From what I can tell you is, manufactures build laptops for company sales and profits, they do not build laptops for longevity. Manufactures market/advertise these laptops for what consumers are looking for, which is style, lightweight and the convenience of mobility. What I’m trying to say here is, laptops or any computer should not be mobile, for they will not last very long. But that’s ok, because the manufactures also understands once you purchase a laptop you’ll become “hooked on” the convenience of, the “need” of, and the mobility laptops. They also price the hardware components much higher on laptops, because they make more money when you buy a new laptop. For that is there sales, and company objective as I see it.

95% of the computer repairs that come to PCTech are laptops.

PCTechs 4 Main Problem/Failure Areas on Laptops:

1. Cracked, damaged, broken laptop LCD screens: Just in the last 3 months, approx 40 laptops came to PCTech for repair estimates from customers within a 20 mile radius of Augusta GA.

Reasons: Manufacture defect in LCD lid design (thin & lightweight), accidental damage, laptop mobility.

2. Failed Hard Drives: Hard drives in laptops I find also have a very high rate of failure. Just in the last month 15 laptops hard drives replaced. Maybe over 100 in the the year from laptops. Maybe 5 desktop hard drives replaced in the last year.

Reasons: Mobility of laptops, heat – lack of proper cooling within the tight compartment of the laptop, accidental damaged caused by user, lack of proper use & maintenance by the user. Hard drives do not like excessive HEAT, and hard drives do not like to be bumped, or dropped around. Another strike against laptops.

Anyone who owns a laptop who does not backup there important data on a regular basis, your setting yourself up for a big mess. Hard drive failure can happen at any time. Data recovery is not cheap, and is not guaranteed especially by cheap methods. Your data, your “stuff”, your work, your whole life on that hard drive can be lost. 1 in 20 clients that I ask, say they do backups. If the data that you have stored on your computer is “so important to you”,, why don’t you back it up? Any hard drive will fail at one time or another, but laptops hard drives fail much quicker than desktop systems.

3. Laptop Motherboard Failures: Also a very high rate of failure over desktop systems.

Reasons: Manufacture design, excessive heat due to lack of adequate cooling, lack of proper use & maintenance by the user. Use a laptop on your bed, couch or even on your laptop blocks the very small cooling vents off on the bottom of laptop, which generates more heat inside of the laptop. The #1 reason for computer hardware failure is heat, the internal hardware/electronics do not like heat,,, another strike against laptops in general.

4. Internal DC Power Jack Connector: The worst design, very common weak spot on Windows based laptops

Reasons: The internal DC Power Jack Connector is a very small, very important part on the laptop, break it, and your laptop is out of action once the battery runs out. Normal use, or accidental damaged caused by one to many hard tripped over power cords, a hard yank on the power cord will eventually loosen or break the power connection internally on laptops. Resulting intermittent battery charging, nom power at all by the power adaptor at all, and a “no power on”, dead laptop. The DC Jack is repairable at approx $135, full laptop dis-asembly is required, if the DC Jack has damaged or shorted out the motherboard….. your basically in for a new laptop.

Tips To Help Maintain Prolong The Life Of Your Laptop:

Be gentle, very gentle with your laptop, the electronics and hardware inside are very sensitive and delicate.
Do not sit your laptop on the floor, or chair, or couch, for you are asking for trouble! Do not drop your laptop, do not step on, sit on, or put anything on on top of the laptop. The screen is very delicate!
When closing the laptop, close the screen lid by the middle of the lid OR by both corners. Grabbing it by one of the corners can flex, torque, twist the lid and LCD screen panel inside, breaking, cracking the screen.
Do not use your laptop on a your bed or couch. The material conforms around the laptop bottom suffocating the laptop from cooling properly.
Do not leave your laptop on overnight, remember it does not cool properly to begin with.
Purchase a USB cooling pad for your laptop. This elevates the laptop, and has a USB cooling fan which circulates cool air to the bottom of the laptop, it’s heat source.
Run a disk cleaner, defragment the hard drive periodically and keep it virus free. A virus infected, fragment hard drive has to work much harder, more work means more heat that the hard drive generates.
Do not spill anything on or close by your laptop, this will create major problems also. If you do, turn your laptop upside down, you want to get that liquid away from the inside of the laptop, and DO NOT TURN IT BACK ON. Take it in for service to have the laptop checked.
And last but not least, for your own sanity, and piece of mind, that “so important data” that you were going to back up, that you just have not got around to backing up, that you thought will be there forever and ever on your laptop……………………….. BACK YOUR IMPORTANT DATA UP today, before you regret it!

