Flash drives are the most popular media for hosting portable applications because they are small, portable, and usable by most PCs. The negative part is you need to remember to bring it with you and not run it through the washing machine.

Shared server drives work great as central source for portable applications but do not provide easy access when outside of the network.

CDs are best used as a backup device for portable applications because many portable applications cannot be used directly from a CD because they require write access to their folder.

Online Storage is used for backups of portable application. They are accessible from any PC with Internet access but require you to download the file to execute them. Many free sites suffer from file size limits, slow connections, and trouble maintaining backups from multiple sources.

Replication of folders between PCs provides copies of the files on all your PCs. Some include online access to your files as well. Servers without the replication software can map to network PCs with the replicated data. On negative side, software is installed on each PC that you want an up to date copy of the files.

Summary

I have tried Flash Drives, CDs, Online storage online, and shared drives. Replication with online backup offers me the best of all worlds. Flash drive is still the best solution for PCs without internet access.

Software Suggestion

DropBox is a file replication provider with online backup access for use on Windows, Linux, Mac OS, and Mobile Devices. The online backup provides 30 days backup of all file changes. The free version has 2 GB storage with limit no limit on the number of PCs being replicated. Registration requires an e-mail address, which become your account id.

Installation is easy with no noticeable performance impact. You can put your DropBox folder on any drive including a Flash Drive. If you want to stop it or start it up manually, you can when you want 100% of your CPU and Internet connection dedicated to something else. Now when I update or add a new portable application to this dedicated folder it is automatically copied to my other PCs when I logon to them. Now

There are other alternatives to DropBox but it is the first one I decided to try and have been happy with it.

Anarchy Online is a free online multi player RPG game that takes place in the future on a distance planet. This futuristic world is a combination of old technology such as swords to futuristic flying vehicles. Game play revolves around improving your character by leveling, adding implants, gaining abilities, equipment, and nano (magic) skills.

When creating a character there are four different breeds and twelve professions are available. Your character starts out on the neutral side but you can optional choose to join either Clan or Omni-Tek. Each side has their own special benefits and regions they control. Within each side are organizations (guilds) you can join. Combat is allowed between between players and guilds within specified locations. Solo, team, and guild play are all available. Characters are developed by leveling them by gaining experience through quests, missions, hunting mobs, killing mobs in dungeons, and other means.

Free to Play, Pay for other editions
Launched in 2001, the classic edition became free in 2004 with the Notum Wars edition becoming free in 2006. The free editions have advertisement on in game bulletin boards. Thats it no other restrictions. You have all the same features that the previous paying subscribers to these editions had.

There are several editions that have subscriptions. They provide access to additional few areas and have access to another race and two additional professions. There are other benefits as well. All paying subscriber have access to the places, professions, equipment, and skills available to the free accounts.

Professions

• Adventurer – all purpose toon with the ability to transform into an animal such as wolf, tiger, and even a dragon
• Agent – expert in concealment and taking on the role of other professions
• Bureaucrat – take control of mobs and create their own obedient servant
• Doctor – best healer in the game and is wanted in any team
• Enforcer – expert in close combat and smashing opponents
• Engineer – expert craftsman and expert in building robots to do their fighting
• Fixer – fastest toon and expert at avoiding attacks. Specialty is quickly getting to distance locations, grabbing the prize, and leaving before being caught.
• Martial artist – expert at special attacks
• Meta-Physicists – pet master and excellent buffer
• Nano Technician – expert at using nano (magic)
• Trader – expert at draining opponents and buffing allies.
• Soldier – expert at arm combat

Breeds

• Solitus – humans
• Opifex – breed for agility and cunning
• Nano Mage – expert at controlling nano-bits
• Atrox – bread for strength and stamina

Ways to Gain Experience and Money

• Quests
• Missions
• Hunt mobs and mob bosses in the outdoors
• Kill mobs and mob bosses in Dungeons
• Craft Equipment

Bookmarks:

