The new Windows Live Messenger features the new My Sharing Folders which enables you to share files with your contacts.
Even if you’re not using it and the feature is being turned off, you will still see the “My Sharing Folders” icon in your My Computer and Explorer.

To remove the My Sharing Folders from My Computer and Explorer…


First, you need to check what version of Windows Live Messenger are you using.
Run Windows Live Messenger, go to Help -> About Messenger and you should see an info box like the image below.

I have Windows Live Messenger version 8.0.0812.00.

I need to paste the command line below to Start -> Run and click on OK button (Refer image below)
regsvr32 -u “%PROGRAMFILES%\MSN Messenger\fsshext.8.0.0812.00.dll

If you got it right, you’ll get a confirmation box saying “DllUnregisterServer in C:\Program Files\MSN Messenger\fsshext.8.0.0812.00.dll succeeded.”

Important Note: If you have other versions of Windows Live Messenger such as 8.0.0787.00, you’ll need to change the command line in order to successfully unregister the fsshext dll. For example, if you have version 8.0.0787.00, the end of your command line would be fsshext.8.0.0787.00.dll instead of fsshext.8.0.0812.00.dll

Good luck!

Kaspersky Lab Benelux introduces an unique offer in collaboration with PC Magazine. As a PC Magazine reader, you will enjoy a FREE 6 months Kaspersky Internet Security 2010 license. If you don’t know what is Kaspersky Internet Security 2010, it is probably the best if not one of the best complete PC protection software to keep your computer safe from virus, trojan, spyware, adware, rootkits, bootkit, botnets, hackers, offensive web content and spam. Kaspersky Internet Security 2010 can run on Windows XP, Vista and 7 (both 32 and 64 bit).

I am very sure that this promo is not being posted at anywhere yet because googling the voucher code doesn’t show any results, so it should still work but maybe not for very long. There is a deadline though for this offer which is the 30th of November 2009.

1. Go to this page http://free.kaspersky.nl/

2. Fill up the form. You have to enter your name in the “Achternaam” box, Voucher code as HP2NT3X2 and then your working email at “Emailadres” and “Herhaal emailadres” box.

3. Click Bevestig button and you should immediately get an email from Kaspersky Lab Benelux ([email protected]) with the KIS 2010 activation code.

4. Download the latest version of Kaspersky Internet Security 2010 and install. Enter the code when asked to activate the program.

For your information, I just found out that the version 2010 of Kaspersky cannot be activated offline using key file. It must be activated online with the 20 characters activation code. However, you can still go to their activation website and convert it to a key file to be used on older versions of Kaspersky.

I tried converting the activation code to a key file and then used KL Key Viewer to check the details on the license. It is a full commercial license (not trial) and it is set to expire on 12 May 2010. Logically if you don’t activate your code, it should be activated automatically by itself when the date reaches middle of November since it is only a 6 months key. So if you ask me how long is this license shelf life, I’d say that it has only 1 month. If you already have Kaspersky Internet Security and a valid license that last until 12th May 2010, then this offer is pretty much useless to you.

Thanks Marc from Netherlands for sharing this tip with us!

***SORRY GUYS THE VOUCHER CODE IS NO LONGER VALID AND VERY LIKELY THERE WON’T BE A REPLACEMENT***

Wake on LAN (WOL, sometimes WoL) is an Ethernet computer networking standard that allows a shut-down computer to be turned on remotely. Most of new motherboards that has integrated ethernet controller supports this feature. You can enable the Wake on LAN feature in the Power Management section of the motherboard’s BIOS.

So what is so useful about Wake on LAN? You see, I am required to do computer maintenance at a company that has more than 10 computers. I can only do that when all of the employees have gone home otherwise I’ll be interrupting their working hours. If I don’t use Wake on LAN, I need to ask them to leave their computer turned on and sometimes I need to manually turn them on if they forgot to leave it on. But with Wake on LAN, client systems can be easily remotely powered up and I can remote access to do maintenance.

There are two ways of how Wake on LAN can work. The first one is you want to turn on a computer on the same local area network and the second one is you want to turn on a computer on another location through the internet. I didn’t know that Wake on LAN can work through Internet until an old friend of mine Dennis from www.annoying.dk told me about it.


This is how Wake on LAN works. The target computer is shut down, with power reserved for the network card. The network card listens for a specific packet, called the “Magic Packet”. The listening computer receives this packet, checks it for the correct information, and then boots if the Magic Packet is valid. A magic packet is data consisting of “FF FF FF FF FF FF” followed by 16 repetitions of the listening network device’s MAC address.

Here is how you can turn on a computer on the same local area network using Wake on LAN.
There are many many Wake-On-LAN tools that can be downloaded on the Internet and of course I always try my best to find the easiest one to use.

