Windows 8 RP installation

Have you made an attempt any time to install the Windows 8 Release preview? Then you never would have missed the error message: “Your PC’s CPU isn’t compatible with windows 8.” This is one Windows 8 installation problem that seems to be circling around those who gone in for the uptake.

The solution to the problem may lie in your computer’s BIOS. Several confused users who have come to the Microsoft’s Answer’s forum have all had the experience of such an error, when trying to install the new Release Preview. I myself had this experience when I tried to install the Release Preview on one of my laptops.

As a first step towards solving this, Microsoft has suggested to check if the minimum number of features is enabled in your computer: Physical Address Extension (PAE), NX, and SSE2. Most CPU’s support these features and so if the error is seen, it could be only due to the NX feature not having been enabled on your computer. This was the explanation from Microsoft for the community. To resolve this problem, enable NX, with the help of manufacture guidelines to enable NX (“No eXecute bit “), or the equivalent XD (“eXecute Disabled”) feature, within the BIOS security settings.

Try to get to the Bios set up page; press a certain key, such as Esc or F2, according to your PC settings. On getting to the page, if you do not find the settings from Microsoft, a phone call to the Microsoft Tech support is the solution. This is one hassle-free way to avail Windows 8 support.

Windows 8 RP installation issues

But the best thing to do may be to update the Bios, assuming that, it is not current. This is because by simply updating the program, you sometimes get the solution to most of the problems. Before you do this, please check your PC makers’ tech support page for a section called Drivers and Downloads, or something like that. Within that section there will be several updates, including one for your BIOS.

Updating the BIOS can be a very risky affair if something goes wrong. So it is best to confirm that the BIOS update stated is the one for your specific PC. Nowadays the manufacturers provide for software download through the browser, to detect your make and model of PC, and pinpoint the correct drivers.

When the BIOS update is complete, you can try the reinstall of Windows 8 Release Preview and see if it gets installed. This is all part of the Windows 8 installation instructional support from Microsoft.

Fixing Outlook printing problems

Those who use Microsoft Outlook 2007 as their email client would have experienced problems with the application at some point of time. Though it is a versatile email management program, it can sometimes invite trouble. One such problem is the frequent crashing of the application, as you attempt to print an email message or calendar. Have you ever been in a situation where your Outlook either hangs or crashes whenever you try to print something from Outlook? Even after updating the printer driver, you might still have the same problem.

Often the cause of the error is usually a corrupted “OutlPrnt” file. Outlook stores all the print style configuration settings in the OutlPrnt file format. So when this file gets corrupted, Outlook will obviously have problem with the printing. So how will you fix such an Outlook issue? It is actually quite simple. Many Outlook problems can easily be fixed with a few simple steps, taking away much of your headache. Just rename the OutlPrnt file, and Outlook will create another fresh copy with default settings, and free of errors.

Fixing printing issues related to OutlPrnt file corruption

• Close your Microsoft Outlook 2007 program if it is open.
• Now go to the Start menu and click on “My Computer” or “Computer” depending on your version of Windows.
• You need to browse to the location where your Outlook program is saved. If you are using Windows XP, the Outlook folder will be located at “C:\Documents and Settings\username\Application Data\Microsoft\Outlook”. And for Windows Vista and 7 users, the folder will be at “C:\Users\username\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Outlook”.
  

  Help and support for Outlook problems

• Open the Outlook folder and locate the file named “OutlPrnt” and click to highlight it.
• Now place your mouse pointer on the file name and click it to edit the file name.
• Type “.old” to add a file extension to the end of “OutlPrnt” file’s name. Press the Enter key to save the extension.
• Now launch your Microsoft Outlook 2007 program. This time Outlook 2007 will create a fresh copy of OutlPrnt file and the problem with the printing will now be solved.

So now you know how to fix the printing issue related to Microsoft Outlook easily and quickly. The Outlook Help menu contains similar tips and tricks that you may find quite useful while dealing with various MS outlook problems. Contact Microsoft Help and Support Center if you want more assistance with this.

Tablet PC features

Today you get to see endless number of tablet PCs coming under various brand names and versions. As there are huge options to choose from, it becomes difficult for one to choose the right tablet PC. You must be aware of certain facts regarding tablet PC before choosing one for your requirements. Below mentioned are some useful tips that you can consider while selecting a tablet PC for your own purpose.

