Set drive jumpers

Jumpers are little connectors which connect adjacent pins. They “jump” between the pins.

Before you set your new drive's master/slave jumper, check the setting on the drive that's already in your system to see whether it's set to "cable select" (CSEL or CS). With cable select, the ATA ribbon-cable connector determines whether the drive operates as master or slave. This makes it possible to install and rearrange drives without having to change master/slave settings, but there's a catch: You have to set the jumper on both drives on the channel to CSEL for cable select to work, and the ribbon cable must support CSEL. You may need to check your PC's documentation to determine if its cables support cable select.

Cable select means that the mainboard will choose whether to make the drive master/primary or slave/secondary. Most mainboards today support cable select. And, most drives will have their jumpers already set to cable select. You can just have all your drives set to cable select, and the mainboard will take care of the rest.


Picture:jumper on the hard drive in cable select postion


The other, more reliable, alternative is to set one drive's jumper to master and the other's to slave. You'll have to remove the existing drive to check, and possibly change, its jumper setting, but the master/slave arrangement is a foolproof approach. You usually want your main hard drive set as primary, or set it as cable select and have the mainboard set it as primary. The Western Digital instructions tell us setting the jumper to primary goes across pins on the lower, longer line of pins.
Picture:primary goes across pins on the bottom row of pins.

Or For master/Primary setting:Place jumper on the first row (vertical)away from
the power supply connector
For slave/secondary :Place jumper on the second row(vertical away from
the power supply connector


To remove jumpers, longer nails are handy, or you could use a small needle nose pliers. Be sure to push the jumper in all the way.

Serial ATA Jumpers and Cabling
Each drive on the serial ATA interface connects in a point-to-point configuration with the serial ATA host adapter. There is no master/slave relationship because each drive is considered a master in a point-to-point relationships. If two drives are attached on one serial ATA host adapter, the host operating system views the two devices as if they were both “masters” on two separate ports. This means both drives behave as if they are Device 0 (master) devices. Each drive has its own cable.


Your serial ATA host adapter may provide master/slave emulation options. See your host adapter documentation for details.



Jumper settings for Seagate SATA hard drives.


Jumper settings for Maxtor SATA hard drives.

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Power Process Controller

Monitor running processes & system's performance simultaneously

The Power Process Controller application was designed to shows you exactly what is running on your computer, including the hidden processes. You can view the details of each process. Browsing the process list displays original file name, version, company, and Creation time, if you discover a rogue program you can easily stop, quarantine or uninstall it so it doesn't run anymore...

Power Process Controller Free Version view the detailed information about Internet connections, DLL files, CPU and memory use, Internet server programs running on your PC. Browsing the process list displays original file name, version, company, and Creation time.

It can take an easily control of much listed process, Power Process Controller add the Blacklist and Whitelist other than traditional Task Manager, the nice function allows you to kill much process synchronously and in good time
Power Process Controller Free Version Trial

Requirements:

· Processor type: Pentium
· Processor speed: 533 MHz
· Memory (Cache): 128 MB RAM Minimum
· Hard disk: IDE
· Soundcard: MME-compatible Soundcard
· Graphics: 256 colors @ 800 x 600
Download Version 5.002
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Advanced Task Manager
Security Task Manager

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Keep the latest Conficker worm infestation off your PC

By mid-November 2008, the Microsoft Malware Protection Center (MMPC) said in a blog posting that it had collected "over 50 distinct exploits of this vulnerability." However, MMPC said the instances were very limited. Then Conficker.A hit the fan. (McAfee and Microsoft call the worm "Conficker," Sophos uses the name "Confick," and Symantec and F-Secure call it "Downadup"; but it's the same virus.) By Nov. 25, MMPC was raising the alarm on its blog in an attempt to get individuals and — especially — organizations to install the MS08-067 patch, which stops Conficker.A dead in its tracks.

At this point, the Conficker furor should've died down and the worm been relegated to the history books. Two inexorable forces, however, combined in early January 2009 to give the worm new life: system admins who weren't applying key patches and a ferociously fecund variant called Conficker.B.

