Youngstown Computer Show Notes for Feb 28 2009

Youngstown Computer Show
February 28, 2009

Segment 1

Last two weeks' poll: http://jdany.freepolls.com/cgi-bin/pollresults/025

New game server at youngstown Computer: counterstrike server

New poll: keyboarding: What is your level of typing skill? http://jdany.freepolls.com/cgi-bin/pollresults/026

Caller 1
Q: Chrome is crashing when trying to install flash
A: it might take several times, but it will eventually install, try to install the latest version of Chrome too

Amnesty Weekend: grab your computer and bring it into the shop today, there will be pizza too, and a Q&A session. Two sessions: 2:30-3:30 covering Windows, and 4:00-5:00 covering the internet.


Segment 2

More about the session: $75 for the session and cleaning

Magic Jack, how much is power is consumed because you have to keep your computer on all the time. $28 a year for a laptop, or $96 a year for a desktop.

FinallyFast.com, if you can't connect to the internet, then how can you get to finallyFast.com?

Poker night: http://youngstowncomputer.com/pokerhelp.htm

Caller 2
Q: got wireless, but it only seems to work fine at home, seems flakey at other hotspots
A: the best things to do is to remove all the stored profiles, except your home settings, so that there not a chance of having conflicting settings because other hot spots could be named the same.

Caller 3
Q: if the power goes out, do you need a UPS to keep 911 access?
A: yes, plus you have to power all your cable modem, router, etc to make sure your internet stays up

News articles on 4G rollout. 50-60Mpbs. Will be coming out in a few years.


Segment 3

SSID = the name of the wireless network

Tale of a hard drive seizing up, the platter would not spin, so they had to send away the drive to another place that has a clean room for about $800

Solid state hard drives: no moving parts. much more expensive

Caller 4
Q: gets a window that there is an execution engine error, how do i get rid of it
A: take a look at the event logs to see what program is causing that error

Caller 5
Q: is there a way to save your favorites from chrome so you can keep them for a reinstall
A: don't know off-hand, check google

Caller 6
Q: outlook express had a message that it needed to compact files
A: if you want to get the archive files back, try the import function {JoeM: I think that this is just normal message, no mails will be lost, there is nothing to import, it is just cleaning up unused space}


Segment 4

Caller 7
Q: any good free anti-spyware?
A: if you have good discipline, then the free ones are ok

Caller 8
Q: screen keeps scrolling/jumping
A: the problem might be with your monitor or video card, try another monitor

Caller 9
Q: laptop will not charge the battery, it won't recognize the battery
A: sounds like the battery needs to be replaced

Caller 10
Q: how to make a wireless network secure?
A: log into the router over the network, and set up a password on the wireles network setup section, each brand of router has slightly different set up screens.

Best Bang for the Buck PC with a Core i7

If you didn't know, the latest Intel CPU is call the i7. It is the successor to the very popular Core 2 chips. The guys at Extreme Tech tried to make a best bang-for-the-buck PC with the i7 CPU for under $1,200. They almost succeeded.

http://www.extremetech.com/article2/0,2845,2341244,00.asp

Next Meeting February 17 2009

Next: This meeting we will try to operate with out our President he is taking some additional training out of town to help him do a better job at his work.

We will go a little deeper into a program that Joe talked about once before, but I find out this is one of those programs that is really great.

I will go into a little more in detail to show you how to really use this to your advantage: Windows Movie Maker.

See you Tuesday
Dick Wilson

Youngstown Computer Show Notes for Feb 14 2009

Youngstown Computer Show
February 14 2009

Valentine's day backgrounds:
http://youngstowncomputer.com/images/vd1.jpg
http://youngstowncomputer.com/images/vd2.jpg
http://youngstowncomputer.com/images/vd3.jpg

This week's poll: What would you like to know more about: http://jdany.freepolls.com/cgi-bin/pollresults/025

Poker during the breaks today:
http://74.219.220.138:8087/
choose head-to-head to play JoeD.
password = 570

Caller 1
Q: I have a computer that has Fat32 on the hard disk, but XP is running on there
A: XP can run on both. it was probably upgraded from WinME.
There can be some problems upgrading, but there are some built-in tools to help you convert.

