November 26, 2009
Soapbox! – Some companies out there just take advantage and have no morals. SoftwareCandy is one of those.
**I will start by saying that this post is entirely my opinion. There is a company that I just became aware of called SoftwareCandy (I will not put their link as they really don’t deserve that). The company claims that they are
Inspired by a Vision
At Software Candy, we believe that your computer should serve you, not the other way around. We believe that your Windows® XP, Windows Vista® or Windows® 7 experience should be fun, easy and productive.
That is why and how we came up with the concept of "the perfect software":
The problem is that what they are doing is going around the web and taking posts and solutions from many sites (sites that do not charge for their time and efforts) and then using that information like if SoftwareCandy was the one who came up with it (not giving credit to the original person), and on top of that SoftwareCandy proceeds to charge for this as well.
So they take others works (things that took and time and effort for the original person to develop) and than take credit for the work and make money from unknowing and unsuspecting visitors to their site.
We as techs all face similar if not the same issues, computer issues are computer issues, but for someone else to wait until you do all the work and then take all the credit for it shows a company with serious moral issues.
To those readers of TGM, I can’t tell you want to do or not do, but remember that you have options. If you don’t see answers to a needed solution here on TGM, you can always search the web for others who work just as hard as TGM to provide assistance without charging you, or you can send TGM and these other sites requests. TGM (as well as many other sites on the web) work very hard to help answer questions sent in by our readers. I’m sure you will be able to get a solution without having to pay a site like SoftwareCandy.
This ends my Soapbox**
November 25, 2009
Software: Resume Templates for MS Office
With unemployment as high as it is currently, sending out your resume has become a full time job for some. I have had a number of family and friends all ask me to look over their resumes (I guess being employed qualifies you to review resumes), and a few of the resumes I saw needed some serious help. So to help them fix their resumes I started looking around for templates and I found some very good and free (if your sending out your resume, you probably aren’t in a position to be more than you have to), and found some very good ones being offered on the Microsoft website (in partnership with monster.com) for MS Office. The templates can be found on the Microsoft Office Online page (LINK: http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/help/FX103504051033.aspx).
The page breaks the templates down by resume type (Basic, Entry level / College student, Experienced Professional, Job-Specific, Career move, Academic). Just click on the resume type your looking for and then select from one of the 4 templates for each category.
Since the templates are being “Powered by monster.com”, you will see a couple of links in Office (only while you are using that specific template) pointing giving you the option to post the resume directly to the monster.com site. If you use monster.com, then that’s an extra help, however, if you don’t use monster all you have to do is just ignore the links, as you are still able to save and print the resume itself without any monster.com labels on your resume.
When you open the template you will see a Joe Doe type set up with some made up information, all you need to do is use that as your guide and over ride that information with your resume information.
If your in the need of getting Microsoft Office, one option to consider is downloading the new beta version of Microsoft Office 2010 (LINK: http://us2.office2010beta.microsoft.com/default.aspx?culture=en-US). The beta includes Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, One Note, Publisher, Access. The beta version of Office 2010 will expire in October 2010, which gives you a full version of Office for free (Legally), for almost an entire year.
For those in the middle of the job search, TechGeekandMore wishes you luck in your quest.
Software: Use NiNite to Simplify your application install
One of the more annoying things about installing or re-installing Windows involves having to install your programs. There is now a way you can speed up the process and eliminate most of the work as well. If you visit Ninite (LINK: http://ninite.com/) you will be able to make the installation of some of the most common programs a simple 1 step process.
The following is from the Ninite site showing the programs you can choose from (as of 11/24/09)
All you need to do is pick all the programs that you would like to install, then click at the bottom where it says Get Installer. You will get a single file to download. Once you have it downloaded, double click it and the remaining work will be taken care of for you.
-Ninite installs apps with default settings and says "no" to browser toolbars and other junk*.
-Ninite checks your PC’s language and 64-bit support to install the latest, best version of each app.
-Ninite runs on Windows XP/Vista/7 and works in the background 100% hands-free.
-All Ninite does is install the apps you choose.
(*The only thing to keep in mind is that the installer will install to your C:\ drive, I point that out to those with more than one drive, in case you prefer to install to another drive.)
November 23, 2009
How to: What to do if you get a virus or malware via a pop up message
There have been many posts on TechGeekandMore concerning viruses, spyware, malware, and scareware. If you wonder why, its because as a tech, the number one question and the number one support call that I will take involves pc’s that have already been infected (because the user didn’t know any better) and what to do to clean up the pc.
