Create Idiot-Proof Backups With Windows' Built-In Tools

When Apple released its Time Machine backup tool in Mac OS X 10.5 last year, many hailed its convenience and simplicity. But your Windows PC comes with all of Time Machine's slick backup tricks built-in.
The backup utility built into Vista and XP doesn't have a catchy name (it's called Backup Status and Configuration), but it's a powerful tool that gets far less attention than it deserves--and it costs nothing extra. Perhaps it should have a name like "Super-Better Backup," or "Burger, Fries, and a Milk Shake Backup."
Apple's Time Machine makes backups on an automated schedule and allows incremental updates. So does Windows' backup app. Your PC can even match Time Machine's most interesting feature, rolling back any given file to an earlier version. I'll explain how to use all of these tools, and I'll provide tips along the way to protect your data from disaster.
Pick the Destination

The most secure backup solution is one that stores your data far, far away from your PC--like, across town in a bank safe. Second best: an Internet-based storage service. Third: a Network Attached Storage (NAS) device.
An external, USB-, FireWire-, or eSATA-connected backup drive such one of the models on our Top 10 External Hard Drives chart is a good choice, especially if you store it somewhere other than on top of the PC it's backing up. As our lab tests have shown, eSATA and FireWire 800 drives are faster than USB 2.0 and FireWire 400 drives (though few PCs come standard with the faster interfaces).
Try to set up a routine of taking the drive with you when you go to work, and bring it home once a week for the backup operation. An even better strategy: Use two external drives, making two sets of backups. With this alternating pattern, you can keep one of the drives at work, or in a fireproof safe, a bank deposit box, a friend's house, or other off-site location to protect your data from a home-office catastrophe.
A network backup offers a great way to store files, and the LaCie Ethernet Disk Mini Home Edition is a good option for the home office, especially if you have more than one PC to back up. But network-attached storage drives are substantially slower than drives that use eSATA, FireWire, or USB connections, and because they're often shared among multiple PCs, they usually stay in once place, greatly diminishing their disaster protection.
Online storage protects you from a fire or other catastrophe, and it allows retrieval from anywhere. Internet backups move slowly, however, because they are limited by your broadband provider's maximum upload rate. Because of the pace, such backups are usually best for saving just individual documents or small folders, not for backing up an entire system. (See "Online Storage Options" for more on this alternative.)
If your PC has only a single hard drive and you can't (or don't want to) find an external solution, you can use Windows to make a second partition, and save the backup data there. Your PC will treat the second partition as a second drive, which can protect it from some simple types of data corruption. But if the drive mechanism physically fails, you'll lose access to the backup too, of course.
To set up a second partition, in Windows Vista, click Control Panel, System and Maintenance, and under Administrative Tools,choose Create and format hard disk partitions to open the Disk Management utility. Right-click your current disk, and pick Shrink Volume. Enter how much space you want to recover. When the action is complete, right-click the Unallocated space, and click New Simple Volume.
Note: Windows XP won't repartition a disk that's in use, so you'll need to employ a utility like the free Partition Logic instead.
Because the Windows backup tools have changed quite a bit with the release of Vista, the next step in creating your backup plan depends on which version of Windows you're running.

Schedule Automated Backups in XP

Windows XP includes built-in, automated backup tools that can save a copy of all your data. From Programs, Accessories, System Tools, choose Backup. Click Advanced Mode to skip the wizard. Click the Backup tab at the top of the window.
Navigate below My Computer to check the drive you want to back up, or highlight the drive name in the left pane and click specific check boxes in the right pane to select items à la carte. Click the Browse button at the bottom of the screen to choose a place on the destination drive to store the data. Click Start Backup.
If you want a long list of redundant backups, leave the radio button set to append data. That way, you can go back to recover files in different states, if necessary. But if you're backing up most of the system, that'll use a lot of space. Choose the second option, Replace the data, if you'd rather conserve drive space when making consecutive backups. That option will provide you with only one version of each file.
Click the Advanced button, and set the Backup Type to Incremental. That setting will save only the files you've changed or added since the most recent backup. (You'll copy everything the first time.) Click OK. Click the Schedule button and save a copy of the settings when prompted. The Scheduled Job Options window will open. Click Properties, and use the Schedule Task pop-up menus to set the time and frequency of the backup. Note that your PC needs to be on to process the backup; but pick a time, such as late at night, when you won't be competing with the utility for system resources. For a primary machine, I like to run a backup every day, but you could be fine with weekly backups on a less frequently used system. Click OK. Choose Start Backup to begin the job the first time.
Schedule Automated Backups in Vista

