Computer Help Desk ...

Quote: Fleastiff

Got this cheapie Wireless Printer from Canon via Amazon.
I can't even get it to work and I already hate the thing.

My laptop sees my own wifi network and also the canon installation network but it won't see each at the same time.

Even if i'm on the canon wifi network nothing I type seems to do anything to the printer and nothing I do to 'settings' on my laptop lets the laptop 'see' the printer.

I think you have to get the printer logged on to your home wireless network. I just did this for my mother when she got an upgradede wifi.

I would suggest plugging the printer into the laptop via cable first so your computer for sure sees it, then install it as a printer. After that the computer should "look for it."

The instructions probably direct you to connect your laptop to the Canon installation network, then go to a specific webpage that is actually the printer control panel, and use that control panel to get the printer to join your own wireless network.

I did it, I'm replacing my 5 year
old HP laptop with a refurbished
HP laptop. It was a tossup it with
a refurbished Dell, which was the
same price. The Dell had no camera,
and I've had good luck with HP's,
so I went with that.

I looked it up and 3-5 years is the
expected life of a laptop. I've had
problems lately. First, keys on the
keyboard stopped working, so
I got a wireless one. Now the
screen is wonky at times, lots
of red/green lines and sometimes
it doesn't come on at all. So
get another one before this fails.

Now I get the fun of transferring
all the files to the new laptop.
This is my first solid state hard
drive. 8GB of RAM, 250MB drive.
The one I have now is 4MB of
RAM and a disk hard drive. I
read the solid state's are faster.

$300 at Target, about $550 new.

Quote: Evenbob

This is my first solid state hard drive. 8GB of RAM, 250MB drive. The one I have now is 4MB of RAM and a disk hard drive. I read the solid state's are faster.

$300 at Target, about $550 new.

Updating data is more complex for SSDs. All the data in a block must be refreshed when any portion of it is updated. The data on the old block is copied to a different block, the block is erased, and the data is rewritten with the changes to a new block.

But generally SSDs are faster and much more reliable since there are no moving parts. They also use less energy so your battery lasts longer. Generally a 250 GB solid state drive is the same price as a terabit hard drive.


As you can usually get an 8 GB USB drive for a few dollars, I am assuming you mean 250 GB drive and not 250 MB drive.

Transferring files is easy these days. Just use Dropbox.

Been using an SSD laptop for almost 2 years. runs like a champ. takes quite a bit to cause any lag

My new HP laptop came yesterday. It's
half as thick, half as heavy, and is twice
as fast as my 2013 HP. It boots up very
quickly, does everything much faster.
The 2013 was twice as fast as the 2006
it replaced.

The first thing I did was try and get
Norton from Xfinity because it's
free to account holders. What an
ordeal. You can't just go and enter
you password and download any more,
that's too easy.

Now they send you to Norton with
a code and Norton does it for you.
The guy actually took over control
of my computer and was going to
install Norton, but I had to verify my
email and Yahoo was down right
then and he couldn't do it.

And am I glad. I looked at the security
that came with the HP and it was a new
version of Windows Defender that I
didn't know about. MS beefed up WD
to the point where it's now competitive
with Norton and McAfee. I read a bunch
of articles and learned what a bad deal
Norton is.

It downloads a huge amount of files and
is constantly running in the background
and slows the computer down by 10%.
WD is built in and only slows it by 4%.
This new version has only been around
a couple of years, I haven't set up a
computer in 5 years.

That Norton guy emailed me twice today
urging me to get Norton protection right
away. Of course, it's a sale for him, he
gets paid by Xfinity every time they sign
up a new sucker.

Something else I didn't know. When I sign
into Chrome on the new HP, all my bookmarks
come with it. Same with Firefox. That means
those companies have access to the info I
have on my browser. I had no idea, I thought
that stuff was on my machine, not on theirs.

Quote: Evenbob

Something else I didn't know. When I sign
into Chrome on the new HP, all my bookmarks
come with it. Same with Firefox. That means
those companies have access to the info I
have on my browser. I had no idea, I thought
that stuff was on my machine, not on theirs.

Chrome for sure is in the cloud. Last time I did Firefox I still had to add my bookmarks.

Anyone know how to make sure a .pdf fills the entire page?

I print reports of 150-300 pages and the .pdf always seems to shrink to fit the smallest pages. I need to have every page automatically fill to the entire 8.5x14 size as some are too small to read. When I print files to the printer, they fill. On .pdf, they shrink.

The refurbished HP I got was made
the same year as my old one, 2013.
The difference is, my old one cost
$400 in 2013 and the refurbished
one was over $1300. It has a bigger
Intel processor and a SS hard drive,
and more RAM.

So I paid $300 now for something
that would cost over $1400 in today's
money. It looks brand new, there
isn't a mark on it.

Most refurb's come from gov't leases.
The feds and states lease hundreds
of thousands of computers a year from
Dell and HP and others. Some of them
get very little use. My old one looks like
it's been in a war zone, the new one
has not got a flaw.