I have talked about this many times before, but last week it happened to one of my customers again. His computer would not boot up after a restart and it kept going to the repair options. He Googled where to go from there and tried to fix this himself.
One of the options is System Restore. Your computer has the capability to periodically create restore points so that if there is a problem and the computer fails to start you can restore to a point in the past where it was still working.
When my customer tried this option, the computer said that System Restore was not turned on. The default used to be that it was automatically turned on and you had to go in and turn it off if you didn’t want it. That is not how it is now. If you want to have this safety feature ready for you it has to be turned on. If my customer had been aware of this, it would have saved him a lot of time and money. After he tried all of the Google ideas, he called me, and I had to reinstall Windows to get his computer working again.
If you want to make sure this is turned on on your computer, it is pretty easy to do. If you have the search bar next to the start button –
You can type “system restore” and it will give you the option to create a restore point. Click on that and it will tell you if System Restore is turned on or off. You only need it for your main drive, not any others since they don’t have the operating system on them.
This one simple thing can help make sure your computer keeps working. If you need help with this, I can walk you through it. Here is a video that explains this and another big issue that can make you lose access to your computer:
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It seems like everywhere you turn lately some kind of AI (Artificial Intelligence) is being talked about. Some tout it as the next big thing, while others, in the words of mama from The Waterboy, see it as “The Devil.” I am sure the truth lies somewhere in the middle.
While I was researching my second book – The Higher Education Scam, I interviewed many people. One of them mentioned to me what they heard about AI from a supposed expert. This expert said, “you will not lose your job to AI, but you will lose your job to someone who knows how to use AI.”
Based on all of this, I thought this would be a good topic to write about, so I decided to ask ChatGPT to write an outline for me. Here is the conversation:
I asked:
“I am writing about how to get started using AI in my monthly newsletter this month. Can you give me an outline and a few pointers?”
ChatGPT said:
Absolutely, Duane — that’s a great topic for your monthly newsletter. An article like this can position you as both helpful and forward-thinking for your clients. Here’s a clear outline and key pointers to get you started:
Newsletter Title:
“Getting Started with AI: What You Need to Know”
Outline:
1. Introduction: Why AI Matters Now
Briefly define AI in simple terms.
Mention how it’s already changing the way small businesses and individuals operate (e.g., chatbots, automation, content creation).
Reassure readers: you don’t need to be a tech genius to get started.
2. Real-Life Examples of AI You May Already Be Using
Voice assistants (Siri, Alexa)
Auto-correct or predictive typing
Spam filters in email
AI in photo editing apps or customer service chats
Grammarly – Writing assistant with AI-powered suggestions.
Canva’s Magic Tools – AI image and design generation.
Google Gemini or Microsoft Copilot – For document help or web search.
Otter.ai or Fireflies.ai – Automatically transcribe meetings or calls.
Include a tip: Try using AI to write your next social media post, respond to a tricky email, or create a to-do list.
4. Do’s and Don’ts for Using AI Effectively
✅ DO start small—experiment with one tool at a time.
✅ DO fact-check—AI can sound confident but still be wrong.
❌ DON’T share sensitive client data with AI tools.
❌ DON’T expect it to do your job for you—use it as a helper, not a replacement.
5. How Duane’s Reliable Computer Services Can Help
Offer help choosing and setting up AI tools.
Offer a 1:1 intro session or group demo.
Mention any AI tools you’re integrating into your own service (e.g., EDR with AI-driven detection, automated maintenance alerts, etc.)
6. Final Thoughts / Call to Action
Encourage them to give AI a try this month.
Offer a quick consultation to help them find the right tool.
Example: “Reply to this email with ‘AI HELP’ and I’ll send you my top tool recommendation for your business.”
Pointers for Writing:
Keep it conversational and non-technical.
Use real-world analogies (e.g., “Think of AI like a really smart assistant that doesn’t sleep.”)
Include a screenshot or short demo gif if possible.
Keep it short and skimmable—use bullet points, bold key ideas.
