Free Computer Consultant ………. Daily Insights

I am very pleased to announce that my video How To Upgrade Memory in a Laptop at Associated Content has been on the front page for a couple of days now and appears to be pretty popular.

Check it and post a comment there (and here) if you like.

My mistake. I told someone that hooking up a Vista Laptop to their WiFi should be a piece of cake. “It’ll prompt you for the key”, I told her.

A home user from one of my clients bought her daughter a laptop for graduation. I gave her the basic buying guide recommendations and she adjusted to fit her budget. She ended up with a Gateway that doesn’t seem too bad.

The Gateway Laptop has a Realtec wireless adapter. I don’t know if that’s the problem or not. I normally buy Dell laptops and pay $15 extra for the Intel wireless adapter.

This old Dell TruMobile WiFi Router doesn’t support WPA, of course, let alone WPA2. So I tried WEP. Then I tried no security. Either way the laptop would connect, but not pick up a network address via DHCP. Ok, I’ll assign a static address. That didn’t work either.

A visit to Google let me know that this isn’t the first time people have found that:

• Vista is harder, not easier to connect to WiFi than XP
• Vista may not like your WiFi router
• Vista can be a pain in the tail; requiring approval or elevated privileges to do basic stuff, and everything is impossible to find - not intuitive at all - for people accustomed to working with XP all day

BTW, my three year old XP laptop connected up right away. And the Vista laptop connected just fine with a cable. Then, of course, IE 7 worked about 25% of the time on the few sites I tried - so I headed over to mozilla.com; downloaded and installed Firefox and guess what? No more internet problems, at least with the cable.

So I’m going to pickup a newer router and try again.

What a pain. I’ve been advising people against upgrading old hardware to Vista, but new hardware from Gateway? Should be a slam dunk. Instead, it could drive a man to drink.

Continuing our MBox 2 Pro and ProTools software discussion, my laptop configuration is a Pentium M 1.7Ghz with 1.5GB RAM and a 100GB 7200rpm hard drive.

The MBox tech support rep had me turn off several devices in order to get the software to run reliably. Naturally, it made sense to setup a hardware profile for MBox recording.

Such devices as network card, wireless adapter, and the Sigma-Tel sound card are all disabled. Then, rather than having to manually unload the Trend Micro anti virus I went into the services applet and disabled the Trend Micro services for the MBox profile under the “LogOn” tab.

That leaves me to manually shut down the BOClean anti trojan software, the Second Copy software and couple others like that, and then we’re ready to start recording.

Simplifies the boot process and helps make sure we don’t forget to shut something down and have recording crash - right near the end, of course.

Digidesign Mbox 2 Pro Factory Bundle is what we bought.

Because of my interest in the One Laptop Per Child initiative, I was suckered into watching the 1 minute 15 second video on Yahoo!. Normally, I won’t watch any videos on Yahoo! because:

1. Yahoo! bandwidth on videos stinks
2. You must watch a stupid commercial first
3. You cannot make up for the bandwidth problem (starting & stopping) by downloading the video and watching at your convenience (see Video Download on my website).

Besides laughing at the hokey reporting by the 60 minutes reporter, there was little value in the video clip other than to see what one of these $100 laptops looks like (looks like something that should have “PlaySchool” across the top).

But the point is, they work. And since they work, and since they only cost $100, why can’t the One Laptop Per Child initiative include children from the United States?

Not everyone in this country is rich and prosperous, despite how it looks when we are taxed at extortionist’s rates so that we can send aid to everyone else in the world - whether they want our help or not.

One Laptop Per Child has the potential to be a great program. Let’s just make sure every needy child is included.

Reason #7 to backup your computer. Ok, I made up the #7 thing, but don’t the guys on TV commercials make it up too?

When you take your laptop or desktop PC in to be repaired, make sure you have a good backup of it. Preferably an entire drive image with a product like Acronis True Image.

And this same advice goes when you or someone you have trusted your computer to might reach for a system recovery disk or boot to system recovery mode.

