15 replies to this topic

[anthony hill]

[size="2"]I have become increasingly impressed with this developing area of technology, there are several manufacturers supporting it e.g. Sandisk with their U3 application, others use portable apps (www.portableapps.com).

For me the attraction is all my software available in a form I want with the settings I prefer on a usb stick which I simply plug in to a host computer with an Internet connection (hopefully). It has major advantages for troubleshooting too with your own tools available and hopefully virus free.

I hope piriform will make their applications available in this form really soon - they can be used off the stick, but to have them as a menu item would be great.

I see potential in both the home and business world for this to develop where the user has a stick - especially as the prices drop 2gb for a fiver, and has little or no software on a machine, only data. The potential for on the fly encryption of this small area then becomes attractive and without performance penalties.
Regards
Anthony

[CTskifreak]

They are.

CCleaner : Builds Page
Recuva: Builds Page
Defraggler: I think you can install it directly to a USB Drive.


AJ

[Anthony A]

anthony hill, on Sep 4 2008, 04:01 AM, said:

[size="2"]I have become increasingly impressed with this developing area of technology, there are several manufacturers supporting it e.g. Sandisk with their U3 application, others use portable apps (www.portableapps.com).

For me the attraction is all my software available in a form I want with the settings I prefer on a usb stick which I simply plug in to a host computer with an Internet connection (hopefully). It has major advantages for troubleshooting too with your own tools available and hopefully virus free.

I hope piriform will make their applications available in this form really soon - they can be used off the stick, but to have them as a menu item would be great.

I see potential in both the home and business world for this to develop where the user has a stick - especially as the prices drop 2gb for a fiver, and has little or no software on a machine, only data. The potential for on the fly encryption of this small area then becomes attractive and without performance penalties.
Regards
Anthony

Have you tried putting the portable versions of Piriform's programs in the Portable apps folder? Most portable programs show up on the Portable Apps Menu if you put them in the right folder.

Here is a shot of my USB Thumb drive using the Portable Apps Start Menu. As you can see from the pic CCleaner integrates perfectly with it. Most of the apps you see listed and many that are out of view are not in the official Portable Apps format. Many programs make portable versions and they will show up and work perfectly from the Portable Apps Start Menu. Just unzip them to the folder. U3 is a different thing though. The programs must be in U3 format to use them with the U3 Start Menu.

[anthony hill]

CTskifreak, on Sep 4 2008, 01:19 PM, said:

They are.

CCleaner : Builds Page
Recuva: Builds Page
Defraggler: I think you can install it directly to a USB Drive.


AJ

Thank you, I was not aware of the option and I will look at it further.
Regards
Anthony

[anthony hill]

Anthony A, on Sep 4 2008, 01:29 PM, said:

Have you tried putting the portable versions of Piriform's programs in the Portable apps folder? Most portable programs show up on the Portable Apps Menu if you put them in the right folder.

Here is a shot of my USB Thumb drive using the Portable Apps Start Menu. As you can see from the pic CCleaner integrates perfectly with it. Most of the apps you see listed and many that are out of view are not in the official Portable Apps format. Many programs make portable versions and they will show up and work perfectly from the Portable Apps Start Menu. Just unzip them to the folder. U3 is a different thing though. The programs must be in U3 format to use them with the U3 Start Menu.

That is interesting, thank you. I had a dabble at this earlier, but will spend a little time later, I think it is the expression ' if you put them in the right folder' I need to look at and understand what it means.
Regards
Anthony

[Anthony A]

anthony hill, on Sep 4 2008, 12:47 PM, said:

That is interesting, thank you. I had a dabble at this earlier, but will spend a little time later, I think it is the expression ' if you put them in the right folder' I need to look at and understand what it means.
Regards
Anthony

When you install the Portable Apps Start Menu on your thumb drive several files and folders are part of the install. One of the folders is called "PortableApps". That is the one to put your apps in so they show up on the start menu.

