Count on this - your hard drive will fail! It is better to be prepared
with the proper backups, than to have to attempt a data recovery on a
failed hard drive!
A
USB Key, also referred to as a flash drive, is a really simple,
inexpensive, and reliable backup medium for your frequently changing
folders and files. You can drag and drop your files from your
hard
drive to the USB Key. If you use the shell folders simply drag and drop
your documents folder to the USB Key.
A CD is also a reliable backup
medium, and
is an excellent choice for
backing up your music, pictures, and video. Any software that you
purchased via download should be backed up to CD as well.
An
external hard drive is another excellent choice for backup. Its huge
capacity will enable you to back lots of data, pictures, video, and
music. These drives come with software that enables you to create an
image backup of your hard drive. An image backup will allow you to
restore all programs and data at once in the event your primary drive
crashes. But use this feature cautiously, because if your hard drive
contains any malicious content, that content will be included in an
image backup and subsequently restored.
Make an inventory of your
software, including registration or
activation
keys. The software and the keys will be required if your hard drive
needs to be rebuilt.
Office Suites:
Microsoft
Office is the most popular office suite on the market. The 2007 version
has been completely overhauled, featuring a new, intuitive 'ribbon'
interface. The 2010 version offers minor enhancements. Users of the
2003 and previous versions should have no trouble adjusting
to the latest version.
Microsoft Office Home and Student Edition 2010 is reasonably priced
at about $150 retail, or about $125 from various software
discounters.
This version gives you Excel, Powerpoint, Word, and One Note. You are
licensed to install the
software on up to three computers in your home.
Office 2007 and 2010 use a new
file
format. If you will be
sharing
your data with users of previous versions of Office, you can
save your
files in Office 97-2003 format. You can also
set the program default
to Office 97-2003 format so you do
not have to remember to do this each time you save a file.
Alternatively, Open Office is a
multiplatfrom, multilingual office suite
compatible with all other major office suites. This product is
absolutely free to download, use, and distribute.
Open Office can read
documents created in Excel, Powerpoint, and Word. However documents
created in Open Office and then saved in the corresponding Microsoft
Office program's file format may not be 100% identical when
opened with Microsoft Office.
Google
Documents is an on line office suite including spreadsheet, word
processing, and presentation components. The capabilities ot this
software are not as extensive as other office suites, but do include
all the basics. Best of all, it is free with your Google account.
Documents are stored on the Google server, and may be downloaded to
your computer in many different formats. You can upload existing
documents, but you should plan on doing some reformatting.
Email
Clients: An Email client is software
that enables
you to communicate
with your Email provider to read, write, store, and forward your Email.
An Email client may be installed on your own computer, such as Outlook
Express. Alternatively, a 'Webmail' Email client is a web browser
application which you access over the interent, which connects to your
Email provider's server to access your Email.
A locally installed Email
client downloads all new messages from the Email server to your
computer. This may included unwanted Email, or Email with huge
attachments.
A 'Webmail' Email client offers advantages to a locally installed
Email client:
- You can screen your mail from the
Inbox
view and
delete unwanted messages without having them download to your computer.
This method offers valuable Anti-Virus and Anti-Spyware protection
since the malware embedded in junk Email will never reach your
computer.
- You can decide whether or not to
download
attachments.
- You do not have to concern yourself with
backing up your Email; this is done for you by the provider.
- You can access your Email from any
computer that has internet connectivity.
Webmail clients are very sophisticated and offer all the
flexibility of locally installed Email clients. Both Comcast and
AT&T offer a Webmail client accessable from their home page.
Other examples of webmail clients are Gmail, Yahoo Mail, Hotmail and
AOL Mail.
Email that you have read with a
local Email client will
be deleted from the server by default. To override, locate and set a
'Do not delete from server' flag usually found in the
preferences section of your local Email client.
If you prefer a local Email client other than Outlook Express, an
excellent and totallly free alternative is
Thunderbird.
Computer Security:
If
you do not use programs that protect against viruses and spyware, you
should consider installing them. There are many really good programs
available to protect your computer, and some are totally free. Make
sure you scan your computer frequently.
Get Anti-Virus.
Password protect your computer's accounts that have administrator
privilege.
