Product Description

Que crafted this book to grow with you, providing the reference material you need as you move toward Vista proficiency and use of more advanced features. If you buy only one book on Vista, Special Edition Using Microsoft® Windows® Vista is the only book you need.

• Tired of the constant barrage of spam, spyware, viruses and other Net nasties? We show you how to rebuke the onslaught of hacker attacks, protect your identity, and keep your sanity, all at the same time.
• ·         Is the new Vista interface making your trigger-finger itch? Ours too…that is, until we turned Windows inside out, shook out all the loose parts and figured out just what makes this beast tick. Learn from our pain and suffering.
•  If you finally broke down and purchased a Windows Media Center computer, or you think you have one and didn't even know it, then you are holding just the book for you. We show you how to get up to speed with your new computer, transforming it from the little PC that could into the media juggernaut you never knew it could be.
• Ready to upgrade? We provide from-the-trenches advice on upgrading to Windows Vista–including detailed rollout advice for IT managers. Plan and manage deployment of Windows easily and efficiently–whether you're upgrading just a handful of computers, or an entire corporation!
• Want to set up a network at work or at play? Check out our hands-on coverage of installing, configuring and surviving on a Windows Vista-based network. We not only show you how to set up Windows networking features, we show you how to install and setup basic networking hardware. No other Windows book goes as deeply into networking as the one you are holding.
• Do you like to fileshare, but wish you could share with the open source community and Apple users? The wait is over; share files with other platforms, such as Novell Netware, Unix, Linux, Macintosh, and other Windows flavors. No longer will the Macs in your network be segregated from the Windows users.

1 Introducing Windows Vista . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .3

2 Installing and Upgrading Windows Vista . . . .41

3 The First Hour . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .79

4 Using the Windows Vista Interface . . . . . . . .123

5 Managing Files and Searching . . . . . . . . . . . .165

6 Printing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .205

7 Sidebar and Other Supplied Accessories . . .235

8 Windows Media Player . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .261

9 Windows Imaging Tools . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .289

10 Scanning and Faxing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .309

11 Producing Videos with Windows Movie

Maker . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .325

12 Sound Recorder, DVD Maker, and Other

Multimedia Tools . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .351

13 Windows Media Center . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .363

14 Getting Connected . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .395

15 Using Internet Explorer 7 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .425

16 Email and Newsgroups with Windows

Mail . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .473

17 Troubleshooting Your Internet Connection . . .529

18 Hosting Web Pages with Internet

Information Services . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .555

19 Overview of Windows Networking . . . . . . . .591

20 Creating a Windows Network . . . . . . . . . . . .613

21 Mix and Match with Old Windows

and Macs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .665

22 Connecting Your Network to the Internet . .703

23 Using a Windows Network . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .741

24 Troubleshooting Your Network . . . . . . . . . . .787

25 Windows Management and Maintenance . .805

26 Tweaking the GUI . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .901

27 Managing Hard Disks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .933

28 Troubleshooting and Repairing Problems . .965

29 Keeping Windows and Other Software

Up to Date . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .989

30 Installing and Replacing Hardware . . . . . . .1013

31 Editing the Registry . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .1041

32 Command-Line and Automation Tools . . . .1073

33 Protecting Windows from Viruses and

Spyware . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .1135

34 Protecting Your Data from Loss and Theft . .1153

35 Protecting Your Network from Hackers

and Snoops . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .1197

36 Protecting Yourself from Fraud and Spam . .1235

37 Wireless Networking . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .1253

38 Hitting the Road . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .1271

39 Meetings, Conferencing, and Collaboration . .1303

40 Remote Desktop . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .1321

41 Tablet PC Features . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .1347

A Windows Programs and Services . . . . . . . .1371

Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .1409

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #250242 in Books
• Published on: 2007-01-05
• Format: Special Edition
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 1512 pages

About the Author

About the Authors

Robert Cowart has written more than 40 books on computer programming and applications,

with more than a dozen on Windows. His titles include Windows NT Unleashed,

Mastering Windows 98, Windows NT Server Administrator’s Bible, and Windows NT Server

4.0: No Experience Required. Several of his books have been bestsellers in their category

and have been translated into more than 20 languages. He has written on a wide range of

computer-related topics for such magazines as PC Week, PC World, PC Magazine, PC Tech

Journal, Mac World, and Microsoft Systems Journal. In addition to working as a freelance

consultant specializing in small businesses, he has taught programming classes at the

University of California Extension in San Francisco. He has appeared as a special guest on

the PBS TV series Computer Chronicles, CNN’s Headline News, ZD-TV’s The Screen Savers,

and ABC’s World News Tonight with Peter Jennings. Robert lives in Berkeley, California. In

his spare time he is involved in the music world, producing chamber-music concerts and

playing various genres of music. He meditates regularly in hopes of rewiring his inner

computer.