Would you like help drafting the full article based on this outline, or do you want to write it and have me review it?”
This took about ten seconds for ChatGPT to give me this outline and some pointers. I don’t normally just copy and paste the response into a document. I usually use it as a starting point, but I wanted to show you a real-life example of what it can do and how it works.
I have been using AI for a couple years now. I regularly run emails through it if I want them to sound more professional, less threatening, or more concise, for example. I also use a program called Otter.ai when I am in meetings. This program will listen to the entire conversation and then transcribe it for me. It then creates an outline and lists any action items. I do pay for this tool, but it saves me hours per month, so it is well worth it.
If you haven’t tried AI yet, you can go to chatgpt.com and create a free account. It is best to create an account because over time ChatGPT will learn more about you and become even more helpful. Just don’t share sensitive information with it. In other words, AI could possibly help you do your taxes, but since it searches online you don’t want to input your social security number.
It is also important to verify any information that AI finds because sometimes it is wrong. I heard about a jr attorney that used AI to prepare for trial, and he found a case that was very similar to his current case, and he used it as an example in the opening statement which a senior attorney had to read. As he read about the other case in the courtroom the judge looked it up on his computer only to find it did not exist. I am sure someone lost their job over that one.
If you are interested in learning more about AI or trying it for yourself, reach out to me. I can help you set up an account and get you started.
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The average US home in 2023 had 17 internet connected devices. Between smart TVs, smart home devices like Alexa and Hey Google, security systems, smart watches, phones and of course computers, making a change to your wifi name or password can be an all-day task of setting up devices again. Just getting a new router or switching to a new ISP is a scary thought.
I had a customer call me recently because he decided to switch from CenturyLink internet and go to Verizon with their whole house wifi pod. He received the new router in the mail and followed the instructions and was successful in getting his computer on the new wifi but none of his other devices connected. He called me to come to help and having gone through this last year, I was ready for the challenge.
The first thing I did was verify his new connection and connect to my laptop so I could make sure the internet was working properly. Next, I ask him to tell me the previous wifi name and password. He had added one character to the old wifi name for the new wifi name. The passwords were the same. I logged into his new system and changed the new name to what the old name was and in just a few minutes all of his many devices began to connect to his new internet.
We did not have to reset any of his devices. Every one of them is connected to the new wifi. So, if you are switching ISPs or even just getting a new router, use the same name as before and the same password and you will probably have all of your devices reconnect also.
If you need to change the wifi name or password because they are compromised, do some research beforehand, so you have all the information at hand to quickly reset all devices. If you need help with this, I am available for this type of work.
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I have talked a lot about password managers in the past and thought I would bring it up again. I know many people are reluctant to try them because they don’t understand how they work or how to set them up. In this article, I will explain all of that and also give you the reasons to go this way and some possible pitfalls too.
If you are currently keeping all of your passwords on a document on your computer and you occasionally update it and print out a new copy, moving to a password manager will simplify your life. No more multiple entries with some scratched out and dates next to each when it was last changed, or the last time you remember changing it. When I help someone set up a new computer and they use the printed document method it usually takes 30 to 45 minutes longer to set up their computer since we have to try multiple passwords and then reset most of them anyway since the person doesn’t remember the correct password. Since they are paying me by the hour, they actually spend more than the yearly cost of a password manager just by having me reset their passwords.
If you are currently keeping all of your passwords stored in a browser and you rely on that browser to keep all of them straight you might be in danger. Those passwords are not secure and could easily be stolen or accessed. With a true password manager, you have one master password that you need to remember to keep all other passwords secure. Typically, you log in to your computer and then log in to the password manager whenever you need a password. This can also be used on more than one device so if you have a computer, phone and tablet all of your passwords can be shared with all three devices, but they are still secure behind your one master password.
Setting up your password manager is easy if your passwords are stored in your browser. You can easily import them directly into the password manager from your browser. Once they are all loaded into the password manager you can delete them from your browser, and this will greatly improve the security on your computer.