1. Nyxbull Wake on LAN

Only MAC address is required and works on LAN. Freeware.
[ Download Nyxbull Wake on LAN v1.0 ]

To find MAC address, double click on the network icon located at tray bar, go to Support tab and click on Details button. The physical address is your MAC address. It is in 00-11-22-33-44 format.

Another way is to open up command prompt and type “arp -a“. The Address Resolution Protocol (ARP) command can only display MAC address of other computer that is turned on. You can’t use it to display your own MAC address.

2. FUSION WakeUp on Lan

Also FREE. What I really like about this tool is it has the ability to get MAC address from IP address. If the target computer is off, you can still try the Get MAC button because it can search in the cache. As for the password box, you can leave it blank.
[ Download Fusion WakeUp On LAN ]

Unfortunately I couldn’t find any simple Wake On LAN tool that can save a list of MAC Address. It will be so much convenient if I can just select the MAC address from the list and click a button to boot up a computer.

We’ll now continue to the more interesting part, booting up computer on another location through Internet. Let’s say I am in Singapore on a business trip and I need to turn on my computer to retrieve some files. It may seem impossible but it is possible. For Wake-on-LAN over the internet, you must have a router that is turned on in order to wake up a computer over the internet.

At first I found Depicus Wake on Lan tool that is able to boot up a computer using Wake-on-LAN over the internet.

One thing I find very confusing about this tool is the Subnet Mask entry. It somehow modifies the entered IP address to become something else. I have just tried different numbers for the last part of the subnet mask, until the small graphical interface tool finally showed my IP in the status bar. The description about the whole Subnet Mask thing on that website is:

How to calculate the subnet-directed broadcast address
1) Convert machine address to binary e.g. 10.208.20.1 = 00001010.11010000.00010100.00000001
2) Convert the Subnet Mask to Binary e.g. 255.255.240.0 = 11111111.11111111.11110000.00000000
3) Invert the Binary Subnet Mask e.g. 11111111.11111111.11110000.00000000 becomes 00000000.00000000.00001111.11111111
4) Or the machine address and the inverted subnet mask e.g. 00001010.11010000.00010100.00000001 Or 00000000.00000000.00001111.11111111 = 00001010.11010000.00011111.11111111 = 10.208.31.255

Please don’t ask me about it… I spent many hours trying to understand and also searching on the Internet for more information about subnet directed broadcast but couldn’t find much. I gave up… No not on Wake-on-LAN over the Internet, but only on this tool.

Update: You can forget about calculating the subnet directed broadcast. Just use the subnet mask 255.255.255.255 and it’ll send the magic packet to the IP address and MAC Address that you’ve specified. Thanks to Ed for this tip.

Then I found 2 websites that allows sending magic packets to boot up computer over the internet. It is a free service that can be used by anyone.

IMPORTANT: Make sure you configure your router to forward port 9 to the computer that you want to boot up otherwise it will not work because the Magic Packet can’t get in your network. Refer to PortForward.com on how to configure port forwarding for your router.

1. Wake-On-LAN Online

You must know the external IP address, MAC address and also the Port. The default port for WoL over the Internet is 9. Some use port 7. Enter the correct information, hit the “Wake Up!” button and it’ll send the magic packet to turn on your computer. I’ve tried it and it worked.

2. RemoteWakeUp

The requirement is save as above. You need to enter IP address/hostname, MAC address and port.

Update: Here’s a third website that provides free Wake on LAN over the internet service.
3. Depicus Wake on LAN over the Internet

Other than entering IP Address, MAC Address and Port, you need to enter subnet mask as well. Just enter 255.255.255.255. Thanks to Ed again for this tip.

If both of the websites is down and you desperately need to remotely wake up a computer, try using a free PHP script created by Soeren. You need to upload it to a webhost that supports PHP. It may not work on some web servers, because the socket functions it makes use of are often disabled on web servers, for security reasons I assume. This is how the Wake-on-Internet PHP script look like.

If Wake-on-LAN doesn’t work for you, try using Wake on Lan Monitor/Sniffer. You can use this tool to test if the magic packet is reaching your computer or not.

[ Download Wake on LAN Monitor/Sniffer ]

Tip: There are some routers that supports Dynamic DNS. This is a very useful feature where if your IP address changes, you can still keep track of your current IP address. My Belkin N1 wireless router has this feature and it’s easy to configure. I only need to sign up with DynDNS.org, and enter the information in my Belkin router.

If you’re interested in knowing how to wake a computer up over the internet using linux, check out Dennis blog.

Windows Media Player 11 offers great new ways to store and enjoy all your music, video, pictures, and recorded TV. Play it, view it, and sync it to a portable device for enjoying on the go or even share with devices around your home—all from one place.

If you do not have a legitimate Windows XP and would like to install Windows Media Player 11, follow the steps below.


