Hasta La Gadget!

Airbnb is more than an amazing site that lets anybody put their spare couch, room, or house up for rent-it’s a game. The goal for hosts: to rise through the search rankings, allowing them to get bookings, meet great people from all over the world, and swim in cash. For guests: to stay at amazing and unique places for a fraction of the price of a hotel room. Here’s what you need to know to win. More »

This article was written on October 26, 2009 by CyberNet.

Welcome to the WrapUp by CyberNet. This is a collection of news stories, downloads, and tips that we have collected over the last few days, but never got around to writing about. Don’t forget to send in your own tips, or just leave a comment on this page if you think you’ve got something we should include.

–News–

Google Reader Starts Using “Magic”
The Google Reader team announced that there is a new way to sort your feeds: by magic. They use your reading habits and web history (if you’ve opted in for web history tracking) to determine what sort of stuff from your feeds you’ll like the most. You can also view popular items from feeds you’re not even subscribed to, which they hope will help you discover new sites you’ll like.

Microsoft Reveals How Windows 7 is “Version 7″
Microsoft has assembled a video that clarifies exactly how they consider Windows 7 to be the 7th version of Windows. The order? Windows 1, Windows 2, Windows 3, Windows 95, Windows 98, Windows XP, Windows Vista, Windows 7. Who did they leave out from the consumer lineup? Poor ol’ Windows Me, that’s who. I think they’re trying to wipe it from their memory (no pun intended).

Microsoft Security Essentials Delivered to Over a Million Users
In the first week Microsoft received 1.5 million downloads of their Security Essentials antivirus software. According to them there were over 4 million virus detections in that first week on over a half million unique machines. That just goes to prove that their are plenty of people who still need antivirus software to keep them safe, and it’s a good thing Microsoft finally got around to offering a solution for free.

–News in Brief–

Windows 7 Compatibility Center Released
Microsoft has posted a site you can visit to see if your hardware or software is compatible with Windows 7.

Whitehouse.gov Now Powered by Drupal
In an interesting move the Whitehouse.gov site has decided to use the open source Drupal software as their content management engine.

Google Maps’ Appearance Takes New Direction
On Google Maps you can now see street names more clearly thanks to a visual refresh they’ve rolled out.  

Windows 7 Launch Day Facts
Over 8 million people tested out pre-release versions of Windows 7 from over 113 different countries.

Flickr Adds People Tagging
Flickr is rolling out people-tagging capabilities that TechCrunch says is better than what Facebook currently has.

Video Walkthrough of Apple’s Newest Additions
Apple unveiled a new “magic” mouse, new iMac’s, and more. This is a video walkthrough of their new products.

Twitter Hits 5 Billion Tweets
Robin Sloan happened to be the lucky person to post the 5 billionth tweet on Twitter.

uTorrent Holds 60% of BitTorrent Marketshare
Vuze, formerly known as Azureus, continues to drop in popularity as uTorrent emerges as the king of the BitTorrent network.

IMDB Turns 19
IMDB, which began as a USENET group, turned 19 about a week ago! Congrats to a site that definitely deserves it.

–Tips, Tutorials, and Reviews–

Ninite Does Bulk Installs for Windows Apps
This amazing service lets you choose the applications you want to install on your machine, and it will then create a custom installer for you to download. When running through the setup process it will keep the questions to a minimum, and according to Lifehacker it’s able to install most apps without asking you a single question. The number of apps supported is pretty incredible, and I could see this becoming a must-have app for anyone that sets up new PC’s regularly.

Burn Windows 7 ISO or put it on a USB Drive
Wow! Microsoft has finally wisened up and provides a tool to create a bootable DVD or USB drive that you can then install Windows 7 from. I’m happy to see the USB drive support in there because using media like that is nice since it’s reusable… as opposed to a DVD that most people probably won’t use more than a handful of times.

VistaSwitcher Improves Alt-Tab on XP, Vista, and Windows 7
I’m always on the lookout for something to improve my productivity, and for that reason I’m always tinkering with different application switchers. As the How-to Geek points out this is one awesome app switcher… especially because of the eye candy it offers.

–Tips in Brief–

How to Set Up a WordPress Blog on Your PC
A guide that covers everything you’ll need to get WordPress up and running on your local machine.

Look Up the Location of Any IP Address
Curious where an IP address is coming from? Just enter it in here to have it retrieve an approximate geographical location.

How to Safely Uninstall Ubuntu from a Dual-Boot Machine
An outline of what you need to do in order to remove Ubuntu without screwing up the other OS’s on your computer.

PortableApps.com Now Does Google Chrome On-the-Go
PortableApps now has a portable version of Chrome… kinda. It will create a portable version from the small file you download. They can’t actually redistribute Chrome as a portable browser due to licensing.

Lifehacker’s Guide to Windows 7
A rundown of all Lifehacker’s best Windows 7 tips.

