For those of you looking for themes for your blackberry, check out the crackberry site. I haven’t found a great one for the torch yet, so if you see anything awesome, give me a heads up.

I pretty much love shopping on the internet. Buying things I know I want/need without having to take the extra time to run to the store? Bonus win.
I shop on all kinds of websites, on-line only stores, stores I go to often which also have on-line stores, ebay, amazon… the list goes on. Sometimes, though, I need to use some kind of aggregator that can pull from multiple shopping sites and help me find what I need. Google shopping is a good one, but I recently found ShopWiki.com which works pretty well. ShopWiki is a guide designed to help consumers find specific products on the Internet with ease. They have buying guides that can help you decide the best products to buy in the category you are looking for and where to buy them. ShopWiki basically crawls other online stores to provide you with a wide range of results to look through.
For example, if you were looking to do some Home Improvement (something I don’t know a ton about and would need a buying guide for), you could start on their Workshop and Home Improvement page and from there move into the related guides like Tools and Hardware, Circular Saws, Miter Saws, Power Drills, Hand Tools, and Workshop accessories.
Or, more likely in my case, I want to figure out what new games to buy for my video game consoles so I would start in the Video Games section and then move on to the Game Guide. Maybe the newest Call of Duty is in my future…

Anyway, check it out. Happy Shopping.

For those of you who were duped into getting the Antivirus 2010 (or other previous year) virus, there are a few simple things you can do to remove it.
Symptoms of the virus are the Antivirus 2010 running and the fake Windows Security Center. It pretends to scan your computer and list a variety of infections that cannot be removed unless you first purchase the software. It also randomly displays fake security alerts on your computer stating that you are infected or have some sort of security risk. If you click on these alerts, it will prompt you to purchase the software. These fake alerts, along with a fake Windows Security Center that advertises Antivirus 2010, are used to further scare you into thinking you are infected so you purchase the software. Sometimes it also brings up a fake blue screen of death. It can also hijack your internet browser (like internet explorer or Firefox) and display a message stating that the website you are trying to access is dangerous and then it prompts you to purchase the software to continue.
First thing you should do it reboot into safemode with networking. To do this restart your computer (Start–>Restart). While it is booting, before you get to windows, press F8 to being up the boot menu allowing you to choose “safemode with networking.” Select that choice and allow the PC to continue to boot. Once logged in and booted up, open your internet browser go to http://malwarebytes.org/ and download the free version of Malwarebytes. When the download is complete install Malwarebytes. After installation run the software by doing a complete scan. Once the scan is complete, it will display the infected files and prompt you to restart to remove these infected files. Agree to this restart. After the restart is complete and your computer is booted back up in normal mode, run your virus scanner to make sure you have removed all residual problems. (if you don’t have antivirus software, get AVG’s free antivirus)

You should be good to go now.

You can also take a look at this website for more information regarding the virus and removal info.

I’ve had the chance to play with the new Blackberry OS 6. I have to say, I’m a fan. I’ve found a few minor annoyances. A little slowing here and there. No available theme options (so I can’t get my calendar listed on my wallpaper), but I think this is going to change when the new theme builder is released.

For those of you buying phones with OS 6 or upgrading your current phone to OS 6, check out this area of the Blackberry website for all the tips, tricks, and shortcuts you can use with your device.
Here is the listing for the Blackberry Torch.

Because of my background in computers and IT, I get asked a lot of “How do I…” questions regarding people’s PC’s. I’ve found one website in particular helpful with respect to these questions: HowToGeek.com

For the things I can’t remember off the top of my head or for the how to’s that are easier explained with visual aids, I search for the issue on this website and almost always find the answer. If you find yourself answering others’ How To PC questions all the time, or have those questions yourself, you should check it out.

For example, today I showed a coworker how to set the default Word 2007 save file type to .doc (instead of the original default which was .docx).

I was signing up for the play station network earlier today and the username “mofomon” was taken.

who took it?
how can this be?

Oh well, I had a backup!

I just spent the last hour yelling at my TV while playing one of the world 3 levels of Mario Bros Wii. So great yet so frustrating at times.

Speaking of Mario, check out this Mario Game Family Tree

I have a Google Wave invite to give out. Who wants it? best comment with a one liner joke gets it.

Now that Windows 7 is being sold on PC’s, time to explore what the best utilities are to keep your Windows machine in shape.

Check out this article I wrote outlining the Best Windows 7 Utilities.

How to view hidden disconnected devices in the device manager on Vista?

In case you ever need to uninstall a device that is no longer connected to your Windows Vista machine, here is how you enable viewing of these devices in the device manager:
Go to Control Panel
System
Advanced System Settings
Environment Variables
New ( user variables if just for you or system variables for all users of your computer )
In the Variable Name box type devmgr_show_nonpresent_devices and in the Variable Value type 1.
Then you need to OK it twice.

Now return to the Device Manager, click on view, and show hidden devices.
The Hidden/Disconnected devices will now be displayed in gray. Have fun right clicking and uninstalling.

Have Windows XP or earlier? Try this:
Go to c:\windows\system32, find cmd.exe, right click and choose “run as administrator”
In the command window which opens, type:
Set devmgr_show_nonpresent_devices=1 (press enter)
Devmgmt.msc (press enter)
In the device manager window which opens click View=>show hidden devices.