I’ve updated this post with 3 methods on installing Windows Media Player 11 final on a pirated Windows. Please try method 1 first, and if it doesn’t work, then try method 2 and so on.
Method 1:
1. Download and extract (unrar, unzip) wmp11-windowsxp-x86-enu.exe to a new folder
-Steps Removed or else I’m in trouble-

Method 2:
1. Download (Link removed or else I’m in trouble) Windows Media Player 11 CRACKED.
2. Unzip and install.

Method 3:
1. Download registry CRACK. (Links removed or else I’m in trouble)
2. Run wga.reg and click on YES when prompted.
3. Restart your computer.
4. Download Windows Media Player 11.
5. Run wmp11-windowsxp-x86-enu.exe and install as normal.

Leave your comments if you have difficulty in getting Windows Media Player 11 installed on your computer.

avast! has been gaining popularity every since version 5 and even more when Avira started to partner with ASK.com. According to download.com total downloads statistics, you can see that AVG grabs the first place, avast! at second and followed closely by Avira. Here is one of the freebies shared by LunarWolf where everyone can use avast! Internet Security 6.0 until 18 April 2012 for free! avast! has 3 home products and they are the free version, Pro and Internet Security. The Pro version has 3 extra protection module which is Sandbox, SafeZone and Command line scanner if compared to the Free version. As for the Internet Security, it comes with everything in Pro plus Anti-spam filter and a built-in firewall. The Pro version cost $39.99 per year and Internet Security at 49.99.

If you are using avast! Free Antivirus or avast! Pro Antivirus, here is your chance to upgrade to avast! Internet Security for FREE which gives maximum protection, powered by avast! SafeZone technology. If you already have a license for avast! Internet Security which expires earlier than 18th April 2012, you can extend it using this license.


Just follow the simple steps below to get your free avast! Internet Security 6.0 license file valid till 4/18/2012.

1. Go to http://www.my-avast.de/AVAST-Aktion-com-so-gehts

2. Fill up the form by entering your first name (Vorname), last name (Nachname), email address and click the Absenden button.

3. Check the inbox of the email address that you have entered in the form. You should receive an email from Globell Marketing ([email protected]) with the subject Registrierung Avast Internet Security 6. In the email, there is a link to download the license file. Download the ZIP file and extract it.

http://www.my-avast.de/aktion/AVAST/down/license-com-so-gehts.zip

4. Download avast! Internet Security 6.0 and install.

5. During the setup, you will come to a License part where you have to select “Supply a license file”. browse for the License com! so geht?s.avastlic file and follow the on-screen instructions to complete the setup.

Note: If your computer already have the free or Pro version installed, all you need to do is double click on the license file where avast! will recognize and ask you “Are you sure you want to insert the license file with the following parameters?” Click the Yes button and avast! will then download the necessary file from the Update tab to automatically upgrade it to Internet Security 6.0.

It is definitely a win-win situation for both users and avast! because when the license expires on April 2012, satisfied users will definitely extend their license subscription with their own money. By the way, the 5 lucky winners of KeyScrambler Premium has been chosen and will be receiving an email from me shortly.

Antivirus software is the most important software you can have for your computer. It can be a very tough decision to choose the right antivirus program especially when there are so many of them and you can only have one on a computer. Late 2008 I did a test on 29 antivirus software to look for the free antivirus that is the lightest on system memory usage. I only checked the total memory usage during idle and during scanning. Other than that, I’ve also checked on the detection to see if it can detect the private trojan which I had at that time. Two years has gone by and I was curious to know if Kaspersky still do well or has been overtaken by Norton? After the new year, I’ve decided to do some tests on a total of 104 different types of antivirus and internet security applications. I’ve taken nearly a month, running the test day and night to finish this report. This is what that has been keeping me really busy the whole month of January 2010.

The test includes Application Launch Time, Boot Time Increase, Time to complete a Full Scan, Memory usage during Idle, Peak Memory Usage and Installation Size. Every test is done on the same clean Windows XP SP3 with all latest updates. Norton Ghost is being used to re-image the hard drive whenever I am going to test the next antivirus so that the test is fair. All antivirus tested had the latest versions, upgrades and updates and default settings being used. Here are the antivirus and internet security that is included in the test.

