ea rly s - BigBearCC.org
Transcription
ea rly s - BigBearCC.org
Volume 7 April 2007 B y l r ea Byte s Award Winning Newsletter of Big Bear Computer Club www.bigbearcc.org Next BBCC Meeting: Tuesday, April 10, 2007 at 5:30 PM In This Issue March Meeting BBCC Club Information Presidents Message February BBCC Calendar BBCC Helpline About Bearly Bytes Membership Report Sunshine Corner Software Review Software Review Review Products Books For Sale Photography Workshop Raffles Window Tip Cash Flow Report Roadmaster BBCC General Meeting Door Prize Winners Discounts, Offers & Deals Acronis Software Word Tip Excel Tip Windows Tip Continued Opportunities Available Membership Benefits Membership Application Map To Meeting Page 1 1 2 2 3 4 4 4 4 5 6 7 7 8 8 9 9 10 11 11 12 13 14 14 14 15 15 15 16 FBI COMES TO BIG BEAR COMPUTER CLUB FBI Agent John Pi will be the April 10th Presenter. He will be speaking on Counter Terrorism and Cyber Intrusion. Agent Pi is on the Counter Terrorism Unit; as well as on the FBI Swat Team 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 NameTags.................................Phyllis Jaeger 866-3895 phylj.jay@charter.net Sunshine Coordinator................Grace Fross (951) 769-1225 gcfross@verizon.net Page 2 President’s Message It is great to see Spring upon us and Winter behind us….you say what winter? We have some exciting news ….the Bear Valley Parks & Recreation has opened up the Computer Lab to the Computer Club for our use to conduct computer classes or workshops. This will be a great fundraiser for the club. Our first workshop will be a Beginner Computer Workshop that will be held on April 21st. This workshop is open to the public so if you know of anyone who needs help, please convey the information. We are only asking for a $5.00 donation to cover for the handouts and materials. Another Workshop coming up will be a photography class as one of our club members, Rick Edwards, is a professional photographer. See the article in this newsletter on the Photography Workshop. If there is anyone in our club who would like to help either the instructor or would like to teach a specific subject, please let me know. You don’t have to be a geek or guru in computers. We certainly could use your help. We would like to extend our sincere appreciate to Jim Applebury and Bob Kopolow for being our in-house gurus when it comes to the RAM session at our meetings. If you have computer related question(s), bring them to the meeting as other members probably have the very same question you have. I will be leaving on a cruise to Hawaii the day after our meeting……so until I get back…. Aloha, Yomar Cleary, President BBCC Calendar BBCC Events Calendar -- April, 2007 Sunday 1 Monday Tuesday 2 3 9 15 22 Wednesday Thursday Friday Saturday 4 5 6 7 10 11 12 13 14 16 17 18 19 20 21 23 24 25 26 27 28 April Fools Day 8 Easter Earth Day 29 Page 3 BBCC MEETING 5:30 PM Board meeting 2:30 PM 30 Beginner Computer class 11:00-2:00 PM 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 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 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 Membership Report January & February 2007 Welcome New & Renewing Members Christine Knight Jeannie Saunders Eberhart Feigler Sherry Worden Quicken...........................Michael Homan 584-2277 vpc@pineknot.com Kent Gale Karen Tangeman Hardware..............................Bob Kopolow 584-7747 bobkopolow@yahoo.com Dorothy Evans Jim Messinger CD Burning.............................Larry Smith 584-1284 kg6erf@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 Sunshine Corner My name is Grace Fross and I am your Sunshine Person for 2007. I am going to need help from each of our members. If you know of someone who is ill or has been hospitalized, please let me know as soon as possible so I can spread some club sunshine to them! My email address is: gcfross@verizon.net. Software Review BootItNG Reviewed by Bob Kopolow bobkopolow@yahoo.com On the TeraByte website, they describe Boot It Next Generation by saying: BootIt™ NG is a partition and multiboot manager with a powerful and simple-to-use set of tools for partitioning, imaging, and multi-booting your computer. It combines the features of several standalone products costing hundreds of dollars more. Reviewer’s comments: The first thing I noticed about BootItNG was the cumbersome installation. I was required to create a bootable floppy with the installation program on it. I was also required to create a floppy with the registration strings on it. A beginning computer user would find all this difficult to impossible. After installation, I decided to repartition my 140MB C: drive into a 70MB C: drive and a 70MB D: drive. This repartitioning took about 15 minutes. After the restart, chkdsk gave me hundreds of errors like “Correcting error in index $I30, recovering orphaned files.” Then I got “Windows could not start because the following file is missing