Category: Software

I recently decided to design a logo for a new blog that someone I knew was about to start. While looking through the fonts installed on my computer, I couldn’t find the right font to use. I didn’t have any additional fonts other than the ones that were installed with Windows XP, so I decided to search online for some new fonts.

I was able to find two fonts that I thought would work for the logo, so I downloaded and extracted the fonts into the correct directory. When I opened up Photoshop to use the new fonts, they didn’t show up in the list. I also checked Word to see if they appeared there, but they weren’t available in that application as well.

I decided to look into the problem and see if I can get the fonts to work properly. I did manage to fix the problem, and have provided to solutions you can try if you are having problems with installing fonts.

Extract and Copy Method

Most fonts that you download from the Web are usually compressed inside zip files. To use these fonts, you will first need to extract the font file and then copy it to the correct directory.

1. Open up the zip file in your application of choice, such as WinZip. If you don’t have Winzip, or an alternative application, Windows XP can natively open up zip files in Windows Explorer.
2. Extract the file to the fonts directory, which is usually C:\Windows\Fonts.
3. Open up the application you plan to use with the font and see if it appears in the list. If it does, then you have successfully installed the font. Continue on if you don’t see the font in the list.

Using the Font Thing Application

If the first method did not install the font correctly, you can always use a font manager application. These help you manage the many fonts that may be installed on your computer. The application I used was an old application (circa 1999), but I was able to use it with no problems on Windows XP. The application is called The Font Thing.

1. Follow the first method, but instead of copying the font file to the fonts directory, copy the file to another directory on your computer.
2. Download The Font Thing from the author’s Web site. The download link is in the upper right corner of the Web page.
3. Install the application on your computer by unzipping the zip archive to a folder on your computer and running the setup.exe file.
4. Run The Font Thing application and then click the Browse tab on the left side of the screen.
5. Navigate to the folder that your uncompressed your font into in step 1. The font should be listed on the left below the directories.
6. Select the font in the list, and then click Install in the toolbar. There should now be an icon (looks like the old Windows logo) beside the font in the list to indicate that it was installed.
7. Open up the application you plan to use with the font and see if it appears in the list. If it does, then you have successfully installed the font.

If you are still having problems with the font, try downloading another font that looks similar from another site and see if you can install that one. Some of the free font files may not be recognized by the application so you may not have success with all fonts. I have only downloaded a few fonts, but have not had any problems with them.

Summary

In this post I provided two methods that I have used to install fonts successfully. My recent problems with installing fonts was solved by using The Font Thing application. There are other font management applications on the market, but this was small, free and easy to use.

Although Windows XP is not the newest operating system from Microsoft (Windows Vista is the new version), I find that there are still many people that prefer XP over Vista. I, for one, am one of those people that prefers XP instead of Vista. I find it a faster more reliable operating system.

I have been using XP for many years now, and have at times looked for ways to tweak the operating system to get the most performance out of my computer. There are many tweak tips on the Internet, many true and many false, but I have decided to put together a simple list that you can use to make you version of XP run faster.

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For many years now MP3 music files have become mainstream. With the enormous number of MP3 players on the market, it seems everyone owns one. It is hard to walk down the street and not see anyone listening to their MP3 player. There are many people out there who may not know how to create their own MP3 files from their CDs.

In this post I will provide a step-by-step tutorial on creating MP3 files from your CDs using Windows Media Player. I chose this application because it is readily available on any Windows system.

Specify MP3 Options

Before we begin creating MP3 files it is important to first ensure we have set some important settings in Media Player. If you haven’t already done so, please start Windows Media Player.

To set the MP3 options, use the following steps:

1. Right-click an empty portion of the top toolbar to display a menu.
2. From the menu select Tools->Options. The Options dialog box should now be displayed.
3. Click the Rip Music tab.
4. Under Rip music to this location you can specify the location you want the MP3s to be stored. If you would like to change this directory, then click Change and select a new directory. Click the File Name button to change the file naming convention for your MP3 files.
5. Under Rip settings, select mp3 from the Format list.
6. By default the audio quality is set at 128Kbps. I usually choose a higher quality since space is not really an option. If you want better quality, move the Audio Quality slider to the right. I usually select 256Kbps as the quality. The file size will be doubled by the quality will be better.
7. Click OK to save your changes and close the Options dialog box.

You have now setup your CD ripping settings and are ready to convert your CD tracks to MP3 files. Since these settings are saved, you will not need to specify them when you create MP3 files in the future.

Converting CD Tracks to MP3 Files

Windows Media Player makes converting CD tracks to MP3 files very easy. The process is fairly quick and you can convert multiple tracks from a single CD at the same time. Use the following steps to create MP3 files:

1. Insert an audio CD into either the CD or DVD ROM in your computer. It doesn’t matter which drive you insert the disc into as both can read CDs.
2. In the Windows Media Player menu bar at the top, click Rip
3. Click the CD/DVD-ROM drive from the list on the left.
4. A list of the audio tracks will now appear with all tracks selected. Click the Start Rip button in the lower right corner if you wish to convert all tracks to MP3 files. If you wish to select only a few of the tracks, then uncheck the checkboxes that you don’t wish to convert, and then click the Start Rip button.
5. The progress bar will be displayed beside the tracks currently being converted. Once the message Ripped to libraryappears beside the tracks you selected, it means that the MP3 files have been created and are saved in the directory specified in the previous section.

You can repeat the above steps to convert tracks in other audio CDs. The MP3 directories are organized by artist and then album within the directory you specified in the previous section. This allows you to convert many CDs while still maintaining some organization.

Note: You will also find some JPEGs included with your MP3s. These are images of the album covers if you have downloaded them from the Internet.

Summary

Creating MP3 files is really easy with Windows Media Player. After you save your MP3 settings, all you need to do is insert an audio CD and select the tracks you want to convert to MP3 files.

A little while ago I wrote a post titled How To Keep Your Computer Running Smoothly where I explain several tools you should install and use to help keep your computer running. In this post I will provide step-by-step instructions on what I do to keep my computers running without any problems.

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In a previous articles titled Conserving Your Laptop Battery Power I listed several tips you can use to help conserve your laptop battery. The tips in that post can be applied not only Vista, but also previous versions of the Windows operating system.

In this post, however, I will discuss a new utility within Vista to help you get even more time out of your laptop battery.

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One of the many complaints users have of Windows is the slow start times they may experience. Some of the time, the slow start time is due to the number of programs that are loaded when Windows starts up. These programs will sometimes create an icon in the system tray near the time in the lower right part of the screen. Others may load but give no indication that they are loaded, except when viewing the processes.

There may also be times when one of the applications causes your system to crash. The reality is that most of those programs don’t need to start up, but are there to make your life easier. In this post I’ll explain several ways of preventing those programs from loading when Windows starts.

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