[Windows]: 6 Ways to Actually Use 1 TB of Cloud Storage

6 Ways to Actually Use 1 TB of Cloud Storage

The cloud storage wars are heating up. Microsoft now offers 1 TB of cloud storage along with Office 365, and both Dropbox and Google are offering 1 TB at just $10 per month. Flickr even offers 1 TB for free.

But the real reason companies are offering so much storage is because they know most users will never actually use anything near 1 TB of storage. Here’s how you actually could.

Back Up to the Cloud!

Backing up all your stuff directly to cloud storage services like Dropbox, OneDrive, or Google Drive was previously not a great idea. These services didn’t offer a lot of storage. Instead, it was better to use dedicated online backup services like CrashPlan, BackBlaze, or Carbonite. These services are designed for backups and offer more than enough storage for backups.

With cloud storage becoming so much cheaper, backing up directly to a cloud storage location is now a very decent idea. You don’t need a separate online service for your backups. Unfortunately, the backup tools integrated into Windows won’t help much — File History on Windows 8.1 can’t back up to OneDrive, for example.

Instead, you could just store all your important files inside your cloud storage folder so you’d never lose them. Or, you could use backup tools that would automatically create copies of your important files in your cloud storage folder so they’d be synced and backed up online. There are many tools that do this. For example, FreeFileSync can work well — it’s like the open-source, modern successor to Microsoft’s classic SyncToy application. Cobian Backup is another often-recommended one. Any backup tool that lets you back up to an arbitrary folder on your computer — select your cloud storage folder here — will work.

Upload High Resolution Photos

Be sure you upload the original, high-resolution copies of your photos whenever you upload them to a storage service. Smartphone apps and photo-uploading programs are often configured to shrink photos you take before uploading them to save on space. With 1 TB available — whether it’s at a generic cloud storage service or Flickr — you don’t need to shrink your photos ahead of time. Be sure they’re set to upload at their “original size.”

These services can automatically upload photos from your smartphone, whether you have an Android phone, an iPhone, or even a Windows Phone.

If you take photos with a normal digital camera and copy them to your desktop PC or laptop, you can also use a tool to automatically upload them to your cloud storage service. For example, Dropbox will offer to automatically upload photos when you plug in a camera or SD card with photos.

Upload Your Music Collection

The web is full of music locker services like Amazon Music and Google Play Music, but you can also use your cloud storage service as a music locker. Even if you have hundreds of gigabytes of music — hopefully all ripped from legitimately acquired CDs, of course — you can upload it all to your cloud storage service. You can then download it to all your PCs or access the individual music files and play them in a browser.

This method may not be as “slick” as a cloud storage with their nicer web interfaces and mobile apps, but it gives you an easy way to sync that music collection between all your computers. Every computer you sync it to will get a full offline copy, and your files won’t be automatically converted to a worse-sounding-but-smaller music format. If you ripped all your CDs to lossless FLAC files, you can keep all those FLAC files and access them from anywhere.

Store — But Don’t Sync — Large Files

There’s a good chance you have an archive of large files. Maybe it’s a media library, hundreds of gigabytes of old photos, massive amounts of home movies, back-up copies of your physical discs in ISO form, or whatever else. All these files can be stored online in your cloud storage service — there should be more than enough room.

To save space on your local computers — after all, you probably don’t want to sync that entire 1 TB back to each computer you use — you can tell the cloud storage service to only synchronize specific folders. You can then download the files using a browser when you need them. To upload new files to these unsynced folders, you can also just use your storage service’s browser-based uploader.

Microsoft’s OneDrive is a bit smarter about this on Windows 8.1, and it will automatically present all your cloud storage files, only downloading them when you open them or ask for them to be downloaded. Other services, like Dropbox and Google Drive, automatically download all your files by default.