Instructions

In order to select the best tablet PC for your requirements, you need to follow the instructions as given below:

• First you must decide on the screen size for your tablet PC. Tablet PC’s are available from the small 8.9” screen to the large 13.3” screen. While deciding upon the tablet PC screen size, you must be aware that the big screen sized tablet PCs are very expensive and are not that good when it comes to performance. Unlike in the case of desktop computers, the tablet PC monitors are meant to be small.
• You must have a clear idea about the performance for your tablet PC. If you are looking for tablet PCs with best price to performance ratio, you can find it somewhere near the middle or even on the low side of the price range.
• It is important for you to set a budget before purchasing the tablet PC. You must not stick onto most expensive tablet PCs unless you have got enough money to burn. You can go through the customer reviews which are available online in order to get the best deals.
  

  Selecting tablet PC

• You must be determined about the kind of ports you want on your tablet PC. Normal tablet PC ports include Type I and II PC card slots, SD card reader, USB ports, VGA port, docking connector, microphone jack, and headphone jack.
• You can decide upon the style that fits for you. One most of the important feature to consider when it comes to the purchase of a tablet PC is the style. You can find end number of tablet PCs with different styles and looks. You must be convinced about the way tablet PC looks.
• You must be sure about the type of hard drive you want in your tablet PC. Both solid state disks (SSD) drivers and mechanical hard drives are available before you.

Hope you can select the best tablet PC by following these instructions. Thank you.

Outlook help

The Outlook application from the software giant Microsoft allows you to access POP3 mail from more than one server computer. It makes the above feature possible by allowing the user to set more than one Outlook account for an email account. You would be asked to enter your account descriptive name and other account details to make this possible. Follow the guidelines briefed below to fetch POP3 Mail from more than one computer using Outlook.

Outlook help instructions

• Launch Microsoft Outlook 2003 application on your device. To launch the application, click on the Start button placed on the bottom left corner of the home screen. Alternatively, you can launch the Start menu by clicking the Windows key on the keyboard. From the Start menu pop up, select the label that reads All Programs. The All Programs submenu will list down all the programs and applications installed on the hard drive. From the programs list, select the application that reads Microsoft Outlook. You may also launch the same by clicking the desktop shortcut label or the taskbar plug in.
• Wait for the application to load. Once the application finishes loading, select the label that reads Tools from the quick access toolbar. From the Tools dropdown, select the label that reads  E-mail Accounts.
• Select the label that reads Add a new E-mail Account.
• Hit the Next button to proceed to the next stage of account setup.
• Click on the label that reads Server Type. From the dropdown, select the label that reads POP3.
• Enter your name, email address and username details when prompted into the corresponding text fields.
• Set the POP3 server account name as Incoming Mail Server in the space next to the label that reads the same.
  

  Outlook help and support

• Similarly enter your SMTP server account name as Outgoing Mail Server in the space next to the label that reads Outgoing Mail Server.
• Click on the option that reads More Settings. This will launch the More Settings window. From the More Settings window, select the tab that reads General. Enter your name into the Mail Account text box.
• Click OK to save the changes made and to close the dialog box.
• Hit the Finish button to add the account.
• Repeat the above steps to add more POP3 mail account.

Adding a POP3 mail account in Outlook 2007 is far simpler. Follow the above steps to fetch POP3 Mail from more than one computer using Outlook. For more assistance and support on the same, feel free to contact our Outlook help desk.

Firefox Help

Being the open source web browser manufactured by the Mozilla Corporation, Mozilla Firefox is now widely used by a good number of Windows and Mac users for browsing the internet. Mozilla Firefox offers a high browsing speed compared to other web browsers now existing in the online world. Besides this, the browser works well without showing any issues in almost all the browsing environments. Nonetheless, it’s also possible to customize the text size on toolbars in Firefox. However, many Firefox users still don’t know how to change the text size in Firefox.

Through this tech post, I wish to serve some guidelines offered by the Mozilla Firefox Support team for changing the text size on Firefox toolbars. The changing procedure is simple and it does not take much time to accomplish the same.

Instructions to follow

• Launch the Mozilla Firefox browser on your Windows powered computer by double-clicking the Firefox icon on your desktop interface.
• Input about:config into the search bar found on the top of the browser window. When done, press enter. Click on the option labeled I’ll be careful, I promise to view the browser configuration settings window.
• Input layout.css.dpi into the Filter text box that appears at the top of the settings window.
• Change the default value of the layout.css.dpi attribute to a smaller number in order to get larger text on Mozilla Firefox toolbars. The default value is 96 and set it to a larger number in order to get smaller text on toolbars.
  

  Technical assistance from Mozilla

• If you fail to locate the record for the layout.css.dpi attribute in the search results, then create a new one. For this, right-click on any vacant area of the page and select the option that reads Integer from the submenu that appears on the screen.
• Type layout.css.dpi into the box that appears and then click Ok.
• Enter 96 as the value of the layout.css.dpi attribute. When done, click on the OK tab.
• After finishing the entire procedure, restart Mozilla Firefox browser to save the new settings.

