Happy Birthday to us!

October 2023 marks 20 years of IT Know Howe Computer Services. There have been a lot of changes during that time.

Windows XP was still relatively new to everyone back then and lots of people still had Windows 98, while businesses had Windows 2000.

In 2003 80% of people had dial up for Internet access. Remember the dial up tones? Play that noise to anyone under 20 and they’ve no idea what it is. The broadband revolution had started with initial speeds 10 times faster than dial up, which was amazing in the day. That was a download speed of 0.5Mbps!

To put internet connection speeds in perspective, it used to take 3 minutes to download 1 MB over dial up. So a 4 MB file would take 12 minutes to download back then. I recently downloaded a 5600MB file (5.6GB) in the same amount of time. What a contrast!

Since 2003 there have been 7 versions of Microsoft Office. And each time it’s changed the previous version was better so everyone would say!

Then there were the actual PCs, which were so fantastic at the time. A run of the mill computer had 128MB of memory compared to 8000MB now (that’s 8GB of course). And your hard drive was normal if it was only 8GB in size!!

While a lot has changed, Fiona and I are still here. All you need to remember is : “For computer support made simple, just call IT Know Howe”.

Posted in Articles, Featured, News

Unsubscribe for Unsolicited Emails

I see lots of Inboxes literally bursting with advertising emails. You know the sort I mean, the ones from every company you’ve ever bought something from and every company in their group.

For all these legitimate companies, there is a legal requirement for them to give you an option to UNSUBSCRIBE. So why not use it?

The next time you get an email offering you discounted gardening goods from a company you once bought a hoe from, open it, scroll to the bottom and look for the VERY small print where you will almost certainly find the word UNSUBSCRIBE. Click on it and another page will open, often telling you simply that you have already been unsubscribed. (If it doesn’t, then read the words carefully and take the steps necessary).

I hardly get any of this sort of marketing material, because I have unsubscribed.

Now, that’s not to say I don’t get a LOT of rubbish emails, but these others are just scams which I cannot stop and just get deleted.

So, take action and help keep you Inbox free of emails you can actually stop being sent in the first place.

Posted in Articles, Featured

Restart to install Windows Updates

When people tell me their computers are running slow, a common problem I find is that Windows Updates have not properly installed.

Ultimately there is a simple answer to resolve this: restart the computer. Now, that is not SHUT DOWN, but rather RESTART. At this point an often “stuck” Windows Update will install, even though there was no indication one was pending.

I would always recommend RESTARTING when you see the option in the list as you go to shut down your computer/laptop. By selecting UPDATE AND RESTART all the pending Windows Updates will install, whereas using the UPDATE AND SHUT DOWN option can leave some items still hanging around in the background, waiting for a restart.

Select Update and Restart

If you are someone who constantly puts their laptop to sleep, then do give it a restart once a week, just so it can clear its thoughts and install any updates should they be pending.

Posted in Articles, Featured