Use it as a File Server

You can also use your cloud storage as a sort of file server. You can configure certain folders in your cloud storage as “Public” folders, or just share individual files and make them public. You can then give the links to people and they can access the files in their browser. This allows you to share your files with friends, or even host them as if they were on public server — no need to fiddle with typical public-photo-uploading or file-hosting services. Of course, your cloud storage service will only want to provide so much download bandwidth, so you can’t let hundreds of thousands of people download your files with this method!

You can also share files with just specific users of the same service, so you and your friends or colleagues could share folders with each other. They’d just be accessible to the user accounts you select, not everyone online with the link.

Receive Files From Anyone

You can also use your large amount of online file storage to receive files from other people. Simply set up a Dropbox Form with Jotform or a Google Apps Script to receive files in Google Drive. Anyone — even people without a Dropbox or Google account — can then access the web form and upload files. The files will appear in your cloud storage service where you can access them later.

This method could be useful if you’re a business dealing with clients and you want to give them a way to easily give you files, but it could also allow you to easily receive files from friends. In the past, you might have worried that these files might suck up your limited amount of cloud storage — but no more. This also allows you to bypass the file size limitations of email attachments without relying on yet-another file-hosting service.

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These are just a few ideas to use all that space, so you’re not letting that cheap 1 TB of storage go to waste. Remember to obey the service’s terms of service — this means no using your cloud storage service to store pirated files, and especially not to distribute them via public links!

[MAC]: How to Install Windows on a Mac With Boot Camp

How to Install Windows on a Mac With Boot Camp

Thanks to the switch from PowerPC to Intel many years ago, a Mac is just another PC. Macs come with Mac OS X, but you can easily install Windows on them with Apple’s built-in Boot Camp feature.

Boot Camp installs Windows in a dual-boot configuration. You’ll know what to expect if you’ve ever installed Linux alongside Windows. Both operating systems will be installed, but you can only use one at a time.

Do You Actually Need to Use Boot Camp?

Before we proceed with the details on how to install Windows in Boot Camp, you should first stop and think about whether or not that is the best choice for your needs, because there are also a couple of drawbacks to consider.

When you use Boot Camp to install Windows on your Mac, you’ll need to re-partition your drive, which is going to take up quite a bit of your available drive space. Since storage on a Mac is fairly expensive, it’s something you should really think about. In addition, to actually use Windows, you’ll need to reboot, and if you want to use OS X again, you’ll need to reboot yet again. The benefit of Boot Camp, of course, is that you’re running Windows directly on the hardware, so it’ll be a lot faster than a virtual machine.

If all you need to do is run a few Windows applications on your Mac, and those applications aren’t games or something that requires a lot of resources, you might consider using a virtual machine like Parallels (there’s a free trial), VMware Fusion, or VirtualBox to run that software instead. The vast majority of the time you don’t actually need to use Boot Camp, and you’d be better off using a virtual machine.

Note: we don’t often recommend paid software, but in the case of Parallels Desktop, it’s something we use at How-To Geek every single day for testing software and running Windows. The integration with OS X is amazingly well done, and the speed blows away Virtualbox. In the long run, the price is well worth it.

You can even use Parallels to load your Boot Camp partition as a virtual machine while you are in OS X, giving you the best of both worlds.

What You’ll Need

You’ll need a non-Enterprise, 64-bit copy of Windows 8.1, Windows 8, or Windows 7 for this. This applies to Macs made in the last several years — if you have an older Mac from 2009 or earlier, you won’t be able to install Windows 8. Check Apple’s detailed system requirements for more information.

Windows doesn’t come with Mac OS X, so you’ll need a full version of Windows — not an upgrade version — to install it on your Mac. You can download Windows installation media for free if you already have a product key, but you’ll need to purchase a copy of Windows if you don’t. You’ll need the installation media in ISO file or DVD form.

You’ll also need a USB drive at least 8 GB in size. This will be used to install Windows and the appropriate drivers on your Mac.