Your entire hard drive will be reformatted and all data and Windows customizations will be lost! Let me repeat that: you will lose everything. All data, all programs you have installed, all songs you have downloaded. Everything.

Unless you have a backup.

Now, with the system recovery, this is indisputable. It’s gone. You need to restore data and reinstall additional programs you have added when it’s all done. If you have no backup…

When you take the laptop or PC into the repair shop, or they come to you, you might fare better. But don’t bet your data on it!

Case in point: Client bought a new HP/Compaq laptop for his son. Pretty nice unit, actually. Got a good price at boogie buy. The latch broke. Couldn’t get the laptop cover open. This particular PC came with XP Home and I upgraded it to XP Pro for him, among other enhancements. Took it in for repair. Thank you very little they not only fixed the latch, but also reformatted the hard drive. What? Procedure, I am told. In their defense, that way they know the PC will work properly when it gets home; without having to clean off viruses and malware which might cause the customer to blame them.

What if your computer isn’t operating, and that’s why you need to get it repaired? (Or the latch is broken.) You can’t backup then can you?

Ah, grasshopper, that’s why you make backup a habit before you shut the machine down.

Remember this tip: whenever you shut your computer off, or even reboot it, there is a chance it will not come back up properly.

So backup first!

See here for more on computer backup.

One Laptop Per Child is a non profit organization whose goal is to give children in developing countries access to computer technology. It’s a noble goal.

These laptops, with wireless but without hard drive, are designed to be easy to use and help these under privileged people gain access to the worlds prosperity.

The laptops have a rechargeable battery but can be powered also by a car battery or a hand crank.

I think this is fantastic, with one exception. That exception is the United States. The One Laptop Per Child program specifically excludes the under privileged in the United States.

As a person who is well aware of some of the rural, maybe a bit backward, areas of this country where people applaud the opening of a Super Walmart so they have access to a $9/hr job, even though statistics show that Super Walmarts are long term detrimental to the economic well being of their county, I ask “Why?”

Why is it that what’s good for the rest of the worlds poor isn’t good for our poor? Our poor only get hand outs from the government when they can coalesce into a large enough voting block to get some politicians notice. And that usually only happens in the inner city.

If the laptop only costs $100 to make due to mass production, then our poor should have access at $100 too.

The seo popularity in past decade has given rise to many web development companies as well as dsl companies and services offering domain name registration. We now have cheap web hosting as well.

Two themes I get barraged with over and over.

1. “You emphasize money too much”
2. “Tell me what you think of this laptop”

(I’m tempted here to do the “Hello, McFly!” thing from Back To The Future, but my loving wife tells me I over due it.)

I fully understand why people keep asking me about cheap laptops. Day after Day. Hoping my answer will change.

Here’s the answer:

• AMD Processor - not bad in and of itself, just an indicator that the manufacturer is cutting every corner possible.
• 5400 RPM hard drive - “Oh, that’s Ok.” They say now. “Is there any way I can speed this clunker up?” Is what they ask 2 months later. (Buy a 7200 rpm hard drive - no exceptions - until 10,000 rpm are available, that is.)
• 1 year warranty, mail in no less - Do you really want to have to box up the laptop and ship it, insured - then wait 2 weeks to get it back? What are you going to say in 13 months when it dies and the repair estimate for your $600 laptop is $800?
• Shared RAM and Vista Home Basic - How many times will you ask why your Vista doesn’t have the cool Aero interface like everybody else’s? Or where the convenient Scheduled Backup feature is? (It’s in Home Premium and above.)
• If all this is really what you want, then buy it. But PLEASE don’t call on me to fix it or “speed it up”.

But I empathize with them

They don’t have a money tree! They work for the man, day in, day out, and watch their expenses go up faster than their salary. Yes, this is despite what the liars, I mean bureaucrats, tell us the rate of inflation is. We know better. Unlike Rudy Giuliani, we do shop at the grocery store and know what everything costs.

According to Michael Masterson, who writes ETR, making more money is the answer

Well, I’ve looked into Michael’s advice. And you know what? Maybe he’s right.

