This week’s email and on-line newsletters are now available:
*   free weekly Terry”s Computer Tips email newsletter
*   weekly on-line Terry”s Computer Tips newsletter

This week’s online newsletter includes:

*   XP Service Pack 3 Didn’t Like Me
My first experience with Windows XP Service Pack 3 was a failure. Read about it…

*   Click2PDF and Firefox 3 — Problem Easily Solved
One of my most-frequently used programs had a problem when I upgraded to Firefox 3. A subscriber also had the problem, so I explained the easy fix…

*   My Security Software Recommendations
My recommendations for anti-virus, anti-spyware, firewall, and anti-spam software…

*   Quick questions and comments from subscribers, and answers, too…
Each too short for full articles, these questions & and answers may help you in the future…

Sponsored Advertisement VIPRE Antivirus + Antispyware Tired of old antivirus software that makes your PC slow down to a crawl? Try High-Performance VIPRE Antivirus + Antispyware Multi-computer discounts Unlimited Home Site License available, too.

The Google Screensaver is one of the amazing free applications that is part of Google’s free Google Pack software package. Make your PC more useful. Get the free Google Pack.

The Google Screensaver is optional as part of Google Pack, but it’s one component that you should not miss. With it, you can have a screensaver that uses your own photos that you’ve accumulated and edited in Google Picasa, from Picasa Web Albums, from your own photos from folders on your computer that you specify (so you can use some photos as screensaver images, but not others), and from photo feeds (which defaults to “Default Google Photo Feed.”)

You can control how often the picture changes. You can also control the type of transition from one image to the next. The Visual Effect lets you choose Pan and Zoom, Collage, Wipe and Cross-Fade.

You can access the control panel…

Continue reading Using the free Google Photo Screensaver

Google made a big change in the Google Pack recently. The free Google Pack software package started out with free Google applications like Google Earth, Google Desktop, the Google Photos Screensaver and Picasa (the photo-editing program that Google purchased).

Google began including other programs like Firefox (with the added Google toolbar), Adobe Reader, RealPlayer, Spyware Doctore (Starter Edition), Norton Security Scan ,Google Talk, and Skype.

Now, you can add Sun Microsystem’s StarOffice to the list! What’s StarOffice? It’s a supported version of OpenOffice, with lots more templates, fonts, and more…

Continue reading Google Pack Now Includes StarOffice

This week’s email and on-line newsletters are now available:
*   free weekly Terry”s Computer Tips email newsletter
*   weekly on-line Terry”s Computer Tips newsletter

This week’s online articles include:

*   A Look Inside Secunia Software Inspector
I’ve found a great tool that examines my computer to make sure that
it has the latest updates of the most common software packages —
not all the updates, but the security updates for the versions I’m
runninng.

*   Updates Last Week
I watch a few operating systems and programs for updates — mainly because these are the ones that I use or in which I am interested. What updates or versions were new last week?

*   My Computer Security Software Recommendations
Want to know which Antivirus program I recommend? Which firewall program? Which Antispyware program? Which Antispam? Or, which router for your home network?

This week’s email and on-line newsletters are now available:
*   free weekly Terry”s Computer Tips email newsletter
*   weekly on-line Terry”s Computer Tips newsletter

This week’s online articles include:

*   Staying Up-to-Date - Problem Running Online Games
A lot of people enjoy playing online games — they can be fun, entertaining and mentally challenging. But, although the game is online, it’s not _all_ online…

*   Updates Last Week
I watch a few operating systems and programs for updates — mainly because these are the ones that I use or in which I am interested. What updates or versions were new last week?

*   My Computer Security Software Recommendations
Want to know which Antivirus program I recommend? Which firewall program? Which Antispyware program? Which Antispam? Or, which router for your home network?

Buy the award-winning NOD32 software here.

Last week, Microsoft gave us another new set of their anti-piracy tools — Windows Genuine Advantage and Windows Genuine Advantage Notification. If you’ve been reading my newsletters for a while, you know that I believe these have no value for consumers and are strictly anti-piracy tools to enhance Microsoft’s bottom line.

Don’t get me wrong. I believe that software piracy is wrong. I do not do it, I do not condone it and I do not support it. The real problem is that past versions of the WGA and WGAN tools have been reported to have way too many false positives — to claim that legitimate copies of Windows were pirated copies. With Windows XP, the false positive would result in nagging by Windows. Vista, on the other hand, disables some functions if it decides that the copy is a pirate copy.

So, what can you do? Not a lot. The WGA anti-piracy is mandatory to get a number of Windows updates and other downloads from Microsoft.com. On the other hand, the Windows Genuine Advantage Notification program really is optional.

First, Windows Updates or Microsoft Updates will tell you that you have a Windows Update component that has to be updated before you can do anything else. This is the Windows Genuine Advantage (WGA) anti-piracy tool. I installed it as I expect that you will.

Once WGA is installed, you’ll get the next update presented — the WGA Notification update. I chose not to install WGA Notification.