IT Queries: Computer problems answered

I’ve had an ADSL internet service installed to my house and since I’ve started using it, my telephone line quality has become terrible. How do I fix this?

ADSL internet services use a certain part of a phone line’s signal which is one of the reasons why you can still speak on the phone while surfing the web.

Because of this, the ADSL signals have to be separated from the other phone services using a little device called a filter, this makes sure the phone and ADSL won’t interfere with each other.

What’s probably happened at your home or office is that a filter is either not installed, not fitted properly or defective.

Check each device that has a telephone connection in your premises has a matchbox sized filter attached and that they are plugged in correctly as shown by the labels on the plugs. If the problem still continues, then you’ll need to unplug devices (called an isolation test) until the problem goes away which will tell you which filter isn’t working correctly.

Hi can you help me regarding internet security? I have McAfee security and also Microsoft Security Essentials? Do I need both and if not which one is best?

You don’t need two Internet security programs, one will be fine and having two or more security programs running on your system runs the risk of them interfering with each other.

On balance, we’d recommend the Microsoft program simply because it uses a lot less of your computer’s resources than McAfee’s Internet security and anti-virus programs. The computer security companies also have the habit of stinging you with expensive upgrades every year or so.

We have a list of the free internet security programs available on our Four Free Anti-Virus Programs post. All of these software packages are fine for home use.

In your other site, 101 Free Business Ideas, you mention Open Office. I’ve installed it but I’m finding my friends can’t open the documents I send them. How do I set Open Office up so Microsoft Word can read what I create in Writer?

Open Office uses its own formats which Microsoft Word doesn’t recognise. You can fix this with a setting in Open Office.

Launch Open Office and create a new Writer document, then select Tools, then Options in the menu.

Once in the Options screen, select Load/Save the General from the menu on the left. In the Load/Save – General screen you’ll find towards the bottom the Default File Format in the options there select text document as the document type and Microsoft Word 97/2000/XP under Always Save As.

This will save the document in a format that most versions of Microsoft Office can read, although keep in mind that there are some advanced features in each program that won’t work on the other.

Is it possible for websites to be in your history that you did not visit (using windows internet explorer)? if so, how?

Unless your computer has been seriously infected with a very malicious bug, it’s impossible for un-visited sites to be in your browsing history list.

However it is possible you don’t know you’ve visited these sites as some web locations activate new sites called pop-ups, these are the screens that appear while you are surfing other sites. They have a relation called a pop under that sometimes appears when you shut down your other pages. It could be that some of these sites are appearing in your history.

Generally though it’s unlikely any site you haven’t visited to appear in your browser history, it is possible though someone else using your computer is visiting sites you aren’t aware of.

Help! My computer is telling me PC Health Advisor says I have 510 problems. Would this be why I am unable to burn CD’s through ITunes?

Any help gratefully accepted!

It is possible that the errors PC Health is reporting are related to being able to burn CDs although it’s difficult to say without seeing the error report.

Generally we don’t like programs like PC Health Advisor as they try to prove their worth by reporting minor issues as errors, so most of those 150 errors are probably trivial things that would be fixed with a computer clean up. You may want to follow those instructions and see how the computer’s performance improves.

CD burning is a black art. You can have ten identical computers and each one will have it’s own quirks with burning CDs. Generally we recommend burning at the lowest speed for the best reliability.

We also find that different brands of blank CDs work better than others. Again this varies with every machine. We recommend always steering clear of the super cheap blank CDs as well given some of them are of pretty poor quality.

The problem may be with iTunes and its Digital Rights Management (DRM), so you might want to check if you can burn CD’s from other programs or even if they are playing in your system. It could be the CD burning issue might be hardware.

I am getting an error on my laptop running Windows 7 Ultimate Program:C:\\Windows\\System32\\DllHost.exe It is very frustrating popping up when I open photos etc., Appreciate any help with this. I run avg free antivirus and ccleaner.