or corrupt”. Not a good thing. It appeared my Window operating system had been corrupted. I performed a complete system rebuild requiring hours of my time. I was NOT a happy camper. At this point, I decided NOT to continue experimenting with this program. Although my experience with BootItNG was horrific, I’ve read good reviews of the program. One of my favorite newsletter authors, Fred Langa, uses it and recommends it. Perhaps I simply wasn’t up to the challenge. In any case, I would NOT recommend this program to anyone but the most sophisticated of users. It could end in tragedy. Operating Systems: Windows 95 thru Vista Retail price: $34.95 Manufacturer: TeraByte, Inc. dba TeraByte Unlimited is currently located in Las Vegas, Nevada, and can be reached using the following e-mail addresses: Sales: sales@terabyteunlimited.com Technical Support: support@terabyteunlimited.com General: corporate@terabyteunlimited.com Page 5 Bob Kopolow has been a computer consultant for 27 years specializing in PCs for personal or small business use. He is experienced in computer security, purchasing PCs for clients, and replacing or adding hardware or software. He is a volunteer to the BBCC Hotline and lives full-time in Big Bear Lake. He owns and operates Equinox Tech Systems. Software Review NTI Backup Now! Deluxe Suite 4.0.20.0 Reviewed by Bob Kopolow bobkopolow@yahoo.com On the NTI website, they describe this software by saying: “NTI Backup Now! 4 Deluxe Suite delivers a total solution for all your data backup needs. It is the first and only software title to provide full image backup and specific file backup for a wide range of storage media.” Reviewer’s comments: The first thing I noticed was the ease of installation of this suite. No problems. A novice computer user would have no trouble installing this software. The NTI Backup Now suite contains two separate programs. NTI Backup Now is a program that backs up selected files and folders from local and mapped drives. DriveBackup is a separate program that can perform a full image backup of your entire hard drive or a hard disk partition, allowing you to save all your data and Windows settings. I’ll start with the Backup Now program. Although the latest version of the program comes up with a screen that says it’s version 4.7, everything else indicates it’s really version 4.5.7 which is their latest version. When the program comes up, I found it strange that I couldn’t resize the window; it was either full screen or a size which they had preset. Nonetheless, the first screen was self explanatory. It shows steps 1, 2, and 3 on the left side. As you click on each, the program indicates what to do. The first step is to choose what to backup. A list of folders and files is displayed on the right and one merely chooses by checking off folders or files. Besides backing up Files and Folders, there’s another option to backup ones “profile”. This option lets you backup Outlook data, Outlook Express data, or My Documents data very easily…a nice addition. The second step is where to backup. My DVD drive was displayed but it told me no media was present. This prompted me to insert a DVD. The third step asked me if I wanted to backup all selected files or only those that had changed. The next step was to choose the Start button to begin the backup. It was very intuitive and I’d say it was the easiest backup program I’ve ever used. The full retail version came with a 92 page instruction manual which I never needed. Backup Now currently supports over 500 different CD/DVD drives and the list is ever-expanding. Under the tools pull-down menu is a Live Update entry. Clicking that will update your program with the latest database of supported drives. NTI Backup Now easily spans CDs or DVDs. It also allows compression of the data it writes, although this seems to slow down the backup which is already pretty time consuming. And even though this program isn’t perfect, it’s the best and easiest to use backup program I’ve reviewed yet. The version of NTI DriveBackup I reviewed was 4.0.20.0 which was part of the suite with the same version number. It too was easy to install, but did require a reboot on my XP system. Upon opening, I found that this program too was impossible to resize. Nonetheless, it looks very similar to BackupNow with the same 3 steps on the left. Step 1 was what to backup. It gives choices of all partitions and drives. Step 2 was where to backup and I was reminded here also to insert a DVD disk into my drive. Step 3 asked whether I wanted data compression and some other options. This program can create an “Emergency Recovery CD/DVD” which boots into a version of NTI DriveBackup that will let you restore from a drive image it creates on CD or DVD. It worked perfectly, but took a lot of time to backup the full drive image even though my DVD is a fairly fast newer model. I tested the DVD which it created and it booted right into a version of DriveBackup. In