PRINCETON PC USERS GROUP - Connect with the PPCUG!

PPCUG is a member of the Association of Personal Computer Users Groups

Princeton PC Users Group

Next Meeting

Tuesday, July 23, 2019

7:00 PM

Mercer County Library, Lawrenceville NJ

Hard Disk Sentinel
FileLocator Pro
and
WinDirStat Utility for Mapping Hard Drive Space

Gabe Goldberg

Hard Disk Sentinel

Hard Disk Sentinel (HDS) is a powerful/flexible multi-system hard drive (HD) and solid-state drive (SSD) monitoring and analysis software. It finds, tests, diagnoses and repairs hard disk drive problems, reports and displays SSD and HD health, performance degradations and failures. HDS gives complete textual description, tips and displays/reports the most comprehensive information about HDs and SSDs in the computer and in external enclosures (USB hard disks / e-SATA hard disks). Many different alerts and report options are available to ensure maximum safety of valuable data.

HDS monitors hard disk drive / HDD status including health, temperature and all S.M.A.R.T. (Self-Monitoring, Analysis and Reporting Technology) values for all hard disks. And it measures disk transfer speed in real time which can a benchmark or detect possible hard disk failures, performance degradations.

HDSentinel is the perfect data protection solution: it can prevent HDD failure and SSD / HDD data loss because it has the most sensitive disk health rating system which is extremely sensitive to disk problems. So even a small HDD problem can't be missed. The Professional version has scheduled and automatic (on-problem) disk backup options to prevent data loss caused by not only failure but by malware or accidental delete also.

FileLocator Pro

Windows file index and search capabilities are mostly adequate. When they're not, FileLocator Pro (FLP) comes to the rescue. From website: Navigate and understand your data! Whether it’s a line of source code, an entry in a log file, a legal brief, or even just a Christmas letter to your family, FileLocator Pro helps you find things fast. Its unique features make it possible to dig out information in even the most obscure file formats.

WinDirStat Utility for Mapping Hard Drive Space

Hard drives are huge, provide more space than once could have been dreamt of. And yet Windows manages to fill them with its bloat. What's occupying all that space? If you don't know, you can't delete the non-useful stuff to slim down data and speed accessing what matters. WinDirStat provides clear graphical representation of occupied space, allowing understanding from an overview to the lowest level directory. From website:
WinDirStat is a free disk usage statistics viewer and cleanup tool for various versions of Microsoft Windows. On start up, it reads the whole directory tree once and then presents it in three useful views:
o The directory list, which resembles the tree view of the Windows Explorer but is sorted by file/subtree size,
o The treemap, which shows the whole contents of the directory tree straight away,
o The extension list, which serves as a legend and shows statistics about the file types.

To make this session most useful: If you use anything besides basic Windows Explorer facilities to map hard drive space, please plan to describe and (if possible!) demonstrate it. There are so many tools for this, it's valuable hearing about as many as possible.

Gabe Goldberg evangelizes for user groups, believing that user groups are an antidote to feeling alone with technical activities, challenges, problems, and triumphs. He's enjoyed being APCUG Region 2 Adviser for many years far longer than he can remember. In that role, he's liaison for APCUG (Association of Personal Computer User Groups) to groups in NJ/DE/MD/DC/VA/NC/WV/PA.

He supports many national and local user groups. He served as Director of (Meeting) Programs for Washington, DC-area CPCUG, one of the oldest and largest PC user groups, where he organized and chaired the Internet SIG. He served on User Support Team for CPCUG's domain and on CPCUG's Board Of Directors. He was founding member and director of several local user groups, and held management jobs in a national IBM user group. He has given hundreds of presentations to these and other groups and conferences. He has facilitated and helped exploit donations of commercial hardware and software to user groups. He's presently Director and APCUG Representative for PATACS, Potomac Area Technology and Computer Society.

Gabe is a technology writer, editor, and consultant targeting audiences from consumers to computer professionals. He worked for a small software company as VP of Technology and Business Development, responsible for product planning, evolution, and development, along with documentation and customer support. He also worked in the leading-edge data center of a federally chartered not-for-profit consulting organization where he developed widely used software tools aiding other installations' mainframe use; before that he designed and developed operating systems at IBM. Gabe shared responsibility for AARP's online Computers and Technology Web site and forums; before that, he co-hosted America Online's advanced Internet forum. Gabe Goldberg is the advisor of the APCUG Region 2 DC/DE/MD/NJ/VA.

There are a group of club members who regularly attend PPCUG meetings. However, Club Leadership including those who have been arranging meetings would appreciate your assistance. We are looking for volunteers to step up and take a leadership role. Any role that you take will look good on your LinkedIn profile!

Directions to the Meeting

Meetings of an organization at any of the facilities of the Mercer County Library System in no way implies endorsement of its programs.

This Year's Meetings Schedule

Updated 06/26/2019 WebMaster: JJB Consulting