Q: Is it possible for me to upgrade the Radeon hd3470 graphics card in my Toshiba a305-s6841 laptop?
A: Unfortunately the answer is no. Most laptops do not allow you to upgrade anything besides the hard drive and the memory (RAM). This is the case for your Toshiba laptop as well.
Q: Can I run Microsoft Office 2007 Student Edition on Microsoft Windows XP Home Edition?
A: You can as long as you have Service Pack 2 (SP2) installed. You can find more requirements over at the Microsoft Office 2007 Requirements site.
Q: I have 2 laptops, one is Windows XP home, the other is Vista and I have the same problem on both. I have a DOS based database that I maintain. The problem is the size of the window that opens is too small to work on comfortably. It will not let me use the mouse to make it bigger and it won’t maximize like normal windows do. I’ve gone to properties and have been thru every tab including font, screen, and nothing I do helps to make the window open to a reasonable larger size for viewing. The full screen option works, but then I can’t toggle to another window without closing the dos program.
A: The only answers are in the properties window so I am going to walk you though the different options to see if you missed any. The first one is the Full Screen option, which you already explained does not work for you but for other people that might be an option so to get to it you click on the bar above the console window and go to Properties. Then in the first tab called Options you will see a section called Display Options and from here you can select Full Screen and then press Ok to have it apply to your window.
DOS Console/ Command Prompt
Dos Console Options
The second option is to modify the Front tab, to get a bigger font. Then from there move onto the Layout tab to change the Window Size. Changing the window size will allow you to make the window take up more space and show more characters per line. The Width controls how many characters wide each line will be and the Height number controls how many lines will show in the window. So change those until you have the window the size you want to show all the information you need.
Dos Console Font
Dos Console Layout
Q: I have a Mac PowerBook G4 running OS X 10.4.11 and I am trying to connect to a windows computer in my office using SMB and I cannot connect. I get an error message that says Error -36. How do I connect to a windows computer?
A: Well you seem to have to parts to your question. The second part of the question is how do I connect to a windows computer. I am pretty sure you know how to do this because in the first part you say you get an error when you connect but just in case you are not sure how to actually connect here are the steps. Open Finder then go to Go -> Connect to Server… and then you would type in smb://ip_address.
Now the first part of your question seems to have to do with how the actual windows server is setup. You will need to check your Console to see if you have the following message mount_smbfs: session setup phase failed and if you do then you know you have an issue where Finder is trying to pass an encrypted password and windows server is expecting a clear text password.
The easiest solution to this is to tell whoever is running the windows server that they should not be allowing plain text passwords and have them change the configuration of the server to require encrypted passwords and then everything will just work. You can get more information off apples support site.
Q: I have a MacBook running OS X 10.4.11 and just got a used Panasonic mini DV Palmcorder (PalmSight). There’s a firewire connection from the camera to the computer but when I plug it in and turn it on nothing comes up on the desktop. I’m assuming I need some software but can’t find anything other than spam on the web.
A: The special software you are looking for should be installed on your computer already and it is called iMovie. You should be able to find it in your Application folder because it comes installed on all Macs.
You will want to connect your DV camcorder to your computer, make sure it is in play mode, open iMovie, then go to File -> Import from Camera… and this should bring up a window allowing you to import the video from your DV camcorder.
Q: How do you transfer data from a floppy disk onto a USB flash drive?
A: The process is fairly straightforward and should be simple enough. First put your floppy disk in your computer and then connect the USB flash drive to your computer.
Go to My Computer, you can get there either by going to Start -> My Computer or you might have a My Computer icon right on your desktop.
From there you should see your USB flash drive and your floppy disk drive. First open up the floppy disk drive by clicking on it. Then from there open up another My Computer window and then select the USB flash drive.
Once you have both windows open you can drag the files from the floppy disk drive to the USB flash drive.
Q: How do I transfer files from my old computer to my new one when my old one can’t turn on anymore?
A: You have two choices when it comes to transferring your files from a computer that does not work to your new computer.
The cheapest solution is to take the hard drive out of your old computer and put it in your new computer. This usually requires knowing a little bit about computers and possibly about jumpers on your hard drive.
If you do not mind spending the money and doing it yourself is not something you want to deal with or do not think you can then you can always bring the two computers to your local computer shop and for a nominal fee they should be more than happy to move the drive from the dead computer to the new computer.
The other solution is to buy a USB hard drive enclosure that you would install your old hard drive into. So you would take your drive out of the old computer and put it in the USB hard drive enclosure. The process is pretty simple and this solution would actually be more cost effective than bringing both computers to a computer shop. Also, once you are done, you have an external USB hard drive that you can use for backups (once, of course, you get all the data off the drive that you need).
Q: I am getting a new computer and will be using it primarily for gaming. Should I go with a 2.4GHz Quad Core processor or a 3.0GHz Dual Core?
A: When it comes to video gaming, processor speed is one of the most important factors. Most video games right now are not built to take advantage of multiple processors or multiple cores in a processor so the number of processors or cores really is not a major factor. You should be more worried about cores when you do multiple things at a time not when you are planning on putting all your computers energy into one task.
So I would say go with the 3.0GHz Dual Core processor. This will allow your computer to do all the background processing tasks on one core while your game can run quickly on the other core at a faster clock speed.
Q: Do Ethernet cards have any effect on ADSL Internet speed?
A: The simple is no, your Ethernet card does not effect the speed of the connection between the DLS modem and your Internet service provider (ISP). There is also very little chance that your DLS speed is after than your Ethernet network card.
So lets get a little more specific and figure out if you can get a little more out of your Internet connection. The normal or average speed of a DSL connection is 1.5 Mbps but they can go much faster. For example my DSL connection is 6.0 Mbps.
Ethernet network cards come in 3 main speeds, 10/100/1000 Mbps. All of these are faster than the average DSL connection so your Ethernet card is probably not slowing you down.
If you have a really old network card, a 10 Mbps card, and it does not have a full duplex mode, that is sending and receiving of data at the same time, then your experience could be better than it is. What this means is if you are sending data, uploading an MP3 file, and you are downloading at the same time, your Ethernet network card has to do one or the other, it cannot do both. So by switching to a card that supports full duplexing you can see better performance.
Also, most modern date Ethernet cards now support technology that allows the data to go from the Ethernet network card directly to your hard drive without going though the CPU. Again most modern computers do this so that helps to speed things up because then downloading items wont actually use up your processor and it allows you to do other things.
I hope you have found this helpful beyond the basic answer that your Ethernet network card is probably considerably faster than your DSL connection but there are some technologies out there that do help a little here and there.
Q: I have downloaded music to my computer and then loaded it on to itunes. When I delete the music from the folder on my computer, itunes won’t play it anymore. Is there a way to permanently move the music into itunes so that I can delete it from my drive?
A: It is actually rather easy to tell iTunes to organize your folder and to copy files to iTunes. If you are using Windows go to Edit -> Preferences… and then select the Advanced Tab and it should default to the General sub tab. If you are using OS X select iTunes -> Preferences… and then select the Advanced Tab it should default to the General sub tab.
From here you want to select the first two check boxes Keep iTunes Music Folder organized and Copy files to iTunes Music folder when adding to library.
