Theresa asks, “Is there any way to make my computer easier to use for someone with limited sight and hearing?” Windows includes a fantastic free utility for this called Accessibility Options. Within the Accessibility Options group you can address various visual and sound options.
Navigating to the Accessibility Options menu is quite easy in any version of Microsoft Windows. First, you will need to locate the Control Panel. Once in the control panel, make sure you have the “Traditional View” option selected which will display many options and their respective icons. The first icon in the Control Panel is Accessibility Options. Double click on it and a new window will open with multiple tabs.
There are two tabs you will be interested in. The “sounds” tab lists several options which, when checked, visually displays the system sound. In other words, if the computer normally makes a beep noise, a visual symbol would display indicating that sound. One tab over from sound is “display” which has options for making the screen higher contrast and changing the blinking cursor – one of the harder Windows components to see.
In addition to Accessibility Options you can adjust the Display Settings – also found in Control Panel. The “appearance” and “settings” tabs contain many options to change how Windows is displayed. There are settings for icon size, desktop size and overall Windows size. Good luck and if you have any other questions on this matter please e-mail them to me.
Jim has a question about Internet Explorer: “My Internet Explorer home page keeps changing, and most recently search results don’t seem to be relevant to what I’ve actually searched for. WHY?” You seem to be the victim of “browser hijacking.” I’ve been asked this question many times in the past but think it’s time to answer the question again with a few things you can try on your own.
At the shop we install A-Squared, Spybot and Malwarebytes (in addition to others) on every machine during routine service. You can download and install each of these from www.filehippo.com free of charge and use them for as long as you want. Once installed, each title is pretty simple to use and all function similarly. Prior to scanning with each piece of software you need to make sure they’re updated completely. I usually run each update twice to verify the software is completely up-to-date and run each singly using the ‘complete scan’ option in each piece of software.
Once each completes you may see a list of potentially bad malware, spyware, and viruses which need to be removed. Each of the three titles includes an automated removal utility which is initiated with a click. Sometimes the computer may need to be restarted to complete the process; however, most of the time the software will remove the infections without the need of a restart.
I am frequently asked why the installed virus software didn’t catch these or fix these problems in the first place. Virus software and those who create viruses are always playing a cat-and-mouse game to see who can outdo the other. In your case the authors of the virus (or viruses) won and you happened to be in the middle. Good luck and if you have questions please ask.
Tip of the week: I was recently invited to test a new product called Microsoft Security Essentials and I’m pleased to say it did an outstanding job. Security Essentials includes utilities for virus, spyware and malware removal. On my test system it did an outstanding job – though I would install it in addition to your normal arsenal of software mentioned earlier. You can download a free copy from Microsoft.com.
(Jeromy Patriquin is the President of Laptop & Computer Repair, Inc. located at 509 Main St. in Gardner. You can e-mail him at Jeromy@LocalComputerWiz.com or call him directly at (978) 919-8059.)