Beginning In Photography: Choosing A Camera

You’ve been snapping away with your nifty little point and shoot camera for a while now and you’ve discovered you really like taking pictures and want to get more creative and have more control over your photos. Naturally the next step is to upgrade to an SLR camera. But which one? There is a ridiculous number of products out there with all sorts of buttons and dials that do this or that. This article attempts to give a brief overview of the things that are actually important when considering which camera to buy.


Firstly, let’s dispel one of the most common myths associated with upgrading equipment. Buying a new camera will not make you a better photographer. Repeat: it will NOT make you a better photographer. Not instantly, not in 2 years time, not in 10 years. What will make you a better photographer is you. Your willingness to learn and develop your skills. Sure a high end camera will give you more control over your image making, but that’s just it; its you controlling the camera, and therefore the end image. Ok, now that we’re on the same track, a few things to think about.

How many megapixels do I need?

We are going to assume that you are looking at digital cameras here, although I should point out that there are some excellent film cameras around at much less expense. So don’t discount film altogether (it’s not dead just yet!). But to answer the question, we first need to answer another: What do you want to do with your photos? If you only want to post your photos on the web, e-mail them or make small prints to put in a photo album, the resolution you need for this is quite low. To give you an idea, a camera with 2 megapixels will create an image that can make a good quality 6 x 4 print (standard photo album size). Most entry level SLR cameras start at around 6 megapixels. Therefore if this is all you want to do with your images, the amount of megapixels does not need to be a major concern. If, however, you want to make large sized prints, you may need a higher resolution camera. While entry level SLR’s often produce very good quality prints up to a certain size, more pixels gives you the freedom of being able to enlarge even further. While image software programs can increase the size of your photos they will lose some quality. Starting with a larger image means that fewer pixels are added by the program and less quality is lost.

Is brand important?

Not as important as some would have you think. While photographers will continue to debate the Nikon vs Canon issue, my belief is that it is a moot point. Both companies produce some excellent products and some pretty ordinary ones. What should be foremost in your mind is build quality. How many plastic parts does the camera have versus metal ones? Metal parts can be replaced, while plastic parts are usually set into a mould and cannot be. Potentially this could mean the difference between having to buy a new part or a new camera a few years down the track. Check how the camera feels in your hand. If it feels solid and sturdy, it probably is. Quality between brands doesn’t differ greatly until you get into the higher end cameras. This is where Nikon and Canon come to the fore and other brands that don’t target this market drop off. However if you decide you don’t need a higher end camera, don’t discount other brands.

What about features?

Cameras come with all sorts of different modes and features. Some of them seem to be included for no other reason than to be a selling point for that particular model. It takes a little research to discern which are actually going to be useful. There are, however, some that you should factor into your considerations. Firstly, what mode settings does the camera have? Many entry level SLR’s have similar settings to point and shoot cameras. I.e. Portrait, landscape, low light etc. While these make things easy, the point of moving up to an SLR camera is to gain more control over your photos. You will never gain the control you want without learning how to use a camera in full manual mode.

Other features, such as a built if flash or cable release socket, may be important to you depending on the type of photography you want to do. If you like to shoot portraits, a built in flash can be a huge help in lighting shadows. If you are interested in landscape photography, you will at some point want to set you camera up on a tripod to capture a low light scene. Using a cable release allows you to press the shutter without actually touching the camera, removing the camera shake that blurs a picture.

One final consideration.

This is possibly the most important of all. Make sure the camera you choose is comfortable and easy to use. Check that you can reach all the buttons easily while shooting and that the dial and menu configurations are logical. This allows you to learn your gear easily so that you can concentrate on the most important thing: taking pictures.

by: Mark Eden

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The Evolution Of HP and Epson Inkjet Printers

When you’re looking for ink for printers, two names rise to the top of the pile: HP inkjet cartridges and Epson ink cartridges. Of course, it really depends on what brand printer you own, but if you’re after high quality prints, HP and Epson will deliver quality both in the printers they make and in the ink they develop for their printers.