Once you've decided where you'll save your backups, configure Windows Vista to automatically save new copies of your data. Open Control Panel, System and Maintenance, Backup and Restore Center, and click the Back up files button. Choose an external hard disk or a CD or DVD drive, or click the radio button to connect to a network location. Click Next.
Choose the types of files that you want to back up. I like to back up as much as I can, checking all of the boxes. (This isn't the same as backing up a complete disk image for a full PC restore, which I'll talk about at the end of this article.) Checking all the boxex basically saves everything that you create or add to a computer other than applications and their settings. The operating system and its settings won't be backed up. Click Next.
Choose a schedule by considering how much data you can afford to lose. If you use this PC for critical, daily work, schedule backups every night. If it's an occasionally used computer, consider backing it up every week. The first time you make a backup, the process may take a few hours, depending on how much you're saving. After that, the system will look for files that you've added or changed, copying only those items to save time and storage space.
Roll Back Individual Files

Certain editions of Windows Vista--Business, Enterprise, and Ultimate--let you browse backwards through a single file, recovering a specific version, not just the most recent copy. Microsoft calls this feature Shadow Copy, and it's enabled by default. Right-click a file or folder, and select Restore previous versions. Each system restore point or backup point that Windows creates initiates a new Shadow Copy. Browse through the different modification dates, and click Open to preview the file as it was. Click Restore to retrieve a copy from the backup for current work.
Thriftier versions of Windows Vista create Shadow Copies but don't allow you access to them. The free ShadowExplorer adds this retrieval feature. After installation, launch ShadowExplorer, and choose the restore date from the pop-up menu. Navigate through the file browser to locate an item. Right-click it, choose Export, and save it to any location you like.


Roll Back Windows to an Earlier State

Windows includes a couple of backup tools to revert your PC to a previous, working condition: Restore Points and device driver rollback. These are most helpful if your system becomes unstable and you need to reset it to an earlier point where it was reliable. Unlike Shadow Copy, these don't let you selectively browse back; they're essentially all-or-nothing switches.
Locate Vista's Restore Points by opening Control Panel, System and Maintenance, System. In the left side, click Advanced system settings. Choose the System Protection tab. Click System Restore.
Windows automatically creates a restore point each day, and before making significant changes to the system. You can also create a restore point manuallly by selecting a disk under the System Protection tab of the System Properties control panel and then clicking Create. If you want to revert to the most recent restore point, click Next; otherwise, click the Choose a different restore point radio button. Choose the date and time, and click Next. Click Finish to begin the process.
In Windows XP, open Accessories, System Tools, System Restore. You should see Restore my computer to an earlier time. Click Next, and pick a date to which the system will revert. Click Next twice to begin the process.
The Device Manager also allows you to undo a single software driver. In XP or Vista, double-click a hardware item, click the Driver tab, and choose Roll Back Driver to revert to an earlier state. This option is most useful if you have problems immediately after updating a driver.
Image a Disk
Once you have a new system working perfectly, consider saving a full copy of the drive as a disk image. That way, if you have to reinstall everything, the image file will already contain your applications and Windows updates--in other words, you can restore your OS and applications in one swoop, and then restore all of your documents from a recent backup.
Many backup and disk suites include imaging software. True Image Home 11 handles nearly any imaging need, with encryption options and even incremental images, so you can keep appending the image without starting over.

