Computer & Internet Newbie Guide

Help Unzipping Files You’ve learned to download files and now what do you do with them? Most seem to have the .zip extension. These files (.zip) are compressed PC files which make downloading large files a much quicker job. But to utilize these files, you’ll need to unzip them first. Here’s how to do that: [...]

Help Defragmenting Your Hard Drive It’s important to keep your computer running smoothly and one way to do that is to regularly defragment your hard drive. Defragging your computer simply reorganizes your computer bits to run more smoothly and efficiently. Even your computer can get messy! A good rule of thumb is to do this [...]

Your taskbar is the bar located at the bottom of your screen. Here are a few tips to change things up a bit if you wish: Hide Your Taskbar If you don’t wish your taskbar to be visible while working within programs or surfing the net, simply tweak the taskbar to hide until you want [...]

Setting A Screensaver Password Here’s an easy way to password protect your computer when you step away for a bit: Right click on an empty place on your desktop Select ‘Properties’ Click the ‘Screensaver’ Tab Click the ‘Password Protect’ box (or it may say ‘On resume, password protect’) Click ‘Apply’ Click ‘OK’ Now it’s set [...]

As you download more files and create more documents and notes on your computer, you’ll find that your desktop can get quite full and messy. It’s easy to fix and get organized again! Right click on an empty spot on your desktop Select New Select Folder Name the folder (example ‘ebooks’) Drag and drop all [...]

It’s a good idea to make backups of your files and save them off your computer for safekeeping. You can use floppy disks (also known as diskettes) to do that: Go to the file you want to save Right click on the file Select ‘Send To’ Select ‘A:’ or ’3.5″ Floppy’ Insert Floppy to your [...]

Finding Files On Your Computer If you can’t remember where you saved a file on your computer, try using the ‘Find’ option. Go Start Select ‘Search’ Select ‘Files or Folders’ Enter the file name in the ‘Search For Files Or Folders Name’ box in the top left corner Click ‘Search Now’ Your computer will scan [...]

Having files open in the wrong programs (hey even your web browser!) can be quite frustrating, but it’s too easy to set a file association by mistake. Your text documents are opening in Internet Explorer, your picture files are opening in Paint (when you don’t want them to), it’s frustrating! Here’s how you fix that: [...]