Apple recommends backing up your files before partitioning or installing Windows. It’s always good to have backups before doing something that could potentially be destructive. If you make a mistake or the partitioning process fails due to a bug, you could lose your files. If you’re careful, this shouldn’t happen.

How to Install Windows on Your Mac

You’ll use the Boot Camp Assistant application that comes on your Mac for this. Open it by pressing Command + Space, typing Boot Camp, and pressing Enter.

The Boot Camp Assistant will copy the Windows installation files from an ISO file or physical disc to a USB drive. Windows will install itself on your Mac from this USB drive. The latest Windows drivers will also be downloaded from Apple and placed on this drive, and they’ll install automatically after you install Windows. This application will also guide you through the process of resizing your Mac’s existing system partition and creating a Windows partition.

First, select what you want to do. You should probably leave all these options checked. However, if you already have a Boot Camp USB drive or you’ve already partitioned your Mac, you can uncheck these options to speed the process up. This is useful if you’re installing Windows on multiple Macs and you’ve already created a USB drive.

Next, point your Mac at the ISO file or USB drive. Insert a USB flash drive and select it. This drive will be erased, so be sure you have backups of any important files stored on it.

The screen will read “Copying Windows files” as your Mac creates the Windows installer drive it will need. This process may take quite a while, depending on the speed of your drive. It’s normal for the progress bar to appear stuck in one position — just be patient.

After your Mac finishes creating a USB installation drive, you’ll see the Create a Partition screen. You can now divide your Mac’s system drive into two separatepartitions — one for Mac OS X and one for Windows. How you should allocate the space depends on how much space you want for your Windows system and how much space you want for your OS X system. If you have multiple hard disks in your Mac, you can use one specifically for Windows.

If you want to resize your partitions after this process, you’ll need to use a third-party tool. Boot Camp Assistant can’t help you with that.

Click the Install button and Boot Camp Assistant will resize your Mac OS X partition and create the new partition for Windows. Your Mac will then restart and boot the Windows installer from the USB drive. Go through the installer and install Windows on your Mac like you’d install it on any other PC.

Select the partition labeled BOOTCAMP when you reach the Where do you want to install Windows? screen. Click the Format option to format the partition as NTFS, and then click Continue.

Warning: Triple-check that you’re formatting the right partition. You’ll wipe your Mac OS X system if you format the wrong partition.

Windows will now finish installing normally. The Boot Camp installer will appear after you finish installing Windows, installing the hardware drivers and utilities you’ll need in your Windows system.

After the Boot Camp installer finishes, you’re free to remove the USB drive and do whatever you want with it. If you don’t plan to install Windows on another Mac, you can format the drive and place your personal files on it again.

The Boot Camp Control Panel

You’ll find Apple’s Boot Camp Control Panel running in your system tray after installing Windows. Click the up arrow in your system tray to view more icons, click the Boot Camp icon, and select Boot Camp Control Panel to open it.

This control panel allows you to choose the default operating system your Mac boots to, as well as tweak keyboard and trackpad settings.

While in Windows, the Mac’s Command key functions as the Windows key, while the Option key functions as the Alt key.

How to Remove Windows From Your Mac

If you want to remove Windows from your Mac and free up space, reboot into Mac OS X and open the Boot Camp Assistant again. You’ll see the Remove Windows 7 or later version option here if Windows is currently installed.

Boot Camp Assistant will automatically remove Windows and expand the Mac OS X partition for you, reclaiming all of that space.

Warning: This will delete all the files on your Windows partition, so be sure you have backup copies first!

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Windows should work just fine on your Mac hardware. These aren’t the PowerPC days anymore — your Mac has standard hardware components. In fact, many of the hardware drivers provided by Apple are the same ones you’d get on a typical Windows PC.

[MAC]: The Beginner’s Guide to Parallels Desktop 10 for OS X

The Beginner’s Guide to Parallels Desktop 10 for OS X

Even if you are a Mac user, there’s a strong chance that you will need to use Windows applications at some point. Luckily there are great virtual machine solutions out there to help you do that easily.

