Hard Drive Recovery

I am going to be posting my experiences with hard drive recovery and providing links to videos and products that will be helpful for others diving into this field. Two of my favorite tools to use is FTK Imager (Free) and PhotoRec (Also free).

Apples, Apples, and More Apples

So, as I've been increasing work with my personal business "DG Computers, LLC" I've had the opportunity to work with a few Apple computers. All in all, it's not as scary as I thought it was going to be. Having fixed hundreds of Windows based computers, I wasn't sure how I was going to be able to handle Apple's range of devices. Now that I've handled a few, it's not that scary at all. Luckily for me, there are plenty of 'geniuses' on the Web detailing step by step how to fix most of the easiest of issues with Apple's products. One of my favorite at the moment is "ifixit.com". Without these resources, I would probably have to buy the technical guides on how to dismantle these intricate machines. I have restored Apple's products, recovered data from Apple's hard drives, and am now in the process of replacing a hard drive on a 24" 2008 era IMac. The funnest part of the last one was removing the front glass with a suction cup. It really is amazing that it is only held in place by magnets. Who'd of thought? Well, on to more adventures and thank you to all of those that put your computers in my hands so that I can fix them for you!

TrueCrypt! Why?

TrueCrypt! Why? Very good question. When I first learned about TrueCrypt, it was how bad guys were using it to hide their secrets from the good guys. Of course it can be used that way, but it is advertised as a secure way to keep your important documents, like password lists, hidden from anyone else. I use it to keep all of my accounts and passwords secure. TrueCrypt is basically a container that you create in TrueCrypt that you use like a "drive" or "folder". Once you copy or move files into this container it is automatically encrypted. This encryption scrambles the information in such a way that only the person with the password can access it, read it, and modify it. If you don't have the password, to bad, so sad. At first it is a little complicated to understand how to use, but once you get the hang of it, it is actually very simple to use. You can encrypt anything from a small container (folder) to hold a few files, up to an entire hard drive. I tried the whole hard drive thing but felt that it slowed down the performance of my computer. It probably would work better on a better computer. So, if you have files that you don't want anyone else to find, especially bad guys, I highly recommend using TrueCrypt. Oh, did I mention that it is FREE!

Recommended Programs

So, I want to share some of the programs that I have found to be very helpful on my computer. I will try to give a brief explanation of the program and why I like it.

Easy Thumbnails - I have been using this program for years and still love it today. Every time I want to share pictures through email, or I need to upload pictures to a website, this program is an easy way to reduce the size of the pictures, but not the quality. With digital cameras today, pictures easily end up being 3MB and more. This makes it cumbersome when trying to share with friends or family through email or just trying to load pictures to a website. I like setting the size of the picture to 1000x1000 through Easy Thumbnails. This reduces the size drastically but the picture looks perfect.

Glary Utilities - Anytime I have a family member that is having issues with their computer slowing down, etc, I install Glary Utilities. It's a great free utility that does a lot of great things to clean up junk off the computer.

Revo Uninstaller - This program is really awesome when it comes to uninstalling unwanted programs. It not only runs the programs uninstaller, but after that it goes further by searching for leftover remnants in registry and folders. It also creates a restore point just in case something goes awry. I love the fact that even if the programs uninstaller doesn't want to work, it will still move forward and erase any remnants left behind by the program.

Primo PDF - I love this program because anytime I run across something I want to print but do not have the option to connect to a printer and don't have an option to save what I am trying to print I just print directly to Primo PDF and it creates a PDF file of what I am trying to print. Very Nice!

AVG Free - AVG has always been a great Antivirus Program, and it's free!

Malware Bytes - A basic Antivirus Program is essential to have, but there always seems to be other "malware" that gets around the AV Program. Malwarebytes does a great job of catching things that your everyday AV Program won't.

Teamviewer - I love this program because I can log in to any of my computers from anywhere in the world as long as I have an internet connection. It's FREE for personal use. You can also use it on a smartphone or Ipad. Once you log in, you get a screen that is an exact duplicate of the computer you are logging in to. Then you can browse files, use the internet, and even transfer files between computers. I use this often! I have even helped my mother fix some computer problems by using this program.

Well, these are a few of my favorites. I don't want to make this too long. If you have any favorites that you like, feel free to comment. As always, make sure you keep a back-up of your data. I had a friend that backed up all of his pictures to one hard drive (brand new)! He erased everything off his computer and installed a new version of Windows onto his computer. Well, the brand new hard drive "broke". I'm not going to go into the technical details, but the data was not recoverable without sending the hard drive in to a company that specializes in replacing the board on the hard drive. For those things you never want to loose, like pictures, videos, or important documents, make sure to have multiple copies on separate devices. I highly recommend an online backup system like Carbonite or Mozy.

If you have any questions for me, please feel free to post them or email me at dgarrison4345@gmail.com.

Starting my adventuring!

I am starting this blog in order to have an easier way to share my techy adventures with friends and family and anyone else that might be interested. I will be sharing ideas and tips and tricks that will be helpful in making life easier on the computer. I appreciate any feedback and comments that are helpful to others and myself. The computer industry is a never-ending plethora of knowledge that continues to change and grow everyday. So, I do not claim to know everything and I do not claim that the things I post or recommend are perfect, just those things that seem to be working great for me at the time. Always subject to change. Anyhow, I hope to help people avoid headaches and save time in the long run. Thanks for reading!