But I did not know of this: CCEnhancer can add to CCleaner’s capabilities by providing support for hundreds of extra programs beyond those supported by default.

According to FreewareGenius, the add-on app supports 270 extra programs including things like Quicktime and Flash, for example,  it works even as a portable app, offers 1-click operation and is simple to use. Nice - who knew? You can try CCenhancer for yourself, just download it from here. It’s free, but donations are accepted.

With the third-party application, AeroSnap for Windows Vista & XP, you can configure your windows to behave similarly to how they would by default if on Windows 7. You can also customize its interactions, including turning on or off “Snap Preview,” disabling the splash screen, removing the system tray icon, setting its auto-start option, or enabling hotkeys. If you want to get even more precise, you can turn on or off left, right and top snapping or set snapping to function by hotkey only.

It looks like this app has been around for some time – the last update was in summer 2008. But if you hadn’t come across yet and still have XP on your netbook, for example, it may be worth checking out. The app is available as a free download here.

A couple of months ago, we looked at a user-created application made by a reader of the Tweaking with Vishal blog that does the same thing. That app could format the USB drive and copy over the installation files from either a DVD or an ISO image. However, one commenter noted he had a bit of trouble with the application, so this other one, called WintoFlash, might be a better alternative. According to various testers, the app “works as advertised” which is good news. However, it does not work straight from an ISO. Instead, the app looks for the folder containing the Windows installation files, meaning you either have to burn the ISO to disk, use an ISO mounter (virtual drive), or create the folder structure on your own hard drive.

However, using the app is simple. It starts off with a wizard that helps you prep the USB drive to become the bootable replacement for the Windows 7 DVD. And if you run into any issues, there’s a discussion forum where you can chat with other users to get help. 

The latest version is available on the WintoFlash site, but please note the software is still in beta.

When running the program, it will automatically detect your profiles and accounts, allowing you to check or uncheck the boxes of the items you want to backup. And should disaster strike, you can also use the application to restore the backups it creates.

MailBrowserBackup is free software licensed under the GNU GPL v2. You can download it for Windows XP SP2, Vista, and Windows 7 from here.

In addition to the tweaks, the software also includes other utilities like a registry cleaner and defragmenter, a disk drive clean up utility, a system performance analyzer, an automatic internet connection optimizer, and more.

The final version of Tweak 7 should become available in July 2009. You can grab the beta here.

Now there’s another application that also lets you change your background, but with a slight difference. This new Login Screen Rotator lets you pick up to 10 logon screen backgrounds which it will then display randomly each time you login. All you have to do is browse for the files you want to use then click “Enable Settings and Exit.” If you ever want to revert back to the default screen, you can use the utility called "Remove files and settings.exe" which is included with the download.

Oh, and if you’re wondering where to get some good images for your logon background, don’t forget this resource.

Once installed, you can use Taskbar Overlord in order to middle-click to close an open application – just like closing a tab in the IE8 or Firefox web browser. He also added a feature that lets you left-click a program icon to switch to the last active window you were using instead of showing you the thumbnail previews (available when you have multiple windows of that application open).

The Taskbar Overlord is actually a little AutoHotkey script that makes these two changes for you. If you’d rather have one of the changes and not the other – you’re in luck. There are actually several different versions of the program available for download:

• Taskbar Overlord - Source Code. This includes both the left click and middle click functionality as an .ahk script file.
• Taskbar Overlord Executable - Left and Middle Click.
  Has both features. Switches to the last active window when left clicking. Closes all windows when middle clicking.
• Taskbar Overlord Executable - Left Click Only.
  One feature only. Switches to the last active window when left clicking.
• Taskbar Overlord Executable - Middle Click Only.
  One feature only. Closes all windows when middle clicking

[UPDATE: Direct links above may not work for you, click here and download directly.]
Future releases and bug fixes will be announced in the following feed: http://www.ocellated.com/tag/taskbar-overlord/feed/.

Other utilities that made the list are: Little Tweaker, Ultimate Windows Tweaker, XDN Tweaker, Windows 7 Manager, and TweakNow Power Pack 2009. As it turns out, some of those are actually Vista utilities that work with Windows 7. If you’re familiar with any of these tools yourself, share your experiences in the comments!

This new, open source screenshot application runs from a small executable file – no installation required. After it’s up and running, you can use keyboard shortcuts to take a shot of either a region (hit the Print button), a window (Alt+Print), or your entire screen (Ctrl+Print).

Unlike Jing, which saves all images as .PNG files, Greenshot lets you specify your image file format along with name and storage location. In addition, you can choose to just copy the image to the clipboard instead so you can paste it elsewhere.

After your screenshot has been copied, you can then add objects including rectangles, circles, and text boxes. A unique feature lets you select an element within the picture and resize it, move it, copy it, cut it, or delete it.

