• Software Tip
  Cheat Solitare
  
  
• Website of Interest
  Ebay
  
  
• Computer Parts
  Graphics Card
  
  
• Tech Tip
  Shortcuts 101
  
  
• eScams
  Important Account Notice
  
  
• Reader's Emails
  
  
• Reader's Tips
  
  
• Questions on our
  Discussion Board
  
  
• A Personal Note from Ray

Software Tip - Cheat Solitare

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        For those of you who have played solitare with a real deck of cards, I have a question. What do you do when you lose? Have you ever pulled out a face down card and played it? I have. In fact, I used to cheat quite often when playing solitare. So when solitare came along on the computer, I always hated that I could no longer win every game whether by cheating or not. That is why I wrote Cheat Solitare.
        Cheat Solitare allows you to right click on any pile and see what the cards are underneath it. After you play the face up card, you can choose any of the cards in that pile to turn over instead of just the top card. Or you can play any of the cards in the pile at any time. It also has unlimited undo and unlimited redraw.
        You can turn on and off any of these cheats to make the game easier or harder.
        I might mention that there is a little glitch in this program that causes part of the screen behind the game to be displayed sometimes when releasing a card. I have not figured out how to fix that. Dragging a card over the area will refresh it.
        The best thing about Cheat Solitare is that it is free. You can download it from http://regvac.com/cheatsol.exe.
        So if you want to better your chances of winning at solitare and discover a whole new world of strategy, try Cheat Solitare.

Website of Interest - eBay

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        If you want to buy or sell something, the first place to go on the internet is eBay (www.ebay.com).
        When it comes to buying things, eBay has such a wide and extended variety of items that no matter what it is, you probably will find it on eBay.
        Items are sold in two ways on eBay: Buy It Now or auction. If you don't want to go through the auction process to get the item and it has a Buy It Now price listed, you can buy it immediately for the Buy It Now price. Brand new items usually are sold with only a Buy It Now price.
        Some items can be bought either through auction or with the Buy It Now price. In these cases, the auction price starts somewhere below the Buy It Now price. With some items the Buy It Now option is removed once the first bid is placed. Bidding on the item instead of buying with the Buy It Now price allows you to buy it at a cheaper price, unless the bids go over the Buy It Now price or someone else buys it using Buy It Now.
        The auction price may have a Reserve on it. This means that the item will not be sold until it gets above the price that the seller has set as the Reserve price. If the auction price is below the Reserve price (only the buyer knows what the Reserve price is) it will say, "Reserve not met".
        As with any auction, before you buy anything from eBay be sure to know how much it sells for in the store and/or how much it is worth to you. The last few minutes of an auction can get wild with the price going up hundreds or thousands of dollars, so don't get carried away and end up paying more than you want.
        If you are in the right place at the right time and no one else is bidding, you just may get a great bargain. Also even though many of the brand new items on eBay are more expensive than in the stores, there are wholesalers that sell products cheaper than you can find anywhere else. So if you take your time and are smart, you can save money buying on eBay.
        The other side of eBay is selling. Some people have made a fortune using eBay to sell wholesale items. Please beware that this is rare and that there are many companies out there which promise to make a millionaire out of you through eBay but instead rip you off.
        A less lucrative alternative is to buy things cheap at garage sales and then resale them on eBay. If you don't mind taking digital pictures of the item and writing a description, you just may make some money after paying eBay's small fee.
        Yet another alternative is to use eBay to sell things around the house that you want to get rid of. I have done this. I usually put the starting auction price at a penny and let it go from there. Some things have brought in less than I expected and others have brought in more. Be aware that you will have to ship the item (or list it as pick up only), so know how much shipping will be and state that amount in the listing.
        This is just a quick look at eBay. If you want to know more go to their website at www.ebay.com and learn for yourself what eBay is all about.


Computer Parts - Graphics Card

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        What you see on your monitor is made of over a million tiny dots called pixels. Your computer has to decide what to do with every one in order to create an image. To do this, it needs a translator - something to take data from the CPU and turn it into a picture you can see. This is the job of the graphics card.
        Many computers have motherboards that handle the job of a graphics card without a separate graphics card. But the graphics that they can handle are limited. For most people this is adequate, but when a computer has to show 3D images fast, like with action games and 3D editors, it needs the help of a graphics card. Plugging a graphics card into one of these motherboards overrides the onboard graphics functions.
        The graphics card is like a little computer hooked into your computer that is designed specifically for performing the complex mathematical and geometric calculations that are necessary for rendering pictures, especially 3D pictures.
        Graphics cards range from the cheap, slow cards to expensive, fast cards. Even though there are many specifications to measure the speed of a graphics card, the most common specification is the amount of memory it has, for example, 128MB or 256MB. The best way to figure out what size of card to buy is to look at the games that you want to play with it. Most of them list the system requirements on the box and one of those requirements will be the graphics card which is also called a 3D Accelerator. A simple game that I have which consists of sitting in a ship and shooting airplanes as they fly by (it was a Christmas gift) requires a 3D accelerator with 4MB RAM. Another more complicated game requires a 32MB 3D Accelerator. Most action games will require even more than that. Getting a faster card than you need will help the game to run smoother, so don't skim on the graphics card, but also don't spend all your money on a card that is too big for your needs
        Graphics cards are inserted in a slot on the motherboard much like the PCI slots.
        Your computer needs may never require you to buy and install a graphics card but if it does, now you know the basics.


