Holiday Software License Giveaway: Handy Backup

Folks, I am pleased to announce my latest software license giveaway drawing.

The folks at Novosoft have generously donated five licenses for Handy Backup Standard to me, to award to my readers. I sincerely thank them for that. So I am going to do a random drawing¹ contest from folks who “enter” by posting a comment (below). The drawing will close Thursday, June 3rd, and the winners announced Friday. So act now.

Handy Backup is a program for creating “backup copies” of the files on your computer, which regular readers know, is something I repeatedly urge people to get into the habit of doing! With a backup program like Handy Backup, you don’t need a ‘habit’, you can set-it-and-forget-it. Below, I will give you my impressions and some screenshots, but first…

CNet Editors say, “Handy Backup Standard offers users an easy, streamlined approach to backing up important files and folders. Novice users will especially appreciate the program’s easy navigation.”

Publisher’s description:

Handy Backup™ Standard is an easy-to-use backup software designed to perform automated backup of your computer. User-friendly interface and a rich set of backup features make it one of the best PC backup software for home and small office use.

• Outlook backup, Windows Mail
• My Documents backup
• Desktop backup
• Windows Registry backup
• Individual files and folders backup
• Backup your Program settings, playlists, skins, etc.
• a variety of free plug-ins that let you back up Outlook Express, Photoshop, Winamp and Windows Media Player, back up Skype and Yahoo Messenger, and much, much more.
• Free Email, Phone, Internet Support

Handy Backup will automatically backup your data with the options of file mask filtering, backup compression, backup encryption, “native”, and other options. The application supports backing up to DVD/CD, Blu-ray, HD DVD discs, LAN/FTP and Online.

Here is a “slideshow” of screenshots of Handy Backup Standard.

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

I found it easy enough for beginners, as it uses a “wizard” to walk you through the process of creating a “task” (a backup, or a restore) the first time it runs (but after that first time, you need to click on “New task”, which is not made obvious). I particularly like Handy Backup’s ability to automatically “span” a backup set across multiple CD/DVD discs (you must place a check in a checkbox, though), prompting you to insert a fresh disc when it fills up the current one. (One other note.. you need to place a check in “Verify the backup after burning” to help ensure a successful write. This should be the default, IMHO.) Handy Backup successfully handled every backup and every restore operation I tested it with. It is a full-featured backup solution.
One critique: it does not support “selective file restoring”.

(Those of you in medium to large business environments will want to look at Handy Backup Server. Handy Backup Server is a complete enterprise backup solution that allows performing centralized backup of all network workstations, on a client-server scheme.)

How to enter? To enter the drawing, simply click on “comment”, and enter a name and valid e-mail (so I can send you the key) in the form. Actually commenting is optional. And, I shouldn’t have to say this, but multiple entries will result in disqualification.

Again, I thank the folks at Novosoft for making this giveaway possible. A 30-day free trial can be downloaded here, Download Handy Backup. Try it out yourself. (And then leave a comment. You may just win an activation key..)

¹ All entrants will be placed into Random.org’s “randomizer”, and the top 5 results will be the winners.

Please have a safe and joyous Holiday.

Copyright 2007-2010 © Tech Paul. All Rights Reserved. post to jaanix.

---

>> Folks, don’t miss an article! To get Tech – for Everyone articles delivered to your e-mail Inbox, click here, or to subscribe in your RSS reader, click here. <<

---

Share this post :

Memorial Day Weekend 2010

Memorial Day is a United States federal holiday observed on the last Monday of May. Formerly known as Decoration Day, it commemorates U.S. men and women who died while in the military service. First enacted to honor Union soldiers of the American Civil War, it was expanded after World War I to include American casualties of any war or military action.

Many people observe this holiday by visiting cemeteries and memorials. A national moment of remembrance takes place at 3 p.m. Eastern Time. Another tradition is to fly the flag of the United States at half-staff from dawn until noon local time.

