M.A.S. Electronics' Blog

The Address Resolution Protocol (ARP) cache is a crucial component of IP networking on any operating system. What ARP does is link Ethernet addressing (IP addressing) to hardware addressing (MAC addressing). Without this system, a machine could not communicate to the outside world as one addressing scheme could not communicate with the other. The ARP Cache is a collection of ARP entries (mostly dynamic) that are created when a hostname is resolved to an IP address and then an IP…

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With a few simple registry tweaks, you can customize the Window’s logon screen to include a warning message and logon statistics. This illustrated walk-through shows you how. If you are responsible for managing Windows systems that are open to the public or have multiple user accounts, you may want to add a warning message to the logon screen. You may also want to display logon statistics on the logon screen. Fortunately, doing so is easily accomplished by tweaking a couple…

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Windows Vista/7 and Windows Server 2008 have several  features to assist users and administrators in diagnosing performance-related issues.  Today, we are going to take a look at the System Diagnostics Report which provides a snapshot view of your system.  The report itself gathers data for 60 seconds, and then may take an additional 60-90 seconds to generate the report.  To generate a System Diagnostics Report, run the perfmon /report command from the Run line or from a command prompt.  Generating…

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As organizations move more and more services to the cloud, it is becoming increasingly important to make efficient use of the available Internet bandwidth. Here are a few techniques you can use to conserve Internet bandwidth in your own organization.   1: Block access to content-streaming Web sites If your organization allows employees to use the Internet for personal use, the first thing you should do is block access to streaming media sites, such as Netflix, YouTube, and MetaCafe. Playing…

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#1 DiskMon This utility looks at all of your hard disk traffic and reports it to the screen. When the window is displayed, the default is to auto scroll the data constantly filling the window as you use your PC. If you minimize the application to the tray (Options | Minimize to tray disk light) DiskMon will blink as it monitors traffic. I found it quite interesting to see just how many reads and writes my laptop processed just working…

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Keep in mind that the same procedure can be used in Windows Vista and Windows 7 Do you have an old 128MB or 256MB USB Flash Drive in the back of your desk drawer gathering dust? If so, you can put that dusty old drive to use again as a Password Reset Disk for Microsoft Windows. The USB Flash Disk Before I show you how to create a Password Reset Disk, let’s take a moment to talk about the USB…

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Keeping your computer moving like the day it was purchased keeps getting more difficult with new viruses, malware, and all the other “interesting” software that shows up on the Internet. CCleaner is a freeware utility that helps keep computers cleaned up and running at their peak by identifying and getting rid of problem cookies, uninstalled program leftovers, and other fragments that clog up your system. I am not usually one to constantly worry about cookies and other things, but thought…

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If you’re wasting too much time waiting (and waiting and waiting) for Web pages to load, give these tips a try. You should see an immediate, noticeable boost in speed, making your browsing experience faster and more efficient. Everyone wants faster Web browsing. After all, who has time to wait for Web pages to load these days? This is especially true if you’re a tab-junkie like me. When you live with an open browser containing 10 to 15 tabs running…

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Microsoft Windows includes several very beneficial accessibility options that are critically important to those users who need them. However, some of those accessibility features can be a minor annoyance to users who do not need them. For example, in Windows 7, press the left-Shift key five times in quick succession. You should see a dialog blog like the one shown in Figure A. Figure A           Open the Sticky Keys dialog box. For some, the ability…

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Takeaway: Share these tips with Windows 7 newbies to reduce initial confusion and help them get up to speed quickly. The Windows 7 environment will spook some XP users at first. It isn’t an extension of XP; it’s an entirely new interface. Although the underlying file structure is the same, there’s less to file management. The truth is, storing and accessing files in XP and earlier versions required some knowledge of the file structure. Windows 7 doesn’t require that knowledge…

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