Tag Archives: vista

EasyBCD 1.52 Up for Download

Posted on by NeoSmart Technologies
5

EasyBCD 1.52 has just been made available on the public servers for download. This is the primary reason for the relative lack of post activity here on The NeoSmart Files, we’ve been really busy with this build.

  • TweakVI Integration
  • Emergency bug fix for Vista/LH non-C: Entries
  • Nifty new section – “Useful Utilities”

Anyway, check it out for yourself, the only way to actually understand what “Useful Utilities” does is to see it at work firsthand. As always, should you feel compelled to say thank you: EasyBCD is a 100% free non-profit product and donations are accepted.

Download EasyBCD

Vista and Longhorn Wallpapers Gallery

Posted on by NeoSmart Technologies
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Just a quick update of sorts: The NeoSmart Technologies Image Gallery now has every single Longhorn and Vista wallpaper released to date,1 most in hi-res, all available for free download. They’re really beautiful and capture what Vista is all about – whatever that is. That’s over 120 high-quality wallpapers for you to enjoy!

  1. We’ve done our very best to make sure we have them all, but if we’re missing some, please, let us know. ↩

EasyBCD 1.51 Released: Dual-Boot Vista and Anything!

Posted on by NeoSmart Technologies
21

After two months of crazy bug-hunting and hundreds of rounds of scenario testing, EasyBCD 1.51 is finally out. If you’re in a really big hurry, go and get it – if not, read on. EasyBCD 1.51 is a very major change from 1.5.

As a matter of fact, if it wasn’t for the fact that it would completely ruin our release schedule, this release would have been dubbed EasyBCD 2.0. It’s that big.

Use our Windows recovery disks to:
✓ Fix all boot errors
✓ Resolve startup BSODs
✓ Restore registry and settings
✓ Clean up virus infections
Easy Recovery Essentials is available for Windows Vista, Windows 7, Windows 8. Windows XP and Windows Server editions are also supported.
Download Easy Recovery Essentials

What makes EasyBCD 1.51 so special is the switch in purpose and technique. In the past, EasyBCD was only a bootloader modification tool that let end-users configure the Windows Vista bootloader, and EasyBCD 1.5 added support for “profiles” that could be used to boot into Linux, BSD, & OS X. Not only does EasyBCD 1.51 add support for several other operating systems, but also it goes a step further. A very big step further. Now, if there is anything that Vista’s BCD bootloader can’t boot into, EasyBCD 1.51 comes with its own additional bootloader that can boot into it. It’s called NeoGrub, and you’re going to love it.

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Windows Vista Crashes, BSODs, and System Failures on Hibernate, Resume, and Wake

Posted on by NeoSmart Technologies
195

While Windows Vista has a whole host of new features to offer, it has one major problem that just won’t go away: it’s totally FUBAR’d after you resume from sleep or hibernate. Unfortunately, many of these issues weren’t present during the beta stage, and were somehow introduced in the RTM build of Windows Vista. This exclusive NeoSmart Technologies report describes some of the symptoms in detail, and we even provide links to possible fixes by Microsoft. All issues have been duly reported and confirmed by Microsoft, so this isn’t just some figment of our imagination. A number of these patches are scheduled to be included in Windows Vista SP1 (Codename Fiji).

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Vista Symlinks Revisited…

Posted on by NeoSmart Technologies
32

It’s not often that something we classify as a “really good” feature turns out to be a bit of a sham, but unfortunately, that’s the case with Vista’s symlinks. Just a couple of days ago, symlinks were our “big Vista feature of the week,” but now, we’re not so sure.

First, a correction. Symlinks haven’t really been added to Windows Vista. Sure, you can use the mklink command to get Vista to intercept calls made to certain paths and have them silently and invisibly replaced with whatever real paths you previously specified, just like Symlinks are supposed to be – but that’s about it. Vista’s symlinks aren’t much better than junctions in 2k/XP that don’t take up extra hard drive space, and indeed are quite a bit less compatible.