1. Avira AntiVir Personal v9
2. Avira AntiVir Premium v9
3. Avira Premium Security Suite v9
4. AVG Anti-Virus v9
5. AVG Internet Security v9
6. AVG Anti-Virus Free Edition v9
7. avast! Free Antivirus v5
8. avast! Internet Security v5
9. avast! Pro Antivirus v5
10. a-squared Anti-Malware 4.5
11. Ashampoo AntiSpyWare 2.10
12. Ashampoo Anti-Malware v1
13. ArcaVir 2010 Antivirus Protection
14. AhnLab V3 Internet Security 8.0
15. Antiy Ghostbusters v6.5.1.4
16. Ad-Aware Pro Internet Security v8.1.3
17. BitDefender Antivirus 2010
18. BitDefender Internet Security 2010
19. BitDefender Total Security 2010
20. BluePoint Security 2010
21. BullGuard Internet Security 8.7
22. CA Internet Security Suite Plus 2010
23. CA Anti-Virus Plus Anti-Spyware 2010
24. Command Anti-Malware v5.1
25. Comodo Internet Security v3.13
26. Digital Patrol v5.2
27. DriveSentry Desktop v3.4 and DriveSentry Security Suite v1
28. Dr.WEB Anti-Virus v5
29. Dr.WEB Security Space v5
30. eEye Blink Personal v4.5.1
31. eScan AntiVirus v10
32. eScan Internet Security Suite
33. ESET NOD32 Antivirus v4
34. ESET Smart Security v4
35. FortiClient Endpoint Security Suite v4.1.2
36. F-PROT Antivirus v6
37. G Data AntiVirus 2010
38. G Data InternetSecurity 2010
39. G Data Total Care 2010
40. IKARUS virus.utilities v1.0.166
41. Immunet Protect v1.0.22
42. iolo AntiVirus v1.5.3
43. iolo System Shield 3
44. KV AntiVirus 2010
45. K7 AntiVirus v7.0
46. K7 TotalSecurity v10.0
47. Kingsoft Internet Security 9 Plus
48. Kaspersky Anti-Virus 2010
49. Kaspersky Internet Security 2010
50. McAfee VirusScan Plus
51. McAfee Internet Security
52. McAfee Total Security
53. Microsoft Security Essentials
54. mks_vir v9.0
55. MultiCore AntiVirus & AntiSpyware v2
56. My Free Antivirus v2.2
57. Net Protector 2010
58. Norman Security Suite
59. Norton AntiVirus 2010 v17.1.0.19
60. Norton Internet Security 2010
61. Norton 360 Version 3.0
62. nProtect Anti-Virus Spyware 2007
63. Outpost Antivirus Pro 2009
64. Outpost Security Suite 2009
65. Keygold Secure Internet Security Suite
66. Panda Could Antivirus
67. Panda Antivirus Pro 2010
68. Panda Internet Security 2010
69. Panda Global Protection 2010
70. ParetoLogic Anti-Virus PLUS v6.1.1
71. Spyware Doctor with AntiVirus 2010
72. PC Tools Internet Security 2010
73. Prevx 3.0
74. Protector Plus Professional v9
75. Rising AntiVirus 2010
76. Solo Anti-Virus 2010
77. Spyware Terminator 2.6.5
78. Steganos AntiVirus 12
79. Steganos Internet Security 12
80. The Cleaner 2010
81. Security Shield 2010
82. The Shield Deluxe 2010
83. Thirtyseven4 Antivirus
84. Trend Micro Internet Security 2010
85. Trend Micro AntiVirus + AntiSpyware 2010
86. Trend Micro Internet Security Pro 2010
87. TrustPort Antivirus 2010
88. TrustPort PC Security 2010
89. Twister AntiVirus
90. Vba32 Personal v3.12.10.11
91. VIPRE Antivirus + Antispyware
92. Vir.IT eXplorer AntiVirus v6.5
93. ViRobot Desktop v5.5
94. VirusBuster Personal v6.2.51
95. VirusBuster Professional v6.2.51
96. VirusBuster Internet Security Suite v3.1
97. Virus Chaser v5.0b
98. VIRUSfighter
99. Webroot AntiVirus with Spy Sweeper 2010
100. Webroot Internet Security Essentials 2010
101. Zondex Guard v5.4.2
102. ZoneAlarm Antivirus 2010
103. ZoneAlarm Internet Security Suite 2010
104. ZoneAlarm Extreme Security 2010
105. F-Secure Antivirus 2010
106. F-Secure Internet Security 2010

Test 1: Application Launch Time
– 10 launches of a web browser (Mozilla Firefox) were timed. The average in launch time is shown in the graph below.

Test 2: Boot Time Increase
– Ten reboots were performed and the average boot time is shown in the graph below.

Test 3: Idle Memory Usage
– Allow the computer to idle for 10 minutes and then the memory reading is being taken.

Test 4: Peak Memory Usage
– Allow the computer to idle for 10 minutes and then the peak memory usage is being taken.

Test 5: Installation Size
– The installation size of each Antivirus program before any updates were downloaded.

Test 6: Detection
– Bifrost trojan being crypted with Incognito to avoid detection. Theoretically it should bypass all antivirus scan time because each stub is nearly 100% unique, thanks to the polymorphic generator. This test will show how good is the runtime scan of an antivirus (heuristic).

Test 7: Full Scan Time
– Scan Times shown below are for default settings for each Antivirus program. 13.23GB of used hard-drive space was scanned with each virus scanner.