Tech Tip - Shortcuts 101

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        One element of Windows is shortcuts. A shortcut is a small file that does nothing but link to another file. Its appearence takes on the same appearence as the icon of the file that it is linked to with the addition of a small box in the lower left corner of the icon with an arrow in it. When you double click on a shortcut, it double clicks on the file that it is linked to.
        Shortcuts are good for putting frequently used programs in more convenient places to run. For example, you may have a program that you run everyday but to run it you must click on the Start button, then go up to the All Programs item, wait for the menu to expand, go to the folder of the program, wait for it to expand, and then finally click on the program's icon. If you had a shortcut on your desktop or in the Quick Launch area of the task bar, you could just click on it to run the program. To accomplish this, some people just drag the program file from Windows Explorer to the desktop. That is not the correct thing to do because it can lead to all kinds of problems. What they should do is make a shortcut.
        There are several ways to make a shortcut. One way is to find the file that you want to link to in Windows Explorer and then right click on it. Select the Create Shortcut item on the popup menu. This will immediately create a shortcut with the words, "Shortcut to" added before the filename that you right clicked on. If you want that shortcut to be somewhere else, you can drag it to where you want it. You may want to rename it to.
        Another way to make a shortcut is to right click on a blank space, like the Desktop, and select New and then Shortcut from the popup menu. This will start the Create Shortcut wizard. Follow the instructions in the wizard to create a shortcut.
        Get to know shortcuts and they can make your computer life much easier.


eScams - Important Account Notice

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        Every once in a while I get an email with the subject, "Important Account Notice". The email starts out by saying, "Dear Valuable Customer, This is your official notification from Chase Bank that the service(s) listed below will be deactivated and deleted if not renewed immediately."
        There is only one problem, I have never had an account or dealt with Chase Bank. In fact, I have never lived even close to a Chase Bank. This email is sent to millions of people in the hopes that it will find some Chase Bank customers and then trick them into giving these imposters their credit card number. It is NOT sent out by Chase Bank.
        If you were to click on the link in the email, it would take you to a website that is identical to the Chase Bank website. In fact, if you were to put it next to the actual Chase Bank website, you would not be able to tell the difference. But the fake website is actually a credit card thief's website.
        This front page has a login section with User ID and Password textboxes. If you enter the wrong ID and password in the actual Chase Bank website, it will tell you that the login is incorrect, but on the fake website any ID or password will get you in. The next page asks for your credit card information. If you type in your credit card information, these thieves will use it to purchase thousands of dollars worth of things they want and you will have to explain to your bank how much of a fool you were. In case you have not understood yet, IT IS A SCAM.
        How do you protect yourself against these kind of scams? First, you should know that your bank will never ask you for your credit card number (especially over the internet). Secondly, you should never click on a link in an email to go to these type of websites. If you want to go to the Chase Bank website, type www.chase.com in your browser.
        There are similar scams like this for other financial institutions, so consumer beware.


Reader's Emails

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Ray - Several people responded to Gil's problem of the hidden taskbar icons. I have put a couple of the responses below.

Scott - I suspect Gil is experiencing the same problems I do. It's not a question of hidden icons that you can access by clicking on the "<". If you have a complex boot sequence, often all the icons that should be in the system tray aren't there, period. It takes a logout and login to fix the problem. Virtually every time I do a restart, I then have to log out and log back in to get all the stuff in the system tray that should be there.

Peggy Ramseyer (and HTH also made this suggestion) - In response to your answer to the following question, I would suggest the following to Mr. Gil Coon:

1. Right click on the taskbar, click on properties, the "Taskbar and Start Menu properties" windows appear, click on the the taskbar tab.
2. Go to the bottom 1/2 of the screen--"Notification Area" and make sure there is not a check mark in the "Hide inactive icons" OR click on the customize button.
3. The "customize notifications" window will open. Here you can see all the current and past items that have been on the taskbar. You can highlight an item and then change the behaivor for each item, ie "always hide, always show or hide when inactive".

Stuart - Out of the blue, when re-booting my Win XP Pro SP2 OS, I received the message "NTLDR missing...." error.
        [note from Ray - I deleted several paragraphs here which told about the many ways that he tried to solve this problem (including using WinRescue), but was not able to]
        Perhaps this is a worthy candidate for you to build a tool to automatically repair this problem.
        Any help will be greatly appreciated.