Game Guides

• Anarchy Online home page
• AOFroobs - very active site created for Anarchy Online free members
• Anarchy Online wiki – this site has great starter guides and much more
• AO links – Organized collections of Anarchy Online links for guides, tools, and more

Tools to Assist Players

• AO Mainframe – Database of all the items found in the game plus tools.
• AUNO – Database of all the items found in the game plus tools.
• AorRK in game map – shows locations of all dungeons, mobs, and much more.
• AoRK goes Google – excellent game map. Forum link
• Kimi’s Anarchy Online Resources – monitor the in game trade channel and tools
• AOGMS.com – player shops
• Clicksaver – great tool for getting specific missions

Multimedia

• Gridstream – Official internet radio Anarchy Online. DJ host parties and other events in the game
• Winamp Plugin for Gridstream

Recently, I started noticing the netbooks at a local Best Buy. They are small notebooks running on low power processors with small screens. What got my attention was how cheap they were starting at $300. You can argue you can get notebook for only for few hundred more but why spend the extra money. For the price of a an extended 3 year warranty on a $600 laptop you can buy a net book.  Think about it, some cell phones cost $300.

To get this low prices and reasonable performance, the Best Buy available NetBooks run Windows XP which Microsoft is trying to retire.  Don’t expect netbooks to run CPU hungry games and applications. Thery are suppose to perform reasonable in internet surfing, e-mail, and doing homework. The one I looked at had 1 GB of memory and runs an ATOM processor. The 1 GB of memory is more than low end Windows XP desktops had a few years ago.  To me these netbooks provide a need for a portable PC that if lost or is broken won’t destroy your bank account. Something like CELL Phones. So I started researching netbooks. and found only a few reviews. Most articles where opinions just like this one.

It seems LINUX is trying to become the OS of choice for these  devices, which explains why Microsoft is not forcing manufacturers to use Windows Vista on these potable PC’s. Once Windows XP became available on netbooks, many Linux versions where returned.  Currently, I would rather stick with Windows than switch to Linux.

Links

Best Buy NetBook listings

2009 NetBooks Product Comparisons from TopTenReviews.com

Top 10 Netbooks from PcWorld

Top 10 NetBooks from IntelliReview

Wikipedia Articles: NetBook , Comparison of Netbooks

Articles

ASUS S101 Review by Kevin (2009-08-02)

Twice as Many Netbooks Are On the Way by Marcus Yam (2009-07-16) – Tom’s Hardware

How to Buy a Netbook Dan Nystedt (2008-12-18) from PcWorld

Microsoft Strips App Limits For Netbook Windows 7 by Michael Scalisis (2009-06-01) from Computerland

Microsoft Strips App Limits For Netbook Windows 7 by Michael Scalisis (2009-06-01) from Computerland

Game over for Linux netbooks? by Eric Brown from DesktopLiinux.com – eWeek

Next year’s netbooks: Notebook, meet smartphone “Google Android, ARM processors and all-day batteries will transform today’s netbook into something completely new.” by David Haskin (2009-05-19) from Computerland

Microsoft Ditches Windows 7 Starter App Limit by Nick Mediati (2009-05-29) from PC World

Three Reasons Why Netbooks Just Aren’t Good Enough by Michael Arrington (2008-11-29) from TechCrunch

Forget Netbooks; Now Mini-Laptops Are Smartbooks by Ashlee Vance (2009-06-29) from New Yorks Times – Bits

Light and Cheap, Netbooks Are Poised to Reshape PC Industry by ASHLEE VANCE and MATT RICHTEL (2009-04-01)  from New Yorks Times

The Next Netbook Trend: Cellphone-Like Contract Deals by Priya Ganapati  (2008-12-15)

What is a Netbook computer? by Michael Horowitz (2008-10-12)

Maximum PC is a monthly magazine for PC enthusiast.  It contains articles on building PC’s, installing and using various operating systems, tools to improve or fix your PC, news, reviews, and even has PC game reviews. Recently, all issues have been added to Googles Book Search.