Sometimes the infection isn’t really bad and a simple scan and delete will clean things up, other times, its a matter of recover/save what you can from the pc and format/reinstall everything (and yes that could mean saying goodbye to important documents or a long downtime). On top of everything else keep in mind that hiring someone like me to clean up your pc could cost $100 / HR or more, and in some cases it may be more cost effective to buy a new pc.
So where do we start, we start at a couple of common things that are DO’s and DONT
1) If your on any website and see a messages like the following
DO NOT CLICK ON YES OR OK, it is a trick used by the writer of the virus or malware (known as social engineering) to get you to install the malware or virus. Since the message will probably pop up as part of the page your on, you may just think that its a natural part of Windows and agree to it, at least that’s what the bad guy hopes you will believe.
Additionally, when online, DO READ WHAT THE POP MESSAGES SAY AND DONT JUST CLICK ON THEM TO GET THEM OUT OF YOUR WAY. ADDITIONALLY DONT BELIEVE EVERYTHING THAT POPS UP (I know this is a hard concept for most). The following are just some of the MILLIONS of possible messages that you could see
Now lets talk about how these happen, they can happen because the website your visiting has been infected by a virus. These days its not just pc’s that get infected it can also be websites both minor and major (Scareware Pop-Ups Target Google, New York Times), so DONT think that because the only sites you visit are major sites (Google, NY Times, Twitter, Facebook, etc) that your entirely safe. You MUST always stay alert.
What if you machine is under attack from a Virus or Malware
Take immediate action as soon as the message or popup comes up. The majority of viruses and malware is written in such a way that not only will your machine get infected, but the infection will go out to the internet (completely automatically) and download additional files and infections to reinforce itself. So the longer you take to address the issue the harder (and probably more expensive) it will be to clean your machine. Image your self getting the flu, you take care of yourself and in a few days your body recovers and everything is normal again. However, if you get the flu and ignore it and just let it continue without doing anything about it, you could get sick enough to end up in a hospital or even dead. (Sorry to make it so over dramatic, but really that’s what it boils down to).
As soon as you receive a one of these type of scareware/malware/virus pop up windows, you need to use the task manager to close whatever program your using to get to the internet (You should NEVER try and close the program with the ok or cancel button on the program as all the buttons no matter what they say will download unwanted files on to your pc). You can access the task manager 1 of 2 ways
Task Manager via Ctrl Alt Del key
 |
Hold down ctrl, alt, and delete at the same time. |
 |
If your on WindowsXP you will see this box. Just select task manager. |  |
If your on Windows Vista or 7, then you will see this window. Select Start Task Manager from here. |
Task Manager via Right Click
|
Use an empty space on the task menu (that’s the bar on the bottom where you see your programs) right click, you will see Task Manager as a choice. Select Task Manager from there. |
Once you have opened the Task Manager, you will see the following window.
From the applications tab you will see all programs that are currently running. You should highlight any program that is connected to the internet (Internet Explorer, Firefox, Chrome, etc and Anything email) and select End Task. You will be prompted with 
and select End Now. Continue doing that until you remove everything that is connected to the internet.
Once you have closed the Window – what next?
This may take a little time, but its best to check you pc and make sure nothing stayed on it that shouldn’t be there. There are 4 things you need to do at this point.
Step#1 -
If you use Internet Explorer
Go to Tools –> Internet Options –> select delete in the browser history section and delete all
If your using Firefox
Go to Tools –> Options –> Privacy and select clear your recent history and remove individual cookies ( you may need to change the setting to remember history to get to the settings)
If you use any other browser look for the area to remove, cache, temp or cookies and remove all.
***Also make sure you empty your recycling bin.***
Step# 2-
If you don’t already have a copy on your pc, download Super Antispyware (LINK: http://superantispyware.com/) and install Super Antispyware. **There is a Free and Pro edition, all you will need is the free edition.**
- During the install you will see the following screens. Make sure you say YES to “Would you like Super Antispyware to check for the latest updates….” then select the default or recommended setting for the remaining screens. On the screen asking for email address you do NOT have to enter anything, you can just select the next button.
Once installed you will see the following screen, just make sure that the definition date (on the bottom right) is current (shouldn’t be more than a day or two old, if not click on check for updates) then select scan your computer (on top left)
You will then see
At which point, select all your hard drives and select “Perform complete scan” and hit next.
Once the scan completes,
You will see the list of items found. I would recommend that all shown items remain with checks and then select next.
The lastly once the clean up completes. You will be prompted to reboot. I recommend you close anything that is still open and select yes to reboot.
