August 2007 - BigBearCC.org
Transcription
August 2007 - BigBearCC.org
Volume 7 August 2007 B y l r ea Byte s Award Winning Newsletter of Big Bear Computer Club www.bigbearcc.org In This Issue August Meeting BBCC Club Information Presidents Message August BBCC Calendar BBCC Helpline About Bearly Bytes Software Review Software Review Barbecue Referrals Rewarded Upcoming Events Pc Infected? Iphone review Excel Classes Memeber Input Cash Flow Report SWUG Conference BBCC General Meeting Door Prize Winners Discounts, Offers & Deals Review Products Review Program Build it Yourself Build it Yourself Build it Yourself Upgrading Upgrading Car Wreck Word Tip Excel Tip Windows Tip Opportunities Available Advertising Director Membership Benefits Membership Application Map To Meeting Page 1 1 2 2 3 4 4 5 6 7 7 7 7 8 8 9 9 10 11 11 12 13 13 14 15 16 16 17 17 18 18 18 19 19 20 20 20 Next BBCC Meeting: Tuesday, August 14, 2007 at 5:30 PM Presenting Rick Edwards Rick Edwards will be doing a presentation on photography at the next Big Bear Computer Club meeting. Everyone is Welcome!! Bring your computer questions and bring your friends! Besides informative computer related presentations we have Our ever-popular RAM (Question and Answer) session This is where you will meet friends who share your computer interests Member’s Drawing for FREE Software products BBCC Club Information BBCC Officers and Key Leaders President...............................Yomar Cleary 878-5622 ycleary@charter.net Vice President.......................Karen Tangeman 585-7413 ktangeman@charter.net Secretary...............................Rosemary Lloyd 584-9358 rosemary@sugarloafpc.com Treasurer...............................Barbara Moore 585-7981 barbstuff@verizon.net Reviews Editor.......................Karen Tangeman 585-7413 ktangeman@charter.net Director-at-large......................Elaine Tennity 584-7158 TeTennity@aol.com Director-at-large......................Kent Gale 585-6460 kentgale@verizon.net Publicity...................................Yomar Cleary 878-5622 ycleary@charter.net Equipment Director..................Don Odekirk 585-6728 djodekirk@hotmail.com Technical Director...................Jim Lloyd 584-9358 inquiries@sugarloafpc.com Webmaster...................Bill Flanagan 866-9379 wiledwill@yahoo.com Newsletter Editor....................Gordon West (909) 584 9776 editorbbcc@charter.net Membership Director..............Dorothy Sirk 585-3449 dorothysirk@earthlink.net. Parliamentarian......................David Philipson 585-9389 philipson@philipsonerdmier.com Historian.................................Nancy Hinz 585-8095 Sunshine Coordinator................Grace Fross (951) 769-1225 gcfross@verizon.net Page 2 President’s Message We just returned from the Southwest User Group Conference in San Diego which was a great experience as always. As mentioned before there were four of us who attended, Barbara Moore, Treasurer; Karen Tangeman, Vice President, Dorothy Sirk, Membership and myself. All the presentations were fantastic with all the new technology that is out there or coming in the near future. There were 71 vendors who provided information on their products. Each of us went to a breakfast presentation then from workshop to workshop then to lunch and again workshop to workshop, then to dinner. It seems all we did was EAT but it was fun; we were all physically and mentally exhausted by the time we got home but it was a great learning experience, just ask Dorothy Sirk. We all came home with at least one or two software programs and lots of trial programs and t-shirts, we will share with you. I was able to line up our presenters for 2008; I think you will enjoy the presentations for next year. The great news is that Rick Edwards submitted several pictures for the Photography Contest and he won for the Club FIRST PLACE!!! Congratulations Rick!!!! It was very exciting for the Big Bear Computer Club to win this award as there were 70 photographs submitted. See the mother Cheetah with her cubs picture in this newsletter. Rick is getting ready several pictures for the APCUG Convention in January, 2008. Yomar Cleary, President BBCC Calendar BBCC Events Calendar -- August, 2007 Sunday Monday Tuesday 5 6 7 12 13 14 19 20 21 BBCC General Meeting 5:30 pm Wednesday Thursday Friday Saturday 1 2 3 4 8 9 10 11 15 16 17 18 Excel Workshop 22 23 24 25 Air Fair 26 27 28 29 BBCC Board Meeting Page 3 30 31 BBCC Help Line The following members have Generously offered to help you with your PC problems by phone or by e-mail. Windows Beginners.....................Carole Allen 866-7677 allenbnc@yahoo.com Windows 95,98,ME,XP..............Bob Kopolow 584-7747 bobkopolow@yahoo.com Outlook Express.......................Joan Kiehl 585-7894 dicjoa@earthlink.net MS Outlook....................... Bob Kopolow 584-7747 bobkopolow@yahoo.com Bearly Bytes Bearly Bytes is the official publication of Big Bear Compute Club. Winner SWUGC & APCUG newsletter contests. Views expressed in Bearly Bytes are those of the authors and do not reflect the opinions of Big Bear Computer Club. Other computer user groups are welcome to reprint our articles as long as they acknowledge the author and the source as Bearly Bytes, Big Bear Computer Club. Editorial Staff: Gordon West, Editor. Columists: Larry Smith, Barbara Moore, Carole Allen,,Karen Tangeman, Yomar Cleary & Rosemary Lloyd. Submissions: All BBCC members are encouraged to send letters, articles, questions and comments to Bearly Bytes for inclusion in future issues. Submi plain text via e-mail and graphics or photos on disk in TIFF or JPEG format. Bearly Bytes Editor, Gordon West editorbbcc@ charter.net Box 4548, Big Bear City, CA 92314 (909) 584-9776 MS Word........................Karen Tangeman 585-1734 ktangeman@charter.net MS Excel.............................Yomar Cleary 878-5622 ycleary@charter.net MSPublisher........................Yomar Cleary 878-5622 ycleary@charter.net Digital Photos....................Barbara Moore 585-7981 barbstuff@verizon.net CD Burning.............................Larry Smith 584-1284 kg6erf@yahoo.com Quicken...........................Michael Homan 584-2277 vpc@pineknot.com Hardware..............................Bob Kopolow 584-7747 bobkopolow@yahoo.com Join our Help Line Volunteers! You don’t have to be an expert; just help others find the answers. Contact any BBCC Board Member to join. BBCC members are encouraged to attend Board Meetings and make suggestions about member Benefits, events, services, etc. Please Join us and share your opinions. Page 4 Letter to the Editor I enjoy very much the CC Newsletters you have been sharing with me. Although I am still in Spokane, WA this helps keep me connected to “home”. I don’t know how long I will be staying here in Spokane (I love it up here, too), but when I come back home to Big Bear I will certainly be back in touch and sign up with the CC once again. Again, thanks for keeping me updated on whats happening with the CC. I hope you will continue to do so. Best to all, Jean Yonkers