital video and
music. As far as such applications
go, these are as good as any other,
and the appeal is widespread
enough to make them all valuable
assets to Windows Media Player 9
Series. NHL Highlight Machine
doesn't appeal to as wide an audi-
ence, but it is attractive to a small
niche and is a very efficient and
valuable service. Explore each of
these services to get the most out
of WMP 9 Series, pct

[tfi MSN Premium offers affordable access

to Windows Media Streams of Major
League Baseball games.

by lake Ludington

PC Today / August 2004 103

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v e

A Look At What's New In PC Gaming

by P. Bryan Edge-Salios

Unreal Tournament 2004

nreal Tournament
2004 is the near-
perfect refinement of
3D multiplayer shoot-
ers. We had high expec-
tations for Unreal Tournament 2004, and
every expectation was met or exceeded.

Graphically, Unreal Tournament 2004 is
gorgeous, with detailed, colorful environ-
ments painting the backdrop for the
chaotic battles taking place against them.
There are also dozens of highly detailed
character skins, including Skaarj warriors,
cyborgs, and anime-style robots.

Throughout the single-player game,
you'll battle computer opponents (bots) in
various matches, eventually commanding
a squad of computerized teammates.
However, the single-player game is still a
pale imitation of Unreal Tournament
2004's true experience: fragging human
opponents. Hosing down an opponent
with a chaingun just isn't gratifying unless
you're truly annoying someone. To that
end, Unreal Tournament 2004 provides 10
multiplayer games. Seven of those games
are team-based.

Double Domination involves capturing
and holding two Domination points for 10
seconds in order to score. Bombing Run is
essentially football with
guns. Invasion places a

team in an Alamo-style mission where it
must defend against waves and waves of
enemy (bot) onslaughts. Assault pits teams
against each other. Onslaught is a strategic
capture-and-hold game. Teams must cap-
ture and hold map points in a connect-the-
dots fashion in order to link their base with
the enemy's, at which point the enemy's
power core may be attacked and destroyed
for a victory.

Individual match types include stan-
dard free-for-all Deathmatch, Mutant, and
Last Man Standing. The goal of Mutant is
to become The Mutant by scoring the first
kill and thereafter scoring as many kills as
possible before dying. Last Man Standing
is a deathmatch game in which players
have limited respawns and regain health
by killing other players.

In addition to new maps and
weapons, Unreal Tournament 2004 in-
troduces new vehicles and play modes.
New weapons include the ion-painter,
the link-gun, and the shield gun. The
link-gun provides both a weapon and a
repair device, and the ion-painter lights
up a target for a suborbital ion cannon
where you can lay some
serious, serious
smackdown. You
can also

control various vehicles and turrets.
Vehicles include the Goliath Tank, the
Scorpion (think Jeep), the Hellbender
(think Humvee), and the Leviathan, a
huge troop transport with four turrets.
The Hellbender, Leviathan, and Scor-
pion accommodate additional gunner po-
sitions to help defend the vehicle. The
Manta, a single-man hovercraft, and the
Raptor, a single-pilot fighter, provide air
support. Human and Skaarj Spacefighters
round out the vehicle selection — yes,
there are even dogfights in space.

Unreal Tournament 2004 is a virtu-
ally perfect multiplayer shooter in every
respect. The single-player experience is
good, but let's not kid ourselves. Unreal
Tournament 2004 is all about multi-
player frag-fests, and in this arena it
kicks major booty.

Unreal Tournament 2004 requires
Windows 98/Me/2000/XP, a 1GHz
Pentium III or AMD Athlon CPU,
128MB RAM, 5.5GB hard drive space, a
64MB video card, and a DirectX 8.1-
compatible sound card. A NIC (network
interface card) is required for LAN
(local-area network) play. I

PC Today / August 2004 105

Hitman: Contracts

Hitman: Contracts puts you
in the role of the myste-
rious, bald, bar-coded assassin
known only as 47. The game
begins with a wounded 47
crawling back to his hotel
room where he drifts in and
out of consciousness, remem-
bering various assignments,
which serve as the missions in
the game.

Every mission consists of one
or more objectives (at least one
of which is killing someone),
which 47 can tackle through a
combination of stealth, sub-
terfuge, and gunplay. Hitman's
emphasis is more on stealth and
resourcefulness than charging
in with guns ablazing, but the
latter is always an option, and
your employers aren't generally
picky about how you get the job done.

To eliminate targets quietly, 47 can sneak up behind them,
knocking them unconscious or killing them with any number of
standard or improvised weapons, such as a shovel or kitchen
knife. Of course, 47 also has firearms, including twin .45 pistols,
a silenced pistol, shotguns, machine guns, and (of course) a
sniper rifle. 47 also carries a lockpick, nightvision goggles, and
binoculars for surveillance. He can only carry his pistols and
one rifle at a time and can only conceal small weapons, which is
an important point when you're disguised.