Conficker.A arrived as a Trojan: in order to infect a PC, somebody had to run an infected program on the machine. It could also try to hit your machine directly, but any sort of firewall would thwart that attack. If the infected system was attached to a network, Conficker.A used the hole (that MS08-067 closes) to spread to other computers on the network. This modus operandi is kinda boring but moderately effective.

Conficker.B uses the Conficker.A approach, plus a whole lot more — as a "blended threat," it's an equal-opportunity infecter.

# Conficker.B uses the old Conficker.A approach: simple Trojans that arrive via e-mail or by downloading an infected program.

# Once a PC on a network is infected, Conficker.B reaches across the network to see whether any of its PCs have not yet patched the MS08-067 hole. After infecting these unprotected PCs, Conficker plugs the MS08-067 hole, presumably so other, similar worms can't get in.

# If Conficker.B finds that it can't get into a computer via the MS08-067 hole, it tries to break in by using the standard Windows admin account, entering each of 248 common passwords. This weak password list (which you'll find under the Analysis tab) includes such all-time favorites as admin, mypass, test, foo, 1111, and many others you may have seen before.

# Once Conficker.B gains entry to a networked machine, it drops a copy of itself onto the target's hard drive and creates a scheduled job that runs the infected file. Conficker.B also loads itself onto all accessible shared folders. Ho-hum.

# Finally, Conficker.B scans and infects all removable devices on the system, including USB drives and external hard drives.

Once a system is infected, Conficker takes a variety of actions, including exploiting several routes that have nothing to do with the Server services. It disables common anti-malware programs and uses DNS modifications to prevent local end-users from surfing to anti-malware-related Web sites (which might be one of the first clues that you're infected). It spreads to mapped file shares and identified removal drives. Once there, it creates a subdirectory folder called Recycler (emulating the Recycle Bin) and places an Autorun.inf file, which may be auto-launched when visited. It attempts to connect to remote admin drive mappings using hundreds of common, weak passwords, including multiple versions of numbers and letters. If you find an infection on your network, you probably want to check out the list and see if any of your passwords are located there. Using either exploit vector, Conficker is able to infect computers that are fully patched after first exploiting one unpatched network computer. Conficker isn't the first worm to do any of these things, but the most popular worms rarely do anything new.

Guide to cleaning and preventing Conficker
# Step 1: Check your passwords. If you have an administrator account with an easily guessed password, change it. Microsoft provides a guide to strong passwords that includes a link to the company's online password checker. If somebody other than you controls your computer's admin password, make sure that person understands the gravity of this situation.

# Step 2: Make sure you've installed the patch described in MS08-067. Open Control Panel's Add or Remove Programs list to ensure that KB 958644 has been installed. Click Start (plus Run in XP), type appwiz.cpl, and press Enter. In XP, make sure Show updates at the top of the window is checked. In Vista, click View installed updates on the left to see all of your PC's patches.

The update in question was probably installed in late October or November of last year; look for Security Update for Microsoft Windows (KB958644)[Download Conficker Worm Patch WindowsXP-KB958644-x86-ENU]. If this patch isn't installed, browse to Microsoft's Download Center to retrieve and install it. If your PC is blocked from visiting this site, use a noninfected PC to download the patch to a removable medium and install the update on the wormed PC from that device.

# Step 3: Run Microsoft's Malicious Software Removal Tool (MSRT). The latest version of this Microsoft tool identifies and removes all of the Conficker variants I've heard about. The easiest way to get MSRT is through Windows Update, but if you can't get through to that service on the infected PC, borrow a computer and download the tool from Microsoft's site.

# Step 4: Disable AutoPlay. If Figure 2 doesn't convince you of the risk of using Windows' AutoPlay feature, nothing will. Simply stated, you don't need AutoPlay that much. Follow the post Disabling Auto-Run in Windows comprehensive instructions to disable AutoPlay.

