First off, sorry for my delay in blog posts - I've just moved across town and it was pretty exhausting. The new business address is 2239 SE Oak St, 97214 - and hey to all you South Easters.

Microsoft has been resting on it's laurels for some time - a massive install base, ingrained technologies like Office and IIS, and strong customer loyalty. That massive install base has been eroded a little thanks to Google and Apple pecking away at it steadily for the past few years and the critically panned bloated monstrosity that was Microsoft's last OS release, Vista. With that in mind, it was absolutely VITAL that the team in Redmond pull off a hail mary and patch a few holes in the sinking ship with a solid OS release, and that's the hope with Windows 7.

I've been running the pre-release version of Windows 7 on my production machine now for almost 3 months, and I've got to say - I LOVE it. This is truly the OS that Vista should have been, and finally gives the layperson a good reason to upgrade from the 8-year-old Windows XP. 

The good:

The UI - It isn't just prettier (although it is REALLY pretty), it's far more functional. The new taskbar is one of my favorite things. Each icon is not only used to launch the program, but also to keep track of files you've opened most frequently, to show you programs that are curently running in miniature little windows for easy and rapid access to the one you're looking for (I'm notorious for having like 4 different browser windows open with various streaming content - watching them all run in miniature is fun in a way that's hard to describe), and to show you at a glance what programs are currently active.  It's a comination of the old Windows XP "quick launch" bar and task manager bar, and it's awesome.

The Speed - compared to Vista's 77 pinto, Windows 7 is a Ferarri. It's obvious the team at Redmond has been focusing a lot on making necessary services start up faster, and unnecessary ones take less resources while coming to life in the background. It boots up much faster than even my barebones XP installation, and seems ready to use almost immediately without the usual Windows "Start lag" where it may LOOK like your icons are up and ready for action but in reality the hard drive and processor are being worked so hard that clicking on Firefox is a wasted effort for at least 5 minutes. 

The Compatibility - so far, I have yet to run into a program that worked well in Vista that hasn't worked in 7. In fact, the few games I play installed without incident and ran faster than they did in XP, which is the opposite of Vista. On top of that, if you have a REALLY hard core Windows XP program that you need to run, and for some reason it just isn't working in 7 (which means it probably wasn't working in Vista, either), Microsoft has harnessed the power of processor-level virtualization technology to allow you to run a full-fledged version of XP from WITHIN Windows 7 and run all XP-compatibile programs on it without incident. This "virtual XP" is completely unaware that it's running within Windows 7 and behaves exactly like XP, so anyway you look at it your covered.

The Future - some technologies that are still maturing but readily available in 7 are totally sweet. Want to stream all of your media from your home computer to your laptop or handheld device? Simply open up the new Media Player, click "Allow Internet Access to my home media" and bam, you've got your movies / music / TV library with you wherever you go. Makes you shed a tear for the poor paperback novel. Add to that the bevy of available multi-touch options and we're one step away from the eye-popping radness of those screens in "Minority Report". Sure, it's going to require that everyone buy a multi-touch enabled monitor or a screen to put on top of their old monitor, but damn, if you've seen any demos of this and not drooled all over your shorts you're a stronger man than I (or at least, a lot less of a giant dork). 

Windows Multi-Touch Tech Demo

There's tons more I could mention but suffice it to say that if you're buying a new computer today, make sure it comes with a "Windows 7 Upgrade License". Windows 7 is set to hit stores on new computers in the next few weeks and be available to end users very very soon. Being a computer repair guy, I can upgrade your systems for you of course. Just give me a ring!

That's all for now, Justin out!

Right off the bat, just want to say that I am extending computer repair service to the Lake Oswego area, so if you're out that direction feel free to give me a ring! Now, on to more interesting topics...

Keeping kids away from all of the filth on the internet doesn't have to be a difficult task, but it seems daunting. Let's face it, even the most innocuous search terms sometimes lead to some really horrifying porn. I can only imagine the kind of results you'd get looking up "Largest bone" for an anatomy paper, "exports of Bangkok" for geography or "Japanese schoolgirl outfits" for ummm... social studies? Ok, I'm done.

Recently, NPR ran an excellent program on "All Tech Considered" that did a great job of summing up all of the various programs out there to assist you in maintining your child's precious innocence for as long as possible. Therefore, I'm shamelessly stealing it. Here's the list:

• The McGruff SafeGuard software monitors Web activity and filters content and there's a free version available. Unfortunately, it only works with newer Windows PCs.
• Some of the kid-friendly Web browsers available include Buddy Browser and KidRocket.
• A guide to setting up parental controls and passwords in Internet Explorer.
• Two Web filters for the popular Firefox browser: ProCon Latte and FoxFilter.
• An excellent resource that tells parents exactly what to expect in video game content, What They Play.
• PowerCop and Time-Scout Monitor (pictured above) are two devices that allow you to control how much time your kids spend on the computer at the source: the power source. Maybe not such a hot idea for laptops, though.
• Chicago Tribune has tips for protecting your kids when they're using a cell phone.
• McAfee's Family Protection software and security software from Trend Micro.
• SpectorSoft has several versions of surveillance software that can record keystrokes and give you reports on your child's Web activity.
• Lori Getz has done a good series of articles for momlogic.com on these kinds of topics.
• Good recent article from Canada.com.
• Nine ways to keep tabs of your kids online this summer, from ABC News.

