Newsletter Archives

In this edition:
Administrator Uninstalling
Sneak Peek Your Emails
Vista Auto Defrag

It's hard to believe we're already one quarter of the way through 2008!

But nonetheless, it's time for another edition of our tips and tricks where we give you some helpful information which we hope makes your everyday computing experience a little bit better than it was.

How to Uninstall as Administrator

To answer the first question, administrator (admin) rights are the equivalent of super-user rights. You can have several users authorised to use a single computer but you may not want them to be able to delete other users' files or the all important system files. You may not even want them to be able to install software just to ensure that they don't accidentally install a virus!

Chances are, there's at least one user account (maybe yours?) on your computer that has been setup with admin rights. But you still may get messages about needing admin rights. It's actually possible that your admin rights are FULL admin rights. This happens more often when the retailer has installed and set-up Windows XP for you.

What you may not know is that Windows XP also has a 'secret' administrator account. You won't normally see it when you login to XP but you can use it in Safe Mode and you'll need to do this to uninstall that pesky program that doesn't know it should do as you say.

To get into Safe Mode, turn on/restart your computer and when the computer manufacturer's logo is displayed start pressing the F8 key. (You'll probably need to press it several times.) You'll then see the Windows Advanced Options menu where you can select Safe Mode. (Note that your internet connection won't work.)

When you see the Windows XP login screen, you'll see the 'secret' Administrator account. By default, the Administrator account has no password. So, unless you or someone else has changed it, just press the Enter key when prompted for a password.

After you're in Windows Safe Mode as the administrator, just use the Control Panel's Add or Remove Programs to uninstall any software that wouldn't uninstall before.

How to Preview your Emails in Outlook
If you're still clicking to open every email you get to see if it's worth reading in full, then this tip is for you.

You can actually read the email without opening it in Outlook by using the Preview Pane. To activate it, go to View > Preview Pane.

In Outlook 2007, it called the Reading Pane and can be chosen by clicking View > Reading Pane and then choosing how you want the Preview Pane to be displayed.

Defragging when YOU want in Vista
As you may know, Microsoft's Vista operating system has automatically defrags your drives. (If you're not sure what defragmenting your drive is, it's a very important, risk-free and quick way to speed up your hard drives. You can read more about defragmenting drives in our bonus report - www.DigitalFileRecovery.com/letters/SpecialRpts/FastSecurePC.html.) In fact, Vista will automatically defrag your system approximately once in every four times your computer is started.

We do recommend you defrag regularly and automate the task to save yourself time & hassle but you may prefer more control as to when defragging takes place. After all, it will slow down your computer quite a bit.

So, if you want to turn off the automatic defrag feature of Windows Vista, right click on your C: drive, and then select Properties. Select the 'Defragment Now' option in the Tools tab. Then un-check the box next to 'Run on a schedule'.

This will turn off the automatic defragmenting feature of Windows Vista. Just please don't forget to defragment your system every once in a while to help your PC run at maximum speed.

That's it for this month. We hope you find these tips useful and if you did, please share them!

And, of course, if you have any suggestions on how we can improve, please let us know.