summary, this is the best backup program that I have reviewed so far. It is easy to install and easy to run. It has some additional features, like backing up ones profile that I really like. I’d recommend this to Manufacturer: NewTech Info Systems, 5 Mason Ave., Suite 150, Irvine, CA 92618 Phone: 949-421-0720, E-mail: info@NTIus.com, web: www.NTIus.com Retail price: $79.99 full retail version, $69.99 download version Operating Systems: Windows 98 thru XP Page 6 See Review on page 5 for Bob Kopolow’s bio Review Products This is your review editor Karen Tangeman from Big Bear Computer Club. Microsoft has graciously sent us a list of available review software for our club. Many of their games are included. If you do not see a software title that you wish to review, let me know and I will ask our Microsoft representative if it is available. Look the list over and if you are interested in reviewing any of this great software contact me at ktangeman@charter.net or 585-7413. Only one program at a time can be reviewed by the Computer Club from this list and after the review is submitted then another program can be selected. If you see something you want to review, get on the waiting list. Remember if you review it, you get to keep it. Games Age of Empires Ill Age of Empires Gold Age of Mythology Gold Combat Flight Simulator 3 Dungeon Siege 2 Halo for the PC Fable The Lost Chapters DVD Flight Sim 2004 Century of Flight Flight Sim X Zoo Tycoon 2 Endangered Species DVD Zoo Tycoon 2 Zookeeper Complete Collection Zoo Tycoon 2 African Adventure Rise of Nations: Gold For HP Pocket PCs: Entertain Pak 2.0 WinCE CD For HP Pocket PCs: Entertain Pak 2004 WinCE Zoo Tycoon 2 Pocket Streets 2005 for Pocket PC or Smartphone Program Software Digital Image Standard 2006 Digital Image Suite 2006 Digital Image Suite PLUS Encarta 2007 Encarta 2007 Premium Money Deluxe 2007 Money Premium 2007 Money Home and Business 2007 Office Mac 2004 Office Mac Professional 2004 Office Small Business Accounting 2006 Plus! SuperPack for Win XP Shared Computer Toolkit for WinXP 1.0 with book Streets and Trips with GPS Locator 2007 Streets and Trips 2007 Student 2006 Student with Encarta Premium 2007 Windows XP Pro x64 bit Edition 180 Day Direct CD Trial *no review required Virtual PC 2004 Virtual PC for Mac 7.0 Virtual PC for Mac 7.0 with Windows XP Home Virtual PC for Mac 7.0 with Windows XP Pro Voice Command 1.5 for mobile devices Windows Live OneCare 1.5 for both XP and Vista Windows Vista Business Windows Vista Home Basic Windows Vista Home Premium Windows Vista Ultimate One Note 2007 FrontPage 2003 Books for Sale We have numerous computer related books that will be going on sale at 50% off. These books are “brand new” computer books. They have never been used. Since there are too many to carry to our meetings, only 4 books will be brought. Here is a list of the books that are for sale. If you see one that you are interested in please contact ktangeman@charter.net or call 585-7413. I will make a point to bring the book you are interested in to the following meeting. And you read correctly, they are 50% off the listed retail price. The books are: MRP 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. Page 7 Access 2003 for Starters The Missing Manual (2 books) Fixing Access Annoyances Access Hacks Tips & Tools for Wrangling your Data Dude, You can do it! How to build a Sweet PC The Outlook Answer Book (for Outlook 2003) Tips, Tricks Photoshop Elements 3 for Windows One-on-one Photoshop Elements 4 The Missing Manual Photoshop Elements 4 One-on-one Windows Vista The Missing Manual HTML and CSS $19.95 $19.99 $24.95 $24.99 $34.99 $35.95 $39.95 $34.95 $34.99 $18.29 50% $10.00 each $10.00 $12.50 $12.50 $17.50 $17.50 $20.00 $17.50 $17.50 $ 9.15 PHOTOGRAPHY WORKSHOP The Big Bear Computer Club is offering a Photography Workshop on Monday, May 14, 2007 from 9:00 am until 1:00 pm. The Workshop will be held at the Parks and Recreation Computer Lab, 41220 Park Ave, Big Bear Lake, CA. The instructor, 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. The Workshop will cover many aspects of photography including the basic skills in photographic composition in order to elevate an ordinary shot to an extraordinary one. Rick Edwards, instructor, is dedicated to developing the essentials that will help you add an extra dimension to your photographs. The Workshop will cover a range of photographic topics like learning all the essential photographic techniques and cover all the vital elements in photography. Included in the composition are: format, subject placement, lines, patterns, etc. The tools of composition are: lens focal length, depth of field, and so on. Another aspect covered will be light and time which includes form, texture, times of day, shutter speed, modifying light and much more. . Basic Photoshop use will be also be included in the Workshop. A donation of $5.00 for the workshop will reserve a space. . Residents