Monthly Archives: May 2007

designing websites

Computer Aid Posted on by

I’ve recently had lots of adventures creating some websites.

Being too busy to do these websites myself, I decided to ask/subcontract a friend to handle the website design.

Well, there were many problems along the way, with a fixed website quote, customers constantly changing their mind, customers wanting something that they liked personally (but not necessarily appealing to their website viewers), long hours, problems with image quality, personality clashes, etc etc.

Along the way, I’ve learned many valuable lessons:

  • Asking a friend to work with you can put a large strain on the friendship.
  • Website design contracts must be in writing (not verbal), clearly defining what will be done, and more importantly, what will not be done.
  • Designing a good website will take a lot longer than you expect, don’t be afraid to accurately quote for the real costs involved (or quote an hourly rate).
  • Maintain a high level of communication with customers (I failed on this one… it was impossible to do, while juggling other work)
  • Avoid flash websites. Whoever holds the source code, has the customer over a barrel (and Google doesn’t like flash).

The end results are fantastic, but its not an experience I’d like to repeat.

For those who are interested, take a look at:

nuzu.com.au

janpowersfarmersmarkets.com.au

Menu Bar and Tabs missing in XP Task Manager

Computer Aid Posted on by

This was a somewhat frustrating problem, aggravated by the fact that IE7 was also acting up.

I managed to fix IE7 by doing a windows repair install, but task manager would just show a portion of what it should.

The performance tab was the worst. Instead of showing 2 graphs (cpu and memory) and some memory statistics, it would just show the cpu graph, no other details, no tabs, no menu bar.

From this, it was impossible to move or resize task manager.

By using keyboard shortcuts, I managed to activate different tabs, and shut it down.

After discounting the possibility of an infection, I eventually stumbled across: http://www.pchell.com/support/taskmanager.shtml

All I had to do was double-click anywhere in the middle of the window (or a blank part of the “border”), to get task manager back to normal.

In order to activate this small footprint mode, just double click in the blank border part of the task manager window.

I cannot believe that I’ve never seen this, after many years of using task manager. It just goes to show that there is always room to learn something new.

inconsistent performance on 802.11B wireless laptops

Computer Aid Posted on by

I’ve noticed an annoying inconsistency with laptops that have built-in 802.11B wireless. Particularly when the WAP (wireless access point) uses WPA-PSK… Some will work, while others won’t.

There is no pattern that I can find. It just seems that some chipsets are designed with more “features” than others.

I always make sure that the WAP has both 802.11B and G enabled, but many times, I just need to cross fingers and hope it works.

I had one situation with 2 slightly different ibm thinkpads: both had 802.11B… one worked and one didn’t.

Where was another recent situation, where the wireless router was working, but no one knew the “password” to add more PCs to the wireless network. I couldn’t connect to the router, since someone had changed the admin password.

Since this was a modem and wireless router, a reset to factory defaults would mean getting a new account password from the ISP.

After all that, I setup 2 PCs to work wirelessly over WPA-PSK (and 1 PC works over wired ethernet).

I then find that a laptop (which once worked wirelessly… in fact, for a while, it was the only PC that was capable of accessing the internet), now cannot get to the internet.

At first I’m not surprised: I need to enter the WPA code… but that doesn’t work.

I take it back to the office, and it works well with the usb wireless G adapter, but the builtin wireless card cannot see my office wireless router. Only at that point, I find out that it only has a 802.11B card.

I’ll need to remember to check for this in the future.

Don’t use a wireless USB adapter if you don’t need to

Computer Aid Posted on by

A customer couldn’t get his laptop to work over his wireless internet, and he was getting windows error messages. He thinks XP needs to be reinstalled.

When I get there, I see he is trying to use a netgear wireless USB adapter (which looks a bit worse for wear).

A glance at his laptop, and I see its an intel centrino, with built-in wireless, so I decide to not use the netgear adapter.

He doesn’t know his WEP security settings, so I decide to connect the PC directly to the modem/wireless router (I forget the brand), and setup WPA-PSK

I pluging the ethernet cable, but I can’t seem to connect to the router.

