Fix WU Utility is a small, portable and freeware tool designed to repair the Windows Update utility built into both Windows Vista and Windows 7. This utility will re-register a total of 114 .dll, ocx and .ax files that are needed for Windows Update to function properly. This application only works on Windows Vista and 7. To fix Windows Update on Windows XP, try Dial-a-Fix.
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Piriform Speccy is a small, portable and freeware utility from the people who brought us CCleaner. Speccy is designed to scan and display a computers specifications. While there is plenty of software out there that can scan and display a computers specifications such as System Information for Windows, SIW can be a little overkill with the amount of information that is shown.

Speccy will just show the important information without all the extra fluff. One Technibble forum member described Speccy as “Portable. Simplistic. Nice GUI. Informative. Straight to the point” which sums it up nicely.
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Fix IE Utility is a small, freeware and portable application designed to help fix Internet Explorer after a Malware attack. Fix IE Utility will re-register 89 DLL and OCX files that are often de-registered in a Malware attack and are required for Internet Explorer to run smoothly. You will still need to run your usual malware removal applications but if Internet Explorer still wont work correctly after the system as been cleaned, its possible the malware de-registered some files and this is where Fix IE Utility helps. Many people would just suggest that the client could just switch to Firefox. However, the core of Internet Explorer is still used inside many other programs so it needs to be operational, even if you don’t use Internet Explorer as a web browser

Fix IE Utility has been tested on IE7 and IE8 on both Windows Vista and Windows 7.
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Reloading Windows and installing various applications is something that Computer Technicians do all the time. While we can streamline our Windows installs using something like nLite, there isnt really a good way to automate the installation of multiple applications. Sure, some technicians make use of .BAT files or a scripting language like AutoIT but the code is often too difficult for some Technicians. This is where Ninite comes in.

Ninite.com (formerly Volery) is a simple tool for Windows that will automatically download all the latest versions of the software you choose from its directory, then install them silently (as in, you shouldn’t see the installers or asked any questions). Some of the software you will see in their directory is Firefox, Thunderbird, VLC, Foxit Reader, Avast, AVG, Flash Plugin, CCleaner, 7zip and much more. This program will not choose not to install the spammy toolbars/search pages that comes with certain software like Foxit Reader.
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Windows 7 is just about to be released (October 22) and you are going to start seeing it on clients machines when their new brand name laptop or desktop comes with it pre-installed. The problem with many brand name laptop and desktops is they often dont come with the Windows 7 disc.

This Windows 7 System Recovery Disc can be used to access the system recovery menu, giving you options such as System Restore, Complete PC Backup, Automated System Repair and Command-line Prompt. However, you cannot use this disc to re-install Windows.

If you already have access to a working copy of Windows 7, you dont need to download this because you can create this disk by going to the run dialog and type: recdisc
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The title pretty much says it all. This .BAT file will kill all currently running apps on a system that the user started with the exception of a few locked Windows processes and some antivirus products. This comes in handy when you are working on a system that has too many processes running and thus slowing it down; often to the point where its difficult to do any work on it.

Being a BAT file, this script is obviously highly customizable. It works on a “if the process is not in this list, then kill it” system; so you can add processes to the list that you do not to be killed such as the menu for your USB drive applications or Firefox.

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Damaged docx2txt is a freeware recovery tool designed to recover text from corrupt Word 2007 XLSX files. Word 2007 files are actually a collection of zipped XML files and the XML format is somewhat unforgiving of data corruption. This application unzips the partially corrupted XML files and tries to read what it can, not caring about malformed XML. This tool pretty much just dumps the text it finds in the XML file to text.

Corrupt Excel xlsx2csv is similar to the above except it is designed to recover the content of corrupt Excel XLSX files. Again, XSLX files are based on XML files which is unforgiving to data corruption. This application has the ability to maintain the cell formatting and the cells content; including seperate workbooks in a single XLSX file. You can copy and paste the content out of the application or export the entire spreadsheet to CSV.

Both of these applications were originally Perl scripts but have since had a GUI made for them (you will see a command window though). These applications are “mostly portable” as it doesnt need to be installed but requires .NET version 2.
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XPQuickFix is a small, freeware and portable tool designed to quickly fix any restrictions and other errors that are often caused by viruses. XPQuickFix can correct 25 common Windows XP problems such as enable the Task Manager, enable Registry Editor, fix a CD autoplay and more.
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AppRemover is a small, free and portable utility designed to be a single removal tool for a huge list of security products. It can remove products made by Avast!, AVG, Avira, BullGuard, CA, ClamWin, ESET, F-Secure, Kaspersky, Lavasoft, McAfee, Microsoft, Norman, Panda, Sophos, Symantec, TrendMicro, TrustPort, Webroot and many more.
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Zone Alarm is a well known internet security package and most of the time it works fairly well. However, because this application has to sink its hooks deep into a Windows to protect the operating system, it can cause serious problems when the application does not uninstall correctly.
It seems, based off Zone Alarms official forums that there are a lot of people having trouble removing Zone Alarm and this is where the Zone Alarm Removal Tool comes in. Its a small, portable and freeware and its probably a good idea to have on your USB drive since you probably wont be able to connect to the internet to download it if you encounter these problems with Zone Alarm.
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