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:
eBay has been around for more than 10 years. However, many computer users still find eBay either dangerous or hard to figure out. In this week’s tip, I set forth some simple steps to help make your eBay experience, a good experience.
In the video, I demonstrate my four steps to finding a reputable eBay buyer:
I also point out, in the video, that none of these rules work unless we all leave honest feedback after the completion of any auction you complete…good or bad. I didn’t mention in the video that you should always know your product and not get caught up in the excitement of auction bidding and over-bid your position.
Take a look at the video below…it will save you a lot of grief when buying on eBay, and probably make you a more frequent eBay buyer!
Those of you who have kept up with me over the years know that I’m not a utility junkie. The fewer utilities and installed programs the better for me.
That being said, I admire and cherish great utilities that serve purposes I need. Some of my favorites over the years include Tech Smith’s Snag It screen capture tool and Camtasia which I use to create our video tips. I also am never without a desktop tape calculator. My current favorite is the Moffsoft Tape Calculator.
A couple of months ago I reviewed a couple of the online backup services and really liked (and continue to use) the Mozy Backup service. Today, Mozy announced the release of their online backup system for Macintosh users. You can read more about it and try it out by clicking this link.
Microsoft Framework .NET consists of a set of tools that allow programmers to tap into some web related technologies for creating rich, interactive applications for our computers and web sites. Unfortunately, it sometimes causes problems as well. This week alone, I helped 3 Quickbooks users overcome problems with their programs hanging or failing to start by uninstalling and reinstalling the .NET Framework.
Starting with Windows 95 all the way through today’s Windows Vista, Microsoft supplied computer users with a great tool listing the different hardware devices attached to and residing in our computers. This tool is called the Device Manager.
Today’s tip focuses on how to use the Device Manager to troubleshoot a video card, sound card or other internal hardware problem. If you suddenly lose sound or your monitor’s picture lacks the quality it had before, or you can’t connect your high speed modem to your computer, this tip will solve the problem a high percentage of the time.
1. RIGHT Click on My Computer from your desktop or Start menu (XP & Vista)
2. Click Properties (or use the Windows key + Pause/Break key to replace these two steps)
3. Click Device Manager (Windows 95-Me, Vista). or in WindowsVista Click the Hardware tab –> then click Device Manager (XP)
4. Click the “+” sign next to the device having the problem
5. RIGHT Click the device itself
6. Click Remove (Windows 95-Me) or Uninstall (XP & Vista)
7. Close any open screens and shut down your computer (don’t just restart, shut it all the way off)
8. When Windows restarts, it should re-recognize your hardware and function properly again.
If these steps don’t work, then you get some extra computer help.
Watch the short (2 minutes) video below to see these steps in action!
My favorite online application suite, Zoho, just got a little more powerful today for spreadsheet users. The Zoho spreadsheet, known as Zoho Sheet, added two huge features today; Macros and Pivot Tables.
Power spreadsheet users use these two features often and will appreciate Zoho Sheet’s new found power. For an overview, watch this video from Zoho:
Get used to me writing more articles about Web 2.0 applications…applications that run in your web browser. I’ve written many already, but today I’m writing about the CNET people’s choice awards for best Web 2.0 applications in ten categories ranging from productivity to entertainment. This is CNET’s second year compiling the awards. This year almost 2 million votes were cast for over 300 Web 2.0 applications.
Many of my own favorites won awards including Zoho, Netflix, LogMeIn, Wikipedia, Gmail, Woot, Firefox, and Pandora. Click over to the article and read about some of these amazing applications.
Computing power is truly leaving the desktop and moving to the Internet. I personally think web computing makes perfect sense for a majority of computer users. Let me know what you think of Web 2.0 or what online applications are your favorites by leaving a comment below!
Last week I wrote a tip called 7 Habits of highly inefficient Internet Users. The very first habit I wrote about was the use of old browsers. Literally, the next day PayPal (the leading online payment source for eBay and person-to-person payments) announced that it would stop supporting old browsers and users who did not upgrade to more modern and safer browsers would not be able to use the service. This will not be an isolated incident. Some banks also require the use of at least Internet Explorer 6 with all its updates or Firefox 2.0.
The iPod has set the standard for media players. It’s ease of use and intuitive interface make it a device that media lovers of all ages and expertise can easily pickup and use.
However, the iPod has one disadvantage when compared with almost every other media player on the market. Once your music is stored on the system, there is no simple way of getting it back off again. If you switch computers or simply want to make a backup of your tunes, you must find a way around this system Apple has put in place to prevent you from pirating the music that has been purchased from iTunes.