I check DHCP and IP settings, but there is nothing wrong.

I do ipconfig release and renew, but it doesn’t get a new DHCP address.

While I explain the strange situation to the customer, the PC finally sees the router. The internet works well, and I setup the wireless settings appropriately.

I restart the router, and again, it takes many minutes for the router to talk to the PC.

But once connected, everything is fine.

Well, there are no real showstoppers, as this only happens when the router is restarted, so I leave another happy customer.

windows media player cannot play this dvd because a compatible dvd decoder is not installed on your computer

Computer Aid Posted on by

Customer gets a typical error message:

“windows media player cannot play this dvd because a compatible dvd decoder is not installed on your computer”.

I’ve seen this before, and have found the quickest solution is to install a different video/audio player.

I start by installing media player classic… but no go.

Next, I install my favorite: jetaudio

And it works.

If Jetaudio hadn’t worked, I would then have tried media monkey, videolanc… one of them would work eventually.

Faulty power supply after just 4 months

Computer Aid Posted on by

A customer calls, saying her PC randomly switches off (sometimes 5 or 10 times per day).

I tell her it sounds like a faulty power supply, but she says that 4 months ago, a tech had replaced the motherboard and the power supply.

Well, I can’t resist a mystery, so I go take a look.

Sure enough, there is barely any dust on the MOBO and PSU fans, so its unlikely that its the PSU.

Murphy’s law says that while I’m there, the PC behaves itself, and I see no power outages.

We agree that I’ll replace the 350Watt PSU with a newer 450Watt unit.

If the problem persists, she will call me, and I’ll refund the cost of the PSU, and try to track down the problem.

Well, I haven’t heard back in over 4 weeks, so it looks like it was a faulty power supply (although unusual for such a new PSU to fail).

Growth in Computer Aid web traffic (and visitors) via SEO

Computer Aid Posted on by

I’m totally amazed at the growth in traffic to the Computer Aid website.

Admittedly, I have spent a lot of time studying SEO techniques, and applying them to the website, and I can see that all my efforts are starting to pay off.

As they say, a picture is worth 1024 words, so here are the results to date:

Computer Aid traffic growth

To be honest, I just look at the figures for unique visitors (the orange bars), as its the most indicative of the true popularity.

A figure like “hits” and “page views” can be easily manipulated… I could double the the hits on Computer aid by just placing an extra 15 small pictures on most of my web pages, but it doesn’t change how many people actually look at my website.

Looking over the last 16 months of growth, I can see that there was no single factor that contributed to the 22-fold increase in unique visitors to the website.

There were a few minor hiccups along the way: the most notable of which was an unintentional “duplicate content” problem in the early days, which caused google to drop my ranking for the words “brisbane computer repairs” from 50th to 350th.

Anyone contemplating doing their own SEO to improve their own website ranking should probably consider the following tips:

  • Start a blog.
  • Update your blog REGULARLY
  • Update your blog at LEAST twice per week.
  • Make sure the vast majority of your blog posts, discuss topics directly relevant to whatever your website is about (eg a website about nuts and bolts should have a blog that only talks about nuts and bolts (eg sizes, shapes, metals, techniques, etc))
  • Pick your wording and titles VERY carefully. A very good grasp of the (English) language is essential. You must consider what a typical “web surfer” would type into a google search, and then use those words in your title and body. This is not as easy as it sounds, yet its very important.
  • Don’t post something that has already been talked about by thousands of others (eg the world trade center bombing in NY)
  • The flipside of the last point is: Do post something you know, which few other people would know. It makes you appear (to google) as an expert in your field. Don’t be afraid of telling your trade “secrets”… chances are: only others in the same field will read your posts, and they probably already know the “secrets” anyway. The internet is a community that punishes those that keep secrets, and rewards those who share.
  • You must think like a marketing executive. Read books about sales and marketing, then apply that knowledge to how you word your overall website. The wording is vital. You must think long and hard about what words and phrases you put on your website (this is not so important for blog posts). You must know what your customers want, and then appeal to them with what you write. Don’t take guesses, you must find out what they want (and sometimes asking the customers won’t give you the answers!)
  • Monitor your own website statistics. If your hosting company cannot give you the statistics you need, then consider something like google analytics.
  • Optimise your web pages. To see how google views your website, strip out all the images, videos, flash, and html tags. If what you have left looks meaningless, then google will rank you accordingly. Put some quality information in there.
  • Check your website navigation. Don’t implement a huge structure of spaghetti links. Ideally, aim for 5 – 10 links per page, and you should be able to get from any page on your site, to any other page, with just 2 mouse clicks.
  • Optimise your .htaccess file (learn about 301 redirect), and make sure xyz.com and www.xyz.com both redirect to www.xyz.com. I’ve seen some sites, where xyz.com returns a 404 error!
  • Read all you can about SEO (or if you don’t have time, then hire an SEO expert)