Tips When Looking For A New Laptop:

Look for a laptop that is built sturdy, has some weight, that might take a bump or drop better then others. Do not let the light weight style, theme, the name, or the “bells & whistles” that attract you to the laptop fool you!
If the laptops are on display, and turned on, lift the laptop up, and put your hand on the bottom of the laptop. Does it feel hot just sitting there on there counter at idle speed on the underside, with nothing intensive running? While you are under there, check the cooling vents on the bottom, are they large enough to properly cool down that laptop? Run your hand over the keyboard from left to right, do you feel heat thru the keyboard area if you do move on, you are not interested in that laptop.
Grab the LCD lid, is it so thin does it flexes the screen? Slowly close it by one of the corners, does the lid flex or twist a bit? If it does, move on, your not interested in that laptop either. Last Christmas I was in Walmart here in town, they had 8 laptops turned on, and on display, they were also chain lock to the counter for security. 5 of the 8 laptops they had on the display counter, turned on had cracked screens, I don’t think they fell off the counter, I think they cracked from customers moving or closing the lid.
And if you find the right laptop, and they offer an extended warranty, find out what it covers, and take it for the maximum length.

95% of the computer repairs that come to PCTech are laptop repairs:

PCTechs 4 Main Areas Problem/Failure Areas On Laptops:

Cracked, damaged, broken laptop LCD screens: Just in the last 3 months, approx 40 laptops came to PCTech for repair estimates from customers within a 20 mile radius of Augusta GA.

Reasons: Manufacture defect in LCD lid design (thin & lightweight), accidental damage, laptop mobility.

Failed Hard Drives: Hard drives in laptops I find also have a very high rate of failure. Just in the last month 15 laptops hard drives replaced. Maybe over 100 in the the year from laptops. Maybe 5 desktop hard drives replaced in the last year.

Reasons: Mobility of laptops, heat – lack of proper cooling within the tight compartment of the laptop, accidental damaged caused by user, lack of proper use & maintenance by the user. Hard drives do not like excessive HEAT, and hard drives do not like to be bumped, or dropped around. Another strike against laptops.
Anyone who owns a laptop who does not backup there important data on a regular basis, your setting yourself up for a big mess. Hard drive failure can happen at any time. Data recovery is not cheap, and is not guaranteed especially by cheap methods. Your data, your “stuff”, your work, your whole life on that hard drive can be lost. 1 in 20 clients that I ask, say they do backups. If the data that you have stored on your computer is “so important to you”,, why don’t you back it up? Any hard drive will fail at one time or another, but laptops hard drives fail much quicker than desktop systems.

Laptop Motherboard Failures: Also a very high rate of failure over desktop systems.

Reasons: Manufacture design, excessive heat due to lack of adequate cooling, lack of proper use & maintenance by the user. Use a laptop on your bed, couch or even on your laptop blocks the very small cooling vents off on the bottom of laptop, which generates more heat inside of the laptop. The #1 reason for computer hardware failure is heat, the internal hardware/electronics do not like heat,,, another strike against laptops in general.

Internal DC Power Jack Connector: The worst design, very common weak spot on Windows based laptops.

Reasons: The internal DC Power Jack Connector is a very small, very important part on the laptop, break it, and your laptop is out of action once the battery runs out. Normal use, or accidental damaged caused by one to many hard tripped over power cords, a hard yank on the power cord will eventually loosen or break the power connection internally on laptops. Resulting intermittent battery charging, nom power at all by the power adaptor at all, and a “no power on”, dead laptop. The DC Jack is repairable at approx $135, full laptop dis-asembly is required, if the DC Jack has damaged or shorted out the motherboard….. your basically in for a new laptop.

Tips To Help Maintain Prolong The Life Of Your Laptop:

Be gentle, very gentle with your laptop, the electronics and hardware inside are very sensitive and delicate.

