Unlike the change from Windows 3.11 to Windows 95 or from Windows ME to Windows XP there are no revolutionary changes. Windows XP users will notice the most difference in terms of the look and feel of the software as visually it looks very similar to Vista, perhaps just a little more intuitive.

Using this software you get the impression that finally Windows may have ‘come of age’ with this release. When pitched against this new release, Windows XP looks clunky, badly aged and flawed by comparison and although visually Vista holds its own a little better, in terms of performance it still looks as though the wheels are about to fall off. I wasn’t against Vista as much as some others however I will admit that due to the fact it was hungry for resources you always got the impression it was about to ‘fall over’ as soon as you started doing anything slightly demanding.

I’m running the 64-bit version of Windows 7 on a relatively new laptop and the comparisons against Vista are startling; faster start up times, less hard drive access, greater stability and even improved battery life. Although I’m unsure whether it would be faster than XP or not, it is worth bearing in mind that this eight year OS never really gained momentum for 64-bit support and as such it could possibly do with being retired even if just to wave in a new, faster era of 64-bit applications.

Ignoring the arguably most important developments in terms of speed, security and stability, it is the little changes and additions that I appreciate most. I like the ability to ‘peek’ back at the desktop by hovering down the bottom right hand side of the start menu, the auto preview when you flick between applications using & and the rotation setting that can be used to change your wallpaper automatically every couple of minutes.

Visually it looks gorgeous; the semi translucent taskbar and menu headers along with various other visual effects make the OS look a lot less flat than XP. Although it’s not a million miles away from Vista, it is certainly more ‘polished’ and due to the noticeable speed increases it doesn’t give you the nagging impression your machine is crawling to a halt as a result of a few visual effects.

I also love the way you can ‘pin’ applications to the taskbar. For example, if you pin Firefox to your taskbar area then the icon will always be visible next to the start menu in what would have been traditionally been the ‘quick launch’ area. The similarities end there however as when you click this icon it the application launches but doesn’t create a new group within your taskbar; the quick launch icon essentially becomes the menu group if you wish to click back to your Firefox session or launch another instance of the browser. Windows 7 handles multiple instances of one application by ‘stacking’ the icons within the taskbar rather than relying on the incredibly inefficient grouped application menus used in XP and Vista.

In all reality the chance of the average user becoming infected is extremely remote but the official line by security experts is that until Microsoft have issued a patch that users should either up their security settings from within Internet Explorer or switch to an alternative browser such as Firefox or Opera.

Most people that read my column know that they should either run a half decent browser such as Firefox or if they insist on using Internet Explorer that they should keep Windows updated at all times. Whilst there is no fix for this particular bug, by keeping your Browser and Operating System up to date you are limiting your chances of running in to problems.

Something that is often overlooked by so many, however, is ensuring that all other applications on your computer are kept up to date as it isn’t just browsers that are affected by security issues. Making a list of all the software on your computer and then individually checking the manufacturer’s website for updates would be quite a laborious and time consuming process which is where my recommendation for this week comes in. Secunia PSI is a piece of software which has just come out of Beta testing that is designed to alleviate such problems by checking the majority of the applications currently installed on your computer for known security vulnerabilities.

There are two versions of this application available, one that runs online and one that you download and install; both are available from http://secunia.com/vulnerability_scanning/. Personally I would recommend downloading the application rather than the online test as the 500kb file will scan a greater number of programs than the online version.

Once the scans have completed, Secunia will list any out of date affected software and give you a vulnerability rating along with a link to obtain the latest version of the application if there is one available. You can view details about each individual threat and to be honest the results can be quite startling; although my laptop managed an initial security score of 92% there were several potentially serious problems that it discovered. One rather obscure bug in my PDF reader (Foxit PDF) could have potentially given a hacker full access to my computer.

I think there is a stage where paranoia can kick in and users can be over cautious but a certain level of precaution should always be taken. Even if you are not worried about the potential security implications of running out of date software, Secunia offers a quick and easy way to ensure that you are running the most up to date and hopefully feature rich versions of all your favourite programs.