For some businesses, correct SE Optimisation can lead to giant leaps in profits.

And remember: some SEO experts are better than others. But to get good optimisation, be prepared to pay more than the original cost of developing the website… any cheaper, and your website probably won’t reach its full potential (or at worst, will drop in popularity).

Power Supply season

Computer Aid Posted on by

It seems (to me) that March/April/May is power supply season.

In these months I’ve found I’ve needed to replace more failed power supplies, than in the rest of the year combined.

I also noticed something similar last year.

I wonder if its just coincidence, or if there is a real reason for this.

I can understand a PSU failing in summer… electronic components under a lot more heat stress. Maybe by the end of summer, many PSUs are ready to breakdown. A rise in humidity, a drop in temperatures, could also contribute to this.

It makes me wonder.

AWA IT and home entertainment franchise

Computer Aid Posted on by

Just got a letter from AWA, asking me if I was interested in joining them as a franchisee.

Hmmm, let me see:

I need to pay them a minimum of $60,000 (of which $30,000 is training costs)

I’ll be locked in to being a franchisee for 5 years (of which the first 3 will probably be spent paying off the initial $60K).

I’ll probably get paid less than what I’m currently getting (but look on the bright side: I’ll probably be busier!).

If they operate anything like Jims Computer Services, or one of the many other computer franchise companies, then they will probably expect you to pay a fee for each potential customer, regardless of whether the customer actually books you.

So from the word go, you are under financial pressure, sales pressure (sound like you must be a good salesman to convert (pressure) each potential customer into a paying one), and must also be good with people and computers.

Its a well known fact that a competent computer technician, who is also good with people, is as common as an honest politician. I’d like to think I’m the exception to this rule, but I know I can improve my people skills (slightly 🙂 )

My understanding of this field is that its probably not capable of supporting a traditional franchise structure, and it will become less-so in the future (with the cost of PCs dropping all the time). It will probably be like having a TV-repair franchise (how many of those do you know of?)

I’m finding even my own way of “expanding” is barely viable (I pay a contractor to fix a computer, I give him the majority of the customers fee, and from what I get, I pay GST and advertising costs, and I usually break even, or lose money). I don’t ask for upfront fees (but I also don’t provide much training). Any money I get is directly related to how busy the contractor is. Its a win-win situation, in that we are both motivated to do our best.

I have spoken to some ex-jims computer people, and it seems that after they sign up, they realise that the agreement is mostly in favour of the franchisor, so they struggle through the “lock-in” period, then they go it alone, by taking all their customers with them.

A lock-in period of 5 years seems very high. And I’m sure that if you try to sell the franchise before the 5 years, you will only get a small fraction of your $60,000 back.

Seems like a lose – win situation to me (franchisee loses, franchisor wins).

Whats sad, is that people will get into this, work their butts off, and at the end, will have very little to show for it.

Sure, by working for yourself, you have the freedom to work as much or as little as you like, but the financial reality is that you will work like crazy, since its not real freedom: you become a slave to “money”.

