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QCS Digest
Wednesday, 19 January 2005
Your editor: Debbie Figg
Email: mailto:publisher.ar@Quick-Computer-Solutions.com
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This issue is sponsored by:
Do you have these problems with Microsoft Outlook?
... viewing attachments
... saving attachments
... using stationery with your emails
... using the address book
... inserting images into your emails
... deleting junk emails
We have the solution - a quick and easy guide to solving your
Outlook problems.
Stop buy and pick up your copy now:
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In this Issue:
The Editor's Rant
Featured Article - Help, My Computer Has Frozen. What Do I Do?
Tips of the Week
You Have To Smile
Resources
Feedback
See You Next Time
Legal Stuff ...
Contact Information
Your Subscription Details
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THE EDITOR'S RANT
Hi Debbie
Welcome to the first issue of QCS Digest.
As this is the first issue, I've included a special
article for you, which hopefully will set you on the right
track to solving one of the most common computer problems.
My aim with this newsletter is to give you the opportunity
to learn from other people's experiences, including mine.
It's also for you to share your solutions or comments
with your fellow readers.
QCS Digest is for you. It is a community like our
QCS Club Forum, so if you have anything you would like to
share, feel free to submit it to me using the links you will
find at the bottom of this email.
QCS Digest will also be evolving as you tell me what you would
like to see in it. If there is something you don't like or
need, voice your opinion (as long as it's clean :-) ).
If enough readers feel the same way about it, then sure, I'll
bow to your wishes.
Let's make this an interactive newsletter. Tell me how you
feel about QCS Digest and I'll post it in the feedback section.
I'd love to hear from you.
I mentioned our QCS Club Forum before. This is where you can
meet other people who have had similar problems to yours
and may have found an answer to them already. Go visit it and
you will be amazed at what you can learn:
http://Quick-Computer-Solutions.com/forum/
Well, I hope you will be pleased with everything you will
learn here, over the coming weeks and months. So lets get on
with this weeks issue.
Until the next issue ...
Remember, Don't Panic - you CAN solve your computer problems
with my help.
Debbie
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FEATURED ARTICLE
Help, My Computer Has Frozen. What Do I Do?
by Debbie Figg
Don't Panic!
** Print This Article Out - You Will Need It When The Time Comes ***
There are several things that could be the problem here. So
it's best to try to identify what exactly has frozen first.
Incident
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It could be:
1. The program you were using has frozen
2. The program you were using is just taking a long time to do
what it needs to do
3. Another program is doing something that has temporarily
caused your computer to slow down.
4. You have just installed a program that uses one or more
driver files (a techie term - you don't have to worry what
it means) that are clashing with ones already in your
system. This is a very common problem with Windows.
5. Your whole computer has stopped.
There are other reasons too numerous to list in a short article
like this, but these are the main ones to start looking at.
Diagnosis
---------
To see which one it could be, let's start with the program
you were just using.
1. Try clicking your mouse somewhere outside the program or
try to start up another program if the frozen one is taking
up the whole screen. If you can click somewhere else, then
it IS just that program that is frozen.
2. So, is it just that the action you last did in the frozen
program takes a while to do or is it that the program is
actually frozen? For example, I use Dreamweaver for
building my websites, but it is very greedy with the
computer's memory, so every so often it does take a while
to do some of the more lengthy number crunching tasks.
- sometimes programs use the Status Bar at the bottom of
the program's window to show the progress of the task.
So see if there is any activity here first.
- if not, then have a look at the lights on the front of
your computer. One of these usually has a little picture
of a disk drive next to it. This flashes every time
there is some disk activity. If there is no flashing
then the program isn't doing any disk accesses. This
usually means the program IS frozen, but it may also
mean that it is only using the memory and doesn't need
the disk.
- wait about 30 seconds to a minute to see if any of these
things indicate that there is something going or not.
If not, then you need to force the program to shut down
(see the Treatment section).
3. If your program IS doing something, then do you have other
programs running that are doing some processing at the
same time? This may not be obvious as you may not have
started them yourself (they may have been started
automatically when Windows starts and are running in the
background). You can tell this by looking at the
Task Manager. I explain how to do this in the Treatment
section, when I explain how to end frozen tasks.
4. If you have just installed a program and it froze either
during the installation process or when you tried to run
the program, then there is a good chance that the
problem is something to do with dodgy drivers.
The solution to this can get rather involved, so a full
explanation of this is beyond this article. If this is
your problem, you can go to the QCS website to find an
explanation of how to do this there.
5. If you can't click anywhere else and can't even get the
Windows taskbar to appear, then it is your whole system
that has frozen. In this case you will need to do what is
called a hard reboot of your computer (see the Treatment
section).
