Decided to upgrade the memory on my (old) PC the other day and was left wondering what kind of memory it originally had i.e. PC133, PC2700 etc.

I opened my machine up and saw that the memory sticks did not have any stickers on them. A search on the internet revealed a nifty little freeware tool called CPU-Z. CPU-Z reveals all the details about memory (in each slot ) including the size, latency and manufacturer. This is invaluable if you want to replace a particular stick of memory (provided you use CPU-Z to note down the details BEFORE anything bad happens …. if your memory stick goes bad, chances are CPU-Z may not be able to read the details !!). Another great feature is that it shows details about your processor including socket specs and L1/L2 cache sizes and far more than what Windows (My Computer-> Properties) shows you. You can also use the tool to check the configuration of a newly purchased machine just to check that you got is what you paid for 🙂

Windows Key Enterprise is a nice addition to any software library.

People often forget their admin password which means they are locked out of their computers. Often your options are limited and people often have to reinstall their operational system, which means loss of data and that you’ll have to install most programs again.

Fortunately, there is another option, namely “Windows Key Enterprise”. With this program you will create a CD that you can use when you start your computer. This CD will allow you to reset your admin password and you’re saved. Much better than reinstalling your operational system don’t you agree? Windows Key Enterprise can be used currently to reset a password for Windows XP/2000/NT. This software is not for free but you can try out their demo version.

Ubiquity is a small Firefox add-on by Mozilla Labs, which goes beyond any add-on that you’ve ever used.

It’s in an early stage of development and still has attracted a lot of attention. Mozilla defines it as a tool that’s supposed to connect the web with words, but simply put, it’s a command line within Firefox that offers numerous useful commands. Say you stumbled upon a Chinese website and can’t understand a word of it. If you have Ubiquity installed you can highlight the text that seems the most interesting to you, press CTRL+Space (or the shortcut for summoning the command line that you’ve chosen) and type ‘translate’. Ubiquity uses online translators to do the job, but even so, it seriously simplifies the process.

Translate is just one of the many tasks you can perform with this hefty extension. You could highlight (or type in the command line) the name of your town, and type ‘weather’ and you’ll be instantly presented with the weather forecast. You can add dates to your Google calendar, you can calculate complex mathematical expressions, you can update your Facebook/Myspace status, you can view Google maps by highlighting the street name and typing ‘map’ in the command line, and much much more. The most exciting part about this add-on is that it’s still being shaped and developed. We can hardly wait for future version. Download the latest version for free from the Mozilla Labs site.

Folder Lock is a free computer security program that password locks, hides and encrypts your files with the click of your mouse.

The program can be used to hide sensitive information from hackers, protect children from inappropriate content, and safeguard your privacy on a shared computer. Folder Lock can also be used on removable media such as CD-RWs, Memory Sticks and USB thumb drives. The software works with Windows Vista/2003/XP/2000/NT/Me/98/98S. New users can test the product out by downloading a 35-day shareware trial.

Some of the most important things in media players are simplicity, support for a lot of video and audio formats and not having to worry about bugs, crashes and computer freezes.

About two years ago I found a new player that is simple and plays almost everything, its name, GOM Player. It plays almost every video format known to mankind and if it doesn’t have the codec it tries to find it on the web. One feature I enjoy is the “time jump” option, which allows you to move through the movie or short video clip with the arrow keys. I often repeat hilarious scenes from video clips so this is a great thing for me. This player can also play FLV files that I download from Youtube. All you need to do is install the FLV Splitter add-on. One my favorite options with GOM player is the “stay on top while playing” option. I can chat with someone and at the same time watch a video that’s playing on the side. Other players go into the background when you try to do something else. There are a lot of preferences that you can change in this player and that’s what makes it so great, you can turn off anything that annoys you.

Memopal is an online storage service for personal or business use that offers backup of your computer files to their Internet server.

There is a 1-week free trial, and currently the price is $99 per year for a personal/1-computer account, with a storage limit of 250GB. I took the free trial, and backed up — not everything on my laptop — most of the desktop and documents files.

Memopal works quietly in the background while you do other things, but — at least for me — it was rather slow. How slow you ask? Well, we started around 4 pm and didn’t finish (I just walked away and let it run) until 11 pm. I’m willing to blame this on my router (laptop is upstairs, main pc is downstairs) and cable. That problem aside, I found the software very easy to understand and work with. Why would you want online storage? Well, when stuff is on the Internet, you can access it from anywhere. So if you are on vacation in Singapore, you can pull out your Blackberry or iPhone and take a peek at something. If you are working on a project with others, but the others aren’t necessarily at your company or it’s not a job-related project — it’s a lot easier to have the files on an Internet server. A hundred bucks might be too steep for some, but it might be worthwhile for a small business owner who does a lot of travel and networks on jobs that have a diverse group of consultants scattered around the globe.