Your Windows Live ID is essentially your online identity for all of the Windows Live services, Xbox Live, Zune and other third party websites (such as Expedia.com) that utilize Windows Live ID. If you're using Windows Live Hotmail and Windows Live Messenger, your Windows Live ID stores all your contacts and email messages. Your Windows Live ID is definitely something you don't want to have compromised and I've got several pointers - or best practices - in keeping your Windows Live ID safe.
Do not hand out your password! Don't give anyone your password to your Windows Live ID. Handing out your password to anyone is simply asking for trouble. Don't even give out your password to friends or family. I can't imagine a reason why they would need it. Just don't give out your Windows Live ID credentials at all.
Be careful giving your Windows Live credentials on non-Microsoft websites. There are some websites out there that will claim they "require" your Windows Live ID credentials for their service. Some sites use this tactic to gain access to your Windows Live ID.
Fact: Microsoft will only ask for your Windows Live ID credentials on login.live.com and nowhere else!
Use a strong password for your Windows Live ID. Don't use common words or names. Use a combination of uppercase and lowercase letters, numbers, and symbols.
Don't use an obvious answer to your secret question. Microsoft provides a list of possible "secret questions" for your account. A secret question is used when you forget your password for your Windows Live ID. Choose a secret question that has an answer that people won't be able to guess (friends, family, etc). The risk you have in using a secret question with an answer your friends might be able to guess is that your friends can try to "hack" your Windows Live ID and have fun with you. Your secret answer must have 5 characters or more and is not case sensitive. Remember to remember your secret answer of course.
Added protection: make your password expire every 72 days. You can login to account.live.com and change your password for your Windows Live ID and configure it to expire every 72 days. I personally don't choose this option rather I change my password every couple weeks on my own.
Neelamadhaba Mahapatro, General Manager for Microsoft's Identity Services (including Windows Live ID) has a post over on the Windows Live Dev Blog explaining Microsoft ongoing to commitment to keeping your Windows Live ID safe and what's being done today to protect Windows Live ID users from phishing.
Written by Brandon LeBlanc on May 5th, 2008 with no comments.
Read more articles on 1429 and 1673 and 169 and 2065 and 2157 and 401 and Contributors and Featured News and Security and Windows Live and protection.
Your Windows Live ID is essentially your online identity for all of the Windows Live services, Xbox Live, Zune and other third party websites (such as Expedia.com) that utilize Windows Live ID. If you're using Windows Live Hotmail and Windows Live Messenger, Read More......(
read more)
Written by Windows Vista Team Blog on May 5th, 2008 with no comments.
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Slow computer getting you down? Wish you could speed up your system so that games won’t crawl by like a slide show permanently set to slow? Well look no further! I shall share five easy steps that you can take to improve your system’s speed! Most of them are free of charge, and all of them should have some effect on your system. So without further ado, we begin with:
1. Remove spyware and adware from your system. Have you noticed recently that ads seem to pop up whenever you go to a Web page? Or that Internet speeds are about that of diseased livestock? Your system’s probably chock full of spyware. What to do? Well, thankfully there are several things you can do. First, download either Spybot-S&D or Lavasoft’s Ad-Aware, and run it. This should remove most if not all of the spyware and adware on your system. Neither of these are particularly robust, however, so we move on to:
2. Remove viruses from your system. Get yourself a decent virus scanner program. Big names include MacAfee, Symantec, or Norton. By the way it should be mentioned that virus scanners like the Big Three tend to be huge. Big, beefy programs that can chew up RAM faster than Dudley Dursley chewed up Harry’s birthday cake. If this is a problem for you, take a look at avast! avast! is a free virus scanner that can be downloaded, but be careful. Phishing sites love to pretend to be “free virus scanner software” and so you have to be careful. Yes, avast! is a respected name and is not a virus, but only if you actually download it and not some trojan.
3. Defragment your hard drive with the disk defragmentation tool, usually located in Start / Programs / Accessories / System Tools. This useful little program will improve performance by compacting your data so that your programs aren’t all located in tiny little bits. Some people might argue this point, saying that defragmentation doesn’t actually improve anything, but look at it this way: it never hurts at worst, and at best has a chance of improving your runtime! So where’s the loss?
4. Remove dust. Buy some cans of compressed air (yes I’m aware of the irony of purchasing a can of air. No, I do not wish to purchase any bridges today). Using this compressed air, blow the dust out of your system. That dust does your CPU no favors and a thick, liberal coating of dust tends to collect when you leave your computer running in a dirty room. Oh and by the way, after you’ve blown all that dust into the air, it’ll settle. All over your carpet. So you might wanna vacuum later. Just an idea.
5. Clean your registry. CCleaner is a good registry fixer that’ll fix all those broken things in your registry. By the way, don’t go mucking about in the registry without backing it up first. If you do not do this, then I cannot be legally responsible for any time rifts, space distortions, or world wars caused by unexpected changes made by CCleaner. That said, properly done, a registry change often helps in improving performance. Also check your startup programs: there are programs that are set to start as soon as Windoze boots, and this can cause Windoze to start up slower. Removing a few (AIM is a good one) might improve your startup process. You might keep your hair a bit longer, too.
