backup

it never hurts to be prepared, even overly prepared. i have the opportunity to fly several times a month. there are 2 radios that are built into the plane. both of these radios have been marginal since i have been flying the plane. last night as i was flying back from atl both of the radios failed. number 1: it was night time, 2: i was dodging weather. these factors combined made a bad situation. this is where backup came into effect. i carry a small handheld radio for such a circumstance. it was working well enough for me to communicate until the batteries died. again i had a backup, spare batteries. phew. i was able to complete the flight with no declared emergencies. i was very thankful that i had been prepared for this. my backups saved the day.

keep it clean

one of the easiest ways for you to make sure that our computer performs well is to keep it clean. i always tell people that you should maintain a clean desktop (mac or pc). on a pc, keep your taskbar clean. if you don’t use a program remove it. if you download a program delete the installation file once it is installed. clean your computer on a monthly basis. on a pc, go to system tools from the all programs menu and do a disk clean up and defragment. on a mac, purchase a program called disk warrior. Go through your computer and get our files organized and delete ones that you don’t need. and BACK UP. it is so important to do this because computers fail.

nascar

ok, this is just plain funny. i had to post this because i was laughing so much at it.

windows cannot load

how many times have you seen the black screen of death on your pc and it says that windows cannot find this file? if you have not seen it and you use a pc, give it some time, you will. the microsoft recommendation will have you in a tailspin by the time you read the end of the repair article. i did not even want to attempt it after reading the article for fear that i would lose an entire day.

there is an easier way. place your windows operating system disk in your cd drive and boot to it. instead of going into the repair console, boot into the install portion of windows. once there select the option to install windows. i know, it sounds scary, but trust me. it will then search for previous versions of windows. once it finds windows, you will be able to select the option for repair. this will reinstall windows and maintain all your files and settings.

vista

the more i encounter vista, the more i dislike it. i have tried to use it, i have given it a fare chance. i dislike it for many reasons, but the main one is, it makes a fast computer slow. there is so much going on in vista and none of it makes your computer faster. the vast warnings that you get when you try to accomplish the simplest of tasks will drive you insane. i get the opportunity to go into people’s homes and set up networks and comps. i recently was on what should have been a blazing machine. guess what?, it had vista. it made this machine crawl. it also networks poorly with its own with previous versions of windows. i am not saying that it cannot be done, but it is not as easy as it should be.

little lance

 i am absolutely elated over the arrival of my son, lance. my wife carrie did such a phenomenal job during labor. she is a champ, no pain killers at all. we got in the hospital room at 5pm and he was here at 630pm. that was fast!! things are going really great for the z’s. lance sleeps a lot. his demeanor is so much different then my daughter emma. he is calm, kewl and collective. there is nothing in the world like having a child. it is a joy that is unexplainable. if you would like to see more here is an online album.

jeremy

i had the privilege of attending jeremy’s bachelor party last night. to say that he endured a right of passage into manhood would be an understatement. let me just say this, they would have never got me to do what he did. he does not easily embarrass like i do. there would have been some fight in me. there was absolutely none in him. he fully cooperated with everything we asked him to do, no questions asked.

on a more technical note, trojans are nasty viruses. the best thing to do when you get one of these things is to wipe out your computer. only after you back up your data of course. another course of action is to remove your hard drive and scan it on another host machine. this way the trojan cannot hide inside if windows.

camp

it is that busy time of year again. things are going relatively smoothly for a campmeeting as it pertains to tech. i am proud of all my volunteers. they do a bang up job and it all would not be possible w/o them.

i have a favorite speaker each year, someone that really says something to me. this year it is gary oliver. he really brought a word. he spoke deep into my life. i highly recommend this dvd. calvary

hotkeys

i am a huge fan of hotkeys. wether it is on a pc, mac, or phone. i like to get to the place where i need to be as quickly as possible. these hotkeys can be found in help menu’s or even in the menu that you navigated to in the firstplace. 
menu pic

menu pic you will notice that i just pulled up the file menu in safari (mac’s browser). all the info on the right side is hotkeys. the same applies for any other browser be it firefox or internet explorer.  

re-check

ok, wow, this is my first blog. these are going to be really short because, frankly i don’t have that much to say.

check and recheck your work. i was having a problem with a computer and thought that all hope was lost. i could not get the thing to boot into bios much less an os. after checking all the normal routes (ram, video card, additional pci components), i left it alone. i came back a day later and decided to recheck my work. the video card was not seated properly. bang, i was able to reload and start from scratch.