Step# 3
If you don’t already have Malwarebytes, download and install (LINK: http://www.malwarebytes.org/). **There is both a free and paid version, home users just need to get the free version.
– During the install you will see the following screens, you can select the default choices. Toward the end of the install you will see a choice for “Update Malwarebytes Anti-Malware” make sure you have a check next to that choice.
As soon as it is installed, you will see the following screen. Make sure to select “Perform full scan” and select all your drives and run your scan.
Once completed you will see a list of all items found. Select all and remove. Then reboot pc.
Step# 4
Lastly, whatever Anti-virus you have, make sure you update it to the latest updates or signature file (depending on which one you have) and run a full scan of all your drives. If it finds anything select removal and then reboot.
If you don’t have an Anti-Virus program or yours is expired, TGM recommends Microsoft Security Essentials which is free. (LINK: http://www.microsoft.com/Security_Essentials/ )
I know this was a long post, but the steps listed above would be exactly the steps I would take if you called me (and probably most other techs) to take care of your pc. Hopefully this information helps you stay informed and helps you save a headache and some money in the future.
November 20, 2009
Tech: You can’t change or save the Windows Power settings. How to fix it.
A situation recently occurred with one of my clients this past week where they couldn’t change the power settings on their pc’s from Power save to any other choice. No matter what they tried as soon as they hit ok, the setting would go back to power save mode. There are a couple of reasons why you would not want power save mode. In there case, the PC’s were actually cash registers (Running Windows XP), and in power save mode, if the pc did not have any activity for a period of 3 minutes (Screenshot below is not from the affected terminals), the pc would go into sleep mode (as XP was turning off, the screen and the hard drive). This setting is not good for Point of sale software, as the pc going to sleep tends to corrupt the point of sale software.
The solution I came up with involved taking a copy of the power management registry entries from a functional machine and then installing the good registry files in the corrupt machine. The process worked very well and everything ended functional again.
Another possible problem one can face with the power management settings is that you have nothing listed. The same bug that would allow the settings not to save, can just as easily remove all the settings within the power management function.
With that all being said, I now share the .reg file I used to restore the settings on all the broken machines.
Just click on the download button below to start the file download. Keep in mind that the file you will be downloading is a registry file (.reg) so your Windows software or Antivirus software may prompt for a message about it being unsafe to download this type of file. The file itself is fine, you can ignore the messages (for this file, however, when surfing the internet that is a message you should not normally ignore), download the file to your desktop and then double click the file to enter the info into the registry.
Any questions drop me a line.
Keep in mind that this file is use at own risk, as neither I nor anyone else at TGM know exactly what your configuration is and this file is being offered as best effort help only.
November 18, 2009
Software: Microsoft Office 2010 Beta is here for everyone
**UPDATED 11/18/2009 – 2PM**
During today’s PDC (Professional Developers Conference) Microsoft made official the public beta for Office 2010. The site that you can now download Office 2010 from is http://www.microsoft.com/office/2010/en/default.aspx .
************************************************************************
A few months ago, Microsoft released “Technical Preview” for Microsoft Office 2010 to a select group (Disclosure: I have been using the Technical Preview since its release). Now its time for Office 2010 to get one step closer to joining the Microsoft offerings.
So Microsoft has now released the Office Professional Plus 2010 for those with TechNet/MSDN accounts. The download can be found @ http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/default.aspx
Additionally, for everyone else there is now an office beta page on Microsoft.com. If you attempt to download from the office beta page you will get a message that says “The Office 2010 Beta will be available soon. Please come back later and try again”, however it is expected (based on chatter from the tech community) that at some point during the PDC conference in Los Angeles that Microsoft will announce and make the download office 2010 beta office.
In the mean time, the office beta page has demo’s and information on what’s new for Office 2010 including the add on to Microsoft office called Office Web Apps:
“Microsoft Office Web Apps are free online companions to Word, Excel, and PowerPoint that give you the freedom to view, create, and edit documents from a supported Internet browser (Internet Explorer, Firefox, and Safari).”
You can find the office beta page @ http://officebeta.microsoft.com/en-us/?CTT=97
November 16, 2009
TGM: Update 11/16/2009
Hello everyone. I know there haven’t been posts recently but due to a extremely heavy workload this past week for all staff of TGM, there just hasn’t been much time. TGM has received numerous questions
- Backing up Contacts, Address Book, etc on a Palm Treo using Palm OS
- How to: Best Practices to maintain your pc in optimum running condition
- Software (Free): Microsoft Word templates for resumes.
