Tips Of The Day For February 2001

Tip Of The Day For February 25, 2001: Most people, when they are buying a new PC, jump straight into the purchase decision. This is usually not the best way to end up with a PC that is best for you. Before you can find hardware that meets your needs, you must ascertain what your needs are! In The PC Buyer's Guide, I begin with a section on Requirements Analysis that's a must read for anyone looking at getting a new PC system.

Tip Of The Day For February 18, 2001: When considering different Internet access options and technologies, be sure to find out all the "fine print". This includes both up-front and on-going hardware and software costs, as well as monthly subscription minimums. Also be sure to have the company tell you in advance about any hardware restrictions or limitations, before you sign on the dotted line...

Tip Of The Day For February 11, 2001: You can improve the performance of your system slightly, and also free up some disk space, by periodically emptying your browser's disk cache. This will get rid of the browser's locally-stored copies of recently-accessed web pages. Bear in mind that doing this will cause slight delays the next time you go to pages that were previously cached.

Tip Of The Day For February 7, 2001: If you have critical data backed up onto removable media such as tapes or disk cartridges, it's a good idea to store at least one media set in a different physical location from where the data normally resides. This gives you some protection in the event of physical disaster. Remember to rotate the off-site media set occasionally.

Tip Of The Day For February 4, 2001: Many motherboards built in the late 1990s will support both EDO SIMMs and SDRAM DIMMs--but usually not both at the same time. Most EDO SIMMs are 5V devices, and SDRAM DIMMs are usually 3.3V. If you mix them you can damage the DIMMs when they get hit with the 5V power being fed to the SIMMs. This isn't true of all motherboards, but it is the case with quite a few of them. As always, consult your motherboard manual and/or motherboard maker's web site before performing any type of upgrade.

Tip Of The Day For February 1, 2001: If you are making a web site, avoid putting spaces into file names. While technically legal, not all browsers seem to handle them correctly, and they also confuse some users.

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