So here is the quick Pros and Cons:
Pros –
Better security, you need a master password to access all of your other passwords.
Passwords can be available on all of your devices.
Only one password to remember.
Password managers will help you reset or change passwords.
No paper copies lying around to get taken or lost.
You can even keep credit card numbers securely in the password manager.
Cons –
Most password managers have a small cost if you want to share across your devices.
You must remember that one password. Most have no recovery if the master password is forgotten.
As you can see, having a password manager is a smart step towards better computing. I know setting up things like this can be daunting, but I can help you through the technical stuff. Call me if you want help with this. Here is a link to my favorite password manager:
I got a new phone recently. I have been putting off getting a new one for a couple years because I didn’t want to deal with resetting all of my MS Authenticator entries. I have close to 30 entries in my MS Authenticator because I am an admin for many different companies. I have helped others reset their authenticators before, but it usually doesn’t work easily, and it becomes a pain to fix it. After reading up on how to do it correctly, I decided to back my authenticator up to my Microsoft account and make the change.
It didn’t work out how I had hoped. The only entries that worked on my new phone after restoring my authenticator were my personal accounts. All of the accounts I manage for others did not work and required resetting them.
When I tried to reset them, I realized that I had added all of the recommended methods when I set them all up. I was able to get a text or email to get into the account and then I could easily go in and reset the authenticator. What I thought would be a nightmare turned out to be easy.
Why am I telling you this? My recommendation is, whenever you are setting up two-factor authentication, set up all of the methods they have available. This will allow you to easily get into your accounts even if your authenticator doesn’t work.
I know all of these extra steps are no fun, but they do keep your accounts safe. I recently had a couple of people at one of my companies that were getting text codes every few minutes for their email accounts. Since we had two factor set up, they did not lose access to their emails and the crooks did not get into their email. We were able to log into their accounts, reset their passwords and then sign out all instances so the crooks lost their ability to attempt to get in.
This happens often. Most months I get at least four or five people with this issue. As I have said before, if you don’t have two-factor authentication set up, Login to your accounts and get it going. If you need help with any of this let me know.
Here is a video I made about two-factor authentication.
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This recently happened to a customer of mine. He is writing a book, not for the general public but something for his kids to read about his journey and life lessons. He has been working on this for years and he is almost finished with it. He is writing it in Word and recently added most of the pictures to it. He called me because he can no longer open this document. It tries to open and then he gets an error message and it closes. This is his only copy, so he was very concerned. After trying a few other programs to open it and converting it to different versions of documents, we finally got it open but there were some errors. Eventually he was able to copy half of the document to a new document and then delete it from the original. This gave him parts one and two and he can safely complete his book.
Document size is a problem many people experience. It might be like my customer when you have difficulty opening a document or it might be when you try to send a document to someone in an email. Yes, your email also has size limits for attachments.
So how can you avoid file size issues? It depends on the type of file and what you want to do with it.
For sending files as attachments, both Gmail and Microsoft max out around 20 MB for all attachments. So, if you have more than one attachment the total of all documents must be less than the limit. The easier way to send large documents is to save them in your OneDrive or Google Drive and then send a link to share the file(s). You can also use Dropbox for this if that is where you store your online files. If you right click on the file or even a folder in your online drive, one of the choices is “share”, add their email address, or copy the link and put it in a new email. As always, I am happy to help with this if needed.
If you are working on a document in Word, Excel, or another program. Consider putting it into two or more documents. You can always google “max size limit” for the type of document you are working with. It is much better to do this before you get an error that prevents you from opening your document. You can also adjust the size of pictures that you add to your document. This usually requires a photo editing program to reduce the file size of the picture.
Hopefully you never get this type of error, but if you do I have a few programs that can sometimes help. Reach out if you need to.
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It seems like Wifi has been around forever, but it only came out commercially in 1999. We have all become so accustomed to having it that anytime there is a break in service or if it comes and goes, we feel like our world has come to an end. Many of the “emergency” calls I get are about wifi or internet.
Based on this, I thought I would give you some quick fixes to the common issues I hear about.