Brian Knittel has been a software developer for more than 20 years. After doing graduate

work in nuclear medicine and magnetic resonance imaging technologies, he began a career

as an independent consultant. An eclectic mix of clients has led to long-term projects in

medical documentation, workflow management, real-time industrial system control, and

most importantly, 20 years of real-world experience with MS-DOS, Windows, and computer

networking in the business world. Previously, he coauthored Special Edition Using

Microsoft Windows 2000 Professional, Special Edition Using Microsoft Windows XP, and contributed

to several of Bob Cowart’s other Windows books. Brian also coauthored

Upgrading and Repairing Windows, with Scott Mueller, and is the sole author of Windows XP

Under the Hood. Brian lives in Oakland, California, and spends his free time restoring

antique computers and trying to perfect his wood-fired pizza recipes.

Everette Beatley is a fourth-year computer engineering major at Christopher Newport

University in Newport News, Virginia. He currently works for Southern Electronics, Inc.

in Kilmarnock, Virginia, as a System Administrator. When not in school, Everette lives in

Lancaster, Virginia, where he enjoys road cycling and waterskiing on the Rappahannock

River.

Eric Butow has authored or coauthored seven books since 2000, including Master Visually

Windows 2000 Server, Teach Yourself Visually Windows 2000 Server, FrontPage 2002 Weekend

Crash Course, C#: Your Visual Blueprint, Creating Web Pages Bible, and Dreamweaver MX

2004 Savvy. His most recent book is The PDF Book for Microsoft Office, an e-book produced

by ExcelUser.com. He is also the CEO of Butow Communications Group (BCG), a technical

writing and web design firm based in Roseville, California. Butow also writes for

Addison-Wesley.

Greg Dickinson lives in Birmingham, Alabama, and has 10 years experience with computer

networking. He works for one of the top 30 banks in the country, packaging and distributing

software packages and updates to the bank’s 6,000 desktops. When not wrestling

with the intricacies of enterprise networks, Greg likes to spend his time recording training

videos and singing in a barbershop chorus.

Diana Huggins is currently the Information Services Technical Communication Specialist

for Great-West Life. She also works as an independent contractor providing both technical

writing and consulting services. Diana has authored/coauthored several certification study

guides, including Windows 2000 Directory Services Design (Exam Cram 70-219) as well as

MCSE Planning and Maintaining a Microsoft Windows Server 2003 Network Infrastructure

(Exam 70-293). To complement this, she also spends a portion of her time providing

technical-editing services and developing certification practice exams.

Alex G. Morales first managed networked computer systems in the 1980s and has since

managed some of the world’s largest Internet sites. Along with several industry certifications,

he holds a bachelor’s degree in anthropology from the University of Texas, and currently

leads a stalwart team of engineers in the global deployment of Windows Vista at

Dell, Inc. Alex lives in Austin, Texas, with his muse, Gwen, her son Evan, and Molly the

Border Collie.

Will Schmied, MCSE, is a Senior Systems Administrator for a world-renowned children’s

research hospital. As a freelance writer, Will has worked with many publishers, including

Microsoft and Pearson. Will has also worked directly with Microsoft in the MCSE examdevelopment

process and is the founder of the popular Internet certification portal,

www.mcseworld.com. Will currently resides in northern Mississippi with his wife, Chris;

their children, Christopher, Austin, Andrea, and Hannah; their dogs, Charlie and Jack; and

their cats, Smokey, Evin, and Socks.

Mark Edward Soper has worked with computers and related technologies since 1983 and

specializes in technology education through training, writing, and public speaking. He has

taught computer troubleshooting and other subjects to thousands of students, and is the

00_SEUMWV_fm.qxd 12/7/06 5:05 PM Page xxxiv

author or coauthor of 17 books, most recently Upgrading and Repairing Networks, 5th edition,

published by Que Publishing, and has also written more than 150 magazine articles.

He has CompTIA A+ and Microsoft MCP certifications and provides online self-help content

for Skywire Software, technology screening questions for ReviewNet. He also teaches

applied technology classes for IvyTech Community College of Indiana. Mark lives in

Evansville, Indiana, and blogs at www.markesoper.com.