47 may disguise himself with a victim's clothing, allowing

him to move freely through assignments as long
as the victim's body was discreetly hidden
and he doesn't act suspicious entering re-
stricted areas or openly brandishing a

weapon. Missions gener-
ally provide environ-
mental resources that you
can use to eliminate a
target, such as dropping a
laxative into soup served to

$49.99
Eidos

www.hitmancontracts.com
ESRB Rating: Mature

your target and then waiting in
the bathroom to eliminate him
quietly and take his clothes.
An in-game map provides
detailed tactical information
about every mission, including
the locations and movement of
enemies and 47's intended
target(s). The map also marks
points of interest, which provide
useful information or objects for
solving each mission.

The best part of Hitman:
Contracts is that you can ap-
proach every mission differently
using a combination of stealth, a
little puzzle solving, or action,
and you're free to choose your
own methods. For example, an
early mission tasks you with
killing the Meat King and one of
his high-level cronies. Killing a
butcher and stealing his clothes provides the disguise necessary
for entry to grounds where a party is taking place. Once inside,
you might bump off a lone guard, take his weapon, and tear up
the party with a machine gun. Alternately, you might enter the
kitchen, collect a plate of chicken, hide a lethal syringe in it (to
get past the guards who pat you down), and deliver the deadly
bird to the Meat King.

The sound and graphics in Hitman: Contracts are dark, cin-
ematic, and even grotesque. This is no game for children, and
the game's Mature rating is well deserved. But what would
you expect from a game putting you in the role of a ruthless
contract killer?

Our biggest complaint with the game are the controls and a
relatively lousy tutorial. Movement is handled by the W, A, S,
and D keys, the mouse, and number keys. 47 can walk, run,
sneak, peer around corners, and jump across balconies. We en-
countered periodic, erratic mouse control, and context-sensitive
help would have been appreciated. Certain mission-specific ac-
tions (such as putting a syringe in a chicken) are not clearly ex-
plained; you just have to figure it out. Some controls are
counterintuitive: Pressing the 5 key activates the binoculars, but
you must right-click to deactivate them. Pressing the 6 key acti-
vates and deactivates night vision.

Hitman: Contracts requires Win98SE/Me/2000/XP, an
800MHz Intel Pentium III or Athlon CPU, 128MB RAM (256MB
RAM for Win2000/XP), 2GB hard drive space, a 100% DirectX
8-compatible sound card, 4X CD-ROM drive, and a 32MB
DirectX 8-compatible video card with T&L (Transform &
^^^^^^^^^^_ Lighting) support. I

106 August 2004 / www.pctoday.com

City Of Heroes

At long last, someone has created an
MMORPG (Massively MultiPlayer
OnLine Role-Playing Game) that isn't just
another dressed-up clone of Ever-
quest. City Of Heroes puts you in the
shoes and colorful spandex of your own
custom superhero, stamping out villainy
solo or with a super-team in the mean
streets of Paragon City.

Like all MMORPGs, City Of Heroes be-
gins with character creation. A basic char-
acter origin and archetype are selected to
create the base for your character. Tankers
and Scrappers are chiefly melee fighters,
Blasters and Controllers fight best at short
range, and Defenders work as support he-
roes, hindering enemies and aiding allies
while providing some ranged support.

Every character begins with a primary
and secondary power set, each containing
multiple powers. As characters advance
in level (called Security Level), you can
purchase new powers. A Tanker, for ex-
ample, might start with Invulnerability
and Super Strength as his first two power
sets and select Resist Physical Damage
and Punch as starting powers. As the
character gains levels, he can purchase
new powers within his power sets or pur-
chase a new Power Set (such as Flight or
Leaping, for example) beginning at the
sixth level.

Once a basic character is created, the
most fun part of character creation
awaits: designing your super-skivvies.
City Of Heroes provides thousands of
options for character appearance, cos-
tume, and colors, though capes are
strangely absent from the costume ac-
cessories. You can store up to eight he-
roes per account, so there's plenty of
room for experimenting with different
character types and costumes.

.?^| JL-*

^ -**>-

City Of Heroes is by far the most user-
friendly MMORPG we've experienced.
The interface is very elegant and intuitive.
It's easy to start playing without diving
into the colorful 100-plus page manual.
(However, the manual has a lot of good
information, so we highly recommend
reading it.) The opening tutorial is excel-
lent and explains basic gameplay very
well and also levels you up to Security
Level 2 once you've completed it.
Waypoints on the horizon mark impor-
tant locations for contacts (NPCs [non-
player characters] that assign missions),
mission locations, or any hero or map lo-
cation you designate as a waypoint.
Movement is handled via the W, A, S, and
D keys and the mouse, and powers are ac-
tivated via number keys or by clicking the
power's icon on the Power toolbar.

