A couple of days ago, my old wireless desktop set (mouse and keyboard) had its receiver die on me. So I had to go out and grab another wireless desktop set for my PC. Microsoft offers some great
wireless desktop sets but I decided to go with Logitech's
Cordless Desktop S 510.
The Logitech Cordless Desktop S 510 is Certified for Windows Vista and has some great features:
- Fast 27 MHz wireless performance.
- Programmable F-Keys that can be set to open favorite applications, websites, or files.
- One-Touch Controls that let you access music, video, volume, email, and the Internet.
- Power Management lets you go longer with a low-battery light and auto-off.
- Tilt Wheel plus Zoom allows you to go side to side or in and out on photos, websites or even spreadsheets.
I took some Unboxing shots to share.
The design of the keyboard is light, thin and simple which is really great.
I see a lot of keyboards with their One-Touch Controls on the top of the keyboard - the S 510 keyboard has the One-Touch Controls on the sides. Volume (music) controls are on the right and on the left is the zoom, internet and sleep/hibernate controls.
The mouse is pretty basic but has the great Tilt Wheel plus Zoom feature that lets me scroll side-to-side instead of just up and down. This is really useful. The Wireless Receiver for the S 510 is made in semi-transparent plastic giving a really interesting effect as you can see inside to the circuit board.
Overall, I'm really happy with my decision to go with Logitech's Cordless Desktop S 510. Logitech also has a really neat website for their Certified for Windows Vista products worth checking out.
Written by Brandon LeBlanc on February 13th, 2008 with comments disabled.
Read more articles on Certified for Windows Vista and Featured News and Logitech and Logitech Cordless S 510 and Windows Vista and keyboard and mouse and wireless.
Are you getting User Account Control popups in Windows Vista asking you always for permission to proceed to do simple tasks? Lets Disable it with these easy steps.
Watch my video tutorials for details:
Alternative way to disable these notifications:
Alternately, you can run the System Configuration Utility (a.k.a. msconfig) by typing msconfig at the command line or search box. When the tool runs, click the Tools tab and scroll down until you see Disable UAC. Highlight it and click the Launch button, then reboot. To turn it back on again, follow the same steps and choose Enable UAC.
If you're a fan of the Registry, you can also disable UAC using the Registry Editor. Launch the Registry Editor by typing regedit at the Start Search box or a command prompt and pressing Enter. Go to
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\System\EnableLUA
and give it a value of 0. You will need to reboot in order for the change to take effect.
UAC is also the culprit for another nagging Windows Vista annoyance. When you run some commands from the command prompt, you're told that you don't have administrative rights to run them, even if you're currently logged in as an administrator.
That's because UAC requires you to run the command prompt as an administrator -- what's called running an elevated command prompt. Simply being logged in as an administrator isn't good enough; you still have to run an elevated command prompt.
One way to do it is to type cmd into the Search box on the Start menu, right-click the command prompt icon that appears at the top of the Start menu, then select Run as administrator.
But if you don't want to go about doing that each time you run a command prompt, there's a simpler way. You can create a desktop shortcut for an elevated prompt, or pin the elevated prompt to the Start menu.
To create a shortcut on the desktop:
1. Right-click the desktop, and select New > Shortcut.
2. In the text box of the Create Shortcut dialog box that appears, type cmd and then click Next.
3. On the next screen, type a name for the shortcut -- for example, Elevated Command Prompt. Then click Finish.
4. Right-click on the shortcut you just created and select Properties.
5. Select the Shortcut tab and click the Advanced button.
6. Check the box titled Run as administrator. Click OK and OK again.
Now, when you want to run an elevated command prompt, simply double-click the shortcut.
If you'd like the elevated command prompt to appear on the Start menu, drag it from the Desktop to the Start button and place it where you would like it to be.
Other Tips Users have watched
Written by PCWizKid on February 13th, 2008 with comments disabled.