Do not sit your laptop on the floor, or chair, or couch, for you are asking for trouble! Do not drop your laptop, do not step on, sit on, or put anything on on top of the laptop. The screen is very delicate!

When closing the laptop, close the screen lid by the middle of the lid OR by both corners. Grabbing it by one of the corners can flex, torque, twist the lid and LCD screen panel inside, breaking, cracking the screen.

Do not use your laptop on a your bed or couch. The material conforms around the laptop bottom suffocating the laptop from cooling properly.

Do not leave your laptop on overnight, remember it does not cool properly to begin with.

Purchase a USB cooling pad for your laptop. This elevates the laptop, and has a USB cooling fan which circulates cool air to the bottom of the laptop, it’s heat source.

Run a disk cleaner, defragment the hard drive periodically and keep it virus free. A virus infected, fragment hard drive has to work much harder, more work means more heat that the hard drive generates.

Do not spill anything on or close by your laptop, this will create major problems also. If you do, turn your laptop upside down, you want to get that liquid away from the inside of the laptop, and DO NOT TURN IT BACK ON. Take it in for service to have the laptop checked.

And last but not least, for your own sanity, and piece of mind, that “so important data” that you were going to back up, that you just have not got around to backing up, that you thought will be there forever and ever on your laptop……………………….. BACK YOUR IMPORTANT DATA UP today, before you regret it!

Tips When Looking For A New Laptop, If you Must:

Look for a laptop that is built sturdy, has some weight, that might take a bump or drop better then others. Do not let the light weight style, theme, the name, or the “bells & whistles” that attract you to the laptop fool you!

If the laptops are on display, and turned on, lift the laptop up, and put your hand on the bottom of the laptop. Does it feel hot just sitting there on there counter at idle speed on the underside, with nothing intensive running? While you are under there, check the cooling vents on the bottom, are they large enough to properly cool down that laptop? Run your hand over the keyboard from left to right, do you feel heat thru the keyboard area………….. if you do move on, you are not interested in that laptop.

Grab the LCD lid, is it so thin does it flexes the screen? Slowly close it by one of the corners, does the lid flex or twist a bit? If it does, move on, your not interested in that laptop either. Last Christmas I was in Walmart here in town, they had 8 laptops turned on, and on display, they were also chain lock to the counter for security. 5 of the 8 laptops they had on the display counter, turned on had cracked screens,,, I don’t think they fell off the counter, I think they cracked from customers moving or closing the lid.

And if you find the right laptop, and they offer an extended warranty, find out what it covers, and take it for the maximum length.

In general, to sum it up here, laptops are VERY delicate machines that are not designed very well to really last. IF you take very good care of it, follow regular maintenance, follow user maintenance practices (keeping it cool), and keep your fingers crossed, it might just last you ok.

Windows Messenger is the Microsoft instant messaging program built into Windows XP. There is also a Windows Messenger service built into Windows XP that helps produce pop up ads via IP addresses. The two programs are completely separate and do different things even though Microsoft has essentially named them the same.

For information on how to disable the Windows messenger service visit one of my other pages located here.

Windows Messenger (the chat program) is equally annoying if you dont use instant messaging. Microsoft has tightly integrated this program into many of its other programs including Outlook Express, Outlook and Remote Assistance. However there are ways to either disable it from starting, remove it, or for the most part completely get rid of it.

How do I disable Windows Messenger from running?

The procedures for disabling Windows Messenger will depend on the version of Windows Messenger installed on your computer.

Windows Messenger 4.0 or Later on a Windows XP Professional

1) Click Start, click Run, type gpedit.msc, and then press ENTER
2) Double-click the following items to expand them:

* Local Computer Policy
* Computer Configuration
* Administrative Templates
* Windows Components
* Windows Messenger

3) Double-click on the option “Do not allow Windows Messenger to run”, and then click Enabled.
4) Click OK, and then close the window

Windows Messenger 4.0 on a Windows XP Home Edition

1) Start Windows Messenger.
2) Click Options on the Tools menu.
3) Click the Preferences tab, click to clear the “Run this program when Windows starts” check box, and then click OK.