Currently, I do not  subscribe to he magazine instead I visit my local library every quarter or so and I will check out a bunch issues for reading marathon. Besides saving a little money, this lets me look at the magazine with fresh eyes taking time to notice ads and editorials which on magazine subscriptions I have a habit of skimming over.

The February 209 issue has some interesting articles and ads. The article Give Windows a Clean Start addresses the need to reinstall Windows by using a new hard drive and  using the old one for a backup. I wished I thought of this a few years ago when I had to reinstall Windows. This article covers all the basis and references some free software to help in the rebuild.

The ads in this issue were also interesting.

• Roboform is suppose to be free application that is used to remember all your user ids and passwords.
• APC Battery backup that automatically power downs idle peripherals. Might be money well spent.
• PC Pitstop free performance and stability scans. I used to use this site to check my internet speed and fix my settings in my NIC card so it would perform as expected.

Extreme Tech’s article 5 Games that Won’t Die!, identifies five PC games (Diablo II, MechWarrior 4: Mercenaries, People’s General, StarCraft, & Fallout) that I never played. At the time of their release, I did think about buying some of them, but instead used my limited funds to buy other games.

People’s General is free, so I downloaded it with plans of playing sometime. Back when it was originally released, I was playing Panzer General II, which I purchased through an SSI 4 game combo pack. Panzer General II is another one of the games that will not die. A very active online community is developing enhancements and new campaigns.

This got me wanting to find other PC games. Using Stumbleupon, I started searching. After a couple of hits, I found a very interesting web page that lists free games for windows XP. This long list of free games is very well thought out. Many of them could be categorized as a PC Game That Won’t Die.

Looks like I will be busy downloading some more.

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Technorati Profile

I recently joined King-War, a free multiplayer online strategy game. It is a web based game with an optional client download. In this game you run a kingdom as the King and Queen on a fantasy land dominated by five races: Human, Undead, Elven, Beast and Monster. Kingdoms are improved  by upgrading technologies, building structures, and creating armies. To acquire more territories and resources you fight , by hunting, adventuring, and attacking your neighbors.

When starting the game it is best to perform fresh-player task which rewards you with extra with gold and other resources. Each task takes time to complete. While a task is completing, you can spend time investigating other parts of the game and reviewing the gaming forum for tips.

I am still new to the game but it seems to be a fun casual strategy game. My first act in starting the game was going hunting with all my troops which turned out to be disaster. So I now I am spending some time completing the fresh-start task and learning the game.  My characters name is JungleGeorge so if you sign up you welcome to mentioned it on your sign up web page.

Recently I started looking into creating screen video recording on my PC. The purpose is to create demos, tutorials, and show problems to software vendor. The tool needs to be free, record full or partial screens, add documentation, and support for audio.

Searching the internet turned many such tools that meet these requirement requirements. So far only, I have only used CamStudio. It is open source and recommended by others. As time permits I will look into trying the others. For now CamStudio has meet my needs of being able to record my screen.

Free Screen Recorders

CamStudio Open Source (SourceForge.net) updated April 6, 2005
Beta Version updated  September 04, 2007

AutoScreenRecorder 3 Free version records screen activities into video files. Free for both personnel and commercial use.  It has no expiration date and can be distributed free of charge. The home site provides step-by-step guides to help in using the tool.

Free Screen Recorder v2.9 from NBXSoft updated August 04, 2007 (review)

oRipa Screen Recorder 1.2.2 from EjoyStudio updated November 08, 2006 (review)

Freez Screen Video Capture v1.2 from Small Video Soft

Wink Tutorial and Presentation creation software

Jing a project set up by TechSmith Corporation. Save online or as a file type is swf  on your PC.
Note: The exclusive use of the file type swf may limit its use.

Screen Toaster Free Online Screen Recorder.  Options for recording full desktop, partial desktop, audio and webcam.

Screen-o-matic a free online to record your screen

Conclusion

If you have any suggestions of views on these screen recorders, please respond in this blogs comments.

