Newsletter Archives

• A wide-ranging trio of questions

  Posted on March 22nd, 2021 at 01:06 Fred Langa Comment on the AskWoody Lounge

  LANGALIST

  

  By Fred Langa

  This week’s top reader-submitted questions cover quite a spread of topics, starting with some unexpected lithium-ion battery behavior.

  Then we examine the reasons for a reader’s deep misgivings about the safety and reliability of cloud-storage services, and we’ll wrap up with a super-simple, three-click solution for a notebook PC whose unplugged performance is simply too slow for practical use.

  Read the full story in the AskWoody Plus Newsletter 18.11.0 (2021-03-22).

  AskWoody Plus Newsletter, LangaList AskWoody Plus Newsletter, LangaList, Power settings, Windows

• Windows’ semi-secret “back door” still exists!

  Posted on March 15th, 2021 at 01:06 Fred Langa Comment on the AskWoody Lounge

  LANGALIST

  

  By Fred Langa

  All current Windows, including Win10 20H2, contain an old, sneaky workaround that lets you log in to a PC even if the usernames and passwords are scrambled, unknown, or forgotten.

  You can even use this method to create a new administrator account on a PC that doesn’t have one and then use that new account to log on and perform recovery or repair operations.

  Plus: Win8/10’s free, automated, Robust File Copy — Robocopy — to the rescue!

  Read the full story in the AskWoody Plus Newsletter 18.10.0 (2021-03-15).

  AskWoody Plus Newsletter, LangaList AskWoody Plus Newsletter, Back Door, LangaList, Windows

• Windows and Linux Interoperability

  Posted on March 15th, 2021 at 01:04 Sandra Henry-Stocker Comment on the AskWoody Lounge

  LINUX

  

  By Sandra Henry-Stocker

  If you, like me, have both Windows and Linux systems on your network, you don’t have to walk from one desk to another to work on each of them in an isolated fashion.

  Instead, there are some very useful options for Windows-Linux interoperability. They allow you to move files between the systems, log in from one system to the other, and mount file shares so that you can use Linux files on Windows or vice versa. You can even run commands remotely between the systems. In this article, we’ll take a quick look at these options.

  Read the full story in the AskWoody Plus Newsletter 18.10.0 (2021-03-15).

  AskWoody Plus Newsletter, Linux AskWoody Plus Newsletter, Linux, Windows

• Taking the plunge with a new PC

  Posted on June 3rd, 2019 at 02:20 Tracey Capen Comment on the AskWoody Lounge

  Buying a new PC was once a fairly simple shop-and-buy process. There wasn’t much to consider beyond memory and drive capacity — and maybe an upgraded video card.

  But recent innovations have made choosing a new machine more complicated. Intel’s Optane technology, for example, claims to make a hard drive as responsive as an SSD!

  See the full story in the June 3, 2019, AskWoody Plus Newsletter (Issue 16.20.0)

  Hardware, LangaList, Tech Help AskWoody Plus Newsletter, Buying PCs, hardware, LangaList, Windows

• Windows 1903 gets its first update

  Posted on June 3rd, 2019 at 02:19 Tracey Capen Comment on the AskWoody Lounge

  Microsoft’s most recent “feature release,” better known as Version 1903, received its very first patch — and it’s optional!

  What’s apparently fixed is the very thing that blocked my initial install of Version 1903. If an external USB device or SD memory card is plugged in, the device is reassigned to an incorrect drive letter during the installation process.

  See the full story in the June 3, 2019, AskWoody Plus Newsletter (Issue 16.20.0)

  Patch Watch, Windows Patches/Security AskWoody Plus Newsletter, Office, Patch Watch, patching, Windows

• Delete the updates?

  Posted on April 26th, 2009 at 06:36 woody Comment on the AskWoody Lounge

  Reader RM writes:

  Woody,

  What happens to all the Vista Updates after they have been installed. Are these files still on my computer, and, can I delete them or just leave them alone?

  Many updates leave dregs on your hard drive, primarily because many updates can be “uninstalled” and the snippets are necessary to return your PC to its original state.

  Some people advise that you can delete the dregs, and give instructions for doing so manually. I say, “Why bother?” If you’re running out of room, follow the instructions in any of my books to run Windows Disk Cleanup. Better, go out and splurge $50 and get a second, big, hard drive. If you aren’t running out of room, fuhgeddaboutit.

  Other Delete updates, Disk Cleanup, Uninstall updates, Windows