Computer Questions 3

Raymond
When installing an operating system, it asked sometime which to use, the Fat32 or the NTFS system, what is the different? And which should I use.

Answer
Windows XP, Windows Vista or Windows 2000 always use NTFS, it offers much better security as FAT32 has none. NTFS is also more resilient and offers much better file compression. For more on NTFS.
If you have already installed using FAT32 you can still convert the operating system to NTFS by following our article on this here

Paul: Question
Hi I am looking for a gaming pc that is capable of playing games such as flight simulator X and online games such as lord of the rings online. I am not very good with computers and don’t no what I’m looking at half the time.... can you help me at all? Thanks

Answer:
The actual brand or make of the computer is not important, many manufactures offer the same specs, so it’s better to put together a spec and then look for a computer around this – a dream spec machine would be A Quad core processor either AMD or Intel, they are both very good, Windows Vista home premium will suffice - 4 gigabytes of ram - 250 gigabyte + hard drive – and a Geforce GTX 280 graphics card, but even the graphics card is around £350 on its own, so a cheaper spec would be a dual core processor either Intel core 2 duo or AMD Athlon 64 x2 – 3 gigabytes of ram – 250 gigabyte hard drive - GeForce 8800GT graphics card which costs around £150.
I’ve not included items such as CD drives network cars, monitors as these are standard items that are part of any new computer.

Brian: Question
why when I print a single page say for a 300 count it process's 300 separate pages to the copier when its the same pages

Answer:
if you are printing directly to the printer there are three things which could cause this, the application you are printing from, try printing two or three pages from another application, if this works ok, then either repair/reinstall the other application or see if there is an upgrade available. The only other thing is the printer driver/software itself, if this is the case download the latest drivers from the manufacturers website. Lastly I’m not sure which printer you have, but printing 300 each time, it must be pretty heavy duty, so if it has an LCD display check the memory and there should be an option to allocate more to a print job which should also increase the printing speed.

Melvin Question:
I cannot open emails with attachments can you tell me why

Answer:
The security settings on your email client may be set too high, if using Outlook Express change them from Tools - Options - Security - Untick do not allow attachments to be saved or opened, if you are using full blown Outlook read more here on this issue

Esther: Question
My Toshiba laptop is on its last legs after nearly 3 years of service. It's been reliable for 2 years but now the hardrive is shot and a virus has infected it. I'm debating whether to stick with a new PC or just start anew with a Mac. I'm not interested in sleekness or smaller size. I'm counting on reliability, simplicity, and something that's less vulnerable to spyware and hacking. Any suggestions?

Answer
Realistically any computer regardless of whether it’s a mac or a pc if it’s not adequately protected will suffer more from such issues as hackers, viruses and spyware.

If you are familiar with macs by all means purchase one, but if not learning how to use a completely new system can be daunting, and then on top of this you still need to install system updates, antispyware and antivirus, the same as a pc.

The best advice I can give is whichever platform you decide to go for make sure the security is a tight as possible, on our computers we use Windows XP and Vista together with the Windows firewall – AVG free antivirus – Spydoctor Antispyware and in 2 years now we have not had any viruses, spyware or hackers cause problems. Feel free to read more on computer security to help provide a very high level of overall security for your computer.

Min: Question
Hi you were recommended fr Yahoo Answers. I have Error Killer Reg. Cleaner which is now being stopped from working by my anti-virus (www.kaspersky.com). It keeps saying file contains new Threat: not-a-virus:FraudTool.Win.32./ErrorKiller & cannot be disinfected. I bought this prod on line Aug. '08 it was working fine until m'soft updated last Fri. I rang them today & they told me to delete it. I have fired off emails to both Error Killer & Kaspersky, but thought maybe you could offer a different view point. It's still on my PC, is a conservative Reg. Cleaner which is good & now I can't run it & don't understand why. Any help would be appreciated Thanks

Answer:
Hi error killer is actually spyware that you need to remove, the reason it cannot be removed is due to its files being in use, try the following download spybot search and destroy, it's free and then run this, if there is any spyware it cannot remove when you reboot your computer it will remove it before Windows loads fully, it should be able to remove this, more on where to get this here .. at the bottom of the page

Laurence: Question
I have a Toshiba Portege R100 and desperately need a new graphics card as i cant play the games i want with the graphics card already installed. With this make of laptop would I be able to buy a new graphics card and get it fitted into my laptop? thanks.

Answer
Unfortunately you cannot upgrade the video card in your laptop, there are a few third party solutions such as USB video cards, but even these will not be good enough to play the later generation of games, so the only course of action i can really recommend to you is to part exchange the laptop for one with a better graphics card.

Margaret: Question
ok so i uploaded pictures from my computer and i put them in some folder and then when i came back half of them said missing shortcut or something and i really need them they are important please please help

Answer
Do you still have the originals in the location you uploaded from? it really sounds as though you have in effect only put shortcuts in a folder and not the actual images, or they have not finished copying for a number of reasons

Mike: Question
Hey, I understand you have info about computers .Well I need help with my computers mouse ,my mouse is on and working ,but it doesn't move my cursor. I have no idea what's wrong with it, Can you help me.

Answer
If the mouse is wireless check the batteries and there should be a small sync button by the battery cover.

If it’s a wired connected type of mouse it sounds as though your computer is not recognizing the mouse driver, go to Control Panel > System > Hardware tab > Device Manager > look for Mice and other pointing devices, then you’ll see the Mouse, delete this > reboot your computer and it should reinstall it.

If this fails can you try another mouse as it points towards a hardware problem.

Craig: Question
Please help me !!! My computer fails to even start up I think the power supply unit is bust. if I remover the hard drive is there any way when I purchase a new p.c. that I can plug in to the old hard drive and transfer all my precious photos onto new p.c. thank you for your help.

Answer
Depending on the interface of your old computer’s hard drive you may be able to install the drive as a slave in a new computer, but I’m guessing it’s more than around 18 months which it this case it will probably have an IDE hard drive and will not fit. The easiest way would probably be to buy an external USB hard drive caddy, if your computer is a desktop it will be a 3.5 inch or 2 inch if it’s a laptop, then you just fit the hard drive into the caddy and this plugs in via a USB port, once you plug it in Windows will automatically install the drivers for this and then you can access it like any other drive. The beauty of this is, you’ll be able to use the external drive permanently as a backup, keeping your precious files and photos in 2 locations.

Josh: Question
My user accounts on my laptop suddenly have passwords on them that I don't know. I don't know what to do short of a Windows reinstall. If you can help in any way it would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!

Answer
I really don’t wish to alarm you, but if all user accounts have suddenly acquired passwords I cant think of any other way this could have been done, other than intentionally.

Can you still login under any of the accounts? If so as long as it has admin rights you should be able to change/remove passwords on all the other accounts. If not use another computer to look online for a copy of Hirens boot disk, you can find from any search engine, download, burn to a CD and you can boot from this and change account passwords.

Feel free to checkout our Windows security guide, if someone has accessed your computer from the web this is concerning if any other damage has been caused or if any files have been stolen

Be sure to checkout our other questions and answer pages

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