If you'd like to see their full blog it's right here.

Once more, don't forget that if you're in Lake Oswego and need your computer fixed, pick up the phone!

I might be shooting myself in the foot professionally by writing this entry, but I feel like the number of people reading this blog before they call me has got to be pretty slim. With that in mind, here are a few steps to take before calling a computer repair guy like myself:

If your computer's acting weird and you suspect you have a virus:

1. Install Malware Bytes (malwarebytes.org), let it update fully, then run a full scan. It's free and they catch a LOT of new viruses.
2. Install SuperAntiSpyware (superantispyware.com), update it, then run a full scan. Also free, also good.
3. Run GMER (www.gmer.net). If anything pops up in RED TEXT then you have a rootkit infection. Do the safe mode thing below and run the virus scans again.

If those things don't work or don't help, try doing them from Safe Mode.

How to get into Safe Mode:

1. Reboot the computer. Just after the initial loading screen and before the windows logo comes up, start tapping the F8 key on your keyboard repeatedly.  If you see the windows logo you've missed your chance, reboot and try again and start tapping F8 sooner.
2. If you did it right, you'll see a diagnostics menu with an option for "Safe Mode" on it. Choose "Safe Mode with Networking".
3. Perform the steps above again.

If your computer is no longer booting all the way into windows:

If you're still seeing the windows logo for a brief amount of time before your computer crashes or reboots, there's hope!

1. Boot into Safe Mode like I described above.
2. Run a disk scan by clicking on the "start" button, clicking on "run", and typing in "chkdsk /f". If you see a black window that's fine, just say "yes" if it asks you if you want to run a scan on reboot.
3. Reboot your computer.

If it's still broke:

1. Boot into Safe Mode like I described above.
2. Open MSConfig by clicking on the "start" button, clicking on "run", and typing in "msconfig". Choose "System Restore" from the tools menu.

Click "Launch". Follow the prompts and choose a date from a few days ago to restore from. This will sometimes fix the problem as well.

if it's STILL broke:

1. Remove any new hardware you've installed.
2. Boot into Safe Mode and click on the "start" button, then click on "control panel"
3. Click on "add/remove programs"
4. Remove any new programs you've installed.
5. Install the virus scanners metnioned above and run scans.

Hope that helps! See you next time.

I hate to be misleading with the title of this post but we're testing web crawler functionality and I had to put "Portland Computer Repair" in there. Anyway, I wanted to diverge a little from my usual "computing for novices" direction and just show you something that *I* think is really cool. For years I've been telling anyone who will listen that in the very near future we'll all have heads-up-displays that show us relevant information about whatever we're looking at, powered by the internet and turning everyone into (book-smart) geniuses. I was thinking of powered contact-lenses as a viewing device, or special glasses or at the far-end of believability some kind of actual brain implant, but these guys have gone ahead and done it with a personal projection system which is also a really cool idea. On top of that, they've actually made it FUNCTIONAL. You absolutely must watch this TED demo of the technology at work, as I promise you within 10 years we'll all have something like this (and hopefully it won't look completely ridiculous):

http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/pattie_maes_demos_the_sixth_sense.html

Think about it! How many times have you met someone you've met before and can't remember a thing about them? Awkward, right? Well, with something like this everyone you see will have their relevant information surrounding them, you will instantly know product reviews and price listings just by looking at an item, you'll know the quality of a restaurant's food and service while you're walking past it, you'll know if you're flight's been delayed while you're reading the morning news, etc, etc.

It's a brave new world and, for me at least, I can't freaking wait.

Like most techs, the number one thing I run into doing Portland computer repair is virus and spyware infection. My friend and fellow computer geek Tad and I were having a conversation the other day, and he mentioned that in all the years he'd done clean ups for other people he'd never personally had a system infected with anything since like 2001, and I was in almost the same boat. Honestly, to avoid virus infection it doesn't take a great virus scanner (although that sure helps), it just takes a few simple precautions:

1. Always keep Windows totally up to date.
2. Rarely (if ever) follow links sent to you in email
3. Use an email service with a good spam filter like Gmail or Yahoo
4. Use Firefox as a web browser and be incredibly picky about which "addons" you install, especially if you're on a strange site
5. Realize that almost nothing is actually free on the web. For "free" screen savers and "free" fonts you usually end up paying a lot in the long run, usually to techs like me to clean up your system.
6. Make sure your neighbors are computer gurus.*

I've talked about (or plan on talking about) the others on the list, so let's start with #1. If you're using Windows, click on the start button,  click on "all programs", the click on "Windows Update" at the top. Install everything it tells you to. Do this about once a week if you know what's good for you.