Actually, the word “develop” pretty well sums up the difference between HP inkjet cartridges, Epson ink cartridges, and their competitors. Both of these giants in the printing industry continually put your money back to work for you by researching, developing, and implementing the most current innovative technologies to deliver the best print solutions to their customers including the ink for the printers they market.

Hewlett Packard didn’t start out making HP inkjet cartridges. In fact, they didn’t start making ink for printers. HP was started in 1939 by Stanford classmates, Bill Hewlett and Dave Packard who made an audio oscillator—an instrument used by sound engineers and then sold eight of them for use in the movie Walt Disney movie Fantasia.

Hewlett Packard’s dedication to providing their customers with new technologies has carried them through the decades. In 1978, HP dove into the field of desktop printing and in 1984 released the “Thinkjet” and later that year, the HP Laserjet Printer. The dependability and affordability of these two HP Printers changed the direction of the entire printing industry. This year, HP’s development and release of Vivera Ink for printers is a new breakthrough in 21st Century photographic imaging.

Epson has long been a household word in both consumer and business printing, simplifying solutions for specialized operations like the first seven-color archival desktop photo printer to offering the home-computer user an Epson ink cartridge that tells you when it’s running dry!

The company is a subsidiary of the Japan-based Seiko Epson Corporation, which evolved from K. Hattori & Company, a company that was established in 1881 and involved in the importing and exporting of clocks and watches. In 1968, Suwa Seikosha (the parent company of the Seiko Group) developed the first commercially successful printer mechanism, the EP-101. In 1975, the Epson brand was established and since that time Epson has been the forerunner of many innovations in desktop printing and ink for their printers. Epson prides itself in its century-long development of precision solutions for its customers.

An attribute Epson and HP share is their attention to precision detail; both continually deliver the best not only in products such as their printers but also in support products like the ink for the printers they sell. Another characteristics these companies have in common is their dedication to doing business in an environmentally responsible manner in the understanding that preserving their market is as important as broadening it.

by: Niall Roche

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Streamlining Regulatory Publishing with Submission-Ready PDF Files

As the business world turns its attention from back office automation to front office efficiency the need to streamline document and information management is starting to play an increasingly important role. This has never been more relevant than in the pharmaceutical industry.

Enterprise Content Management applications, eCTD software and other information management tools all provide benefits that are designed to better manage information and streamline document workflows. As much as these applications aid in general contributions to document management, there are still further requirements in regulatory submissions that the generalities of these applications don’t address. The cost of government and regulatory compliance leaves a lot of room for improvement – a key area being the document conversion and publishing process. The real and opportunity costs of non-compliance leave most companies spending an inordinate amount of time and money ensuring document quality and compliance. What if there was a tool that would not only automate document conversion and publishing but reduce the need to perform quality checks and balances? Streamlining the sub mission process not only saves money but it can generate millions of dollars on the back end of the life cycle of the product. This article talks about real-world process improvements, cost reductions and the opportunities for streamlining document submission processes, highlighted by applications with proven track records.

Time to market has always been a critical success factor for manufacturers and marketers of consumer products. But when every day’s delay can mean millions against your bottom line – and when your product might mean the difference between life and death for millions of people worldwide – the stakes are that much higher. These are the stakes that leaders of Life Sciences and Pharmaceutical companies must contend with every time a new drug or technology is faced with regulatory approval. For a blockbuster drug like LIPITOR® or NEXIUM®, that are now prescribed in excess of $10 million every day, reaching the marketplace quickly can make or break the financial quarter or even a full fiscal year. High stakes indeed.

The regulatory minefield

For Life Sciences and Pharmaceutical companies, time to market is always held hostage, to some degree, by the global regulatory landscape. Few industries face regulation on the same scale and level of complexity. Such intense oversight and scrutiny is reasonable for an industry of such intricacy and potential impact on the health and wellbeing of much of the world’s population. At the same time, the agencies that impose these regulations, like the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in the United States, face intense pressures of their own.