- Software: Downloading the beta of Microsoft Office 2010
- Software: Yahoo Messenger 10 is now out. **Things to look out for during the install.
All of this and more, this week on TechGeekandMore. As always if you are in the need of help, you can send your information to techgeekandmore (at) Gmail (dot) com. Include as much information as possible (even if it seems irrelevant to the case), and TGM will do its best to get you the most information to help you with your issue. Remember, with your computers if you are going thru a problem, there are many others that probably have the same issue. You speaking up may give help to many others.
Thank you for your support of TechGeekandMore
The TGM Staff
Palm: Backing up Contacts, Address Book, etc on a Treo using Palm OS
Sometimes questions come in the most unexpected ways. This one just happens to be one of them. I was at a major electronics retailer here in So. Pennsylvania pricing out cameras ( A possible Christmas gift for someone), and next to me was another customer who was asking about mini SD cards for her phone (She has a Treo running Palm OS software) and was trying to figure out what she needed and how to use it. The store clerk was having difficulty answering her question, so I stepped in (The boy scout in me I guess). Found out that she has been having issues with her phone and that every time that it needs to be reloaded or replaced by Sprint (Her provider and for the record I as well use Sprint), that she ends up having to manually enter all her contact and other data back on her phone. She wanted to see if by getting the miniSD which her Treo has a slot for, if she could then back up or store her info on the miniSD so that she would not have to keep reloading (Sprint does not back up any data on Palm phones from previous experience).
SO I helped her (with the store clerk asking questions as well, isn’t it fun when the customer helps the staff) to get the miniSD which was not problem. Then (after she paid for it), I helped her get the card into her phone and made sure that the phone would recognize the card. However, with not having to support the Palm OS (This is not the PRE software but the older Palm OS software from a few years ago), I told her I would look up the details and post it on TGM. So for Andrea, and all those still using Treo phones, here is information on keeping a backup of your phone data.
1st option –
Of course, if you have your Treo set up to sync with your pc using the Hot Sync software then your contacts and address book, etc would sync with your pc. If you phone is reloaded or replaced, the data from your pc can be reloaded to your phone. However, sometimes people cant sync their phones with the computer on a regular basis.
2nd option –
Using the built in miniSD card to back up your data. With the cost of SD cards these days, that just seems like such a simple idea (During my trip to the store where I met Andrea, I purchased a 2 gig SD card from Kingston for $6.99), however, Palm in its older software did not have a built in feature to back up to SD. Which makes no sense since the phone has the card slot, but I guess they figured all backups would be with a pc. With that being said there is an option out there, so that you can backup to the miniSD (using a 3rd party application). There is a software option called “BackupMan v2.3” from a company called Bits ‘n Bolts Software that will add those features to the Palm OS
Screenshot from the Palm Gear store (http://www.palmgear.com/?fuseaction=software.showsoftware&prodID=46552) where you can purchase the BackupMan software.
Unfortunately there is NO Free option that TGM is aware of to backup to the miniSD (if anyone is aware of one, please let TGM know) but the BackupMan software give a 7 day trial so you can download and try the software for a week without having to pay for it, so that you can make sure it fill your needs.
Some of the features/benefits in the BackupMan software are
- Backups can be triggered after each HotSync operation to ensure your latest conduit-based data is always up to date.
- Daily backups can be scheduled to backup your handheld at a specific time of the day.
- Hourly backups can be enabled to ensure your backup is always current throughout your day.
- Scheduled backups can be enabled or disabled on specific days of the week or times during the day.
- You can create backups on a ridged schedule, or based on system events such as a HotSync operation, when you turn off your handheld, or even when you exit your important programs.
- Everything in BackupMan can be automated, even the restore! It’s just a single tap to get you back to work after a hard reset.
- Allows restore of complete device or just a few files, it’s your choice!
The software costs $14.95, but since you can try it before buying it, you can make sure it works for you.
Links
Palm Gear.com (http://www.palmgear.com/?fuseaction=software.showsoftware&prodID=46552)
Bits ‘n Bolts.com (http://www.bitsnbolts.com/backupman.php)
November 9, 2009
And More!: Black Friday 2009 Ads – Finding deals for the 2009 Holiday season.
With financial situations being as tight as they are this holiday season, it’s important to try and get the most for your money. A recommendation we can give is to visit Black Friday 2009 (http://bfads.net/).
The Black Friday site shows discounts for a large groups of retailers such as Walmart, Kmart, Sears, Lowe’s among others.
