A friend of mine, Luy, with IT Support Guys, wrote an excellent blog post on how Microsoft has failed to promote their new security app, even on their own search engine Bing.

Well, it’s called Microsoft Security Essentials and it’s available for download from Microsoft. I’ve installed it on several customer computers and have been rather happy with it. I just got around to installing it on a machine of mine, however, because I keep my system from getting infected in the first place, my machine is not really a good testing environment. But I digress…

The stats coming from Lee Matthews at Download Squad:

The Microsoft Malware Protection Center blog has posted some interesting numbers. After its first week, Security Essentials has already been installed more than 1.5 million times. From the approximately 535,000 machines reporting statistics, MSE has logged over 4 million detections.

44% of MSE users are already running Windows 7 with XP following at 33% and the remaining 23% on Vista. The number of detections per OS is also interesting. 52% of the 4 million reported were found on Windows XP systems compared to only 32% on Vista.

Windows 7 users fared even better. Though they represent the largest group of MSE users, only 16% of detections came from systems running Microsoft’s latest OS. The post also reports 1/3 of these machines are using the 64-bit version, which “is even more resistant to malware than 32-bit due to PatchGuard,” states Microsoft’s Joe Faulhaber.

Surprising that over half of the detections come from only 33% of users? Not really.

Go download and try out Microsoft Security Essentials yourself, and let me know in the comments how you like it? Is it better than the paid apps (like Norton or McAfee), or existing free anti-virus (like AVG or Avira)?

• October 19, 2009 -- Get Rid of those Fake Antivirus programs with Remove Fake Antivirus
• October 15, 2009 -- Internet Connection Hosed? Try Winsock XP Fix
• September 15, 2009 -- Re-Enable Fixes Windows Features That Have Been Disabled by a Virus

I keep it on my thumb drive so I always have it when I need it. And although the name says XP Fix, it works in other versions of Windows as well.

The Winsockfix Utility will:

• Detect your current Operating System
• Release the IP address, taking you “Offline”
• Reset the TCP stack using Netsh.exe (Windows XP only)
• Delete the current Registry TCP and Winsock Values
• Import new “Working” Registry Values
• Backup any Current “Hosts” file
• Replace the “Hosts” file with a default one
• Reboot the Computer

Often times, as a computer repair guy, you’ll encounter someone who can’t connect to the internet, and when the problem doesn’t seem to be related to any network hardware, it’s probably related to the TCP/IP stack, the HOSTS file or some registry settings. This mostly happens when adware, malware or viruses change these settings or modify the files needed to connect to the internet. When you get rid of the problem source, the files it modified are still jacked up.

That’s where this program comes to the rescue. Make it the first thing you try, before spending countless hours troubleshooting other things or reinstalling programs, and you’ll have super fast resolution times and can move on to your next customer.

Download Winsock XP Fix

• September 15, 2009 -- Re-Enable Fixes Windows Features That Have Been Disabled by a Virus
• August 30, 2009 -- Lock Windows With Your USB Flash Drive
• August 27, 2009 -- Make a bootable USB installer for Windows XP, Vista, 7 with WinToFlash

So I went searching for the steps to make a bootable USB thumb drive with the Windows 7 install files on it, and got lucky when I found an excellent 7 step guide on CrunchGear. I’d recommend going to view that if you need the steps explained all along the way. But I’ll put them here, short and sweet.

1. Since you can’t download the Release Candidate anymore that eliminates the first step.
2. The second step is to download WinRAR, I use and recommend 7-Zip for all your unzipping needs, and it does the same job we need it to do in step 3.
3. The third step is to extract the files from the ISO you downloaded (hopefully before Microsoft stopped offering it for download in August).
4. Next step is to format your thumb drive to NTFS, and you need at least a 4GB thumb drive for the Windows 7 install files.
5. That was pretty easy right? Now the hard part. Basically copy the bootsect.exe file from the /boot subfolder in the Windows 7 directory you created in step 3 to your C: drive
6. Open the command prompt and go to the C: drive (or wherever you copied the bootsect.exe file), and type in this command:

   “bootsect /nt60 f:”

   (without the quotes and replace ‘f’ with the letter of your thumb drive)

   That should copy the Windows 7 boot files to the thumb drive, then…

7. Copy the Windows 7 files to the thumb drive

That’s it. It worked beautifully for me and I’m now enjoying Windows 7 on my new Acer netbook. Everything works great and I can’t wait for the final version of Windows 7 to come out on October 22nd.

Mark your calendars. Mine is already marked.

Read the original 7 step guide at CrunchGear

• October 15, 2009 -- Internet Connection Hosed? Try Winsock XP Fix
• August 30, 2009 -- MalwareBytes Anti-Malware Won’t Run? Here’s How To Fix It
• August 30, 2009 -- Lock Windows With Your USB Flash Drive

Developed by Tangomouse the program has the ability to restore functionality to these Windows features:

• Windows Registry
• Command Line Tool
• Windows Task Manager
• System Restore Config
• Folder Options
• Run command

The ghacks article explains that:

The program will display all support functions in its interface. All are checked by default and a click on the Enable button will enable these again. Nothing will happen if they are already enabled. Users who only want to enable a specific function can uncheck the other options in the interface easily.

The file can be downloaded from Softpedia, it works with XP, Vista and Windows 7, and the best thing about it: It’s portable. So you can add it to your thumb drive and have it handy whenever you encounter a Windows installation that has been crippled by a virus.

• October 15, 2009 -- Internet Connection Hosed? Try Winsock XP Fix
• October 19, 2009 -- Get Rid of those Fake Antivirus programs with Remove Fake Antivirus
• August 27, 2009 -- Make a bootable USB installer for Windows XP, Vista, 7 with WinToFlash

Making a bootable USB flash drive for Windows Vista and Windows 7 isn’t all that tricky, but it’s always nice to find an app that simplifies things. Not only does WinToFlash make the process about as easy as it can get, but it can also create Windows XP, Server 2003, and Server 2008 installers.

The default options make it easy to roll a silent Windows install, or you can flip the custom switch and specify the exact setup parameters you want to use.

The handy app also has one more trick up its sleeve: moving Windows Preinstall environments. PE discs can be extremely handy for troubleshooting and repairs, and being able to painlessly zap them over to a USB flash drive means not having to burn a new copy every time someone’s haggard old optical drive decides to chew up your CD.

WinToFlash is a free download and is totally portable. It’s an excellent tool to add to your USB-related utilities.

Download WinToFlash.

• October 15, 2009 -- Internet Connection Hosed? Try Winsock XP Fix
• August 30, 2009 -- Lock Windows With Your USB Flash Drive
• October 19, 2009 -- Get Rid of those Fake Antivirus programs with Remove Fake Antivirus

Last day to get Windows 7 Release Candidate. The OS will continue to run another 10 months free of charge.

Posted via web from pcrepair’s posterous

• October 18, 2009 -- Microsoft’s Security Essentials : 1.5 Million Installs in One Week. Is it the End for Norton?
• October 15, 2009 -- Internet Connection Hosed? Try Winsock XP Fix
• September 15, 2009 -- Re-Enable Fixes Windows Features That Have Been Disabled by a Virus