Bluetooth, IE to Get Critical Microsoft Patches

Microsoft plans to issue seven sets of security patches next week, including critical fixes for DirectX, Internet Explorer and Bluetooth wireless software for Windows.
The updates are due Tuesday, the day Microsoft had previously scheduled to release its security patches. Fixes are also slated for Active Directory, the Windows Internet Name Service (WINS) and the Pragmatic General Multicast (PGM) protocol, used by Windows to stream media to many recipients. These updates are all rated "important."
A seventh update, rated "moderate," is listed as a "Kill Bit" update for Windows. This type of patch will disable code that is known to have a security bug.
"The Kill Bit will more than likely be for a third-party application," said Andrew Storms, director of security operations with security vendor nCircle.
Lately, Microsoft's security group has had to pay more attention to software that runs on top of Windows, as attackers have increasingly looked to products like QuickTime, Adobe's Flash and other media players when devising their attacks.
Last Friday, Microsoft warned that a widely publicized flaw in Apple's Safari browser could be combined with another Microsoft bug to let attackers run unauthorized software on a victim's PC.
It's not clear whether Microsoft plans to patch that bug. The IE update could include a fix, although it's unlikely that Microsoft has had enough time to run this software through its testing process, Storms said.
It is unusual for Microsoft to patch Bluetooth, a protocol used to connect devices like headsets to Windows, but added that "the more interesting question is will this patch and/or the bug extend into Windows mobile where it will more than likely have a greater impact?"
Microsoft announced the planned patches in a note posted to its Web site on Thursday.

Apple Releases QuickTime 7.5 With Bug Fixes

Apple has again released a new version of QuickTime, its multimedia player that has been plagued by software vulnerabilities.
The latest version, 7.5, repairs five vulnerabilities, all of which could result in a hacker taking control over a person's PC. Four out of the five problems affect both Apple's OS X and Microsoft's XP and Vista operating systems.
Apple posted details of the flaws on its Web site.
Two of the problems concern PICT image files, which could be engineered in order to exploit the software vulnerabilities, causing the machine to crash or execute other code.
Apple wrote that the other three vulnerabilities could also be exploited by maliciously crafted files. Content in the AAC audio, Indeo video or QuickTime formats could be built to take advantage of those problems.
In April, Apple released 11 patches for QuickTime, some of which could have also allowed a hacker to execute malicious code on a machine. Four patches were issued in January to fix critical flaws as part of version 7.4.