Software Review VISTA HOME EDITION By Yomar Cleary ycleary@charter.net MY EXPERIENCE WITH VISTA HOME PREMIUM Recently I decided to upgrade to Vista Home Premium Edition, so I ran the Windows Vista Upgrade Advisor. When you run Vista Upgrade Advisor, it will notify you if your computer is Vista ready. It also notifies you which application could cause a potential conflict during the upgrade and it will tell you to remove that application prior to installing the upgrade. Make sure you remove that application, otherwise you will have problems. I found that my Compaq Presario had only 512 MB and I needed at least 1-Gigabit to run Vista Home Premium. We added another 512 of memory to bring it up to 1 gigabit. Before upgrading it is good to make a clone of your hard drive in case there is a problem with Vista, you can revert back to your original status. Since I had XP Home Edition, I was able to upgrade; anyone with XP Home Professional will have to do a clean install. Vista requires plenty of power to efficiently run many of its features; anything less than the recommended guidelines, your computer will run slow. The installations went well but expect to spend a couple of hours doing the installation. Once the upgrade was installed, my hard drive including my documents, my programs and my Outlook Express were imported into my newly install Vista. It’s confusing enough to learn a new operating system, but when familiar controls have been switched around, it becomes a challenge. One example is the Control Panel, its nothing like the Control Panel we are used to in XP. Vista has even changed the way you turn the machine off, which is great. Windows is put into a powered down state instead of turning completely off. So you still save power but the system starts up immediately when you need it. And Vista comes with great security features that anyone with Vista would not need any other software. There is Windows Defender that protects you from spyware; a phishing filter is part of the security which notifies you if you are at a fake site. Another security feature is the User Account Control which makes you authenticate all your actions that change the system—this can become annoying after awhile but you do have the option to disable it. Not a good idea though. If you have Outlook or Outlook Express it will export into the Microsoft Windows Mail during installation. This is a great feature having your contacts and favorites and all settings exported automatically. I found a new feature in which you can go to the search box, type complete or partial words, you will get a list of all the email messages that contain your search criteria. Another good feature is suspected junk mail is automatically moved to the junk mail folder but you need to check it to make sure it does not send a good email to the Junk File folder; I found a few of my emails there. I did run into a problem with Windows Mail, seemed to run very slow which caused some very frustrating moments. I find that Windows Mail is still running rather slow. Microsoft Support worked with me very diligently to resolve my problems but I feel confident that the Microsoft Programmers will work out the problems being experienced by those using Windows Mail. I have been a dedicated Outlook Express user for many years and feel that it should have been left as it was. In the Folder Pane under Windows Mail it provides a “Microsoft Communities” that I found helpful. You can go into the Windows Mail Microsoft Communities newsgroup to read as to what types of problems other Vista users are experiencing and find helpful hints to your problem; and you can also post your own comments. A unique feature in Vista is the Windows Sidebar. This is located on the right hand side of the desk top. This Sidebar includes a clock, news headlines, weather and a photo viewer. There are several types of clocks you can select which makes it interesting. The news headlines are a great feature, as you can keep up with the latest news right on your desktop. I am always curious to know what the weather is doing and there it is right on the desktop. As for the photo viewer, it’s a good touch but I could do without it on the desk top. The Windows Sidebar can clutter your desk top but the good thing is; you can remove it. Page 5 Another feature is the Aero which I am not able to experience as it requires a more powerful computer to run it. So I am unable to tell you about Aero other than what I have read and that is that Window edges are translucent; menus and windows fade away when closed; the taskbar shows actual thumbnail images of the open documents; all the icons have been redesigned with a clean, 3-D look and greater resolution. I ran into a snag when I tried to scan through my HP Officejet 5610 All-in-One printer. Vista does not recognize the scan button on the printer; I panicked and then I went to the help line to find out why and how I could resolve the problem. As it turns out Vista comes with its own scanner software. You go to “Photo Gallery” then to the “File” tab, down to “Import from Camera or Scanner”; click on Scanner and your printer communicates with Vista. Whew!!!!! I don’t feel I did Vista Home Premium justices in my review since I was unable to review all the programs due to the fact that my PC software did not meet all the standards for Vista. I hope that this review has given you a glimpse of what Vista is all about. So far what I have experienced working with Vista has been enjoyable but there is so much more to learn. I have only touched the tip of the iceberg! FIVE VISTA PROGRAMS: 1) 2) 3) 4) 5) Vista Basic ………………………..Least equipped Vista Home Premium…………….Full experience Vista Business,……………………Small & Midsized businesses Vista Ultimate…………..……..…..High end users/gamers/multimedia Vista Enterprise……. …….………Large Corporations REQUIREMENTS: 1 Ghz but 2 Ghz processor is better for Home Premium 800 MHz CPU 1 Gigabyte of DDR RAM Direct X9 capable graphics card DVD-ROM Drive Broadband Internet Connection Windows Vista Ultimate $499 Windows Vista Business $379 Windows Vista Home Premium $299 Windows Vista Home Basic $259 http://www.microsoft.com/windows/products/ windowsvista/default.mspx Page 6 It’s my privilege to be a charter member of the Big Bear Computer Club since 1995. I am the current President of the Computer Club and have been doing the Publicity for the last seven years. I am also teaching Microsoft Excel for beginners at the Computer Lab in partnership with the Bear Valley Parks & Recreation. The Computer club has broadened my computer knowledge tremendously especially by attending the Computer User Group Conference in San Diego and Las Vegas. I have been involved with computers since 1978 and loved every minute. UPCOMING BARBECUE At the August 14th Computer Club meeting, the Board is having a barbecue with hamburgers, cheese burgers, hot dogs, chips, potato salad, macaroni salad and the condiments. All we need is for you to come and enjoy the barbecue. Oh yes, all you have to do