Recent media and congressional examination of several high-profile cases in the drug industry have put the FDA and its international counterparts firmly on the defensive. This is not good news for the industry. Scandals surrounding first the cardiovascular effects associated with Non-Steroidal Anti-Inflammatory Drugs (NSAIDs), and more recently the “sleep driving” and “sleep eating” side effects of popular new insomnia treatments are causing a significant retrenchment within the regulatory community. The FDA in particular is facing growing pressure for congressional action to address these issues but the proposals currently under consideration, in the opinion of many industry players, would harm, not improve, patient safety by making it more difficult to get promising new drugs approved and into the hands of doctors and patients.

The FDA has also been perceived in the past as “cozying up” to the industry and of rushing promising new drugs and technologies to market without an adequate paper trail. The result of this perception, justified or not, is heightened scrutiny, leading the agency to become progressively more conservative and defensive in its decision-making and in its approach to reviewing and approving submissions for new medicines and technologies. At the same time, promising new areas of study such as the Human Genome Project (HGP) are turbo-charging innovation and discoveries in the research community. In fact, the Wall Street Journal recently cataloged over $1 billion worth of currently pending IPO filings and there is a growing collection of existing bio-engineering companies applying HGP concepts in the marketplace.

The combination of more rigorous oversight, increasing threats of litigation and the explosion of complex, technology-driven areas of research have created a perfect storm for companies looking to succeed in this complicated landscape. It has also led to an atomic explosion in the size and complexity of submissions related to new drugs and technologies. Though this cutting edge research is conducted using the latest technology, it is remarkable how often the key results are compiled and maintained on nothing more sophisticated than a series of unconnected MS Word documents and even hand-written forms. Documentation for a single research study may consist of tens of thousands of pages with a full submission including multiple study results documents. Extend this over multiple jurisdictions, different languages, add in the complexity of joint ventures, patent laws, sub-contracting and outsourcing research and it is hardly surprising that some FDA and EMEA (European Medicines Agency) submissions were traditionally delivered not by the box load but by the truck load.

Electronic submissions: technology to the rescue?

When every day is critical, ensuring that you have effective regulatory submission processes and technologies in place is “table stakes”. Having leading-edge document management technologies coupled with collaborative document transformation tools, on the other hand, is a significant competitive advantage. The effective implementation of these technologies can significantly accelerate submission lifecycles that contributes directly to the bottom line.

Preparing submission compliant documents, typically in PDF, is a time-consuming and highly iterative process critical to successful submissions. As discussed earlier, the highly collaborative and fractured nature of the research and development process means that many of the original source documents that make up the submission need to be manually reworked. The rework stems from deficiencies inherent in MS Word, particularly the inability to retain key navigation information during conversion to PDF. This kind of manual rework is time-consuming, prone to error and, not surprisingly, very expensive. These deficiencies can be overcome during the PDF creation process by having the right technology in place.

Not all solutions are created equal

The excessive size of these submissions is also a significant burden for the agencies themselves. For its part, the FDA plans to streamline and simplify the process by moving all submissions to an automated electronic platform by the end of 2007 – with the caveat that this may be pushed out to a later date. The standard, known as eCTD (electronic Common Technical Documents) is an interface between industry and agency for transferring regulatory information while at the same time taking into consideration the facilitation of the creation, review, lifecycle management and archival of the electronic submission. The specification has set criteria that make electronic submissions technically valid, and any eCTD-compliant submission prepared in any compliant environment can be transferred to another environment built on technology from another vendor. In theory it sounds ideal, however in practice it should be remembered that not all technologies are created equal.

With the FDA demanding the use of the eCTD format, the leading players in Life Sciences and Pharmaceuticals were quick to make the transition; recognizing the opportunity to streamline their own processes and take advantage of the inherent cost savings. Even companies not required to make eCTD compliant submissions are seeing the advantages of an electronic workflow in accelerating time to market. They are finding ways to leverage the technology and transform eCTD into suitable printed CTD. These companies have also seen the way the wind is blowing with the news that the European Union has mandated that all 27 member countries be ready to accept eCTD submissions by 2009. Can the chapter of paper submissions be nearing its end? Can the rest of the world be far behind?

