iDump – free your iPod

iDump is a portable Windows application that lets users transfer songs from their iPod to any PC. It has a very simple interface and using it is no brainer. Just connect your iPod to PC and launch iDump.

Once your iPod is connected, iDump will automatically display all the songs stored in it allowing you to choose which ones you want to copy to your PC. But before you start selecting songs, head on to the Output Options tab first and set an output directory for all the songs that you’re going to transfer. Once done, you can go back to the main tab and start selecting the songs.

To select songs, just click the box beside the song title or if you want to transfer everything, right-click anywhere and click Select All. When you’re done choosing, click the Start Copy button on the upper-right side. If you’re not familiar with the title, just right-click on the song and click the Play button. Your default music player will open and will start playing the song.

There’s also a search bar which makes it very easy if you intend to transfer only few songs out of thousands stored in your iPod.

Another cool feature of iDump is that it imports even your Playlist. Just click the drop down box and choose the playlist you want to be displayed.

iDump may not be as feature-rich compare to other commercial apps out there but it’s still an awesome app for me. It has all the features I need for its purpose, it’s lightweight, and best of all, it’s freakin’ FREE!

iDump works well on Windows XP/Vista/7. The only downside of it I guess is that it’s not compatible with iPhone and iTouch (but for me it’s okay since I don’t own any of those).

Also see: SharePod

© 2011, The content is copyrighted to The Heat Web blog by Christian Casino. Please refer to the license before using our content.
Permalink | Post tags: Freeware, iPod to PC, iTunes, portable application, recommended, song, Windows

PhotoBooth for Win7 is a copycat of the Photo booth app in Mac. It is a portable application which means you can easily store it on a USB and use it on any PC with a webcam.

Image credit: Tech-Recipes

When you launch the app, it will automatically detect your webcam so you can easily take snapshots. It has all the buttons that you will see in the Mac’s Photo booth like the camera button, effects, single shot, multi-shot, and the video button which I think is for design purpose only because it’s unclickable.

PhotoBooth for Win7 has a good number of photo effects, just the same as what you can see in Mac’s. There is mirror effect, black and white, pop art, fish eye, cool backgrounds (but I can’t make them work), and even upload your own backdrop images!

PhotoBooth for Win7 does not automatically save the captured images to your hard drive so make sure you save it first before you close the app or else you have to start your photo shoot again. To save the pictures, just click the captured images then click the Download button.

Unlike the original Photo booth, Windows’ version does not have the option to share pictures via email, however, you can instantly share your pictures to your Facebook or Flickr account right within the app.

PhotoBooth for Win7 is one of the most decent webcam effects application I’ve tried. It has a lot of potentials and I’m hoping that the developer will continue to update it.

* It works well on Windows 7.

© 2011, The content is copyrighted to The Heat Web blog by Christian Casino. Please refer to the license before using our content.
Permalink | Post tags: photo booth, portable, recommended, webcam effects, Windows

G+ Notifier is a portable desktop app that alerts you when you have new notifications or updates on your Google+ account. When you launch the app, it will just sit in the notification area (system tray) and popup a balloon every time you receive new notifications. When you click on the balloon, it will bring you to the notification pane which contains all the latest and previously received notifications.

Currently, G+ Notifier doesn’t show you the exact things that happen on your Google+ account like when someone commented on your post or someone added you to his circle, instead, it just shows you the number of notifications you haven’t checked yet. However, it’s part of the developer’s future plans for the app to include the exact activities that happen to your account. And that should look like this if ever: The developer has left a comment below to tell us that he has already updated the app which shows a notification window like the screenshot below.

G+ Notifier is free to use and works well on 32 and 64-bit versions of Windows XP/Vista/7.

© 2011, The content is copyrighted to The Heat Web blog by Christian Casino. Please refer to the license before using our content.
Permalink | Post tags: desktop, Google Plus, notifications, portable, recommended, Windows

KShutdown is an advanced shut down utility for KDE, Linux, and Windows. It allows you to set the exact date and time you wish to shut down your computer just like the sleep mode on televisions.

Aside from “shut down”, you can also choose other actions like lock screen, restart, hibernate, sleep, and logout.

You also have the option to display the progress bar so you always know the remaining time. The progress bar is conveniently located at the upper most part of your screen.

KShutdown may not be that useful or should I say “a real must-have” unless you’re the type of person who always forget to shutdown your computer but I still recommend that you download it and keep it for emergency purposes.