Windows Messenger 4.5 or Later on Either Windows XP Home or Windows XP Professional

1) Click on Start, Run
2) Type REGEDIT and Press Enter
3) Click on the Pluses (+) next to the following items

* HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE
* Software
* Policies
* Microsoft

4) If the folder Messenger is not listed, click on the Edit menu, point to New, click Key, and then type Messenger for the name of the new registry key
5) If the folder Client is not listed under Messenger, click on the Edit menu, point to New, click Key, and then type Client for the name of the new registry key
6) On the Edit Menu, point to New, click DWORD Value, and then type PreventRun for the name of the new DWORD value. Remember all of this is case sensitive.
7) Right-click the PreventRun value that you created, click Modify, type 1 in the Value data box, and then click OK.
Quit Registry Editor.

How to Stop Outlook or Outlook Express from Running Windows Messenger When They Are Opened

Outlook
1) Open Outlook
2) Click on Tools, Options
3) Click “Other” tab
4) Uncheck the box for Enable Instant Messaging in Microsoft Outlook
5) Click OK

Outlook Express
1) Open Outlook Express
2) Click Tools, Options
3) Click General tab
4) Uncheck the box  for Automatically log on to Windows Messenger
5) Click OK

What about Removing Messenger or Uninstalling Windows Messenger from Windows XP

The procedure for removing Windows Messenger depends on whether your system has Windows XP Service Pack 1 installed. To determine whether Service Pack 1 is installed follow these directions:

1) Click on Start
2) Right click on My Computer
3) Click on Properties
4) On the General tab, under System if the words “Service Pack 1″ are listed you have the service pack.

Removing Messenger from computers WITHOUT Service Pack 1 installed

Make sure your Internet Explorer, Outlook Express, Windows Messenger and other programs are closed before doing this.

1) Click on Start, Run
2) Type the following (or cut and paste it) into the Run line

RunDll32 advpack.dll,LaunchINFSection %windir%\INF\msmsgs.inf,BLC.Remove

3) Click on OK

Removing Messenger from computers WITH Service Pack 1 installed

1) Click on Start, Control Panel
2) Double click on Add or Remove Programs
3) Select Add/Remove Windows Components
4) Uncheck Windows Messenger
5) Click Next
6) Click Finish
7) Restart your computer

How to Remove Windows Messenger from Outlook Express

1) Click on Start, Run
2) Type REGEDIT and Press Enter
3) Click on the Pluses (+) next to the following items

* HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE
* Software
* Microsoft
* Outlook Express

4) Right click on the Outlook Express folder, click on New, click on DWORD value, and then type Hide Messenger for the name of the new registry key
5) Right-click the Hide Messenger value that you created, click Modify, type 2 in the Value data box, and then click OK.
Quit Registry Editor.

What about MSN Messenger ?

MSN Messenger is another chat program from Microsoft that can run simultaneously with Windows Messenger. Follow the instructions below to remove it.

1) Click on Start, Control Panel
2) Double click on Add or Remove Programs
3) Find MSN Messenger in the list and click on it
4) Click on Remove

If you want more information about MSN Messenger, visit Jonathan Kay’s MSN Messenger Resources page

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You can see an example of full screen mode by viewing the screenshot below. You notice the top bar just contains standard buttons bar gone are the title bar, menu bar, and address bar in Internet Explorer. This view may be ok to look at a website, but when you want to type something in the address bar to go somewhere else in can be a problem.

Luckily, getting switching between normal mode and full screen mode is very easy. Its just one key on the keyboard – F11.

Press F11 to switch between full screen and normal viewing.

That’s all there is to it.

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Microsoft Support for Windows Vista (with no service packs installed) ends on April 13, 2010, while support for Windows XP (without Service Pack 3 installed) ends on July 13, 2010. Windows 2000 support will end on July 13, 2010 as well.

There is no Service Pack 3 for the 64-bit version of Windows XP. If you’re running the 64-bit version of Windows XP with SP2, you have the latest service pack and will continue to be eligible for support and receive updates until April 8, 2014.

What Does It Mean When Support for My Operating System Ends?

If you are still running a version of Windows where support has ended, it means that version of Windows will no longer receive any updates from the Windows Update or Microsoft Update site. These updates are generally provided for security reasons to help protect the PC from harmful viruses, spyware, malware, and other malicious software. Windows Update also provides new drivers for your hardware that can improve the reliability of Windows.

