If you have noticed your computer running a little sluggish and slow lately, it might be time to defragment your hard drive. Your hard drive does need to be cleaned out regularly and defragmented in order to keep everything working...
In the course of doing my job, I use certain programs on a regular basis. On any given day, I might be doing word processing, web design, programming, image editing, trouble shooting, and of course email and web surfing. Here...
"My computer seems to get slower and slower. A friend told me I need a registry cleaner. Will that really help? If so, where can I get a good free registry cleaner to do the job?"...
"How can I password protect a file on my Windows XP system? I want to add a password so that nobody can open the file without knowing the password. I tried the Sharing and Security option, but there was no...
"I've heard that Google keeps a log of everything that people search for. If this is true, can I delete my search history? Who else is keeping track of what I search for?"...
“A tech support guy told me my system is running FAT, and advised me to convert my hard drive to NTFS. I didn’t really understand his explanation… can you explain the difference and when it makes sense to convert FAT...
"I'm looking for a pocket-sized video camera with a price tag that's just as small. Can you recommend some tiny digital video cameras that don't cost a fortune?"...
Are you a camera klutz? Don't know the difference between an f-stop and a fill flash? Then today's new automated digital cameras are just perfect for you. Just point and click, they do the rest. Here are my picks for...
You've opened a Gmail account and now you can send and receive email on the web. Lots of email... 5.2 gigs and counting. But beyond all that space, Google's Gmail can give you better control over how you manage your...
Do you have a clean hard drive? If you're selling a computer or discarding a hard drive, you'll want to clean off your personal files first. Or maybe you're getting that annoying "low disk space" message. Don't ignore it, or...
Who is Craig, and what's on his list? If you have something to sell, or something to say, and you haven't heard of Craigslist, read on......
"I have photos, MP3s and some Word documents on my hard drive. How can I share my hard drive online so that just certain people can access my files? My colleagues have Internet access but we do not share a...
"On Facebook, I always get invitations to add 'applications' to my profile. Some sound interesting, but I'm not even sure what an application is. Are they part of Facebook, or something from the outside? Do I need to worry about...
Can the boss really see when you're surfing the Internet at work? Can the geeks from the IT Department monitor everything you do on your PC? Are any of them keeping tabs on those last twenty minutes of your lunch...
"I keep getting emails from friends about adding my cell phone to a Do Not Call registry. Looks like a scam to me... Is the Do Not Call Registry for real, and if so, should I put both my home...
"Suddenly, I can no longer upload music to Myspace. The message says 'Your upload privileges have been suspended' but all copyrights are mine. Any suggestions?"...
Devoted fans of Macs and PCs have been in heated debate for years, even before those "I'm a Mac", "I'm a PC" commercials ever appeared. Let's set aside the question of which camp is "right" and focus on the reasons...
Going online can be like taking a walk in the park after midnight. Behind every tree there may be someone getting ready to mug you. This article will tell you how to surf the web with a higher level of...
"I keep seeing articles that mention something called Web 2.0, but they never give a good definition. What is Web 2.0? How is it different than the one Al Gore invented, and when is Web 3.0 coming?"...
It's happened to all of us at some point. One stray mouse click, and poof! You've deleted a file that you did not mean to. But must it really be the final goodbye to that file? Happily, there are tons...
"I downloaded Cute Partition Manager and was just about to delete the restore partition from the D drive of my old computer. I just want to make sure that doing so won't mess up the info on the C drive....
"When I start up my computer, the printer starts printing out a bunch of almost-blank garbage pages, containing hearts, smilies and lots of other gibberish. I don't know why it does this, and don't know how to stop it. Can...
I just did a search for my phone number on Google and was shocked at the results that popped up. It showed my full name, street address and a map of my neighborhood with a big arrow pointing to my...
"My daughter has two Myspace accounts. One gives out too much personal information and we want to delete it. But we don't remember the password and we no longer have access to the email account she used to create the...
"I'm having a terrible time with spam emails. Suddenly I started getting dozens per day, and I can't seem to get rid of them. Is there a spam blocker or spam filter that's easy and just works?"...
After helping a friend clean up a nasty spyware infestation, we had one remaining problem. Windows would say "RPC Server is Unavailable" when starting up, and also later when trying to print or install new software. Some other things just...
"When I go to My Computer the CDROM and DVD icons are gone. They were there yesterday, and working fine. It seems like this happened after I removed some CD burner software. Now I can't install anything from a CDROM,...
"I'm having trouble starting up my Windows XP system. A friend told me to run the Recovery Console from the bootup screen, and then enter some commands. But I don't see a Recovery Console option when I turn on the...
Cyberspace malefactors are enslaving millions of unsecured computers into zombie networks that are responsible for spewing out mountains of spam and attacking legitimate websites that oppose the spammers. Is your PC part of the problem? Find out now......
"I got a warning from a friend who told me not to use the Google Desktop program. He says it will secretly make copies of my personal files and send them to Google's own servers, and from there they could...