is bring your non-alcoholic beverage. This is a way to “thank you” for your support of the club. The meeting will start at 5:00 pm instead of 5:30 pm so we will eat first, followed by our meeting and presentation. Are you sure your PC is not infected? NEW MEMBER REFERRALS REWARDED Did you know that if you bring a guest to a meeting that you will get an EXTRA door prize red ticket? Now, if you bring a guest and that guest signs up as a member you will get to pick a free gift from our special gift table. Also you can pick a free gift if you refer someone to the Computer Club and they join. They need to announce that they were referred by you. DON’T MISS OUT ON THE GREAT FREE GIFTS! UPCOMING EVENTS We present the new Panda TotalScan, Panda’s most powerful online scanner. With TotalScan, you can and find out whether it is infected with viruses, spyware, Trojans or any other threat. Scan your PC with TotalScan and make sure it is not infected. EXCEL WORKSHOP..........................August 18th LATEST TOTALSCAN STATS National Nite Out…..................…….…August 7th Hundreds of thousands of PCs scanned 1,100,000 viruses, spyware and other threats detected 54.44% of the PCs scanned have viruses 2,500 new viruses, spyware and other threats every day Air Show……………...................….….August 25th www.nanoscan.com/as/v1/ Powered by TotalScan Page 7 IPHONE REVIEW BY JACK WILLIAMS MAC USER GROUP I decided to get a couple of weeks experience with the iPhone under our belts before giving you a review. Yes, Ellyn and I decided late on June 29th to join the line at the Victoria Gardens Apple Store and buy two iPhones. We arrived about an hour and a half after the phones went on sale and the line was only 200 feet long by then. Victoria Gardens security folks told us the line was almost 300 yards long at the 6:00 PM launch time. Apple Store staff walked the line on a regular basis handing out water bottles and even taking coffee orders (ours was for coffee with cream). Fifty minutes after joining the line we had two new 8GB iPhones and belt-clip cases. Now that we’ve lived with them for two weeks, we love them. The screen’s touch technology is truly unique and amazing; we were both quite skeptical about the virtual keyboard but even it works surprisingly well. AT&T’s weak coverage in the eastern end of the Big Bear Valley seems to be the only downside. Evidently, Cingular is/was using the TMobile site out there and there’s been a disconnect with AT&T’s acquisition. AT&T is aware of the issue and says they’re working on it. The reality of the iPhone is that it’s not a cellphone with a lot of other stuff pasted on to it. It’s truly a microcomputer that has the services of a cellphone included. Apple’s agreement with AT&T greatly simplified their pricing structure into three tiers with a lot of unlimited services which can be seen at http://www.apple.com/iphone/easysetup/rateplans.html The bottom line for us is that we’re very happy with our iPhones and are curious what new features may be coming through software updates. P.S. With the iPhone, I’ve retired my pristine Hewlett-Packard iPAQ PDA, do you know anyone who could put it to good use? MICROSOFT EXCEL CLASSES The Big Bear Computer Club is offering a Workshop on basic knowledge of “MICROSOFT EXCEL” on Saturday, August 18, 2007 from 9:00 am until 1:00 pm. The Excel Workshop will be held at the Computer Lab at the Big Bear Valley Parks and Recreation Building located on 41220 Park Avenue in Big Bear Lake, CA. Yomar Cleary will be the instructor for this Workshop. The “Microsoft Excel” Workshop will include Getting Started, Editing the Workbook, Formatting and Creating Charts, plus much more. For more information or to sign up for the Workshop, please contact the instructor, Yomar Cleary, at (909) 878-5622 or email her at ycleary@earthlink.net. Anyone wanting to learn on how to get the full use of their computer should plan on attending the Big Bear Computer Club meetings held the 2nd Tuesday of the month, 5:30 pm. The meetings are held at the Big Bear Discovery Center which is located at 40971 North Shore Drive in Fawnskin, CA. The public is welcome to attend. Page 8 BIG BEAR COMPUTER CLUB CASH FLOW STATEMENT NEED MEMBER INPUT The Board would like to make the club meetings more interesting to the beginner computer user, intermediate and advance but we need your input as to what you would like to see and hear at the meetings. We want YOU to come to the meetings and enjoy coming so we welcome any suggestions you have to offer. ~ What type of presentations would you like? ~ Do you want training meetings? ~ More time with RAM (Question & Answer period) ~ Time of the day you would like the meetings to be, morning, afternoons, or evenings? ~ Day of the week? ~ Do you want a postcard mailed to you as a re minder of the meeting? ~ Are you okay with having the newsletter emailed to you? Jot down your thoughts and bring them to the next meeting, the Board really wants to hear from you. You can also mail them to our P. O. Box 645, Big Bear City, CA 92314. No need to sign your name if you want to stay anonymous. We want to see you at the meetings, remember mark your calendar for the 2nd Tuesday of the month at 5:30 pm Big Bear Discovery Center. July 2007 Cash in Bank CASH RECEIVED Membership Dues $300.00 Fundraising Equipment $0.00 Donation 50/.50 $25.00 Donations $1.00 Advertising $60.00 Bank $0.00 Other Income $0.00 Total Income $386.00 CASH DISPERSED Petty Cash $0.00 Dues & Fees $0.00 Fundraising $0.00 Newsletter $17.95 Equipment $0.00 Promotion $50.00 Programs $0.00 Advertising $0.00 Supplies $21.32 Other $0.00 Total Expenses $89.27 $2,618.18 $3,004.18 $2,914.91 Philipson & Erdmier Attorneys ~ Criminal Defense ~ Workers Compensation ~ Personal Injury ~ Civil Litigation ~ Family Law ~ Probate Law Page 9 719 Pine Knot Ave, Big Bear Lake 909.866.4140 or 909.878.2118 BBCC Memebrs at the Southwest User Group Conference in San Diego, left to right; Dorothy Sirk, Karen Tangeman, Yomar Cleary, & Barbara Moore BIG BEAR GETS RECOGNITION IN SAN DIEGO Rick Edwards winning photo at the Southwest User group Conference! SUPPORT OUR ADVERTISERS We have four Advertisers supporting our Bearly Bytes newsletter; one way to say “thank you” is by supporting their business. They are: The Paper Clip Stationers: Gear Works; Philipson & Erdmier Attorneys and the Abacus Group. If you or you know of someone who would like to advertise in the club newsletter, contact Yomar Cleary at ycleary@charter.net. The cost is very minimal $10 per month. Page 10 At the Southwest Computer User Group Conference held in San Diego recently, Rick Edwards, a member of the Big Bear Computer Club, was awarded First Prize on the submission of a picture of a mother Cheetah with her cubs taken in Kenya. Rick Edwards is an associate of The Royal Photographic Society who perfected his photography while living in Nairobi Kenya watching wildlife in the many parks in Kenya. During his last two years of his stay in Kenya he became the official photographer