Computer Tips for Travelers

Updates, Updates, all those *maddening* updates. I just have to vent. Updates are important, and I will continue to accept them and wait for them to install, but OMG they’ve become SO numerous.
If you live in a house and have a hardwired Internet connection, you probably don’t notice it so much. Just leave your [...]

Practice Safe Computing.
You need to have security programs (Antivirus and Anti-Spyware) for your computer if you access the Internet.
Security suites are notorious for hogging system resources and requiring frequent updates.
The most popular programs tout many extra features, leading to what is referred to as “bloat”.
These programs will protect you, but in doing so, they [...]

This was one of the exercises in our Boot Camp last week and we think everyone should know how to do it. We preach backup all the time, but we don’t preach a particular way to do it because there are so many choices. As long as you know that your important files [...]

Has this ever happened to you?
Your computer crashes and you take it to a techie who gets it working again but needs to reformat (erase) the hard drive.  You get your computer back with nothing on it.  No problem you think, you have a backup of your important data on Disk, either CD/DVDs or a [...]

By Chris Guld, GeeksOnTour.com: Have you heard that using Free anti-Virus programs is not as good as using the ones you pay for? We don’t think that’s true. But, we’ve heard that opinion tossed around enough that we want to give you our opinion. There are several Free anti-virus programs that we think suit most [...]

You may have heard about the hands-on class we teach from our website, or past blog posts.  We call it ‘Computer Boot Camp’ because it is Basic Training for computer users.

Specifically, it’s for laptop users with Windows (XP or Vista) operating system.  We will be offering this class as a Gypsy Gathering pre-rally in [...]

Have you heard that using Free anti-Virus programs is not as good as the ones you pay for? We don’t think that’s true. But, we’ve heard that opinion tossed around enough that we want to give you our opinion.

There are several Free anti-virus programs that we think suit most people’s needs just fine. They are:

AVG [...]

You may have heard of a nasty virus about to come to life on April 1. It would be nice if this was an April Fools joke, but odds are – it’s not. It’s called Conficker and its all the buzz in geek-land these days. If your computer is infected, it is supposed to start [...]

Jim provides a service he calls ‘Computer Cleanup’ for Windows-based computers. It’s kind of like a tuneup on a car. He charges a flat rate of $99 for this service. Sometimes it takes 3-4 hours, sometimes it takes 3-4 days! Every computer is different, and he has a lot of tools and tricks that he [...]

Have you ever had a problem with a website and seen a help screen that suggested you ‘clear your cache?’ It is often a good thing to do, and solves many problems.

First of all, what is a cache? It’s the space reserved for temporarily keeping copies of web pages you visit. [...]