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Issue 97 - August 16, 2000
ISSN 1488-3163; PC Improvements (c) 2000
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Welcome to the 97th issue of the PC Improvement News. PCIN
consists of news, tips, thoughts, and contests. There is something
for everyone, and if this is your first issue, I'm sure there
will be something for you. I am willing to discuss any computer
topic. Email me at mailto:editor@pcin.net with any suggestions.
If you give me two or three issues, I know that you will come
back for more!
Recommend PCIN to others and be entered in a monthly draw.
The August prize will be Microsoft Word 2000. Recommend PCIN
at http://www.pcin.net/recommend.shtml
OPENING THOUGHTS
You may remember that I mentioned a month or so ago that
I was working on a new logo. Well, I'm almost done, so the
redesign of the site and the HTML version of PCIN will start
in another few weeks. I'll keep you posted.
Correction: Last week I stated that Excite was going to run
their site on Windows 2000 Datacenter Server. I looked all
over the place for a link to include, but I couldn't. Well,
that is because it is Lycos that will be doing this, not Excite.
You can read more about this at http://www.microsoft.com/solutions/ecommerce/lycosCS.htm
Don't forget to recommend PCIN before the end of August (recommend
as many times as you'd like) and win Microsoft Word 2000.
Recommend PCIN at http://www.pcin.net/recommend.shtml
The NEWS
Cowpland Resigns From Corel
"Michael Cowpland resigned Tuesday as president, chief
executive officer, and chairman of the board of embattled
Corel to spend his time on "new start-up opportunities,"
according to a statement from Corel. The news had been expected,
according to analysts, who pointed to the company's ongoing
financial struggles as evidence that a change is needed
at Corel's helm."
For more info:
http://www.infoworld.com/articles/hn/xml/00/08/15/000815hncowpland.xml?0816weic
The Community Feeling of the Web
From the August 11, 2000 issue of ComputerWorld Canada:
Have commercial interested destroyed the Web's community
feel?
76% The Web used to be a fun and freewheeling place. Now
business controls it, and it's just another advertising
medium.
13% As with any human invention, the web is evolving. Change
is good, and the Web is fine.
6% Business is slowly ruining the community feel and
the spirit of the Web.
5% The Web is more serious than it used to be, but
it's also more useful.
Netscape Admits to Collecting User Data
A few weeks ago there were reports that Netscape's SmartDownload
software was monitoring what users were downloading, even
from non-Netscape sites. Well, Netscape/AOL has finally
admitted it. They say that they never actually kept the
data (it was sent to them and was never used?) but that
in a soon-to-be released version the collection will stop.
For more info:
http://www.forbes.com/tool/html/00/Aug/0810/mu7.htm
The 10 VISA Commandments
"In an attempt to reduce online credit-card fraud,
Visa U.S.A., in San Francisco, announced 10 "commandments"
for online merchants to guard its cardholders' information.
And next week, Visa will follow up by releasing the details
of a broad online security program. John Shaughnessy, senior
vice president for risk management at Visa, said merchants
would be required to obey these rules or face fines, sales
restrictions, or loss of membership."
For more info:
http://www.infoworld.com/articles/hn/xml/00/08/11/000811hncommand.xml?0814mnne
I NEED HELP
I offer a free help service via email. If you have a question,
you can email me and I will try my best to answer them. I
can answer about most of them, but there are things that I
have never tried or experienced so I don't have an answer.
I post those questions here and see if any of the readers
have any suggestions. I will include all reasonable suggestions
with credit to you.
These are NOT my own questions and they are NOT my answers.
I will NOT check the validity of these comments. That is up
to you. If you do try one of these tips, please let me know
how the suggestions worked out. Did they work or not? Please
send in your questions or results to mailto:freehelp@pcin.net
Previous Questions
Q 96-01)
My PC stops defragging at 65%. Any suggestions?
(PII-400, Win98)
A 96-01)
Rob said, "Run scandisk to fix any errors, then
shut down any programs running in the background. Those
little icons in the system tray, screen saver (maybe),
Ctrl-Alt-Del ONCE and shut down stuff in there except
for explorer and Systray. This will keep any programs
from trying to write data while the defrag is in progress.
It might help anyhow :-)"
John Hills said, "I think this problem is one of
three things.
1. Your hard drive is nearly full up and there is not
enough room for defrag to copy data to another portion
of the hard disk or not enough space for windows swap
file to add extra memory as required. Try deleting some
old or replaceable stuff to create more space.
2. There is a problem with a corrupt file or corrupt File
Allocation Table. Try running scandisk from the DOS prompt,
which is more efficient than scandisk from within windows.
At the C:\> prompt (type) SCANDISK /SURFACE
3. Unlikely but you could have a duff address in your
memory modules."
Liam Donaldson said, "Try checking that all background
programs are stopped or disabled. Programs like Screen
Savers, Virus Checkers etc. These can interfere with Scandisk
and Defrag."
Joe Crowe said, "I had the same problem a while
back. My son had ripped a Sony Playstation cd and stored
the file on my hard drive. He used my hard drive because
I had the room and he didn't on his hard drive. When I
ran defrag it stalled when it came upon the ripped Sony
game file. When this file was removed defrag ran normally.