interested in attending this Photography Workshop need to register by calling Rick Edwards at (909) 547-0109. Raffles One of the benefits of being a member of BBCC is the possibility of winning computer items. Microsoft has been very generous in donating (from the APCUG Conference) 2 laptop shoulder bags and 2 Microsoft Vista Launch kits for us to raffle. One item will be raffled at the next 4 meetings. The Microsoft Vista Launch Kit includes: 1 Microsoft Vista Product Guide (Instruction Book on Vista) 1 Windows Vista Mouse Pad 2 DVD’S of useful tools and demos on Vista 1 Belkin easy transfer cable (Worth $39.99) 1 Windows live 128MB USB Key (worth $10.00) 1 Microsoft Office Live trial card 1 SanDisk Cruzer® Micro with 2GB (enhanced for Windows ReadyBoost™ worth $50) 1 T-Mobile DayPass for WiFi 1 Windows Vista Magazine 1 game Flight Simulator X (worth $69.99) The Launch Kit alone is worth aprox. $170.00. Tickets for the raffles are $1.00 per ticket or 6 tickets for $5.00. The first raffle was started at the March 13th meeting with 1 of the laptop shoulder bags being raffled. A Launch Kit will be raffled at the April meeting, a laptop shoulder bag in May, and the final Launch Kit in June. I hope every one will buy a ticket or two to help us raise money for the club, and good luck in winning one of these great products. By the way, make sure you look for the purple tickets. Page 8 BIG BEAR COMPUTER CLUB CASH FLOW STATEMENT WINDOW TIP By Larry Smith February 2007 1.While Google is a great search engine, you’ve probably noticed that when you do a search, Google usually returns more results that you can comfortably chew. But how can you limit Google’s search results? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_document_format Cash in Bank $2,673.99 CASH RECEIVED Membership Dues $75.00 Fundraising Equipment $0.00 Donation 50/.50 $29.00 Donations $1.00 Advertising $0.00 Bank Discount Earned $0.00 Other Income $0.00 Total Income $105.00 $2,778.99 CASH DISPERSED Petty Cash $0.00 Dues & Fees $0.00 Fundraising $0.00 Newsletter $132.11 Equipment $0.00 Promotion $50.00 Programs $0.00 Advertising $0.00 Supplies $0.00 Other $0.00 Total Expenses $182.11 $2,596.88 2. How can you fix the browser or even reinstall the program if it becomes corrupt? If you don’t yet have the very latest Internet Explorer, you can fix many problems by visiting http://windowsupdate.microsoft.com and updating to the latest version. If you’re already up to date, however, the site won’t let you reinstall the program. You need to fool the system into thinking you don’t have the latest version. Launch REGEDIT from the Start menu’s Run dialog and navigate to the key HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\ SOFTWARE\ Microsoft\Active Setup\Installed Components\{89820200-ECBD-11cf-8B85-00AA005B4383}. In the right-hand pane, double-click on the DWORD value IsInstalled and change it from 1 to 0 (no matter whether you choose Decimal or Hexadecimal). Close REGEDIT and go to the Windows update site again. Now it should let you “update” IE and, with luck, fix the problems. By the way, you can do the same thing if you need to repair Outlook Express, but at the key HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Active Setup\ Installed Components\{44BBA840-CC51-11CF-AAFA00AA00B6015C}. Continued on page 14 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 ROADMASTER ANNOUNCES SCROLLING MESSAGE SYSTEMS FOR CARS Personalize your Car with Warnings and Announcements! Roadmaster USA Corp. www.roadmasterusa.com, the leading automotive company providing mobile & home audio equipment, auto accessories, and car care products, announced today Roadmaster scrolling message car systems: the Roadmaster Scrolling Digital License Plate Frame (Model RLPF100) and Scrolling Rear Deck Message System (Model RRDS100), which let your personalize your car with your own messages or ads that scroll on your license plate or in the back window of your car. Both priced at $69, the scrolling systems come with 99 pre-set words and phrases, including “Help me,” “Slow down,” “Turning left,” “Your lights aren’t working,” “Baby on Board”, and they also let you program 5 interchangeable messages of up to 120 characters each. Messages can be combined or repeated and the speed and brightness of the LED can be adjusted with the included wireless remote. The scrolling systems are easy to install and include 12 Volt hardwiring. Scrolling Messages for Cars The Roadmaster Scrolling Digital License Plate Frame and Scrolling Rear Deck Message System are great for announcing the sale of your car with the price and phone number; showing your website URL or store name; or for giving warnings and sending notes to other drivers and friends. The systems can also be used for news and fun phrases, such as sports games results, holiday greetings, or your personal philosophy or motto. Scrolling Rear Deck Message System for Trade Shows, Stores, and Cars In addition