Your daily dose of practical, easy to follow tech tips!
Question from William: Every time I check for new Windows Updates on my Windows 10 Lenovo laptop it tells me there are a couple of driver updates available as “optional” updates.
Should I go ahead and let Windows Update install those optional updates or should I just skip them?
I’ve been confused by this for a long time.
Rick’s answer: [Read more…]
The Coronavirus pandemic has left lots of folks looking for some way to make up for lost income.
Unfortunately, that presents an opportunity for crooks and scammers to make a few extra bucks as well.
The latest scam to hit the Facebook world is targeting people who could use a little financial help at this difficult point in time.
Question from Carla: Is it safe to leave a laptop running in it’s laptop bag while I’m on my way to work?
I often find myself finishing up a project at the last minute and leave my computer running and crunching numbers during my commute.
A co-worker told me it’s a bad idea to carry a laptop while it’s running. Is she right?
Rick’s answer: Yes, I’m afraid your co-worker is right, Carla.
Laptops need proper air circulation or else they’ll eventually overheat and burn up. The damage done to the internal components can be gradual, but if they keep over-heating they WILL fail at some point. [Read more…]
Question from Ellen: I need to purchase a new laptop. What are your thoughts on an SSD drive vs a regular hard drive?
Costco has two HP computers going on sale both with 12GB of memory. Both come with an Intel i5 CPU.
The difference between the two machines is the first one comes with a 512GB SSD and the other one comes with a 1TB hard drive.
They both are coming with Windows 11 (which I’m not thrilled about).
Which drive do you recommend? [Read more…]
Question from Charley: Before I ask my question I want to thank you for everything you do to keep us informed and help us use our computers better.
You really are such a great help to people who are clueless like I am.
Now, I have a problem I hope you can help me with.
I recently bought my first Windows 10 computer (an HP laptop). I like it ok except for all the notifications that pop up in the lower right corner of the screen.
Is there a way to limit the notifications to just the ones that I really need to see? [Read more…]