GIMP is ideal for many home users as it is a small and free application which boasts a large number of features that would probably prove sufficient for who needs something slightly more than Microsoft Paint but less than Photoshop. My only reservation with the application was that the UI (User Interface) was a little bit inconsistent with the overall feel of Windows and as a result it takes a while to get to grips with and often feels alien to the average PC user.

This week I stumbled across another very capable application called Paint.NET which once again is free to download and use. Unfortunately it is not quite as powerful as GIMP but for most users this will be compensated for by the fact the interface will be extremely familiar to the average Windows user, to the point where it is almost intuitive, resulting in a much easier learning curve. The majority of users will find the features of Paint.NET more than enough for day to day photo manipulation however also thrown in to the mix are a number of extremely powerful tools.

First and foremost the application supports layers; unless you’ve ever used layers it’s difficult to explain in words exactly what they are and how they can help you. The simplest analogy would be to think of them as a number of transparency slides, which when all stacked and viewed together form the basis of a whole image. If you change one of the individual slides the overall image will look different, but no changes will be made to the other slides. This means that changes that you make to one layer which are later altered won’t result in a trial of obvious damage to the image caused by previous alterations.

Another nice feature is the way that the application handles multiple images; rather than having a number of windows that can be minimised and reopened as and when necessary, Paint.NET has a clever style of tabbed interface. In order to navigate between open files you simply click a thumbnail of the image from a scrollable selection on the top right hand side of the screen.

Additional features, updates and bug fixes are released on practically a monthly basis and there is an active forum that offers a number of plug-ins, should you require any extra functionality that isn’t provided as standard.

In terms of special effects, the application has a large number built in as standard; ink sketch, oil painting, blurs, distortions, noise control, red eye removal, sharpening, softening and so on. The image can also be manipulated by way of adjustments such as hue, saturation, level, brightness, contrast and sepia controls. The standard drawing and selection tools are provided and of course the intensity, tolerance or size of these tools can all be easily adjusted as necessary.

One selling point of GIMP was that it is cross platform compatible however Paint.NET can only be used in Windows and more specifically in the later versions, either XP or Vista. This is unlikely to be a problem for most my readers so if you found GIMP a little confusing and don’t have the time, patience or money for Photoshop then I would urge you download this tiny 1.6mb application by visiting www.getpaint.net.

If I can just clarify to my readership that Windows Vista is a good Operating System and in terms of bugs and security vulnerabilities it’s light years ahead of how Windows XP was this far into its distribution cycle. I’m not saying that you should rush out and buy it tomorrow if you’re happy with XP, but all I am saying is that if buying a new machine and you’re given the choice then definitely go the Vista route.

Other than which edition you’re going to get (Home Basic, Home Premium, Business or Ultimate) there is an equally important consideration in whether you’re going to go for the 64 bit or 32 bit version of Windows and unfortunately this is a consideration that’s often overlooked.

Ultimately your choice may have already been made for you by the system manufacturer; if your system only has a 32-bit processor then you can only use the 32-bit version of Windows. Those lucky enough to be buying a 64-bit processor will have the choice of going for either the 64 or 32-bit version of Windows and as such this article will be focusing on these users. If you’re not sure what on earth I’m talking about here I should probably explain a little more about what a processor is and how it works.

The processor could be considered the most central part of your computer and is responsible for performing the billions of calculations that are performed every time you use your machine. There are a number of measures that can be applied to a processor to determine how powerful it is but one of the primary considerations is how many bits of information it can handle at any one time. My old Commodore 64 could handle 8 bits of data at once, most current PC processors can handle 32 bits and the newer, more powerful models can often handle 64 bits.

I feel that this oversimplification could be misleading as there are of course a million other factors that play a part in the performance of the processor; another important consideration for example is how many thousands of times a second the processor can move these bits of information around. Suffice to say, a 64 bit processor should perform better than a 32-bit processor of similar specification as long as it’s using software written to take advantage of the additional data handling capability.

