Archive for the ‘Windows’ Category

Record Game Sounds with Fraps

For those of you wondering how to record the sounds outputted by your computer, this simple post should configure Windows to allow you to record the sounds with programs such as Fraps.

Load up Fraps and hit the Movies tab. Make sure Record Sound is checked and Detect best sound input is selected. Next, head into Control Panel, Sounds and Audio Devices (in classic view). (more…)

Check if Your Computer Can Run a Specific Game

System Requirements Lab is a simple tool designed to help you check your computer’s hardware and detect whether it meets the official minimum and recommended requirements of a PC game. It requires the installation of a quick Java applet (SRLApplet from Husdawg, LLC).

Select Your Game

On the front page you’ll see a box asking you to select a product. It lists many of the newer generation games. Pick one and hit Can You Run It?

A loading bar will appear, and depending on whether you’ve used it before, it’ll ask you to install the applet. Let the applet install, and your results should appear shortly.

The Results

The first thing you’ll see is a quick glance at where your PC stands relative to the minimum and recommended requirements.

The second thing you’ll see below is a list of the required PC specifications, and then your PC specifications with a rating bar relative to the requires specifications. It’ll also list any “helpful” information, including links to free driver updates, and if your hardware does not meet the requirements, a link to their recommendations (which uses a page from the store TigerDirect).

Keep Pidgin Always on Top

For Windows – Keep Pidgin’s buddy list “always on top” of other windows for easy access to instant messaging without the hassle of switching windows. First, head to Tools → Plugins in the buddy list.

Scroll to the bottom, make sure Windows Pidgin Options is checked, then click it and Configure Plugin.

Next to Keep Buddy List window on top, click the menu and select Always. Hit Close to both windows and Pidgin should now remain on top of your other windows.

Sound Notification on Hitting *lock

Windows stows away a setting that enables a beep whenever one of the lock keys are hit (Caps Lock, Scoll Lock, and Num Lock). For those of you who need extra notification when you accidentally hit the Capslock button, we’ll show you the quick Control Panel setting.

Open Control Panel, enter Accessibility Options, and check the box that says Use ToggleKeys. Hit OK and you now have auditory notification when you hit a “toggle key.”

Disable the Sleep Button Function

New keyboards now often come with a sleep button, which can sometimes be in an easy to hit location (e.g. near Esc key). Luckily, the Control Panel provides an easy way to change the function.

Head over to the Control Panel, hit Power Options, and click on the Advanced Tab. Under When I press the sleep button on my computer, select from a number of choices. I picked “ask me what to do.”

Demo Software in a Sandbox

Sandboxie, a free application, creates a virtual layer on your computer where you can run and install various software applications without actual changes to your true hard disk.

Simply, Sandboxie forces applications to write to the layer instead of the hard disk, and is able to wipe everything clean afterwards, perfect for demoing software. In this post we’ll be explaining the very basic usage of Sandboxie so you can run and install programs into a layer (sandbox). Download and install from here. (more…)

Disable Windows XP’s Startup and Shutdown Sounds

We’re going to show you how to easily disable Windows XP’s startup and shut down sounds, and optionally, any other sounds that Windows makes when you perform an action. You can also use these settings to change the sounds associated with start up and shut down.

Head over to Control Panel, head over to Sounds and Audio Devices, and hit the Sounds tab. Scroll down to either Start Windows or Exit Windows and select [None] from the option menu. That’s it!

Deploy a Local Web Server on Windows

In this tutorial, we’re going to show you how to quickly deploy a local WAMP (Windows Apache MySQL PHP) server in a few minutes using XAMPP. Using a local webserver, you can install PHP web applications on your local computer (such as a personal wiki, chat, forum, etc).

For this tutorial, we’ll be showing you how to setup XAMPP using the self extracting 7-Zip file. (more…)

Quick Screenshots with Faststone Capture

For Windows, Faststone Capture 5.3 is a free (for noncommercial use) lightweight application allowing you to take screenshots (pictures) of your desktop.

It allows you to easily take a picture of the current window, the selected window/object, a rectangular region, a freehand region, full screen, and scrolling regions (like a webpage in a web browser). It’ll allow you to save or annotate the image in the same dialog, eliminating the need for pasting into Paint. Other features include a magnifier and a screen color picker.

Download it here.

Sync Host and Guest Folders in VirtualBox

As a follow up to our seamless Ubuntu in Windows tutorials, we’re going to show you how to sync a Windows (host) folder to a folder in the Ubuntu (guest). You’ll need to have guest additions installed on the guest OS for this one.

For this tutorial we’ll be syncing the H: drive on Windows (yours will probably be C:) with /home/jason/windows in Ubuntu. (more…)