[1984]

thats interesting anthony. didnt know about that apps start menu thing. pretty cool, and im gonna grab it.

[YoKenny]

That would be interesting to put on a WinPatrol USB Flash Wristband:
http://winpatrol.stores.yahoo.net/winpatro...-wristband.html

[Anthony A]

YoKenny, on Sep 5 2008, 11:25 AM, said:

That would be interesting to put on a WinPatrol USB Flash Wristband:
http://winpatrol.stores.yahoo.net/winpatro...-wristband.html

It's great the things you can put on a USB now. I have most of my main apps on it. I use portable apps on my machines to. When you maintain multiple machines it's much easier to use a portable version of an app and set it up once than copy the folder to your other machines and USB thumb drive. Having to install on each machine separately and than set up the app is a pain on multiple machines. I probably have 50 portable apps if not more.

[Andavari]

Anthony A, on Sep 5 2008, 10:37 AM, said:

I probably have 50 portable apps if not more.

That's a very impressive amount I must say!

The only portable apps I've ever used and kept are for burning onto DVD's to playback the audio (mp3) and video (avi) which in the past was VLC Media Player Portable, and now SMPlayer Portable. Although I may go back to using VLC Media Player Portable simply for the fact of it being smaller in filesize.

[Anthony A]

Andavari, on Sep 5 2008, 01:54 PM, said:

That's a very impressive amount I must say!

The only portable apps I've ever used and kept are for burning onto DVD's to playback the audio (mp3) and video (avi) which in the past was VLC Media Player Portable, and now SMPlayer Portable. Although I may go back to using VLC Media Player Portable simply for the fact of it being smaller in filesize.

MPUI is a front end for MPlayer just as SMPlayer is a front end for it. MPUI is smaller than both SMPlayer and VLC. In my screen shot of the Portable Apps start Menu you can see it's installed there. http://mpui.sourceforge.net/

There are hundreds of portable apps out there now. Check this site out http://www.portablefreeware.com/

[YoKenny]

YoKenny, on Sep 5 2008, 11:25 AM, said:

That would be interesting to put on a WinPatrol USB Flash Wristband:
http://winpatrol.stores.yahoo.net/winpatro...-wristband.html

I think that it is way too complicated for my needs.

I prefer to use Windows Explorer to load applications onto the Flash drive then I just navigate to the application on the Flash drive and run it from there.

[Andavari]

Anthony A, on Sep 5 2008, 12:48 PM, said:

There are hundreds of portable apps out there now. Check this site out http://www.portablefreeware.com/

I now have some portable actually installed now for keeps which I made my own installers for:
ClamWin Portable, and Eraser Portable.

I much prefer Eraser Portable over the install version because it doesn't install all those shell extensions, and all that WinSxS stuff. Much cleaner in my opinion!!!

[Anthony A]

Andavari, on Sep 6 2008, 11:16 AM, said:

I much prefer Eraser Portable over the install version because it doesn't install all those shell extensions, and all that WinSxS stuff. Much cleaner in my opinion!!!

That's another reason I like to use portable apps. Whenever I decide to "install" a program I always look for the portable version first and use it if it's available. That is why I have so many portable apps.

[YoKenny]

YoKenny, on Sep 5 2008, 07:38 PM, said:

I think that it is way too complicated for my needs.

I prefer to use Windows Explorer to load applications onto the Flash drive then I just navigate to the application on the Flash drive and run it from there.

I had a perfect example of that today.

My friend's son's system was infected by one of the antivirus2008 nasties and it would not let me run MBAM nor download SDFix.

I brought it up to my apartment and sat it beside my XP Pro system and fired up the BleepingComputer tutorial of SDFix

I downloaded SDFix onto Flash stick on my system then I followed the directions step by step and it worked great.

[CeeCee]

So far, I have only used my flash drive for backups. I had Opera portable though, but i removed it, since it was so old version and i really don't have any use for portable Opera.