New FireFox 3.0 is coming

Just more than 10 years ago, Mozilla threw its open-source code into the public domain. Today, its browser -- Firefox -- is preparing to launch its third major release in hopes of continuing to eat away at Microsoft's Internet Explorer.
Firefox already has more than 18 percent of the global market, according to Net Applications. With the release of Firefox 3, Mozilla could see a boost in downloads and market share. Microsoft's next version of Internet Explorer won't come to market until later this year.
On June 17, Mozilla will release Firefox 3. After more than 34 months of active development and the contributions of thousands of people, Firefox 3 will be downloadable free from the Mozilla Web site. Mozilla is promising this is the best browser -- period.
"Firefox 3 is a very nice browser. It's still going to have to go up against Internet Explorer {Windows] and Safari [Mac], which have the home court advantage on their operating systems," said Michael Gartenberg, an analyst at JupiterResearch. "It shows that the browser market is anything but stagnant."
A Focus on Security
Firefox 3 is based on the Gecko 1.9 Web rendering platform. Building on the previous release, Gecko 1.9 has more than 15,000 updates, including some major re-architecting for improved performance, stability, rendering correctness, and code simplification and sustainability. The result, Mozilla said, is a more secure, easier to use, more personal product with a lot more under the hood to offer Web-site and Firefox add-on developers.
Mozilla begins with a focus on security. Users can click a Web site's favicon [icon] in the location bar to see who owns the site and to check if the connection is secure. Identity verification is prominently displayed and easier to understand, Mozilla said. When a site uses Extended Validation (EV) SSL certificates, the site's favicon will turn green and show the name of the company.
Firefox 3 also has malware protection to warn users when they arrive at sites known to install viruses, spyware, trojans or the like. And a new Web Forgery Protection service blocks the content of pages suspected as Web forgeries. New SSL error pages, Mozilla said, are clearer and stricter, and Firefox automatically disables old and insecure add-on and plug-in versions.
Add-ons that provide updates in an insecure manner will also be disabled. Firefox will inform antivirus software when downloading executables and the browser respects the Vista parental control setting for disabling file downloads.
Easier, More Personal
Mozilla also concentrated on making Firefox easier to use and more personalized. In terms of password management, that means an information bar replaces the old password dialog so users can save passwords after a successful login. The add-on whitelist has been removed, making it possible to install extensions from third-party sites in fewer clicks. And a new download manager aims to makes it much easier to locate downloaded files. Users can also see and search the Web site where a file came from.
Firefox 3 allows users to add bookmarks from the location bar with a single click and associate keywords with bookmarks to sort them. Web applications, such as a favorite Webmail provider, can now be used instead of desktop applications to handle Web-site mail links. The Add-ons Manager can be used to download and install a Firefox customization from the thousands of add-ons available from Mozilla's Web site.
Gartenberg expects the competition to dominate browsing will continue. Even now, Microsoft is working on the release of IE 8 and Apple is seeding Safari 4. "Clearly, Web browsers are still very important, as important as they were 10 years ago, but just in a different way," he said. "The bottom line is no one is actually paying for a browser any more. A browser is free. It's something you give away in order to make money elsewhere."

Readers Respond to Microsoft XP SP3 Difficulties

eWEEK readers report the problems they encountered installing Windows XP SP3 on HP desktops with AMD processors.

For more than a week, eWEEK readers have been responding to two articles about the difficulties of trying to install Windows XP Service Pack 3 on Hewlett-Packard desktops that use microprocessors from Advanced Micro Devices.
The first of these problems with SP3 on HP PCs was documented by bloggers, such as former Microsoft employee Jesper Johansson, who as far back as May 8 began writing about an endless reboot cycle that occurred when installing SP3.
A number of readers also reported encountering difficulties after they tried to install SP3. Customers with those AMD machines reported a number of problems, including endless rebooting, when they tried to install the SP3 service pack. The problem seems to stem from the fact that HP used the same images for AMD-based PCs that were used with Intel-based hardware. It appears that the patch looks for an Intel driver that is not included with AMD-based desktops.
HP is working on fixing the problem. For now, a company spokesperson has urged users not to download SP3 until HP and Microsoft can create a fix for it.
Readers had their own approaches to the problem. On May 19, a reader called Jeff commented that he had found that switching to safe mode helped him uninstall the patch.
"My HP started looping after the installation of SP3," Jeff wrote. "I went to safe mode and uninstalled it, then applied the fix from HP and it took care of the problems. I am running XP Media Center Edition."
Another reader, who called himself Nathan, wrote on May 15 that he tried to install SP3 on three different PCs in his home and the rebooting problem seemed to have occurred only on one machine, although the other two had problems.
"Luckily, I back up everything on a regular basis from all three computers," Nathan wrote. "The computer that we use for business immediately began to reboot. It would reboot, and then instead of Windows XP showing up, the blue screen of death would appear, followed by another endless circle of reboots. We ended up reinstalling Windows on this particular PC, as we needed this computer up and running in order for our business to continue."
Some readers focused their complaints on AMD, HP, Microsoft or a combination of all three vendors, while one anonymous reader summed up some of those sentiments in a May 18 comment.
In other cases, some readers encountered problems installing SP3 on PCs that were not from HP and used Intel processors. Other readers reported no problems with Intel-based computers. In its own blog, Dell reported no problems with its machines, and so far, HP has taken the brunt of the complaints.
In one anonymous May 16 comment, a reader offered some praise for a Microsoft technician who had helped out, but concluded that being more cautious next time might help in any future updates.
"I will follow my instinct not to install this package until the dust settles; and when I do, if I do, I will make sure I shut down every application, not just anti-virus and obvious ones; I will use safe mode; I will have made the most thorough backup effort ever, I will have that tech's name on speed dial, and I will make sure I have no deadlines," the comment read. "I will read every post I can find on this topic and have a game plan for restoring if anything goes wrong. And I will hold the line against Vista as long as possible."

