Episodes

This tip is based on what is probably the most common question I get, which is “Why is my computer running so slowly??” It is definitely frustrating when the computer lags behind. If your computer suddenly starts to run a lot more slowly than you think it should, there are a couple of things for you to check on. First, you need to check on how long it’s been since the computer has been restarted. It’s important to note, I’m not saying how long since you turned it off, and then powered it back u...

If you think having security cameras in your home would be expensive and complicated, I have good news! I got some recently and they were really easy and affordable. When you’re not at home, it’s nice to know that everything is okay. And even when you are at home, being able to see in another room, or outside, can be pretty convenient. When I’ve thought about implementing security cameras inside and outside my house in the past, I just put it off because it seemed like a “big project” – researc...

It used to be easy to just search Google for an image and download that full size image to your computer. Google changed their image download process a while ago, and it’s not quite as obvious how to get those full size images saved. But you can still do it! Here’s how. Note: what you do with the images you download from Google is your business. I’m trusting that whether you’re using them on your blog, your website, your podcast cover art, or wherever, that you are only using images with the pr...

There are a few things about Windows 10 that don’t really make sense. When I set up a new computer, or when I do the upgrade from Windows 7 to Windows 10, I make sure these things are all configured properly. If you’re running Windows 10, one of the things you should check on is System Restore. Important note: If you’re still running Windows 7, you’ve probably been getting notices on your computer that time is running out. It’s true! You need to upgrade to Windows 10, because support for Window...

There are more than 120 million “smart speakers” in US homes. In our house, we have the Google Home speaker, and here in my home office I have Alexa. But most people just ask Alexa boring stuff, like “what’s the traffic like this morning” or “is it going to rain today”. There are lots of FUN things you can ask Alexa too. She actually has kind of a clever and sassy personality. Next time you’re talking to Alexa, try out some of these: Human: “Alexa, flip a coin” Alexa: “You got heads” or “You ...

“Spearphishing” is one of those terms used by computer security people to describe a particular kind of computer attack. I think it’s a pretty interesting strategy to learn about. But to understand spearphishing, we have to back up a bit and explain a few things about the fishing/phishing analogy and how one translates to the other. Most people know what traditional fishing is. You put some bait on the end of your line, throw it in the water and hope you get a bite. You’re kind of putting it o...

When you get a new computer, you can’t just turn it on and start using it. Those days are long gone. Now, you have to navigate past Microsoft’s tricks and traps. And it’s important to do it right from the beginning – otherwise you could end up with a lot of frustration and wasted time trying to fix it. Today I’ll tell you 3 of the important steps in the process I use for setting up a new computer. I go through the same process when I’m prepping a laptop for resale also. Install Chrome and set ...

I recently had a client forward an email to me. The email told her she had to confirm her agreement to the AOL Terms of Service, or she could no longer use her email account. She was concerned that her email would get cut off. She had nothing to worry about. The email she got was a typical phishing email. That means it was just trying to trick her into clicking through and giving out her email password, which would give the scammer control over her email account. I wanted to show you this actu...

Well, it finally happened. I’m almost out of storage space on my Google/Gmail account. I actually got this Google account back when the Gmail email service was first introduced, which was in 2004. So it’s taken me 15 years to almost fill it up. Google gives you 15 gb of storage space with each account, and I archive the majority of my emails, so that kind of tells you how much you can fit in 15 gb. It’s a lot. But your Google account doesn’t just store emails. That 15 gb of space is also used ...

I didn’t like Windows 10 when it first came out several years ago. I’m fine with it now, since it has improved a lot since then. But there’s still one thing I can’t stand – the way it hides the scroll bars. Fortunately, this is fixable. I think you’ll enjoy using Windows 10 more if you make this little adjustment. To see what I’m talking about, all you have to do is hit the Start button (the white Microsoft logo in the bottom left corner of the screen). See that thin little line at the top? Th...

Sometimes when you’re experimenting or learning how to do something in Microsoft Word, it helps to have a “dummy” document that has several pages of text to work with. This came up recently with one of my long-term clients. In fact, this lady was probably one of my very first clients when I started my computer business up in Maine. She works with Microsoft Word all the time, and recently upgraded to Office 365. Her previous version was very outdated, so there were a number of changes in the wa...

Have you ever tried to read a serious article online, and you were just constantly distracted by the sidebars, the ads, and all the other “clutter” on the screen? Chrome has a secret “reader” mode to get rid of all that so you can focus on the content. Most people don’t know about this option because it’s not all that easy to get to it in Chrome. In fact, Google still considers it to be “experimental” so that’s why it’s not yet on the regular Chrome menu. But you can put it there. But first, y...