to its use in cars, the Roadmaster Scrolling Rear Deck Message System version is a stand alone device that can also be used at trade shows or in stores to display special sales, openings and closing times, and other business announcements. All states allow non-scrolling messages to be displayed in moving cars, but some states may restrict the use of scrolling messages while the car is on the road and may only allow their use when the car is parked or stationery. Roadmaster recommends that customers check their state and local regulations to see if scrolling LED products can be used while their car is in motion. The Roadmaster Scrolling Digital License Plate Frame (Model RLPF100) and Scrolling Rear Deck Message System (Model RRDS100) are available immediately through most major superstores, retailers, and car dealerships, both priced at $69. For more information, see the website: www.roadmasterusa.com. Page 10 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. Door Prize Winners March 2007 CD-R by Verbatim - Bill Flanagan CD & DVD Label Maker by Acoustica - Don Meline Family History T-Shirt by Family History - Jim Applebury MediaOne by InterVideo - Gordon West Door prizes graciously donated to us by our Presenter Terry Currier DVD+ R by Verbatim - Kathy West Backpack by Moxi - Bob Kissinger 1.0 GB Micro SanDisk Cruzer by Skype - Yomar Cleary 50/50 WINNER $37.00 - Bob Kissinger Laptop Computer Bag by Microsoft - Barbara Moore BBCC GENERAL MEETING April 2007 Club President Yomar Cleary welcomed all of the members. She introduced the other board members in attendance. Individuals on the board gave brief reports. Barbara began with letting the members know about the Beginning Computers Workshop 101. The date is April 21, 2007 from 11:00 AM until 2:00 PM at Rec & Parks. It is open to the public. A $5 donation is requested. Barbara passed around a sign-up sheet. Rosemary asked for volunteer tutors to teach future classes at the Community Computer Lab. Kent welcomed guests. Elaine asked for volunteers to bring refreshments to future meetings. Yomar introduced two special raffle prizes. The March drawing was for a Microsoft laptop carry bag. In April a Microsoft Windows Vista Launch Kit will be raffled off. Karen talked about available review software, including games and other software from Microsoft. Karen then introduced Terry Currier, our presenter. He started with some computer trivia questions from trivia. com. Also, he tested us with some Microsoft Word commands. Then he went on to discuss some of his favorite utilities. They are all free. First was ‘A Really Small App’. It shows information about your computer and other computers that are connected to yours. The next utility tells what hardware is on your computer, i.e. processor, memory, etc. It is very user friendly and fast. It reveals product keys and drive size, as well as performing benchmarking functions. The FastStone viewer is used to look at digital photos. It is photo manipulator, too. Go to FastStone.org to download it. There are lots of handy features for cropping, resizing, removing red eye, zooming, adjusting color balance, checking camera settings, etc. Another photo program, PhotoRazer makes it easy to downsize photos. It is available at Stormdance.net. FreeCommander may be easier to use than Windows Explorer. FreeCommander also shows network connections and a DOS window. Next, Terry showed a program uninstaller. MyUninstaller is more complete and gives more information about the programs on the computer. It looks at the uninstaller provided by the software manufacturer. GoodSync is used to back up files to another computer, an external hard drive, thumb drive or CD. It is easy to select files to back up and restore. The next program runs off of a thumb drive. SIW.exe is the name. It shows programs, license keys, file associations, what automatically loads on boot, running programs and more. It is a very small program. After Terry’s presentation, Jim Applebury and Bob Kopolow answered a few questions in the RAM session. One member has a copy of Windows XP that is not showing as genuine. It may be Microsoft’s problem with Windows Genuine Advantage. It is important to get updates for security, especially Service Pack 2. There was some discussion regarding high speed Internet service vs. dial-up. How do people find out what programs and hardware will work with Vista? Run the Vista Upgrade Advisor on Microsoft. com. What does it take to get on the Internet wirelessly? What is the difference between a Hot spot and cellular service? Remember to lock down your wireless router so others cannot surf using your Internet service wirelessly. After the door prizes were given out, we concluded the meeting. Thus ended another productive and educational evening. Submitted by Rosemary Lloyd, Secretary 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. GEAR Software Software and Developer Tools for DVD and CD Recording