Microsoft Vista Sleep issues

My computer fails to sleep properly
Now this issue can be caused by a number of different problems, device drivers that aren't compatible with sleep have been the most common in the past. However Windows Vista has a new setting which can prevent the computer from sleeping if it has been configured to share media or files
To check the setting go to Control Panel -> System and Maintainence -> Power Options -> Change when the computer sleeps -> Change advanced power settings -> Multimedia settings. From here you can allow the computer to sleep, not sleep, or not idle to sleep.
Alternatively the computer may be set to S1 Suspend in Power Options within the BIOS, S3 Suspend is the required setting to power the system down. Most computers allow you to enter the BIOS by pressing Delete of F1 on the first or second screens.
I've lost my options for hibernate
It is possible that hibernate has been disabled, a common reason is the Disk Cleanup wizard which has the option to remove the hiberfil.sys file, which disables hibernate.
To re-enable hibernate you'll need to launch an elevated command prompt. To do this press Start, type cmd and press CTRL+SHIFT+ENTER. You should get a command prompt with 'Administrator' in the title. Then type in 'powercfg -h on' without the quotes. This should re-enable hibernate and recreate the hiberfil.sys file, and bring all the hibernate options in the Control Panel back, you may need to reboot to see the hybrid options however.
I get a digital rights error when trying to watch a DVD
This can be caused by a out of date or not fully functioning video driver, ensure you install the latest video driver for your graphics card. Or it can be caused by modified firmware on your DVD drive.
I get an error when trying to start a game from the Games Explorer
This can often be caused by 3rd party programs or registry hacks designed to remove the overlay arrow on shortcuts. To resolve this issue download the following registry file and doubling clicking or opening it.

Gartner: Ignore Vista until 2008

Companies shouldn't rush to upgrade to Microsoft Windows Vista, according to analysts at Gartner, who believe most could safely hold back until 2008.
The majority of improvements in Vista, the update scheduled to arrive in 2006, will be security-related and most of this functionality "is available via third-party products today," Gartner analysts said in a research note published on Friday.
While Vista will "offer incremental, evolutionary improvements" over its predecessors, Windows XP users should "pursue a strategy of managed diversity," the analysts recommended. That means they should only bring in Vista on new machines and that not until 2008.
In its research note titled "Ten reasons you should and shouldn't care about Microsoft's Windows Vista client," Gartner highlighted some of the weaknesses in Microsoft's platform strategy.
Internet Explorer 7 will have many security improvements "to stem defections from IE to Firefox" and "has been accelerated" to be delivered in early 2006. But the "important ability to restrict some browser activities to a lower privileged process" will not be available because it requires Vista functionality," Gartner cautioned.
The analysts acknowledged that companies that use IE 7 and Vista will have fewer points of weakness. Also on the security issue, the Windows Vista personal firewall is better than the one included in XP Service Pack 2, Gartner said, and will, crucially, improve security on inbound and outbound traffic--a particular issue with laptops. But, the analysts said, people should already have "a more than capable" firewall on their laptops anyway.
Another Vista feature that Microsoft is emphasizing is its search capabilities. "Search is slow in Windows XP, and files, e-mail and calendar objects cannot be found with a single search," according to the research paper. Though Microsoft has tried to remedy this in Vista, "competent third-party desktop tools are already available" from companies like Google, Gartner pointed out.

Written by:By Colin Barker Special to CNET News.com -->

Early adopters of Microsoft's new OS report problems with its implementation of a long-anticipated upgrade to the 'Net's primary protocol.

