Newsletter Archives

• “Stuttering” glitch on a brand-new PC

  Posted on March 1st, 2021 at 01:08 Fred Langa Comment on the AskWoody Lounge
  

  LANGALIST

  “Stuttering” glitch on a brand-new PC

  By Fred Langa

  A subscriber’s new system experiences erratic mouse and touchpad problems almost from the very first startup.

  Unwanted pauses, hesitations, and stutters can afflict any PC of any age, potentially causing problems with numerous subsystems: mouse, keyboard, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, Ethernet, disks and memory, screen operations, and more! Here are the likely causes, and fixes.

  Plus: Taming CCleaner’s Smart Cleaning feature.

  Read the full story in AskWoody Plus Newsletter 18.8.0 (2021-03-01).
  This story also appears in the AskWoody Free Newsletter 18.8.F (2021-03-01).

  AskWoody Plus Newsletter, LangaList AskWoody Plus Newsletter, hardware, LangaList

• Glacially slow, 10-minute boot times!

  Posted on February 22nd, 2021 at 01:04 Fred Langa Comment on the AskWoody Lounge

  LANGALIST

  Glacially slow, 10-minute boot times!

  By Fred Langa

  When a PC bogs down to the point where it takes a full 10 minutes just to fully wake up, you know something’s seriously wrong!

  The PC’s owner thinks his startup apps are to blame, and asks how to analyze the PC’s boot process.

  Win10’s free, built-in startup analyzer is part of the answer — but only after trying several other approaches first!

  Read the full story in AskWoody Plus Newsletter 18.7.0 (2021-02-22).

  AskWoody Plus Newsletter, LangaList AskWoody Plus Newsletter, LangaList, Slow boots

• From the mailbag: PDF woes; and a cleanup tool kills two PCs!

  Posted on February 15th, 2021 at 01:05 Fred Langa Comment on the AskWoody Lounge

  LANGALIST

  From the mailbag: PDF woes; and a cleanup tool kills two PCs!

  By Fred Langa

  One reader-submitted email asks for the fastest, easiest way to print or save-as-PDF only limited portions of AskWoody Plus — or any other email or web page!

  The second details a reader’s first-hand experience with the destructive power of a too heavy-duty PC maintenance tool.

  Read the full story in AskWoody Plus Newsletter 18.6.0 (2021-02-15).

  AskWoody Plus Newsletter, LangaList AskWoody Plus Newsletter, LangaList

• More on Win10’s Ransomware protection

  Posted on February 8th, 2021 at 01:45 Fred Langa Comment on the AskWoody Lounge

  LANGALIST

  More on Win10’s Ransomware protection

  By Fred Langa

  Many subscribers tried enabling this optional security enhancement, only to discover it can be hard to get going!

  There are at least five reasons why Ransomware protection — and other Win10 security features — might not be available on your PC.

  Here’s what they are, and what you can do about them.

  Read the full story in AskWoody Plus Newsletter 18.5.0 (2021-02-08).

  AskWoody Plus Newsletter, LangaList AskWoody Plus Newsletter, LangaList, Ransomware, security, Windows 10

• Have you enabled Win10’s ransomware protection?

  Posted on February 1st, 2021 at 01:05 Fred Langa Comment on the AskWoody Lounge

  LANGALIST

  Have you enabled Win10’s ransomware protection?

  By Fred Langa

  This free, optional feature is disabled by default but, if enabled, can help protect and recover your PC from a ransomware takeover!

  It’s easy to enable the ransomware protection, but you should know about its quirks and drawbacks before doing so. Here’s how to decide whether this optional protection is for you and, if so, how to get it going!

  Read the full story in AskWoody Plus Newsletter 18.4.0 (2021-02-01).

  AskWoody Plus Newsletter, LangaList AskWoody Plus Newsletter, security, Windows 10

• Excess heat during laptop recharging?

  Posted on January 25th, 2021 at 01:30 Fred Langa Comment on the AskWoody Lounge

  LANGALIST

  Excess heat during laptop recharging?

  By Fred Langa

  A reader is concerned: His laptop’s CPU temperature rises during battery-charging sessions. Why would the CPU heat up?

  Relatedly, what are normal CPU temperatures, anyway? What’s a safe temperature rise?

  Plus: A tiny freeware app that prevents PC overheating!

  Read the full story in AskWoody Plus Newsletter 18.3.0 (2021-01-25).

  AskWoody Plus Newsletter, Hardware, LangaList hardware, LangaList

• Four GB of RAM vanishes … but then reappears

  Posted on January 18th, 2021 at 02:35 Fred Langa Comment on the AskWoody Lounge

  LANGALIST

  Four GB of RAM vanishes … but then reappears

  By Fred Langa

  A long-stable Win10 PC with 12GB of RAM suddenly crashes after losing track of a full third of its memory — only to have the missing RAM later reappear and work fine!

  The other symptoms seem to rule out simple RAM-chip failures or software-caused glitches. What the heck is going on here?

  Read the full story in AskWoody Plus Newsletter 18.2.0 (2021-01-18).

  AskWoody Plus Newsletter, Hardware, LangaList LangaList

• Drive-dense system suffers from sub-par performance

  Posted on December 27th, 2020 at 21:05 Fred Langa Comment on the AskWoody Lounge

  LANGALIST

  By Fred Langa

  The final LangaList for 2020 takes a look at a subscriber’s PC with a strikingly unusual configuration.

  It’s a high-capacity machine, but the owner reports slow boots and RAM use that never drops below about 17 percent — even at idle!

  Read the full story in AskWoody Plus Newsletter 17.51.0 (2020-12-28).

  AskWoody Plus Newsletter, LangaList AskWoody Plus Newsletter, Disk unmounting, RAM use, Slow boots
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