Caller 2
Q: Can you make MP3s into a regular audio CD?
A: very simple, just tell your burning software to make an audio CD

Caller 3
Q: Question about google earth, put my address in and it came up very good, then I put in my neighbor's address about a quarter of a mile away, and it keeps coming up to my address. Is there something I can delete?
A: it is possible that the mapping software is mapping two address that are close enough to the same point on the map


Segment 2

For the caller from last week, there is now an article about how to make better google searches: http://www.google.com/support/websearch/bin/answer.py?answer=136861

Caller 4
Q: Running XP, I have a word document in Microsoft office word, and I went to "save as" and I put it there, and then I went to "My Computer" , and then when I click on the D: drive, where I normally store stuff, I get a message the says "The selected drive is not in use, check to make sure a disk is in the drive" even if there is a disk is in there it is not letting me record to the disk.
A: sounds like something has changes in the way the packets are sent to that CD drive, I'm wondering if something else is linking to the D: drive like a flash drive or a card reader or something like that. I usually try to make a test folder on the drive to make sure that the drive is receiving data. I would check and see that another removable drive is not kicking the CD-rom drive to another letter that Word does not recognize.

What is RSS? Really Simple syndication: It is a way for web sites to publish new items, like articles, or pictures, or audio files (podcasts) or videos (video podcasts or vlogs). You just use an RSS reader to subscribe to these feeds which will let you know when something new is available without you having to view the site directly.

Everyone make a blog. We will collect the feeds and show them on the youngstown computer site.

Caller 5
Q: got the virtuMonde virus
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vundo
A: this is the one of the toughest to get rid of. you will have to bring it into the shop to have it cleaned up.

Caller 6
Q: any reccommedations for a new laptop? do tax work, spreadsheets, etc. no gaming, but like a fast computer
A: Alienware has great, top of the line laptops. look at dell, HP, and alienware, compare what you get for the money.

Caller 7
Q: problem with an external hard drive. have about 850Gb of data, but I can't see any folders, but in DOS I can
A: don't know, please call the office


Segment 3

Bad advice from salespeople and tech support people:
Looking for video driver from Dell was told: you will have to replace your motherboard
running the restore disk, and they lost all of their stuff

Caller 8
Q: put in a new motherboard, but the restore disk will not get windows started
A: you will need to install windows from the windows install disk and get the correct drivers for the new motherboard, try different memory chips

Caller 9
Q: I tried to change the ink in a cannon printer, is there someone that could fix it?
A: it is possible to fix, but it is probably better to buy a new one


Segment 4

To improve your clicking speed, improve your mousing skills, try playing games, like this diner game on Yahoo games.

Soon to have a branch of Youngstown Computer in Austintown.

Caller 10
Q: converted my old movies to DVD, is there software to take an image from a DVD movie and just turn it into a picture that I can use for like a cd cover?
A: most capture software can do this, search download.com for programs that capture images from video. Adam recommends using Alt-printscreen to capture the image {however this might not work because video players usually use directX to play video, and those images will not show when you use the printscreen button -- JoeM}

Internet Cache - most internet browsers save pictures and all parts of web pages on your local computer to make loading of the web page faster the next time. Sometimes, if the site changes its pictures very often, to force your browser to ignore your cached data, use Ctrl-F5 to refresh from the internet.

