The Lady Programmer

Today, I decided to see how I can put back the old task manager that comes with every Windows XP system. I could not see the task manager each time I wanted to kill some process that hanged up on me.

So I searched for the Internet to find a solution, the first one that I’ve seen is the Remove Restrictions Tool (RRT). A good tool, but I need to pay for it. I don’t want to, since I can go around modifying the registry itself without getting a heart attack.

The next thing I did was to search Google to find out which part of the Windows registry I should look to. Google did not give me the results I was looking for.

Then I suddenly remembered Maddy, the guy behind Great Registry Hacks. Sometime last year, he was a constant EC dropper and visitor of my blogs, so I decided to search his blog. I decided to contact him after trying to search for that thing that I need to find.

Maddy was fast! He emailed me back with two solutions: a free software he wrote to enable/disable the task manager, and a direct hack to the Windows registry.

But it was not enough to make the task manager appear. His next suggestion was to install Process Explorer instead. It worked! Thanks to Maddy!

Process Explorer: a lightweight replacement to default Windows Task Manager

I’ve met Process Explorer in my previous work, so this software is not news to me. It just did not occur to me to use this instead of figuring out how to make the Task Manager work.

As I exchanged conversations with Maddy over YM, it looked like my Task Manager was corrupted. I tried to open the file then returned an error message indicating that the file cannot be found. (UPDATE: I got the Task Manager back after installing Process Manager then clicking “restore Process Manager” command on the menu.

Here’s the download link: download Process Manager from Microsoft.

If you need some help with the Windows registry, then go to Maddy’s Great Registry Hacks and ask him.

I got hold of a copy of the software at Computer FileExtensions.com today but I was not able to install it successfully. I have a 64-bit Windows XP system and that software prompted me that it is not designed to work with my existing system.

With so many hardware already ready to run 64-bit system, I find it strange that Computer FileExtensions still issue an application that will still only run on 32-bit operating systems.

Computer FileExtensions is supposed to fix the registry. At first glance, the website boasts of a huge database of file extensions that the software can fix – it is practically from A to Z, zero to 9 and those extensions that begin with the @. Almost every extension that you can think of are covered by this software: file extension BIN, file extension TMP and file extension TORRENT are some that are included in the list.

With so many 64-bit systems sold in the mainstream computer market, I think it is worthy to wait for the 64-bit version. If you happen to have a 32-bit system, then maybe you can give this software a try.

One of the sites that I had gone today is Drivers Software. This is another software resource to hunt for drivers. I had been able to bookmark this one as another site to find drivers whenever I perform preventive maintenance on my PC.

Out-of-Date Driver Detection

There is this one particular thing that I like on this site: the site offers two big buttons that offers options to either choose UPDATE DRIVERS or conduct FREE SCAN. Either way these buttons lead to download a software to use for both functions.

scan or update?

I did click one of the buttons to download and install the software. Like other typical software this one starts out with a helpful wizard-like interface. Eventually, this software informed me that I need to update my Nvidia drivers as well as my Realtek sound drivers too.

those two drivers that need to be upgraded

The scanning was really free, but updating those two drivers are not. When I hit the NEXT button, it lead me to the page where I had to pay for the upgrade feature. The scanning feature really saves me a lot of time in checking whether all of my drivers are upgraded.

The Website

The site lists down all the drivers that Drivers Software keeps track of. Initially, I mistook that for free downloadable links, but I noticed that each one of this links points out to the same software file that I had to install to detect and upgrade outdated software.

The search feature also needs more work. I tried entering “Epson C41UX” but that returned zero results. I had to enter “Epson” on the search box instead to see the link going to all Epson drivers. I clicked on that single link and I found the particular driver that I am looking for.

I am not yet done with this blog’s redesign. Anyway, I just made a quick drop to inform all of you about contest. Here’s one that will appeal to those who are into those geeky programming stuff like me:

Are you the next XML superstar?

This contest is being made to raise familiarity in XQuery, XML and DB2. It is open to all students, professionals and hobbyists. It is even divided into five separate tracks, which is based on the skill level of the individual. Enter into one, or enter all of them and get bigger chances of grabbing the top prizes.

The video mania is probably the easiest way to participate and grab a prize, which is actually in the form of a Nintendo Wii. However, if you want to get the most attractive prices in the form of an iPod Nano, an IBM overseas lab trip or an iPhone, then a contestant must challenge himself or herself by participating in programming contests.

If you think you are now up to this challenge, then take part now in this IDUG contest, help raise awareness, boost your programming skills and win a prize. Be sure to check out the website for the detailed mechanics of this contest.

I was offline yesterday. I decided to do put in some downtime and do preventive maintenance work. In the long run it does wonders.

What’s my preventive maintenance duty like?

• Recovering hard disk space
• deleting unneeded personal files (to make my files more manageable)
• deleting old installers, drivers and updates (they take too much space and I download new versions anyway with my fast internet connection)
• uninstalling all programs that I don’t use
• clearing out the temp files folder (which had grown to a gigabite of space) 
• clearing the trash bin
• Checking my firewall settings – making sure that it is set to optimum, just enough to let my torrents, downloads, file transfers work I still use the free Comodo personal firewall at its optimum defense setting.
• Switch to using a free antivirus program. I settled for Avira AntiVir Personal. I have a firewall anyway. It is also important to run a full scan once in a while.
• Defragmenting the hard disk. Very important. Diskeeper 2008 is still my favorite because it allows me to leave autodefragmentation on; it is also possible to defragment the page file too – which results to a faster performance that I experience myself. 
• TuneUp Utilities is an all-in-one nifty utility where I can do most tune ups like unchecking or removing programs that run on startup, optimizing my internet speed, repair, clean and reduce registry size and do check disk operations. What’s great is that I don’t need to hunt for separate programs to do each of those operations. I can even configure it to do automatic tuneups in the background.

Doing preventive maintenance regularly is one way to take care of the PC and detect any potential problems that can be seen.

Are you doing regular PC maintenance? Or do you wait for your PC to be broken? Share your thoughts.