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Leo Laporte A technology journalist, author and broadcast personality. His specialties lie in computers, the Web, video games, digital music and consumer electronics. |
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Amber MacArthur An experienced Web content and usability strategist, Amber is also a tech journalist who specializes in Internet, software, and gadget trends and tips. |
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Cleaning Laptop Screens
Terry, Arizona City, AZ
Q: What do use to clean the screen for a laptop?
My favorite product is Klear Screen. I strongly recommend against using any ammonia or alcohol based cleaner like Windex. This will strip the glare coating off your screen. Klear Screen is very gentle and does a great job. It also comes with appropriate soft, lint free cleaning cloths.
Do Not Intrude Registry
Melanie, Washington, OH
Q: I just ran across the website blue security (http://www.bluesecurity.com/default.asp). it allows you to add your name to a "do not spam" registry and allows you to actively deter spam by reporting spammers via a downloaded program. i would like to know if this program, and other types like it, are any good? do they work? do they actually decrease the amount of spam you receive? also, the program is, regrettably, only for windows systems. i’m on a macintosh. is there anything i can do to rid myself of these unwanted e-mails.
Blue Frog is a unique and possibly effective spam fighting solution that relies on its 75,000 members to actively deter spammers. It will never stop all spam, because for the most part spammers are renegades and immune to polite requests or even threats, but it may be an effective part of a larger anti-spam strategy. This blog posting from the Spam Kings blog at O’Reilly.net does a good job of explaining the pros and cons: http://spamkings.oreilly.com/archives/2005/12/the_blue_frog_has_teeth.htmlThe good news is that its free and it couldn’t hurt to sign up. The bad news for you, is there’s only Windows and Macintosh clients.
My recommendation for all users to to encourage your ISP to add server side anti spam filtering. By blocking spam at the server you’ll download far fewer messages. Many ISPs offer the free open source Spam Assassin to their customers and it works very well. If your ISP doesn’t offer spam filtering, you might want to try a service like OnlyMyEmail, http://onlymyemail.com. It’s $3 a month and very effective.
Even a server-side solution won’t block all spam. On the Mac I recommend using Mail’s built-in spam filtering to get the rest, or Michael Tsai’s SpamSieve, it’s $25. Both of these computer side solutions have to learn what you consider spam, so some training is required before they’re truly effective.
I Forgot My Password
Cindy, Erie, PA
Q: Honest to God!! I forgot my password on my older computer. The only way I can access it now is thru my granddaughters desktop and she has no admin rights. She’s 11. I thought you’d said something in one of your shows about accessing admin thru safe mode. I tried it and no luck. HELP!!!
p.s. Love your show. I work days when its on, so I record it daily and watch it when I’m home.
In XP there’s a hidden Administrator account you can usually access by booting to safe mode, entering Administrator with a blank password. But you’re using the more secure Windows 2000 and that old trick won’t work. I recommend the free Emergency Boot CD from http://ebcd.pcministry.com/. It’s a Linux boot disc that can wipe out all your passwords so you can start over. It’s free, but you must have access to a computer that can download the file and burn it to a CD for booting. platforms enforced by many cell carriers. I believe this will change, and that Java will be the language of choice going forward.
