Posts Tagged ‘How To’

How to change your admin password on D-Link DIR-655N router

February 1, 2010

Recently, I upgraded my old D-Link D-624 to a D-Link DIR-655N router so that my laptops can benefit from the 802.11 N speed.  It’s supposedly 14x faster and 6x further than the previous 802.11 g, according to the manufactures website.  Also, it is backwards compatible with any802.11 g devices.

One of the first thing I did after setting up the hardware is to change my admin password.  It’s one of the easiest things to do that can protect you from nearby hackers.  The default user id and password for most D-Link router is

Username=admin

Password= (leave blank)

and the router address is usually 192.168.0.1.

Step 1. In your browser type in 192.168.0.1 and hit enter

Step 1a. At this prompt page just hit log in since there is no default password

Step 2. Click on Tools and there under Admin Password go ahead and change it to something you can remember, then click Save Settings.

Short and simple.  Make sure you close out your browser and try to log in with the password you just entered.

How to remove Windows.old

November 20, 2009

Have you upgraded to Windows 7?  If not, then you should.  Once you upgrade to Windows 7 you will find that there is a huge file (over 100GB) that contains your old Windows system.  I upgraded from Vista and the file was located in the C: drive and ate up a big chunk of hard disk space.  Before you remove this huge file make sure you make all your recovery disks and also back up your files.  Here’s how to remove the file safely.

1. Run Disk Cleanup from the start menu

2.  The Windows.old file is located on the C: drive, click ok

3. You won’t find the option here until you click on “Clean up system file

4. Again select C: drive

5.  Here you will be able to select “Previous Windows installations(s)

Now you should see some extra disk space and maybe even a bit improvement on system performance since you got rid of thousands of files that you don’t need anymore.

How to setup a new hard drive on Vista.

October 24, 2009

As of now you probably have heard of SSD, solid state drive, which is simply your thumb drive on steroids.  SSD have no moving parts and uses NAND flash memory so the have great speed and greater reliability.   With new technology old technolgy gets a discount.  Nowadays a Tera-byte hard drive is less than $100.  You can even find it even less online for around $70.  Recently, I received one as a gift from a friend.

After you install the hard drive, follow the provided installation pamphlet,  you have to set it up on the PC and format it.  Here’s how to do it.

Note: a terabyte hard drive took me a few hours to format the drive so be patience when you are formatting the hard drive.

1. In Control Panel select System and Maintenance and select Create and format hard disk partitions.

System and Maintanence

2.  Now you should see Disk Management application loaded and you should see a disk “Not initialized”.  You wan to right click on the “Disk 1″ area and select initialize.

New Simple Volume Wizard 1 - Initailize

3. If you hard drive is less than 2TB then you would want to select MBR (Master Boot Record)

Initialize Disk

4.  Now you want to right click on the “unallocated”  area and select New Simple Volume

New Simple Volume

5.  New Simple Volume Wizard pops up and you continue through.

New Simple Volume Wizard

6.  Pick a drive letter you would like to associate with that new hard drive.  I picked M for “Mass Data”.

New Simple Volume Wizard 2

7.  Here you want to leave everything as is except for the Volume label.  Change it to whatever your heart desires.

New Simple Volume Wizard 3

8. Now you are done, your new drive should show up when you click on “My Computer”.

New Simple Volume Wizard 4

How to setup dual monitor on Vista

July 30, 2009

What you’ll need:

1. 2 monitors, of course

2. A graphics card with dual video output like the NVIDIA GeForce 9600 GT

Turn off your computer and plug both monitors into the graphics card, the image below shows the dual DVI ports to plug your monitor cables into

GeForce_9600_GT_bracket_med

On Vista right click on the desktop background and select Personalization

DualMonitor

Then, select Display Settings

DualMonitor1

Click on the “2″ or second monitor and check the box that says “Extend the desktop onto this monitor

DualMonitor2

Now you are done.  Both monitors should be on and you can drag and drop anything between the two.

Woman: How to Pee standing up

July 7, 2009

Man has been able to pee standing up as soon as he learn to stand up by himself.  However, women were denied this right.  It’s always been squatting or sitting on a toilet for the ladies.  Well, here is the answer for females that want to pee standing up.  If I were a female I might have one of these for those last resort situations.

Make: Projects – Outlet-mount device charging pocket

July 5, 2009

This looks like a fun project.  Save money from buying a similar item and also reuse a bottle so that there is less garbage in a landfill.

http://blog.makezine.com/archive/2009/07/make_projects_-_outlet-mount_device.html

How to create an encrypted volume using TrueCrypt

January 2, 2009

My favorite file encryption tool is TrueCrypt.  TrueCrypt is a great tool to encrypt a bunch of files at once in real time.  You first have to create a volume, basically a volume is a container.  Once you mount the volume you have an encrypted drive that you can place all your important files there.  No one will be able to get to these files.  As a bonus all the files on the encrypted volume will become completely hidden.  The original post is here.  Here is my version on how to create a volume where you can save all your files.

Step 1 – Create Volume

Step 2 – Create a file container

Step 3 – Select Standard TrueCrypt volume

Step 4 – Select the Volume Location and Name and save it to the desktop

truecrypt4

Step 5 – Select your Encryption Options, I would stick to the defaults, but you can pick whatever encryption method you like

truecrypt5

Step 6 – Type in the size you would like it to be.  I always create a file that is smaller than my flash drive so that I can move it conveniently.

truecrypt61

Step 7 – Create a password, the longer the better

truecrypt7

Step 8 – Format the volume and you are done, mount the file and you have an encrypted volume.

truecrypt8

truecrypt9

Torrents

December 21, 2008

Wikipedia list torrents as “…generally signifies a strong flow of something, especially fluids and particles, and in particular water or rain.”   In the Internet world torrents are strong flows of bits and bytes from seeders to leechers. Well, not quite exactly.  Torrents are nothing more than a file you download  to start your downloads.  Here is a short description of how to download movies, music, pictures using torrents.

1. Download a torrent client, here is a list, and install it.  I personally use Bittorrent.

2. Browse one of these torrent sites and search for stuff you like to download.

3. Download the torrent file you picked.

4. Open the torrent file with your torrent client (Bittorrent) and it will start downloading.

Happy Downloading

Enable GPS on Blackberry Curve 8330 – Verizon Wireless

December 11, 2008

If you have a Verizon Wirless Blackberry Curve (8330) and your software version is less than 4.5.0.77 then you need to update it to that version to enable the GPS.

1. Goto http://vzw.smithmicro.com/blackberry

1a. Select “Personal Email” even if you are using a “Corporate Email”

vzw

2. Select Blackberry 8330, type in your phone number and click on “Download Now

vzw-2

3. Save the file to your desktop, then run the file once it is downloaded

vzw-3

This will update your Verizon Wireless Blackberry Curve 8330 to version 4.5.0.77 which will allow you to enable GPS.

On the Curve go to Options -> About to confirm the correct version

To enable the GPS go to the Options-> Advance Options ->GPS

Then make sure the GPS Services is set to Location On.

Now get lost.

How to disable the NumLock on a IBM Thinkpad T43

November 5, 2008

For those of unfortunate users of the old IBM Thinkpad T43 there is an annoying feature that enables a numlock on the keyboard.  This should fix most Thinkpads that have numbers on the keyboards instead of the regular 10-key on the right side.

1. Start->Run->Regedit

2. Navigate to HKEY_USERS\.Default\Control Panel\Keyboard

3. Change the value for InitialKeyboardIndicators from 2 to 0.


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