Rick's Daily Tips

Q&A: Why is my computer only recognizing 4GB of RAM even though I installed 8GB?

Posted on August 11, 2017

Question from Shawn: Hi Rick. Having recently read your post about adding RAM to speed up your PC, I just bought two 4GB Crucial RAM sticks to upgrade my Dell 755 desktop computer to 8GB.

This PC is running Windows 7 Home Premium 64 bit so it should recognize the entire 8GB, but for some reason it’s only recognizing 4GB. Do you think I have a bad RAM stick?

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Q&A: Can I place an icon for ‘OneDrive’ on my Windows 10 desktop?

Posted on August 9, 2017

Question from Danielle G.: I use OneDrive all the time and I’d like to be able to access it by clicking a desktop icon.

The problem is I can’t figure out how to create an icon for it. Is it even possible to do that?

My computer is an Acer Aspire All-In-One with Windows 10 on it.

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Q&A: Why is the Internet not working on my laptop?

Posted on August 6, 2017

Question from Caleb H.: Rick, I have a Dell laptop with Windows 10 Home Edition. It’s connected to the Internet with a LAN cable plugged into my router (it’s an older router and not wireless, but it works great).

I know the router and modem are working fine because my desktop PC can load web pages with no problem at all.

The laptop was working fine last night, but when I woke it up from sleep mode this morning I couldn’t load any websites or check my email even though the little indicator in the lower-right corner of the screen says I have an active connection to the Internet.

What do I need to do to get my Internet connection working again? Rebooting the PC didn’t help. Thanks in advance.

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Q&A: Why won’t Opera’s VPN connect with AVG Antivirus enabled?

Posted on August 5, 2017

Question from Callen W.: I really need your help Rick. I followed your advice and installed the Opera browser so I could use the built-in VPN.

Everything worked perfectly for a couple of days, then Opera started hanging up and no websites would load.

I noticed that the VPN button in the address bar was white instead of blue so I clicked on it and saw that the VPN was turned off and trying to connect.

Every time I try clicking the button to turn the VPN on it says “Connecting” but it never connects.

I did some research and saw where someone said it could be a conflict with my antivirus software. I temporarily disabled AVG Antivirus and sure enough, the VPN connected just fine and websites started loading with no problem.

The problem is when I re-enable AVG the connection issue comes back after a little while.

I’ve used AVG for years and I’d rather not have to give it up just to use Opera and its built-in VPN. Is there something I can do to make Opera and AVG work together?

Rick’s answer: [Read more…]