Treatment
---------
If you have determined that your problem is a frozen program
then follow these steps to force it to close.
(If you haven't used the Task Manager before, then I must
repeat 'Don't Panic' as you aren't going to do anything that
will seriously affect your computer. If anything untoward
does happen, it's just a simple case of rebooting your
computer and everything will be back to normal.)
1. Press ctrl+alt+delete key combination to make the Task Manager
window appear. In Windows 98, you only see a list of the
programs that are running. In Windows NT, 2000 and XP
the Task Manager shows you all sorts of things on different
tabs.
2. Click the Applications tab to see programs that you have
started.
Click the Processes tab to see all the programs that are
running, including the ones that are in the Applications
tab. What you see here are the actual names of the programs
rather than their descriptions. Don't worry about this as
you don't need to know the names, just which one is hogging
the memory.
3. If it is a program that you started that is frozen, you will
need to use the Applications Tab (or for Windows 98, just
the Task List that you see). So click the tab now.
a.) Right click on the program's name and select the
'End Task' option.
Windows will now force the program to close.
4. If the freezing is not to do with a program you started,
you need to use the Processes tab. So click the tab now.
a.) Click on the button at the top of the CPU column
until the column is in descending order. The programs
at the top of the list will now be constantly changing
places. Don't worry about this.
b.) The program at the top of the list is the one that is
using most of the CPU (the chip that runs your computer).
Other than 'explorer.exe' or 'System Idle Process'
(don't touch these), this is usually a non-Windows
program.
c.) If there is one that is constantly coming back to the
top of the list with anything above about 20 in the CPU
column and that is not a Windows program, then that is
probably the culprit.
d.) Note it's name and click the Image Name column header,
as it's easier to click the program if it's not moving
around.
e.) Right click on the program's name and left click on the
'End Process' option.
Windows will now force the program to close.
f.) A dialog box will appear saying that this could be a
dangerous thing to do, but this doesn't matter in this
case as we know that we need to close the program this
way. So just click Yes.
g.) Another box will most likely appear asking whether you
wish to send the details of the error to Microsoft.
Click the 'Do Not Send' button.
If you need to hard reboot your computer follow these steps:
1. Keep your On/Off key on your computer pressed down until
it turns off, then press it again to switch it on. This
does solve almost all freezing problems.
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This article was written by Debbie Figg who runs
http://Quick-Computer-Solutions.com
Your One Stop Solution Shop to your computer problems.
Stop buy and pick up your solutions.
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TIPS OF THE WEEK
Did you know you could do this?
1. Close a program down when you have finished with it by
pressing alt+f4 on your keyboard?
2. Close a document in Word, but leave Word running by pressing
ctrl+f4? This works with any program that allows you to
have multiple documents open.
3. Assign categories to your contacts in Outlook to make
finding a contact much easier?
a.) Right click on a contact and select Categories.
b.) Tick the category you want to use and click the OK
button.
4. Choose which program to open a file with?
a.) In Windows Explorer, right click a file and select
Open With.
b.) If the program is in the list, select it.
c.) If the program is not in the list, select Choose Program.
d.) Click the program you'd like to use and click OK.
(If you'd like to always use this program for this
type of file, check the Always use... box too)
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YOU HAVE TO SMILE
Little Mary was not the best student in Sunday School. Usually
she slept through the class. One day the teacher called on her
while she was napping, "Tell me, Mary, who created the universe?"
When Mary didn't stir, little Johnny, an altruistic boy seated
in the chair behind her, took his sharp pencil and jabbed her
in the rear.
"God Almighty!" shouted Mary, and the teacher said, "Very good."
A while later the teacher asked Mary, "Who is our Lord and Savior?"
Mary didn't even stir from her slumber. Once again, Johnny came
to the rescue and stuck her in the ass.
"Jesus Christ!" shouted Mary and the teacher said, "Very good."
Then, a little while later, the teacher asked Mary a third question.
"What did Eve say to Adam after she had her twenty-third child?"
Once again, Johnny jabbed her with his pencil. This time Mary
jumped up and shouted,
"If you stick that damn thing in me one more time, I'll break
it in half!"
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RESOURCES
QCS Club Forum - ask your questions and share your solutions:
http://Quick-Computer-Solutions.com/forum/
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FEEDBACK
Tell me what you think about QCS Digest and your comments
- good or bad will be published here.
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SEE YOU NEXT TIME
Well that's all for this issue. I hope you enjoyed reading
it as much as I enjoyed compiling it for you.
May all your problems be little ones,
Debbie Figg
http://Quick-Computer-Solutions.com |