Some Americans view Memorial Day as the unofficial beginning of Summer, and the holiday is also used as a time for picnics, barbecues, family gatherings, and sporting events. One of the longest-standing traditions is the running of the Indianapolis 500.

“HERE RESTS IN HONORED GLORY AN AMERICAN SOLDIER
KNOWN BUT TO GOD”

Please have a safe and joyous Holiday Weekend.

Copyright 2007-2011 © “Tech Paul” (Paul Eckstrom). All Rights Reserved.

---

>> Folks, don’t miss an article! To get Tech – for Everyone articles delivered to your e-mail Inbox, click here, or to subscribe in your RSS reader, click here. <<

---

Thank You, Tech – for Everyone Readers | One Million!

The old odometer has just clicked over the 1,000,000^th visitor to my humble tech Tips, Tricks, and Advice site, Tech – for Everyone.

Since I first published article #1, The first Tech Paul Post: secure your web connection, in June of 2007, I have learned a good deal, made some very important friendships, and – hopefully – helped a few folks learn a few things, solve a few problems, and better enjoy technology along the way.

To you – Dear Reader – I say…

A few other T4E stats:

# of articles posted: 1,056 (roughly 93.56% original, 6.44% re-postings.) Use my “Search widget” to browse prior tips & answers by keywords, or browse my writings by month.

# of Reader Comments: 3,892 (almost exactly half of those are my replies.. so lets say, 2,000 readers have asked questions/commented. I welcome your comments on my articles and questions about computers and “tech”. Dialogue is what keeps the Web relevant and dynamic.)

Most popular article: Manage Startup programs in Vista (115,584 page views)

Most downloaded program (referral): Security Task Manager (928)

# of cups of coffee consumed by Tech Paul while writing all these articles: 16 (… but, they were Olympic swimming pool-sized cups. Ha!)

I never intended to write so many posts, nor write for so long.. my intention was simply to publish a few How-To’s so I could say “read this”, instead of repeating myself (when people find out you’re a tech.. they ask you questions!). But let’s see if we can’t make it through another three years together – shall we?

If you are looking for who won my latest contest drawing, click here.

Copyright 2007-2010 © Tech Paul. All Rights Reserved. post to jaanix.

---

>> Folks, don’t miss an article! To get Tech – for Everyone articles delivered to your e-mail Inbox, click here, or to subscribe in your RSS reader, click here. <<

---

License Giveaway Winners Announced

I’m sure many of you are eager to see who the lucky 10 winners are. Sorry about the delay, but today was kind of special here at T4E… (click here, and see why.)

NOD32 License Giveaway Winners Announced

The folks at Eset have generously donated ten licenses for NOD32 Antivirus 4 to me, to award to my readers. I sincerely thank them for that.

You might not have heard of Eset or NOD32, but it has quietly been around, and winning awards, since the early 90′s (the days of DOS). For the last year, I have been using it as my primary anti-malware defense on my principle machine and I have not been disappointed. This Internet security tool passed my every test and I recommend it; and I do so to folks of any skill level.

“As far as reputations go, ESET’s NOD32 is practically unimpeachable. Version 4 of the popular and effective antivirus and antispyware builds on that rep, emphasizing its community-sourced ThreatSense for preventing attacks before they occur, a slick interface, and some of the highest independently-tested detection rates married to low rates of false positives. “ — CNET editor Seth Rosenblatt.

A 30-day, fully-functional free trial of NOD32 can be downloaded here, Free 30-day trial. Try it out yourself. (And then leave a comment. You may just win one of these valuable prizes!) Again, I thank Kimbal, and the folks at Eset for making this giveaway possible.

Without further ado: Congratulations to..

(These licenses were provided by Kimbal Binder, Network Security Manager at Rain Networks. Those of you who are in IT may want to click here and visit the IT Security Resource Center, and learn more about Eset in the enterprise (trials available). Please direct questions to Kimbal at Kimbalb(at)rainnetworks(dot)com.)

Winners have been sent an e-mail containing their license keys. (You may need to check your Junk folder.)

