Game Explorer in Windows Vista:

Gaming has taken a big leap with Windows Vista and Directx10. Now even the in house games of windows comes with 3D support, not the least Games on Vista have their on explorer now.Yes you heard it right!!. Games when installed on windows either leave a shortcut on desktop or a link on program menu but now whenever you can just find them real quick with Game Explorer which is right off the start menu.

Games have been give a better preferences in Vista. The Game explorer can manage all the games. And not only this it can tell you more.

Features of Windows Vista Game Explorer:-

1. Start Menu in Windows Vista, provides a central launching pad for all games.
2. Icons for each game provide easy access to the games.
3. Display detailed information about the game, such as the game publisher and developer
4. When you last played; which version of the game you own
5. Box cover art and the release date, genre, and rating for each game.
6. Right-click on a game’s icon for easy access to a menu of play tasks (which can be customized by the game developer for each game) and any online options, such as linking to the game’s website.
7. You also have support section there, which can tell you what kind of configuration is required and get help, support, and important publisher updates; or easily add or remove games.



Issues and Problems with Game Explorer in Windows Vista:

* Vista doesn’t always automatically put installed games into the “Games” section of the OS. For instance, War Front, Titan Quest, and Half-Life 2; all relatively popular games - do NOT get put into that section.
* Some titles install to “games’ by default, while others simply create a new directory under the developer and /or manufacturer folders. I’ve noticed that if you change the default directory to “games’ then at least the launch icon appears in the games section of Vista, but it still doesn’t provide detailed information on all titles
* When you drag the icon into that section Vista doesn’t create a consistent icon as it would Company of Heroes, Never Winter Nights 2, or even older games like X3 and Guild Wars.

Possible Solution for Game Explorer:

* The games explorer do a Google image search for the game title, and allow the user to pick what image they want. 9 of 10 times a Google image search will throw the box art up on screen. Then, after the user is satisfied with their selection Vista saves the image to the HDD in a specified default folder for game, movie, and CD art.
* Allow the user to go in a modify the image if they wanted to because the OS would have to reference the image in a database to pull it up every time the icon was displayed.

__________________
Prasanna Vignesh
MCPD | Web Developer

How to set effective parental control on Vista:

Children Safety, In this term, there are 2 different perspectives to see. First is on their mental problem when exposed to the adult sites and videos. Second is the Logical stress facing the malicious scripts (Viruses, Spyware, and so on).

Vista has a great Parental Control for your children. Parental Control is design for your Children Safety and avoids them from any harmful contents and sites.
Vista has done a great move in this section.

By integrated the system with an advance but easy navigated parental Control, Vista make every parent feel “safe” using them as their children’s PC OS.

What you can do with Vista’s Parental Control ?

With Vista’s Parental Control do the following task easily:

* Parent can define which site their children are restricted (Normal Parenting Control)
* Parent can limit the download processes (this one sound’s interesting because you can prevent your children to download adult movies that have a big sizes)
* Parent use the “Time limit” for each of the computer user (this sounds promising because if your children interact to much with computer, there will be a health problems occur)
* One more interesting feature that Vista has is that it can block application from running without permission. This is practically important because if you manage to lock all media player for playing movies, you can decrease the “opportunities” of your children to open adult movies.


Below is the mini guide to set your parental control in Vista:

1. From the ‘Control Panel’ Window, Choose the ‘User Account’ and click the ‘Manage Another Account’
2. Choose and click on the desired account (example: ‘Jennifer’)
3. Click ‘Set up Parental Controls’
4. Choose one account that you want to control (example: ‘Jennifer’) and Vista will pop-up the Parental Controls setup window
5. Click ‘On’ in the Parental Controls. And all components will light up (including an option labeled ‘Up to ADULT ONLY’)
6. Choose ‘On’ in the ‘Activity Reporting’ option
7. Click other option, like ‘Web restrictions’. After the process, the next window will come up
8. Choose ‘On’ again at the option ‘Do you want to block some web content?’
9. Next, decide which content that you want to block in the ‘Web Contents’ list (You may choose: ‘Pornography’ and ‘Sex Education’)
10. Click OK to close the window and at the same time, ‘Jennifer’ has been protected!

Thanks

__________________
Prasanna Vignesh
MCPD | Web Developer

Download 3D Virtual Desktop for windows XP and Vista:

3D Virtual Desktop is cool small program which doesn’t require even a installation and lets you manage 4 desktop in 3d Environment. You can rotate it left or right and can have 4 desktop with as many programs opened. You just have to download and unzip it. Then run the “YouDm 3d” to start the service. You might not get any effect when you just click it. You need to set some of the settings and then use the hot keys to move your windows in and out and rotate to chose another desktop.!!!



You will have to use the hot keys like ctrl and shift so that you can rotate around the desktops. Here is the configuration screen. Don’t forget to choose your language when you start the screen. This can also be configured to start with windows.



You can also choose to use anti aliasing feature and your graphics hardware to be used or not. It will depend on you hardware. Right now , my screen becomes little blurred when i rotate it but thats it. Thats not a problem.