KShutdown is a very simple tool but for me, it rocks! It has a portable version for Windows and installer version for both Linux and Windows.

Check out the opposite of this article: Insomnia – Prevent Your PC From Sleeping

(via ShareSummit)

© 2011, The content is copyrighted to The Heat Web blog by Christian Casino. Please refer to the license before using our content.
Permalink | Post tags: hibernate, portable, schedule, shut down, sleep mode, Windows

Quitter is a Twitter client that runs in a command window (or “DOS window”). It doesn’t have a visually stunning interface that makes it very simple and straight-forward. It is completely portable and you can easily fit it in any USB with its file size of 150KB only!

Quitter is very easy to set up. Just run the program and allow Quitter to access your account.

Once you’re done, you can now use Quitter to:

• Read, post, reply and re-tweet
• Organize the people you follow into groups and read tweets by group
• Filter (or highlight) tweets from specific users or that contain certain #hashtags
• Use URL shorteners like TinyUrl.com for tweeting URLs
• Easily open tweeted links from other users in your default browser (no copy/paste needed)
• Send and receive direct messages
• Follow or unfollow other users

Quitter is definitely a must-have Twitter client for those people who are looking for a simple yet feature-loaded client.

* Quitter runs properly on Windows 2000/XP/Vista but requires Microsoft .NET Framework 2.0 or higher

Also see: The best and the hottest Twitter-related applications and websites

via TechnixUpdate

© 2011, The content is copyrighted to The Heat Web blog by Christian Casino. Please refer to the license before using our content.
Permalink | Post tags: command window, portable, Twitter client, Windows

TeraCopy uses dynamically adjusted buffers to reduce seek times and asynchronous copy to speed up the file transfer. It lets you pause and resume file transfer and in case there has been a copy error, it will try to resolve it for several times but if it will not work, it will just skip the file without terminating the entire transfer.

TeraCopy is very simple to use. Just drag and drop the files or folder you want to move or copy into the TeraCopy interface then choose your desired location.

During my testing, it was able to copy a 1.45GB file to my external hard drive in less than 8 minutes with an average transfer speed of 3.4 MB/s. You’ll appreciate TeraCopy more if you’re transferring really huge files.

Another way to transfer files using TeraCopy is by right-clicking on the file you want to copy/move and choose TeraCopy then select the target folder. That simple!

TeraCopy can replace the standard Windows Explorer copy and move functions, allowing you to work with files as usual.

TeraCopy is free for home users and it has a portable version which you can download directly from their website.

© 2011, The content is copyrighted to The Heat Web blog by Christian Casino. Please refer to the license before using our content.
Permalink | Post tags: application, copy, portable, transfer files, Windows

1. Favorite Web Browser

It’s always nice to bring your favorite web browser anywhere you go so you can always have all your bookmarks, plugins, and settings along with you. I know that most of the computers now have their own web browser installed but it’s still better if you’re going to use something which is you’re more familiar and comfortable with, right?

Download Firefox Portable

Download Google Chrome Portable

Download Portable Opera

2. File Archiver

There are times when we receive an e-mail, we need to use a tool that can open attached files like RAR, ZIP, ISO, and etc. that is why we need to have a portable file archiver on our external device.

Download 7-Zip Portable

Download WinRAR Unplugged

Also see: 7 File Compression Tools

3. Media Player

If you have a lot of movies or songs saved on your external device, you should always be ready to have a portable media player too so you’ll always be sure that you can play it on any computer.

I recommend using VLC Media Player Portable so you don’t have to worry about downloading codecs when playing your media files.

4. E-mail Client

If you want to take your e-mail, address book, and account settings with you, you should be using a portable e-mail client so you can easily check your e-mail anywhere you go.

Download Thunderbird Portable

5. Anti-Virus

Scared of virus attack? You shouldn’t be! Take with you a portable anti-virus so you can easily scan files on any PC that you’re using.

Download ClamWin Portable

Download SpyBot – Search & Destroy Portable (Spyware detection & removal)

6. Instant Messaging

Do you always want to have a communication with your friends, family, and loved-ones even when you’re away from them? Good thing there are instant messaging tools that allow you to chat with your friends and family even when you’re thousand miles away from each other. With these portable instant messaging tools, you can bring with you your friends list anywhere you go.

Download Digsby Portable

Download Pidgin Portable

7. Notes

If you need to take down notes quickly, you should always have Notepad++ with you anywhere you go. Aside from being a text editor, it also serves as a source code editor with syntax highlighting. One main advantage of Notepad++ over the built-in Windows text editor, Notepad, is tabbed editing, to easily work with multiple open files.