There is no treasure or inventory in
City Of Heroes. Dying prior to the
fourth level is penalty-free; after the
fourth level, an experience point debt is
incurred, which just serves to slow ad-
vancement. There are three main re-
sources in the game that you can acquire
by defeating villains and /or completing
missions: Influence, Inspirations, and
Enhancements. Influence acts as money
and is used to purchase Inspirations and
Enhancements. Inspirations grant tem-
porary benefits such as damage in-
creases or health or endurance recovery.
Enhancements are semipermanent mod-
ifiers that improve your powers, in-
creasing their range, accuracy, damage
potential, and other attributes.

City Of Heroes breathes fresh air into a
crowded MMORPG market and offers the
best, most user-friendly interface we've

CityOfHeros

$49.99 (plus monthly fees)
NCSoft
www.cityofheroes.com
ESRB Rating Teen

seen. Our experience with the game was
rock-solid, with virtually no lag, server
crashes, or connection problems. The only
downside to this stellar game is its steep
entry price of $49.99 for the game and
$14.95 per month (less if you purchase
larger blocks of months in advance).

City Of Heroes requires Win98/Me/
XP/2000, an 800MHz Intel Pentium III
or AMD Athlon CPU, 256MB RAM, 2GB
hard drive space, a 4X CD-ROM, a
GeForce 2 Series or ATI Radeon 8500
video card (or better), a 16-bit sound
card, and a 56Kbps (kilobits per
second) modem. I

- ■

Last Bytes

Google On Holiday

by Carmen Carmack

If you logged on to Google (www.google.com) during Earth Day this
year, you would have seen the Google logo transformed into a
scenic mountain lake. This was not the work of an environmental
hacker out to deface the Google Web site. On the contrary, to cele-
brate holidays and other historic dates, the company has temporarily
changed its signature logo since 1999.

For an entertaining look at these logos at any time of the year,
check out Google's online logo museum at www.google.com/holiday
logos.html. By default, the page displays the current year's collection.
It also includes links to archives for past years' logos. For example, click
the 2002 link under the More Holiday Logos heading, scroll down to
the May 20, 2002, entry, and click the Dilbert Google Doodle link to
see Dilbert's efforts to develop a new Google logo.

Soogle
G ogle
Gopgle

"Warez" The Beef?

The U.S. government, along with trade associations, such as the BSA (Business Software
Alliance), the MPAA (Motion Picture Association of America), and the RIAA (Recording
Industry Association of America), have a beef with warez groups (organizations that illegally
distribute copyrighted software, games, music, and movies on the Internet).

Earlier this year, an effort dubbed Operation Fastlink targeted nearly 100 individuals with
searches in 10 countries and 27 states. The international investigation, which began with coor-
dinated efforts between the FBI and the U.S. Department of Justice, culminated with the
seizure of more than 200 computers in April. The estimated value of the pirated material
stored on the computers was in excess of $50 million, according to the Department of Justice.

A previous crackdown, known as Operation Buccaneer, targeted more than 40 individuals.
The effort has resulted in numerous felony convictions.

Tech Trash Is Treasure

Not sure what to do with your old computer equip-
ment? Don't shove it in your closet or dump it in
the trash. Instead, consider reusing or recycling it.

The EIA (Electronic Industries Alliance) sponsors the CEI
(Consumer Education Initiative) Web site (www.eiae.org).
The site provides details about reuse and recycle programs
available through various organizations. You can also find
information about local or nationals programs. Earth 911
(www.earth911.org), another handy online source, is a
clearinghouse for programs that prevent environmental
waste, including cell phone and electronics recycling.

Hardware manufacturers, including Dell, IBM, and HP, sponsor many nationwide consumer
electronics reuse and recycle programs. Some of the programs are free with a qualified purchase,
and other programs require a small fee for shipping, picking up, or refurbishing equipment. Some
local governments and national retailers also sponsor used electronics collection days in desig-
nated locations. Dell's 2003 Recycling National Tour, for example, visited 15 cities and collected
almost 2 million pounds of computer electronics.

Know What I Mean?

The real problem
is not whether
machines think
but whether
men do.

-B. F. Skinner, behaviorist and

author, in his 1969 book

"Contingencies of Reinforcement:

A Theoretical Analysis"

"To Start
Press Any Key'

"Where's the ANY
key? I see Esk [ESC],
Catarl [CTRL], and
Pig-Up [PGUP]. There
doesn't seem to be
any ANY key. Woo!
All this computer
hacking is making me
thirsty. I think I'll
order a [TAB]."

-Homer Simpson, "The
Simpsons" season seven.

108 August 2004 / www.pctoday.com

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