Rick's Daily Tips

Ditto – a great Windows Clipboard replacement

Posted on December 31, 2012

ditto For me, one of the biggest annoyances of Microsoft Windows has always been the Clipboard utility. Well, it has for me at least.

Why? Because it can only remember the contents of the last “Copy” or “Cut” and if the computer crashes or gets shut down for any reason, whatever is on the Clipboard at the time is lost forever. If you do a lot of Copying, Cutting and Pasting like I do that gets really old in a hurry.

There are a number of good Clipboard replacement programs out there, but the one I like the best is called Ditto. This little gem runs as a stand alone program. It runs in the background, waiting patiently for you to call it up by clicking on its icon in the System Tray. I’m pretty picky about which programs I allow to load automatically every time Windows boots up, and this is one of them. [Read more…]

Rick’s Picks: 6 of my most visited websites

Posted on December 31, 2012

I spend a lot of time on the Internet both for work and pleasure, and over the years I have come to rely on a number of websites that help me with both. Here are six that I find myself visiting over and over:

1 – TodaysPhoto.org – Yep, this one actually belongs to me, but I enjoy posting the “Picture of the Day” every morning and reading all the wonderful comments left by members of the TodaysPhoto community. I hope you’ll check it out and stop by yourself as often as possible! I post a new photo every morning at 7am eastern time.

2 – Pandora – I love listening to music and Pandora allows me to listen to just the kind of music that suits my mood at the moment. I have created “stations” that play nothing but Bluegrass, Bluegrass Gospel and Country. If I don’t like a song (or it doesn’t fit the genre of the station) I can give it a “thumbs down” and it will never be played on that station again. If I like one particularly well I can give it a “thumbs up” and Pandora will seek out and play more songs that are similar to it. I love Pandora! [Read more…]

How to find the “Search” and “Run” boxes in Windows 8

Posted on December 30, 2012

As I explained in this post, Windows 8 looks and works quite a bit differently from previous versions of Microsoft Windows. Some items have been hidden or moved to new locations while others have been either replaced or eliminated altogether.

There is the missing Start Menu of course (click here for instructions for adding one), and a couple of other rather important items aren’t in their usual places. But luckily, they are extremely easy to find and use. Here’s how: [Read more…]

How to calibrate your screen colors in Windows 7/8

Posted on December 30, 2012

calibrate-screen Here’s the scenario: You take a great picture, spiff it up a bit in your favorite photo editing program, then sit back and admire the rich colors that look pretty much exactly as you remember them looking when the picture was taken.

But there’s a problem. When you print the photo or view it on another computer, the colors look absolutely horrible!

If this happens to you, the culprit is most likely a miscalibrated computer screen. Windows 7 includes a nifty utility that can help you calibrate the colors on your monitor. It’s called the Display Color Calibration Wizard, and here’s how you use it: [Read more…]

Should you upgrade to Windows 8?

Posted on December 28, 2012

I have been asked by several friends and acquaintances whether they should upgrade their Windows based PCs to Windows 8, and my answer has been, and continues to be, “NO”. Why? Well, there are several reasons:

1 – The learning curve.

While Windows 8 is very similar to Windows 7 under the hood, the Metro-style GUI user interface is quite different and it will definitely take some getting used to. In my opinion there was no valid reason for Microsoft to try to make desktop PCs and laptops look and act like tablets, but that’s exactly what they did. And while Windows 8 ships with a few minor improvements over Windows 7, there aren’t enough of them to justify having to learn a new user interface. [Read more…]