There is no shortage of document workflow, rendering and output solutions available but the requirements for eCTD compliant submissions are unique and require an integrated solution that puts the focus where it belongs – squarely on delivering final submissions that can handle the complex, ever-evolving landscape of this leading edge industry. The documents for an Investigational New Drug Application (IND) or New Drug Application (NDA) submission are always “in play” – constantly under review, endlessly annotated and eternally being “improved”. These improvements must not corrupt the perfection of the submission, which is often the result of post-production re-rendering where critical errors are made or repeated.

Software applications, like those offered by Adlib Software, avoid these pitfalls by focusing on document rendering quality while employing a design philosophy of stable, open protocols and standards such as XML and Web services. Adlib’s document transformation technologies streamline the rendering process for documents being used in the submissions process. By integrating seamlessly into the document workflow, any source document can be easily rendered automatically into a submission-ready PDF.

Robust rendering is the core

Robust PDF rendering forms the backbone of any document management workflow and is the lifeblood that flows through the entire eCTD submission lifecycle. By creating higher quality renditions, quality assurance churn can be reduced to only minutes per document. This is a significant process acceleration over traditional QA cycles – searching for missing, broken and invalid hyperlinks – that usually takes hours to complete. The cost savings, projected over submissions running into the hundreds of thousands or even millions of pages, have proven to be enormous.

Submission-ready PDFs are infinitely flexible and contain an almost limitless set of features. These PDF outputs can be readily equipped with essential elements like version control, downgrading, font embedding, automated Table of Contents creation, audit history and submission taxonomy. These PDF documents are also flexible and scalable at every stage of the submission lifecycle, particularly important given the FDA’s increasingly aggressive use of post-marketing “risk minimization action plans” (RiskMAPs) – including the requirement to submit additional safety information (such as larger safety studies to screen earlier for relatively rare potential adverse reactions) – after the original submission is made.

The right instruments: powerful, flexible and nimble

When it comes to partnering with leading edge players in Life Sciences and Pharmaceuticals, Adlib Software is uniquely positioned to supercharge the submissions process with its powerful document transformation framework anchored by Adlib Express Server and Express Web Services. For more than 10 years, Adlib as enabled several key industry players to gain a competitive advantage by maximizing the efficiency of document workflows. The difference with Adlib Software’s solutions compared to some of the other PDF rendering engines is that Adlib Software cut its teeth working with global Life Sciences partners to ensure that the quality and fidelity of its PDF renditions not only meet but exceed the demands of regulatory submissions.

Several of Adlib’s customers have reported savings amounting to millions of dollars with the majority of the direct cost savings coming from substantial QA cycle time reductions due to unprecedented confidence in PDF rendering quality. QA has been reduced to a couple of minutes compared to what used to take hours. Given the sheer volume of document rendering that takes place for just one submission and multiply that by the number of submissions performed each year, the numbers add up quickly. The indirect impact, although harder to measure may even have a greater impact on the bottom line. By streamlining the submission process and providing higher quality submissions, product hits the market sooner. As mentioned earlier, each day gained could be worth millions of dollars in extra sales. Not a bad ROI is it.

With its advanced publishing features and support for multiple formats including MS Office-based sources, Adlib Express Server applications give companies all of the advanced features necessary to significantly accelerate submission compliant document workflows. Some of these features include automated, accurate optical character recognition (OCR) to create searchable files from images and PDFs, stamping to create headers, footers, volume numbers and cross-references from hyperlinks, as well as dynamic Tables of Contents generation capabilities. Importantly, Adlib Express also normalizes hyperlink styles to meet FDA standards and includes advanced bookmarking control with the ability to merge and/or volumize PDFs based on page count, size or other variables. Adlib solutions are XML-ready with XML Job Ticket support and Web services. A truly complete solution.