Read more articles on Microsoft Windows Vista and User Account Control and administrator and windows vista powertoys tweakui tweak tip howto UAC.
Set a fixed size Page File
In Control Panel the System applet has different tabs where you can manage these settings. The recommended size for a fixed Page file is shown at the bottom of the Virtual Memory tab. Choose this size as both the minimum and maximum under “Custom size”.
For A speedy networking
In Networking, Turn off Qos Packet Scheduler
On many machines, this will speed up networking. You can also Uncheck “IPV6″ since you probably don’t need this just yet.
Turn off the “chrome”
Turning off the fancy Aero interface, turning off the sidebar, and otherwise disabling the features that make Vista look and feel unique will help speed up performance. Free programs like CCleaner (”Crap Cleaner”) have features that let you manage the startup programs and clean up unneeded files off your hard drive.
Written by PC Freak on February 13th, 2008 with comments disabled.
Read more articles on tutorials.
Welcome to "The Quest for the Holy Desktop WMI Filter”, this is a global search for what you could call "The Perfect Desktop WMI Filter". A WMI filter which, by using WMI Query Language (WQL), should be able to spot DESKTOP computers only. It should be a general query - meaning it should be possible to use the filter in most Active Directory environments around the globe for Group Policy filtering.
So, what is a desktop really? Well, actually in this case we’ll say it’s the opposite of a laptop. Hmm, then what is a laptop? Easy enough: a computer with a battery! We’ve got the WMI filter for finding laptops already:
Select * from Win32_Battery - don’t you just love the simplicity in this query?
This filter will make a computer with a battery respond back with "TRUE" (because the WMI class instance is present), meaning a GPO with this filter will apply to computers with batteries. Simple right? And you might think it’s easy to just "turn it around" to find desktops, like:
Select * From Win32_Battery Where Availability != 2
or
Select * From Win32_Battery Where Availability IS NOT NULL
or
“Where Not X Like Y” or whatever
Maybe it is, maybe it’s not… I think it’s pretty damn hard! For spotting laptops we could have tested the classes Win32_PortableBattery, Win32_PCMCIAController, Win32_POTSModem as well - but somehow I think most people will agree, that the "essential ting", which makes a laptop a laptop, is in fact the battery presence!
But, our tests for spotting DESKTOPS only (machines without a battery - yes, I know this will include servers as they a "stationary" too) have not been a success yet! We probably just need the correct syntax? And this is where you get into the picture!
Are you able to crack open this nut? There’s a cool price!
This all started on a mailing list for Group Policy guys and girls - called GPTalk - created and maintained by Group Policy guru and MVP Darren Mar-Elia - the guy behind GPOguy.com and SDM Software. You can join the list RIGHT HERE and participate in this contest to WIN a free copy of the:
BUT you have to be the first person to crack this thing, there’ll be only ONE WINNER - that could be you!
I’ll be evaluating incoming answers - FIFO: "First In First Out" method is used. Hopefully we’ll see the most simple solution first - simplicity works, right? Actually I wouldn’t know in this case would I…
One important thing! We will ask you kindly to TEST any WMI query submissions before sending them to everybody on the list. During your testing, you should use a tool to verify the WMI filter against a minimum of 2 desktops and 2 laptops. You can use the free WMI Filter Validation Tool to test you WMI filters in your environment. Personally I’m also using Scriptomatic version 2 and WBEMTEST for finding the available classes, items, queries etc.
Please have a look at the "rules" further down!
Why do this? Well, because it’s fun - and useful at the same time… When looking at it generally, the purpose of this filter is to say: "I want these user settings to apply, but only when the user logs on to stationary machines". This can be used for a lot of security related setting, eg. in the case where Automatically cached Offline Files/Folders are unwanted on stationary machines for certain users etc. The job of most WMI filters placed on User policies is to limit which machines the policy setting(s) should apply to (even though WMI filters could check for user specific things too). Besides from that it’s a nice challenge, we can pretty easily "spot" laptops, as they have batteries – and desktops don’t, but that’s not good enough for Mr. WQL, is it?!