for the Kenya Wildlife Service. Ricks work can be seen in numerous brochures, magazines and books on wildlife and his beloved Kenya. www. fotodimensions.com. Sue’s avon Need Avon? Just go to Sue Crane’s website and look over the catalogue. This is a way she can earn money to pay for her MS medication which has become very expensive so why not help her out. http://www.youravon.com/suecrane Door Prize Winners July 2007 Panda Antivirus by Panda - Doug MacIver Tour Coupon (4 people) by Big Bear Discovery Center - Ray Norman Laplink Everywhere 4 by Laplink - Barbara Moore HP Photosmart 325 by HP - Jerry Land Microsoft Vista Launch Kit by Microsoft - Albert Neal 50/50 WINNER $12.00 - Yomar Cleary BBCC GENERAL MEETING July 2007 The presentation began with Ivan explaining the different video formats available. They are DVD (MPEG-2), SVCD, VCD (MPEG-1), MPEG-4 and DivX. Ivan focused on two items in the ADS Technologies product line. The first was the DVD Xpress DX2. It is essentially a video capture ‘card’ in a box. Connect it to the USB port of a computer. Then connect a VCR, an old video camera, a newer DV camera, a DVD player or other video source to the DVD Xpress DX2. You can copy the video directly to DVD or CD or make movies for your Sony PSP or Apple iPod using the easy wizard. Make high quality video without a lot of effort or learning curve. A few years ago, people spent a lot of money on video capture cards and the editing software that went with them. Today the technology available makes converting old video much easier. Secondly, Ivan talked about converting analog audio to digital files. ADS Technologies offers a product called Instant Music. It is a small box that connects to the computer via USB. To capture music, connect a tape player or record player to the Instant Music device. It enables you to capture the audio and convert it to MP3, WAV or WMA files. Then the music can be burned on CD or downloaded to an iPod or played on the computer. Again, a wizard walks you through the process, including automatically cleaning up the files (reducing pops, clicks and hiss). However, if you want to manually play with the sound files, there is a wave editor program included. Both of the items that Ivan showed to us might come in handy for people who want to convert their analog audio and video to digital – before the magnetic tapes lose their data and the LP’s warp. After Ivan’s presentation, Rosemary and some members answered a few member questions in the RAM session. Topics covered included what to do if Windows complains that the page file is too small and should you be concerned if your anti-spyware program finds one file that it considers a threat? The door prizes were given out and we concluded another educational enlightening evening. Submitted by Rosemary Lloyd, Secretary July 13, 2007 Page 11 DISCOUNTS, OFFERS & DEALS UG Discount from Total Training Total Training is pleased to offer 15% savings on our products to Adobe UserGroups. Our full product line offers comprehensive video tutorials on creative design, web design, digital video, and digital photography. Use coupon code “save15ug” to order any of our point products. Please share this discount with the members of your group and let our Adobe experts do the rest. Offer is not valid on closeout or bundle products. http://www.totaltraining.com/home.asp?c=u sergroup&n=010107 Coupon code: save15ug O’Reilly Books As for new books, O’Reilly has 5 new titles for Vista alone (“Windows Vista: The Missing Manual,” “Windows Vista for Starters,” “Vista in a Nutshell,” “Vista: The Definitive Guide,” and “Windows Vista Pocket Reference” and 8 Microsoft Office 2007 titles which include a Missing Manual and For Starters book each for Word, Excel, Powerpoint, and Access. We also have the long-awaited “Rails Cookbook” just in time for Rails 1.2. We have many new releases’ for this month. For the full list of new titles, go to: http://www.oreilly.com/store/newreleases.csp For New Releases on Books, PDFs, and Rough Cuts: Get 35% off from O’Reilly, No Starch, Paraglyph, PC Publishing, Pragmatic Bookshelf, SitePoint, Syngress, or YoungJin books you purchase directly from O’Reilly. Just use code DSUG when ordering online or by phone 800-9989938. http://www.oreilly.com/store/ Free ground shipping on orders of $29.95 or more. For more details, go to: http://www.oreilly.com/news/freeshipping_0703.html Did you know you can request a free book or PDF to review for your group? Ask your Review Editor for more information. Advanced WindowsCare v2 Personal Is a comprehensive PC care utility that takes a one-click approach to help protect, repair and optimize your computer. It provides an all-in-one and super convenient solution for PC maintenance and protection. This fantastic program is available free of charge for private use. www.iobit.com Peachpit We provide your group members with a 30% discount off the list price of any of our books. At checkout, right before they put their credit card number in, they must enter the user group coupon code UE-23AA-PEUF (case-sensitive). This coupon code is an exclusive offer that may not be used in conjunction with any other coupon codes. www.peachpit.com Tiger Direct, through its parent company Global Computer, is offering all APCUG member user groups discount pricing on all products they carry (and that is a lot). This program will provide similar discounts that vendors normally provide their corporate accounts. All products include everything on their web site, in their catalogs, and special orders. Most items will have a varied % off but all items will be lower than advertised. In other words software, hardware, peripherals, printers, servers, all may have a slightly different discount rate as do brands such as HP, EPSON, LENOVO, IBM, etc. This discount includes all major brands, including their own Global and Tiger Direct Systemax custom computers as well as printer ink and toners, peripherals of all kinds, and media. To get the UG discount, your members should call Clay Bennett, Senior Manager, Global Computer, and identify themselves as belonging to your user group which is a member of APCUG. Please have the item number and description to give Clay, as well as quantity and a credit card for payment. Clay may be reached at 866 310 1947. The web site is: http://www.globalcomputer.com Page 12 PicturesToExe Deluxe 5.0: A powerful slide show software for all Windows operating systems including Vista. This program has genuinely unique features designed to bring the simplicity and convenience of creating impressively beautiful and professionally-looking slide shows consisting of any number of pictures in a standalone EXE file or SCR format (screen saver) to home PC users, amateur and professional photographers, designers, painters, lecture readers, teachers, and all the people desiring to make their interactive galleries or presentations look both wonderful and gorgeous. A very special feature of PicturesToExe Deluxe 5.0 is the possibility to turn a