Adlib Software then takes things to the next level with its Exhibit product. Exhibit enables organizations to leverage existing XML backbones, as well as folder structures for Rest of World (ROW) submissions in either paper or volumized PDF formats. Exhibit works with eCTDs as well as other submission formats (e.g. 510k) and with other applications to provide the ultimate in flexibility and interoperability.

Exhibit was developed in partnership with several world leading pharmaceutical companies to automate the process of creating paper-based submissions from eCTDs. It’s a collaborative browser-based solution that optimizes the capabilities of Adlib Express Server to prepare electronic submissions for print or volumized PDF destinations. It includes the ability to convert electronic hyperlinks into paper-based bookmarks and references as well as automated features that allow for intelligent document assembly; modifying Tables of Contents, page scaling, the application of headers and footers, page numbers and the insertion of tabs and slip sheets. All of these advanced operations are available with Express Server but leveraged through applications like Exhibit.

The benefits of a solution like Adlib Express Server is that the scalable conversion, publishing and OCR functionality can be leveraged for not only regulatory submission processes but it can also be applied across the entire enterprise to create a complete rendering framework for all sorts of document workflows. The robust infrastructure of Adlib Express Server is designed to be a foundation for growth that allows Life Sciences and Pharmaceutical organizations to take advantage of existing investments in skills and technology to achieve document management efficiencies that truly support the critical work they do on behalf of humanity – and their shareholders. These solutions are also flexible and scalable enough to act as the launching pad for adopting innovative new methods of information management to achieve competitive advantages over time.

by: Scott Mackey

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How To Troubleshoot Your Computer Hardware

There could be many reasons why you’d want to troubleshoot your computer, well, one actually and that’s because something is not working right. The process of troubleshooting is something you learn after working for a long time with computers. Often enough when there’s a problem, nothing is going to explicitly tell you what is causing the problem and how you can fix it. By taking logical steps and walking through the process of troubleshooting you should be able to solve almost any computer problem, software or hardware related. It involves identifying the problem(s), finding the cause of that problem, determining the solution, executing that solution, and testing and checking that solution to see if it solves your problem.

As an example let’s say one day while using your computer the screen suddenly turns all black and you can’t see anything. We found a problem now what would be the first step to take to fix it? First check to see if the monitor is on and is receiving power, most monitors when they have power, but no connection or connection problems with the computer will display a message that says this monitor is working, but make sure you check your cables. So the next logical step to take would be to check the cable to make sure it is properly connected and secured to the VGA slot behind your computer case and to make sure the monitor cable is plugged into the monitor. Now, here’s where you have to decide what would be the next best course of action to take. you could either swap out your monitor with another monitor that you know is working to see if the problem is the monitor itself and nothing else or you can try to see if the problem is your graphics card. If your replacement monitor works, good, then you know your culprit is a bad monitor and you’ll most likely have to get a new one, because monitors are dangerous and too costly service. If the replacement monitor you used shows up a black screen as well, the next thing you’d do is check to make sure the graphics card is properly seated in the motherboard, if it is and the display is still not showing up, then swap out the graphics card to see if your problem is fixed.

Generally there are only so many steps you can take before you solve the problem and everything is back in order. Make sure that before you start testing and swapping out parts that the problem wasn’t caused by you changing a software setting in Windows or some ambiguous option in the motherboard’s BIOS that causes your problem.

Motherboard

The motherboard is the heart of the computer, every part of the computer relies on the motherboard to function correctly. It maintains connection between every PC component and ensures that things are operating smoothly between them. Many signs of motherboard failure is that the computer won't boot up, not reaching the POST test, erratic system behavior, different combinations of components not working. Because everything is connected to the motherboard certain parts may or may not work correctly if the motherboard is faulty so be sure to test those parts before thinking they're dead and getting new ones.

Be sure to do a visual inspection of the motherboard to make sure all cables are seated properly, the fans are spinning, and that the CMOS battery is in it's proper place.