No doubt, the above-mentioned pointers offered by the Mozilla Firefox Support team will surely help you to change the text size on toolbars in the Firefox browser. If you have any doubt on this topic, contact the Mozilla Technical team by dialing the support number provided on the Mozilla’s official website.

Get Windows help

Your computer will have an IP address assigned when it joins an Ethernet network, so that the network can locate your computer and allow you to communicate with other computers residing on the same network. Majority of the computer users are need not worry about their IP Address as the DHCP of their local Internet service provider does the job for them. But for people such as system administrators, knowing the IP address is important. You can follow these Windows Tech Support guidelines to retrieve the IP address of your computer!

Instructions:

• One simple method to access your IP address is by navigating to the Windows Command Prompt interface. To open the Command Prompt, click the Start button, select All Programs and then click Accessories and finally, select Command Prompt option from the list.
• An alternative method to open the Command Prompt window is by clicking the Start button and then typing CMD into the Search box field located to the bottom of the Start menu.
• You will receive a black windows with a prompt (C:\Users\username>) on your screen. Type ipconfig into the Command Prompt window and hit Enter key, to run the command.
• You will receive a long list of information on your Command Prompt window out of which IP4 Address is your internal IP address that is used to communicate with your local network. The IP address of your computer is a numerical representation which looks similar to 192.168.1.100.
• So if you find it difficult to use the command line interface, you can switch to the Control Panel method. Open your Control Panel window, double click Network and Internet and select Network and Sharing Center and further click on the Change adapter settingslink located at the top left corner of the window.
  

  Windows help instructions

• Select the type of network which is either Wireless Network Connection or Local Area Connection by double clicking on the link.
• You will receive the Connection window on which you need to locate the Details button and click on it.
• The new window will list out the IP address information of your computer out of which IP4 Address is your internal IP address that is used to communicate with your local network.

Follow the above instructions to find your local IP address. You can also get help from Windows Tech support incase if you are not able to find your IP address.

Outlook Express Support

Being one of the most popular email managing programs developed by Microsoft, Outlook Express is widely used by businesses and organizations for sending and receiving important email messages. Besides this, you can insert URL links in your email messages, so the recipient can easily visit the particular website by simply double-clicking that specific link. Here are a few pointers, which will aid you to open URL links in Outlook Express.

Steps to follow

• Click the Start tab on the bottom left part of the Windows desktop screen to bring up the Windows Start menu.
• Now click on the All Programs option in the Start menu to view the list of software programs installed on the Windows system.
• Go through the list of applications and locate the Outlook Express folder in it. When done, double-click Outlook Express option to launch the application.
• Next, open an email message with a URL link embedded in it. Normally, the embedded link will start with the website address code: http://. In most cases, this link is highlighted with a blue color, so you can easily distinguish it from other text in the message.
• Now double-click the highlighted web link in the email message. This will open your default Internet browser and you will be able to view the desired website.

Sometimes you cannot open the web links by simply double clicking on it. This mainly occurs if you don’t set up the Internet Explorer as the default web browser for Outlook Express. Follow the Outlook Express Help guidelines briefed below to accomplish this task in a simple manner.

• Open Internet Explorer browser on the Windows computer by double-clicking the IE icon on the Windows desktop screen.
  

  Outlook Express support center

• Access the Tools tab on the browser’s quick access bar. Then you need to choose the Internet Options tab from the drop-down tools menu.
• Click on the Programs tab in the Internet Options window.
• Select Default web Browser option and place a tick mark in the field that corresponds to Internet Explorer option. When done, press Enter. Now launch the Outlook Express program again and try to open the URL link embedded in an email message by double-clicking on it.

Hope this blog post has helped you. For additional help, you may ring up the Outlook Express Help panel, which is available 24/7.

Outlook email help

Microsoft Outlook allows its users to transfer all email settings and data files from one computer to another separate one, using a USB flash drive. The entire file transfer process can be finished within an hour or two, depending on the size of the file being transferred. Follow the below instructions for a hassle-free Outlook email setup file transfer.

Instructions

• Turn on your computer.
• Right-click on a free space on the desktop of your old system. Select the New option and further choose the Folder option to make a folder on your computer desktop. You can use this folder as a temporary back up of the files on Outlook. Name the folder as Outlook backup, or something that you can relate with an remember easily.
• Launch the older version of Outlook you have on your computer. Select Files from the menu bar, and choose the Export a file option. Some of the older versions of Outlook have Import and Export as a single option. Select either the Export or the Import and Export option, to export the Outlook files.
• Launch the Export Wizard and select the set up files that you want to transfer. You would be asked to enter the Export destination details before you initiate the file transfer process. Enter the backup folder location as your Export destination. Select Finish, to initiate the file transfer process.
• Plug in USB flash drive into your old computer’s USB port.
• Check the backup folder and make sure all the files are exported. After you are done with the exporting, copy the set up and email files into your external USB flash drive.
  

