The Computer Tutor

Everyone uses Google all the time to find something online. It’s still by far the best and most comprehensive search engine available, which is why it’s also the most popular (Bing doesn’t even come close, in spite of Microsoft’s marketing machine telling you it’s so great). But did you know that Google does a lot more than just find websites and look up information?

Google does a TON of things that are interesting, educational and maybe even a little bizarre. Here are three things that you can do with Google that I’ll bet you didn’t know about.

You can view high-resolution images of important art (click here)

You can play Atari Breakout (click here)

Every drive on your Windows computer has a letter of the alphabet assigned to it. The hard drive is probably drive C, and the CD/DVD drive (if you have one) is probably drive D. If you plug in a flash drive, it would most likely be drive E, since a new drive will take the next available drive letter. But if you set up a regular backup to a portable USB drive, you need to change the drive letter of that drive first. Here’s why.

When you set up a backup that goes to a portable or external hard drive, you have to tell the backup software a few things.

That last item – where to send the backed-up files and folders – is the key element here.

So you have your external drive plugged in, and let’s say it takes the drive letter “E” since that is the next letter available, alphabetically. This means that each day, your backup program will take those selected files and folders and put them in their proper place on drive E, your backup drive.

And that’s all fine, until something different happens.

When you’re using the computer, you should not have the external drive connected to it. But let’s say you are using the computer, and for whatever reason, you plug in a flash drive to see what’s on it. Then you leave that flash drive sitting in the USB port. That means the flash drive is now drive “E”.

Later on, you plug in your external drive so that the computer can do its backup. Maybe the backup is set to happen at 1 am (a popular time for overnight backups to start). BUT – what you didn’t notice is that the external hard drive is now drive “F” – the next available letter in the alphabet.

So when your backup program fires up at 1 am, it’s going to look for drive “E” – just like it’s supposed to – but drive “E” is the flash drive. There are several problems that could arise from this:

All of those problems can be avoided if you just do one thing when you’re setting up the backup. This is something I do every time I set up a backup for a client. You should change the drive letter for the external/portable drive, and you should assign it a letter that’s way up in the alphabet, like “P” or “M”. That way, it will always stay that letter when you plug it into your computer. The only way you could “bump” that external drive off of one of those letters would be to plug in so many other flash drives or other things that all the other letters are used up. That won’t happen, so you’re safe with a letter that is near the end of the alphabet.

Here’s how you change the drive letter:

4. In the new window that opens, click on “Disk Management”

5. Now you’ll see a list of all your drives, including the external drive

6. Do a RIGHT click on the external drive and choose “Change Drive Letter and Paths”

7. Now click the Change button:

8. Click the drop-down menu and choose the letter you want to use, and click OK:

You might get an alert that pops up saying that some programs may not work properly if you change the drive letter for this drive. That’s fine, because the only program that will use this external drive is your backup program (I use Macrium Reflect), and you’re going to tell it the new drive letter anyway.

Remember, you need to do this BEFORE you set up the backup. Otherwise, you’ll have to go back into the backup program and tell it the new drive letter too.

And as always, if you want to set up a backup and this all sounds like more than you want to deal with, I can do all of this for you remotely. So you don’t have to bother with it, you don’t have to bring your computer anywhere, and you don’t have to have someone come in to your home or business.

I love Netflix. And so do millions of other people. There are so many choices of what to watch, it’s almost overwhelming. But the “standard” Netflix content categories that you normally see on the screen are often too broad to really make a specific selection. However, when you know this little trick and the proper category codes, you can choose EXACTLY the type of movie you want to watch.

You know if you just go to Netflix.com to choose something to watch, you get the standard list of categories such as Action, Drama, Comedy, Documentary, etc. Those categories are sometimes just way too broad! What if you want to watch a political documentary? or an Irish movie? or a Korean TV show? You can actually find those things on Netflix, if you know this little trick!

You just have to go on your computer, open a web browser such as Chrome or Firefox, and type this in the address bar at the top:

http://netflix.com/browse/genre/xxxxx

BUT – instead of that series of Xs at the end, type a number. The number you put there will depend on what you want to watch. To use the examples I mentioned above, let’s say you want to watch a political documentary. That number is 7018. So you would enter this address in your web browser:

http://netflix.com/browse/genre/7018

When you do that, Netflix offers up all kinds of choices (this image only shows a few of the options):

Then you just go to Netflix on your TV, search for the name of the movie you want, and watch it.