Puppy Linux by Barry Kauler (wikipedia) is a small Linux distro that is designed to be started from a LiveCD and run entirely in memory. It’s low resource requirements makes it runnable on both old and new hardware.  Many applications are available for Puppy Linux making it very customizable. Fans of Puppy Linux have published their own LiveCD setups (Puplets). With its latest release 4, Puppy Linux is much easier to install on a hard drive. Puppy Linux has two official websites http://www.puppylinux.com/ and http://www.puppylinux.org/.

Installing

Barry Kauler’s .COM site provides instructions for running its OS from an CD, USB Drive, and hard drive.

Adding Applications (Packages)

• Click Desktop Icon Install. Run PETget Package Manager. Select from hundreds of applications to install.
• Many packages are announces in the forum Topic Additional Software (PUPs, n’ stuff)
• DokuPuppy (wiki) is an active site the provides links to many additional programs fro Puppy Linux.
• Puppy Linux CA is another download site with packages available for download.

Conclusion

Puppy Linux maybe a small OS but it is packed with power. Finding some packages and customizing this OS maybe be challenging. However that can be said for any Linux distro. Many users published their own derivatives also known as Puplets. So if the base install is to thin for your wants, take a look at this sites of available derivatives (forum, oldwiki).

The Popehat Oblivion Omods Project

(POOP) is a collection over 80 mods and tools used to enhance the Oblivion PC game. The POOP team did not create them; instead, they got permission from their creators to include them in this collection. Many of the mods were repackaged as OMOD files to make installation much easier. The installation instructions are very thorough with only a few unclear points.

It is mentioned that this collection was created for high-end machines. Do not worry, if you do not have a high-end PC, the instructions include advice on picking settings and mods that are best for your PC specifications. Besides, if a mod is causing more performance issues than it is worth, just remove it. Many of these mods work very well on medium to low-end PC’s

I rate my PC medium when it comes for performance. After installing most of the MODS, my game FPS was between 15 to 25, which is ok, but I will be doing some tweaking to improve it. Some mods I did not include were the optional mods , changing leveling, AEVWD, and DarNified UI. I just did not like the blocky gold font I got with “DarNified UI”, so I used “MajorJims_UI” instead.

Advice: After you finish initial install of Oblivion with its patches, start it using its desktop Icon or its start menu line. This will create the OBLIVION.INI with much more usable values. I used OBMM start it the first time and it caused me some obvious performance issues. So I deleted the OBLIVION.INI file and recreated executing the Oblivion icon.

In case you are curious here are my PC specifications

Processor: Intel 2.8 GHZ with HyperThreading
Memory: 2.5 GB of RAM =  (2 * 1GB) + (2 * 256MB)
Video: BFG NVIDIA GeForce 6200 OC 256MB AGP
Audio Card: Creative SB Audigy 2 ZS (WDM)
Monitor: CRT 19 inch Viewsonic Professional Series

Since the announcement of POOP v2, I have been kind of a stalker. Here is a list of posts that discuss this fabulous collection.

• The Popehat Oblivion Omods Project – Blog dedicated to the POOP project
• Quarter To Three Forum
  • Getting ready to POOP again…[Oblivion Mods] (2008-08-16)
  • [Oblivion] I’d Like You To Play With My POOP (2008-06-10)- Torrent referenced does not exist anymore
• Bethesda Game Studios Forums
  • Popehat’s Oblivion Omod Project, Attention all modders. (2008-06-20)
• Popehat -
  • Building A Better Oblivion (2008-06-09)
  • Popehat Oblivion Omods Project (POOP): POOP dies on Monday (2008-05-09), Page#7 Bash Instructions
• Octopus Overlords
  • OBLIVION – Who’s playing? POOP v.2 is a good time to start! (2008-08-02) – includes some screen shots
• Gaming Trend
  • [Oblivion] I’d Like To Invite You To Play With POOP (2008-06-09)

Update 03/15/09

Bit Turrent File can be downloaded here

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