Stuff we have tried - and the rules
We’ve been around solutions looking for Win32_SystemEnclosure > ChassisType before - which basically doesn’t work in a WMI filter because that’s an Array (and yes, I’ve also seen lots of posts on forums out there claiming that particular class is the solution – but for WMI/WQL queries it’s not). If would work in a script (because you can add additional logic to scripts), but we are searching for a WMI Filter - not workarounds of any kind!
As mentioned we tried with the Win32_Battery WMI class. However, as desktops don’t know this class at all, they’ll return FALSE no matter what. Basically a desktop computer is gonna say “Heck, I don’t know anything about that class *Panic* I’m out!” – or just “False”… Bummer!
We have also tried PowerSupplyState, Win32_DesktopMonitor, Win32_DisplayConfiguration, Win32_SystemSlot, Win32_Fan and other classes – just haven’t found the perfect “this is definitely a desktop WMI item value or class”…
We’re basically looking for something like:
A) Select * from Win32_SomeClassOnlyDesktopsHave
Or
B )Select * from Win32_SomeClass.SomeItem = “SomeValueOnlyDesktopsHave”
Or
C) Some way of saying “if you don’t know the class (eg. Win32_Battery), then apply the GPO anyway”
Again, the “quest” is to find the perfect, *universal*, way of spotting “Non-laptops” or Desktops – it can of course be done by looking for some special computer Manufacturer/Model, BIOS version, specific hardware driver or whatever – but that stuff it most likely gonna be different from environment to environment. Also, if we all just used computer names like “DESKxxx” for desktops and “LAPTxxx” for laptops, we could have used WMI filters for computer name – but unfortunately that’s not the case - or at least I won’t consider that a valid solution 
The thing is, that normally it’s the LAPTOPS that have special hardware – like Batteries and built-in Modems, PCMCIA slots etc. – so they are pretty easy to find. With desktop computers it’s another story – hope you can help us out here!
Please, again, we know lot’s of “workarounds”, but what we need is a *WMI filter* and it has to return *TRUE* for *DESKTOPS* (or let’s call the NON-LAPTOPS or NON-PORTABLES, it doesn’t really matter).
Remember, simplicity works - maybe the answer/solution is pretty straight forward? Feel free to post any additional questions to the mailing list!
Another example of what has been tried
We could maybe try to go for presence of PCI (and not Mini-PCI) or AGP slots, as we expect most desktops to have PCI slots (and laptops to have Mini-PCI, but that would depend on the form factor) – or maybe AGP (but does onboard VGA count as AGP? Any PCI VGA cards left out there? Yeah, probably…). If not we could maybe go for something like this:
A) Select * From Win32_SystemSlot Where SlotDesignation = “PCI%”
Or
B) Select * From Win32_SystemSlot Where SlotDesignation = “AGP”
However, this is not accepted as a solution as we cannot say that all desktop computers have AGP slots. But - maybe you can convince us otherwise?
Other cool Group Policy information:
You’ll find additional Group Policy information at these sites:
www.gpanswers.com - The home of Group Policy guru and MVP Jeremy Moskowitz, check out the community there too!
TechNet Group Policy Forum - A brand new Group Policy forum on Microsoft TechNet
The Group Policy Team - The home of the Microsoft Group Policy Team
Jakob H. Heidelberg blog - My own blog, mostly about Group Policy and Security
www.heidelbergit.dk - My website with blog RSS, certifications, LinkedIn info etc.
Hope to hear from you soon - O’ Yee Knight of the Microsoft Group Policy Table!
Written by Jakob H. Heidelberg on February 13th, 2008 with comments disabled.
Read more articles on Darren Mar-Elia and Jeremy Moskowitz and MVP and gpanswers.com and gpoguy.com and group policy and microsoft and technet.