For an Irish movie, the code is 58750, so you would enter http://netflix.com/browse/genre/58750. That gives us loads of Irish movies:

And for Korean TV shows, the address would be http://netflix.com/browse/genre/67879 and you would get even more choices:

So here it is – a list of all the codes for the “other” Netflix categories:

Action & Adventure: 1365

Now you definitely can’t complain that there’s nothing to watch!

Popular programs come and go. What was highly used a few years ago may no longer be used much at all, and in fact could even be inviting hackers into your computer. Why keep an unsecure program that you don’t even use anymore?

The program I’m referring to specifically today is QuickTime.

QuickTime is a media player, which means it can play audio or video files. It’s made by Apple, but it is commonly seen on both Mac and Windows computers. It used to be very popular and was often used to play movie files that ended with the “.mov” extension.

These days it’s not really used much. Apple has not come out with a new version of the software in more than 10 years, and in terms of computer software that means it’s very outdated. They also just announced recently that they won’t be issuing any new security updates for QuickTime programs running on Windows computers. They are going to continue to support it on Apple computers.

That means whenever a new security flaw is found in QuickTime, it won’t get fixed if you’re running Windows. So hackers or scammers would be free to exploit that security problem on  your Windows computer, because they know the problem is not going to be fixed by Apple. So you should just get rid of it.

To remove QuickTime, just go to Control Panel – Programs and Features and find it in the list. Do a right-click on the name and choose “uninstall”. Doesn’t get much easier than that!

Of course, the next question might be “If I have some .MOV video files saved on my computer, and I no longer have QuickTime to play those video files, how can I play them?” Good question! You have a couple of options, at least:

Windows Media Player is already on your Windows computer, and VLC Media Player is a free download at http://www.videolan.org/vlc/.

When Windows 8 first came out and people sat down at their computer to use it, the first common reaction was just plain confusion. Everything had changed. The Start button didn’t do what it did in Windows 7, and people didn’t know how to get to the places they used to be very familiar with. If they had known this little secret key combination, they probably would have felt less stress and they may have actually gotten some work done.

Windows 10 is similar. Microsoft thinks we should be so grateful that they “gave” us back the Start menu, but the Windows 10 Start button and Start menu aren’t nearly as functional and practical as the one that came with Windows 7. It’s just one of the reasons I don’t recommend “upgrading” to Windows 10.

But even Microsoft has its fleeting moments of good judgement. Part of the design of Windows 8 includes a secret key combination that gives you a menu of the common places in your computer that you might want to find. That key combination works in Windows 10 also, and I use it quite often when I’m working with either of those versions of Windows on a client’s computer.

The key combination is: Windows key + X

Just hold down the Windows key (lower left area of the keyboard) and tap the letter “x”. This only works with Windows 8 and 10, so if you have Windows 7 you can’t use it (but if you have Windows 7, you don’t need this).

When you hit Windows + X, you’ll see a neat little “common places” menu pop up that looks like this:

This handy little menu is commonly called the Power User Menu, but it is also sometimes known as:

As you can see, there are some handy locations on there. Some of them you might not be all that familiar with. Here’s what I recommend, as an “educational exercise” and it won’t take long: Open the Power User menu, and click on the first place in the list. That way you’ll be able to see exactly that that is, so that you can access it in the future when you need to. Then open it again, and check the second one in the list and so on.

Here are a few examples:

It actually is a pretty handy thing to know about.

Even better is a tool called ClassicShell (get it free here). That’s a free program that actually gives you back the old Windows 7 Start Menu, on your Windows 8 or Windows 10 computer. When Windows 10 first came out, it didn’t work well with ClassicShell. That may have been resolved now.

Microsoft is still trying to “upgrade” all Windows 7 and Windows 8.1 computers to their newest concoction, Windows 10. We’ve been battling that with free software (GWX Control Panel) and it’s a constant fight. Now there’s a new program (also free) to put an end to the threat of upgrade.

A little background first.

When Microsoft started getting really aggressive about pushing Windows 10 onto computers even when people didn’t want it, they got some strong pushback. And rightly so. Some people, including myself, like Windows 7 (or even Windows 8.1) and want to keep using it. We choose NOT to go to Windows 10.

So Microsoft announced that they were ever so graciously offering the option to disable operating system upgrades. This can be done on a computer-by-computer basis. All you have to do is follow their steps. Easy, right?

No, not easy. The process required configuring the Windows Group Policy Editor. If you don’t know what that is, you’re in good company because most people don’t. And in some cases it also involves editing the Windows Registry – something that the average user should never attempt, as a mistake could completely mess up your computer. So Microsoft technically did offer a way to not get Windows 10, but then they made it so technical and difficult that most people couldn’t do it. It’s even been called “user-hostile”.

