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The computer has opened the world to anyone who can get to the internet. For those who haven’t spent a lot of time online, this may seem an exaggerated statement, but once you begin to explore the digital world, you will find yourself in a world without apparent limits.

Any project you may want to try, any information you need, any facts you want to check, you can find on the World Wide Web. You don’t even need to know how it works, nor the ‘best’ way to do things. Find a Search engine (see the above picture) and type in your query.

The Search engines recognise a range of human ways of expressing things, so it almost doesn’t matter how you specify what you’re interested in. You can type, ‘ship, sink, year’ and search through the results to find when the Titanic sank or you can type in ‘when did the titanic sink?’

Capital letters don’t matter as the search will return similar results with or without them. If you want to search for a particular phrase just enclose it in quotes. “(phrase)”

The worst part of searching the net is the possibility of getting lost. You get a page that has links to elsewhere on it and you click the links. They in turn lead you to more links which takes you further and further away from the original page. Eventually you wind up reading something that seems totally unrelated to the place you began your journey.

Note that this ‘worst’ aspect is, for a lot of people, the best part of web surfing. There is something strangely compelling about following the link-trail into realms of information you weren’t expecting to visit and a lot of new things can be learned along the way.

But if you’re trying for specific information to complete a project, link surfing can strip time from your budget faster than you would believe.

By: Mr JM
There is a final step to using your new computer – getting it all set as you like it. I have seen people who fill their screen with icons. To me it looks chaotic and impossible to use, yet only rarely has my offer to ‘tidy up’ things been accepted. There’s probably a field of psychology to be explored in how people like to use their computers and why they do things the way they do.

Personally I don’t like a lot on my Desktop – I tend to store things in other locations away from my profile and if I need them regularly I place a shortcut to them on the Desktop instead. Your Desktop is found in C:\Documents and Settings\username along with other things in your profile.

Microsoft and other software vendors like to store things in various folders under C:\Documents and Settings\ that are personal to a user. Firefox and Internet Explorer store Bookmarks and Favorites there. Outlook places your PST file (where your downloaded email is kept) there as well

The problem with this, and why I don’t like to store things on my desktop, is a number of those folders get added into your loaded Profile. Put too much in there and you can slow your computer down noticeably. In fact, one way to help restore your computer to the power and speed it had when new if to clean up your Profile. Microsoft even have an applet (a little application) to do a basic job of it for you.

Check out [Start] [All Programs] [Accessories] [System Tools] [Disk Cleanup] – just run it as is, without changing the settings, and see just how much junk even Microsoft thinks it has put on your computer.

By: Mr JM
Once you have all the needed in hardware, in drivers for the hardware and in software installation disks or downloads, things are ready to roll. With Windows installed on the machine, the chances are the video resolution is still set to Windows default. So the first driver to install is the video driver, either for the on-board video or for the add-in video card you’ve installed. Then at least you’ll have a decent looking screen to work with.

For me, the next install is the network drivers – that way I can copy down the rest of the software directly from the current computer.

I probably should do the network ones first but I abhor the default settings on my screen, and it takes little time to copy out the video drivers to a USB memory stick.

Before I run the network drivers and connect up, I make sure the Windows Firewall is turned on. This provides a very basic level of protection against invasion from outside your network. Click [Start] [Control Panel] [Windows Firewall] and turn it on.

Once the network drivers are installed I restart the computer so it will set itself up as part of my network. When I ran the Windows setup and it asks about network settings, I just accept default settings but I name my Workgroup differently than just ‘Workgroup.’ By matching the name of the Workgroup of the other computers on the network, the new computer will join the Workgroup as it starts up.

The next step is to ensure there are ‘shared’ drives or folders on the machine from which you need to copy programs and drivers. You can also share folders on the new machine and then ‘push’ the files across from the old machine. Or you can simply copy all you need out onto CDROM, DVD, or USB memory stick.

Once you have the drivers, install software for the programs you want to run and all your documents and user files on the new machine, you can basically turn off the old computer and move the new one to where you want it and just work on that.

Most computers these days are on the end of an ADSL connection to the internet. So, the first thing to install is the Antivirus software – I run with Symantec Antivirus, but there are good free programs out there, such as AVG, which will guard against nearly all attacks.

You also need to make sure you have Spyware protection, but that isn’t as important until you start browsing – there are viruses out there that will reach across an unprotected link to the internet and infect your machine.

By: Mr JM
For my situation, it’s not as drastic as having to freeze the hard drive. And we have a home network to connect a number of computers so transferring the data is easier than having to copy things out to a DVD or CDROM.

What I did do was buy a new hard disk – we went to the local Computer Swap-Meet (a market where small traders get together once a month) and found a 500GB (GigaByte) SATA hard disk for eighty dollars. It is easily big enough to take all the data I want from the old machine with space left over.