"My daughter is 12 years old and I just found out she has a Myspace account with some stuff that's not appropriate. The account was deleted, but I want to make sure she has no access to Myspace in the...
"My child is 16 and has a Myspace page. He tells me the only way to make his Myspace profile private is to set his age to 14 or 15 years old. Is there a way to set the Myspace...
Have you ever visited a friend's Myspace profile and they had some cool music playing when the profile is displayed? Here's how you can add music to your Myspace profile......
"I have Windows XP and the system has gotten very slow and flaky. I would like to learn how to reformat the drive. Can you teach me in simple English how to completely format the drive and then re-install the...
"When I run Task Manager, I see a process named lsass.exe that is active. I'm worried that this might be a virus... should I get rid of it?"...
I often get mail from people who misunderstand or fear browser cookies, so I've written a a guide that tells you everything need to know about these tasty little critters. Read on for a closer look at the good, the...
Remember that 1995 movie "The Net", starring Sandra Bullock? Okay, I didn't see it either. Somehow I couldn't imagine Sandra as a software engineer after watching her in "While You Were Sleeping". But I digress... the movie was a story...
"Sometimes in my emails or websites, the images do not appear, but a little red X shows up. Can you tell me please how to correct this?"...
"I've purchased a bunch of music from iTunes and have enjoyed listening to them on my computer. But my portable music player is not an Apple iPod, so I can't take my songs with me. Is there any way I...
"Some of my geeky friends are telling me that Windows XP is full of security holes, and that I am putting my privacy at risk by going online with a Windows PC. Can you offer some tips to help me...
Sooner or later, something terrible will happen to your hard drive. That's not a very happy thought, but the good news is you can survive a hard drive failure with only minimal inconvenience -- if you back up your files....
"My computer seems to get slower and slower. A friend told me to clean my registry. Will that really help, and how can I do that?"...
"How do I clear the list of sites visited in my web browser? There are some nosy people in my office and I don't want them to be able to see what web sites I have visited."...
I keep hearing about RSS, XML and RSS feeds. I have only a vague idea of what they are, but then people start talking about RSS aggregators, and I get really confused. What are they talking about and why would...
"Bob, When I send a large attachment, it keeps on resending to the recipients several times. Can you explain to me why this happens? If I notice it is sending more then once sometimes I can delete the email from...
No matter what I do, including extensive research on Firefox site and the Internet, I still get CPU usage of 99% with Firefox, and it won't go away. It stops my system until I shut it down with ctl-alt-delete. Sometimes,...
Suddenly Explorer can no longer display thumbnails. Except for .bmp files all I get is black line box with the blue E -- NOT a thumbnail of the .jpg or .gif file. Short of FORMAT what can I change to...
I started using Mozilla Thunderbird early this year. About a month ago it started acting up. When I open the program it will take from five to fifteen minutes before it will start to download any messages. Once open, it...
Norton AV just found adware and told me to go the adware site to get uninstall directions. I downloaded the instructions to a floppy, had NAV scan the floppy and it reported that the adware is on the floppy. Is...
Whenever I try to delete a file (or folder) from my CD-RW disk, I get an error message saying the file cannot be deleted because it is read-only. Changing the attribute doesn't help because the "read only" designation is automatically...
I have an e-mail "notifier" and it says "Hey you've got mail". Lately some emails have not been showing up in my Inbox, but sometimes I find an unread message in either Deleted Items or Drafts folder. Can you help...
I'm trying to clean my computer like you suggested but when I run ScanDisk it keeps restarting. Finally I get a message "ScanDisk has restarted 10 times because Windows or another program has been writing to this drive." You mention...
"I have a large number of icons in my system tray (in the left hand lower corner of the screen) which I don't use and would like to remove. Do they in anyway slow down the computer?"...
"I have some files on my computer that I want to get rid of but they just won't delete. I have tried deleting them in safe mode & still no joy. Every time I try to delete them it says...
"I accidentally deleted a picture from my photos file. How do I find and recover it?"...
"As a fairly new computer user, I find that deleting files is a problem for me. When I want to delete a file, I get a message that I should check to see what the file does before I delete...
"My computer is 5 years old and it freezes up and shuts down on me at times. So I am considering buying a new one. How do I get rid of any files on it before I donate it to...
"I received an email recently, with no attachment, and when I tried to open it, my computer froze. Even a ctrl-alt-del wouldn't help. Every time I try to open, or just click on and delete this message my computer freezes....
"When I boot up, I get a "CMOS checksum error" message and I must press F1 to continue or DELETE to enter Setup. How can I solve this problem?"...
Is your computer running slower than usual? Has your browser's start page been hijacked? Having trouble reaching your favorite search engine? Popups driving you crazy? Most likely your computer is infested with spyware, the cockroaches of the digital age....
I have an unorthodox strategy for dealing with computer viruses. It doesn't involve the use of firewalls or anti-virus software. But if everyone understood the simple virus safety tips I'll outline here, the virus writers would get very bored very...
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