My thanks to Kimbal, Eset, and all who participated in this contest.

TGIF!

Copyright 2007-2010 © Tech Paul. All Rights Reserved. post to jaanix.

---

>> Folks, don’t miss an article! To get Tech – for Everyone articles delivered to your e-mail Inbox, click here, or to subscribe in your RSS reader, click here. <<

---

A Few Hours Remaining

Entries must be received before midnight (Pacific) tonight (Thurs. May 27th) so act now!

---

** A Chance To Win A Valuable Prize! **

---

The folks at Eset have generously donated ten licenses for NOD32 Antivirus 4, to award to my readers. You might not have heard of Eset or NOD32, but it has quietly been around, and winning awards, since the early 90′s (the days of DOS).

To enter the drawing, please see: Software License Giveaway: NOD32 Antivirus 4. Enter my current giveaway and (possibly) win!

Entries must be received before midnight (Pacific) tonight (Thurs. May 27th) so act now!

[These licenses were provided by Kimbal Binder, Network Security Manager at Rain Networks. Those of you who are in IT may want to click here and visit the IT Security Resource Center, and learn more about Eset in the enterprise (trials available). Please direct questions to Kimbal at Kimbalb(at)rainnetworks(dot)com.]

---

* * *

BONUS: For those of you who missed out on winning a  license for SYNCING.NET, you have another chance as Bill Mullins is currently running a drawing contest for 12 licenses for the top-of-the-line Enterprise grade, Flagship Business Edition.

To go there and enter, click here. (Bill’s site is certainly worth a visit even if you aren’t interested in this contest, so check it out!)

* * *

Copyright 2007-2010 © Tech Paul. All Rights Reserved. post to jaanix.

---

>> Folks, don’t miss an article! To get Tech – for Everyone articles delivered to your e-mail Inbox, click here, or to subscribe in your RSS reader, click here. <<

---

HTC Incredible, 10 Products, Contest Deadline, more…

A few interesting items for your consideration…

HTC Incredible, source Crazy World of G
“Two days ago, my HTC Incredible arrived (a day ahead of schedule) and I charged it up and set it up the next morning. I was amazed at how easy it was to set up and how fast and snappy the Android OS is! …”

The 10 Most Overrated Products, source PC World
“Hype springs eternal. Lots of technologies, products, and services don’t merit the praise heaped on them. Here are 10 tech items that don’t live up to their billing–and 10 that deserve respect that they don’t receive …”

Know What An Internet (Web) Bot Is?…A Botnet? source Paul’s Home Computing Blog
“Okay…now let’s cover the dirty side of these destructive, criminal, and obnoxious rascals …”

---

** A Chance To Win A Valuable Prize! **

---

The folks at Eset have generously donated ten licenses for NOD32 Antivirus 4, to award to my readers. You might not have heard of Eset or NOD32, but it has quietly been around, and winning awards, since the early 90′s (the days of DOS). To enter the drawing, please see: Software License Giveaway: NOD32 Antivirus 4. Enter my current giveaway and (possibly) win!

Entries must be received before midnight (Pacific) tonight (Thurs. May 27th) so act now!

[These licenses were provided by Kimbal Binder, Network Security Manager at Rain Networks. Those of you who are in IT may want to click here and visit the IT Security Resource Center, and learn more about Eset in the enterprise (trials available). Please direct questions to Kimbal at Kimbalb(at)rainnetworks(dot)com.]

Copyright 2007-2010 © Tech Paul. All Rights Reserved. post to jaanix.

---

>> Folks, don’t miss an article! To get Tech – for Everyone articles delivered to your e-mail Inbox, click here, or to subscribe in your RSS reader, click here. <<

---

Share this post :

Brief Lesson In Networking: Gigabit Ethernet*

Reader asks why upgrading to Gigabit Ethernet didn’t improve their Web surfing speed.

(Folks, I am networking a new office today and do not have time to write a new article. This article demonstrates some fundamental concepts of “networking” computers together, as well as “Internet speed”.)

