Optimizing Your PC Series

I will be posting easy to follow procedure on how we can optimize or speed up our computer.  However this post means we are dealing with computers with no hardware issues or severe Windows Operating System issues:

The first step in anything that we do with computers is to create a System Restore Point so that we would have a point to go back to just in case something wrong went wrong along our optimization steps.  The last working settings (current) would always be available for us and gives us a chance to correct what was done inappropriately.

1.  CREATE A SYSTEM RESTORE POINT

Windows XP 
Step 1: Open System Restore
     - Click the Start Button
     - Choose All Programs
     - Click on Accessories
     - Choose System Tools
     - Click System Restore

Step 2: Create Restore Point
     - Click Create a Restore Point radio button
     - Click Next
     - Name the Restore Point (eg MyRestorePoint1)
     - Click Create
     - Close System Restore once restore point is completed by Windows

Windows Vista
Step 1: Create System Restore Point
     - Click Start Button
     - Right click Computer
     - Click Properties
     - On the Left Panel, select System Ptotection
     - Automatic Restore Points local disk system should already be checked
     - Click Create
     - Name your Restore Point (eg MyRestorePoint2)

Windows 7
Step 1: Create your System Restore Point
     - Click Start Button
     - On the search box, type in Create
     - Select/click Create a Restore Point from the list suggested under Programs
     - System Restore Window opens
     - Click Create
     - Name your restore point (eg. MyRestorePoint3)


System Restore Issues:
Most common reason to System Restore failure are due to:
    1.  System Restore is disabled.
    2. Not enough room on the hard drive to create a system restore point.

To check is System Restore is disabled, right click My Computer and click Properties, click the System Restore tab and uncheck the Disable System Restore/Turn off System Restore on all Drives checkbox.

If there's not enough hard disk space to create a restore point, remove any unnecessary programs to free up disk space to create one.

Important Note:
-  System Restore will only backup Windows XP settings. It will not bring back personal items deleted or will it remove personal files that have been added to the computer since the last restore point.  If you have to go back to a Restore Point, new emails, photos, documents (any personal files not related to system settings) will remain.
-  Restoring to a previous point will not remove the virus that have infected the computer and may also cause problems to newly installed programs.

Topic Next Week will be Setting your Virtual Memory

No Desktop on windows 7 resolution and replacing corrupted explorer.exe on windows 7

No Desktop on Windows 7 and Replacing corrupted Explorer.exe on Windows


Heres the fixes in the order that they should be performed:

1: Try opening Windows Task manager. Do this by pressing Control+ALT+Del. If this does not work then skip to step 2. If it opens up then click on the new task button and type in “explorer.exe” (without quotes of course). If this restores your desktop then your good to go! Have fun, and thanks for reading. However if this does not work but your task manager worked then start a new task called cmd.exe and go to step 3 (skip 2, thats for people who have no task manager).

2: Restart windows in Safe Mode With Command Prompt by cycling the computers power and pressing F8 repeatedly when the first screen comes up. When the choice menu comes up, choose “Safe Mode with Command Prompt” and move to step 3.

3: If you’ve gotten to here then I have some bad news: your explorer.exe has been damaged, moved or deleted, not simply turned off. The good news is that you can still fix it easily! heres what you’ve got to do. In Command prompt (which you should have open) type this command exactly:

cd %systemroot%\i386

It should take you to that folder, and once you are there type in:

expand explorer.ex_ %systemroot%\explorer.exe

Voila! You have replaced your explorer.exe with a (hopefully) healthy one!

To run it simply type:

start %systemroot% explorer


Screenshot

No Internet After Installing Norton product

No Internet Connection after Installing Norton Product

1. Create System Restore
2. Back-up Registry
3. Removed Norton Product using Add/Remove Programs.
4. Run Norton's NRT application
5. Remove all Norton Entries from the Registry
6. Remove all other Security Software entries from the Registry

    To open Registry
    - Open Run dialogue box
           - Win+R
    - Type "regedit" (without quotes) + Enter
    - Press Ctrl + F then enter the name of the security software you are looking for then delete.
7. Flush DNS and Release Renew Ip
   Open Command Prompt
   - at Run dialogue, type cmd or Command + Enter
   - at cmd window, type in ipconfig /flushDNS then press Enter
   - type in ipconfig /release then Enter
   - type in ipconfig /renew then Enter
8. Check the network connection
    - Make sure it is automatic
9. Restart PC
10.  Internet Connection should be back

Other Solutions to try
- If Norton is still installed, you can try disabling the Smart Firewall from the Norton Interface then check the connection

Flushing DNs and Resetting the Winsock

1. Click Start > Run, type  ipconfig /flushdns and click OK.

2. Click Start > Run, type  cmd and click OK.

3. in the command prompt, type the following and press Enter after each line:

netsh int ip reset resetlog.txt [Enter]
netsh winsock reset [Enter]

exit [Enter]

You can also:

 Locate & delete SMR300.sys under C:\Windows\System32\drivers.
- Uninstall SMR utility 3.1 from device manager
- Restart the computer.
- Create new windows user account.
- Turn off the User Account Control.
- Install Norton Internet Security on the new user account.
- Restarted the computer,  Log in to customer's user account.
- Activate the product.
- Ran the live update and quick scan.
- Deleted the user account which we created.

Then try to look for this in the Registry:

This can happen if the uninstall process fails and leaves behind a Symantec registry value. Do the following to fix the problem: 
WARNING: We strongly recommend that you back up the registry before you make any changes to it. Incorrect changes to the registry can result in permanent data loss or corrupted files. Modify only the keys that are specified. Read the document How to back up the Windows registry for instructions. 

1. Click Start > Run. The Run dialog box appears. 
2. Type regedit and then click OK. The Registry Editor opens. 
3. Navigate to and select the following key: 

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Services\DHCP 
4. Double-click the DependOnService value in the right window. 
5. Delete the SYMTDI entry from the list of items. 
6. Click OK. 
7. Click Registry, and then click Exit. 
8. Restart the computer.

Make a compressed folder in Windows XP

Sending a large number of files as an attachment to an email could be a tedious process. There is a chance you may miss one file.

An easy solution is to group all the files in a compressed folder/zipped folder. This way, sending multiple files would be a very easy job.

But how do you compress a group of files in Windows XP?

Compressing a file, a group of files or a folder in Windows XP is an easy three step process.

Step 1

- Open Windows Explorer

- Go to the folder of the files you wish to compress.

- Select the files to be compressed.

Step 2

- On the menu bar, click the File menu.

Step 3

- Point the mouse pointer to Send to (another drop down menu opens), then point to Compressed (Zipped) Folder.

That's it! Your files are now group in one compressed folder which can be easily sent as attachment to emails.

Make Default Sheet in Excel

There are times when you want a certain sheet in Excel to open up everytime you want to open excel.

Well, you're problem is solved my friend with a few codings, you can make a certain sheet your default sheet.

Just follow this simple steps:

1. Right click the tab of the sheet you wish to be your default sheet.

(Image when tab is right clicked)

2. Click/Choose View Code

3. Visual Basic for Application will now be displayed on screen.

4. Double click "ThisWorkbook"

5. Code Editor Window opens

6. In between Private Sub Workbook_Open() and End Sub, enter the following code:

Sheets("nameofmysheet").Activate

Where "nameofmysheet" is the name of the sheet/tab you wish to be displayed first. By

default, the sheet/tab is named "Sheet1".

That's all for making a certain sheet your default sheet in MS Excel.

Hope this helps folks,

Till next tutorial.

See you then...