Anyway, thats enough ranting for now 🙂

cockroaches in the power supply

Computer Aid Posted on by

This is probably the worst job job I’ve ever had to do.

Customer say her PC stopped working. Something popped, and there was a burning smell from the PC.

Sounds like a straightforward power supply replacement.

When I get there, the living rooms looks quite sparse… seems like a lower-class house (not that I care about class).

The PC (it looks very new… its just out of warranty) is in the corner of the living room, on a wooden bench with a tablecloth. Customer has broadband internet.

A few quick checks, and I see the power supply needs changing. I go to the car, get a new power supply, and test it to make sure it works. The new PSU works well, so I tell the customer I’ve found the cause, and I can easily fix it..

She asks how much I reckon it will cost in total. I tell her, and she says she will need to go the the auto-teller, to get the cash.

So I’m left alone in the house (with 3 young kids… I suspect they should be in school). It seems a bit odd.

Anyway, I complete the PSU change, start the PC, and notice the keyboard and mouse don’t work. I get my cheap KB and mouse from the car, and can finally login.

Since I’m waiting for the customer to return, I sit down and start checking the antivirus, etc… as the PC seems a bit slow.

I start to notice movement out of the corner of my eye…

Its a cockroach, climbing up the PC speakers.

As I continue working, I notice more of the critters “exploring” the table… Since I’m no longer making a lot of “noise” from changing the PSU, they seem to decide to start exploring… All up, I’d say the table was a host for about 10 or 20 cockies of various sizes… all exploring the PC, speakers, widescreen LCD monitor, etc…

As I work on the PC, I find I need to flick away the ones that get too close to the keyboard or mouse… Now I think I can see why the power supply failed…

My mind starts to play tricks on me: I think I can feel something in my hair… on a few occasions, I imagine something crawling up my pants leg… but there isn’t anything there.

The customer eventually gets back, pays me, and I’m relieved to be out of there.

Faulty PATA disk cable

Computer Aid Posted on by

An elderly customer was having many mysterious problems with his PC.

His secondary hard drive was a removable type, but sometimes it wouldn’t be detected… Starting nero would typically freeze the PC, as would starting IE6.

The printer was making odd noises (easily fixed by inserting the ink cartridge which wasn’t pushed in completely).

The PC was also very slow (about 3 minutes to boot).

When IE would work, I could click on web links, but opening links in a “new window” would always freeze IE.

He also had many “utilities”… registry cleaners, spam cleaners, norton IS, etc etc. So some of the problems could have been “self induced”.

Anyway, with only 256Mb of RAM, I just did some initial cleaning of startup programs, then ordered some more RAM, and promised to return when the RAM arrived.

I installed the RAM on a Monday, fixed a few other minor problems, but the PC was still much slower that it should have been, nero would still freeze, and IE would still behave strangely.

Rather than take the PC (and not have time to have a good look at it over the week), we decided I would take it away on Friday, so that I could check it over the weekend.

Once I got it back at the office, a repair install of XP didn’t do much (the IE problem was fixed… and upgraded to ie7)

I Uninstalled nero 7, installed nero 6, and nero still froze.

And the CD drive would show up in the bios correctly.

I unplug the CD writer (the CD writer and the removable hard drive were on the same ATA cable), and suddenly the PC is much much faster.

So I figure: It must be the CD writer. CD drives often fail in strange an unpredictable ways.

So I get a new DVD writer, and nero no longer freezes. Good. I try to create a data CD, but Nero won’t detect the drive as a “burner” (but it will read CDROMS correctly)…

I try installing nero 6 , nero 7, but both give problems.

I start to suspect the ATA cable. I move the master plug from the removable drive to the new DVD burner, but the problem persists… I would have thought a faulty cable would cause problems with both drives on the cable…

I try a new cable, and wow, everything works perfectly.

This is the first time I’ve seen a faulty PATA cable, and no obvious signs to indicate where the problem was.

Next time I find a PC that is mysteriously slow (despite my usual efforts), then I will need to look more closely at the hardware.