Ray - NTLDR is the first file that your computer looks for when starting up. NTLDR then directs your computer to load Windows. The solutions that you found simply are finding a copy of NTLDR and some of the other files that it uses and copying them to the C drive where they should be. WinRescue regularly backs up these files and a restore should have worked. If it didn't work, either you do not have backups of these files, the files were restored to the wrong drive (sometimes Windows switches drive letters and so D or E may be the drive to copy them to), or the absence of these files is not your problem.
        If I were to write a program to solve your problem it would simply do what WinRescue (http://regvac.com/rescuexp.htm) already does.
        If you do not have a floppy drive, we have a XP Recovery CD Maker (http://www.xp-recovery-cd.com) which will make a boot CD (which would also have the NTLDR files on it).
        (this is a tip sent to me by Moonglum7) If you have a Windows CD, you can start your computer with the CD in the CD drive. When it reaches the install screen, press R (for recovery), log on to your Windows drive, then enter fixboot at the command prompt, the boot sector will be rewritten and Windows will now boot with no further problems.

Cherry Jason - Perhaps you have already covered this, but can you do a step by step process for how a novice computer user can create a Windows XP bootable disk, (CD-Rom media). I knew how to create a floppy boot disk for Windows 95, 98, & ME, but can't seem to get the process to work for Windows XP.

Ray - It takes a whole different and much more complex procedure to make a boot CD than a boot diskette. There are a couple of websites that have tools to build boot CDs with: Bart's PE Builder boot CD (http://www.nu2.nu/pebuilder) and ReatogoBuilder CD (http://www.reatogo.de/index.htm).
        I wrote a program to help you make a boot CD using BartsPE. It is called XP Recovery CD Maker - http://www.xp-recovery-cd.com. XP Recovery CD Maker steps you through the process of using BartsPE. BartsPE is not compatible with all versions of WinXP, so you should use XP Recovery CD Maker in trial version before purchasing it. BartsPE is free. And I think that ReatagoBuilder CD is free too. I have not used ReatagoBuilder. What I have seen of it, it seems to be exactly the same thing as PEBuilder.

Jay - I need a tip on how to get my email dates in my inbox back in sequence starting from the oldest date at the top of my inbox and going down to the most recent email date. Somehow several of my email dates jumped out of sequence and they wound up between back emails and the most current ones in my inbox.

Ray - If you look at the top of the inbox box, you will see column headings, such as, From, Subject, and Received. One of them may have a triangle pointing up or down. The triangle means that your emails are sorted according to that column in the direction of the triangle (which is actually an arrow). So if the triangle is next to From and is pointing down, your emails are arranged in alphabetical order according to the From email address.
        You want the triangle in the Received column pointing up. This will arrange your emails according to the date that they were received with the newest at the bottom (to have the newest at the top, the triangle should be pointing down).
        All you need to do is click on the word and heading, Received, in the Received column and the emails will be sorted according to date. To sort them the opposite way (so that the triangle points the other way), just click on it again.
        What probably happened is that you accidently clicked on one of the other column headings and so the emails were and are sorted according to it.


Reader's Tips

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Deas Plant - I noticed in the latest newsletter that some-one suggested a sheet of glass as a mousepad. Sounds like it might be a good idea but I think mine is better. I use an ordinary nylon/teflon kitchen cutting board. I used to run my mouse straight on the laminate top of my PC desk but found that it would get sticky deposits on the mouse feet that made it hard to move the mouse around and required periodic cleaning. Since using the nylon/teflon cutting board, I don't have this problem. Works for me.


Questions on our Discussion Board

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Printer Spooler Repair

Close All Programs during Software Installations

Windows XP System Restore not working

Virtual Device Drivers Error

Error: In Generic Host Process for Win 32 Services

Programs automatically called from Explorer

Problems with WinXP Pro

problem printing

How do I get earlier updates for WinXP?

XP HE - Ripristino Configurazione Sistema

Can't map PCs on LAN to drives

Why does icq5 still show up after uninstalling?

WinRescue XP - Windows Restore Points

Windows XP account users

Application failed

Broadband Works, but Dial-up Won't

AOL my favorite places

unwanted pop ups

Excess Broadband Usage

Active Desktop

Dropping .dll files

Deleted Items Area

Slow running pc

Having Internet Explorer as my default browser

msn messenger

Maximizing open windows

USB "thumb" thinks it's a CD

Page cannot be displayed

icons

Windows ME problem

Unwanted Spam

ME System Restore does not work

linux

The passrv.exe

How to ask question


A Personal Note from Ray

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        I have started a Discussion board where you can ask computer questions. Those of you who know something about computers can answer questions too. The Discussion board is located at www.regvac.com/cgi-bin/forum/Blah.pl In the next week or so, I hope to add some of the questions that have appeared in this newsletter. If you have any questions, please post them there.
        If you do not want to be subscribed to this list, please use the unsubscribe link.


Thanks for reading,
Ray Geide