Home wifi is spotty or doesn’t reach certain rooms/floors. First, realize that the equipment you typically get from your internet supplier is not the strongest. For most homes I recommend getting a mesh wifi system. This is a series of small pods. One pod needs to connect to your existing router and create a new network, each subsequent pod is wirelessly connected to the others and spread about your home to give complete coverage. These pods even have ethernet ports so you can wire a few items to each pod if needed. This set up can also work in offices that are not wired for the internet. Also, they make pods that are waterproof so you can even extend your network into the yard. I can offer recommendations and help with installation if needed.
Computer wifi or ethernet port quits working. This is a very frustrating situation that I hear about often. Yesterday my internet connection worked fine but now it doesn’t even show a connection. There are a few levels to this one. Sometimes the settings just magically get turned off. I don’t believe it is intentional or even accidental because the settings are usually buried a few levels deep in the many settings menus. Some laptops have physical buttons on either side to turn wifi on or off, or they might have a function key that does this. If you can locate one of those, the repair can be very simple. If not, you can go to the Device manager and actually turn your wifi card off and back on. Sometimes this works. Occasionally the internal wifi card or even the ethernet port quits working all together. This used to be a big deal, I would have to open the computer and then replace the wifi card or for ethernet add an expansion card to a desktop. Laptops used to be very difficult to fix ethernet cards since laptops don’t have expansion cards. Now all you have to do is get a USB adapter for either wifi or ethernet. These are not expensive and fix the issue in minutes.
I hope you never experience issues like these, but if you do I can help you get back on the information super highway in no time.
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Yes, February 10th was National Clean Out your Computer Day. I know most of you probably have not celebrated this day before and are probably wondering why I even mentioned it. This just gives me an excuse to take you through some very important computer maintenance issues that usually get overlooked and can make a big difference for your computer.
So how do you celebrate this day?
The first thing is to get rid of unnecessary files that are on your computer. The files I am referring to are the temp files that are created when updates happen. There are tools built into both PCs and Macs that will remove these files, but I like to use a program called CCleaner (ccleaner.com) to do the job. This program is available for both platforms and will go through your computer and get rid of all of those temporary and unneeded files. It will also work in the background and tell you when you should run the cleaner again. They have a paid “Professional” version and a free version. The free version should be just fine.
The second thing you should do is look at your desktop and move any files stored there to your documents folder. By keeping your desktop relatively empty you will know if a new icon appears on it. Many times, unwanted programs that you accidentally install will drop an icon onto your desktop. If you notice anything suspicious you can take action to remove it. I am always available to remove those pesky programs that just happen to appear.
The third thing to do is make sure your backup is working properly. If it isn’t working correctly now is a good time to fix this so you won’t lose any documents in case of a computer failure. If you are not sure how to check your backup or you don’t have a backup, I can help with this also. If you are using a cloud service like OneDrive or DropBox as a backup, you might want to watch this video since those are not really backups but syncs.
The last thing is to make sure that your anti-virus is working properly. If it has expired and you are no longer protected, your data could be in jeopardy. I have written a lot and made videos about anti-virus software. If you need one, I can also help with that.
Now that you have done all of these things your computer will hopefully be more organized, maybe a little faster and definitely safer. So Happy National Clean Out your Computer Day!!
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If you have a Windows computer, it is nearly impossible to not have a Microsoft account anymore. They have made it very difficult to set up a computer without using a Microsoft account. In this article I will discuss the good and the bad and some things you should not do with Microsoft accounts.
Before we get into that, what exactly is a Microsoft account? According to Google’s Generative AI:
A Microsoft account is a personal account that allows you to access Microsoft’s products and services. You can use your Microsoft account to:
Sign in to Windows, Xbox, and other Microsoft devices
Access online apps like Word, Excel, and PowerPoint
Save files and photos in 5 GB of cloud storage
Access the Xbox network and community
Customize privacy settings
Receive alerts for suspicious account activity
Use optional password less sign-in
Automatically sync data to the cloud
You can use any email address as your Microsoft account username, including addresses from Outlook.com, Yahoo!, or Gmail. It is even possible to use your company email as a personal Microsoft account, but it is not a good idea. Microsoft accounts used to be called “Windows Live ID”.