Also check for any broken or leaking capacitors, those can immediately render a motherboard dead.

Make sure that all of the jumpers are set correctly as well, you should be able to find jumper information in your motherboard's manual, and if you don't have the manual you should be able to find the manual on the Internet at the motherboard manufacturer's website.

Many of the problems caused by a bad motherboard is also similar to problems caused by a faulty or dying power supply, so be sure to check if the power supply is faulty or swap it out for another to see if your problem is fixed. If you have a spare motherboard you can try swapping out the motherboard to see if that solves your problem, if that's the case then the motherboard is most likely faulty. If you think the motherboard is faulty and it is still in warranty you should be able to send it back to the manufacturer for a new one with no hassle, sometimes they might even pay for the shipping & handling if it is a big problem that is happening with a certain line of motherboards. Make sure that when you open a motherboard you keep all of the packaging and the box, and if there are any stickers that will void the warranty if removed make sure you do NOT remove them, so that way it is easier to send back.

Power Supply

If you suspect your power supply is giving you trouble, make sure you check it out fast, because power supplies can make trouble with the rest of your system as well. Irregular voltages sent from the power supply can short circuit and overheat your components thus frying them and making them unusable. Some faulty power supplies have even caught on fire, but if you’re lucky it might just smoke a little and start to smell. A few signals that your power supply is bad or is going bad would be erratic and seemingly random system behavior like system hangs and crashes, and burning smells along with smoke.

If you recently upgraded your system or added new hard drives, disk drives, a graphics card or anything for that matter, be sure to check if your power supply is being overloaded with hardware. A good way to check is to use a power supply calculator. One time when I upgraded my system with a new fancy PCI Express 16x Graphics card, well it was fancy back then, I had problems with the graphics card performing while in 3d games, it was all due to my power supply being unable give it enough juice on the 12v rails so it performed poorly and didn’t act as it should have, I even swapped out the graphics card for another one believing it was bad, after checking the manufacturer’s forums it seemed like a lot of people were having problems with faulty cards, so I figured mine must have been faulty too. After getting the new card it seemed like it performed better for a little bit longer, which could’ve just been some optimizations they did to circuit board. Seeing how they sent me an upgraded version of the same card, but it wasn’t until I checked my power supply wattages that I found the real culprit.

The first thing to do to diagnose your power supply is check the power supply connectors, make sure everything is plugged into the motherboard and the power cable is plugged into the power supply, you wouldn’t believe how many people forget to plug in their computer. Many power supplies also have a power switch on them so check to make sure that no one accidentally or purposefully switched it off maybe for a prank. Check the fan to see if it is spinning at the correct speed and if it’s dusty vacuum it out. Determine if the power supply cables are giving out the right amount of voltage, if you computer will let you boot you should be able to check them in the BIOS menu to see if the correct voltages are being given. Normal power supplies give +3.3 volts DC, +5 volts DC, -5 volts DC, +12 volts DC, and -12 volts DC.

Memory

Faulty RAM can have many adverse effects on your system. Constant lockups, computer rebooting, memory error message (duh), system crashes, and sometimes refusing to boot up are all signs of memory errors. Though, these are also signs for motherboard, hard drive, and power supply problems too. Luckily for you if you think your memory is subject to causing a disruption in your system there are programs that can check the memory for it's performance and to see if it is generating any errors.

Memtest86+ is an amazing memory diagnostic program. It is based off of the original Memtest86 that has been around since 1994 and is used by system-builders, average joes, and professionals in the IT world. It's a standalone memory check test which means it can be easily run without a bootable operating system, that's good if you can't just seem to get your PC started and want to rule out your memory as quickly as possible.

How To Use Memtest86 With Your Floppy Drive To Test Your Memory

First go their website at www.memtest.org and select the most appropriate version to download. You can download the bootable iso or the Pre-compiled floppy drive depending on whether you want burn a CD or use your floppy drive. We're going to go into details on floppy method.