One final bit of advice. Oftentimes I’ll see on PC-building Web sites people wondering why their computer is “running so slowly even though they have the best gear.” The word of advice? Check your PSU (Power Supply Unit). How far do you suppose you’d get if your car’s gas tank had a maximum capacity of 2 gallons of gas? Would you want such a car? Well, your “awesome gear” won’t get too far on a puny PSU either. If your computer’s operating much slower than you’d expect from your hardware, consider replacing your PSU with one that can actually handle your power-hungriest parts (usually your CPU and GPU). Calculators for what wattage of PSU you might need are all over the Web. Just to be safe it might be better to go 50 watts or so above the recommended, just in case you decide to add something else later.
Tags:adware,
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Clean,
Computer,
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defragment,
defragmentation,
disk defragmentation,
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Hard drive,
Internet,
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lavasoft,
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Written by Jason on May 5th, 2008 with no comments.
Read more articles on 1429 and 1673 and 169 and 2065 and 2157 and 401 and CPU and Contributors and Defragment and Internet and Performance and Ram and Spyware and Virus and computer and defragmentation and disk defragmentation and hard drive and registry and remove and speed and spybot and startup.
Gradually more buyers are either purchasing vista or are stuck with it as part of their new laptop or desktop purchase. Below are the actual Windows Vista features which are not available in all editions. Check to see if you are getting the features you need before you buy the Vista Edition of your choice. A common feature not available in the Home editions of Vista is the “Windows Fax and Scan” support. So if your looking some common and no so common features you might want to get
Look and Feel
| Home Basic | Home Premium | Business | Enterprise | Ultimate |
| Fancy Windows transparency (”See through glass style”) |
| Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Windows Flip 3D |
| Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Live Taskbar Thumbnails |
| Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
Security features
| Home Basic | Home Premium | Business | Enterprise | Ultimate |
| Parental Controls | Yes | Yes |
|
| Yes |
NOTE: Also it is important to note that the ability to access advanced areas to control security features manually for example such as the “Security Policies” secpol.msc is not available in the Home editions.
Performance support
| Home Basic | Home Premium | Business | Enterprise | Ultimate |
| Maximum RAM (64-bit version) | 8 GB | 16 GB | 128+ GB | 128+ GB | 128+ GB |
| Physical processor support | 1 | 1 | 2 | 2 | 2 |
File System Tools and Support
| Home Basic | Home Premium | Business | Enterprise | Ultimate |
| Scheduled backup |
| Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Windows ShadowCopy |
|
| Yes | Yes | Yes |
| System image backup and recovery |
|
| Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Encrypting File System (EFS) |
|
| Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Windows BitLocker Full Drive Encryption |
|
|
| Yes | Yes |
Bundled applications
| Home Basic | Home Premium | Business | Enterprise | Ultimate |
| Added games |
| Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
Digital media features
| Home Basic | Home Premium | Business | Enterprise | Ultimate |
| Windows Media Center |
| Yes |
|
| Yes |
| Windows Media Center HDTV and CableCard support |
| Yes |
|
| Yes |
| Xbox 360 Media Center Extender compatibility |
| Yes |
|
| Yes |
| Windows Movie Maker | Yes | Yes |
|
| Yes |
| Windows Movie Maker HD format support |
| Yes |
|
| Yes |
| Windows DVD Maker |
| Yes |
|
| Yes |
Networking features
| Home Basic | Home Premium | Business | Enterprise | Ultimate |
| Number of supported simultaneous peer network connections | 5 | 10 | 10 | 10 | 10 |
| Network Projector support |
| Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Presentation Settings |
| Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Remote Desktop | Client only | Client only | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Join domain (Windows Server/SBS) |
|
| Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Offline files and folder support |
|
| Yes | Yes | Yes |
| IIS Web Server |
|
| Yes | Yes | Yes |
Mobility features
| Home Basic | Home Premium | Business | Enterprise | Ultimate |
| Windows Mobility Center | Partial | Partial | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Sync Center | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Tablet PC functionality |
| Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Touch screen support |
| Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Windows SideShow (auxiliary display support) |
| Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
Other features
| Home Basic | Home Premium | Business | Enterprise | Ultimate |
| Windows Ultimate Extras |
|
|
|
| Yes |
| Windows Fax and Scan |
|
| Yes | Yes | Yes |
Other Tips Users have watched
Written by PCWizKid on May 5th, 2008 with no comments.
Read more articles on 1429 and 1673 and 169 and 2065 and 2157 and 401 and Contributors and Ultimate and Windows Vista.
Why upgrade? Chances are you have bought something online with a credit card, used internet banking, or dealt with confidential information on your computer. If you use a wireless router with anything less than WPA2 encryption, your information may not be as secure as you think.
“WPA2 security is definitely worth the modest amount of effort required to set it up. The original WPA security standard can be cracked with relative ease unless you use a passphrase that is longer than 20 characters and is not merely composed of words that can be found in a dictionary.” [Quote from the PC World article: Wireless Tips: Your Wireless Network Needs a Security Update]
1. Check current devices for compatibility. Your router and wireless network card may already support WPA2; Google your devices and find out. If they do, download the latest drivers for your wireless network card and update the firmware on your wireless router (very easy to do, but follow the manufacturer’s instructions carefully).
