Caring For Your Laptop

After spending your hard earned cash on a notebook pc, and relying on it in a variety of ways, some time should be spent looking after your investment to make it work more efficiently, and to prolong its life.

The Screen

Some notebooks come with their own cleaning cloth. If not, ask your local pc store about a spray or what is best for cleaning the display. Do not use household domestic cleaners. As a last resort and if your budget is stretched, just use a damp cloth. Make sure you unplug the power from the machine before you start cleaning. If you are using a spray, never apply it directly to the screen, as it can run down the screen and into the circuitry. Instead, spray a small amount onto a soft cloth and then very carefully wipe the screen. Do not apply too much pressure. Never use tissues or even a wool based cloth as these can damage the display with scratches and also leave behind residual fibers. The best type of cloth to use is something similar to the cloth you use to clean your sunglasses.

The Battery

If your notebook is going to be left idle for more than two weeks, or it will be continuously plugged into AC power, take the battery out. If your notebook spends most of its time plugged into AC power, it's a good idea to run the battery down once a week until it is completely flat, and then fully charge it.

The Keyboard

Over time the keyboard on your system will collect dust, food crumbs and all sort of other rubbish. After a while the rubbish works its way between the keys and actuators and makes typing less accurate. As a way of dislodging some of the build up in your keyboard, turn off your notebook, open up the screen and then turn it upside down. Being very gentle, shake it sideways a couple of times and tap on the underside and around the edges of the case. This should remove some of the larger particles. If you want to take it one step further, you could try using a can of compressed air to blast away the dust etc. Just be careful you don't jam objects in place even tighter. To clean up the keys, use a lint free cloth moistened with water. Go very easy on the water as you don't want the water to seep anywhere.

The Chassis

To give the chassis on your laptop a clean, it is a very good idea to contact the manufacturer first, on their tech support line, for advice on how to clean your particular model. The reason for this is there are so many different types of materials used in the making of cases.
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Computer Scrapbooks

When digital cameras were first released on the market, everyone was excited. Finally, here was an easy way to take and store photos. No more would our closets be plagued with boxes and envelopes housing a hodgepodge of unorganized photographs. What we didn't realize was that soon, our computers would be filled with a hodgepodge of unorganized photographs.

The explosion of home computers and the Internet has led to an increased need for people to organize computer scrapbooks. It's easy to accumulate literally thousands of digital pictures, and it's just as easy to get them all mixed up. Try finding a favorite photo as you're scanning through a list of numbers and letters. Creating computer scrapbooks makes it quick and easy to locate the photographs, as soon as you want to see them.

When preparing your computer scrapbooks, the first step should always be renaming your photos. You should use file names that are easy to understand and organize, rather than keeping the default names set by your digital photography software. Anyone who has used a digital camera or camera phone knows just how hard it can be to decipher the file names, let alone selecting the photographs. Proper titles listed in computer scrapbooks make it easy to remember which pictures you have.

One key point to remember is that all of your computer scrapbook files will be sorted in alphabetical order. This can get confusing, particularly if you're naming pictures by date. Rather than call your photos 'January10', 'April21' etc, use the numerical format year, month and then day. Those same files will now be called 20050110Baby and 20050421Baby. In doing so, your computer will display them in the correct date order for you.

After your photo files have been renamed, you need to create folders to store the different types of photo files. Try organizing your computer scrapbooks by subject, theme or occasion. This will allow you to find your photos much easier later on. For example, create a folder called 'Baby Pictures' and save all of your baby photographs in that folder. By setting up and following a naming system, you'll soon have the most well organized computer scrapbooks around.

Whether or not you print your digital photos, always create backups of all your computer scrapbook files. There are many archiving programs that can be used to compress large files, enabling them to be stored on a CD or other removable disk. It is essential that you label your CDs to keep your computer scrapbook backups as organized as the originals. You can write the title on the CD itself, but you should also remember to alter the name of the CD as read by the computer. Most CD writing software automatically prompts you to give the CD a title, but check the instructions before you start the burning process so you, and your computer, will be able to clearly identify the CDs.

Digital cameras make it easy to take and save pictures. Computer scrapbooks make it easy to find the pictures anytime you're ready to take a trip down memory lane or share the digital images with your friends.

Barbara Miller writes for several popular web sites, including http://gemug.com and http://gymif.com

Flash! Shuffle! Play!

Interesting story from MacCentral about the reaction of competitive flash MP3 player makers to the iPod Shuffle.

I think they are missing the point. The players these folks have made are solid products, but they are geek products - heavy on the features, not so heavy on simplicity or coolness. Whereas Apple's no-screen, oh so primitively simple player will likely be popular because it's just so freakin' easy - plug it into the USB port and be done with it. And it's really tiny and looks really cool.

That said, Apple has yet to solve their biggest problem in the music space, the one that I think decides whether they are the initial big guy who fades away to being a sideshow, or actually stays in it for the long term. That's the whole digital rights management (DRM) issue. Apple is using a very nice DRM scheme that was better than anybody's when they first came out with it; you buy songs from their store, you can play them on up to 3 computers and associated iPods and pretty much burn to CDs at will (You can't burn the same playlist containing a protected track more than 10 times, which is not an issue for anyone not stealing music.)

Since then others have fallen in line with similar systems (notably the Microsoft music store) but... they are similar but different.

Eventually, if music bought at different stores can't be played on different players, there is a problem. What happens when some music is only available online from Microsoft, and other music is only available online from Apple? The whole thing becomes a headache for consumers.

At some point there needs to be some interoperable DRM scheme that lets consumers choose their software and portable players and still buy everything. Apple, dominating the market for now, may be tempted to keep things as they are, but in the long term I believe it's a big mistake. There would be a real advantage to making it possible for someone with a non-iPod player to buy music from them and play it on that device.

What's more, if they don't do it, eventually software to crack the DRM will just show up all over, and then you start to get a real mess.

iShuffle

Lots of announcements at MacWorld today, including the new flash ROM iPod. When I started reading the description, I thought, "Ugh" - no display? it only works in shuffle? - but by the end I decided I liked it. I use my iPod in shuffle mode 99% of the time, and it is so freakin' tiny that it would be perfect for taking to the gym, or running/walking, etc. 12 hours of battery life and it weighs less than an ounce. Sweet.

And the Mac Mini? Not for me, but they have finally offered something that fills in the low end price point in their line. I think it's telling that it's designed so you can chuck your PC box, replace it with the oh-so-fabulous-looking little white thing (and it is TINY) and plug your old keyboard, mouse, and monitor into it. Obviously designed for low-end PC users interesting in switching.