How much time do you spend downloading free apps that troubleshoot, cleanse, or optimize your computer? Probably more time than you think. Why? Because half the time, after we download these programs and give them a test run, we learn that in order for the app to fix the 37 critical issues it’s identified, we’ll have to buy the full version of the program. Nice. Funny how it never seems to say anything about that in the demo’s documentation before you download it, isn’t it?

The free edition of Advanced SystemCare spares you a lot of this nonsense by finding any problems, fixing them, and telling you when it’s done. Click a satisfyingly simple blue button with the word “Care!” in the middle and the app takes off, scouring your PC for spyware, obliterating your surfing history, and mopping up any junk files. While it’s at it, the program will also tune up your registry, optimize your system, and defrag your hard drive – but only if necessary. Because it runs so quickly and with very little involvement from you, you can run it however many times a day you like. You might be surprised at how many registry problems can crop up over the course of an hour, or how much spyware can accumulate since you sat down. Or maybe you won’t. The app does permit you to pay for an upgraded edition that’ll work better and faster, but the free version, for how much it does and how fast it does it, is certainly worth the time it takes to download it.

Image source: gd-computing/halo3forum.com

If someone told you could get Internet service on your laptop without connecting to a Wi-Fi hotspot, purchasing a cellular Internet card, or paying additional fees through your Blackberry’s wireless network you’d want to know the catch, as well as the cost.

The only catch is that you need to already have a Blackberry with a flat-rate data plan, the USB cable that came with it, and fifty bucks. That’s how much it’ll cost you to download Tether, an app that once installed on both your Blackberry and laptop, will permit you to tether the two devices with the USB cable and start surfing the Web on your laptop.

Seriously. It works. Simply connect the two devices with the cable – make sure your laptop’s wireless card is disabled, because you won’t need it – and fire up the app on both devices. Status windows on both will acknowledge the connection and you’ll be ready to surf. That’s it. Tether connects via Bluetooth, too, but the wired way yields a more reliable connection. So Tether up and enjoy the ability to surf anywhere where your Blackberry already gets service. The first place we’d recommend? On a quiet bench at the park, blocks away from that stuffy coffee shop with its pay-per-minute Wi-Fi.

Image source: Tether.com

Smart phones have turned every idle minute into an opportunity to catch up on e-mail. But you’ve probably noticed something. Say you were in line at the bank when you started catching up on your messages, but then after your transaction’s done, you decide to sit down and finish e-mailing. Had you really intended to use that time to deal with your mail? Same goes if you’re waiting for a child or a friend to show up — how often have you made that child or friend wait so you can finish sending your message?

Start using the “doctor trick.” When doctors have one patient after another throughout the day, they don’t take every phone call as it comes in or return every call the second they see the little pink message slip. And you know this is true if you’ve ever waited for a doctor to call you back. Many doctors will wait for those little message slips to pile up, will return them during a quick break, and then will get back to business until they have time to deal with the next message pile. Sure, your doctor — as well as you — needs to deal with emergency messages as they come in, but as for the rest,  just because a call or e-mail is actionable, that doesn’t mean it has to be acted on the second you receive it.

Experiment. Set aside two half-hour blocks during the day to check your messages, and you might find that you won’t be keeping people waiting and you won’t risking your life checking your messages while crossing the street. And not incidentally, only checking your e-mail during designated times does wonders for productivity in the home or office, too.

This simple strategy has been known to change people’s day-to-day lives dramatically. Leave a comment if you’ve tried this approach, or if you have a different timesaver tip you’d like to share.

Image source: Wikimedia Commons

Sending photos back and forth as e-mail attachments never seems to be a problem until the worst possible moment, typically around the time you need to exchange high-resolution images with a client or colleague and you discover that one or both or your e-mail systems can’t handle the size of the photos. Or, you figure out that you can send photos one at a time, but by the time your client sees your e-mail with the subject line “Photo 17 of 25,” you can assume his patience is long gone.

Enter Picasa, a killer app that allows you to share photos without transmitting them. Say you have a folder of 25 very high-res photos on your desktop. After downloading Picasa, you can add your photo folder to the easy-to-navigate window that opens once you start the program. Then, you can sync that folder to a public Web album. Once synched, a URL is dedicated for that folder – the naming convention would be something like http://picasaweb.google.com/name of your Gmail account/name you gave the folder#. At that point you can send your client the URL corresponding to that folder and have him download the photos himself.

Making this transaction even easier is that you can caption each photo and alter the captions before or after you sync the images. Likewise, you or your recipient can add images on either side; just let each other know to check the public folder again to see the changes. For any photographer, art director, editor, or other businessperson who handles images, this is a timesaver you don’t want to do without for too much longer.