Category: Intermediate

Different types of graphics card slots

PCRepairMan

Here I’ll try to explain briefly the graphics card slots used on most PCs.

Video or graphics cards come with three different connector types – PCI, PCI Express and AGP. The slots in your PC’s main board (motherboard) will dictate which one you need.

  • PCI are often white slots and have been around since the early 90s
  • PCI Express also known as PCIe  are often black slots but manufacturers can choose the colour. Useful eh?
  • AGP slots are mostly brown and they have different speeds. The newer versions for sale are predominantly designed for AGP 2.0 and 3.0 standards but check first
  • ISA cards are very old and it’s unlikely you have one of these as they were predominantly an 80s technology

You’ll also need to think what you will be using the graphics card for. Heavy graphics use (eg gaming, 3d rendering etc) will mean you need a more expensive card whereas a cheaper one will suffice for the odd Internet surfing and Word document. Gamers tend to look at FPS (Frames Per Second) as a benchmark to performance but there are a number of factors that contribute.

Hope this helps explain the graphics card slots minefield a bit more! Take a look at my deals on ATI graphics cards and Nvidia graphics cards.

 

Change Windows startup sound to a voice

PCRepairMan

Change windows startup soundYou know in all those futuristic films where computers speak to their owners? Ever wondered if you can actually get yours to welcome you in this way? Well let’s have a go at doing this and see what we can use it for.

This should work on Windows from XP upwards. If you have security settings a bit high then running scripts may be an issue but it won’t hurt to try this.

Click on Start > All Programs > Accessories > Notepad

In the notepad window, paste the exact code below:

Dim speaks, speech
speaks="Welcome PC Repair Man, what can I do for you today"
Set speech=CreateObject(“sapi.spvoice”)
speech.Speak speaks

Obviously once you have this working, you’ll replace the text with your own!

Save as startmessage.vbs. You can rename this file to anything you like but keep the .vbs on the end. If you can’t see the .vbs then you really should turn on file extensions, it helps you to identify files. Turn on your speakers then double click this file to see if it works.

Copy the saved file and paste it into the following folders (I’m presuming that C is your Windows drive, most are):

  • For XP users: C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Start Menu\Programs\Startup (in Windows XP)
  • For Windows 7 and Windows Vista: C:\Users\ User-Name\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs\Startup

When you next start your computer, it will welcome you!

NOTE: I’d suggest you don’t turn off the Windows startup sound, it’s best to keep the rest of the system as-is.

To remove, simply delete or move the startmessage.vbs out of your startup folder.

Want to trick a friend? Create a personal message and drop it into their startup folder. Watch as their computer reminds them of something they’d rather not be reminded of like “Hey John, bad luck on the driving test” or “Is that a pimple on your nose, Lucy”.

Don’t be evil, or if you do, don’t tell them it was me that told you how to do it….

 

Disable Livefyre trackbacks in WordPress

PCRepairMan

livefyre review

I was quite a big fan of Livefyre for a while. Yes there have been many comments about how Comment Luv or Disqus are better and it seems everyone has their own preference. A while back I noticed that Livefyre had a quirk that meant that even if you turned off trackbacks via WordPress admin, this was only activated for new posts and not existing ones. For reference, in WordPress this is turned off in the Settings > Discussion menu.

This isn’t a fault in Livefyre, more a problem with the lack of easy control of posts that have already been published or are in draft within the WordPress database.

So if your older posts have trackbacks enabled you could see something like this (a screenshot from one of my posts here):

 Livefyre trackback removal

Hmm, not doing the article a great deal of favours is it really? From a search engine point of view this article now has duplicate content and more outgoing links.  So what can we do to get the older posts to not display trackbacks? Well we could go back in and edit all the posts that we are aware of by unticking the ‘Allow trackbacks’ box. Unfortunately, on larger blogs this is not practical. Time to get our hands dirty with some SQL statements.

Disable Livefyre trackbacks in WordPress using phpMyAdmin and SQL

Login to your control panel and fire up phpMyAdmin. Select your WordPress database and back it up. If you’re not sure how to do this, I wrote a detailed article here:

Backup WordPress MySQL database using phpMyAdmin (opens in a new window).

So now we have a working backup, select your database and click on the SQL tab from the top menu bar. Insert this code into the command box and click on ‘Go’:

UPDATE wp_posts SET ping_status='closed' WHERE post_status = 'publish' AND post_type = 'post';
UPDATE wp_posts SET ping_status='closed' WHERE post_status = 'publish' AND post_type = 'page';
UPDATE wp_posts SET ping_status='closed' WHERE post_status = 'draft' AND post_type = 'post';

Note that you need to replace wp_ with your own table prefix if it’s different. You should now have all your old posts that have been published (and any draft posts waiting to be published) disabled for trackbacks.

 

Backup WordPress database tutorial

PCRepairMan

wordpress backup

This is a tutorial on how to backup your WordPress database manually using phpMyAdmin and the SQL export method. It may sound difficult for the non-technical but it isn’t really and is something that is essential for the maintenance of any WordPress site. If you have ever lost any data before you’ll know what a huge and time consuming problem this can lead to so let’s get going.