Early adopters of Microsoft's new Vista operating system are reporting problems with its implementation of IPv6, a long-anticipated upgrade to the Internet's primary protocol.
IPv6 supports a 128-bit addressing scheme, which lets it support an order-of-magnitude more devices that are directly connected to the Internet than its predecessor, IPv4. IPv6 also has autoconfiguration, end-to-end security and other enhancements.
Vista supports IPv6 by default. Vista runs a single-stack, dual-IP-layer architecture, which means it is IPv4- and IPv6-capable out of the box. It supports tunneling of IPv6 traffic over an IPv4 backbone and includes IPSec that works for both IPv4 and IPv6.
Network management software vendors and users are reporting problems with Vista's IPv6 implementation.
"Vista is showing some serious deficiencies around IPv6 and IPv4 insofar as their compliance or the transparency of their compliance around IP behaviors," says Loki Jorgenson, chief scientist for Apparent Networks, a provider of network assessment and optimization tools.
"For example, Vista doesn't expose any of the [Internet Control Message Protocol] errors to applications running on Vista," Jorgenson says. "The application can't get access to that message, and subsequently all it sees is that the network connection is not working. This is a big challenge for us around Vista. It's not clear at all why IPv6 isn't properly supported in this regard."
Duane Murphy, president of Managed Information Services in Long Beach, Calif., says he has experienced problems with Vista's IPv6 implementation on the networks he runs for law firms. Murphy used Network Instruments' Observer 12 application, which supports IPv6, to isolate Vista's IPv6 problems.
"We are seeing a number of applications that are IP-based that do not like the addressing scheme of IPv6," Murphy says. "We will send a print job to an IP-based printer, and the print job becomes corrupted. We're seeing this with Window's Vista machines. When IPv6 is installed, this happens without fail. As soon as we remove IPv6, all of our printer functions return to normal."
Murphy says the printing problem has cropped up on 45 Dell Latitudes and Dimensions running Vista Business or Vista Ultimate.
"We're also seeing loss of network connections on IP when you have both IPv6 and IPv4 loaded on the same machine with an IPv4-based network," Murphy says. "As soon as we remove IPv6, we suddenly have connectivity to the rest of the local workstations."
Murphy says he believes the problems stem from Vista's IPv6 implementation.
"We are connecting Observer to the monitoring port of a Cisco or HP switch, which allows us to monitor all the traffic across the network," Murphy says. "We figure out the name of each workstation, then we do a protocol analysis to figure out what protocols are running across the network. Once we do the protocol analysis, we can drill down on IPv6 and figure out what's wrong."
Murphy says he is recommending that his clients remove IPv6 from their Vista workstations.
"We are asking them to remove IPv6 on their new workstations until they are ready to move their entire network to IPv6," Murphy says. "This is something that needs to be brought to the attention of network managers from a troubleshooting standpoint. For the first three networks where we saw this, it took us almost six hours per network to figure out what was going on."
Microsoft says it is difficult to comment on the problems Murphy has faced with Vista's IPv6 implementation but the company has taken steps to address these types of compatibility issues.
"We recognize that not all applications and drivers were up to date by launch and that there have been some compatibility issues as a result," says Ian Hameroff, senior product manager with Windows Server Networking. "But we also know that Windows Vista is the highest-quality, most secure and most broadly supported operating system we've ever released."
Hameroff adds that Microsoft is running an IPv6 network and "to my knowledge has not experienced these types of issues" that Murphy describes. "We would welcome feedback from these vendors and are here to help."

For more information about enterprise networking, go to NetworkWorld. Story copyright 2007 Network World Inc. All rights reserved.