When you delete a file, the operating system does not really remove the
file from the disk; it only removes the reference of the file from the
file system table. The file remains on the disk until another file is
created over it. Before the file is overwritten, anyone can easily
retrieve it with a disk maintenance or an undelete utility. A 'File
Shredder' program will delete files by making multiple write passes on
top of the file's data. We recommend a free 'File Shredder' program
called Eraser.
Get
Eraser.
If your hard disk contains sensitive
data,
you might wish to
secure the data with some type of data encryption. The
Business and Ultimate editions ow Windows Vista and Windows 7 offer an
all or nothing disk encryption
solution termed 'Bitlocker'.
We recommend a really great,
totally free, encryption tool called
'Truecrypt'. This tool enables you to create a file on your hard disk,
which when mounted within the Truecrypt software, becomes a virtual
volume, but looks like a separate disk drive to all programs. Once the
volume is dismounted, you can copy its underlying file to your backup
medium. Truecrypt also has a traveller mode, so you can copy the
underlying file and a small truecrypt driver to a USB key, plug the key
into any computer anywhere, run the small driver as an application
without installing it, and mount your underlying data file directly
from your USB Key. If your computer or USB Key is stolen, your data
will not be compromised.
Get
Truecrypt.
Screen Capture:
Screen Capture is a time saving technique that allows you to capture
any portion of your screen as a jpg image. Windows Vista and Windows 7
have a Snipping Tool built into the operating system to accomplish
this. Just click on the Windows button and type "sn", you will
see the Snipping Tool in the search results. Launch it, then drag a
rectangle over the area you would like to capture and save to a file.
If you are using Windows XP, you can use a free screen capture program
called ScreenHunter. Launch ScreenHunter, set your output to jpg, put
ScreenHunter in standby mode, then when you are ready to capture, right
click on the ScreenHunter icon in the taskbar notification area, click
on Capture Now, then drag a rectangle over the area you would like to
capture.
Get
ScreenHunter.
Windows 7: Windows
7 contains some features which might enhance your productivity if you
take to them. Some of these features take advantage of pinning a
program to the taskbar. To do this, drag the program's icon from the
desktop or the start menu to the taskbar. When a program that is pinned
to the taskbar is running, its icon on the taskbar is overlaid with a
transparent rectangle. If you hover the mouse over the rectangle, a
small reproduction of the program's window will appear. This feature is
called "Aero Peek".
The recent documents list that we are
familiar with from previous versions of Windows has been revised and is
now called "Jump Lists". Each program that is pinned to the taskbar has
its own Jump List of recently opened documents which pops up when you
right click on the program's icon on the taskbar. Click on a document
to open the document in the program.
"Aero Snap" is a feature
which enables you to display two windows side by side maximizing
desktop
real estate. Drag an open window to the left edge of the screen and it
will resize to occupy half the screen docked to the left edge. Do the
same thing with another window to the right side of the screen. This is
a great feature when using a wide screen monitor. Drag an
open window
to the top edge of the screen and it will maximize.
If you have
many windows open on your desktop but would like to focus on just one,
shake the window and the others will minimize. Shake it again and the
others will come back. This feature is known as "Aero Shake".
The "Sticky Notes" feature on the start menu is the elctronic
equivalent of post-it notes on your desktop.
The snipping tool on the start menu enables you to capture a
rectangular portion of your screen as a .jpg file.
The
right side of the taskbar, known as the notification area, can get
cluttered with icons of programs that run at startup. While it is good
to know what runs at startup, it can be quite annoying to see these
icons and popup messages for things like volume control, network, power
etc. Windows 7 enables you to select which of these icons and their
notifications you would like to display in the taskbar.
Internet
Explorer 9: Internet Explorer 9 was released in March
2011. It is a fast, streamlined web browser. IE 9 features tight
integration with Windows 7, featuring one click access to your
favorite web sites using "Jump Lists" (see above discussion on Windows
7). But Microsoft has let down many of its customers by making IE9
incompatible with Windows XP. As of April 2011 it is estimated that 40%
to 50% of the computers in use are using Windows XP. The
technical reason that Microsoft cites is that Internet Explorer 9 uses
a feature called Direct2D, which is an Application Programming
Interface available in Windows Vista and Windows 7 that takes advantage
of more modern graphics hardware. However, the recently released
Firefox 4 does run on Windows XP, leveraging Direct2D on newer
operating systems and using alternative code for older operating
systems. Microsoft's planned obsolescence approach is designed to get
users to migrate to Windows 7.