And you can run more than Windows in a virtual machine — Linux runs perfectly in a VM, and is usually the best way to learn. Today we’ll be showing you how to install Windows in Parallels Desktop, but the same principles work for Linux.

What is the Advantage of Parallels Desktop?

Parallels has been around for eight years, as a virtual machine for Mac, further bridging the gap between Mac and PC (among others). With the latest variant, you can natively download freeware operating systems like Ubuntu, Chrome, Android and, of course, Microsoft Windows. Unlike Bootcamp, there aren’t any version limitations either, you could install any version of Windows, past present, or future (read ‘Technical Preview’) and it will work exactly as well as it is supposed to.

Parallels Desktop shares the system’s resources instead of dedicating them, that way you are using the same storage and resources for all platforms, making it easier to manage and manipulate. Other virtualization tools like VMWare fusion, or Hyper-V, normally create and restrict the workspace to the image size. This is where Parallels Desktop earns its price.

Also, Parallels Desktop has the ability to support retina resolutions and scales accordingly, which makes content visible natively, without any fragments or aliasing. Additionally for any virtualization tool it is quite a chore to match the performance of the real thing, but Parallels does a good job of running things quickly.

How to Install an OS using Parallels Desktop

We’re going to start with the assumption that you have acquired and installed Parallels Desktop 10. Launch the tool and let’s get started.

As soon as the app launches you will be greeted with a welcome screen. Or, if you have a previous operating system(s) installed, you will be able to view them in a list. If there is a “?” next to your operating system, that means the intended media is missing (we’ll get into that later).

If you are shown an operating system, look at the upper right of the window and click on the “+” button. That will take you to the default launch window.

Here, select your operating system. It comes with the option to download prepackaged open source operating systems like Chrome OS, Ubuntu, or Android. You can even use your Mac’s rescue to create a virtual OS X – This can come in handy if you are planning on experimenting with tools and terminal commands (you could potentially reset your system in a single stroke with those things).

Let’s see how it works with an installation of Microsoft Windows 8.1. Click on “Install Windows or another OS from a DVD or image file.” This will make PD scan for all images on your storage. If it does not find it, you can “Locate Manually.” From the list of options, DVD, Image File, or USB, select the one that applies to you. If all you have is a legally acquired key, Microsoft will let you download an image from their site.

Click on image file and drag the image to the designated area. Enter the your serial key and check “express installation.” Now, you will be lead to a screen where you can select your ideal usage from the Windows Installation.

It gets a touch interesting here, as you have an option that you would have to enable yourself, Parallels Desktop 10 lets you turn Windows 8.1 into a Windows 7 like menu, Or, leave it as-is. Make a choice.

Now, pick the name and location of the installation, and press continue. You can choose to install it on an external drive if you want. Press continue, and it will start creating the virtual machine.

Now, the installation process is exactly the same as installing Windows on a PC. During the virtualization, press ⌃ + ⌥ (control + alt) to free the mouse, otherwise it will be confined to the virtual space. By default, your windows will launch in fullscreen mode.

At this point, your Virtual copy of Microsoft Windows is ready to deploy (ignore the floppy disk, I was feeling nostalgic during installation). If you want to switch between OS X and Windows, just free the mouse (as mentioned earlier) and switch screens as you normally would on a Mac. Shutting down Windows will terminate the simulation and take you back to your OS X desktop.

Terminating virtualization will take you to a launch screen. If there are aspects of your configuration that you want to change, you can do so by checking the configuration icon in this window. You can also do this, by clicking the same icon in the launch window that welcomes you.

Here you can change any setting you want. Be warned, there are limits to what your system can sustain and the recommended settings are generally the best ones to go by, however, if you feel like taking the risk, here is where you can adjust the sliders to suit your computing needs.

