Free Tool : FreshDiagnose

Just a quick post to share a free tool I found today.
I wanted to get a figure for disk throughput on my desktop and after browsing some tools ended up downloading FreshDiagnose. You do have to register to get an code to unlock it's functionality, but an email address and password is as much as you need to supply.

It can benchmark just about any aspect of your pc, the screenshot below shows the disk benchmarking for my laptop. It's free and I can see it being highly useful as my role increasingly requires me to look at different systems.

Free Online Storage : Dropbox

Am really liking this tool, and am favouring it over my usb drive for smaller, more frequently accessed stuff.

Tool : CPU-Z

I just read a post of Brent Ozar’s about the SQL Server installation at Stackoverflow.com and how the power-saving feature of the Nehalem processor was causing some fun.

Anyway, he points to an excellent FREE tool, CPU-Z which is new to me.
As Brent's post details, compare the 'specification' of the processor with the 'core speed' it is achieving.

Simples...

Download CPU-Z : http://www.cpuid.com/

Subnet Calculator tool

A useful time saver...

http://www.t1shopper.com/tools/calculate/ip-subnet/

Tools : 7zip

7zip is a file compression utility.
Like Winzip and Winzip Command line put together, oh, and it is FREE!

Download from here : http://www.7-zip.org/

I used the following command in a batch file to zip up an entire folder.
"C:\Program Files (x86)\7zip\7za.exe" a -r e:\sqlbackup\ssrs\ssrsarchive.7z e:\sqlbackup\ssrs\*.* -x!ssrsarchive.7z

the 'a' parameter at the start is tells it to add files.
the '-x' at the end tells it what to exclude (in this case the archive itself!)

Devcon - Controlling Devices from the command prompt.

Devcon - Controlling Devices from the command prompt.

1) Download Devcon from here > http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=311272

2 ) Open an Administrator command prompt

3) Use Devcon!


To see the classes of devices installed >

D:\devcon\i386>devcon classes

Listing 58 setup class(es).
WCEUSBS : Mobile devices
USB : Universal Serial Bus controllers
Media Center Extender: Media Center Extender
PnpPrinters : IEEE 1394 and SCSI printers
Dot4 : IEEE 1284.4 devices
Dot4Print : IEEE 1284.4 compatible printer
CDROM : DVD/CD-ROM drives
Computer : Computer
DiskDrive : Disk drives
Display : Display adapters
fdc : Floppy drive controllers
hdc : IDE ATA/ATAPI controllers
Keyboard : Keyboards
MEDIA : Sound, video and game controllers
Modem : Modems
Monitor : Monitors
Mouse : Mice and other pointing devices
MTD : Memory technology driver
MultiFunction : Multifunction adapters
Net : Network adapters
NetClient : Network Client
NetService : Network Service
NetTrans : Network Protocol
PCMCIA : PCMCIA adapters
Ports : Ports (COM & LPT)
Printer : Printers
SCSIAdapter : Storage controllers
System : System devices
Unknown : Other devices
FloppyDisk : Floppy disk drives
Processor : Processors
MultiPortSerial : Multi-port serial adapters
Memory : Memory devices
SmartCardReader : Smart card readers
Sensor : Sensors
VolumeSnapshot : Storage volume shadow copies
BiometricDevice : Biometric Devices
1394 : IEEE 1394 Bus host controllers
Infrared : Infrared devices
Image : Imaging devices
TapeDrive : Tape drives
Volume : Storage Volumes
Battery : Batteries
HIDClass : Human Interface Devices
61883 : 61883 Device Class
LegacyDriver : Non-Plug and Play Drivers
SmartCard : Smart cards
SideShow : Windows SideShow
SDHost : SD host adapters
Transfer Cable : Transfer Cable Devices
AVC : AVC Devices
MediumChanger : Medium Changer devices
SBP2 : SBP2 IEEE 1394 Devices
XnaComposite : Microsoft Common Controller For Windows Class
SecurityDevices : Security Devices
SmartCardFilter : Smart Card Filter
Bluetooth : Bluetooth Radios
WPD : Portable Devices