First off, please bookmark this page in your browser, you’ll probably need to refer to it again for the first few backups!

Login to your cPanel. This is where you will see lots of useful tools and the one we shall use is phpMyAdmin shown below.

php myadmin wordpress backup

Click to open it and you will now have to select your database from the left hand side, usually something like mysite_wrdp1. Don’t select the information_schema as this is not the one we want.

Now you look to the right of the screen and you can see tabs relating to functions we can actually run on the database.

phpmyadmin sql wordpress

We want to select ‘Export’ here. Now for the bit everybody gets wrong…. You should select the ‘Custom export method’ which gives you greater control over the final exported database. For ease of reference, I have compiled a screenshot of the best options to select for the majority of users. Make sure you click to select all tables in your database, I have seen so many people just backup one table within the database and the backup is effectively useless. Here are all the settings you need to have in the latest version of  phpMyAdmin:

database backup wordpress phpmyadmin latest

Notice I have removed the prefix from the table names (shown in blue above) as you or a program may have modified this. By default it is wp_ but many security packages rename it. There is nothing to do here, I’m just pointing this out for clarity.

Now you can click on ‘Go’ and you should be able to download a working copy of your database. You can’t really view this file as it requires a database server (although you can connect to it with a few software tools that exist). You can however upload it to a new installation or use it when the poop hits the fan and disaster strikes on your server.

That’s about all you need to do to have a working backup of your database. Remember to FTP into your server and copy all the files over too as many files and folders are necessary to get back up and running as you were. For example, your wp-content/uploads folder is not backed up automatically and this is where most images used on your blog are stored.

Automatic WordPress SQL backups and file copying features

If you want a click-and-forget solution then I would heartily recommend the excellent WP-Twin which you can download here https://wp-twin.com
This neat program not only backs up your database but also ALL of your files on the server, meaning that any special folders outside of WordPress get copied over too. It has an easy reinstall option that takes the pain out of disasters, well worth it if you aren’t too sure how to go about reinstallation.

I hope this helps you to start a decent WordPress backup regime and I’d be happy to know if this helped you, please drop me a comment below or click the social buttons to share with others.

 

Can I install OEM software on Mac Boot Camp or Virtual Machine?

PCRepairMan

Well, it seems there are lots of people asking about this installing OEM Windows software on Mac desktops and laptops. This is a grey area that I’d like to clear up (or make slightly off-white). I’ll present the facts and you can make your own decision.

OEM versions are, in theory, to be used by system builders. It is generally accepted now, although unwritten, that people can readily purchase these and install them. Just look at the plentiful supplies on major ecommerce sites and you’ll see that the OEM software is not just for system builders. Effectively, someone who installs an operating system on a PC is doing the job of a system builder, it’s just the component assembly part they are missing, and many system builders actually buy whole machines now anyway.

The thing to note with OEM software, is that if your computer dials out for licence verification then it needs to be installed on just one piece of hardware to be classed as genuine. That’s the only check. Since Retail versions are much more expensive than OEM, people are naturally drawn to them.

There are a few things to be aware of for OEM installation which I’ll clarify here:

1)  Retail versions come with both 32-bit and 64-bit installations as an option. OEM versions are one or the other, so you will want to make sure you’re ordering the right version. For your Mac, check that it is a 64 bit machine and go for this if it is. If you do have 64 bit then choose a product like Windows 11 as it’s stable, well rounded and I have seen Windows 7 & 8 splutter and complain a few times. Something like a cheap Windows 11 OEM would be perfect.

The differences in 32 and 64 bit operating system software can often be marginal unless you are really pushing the computer hard, but for a small price difference 64 is a better operating system when on full load. Many software programs are 32 bit so they don’t take advantage of the extra ‘word architecture’ but when you run something like Adobe Photoshop 64 bit that is resource-hungry, it can be noticeable.

2)  OEM versions are tied to the hardware they are installed on and cannot be moved. This will only be an issue if you are planning on using virtualization software as well as your bootcamp (dual boot) installation, since the virtual machine “hardware” looks different to the real hardware.

3)  OEM versions do not come with telephone support from MS, although if you try to talk to a Microsoft representative about issues you are getting on a Mac then you may be fighting a losing battle as they are known to pass them back to you.

To summarise, I would go with an OEM dual-boot installation (64 bit if possible) OR run a virtual machine. You may even be able to run a cheaper XP licence as a virtual machine and this may suffice. If it is to run an older program such as MS Money this could work well as it may run more happily too.

64 bit architecture explained on Wikipedia

Drop me a comment below if this helped you or please click the social buttons to help others save a bit of money too.

WordPress SEO by Yoast – using sitemaps

PCRepairMan

If you are using the fabulous WordPress SEO plugin by Yoast, you’ll find that it also does the job of creating a sitemap for you.  You need to opt in to this within the plugin’s settings field here:
“XML sitemaps” then tick the “Check this box to enable XML sitemap functionality“.

There are a few caveats that this plugin doesn’t make you aware of though and this can affect the whole indexing of your website by the search engines.

