It's Geek To Me

Q: I have similar problems as the vgrabber issue in a recent column (Issue #328, November 3, 2013) and I tried what you suggested for the chrome user and it did not work.  Is there a difference in Google Chrome?  My computer has windows xp running internet explorer 8.I had Firefox and it quit working […]

Q: My computer had some kind of glitch that happened a year ago. The main symptoms were: The computer ran slower for most tasks, The focus would jump from my window to another window seemingly at random times. It seemed “jittery” a lot where it would sometimes quiver between one window and another. That was […]

Q: I’m thinking of buying a new PC but I don’t like Windows 8. I know Microsoft has built an optional desktop environment into newer versions of Windows 8, but I feel like a Luddite for not wanting to switch to the new look of Windows. Do you know of a really good tutorial for […]

Q: This stupid computer is designating most emails I receive to be SPAM whether they are or not!! Every time it happens I go to my JUNK email lists and designate a known recipient to be a SAFE sender but it seems to do no good. Obviously the computer is using some flawed criteria to […]

Let me start today’s column by thanking the several people who contacted me after last week’s issue to tell me that the “Submit a Question” form on my website was broken!  Well duh, Geek!  No wonder you’re not getting many new questions!  In my defense, I almost never see the site as anything other than […]

Q: When editing text in documents, I used to be able to highlight text and when I typed the replacing text, the highlighted part would disappear if I stuck the Backspace key or if I just started typing the replacement text. Now when I highlight text and hit Backspace, nothing happens. If I type the […]

Q: My computer takes longer and longer to start up and shut down. I noticed that there are 73 processes running. How do I find and turn off everything that I don’t need for startup? I can’t imagine needing 73 processes running in the background! Am I wrong? Secondly, I recently downloaded something that I […]

Q: Somehow, a program called Pareto Logic was downloaded (possibly piggy-backed on another program) and installed on my laptop. I attempted to remove it, but only managed to remove part of it. Now, it pops up once a week on boot-up. Since it’s only partially there, it warns me that it cannot continue updating because […]

Q: My wife’s computer is constantly “locking up” on her when she tries to play any game on the “pogo” site. I am always doing disc clean but it doesn’t seem to her. We have the Viper Internet Security system installed and it does a deep clean three nights each week. Her computer is a […]

Q: In cleaning out closets, I came across many of those old 4″ x 4″ backup discs – many of them having grandchildren’s names tabbed on them. I am currently using Windows 8 (not my choice). Is there any way or any where I can recover the information that is on them? Thank you for […]