slide show into a standard screen saver for Windows. Additionally, users of PicturesToExe can also simply save their slide shows as an AVI file. There are many more special features to this program. MSRP Standard Edition $39 Deluxe Edition $59. For more information and system requirements please visit http://www.wnsoft.com/. Review Products Screensaver Factory 4.5: This is the latest version of Blumentals powerful screensaver development software that enables users to create stunning professional screensavers within minutes. Screensavers can be made from any set of images, video files and Flash(SWF) animation clips. Background music can be added and it is possible to select from over 100 smooth picture transition effects and other options. Screensaver Factory is very easy to use and it enables one to make standalone self-installing screensaver files and CDs for easy setup and distribution. Screensaver Factory 4 is fully compatible with Windows 98, Me, 2000, 2003, XP and Vista. Pricing and Availability Screensaver Factory is available in Standard, Professional and Enterprise editions. A free trial of Screensaver Factory is available immediately at www.blumentals.net, Pricing varies from $39.85 US to $79.85 US. Upgrade pricing is available for existing customers. Professor Fizzwizzle and the Molten Mystery! GAME. While on a well deserved vacation, Professor Fizzwizzle’s investigation of a strange volcano has landed him in a hot spot of trouble. Now it’s up to you to master exciting new gadgets, outwit the Bat-Bots, and vanquish a truly cunning villain! Available on PC, Mac, and Linux, Professor Fizzwizzle’s latest adventure pits him against the fiendish foe, Penny Pyroclast, and her island full of mind melting puzzles. Featuring over 210 levels in three different difficulty levels, Professor Fizzwizzle and the Molten Mystery is packed with fun for gamers of all ages and skill levels. For more information on system Requirements and price please go to www.grubbygames.com. BBCC Review Program One of the great benefits of Big Bear Computer Club is FREE software, hardware (that’s right, even free hardware!), and books for BBCC members. In return, all the member has to do is write a Product Review for Bearly Bytes. That’s it, and the review product is theirs! How are members going to know if a product is any good unless another member tells them? Our members are all notified of free product reviews through e-mail press releases and our monthly newsletter. Also, at every monthly meeting 2 products up for review are presented and explained to all club members. Upon accepting a product for review, the review editor sends the member 2 documents on “How to write a Review.” One is a question/answer form and the other is a guideline outlining exactly what information you need to include in writing the review. You have 60 days to complete the review and return it to the review editor. That’s it. The review is then published in our monthly newsletter Bearly Bytes for other members to read. The review is also sent to the vendor who markets the product. The program is then yours. The review editor is available at all times if any member has any questions or problems with the review. Our review program is a wonderful way to receive free products and to keep other members educated. Page 13 Build It Yourself By Brian K. Lewis, Ph.D., Columnist, Sarasota PCUG, Florida www.spcug.org bwsail@yahoo.com Obtained from APCUG with the author’s permission for publication by APCUG member groups. You may never have considered building your own computer, but it is really just an assembly job. When you are familiar with the components of your system, you will find it is easier to understand and possibly diagnose problems. A couple of weeks ago I had the opportunity to assemble two new computers for one of my children. She needed two additional systems for the growing work force in her business. I had forgotten how much fun it is to put a new system together. So, I thought I would share some of the reasoning behind the selection of the components and assembling them into a working product. Even if you don’t build a new computer, it might be useful the next time you are looking for a new system. For these computers it was not necessary that they be “state of the art”, so I selected an Intel Celeron D central processor(CPU). These CPUs function quite well, especially at the 3.2 Ghz speed. Since they were intended for a specific office environment the price point and the speed were ideal. However, Celeron processors do not support dual-threading nor are they dual-core processors. If you want the latest in processors then you should consider the Intel Core-2 Duo or an AMD dual processor. Another alternative would be to use a 64 bit processor instead of these 32 bit processors. The main drawback to that is that most software isn’t really ready to take advantage of 64 bit processing and there are still problems with some drivers for peripheral equipment. Once I decided on the CPU, the next step was to find an appropriate motherboard. I selected an Intel 946 series with the 775 socket. This motherboard supports Intel processors from the Celeron D to the Core-2 Duo. This makes it a good choice for any upgrades to another CPU. It also supports up to 4GB of RAM. This board also features built-in sound and video. Naturally that has both pros and cons associated with these features. With the integrated video you can run Windows Vista in the mode which uses the “Aero Glass” graphics because it borrows memory from the system RAM. As this graphic interface is one of the primary features of Vista, you would need to install a separate video card which meets the requirements of the Vista video specification. For the computers I was building this was not a problem as they will not be running Vista. Instead I purchased 2 OEM copies of Windows XP which run very well with the integrated graphics on this Intel board. The Intel motherboard also requires DDR2 RAM (system memory) modules which improve the processing speed over that of the original DDR RAM. It also has a front-side bus which can run at 533, 800 or 1066 MHz. With the Celeron D this bus runs at 533 MHz. For those who are not familiar with bus speeds, the front side bus refers to the speed at which information is transferred to/from the various peripheral slots to the CPU. In today’s computers this can be one of the bottlenecks for data transfer. The other is the Input/Output transfer for the hard drive. Other features of this board include 8 USB 2.0 ports, a 10/100 LAN port and four SATA hard drive ports. I have always found Intel motherboards to very solid and dependable performers. If I were intent on building a faster system with a Core-2 Duo or AMD processor then I would be looking for an ASUS motherboard. In general they get much stronger reviews related to state-of-the-art installations. I have also used them in a number of systems some of which are still running some five years later. So I always consider them for a