by John Ackerley

The first time I saw TuneUp Companion I was a little dubious about what it claimed it could do with my vast music collection.

The company that produced TuneUp recognised that there was a problem with the general public’s home iTunes music collection. With missing information and the lack of album art on offer that even iTunes own database could not handle.

I myself found iTunes “Get Album Artwork” option was useless at the best of times but TuneUp claimed to be able to clean up at least 90% of my music.

After downloading their soft ware I started up iTunes and TuneUp started at the same time adding a small box next to the window. The first thing that greats you is a picture of a cool retro rocket-man logo while it connects to the TuneUp’s server.

The free version gives you the chance to clean up to 100 songs and download 50 album covers to get you started after that you have a choice of two payment options.

$19.95 - £12.58 for one year

$29.95 - £18.86 for a lifetime subscription

Currency conversion correct on 25/05/2009 0.62970 British pound per US dollar

These will give you unlimited clean up’s and album art downloads.

With my 5969 songs I spent a good part of the day cleaning my library and at the end I had only 764 tracks left with messed up info. This to me was excellent as I have a lot of white label tracks in my collection.

That’s not all this software does though with a few extra features. As you play a song you can click on the “Tuniverse” tab and see videos from YouTube a Bio of that group and concert Notifications, locations, ticket prices and places to buy them.

I believe that TuneUp is a must have for all iTunes user’s as it makes a handy add-on and makes iTunes look how you always wanted it to.

TuneUp Media is a software application (Windows and Mac) for the iTunes software. Now, I am not an iTunes user, but from what I hear, it is a great program to organize your mp3s, add missing cover art and much, much more.

On Tuesday May 19th an new version of TuneUp Media was released to Apple Retail stores worldwide. Both the retail and online version of TuneUp will contain a massively updated user interface and performance enhancements for iTunes. Here’s a three minute video that demonstrates all that TuneUp can do for your iTunes music collection:

TuneUp Media has kindly offered WindowsTalk one free TuneUp Gold registration code to give away to our readers & followers.

To qualify, please post a response in this thread stating that you use iTunes (a requirement to run TuneUp) and that you would like to be entered in the draw.

One winner will be picked at random (using randomizer.org) from the first five (5) responders.

From a TechNet Flash email:

“Want a quick way to check if your PC can run Windows 7? In general, if your PC can run Windows Vista, it can run Windows 7. But if you're not running Windows Vista, or are just not sure if your system is ready to run Windows 7, download the Windows 7 Upgrade Advisor Beta. The Windows 7 Upgrade Advisor Beta is a pre-release version, and is available in U.S. English only.”

By Stephanie Calahan

Can you find the files on your computer, or do you find it easier to just re-create the document? Whether you work at a Fortune 500 company, a small to medium-sized business, run a business out of your home, or run your household, vast amounts of electronic information are now part of the typical workspace. "eClutter" affects productivity and increases stress in much the same way that paper clutter does. Here are 6 tips to help you find what you need on your computer.

Use Clear File Naming Conventions

When computers were first introduced to the working population, there was a limit on how you could name your files. This led to very cryptic names. Fortunately, today technology has advanced. You can now name your files just about anything you want. Avoid using shortened naming conventions to name your files. You should be able to immediately recognize what a document is from the file label.

Be Consistent in Your File Naming

Work to create a file naming standard for both your electronic and paper files and folders. For example, "Financial Plan - Home version 3" or "2006 Sales Proposal - S. Hammitt."

Find Your Important Files Fast

Most computer programs display folders and files in alphabetical order, with numbers coming before letters. In order to use this to your advantage, put a digit, such as 0, 1, 2, etc. in front of your folders or files that you use most often. For example, you could name a file "0 Phone Calls for Today", or "1 To Do List." By putting the digit in front of the name, you will always have your most frequently used folders and files appear at the top of the list. Note, you can frequently use this technique with your email folders as well.

Make Finding Your Digital Photos Easy

The digital photo industry has taken all of us by storm, and why not? It is wonderful! The cameras often provide great picture quality with instant gratification. You instantly know if you got the shot of your son or daughter making that adorable face . . . Many camera makers, such as Kodak, have made downloading all of your digital image files as easy as pressing a button and presto! They are all on your computer. The downside is that loaded straight from your camera, your images have cryptic file names. If you don't have time to rename every file, start by downloading like photos to a specific folder. For example "2008.08.24 - David First Day of School." This folder contains all of the photos that we took for my son's first day of school as well as the day the shots were taken.

Match Your Paper and Electronic Filing

Organize the files in your computer to match your paper filing system -- use the same categories, sub-categories, and file names. Then, if you have paper files that correlate to your electronic files, name the paper files the same thing. Why learn two filing systems when you don't have to?

Start Your Files with the Year then The Rest of the Date

If you have a practice of using the creation date as a part of the file's name, consider starting the naming with the year first. So, if you had a file that was created on January 03, 2008, rather than saying 01032008 (where all 01 items would sort together regardless of year) try 20080103. This allows everything to be sorted chronologically by year and then month and day. All of one year will automatically be sorted together.