Home Networking with XP

In home networking, sharing is what you do to make hard drives, folders, files, and peripheral devices available to all users of the network. You can configure your network so that the computers share hard drives (which automatically makes them share folders), or you can make it so that they don't share hard drives but can still share folders.
Even if your network does share hard drives, it's best to actually create shared folders because doing so makes it easier to get to those folders from the other computers on the network. When you open Network Neighborhood or My Network Places and double-click a computer icon, all the shares on that computer are displayed. If the only share is the hard drive, many mouse clicks will be needed to navigate through the drive to get to a specific folder.
You can create as many folder shares on your computer as you please, using the same steps you use to share a drive.
Here are the basic steps (note that the options will vary, depending on the operating system you're using) in My Computer or Windows Explorer:

1. In My Computer or Windows Explorer, right-click the icon for the folder you want to share and choose Sharing from the shortcut menu that appears.

2. Select Sharing or its equivalent, depending on your operating system (for example, it might be Share This Folder).

3. Click the Shared As (or New Share or the equivalent, again depending on your operating system) button.

4. In the dialog box that opens, name the share, and optionally, enter a description in the Comment field.

Using hidden shares
You can hide a shared folder from Network Neighborhood or My Network Places. The cool thing about a hidden share is that you can get to it if you know it exists and if you know the trick for accessing it. A hidden share can be a useful location for documents you don't want other network users to see when you can't easily set security options for the computer that holds those documents.
A hidden share works only if you keep in mind the basic rules about shares:
Shares are for remote users, and they're irrelevant when somebody is using your computer. The folder you hide isn't hidden from anyone who is using your computer.
If you want to hide even one folder on a drive, you cannot share the drive, because as soon as you do, every folder in the drive can be seen. Folders are children of drives, and when you share a parent, you share all its children.
A hidden share must be a parent share, because if it's a child of a share, it's visible in Network Neighborhood and My Network Places as soon as a remote user expands the parent share.
The best way to hide a folder from everyone (users who work at the computer and users who access the computer across the network) is to make it a subfolder of a folder you're not sharing, on a drive you're not sharing.

Create a parent folder for the express purpose of creating a subfolder that you want to hide. Give the parent folder an innocuous name so that nobody who uses your computer would be curious enough to expand the folder in Windows Explorer and find your secret. For example, create a folder on your drive and name it Tools or Maintenance. Then create a subfolder and name it Logfiles or another name that seems equally boring or technical. In Logfiles, you can keep all your naughty and nice lists, and no one will suspect a thing.

Another nifty place to put a hidden subfolder is in the Windows folder (C:Windows or C:WINNT in Windows 2000). There's no reason to share the Windows folder because its contents are specific to the local computer. Other people who use the computer are unlikely to scroll through the subfolders in the Windows folders, unless they're suspicious about your ability to be sneaky.
Creating a hidden share
To hide a folder's share, follow the steps just described to create a folder share. However, when you give the share a name, make the last character of the share name a dollar sign ($). That's it, the share is hidden. Easy, huh?

Getting to your hidden share from a remote computer
When you work at a different computer and you want to get to a file that's in your hidden share, follow these steps:

1. Choose Start --> Run.
The Run dialog box opens.

2. Type \\ComputerName\ShareName in the Open text box, substituting the real names of the computer and the share.
For example, if you're trying to get to a hidden share named Logs$ on a computer named Den, type \\den\logs$. A window opens to display the contents of your hidden share.

Keeping the secret a secret
When you use the Run command, Windows saves the command. The next time you open the Run command, the last command that you typed displays. Just click OK to run the command again. Very convenient, eh? Uh, not if you share the computer with other users.
The way to prevent your command from being visible to another user is to make sure that you log off when you leave the computer you were using. This ensures that nobody else can sit at the computer using your logon name and settings. The Run commands are saved on a user-by-user basis, so when a user named Mom is logged on, only commands issued by Mom are visible in the list.

Must use same version of Windows XP in order for these instuctions to work.

Network your PRINTER

The printing processes in Windows run smoothly and automatically most of the time, even across a network. However, knowing a few tricks makes network printing easier for all the users on your network.