Errors

There are possibilities of errors that you might come across when you use Parallels Desktop 10.

If you get this error, it is normally caused by a module trying to read/write an NTFS partition (not natively supported on OS X), so even though it says to “uninstall” the tool, you can make do by just disabling it.

The following errors appears only when you have installed windows with various customizations, if this warning does appear, it is simply telling you to avoid interacting with the bootcamp drive while the virtualization is suspended (not terminated).

That ought to do it, you can now run Windows on OS X without having to switch away to anything.

[Windows]: How to Use OpenDNS on Your Router, PC, Tablet, or Smartphone

How to Use OpenDNS on Your Router, PC, Tablet, or Smartphone

Most home networks rarely have one single type of client connecting to it. Usually, there’s a blend of Windows, Android, iOS, and maybe even Macs. How do you keep all these clients connected while keeping younger users out of trouble?

We’ve talked about OpenDNS in past articles and just recently, we discussed the possibilities of using your router for basic parental controls. In that article, we mentioned that our example router actually defers to OpenDNS as its designated “parental controls”.

Using the router doesn’t always turn out to be an effective solution if the problem is with Internet access. While you can block keywords and domains, you will quickly find out that controlling that is akin to the time-worn analogy of the finger the dike. You may be able to block a couple problem websites at first, you’re going to need something much more robust and enveloping to really get the job done.

The nice thing with OpenDNS is, you can do web filtering at the router, or you can assign it to individual clients. This means, as a grownup, that you don’t have to deal with a neutered Internet experience.

Today, we’re going to show you exactly how to do that and then configure your Windows, Mac, Android, and iOS clients to take advantage of the change.

A Brief Reintroduction to OpenDNS

You may be wondering how this works, and it’s really very simple. First go to OpenDNS.com and create an account for their parental controls. We choose OpenDNS Home, which takes only a few minutes to set up and is completely free.

All they really need is some basic information, however, they may prompt you for more. When you’re done creating an account, you will need to confirm via the email address you provided.

The next screen you encounter will explain to you how to change your DNS for various clients and access points on your network.

Instructions for changing your DNS on your router, PC, server, and even mobile devices are available. We’ll go ahead and quickly show you how to do all that in the coming sections.

Changing Your DNS

You have two configuration options on your home network. You can change the DNS on your router, which is the main connection point to and from the Internet.

This has the advantage of covering everything in an umbrella of protection. This is also its disadvantage because every computer behind the router must then use the same router settings unless you specifically assign a client to use another DNS server.

Another disadvantage is that there’s no way to tell, at least with the free version of OpenDNS, where the traffic is coming from, so if you see a bunch of blocked websites, it could be you, it could be your spouse, it could be your children, or anyone else who comes over and connects to your network.

Preferred Method: Configuring Your Router

Nevertheless, the preferred method to using OpenDNS is to configure your router to direct all DNS request through their servers.

We’re going to explain the basic method for changing your router’s DNS. You should most definitely check out the guide corresponding guide for your router when it’s time to set yours up, especially if it’s not immediately apparent how to do so.

In general though, this is what you should expect when configuring your router. First access your router’s configuration panel by opening it in your preferred web browser. We covered this in Lesson 2, so if you’re unsure how to do this, we recommend reading it.

Once you’ve got your router open, you want to locate where you can input different DNS servers. OpenDNS’s primary DNS server is 208.67.222.222 and their secondary server is 208.67.220.220. In the screenshot below, we see where we enter that on our router.

Once inputted, you will need to save your changes. Depending on your router, it may be an actual “Save” button or it may say “Apply.” Regardless, if you don’t commit your changes, they won’t take effect.

That is all you need to do to your router, all DNS requests will now be routed through OpenDNS, however, you still need to flush your DNS resolver cache and web browser cache.

