Thread: Tweak And Extend Your Wireless Network

ONE OF THE best time-savers we know is a dependable Wi-Fi connection that ensures you don't get knocked offline when you need to send or receive a file. The free DD-WRT and Tomatocloud firmware lets you monitor bandwidth and get advance warning of any issues, extend your wireless signal, overclock the router and prioritise important traffic.

1. Cut your commute by working at home and accessing the PC In your office With free remote-control software such as LogMeln and TightVNC (on our DVD). You can save on petrol, claim tax relief on home IT kit and convince your boss you'll be more productive without leaving home.

2. Backing Up files is dull tiGt crucial, so set up software to do it for you, Sync Back (tinyurl.com/PCA-syncback or on our DVD) schedules backups to external storage, To protect your data against fire, lightning or theft, back up online, Carbonite and Mozy Home offer affordable web space,

3. Take some shortcuts: Ctrl, C to copy; CtrL V to paste is just the start. Launchy can start programs, open documents and perform advanced actions via your keyboard, You can also assign key combinations with TypeltIn

4. Services such and log and guide your fitness regimen. To get your finances in shape, try registering your monthly income and regular outgoings at or is another good information source.

5. Don't be a slave to email. Create three folders: Action, Later and Archive, Each day, delete emails you don't need, Respond to ones you can answer immediately, and file those you want to keep in Archive, Put those that will take longer than two minutes to reply to into Action, and move those you need to follow up on to Later,

6. Remember The Milk is our favourite site for creating an online to-do list. You can even sync it to your phone, should you wish to, Remember The Milk also has a Firefox extension that integrates the service with your Gmail inbox, so you can turn emails into tasks,

7. Ditch your laptop and take your PC with you on a USB flash drive or iPod. Portable Windows software such as MojoPac and U3 put a desktop on a drive,. enabling' you to run applications and save documents. See our workshop at.



8. A Use a single mailbox. If you've got several email accounts, you U can get lost trying to keep on top of them all. Google Mail's Mail Fetcher can retrieve messages from up to five POP3 email accounts. You can send mail from your non-Gmail addresses via Gmail's Compose screen too.

9. Get on top of your busy schedule by setting up an automated email reminder for recurring events or tasks, Google Calendar witt happily send alerts via SMS or email, but most web-based calendars and task managers, as well as sites such as HassleMe (hassleme,co,uk), support alerts of this type,

10. Never forget your usernames and passwords. Instead of W writing everything down on Post It notes, lock up your store of sensitive passwords in a secure, encrypted password database. KeePass (KeePass.info) assigns a single master password to your secure database.

11. If you want to secure a business plan, family snaps or other private files from prying eyes, T rueCrypt or on our DVD) is ideal for storing files in a password-protected vault. TrueCrypt can secure a folder or an entire disk. And it's great for a USB drive, which could easily be lost or stolen.

12. If you'd like to get TV and music online, try episode-collection W sites such as Joost.com. BBC iPlayer now offers whole series for streaming and download. You can stream music for free to your PC from Deezer (deezer.comjen) and Lastfm - or get an internet radio, of course.

13. Search smarter, Drill down through Google search results with advanced operators, Enclose phrases and proper names in quotes to bring up exact matches, Use the + and - signs to specify meaning and use the filetype: operator to find certain kinds of documents (as in budget filetype:xls),

14. Reduce print costs. Print at the lowest quality, opt for duplex printing and shrink several pages on to'each sheet of paper (use preview first), Use the Aardvark F'irefox plug-in to delete ads from web pages. CutePDF will also print documents as PDF files.