Note: To me, the idle memory usage readings is no longer accurate because a lot of antivirus is able to clean its memory usage bringing it to a really low number when the computer is idle. Do take a look at the peak memory usage instead. If I would to compare between the few giant antivirus brands such as Avast, Avira, Norton and Kaspersky, I’d say that Avast is the lightest of all. As for Kaspersky, it is also very light but it took longer to run Firefox and this is caused by the Kaspersky URL Advisor plugin. If you remove the plugin from Firefox, it only takes about an average of 0.79 seconds. As for Avira, it has one of the fastest launch time but the peak memory usage is pretty high and the boot time is slower than Kaspersky and Avast. From the charts, I also found out that Outpost did pretty well. It is able to successfully block the crypted Bifrost trojan by detecting memory injection/modification.

Update: Added F-Secure (duh not sure how I missed that one) in the test report and also included full scan time test which I suppose to attach but somehow it got left out. Make sure you hit the Refresh/Reload button to see the latest bar graph.

Look what I’ve found! A Microsoft Office 2007 Enterprise keygenerator and also Microsoft Office 2007 Application keygenerator. I seriously don’t know what the application keygenerator is for. I have not tested it and I can’t tell you if it’s working or not. I downloaded this from a very reliable warez site. Definitely virus and trojan free.

As you can see at the two pictures above, it did say “Vista Offline Activator” coming soon. I can’t wait for that! There are still report saying that currently there are no 100% cracks for activating Windows Vista yet. So maybe this is the one! Let’s wait and see…

In the meantime, you can download the Office 2007 keygenerators and try them out.

[ Download Link Removed due to Copyright Notice ]

Everyone loves gadgets but not everyone can afford or willing to spend on them since they are not a necessity. I personally love gadgets too and I only buy what I think is necessary. The latest gadget that I bought recently is the Logitech Harmony One Advanced Universal Remote. The name of the gadget itself tells you that it is a universal remote that is meant to combine all your multiple remotes into one. I have 6 remotes sitting on my living room and they are for Television, AV Receiver, Satellite (Astro), WD TV (media player), ceiling fan and air conditioner. When you have that much of remotes lying around, there are times when you will need to look around just to find that particular remote because it is probably hiding it one of the corner at sofa. Moreover for older people who are not so technologically advanced, it can be very confusing for them to even watch a TV with so many remotes involved.

Now with this Logitech Harmony One Advanced Universal Remote, I can control all of the electrical appliances at my living area with only one remote and keep the others away. I go to know about this universal remote through my wife’s cousin-in-law and immediately went searching for one at our local Malaysian auction website (Lelong). When I got the remote, the remote looks pretty slick with a shiny surface and a full color touch screen. What I like most about this remote is you can turn on multiple devices with a single button, sort of like macro commands. For example, when I want to watch Astro, our local Malaysian satellite TV, I would have to turn on the TV, AV Receiver, and Satellite. The Harmony remote can do all that for you with a single click.


As good as it sounds, the setting up can be quite a pain. It took me a couple of days to get nearly everything right (even now it’s still not perfect but I can live with it). Even though setting up the Harmony remote is from the guided online setup, but it is not that easy.

First of all you need to add the devices to the Harmony remote by keying in the exact model of the devices. Then you can setup Activities, which is the same as macro commands to automatically turn on multiple devices. This part can be quite tricky as some devices takes longer time to power on, such as the Astro Byond (Pace) decoder. You will need to play around with the delay settings to get it right. The troublesome part is when the Harmony remote doesn’t work, you will have to connect the Harmony remote to your computer, tweak the settings, re-upload the configurations to the remote and then try again.

Logitech Harmony remote can control up to 15 devices and has support for 5000+ brands and 225,000+ devices. If the model is not in the list, you can use the infrared learning capability to copy the code to the Harmony remote. Amazon is selling the Logitech Harmony One Advanced Universal Remote at $165.55 but I bought it at $243 in Malaysia. Oh well, the price of imported stuff in Malaysia is always more expensive.

[ Visit Logitech Harmony Remotes Official Website ]

If you didn’t notice, nearly all bloggers that generates revenue from their website through advertisements never talk about AdBlockers. Reason is if they introduced a good advertisement blocker and you ended up using it, they’ll loose YOU (or perhaps a few hundreds or thousands depending on how much readers the site has) to view the displayed advertisements or clicking it because it is relevant to the visitor. Even Martin from Ghacks also mentioned “Turning off the adblocker helps me generate revenue. Each visit pays so to speak. Even if you do not click on the ads it helps me pay my bills.” I fully agree with Martin but the painful truth is people installing quality ad blockers have a 99.99% probability of never clicking on an ad to begin with.

There are anti-adblock scripts that is able to get pass adblockers but I wouldn’t want to embed that into my ads because it is like forcing you to view the ads when you don’t want to. Maybe you have a broadband subscription with limited bandwidth and don’t want to waste your bandwidth in loading advertisements. Anyway, today I am going to do something that bloggers never do, that is to introduce you a very good quality ad blocker software that has been in development for 9 years. Other than that, I am also going to show you how to register the software that normally cost $23.76 for FREE!