The Ruckus service, which served lots of university campuses, has closed its doors.
http://www.paidcontent.org/entry/419-college-online-music-service-ruckus-closes-down/

Bargain All-In-One Printers (via PCMag.com)

PC magazine has a list of some great savings on some all-in-one printers, if you are looking for a new one:

http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2340851,00.asp?kc=BG021209N-2

The 20 Best Free PC Games (via ExtremeTech.com)

Looking for some cheap entertainment? ExtremeTech has a list of 20 free games for your PC. I'm going to have to give some a try.

http://www.extremetech.com/article2/0,2845,2340696,00.asp

MCCC Next Meeting: February 17 2009

I tried to get a local person to come to our meeting and speak to us: Joe Danyi, he has a local radio program on Saturday afternoon. I called him 3 times and sent him an email. The result: he did not even call or say he didn't want to do it.

So if this is the way he answers his trouble calls I guess we don't need his help.

Next: This meeting we will try to operate with out our President he is taking some additional training out of town to help him do a better job at his work.

We will go a little deeper into a program that Joe talked about once before, but I find out this is one of those programs that is really great.

I will go into a little more in detail to show you how to really use this to your advantage: Windows Movie Maker.

See you Tuesday

Dick Wilson

Youngstown Computer Show Notes for Feb 7 2009

Segment 1

Last week's poll: http://jdany.freepolls.com/cgi-bin/pollresults/018
This week's poll: Your Safety Zone, how much do you do online
http://jdany.freepolls.com/cgi-bin/pollresults/019
Joe D had a bad week: car, furnace, GPS, laptop screen all failed
Joe D talks about his adventures about buying a new power cord for his GPS on bestbuy.com.

Youngstown Computer 330-259-7278, 71 Terrace St. Suite 104

Caller 1
Q: I can't play the eAudio books from the library on his iPod
A: try http://download.com , search for DRM stripper.

Segment 2
We don't advocate the use of DRM stripping software, however, that stuff is out there.

Caller 2
Q: how can I search better, for more focused searches?
A: there is an article about that we posted a while back, we will post it later.

Caller 3
Q: where is my email stored? locally or on the server? when I get a crash, I lose all my emails
A: you will have to see where msn stores your local mail folders and make sure you back those up

Caller 4
Q: when I copy my resume from Word to an online job application, all the formatting is messed up
A: try paste it into Notepad first, then copy and paste that into the web application. web apps usually cannot take bold, underlining, etc.

Caller 5
Q: he wants to take files from one computer to another
A: try using a flash drive, copy the stuff you want onto the flash drive, then put the flash drive into the new computer and copy the files to the new computer
All of your personal stuff is stored under "Documents and Settings\[username]" on XP, "users\[username]" on vista.

Weekly poker game: http://www.youngstowncomputer.com/pokerhelp.htm

Segment 3
Adam had a karaoke debut.

News:
Magic jack has had a lot of good reviews, but...as more people are getting into it, there are more problems. There is no call-in tech support. http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2340417,00.asp
Joe D does not look at beta software, so he has not looked at Win 7 beta. http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windows-7/default.aspx
IE 8 release candidate is out though, and he does seem to like it. http://www.microsoft.com/windows/internet-explorer/beta/default.aspx

Caller 6
Q: my ISP says that I need a new driver, or uninstall/install it
A: this is a tough thing to troubleshoot, try another ISP to see if that is the problem

Caller 7
Q: your history thing? what were you saying about it?
A: yes, IE 8 has a privacy mode that turns off the history

Caller 8
Q: vista recovered to an earlier restore point, and now norton won't update itself, and the microphone won't turn on
A: Joe D thinks that there might be more than one problem, you should bring it into the shop


Segment 4

Apps on the iPhone.
http://pmsbuddy.com/
ipod stungun: Stun-O-Matic http://itunes.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewSoftware?id=301317579&mt=8
google latitude http://www.google.com/latitude/intro.html
http://supportyoungstown.com

Caller 9
Q: can't find an worksheet that I got as an attachment and worked on and saved, but I can't find it
A: go to the start ment and choose search or find, then search for the name or part of the name, you can also look in the contents, so look for something that you know is in the file and not in others. it is probably in the temporary files folder