November 2008

Lithium-Ion, It’s light, It’s powerful, It’s….

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…the element of choice.
A recent trip drove home the importance of battery life in laptops. Although my laptop was relatively new at less than a year old, it lasted just under 2 hours on battery power. I had all the energy saving features on and I had dimmed the screen, but it didn’t seem to help much. When I got home I did some checking to see what was coming in the way of battery technology. While I found some information on new technologies, most seemed far from being ready to use. In fact there were only hints that there would be anything new within the next five years.

Lithium-Ion, It’s light, It’s powerful, It’s…. Read More »

November 2008 Newsletter

  • Ultimate PC Tune Up Guide
  • Fighting Scareware
  • Laptop Fires Trigger New Recalls
  • “Trail of Toxic Waste”
  • Bits from Bill: The Truth Behind Windows 7
  • Election Poll & Survey Results
  • Average Desktop CPU Speed Slows?
  • Survey: Our Digital World
  • Tip #1: Windows Recovery Environment
  • Tip #2: System Restore with No Reboot
  • Tip #3: Favorites & Good Bookmarks
  • November 2008 Newsletter Read More »

    PC PITSTOP FIGHTS SCAREWARE – AV2008(9)

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    This happened just 2 days ago. On Saturday I installed a new copy of Windows XP. It was a brand new copy and I put it on a brand new hard drive for the purpose of software testing. I finished the install and applied the drivers. I was behind a router which acts as a firewall. I opened the IE browser and went to a favorite site. I read the forums and exactly 23 minutes after the install I was receiving AV2009 popups. It’s scare ware. It told me I was infected and needed to download their program to remove the threat. I couldn’t believe it. I didn’t even have an email client installed, no Instant Messenger.

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    The Ultimate PC Tune Up Guide

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    Welcome to the Ultimate Guide to keeping your PC running fast and great. As I discussed in a prior article, the more you use your PC, the more your PC requires maintenance. Every email you read, every web site you visit, and every document you create, leaves little bread crumbs on the hard drive. Over the space of the days, weeks and months, these thousands and thousands of bread crumbs ultimately slow down your PC. Fortunately, there are ways to keep your PC like new, and in some cases better than new. Let’s get started.

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    Laptop Fires Trigger New Recalls

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    Just in case you were getting bored with the economy and the candidates, Sony brings you their 2nd Annual Battery Recall. This event is being held at the Palm Shore Resort and is hosted by Dell, Toshiba, and HP…… . Sorry, but a little levity helps as the occurrence of laptops catching fire, exploding and possibly damaging life, limb and property has become so commonplace that it’s almost a seasonal event.

    Check out Robs video of what happens when a laptop catches fire. It’s had almost a million and a half views.

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