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Welcome to our archive of helpful Macintosh
T I P S


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Dos and Don'ts

Problems

Timesavers and General Tidbits



 Dos and Don’ts

DO RUN MAINTENANCE REGULARLY

Your computer needs cleaning, just like your house. Run maintenance programs on a regular basis to keep your Macintosh performing well. Disk First Aid is typically available on a MacOS installation and should be run occasionally—once or twice a month is often sufficient. You can also purchase other disk utilities for more extensive and varied maintenance operations. Norton Utilities is a common choice (and recommended by BlueScreen), and MicroMat’s TechTool Pro is another option for your Macintosh.

DON’T WORK OFF OF A FLOPPY DISK

Many of us still use floppy diskettes to transport files. But if you work on (or make changes to) a file on a floppy, it can cause problems. You may get errors opening the files, and files can even be corrupted and lost. The best practice is to move your files off of the floppy onto your hard drive. Edit your files from your hard drive and save them there. When you are finished, move them back to the floppy disk.

DO KNOW WHAT CD-ROMS YOU HAVE WITH YOUR SYSTEM

When you buy a system (new or used), pay attention to what types of CDs come with it for your operating system and programs. Some systems come with separate CDs for the Windows operating system, word processing program, anti-virus software, etc. Other systems will come with only a Rescue CD.

A Rescue CD contains a snapshot of the computer as it was when it left the manufacturer. If serious problems develop on the system, the Rescue disk can only restore the system to the ‘snapshot’ state. The downside is serious: often this process erases all your information on your hard drive, which includes your personal files and data.

When you have the full, individual CDs for the operating system and programs, you have more options for repair, customization and recovery. Often, if problems develop, you can repair just the software that is causing the problem without losing your personal files or data. Also, let’s say you wish to uninstall a program to free up some hard drive space. This is no problem if you have the CD for that program—you can always reinstall it later. With Rescue CDs, this can be difficult or impossible to do.

The downside to purchasing a system with full, individual software CDs is that it might cost more. Companies spend more to purchase and distribute the numerous CDs that make up all of the installations on your system, so they pass this cost to you. When buying a system, you may have to decide if the cost is worth it to you.

Generally, BlueScreen Computer Services recommends having the full CD for each operating system and program, not the Rescue CD.

DO KNOW WHAT YOUR SOFTWARE’S SERIAL NUMBERS ARE

You almost always need a serial number to install any program or operating system.

If you’ve just bought the software, chances are that the serial number is right in front of you: on the box, CD cover or CD itself. But if you’re buying a used system or piece of used software, it may harder to find the serial number(s).

In such a case, be sure to ask if any serial numbers are required for using any of the CDs provided. You’ll need them to reinstall your programs if you ever have a problem. An installation CD without its serial number is usually useless.

DO KEEP YOUR ANTI-VIRUS SOFTWARE UPDATED

Installing your Anti-Virus software is not enough to protect against computer viruses. Your Anti-Virus software can only protect you against the list of viruses that it knows about. Everyday new viruses are created, and the makers of your Anti-Virus software is always working on updating their virus lists.

Your Anti-Virus software should have an easy-to-use update button or trigger—use it often! Once a week is a good general plan, but you aren’t causing any trouble if you wish to check for updates more often than that.

Just remember: if your Anti-Virus software doesn’t know about a new virus, then it will allow that virus past your computer’s defenses. Keep your software in-the-know.

DON’T TRUST EVERYTHING ON THE INTERNET

Be warned: there are many programs that will try to install themselves on your computer as you surf the internet, and all they need is for you to answer Yes to one question.

Some of these programs are good. They may help your internet browser show you certain graphics or play certain types of sound files. But many programs are not necessary and can actually bog your system down. One type of unnecessary software is ‘spyware’, which tracks information about you, your surfing habits and your computer, and sends it back to its creators.

When you meet up with any screen with a Yes or No question on it, do not click an answer before reading the question. Otherwise, you could install something you don’t want or need on your computer. If you don’t understand the question being posed, a safe option is usually to close the window via the ‘X’ button in the upper-right corner.

DON’T UNPLUG YOUR KEYBOARD OR MOUSE WHILE THE COMPUTER IS ON

Don’t disconnect any cables while your computer is powered up. A range of issues can arise if you remove a part of your computer without shutting down first—from error messages to internal system board damage.

The exceptions to this rule are USB and 1394 Standard hardware devices. These items support ‘hot-plugging’, or are ‘hot-swappable’, which means they can be added to and removed from a system at any time. If you have any doubts as to if a given hardware piece is hot-swappable, check its user manual so you don’t make a costly mistake.



Problems

ICONS NOT DISPLAYING PROPERLY

Sometimes a problem develops where the icons on your desktop are displayed wrong, or when you double-click a file icon, the program that created the file doesn’t open. This can indicate a problem with the Desktop Database.

The Desktop Database tracks file locations, icons and other information about your files, and can be recreated to fix such problems as mentioned above. Here’s what to do:

Reboot your Mac. While your computer starts up, hold down both the Option and the Command (Apple) keys. Continue to hold them down until you get a message asking if you want to rebuild the desktop on your drive. Click OK and you will then see a progress bar with the words 'Rebuilding the Desktop' in it. After that finishes, your Mac will finish booting and your icons should show up properly.



Timesavers and General Tidbits

WHATIS.COM

As with any field, the computer world has a lot of technical terms that can be confusing.

To better understand articles and user manuals, we recommend a particular website that strives to define every term in the computer world: Whatis.com. While some sites have good definitions for people who already know a lot about computers, Whatis.com defines terms in plain language, and has helpful cross-referencing for basic and advanced items.

Try them out at whatis.com.

SHORTER WAIT TIME TO BOOT

Macintoshes are ready for networking as soon as you start using them. Every time you boot your Mac, networking components load to prepare your Macintosh to join a network. But if you have no plans to connect your Mac to other computers, then there is no need to load these components. You can cut down on the time it takes to boot by telling your computer not to load these components.

To find these components, you will have to enter your Control Panels and open the Extensions Manager. You should be able to find the networking components here: AppleShare, File Sharing Extension, and Network Extension (also, File Sharing Monitor, Network, Sharing Setup, and Users & Groups on some Macs). Disable these items by clearing each item’s checkbox. When you are done, close the Extensions Manager and reboot.

Your Macintosh should now start up faster and have more memory available for your applications. And what you have just changed is reversible. If you ever decide you need these components to run, simply re-enable them in the Extensions Manager.

TAKE A SCREENSHOT

A screenshot is really a snapshot of what is displayed on your monitor. As long as your PC is not locked up, you can take a screenshot whenever you like.

Screenshots can be useful for a variety of reasons, but here’s our favorite one: a screenshot can serve as detailed evidence.

When a computer is having problems, you may see error messages. The message may be lengthy or very technical (or both). But it can be very useful to the person diagnosing your computer. If you get an error message you do not understand or would have difficulty remembering, take a screenshot. It’s the easiest way to save the message to give to others later.

To take a screenshot on a Macintosh, press Command + Shift + 3. This saves the monitor image as a PICT file on your hard drive, with the name PictureX (where X is a number from 0 to 9).





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