A few months ago, an independent programmer came out with the free program GWX Control Panel, which has been better than nothing. It monitors for whenever Windows 10 tries to sneak in and alerts the user so you can swat it away again like a mosquito. But Windows 10 is a pesky and persistent mosquito so it keeps trying to get back in, and GWX CP alerts pop up, and things need to be reset. It’s a constant battle.

So now we have Never10. It’s a free program, created by Steve Gibson of Gibson Research. Steve does a weekly podcast with Leo Laporte called Security Now, and he’s been in the computer security industry for decades. He’s definitely someone to trust, and he knows what he’s doing. And he also does not want Windows 10 on his computer.

You can get Never10 here: https://www.grc.com/never10.htm (just click the green “Download now” button on that page).

Never10 does not install anything on your computer. You just download it, and run it. You know that difficult process from Microsoft that I mentioned earlier? That’s exactly what Never10 does. It takes care of those steps for you, and it disables the Windows 10 operating system upgrade for your computer.

When you first run it, you will probably see a window like this:

If you see that window, just click the button at the bottom that says “Disable Win10 upgrade”. When you do that, it will do what it needs to do in about a 1/2 second, and you’ll see this message:

Click “Exit” and you’re done. Of course, if Windows 10 upgrades are already disabled on your computer, you might see that second message right off the bat.

Once you see the green message, you can delete Never10 or you can leave it wherever it downloaded to (it takes up almost no space). You can then also uninstall GWX Control Panel. And if your’e really geeky and want to see all the technical stuff about Never10, you can see that here.

If you’re uncomfortable with running Never10 on your computer, I can take care of it for you through my Remote Support service. Details on that are here: http://ComputerTutorFlorida.com/remote

Last week we talked about how to access the secret expanded Send To menu, and I mentioned that it was possible to also add folders and locations to the Send To menu. You can also delete some of the ones that are there by default if you don’t need them. Some people have asked about how to do this, so that’s what we’ll do today.

As a quick review, here are the main things to know about the Send To menu:

Here’s how you customize the Send To menu.

First, you need to actually get to the folder that IS the Send To menu. If you’re geeky, you could do it the old-fashioned way and drill down in Windows until you get to it:

But really the easier way is to hold the Windows key and tap the letter R. In the window that comes up, type: shell:sendto

That takes you directly to the folder where all of your “send to” options are. As you can see, it looks like any other folder on your computer:

At this point, you can add or remove items from this folder based on what you want in your “Send To” menu.

If something is there currently that you would never use (I’m guessing you probably don’t send too many things to a “fax recipient”), just right-click and delete it.

To add a new folder or a new location here, you just create a shortcut for that folder or location inside the Send To folder. For example, let’s say you want to add the Pictures folder as a destination in your Send To menu. With the Send To folder open, do a right-click in the main open area and choose New – Shortcut. Then click on Browse and choose your Pictures folder. Now, when you right click and choose Send To on a picture, you can opt to send it to the Pictures folder. Easy!

It just takes a minute to get the Send To menu just the way you want it, but it can save you a lot of time in the future because it makes the process a lot more efficient.

You’re probably already familiar with the “Send to” menu in Windows. What most people don’t know is that there’s a hidden, expanded “Send to” menu that gives you a lot more options.

The regular Send To menu is certainly no secret. In fact, I use it all the time – most commonly, to put shortcuts to often-used programs right on the desktop for easy access.

Just about any file or folder can be “Sent” somewhere. When you right-click on a file or folder, you get a short menu that pops up, and one of those options is “Send to”. When you put your mouse over the words “Send to”, you’ll see another menu fly out – and you can choose where you want to send that file.

It looks like this:

So you can see I have the option to send that Word document to Adobe Audition, or a compressed folder, or Dropbox, or Evernote, or any other of the locations or programs in that list.

But what you’re seeing there is just the REGULAR “Send to” menu.

We’re looking for the Secret Super Duper EXPANDED “Sent to” menu.

To get to that, you just add one small step to the process. Before you right click on the file or folder that you want to send somewhere, hold down the SHIFT key. Then right click on the file or folder (you can release the Shift key after you do the right click). When the menu appears, move your mouse down to the Send To line, and you’ll now see this:

As you can see, lots more options! Instead of 12 locations or programs that we had in the first one, the “Secret Send To Menu” has 28 – more than double. Most of the additional options are the commonly used folders on your Windows computer

Of course, what shows up as options in the “Send to” menu (either one) will vary somewhat between different computers. In my case, I have added a few of the options manually on the shorter version. You can add to that menu or delete items from it so that it’s customized the way you want it.