top of the line system. The next item I considered was the case for these systems. The one I selected was an Antec Sonata II which is a mid-size tower. This comes with an air control system that channels air from outside the case directly to the CPU. It has a 120 mm exhaust fan and provisions for an additional fan in the front of the case. The Antec power supply provides 450 watts maximum and has two fans. The exhaust fan runs only when the power supply reaches a specific temperature. As it turned out, this was the quietest case I have ever used. The fans are really whisper quiet. With any ambient noise in the work space you really can’t hear the computer. This is also related to the shock mounting of the hard drives. The hard drive cage has individual removable mounts with rubber grommets around the attachment screws. Each drive is therefore mounted on these rubber grommets and essentially no vibration is transmitted to the cage or the case. One thing I haven’t mentioned yet is the RAM I installed. For these computers, considering how they were to be Page 14 used, I only installed one GB of RAM. This was one Kingston 1GB DDR2 240 pin module for each system. This leaves one slot open for additional memory should an upgrade be needed. Installation of the components into the case is not really difficult. The first part is to screw in the motherboard supports and to replace the I/O shield at the back with the one supplied with the motherboard. I always install the CPU, the CPU fan and the RAM before I try to put the motherboard in the case. Then the trick in getting the motherboard into position is to make sure that you tilt it toward the back so it fits the I/O shield and then lay it on the supports. You generally have to put a little pressure on the front edge of the motherboard to get the screw holes lined up. Once it is screwed down you can install the power connectors and the various connectors for the LEDs and front panel USB connectors. The Antec case manual is quite helpful in this regard. The Intel instructions are all pictorial and might take some thinking if you’ve never done this before. I found that the ASUS motherboard manuals are much better designed for non-commercial installers. Intel obviously figures that anyone using their motherboard has done this before. Now we get to another really important component, the hard drive. As I mentioned earlier the motherboard supports up to four SATA (serial ATA) drives. So I selected Seagate Barracuda SATA2 160 GB hard drives for these systems. I went with Seagate because I have found over the years that they are more reliable than other brands. Even though some are now Seagate subsidiaries, I still prefer the Seagate label. Also, I would not consider installing IDE drives in any new computers. The transfer rates for SATA2 are so much better it doesn’t make sense to install an IDE drive anymore. The other point is that the price of SATA2 is quite competitive with IDE. I suspect that it won’t be long before it will be very difficult to find IDE drives. Oh yes, the cost of 160 GB drives is only a few dollars more than an 80 GB drive. And, you can go up to 500 GB for not much more. The attachment to the motherboard uses a power cable from the power supply and the data cable which comes with the motherboard. Each of these are keyed so they fit only one way into the drive and the motherboard. At this point I usually do a power-on test to see if everything wakes up. So I connect the video monitor and external power, then press the power switch. Once the power connection is made the motherboard LED lights up. Then pressing the power on results in the case fan and CPU fan spinning. Of course I get an error message on the monitor that there is no operating system. But everything else looks good. So I just hold in the power button until the system powers down. Then I disconnect the power and video. The only other internal drive that I installed was an NEC DVD burner. This fits into one of the exposed 5 ¼” drive slots. To get this in you have to remove one of the slot covers. The easiest way in the Antec case is to push it out from the inside. Then on the back of this cover are two rails that are removed and attached to the DVD drive with the supplied screws. Then you simply slide the drive it so it is supported by the rails. The motherboard comes with an IDE cable that attaches to the motherboard and to the drive. Each end is keyed so you really can’t attach it incorrectly. These systems did not require a floppy drive. The monitors I selected for these systems are a Samsung 17” LCD. The monitors have an adjustable height stand and can be rotated for either portrait or landscape orientation. The contrast ratio is one of the highest I’ve seen for LCD monitors. In addition, I didn’t find any dead pixels in any of the three systems I purchased. I’ve had similar success with other Samsung monitors I have installed. The final hardware components are the mouse, keyboard and speakers. The speakers for these systems are an inexpensive CyberAcoustic set since they are headed for an office environment. You can certainly find better and more expensive speakers if you prefer. The keyboard and mouse are a wireless combination from Logitech. As I use Logitech’s wireless systems, I find I really like the way they operate. the only drawback is that they do require batteries. However, in the mouse that I use with my laptop the two AA alkaline batteries lasted for a year. The mouse and keyboard operate using an RF (radio frequency) receiver that plugs into the PS/2 ports on the case. With Windows XP both of these were immediately recognized as being the usual PS/2 components. As I mentioned earlier, the operating system for these computers is Windows XP. After I had all the components installed I put the Windows CD in the drive and rebooted the computer. The system booted from the CD with no problem. Then it all that was needed was to follow the on-screen instructions to partition and format the new drive. After that Windows continued with the installation of XP. That took about 30 minutes after the completion of the drive formatting. The final steps in the preparation of these systems was the downloading of various software components. These included Firefox, Avast anti-virus, ZoneAlarm firewall, Spybot, Spyware Blaster, Ad-Aware and OpenOffice software suite. I can highly recommend all of these components as I have used them myself for multiple years and installed them on many other computers. Oh yes, the total cost for each system, including the monitors was just over $800.00. Page 15 Sure, you can buy a computer for less, but you may not get what I consider to be quality components. And, you won’t know your system as well as the one you built. How long does it take to assemble a computer? With experience it will take a few hours. If you have never done it before, I suspect it could be 4-8 hours. But like anything else, when you do it yourself there is a great deal of satisfaction obtained from a