Your Windows 7 Reliability Monitor

Friendly Computers found this article useful to keep your PC on the right track and would like to share it with you.

One of the cool little features that arose from the ashes of the disaster known as Windows Vista was the Reliability Monitor. A little-known tool which is almost hidden within the action center, the Reliability tool is great for tracking your computers reliability.

I remember using it when I was running Vista and nearly forgot about it until I was reminded by a weekly podcast to which I subscribe. I did my best to see if we have ever covered the Reliability Monitor here on Windows7News and as far as I can tell, we haven’t.

“Reliability Monitor is an advanced tool that measures hardware and software problems and other changes to your computer. It provides a stability index that ranges from 1 (the least stable) to 10 (the most stable). You can use the index to help evaluate the reliability of your computer. Any change you make to your computer or problem that occurs on your computer affects the stability index.”

Per Microsoft, the Reliability Monitor is intended for advanced computer users, such as software developers and network administrators, but it is easy to use, so even moderate users will have no problem using the tool to track their system over time.

There are two ways to find your PC’s Reliability history:

You can use Windows Search and begin typing the word ‘Reliability’ until the option shows.

Or

Right-click on the white flag in your taskbar to open Action Center.

Click Maintenance. Then, under Check for solutions to problem reports, clickView reliability history.

In Reliability Monitor, you can:

• Click any event on the graph to view its details.

• Click Days, or Weeks, to view the stability index over a specific period of time.

• Click items in the Action column to view more information about it.

• Click View all problem reports to view only the problems that have occurred on your computer. This view does not include the other computer events that show up in Reliability Monitor, such as events about software installation.

The layout of the program is pretty self-explanatory and very basic.

You can click on specific unreliable instances to view the details.

The Reliability Monitor is a very basic program with a very basic use. It’s one of the many useful tools provided natively in Windows 7 which can help you keep your PC on the right track.

Source: http://www.windows7news.com/2010/07/28/reliability-monitor/

How to Run the System File Checker (Sfc.exe) Offline in Windows 7 and Vista

Friendly Computers found this article useful and would like to share it with you.

The System File Checker (sfc.exe) is an useful tool that lets you scan the integrity of Windows system files, and repair corrupt or missing system files. Numerous cases have been resolved thus far by running Sfc.exe with the "scannow" parameter. However, there are situations where in a corrupt or missing system file prevents Windows from booting normally, and running Sfc.exe from Windows isn’t possible. In such cases, Sfc.exe can be run offline using two additional parameters, via the Windows Recovery Environment (Windows RE) in Windows 7 and Windows Vista.

Booting into Windows RE

Configure the boot order in the BIOS such that the first boot device is your CD/DVD drive.

Insert the Windows 7/Vista Setup DVD and restart the computer.

Alternately, you may use the Windows 7/Vista System Repair Disc if you have one.

When prompted, press a key to boot from the DVD. In the "Install Windows" screen, clickRepair your computer

Select your Windows installation, and click Next

Editor’s Note: Make a note of the drive-letter of your Windows 7 installation, as seen from Windows RE. This is the drive-letter you want to reference when running Sfc.exe offline.

Click Command Prompt

To scan the integrity (and repair) a specific file, use this command:

sfc /scanfile=d:\windows\system32\zipfldr.dll /offbootdir=d:\ /offwindir=d:\windows

The above command scans the file zipfldr.dll and replaces it if required.

To scan the integrity of all system files and repair them, run this command:

sfc /scannow /offbootdir=d:\  /offwindir=d:\windows

This process takes some time (<5 min in my case) to complete, and there weren’t any integrity violations.

Source: http://www.winhelponline.com/blog/run-sfc-offline-windows-7-vista/

Add Some Visual Flair to the Task Manager Display in Windows 7

Friendly Computers would like to help you to customize Task Manager Display in Windows 7.

If you love to customize your system as much as possible, then we have a fun way for you to change the color scheme for the Task Manager Window. Those Performance and Networking tabs will have a fresh new look in only a few minutes.

Before

The default color scheme for the Performance and Networking tabs is not bad, but if you love customizing your system then even this can be changed.

Getting Started with Task Manager Modder

Task Manager Modder comes in .7z zip file and has a single file inside (Task Manager Modder.exe). All you will need to do is place it in an appropriate Program Files folder and create a shortcut. When you start Task Manager Modder for the first time you will have to agree to the EULA in order to use the program.

You will see an embedded Task Manager Window inside the program window for viewing color modifications and the color controls at the bottom.

Here is a closer look at the color adjustments toolbar. You can select from the set of included colors for each option or enter your own custom color codes if desired. During our tests we chose the colors included with the program.