If your devices don’t support WPA2, and the security of the information transferred over your network is important to you, consider buying a wireless network card and router that support WPA2. Most recent wireless devices have WPA2 as standard.
2. Download the WPA2 Hotfix for Windows XP. This threw me when I was setting up my network. You need to download this hotfix or WPA2 will not work. It’s that simple. The hotfix is #KB893357 available from the Microsoft Web site.
3. Set a strong password for both network key and wireless router. What’s the point of all this if you set a one word password? So make it greater than 20 characters, consisting of numbers, uppercase and lowercase letters, and obscure characters such as @ and &. Randomize it — be creative. Get your pets to walk on your keyboard. Just don’t be predictable. Pretend you’re Jack Bauer and this is a matter of national security.
4. Don’t bother with MAC filtering or Hide SSID. They add little or nothing to your security. Unless you have a specific reason for doing so, activating them generally only makes your life more stressful.
5. Use TKIP & AES encryption when selecting the encryption settings on your wireless router and on your computer; select WPA2-Personal with TKIP & AES encryption. This is a very high level of security for today’s standards.
HOT TIP: WPA2 Personal is the one to use unless you run a large enterprise.
BONUS TIP: Use the Windows Wireless Assistant built into Windows rather than the one your wireless network card came with. It generally works with less conflict and generally uses less system resources. It’s one less “Yet Another Program That Wants To Load At Startup.”
Tags:compatibility,
Computer,
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Microsoft,
Network,
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Written by Jason on May 5th, 2008 with no comments.
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If you’re running Vista, but still manage XP machines, don’t use a Vista machine to slipstream XP SP3, it mucks up the PID process.
Post from: ITsVISTA
Don’t slipstream XP SP3 on Windows Vista! - KezNews.com
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Written by Joe on May 5th, 2008 with no comments.
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Trojan.Win32.BlackBird (also know as Worm.Win32 or BlackBird) used to be a real virus, now fake anti-spyware software like IE Defender will display Trojan.Win32.BlackBird as their scan result to trick user to buy the fake anti-spyware program. The fake anti-spyware program usually get installed onto your PC without your permission, through Trojan, malware and virus (or [...]
Written by Alex on May 5th, 2008 with no comments.
Read more articles on 1429 and 1673 and 169 and 2065 and 2157 and 401 and Contributors and Spyware Removal.
Adware.Win32.MalwareAlarm, part of a fake system popup driven by fake anti-spyware software such IE Antivirus or MalwareAlarm, will display Adware.Win32.MalwareAlarm related warning messages in your Windows XP or Vista computers. The fake anti-spyware program usually get installed onto your PC without your consent or notice, through Trojan, malware or virus. In many cases, the trojan [...]
Written by Alex on May 5th, 2008 with no comments.
Read more articles on 1429 and 1673 and 169 and 2065 and 2157 and 401 and Contributors and Spyware Removal.
Like busses you wait ages for a Windows Service Pack, then two come along at once. Hard on the heels of Vista SP1, which mostly went without a hitch, we can now look forward to XP Service Pack 3, the last for the operating system, which is now heading towards retirement, probably next year.
If you were around when MS unleashed SP2 you are forgiven for a brief shudder of trepidation, but I think this one should go quite smoothly. Unlike XP SP2, which re-wrote a lot of the operating system’s code, this one focuses on rolling up all previous security updates since the release of SP2, and a reported 1074 fixes and upgrades. Most of them are anonymous behind the scenes things that you’ll be happier not knowing about (because they are mostly deathly dull…), but there are a few interesting bits and bobs. One of them is a new Product Activation module, which allows users to install XP without having to enter an activation key, better network integration with Server 2008 and there’s a promise of improved performance with Microsoft Office. XP SP3 will be on your auto update list in the next few days or weeks but if you just can’t wait you can jump the queue and download it from Microsoft Update. Be warned, it’s a bit of a whopper at 428Mb, you need to have installed SP1 or SP2 before you can install SP3, and this is for the 32-bit version of XP only.
Tags:activation key,
download,
integration,
Microsoft,
Microsoft Update,
Office,
office xp sp3,
Operating system,
Performance,
Security,
security updates,
service pack 3,
upgrade,
Windows
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Written by Jason on May 5th, 2008 with no comments.
Read more articles on 1429 and 1673 and 169 and 2065 and 2157 and 401 and Contributors and Microsoft Update and Office and Performance and Security and Upgrade and Windows XP and activation key and download and microsoft and operating system and security updates and service pack 3 and windows.
Alun Williams pointed out that if you pass invalid parameters to DeferWindowPos ,
it does not destroy the HDWP .
Well, yeah, because if you pass invalid parameters,
then all bets are off . Different functions perform different degrees of parameter
validation; Read More......(
read more)
Written by The Old New Thing : Code on May 5th, 2008 with no comments.
Read more articles on 1429 and 1673 and 169 and 2065 and 2157 and 401 and Code and Contributors.
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