This is so simple and so useful, I can’t believe it’s not more widely known. It would be really handy for when a client is trying to tell me what an error message says, or what the content is in some other Windows message.

The way this comes up most of the time is this: a client gets some kind of error message that pops up on their computer, and they don’t know what it means or what to do with it. So they call me. Sometimes by the time they call, the message has disappeared on its own, or they have clicked on something and caused it to close, so they can no longer tell me what the message actually said.

Or, if the message is still on the screen, they don’t read me the exact wording – they just sort of “summarize” what it says. This doesn’t work, since their summary doesn’t necessarily include all of the critical content that could tell me what is going on.

What I need is a quick relay of ALL the actual text and what buttons are available to click. What most people don’t realize is that you can do that with a simple copy and paste.

To show how it works, I’ll use a dialogue box that I created:

When you see something like that come up on your Windows computer screen, here’s what you do:

And rather than open a word processor program, you could just as easily open your email, compose a new email message and paste the content of the box right there.

The nice thing is that the copy/pasted content includes everything – the title at the top, the content of the message itself, and the names of all the buttons that are available. This way it leaves no margin for error – your tech can easily and accurately see what the dialogue box is telling you.

Of course, if someone knows how to do it, it’s possible to just take a screenshot of the dialogue box and save that image, then email that. But that’s not nearly as easy as a simple copy and paste!

Obviously you want to make sure your computer lasts as many years as possible. And now, this is especially true if you are using Windows 7 or Windows 8 because if you buy a computer right off the shelf now it will most likely be running Windows 10. The laptops I sell are almost all Windows 7 since that is still the preferred operating system (in my humble opinion) and it will be supported through January of 2020. But it’s all the better if you can keep your current laptop running well for as long as possible.

Here are 6 things you can do to help your laptop to have a long life:

1. Never use it on a soft surface. You might see ads for laptops showing someone in bed but that’s just marketing nonsense. A laptop by nature runs hotter than a desktop computer because all of the components are crammed into a small space. There are exhaust vents on the bottom or sides that need to be kept open for the hot air to escape. If it doesn’t, your laptop will overheat – this can damage it, and it might even shut down if it gets too hot.

2. Always use a cooling pad. This kind of goes along with #1 – it keeps your laptop nice and cool. A cooling pad is basically just a small “platform” that your laptop sits on while you use it. The cooling pad has one big fan or 2-3 smaller fans built in, so that it automatically sucks the hot air away from the laptop. A cooling pad is less than $20 and you can get them anywhere computer supplies are sold (here’s a nice one for $15 on Amazon).

3. Don’t lift up just one side of the laptop. This is something I see all the time. When a laptop is brand new, the connection that the power cord has when plugged in to the back of the laptop is nice and solid. But if you tilt up the laptop from the front (to retrieve a piece of paper, or to look under it, etc.) the power plug is stressed. Doing it once might not matter, but when you do that more than a few times, eventually it will mean that the power cord plug won’t make contact with the power jack inside the laptop. That’s when you have to wiggle it or hold it a certain way in order for it to make contact and provide power. You can eliminate most of that problem ahead of time though – if you want to get under the laptop, just lift up the whole thing at the same time.

4. Thunder or lightning? Unplug! In our house, whenever we hear thunder or see lightning, we unplug all of the computers as well as the big screen TV. You should unplug anything you would not want to have to replace. Voltage surges can happen anytime, but they are usually the worst during an electrical storm. And don’t tell me, “It’s okay, I have a surge protector.” If lightning strikes nearby, your little surge protector is no match for it. The nice thing about a laptop is, assuming your battery is good, you can still keep using it even during the storm. I also leave my Verizon FIOS modem plugged in, so I can still go online with my laptop. If the modem gets fried, Verizon will just send me a new one.

5. Remove the battery for extended periods of non-use. If you’re planning to not use the laptop for 30 days or longer, it’s best to just take the battery out during that time. Depending on how strong the battery is, it might be low (or dead) when you put it back in, but just let it charge up and start using it again.

6. Keep liquids away! It’s always a shame when someone brings me their computer after it’s had something spilled on it. Coffee, beer, milk, Coke, Kool Aid – it’s all bad and has the potential to permanently destroy your expensive laptop. If you’re going to spill anything on it, spill water – it’s the least destructive and at least it will dry completely. But if it short-circuits something on the motherboard, even spilled water can mean you’re about to replace your laptop. And it’s so easily preventable! If you must have a drink nearby while you’re working on your laptop, make it something like a bottled water that has a lid. Replacing the lid each time you take a drink is a whole lot better than replacing your laptop!