Your daily dose of practical, easy to follow tech tips!
Question from Bill: I hope you can help me with a Windows issue, Rick.
When I click the Start button and search for something it always gives me a bunch of results from the web right below the regular results it found on the computer.
I’d love to get rid of those web results because I’m always clicking on them thinking it’s finding something on my computer when it’s really on some website.
Is there any way to omit the web results from my Windows searches? [Read more…]
Question from Liz: I recently found out that everyone who looks at my Facebook can see my profile picture.
I don’t like that because I don’t want all the stalkers and scammers that are on Facebook to be able to see any of my pictures.
Lord only knows what they could do with it if they ever managed to steal one of them.
I finally got my settings changed to where it hides my posts and the rest of my pictures from strangers, but my profile picture is always visible even with its privacy set to “Only Me”.
How can I make it so that only the people who are actually friends with me on Facebook can see my profile picture? [Read more…]
Rick’s Tech Tips Newsletter
Question from Martha: About three or four times a month I get a call from the number (205) 595-XXXX.
(I blanked out the last four digits to protect the caller in case everything is on the up and up.)
The strange thing is this person just calls and then hangs up just as soon as I answer. Then it’ll be a week or two before they call again.
I won’t tell you where I live because I don’t want this person to see it and hunt me down. I know I’m probably just being paranoid, but it does worry me.
My question for you is do you know if it’s possible to determine where that caller is located just from looking at the phone number? [Read more…]
Question from Ed: I have a Lenovo laptop that came with Windows 8.1 preinstalled.
The hard drive died and I have to replace it and my co-worker recommended that I install Linux on it.
The thing is, there are so many Linux versions to choose from that trying to pick one is about to make my head explode.
Which version of Linux do you recommend for a system that was running Windows 8.1 previously? [Read more…]
Question from Elliot: A year and a half ago I bought a wireless keyboard/mouse combo to make it easier to use my laptop. I hate those trackpads and small keyboards!
I was typing an email this morning and all of a sudden the keyboard just stopped working. I figured the batteries needed to be replaced, but new ones didn’t fix the problem.
The mouse still works fine and a wired keyboard I plugged in works too. I rebooted the laptop but that didn’t help.
What do you think might be the problem? [Read more…]