I came across something this morning that looks like it might really fit the bill:

Who Loves Money - Zero Investment Marketing Techniques

It’s an ebook due out May 1, 2007. The research I’ve done on the two guys who authored it is pretty impressive. I’m going to check it out, maybe it’s right for you too.

Who Loves Money eBook

Who loves money? Not me. But I sure do like the things money can buy. Like a decent laptop.

I get asked time and again how to buy a laptop. Sometimes it’s for a student, other times for an adult who just wants the freedom to roam around the house while computing.

The best advice I can give is to consult my laptop buying guide.

But what if the advice there leads me to a $2000 laptop that I can’t afford?

Simple. You make compromises. At this point, only you can decide where you are willing to skimp.

The $2000 laptop is tailored to last 3 - 4 years, with contented computing along the way. Ok, maybe you’ll have to reload Windows at the 2 year point to regain that new computer performance, but at least you can do it.

Here are 7 areas to consider for paring the cost:

1. Overall brand quality. Not a good idea in my book. Witness previous posts about the Sony VAIO. Others on the web have had similar recommendations to avoid that one.
2. Processor. I normally pick the fastest processor on the price/performance curve that sits right where cost starts increasing faster than performance gain. You can cheat a little here and hopefully still get 3 years from the hardware.
3. RAM. This isn’t a bad place to save some money, because you can easily upgrade later. Just don’t go through the manufacturer; companies like DELL can really sock it to you on upgrades. Choose someplace like Crucial.com instead.
   Tip: Depending on price structure, getting, say 512MB in 1 DIMM now lets you add 1 more 512MB DIMM later for a total of 1GB and still make use of the 512 that came with it. If you buy 512 via 2 DIMMs, you will have to remove 1 or both DIMMs later to add more, thus throwing away value (maybe you can eBay it for a couple bucks).
4. Screen. Older eyes might prefer the lower resolution of a less expensive screen. Most laptops have 1 or maybe 2 native resolutions that actually look good. These are fairly high resolutions that many over 40, especially women, find difficult to read. Dell’s WSXGA is as good of screen as WSXGA+ or WUXGA, just lower resolution. Compare before you buy!
5. Hard Drive. Go smaller if you like, but don’t go slower. 7200rpm or faster (faster not available as of this writing) is all you want to consider. End of discussion, don’t listen to anyone else.
6. Video card. For strictly business usage on Windows XP, you can save a little here. If you are doing a lot of graphics work, watching movies, or expect to use Windows Vista with the Aero interface, I wouldn’t advise skimping here.
7. Warranty. This is your call. See my post on CompleteCare. Repairs are expensive; do you ordinarily self-insure? Computer hardware has a nasty habit of dying within 30 days of warranty expiration - call it Murphy’s Law if you like.

There you have it!

The choice is yours. Choose wisely!

When it comes to computer warranty, I expect to see a minimum of 3 years on everything. When it comes to a laptop computer, I want the warranty to last as long as I expect the unit to be in service.

Why? Repairs are just too expensive - and too likely to be needed. (Especially if a student under age 30 is involved.)

Here there is a connection to why I don’t think too much of big box stores, as I have previously written. Usually they offer a low, low price with very little warranty; and usually a crummy laptop besides. After you add the cost of a decent warranty, you could have bought a nice Dell.

Dell offers a comprehensive warranty package called “CompleteCare”. What this does is cover the laptop against abuse that you yourself impose upon it - like dropping it, spilling on it or leaving it in a cold or hot vehicle. No, the normal warranty won’t cover that stuff.

One recent incident where a client wished they had purchased completecare came after an employee used the laptop at home, on a desk, with a 100 watt bulb in a flex-head lamp poised right on top of the screen.

The next day he noticed that not only was there visible melting of the top of the case, but the screen had a 1 inch black stripe extending from top to bottom just under the melted spot.

Repair cost? $759 for JUST THE PARTS. Labor is extra.

Worth the cost of repair for a 2 year old laptop? Not hardly. Either use it with an external monitor for the rest of its life or junk it.

CompleteCare costs more, but you decide if it’s worth it to you. From time to time, CompleteCare can be as inexpensive as $79 more.