28/06/2010 by Bertha.

I have a client who is having big problems with her computer at the moment. Turning it on is a bit like Russian Roulette - sometimes is works without a hitch, other times is refuses to start properly.

While it might be possible to track down the cause for this "interesting" problem it will be much easier to bite the bullet and re-install Windows. That way she will end up with a computer that is as it was when she first bought it, a pristine installation of Windows and lots and lots of nice empty space on her hard drive.

And therein lies the problem (as you might have noticed).

The downside with reinstalling Windows, is that you loose everything you have saved on the hard drive. That’s all your documents, pictures and music. All the programs you’ve installed will disappear - though that’s not always bad as everyone has some programs they installed to try out and never used them again. Even your desktop and favourites will revert back to the standard Windows version.

Don’t worry all is not lost if you do three tasks. Ideally you should be doing these all the time but, as long as the computer will start, you can get away with doing them before reinstalling Windows.

Firstly, back up all your documents, pictures, music; everything you have saved, value or worked on. It is possible to save these onto CDs or DVDs but you can soon run into space problems. It can therefore be better to use an external hard drive which just plugs into a USB socket, is a lot cheaper than using CD/DVDs and is a lot quicker to copy your files over.

Secondly, make sure you keep the disks or downloads you used to install the programs you use regularly in a safe place. Don’t forget to keep any serial numbers, login details or other such codes somewhere you can find them. With some programs (Google Earth for example) you will be able to download the latest version though if your computer is getting on a bit you might prefer to stay with an older version. Try www.oldversion.com where there is a huge library of such older versions.

Finally, it is a simple task to save both the Desktop settings and the Favourites from Internet Explorer. Both are stored in the same place but it varies between XP and Vista.

XP users need to look in C:\Documents and Settings\Users name while Vista users should look in C:\Users\Users name. In both cases once you get to the folder you’ll see two folders called "Desktop" and "Favourites" respectively. Just copy those to your external drive or where ever you’re backing up to.

Once Windows has been re-installed all you need to do is re-install your other programs and copy the backup files into the same place they originally were. That is "Desktop" to "Desktop", "Documents" to "Documents" etc. Don’t forget, there will be folders with the same name already there so your computer will ask if you want to replace these with the ones you’re copying from your backup source. Its just being captious so say yes to replacing.

The entire job isn’t hard just takes time, allow at least a day from start to finish.

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21/06/2010 by Bertha.

You might have noticed on the news that Pixar’s Toy Story 3 is due for release soon (19th July in the UK actually). Believe it or not the original was released way back in 1995.

This wasn’t Pixar’s first film to win awards. Their first recognition was for a short called Luxor Jnr which won an Oscar in 1987 and is the reason they use a lamp as their logo. It’s well worth watching, not only is it very good but it changed the way the film industry thought of computer animation.

Once Pixar, (who are now owned by Disney but have had both George Lucas, of Star Wars fame, and Steve Jobes, as in Apple Computers, as former owners) let the computer animation gene out of the bottle, others have followed suit. One from amongst my favourites has got to be a rather inept, accident prone Polar Bear from South Korea (with French and Spanish input) called Backkom or Bernard in English.

The video below gives a fairly accurate example of just how painful it can be if you are a bear!

Further exploits of Bernard can be found on YouTube including this one of Bernard at the Gym.

Try not to waste too much time with the bear.

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14/06/2010 by Bertha.

Second blog entry of the day? Can’t be feeling well. Actually that could have been not far from the truth if I didn’t know a scam when I hear one. Read on and beware.

Just had a telephone call from “Virtual PC Doctor” who told me that my computer was infected and needed cleaning. As proof of this I was told to run the Event Viewer (don’t worry it’s a techi type program in Windows). Once this had opened it would prove to me that my computer was indeed infected and there would be a large number of errors and warnings (this is Windows so what’s new there then?).