Steve Suehring is a technology architect and author with a diverse background of computing

experience. In recent years, Steve has worked on several books and magazine articles

and has been an editor for a popular technology magazine. Steve has spoken at conferences

and meetings internationally and currently works with clients to help them optimize and

better utilize technologies, both old and new.

Brent Thal is a Virginian who is a senior at Christopher Newport University in computer

engineering and plans to attend graduate school in computer science and applied physics.

Brent comes from a long line of engineers. His grandfather was a mechanical engineer, and

his father is a registered professional engineer (P.E.) in civil engineering and an adjunct professor

of engineering at the University of Virginia. After graduate school, Brent plans to

work in the computer engineering field for a highly reputable company and continue to

write as a contributing author.

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

Welcome

Thank you for purchasing or considering the purchase of Special Edition Using Microsoft Windows Vista. It's amazing the changes that nearly 20 years can bring to a computer product such as Windows. When we wrote our first Windows book back in the mid-1980s, our publisher didn't even think the book would sell well enough to print more than 5,000 copies. Microsoft stock wasn't even a blip on most investors' radar screens. Boy, were they in the dark! Who could have imagined that a little more than a decade later, anyone who hoped to get hired for even a temp job in a small office would need to know how to use Microsoft Windows, Office, and a PC. Fifteen or so Windows books later, we're still finding new and exciting stuff to tell our readers.

Some people (including the U.S. Department of Justice) claim Microsoft's predominance on the PC operating system arena was won unethically through monopolistic practices. Whether or not this is true (we try, almost successfully, to stay out of the politics in this book), we believe that Windows has earned its position today through reasons other than having a stranglehold on the market. Consider that Windows NT 3.1 had 5 million lines of code. Windows Vista weighs in with about 50 million and takes up 4 or 5 gigabytes of disk space by itself. This represents a lot of work by anyone's accounting. Who could have imagined in 1985 that a mass-market operating system two decades later would have to include support for so many technologies, most of which didn't even exist at the time: DVD, DVD±RW, CD-R and CD-RW, Internet and intranet, MP3, MPEG, WMA, DV, USB, FireWire, APM, ACPI, RAID, UPS, PPOE, gigabit Ethernet, 802.11g, WPA2, IPv6, Teredo, fault tolerance, disk encryption and compression...? The list goes on. And that 4GB of disk space Vista occupies? It would have cost more than a quarter of a million dollars in 1985. Today, it costs a dollar or two.

Although rarely on the bleeding edge of technology, and often playing the role of the dictator with partner businesses and exterminator with competing businesses, Bill Gates has at least been benevolent from the users' point of view. In 1981, when we were building our first computers, the operating system (CP/M) had to be modified in assembly language and recompiled, and hardware parts had to be soldered together to make almost any new addition (such as a video display terminal) work. Virtually nothing was standardized, with the end result being that computers remained out of reach for average folks.

Together, Microsoft, Intel, and IBM changed all that. Today you can purchase a computer, a printer, a scanner, an external disk drive, a keyboard, a modem, a monitor, and a video card over the Internet, plug them in, install Windows, and they'll work together. The creation and adoption (and sometimes forcing) of hardware and software standards that have made the PC a household appliance the world over can largely be credited to Microsoft, like it or not. The unifying glue of this PC revolution has been Windows.

Yes, we all love to hate Windows, but it's here to stay. Linux and Mac OS X are formidable alternatives, but for most of us, at least for some time, Windows and Windows applications are "where it's at." And Windows Vista ushers in truly significant changes to the landscape. That's why we were excited to write this book.

Why This Book?

We all know this book will make an effective doorstop in a few years. You probably have a few already. (We've even written a few!) If you think it contains more information than you need, just remember how helpful a good reference can be when you need it at the 11th hour. And we all know that computer technology changes so fast that it's sometimes easier just to blink and ignore a phase than to study up on it. Windows Vista is definitely a significant upgrade in Windows's security and sophistication—one you're going to need to understand.

Windows Vista might seem similar to its predecessor, Windows XP, but it's a very different animal. Yes, the graphics and display elements are flashier, but it's the deeper changes that matter most. With its radically improved security systems, revamped Control Panel, friendlier network setup tools, new problem-tracking systems, improved support for mobile computers, and completely revamped networking and graphics software infrastructures, Vista leaves Windows XP in the dust. In all ways, it's superior to any operating system Microsoft has ever produced.