I love it when technology actually helps someone in a practical way. Or in this case, it helps a LOT of people, and we all have the opportunity to participate. There are an estimated 285 million people in the world who are visually impaired. And there are 39 million people who are actually blind. For those of us who are fortunate to have good vision, it’s hard to imagine how it would be to navigate the world without sight. Think about this. What if you were in a grocery store, shopping for the...

If you have a website you visit regularly, there’s no easier way to get there than to have a shortcut icon right on your desktop. And Chrome makes it VERY easy to do that! In the past, I would do this the “manual” way. That’s where you navigate to the website page where you want the shortcut to go to. Then you move Chrome off to the side of the screen so you could see the desktop area. Then you find the little “padlock” up in the address bar, and you click and drag that padlock to the desktop a...

Today’s tip has to do with a weird thing that some users are seeing in Chrome. The text characters are missing some pieces and it just looks all weird (and even unreadable). Here’s how to fix it. What we’re talking about today falls into a category I call a “niche tip”. This means that some people won’t care about at all, since their computer has not had this particular problem. This tip resolves an issue that’s not even an issue for them. But for other people, the ones who are experiencing th...

I find it pretty amazing that even after all this time, and all the alerts and warnings, and all the bad things that have happened…the scammers are still able to trick people into opening email attachments. If you follow my guideline about this, you won’t ever have a problem. There are several ways for your computer to get infected with a virus or malware. But do you know what the #1 most common method still is? Email attachments. Yes, here we are in 2019, when you’d think everyone in the worl...

Today we’re “sort of” veering away from a strictly computer-oriented tip (although what I’ll show you is done on the computer). This has to do with an annoyance I had with Netflix until I figured out how to solve it. To illustrate the problem, I’ll give you a specific example from my usage. Here is what my home page on Netflix looks like: The issue I’m talking about today is that first section at the bottom of the screen, called “Continue watching for Scott”: Whenever you start watching some...

I get questions regularly now from people asking, “What happens when Windows 7 expires?” They’re concerned that their computer will stop working, or that they will lose their important files. Fortunately those things won’t happen, but there is still reason for concern. Here’s the bottom line. The main factor for consideration here is Windows Updates. Every month, on the second Tuesday, Microsoft sends out Windows Updates. This is called Patch Tuesday, because many of the updates being sent are...

Seems like the only movie people have been talking about lately is Avengers: Endgame. I’ve seen some people saying they’ve been to see it several times. Personally, I haven’t seen it and don’t really have any plans to. I haven’t read comic books since I was a kid, and never got into the whole “super heroes” thing. But congratulations to Marvel for such a huge success. Today’s tip is for those that love watching movies and/or TV shows. I found a couple of online services that could be pretty han...

Why do you think audio books are so popular now? I think it’s because people want to read, but they simply don’t have time to sit down and visually read a book. With audio books, you can “read” a book while you’re driving, or biking, or walking the dog. But here’s the problem. There are lots of blogs and articles on the internet that are full of amazing content – but they are only available as text. Not audio. So you might miss out on a lot of good stuff, just because it takes too long to read ...

Something I hear from clients from time to time – “I tried to print this web page, and when it printed it’s all messed up! What’s wrong with my printer?” However, the problem is not with the printer – it’s working fine. But there is a solution. Here’s the underlying problem. A web page is designed to look good when viewed in a specific way: on your monitor. Or on your phone (actually, a properly created website will know if it’s being viewed on a computer or on a mobile device, and adapt the co...

Everyone knows about Audible, the audio book subscription service at audible.com. For $14.95 per month, you get one audiobook and 2 “audible originals”. It’s a great service for people who don’t have time (or don’t want to take the time) to actually read a book. You can listen to a popular or best-selling book while doing something else, just like many people do with podcasts. But what if you don’t want to pay $14.95 per month? What if you don’t want to pay ANYTHING per month? Turns out there a...

You probably have a ton of fonts stored in your computer. Probably more than you’ll ever use. I know I do. Wouldn’t it be easy to choose a font if you could see all of them together? Here’s how to do that. This is a free little program that runs on Windows, Mac or Linux. It’s called Print My Fonts, and you can download it here. It will download in a .zip folder, so you’ll need to open that folder and drag the file to your desktop and run it. The nice thing is, it does not need to install anythi...

Windows 10 is just LOADED with some really great shortcuts, and a lot of people don’t know about many of them. I’m sure I don’t know about all of them. But here are ten shortcuts that I (and others) have found really handy. Shortcut #1 If you’re using Chrome or Firefox, with a bunch of tabs open, and you accidentally close one – don’t panic! Just hit Ctrl + Shift + T and the tab that got closed will automatically re-open. Shortcut #2 In just about every program, Ctrl + Z will undo your last ...