Windows 7 – First Impressions

I just finished installing the Windows 7 Beta version released by Microsoft on Friday. I installed it on my Toshiba Intel dual-core processor with 4 GB of RAM. It was running Windows Vista which took more than 4 minutes to fully boot (I consider the boot up process to be finished when the hard drive stops spinning and I don’t have to compete with a still booting computer to do what I want to do), and running any...

Rick’s Answers his email Videocast – 0...

Brought to you by Harlene, Kristina, Sage, Herb, Crystal, Marion, Mariane, Donna, Dona, Chris, Barbara, and Rosie this week’s edition includes some AVG questions and frustrations, Macintosh advice, Microsoft Office 2007 problems, and of course much more! ...

Microsoft Word’s AutoComplete and AutoCorrec...

If you use Microsoft Word, you may notice that at the end of a letter, if you start typing ‘Sin’, a little yellow box flashes up with ‘Sincerely’ in it. Likewise, if you start a letter with ‘To whom’, the box flashes at you with ‘To whom it may concern’. These little yellow boxes are part of Word’s Auto-Complete and Auto Format functions. Microsoft Word tries to guess...

Netbooks are NOT made for Windows XP or Vista

One year ago, ASUS started a fire storm of new computers that now go by the name of netbooks with the release of their EeePC.  I wrote about this subject just a few months ago, but with the holidays approaching and netbooks are high on gift giver’s radar screens so I want to explore netbooks a little more in depth. Netbooks make attractive gift giving ideas for a few reasons: They are inexpensive; usually cost...

What is Open Source?

Open Source software began soon after computers became main stream in offices and then homes. In a nut shell, Open Source refers to software developed under a set standard of rules that developers agree upon to make the software freely available, no penalties for copying or sharing the programs (in fact, it is encouraged to share the software), the source code (programming) must be made available to anyone, and the software...

Get a new computer for almost free

If you would like or might even need a new computer, but aren’t crazy about spending $500-1500 in our current financial environment, consider upgrading your computer for free. Yes, I said free. The only investment you will incur is some time. “How”, you ask? By upgrading your computer’s operating system to one of the many Linux options. As many of you know, I started dabbling and learning more about...

Choose how many recently opened files show in Micr...

In almost any program where you can create, save, and edit documents, clicking the File menu (or the Office orb in Office 2007) shows a list of your most recently used documents for that program. With Microsoft Office, you can control exactly how many recent documents are shown. With Microsoft Office 2003 applications (Word, Excel, PowerPoint, etc) and all versions prior, you control this option by following these steps in...

Vista can run faster if you…

I just finished my normal Sunday morning routine of breakfast with the Sunday paper. I always peruse the Sunday high tech ads to keep tabs on prices. Computer prices continue to drop (and I still think manufacturers are getting a kick back from Microsoft) to help spur sluggish sales. However, the past few weeks, I picked up on another trend; increased RAM. In this week’s big 4 ads (Office Depot, Office Max, Circuit...

Adobe Reader 9 update – DON’T DO IT!

Adobe released version 9 of their PDF (Portable Document Format) Reader program. Once the king and almost sole PDF reader on the market, it, like so many other mainstream programs, has become bloated beyond recognition. This software bloat slows down the performance of even the fastest computers, and for this reason, I firmly stand against software bloat. I added Adobe Reader to my do not use list almost two years ago....

Solution to strange folders synchronizing error in...

I ran into a problem with Microsoft Outlook 2007 that I never seen. When Outlook was running, a small icon in the system tray was working like crazy on synchronizing folders. Synchronizing folders in Outlook 2007 is usually reserved for large office environments where users share calendars, contacts, etc. This particular computer user was on a standalone system. The little icon itself wasn’t the problem, but the fact...

More Linux success stories

I want to keep singing the praises of an operating system that I used to make fun of on our show; Linux. In partial defense of myself, Linux traditionally has been known as the geeks operating system, and a user needed to be permanently attached to a forum for help and have an affinity for the command prompt or as its known in Linux, the terminal. That started to change about 10 years ago or so with the advent of Graphical...

Great digital photography debate topics

Technology is no different than politics in that there are a variety of topics that people have opinions on. While you may not know much about these topics now, what you know about them can have a great impact on knowing who to listen to when it comes to learning more about digital photography and related topics. PC vs. Mac: The Mac people will tell you that Macs are better for graphics, easier to use more stable. PC...

Warning: Your computer may be infected with viruse...

Extortionware? What is extortionware. I have seen at least 10 computers in the past two weeks that have recently been infected with extortionware – viruses and spyware that infect your system by pretending to be an antivirus or other security program. With names like Windows Antivirus, WinAntivirus, XP Antivirus 20008, etc. these programs appear to look and feel official. However, they are some of the worst virus or...

“If it is free, it must not be any good.R...

This statement was uttered by an imbecile. A customer of mine told me last week that he heard this quote from a tech person from some company after a discussion of AVG Free. The week before this customer’s computer was almost crippling slow primarily because it had one of the newer versions of Norton Internet Security installed. After taking Norton off the system (approximately 20-25 minutes to do so) and adding AVG,...

3 Important Steps to practice when confronted with...

Throughout my week I receive many exasperated calls from computer users and encounter flustered users when I visit their home or office. In the almost 13 years that I’ve been helping people with their computers, I have found that many problems can be resolved quickly IF the following three steps are practiced: When the event occurs, push away from the computer, take a deep breath and reach for a piece of paper and...