Is Windows Vista so easy to use that books are unnecessary? Unfortunately, no. True, as with other releases of Windows, online help is available. As has been the case ever since Windows 95, however, no printed documentation is available (to save Microsoft the cost), and the Help files are written by Microsoft employees and contractors. You won't find criticisms, complaints, workarounds, or suggestions that you use alternative software vendors, let alone explanations of why you have to do things a certain way. For that, you need this book! We will even show you tools and techniques that Microsoft's insiders didn't think were important enough to document at all.

You might know that Windows Vista comes in a bewildering array of versions, primarily Home Basic, Home Premium, Business, Enterprise, and Ultimate (not to mention Starter, which is sold only in emerging markets, and several extra versions sold in the European Union to comply with antitrust court-mandated restrictions). But Vista is Vista, and all that really distinguishes the versions is the availability of various features. Most of the differences matter only in the corporate world, where Vista will be managed by network administrators, so you don't need to worry about those yourself. For the remaining features, we tell you when certain features do or don't apply to your particular version of Windows Vista. (And we show you how to upgrade from one version to a better version, if you want the features your copy doesn't have!)

In this book's many pages, we focus not just on the gee-whiz side of the technology, but why you should care, what you can get from it, and what you can forget about. The lead author on this book has previously written 16 books about Windows, all in plain English (several bestsellers), designed for everyone from rank beginners to full-on system administrators deploying NT Server domains. The coauthor has designed software and networks for more than 20 years and has been writing about Windows for 10 years. We work with and write about various versions of Windows year in and year out. We have a clear understanding of what confuses users and system administrators about installing, configuring, or using Windows, as well as (we hope) how to best convey the solutions to our readers.

While writing this book, we tried to stay vigilant in following four cardinal rules:

• Keep it practical.
• Keep it accurate.
• Keep it concise.
• Keep it interesting, and even crack a joke or two.

We believe that you will find this to be the best and most comprehensive book available on Windows Vista for beginners through advanced users. And whether you use Windows Vista yourself or support others who do, we firmly believe this book will address your questions and needs.

Our book addresses both home and business computer users. We assume you probably are not an engineer, and we do our best to speak in plain English and not snow you with unexplained jargon. As we wrote, we imagined that you, our reader, are a friend or co-worker who's familiar enough with your computer to know what it's capable of, but might not know the details of how to make it all happen. So we show you, in a helpful, friendly, professional tone. In the process, we also hope to show you things that you might not have known, which will help make your life easier—your computing life, anyway. We spent months and months poking into Vista's darker corners so you wouldn't have to. And, if you're looking for power-user tips and some nitty-gritty details, we make sure you get those, too. We try to make clear what information is essential for you to understand and what is optional for just those of you who are especially interested.

We're also willing to tell you what we don't cover. No book can do it all. As the title implies, this book is about Windows Vista. We don't cover setting up the Server versions of this operating system called Windows 2000 Server, Windows Server 2003 Server, and the upcoming Windows Server code named "Longhorn." However, we do tell you how to connect to and interact with these servers, and even other operating systems, including Mac OS X, Linux, and older variants of Windows, over a local area network.

Because of space limitations, there is only one chapter devoted to coverage of Windows Vista's command-line utilities, batch file language, and Windows Script Host. For that (in spades!), you might want to check Brian's book Windows XP Under the Hood, which is still relevant to Vista.

Even when you've become a Windows Vista pro, we think you'll find this book to be a valuable source of reference information in the future. Both the table of contents and the very complete index will provide easy means for locating information when you need it quickly.

How Our Book Is Organized

Although this book advances logically from beginning to end, it's written so that you can jump in at any location, quickly get the information you need, and get out. You don't have to read it from start to finish, nor do you need to work through complex tutorials.

This book is broken down into six major parts. Here's the skinny on each one:

Part I, "Introducing Windows Vista," introduces Vista's new and improved features and shows y...

Customer Reviews

Special Edition Using Microsoft Windows Vista (2nd Edition) (Special Edition Using)
this book is another great help when tackling trouble or using it to use windows vista's full potential. it has more information to find what you want faster than going to Microsoft web pages.It also comes with a dvd which makes looking up information a lot easier.Well worth the price.I keep this close to my computer.

Not a good Kindle choice
This is a very good treatment of Vista, and in the paperback version I have found it helpful. The Kindle version, however, does not handle the illustrations well. I could not read the diagrams. Perhaps in an update of Kindle it will be possible to magnify and move the figures, but at present it is hopeless.

Good reference
Now I have not read the book all the way through. I only use it as a reference when I can't figure something out on my own.

It has had the answer every time I needed it, so I am very impressed so far. Also bought the book on the new version of Office by the same authors and have the same thing to say about it.

Good Stuff