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Disabling Auto-Run in Windows

Disable Autorun to Secure your Windows Computer from Worms See: Keep the latest Conficker worm infestation off your PC

Autorun is also known as AutoPlay. AutoRun, and its companion feature AutoPlay, are components of the Microsoft Windows operating system that dictate which actions the system takes when a drive is mounted. When a CD-ROM is inserted into a CD-ROM drive, AutoRun is the technology that starts an install program, or plays audio content. AutoPlay is the feature that can detect content on the CD-ROM, or indeed any removable media, and give the user options based on the media type of files found. AutoPlay is a feature introduced in Windows XP which examines removable media and devices and, based on content such as pictures, music or video files, launches an appropriate application to play or display the content.

The Nick Brown method nulls any request for autorun.inf and works on XP Home or Pro, as well as Windows Vista which truly disable autorun can be done via this simple autorun registry hack:

REGEDIT4
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\IniFileMapping\Autorun.inf]
@="@SYS:DoesNotExist"

All you do is to copy these three lines into a file called NOAUTRUN.REG (or anything.REG) and double-click it.

Save the file as something.reg. (You have to be sure to change the "Save File as Type" to "All Files" before saving, or Windows will try to save it as a .txt even if you typed in .reg.

Download Reg file here
To check that the registry settings of this hack are in place, open Regedit, walk down to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\IniFileMapping and you should see on the right under column Data
"@SYS:DoesNotExist"
********************************************

If you opt to disable autorun using any other method, you will first need to install an autorun patch from Microsoft that allegedly resolves issues that cause autorun to run even after it's been disabled (using methods other than the above recommended method).

Prerequisites to disable Autorun capabilities To disable Autorun capabilities, you must install the following updates: * Update for Windows XP (KB950582) * Update for Windows Server 2003 for Itanium-based Systems (KB950582) * Update for Windows Server 2003 x64 Edition (KB950582) * Update for Windows Server 2003 (KB950582) * Update for Windows XP x64 Edition (KB950582) * Update for Windows 2000 (KB950582) Note Windows Vista-based systems must have update 950582 (Security bulletin MS08-038 (http://www.microsoft.com/technet/security/Bulletin/MS08-038.mspx) ) installed to take advantage of the registry key settings that disable Autorun.

Disabling Auto-Run in Windows XP.

Disabling Auto-Run in Windows XP & Vista. REGISTRY WAY Stop Autorun on removable/USB drives with or without CD ROM drives. In Windows Click Start, then Click Run Type regedit Click OK Click > HKEY_CURRENT_USER Software Microsoft Windows CurrentVersion Policies Explorer. With Explorer highlighted, in the right-pane right click the value NoDriveTypeAutoRun and select Modify from the drop down menu. The base value will be set to Hexadecimal. If not, select Hexadecimal. (f necessary create a dword called NoDriveTypeAutoRun) Type 95 and click OK. Note that this will stop Autorun on removable/USB drives, but still allow it on CD ROM drives. If you want to disable autorun on both, substitute b5 for the 95. Click OK There is no need to logoff; the NoDriveTypeAutoRun setting should take effect straightaway. The value data may reset to 91 instead of b5 in Hexadecimal , the value which is used to test autorun on floppy disks. Right click to modify it (make sure to keep the value in Hex). Then hit F3 and modify every instance of the NoDriveTypeAutorun. Exit regedit and reboot for this manoeuvre. Or download this registry file NoDriveTypeAutorunCD&USB to right click the file and run as Administrator. When it asks you to merge the information to the registry click Yes.

Disabling Auto-Run in Windows XP. Group Policy way Start Menu \ Run and type in: gpedit.msc In Group Policy window, select Administrative Templates \ System in the tree view. Select an item in the right side pane called "Turn off Autoplay" Double click the item, and set the radio button to Enabled, and change the "Turn off Autoplay on" to All Drives. Click OK Now restart, that's it!

