Reset Windows Media Player 12 to Default Settings

I cannot emphasize enough the power of search engines when it comes to troubleshooting. I have been having some issues with Windows Media Player 12 for a while now. Song albums just refuse to display when a song is playing, and visualizations do not work anymore (they are enabled, but all that shows is a black screen).

I found some suggestions online to reinstall Windows Media Player altogether, but that is burdensome. Fortunately, Google led me to another quick and easy fix, which I will share here for anyone else experiencing similar problems. Apparently, just resetting Windows Media Player to default settings will fix a lot of problems. Here’s how:

Fix Chrome's Resolving Proxy Delay in Windows

If like me, you recently updated your copy of Chrome/Iron to version 15, you may have noticed a slight delay in the initial loading of the first page when you open the browser. Fortunately, this only happens at the very first page when you start the browser afresh, but it is still very annoying. If you look at the browser status bar down below during this two second delay, you will see a strange “Resolving proxy…” message. After a short encounter with Google, I came across a simple solution.

[Android] Disrupt Wireless Connections with WiFiKill – Root Required

Feeling evil lately? Have a roommate that likes to hog the bandwidth on your network? Or even repeat intruders on your unsecured wifi because you are too lazy to set security? All is well, all is well. While browsing through the GetJar app store a couple days ago, I came across a very sinister app. Please, it is best you stop reading now if you do not have the stomach for evil-capable apps.

Hide Desktop Icons with an AutoHotKey Script

Buried under the heaps and stacks of shortcut icons lie the often neglected wallpaper. You keep telling yourself you will clean out the desktop one day, but let’s face it, that is never going to happen. Wouldn’t it be nice to have something in the taskbar similar to the “show desktop” feature that will instead hide icons? AutoHotKey makes this possible.

Now I realize you can right click the desktop, point to View > uncheck Show Desktop Icons to accomplish the same task, but that takes too long! Plus, you will get a brief overview of how to work with AutoHotKey scripts in the process. By the end of this tutorial, we will have created a program (which you can place in the taskbar) that will hide desktop icons in just one click.

^ Image Credit: Messy Desktop

[Comic] A Conversation Between Bill Gates and Steve Jobs

Ever wonder how a typical conversation between Bill Gates and Steve Jobs would go? Here’s a theory:

Check Out This Awesome Rendition of the Green Hill Zone Theme from Sonic

Any die-hard Sonic fans out there? If you are, then the following video will be quite the treat. It is an awesome rendition of the Green Hill Zone Theme song from the original Sonic the Hedgehog games (surely you must have played it some time in your life, right?). The video begins with a bunch of Google Doodle Muppets having a conversation in Portuguese, which you can choose to skip.

Classic.

Check out his blog at: www.sonaje.blogspot.com/2011/09/tema-de-green-hill-zonesonic-hedgehog.html (a downloadable mp3 is available there)

Site Updates and Announcements

Heloo WiredHutters. In case you haven’t noticed, I have recently added a RSS Subscription Form off to the right. The reason for this is because I realized that it is probably very annoying for readers to keep checking back to see if new content has been posted. My output rate of articles is approximately once per week, give or take. But I cannot forever guarantee that consistency because of life’s demands.

So if you prefer to just receive updates by email, the RSS Subscription Form to the right will come in handy. Every time a new article is posted, you will receive an email notification of this within a day. If you want to subscribe through a feed reader, simply click on the “Subscribe RSS” text next to the very cool RSS icon (yes, I spent hours looking for that!). *The RSS Feed can now be found up top on the navigation bar.*

Also, I am running out of topics to write about! Well, not quite, but that day will come. Just to give my readers a little sneak preview, I have planned upcoming articles on some software, Linux, Android, Windows tips, and maybe a little programming. So if you have anything in mind, specific or vague, but just anything, you would like me to write about, feel free to spill your guts in the comments. 

Google Chrome, The Innovative Pest

Google Chrome is great. Released in the year 2008, Chrome has steadily gained traction among users ever since. It is fast, pretty, and renders web pages well, which is all we could ever ask for. Chrome has been steadily climbing the ladder in popularity, while Firefox is slowly but surely tumbling down. Just take a look here at a graph provided by StatCounter. I think it is safe to say that many of the recent changes you see in Firefox are mainly due to this – panic from Chrome’s success.

[Comic] Intellectual Freedom

"Piled Higher And Deeper" by Jorge Cham
www.phdcomics.com

Okay, this isn't related to tech or anything, but as a college student this had me cracking!

Make an Image Background Transparent with GIMP *Updated*

You have just found the perfect image for your project. Except, you do not want the background image to be visible. So you open up Paint, and start erasing around the section you want. Then you discover that this will only make the background white, not transparent!! Sometimes, all we want is the dang image itself on a transparent canvas, so that we can use it on say, a website, and it will blend nicely. Don't fret, you will learn how to do just that after watching the video below. You will be needing GIMP to accomplish this.

                        Before                                                                 After                                    

                                                                              

Image Credit: Penguin

Download Free RAM (humor)

Today is your lucky day. Today is the day I unveil the sacred domain I have kept to myself all these years. What, you may ask, is this man talking about? Imagine a world, more specifically the World Wide Web, where free RAM thrives in limitless wonders. Yes, be prepared to experience the ultimate phenomena of free downloadable RAM. With infinite memory, never will you have to close your applications ever again.

Trim Firefox's Bookmarks Bar

One thing that irks me about the new Firefox look (FF 4+) is the bookmarks bar. Just take a look below and you will see what I mean:

There are a couple of unnecessary things here like the Subscribe and View Bookmarks Toolbar options. But what bugs me most is the Unsorted Bookmarks option which appears out of nowhere! You cannot delete or move this element up and out of the way, unlike in Firefox 3.

I do not use Unsorted Bookmarks nor have I ever met anyone who does. The menu item is an eyesore, takes up space, and gets in the way. That’s not to say Mozilla should get rid of this feature all together, but at least allow users the option to customize the bookmarks bar to suit their needs. After all, that is what Firefox is all about – customization.

Fortunately, there is a way to hide these unnecessary bookmark elements; without installing any add-ons and slowing down the fox. We will modify the appearance of the Bookmarks Bar through the userChrome.css file.

Fanboy's Adblock List – Adblock for Opera, Iron, Firefox and IE9

What is your reaction when you see a flashy obtrusive ad on a website? 

A) Scream

B) Shriek

C) Pull hair

D) Bang head

E) Ooo…pretty colors…

[Comic] The Magic Word: sudo

This is probably one of the funniest comics I have come across on the web. It was sketched up almost 5 years ago, so it is old, but still gold. But to truly appreciate the joke behind this comic, you would have to know some Linux.

In a nutshell, sudo is a command that temporarily gives a user elevated rights to perform certain actions in Linux. Think of it as "Run as administrator" in Windows.

3D Analyzer - Graphics Card Emulator

Ever been in that situation where you just spent countless hours downloading a game shelled out a day’s work worth of greens for a game, only to find out your computer can’t handle it? If you are economical like me, you probably have one of those low-end computers that you can find in stores for no more than half a grand. We do what we can to save money. Sadly, most of these low-end computers do not come equipped with a decent graphics card, and this means bad news for gaming. Most pc games nowadays require a dedicated graphics card (i.e. not integrated); otherwise the game will look like garbage or simply not run at all. Fortunately, all hope is not lost. Let me introduce a software called 3D Analyzer.