Using a printer shortcut on the desktop
Sometimes you just need a printed copy of an existing document and you don't want to open the software, open the document, and use the commands that are required to print the document. If you put a shortcut to the printer on your desktop, you can drag documents to the shortcut icon to print them effortlessly. Follow these steps to create a printer shortcut on your desktop:

1. Choose Start --> Settings --> Printers.
The Printers folder opens.

2. Right-drag the printer icon to the desktop.
When you release the right mouse button, a shortcut menu appears.

3. Choose Create Shortcut(s) Here from the shortcut menu.

A printer shortcut appears on your desktop.
Using the printer shortcut is easy and timesaving. You can use it whenever you have any folder or window open (such as Windows Explorer, My Computer, or My Documents) that contains document files. Just drag a document file to the printer shortcut on the desktop. That's all you have to do - Windows does the rest.

If you right-click a document file instead of dragging it to a desktop shortcut, you can choose Print from the shortcut menu that appears. Again, Windows takes care of the rest.
Using separator pages to identify users
If everyone in your household uses the printers, you are likely to experience a lot of printer traffic. It's less messy if each job comes out of the printer with a form that displays the name of the owner. Luckily, such a form exists in Windows, and it's called a separator page. A separator page (sometimes called a banner) automatically prints ahead of the first page of each document.

The downside of separator pages is that they can be a huge waste of paper. They work best if most of your print jobs are made up of multiple pages. You may end up spending the money you save on ink purchasing ream after ream of paper. Also, if your household is filled with people who don't believe that "neatness counts," you'll just have one extra piece of paper per print job to get shuffled around in a big ugly pile.

Adding separator pages in Windows 95, 98, and Me
For a Windows 95, Windows 98, or Windows Me print server, go to the computer that has the printer attached to turn on separator pages using these steps:

1. Choose Start --> Settings --> Printers.
The Printers folder opens.

2. Right-click the appropriate printer icon and choose Properties from the shortcut menu that appears.
The printer Properties dialog box opens, with the General tab in the foreground.

3. Click the arrow to the right of the Separator page list box and choose a Separator page type.
The Separator page choices are None, Full, and Simple. Both the Full and Simple separator pages contain the document name, the user name, and the date and time that the document was printed. The Full option uses large, bold type, whereas Simple uses the Courier typeface that's built into the printer.

4. Click OK.

Adding separator pages in Windows 2000 and Windows XP
If you have a Windows 2000 Professional print server, follow Steps 1 and 2 in the previous section "Adding separator pages in Windows 95, 98, and Me," and then follow these steps:

1. Click the Advanced tab.

2. Click the Separator Page button.
The Separator Page dialog box appears.

3. Click Browse to select a separator file.
Separator files have the .sep extension. Choose Sysprint.sep for PostScript printers or Pcl.sep for non-PostScript printers.

4. Click OK twice to close the dialog box.
Troubleshooting network printing
Sometimes when you're printing to a remote printer, you see an error message indicating that there was a problem printing to the port. (The port is the path to the remote computer that has the printer attached.) Before you panic, check the condition of all the hardware.

Check the print server
Computers that have printers attached (called print servers) have to be turned on if you want to print from a remote computer. If the computer is turned off, turn it on.
It doesn't matter whether you know the logon password for the user name that appears during the logon process; nobody has to be logged on to a computer to use its shared printer. The Windows operating system on that computer simply must be started.

Check the printer
Make sure that the printer is turned on. Check any buttons, indicator lights, or message windows that may be trying to tell you that something is amiss. When the printer's "ready" light isn't on, the most common problems are that the printer is out of paper, a paper jam has occurred, or the cartridge is out of toner (or ink).

Check the network cable
If the computer is on and the printer is fine, check the network cable. A cable that isn't connected properly can't send data.

Check the Windows XP SP2 Firewall
If a shared printer is on a computer running Windows XP SP2, make sure that the firewall is configured to allow access to the printer by remote computers. Use the following steps to view or change the firewall's settings:

1. Open the Properties dialog box for the network adapter.

2. Click the Advanced tab.

3. Click the Settings button.

4. Click the Exceptions tab.

5. Be sure a check mark appears in the File and Printer Sharing option.