Everyone should manage their computer’s power differently according to
how they use it and whether it’s a battery powered laptop or desktop
workstation. I prefer to just have my monitor turn off after an hour of
inactivity. Others may wish to have their computer standby or hibernate
after a certain amount of time. Power conservation is essentially the goal
and therefore your monitor is likely going to be the biggest issue.
Follow the steps below:
1. Right-click on an empty portion of your desktop and choose
Properties.
2. Select the Screen Saver tab.
3. Click the Power button.
4. A gray window should appear with several options that tell the
computer when to turn the monitor and hard drives off, or put the system
in standby or hibernation (hibernation only available for Windows XP
users).
There is no one way to configure these settings; experiment to see what
suits you best. I will say if you’re going to use the standby or
hibernation options, pick one and disable the other. I would recommend
hibernation over standby as it powers the computer all the way down,
protecting your data in the event of a power outage. As I touched on
before, the monitor consumes the most power and will be the most
advantageous to shut down when not in use. Don’t make the “time to
shutdown” too short as constantly powering the monitor and computer on and
off can cause unnecessary wear-and-tear on internal components. Turning
the hard drives off conserves some power and should lower the computer’s
internal temperature a bit. So, go ahead and put the power back in your
hands, and save some energy in the process.
This is a rather long one, but it is critical to follow these
guidelines!
"The simple fact is good internet safety is based on what I call the
Four Pillars of Internet Security. They are:
•
Firewall protection
•
Anti-Virus
•
Anti-Spyware
•
Patching
•
Anti-Phishing/Pharming
"With these basics, your internet experience is dramatically safer."
Antispam, antiphishing tools, content inspectors and the rest are not absolutely necessary. At least use the McAfee
Site Advisor that is available for Internet Explorer and Firefox.
Introducing Security On The Cheap
Getting these (mostly) free basics in now will make your internet
experience dramatically more secure. Here is one instance of the
old adage "you get what you pay for" that is not always true. Some
security programs are such resource "hogs" that they can bog down you
computer.
1. Get an antivirus program
Grisoft’s free antivirus is really good.
I’m a fan of CA’s free AV program. Well…it’s not totally free, but they
do give you one year free and then charge after that. And last but not
least is the free AntiVir. Want to pay? Kaspersky’s is excellent but it
costs ($40). If you want other suggestions, ask your friends or download
the various trial versions out there.
2. Get a software firewall
I’m not sure I would bother to spend money on a firewall, I don't. Either
ZoneAlarm or Sygate personal versions are fine and both free.
3. Get an Antispyware tool
The best commercial grade antispyware programs out there are CounterSpy
and WebRoot’s SpySweeper.
If you don’t want to spend $20 or more on a commercial antispyware
program. Microsoft’s free one is actually decent. The two other free ones
are Spybot and Adaware. These are the two I rely on the most. But get something and get it fast.
4. Patching
The final leg of the Four Pillars of Security is getting your security
patches from Microsoft (or whatever operating system you have). You would be amazed at how many people haven’t
updated to the latest patches.
That’s the list of the really important security programs.
Here’s a host of other little tools you can get that will make your
experience even safer:
Antiphishing
Download Cloudmark’s free antifraud tool. It’s great and if more people
used it, the phishers would be out of business!
Antispam
Some would argue that a spam filter is vital for security.
Actually, it really isn’t if you’re relatively intelligent, since spam
is more of a nuisance than anything else and if you can stand deleting
messages, you don’t need one. Plus you NEVER open any attachments or email
from people you do not know or trust. But that being said, spam
for some is a royal pain,
and a good antispam tool is can be a lifesaver.
"Here’s my advice: Have a primary email address you use for important
correspondence. Do not give it out to everybody. Have a
secondary email for "junk". This is the one you use for signing up
for things on the web, for those people that like to forward you every
joke they get. I also use gmail for a lot of my mail and have it
forwarded to me from there because they have an excellent anti-spam
filter plus you can check your mail from anywhere."
iHateSpam for $20 is pretty good. Cloudmark also has a very good one.
Shop around, but you’ll find there’s a lot of junk out there, believe me.
See the email etiquette article below for an easy way to reduce spam.
And then, of course, there is your operating environment. If you can
live with it, Linux or Macs are infinitely safer than PCs. Mainly
right now because the are less prevalent and not as big a target.
That is changing. Don’t want to
migrate to another OS? Then at least get Firefox, which will add a lot of
security to your browsing experience. That’s it for now. Feel free to
comment if you have any other ideas or opinions. Or email us as we
are constantly checking out new programs.
This excellent message ABSOLUTELY applies to ALL of us who send e-mails.
Do you really know how to forward e-mails? 50% of us do; 50% do NOT. Do
you wonder why you get viruses or junk mail? Do you hate it? Every time
you forward an e-mail there is information left over from the people who
got the message before you, namely their e-mail addresses & names.
As the messages get forwarded along, the list of addresses builds, and
builds, and builds, and all it takes is for someone to get a virus, and
his or her computer can send that virus to every e-mail address that has
come across his computer.
Or, someone can take all of those
addresses and sell them or send junk mail to them in the hopes that you
will go to the site and he will make five cents for each hit. That's
right, all of that inconvenience over a nickel!
How do you stop it? Well, there are two easy steps:
1) When you forward an e-mail, DELETE all of the other addresses that
appear in the body of the message. That's right, DELETE
them. Highlight them and delete them, backspace them, cut them,
whatever it is you know how to do. It only takes a second. You
MUST click the "Forward" button first, then you will have full editing
capabilities against the body and headers of the message.
If you don't click on "Forward" first, you won't be able to edit the
message at all.
2) Whenever you send an e-mail to more than one person, do NOT use the
To: or Cc: columns for adding e-mail address. Always use the
BCC: (blind carbon copy) column for listing the e-mail addresses. This
is the way that people you send to only see their own e-mail
address. If you don't see your BCC: option click on where it says To:
and your address list will appear. Highlight the address and
choose BCC: and that's it, it's that easy. When you send to BCC: your
message will automatically say "Undisclosed Recipients" in the "TO:"
field of the people who receive it.
So please, in the future, let's stop the junk mail and the viruses!
Finally, here's an idea!!! Let's send this to everyone we know. (but
strip my address off first). This is something that SHOULD be forwarded.