Unfortunately, Greenshot doesn’t let you upload photos to the web like Jing does, but you can always use Windows Live Photo Gallery or your favorite FTP program for that. Greenshot may not replace Jing for me, but it definitely has some useful features that make it a worthy addition to my everyday toolkit. 

From the company’s homepage, you can download the following utilities:

1. An Extended Windows Explorer

2. A Screen Capture and Desktop Recorder

3. A Keyboard Shortcut Manager

4. An Image Converter, Resizer, and Denoiser

5. A Disk Analyzer

6. An FTP and SFTP Client

7. An Extended Task Manager

8. A File Compression Extension

Over the years, you’ve probably downloaded a few programs similar to those on this list – in fact, you may have even paid good money for them. As noted on the Extensoft site, similar programs like SnagIt, Camtasia, WinZip, Cute FTP, and others charge quite a bit once you get beyond their free trial. Buying each one of those apps piecemeal, and you could end up spending a lot of money.

If you’re someone who needed the advanced features that the professional editions of those apps offered, then your money did not go to waste. But if you only need, say, 80% functionality and none of the complex features, then Extensions for Windows says they have you covered…for free.

At first, I thought Extensions for Windows was a suite of Windows XP tools, so I didn’t try them out. However, it looks like Extensions runs on Vista, too, so now I’m definitely going to give them a shot.

Have you tried Extensions for Windows? If so, let me know about your experiences in the comments.

The new app UAC Snooze lets you temporarily shut off UAC prompts by clicking on the icon it installs in your system tray. The app is available as a free trial for 30 days, then, to continue using it, a one-time fee of $5 is required.

UAC Snooze provides the following features:

• Temporarily turn off UAC prompts by clicking on the UAC Snooze icon in the system tray
• Can be configured to start automatically with Windows and not require a UAC prompt
• Clicking on the icon can turn off UAC prompts or snooze for 1, 5, 10, 30 or 60 minutes (or user-defined time)
• 10 user-defined snooze intervals can be defined
• Right-click on icon to bring up menu to select action other than the default
• When prompts are off, click on icon again to turn prompts back on
• Options to modify prompt action when program opens and closes
• Tooltip shows time remaining until prompts will be turned back on
• Icon changes based on state (Prompts On: UAC Shield , Snooze: Shield with a Z , Off: Shield with an X)

UAC Snooze works on both 32 and 64 bit systems and can be downloaded from here.

(via AskVG)

However, it turns out that there is an add-on for Task Manager called Task Manager Extension which will add more features to this program. With Task Manager Extension installed, you’ll have new features like icons in the processes window, Windows processes will be greyed-out so you’ll know to leave them alone, and you’ll have tons more features from the right-click menu including options for displaying the system path and time the process has been running.

I think for casual users a simple tool like this would be much more friendly to use than Process Explorer, for example. Unfortunately, this program only works on XP and lower, and not on XP 64 or Vista. How disappointing! If anyone knows of any similar program for Vista users, please let me know.

(thanks DownloadSquad)

He also mentions another utility called Easy Duplicate File Finder, which he found on PCWorld’s site. However, this program was not too good for Windows Vista as it had issues with the Vista file junctions (like, for example, the program didn’t know that c:\Users\Sarah\Pictures is really the same as c:\Users\Sarah\Documents\My Pictures\). This slowed the program down quite a bit.

If you have any favorite programs to recommend, leave us a note in the comments!

(Thanks AppScout!)

Add a Folder to Your Favorites: Drag the beloved folder from Windows Explorer to the Start button, and from there to the Favorites menu. In Windows XP, you also have the option of opening the folder and then clicking Favorites, Add to Favorites from inside the Explorer window.

Fix a Photo's Exposure: Microsoft's Windows Live Photo Gallery app improves on Vista's Photo Gallery program. Select Fix, Adjust Exposure In Windows Live Photo Gallery (which runs in both Vista and XP), and you'll get both Highlights and Shadows sliders and a histogram, as well as the familiar old Brightness and Contrast options.

Read the News: A number of free services can send you RSS feeds over e-mail. My favorite is SendMeRSS.com, which is so easy that you don't even have to register with the site, although doing so will make adding feeds simpler. Just enter the URL for the RSS feed you want, type in your e-mail address, and click Feed. From then on, new items will automatically appear in your inbox.

Email Large Files: My rule of thumb: Never e-mail more than 1MB of content without the express permission of the recipient. As an alternative, try YouSendIt, a brain-dead-simple take on the FTP transfer. The service is free for any file under 100MB, and individual files can be downloaded up to 100 times. You don't even have to sign up and enter a password (though the service offers additional features if you do, and even more if you pay). Just enter both e-mail addresses, point to the file, and click the Send button.

There are eighteen other great tips like those above, so you're sure to discover some tip, idea, or software app to use that you didn't already know about before.