Hackers love to take a security vulnerability in Windows and exploit it to their advantage. So, if a vulnerability is found in Windows XP or Windows Vista and you are not running the latest service pack, you will not be protected

How Can I Tell What Service Pack is Installed?

Follow these steps to discover what Service Pack is installed:

1) Click on the Start Button
2) Right-click on either My Computer or Computer (depending on your Windows version)
3) Click on Properties

On this window, it should tell you which version of Windows along with which service pack is installed). It should also tell you whether you are running a 32 bit or 64 bit version of Windows.

Where can I download the latest Service Pack for Windows?

For Windows XP, click on the following link to download Service Pack 3

Windows XP Service Pack 3 info

Windows XP Service Pack 3 download

For Windows Vista, click on the following link to download Service Pack 2

Windows Vista Service Pack 2 info

Windows Vista Service Pack 2 download

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Whenever you type an address directly into the Internet Explorer’s address bar, the URL will be saved in IE’s history. If you pull downdown this list later, those URLs will show up.  Because of privacy and security concerns, you may want to delete these entries periodically. Although you can remove the website URLs from the address bar dropdown list by clearing the history from Internet Explorer, its tougher to delete individual addresses from this list without some registry editing.

I’ll show you how to edit the Windows registry to delete individual entries, as well as a couple free programs that can delete or even edit these URLs.

Manually Editing the Registry to Remove Typed URLs

Use the following directions to delete individual URLs from the Address Bar list in Internet Explorer

1) Click on Start, Run
2) Type REGEDIT and press Enter or Click OK
3) Click on the pluses(+) next to the following folders

• HKEY_CURRENT_USER
• Software
• Microsoft
• Internet Explorer
• Typed URLs

4) You’ll find a list similar to the following in the right hand column. Right-click in the NAME column and delete the desired URL.

5) Close the Registry Editor
6) Close all open Internet Explorer windows
7) Reopen Internet Explorer and the unwanted URL in the address dropdown list should be gone.

How to Delete Individual URLs from FireFox Address Bar

In Firefox, its much easier to delete individual URLs. Simply drop down the address bar list and highlight the unwanted URL. Then press CTRL-DELETE on the keyboard to delete the individual unwanted address.

Programs to Delete, Edit or Change Typed URLs in the IE Address Bar

EditURLs – Free browser tool that provides the user with the capability to edit individual URL addresses in Internet Explorer’s Address Bar. These URL addresses are also referred to as “Typed URLs”

IE Address Bar Editor - Another freeware program to remove individual URLs, although not quite as easy to use as EditURLs.

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Here’s a new one to us: Linking your Windows Live ID to Windows Media Player 12 in Windows 7 allows you to stream your entire music library to any computer. Even better: no need to install third-party software with this method.

There are many, many ways to stream your music collection over the internet—but there’s something appealing about using the built-in software that Microsoft bundled with Windows 7. If you’re already using Windows Media Player 12, you can listen to your home music collection from any Windows computer through the internet. What’s more, it actually should work with all your media, not just your music.

In order to use this feature, you’ll need a Windows Live ID; then you’ve got to link your Windows Live ID to your media collection. In Windows Media Player, navigate to the Stream menu and choose “Allow Internet access to home media.” You’ll want to “Link an online ID.” If you see “Add an online ID provider” in the next box, click it because you’ll need to download some software depending on what version of Windows 7 you’re running.

Enter your Windows Live email address and password to link your media collection. Go back to the Stream menu, and click “Allow Internet access to home media.” In order to enable another Windows 7 PC access, you’ll need to repeat these steps. After you’re finished, your library will show up in the Other Libraries category of the left-side pane in Windows Media 7.

We don’t know a lot of people who actually use Windows Media Player, but this awesome feature could convince some—and it’s something that would be great to see in more tight-fisted media players. (Ahem, iTunes, we’re looking at you.)

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f it seems like the desktop shortcuts on your Windows 7 keep disappearing, you’re not hallucinating. Windows 7 automatically deletes broken and network shortcuts if there are too many. Here’s how to stop Windows from throwing these (often still useful) shortcuts away.If you have four or more “broken” desktop shortcuts (which includes shortcuts to disconnected network locations and shell folders), System Maintenance in Windows 7 will delete the shortcuts in its weekly maintenance. While Microsoft suggests keeping the number of these type of desktop shortcuts to four or less, or as an alternative, turning off System Maintenance altogether, it may not always be practical to do so.