How to Create a Virtual Hard Drive in Windows 7
A perfectly outlined guide to creating a virtual hard drive in Windows 7 that will appear as though it’s a second drive on your machine.

Microsoft Releases Windows 7 Sponsored Themes
You can now grab themes for products/companies such as Ferrari or the video game Gears of War.

Adobe Browserlab Open for All
I thought this was already open for everyone, but according to DownloadSquad Adobe just opened the doors so that you can easily start testing your site in all the most popular browsers.

Flickr Schedulr Lets You Upload Pics When it’s Convenient
Schedule your photos to upload when you won’t be using your PC.

How to Build a WiFi Home Surveillance System
An awesome tutorial on what you’ll need to create a motion-sensitive surveillance system in your own home.

Performance Showdown: Windows 7 vs. Snow Leopard
Spoiler: I wouldn’t really say one OS comes out on top of the other. They both have things they’re good at.

–Downloads–

• Avant Browser 11.7.40 [Mirror]
• CDBurnerXP 4.2.6.1748 [Mirror]
• Foxit Reader 3.1.2.1013 [Mirror]
• Google Chrome 4.0.222.12 ^Beta [Mirror]
• Google Desktop 5.9.909.30391 [Mirror]
• Maxthon 2.5.9.2246 [Mirror]
• MediaMonkey 3.1.2.1275 ^Beta [Mirror]
• Miranda 0.8.9 [Mirror]
• Miro 2.5.3 [Mirror]
• OpenOffice.org 3.2 ^Beta [Mirror]
• PDF-XChange Viewer 2.0.42.5 [Mirror]
• PeaZip 2.7.1 [Mirror]
• Picasa 3.5.79.74 [Mirror]
• Pidgin 2.6.3 [Mirror]
• RSSOwl 2.0 ^RC2 [Mirror]
• SeaMonkey 2.0 ^RC2 [Mirror]
• TrueCrypt 6.3 [Mirror]
• uTorrent 1.8.5 ^RC1 [Mirror]
• uTorrent 2.1 ^Beta [Mirror]
• VLC Media Player 1.0.3 ^RC1 [Mirror]
• WinMerge 2.13.9 ^Experimental [Mirror]

Copyright © 2011 CyberNetNews.com

Related Posts:

Confirmed: Public Vista SP1 Download Next WeekNew Updates Increase Vista’s PerformanceMicrosoft Releasing Plans For Windows Defender Beta 2Vista SP1 Download Coming SoonMicrosoft Releases Process Explorer 12

This article was written on January 15, 2008 by CyberNet.

When using your web browser there are a lot of things that you can do to speed up your efficiency and productivity, particularly when it comes to keyboard shortcuts. Thanks to a comment by Inferno_str1ke it struck me that some people may not realize the different ways you can make their browser open websites in a new tab. His comment sparked some “thank you’s” from other readers, and here’s what he had to say:

For about four months I was using the Google Toolbar search box exclusively, but now I’ve even dropped that in favour of keyword searches. I just hit Alt+D to jump to the URL box, type g,w,v,i,f for Google, Wikipedia, Google Video, Google Images and Facebook respectively, type a query and hit Enter or Alt+Enter if I want it in a new tab.

Did you know that in Firefox from the Address Bar or Search Box you can hit Alt+Enter to pull up the site in a new tab? We thought that this would be a good thing to share with all of our readers, and here’s a quick rundown of the various ways you can have sites open in a new tab for each of the different browsers:

–Firefox & Internet Explorer–

• Ctrl+T – Open a new tab with a blank page loaded.
• Alt+Enter – While in the Address Bar or Search Box this will open the requested site in a new tab.
• Ctrl+Shift+Enter – When you’ve selected a link using the keyboard this shortcut will open the hyperlinked site in a new tab.
• Ctrl+Enter – When you’ve selected a link using the keyboard this shortcut will open the hyperlinked site in a new tab in the background.
• Ctrl+Shift+Click – When left-clicking on a link with the mouse hold down the Shift key to have the hyperlinked site open in a new tab.
• Ctrl+Click – When left-clicking on a link with the mouse hold down the Ctrl+Shift keys to have the hyperlinked site open in a new tab in the background.

–Opera–

• Ctrl+T – Open a new tab with Speed Dial loaded.
• Shift+Enter – While in the Address Bar or Search Box this will open the requested site in a new tab.
• Ctrl+Shift+Enter – While in the Address Bar or Search Box this will open the requested site in a new tab in the background.
• Shift+Enter – When you’ve selected a link using the keyboard this shortcut will open the hyperlinked site in a new tab.
• Ctrl+Shift+Enter – When you’ve selected a link using the keyboard this shortcut will open the hyperlinked site in a new tab in the background.
• Shift+Click – When left-clicking on a link with the mouse hold down the Shift key to have the hyperlinked site open in a new tab.
• Ctrl+Shift+Click – When left-clicking on a link with the mouse hold down the Ctrl+Shift keys to have the hyperlinked site open in a new tab in the background.