Just so you all know what to the Event Viewer looks like here’s the relevant section from Big Bertha.

To the untutored/inexperienced this look terrible - “the end of the world is nigh” kind of things.

It is nothing of the sort.

Windows is a very complicated beast which has to work even after you throw in an infinitely different mix of other programs. As a result there are always errors and warnings of one sort or another happening and being recorded. As list like that above (and a similar one in your computer) is not an indication of doom and gloom pending. The reverse is actually true. Such a list is just Windows getting on with the day to day business of a computer’s life.

Had I been suckered by the “sales” pitch it appears that I would have been instructed to download a remote assistance program.

This is where the danger really kicks in. Never, ever be tempted to let this happen. Ring me immediately, though preferably not in the middle of the night unless you have actually let them take your computer over. That is what would be classed as an emergency, so ring!

Melodramatic? Well no. Depending on the scam (there is more than one variation) at best you will end up giving away anything from £20 to £1500. At worst everything from your computer will be copied and used. That’s your any credit card details ever typed in, your on-line banking details, you photos, personal letters even all your e-mails.

Remember, keep your anti-virus up to date, never respond to cold calls, never trust e-mails from your bank/Microsoft/Norton/McAfee or anyone else and always assume that everything you have ever done on your computer is there for the taking by the unscrupulous.

Want to see how it goes? Nip over to the Berthanet Facebook page where you can watch a YouTube of the “sales pitch”.

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14/06/2010 by Bertha.

Following on from last week’s blog about web cams, what do you do if the place you want to look at doesn’t have a web cam? Don’t worry throughout an ever increasing number of locations around the world there is the chance take a virtual drive down the streets of towns and cities.

Thanks to Google Street View you can use either Google Maps or Google Earth to “visit” places you have only dreamed on visiting in the past. For a map of the current coverage levels click HERE, the areas in blue have Street View available.

Being a faithful Yorkshire man lets have a quick look round Fountains Abbey. The coverage here is extensive as it’s a World Heritage site so there’s lost to look at.

First open your web browser and go to Google’s home page. If you look at the top left of this page you’ll see the words “Web”, “Images”, “Videos”, “Maps” etc. Click on the word “Maps” and you’ll see the usual Google search setup above a map of (if you’re in the UK) Great Britain.

Do a search for “Fountains Abbey” (type then click on Search) and you’ll see something like the picture below.

Look for the little yellow figure (boxed in pink) and click on him but hold the mouse button down. Move the mouse over towards the map and the figure will come with it.

Once you’re over the map these little blue lines will appear where ever there is a Street View image available. The actual location is shown by the green arrowed circle under the little pop up picture (which is a thumbnail of what you’ll see). Take your figure off the mouse once you’ve reached the place you want to look at and you’ll see…

In the main picture move the mouse over the yellow line and double click to “walk” along the route. The little picture gives an idea of the way you are facing.

Have fun!

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07/06/2010 by Bertha.

Fancy a tour round the world without leaving the comfort of your armchair? Then the world of the Webcam is for you.

For the uninitiated a webcam is a video camera giving a continuous feed to the Internet. The image is updated from every second or two to even as much as every hour.

Where to find the view you want though. Well try Earthcam for starters.

Here you’ll find all sorts of things ranging from the romance of Paris, to the natural majesty of the Niagara Falls. There’s bridges galore from the Golden Gate to the Whitby Swing, there’s ones full of activity (New York’s Times Square) to less frantic, more calming ones like Live Lava Lamp cam!

For nature lovers there is the impressive Old Faithful Geyser Webcam, the view over Cape Town towards Table Top Mountain and even a bird table in Douglas, Isle of Man.

For the more adventurous among you how about joining the Webcam crowd? While it isn’t simple and it will have an effect on your usage allowance it can easily be done.

For more advice have a look at Cowboy Frank’s and the ICWEBCAMS advice pages.

Till then here’s two of the favourites here at Bertha Central.

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