Once I have the new machine set up with all my programs and information, I will clean my current computer and set it up with all the installation software and use it as a server for our network so we can store downloads there and backup our documents and data.

Then every so often, we write out files to a DVD in 4.5GB chunks and store them as extra backups.

The current task is to install the new hard disk in the new machine and get it formatted. Then I make sure the new machine runs on the network as it should and I can start copying the data over.

The first step in getting the new machine set up has already been done – I logged into the manufacturers’ sites and found Windows XP drivers for all the main bits of the computer. The place to start for this is on the Motherboard maker’s web page.

In the CMOS settings, entered by pressing [Delete] (or [Del]) on most machines, although sometimes it’s [F2] or [F1] you will find a motherboard ID or BIOS number. It may look something like RL86510A.86A.0089 on an Intel motherboard, which on checking on the site shows a D865PERL Main board. That will then lead to a variety of drivers to download.

The essential ones are normally onboard ones such as video, network and sound, but there may also be chipset drivers which will tell Windows how to ‘talk’ optimally to the hardware and can give a performance boost to the system

By: Mr JM

So there you are, new computer open and ready for your tender surgical skills, it’s been built into Windows & is ready to run and all you need to do is add in your old failing hard drive so you can get all your precious data from it.

What do you do? Walk, don’t run, to the freezer and find your carefully baggied hard drive, remove it from the coldness, wipe off any moisture from the baggie and then your hands, then remove the drive from the (up till now) sealed baggie.

Wasting as little time as possible, plug in your cold hard drive, both data and cable, check everything is secure and there’s no stray metal bits touching any of the circuitry, then turn on the computer. Wait through the boot process, endure the mostly agonizing wait while Windows decides everything is in place and then click [Start] [My Computer] then click the [Folders] button up in the menu bar.

What you should see in the left side (where the folders are shown) is your C:\ drive, then a D:\ drive which should be your briefly re-animated dying drive. The CD/DVD drive, if still connected (you didn’t need to use the cable for the hard drive) will be the E:\ drive.

Click on the D:\ drive in the left panel and on the right side you will see all the folders on that drive.

Now it gets complex – where is your data?

Unless you’ve set up specific folders previously, Windows will have stored your stuff in several default locations.

Documents – D:\Documents and Settings\Username\My Documents …note that Username is the name you used to sign in – you may never have actually logged into Windows but it happened automatically as Windows started. The default folders are called Administrator, Default User, and All Users. Anything else that looks like a name is probably the one you used.

Emails – if you use Microsoft Outlook, the PST file is found in - D:\Documents and Settings\Username\Local Settings\Application Data\Microsoft\Outlook

Favorites – for Internet Explorer they are found in D:\Documents and Settings\Username\Favorites – copy all the files there.

For Firefox they are called Bookmarks and they’re found in -
C:\Documents and Settings\Username\Application Data\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\zxpw2j3t.default\bookmark.html – note – your Firefox folder will have something similar to \zxpw2j3t.default\ but it will be different – it’s a random folder name.

For other locations, leave a comment here and ask, but usually if you get all the above copied, you’ve got most of your life.

By: Mr JM

Now you have your Windows XP computer up and running nicely – the Video card is installed, sound is working and your computer is once more talking on the network or through your ADSL (Broadband) modem to the Internet.

How do you get your precious information from your dead Hard Drive?

Sometimes a hard disk dies for good. If that’s the case, you need to figure if your information is worth the maybe $1000 to get professionals to recover your data. They can open the drive, pull out the platters where all those little magnetic moments happen, insert the platters into a different drive and pull out your bits.

But mostly, the hard disk dies slowly. Here’s what to try – once you have a compatible machine to put the drive in.

You need the new PC to be ready to run, but open so you can insert your old drive. If you aren’t sure about what goes where, get some help. If the new machine is SATA and the old drive is ATA, disconnect the DVD in the new machine so the old hard disk can connect on the ATA cable.

Next, find a nice sealable plastic bag, one big enough to take the hard disk in it. Sandwich bags with the clip-lock seal are great for this. Take your old hard disk from the machine, carefully removing the attached cables – the ribbon or SATA cable should come off easily – the power cable may take a bit of a pull, but try to make sure you pull straight out.

Also be sure that when you are pulling on the power cable, there is nothing of knuckle-busting capability within reach of your freely swinging hand as the cable releases. Computers do like to take a blood sacrifice from anyone who opens them.

Place the drive in the plastic bag and seal it – seal it good – you do NOT want moisture in there. Now place the bag in your freezer overnight.

Yes, that’s right, in the freezer. It doesn’t have to be a standalone freezer – the one in the top of your fridge will do fine. Try to avoid using the one in the local supermarket – not only do they frown on the idea, but someone is going to get a hell of a surprise when they try to carve your drive for dinner.