Q: “I recently purchased a Linksys WRT 310 wireless router that has four Gigabit ports. My Dell desktop is a XPS which I was told was “Top of the Line” has a built-in gigabit port. I even purchased new cables to make sure my network was going to be “gigabit”. I hooked it all up and I don’t see any improvement in my internet. The salesman told me that “gigabit” was the fastest.. so how come I’m not surfing faster? Did I do something wrong or do I need to buy a different brand? Thanx.”

A: No, you (most likely) didn’t do anything “wrong”, and you don’t need to buy a different router.

Let me, first of all, cover a few “basics” (see also, Wired or Wireless?*)
Kilo = 1,000 = thousand
Mega = 1,000,000 = million
Giga = 1,000,000,000 = billion

And then let me ask you to look at a simple network diagram.

In this diagram, the Internet is represented by the “cloud” (thus.. “cloud computing”) and I made it appropriately dark and stormy. The Internet connection is represented as the yellow zigzag — this can be a phone line (dial-up, DSL, IDSN) or cable, or satellite, or WiFi.
The blue arrows are the Ethernet cabling of your network (aka “LAN”) which is now Gigabit.

For sake of argument, I made the Internet connection a cable High-speed connection, and I made the download speed a Premium-grade 12 Mbps .. 12 “megabits” per second. Note that I said “download speed”. Unless you order a special line into your home/office, your “Internet speed” is always your download speed. And, your “upload” speeds are always significantly slower.. as represented by the 486 kilobits per second.

The lines (cables) you changed are the blue arrow lines. And so, yes, you have billion-bit lines there (Gigabit). You have multiplied by a thousand the theoretical rate at which computers A, B, and C can “talk” to the router and to each other. You did not change how the modem and the cloud are talking. That is still 12 Megabits down/point 486 (.486) Megabytes up.

Your Internet speed is controlled by two things: one, your service “level” (3 Mbps is more expensive than 1.5, and 6 Mbps is even more expensive, etc.) and two, the technology that can come into your home — dial-up, DSL, ISDN, Satellite, cable, wireless, and fibre-optic.

Because your desktop can “talk” to the router at a higher rate of bits, you might notice a very slight improvement in surfing speed.. but, if you want faster Internet, you have to upgrade either your service level, or/and the method it comes in on (change the yellow zigzag) .. For example, upgrading from dial-up to cable.

The advantage to Gigabit Ethernet comes in when transferring data across the LAN.. say, from computer A to computer B. Such as if you are backing up the files on A over to B, or “streaming” videos from C to A and B.

The Linksys is a good router (though I read that it runs hot, so you want to keep it in an open, well-ventilated area) and all-Gigabit on your LAN is a “good thing”.
I think you were simply expecting the wrong results from your upgrade.

Today’s free link: Curious as to what speed your ISP is really providing? Click here, and pick the “server location” nearest to you. You’ll see both your upload and download speeds. Flash required.

Orig post: 3/8/09

---

** 3 Chances To Win A Valuable Prize! **

---

1) The folks at Eset have generously donated ten licenses for NOD32 Antivirus 4, to award to my readers. You might not have heard of Eset or NOD32, but it has quietly been around, and winning awards, since the early 90′s (the days of DOS).

To enter the drawing, please see: Software License Giveaway: NOD32 Antivirus 4 Enter my current giveaway and (possibly) win!

---

2) For those of you who missed out on winning a business-use license for LAlarm, you have another chance as Gizmos For Geeks is currently running a drawing contest for 30 licenses (yes, 30!). To go there and enter, click here. (The site is certainly worth a visit even if you aren’t interested in this contest, so check it out.)

---

3) PC World’s $25K Dream Come True Sweepstakes. (prizes awarded daily)

Copyright 2007-2010 © Tech Paul. All Rights Reserved. post to jaanix.

---

>> Folks, don’t miss an article! To get Tech – for Everyone articles delivered to your e-mail Inbox, click here, or to subscribe in your RSS reader, click here. <<

---

Share this post :