  Outlook email help desk

• After copying the files, safely remove the flash drive.
• Insert the flash drive containing the backup files into your new computer.
• Open Outlook on the new computer. Select the option File, then the Import option or the Import and Export option.
• Follow the onscreen instructions to import all the necessary files and email setup files from your flash drive to your computer desktop. Click Finish to initiate the file transfer process.
• Check whether you have successfully imported all the files and folders into your new computer.

Now you know how to transfer Outlook Email setup files from your old computer to the new computer. To get more assistance on this, contact the Microsoft Outlook support team.

Problems with Microsoft mouse

Is your computer’s mouse behaving strangely of late? Do you have difficulty in using your computer mouse? You might not be able to make selections if you have a faulty mouse connected to the computer. If your mouse is defective, there will be delayed reactions, or no response at all. Your mouse keys won’t work, or sometimes the cursor would disappear.

Mouse related Microsoft problems

There can be two reasons why your computer mouse is malfunctioning. One is a hardware complaint with the mouse device, and the other is a software or driver issue. By carefully noticing the symptoms displayed by the mouse, you could easily figure out what exactly is causing the problem, whether it is a hardware fault, or a device driver issue. By using the Device Manager utility, you could perform the troubleshooting steps more easily and effectively.

Troubleshooting computer mouse problems

• Click the Start button on the Windows taskbar and select the “Run” option.
• Type “sysdm.cpl” into the Run type field, and click “OK” or press the Enter key.
• This will open the System Propertieswindow.
  

  Help and support from Microsoft

• Click on the “Hardware” tab.
• Under this tab, you will see three sections: namely, Device Manager, Drivers and Hardware Profiles.
• Click on the “Device Manager” button under the Device Manager section.
• Now you will get the Device Manager window, where you can see the list of hardware devices connected to your computer.
• Locate the Mice and other pointing devices option and click on the “+” symbol to expand the option.
• This will display the name of the mouse device connected to your computer.
• Right-click on the active mouse and then select “Properties”.
• Now click on the “General” tab and further click on “Troubleshoot”. This will bring up the self-troubleshooting wizard, which will check for possible errors, and will automatically try to fix the problem with your mouse.
• If this doesn’t fix the issue, proceed to the next step.
• Assuming that yours is a USB plug-and-play device, download and install the Microsoft Fix-it USB troubleshooting tool. You can download this from Microsoft website. Run this tool and follow the onscreen prompts to perform the repair. This should help fix the problem with your mouse.

Many Microsoft problems related to your mouse can easily be solved if you take the right troubleshooting steps. Seek assistance from Microsoft Help and Support Center in case you need advanced help.

Run System Restore in Windows Vista

Microsoft Windows includes a very useful utility called System Restore which helps fix undesirable changes to your Windows machine. If your Windows computer is exhibiting problems, one easy way to fix the issue is to do a system restore, which rolls back your system settings to a previous state. Performing a system restore will remove any changes that were made to your computer since the creation of the last Restore Point.

In most cases, this typical fix works for any computer. But what if the situation is worse, and your computer won’t even load Windows normally, or start Windows in Safe Mode? Here is good news for you: Windows Vista lets you run System Restore from a command prompt. The following Windows Vista Help guidelines will tell you how to do this.

Running System Restore from the Command Prompt

• Make sure you don’t have anything in your CD/DVD drive.
• Click the Start button and select the “Restart” option from the Windows Start menu.
• When the computer restarts, press F8 repeatedly to bring the “Advanced Boot Options” screen. Select the option “Safe Mode with Command Prompt” by using the arrow keys on your keyboard.
• If you have multiple operating systems installed on your computer, you need to select Windows Vista.
• After selecting “Safe Mode with Command Prompt”, press the “Enter” key.
  

  Help and support for Windows Vista

• Your computer will now load Windows Vista with limited accessibility features and drivers. You need to login as an administrator or as a user with administrative privileges.
• Once Windows loads completely, you will get a command prompt on your desktop screen. Type “C:\windows\system32\restore\rstrui.exe” in the prompt and press the “Enter” key.

This will launch the System Restore utility on your computer. You are now ready to perform the system restore, and roll back your system to a previously set restore point. Don’t be confused if you see odd looking graphics. Just follow the onscreen instructions to complete the system restore process. Windows Vista Help menu contains useful tips on how to perform a system restore easily. Go through it, and be equipped with information to handle any similar issues in the future. Follow the above mentioned steps to try to solve your issue. If required, seek advanced assistance from the Windows Help and Support website.