Audience Questions

Audience QuestionsHour 1

Hour 1 Hour 2 Hour 3

How can I write a blog?

Watch Ryan from Long Beach, CA Comments

Leo encouraged Ryan to start a blog. He's a musician and has been writing a blog for about a year with Control Forever. He's gotten into crowdfunding with IndieGogo for his current album as well. Leo says to use social media like Facebook to get the word out, but don't rely on it.

Check out Ryan's Indiegogo page for his new band JKHD.

Am I safe from the VPN Filter hack?

Watch Neil from Phoenix, AZ Comments

Neil is worried that the VPN Filter hack will affect his Asus router because his model isn't protected. Should he be worried? Leo says first thing he can do is update his firmware. Asus keeps their firmware up to date regularly and uses open source DD-WRT firmware. So if there isn't one, he can patch it himself. But Asus routers are great because they update them constantly. Neil should reload the most current firmware, even if he has already updated it. That will wipe out any additional problems.

How can I digitize a large quantity of photos?

Watch Richard from Tuckahoe, NY Comments

Richard has tons of photographs and he has to digitize all of them. He's thinking of using his iPhone to take pictures of them and then put them on Google Photos. Leo says the only issue here will be time. Essentially taking a photo of the physical photos is all a scanner is doing anyway. The advantage of using an actual scanner, however, is that there will be perfect lighting and the picture is exactly flat to the camera. The scanner can get a high resolution photo by being able to slowly scan across the image.

Leo says if he uses his phone or a camera, he'll want to get an easel or something so that he can position the photos to consistently eliminate glare. He'll also want to make sure to light it well. He could even get a plate of glass to put on the photo to flatten it out, and then he should use a tripod with his camera so it's exactly parallel to the photo.

Audience QuestionsHour 2

Hour 1 Hour 2 Hour 3

Why can't I use my Apple TV with my new 4K TV?

Watch Murray from New Jersey Comments

Murray has an Apple TV 4K and it's not working with his LG TV unless he reboots it. Leo says it's probably an HDMI handshake issue. It could be a bad HDMI cable. Or worse, a bad HDMI port. Apple says to hold the menu/volume buttons down for 5 seconds. The Apple TV will run through resolutions until one wakes it up.

David calls in to recommend getting a Gefen HDMI Detective. MonoPrice has a similar product called Dr HDMI. The HDMI can fall asleep and it has trouble waking up. Dr HDMI will keep his HDMI ports awake.

How can I speed up my iMac?

Watch Jody from Los Angeles, CA Comments

Jody has an old iMac with a 2.66GHz dual core processor. Leo says that's still a useful computer, even with its age. Jody says Lightroom stalls on it. Leo says that's more the fault of Lightroom. But a new iMac would also give him a larger screen and far more accurate color depiction. A new iMac will still have its hands full with Lightroom because its just a pig with memory resources. It's poorly written for today's modern platforms. Here's what to try before Jody buys a new iMac: Install a Solid State Drive (SSD). That will speed up the performance dramatically. Then use the optical drive as a data drive. He should also update the RAM with as much as he can afford. That won't solve the shortcomings of the old graphics processor, but it's a start.

Buying a new iMac Pro would also help, if he's ready to upgrade. But even with that, Lightroom can bog down.

Audience QuestionsHour 3

Hour 1 Hour 2 Hour 3

Why can't I reinstall Windows 10?

Watch Marshall from Des Moines, IA Comments

Marshall has a friend who needs to reinstall Windows 10. Leo says to download the Microsoft Media Installer and install it on a thumb drive. That will then enable him to install the OS from USB. Marshall says he's having trouble because it can't see his hard drive. Leo says that it sounds like it's a hybrid drive and Marshall may need to update his drivers in order to install. Leo says that Intel's 32GB SSDs were hybrid drives paired with a spinning hard drive. It's not a good solution at all. The OS is going to see two drives instead of one and when he goes to install, it may have issues. That's why Fusion drives don't work.

So he should erase the drives, and when he goes to reinstall Windows, he should install it on the C Drive. Then go to Lenovo's official support site and download the latest drivers. Once he gets the drivers, Windows should see the drives.

How can I tell if a call is a scam?

Watch Michael from Santa Monica, CA Comments

Michael has been getting robocalls for a new scam, where they contact him regarding his internet activity after buying Google ads. Leo says that there's always a new scam and it becomes even more important to know that they are out there and when he gets a call he doesn't recognize to ignore it.

Key signs it's a scam: they accept something other than a credit card as a form of payment (like gift cards). There are a ton of misspellings. And if you give someone remote access, the only way to make sure you're not compromised, is to backup your data, format your hard drive, and reinstall your OS. Nuke it from orbit. It's the only way to be sure.

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