It sounds like something has slipped past the AVG anti virus and found its way onto your computer.

We’d suggest downloading and running Malwarebytes and then follow our Removing a Trojan instructions.

AVG has had some major upgrades recently and it is possible malware has got around it because the software isn’t the latest upgrade. So you may want to download and reinstall AVG or one of the free alternatives.

My son is interested in building his own computer. I have concerns that if it doesn’t work we will have to spend more money on another computer.

He has checked out various websites and feels confident he can do it.

His requirements are:

• 1-7 960 CPU
• Asus Sabertooth X58 Motherboard
• 12 GB Ram
• GTX580 Graphiics card
• 1T Hard Drive DVD Player

Generally I’d recommend just buying one. Like cars, it’s cheaper to buy one rather than build one from scratch.

However, it’s a good experience to build one from scratch so I’d recommend your son giving it a go. Just make sure he includes an anti-static wrist strap (around $15) in his budget and make sure he reads the instructions closely.

Remember that nothing on a computer should be forced and screws only need to be a little past finger tight.

Building your own anything is a good learning tool for kids and adults, even if it does cost a bit more than buying a brand name.

This isn’t a tech question, but rather one of copyright.  When I send a private email message, who holds the copyright to that?  Do I? – in which case my permission needs to be sought before forwarding it.  Or does the recipient have the legal right to do anything he/she likes with whatever drops into his/her inbox? – Lesley

That’s a great question, Lesley and being a legal question it doesn’t have a straight answer. A strict reading of the various copyright statues indicate the original writer of a letter or email does have copyright protection. Although lawyers advise you should have a disclaimer asserting copyright at the end of your emails.

Of course this doesn’t prevent “fair use” of your email’s contents, so key parts of it still could be still distributed if the extracts meet the criteria that determines fair use.

Copyright law is a pretty blunt tool to use when it comes to email contents, it may well be there are various privacy laws, employment conditions or other legal restrictions depending on where you live and whether the emails relate to business or private matters.

Generally it’s good manners to ask permission before forwarding an email containing sensitive information, however given the ease of copying of distributing digital communications, you should be wary of sending anything electronically that could embarrass or damage you. Some ideas on email etiquette are available on the PC Rescue site.

Overall though, no-one has a “right” to do anything they like with emails they receive, there are both moral and legal issues with passing on any private information they come across, whether it’s by a letter, email or any other way.

Note this is not legal advice and it is essential to seek guidance from a professional legal practitioner on your specific circumstances.

I decided to Uninstall Internet Explorer 8 from my computer and change to Firefox and Opera for my web browsers.  However, when going to uninstall IE8 it told me that I risk corrupting all the programs that I had loaded since installing IE8. Should I ignore the warning or simply leave IE8 unused on the computer? Thanks.

The warning is a bit over the top however, technically speaking, damaging some files or settings is a possibility (although that’s an indictment on Microsoft’s installation routines and Windows’ general susceptibility to mischief by rogue programs).

Internet Explorer 8 is probably the best of all the IE versions and Internet Explorer is critical to running a lot of basic Windows processes.

On balance, unless there’s something important on your computer that insists on running on an earlier Internet Explorer version, it’s best to leave IE8 on your system. We’ve listed the main four alternatives to IE previously and think all of them do a good job.

Val asks;

1) If I open a webpage and leave it open without doing anything on it am i still using megabytes?

2)If am on a website steaming a video and I pause it am I still using megabytes?

The answer is both questions is “probably”.

In the case of the web page, many sites have a feature called auto-refresh, where the page reloads itself every few minutes to either show updated information or in an attempt to fool advertisers into thinking more people have visited it.

With online videos, the reason it slightly different. To make viewing more pleasant, most online viewers use a method called buffering where the next few minutes are stored on the computer. Usually when you pause a video, the buffering continues so the download continues.

If you’re concerned about the amount of data you’re using, then it’s best to shut down your web browser when you aren’t surfing the Inter.