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By George Sabin I tried to find another PIM ... I really did. I tried about a dozen other
programs: After reviewing and researching about 40 PIMs over a period of 4 days, about 14 hours a day, nothing comes close to EccoPro yet. ECCO still smokes them all hands down for features and especially speed. It is extremely fast on a flash drive as well. I had to put a few .dll 's in the directory and voila! My ECCO size is under 2.5 megs in an optional SFX autolauncher file. A bit stripped down but able to hold years worth of personal data opened with one doubleclick on a thumb drive SFX Icon. After the Flash Drive installation you will need to copy the following
(4) .dll files to your ECCO main directory on your USB stick ...
The deleted parts and components are non-essential for the majority of users except for those who have had success at tweaking these components. [I have not been happy with these features so I removed them] A simple Thumb drive installalation with no SFX and with the 4 .dll 's above copied into the Ecco Directory works on all machines you place it in. [Regardless if it is a Windows BartPE Boot CD or not] [Unless the permissions on the machine are severely restrictive or imited.] I added "My Basic Template" in the main directory and an advanced template "Getting things done 3" from the Yahoo EccoPro Forum download area. I will post my Basic template on the file section of the Forum. [Very basic ... but straitforeward.] I might also post an SFX stripped file that drops ecco in the Local temp folder and launches it with one double click. This SFX can be specialized in a few ways to launch and be used to back-up from the flash drive and secure erase the temp installation on exit. [A few command lines] I have reached my happy place with this ... but if others want to develop and perfect some flash drive specialized sequence for SFX use and secure back-up on the flash and deletion on the "mother" computer please drop me an E-Mail to: G-R-S@comcast.net. I think it would be a worthwhile effort. To use it as an SFX you must have permissions or Admin priveleges. Even if your Directory is placed back on your thumb drive. [The SFX hasn't many benefits unless you are adapting it into a Windows PE "Barts PE" Thumb drive allowing you access to most modern PC's that do not have a boot or Bios password. Read about SFX and WinPE below!] If permissions are too restrictive ... It is possible to bypass most security except a bios password ... by first copying ECCO via a windows PE boot to a directory you can access with your limited permissions and placing a shortcut where you need it in the OS and folder of choice on the Host PC. [The host PC doesn't see it as an install nor a registry change and will only freak on you if you have an active file compare program running ... like "Black Ice" ... Not sure if even Black Ice would catch it though.] A "standalone" ECCO folder with the .dll's will work without a registry install. I tried it on one laptop [win2k], one dual cpu server [win2k] and one xp pro server ... worked fine. To explain SFX: Windows has a Program called Windows PreInstall Environment
... WinPE ... it has been used by system admin people for some time now.
Bart is the best known person on the web for creating Boot CD's [has been
for years] He has put together the best boot CD system for creating your
own Windows PE environment ... Essentially it allows you to boot an entire windows XP operating system from a CD or ... yes you guessed it ... a Thumb drive. It is a trimmed down XP environment that has full capabilities to run your windows programs to fix, hack, repair ... modify registries, retrieve passwords, clean out viruses and rootkits, and remove spyware from the host computer. Since the program is run in Ram and launched from the CD ... complete access and work can be done to the host computer. The SD Card for My Palm Treo [that also goes into my thumb drive] has all my Palm back-up stuff ... a Full XP OS boot disk, and all my important docs, E-Mail, ECCO, Inspiration, and 700 Megs of other software and a hidden encrypted drive as well. It's a project I needed done for a long time and finally muscled through it. "Perfect security and all critical docs and programs on me at all times and in duplicate." About 80 hours into this project I found an ISO image available on the
web torrent files. "isohunt" should have the torrent address.
"bittorrent" is a nice standalone program that can be found along with a
variety of portable softwares on this site ... The torrent title should be found under a search for ... "tech182" [Saved
me another 40-80 hours of project time] Nicely done WinPe ... only a few
bugs. [VNC wasn't loaded correctly] It seems to handle loading network
settings as well. Of all the like ISO images I have tested [about 10 gigs
worth] This one is the best. Use "Flashboot" to load it on a USB Drive
... or the PC Mag article explains how ... Misc WinPe and Flash Boot Links: Thumb drive security. Locking down your ECCO database. There are 6 encryption and security products I find exceedingly usefull. [All Freeware!] I reviewed over 70 Encryption and security products selecting ones with the best reviews and/or most awards ... from freeware to expensive professional versions and did my research at two different intervals over a one year period. [I also considered the results from a project I had done 5 years ago on security.] Security had to protect basic documents and files and millions of dollars worth of trade transactions or business communications and all passwords, and sensitive information. Fully "Corporate espionage" and "Govenment intrusion" proof. My goal was to find small fast practical reliable bug-free ultra-secure pc security. My second goal was that those secure programs could be thumb drive launched and or mounted. Interestingly enough ... my solutions for PC security also can be entirely mobile and thumb drive mounted. I will not go into the elaborate details and choices and reasons why I consider them the best, but just share my results. Of the 70 or so reviewed ... most were file or folder encryption; password or created a mounted encrypted drive, software ... some however encrypted your entire drive. [Boot sector and Operating system and all sectors of your drive.] I found that entire hard drive encryption was not a great solution ... it is less secure in a number of ways and does slow your pc down a tad. [Why encrypt what doesn't need it like your OS and empty sectors?] I still have one "Complete Drive"
encryption program to test before I am done. [Safeguard Easy] [I bought Roboform and Passtogo ... http://www.roboform.com/ ... for my "Web Launched" passwords ... even though it has strong encryption ... I dual encrypt those files again with another program.] Each of these programs can be thumb drive launched and or mounted. Each has its own learning curve quirkiness, with TrueCrypt being the best and most practical ... but also having the hardest learning curve and the most quirky interface and process. I really searched and searched to try and find something better than TrueCrypt due to its quirky setup, however it simply won hands down for its "real world" practicality, features and usefullness. George Sabin
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