1. If you are now making reference to this sitemap elsewhere (such as within W3 Total Cache etc) then you will need to alter the path to your sitemap thus:

https://yourdomain.com/sitemap_index.xml

2.  You will need to remove any other sitemaps from your root folder. Look for:

sitemap.xml
sitemap.xml.gz

 

3.  Make sure that your robots.txt has this line:

https://www.yourdomain.com/sitemap_index.xml

 

Your XML sitemap doesn’t actually exist at this location so don’t think it’s not working if you can’t see this file. Yoast’s WordPress SEO plugin places the files in a subfolder of your uploads directory, and using WP Rewrite the URL will resolve to the right sitemap. It also works with Multi Site installs whether domain mapped or not.  To check it is functioning, fire up your browser and navigate to the sitemap (as in step 3 above). You should see the file there.

 

Hope this helps!

 

Check you have the latest Norton product version

PCRepairMan

norton-internet-security-2017-cheapest-renewal-price-serial-keyHere’s a well kept secret….Symantec offer a way to check you have the latest Norton product on your system and they actually give you a free upgrade if not.

If you are running a Norton product such as Internet Security, Antivirus or 360, click here to check for a free upgrade to other versions of Norton.

Save the file to your desktop and run it, it will prompt for action if you can get a free upgrade.

For cheap prices on Norton renewals, take a look at my software store which currently has huge discounts on Norton products

Notepad++ compare icons explained

PCRepairMan

Notepad++ compare iconsHere’s a brief explanation of the Notepad++ compare icons which are surprisingly undocumented:

 

  • Green plus symbol = line added
  • Red minus symbol = line deleted
  • Yellow exclamation mark symbol = line changed
  • Blue arrow symbol = line moved

 

You can access the compare menu from Plugins, Compare, Compare or by simply selecting Alt-D. You need to load the 2 files to compare first and have them as the last 2 on your tabbed list.

We’re sorry Thunderbird had a problem and has crashed

PCRepairMan

Thunderbird crashes repair fixIf you see the error “We’re sorry Thunderbird had a problem and has crashed”, all is not lost. I’ll take you through some fault-finding stages that may help.

Here’s what the window looks like on most computers:

Thunderbird had a problem and has crashed

Yikes, not great information there and submitting information to Mozilla doesn’t help you in the short term, although it helps them to develop the software better.

OK, the first step I take is to download and install the excellent free MozBackup from here:

https://mozbackup.jasnapaka.com/download.php

Close all open programs and run the tool. Create a backup accepting all the default options (this backs up everything).

Now we can work on the program without risk of losing data. Download the latest version of Thunderbird from here:

https://www.mozilla.org/en-US/thunderbird/all.html

Now we are going to run the installation program and install it to the exact same location your existing one is in. Note, we are not uninstalling the existing version. If you are not sure of the location, accept the defaults. The installation program will not tell you it has detected an existing version but that’s OK.

 

Thunderbird reinstall after crash

 

For reference, I have done this countless times and the last was overwriting a version 8 with version 9.  If you are running a really old version then there may be a compatibility issue but I haven’t found anything that version 9 can’t successfully overwrite yet.

Restarting Thunderbird after the reinstall

Now we can start Thunderbird. It may prompt to update plugins which you can accept or disable those you don’t use. You should find your data exactly as you had before. In my experience, you only need to fill in your SMTP server details (if at all). If you have anything missing you can run MozBackup to reinstate it.

Install any plugins or add-ons that aren’t there that you previously had such as Spam filtering (via an Internet Security package or other such as SpamFighter etc).

Job’s a good’un and you should now have a fully functioning Mozilla Thunderbird without the “We’re sorry Thunderbird had a problem and has crashed” window!

Midnight Commander tutorial

PCRepairMan

Midnight Commander tutorialMidnight Commander is a great free file manager but the problem is people are overwhelmed by the interface. Here is a quickie Midnight Commander tutorial so you can navigate and get to the files you want.
All files and directories can be moved, copied or deleted and their contents viewed by using the F keys on your keyboard. Make reference to the options list on your screen. Use a combination of F key, cursor and mouse to navigate around the screen.

 

Midnight Commander Select Files

In the directory panes, select single files simply by using your cursor keys to get to them.  Select multiple files by using your Insert key to highlight and press Insert again on any file to deselect.
You can filter for groups of files: the + key will bring up a selection box into which you can enter wildcards. A wildcard selects all files of a certain type, for example:

*.doc

would select all files that have the ending “.doc” in a given directory.

 

Midnight Commander File Operations

You can view contents or edit files using the F keys on your keyboard and press Enter (or double-click) on a file to execute or open it with an external program if you have this installed in the environment you are running in.  Since most people will be using this from a boot CD then you may not be able to open any file. If using Linux then you need to have the program installed in your distro to open the corresponding file.

There are two ‘file’ menus. F9 is for accessing operations such as changing permissions or ownership. F2 deals mostly with zipping and extracting files and subdirectories.

Note: In Midnight Commander if you are moving or copying files, it will first assume you are doing this to the opposing directory, but gives you the option to change the destination.

 

Hope this helps!