Set Up File Sharing in Windows 7

If you have multiple computers at home and want to network them together to share files and devices then this article is for you! In this article I'll show how to setup file sharing in a mixed environment consisting of Windows 7 and Windows XP.

The computer that will be sharing (serving) the files will be the Windows 7 computer. The computer that will be accessing the shared files on the Windows 7 PC will be a Windows xp computer. This article assumes that you either:

A: have your internal software firewalls disabled since they can often obstruct network access. Only do this if you access the internet through a router (or a wireless router).

or

B: know how to allow network access to your internal subnet. Since you're reading this article it's pretty safe to assume that you have no idea what I'm talking about in point B. Just go ahead and turn off your firewalls (for now at least).

On your Windows 7 computer:

1. Click the Windows globe on the bottom left (the old start button).
2. Right-click "Computer" and click properties.
3. Take note of the Workgroup name.

On your Windows XP computer:

1. Click Start.
2. Right-Click "My Computer" and click properties.
3. Click Computer Name.
4. Click Change.
5. Select Workgroup.
6. Type in the same workgroup name.
7. Click Ok twice.
8. Reboot.

Back on your Windows 7 computer lets share your documents folder to everyone in your workgroup:

1. Click Start.
2. Click Computer.
3. On the left window, under libraries, right-click documents and click share with: specific people
4. Click the drop down.
5. Select Everyone.
6. Click Add.
7. Click Read and change it to read/write
8. Click Share
9. Select My Documents
10. Click Next.
11. Sharing your documents may take awhile depending on how many have.
12. Click Done.

Back to your Windows XP PC:

You may now access documents on the Windows 7 computer by

1. Opening your "My Computer".
2. Click "My Network Places" on the left.
3. Click "Entire Network".
4. You should now see the name of your Windows 7 computer.
5. Double click the Windows 7 computer and you'll see any shared files plus any shared devices.

You can follow the steps above to share any other files or folders on your Windows 7 computer.

Source: http://goo.gl/flT1f

The Windows Registry Checker

The Windows Registry Checker automatically scans your computer's registry for erroneous and invalid entries. The tool's main purpose is to restore a registry backup if faulty or invalid entries are found. You can do this by running the scanreg /autorun command from a command prompt. The Windows Registry Checker tries to repair the registry if no recent backup is found, similar to when you type scanreg /fix from a command prompt.

The Windows Registry Checker is also used by Windows setup to scan an existing registry for damage before an upgrade. If the tool detects registry damage, it attempts to fix it..

However, the Registry Checker was only used in Windows 98 and Windows Millennium and has been abandoned in all current versions of Windows, including Vista and Windows 7.

Computer users with a current system who want to check and repair their registry need to have an alternative tool, and this is where 3rd party software known as registry cleaners come in handy.

Such modern registry cleaner tools are usually far more advanced and have more options as opposed to the plain command line tool scanreg. While the scanreg registry checker in Windows 98/Me was rather limited in its capability to find errors and to fix them - no such problems exist for the current top of the line registry cleaners. Therefore, a registry cleaner software is a "must have" tool for any serious PC enthusiast. Needles to say that those tools do all and much more what the Windows built in registry checker tool did.

A registry cleaner will

scan the registry for faulty and invalid data
remove obsolete and outdated entries
shrink and compress a bloated registry
fix errors and wrong system references

Such software usually also provides very important means to backup and restore the registry data before any operation. You see, a computer's registry is crucial and without it no Windows based PC would function. Accidental damage caused by any registry software could be fatal. It is therefore of uttermost importance that the registry cleaner has such a backup and restore function.

In addition, before any such critical operation like using a registry checker and repair tool it is also advised to create a system restore point. If you want to be on the safe side you might even want to create a complete backup of your system. Better safe than being sorry, even if the actual chance of something going wrong is rather small.

Registry cleaners are very powerful tools, they can fix a slow computer and can get rid of crashes and errors, but such a powerful tool needs to be used carefully and responsibly.

Source: http://goo.gl/hbpra