Ad Muncher is a system-wide ad blocker, dealing with annoyances like banner ads and popups along with new rich media ads like video ads, interstitials and floating ads. Many types of spyware and adware installers are also blocked, as well as third-party tracking systems. It works out of the box, without the need to choose what you want blocked or configure third-party filter lists, and works with all browsers and many advert-displaying programs such as ICQ, Windows Live Messenger, Yahoo Messenger, Yahoo Music Jukebox, SopCast, iMesh, BearShare, Pando, PalTalk, etc.

Ad Muncher has been in constant development for over nine years, and has been used successfully on millions of computer systems around the world. After these years of development and user feedback it has evolved into a rock-solid application with some of the most advanced advert and popup filtering systems currently available.

A quick list of features that differentiate Ad Muncher from many other advert removal products:

Not just a popup remover, also removing embedded adverts and many other annoyances.

System-level filtering of adverts in all browsers and most advert-displaying programs.

Extensive configuration options to tailor Ad Muncher to your needs.

Extremely fast filtering engine.

Continuing intensive development, with no end in sight for continually improving Ad Muncher releases.

Follow the steps below on how to register Ad Muncher for free.

1. Download and install Ad Muncher.

2. Run Ad Muncher, enter the name and code shown below and click the Register button.
Name: Request to remove by AdMuncher
Code: Request to remove by AdMuncher
This license is for Komputer Swiat readers living in Poland. If you’re not living in Poland, you should get the error message “The Komputer SWIAT license can only be used from within Poland, and you are connecting from appears to be in COUNTRY. If you are currently in Poland, please contact us for further assistance.”

3. Click Proxy Options button, check “Use proxy when contacting the Ad Muncher servers”. Make sure the Type is selected as HTTP, enter the address as 213.25.107.4 and port 80. Click OK and click Retry. The proxy address belongs to Poland so when you try to update or validate the license code with it, Ad Muncher will think that you’re in Poland.

4. Wait for a few seconds and you should see a dialog box that says “Your license was successfully verified. Thank you for supporting Ad Muncher development. Click Close to continue.

Whenever you need to update the program or advert list from Options > Updates, you have to make sure that you’re using a working Poland proxy or else it will tell you that the license can only be used in Poland. I am sure one day either the Poland proxy that I provided will stop working or Ad Muncher server starts blocking it. When that happens, you can search in Google for another working Poland proxy.

Ad Muncher installer is only 418 KB in size. The minimum system requirement to run Ad Muncher is Pentium 60, 32 MB ram, 2 MB disk space. Supports from version of Windows (95, 98, ME, NT4, 2000, XP, 2003, Vista).

Note If you like my articles and would like to help, you can add my site raymond.cc to your filter list to stop filtering the ads or to allow the advertisement to continue loading. It does help to pay the bills even if you don’t click the ads. Thanks!

My apologies for the delay in posting this new antivirus benchmark results. The report was in fact ready since last week but only a selected amount of forum members gets to see it first to report on any typing errors. If you didn’t know, even if you have the fastest computer in the world, ALL antivirus is capable of slowing down your computer and I strongly believe that we have the right to know the real truth on how slow can the computer get with a particular antivirus software. Most if not all antivirus website claims that their antivirus is the FASTEST or LIGHTEST but after putting them into 18 different benchmark tests, it doesn’t really seemed like what it claimed.

One of our reader Liam K. posted in the comment that the well known fact of the two least memory-intensive antivirus programs are Avira Antivir for free and NOD32 for paid. Whether it is true or not, there are millions of users on the Internet using different kind of antivirus software and it is just not possible to ask them to uninstall their current antivirus and use either Avira or NOD32. Everyone has their own opinion on which antivirus works best for them and hopefully this benchmark tests that I am doing will help everyone to know why certain actions they perform on their computer seemed slower than before.


The antivirus are tested in a very fair manner where all the steps and methods are performed exactly the same on every antivirus. Default settings on the antivirus are used during benchmark since most users doesn’t change the settings. Antivirus developers would have known about this and adjusted the default settings to suit most users. It is not logical for the antivirus developers to enable the paranoid mode by default where it prompts the user for action on every little thing they do on the computer.

The good thing about the current method which I am using to display the chart is via FusionCharts where it uses flash to generate the chart in real time based on an external XML file. This allows me to easily add more benchmark results to the chart in future. For your convenience, I have also calculated the percentage difference to show the difference between using an antivirus and without the antivirus. All you need to do is just move your mouse cursor over the bar at the graph.

