Tech Spot

I just recently upgraded to Outlook 2007 (in 2011, I know).  The calendar reminders weren't working even though I made sure default reminders were turned on.  I missed a meeting or two. :(   What worked for me was to close Outlook, then open a Command Prompt (Start > Run > cmd).  Then go to the directory containing outlook.exe to clean the reminders database.  Type the following (in bold ) from the command prompt: C:\Documents and Settings\User> cd "\program files\microsoft office\office12" C:\Program Files\Microsoft Office\Office12> outlook /cleanreminders Start Outlook and your reminders should pop up.  If not, follow this link to an in-depth article for more troubleshooting: Outlook Reminders Problem

Amazingly simple fix for this, yet mind-boggling as to why it works.  I run Windows 7 64-bit Home Premium on my desktop PC, and MP Navigator kept crashing whenever I tried to scan something from my Canon Pixma all-in-one. This solution is courtesy of some posters on answers.microsoft.com  .  There are some shortcuts in a directory, maybe from when your PC manufacturer installed Windows.  I only had a MSN link in there. You may want to back up other shortcuts if you have added some yourself and copy them to the Desktop or add them to your browser bookmarks. THE FIX: "Believe it or not, the solution to this is so much simpler. Go to the following directory: C:\Users\[your user name]\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\Network Shortcuts And delete the short cut in there to web sites. All fixed!"

Many people already use the fantastic (and free!) VideoLAN VLC media player or Media Player Classic (also free) to play videos.  But newer digital cameras and camcorders with 720p or 1080i/1080p output are using the AVCHD ( A dvanced  V ideo  C oding  H igh  D efinition)  output format.  Unfortunately this means you get to see a blank video or extremely choppy video when playing it back on your computer. Here's how to play without choppiness (provided your Windows computer is relatively newer and not say, a netbook). 1) If you don't already have it, download the excellent  Media Player Classic HC version  (offshoot of the "original" MPC, which appears to have ceased development).  Remember to pick the "x64" download option if you are running Vista 64-bit or Windows 7 64-bit. 2)  Download the ffdshow codec  and install. 3) Run MPC-HC, go to View -> Options and select 'Output' under Playback.  Change the DirectShow video to "EVR"

It seems hard drive makers have long struggled with fierce competition, leading them to manufacture disks that are not terribly reliable.  Hitachi/IBM had the infamous Deskstar 75GXP (aptly renamed the Deathstar by exasperated owners and amused bystanders).  I do believe Hitachi has long since recovered from that.  When my Samsung HD642JJ 640GB SATA drive started showing a S.M.A.R.T. B8 end-to-end error code, I sought to find a good replacement without having to set up RAID.  My initial research brought me to the Western Digital Caviar Black series, and then to their enterprise offering, the RE3 and RE4.  However, reviews on Newegg.com and Amazon.com showed no anecdotal improvement in reliability (around 10%+ DOA and quick failures, though poor packaging may have been to blame).  I ended up getting the well-reviewed Samsung HD103SJ 1 TB SATA 7200 RPM 3.5" HD.  Now here is how I ended up almost botching the data transfer: 1) I read that XXCLONE was much easier to install and use,

I recently installed Cygwin with bash as my preferred shell.  Most shell prompts simply give you a $  or # sign by default.  You don't know where you are in the directory structure unless you type pwd .  There is a simple line you can place in your .bashrc  file in your Cygwin home directory (C:\Cygwin\home\ userid ). If you don't have a text editor or aren't familiar with the UNIX editors such as vi (bvi) or emacs, I'd recommend nano .  If you don't have nano installed (check by simply running nano  in the Cygwin window).  You can install that by re-running the Cygwin setup.exe in Windows.  In the setup, expand the Editors section and click the area to the left of Nano until you can check its checkbox, then proceed with the setup.   nano  has more of a Notepad-like interface than anything else I've seen.  To edit your .bashrc  file with nano , simply type: nano .bashrc Scroll down to the bottom (use your arrow keys or press Ctrl-V).  Add the following line:

I installed Cygwin with the default options, but did not like how the terminal window was based on the Windows CMD (command line).  I did some reading and found that many people recommend mintty which is based off PuTTY v0.60, arguably a better terminal interface. However once you install mintty, you don't automatically get your shell.  Running mintty from the Start menu or shortcut icons just dropped me into the /usr/bin directory with limited shell functionality (couldn't do ls , etc. but could do cd ).  Weird.  The way to get this right is to edit the C:\Cygwin\cygwin.bat file from Windows, remove or comment out the default shell call, for example: @echo off C: cd C:\cygwin\bin REM bash --login -i start mintty.exe c:\cygwin\bin\bash --login -i You also might want to look into other startup options such as sizing of the window; you have different options  like: start mintty.exe -s 120,60 c:\cygwin\bin\bash --login -i           [opens a mintty window with 120 cols, 6