Here are three examples that we set up on our system. You can have a lot of fun experimenting with the color schemes to get that “just perfect look��. When you have everything fixed just the way that you like click on Modify Taskmgr. Keep in mind that if you have the Task Manager Window open it will temporarily close while the colors are changed then restart. Click Exit when you are finished modifying the color scheme.

After

Our Task Manager Window definitely had a different look and feel to it afterwards.

If you need or want to change back to the default color scheme just click on Restore Taskmgr. As discussed above, if you have the Task Manager Window open it will temporarily close while the colors are reset then restart.

Conclusion

By changing the colors in Task Manager, it could actually help you identify performance issues easier. So if you love to customize as much of your system as possible, then you can definitely have fun with Task Manager Modder.

Links

Download Task Manager Modder

Source: http://www.howtogeek.com/howto/22470/add-some-visual-flair-to-the-task-manager-display-in-windows-7/

Beginners Guide for Setting Up Windows 7 Media Center

Friendly Computers would like to share this article with new Windows 7 users. Media Center is one of the new features you might be interested.

If you’re moving from XP to Windows 7, one of the new features you might be interested in is Media Center. In this tutorial we’ll walk through the process of configuring it for the first time and look at some of its default features.

Unless you happened to be using XP Media Center Edition or Vista and are new to Windows 7, Media Center is probably completely new to you. Let’s take a look at setting it up for the first time and getting important basic features working.

Note: Windows Media Center is only available in Windows Home Premium and above.

Windows 7 Media Center Setup

Click on the Start Menu and click on Windows Media Center.

Windows Media Center will launch…click on the Continue button.

On the Get Started screen you can select Learn More, Custom setup, or Express. The quickest way to get rolling is to click Express. You can start with Custom setup, but it will take longer, and you want to get started right away. Also, you can change customizations at any time after you have it up and running.

Now you have access to all of the default features in WMC…Pretty simple right? In this example we have a home network with Windows Home Server and we get a message asking if we want to use the Media Center Connector which we’ve previously covered.

Another message that will pop up is for adding a Desktop Gadget if you want.

The gadget will transition between different Internet TV programs that are available to watch. Click on the Wrench icon to change its settings. You don’t have to install the gadget at all, but if you do this is what you can expect.

Setup Internet TV

You’ll probably be interested in watching TV and videos right away so on the menu screen go to TV and click on Internet TV.

The Free streaming Internet TV window will come up, agree to the Terms of Service and click Install. After installation you can start watching the available streaming TV programs.

For more on this head over to our article on how to watch TV programs without a TV tuner card in Windows 7 Media Center.

Setup Live TV

If you do have a TV tuner card, another thing you’ll want to setup right away is live TV. Make sure you’re antenna, cable, or satellite cable is connected to the card.From the main menu under TV scroll over to Live TV Setup.

Verify the Region for your local TV service is correct.

Enter in your zip code to get the Program Guide for your area.

Agree to the Program Guide Terms of Service…

Then you’ll need to agree to the EULA for Microsoft PlayReady.

Wait while the Program Guide is downloaded and PlayReady is installed.

After everything is setup you’ll be able to navigate through the Guide to view you’re favorite shows. If you like to use WMC to mainly watch Live TV, a cool trick is automatically starting Media Center in Live TV mode.

If you’re hard of hearing, or just want to mute the volume on a show, Close Captioning is available as well.

Use Media Center as a DVR

Another cool feature you’ll want to get started with is using it as a DVR to record, pause, and rewind live TV. The process is simple, while watching Live TV simply click the Record button.

You’ll know it’s recording by a small message popping upon the left side of the screen with the red record button.

Click the Record button again to stop it and you’ll see the Record button is no longer there.

Then you can watch the recorded TV by going to the main menu and under TV select Recorded TV.

This will pull up a list of the different shows you’ve recorded.

Your recorded live TV files will be in the Recorded TV Library Folder as “.wtv” file format. Keep in mind the Recorded TV  files are lossless and will be quite large, so make sure you have the appropriate disk space. If you want to convert the files and remove commercials, check out our article on MCEBuddy.

You can also convert the files to “.dvr-ms” format by right-clicking the file and selecting that option from the Context Menu.

Watch Netflix

If you have a Netflix account, by default you can watch instant streams through WMC. In the main menu navigate to Movies and select Netflix.

Agree to the Terms of Service and click Install.

Now sign into your account or if you don’t have an account you can start a free trial.

After signing in you can go through your Queue and browse for movies and programs that are available to watch instantly.

You have the ability to manage your Netflix DVD and Instant Queue directly within WMC.

For best viewing results you can watch your videos in full screen.

This should get you started with Windows 7 Media Center. Setting it up and getting the basic features working is relatively easy following the wizard driven user interface.

Source: http://www.howtogeek.com/howto/22353/beginners-guide-for-setting-up-windows-7-media-center/