An alternative to IE9 one
click access web sites, which is available on Windows XP,
Vista, and 7, is to create a shortcut to that website on your desktop.
Right click anywhere on your desktop, then click on
New>Shortcut. Type in the URL, for example:
"http://www.stuartcomputer.com". If the URL is very long, copy and
paste it from the address bar in your browser.
Firefox:
Firefox 4 was released in March 2011. It is a thoroughly updated
version of the tried and true Firefox browser, leveraging
inprovements in hardware and operating systems while maintaining
compatibility with older systems, and featuring speedy web browsing
with a vastly improved user interface. Firefox 4 improves the use of
screen real estate by replacing the menu bar with the Firefox button,
and by placing the tabs across the top, at the same level as the
Firefox button. The entire interface is customizable so you can restore
the look and feel of Firefox 3.6 if you so choose.
Firefox
5 was released in June 2011. With Firefox 5, Mozilla changed its
numbering scheme, so a whole new version will be released every few
months. While Firefox 4 contained many changes to the user interface,
Firefox 5 contains mainly incremental fixes to Firefox 4.
Firefox
6,7,8,9, 10, 11 and 12 have been released between August 2011 and April 2012,
providing many improvements and bug fixes, including much improved use
of your computer's memory.
The
menu bar can be turned on or off depending on your preference. To turn
it on, click on the orange Firefox button on the top left, then
Options>Menu Bar. To turn it off, click on View>Menu Bar.
When
the menu bar is off, you can temporarily toggle it on by pressing the
Alt key.
Use the F11 key to toggle full
screen mode on and off. This is a great feature for laptops with
smaller displays.
If
you have a wide screen monitor, a really useful feature is the
Bookmarks Sidebar, which places your bookmarks in a small sidebar
allowing you to easily navigate to you bookmarked sites. From the menu
bar, click View>Sidebar>Bookmarks.
If you have lots of tabs open,
you can unclutter the tab bar by pinning your frequently used tabs as
"App Tab"s, causing that tab to appear as an icon without text
to the right of the Firefox button. Right click on the tab, then
select Pin as AppTab. To unpin, right click on the "App Tab" and click
Unpin Tab.
Flagfox: Flagfox is
a Firefox extension that displays a flag icon indicating
the current webserver's physical location. Knowing
where you are connected adds an
extra layer of awareness to your web browsing. Imagine being connected
to your bank or brokerage server and seeing a flag other that
the US flag. That would be an indication that the site is probably a
copy trying to obtain your login credentials.
Get FlagFox.
Hover over the flag for more
information about the webserver. Right click on the flag and click
'Geotool' for a map of the server location and even more detailed
information abot the server.
Mozbackup:
Mozbackup is a handy utility that backs up and restores your Firefox
and Thunderbird profiles. Your Firefox profile includes your bookmarks,
browsing history, stored passwords, etc. Your Thunderbird profile
includes your email and address book.
Get Mozbackup.
Mozbackup is a great tool to use
when migrating to a new computer. Use it to backup your Firefox and
Thuderbird data on your old computer. After insatlling Firefox,
Thunderbird, and Mozbackup on the new computer, copy the backup files
to the new computer and restore them.
Strong
Passwords: In this day and age when hackers and
information thieves are plentiful it is very important to use strong
passwords. Here is one method of creating strong passwords for your
frequently visited sites. Select a keyword that you will remember, that
contains both letters and numbers, for example an address of a location
you used to live, or your favorite athlete's name and number. This
example uses an address, '87 High Ridge Road'. Converting this to a
password results in '87higHridgE'. Note the unusual use of upper
case letters in an easy to remember location. Now add a special
character: '#87higHridgE'.
For additional protection, make
your password unique for each web site. For example, add the first
three characters of the web site after the special character, again
using unusual upper case letter locations: '#yaH87higHridgE' for
Yahoo, or '#goO87higHridgE' for Google.
Keep your laptop cool:
Laptops tend to heat up as you use them. Over time, dirt can accumulate
in the areas around the fan, restricting airflow and increasing heat.
Many laptops have the exhaust on the side, and the air intake on the
bottom. When this type of laptop is flat on a desk, the air intake is
blocked. A simple trick is to elevate the rear of the laptop with a
three sided ruler. If you place the top of the ruler just in front of
the rear feet of the laptop, the rear feet will prevent the laptop from
sliding off the ruler, and the front feet will prevent the laptop from
sliding around the desktop.