It takes a few hours to complete all 18 benchmarks on one antivirus and currently I have only tested 20. I will continue to benchmark more antivirus software whenever I can and update the chart. You can access the latest antivirus benchmark from http://www.raymond.cc/antivirus/ or from the top navigation bar where it says “Lightest Antivirus Test“. So far I’ve noticed that most of the time there won’t be much difference on the performance for the same brand of antivirus but different product. For example, the performance of Kaspersky Antivirus and Kaspersky Internet Security is pretty much the same. Do take note of the version number as well because newer builds could have better performance.

Oh and by the way, if you have a Facebook account, don’t forget to hit the Like button on the antivirus benchmark page to show your support on the new antivirus benchmark test.

Trend Micro has been around for a very very long time. Back then it was called PC-Cillin and now is renamed to Trend Micro. I still remembered the first time I heard of PC-Cillin when I was using my cousin’s 100Mhz computer. I wasn’t a big fan of Trend Micro antivirus products because it always didn’t score well when put being tested by AV-Test. The latest report shows that Trend Micro Internet Security 2010 ranks either second lowest or the lowest when compared to other commercial antivirus such as Norton, Kaspersky, G Data, Panda, Avira, F-Secure, Bitdefender, CA and PC Tools. On my latest antivirus 2010 performance test report, Trend doesn’t seem to put a lot of load on the Windows computer and it was even able to successfully block a crypted Bifrost trojan when many others failed to do so…

It is always up to the individual to determine if whether Trend Micro is the best or not because I do have a friend name Jay who is a very good coder and he thinks that Trend is the best. Heck he even recommends me to use it. Here’s a very good news to Trend fans because you are able to get hold of 1 year Trend Micro Internet Security 2010 license for FREE!


Trend Micro Internet Security 2010 has the following features to protect your computer:

Antivirus

Antispyware

Firewall

Protects Windows and Important Programs from Unauthorized Changes

Web Threats Protection

Spam Email Filter

Parental Controls

Data Theft Prevention

As usual, Internet Security suites normally offers a bunch of protections which probably you don’t need. For example, if you don’t use a POP email, then you don’t need Spam Filter. Also if you don’t have kids, you don’t need Parental Controls as well. You can turn them off and logically it should work slightly faster.

To get your free 1 year Trend Micro Internet Security 2010 license, all you need to do is just download the 149MB TIS175_IOMEGA.exe setup file from this promotional link. During installation, when asked to enter your Trend Micro Internet Security serial number, just select “Install a free trial version“. You will also come to a part where you need to activate the program by entering your email address. You will need to download around 75MB for the first update.

Thanks Flash113 from For-Free for sharing this tip.

I always believe that people who knows about computer living in the United States is very lucky. First of all, they can purchase nearly everything from the Internet and most of the time shipping it to your home is free! For people who live in other countries, we can order stuff from USA via the Internet but we’ll have to pay for the ridiculously expensive shipping fee and import tax which sometimes cost more than the product that we’re buying.

Other than that, members in the Microsoft Professional Accountants’ Network (US) can get one complimentary genuine product key license for Microsoft Office Accounting Professional 2008 worth $199.95 for FREE! The best part is joining the Microsoft Professional Accounts’ Network cost NOTHING!


Office Accounting Professional 2008 is a complete accounting solution that helps small businesses save time managing everyday financial tasks, get organized, and grow their business online. With its familiar Microsoft Office interface, this program is easy to learn, so you can be productive right away. Smooth integration with other Microsoft Office programs makes information sharing simple and helps boost productivity.

By organizing all of your business information in one place, Office Accounting Professional 2008 helps you find the right information at the right time, so you can make better-informed business decisions. Plus, new features will help you sell products online, get paid faster, work easily with your accountant, and more.

To get the free complimentary license of Microsoft Office Accounting Professional, you’ll have to enroll your organization in the Microsoft Professional Accountants’ Network (MPAN). The steps includes providing your organization contact information, signing the Microsoft Partner Program legal agreement for your organization, and completing the registration process by providing profile information about you and your organization.

If for some reason you’re unable to get your free complimentary Microsoft Office Accounting Professional 2008 product key after enrolling your organization in the MPAN, then you can head straight to http://www.ideawins.com/OA2008ProMPANStartDownloads1.aspx to generate your free Microsoft Office product key and then download the X14-19363.EXE installer. You are only required to enter your email address and the weird part is Microsoft doesn’t even have simple validation for the email address format. You will need an internet connection to activate the Microsoft Office Accounting using the 25 character product key.

Microsoft Office Accounting has a few version ranging from Express, Standard, Professional and Professional Plus. The Express version is free for anyone but it lacks of many features compared to Professional edition. Do take note that this complimentary free genuine Microsoft Office Accouting Professional 2008 product key is meant for members of Microsoft Professional Accountants’ Network and not everyone. Trust me, even if you manage to get the free license, this software would be quite useless to you unless you know accounting. Microsoft Office Accounting is not like the normal Microsoft Office which contains Word, Access, Excel, PowerPoint and Outlook.