Clearing Your DNS Resolver Cache on Windows Clients

Open a command prompt on Windows 7 or Windows 8.1 by opening the Start menu or Start screen, respectively, and entering “cmd” in the search box. Instead of simply hitting “Enter” though, use “Ctrl + Shift + Enter” to open an administrator command prompt. You will know you have administrator privileges because it will say so in the title bar.

With the command prompt open, type “ipconfig /flushdns” (the command is the same for both Windows 7 and Windows 8.1). You should do this on all your Windows clients, so if your kids each have a computer, you want to flush their DNS caches.

Clearing the DNS Resolver Cache on OS X Clients

To clear the DNS resolver cache on your Mac, you will need open the Terminal.

With the Terminal open, type the appropriate command:

sudo dscacheutil –flushcache (OS X Yosemite)

dscacheutil -flushcache;sudo killall -HUP mDNSResponder (OS X Mavericks)

sudo killall -HUP mDNSResponder (OS X Mountain Lion or Lion)

If you’re using another version of OS X, you should check out this link, which has information for flushing the DNS cache all the way back to OS X 10.3.

Clearing Your Browser History

It will be necessary to also clear any and all caches on whatever browsers you use.

On Windows, you’re most likely using one or more of the three most popular browsers: Internet Explorer, Mozilla Firefox, or Google Chrome. On a Mac, it is often Safari.

Clearing Internet Explorer’s Cache

For Internet Explorer, the most consistent way to do this is to use the Internet Options found in the Control Panel. The first tab is the General settings. Click on “Delete” under Browsing History.

You can wipe everything out in one fail swoop if you like, but the cache data is known here as “Temporary Internet files and website files.” Click “Delete” when you’re ready to clear Internet Explorer’s cache.

Clearing Mozilla Firefox’s Cache

On Mozilla Firefox (as of writing, we’re using version 31), you want to click on the Menu icon and select “History.”

Then choose “Clear Recent History…” from the options near the top of the History Sidebar.

First, select “Everything” in “Time range to clear:” and then you also want to open the “Details” so you can see what is to be deleted. Note in the screenshot, the option you definitely want to select is “cache.”

Click “Clear Now” when you’re ready and Firefox’s cache (and whatever other options you choose) will be deleted.

Clearing Google Chrome’s Cache

When clearing Chrome’s cache, open the menu and select “History” from the list. Alternately, you can use “Ctrl + H”.

On the resulting History screen, click “Clear browsing data…” to delete the cache.

We want to “obliterate” browsing data from “the beginning of time.” Make sure you’ve have selected “Cache images and files” from the list. The rest is up to you.

Once you’re ready to commit, click “Clear browsing data” and everything in the cache will be wiped clean.

Clearing Safari’s Cache

Simply open the Safari’s preferences (the fastest way to do this is to use “Command + ,”) and then click on the “Privacy” tab.

Click “Remove All Website Data…” and then “Remove Now” on the subsequent screen.

Alternative Method: Configuring Individual Clients

The other option for an OpenDNS configuration is to change each client in your network, or you can change the DNS on your router, and Mom and Dad can configure their own computer with their ISP’s DNS server settings, or they can use Google’s public DNS servers (8.8.8.8 and 8.8.4.4), to access the Internet unfettered.

Changing DNS Servers on Windows Computers

That said, we’re going to show you how to configure Windows clients with OpenDNS’s settings. On Windows 7 and Windows 8.1, the routes and ends are the same. We’ll show you the screenshots from Windows 8.1.

Both Windows systems should have an icon of the network to which you are connected in the lower-right corner of the taskbar. Right-click on that network icon, in this screenshot, it’s a wired connection but on your computer it may be a Wi-Fi bars.

Regardless of your network connection adapter, you want to choose “Open Network and Sharing Center” and then choose “Change adapter settings” on the left-hand side.

When the adapter screen opens, you want to right-click on your network adapter (you will probably only have one, and it will probably be a Wi-Fi connection) and then choose “Properties.” In the following screenshot, our wired connection “Eth0” has a great many items attributed to it but the one we want to affect should be at or near the bottom.