The GEAR PRO Product Family is cross-platform, full-featured professional recording solutions For complete information, please go to www.gearsoftware.com APCUG 20% Discount for GEAR Software http://www.gearsoftware.com/products/APCUGactivation.cfm Promotion Code: ACU20 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 ACOUSTICA SPIN IT AGAIN Transferring your old records and tapes to CD or MP3 has never been easier with SPIN IT AGAIN! CD-DVD LABEL MAKER Create your own CD/DVD labels and CD jewel cases with ease! For more information on these programs go to www.acoustica.com For a 20% discount, use coupon CLUB2007 Page 12 Acronis Software Support of WindowsVista By Gene Barlow - User Group Relations - Copyrighted March 2007 On February 7, 2007, Acronis, Inc. announced that it will “fully support Microsoft’s latest operating system, Vista, with its products for desktop operating systems”. This statement of intent has already been accomplished for two of their most popular products for home users – Acronis True Image 10.0 Home and Acronis Disk Director Suite 10.0 . This article will show you how to obtain these Vista supporting utilities. Acronis True Image 10.0 Home: This is the top rated backup utility on the market today. It helps you backup your important data files as well as your entire computer -- operating system, application programs, and all. Used regularly it will protect your important files from hard drive crashes and other system problems. Acronis True Image 10.0 Home edition was released three months prior to the release of Vista, with full support of Vista included in the product. Earlier this month, Acronis made available build 4942 of True Image to correct any problems with their new release. You should install this new build to give you the latest True Image software. Acronis Disk Director Suite 10.0: This is an outstanding partitioning utility to help you organize and manage your computer’s hard drive. Using this utility, you can have both Windows XP and Vista running on the same computer. This is a much safer way to start to use Vista rather than instantly replacing your stable XP system with Vista. Earlier this month, Acronis made available build 2160 of Disk Director Suite to provide full support of Vista in this excel lent partitioning utility. So, how does this announcement affect you? There are three options to consider as follows: Not a User of Acronis Utilities: If you do not already use one or both of these excellent Acronis products, now is the perfect time to get them. We are offering both of these products that normally list for $50 each at our user group discount price of just $29 each. That price includes a special tutorial with each product to help you start to use them quickly and safely. To order either or both of these Acronis products, go to www.usergroupstore.com and place your order using our secure online ordering system. The order code for this special price is UGNL0307. Use Older Acronis Utilities: If you already have one or both of these Acronis products, but are still using an older version (prior to version 10.0), you should get the latest release (version 10.0) to be ready for Windows Vista in the future. Our user group discount prices for these products is lower than the upgrade price from Acronis, so order a new license of the product from us at a great discount price and get the tutorials as a bonus. To do this, follow the ordering instructions in the prior paragraph. Use Version 10 Acronis Utilities: If you already use version 10 of these Acronis products, then it is important that you download the new builds for these products to get the full benefits of your software. The process to download these new builds is quick and easy to accomplish. There is no charge for these updates as long as you are a current owner of version 10 of these products. For those that we promised a free update of Acronis Disk Director Suite 10.0 with Vista support, this is what you need to do. Follow the instructions below to download these new builds and install them on your computer. Downloading New Builds from Acronis: To download the new builds from Acronis is quick and easy to do. There are three steps to accomplish this. First, you must set up an account on the Acronis web site. Next, you must register the Acronis products you use in your account. Finally, you can download the latest builds of your registered products from your Acronis account. I describe these three steps in detail at www.ugr.com/questions.html. Print out these instructions and follow them carefully and you will have your new builds installed quickly. I hope this information helps you take advantage of the Vista support in Acronis True Image 10.0 Home and Acronis Disk Director Suite 10.0. Download and install these new builds and your Acronis software will be ready for Windows Vista when you are. If you have questions about this article or the downloading of new builds, please send