Your daily dose of practical, easy to follow tech tips!
Question from Luella F.: The screen on my Acer Aspire One D270 netbook stays blank like it’s not getting any power when I turn the machine on. Everything else seems to be working ok because the power light comes on and I can hear the fan running.
Do you think it needs a new screen? If it does, would it cost a lot to get it fixed? I don’t want to put much into it at this point.
Rick’s answer: [Read more…]
Does your router’s Wi-Fi signal have trouble reaching the far end of your home? If so, you can extend the reach of your Wi-Fi signal by making a simple antenna booster out of paper and a sheet of tin foil.
These DIY antenna boosters really work, they are easy to make, and the entire project will only cost you a few pennies (and a little bit of your time).
How do they work? By redirecting some of the radio waves transmitted by your router’s omni-directional antennas towards the area of your home where the signal is the weakest. [Read more…]
Question from Gillian S.: My Acer Aspire 5715z laptop won’t boot into Windows and my friend says I need to reset it back to the factory condition.
The problem is I don’t have a restore disc for it. Is there any way to restore this computer without a restore disc?
Rick’s answer: Gillian, if the hard drive is working properly and the recovery partition isn’t damaged, you should be able to easily restore your laptop back to its factory condition. Here’s how: [Read more…]
Question from Shelley: Hi Rick. I have a question and you’ll probably think it’s silly. Will just any power cord that will fit be ok to use with my computer? It’s an Acer Aspire ME600.
I just moved into a new dorm, and somewhere along the way I lost the power cord to my tower. I searched the entire campus between my old dorm and the new one and I couldn’t find it anywhere.
My new roommate gave me a cord that she had left over when she replaced her old monitor. It fits in the socket perfectly, but it seems to be a little thinner than the one that came with my computer.
Do you think this old cord will work ok, or do you think I should buy a new one?
Rick’s answer: [Read more…]
Question from Richard S.: Back in March 2011 I bought an HP Desktop computer with Windows 7 on it. I also bought a copy of Microsoft Office 2010 at the same time and got a discount on it because I bought it with the PC.
Now I want to upgrade Windows 7 to Windows 8.1, but I’m afraid that changing the Windows version will void my Office license since it came with Windows 7.
Can I safely upgrade my computer to Windows 8.1 without voiding my Office license?
Rick’s answer: [Read more…]