__________________
Prasanna Vignesh
MCPD | Web Developer

Secret of Graphics in Windows Vista - Directx 10:

Windows Vista had been loved due its excellent real time graphics.But have you ever thought what makes those graphics real ? Thanks to DirectX 10 which is making thses ultra high real time graphics real.Before I dig into Directx 10.Lets get to know little about it.What is Directx ?

Directx is the core which makes the games work.All the graphics designs which you even cant imagine in real time, is possible due to it.When Microsoft launched its operating system in 95 it was quite unfriendly do ue to internal restriction on hardware like audio device video cards and other peripherals.Thus directx made a set of api or functions that can be used in windows.The main advantge was taken by games which had much more freedom

How DX10 makes it so real ?

1. In real world every point is uinque.Even 2 points on your face is not similar.When Dx stared initially due to restriction on hardware and development part it was restricted on number of unique objects that can show in Scene.But with DX10 you can show hundreds of unique objects.This means if you have to show 100 flowers in a field you need not to create one and copy it to 100 but create 100 different one.That makes it more real.
2. Displacement Mappings one more technique that makes Humans showing in most of the hi-fi video games so real.More details texture you have much real the image will look.DX10 has something called as geometry shaders.By adding more “triangles” in a particular point it makes them real.

Now think of those graphics u see on your vista’s desktop.Thats what DX10 making it happen

Comparison of DX 9.0 and DX 10

Lets take a look at the images below and You will need no words to say how much they differ:



Above: Image Generated By DX9


Above: Image Generated By DX10

Can it make my CPU slow and system crash.?

It can if you don’t have a separate Graphics card.The gae has gone when the cpu had to all the work.If you have a separate graphics card DX10 will transfer the load on to it while your cpu can still do other things like downloading email checking and browsing.

You can read these topics for DirectX 9L which is going to be DirectX10 for windows XP.I found it through google search DirectX 9.L will be a DirectX 10 for Windows XP


So what does all that mean ?

Over all as the end user you might be more concerned about your system performance.Thus u want to play hi-fi games without ur system crashing down or getting ur screen blank.Keepin this in mind the benefits of DX10 with Windows Vista you might be compelled to upgrade seeing these advantages, specially as a gamer u will.

__________________
Prasanna Vignesh
MCPD | Web Developer

Add to Favorites Menu:

Add to Favorites is a classic case of learning a technique in one area (IE7 or Mozilla) and applying the knowledge to another area - Regedit.

Regedit's 'Add to Favorites' is ideal for that moment when you have taken ages to find a value, yet you know that you will have to return on another day to fine-tune the data. Tag the value by clicking on Regedit's Favorites menu, and choose 'Add to Favorites'. Fittingly, this is my favorite Vista Registry tip.

__________________
Prasanna Vignesh
MCPD | Web Developer

Best Practice for Editing the Vista Registry:

* Before you make any changes to the registry settings, get into the habit of exporting at least that branch of the registry.
* Backup the system state before you try anything radical in the registry.
* Check out the .sav files in the \system32\config folder.
* Research Volume Shadow Copy, and test how it restores a previous version of your registry files.
* If your computer has a serious problem, which requires pressing F8 at boot-up, remember to try Last Known Good as your first recovery option.
* Seek alternative methods; think laterally. Instead of risking making changes with your registry editor, what else could you do? I urge you to consider configuring a Group Policy rather than tweaking the registry. Occasionally Vista may provide a new GUI to configure a setting, for example, instead of launching regedit and changing the value for AutoAdminLogon, you could launch the Control Panel --> Users and un-tick the setting called, 'Users must enter a user name and password.'
* Learn how to perform a remote registry edit with: Connect Network Registry.
* As you work through my registry examples, make a point of studying each page's 'Key Learning Points'.

__________________
Prasanna Vignesh
MCPD | Web Developer

Back up on a schedule:

The final step of the Backup program encourages you to create a schedule for automated backups. The first one you create is a full data backup; subsequent runs are incremental, backing up only files that are new or changed since the last backup.

__________________
Prasanna Vignesh
MCPD | Web Developer

Data file backups:

Windows Vista gives its new Backup utility star billing. For Home Basic and Home Premium editions, you can choose file-based backups based on file types and save your selection for reuse.

__________________
Prasanna Vignesh
MCPD | Web Developer

Monitor auto-starting programs:

Windows Defender gets pigeonholed as an anti-spyware program, but it's actually a useful diagnostic tool. After you've installed all your apps, check out which ones are starting automatically with the help of the Software Explorer. The Startup Programs list, shown here, allows you to see all programs that are currently set to start with Windows, with full details in the pane on the right. You can remove or disable anything in the list. Other options show you running programs, programs that have active network connections, and Winsock service providers.

__________________
Prasanna Vignesh
MCPD | Web Developer

Skip the product ID:

One of the very first steps in setting up Windows Vista is this prompt to enter a product ID. If you're familiar with Windows XP, you probably enter this reflexively. But in Vista RC1 (and probably in the final version as well), you can leave the product ID box blank. If you do this, you'll see a stern warning that says you better input that ID if you know what's good for you. You can safely skip it if you know you have (or will have) a legitimate product ID but it isn't at hand, or if you are planning to evaluate Windows Vista for 14 days or less.

__________________
Prasanna Vignesh
MCPD | Web Developer