Select “Internet Protocol Version 4 (TCP/IPv4) from the list and then choose “Properties” underneath it.

You now find yourself on your adapters IPv4 properties screen where you can input your custom DNS settings. Select “Use the following DNS server addresses” and you can then input OpenDNS’s servers, or you can input your ISP’s DNS servers for an adult-friendly alternative configuration.

In the following screenshot, you see how this looks with an OpenDNS configuration.

When you’re finished, click “OK” and while you’re at it, go about the processes we discussed previously for flushing the DNS cache and browser cache(s). At this point, any computers using the OpenDNS’s servers can thus be filtered and logged.

Alternatively, click the “Advanced…” button, then the “DNS” tab.

On the DNS tab, you can then “Add” DNS servers and order them in order of use using the green arrows on the right side of the tab.

Changing DNS Servers on a Mac

Like Windows clients, OS X will assume you want to use your router’s DNS servers unless otherwise specified. To change the DNS servers on OS X, open Spotlight (“Command + Space”) and then choose the Network system preferences.

On the resulting windows, choose your Wi-Fi (or LAN) connection and then click “Advanced” in the bottom-right corner.

Once the advance settings are open, you want to click the “DNS” tab, and just like on Windows clients add OpenDNS servers using the + button.

Click “OK” to save your new settings and return to the Network system preferences.

Changing DNS Servers on an Android Device

To change the DNS servers on an Android device, open your Wi-Fi settings and long-press on your connection.

Choose “modify network” from the two choices.

On the next screen, tap “show advanced options.”

In the advanced options, scroll down to the DNS servers and change them to OpenDNS’s (or Google’s) servers.

Click “Save” and you’re finished.

Changing DNS Servers on an iOS Device

If you use an iPhone or iPad, you too can change your DNS servers. Open your device’s WiFi settings and tap the blue “i” next to your connection.

In your connection’s settings screen, simply change your DNS servers. Since most DNS has two servers, you’d want to separate them with a comma, in order of preference (DNS 1, DNS 2).

Finally, tap the “Wi-Fi” back button and you’re finished. Your iPhone or iPad will now use the assigned DNS when it connects to your connection via Wi-Fi.

A Quick Overview of Free OpenDNS

When you first access OpenDNS, you’ll need to add your home network. If you’re connecting from a computer from within your network, your IP address will be shown at the top. Go to the Settings tab to add your network.

You also want to take a moment to set your web content filtering level. Filtering is spread across three levels in 26 categories. Click “View” to view the categories and “Customize” to add or remove categories to create custom filtering levels.

If you are happy with the level of filtering but there’s a site or two that you don’t want your kids to access, you can add them specifically to the filter.

Once you select a filter, it should take about three minutes for the changes to take effect. Thereafter, when your kids visit something blocked by OpenDNS, they’ll see a screen similar to this.

In addition to the OpenDNS’s filters, there’s a great many other options you can investigate, but before we conclude today, we want to touch upon the “Stats” features found in OpenDNS. You might be happy with the way OpenDNS filters web content and if so, that’s great. But if you want to know what kind of traffic is going in and out of your network, you’ll want to take a glance at network stats.

Stats can be shown for a range of dates, whether it’s the most recent week, or a whole month, you can look at requests and see what websites your clients are visiting. You can even download a copy of the log or output to a printer.

OpenDNS gives you a relatively barebones approach to parental controls – filtering and logging – but that may be enough for many families. When combined with other methods, other parental controls methods for example, it can really wrap your network in a tight protective cocoon.

Even if you use your system’s baked-in parental controls, OpenDNS is nice to have as a backup filtering and monitoring layer, especially if you have devices on your home network that use your Internet connection such as tablets and phones.

With all that aside, let’s hear from you. Is OpenDNS something you would use or are you an OpenDNS expert? Talk to us in the discussion forum and let us know what you think.