Rick's Daily Tips

Q&A: I installed a really old game and it messed up my son’s computer. How can I fix it?

Posted on October 9, 2020

Question from Stuart K.: I was cleaning out my closet yesterday morning and I found an old game disc with “Age Of Empires” on it.

I remember that I loved playing that game when I was a kid so I installed it on my son’s ASUS ROG gaming PC (with Windows 10).

The game played just like I remember and I didn’t notice any problems with anything else. Everything seemed to work fine so I shut the computer down.

My son used the computer for a few minutes and then shut it down when he got ready to leave for school.

This morning when he turned it on he noticed that the screen resolution was wrong and the screen was flickering really bad. He shut it down and restarted it and got the same result.

He asked me to help him get it straightened out, but so far I’m not having any luck.

[Read more…]

Scam alert: Dangerous new Android malware puts your bank account at risk

Posted on October 9, 2020

As you probably know, Android devices have become a huge target for hackers and scammers due to the massive number of Android devices that are begin used today.

Unfortunately, there’s a new form of Android malware that potentially puts the bank accounts of every Android user at risk.

[Read more…]

You won’t believe Apple’s “fix” for iOS 14 update related issues

Posted on October 6, 2020

Did you update your iPhone to iOS 14 and immediately start having issues with the device?

Numerous iPhone users are complaining that the update to iOS 14 has resulted in shorter battery life and some apps failing to work as they should.

Even worse, a few users have reported that their phones are getting hotter than normal while using a wide range of resource-intensive apps.

Well, Apple has released this Support article explaining what you need to do to fix these iOS 14-related issues. And to be sure, you probably won’t like it.

In a nutshell, Apple is advising you to do the following: [Read more…]

Q&A: Why is Google saying my blog might be hacked?

Posted on October 5, 2020

Question from Brianna L.: I need your help, Rick. And I need it quick.

I woke up this morning to find several messages in my inbox telling me Google is reporting that my blog has been hacked.

I searched Google for my blog’s name and sure enough they’re showing this message with my site’s URLs in the search results:

“This site may be hacked.”

Then I checked my blog stats and found that the page views had dropped to almost nothing, literally overnight. They are usually in the thousands.

I carefully examined every page on my blog but I couldn’t find anything that resembles a hacked page.

After that I did a Google search and saw where someone was recommending a check for strange plugins that could be causing the problem. He said to look for plugins that I didn’t remember installing.

I checked the list of installed plugins but the only ones I found were the ones that I actually installed myself.

I have three questions for you: [Read more…]

How to access your PC’s UEFI Firmware settings in Windows 10

Posted on October 5, 2020

In Windows 7 and earlier versions of Windows it was easy to access a PC’s BIOS settings.

All you had to do was press a special key right after you pressed the power button and you’d be taken directly to the “BIOS Settings” screen.

Once on that screen you could make several changes to system behavior (choosing which drive to boot from, for example).

Likewise, you could display the “Boot Options” menu simply by pressing the F8 key immediately after pressing the power button.

But things are different with newer machines that were designed to run Windows 8.1 and Windows 10. [Read more…]