final working system. Who knows, you might enjoy trying it. Even if you don’t I hope this article has given you some additional insight into the workings inside that “black box” called a computer. Dr. Lewis is a former university and medical school professor, but not in computer science. He has been working with personal computers for over thirty years teaching, repairing, assembling and writing software for computer systems. He can be reached at bwsail at yahoo.com. This article has been provided to APCUG by the author solely for publication by APCUG member groups. All other uses require the permission of the author (see e-mail address above). Thoughts on Upgrading PC Hardware and Software By Dick Maybach, Columnist, Brookdale Computer User Group (BCUG) Brookdale, NJ www.bcug.org n2nd@att.net Obtained from APCUG with the author’s permission for publication by APCUG member groups. I can think of three valid reasons for upgrading a PC: (1) to try something new, (2) to improve performance, and (3) to solve a problem. Trying something new means you are treating your PC as a hobby. In this case you don’t really need to upgrade, but you want to. Just bear in mind that there are risks, which means that you may get more adventure than you planned on. Improving performance is difficult to justify, unless your system is very old. Almost any system will do just fine surfing the net, word processing, balancing your checkbook, etc. Upgrading your hardware will often provide no discernable speed-up, because the speed is really limited by your typing speed or Internet connection. Upgrading your software may actually slow things down, because newer software has more features and requires more computer resources. This leaves problem solving. Your hard disk may be full; your motherboard may have only old, slow version 1 USB ports; or your bank may require a recent version of Quicken for on-line banking. You shouldn’t upgrade to Windows Vista unless you replace the PC, and even then you may have problems. A friend of mine bought a new Dell PC with Vista and found his old printer wouldn’t work and he could no longer access the Internet. Operating system designers can’t possibly test every combination of hardware and software. As a result, they concentrate on new components, since most operating system sales are for new computers, and there may be problems with older peripherals and software. You should back up all your files before you make any system change, no matter how trivial. And any time you open your system case, you should use a grounding strap to avoid damaging components with static electricity. This is especially important during the approaching winter months, when the humidity in your house is low. Let’s look at the easy upgrades first. Adding RAM is usually not difficult; just plug it in and look at your CMOS screen to be sure the PC has recognized it. (Of course you must use the correct chips. Check your PC manual.) You can usually add new peripherals, such a CD-ROM, DVD, or a second hard disk drive without problems, although if you have already filled all of the available ATA slots, you will have to add a second disk controller. Take your system to a reliable shop if you have doubts about your abilities. Replacing a hard disk is somewhat more difficult, because you must transfer all your software to the new unit, which requires disk copying software. You can’t just copy your files with Windows Explorer. More adventuresome is installing a new motherboard. Be aware that upgrading your motherboard may not result in a noticeable performance improvement unless you also upgrade your hard disk and/or your video controller. If your current motherboard is very old, you must also upgrade its case and power supply. Changing the video controller or monitor is also not too hard. Most monitors are plug-and-play so Windows should automatically recognize your new monitor. Page 16 When you buy new peripherals, be sure you get any drivers they need. Many PC manufacturers don’t include a complete Windows, but strip off all the drivers except for the equipment they sell you. If necessary, download any missing drivers from the Internet before you change your hardware. An alternative to an upgrade is a complete new system, and the vendor will insure that all the software and hardware plays well together. This leaves your old system intact so you can transfer your files without risk of losing anything. Regardless of your approach, you must also choose where and what to buy. Where is a choice between mail order and a local dealer. What is a choice between name brand and commodity hardware. The choice between mail order and local dealer depends on how much experience and time you have. The low profit margins in PC hardware mean that both component manufacturers and system assemblers spend little time on testing. Dead-on-arrival hardware and infant mortalities are common. When this happens you are entirely dependent on the company that sold it to you. If you purchase from a mail-order firm, you must either trouble-shoot any problems yourself or ship the entire system back to the seller, while a good local dealer can often make repairs in a few hours. You are trading off convenience for cost, because using mail order can often save you a few dollars. Name brand hardware costs more than its commodity equivalent. The difference is between Sound Blaster and “Sound Blaster equivalent”. I favor name brands. You can be sure that every vendor of software that uses sound has tested its products with Sound Blaster cards, but it is impossible for a small manufacturer to test its sound card with every program. The less you pay for a system, the more likely it is to contain commodity parts. System manufacturers and assemblers usually purchase components on an Original Equipment Manufacturer (OEM) basis, and most parts sold at computer shows are OEM. The cost of these is less because the dealer relieves the manufacturer from all customer support. This means that the component manufacturer often won’t even talk to the end purchaser. Your only warranty is from the seller, and you must select him or her with care. Finally, schedule any upgrade when you have some time. Plan on taking a weekend for simple jobs and more for complex ones. I’ve found that I need a couple of weeks (not full time of course) to get my PC fully functional after reinstalling an operating system for example. This article has been provided to APCUG by the author solely for publication by APCUG member groups. All other uses require the permission of the author (see e-mail address above). BBCC Member Karen Tangeman’s car after hitting a power pole I had come around the little curve and just passed the 30MPH sign and I heard a noise from the engine, and the car started pulling to the right. The next thing I knew I had hit the power pole. That’s it. No other cars involved; nothing. Sure totaled my car. I can’t believe I walked away with only bruising. The Lord is good. Page 17 WORD TIP EXCEL TIP By Karen Tangeman By Yomar Cleary Searching for Text with a Certain Format Viewing More Than Two Places in a Worksheet Word has a power search capability that you can use to search not only for text, but also for any formatting you have applied. For instance, you can search for specific character formats applied to your text by following these steps: Applies to Excel 97, 2000, 2002, 2003, and 2007 1. Press Ctrl+F. Word displays the Find tab of the Find and Replace dialog box. 2. Click on the More button if it is available. Word displays an expanded version of the Find and Replace dialog box. Delete anything in the Find What box. Click on the No Formatting button if it is available. 