Technology blog gHacks demonstrates how to fix the problem with a script that lets you take ownership quickly. Make sure to back up all important files before doing something like this.After installing the script, users should right-click and take ownership of C:\Windows\diagnostics\scheduled\Maintenance\TS_BrokenShortcuts.ps1. After that, the user must run Command Prompt:

Open an elevated command line prompt. You do that by clicking on the Start orb, All Programs, then Accessories. Right-click the Command Prompt link and select to Run As Administrator.

Now issue the following command to grant the active user full rights of the file. Make sure you replace USERNAME with the name of the active user.

icacls c:\windows\diagnostics\scheduled\maintenance\TS_BrokenShortcuts.ps1 /grant USERNAME:F

Now you can edit the file normally in a text editor like Notepad. Open it and locate the line (line 11)

[string]$list = ""

Delete everything below that is below that line up to (line 22)

return $list

The lines that are deleted are:

Get-ChildItem -Path $path -filter *.lnk | Foreach-Object {
$fullPath = ConvertTo-WQLPath $_.FullName
$wmiLinkFile = Get-WmiObject -query "SELECT Name,Target,AccessMask FROM Win32_ShortcutFile WHERE Name = '$fullPath'"

if(-not(Test-ValidLink $wmiLinkFile) -and (Test-Delete $wmiLinkFile))
{
$list = AttachTo-List $list $wmiLinkFile.Name
}
}

As always, proceed at your own risk when tackling these sorts of low-level system tweaks, but if this is an annoyance you’ve been dealing with, it might be worth a try. In addition, a similar procedure can prevent Windows from cleaning up unused desktop shortcuts, but after this tweak Windows should no longer delete these “broken” shortcuts

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If you’ve started using the Start Menu search box as your primary application launcher, you may have come across a weird annoyance: By default, you can’t open the Recycle Bin from the search box.

Over at the How-To Geek site (my home away from Lifehacker), writer Matthew writes up the quick and easy trick to opening the Recycle Bin from the start menu, through the search box or even just using the mouse; all you need to do is create a new shortcut to the Recycle Bin, which will then be searchable and launchable from the Start Menu search box.

To make your own shortcut, just open up the Start Menu folder (type Win+R, paste %AppData%\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu, and hit Enter), create a new shortcut (right-click -> New -> Shortcut), and paste explorer.exe shell:RecycleBinFolder into the prompt. Give it a name (Recycle Bin Shortcut, perhaps?), customize the icon if you like, or even add a shortcut key. More importantly, you can now launch the Recycle Bin easily from the Windows Start Menu search box. You can use the same trick anytime you want to open something through the keyboard, by just creating shortcuts in the Start Menu to your favorite portable applications, documents, or scripts.

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Developer and blogger Darren Beckett rounds up a crop of five e-readers and gives them a short price and feature comparison with the newly released iPad—and rolled the results into an eye-friendly infographic.

(Click the image above for a closer look.)

We may have our problems with the iPad, but that doesn’t mean people aren’t interested in buying it. This comparison pits the iPad against other similar devices, highlighting price, screen size and type, storage, input, multi-tasking, multi-function, and connectivity. The chart’s not perfect (it only compares the bottom-of-the-barrel iPad, so when it says the connectivity is only Wi-Fi, keep in mind that more spendy iPads also have 3G), and it’s not as detailed as, say, this excellent comparison of the current crop of smartphones (which includes monthly fees for a true cost of ownership), but it still offers a nice overview of the market if the iPad’s piqued your interest.

Most e-reader enthusiasts would likely point to the iPad’s lack of e-ink as a pretty big red mark—and that because of that the iPad maybe isn’t something you’d even want to compare to an e-reader. But convergence devices like the iPad are certainly attractive when they can swallow the functionality of other devices (like e-readers) and offer a lot more at a similar price, so you can be sure that a lot of people interested in buying a Kindle will also be considering the iPad.

Give your thoughts on the matter—especially if you’ve got experience with any of the other readers listed—in the comments. (Note: The JooJoo is still an unreleased product but is, in theory, more like the iPad.)

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