First, the positives of having a Microsoft account:
It allows you to sync settings, documents and browsers across two or more computers. This is great if you have a desktop at home and a laptop that you carry around or use for travel.
It is easier to set up a new computer since you can just sign in with your account and synchronize the above-mentioned items.
You should never get locked out of your computer because you can always reset your password by using the email account connected to your Microsoft account on another device.
It allows you to use fingerprints, pins or your face to login.
Next, the negatives of having a Microsoft account:
All of your documents and settings will sync across your devices.
You must use their cloud. It is difficult to only save documents on your computer.
In small businesses it is difficult to set up computers for employees and it is difficult to get into the computer if that employee leaves and you don’t know their password.
Microsoft will have control over your computer, programs and documents.
Microsoft accounts can be used with many different things. You can use it only as the method to sign into your computer. You can use it only for signing into your Office365 programs or you can use it for both.
It is possible to have a personal and a business Microsoft account that use the same email account. (this can cause a lot of issues for people)
Next, I will list the things you should never do with your Microsoft account.
You should never use your Microsoft account to set up a computer for someone else. If you are a small business owner and you don’t use the entire expensive suite of Microsoft this makes setting up an employee’s computer difficult.
You should never share your Office 365 programs by signing into someone else’s computer with your Microsoft account.
As a business owner it is not a good idea to simply hand a new computer to an employee and have them set it up for themselves.
Microsoft mainly caters to large enterprises, but it is possible to set up and use computers without falling into these issues. No one wants to find their personal documents and pictures on their employees’ computer. This is something I help small businesses with all the time. Before you set up your next computer, whether it is a business or personal computer, give me a call and I can help you make the best of the Microsoft accounts without compromising your security.
There are applications out there that claim they will keep all of your drivers updated on your computer to help keep your computer running smoothly. I see these on computers all the time and if they are the free versions I always uninstall them. If the customer has actually paid for the application, I have a discussion with them about these applications.
First of all, what are drivers? A driver is a software component that lets the operating system, and a device (printer, monitor, mouse, etc.) communicate. The most common drivers and the ones most people have heard of are for printers.
Now that you know what drivers are and what they are used for, let’s discuss these applications that supposedly keep your drivers updated.
If you are on the internet and you do a search for printer drivers and you don’t specify the brand, you might end up downloading and installing a program called a driver updater. I did a Google search and found dozens of these programs. Some of them are stand alone programs and others are part of program suites bundled with anti-virus and other similar applications.
One common theme is that they all install for free and then when you run them, they will tell you about the many drivers you have that need updating. They will be happy to update them for you, all you have to do is purchased their upgrade. This is always their endgame.
Drivers are not like the other types of software on your computer. They don’t get regular updates and generally are not security risks. Occasionally a manufacturer will find a defect in a driver and will issue a fix, but this doesn’t happen very often. Usually new versions of an operating system can cause the need for a new driver, but you will know if this is needed because your device will not function properly. Incases like this, many times you will get a driver update from that operating system to fix the issue with the driver.
If for some reason the operating system doesn’t help you, you can go to the manufacturer’s website and get the necessary driver. I have never seen one of these driver updater programs help in this situation.
In my experience, the only thing these driver updaters do is slow down your system and try to scare you into sending them money to fix a problem that really doesn’t exist. I know many anti-viruses have this as an addon, including Avast, Norton, AVG. McAfee and others. I don’t recommend any of these anti-viruses. They all act like marketing companies always trying to sell you more stuff by scaring you.
Save your money and don’t fall for the driver updaters. If you end up with one of these on your computer and are not sure how it got there, you are not alone. I see this all the time. I can help you get rid of these if you don’t know how. I can also help you if you have other software on your computer that you are not sure what it is and where it came from.