a note to gene@ugr.com and I will try to assist you. Gene Barlow - User Group Relations - gene@ugr.com - PO Box 911600 - www.ugr.com - St George, UT 84791-1600 This is one of a series of monthly technical articles that I distribute to those that have subscribed to this newsletter. You can subscribe at www.ugr.com/newsletters.html. Watch for them and learn more about your computer and its hard drive. If you do not want to receive these newsletters, simply reply and ask to have your name removed from the list and I will do so immediately. User group newsletter editors may print this article in their monthly newsletter as long as the article is printed in its entirety and not cut or edited. Please send me a copy of the newsletter containing the article or a pointer to the article on your web site so that I can see what groups are running the articles. Page 13 WORD TIP By Karen Tangeman AutoCorrecting for Your Common Errors Chances are good that you already know what AutoCorrect is and that it can be a boon for those words you habitually mistype. (Exactly why I invariably mistype some words, I’ll never understand.) However, setting up AutoCorrect to compensate for your mistyping can be a bother. Here’s a quick way to make short work of adding your mistyping’s to AutoCorrect: 1. Assuming that Word flags the mistyped word as misspelled, right-click on it. A Context menu appears. 2. If spelling corrections are offered in the Context menu, there should also be a menu choice called AutoCorrect. Choose it and you will see the same spelling corrections in the resultant submenu. 3. Choose the correct spelling in this submenu. What you have just done is tell Word that you want to create an AutoCorrect entry that will automatically correct the mistyped word using the selected spelling. Fast, neat, and easy! This tip applies to Microsoft Word versions: 97 | 2000 | 2002 | 2003 Page 14 EXCEL TIP WINDOW TIP By Yomar Cleary Keep a cleaner desktop when multitasking Are you one of the many busy Excel users who frequently have two, three, or more workbooks open at once? If so, you know that kind of multitasking can create a lot of screen clutter. In the Windows taskbar, you’ll have an icon for each open workbook. Within the Excel window, you can navigate between workbooks by pressing [Ctrl][F6] or by opening the Window menu and selecting a workbook from the list of open files. Excel offers an option that can help you avoid screen clutter while keeping as many workbooks open as you like. To try it out, open three or four workbooks, and go to Window | Hide. When you do, Excel erases all traces of the current workbook from your screen. The workbook is still open, but you can’t see it. To make a hidden workbook visible again, go to Window | Unhide, and you’ll see a list of the hidden workbooks. Select the workbook name that you want to display, and click OK. Don’t worry about forgetting that you have a workbook open. If you close Excel while a workbook is hidden and you haven’t saved your changes, Excel asks if you want to save the changes to any unsaved By Larry Smith From page 9 Wireless Network Information, Bluetooth Information, Router Tips and more! This section of Tech Tips is dedicated to all computer networking related articles. It will cover topics such as how to build a wireless network, Bluetooth information, router tips and more. We’ve created Tech Tips to help educate the consumer so that they can be smarter shoppers, and smarter shoppers are happy customers. We hope that Tech Tips will give you the information and advice you need to make the purchase that best fits your computer networking needs. As the Tech Tips archive builds over time, we hope that the networking topic you are interested in will be listed. Enjoy! “Wireless Networking Part 1” “Wireless Networking Part 2 “ “Bluetooth definition, what is Bluetooth technology?” “Voice Over Internet Protocol” Get FREE Geeks.com Tech Tips Newsletter, discounts, and more! Post Our Articles! Tech Tips Article http://www.geeks.com/techtips/ techtips.htm OPPORTUNITIES AVAILABLE Don’t Forget! Historian……………………Now this is another simple position, it’s a matter of putting press releases in a three hole binder or can be creative and do a scrapbook which ever works. The publicity person would collect those releases and pictures. Bring your empty printer cartridges to the meeting. Advertising Director……….Send out four invoices every three months to our advertiser and if very energetic ask around to obtain a couple more advertisers. Club members can also advertise for $10 a month. This program is all set up for you. Pick it up and run with it……..you could do it!! 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. 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 15 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 16 BBCC is a proud member of APCUG and Southern California Regional User Groups
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