This also happened with a file with the Winrar extension
I had stored on my hard drive. Having said this my suggestion
would be to look for such a file on your hard drive. The
file could be the reason defrag stops. If the file can
be removed and or saved to a backup device then do so
and run defrag again and see what happens. There could
be other reasons why defrag stops but this is what happened
to me and is only a suggestion. Note: always run scandisk
before running defrag! Running defrag without running
scandisk first can cause your files to become corrupted!"
Q 96-02)
When I switch the computer on it states that it hasn't
been shut down properly and performs scandisk. This message
is intermittent and has just occurred. The computer has
been shut down properly but the message still appears.
(AMD500, 128MB RAM, Win98)
A 96-02)
John Hills, "Scandisk will run because of a bad
shutdown as a matter of course. It will also run if it
senses the hard drive is not a full ticket. I presume
the latter is the cause. Therefore, as in the previous
question, execute answer 2. Incidentally, this is a very
good reason why it is foolhardy to disengage scandisk
after a bad shutdown, because you never know what damage
to files may have been caused. There is a possibility
that you need to boot into dos and rewrite the master
boot record. C:\>Format /MBR This will not reformat
your hard drive or cause any data loss, PROVIDED /MBR
is at the end. Virus checkers can often cause a MBR problem."
Varden Morris said, "Obviously your computer is
not shutting down properly. To fix this problem start
up your computer in "safe mode" then shut it
down. To start your computer in safe mode press the F8
key when it starts to boot up. A menu listing will then
appear. Select the safe mode option."
New Questions
Q 97-01)
I am using IE5 Offline Web Pages. When creating off-line
folders it asks you how deep you would like to go. The
exact wording is:
Download pages '3' links down from this page.
Is there anyway to increase this value to greater than
3?
Q 97-02)
All the icons in my personal folder will change. For
no reason at all that I know of. All GIFs to something
new and all JPGs as well. Sometimes they will change to
an icon that's on the desktop & other times something
else.
If you have an answer to these questions or have a question
of your own, please email me at mailto:freehelp@pcin.net
THE TIPS and OTHER STUFF
Cheap Trick of the Week
**Colourful browsing**
The Internet can be colourful all right, but your Internet
Explorer browser provides a pretty dull frame for it all,
doesn't it?
But you can easily brighten it up with the pattern or picture
of your choosing.
It just takes a little Registry tweaking. (If you're not
familiar with Windows' Registry, see http://www.WE-Compute.com/registry.html
for instructions and important precautions.)
In the Registry, make your way to HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Internet
Explorer\Toolbar. Right-click on Toolbar and create a New
String Value named BackBitmapIE5 (if you're running a version
of IE earlier than 5.0, the value should be just BackBitmap).
Double-click on the new string value to bring up its Edit
String dialogue box. In the Value Data field enter the pathname
to the bitmap (that is, to a file with a .BMP extension)
you want to use, such as C:\Windows\Bubbles.bmp. You'll
find lots of such files in the Windows folder where the
desktop wallpapers are kept.
Click on OK to close the dialogue box and launch Internet
Explorer.
Bye-bye to grey-flannel browsing.
You may have to experiment with various graphics before
you get one that's attractive but also the right colours
to read icons and menu titles against.
Windows Scripting Tip
Subscriber John Hills sent in this tip:
I thought this might be a useful tip although you may have
to tart it up to make it understood by everybody.
With the ever-increasing frequency of script viruses arriving
with your email and the inability of virus checkers to pick
them up unless you have the very latest updates the following
may prove useful.
In your security settings for IE 4 or 5 and accessible through
Outlook Express the first 5 options are available to enable,
disable or prompt for running Active X controls.
If you disable all Active X scripting none of these script
viruses can run. Also, if you have any emails with Active
X attached to them, a warning message will come up and prevent
the Active X from running.
The downside to this disablement is that spam emails coming
to you cannot whisk you off to their website before you
know what is happening and some, very few, websites fancy
stuff may not work as it should.
Windows NT/2000 Tip Site
If you are looking for a site with lots of Windows NT/2000
tips, then http://www.jsiinc.com/reghack.htm
is what you're looking for. As of the last time I looked,
there were 2800 tips. You can view them individually, or
you can search them.
DISCLAIMER and OTHER STUFF
PCIN is brought to you by PC Improvements. The opinions expressed
are those of the editor, Graham Wing. PC Improvements and
Graham Wing accept no responsibility for the results obtained
from trying the tips in this newsletter.
- If any of the links are too long to fit on one line,
you may have to cut and paste.
- You can only win one contest every 30 days.
- To subscribe another address or unsubscribe, please visit
http://www.pcin.net/ and follow the appropriate
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and be entered in a monthly draw.
- There are only 2 ways to get on the subscriber list.
You have either been subscribed by filling out a subscription
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FreeHelp from me in the past.
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Graham Wing can be reached at mailto:editor@pcin.net
Copyright 1998-2000, PC Improvements and Graham Wing. All
rights reserved. This publication may be reproduced in hole,
or in part, as long as the author is notified and the newsletter
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