photo credit: Smithsonian Institution
Name: TERRY JAMESON
From: LARKSPUR CO.
OS: Windows XP
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RICK,
I WOULD LOVE TO USE FIREFOX, BUT IT SHUTS DOWN CONSTANTLY. THE INFAMOUS BOX COMES UP AND STATES THAT IT HAS “ECOUNTERED A PROBLEM AND NEEDS TO SHUT DOWN.” I HAVE TRIED TO UPDATE IT SEVERAL TIMES, BUT IT CONTINUES TO BE A PROBLEM.
Normally, I don’t read or answer questions written to me in all caps. Not because I think the person is Continue reading →
photo credit: Heliøs
A common problem I hear throughout my week is “My computer is slow.” I finally learned to ask, “Is your computer slow, or is your Internet slow?” The computer user usually pauses, thinks and often responds that it is his or her Internet that is slow; not the computer.
When I sit down at a client’s computer, I can quickly determine the health of a computer based on how quickly I can perform simple tasks like checking background processes, determining how current and what security products are being used, free hard drive space, and how much RAM is installed on the machine. Generally speaking, if a computer was bought any time after Continue reading →
This is a re-release of an almost 2 year old tip that you probably missed…it will save you boat loads of time!!!
Firefox 3.0 was released last week after a long development period. The Mozilla folks put together an extremely good package and made genuine improvements in speed and features…a rare accomplishment in today’s software arena where programs get larger and less usable.
The feature I use the most, so far, is the incredibly fast Continue reading →
photo credit: alvi2047
If you don’t mind sitting at your desk to watch a television program you missed or just want to see it on your own time, you can do so using the web. Everyday, the number of TV watchers watching live television drops. The phenomenon is so big, it now has its own name: time shifting. Time shifting means watching a program on your own time instead of the time listed in the TV listings.
The most common way to time shift your TV watching is the Digital Video Recorder (DVR) made popular by the TiVo service and now included in almost any satellite or cable package. However, watching TV shows on the web is becoming more and more popular with the majority of Internet users finally using high speed connections and the improved watching experience available on the web.
In today’s meeting, I discussed Continue reading →
photo credit: mansikka
Over the past few weeks, I witnessed many situations in my daily computer help rounds that would have been far less painful and costly for the computer user IF they utilized the cloud.
The cloud I refer to is a broad term for using programs found on the web versus on your computer. Another commonly used term for this type of computing is Web 2.0. Here are some examples of problems I ran into recently that could have been minimized or avoided had the person used a cloud application.
Today, for example, I had a client who had a problem with Microsoft Outlook and an Internet Explorer 8.0 update gone awry. Her ability to email, access her calendar, contacts, and to-do list were all lost. Cloud solution: Web based email and calendar systems from Google or Yahoo.
Earlier this week, a customer needed to Continue reading →
photo credit: Adam Tinworth
Probably the biggest single misconception I hear from computer users almost daily goes like this: “I never open anything from someone I don’t know, so I’m safe.”
I promptly offer a retort to this highly uninformed comment by saying that many security breeches occur because of an email or message (think Facebook, Twitter, etc) that appears to be from a friend or family member. The bad guys in the tech world know precisely how to manipulate the minds of unsuspecting computer users…it’s called social engineering.
And because they know that many computer users put a lot of credence into this false thought process, they work harder to make their messages appear to be from trusted people or companies.
Messages that appear to be from your friend can be used if their address was Continue reading →
This is a quick tip on using an extra feature of tabbed browsing. What’s tabbed browsing? If you aren’t using tabbed browsing yet, you need to start…today! Click here to get started and learn how to put this powerful feature of all modern browsers to work for you.
Today’s intermediate tabbed browsing tip only works in Firefox, Google Chrome, and Opera. Microsoft has not Continue reading →
photo credit: jennconspiracy
I’ve written about this before, but it bares repeating on occasion for new visitors to the site and long time visitors who haven’t learned yet. The advice is simple:
Do not download free screensavers, wallpaper, email programs (Incredimail, etc), or games from the Internet.
Unless you are WELL versed in the origin of these items, they can easily destroy your computer’s ability to compute.
“Slow computer” is the most common computer ailment Windows users search for on the web. Sadly, slow computer disease (SCD*), does not have to be the pandemic it is because it is 100% preventable.
Here are my 5 simple rules to prevent SCD for Windows users: Continue reading →
AVG released version 9 of their free antivirus/antispyware product a couple of weeks ago. You may have started to see notifications from them that you need to update before December 1. Typically, they provide a deadline, but previous versions work for a number of months after the deadline. Continue reading →
Google started as a college project 12 years ago, then as a startup search engine just 10 years ago. Today, Google owns more than 60% of all web search traffic and employs close to 22,000 employees worldwide.
You probably interact with Google via their search engine primarily. However, you are missing out on some truly great services that Google also provides in addition to their fast and accurate search engine.
In this article, I will share 7 of the many other services Google provides.
When you arrive at google.com, click the link that says News at the top of the page or you can directly visit news.google.com. Google News is an auto-generated news page that refreshes automatically every 5-10 minutes and displays headlines from more than 4500 news sources around the world. To me, it is the ultimate newspaper?unbiased and unfiltered. And even more helpful, starting a Continue reading →
HelpMeRick.com started as a monthly tip site for beginners in 1996, and now supports our popular call-in computer show, and hosts thousands of useful computer tips and links.
Even if you are an experienced computer user, use our site as a resource to provide help to the friends, family members and co-workers you provide tech support for every day.
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