About twice a year I’m required to send a fax to a business, doctor etc. The problem is that I got rid of my fax machine a couple of years ago when I got rid of my phone land line. I then end up going to a friends house or Office Max and while it’s not a big deal, there is an easier solution.
MyFax.com has a free fax service if you have needs are minimal. You are limited to two faxes a day plus the file must not exceed 10MB in size and contain a maximum of 10 pages. Supported files types include Microsoft Word, Excel, PowerPoint, PDF, TIF, GIF, JPEG, etc.
Here’s a link which shows all the ways you can send your message.(click here)
VLC 1.0 is a great program to watch just about any video. It’s open source and free, but donations are welcome. Give it a try – I think you’ll like it.
BB Flashback Express has a free screen and audio capture utility which sure beats having to pay $100’s to use Camtasia. I haven’t given it a try (I have Camtasia),but for free what have you got to lose?
Many times I’ll get a phone call wanting some computer help and I try to help as best as I can, but it’s always aggravating since I can’t see the other person’s computer screen. Here’s a solution – LogMeIn.com.
If you have them setup a LogMeIn account and download and install the software, you can then view their computer screen and see exactly what they’re doing. This is FREE for the basic version while the Pro version is $200. There are similar products, but no other free versions of similar software.
Here’s a nice YouTube video explaining the process:
One fairly easy and free way to protect the kids (and yourself) on the internet is to use OpenDNS as a way to connect to sites. It has parental controls with 50 filtering categories plus phishing protection. You can even make the changes on your router so that all computers in your house will be protected. You do need to create an account with OpenDNS, but that is easily done. I’m running it on my main computer to give it a test.
Instead of using Google to find specific sites, AllMyFaves.com puts many of them together with a pleasing appearance and easy interface. Thanks to MarkP for this tip.
Adobe Reader seems to be having more security flaws lately. One way to reduce those problems is to turn off Javascript in Adobe Reader. Here’s how to do it:
Open any PDF document.
- Edit
- Preferences
- Javascript – uncheck the box to enable Javascript.
If you’d ever like to know what hardware and software (including serial numbers) are on your computer, you have two nice options. Belarc or System Information. Both are free and will tell you everything you need to know about what is on your computer.
Windows 7 should be coming out in a few months and if you can wait, you’ll be rewarded. All the press I’ve seen lately says Windows 7 is MUCH BETTER than Vista. Here’s a site with many of the new features.(click here).
Note – Windows7 is slated for an October 22nd release!
About twice a year I’m required to send a fax to a business, doctor etc. The problem is that I got rid of my fax machine a couple of years ago when I got rid of my phone land line. I then end up going to a friends house or Office Max and while it’s not a big deal, there is an easier solution.
Many times I’ll get a phone call wanting some computer help and I try to help as best as I can, but it’s always aggravating since I can’t see the other person’s computer screen. Here’s a solution – 
PCMAG.com has a great list of 173 Free applications which might just be all you need for your computing needs. (
