I was recently introduced to Linux. I have always been a little scared of Linux because most of it has always been about knowing the Unix commands. The great thing about Linux is that there are many different flavors (ie distributions) and each was designed for a specific purpose. Most people have heard of Red Hat which was designed for server functions. Another very popular Linux distribution is called Ubuntu. This distribution was specifically designed for home PC use. After installing it a few times I started enjoying it quite a bit. It has good aesthetic attributes and seems to respond very well even with older hardware which makes it great for use on an old PC that you can’t run the new versions of Windows. It comes with Firefox and an email client that works pretty well. I would recommend it for anyone how comes upon a free PC or laptop that doesn’t have Windows with it.

The reason I bring all this up is because of a paper I wrote back in college. I was tasked with writing a paper about a future technology that had not been invented yet. I chose to write how someday hard drives will be a thing of the past and that everyone will have their own storage medium that can run their computer from any operable computer. I predicted that eventually people will be able to carry a Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) device and from those would be able to use their computer. This is still not invented, but I believe it may be on its way. I recently visited http://www.pendrivelinux.com/ and found that you can install a non-persistent bootable version of Ubuntu on a USB drive. That means you can take your PC with you wherever you go and no matter which computer you have access. Just boot to the USB drive and you have access to all your files and emails.

I have been seeing more and more of my customers still using their 5+ year old computers and laptops. This has it’s ups and downs because the manufacturers are actually making quality products however parts are becoming more scarce for those machines thus driving up the cost to fix them.

It seems that the first thing to go is the hard drive. Either you start seeing Windows S.M.A.R.T errors or your Windows installation becomes unstable or corrupt due to bad sectors. It is still possible to retrieve the data when this happens, but I will say it again: have a backup of a backup of a backup.

It is usually random other things that start going wrong (i.e. video card BSODs, virtual memory messages, random reboots from hardware driver issues, etc.)

With Windows 7 out now I would suggest to most of my customers that it is nearly time for an upgrade. Hardware is pretty cheap right now and with the economy the way it is a lot of places are trying to nearly give away decent computers and laptops. Frequently look through hole-in-the-wall computer fix-it joints to see if they have any refurbished computers or laptops with decent specs. Make sure to do your research on what to look for (http://www.laptopadvisor.com/)

If you have an aging computer and you live in the Hiram, Georgia area then please either email me or call me with your questions.

Why is it possible to burn an ISO file to a CD or DVD but not to a USB drive? Well, actually you can! I recently found software that will mount the ISO and copy the files to the USB drive and also makes the USB drive bootable. Now instead of having to burn CDs you’ll never use again you can just go and get a 1GB flash drive and you can use it again and again without degrading the drive unlike a rewritable CD or DVD. The software is called unetbootin. The software comes pre-configured to automatically find about 50 different bootable types of software including operating systems, live anti virus CDs, hard drive management, etc… It does require internet access to download the software first and then it burns to the flash drive. The only con about the software is that it takes a long time compared to burning a CD or DVD.

One thing that many people worry about are their personal files just vanishing one day if their hard drive bites the dust. Most people go out and purchase a flash drive or an external hard drive and back up all their files. The only problem is the fact that it is an expense. When money gets tight, free is the best price.

I recently came across a website offering 2GB of free space to back my files up. This was fantastic because I love free technology stuff, but also because this ensures that even if the remote hard drive I am backing my files up to dies their technology will still be able to recover all my files. The downside to backing up your files to an external drive, or flash drive, is that if your main HD and your external HD could both go bad, and lose your flash drive, then you would be without any files. Another great thing about this website is that you can access your files from any computer that has an internet connection.

The website is http://www.idrive.com/. When you sign up you automatically get 2GB for free. However, you could get up to 10GB if you put in your email info and SPAM the people in your friends list. If you don’t feel comfortable with that go create a new email address that has no contacts and use that. Easy peasy!

Get ready for it! You may not even know about it yet but it is out there. Virutalization has been around for a couple of years now and is building momentum. Microsoft is already gearing end users up for it by implementing their new “XP Mode” inside of Windows 7. Virtualization just means that you run another operating system inside of the operating system that you booted into when you turned your computer on. Currently this is a huge push for it on the server side of computing but it will soon be targeting home users.

