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Books on CD are a wonderful thing

Just like Rick, I also spend a lot of time in my car driving from one appointment to another. Lately I have discovered the joy of reading, both traditional books and audio books.

All through school I was never much of a reader. In fact, it wasn't until college that I actually kept up with reading the required text and that was only in classes that I enjoyed like American Government and Creative Non-fiction (yes that was a real class I took).

Late last year I installed a nice bookshelf in our bathroom and since then I have read about 5 books and too many entire magazines to count.

Windows 98 vs. Windows Vista

I've seen a fair amount of Windows 98 machines lately and read many, many articles and reviews about the upcoming (six months?) release of Windows Vista. If a computer user doesn't load a Windows 98 machine with bloated security software (Norton) or too many background programs and utilities, it runs pretty darn well…even fast! Windows Vista, on the other hand, continues to baffle industry experts on exactly what the purpose of the 'upgrade' is. After simplifying the operating system choices and essentially having one version of Windows, there will be at least five versions to choose from next year!

You are wasting money!!

Yes, YOU are wasting money if you don't take advantage of this web site, our newsletter and the radio show. One common trait that Adam and I share (despite occasional thoughts to the contrary by our wives), is that we hate wasting money on technology. Of course, we love technology, but we don't like throwing money at it unnecessarily. Not too many technology nerds will tell you not to upgrade your Windows 98. Likewise, not too many technology people will tell you not to buy a photo printer.

We look at each individual situation and customize our answers and solutions to the requirements and uses of each computer user. Pre-packaged, one size fits all tech support and advice does not work, never did work, and never will work. People are too regimented and stubborn to change their ways without significant reason or pain. We recognize that human trait and strive to mold our advice to each individual situation. Not only do we strive to provide that kind of service, I challenge you to find anyone, anywhere who accomplishes such a task at the level we do!

A Better Movie Theater Business Model

I have always enjoyed SciFi and superhero movies. My three favorite movies until I was in high school were Superman, Star Wars and Raiders of the Lost Ark. Since then I have learned to appreciate the art of finer cinema, but I still l will go back and watch each of these three movies at least once each year.

Superman Returns starts today but I probably won't go see it. I would love to take my family to it, but it would cost our family $36 if we sneak candy in.

Once we are in the theater we have to figure that at least two of the kids will need to use the restroom during the movie and so we will likely only see 110 minutes or less of a 120 minute movie.

Keep all your disks and documentation

I worked on a computer today which needed reformatting because of massive failure from viruses and spyware. They handn't followed the "Castellini on Computers Approach to Security" so the computer needed my help. When I need to perform a reformat, I need to have all the original software or restore CD's to get everything up and running again. If my customer doesn't have the disks, then I have to search the Internet for their particular system.

The most important disks contain the information that tells Windows how to interact with your attached hardware (drivers). Usually, they are contained on either a restore CD or a CD marked Drivers and Utilities. Keep in mind that you can save time and money by putting all the original documentation and any disks that came with your new system (except for the AOL disk) in a manilla envelope or big zip lock bag. This is all important and vital information to your computer.

So, what’s wrong with AOL?

Everybody is picking on AOL this week. MSNBC had a huge story on the poor quality of AOL's customer service and (as Rick pointed out) AOL made it to number one on PC World's "25 Worst Tech Products of All Time."

So, what's wrong with AOL? I will use an analogy to explain. Imagine a small pioneer road in the early 1800s. In the early days of roads the shortest distance between two points was any path that started and ended in convenient locales. How fast the road was to travel, the smoothness of the road, and the incline made little difference.

RAID – It’s not just for cockroaches anymore

I worked on a computer this weekend that had two hard drives (150 GB each) in a RAID (Redundant Array of Independent (or Inexpensive) Disks) configuration. It was the first time I had worked with this type of computer. There are different flavors of RAID available and they are described as Level 0, Level 2, etc). In simple terms, RAID automatically makes copies of everything on the first hard drive to the second hard drive…also known as mirroring.

This is done for a couple of reasons. The first is obviously backup. RAID allows for continuous seamless (and transparent) backup from one drive to the other. Performance for some applications like high end graphics or Computer Aided Drafting (CAD) becomes slightly better with hard drives configured in a RAID format. Up until recently, RAID has been reserved primarily for computer servers (think large offices, Internet providers, web hosting, etc). Hard drive costs have dropped dramatically in recent years and storage size is skyrocketing. These two factors are propelling the implementation of RAID in personal computers.

Cell phone confession

There are two facts about my business:

  1. I could not do my job without a cell phone.
  2. I would not make much money to feed my family if I didn’t talk while driving.

Many cities and even states are looking at banning talking on cell phones while driving. Some want an all out ban, others say the driver must use a ‘hands-free’ setup. Unlike many drivers, I still keep a picture firmly planted in my head of the horrific crashes we were shown in Drivers Ed almost a quarter century ago. I also remind myself daily that my odds of getting in a fender-bender are higher than others because of the mileage I spend on the road (all my work is done on-site, so I travel from job-to-job all day long versus commuting to and from a central office).

MSCONFIG: These items are unneccessary

We talk about the Microsoft Configuration Utility (msconfig) so much, that we have a t-shirt available for it in our store. Msconfig is accessed by:

  1. Click Start
  2. Click Run
  3. Type:   msconfig
  4. Click OK

Once in the utility, you want to click the "Startup" tab. Here is a list of some the programs that can be safely unchecked. After doing so, click OK, and restart the computer as instructed and your computer should run just a little better.

  • jusched – Java update utility
  • realsched – RealOne Player update  utility
  • qttask – QuickTime system tray icon
  • realplay – automatically starts RealOne Player
  • Microsoft Office Fast Start – a starter program to help launch Office applications a hair faster
  • Anything Adobe – Adobe Reader is used so seldom, that having it start its utilities every time we start our computer is a waste of precious computing cycles and resources
  • Sonic Update – update utility for Sonic CD burning software
  • Kodak Updater – This update utility from Kodak really eats at performance
  • Music Match or mmplayer – an audio player that has no business starting automatically
  • iTunes Helper – especially if you don’t use an iPod. If you do own an iPod, it isn’t a necessary program to run at startup
  • AOLSP Scheduler – And anything else labeled with AOL…again,  unnecessary to start all this stuff at startup.
  • Microsoft Works Calendar or Update – neither should start at boot up
  • Money Express and/or Agent – related to Microsoft’s Quicken like program "Money"
  • Qagent – Quicken utility
  • Quickbooks Update – Quickbooks updates can be initiated from Help in the Quickbooks program. 
  • Tkbell – related to RealOne player
  • Iomega – related to Iomega external or internal drives and how icons are displayed
  • Reminder – Greeting card programs of various brands. If you don’t use the reminder program, uncheck this box. 

These are the most frequent programs we come across that do NOT need to start automatically. Unchecking the boxes in msconfig has absolutely no effect on running the actual programs. For more information on what the heck is starting up automatically on your computer, check out this easily navigatable list. 

 

I love PayPal

I have been raising a little money by selling stuff on eBay so I can buy my wife a Ferrari for Mothers day. As it turns out, the items I sold only went for about $50, so I will have to find her something else.

EBay is amazing, but PayPal is amazing-er (a little Bushism).

Both items closed yesterday and by this morning I had the money in my PayPal account. I took the items to the post office and I used my PayPal debit card to pay for the shipping.

When I got home I took a look at my PayPal balanced and saw that I was earning 4.62% on my PayPal money market account which requires no minimum balance and has no limits on withdrawls.