Administrative Tools

We are going to look at Performance Monitor, also known as PerfMon.exe: a complex tool used to do just what it sounds like it does - monitor the performance of your computer. Using it, you can see how your computer manages its resources. This can help you make choices about which programs work the best in unison for your computer. For example, if you like to listen to music while running an advanced program for work or a video game for play, which music client provides the least drag on your system? Also, the information it gives you, may help you make decisions about other software and hardware choices if your computer’s performance is below your expectations.

In our first tutorial about the Event Viewer I skipped over several items, promising to come back to them later. Now, let’s explore some of those items, to see what the Event Viewer can do for you, besides letting you look at what’s going on. There is definitely more here than meets the eye. In this tutorial we’ll explore how to create and save custom views, so you can keep an eye on any kind of logged information you are interested in.

I’m sure some of you are asking "What on earth is the Event Viewer, and why would I want to work with it?"
As any other version of Windows, Windows 7 starts to keep track of what it is doing as soon as you start it up, and continuously saves log files that can provide a wealth of information when something goes wrong (and even when everything is fine). The Event Viewer gives you an easy way to look those logs. In this tutorial, we’ll take a look at the logs and the information Event Viewer gives you about what’s going on inside.

I would like to continue our series of more advanced articles on managing user accounts and groups, with a tutorial about how to use the Local Users and Groups panel (snap-in) from Computer Management to create user accounts and user groups.

The Devices and Printers panel (or Device Stage as named by some) was first introduced in Windows 7 with the aim to provide a friendly way of interacting with external devices connected to your computer. However, in order for the concept to work as intended, hardware manufacturers need to provide support for this feature in their Windows drivers.
This article will explain what Devices and Printers panel is, where to find it, both in Windows 7 and Windows 8, and how to use it.

Most people will edit user accounts on a Windows computer using the User Accounts panel found in the Control Panel. However, there’s another way which gives you access to a lot more detailed information about the users defined on your computer and the permissions they have. It is done via a rather hidden panel called Local Users and Groups. This tutorial will show how to find it, what information you can access and how to use it to have better control over user accounts and their permissions.

Do you know how awesome the System Configuration (msconfig.exe) tool is? I had an idea but, until doing a complete research and lots of testing for this article, I wasn’t aware of all its great functionality. I’ve discovered some great configuration options and you should read this tutorial to learn about them.