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Sunday, May 30, 2004

Show #44

There are no dumb questions. And we’re working on fewer dumb answers. Call 1–800–520–1FKI right now!

 toc | toc 

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Noon-1p

Lisa in Los Angeles

uses a private tech support service called infusion 3. She likes it.

My two favorite Tivo secrets are the :30 second skip:

Press Select, Play, Select, 3, 0, Select to toggle the 30 second skip mode.
Press the advance button on the remote to skip ahead 30 seconds at a time - perfect for skipping commercials.

and the Sort command for the Now Playing List

Enter Now Playing then press (S)low (0)Zero (R)ecord (T)humbsUp. You can enter 1 to sort normally, 2 to sort by expiration date, and 3 to sort alphabetically.

The full list of Tivo backdoor codes is available from the Tivo Community Forum.

Matt in Florida

is having trouble with the sound on his Nforce2 based motherboard. I suggest getting the latest drivers from your motherboard manufacturer. He also asked how to upgrade his Tivo’s capacity. I recommend upgrade kits from Weaknees. For Replay users DellHill in the chat room recommends www.replaytv.us

Ira in Manhattan Beach

asks about using labels on CDs and DVDs. I don’t like to do that because they can peel off and gum up the works. I just use a sharpie to write on the CD, but if you want a nice look buy an ink jet printer that can print on specially manufactured CD blanks - they look very professional and won’t hurt the CD. Epson and others makeinkjet printers that use plastic inserts to print on CDs. You can also buy dedicated CD printers, but they’re relatively expensive.

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1–2p

Lily in Venice

needs to remove Norton Anti-Virus 2004. She should follow the instructions from the Symantec knowledge base.

Jordan in Huntington Beach

wants to add his MP3s to iTunes so they’ll copy to his iPod. Just double-click them (providing iTunes is your default MP3 player) or open iTunes and select Add to Library… from the File menu.

Judy in Colton

wants to know where where can she find an HP 5150 printer manual. There’s one on the CD but she can’t print it. Markaci from the chat room found it on HP’s site. Also she wanted to join the MP3 revolution. Here are some good free MP3 rippers for Windows:
MusicMatch
CDEX
AudioGrabber
iTunes

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2–3p

Chuck in Fontana

wants to speed up his Windows system. Check Black Viper’s site for Windows services you can safely turn off. Run msconfig — click Start→Run, type “msconfig” and hit enter — to turn off unneeded programs at startup. Defrag your disk drive, too, if you haven’t done it in a few months. Click Start→Run and type “defrag”.

Rochelle in Northridge

is missing a key system file, but can’t use the Windows XP install disc to restore it because she never got one. This is a reprehensible trend among OEMs and I blame Microsoft. The company gives PC vendors a break on Windows if they don’t include an install disc - this is to discourage piracy but it only inconveniences honest users and pushes them toward piracy, in my opinion. Rochelle, you need to “borrow” a friends XP install disc and run the recovery program, or bring it to a computer store where they should be able to do it for you in just a few minutes.

MJ in Studio City

wants to separate the audio and video from a DVD so she can edit it on a Mac. DVDBackup is a great free DVD ripper. For more DVD tools and information specific to Macintosh visit the Worm in the Apple web site.

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Chat Logs and Show Audio

Show Archives
Hour 1 audio (MP3)	Hour 1 chat log (ZIP)
Hour 2 audio (MP3)	Hour 2 chat log (ZIP)
Hour 3 audio (MP3)	Hour 3 chat log (ZIP)

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