If you're using Windows XP, click with the right mouse button on "My Computer" (either on your desktop or on the start menu) and select "properties". That will bring you to a screen like this:

Under the "system" heading you see something like "Service Pack 3". If it doesn't say "Service Pack 3" or it doesn't say "Service Pack" at all you're in trouble. There are viruses out there that can infect you directly without you having to click on ANYTHING using Windows exploits that were open prior to Service Pack 3. Go to the Windows Update site and install it now.

If you're using Windows Vista, it should say "Service Pack 1". If not, do the same. 

* - interesting fun fact, if you're on DSL or FIOS for a highspeed network connection chances are you're sharing a single external IP address with your neighbors. Internet providers sometimes put everyone on a local network to save their increasingly valuable network addressable IP addresses. This means that any viruses your neighbors may get have the potential for attempting to attack your system directly and with a lot more success than if you had your own IP. Soooo, basically, if your neighbors have bad internet habits and filthy systems then you're at risk. Just like that one guy coughing his head off on your flight to Tucson gives everyone else the flu. Jerk.

See ya next week!

Saving customer's busted hard drives is always a harrowing process. In a lot of cases, you're literally holding someone's livelihood in your hands, or trying to resusitate their sick child in the form of a screen play or novel they've been working on for years. It can be wonderful to restore this kind of data and see the relief on someone's face, but absolutely devastating to have to break the news that the hard drive is beyond repair.

Hard drives break pretty often. They're basically the only moving part in your computer, and they freaking MOVE.They function like record players that spin around completely 7200 times a minute. Oh, and at like 200 degrees.So fast record players in hell, basically. Frankly, it's a wonder they don't break more often.

For this reason it's incredibly important that you make weekly backups. The problem is that a huge portion of the computing populace has no idea where their files actually reside on the hard drive or how to back them up, and the backup solution built into Windows XP  might has well be another version of Solitaire for all the good it does. Windows Vista's is slightly better, but still no shining star.

Soooo... without further ado, here's my first attempt at a little video to show you how to setup nightly backups to an external hard drive using the free Cobian backup. First you'll need to buy an external USB 2.0 hard drive and plug it in. You shouldn't have to spend more than $70 or $80 on one. They're everywhere, and they look a lot like this. Then, you'll want to follow my step-by-step instructions that I outline in my first ever wacky computer repair video here:

I hope that's pretty straightforward. Comment below with any questions and I'll help out the best I can! See you next week.  

Hey there, greater Portland area. Looking good today! Have you lost weight?

I'm Justin, the head geek and owner of 12:01 Computer Solutions, and I've had this blog idea kicking around in my head for awhile. You see, I run into a lot of problems with computers and such that could have been avoided relatively easily with a little fore-knowledge, and I figured, why not do what my Mom always taught me and share?

So, each week I'm going to try and impart a little of what I know to help you in your day to day computing life. Keep in mind that the advice on this blog is free and worth every bit what you paid for it.

Without further ado, let's get on to the useful bits. This weeks topic is:

UPDATES
(and why to avoid them)

Now, I would imagine that most techies out there would lynch me for advising you to avoid updates, and they're right in some respects, but I'm going to anyway. Here's why: You see, spyware and virus writing is now a multi-million dollar industry. There are actually entire businesses with employees and HR guys and dental plans existing overseas and out of the watchful eye of the US justice system that write spyware for a living.They've got focus groups and trend analysis, and one thing they've learned is that people seem to trust things that look like updates. "You're anti-virus is out of date!" they say. "Windows needs to be updated!" they say, and then they convince you to click "yes" to a bunch of things that a brain damaged four-year-old would never agree to and WHAM. You're chock full of virus. 

There are only two things on your computer that require constant updates. Your virus scanner and Windows. Both of these things SHOULD be set to update automatically. Your virus scanner definitely is, Windows probably is. To make sure Windows XP is, just:

1. Click on Start
2. Click on Control Panel
3. If you see an option for "Security Center", click on that, otherwise:
4. Click on "Automatic Updates" or "Manage Automatic Updates"
5. Make sure "install updates automatically" is set and that it's set for a time your computer will be ON.

If you do shut down your computer every night, make sure that you click on "install updates and shut down". This will ensure that Windows is kept up to date.

Now here's the tricky part: IGNORE EVERY UPDATE MESSAGE YOU ARE PRESENTED WITH. Remember what they taught you in health class and Just Say "NO" to everything, close every update prompt window, click on every "X", kill every stupid Java script and HP balloon prompt telling you anything regarding updates. A few bug fixes are just not worth the possible infection, especially if everything on your system is running fine to begin with.

See you next week!