By using these tips and techniques you will be able to find your electronic files quickly and with little effort.

(c) 2009 by Stephanie LH Calahan. Productive & Organized - You don't have to do it our way, because we help you find YOUR way! (tm) Sound interesting? It is!

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Stephanie_Calahan
http://EzineArticles.com/?Dont-Recreate-it---Find-That-Computer-File-Quickly&id=2348744

My colleague, Security MVP Corrine Chorney of Security Garden has just published an excellent article on PC security for folks like you and me. The premise of the article is: “The best way to protect your garden is to fence it in.The same applies to your computer.”

I encourage you to have a look at her article and then have a serious look at your own PC security measures and see if you need to make any changes.

Security Garden: Basic Computer Security for the Home User

For those running the Release Candidate of Windows 7, likely you have received at least three (3) 'test updates' so far. Microsoft tells us there will be more, and Computerworld has an article on it here.

A partial quote:

“Microsoft plans to test Windows 7's update mechanism by feeding users of the just-issued Release Candidate as many as 10 fake updates in the coming week, the company said Friday.

It will be the second time that Microsoft has released phony updates for Windows 7; in February, it tested the beta by delivering five bogus patches.

People running Windows 7 RC, which publicly debuted late on May 4, will be offered the mock updates beginning on Tuesday, May 12, said Brandon LeBlanc, a Microsoft spokesman. Microsoft wants to "verify our ability to deliver and manage updating of Windows 7 in certain real-life scenarios," LeBlanc explained in a blog post Friday evening.

As before, the updates do not actually deliver any new features or fixes, but replace existing system files with exact duplicates.”

“PDF” stands for ‘portable document format’ and is a popular format for downloadable documents, forms and user guides and manuals.

For years, Adobe Reader was the only way to view these files, and while it is still available, it has become a large, unwieldy program (some call it ‘bloatware’) that can slow your system down. Typically, most PC builders preinstall Adobe Reader on their computers, but you can remove it, and I suggest you do.

As an alternative, I used to use the Foxit Reader, but now it has problems of it’s own, as reported over at Security Garden: “Foxit Reader Goes from Bad to Worse”.

Corrine also provides a link to several free, open source alternatives to Adobe Reader. Presently, I am running SumatraPDF on Windows 7 RC.

Please have a look at Corrine’s post for more information.

My friend Rahul at WinSpark.net is giving away five (5) free copies of Glary Utilities Pro, a US$39.95 value.

For more details on Glary Utilities and how to enter this simple contest, click on over to WinSpark.net and have a look at this post:

{Glarysoft Giveaway} Win Glary Utilities PRO

You can download a free 30-day trial of Glary Utilities Pro here at http://glarysoft.com/

By Adi Moga

Technology develops more every year. If we make a comparison between what we have now and what was a few years ago we would be amazed how many new things were invented. Since computers were released on the market people went crazy. Nowadays everyone has a computer or a laptop at home. The internet provides you with endless information, you can find anything online, from pictures to websites, to restaurant locations, to phone numbers , to movies to anything that comes across your mind.

A computer includes a keyboard, a mouse, a unit, a screen and so on. We have computers everywhere: at home, at school, at work etc. At work people can’t personalize their computer because it’s office supplied and you can’t make it your own. But personal computers are probably the only things that contain your most intimate things. For example many people have on their computers pictures, movies they like, documents they wrote and so on. If you enter in someone's computer you will probably find out many things about that person.

Each one of us, that owns a computer has on the desktop a Cool Background. Backgrounds are the pictures people set to appear when the computer is open. There are millions of Cool Backgrounds from which you can choose. On the internet you can find many pictures that could look great on your desktop. Some people prefer to put a landscape as a background, other want objects, some prefer to put famous people in very sexy positions, but the thing everyone has in common is the fact that the background image is something we like very much.

Cool Backgrounds for girls are for example: flowers, pets, animals, sunny beaches, boys, actors, the wallpaper of a movie etc. Some people just don`t want to have something in the background and leave it empty, chose only a certain colour like blue or black. Boys usually have cool backgrounds that include custom made expensive cars, pictures of engines, football fans have the emblem of their favourite team and so on. Cool Backgrounds are also the pictures we take of ourselves. Many girls and even guys put as a background their best picture. When going to someone’s home, the first thing we see is the desktop background, so it definitely means something.

In the end, Cool Backgrounds are the backgrounds you like. There isn't a certain fashion or trend when it comes to desktop backgrounds. These backgrounds can be changed as often as you want to. Each person has it’s own character and his own preferences. It’s best to set a background that allows you to see also the small icons from your desktop. Choosing a background with a lot of white will make your work on your computer rather hard because you can’t see the icons. In the end, people are free to use any background they like, from porn images to silly things.

http://www.techpin.com

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Adi_Moga
http://EzineArticles.com/?Cool-Backgrounds&id=2322262