Hopefully we’ve saved you some time!

Copyright © 2011 CyberNetNews.com

Related Posts:

Using Google’s Keyboard ShortcutsCreate Keyboard Shortcuts to Apps and DocumentsUltimate List of Keyboard ShortcutsCyberNotes: Override & Modify Keyboard Shortcuts on a MacKeyboard Shortcut Pop-up Menu Now in Gmail

This article was written on December 11, 2007 by CyberNet.

I’m not sure how long this is going to be available, but it looks as though Windows XP users can download the first Release Candidate of Service Pack 3 (SP3) straight from Microsoft. One member over at the WinMatrix forum posted the download link, which directly points to XP SP3 executable installer located on the Windows Update server.

The download is 336MB so make sure you have some time set aside for it to finish, but I have downloaded and verified that it is the real deal. Here are a few things you should know before downloading XP SP3:

• SP3 is cumulative, so users can install SP3 on top of Windows XP SP1 or SP2.
• SP3 is able to update any version of XP, including XP Media Center.
• SP3 will not upgrade Internet Explorer to version 7. The Service Pack does include updates for both versions of Internet Explorer, but the main version of IE that you’re running will remain untouched.

The installation process took me about 15 minutes to complete, which I would say is good because I was expecting it to take much worse. Here is a screenshot gallery from my journey:

(Click to Enlarge)

Download Windows XP SP3 (RC1) from Microsoft

Copyright © 2011 CyberNetNews.com

Related Posts:

Windows XP SP3 (RC2) Standalone DownloadsDownload The New Windows Media Player 11Windows XP SP3 (RC 2) Download on Windows UpdateMicrosoft Releases Windows Defender Beta 2Microsoft Accidentally Makes Vista 5308 Publicly Available

This article was written on April 03, 2008 by CyberNet.

Tutorial Thursday

The biggest reasons that I hear as to why people don’t perform backups is that they are either too lazy to set them up, or there just isn’t a good time to schedule them. The later excuse is often because they don’t want to “waste” their computer’s processing power and memory performing a backup when they are actually trying to use their computer. Sure they could leave it on overnight, but that just seems silly to leave a computer on for an extra 8 hours when all you need is 20 or 30 minutes to perform an incremental backup.

If you use one of those two excuses I’m hoping that the free Windows application I’m going to show you today will solve both of them. The solution is called IdleBackup, and as the name implies it can be used to backup important files and folders on your computer. The thing that really makes this unique is that it will check to see if the computer has been idle for at least one minute before performing a backup.

Once you get IdleBackup installed on your computer you’ll be presented with a window that looks like this:

(Click to Enlarge)

As you can see it is a pretty simple program without an over abundant amount of things to confuse you. All you have to do is check the box(es) corresponding to the areas on your computer that you want to backup. Each folder that you designate will be listed below the selection area for easy viewing.

The next thing that you’ll want to configure is the destination location for the backup files. This can be a location on the current hard drive, an external drive (memory card, USB drive, etc…), or another computer on the network:

And lastly you’ll want to set how often the files should be backed up. Check the Automatic on box if you want IdleBackup to stay on a set interval, otherwise backups will only be performed when you manually start them. If you do decide to enable the automatic backups you’ll want to specify how often the program should check to see whether the files have changed or not.

Backups, unless manually started, will only begin once the computer is idle for one minute regardless of whether the timer has hit the magic number you specified. That means if you schedule a backup for every 15 minutes, but use your computer for four straight hours the backup won’t begin until after you’ve finished.

The countdown area will show how long you have to wait before another backup is performed, but if you see it “stuck” on 60 seconds (like in the screenshot to the right) it’s because the computer is not idle. Once there is no activity on the machine the countdown will wait 60 seconds to ensure that the computer is idle, and then it will begin the backup process.

By default the IdleBackup will check keyboard/mouse usage and CPU activity to determine whether the computer is idle. I’m not sure how low the CPU usage needs to get before being considered “idle,” but if you find that backups are never being performed it might be good to disable the Cpu activity check feature.

There are some things that would be nice to configure, such as the amount of time the PC has to be idle before initializing a backup. However, that is a tradeoff you have to make for getting an application that is extremely simple to use.

Note: The first time that you run a backup it may take awhile depending on how many things need to be transferred. After that it will only copy changed files, and will never delete a file from the destination even if it is deleted from the source.

Get IdleBackup

Copyright © 2011 CyberNetNews.com

Related Posts:

Your Week in Review with Sunday’s SummaryCyberNotes: Powerful Free Backup SoftwareChange Your Google Talk Status to AwayPoll: Where Do You Backup Important Files?Almost Real-Time File Backups