Tool designed to manage your Autoplay Handler collection Autoplay Repair 2.2.2 Autoplay Repair has been written to remove corrupted entries from Windows XP's autoplay. The background is that after an uninstallation of several applications like media players, some invalid entries still may remain in Windows XP's autoplay sections. These are visible every time a CD or DVD is put into the drive and the autoplay selection dialog appears. Now with Autoplay Repair it is possible to remove these invalid entries and even create new or modify existing so called autoplay handlers quickly and easily. But Autoplay Repair can also be used to remove unwanted entries or just to tidy up the Windows autoplay sections for a better overview. In addition to that Autoplay Repair has some other necessary features to offer. Here are some key features of "Autoplay Repair": · Create, modify or delete (corrupted) Autoplay Handler entries from the Windows Registry quickly · Have control of the main autorun sections in the Registry: add, edit or delete single entries · Disable or enable Autoplay for each installed drive on your computer · Create backups of Autoplay and Autorun sections to restore deleted or edited Registry entries if needed Requirements: · Microsoft .NET Framework 1.1 or above Developer: Darius Baczynski Freeware / FREE 214 KB / Windows XP DOWNLOAD HERE

Disable AutoPlay in Windows Vista

Disable Through Control Panel
Open your Control Panel, and then click on "Play CDs or other media automatically" to open the AutoPlay dialog.
Disable AutoPlay Globally
The quickest way to disable AutoPlay entirely is to just uncheck the box for "Use AutoPlay for all media and devices", which should usually work.

Disable Through Group Policy Use the Group Policy editor on the Business and Ultimate versions of Vista. Open up gpedit.msc through the start menu search box, browse to Windows Components \ AutoPlay Policies, and change the value of "Turn off Autoplay" to enabled. You can choose whether to disable for just removable devices, or entirely.

Disable with Registry Hack

The Group Policy editor is not available on Windows Vista Home editions,included here is the registry tweak to disable AutoPlay entirely.

Download and unzip this registry hack and then double-click on the appropriate file.

* DisableAutoPlay.reg will disable autoplay entirely.
* DisableAutoPlayRemovable.reg will disable autoplay on removable devices.

Disabling Auto-Run in Windows Vista. REGISTRY WAY

# Open the Registry Editor (regedit.exe) and browse to the following key:

HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\Cdrom
# In the right pane, right-click Autorun and select Modify.
# Enter 0 for the Value data. Click OK, then exit the Registry Editor

Click Start, type autoplay and press enter. If prompted by User Access Control (UAC), click Continue.
# Remove the check from 'Use AutoPlay for all media and devices'
You may also wish to change each individual item to 'Take no action'
# Click Save and the Autoplay window will close.

Disable Autoplay easy with TuneUp Utilities

Start/Program/Tune Utilities TuneUp System Control Drives Right Hand Side-AutiPlay: Untick-Monitor CD drives for Media Change Click Advanced Untick ALL Ok

Disable Autoplay easy with Tweak UI from Microsoft PowerToys for Windows XP.

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PDF Creator

PDFCreator easily creates PDFs from any Windows program. Use it like a printer in Word, StarCalc or any other Windows application.

• PDFCreator 0.9.7 released 2009-02-04 Improvements: - Create very small PDF/A files - A new version of the pdfforge.dll supports direct creation of PDFs from images and can create booklets - Supports Windows 7 Beta - New Browser Add On - Many minor improvements
  

• PDFCreator 0.9.6 released 2008-09-19
• PDFCreator 0.9.5 released 2007-12-24

As PDFCreator is Open Source, there is also a source release

License : GNU General Public License (GPL)

Version 0.9.6 of PDFCreator
Improvements:
- Using GPL-Ghostscript 8.63 now.
- Full vista support
- Following file formats are supported : PDF (including PDF/A (1b) and PDF/X (X-3:2002, X-3:2003 and X-4), PNG, JPEG,BMP, PCX, TIFF, PS, EPS, TXT, PSD, PCL, RAW
- Support for signed PDFs.
- Added some new com-samples.
- Direct conversion for faster processing of JPEG and BMP images without printing added

• 
  

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