As these processors are backwards compatible, you can install a 32-bit version of Windows on your 64-bit processor but as a result your machine will not be able to take advantage of this additional data bandwidth and you will be essentially handicapping your new processor; this is where the 64-bit version of Vista comes in to play. Whilst it is true that Microsoft did release a 64-bit version of Windows XP it unfortunately never gained any real support and as such was never developed in to a viable platform.

With 64-bit processors becoming commonplace and with a large wave of support for these new, more powerful versions of Vista it looks like 64-bit computing has finally arrived so now there are important decisions to be made. I think I have explained the primary speed advantage however there are also a number of other benefits from making the switch and rather predictably a large number of disadvantages. As this decision is an important one I plan next week to go over both sides of the argument so that you can decide which version is right for you.

Fortunately RSI is something that is very easily avoidable if you take the right measures. In previous articles I’ve talked about the importance of posture and taking regular breaks but this week I’m going to talk about a design of keyboard that I’ve been using for years to minimise the likelihood of these conditions resurfacing.

The Microsoft Natural range of keyboards have been around since 1994 and are specifically designed to prevent carpel tunnel syndrome along with other RSI injuries. Since I unfortunately don’t have the luxury of including pictures in my articles I can probably best describe the keyboard as being split down the middle with both halves being placed at a slight angle from one another. The centre of the keyboard is elevated slightly and then gently slopes downwards towards the extremities.

A couple of years ago Microsoft introduced the Microsoft Natural Keyboard 4000 which is the keyboard that I have just upgraded to and will be reviewing today. In addition to the split that I spoke about above, this keyboard is actually elevated at the front and then slopes backwards resulting in the space bar being the highest key rather than the lowest, as it would be on a conventional keyboard. A non removable wrist rest is literally built in to the keyboard; made out of leatherette cushioning, this is one of the most comfortable wrist rests I’ve ever used.

The idea is that in this position your hands aren’t unnaturally angled when typing and although it does take a little while to get used to, touch typing is certainly not hindered by the design. On first impressions those that have seen my keyboard have assumed that my wavy, irregularly designed keyboard would actually increase my chance of RSI but they couldn’t be further from the truth.

We assume that a device such as a keyboard which has been with us for decades would have, by now, been designed to be as kind to our hands, wrists and arms as possible but next time you sit at your computer, place your fingers on the home keys (a, s, d, f and j, k, l, and take a look at the unnatural position your hands are in. Using a conventional keyboard your arms plunge downwards and inwards from your shoulders towards the keyboard and then unnaturally twist upwards and outwards so that you can achieve the correct position to reach the keys.

Of course, there are other natural keyboards on the market but this is certainly my favourite at the moment; asides from the split design the overall build quality and feel of the keyboard is absolutely fantastic. The keys are next to silent when typing but still depress thoroughly and retain tactile; one of my pet computing peeves is keyboards with silent keys that don’t convey a sense of responsiveness when you press them. One finger typists won’t really be worried about this but if you’re touch typing then you do need a sense of feedback from the keyboard you’re using. We of course have the additional special function keys so that frequently accessed applications and commands can be used by using just the one key along with a rather interesting zoom key which so far I haven’t had the need to use.

At around £30 the keyboard isn’t particularly cheap but it’s very difficult to put a price on your health especially when you consider that some of the symptoms of RSI can remain permanently. If you even do just a moderate amount of typing then this keyboard would certainly represent a worthwhile investment.

Funnily enough, now that Microsoft have hidden or moved all my commonly used menus in Windows Vista I find myself relying on these short cuts a great deal more than I used to. I’m sure that trying to convey these to you in a list format probably isn’t going to make this one of the most exciting Click articles that I’ve ever written but I do know that it’s one of the most useful.

To point out the obvious, these short cuts usually require you to press two keys at once and the ALT, CTRL, Windows and Shift keys are all located down the bottom left hand side of the keyboard. I have split the shortcuts into several sections depending on where they are going to be applied and don’t worry about which version of Windows you own as most share the same shortcut keys.