3. Click on the Format button and then choose Font. Word displays the Find Font dialog box. Notice that all the character attributes (Superscript, Subscript, and so on) in the Effects area are shaded. This means these attributes do not matter; they are ignored by Word when searching. 4. Select the character attributes you want the matched text to have. Make sure the check box beside the attribute is selected. It should have a check mark in it without any gray. 5. Click on OK. 6. Click on Find Next. This tip applies to Microsoft Word versions: 97 | 2000 | 2002 | 2003 | 2007 Page 18 Jesse asked if there is a way to view more than two areas of a worksheet at the same time, other than by hiding rows. The easiest solution is to just open additional windows for the worksheet. Choose Window | New Window (prior to Excel 2007) or display the View tab of the ruler and click New Window in the Window group (Excel 2007). Excel opens additional windows that contain the exact same worksheet. You can then choose Window | Arrange (or click Arrange All in the Window group of the ribbon) to arrange the windows any way desired. When you open additional windows in this manner, the windows are independent of each other, meaning that you can scroll them independently. If you make a change in one window, the same change is made in all the windows. (This makes sense, since they all display the same data.) Once the windows are situated the way you want them, you could save the arrangement as a view (View | Custom Views or, in Excel 2007, Custom Views in the Workbook Views group of the ruler). That way you could quickly recall the appearance of your windows any time you desire. WINDOW TIP By Larry Smith Memory Performance Tweak: These Settings will fine tune your systems memory management. You should have at least 512MB of ram. Go to start\run\regedit and then to the following key: HKEY_ LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Session Manager\Memory Management. Then DisablePagingExecutive and double click it and in the decimal put a 1. This allows XP to keep data in memory now instead of paging sections of ram to harddrive yeilds faster performance. Then LargeSystemCache and double click it and change the decimal to 1. This allows XP Kernel to Run in memory improves system performance alot. Reboot and watch your system fly. Remove text from desktop icons: Removing the text below an icon on your desktop has been a classic Windows tweak for years. In Windows Vista, the same old tweak works. Right click on the icon and select Rename. Then hold down the ALT key and type in 255 on your right keypad. If you are on a laptop turn on numlock and use the K and I keys to enter in 255. This is the code for a space. Hit Enter when you are done. If you want to remove the text from multiple icons then make sure that you do ALT + 255 a different number of times for each icon. Get rid of the dog on the search screen: Click “Change preferences” on the main screen of the search utility then click “Without an animated screen character.” The dog will disappear. OPPORTUNITIES AVAILABLE Don’t Forget! Bring your empty printer cartridges to the meeting. NAME TAG OPPORTUNITY How would you like a very easy, simple job to help the club? There is one and that is to hand out the name tags as members and guest arrive to the meeting and collect those name tags after the meeting. Come on you can do!! Just so you won’t sit there bored, you can sell 50/50 fundraiser tickets to those members who want to participate—THAT IS IT!! See Yomar at the meeting or call her at (909) 878-5622. The printer cartridge program is a BBCC fund-raiser that helps us purchase supplies and pay for Big Bear Computer Club expenses. Thank you for your participation. Advertising Director Bill Flanagan Bill Flanagan has accepted the position of Advertising Director and will be looking for advertisers so if you or you know of someone who would like to support the Computer Club, please direct them to Bill at (909) 866-9379 Membership Benefits Monthly Meeting with: Presentation and demonstration of popular hardware and software. RAM (Question & Answer) Session Tech news and Virus Alerts Member Software Raffle 50/50 Drawing Bearly Bytes -- BBCC’s award winning monthly newsletter mailed to you first class. Club Website: www.bigbearcc.org Free software review program Members Help Line Members E-mail Notifications Members only Discounts Special Interest Groups (SIGs) All this for only $25 per year!! Mail your application and dues to: BBCC Treasurer PO Box 645 Big Bear City, CA 92314 or bring your application to a meeting For information and directions phone Yomar Cleary, President 878-5622 Page 19 BIG BEAR COMPUTER CLUB, INC. Membership Application □N ew □R enewal □U Full Name__________________________________ Mailing Address_____________________________ City, State, Zip_______________________________ Phone_____________ Message________________ Owner E-mail address______________________________ Area you live in ______________________________ pdate Information □ □ □ □ Retired DEMOGRAPHICS Student Working Adult Business FAMILY MEMBERS WHO WANT TO JOIN AS ASSOCIATES ($5/YEAR): Name__________________________ _______________________________ Operating System(s) □ WINDOWS Beginner □ E-mail______________________ ______________________ Apple/MAC □ Intermediate LINUX □ OTHER _____ Advanced Instructor MS Office □ □ □ □ Digital Imaging □ □ □ □ Desktop Publishing □ □ □ □ Web Design □ □ □ □ Other Interests:________________________________________________ □ YES! CALL ME, I WOULD LIKE TO GET INVOLVED & MEET NEW FRIENDS. Big Bear Computer Club Meetings are held at Big Bear Discovery Center - 2nd Tuesday, 530PM MEETING MAP BIG BEAR COMPUTER CLUB, INC. PO Box 645 Big Bear City, CA 92314 Where computer enthusiasts meet to share knowledge and experiences and have a lot of fun! BBCC is a non-profit educational community organization open to everyone interested in computers and how to make them more useful and friendly. To learn more about BBCC: Come to a meeting: 2nd Tuesday of the month, 530 pm, Everyone is welcome! Visit our web site: www.bigbearcc.org Contact our President: Yomar Cleary 878-5622 ycleary@charter.net Page 20 BBCC is a proud member of APCUG and Southern California Regional User Groups
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