In the last couple of weeks I’ve had two instances of a computer not powering up as expected. First it was my own family desktop. Then last week a client asked me if I could replace the power supply in her desktop.

Her cousin had ensured her that the problem with her laptop not starting up was due to a fried power supply due to a severe lightning and thunderstorm that knocked out the electricity to the house.
It makes obvious sense. Occam’s razor theory would suggest that the most logical and simple cause is more than likely the one you’re …read more

Microsoft offers a suite of utilities called Sysinternals for free for troubleshooting your PC. The suite is far superior to many of the alternate freewares that are available.
Mark Russinovich, now a Fellow in Microsoft, originally developed them along with Bryce Cogswell when they were in the company Winternals Software. The company subsequently was acquired by Microsoft in mid 2006. Initially, many of the tools were not just freeware but were also accompanied with the source code. No longer, of course.
The utilities are categorized under File and Disk utilities, Networking utilities, Process utilities, Security utilities, System information, etc. The Windows Sysinternals …read more

‘Obama’ viruses are fast spreading. Reports of spam that Bush killed Obama are being circulated.  Emails with “special videos” of Obama’s victory speech are trolling around the Internet too, which when opened aim for any personal information. Unsolicited world news is usually spam, and don’t open these mails (and don’t forward them) even if they say that Bush killed Osama.
Basic users have always been Microsoft’s target audience, unlike some other operating systems that seem to be cut out for power users. In this tradition, Window 7 is apparently going to have troubleshooters in eight categories, to enable users use diagnostic …read more

This should be a very short post as I have a fun contest starting on Monday here so we’ll keep it light and easy for now…
Below are a few simple ways to make sure your computer stays safe and secure for that much longer (they all eventually get messed up, even you Mac):

Run a software firewall (Windows XP comes with one built in, not too sure on the Mac OS front but I would imagine they have something).
Keep anti-virus software installed and up-to-date (AVG is free for the PC and ClamXav is free for the Mac).
Install a router. Make …read more

Please, keep the stories rolling in. This is yet another bothered IT admin reporting:
Don’t yell and don’t swear, if you want me to take your request seriously and not dump it at the bottom of my list of things to do then talk to me professionally. I have things to do and you have things to do and it only exacerbates things when you raise your voice when I explain that it will take some time to get to your request. There are 50 other people who called before you and gave me the same story.
We all think we’re …read more

This is my first post on That Damn PC and I’m happy to be here. I’ve spent my life tinkering with computers, blowing up electronic equipment and picking on the end-users at all of my IT jobs… Now I want to give back. I started blogging over the past couple of years and made it a point to be honest, open and most important of all, sarcastic. I have a couple of blogs that I write for in the Philadelphia area (as this is where I’m from) and they all have a twist of sarcasm, wittiness …read more