Your daily dose of practical, easy to follow tech tips!
Question from Melinda: I have a question about my Acer Windows laptop, Rick.
Yesterday morning I asked a friend on Facebook a computer question and his reply was that I need to run a file called cleanmgr.exe.
I’m a little leery about running .exe files because I remember reading that they can be dangerous.
Here’s my question: Is cleanmgr.exe a virus or is it safe for me to run? And if it’s safe, do you think I should run it? [Read more…]
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Question from Steve: I could use some advice, Rick. I need a 200ft Ethernet cable to run between my router and a Desktop PC that’s located on the far side of my office building?
Do you think it would be ok to connect eight 25 foot Ethernet cables together with RJ45 couplers? I already have the cables and the couplers are dirt cheap.
Do you think this would work ok? I’d like to save some money if we can, but we really need to have this machine get (and stay) online most of all.
Rick’s answer: [Read more…]
These days most people are aware that viruses, spyware, adware and other types of malware are lurking in the shadows of the Internet, just waiting for an opportunity to sneak onto their computers’ hard drives and perform all kinds of mischief.
What many folks don’t know however is just how easy it is for a computer or mobile device (and the sensitive data stored on it) to become compromised simply by using an out-of-date web browser that doesn’t have the latest security updates installed.
Question from Marc: Beginning last Tuesday, every time I load Firefox it opens the page that was open when I quit the previous session. It’s really irritating.
I must have done something wrong, but I don’t know when or how. Can you tell me how to get Firefox to always open my home page every time it loads?
Rick’s answer: Marc, somehow a key setting has been changed that’s causing Firefox to behave that way, but luckily it’s very easy to fix. Here’s how: [Read more…]
Question from Amber: After my Windows computer has been sitting idle for a few minutes the hard drive just shuts down.
When I get back on the computer and press a key or move my mouse I can hear the drive starting back up again and I have to wait several seconds before I can do anything.
This is extremely irritating. I don’t mind the hard drive shutting down when the computer goes to sleep but I want it to remain active while the computer is up and running.
How can I fix this? [Read more…]