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How To Connect Windows 7 Media Center To an Xbox 360 and Stream Media

February 3, 2011 Home Tech, PC 101, Window 7

If you’re new to Windows 7 and own an Xbox 360, you might want the ability to watch the Media Center Content from Your Xbox. Here we take a look at how easy it is to set it up using Media Center Extenders.

The cool thing about Windows 7 Media Center is you can access your movies, music, and other digital media from it with your Xbox. Here we’ll walk you through the process of adding media to the Windows Media Center (WMC) Libraries then setting up your PC and Xbox to talk with each other so your Xbox 360 can access those Libraries.

How to Configure Windows 7 Updates

January 20, 2011 Computer / Network Security, Home Tech, PC 101, Window 7

If you’ve been a Windows user since XP, you probably know the importance of keeping the OS up-to-date. If you’re new to Windows or more specifically Windows 7, here we’ll take some time to go over the importance of making sure you have Windows Updates configured properly.

If you want to help make sure that your PC is is more stable and less vulnerable to malicious attacks, the 2 main things to keep up-to-date is your Antivirus software and Windows Updates. The 2nd Tuesday of each month Microsoft has what’s called “Patch-Tuesday”. This is the day when Microsoft releases patches to improve stability, fixes to known vulnerabilities, and zero-day attacks. Let’s take a look at the process if you’ve just re-installed Windows 7.

Windows Update

To check to make sure your Windows Update settings are on…click on Start>>All Programs and scroll to Windows Update.

If this is the first time you’ve run Windows Update on your machine, don’t be alarmed if you find the following message. If you want keep it simple, just click on the Turn on automatic updates button, which should be fine for most users. If you want more control, click on Let me choose my settings.

Getting Started with Windows Live Photo Gallery 2011

December 30, 2010 Home Tech, Window 7, Window Live Essentials

Over the past few weeks we’ve been covering the different offerings available in Windows Live Essentials 2011. Another program we’ll take a look at this week is Live Photo Gallery 2011. Photo Gallery is a set of tools for organizing, sharing, touching up you photos and publishing them online. It has a lot of features not included in previous versions such as the ability to create Panoramas, movies, slideshows, and actually has an interesting search feature using Facial Recognition.

Install & Setup Live Photo Gallery 2011

Installation is simple and very similar to any of the other Live Essentials programs you may have installed already. Right-click on the Windows Live Installer file and click install as Administrator.

Remember that you aren’t required to install everything in the Live Essentials Suite…only what you want.

As we mentioned in our previous post about Live Movie Maker, the two install together.

You’ll see a progress bar and dialog box while installation takes place. The amount of time it takes will vary between systems and your mileage may vary.

When installation is complete, a restart shouldn’t be required and you just need to close out of the installation window and begin using it.

Create and Edit Home Videos with Windows Live Movie Maker

December 21, 2010 Home Tech, PC 101, Window 7, Window Live Essentials

Over the past few weeks we’ve been taking a closer look at the apps in Windows Live Essentials 2011. For this week’s tutorial we’ll take a look at getting started with Windows Live Movie Maker 2011.

Installation and Setup

Download the Windows Live Essentials 2011 Installer file and kick off the process.

Again, it’s worth noting that you aren’t required to install all of the apps in this suite, only the ones you want. Since we’re covering Live Movie Maker make sure to select Photo Gallery and Movie Maker then wait while it installs.

Note: You will need to install Photo Gallery and Movie Maker together, but we’ll just be covering Movie Maker in this article.

When installation is complete a restart is required.

When you come back from the restart you’ll find Live Photo Gallery and Movie Maker in the Start Menu.

Launch Live Movie Maker and we can get started creating a home movie for friends and family or to post on YouTube.

Getting Started with Windows Live Writer

December 17, 2010 Home Tech, Window Live Essentials, Window XP

Copy of sshot-2010-12-16-[9] Recently we showed you how to setup Windows Live Essentials 2011. We also took a closer look at one of the apps – the Bing Bar, and today we will take a look at Windows Live Writer which is a valuable program for bloggers.

Installing Windows Live Writer

If you haven’t installed it already just download and kick off the Windows Live Essentials installer. Remember you don’t need to install everything in the suite and when the install kicks off, select Choose the programs you want to install.

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Now select the programs you want to install. In this example we’re just going to install Windows Live Writer (WLW).

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After installation is complete you’ll find Live Writer in the Start Menu.

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Configure Your Blog with WLW

After you have it installed and launch Live Writer you’ll be prompted to configure your blog with it.

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Choose the blog service you want to setup with WLW. You can use it with most of the popular services like WordPress, Blogger, Live Spaces, and several others.

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How To Connect Windows 7 Media Center To an Xbox 360 and Stream Media