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Windows Longhorn/IE7 Beta Program Rewards!

Posted on by NeoSmart Technologies
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Windows Vista RTM’d a week ago, and now, the beta testers have gotten their swag. If you (actively) participated in the Longhorn Beta program, this is your chance to get a free (as in free speech beer) Windows Vista Business or Ultimate Edition product key (legally, and it activates!).

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The NeoSmart Image Gallery…

Posted on by NeoSmart Technologies
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The best thing about having our own server is that we don’t have to worry about the load. That means we can use resource & bandwidth hungry scripts like our image gallery without a fear in the world. To celebrate, we’ve taken this opportunity to completely redo our image gallery, and have filled in all the blanks. You’ll find images of all sorts and kinds there now, but we’d like to direct your attention to one gallery (and it’s brethren!) in particular: Windows Vista.

Besides the huge build gallery, there’s also, for the first time, every single RTM Vista wallpaper, all in hi-res quality, available in both widescreen and standard format. The “ambience,” “paintings,” “Vistas,” and “textures” categories are all there, in pristine digital goodiness, awaiting your downloads! Drive our hamsters mad, work them like they’ve never worked before; what else did we get them for!?

[digg]

RTM Confusion, Build Mixups, and Ethics

Posted on by NeoSmart Technologies
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Windows Vista has RTM’d. No it hasn’t, Microsoft told me it goes out on Wednesday. Vista’s not coming out ‘till 2007. Vista RTM’d a month ago and Microsoft is planning to release it in time to subvert the minds of the American public to vote Democrat!

It doesn’t matter which of these you believe, it seems all and none of them are true at once. It also seems that something mighty fishy is going on in the higher-echelons of Vista blogging. Since last night, there have been rumors abound that Vista had “gone gold” at build number 6000.16386 – RTM was here. This “news” wasn’t confirmed by any independent sources at the time. Clear as mud, but at least no conspiracy theories – yet.

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Vista Gets It: Symlinks at Last!

Posted on by NeoSmart Technologies
11

OK, we take our last post back, Vista does have several exciting features to blog home about (and guys, for the last time, that comment’s what they call sarcasm!) one of which is the much requested “Symlinks” feature. It’s been in practically every other operating system for the past decade+ and is one of the most essential time-saving devices ever to be implemented. For those of you (Windows-dwelling creatures) that don’t know what a symlink is yet, here’s the Wikipedia definition.

Symlinks save tons of space by making files “pretend” to exist where they don’t, but even more importantly is the time they save by allowing you to create/reference a static filepath in all your programs – then have that “file” redirect to the real deal, no matter how often it changes. If you’re a web-dev kinda guy, think of it as mod_rewrite for your hard drive, without the PCRE libraries though… (come to think of it, the first OS to implement regex into symlinks has my vote!)

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Microsoft Murders Max

Posted on by NeoSmart Technologies
17

Well, it’s official at any rate. Contrary to what you’ve heard, Windows Vista will not be shipping with any of the original technologies, features, capabilities, or subsystems originally promised (and for those of you that really couldn’t tell: it’s called sarcasm!). First it was the real Aero – complete visual control over one’s system. Amazing graphics, sidebars that were a part of the Windows Core, Aero Diamond. Then it was NGSCB and its amazing security features – not DRM, but total privacy control; your privacy. Monad. Last we heard, it was WinFS, the king-pin feature that was promised to change the way you think of data… And now the last one is gone: Microsoft Max is dead.

Microsoft Max was a “virtual photo albums and distributing them online in a peer-to-peer fashion.” But it was more than just a sharing tool, it, in-keeping with the original Longhorn “tradition” provided a different way of looking at the data stored on your drive. Microsoft Max + WinFS would have been a formidable duo, but alas, it was not to be. For example, “3D Mantle View” (pictured above), treated albums as individual items. It provide a way to visually “stack” these and photos on top and around each other in ways that pertained to the way you actually used them – visualization of information movement.

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