The Windows development team does not put a lot of effort on displaying information about your laptop’s or netbook’s battery information. If Windows 7 is installed on a computer with a battery, it will detect the battery presence and shows you the level of the battery charge. In Windows XP, it also shows you the battery level together with an estimated remaining time. Previously I have posted a software called BatteryBar which is very useful in giving you more information about your battery such as capacity, charge rate and etc. However BatteryBar requires installation and hooks three DLL files into explorer.exe, increasing the memory usage of Explorer.

Fortunately Nir Sofer has created a small (74KB) portable tool called BatteryInfoView that displays the current status and information about your battery. The displayed battery information includes the battery name, manufacture name, serial number, manufacture date, power state (charging/discharging), current battery capacity, full charged capacity, voltage, charge/discharge rate, and more…


Not all battery information are displayed on BatteryInfoView as some information such as battery temperature, manufactured date and serial number will only be displayed if the battery provides this information.

Running BatteryInfoView.exe will by default display the battery information. There is another view called “Battery Log” where a new log containing the status of the battery (Power State, % Capacity, Capacity Value, Rate and Voltage) is added every 60 seconds. You can change the log interval in the ‘Advanced Options’ window (F9). You can also easily create a HTML report by right clicking on the program and select HTML Report – All Items. The HTML report file (report.html) will be saved to the same location as where you run the BatteryInfoView.exe from.

BatteryInfoView is free, portable and works on any version of Windows, starting from windows 2000 and up to Windows 7. Since it is portable, this tool will be on my USB flash drive toolbox.

[ Download BatteryInfoView ]

Writing Chinese character is tough. I was really good at it when I was a small boy but when I stopped going to tuition, I slowly started to forget how to write certain Chinese words and eventually forgetting nearly everything. Writing Chinese is not as easy as English because if a character short of a dot, it’d bring a different meaning. Today I will be sharing with you about writing Chinese CAPTCHA.

A CAPTCHA is a program that can generate and grade tests that humans can pass but current computer programs cannot. For example, humans can read distorted text as the one shown in the form, but current computer programs can’t. Actually cracking CAPTCHA is possible (jDownloader and CryptLoad developers are good at it) when it involves letters and numbers, but what if the CAPTCHA is in “chinese characters”? There’s no way for a computer user that don’t know a thing about Chinese to write or type out the Chinese character CAPTCHA.

I am going to show you how easy it is to write chinese characters to solve chinese CAPTCHA.


As far as I know, usually people type Chinese characters in computers using “pin yin” which means spelling of the sound. An example is “wo” means me or myself in chinese pinyin. IF you can read Chinese character but your computer is not equipped with software to write Chinese characters, you can still use Google Translate. Here’s another example, let’s say that the Chinese CAPTCHA shows this character 我 and I know that it means “me”, I open up Google Translate, select translation from English to Chinese, type “me” in the box and click Translate. The Chinese character 我 appears allowing me to copy the character and paste it to the CAPTCHA box.

I believe many of you doesn’t know how to read Chinese characters, so the above method won’t work. There are software such as NJStar Chinese Pen that cost $99 with Chinese handwriting recognition software that enables Chinese input using mouse. You can draw out the Chinese character using your mouse and it’ll automatically recognize what you’re trying to write and lets you paste the text whenever you want. Don’t worry because I definitely won’t ask you to buy or install something that you won’t be using and find it hard to uninstall because everything is in Chinese.

I found two sites that allows you to draw Chinese character online without installing any software.

1. NCIKU

The handwriting tool allows you to find characters by drawing them. Simply write the character in the box and select the desired one from the list that appears. The tool searches its character database based on the appearance of what you draw, the stroke order you use, and other factors. Even if you are unsure how exactly to write a character, the character you are looking for will most likely be included in results for you to recognize and choose from. Correct stroke order is not essential. NCIKU will find your character even if you don’t write it perfectly.
[ Visit NCIKU ]

2. Chinese-Tools

This tool allows you to enter Chinese character by writing it on the screen with the mouse cursor. Very useful when to check a character you don’t know the pinyin. Two things I don’t like about Chinese-Tools is it uses Java and it recognizes Chinese character according to correct stroke order. If you don’t know how to write Chinese, you definitely don’t know the correct stroke order.
[ Visit Chinese-Tools ]

I know for sure if I don’t tell you what is this article for, you’ll start bashing the hell out of me that this article is useless like what some of you all happily did these past 2 days. For your information, the reason on the existence of this blog is for me to write what I’ve learned about computers and not to impress anyone! I will be happy if you like what I like but if not, this blog site will be updated again tomorrow which probably will have something that you’d like.

This is a weblog (see how I usually start the article with a real life story?), not like some sites that is created just to make money by copying here and there. Anyway I’ll still inform you that this method can be used to obtain a 1 year free BitDefender 2009 license because they’ve upgraded their system with Chinese CAPTCHA to stop non-chinese users in registering a license.