8. Office Suite

If you need to finish your thesis while you travel, OpenOffice.org Portable will be your best friend. It includes a word processor, spreadsheet, presentation tool, drawing package and database so you can easily access and edit all your documents anytime, anywhere.

9. Blogger Tools

If you’re a blogger, it’s really a must to have Windows Live Writer on your portable device so you don’t have to setup everything again from blog settings to FTP and Ping settings especially if you work with multiple computers.

Aside from portable WLW, a blogger should also use a nice screen capture tool every time you need to take screenshots and a portable FTP client so you can always take you server list or settings with you.

Download Lightscreen Portable / Snippy for Windows XP

Download FileZilla Portable

Also see: 5 Essential Software For Amateur Bloggers

There you go! So the next time you will be leaving your home, don’t forget to bring with you your external device along with these portable applications so you’ll always be prepared and productive even on the go.

Friendly reminder: Just don’t forget to get your USB before going home or you might end up losing your important files.

© 2011, The content is copyrighted to The Heat Web blog by Christian Casino. Please refer to the license before using our content.
Permalink | Post tags: external device, must have, portable application, USB

With SP Grab, you can take screenshots of your entire screen, active window, or of a selected area. The application is very small and you can just run it in the background so you can quickly create screenshots when you need to. Once the image is grabbed, you can save it to your computer, copy to your clipboard, upload to its server or to your own FTP just like TinyGrab, but this one is better because it doesn’t have any limitations and it’s free!

You can also customize the hot keys so you can easily take screenshots. The default keys are:

FULL SCREEN: Ctrl+Shift+F

ACTIVE WINDOW: Ctrl+Shift+A

SELECTED AREA: Ctrl+Shift+S

SP Grab is a portable application which means, you don’t have to install anything! Just download it, extract the file, and launch the application. That simple!

© 2010, The content is copyrighted to The Heat Web blog by Christian Casino. Please refer to the license before using our content.
Permalink | Post tags: FTP, portable, screen capture tool, screenshot, upload

Sleep mode is a great feature, however, when you’re doing something like watching a movie or burning DVDs and then suddenly your system will sleep, that’s a bad thing because you’re still using it – even though you’re not actually using it because you’re not doing anything like moving your mouse or typing keys. That’s why most of the media players and other programs now have the capabilities to tell Windows not to sleep while they’re running. But how about those programs or internet activity that do not have the ability to block sleep mode such as downloading a large file, presenting a PowerPoint, etc.

Actually, there are three ways to prevent your PC from entering sleep mode. First is adjusting the Power Settings of your PC.

Go to your Control Panel and then double-click Power Options and adjust the settings based on your preferences. However, you have to undo everything once the task is finished which is quite annoying because you have to repeat these steps every time you want to prevent the sleep mode.

If you don’t like the first option because it requires a lot of work, check out Insomnia.

Insomnia is a free, small, and portable application that prevents your PC from sleeping. It calls the SetThreadExecutionState API to disable sleep mode for as long as it’s running.

Download Insomnia

The third option is by using another application called Caffeine.

Caffeine is almost the same as Insomnia. It prevents your PC from sleeping by simulating a key press once every 59 seconds, so your machine thinks you’re still working at the keyboard. It’s also a portable and very small application.

When Caffeine is running, it will add a “cup filled with coffee” icon in your notification area.

If you want to disable it, just double-click the icon and the cup will be emptied. Just double-click the icon again if you want to activate Caffeine.

Download Caffeine

© 2010, The content is copyrighted to The Heat Web blog by Christian Casino. Please refer to the license before using our content.
Permalink | Post tags: power options, prevent, sleep mode, standby, Windows

iTunes is a really great media player however, many people hate it because it’s so huge and it has a lot of extra components that is needed to be installed in order to use it. So if you want to uninstall and completely remove all the traces of iTunes from your computer, you should use ByeTunes.

ByeTunes is a free tool specifically developed to completely uninstall iTunes from your computer. Just download this portable tool (no need to install), run it and it will ask you if you want to completely uninstall iTunes from your computer, and once you click Yes, it will start removing all the traces of iTunes from your PC.

© 2010, The content is copyrighted to The Heat Web blog by Christian Casino. Please refer to the license before using our content.
Permalink | Post tags: Apple, iTunes, portable, removal tool, uninstall