General

Alt+Enter View properties for the selected item

Alt+Esc Cycle through windows in the order they were opened

Alt+F4 Close the active window

Alt+ Spacebar Open the shortcut menu for the active window

Alt+Tab Switch between open windows

Shift+Insert Hold this down whilst inserting a CD and it WON’T autoboot

End Display the bottom of the active window

Home Display the top of the active window

Windows key Displays the start menu

Windows key+D Minimizes all windows

Windows key + E Opens a new Explorer window

Windows key + F Displays the find all files box

Windows key + L Locks your computer

Windows key + R Displays the Run command box

Explorer

Shift+Delete Delete the selected item permanently without placing the item in the recycle bin

Left arrow Collapse the current selection if it is expanded, or select the parent folder

Right arrow Expand the current selection if it is collapsed, or select the first sub folder

Clipboard

Ctrl+C Copy an item to the clipboard

Ctrl+X Cut an item to the clipboard

Ctrl+V Paste an item from the clipboard

Internet Browsing

F11 Full screen mode

Ctrl+Mouse forward Zoom in

Ctrl+Mouse backward Zoom out

Ctrl+0 Reset zoom level

Alt+Home Go to homepage

Ctrl+T Open a new tab

Ctrl+Tab Switch between tabs

Ctrl+W Close tab

Alt+D Go straight to the address bar

Alt+Left Go back to the previously viewed page

Alt+Right Navigate forward through viewed pages

Navigating to menu options within programs is also easy when using keyboard shortcuts. To select the edit menu press ‘Alt+E’ together, for the file menu press ‘Alt+F’ and so on then once the menu option has been opened you can navigate around them using the cursor keys then select an option with the enter key.

I did say that this wouldn’t be Shakespeare but cut out the list above, have a play around, and I promise you’ll find at least some of these key combinations useful. Once you’ve used them a couple of times it will then become second nature to hit the keyboard shortcut rather than relying solely on your mouse.

Don’t get my wrong, all in all Office 2007 is a lovely new piece of software, but it’s because of these teething problems that my mind started wondering back to several years ago when I first used a piece of open source software going by the name of OpenOffice and decided to give it another go.

Now up to version 2.2, OpenOffice has developed quite nicely since I last had a play around and best of all it’s still completely free of charge. I’m not going to advocate for a minute that those who have already paid for a recent version of Office should make the switch over but for those without an Office Suite installed on their computer (or even worse, the dreadful Microsoft Works), OpenOffice is a fine choice.

There are six main applications which make up the OpenOffice suite which include:

Writer – This is essentially Microsoft Word which we will all be familiar with. As you would expect it has all the usual features of a Word Processor along with the ability to export files in PDF format which is certainly a handy feature.

Impress – An alternative (albeit cut down) version of Microsoft PowerPoint which is used for generating presentations and slide shows.

Math – This application will be next to useless to everybody but for those that need it this allows you to create mathematical functions and equations for text documents.

Draw – Again not necessarily suitable for all users, Draw is a vector drawing tool which would be ideally suited for creating diagrams and flowcharts.

Calc – All of the primarily functions of the spreadsheet application Excel have been covered in this application with no major omissions and a couple of nice improvements compared with the Microsoft offering.

Base – I don’t recall this functionality being present when I last used OpenOffice but the base application is designed as an alternative to the Microsoft Access database package and packs some pretty powerful features.

Those used to previous versions of Microsoft Office will not have any trouble whatsoever picking up any of the above applications as particular effort appears to be made OpenOffice look as familiar as possible. In addition to this it’s nice to note that you shouldn’t have any problems opening your old files or saving in an industry standard format as OpenOffice does support an impressively large number of file formats.

Whilst not a tiny, the Windows version of OpenOffice weighs in with a fairly modest 93mb download which is extremely comparable when pitted against the huge Microsoft Office package. It is worthwhile mentioning that there are other versions also available for both Linux and Mac users, and all these versions can be downloaded free of charge from www.openoffice.org