The class for Portable Devices is 'WPD'

List all Portable devices currently plugged in >

D:\devcon\i386>devcon listclass wpd

Listing 1 device(s) for setup class "WPD" (Portable Devices).
WPDBUSENUMROOT\UMB\2&37C186B&0&STORAGE#VOLUME#_??_USBSTOR#DISK&VEN_CORSAIR&PROD_
UFD&REV_1100#AA23000000001534&0#: G:\

Yes, my current USB drive is made by Corsair!
If we'd already have known part of the name, we could have found like this >

D:\devcon\i386>devcon find *corsair*

USBSTOR\DISK&VEN_CORSAIR&PROD_UFD&REV_1100\AA23000000001534&0: Corsair UFD USB D
evice
1 matching device(s) found.

Finally, we can issue a command to safely remove the device >

D:\devcon\i386>devcon remove *corsair*

USBSTOR\DISK&VEN_CORSAIR&PROD_UFD&REV_1100\AA23000000001534&0: Removed
1 device(s) removed.

Tool : HD_Speed

Simple tool that is free (we like free)


http://www.steelbytes.com/?mid=20

http://lifehacker.com/5166662/hd_speed-benchmarks-your-disks-and-drives

Tools : IsoRecorder

Free, light, cd recorder software...

http://isorecorder.alexfeinman.com/v2.htm

Recommended : Notepad++

Notepad++. A FREE notepad replacement.

http://notepad-plus.sourceforge.net/uk/site.htm

Am using it instead of ultraedit now...

Useful tool : FreeUndelete

FreeUndelete : A file recovery app that is FREE (and works well).

http://www.officerecovery.com/freeundelete/

(It rescued me today when my clumsy fingers deleted a folder on my usb stick)

Blogging : Source Code Highlighter

I have changed over to Alex Gorbatchev's excellent Syntax Highlighter tool for source code blogging and have spent the evening coding back through my posts to apply it (yawn)...

this is what it does for you (excuse the old school example code) -

10 print "hello world!"
20 goto 10

here is where to find it -

http://code.google.com/p/syntaxhighlighter/

Useful tool : WindirStat

A funky tool to help visualise and hence clean up hard disk bloat. It proved very helpful in finding over 5GB of rubbish left in c:\windows\csc by a colleague who used 'Client Side Caching'.

The application even features an animated Pacman character during disk analysis :)

Download it for free @ http://windirstat.info/

Windows Installer Cleanup Utility

As someone familiar with repairing installer issues manually, I was surprised to find they had issued a tool to help. Windows Installer Cleanup Utility crucialy zaps the files in the c:\windows\installer directory for the application you chose and removes registry entries so you can restart a failed installation.

1) Download & Install from http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;290301

2) Run from 'start > all programs > windows install cleanup'

3) Select the program you wish to cleanup.

Security : Chaos Generator

Chaos Generator. A free random password generator tool.



Download from http://safechaos.com/

FTP Server : Filezilla

I originally needed a ftp server for testing ftp functionality in an application. Filezilla Server was recommended to me as quick, easy and most importantly FREE!


Download it here > http://sourceforge.net/projects/filezilla/


They also do a free FTP client hence I'm ditching SmartFTP for Filezilla >


Yes, I know you can ftp from within I.E and the OS, but this is the real world, where usability and reliability rule :)

ISO Image Tools

Not so long ago, I was swimming in discs. Software and OS discs each on CD, neatly filed away in multiple folders. I was beginning to rival an MSDN subscription in terms of volume when I had a sort out, binned anything that had been superceeded and consolidating the rest to DVD.

The latest updates and installers are taking the form of ISO files i.e. image files of installation media. These are the FREE tools I rate for dealing with ISO files.

Daemon Tools - Emulates an optical drive so you can use an image without burning to disc.

UPDATE May 2010

Virtual Clonedrive is better and doesn't prompt you to install lots of add-ins / extras.

DoISO - Create ISO files from a given directory.

ImgBurn - Burns ISOs to disc and extracts images from discs. Especially good with 'difficult' discs. Used to be known as DVD Decrypter.