While it may not make since to use it at home for the common user there are many practical uses for it. Say you upgrade your home PC or laptop before your work laptop and you need to use software on your home machine that is not compatible with Windows 7. Just use the “XP Mode” (a virtual machine) to run the software. It is also good vice versa.

There are several companies offering virutalization. You can use the VMWare player and the Sun Virtualbox for free. You will need a product key on operating systems that require it.

Have a few old flash drives laying around? Well now you can make use of them. Go to www.portableapps.com and download the executable. Plug in your flash drive and run the install. Once you have finished you flash drive will be transformed into something very useful. You can run anti-virus software, game, email, the whole Open Office Suite, anti-spyware, and just about anything else you can find a portable version of.

Amazon.com is offering the Windows 7 Professional upgrade for a discounted $99 and the Home Premium version for only $49 through July 11th, 2009.

Have you ever heard the term Cloud Computing? This is a fairly new term in the world of computers. Cloud computing is the idea of having a wide area of which to access files, and run applications, all which usually run in your internet browser. For example, Google Apps is considered cloud computing because you open your web browser to access their word processor, spreadsheet applications, and presentation application and be able to create new documents, save documents, and upload previously created documents. All of the files that you save are saved to Google’s file servers and are accessible anywhere in the world that you have an internet connection.

Microsoft has also come up with their own Cloud Computing application called Sharepoint. Sharepoint is an application that is installed on one of a company’s servers and is fully customizable. It can be used like Google’s Google Apps or can be utilized exclusively internal to the company. It looks a little nicer than Google Apps but can be difficult to customize. Many companies are outsourcing as they move to the cloud because of the fact that most businesses are small to mid-sized and does not have their own internal IT department. Also, since it is still pretty new there are many IT professionals that are still unfamiliar with Sharepoint and don’t have the time to take the necessary training.

My suggestion would be that you, the reader, go sign up for a free gmail account and start playing around with Google Apps so that as the IT industry moves toward a decentralized type of information technology you are not left behind.

I’ll assume that if you are reading this that you have some sort of high speed internet (DSL, Cable, etc…) so I will go ahead and tell those users still on dial up that this article will not apply to them. A lot of people will have their ISP come and set up their internet for them at home. The only downside to that is they only install the modem and no router to go along with it. A lot of modems now have some built in security but not the amount of security that most professionals would suggest. Nowadays everyone that connects to the internet needs some sort of firewall between their computer and the outside internet.

The best and easiest way to accomplish this is to purchase router. Routers have a built in firewall that will protect you against hackers.  Here are a few routers I would recommend:
http://www.walmart.com/catalog/product.do?product_id=10730619
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16833320026 (My recommendation)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16833156001

If you live in my service areas of Carrollton, Dallas, Douglasville, Hiram, or Villa Rica then you could email or call me and we could schedule a service call for me to come out and set up a new router for you or give you an estimate on a home office set up.

The first step in making your own website is to decide on a domain name (ie pcbitsandbytes, google, yahoo, etc…). After you decide on the name you need to check and see if it is available. Once you have a unique website domain name you need to decide on where to have your website hosted. Most of the businesses that provide your domain name have an option to have your website hosted through them. Go Daddy is pretty competitive. If you are an experienced computer user then using software like Adobe’s DreamWeaver might work well for you. If you are somewhat experienced with computers then software like Microsoft’s Front Page would be good for making a basic website. I have tried using both of the website building software that I have suggested so far and have made working websites. For this website I wasn’t sure how I was going to make a professional looking website. I work on computers for a living and had no idea how to make a professional looking website.  I was introduced to WordPress by a friend and found it so easy to use.

There is also the option of hosting your own website.  I tried this option for awhile as well and I will tell you it was not easy. Finding the directions to set up IIS took a long time because there are not too many websites out there that give good, detailed, step by step directions on how to set it up correctly. Plus you have to make sure that you are keeping IIS up to date because of all the hackers out there that are trying to do harm to whomever they can.

So, my suggestion is you get with a website like WordPress or Blogger or something like those two if you are like me and have little to no website creating experience. The easier you can make it for yourself the less frustration you will face.