Open up the .zip and extract the files to a folder, then click on install.bat, you will be asked to “Enter target diskette drive:”. Type A and hit enter then it will ask you to insert a formatted diskette into drive A: and press -Enter-: after you hit enter it will write some files to your floppy so you can boot your computer with the floppy to test for errors.

After the floppy has been formatted with Memtest86+, leave the floppy in your floppy drive and reboot your computer. Remember to set your floppy drive as the first boot device in your BIOS menu.

The program will automatically load and perform the memory diagnostic tests on your computer. During the testing if there any errors they will show up and at the end of the test it will tell you how many errors you've had.

After testing your memory if you receive any errors you should make sure that your memory is okay either by swapping it out and seeing the problems still occur or try your memory in another system. If the memory passes the tests then you proceed to troubleshoot something else with good faith that your memory is fine.

Hard Drive

The hard drive is that ultimate safe to everything important on your computer. It keeps all of your information, files and folders, music, videos, favorite websites, and programs. With a bad hard drive there's no reason to have a computer. In terms of fixing a computer if the hard drive isn't salvageable then most people don't even want to bother with the rest, because their computer is probably a piece of junk that has been handed down from time to time. Generally when a hard drive is about to fail it's usually years down the road from first acquiring the computer. So the next best option rather than replacing the drive is to just buy a new computer, or build a new one, because your old one sure is probably not running as fast as it used to.

Luckily before your hard drive kicks the bucket there is usually a few warning signs:

Abnormally slow file transfers

Problems with booting, especially when Windows is being loaded

Corrupted files

Disappearing files or folders

Loud hard drive noise is a good sign that there is a mechanical problem going on inside

If your hard drive exhibits any of these signs be sure to transfer all of your files to another source immediately, and do not continue to do day-to-day activities with that hard drive. If it doesn't show any of these tell-tale signs, however you have a gut feeling that your hard drive is on the brink of destruction you can try using many different drive testing utilities available on the internet. The hard drive manufacturer usually has at least one qualified tool that you can download from their website and run. Other ways to check the health of your hard drive involves running the Windows Error Checking tool by right clicking on your hard drive in 'My Computer' then selecting 'Properties' and going to the 'Tool' and clicking on “Check Now”, or checking the SMART status located in your motherboard's BIOS. SMART stands for Self-Monitoring, Analysis and Reporting Technology. Most motherboards nowadays has this technology. It should be automatically enabled in your BIOS, if it's not then your hard drive won't get checked. What it does is on boot up it will perform quick tests on your hard drive to ensure it is running correctly and it will continue to monitor it for any errors or abnormal problems that may occur as long as the computer is turned on.

Monitor

Watching movies, videos, playing games, and looking at NSFW material are all amazing things we can do on our computers. Yet there may come a day where you just want to get on your computer and relax in your computer room looking at all that NSFW material you have bookmarked under the “Special Sites” category, but you can’t because your monitor won’t turn on. No, you don’t frump and punch holes in the walls to look for an outlet for your rage. You troubleshoot it, and hope to god that your monitor isn’t broken!

When diagnosing a screen problem, half the time it’s usually something very easy, like a cable coming loose, or the monitor getting unplugged accidentally; unfortunately the other half the time it’s probably a problem that’s related to your monitor being old, or a problem that’s related to your graphics card instead. So you may have to diagnose both items at the same time to see which solves your problem.

First, check all your cables, I know this is probably getting a little old with the checking connections and everything, but so many computer problems can be avoided if people just remember that their computer isn’t always going to stay the same way they left it. A foot could kick out a cable, a dog or a cat that got to curious, or almost anything can render half your hardware useless.

After checking all your cables, make sure your screen has power, if it has power and shows a message such as “This monitor is working correctly please check your cable” and shows bars of color on the screen, that means that your monitor is not getting a signal from your computer. Try swapping out the monitor for another one to see if it still says that message. If it does then that means the problem is most likely something to do with your graphics card not seated in the motherboard, or just isn’t working properly, you may want to try swapping out another graphics card to see if that solves your problem.

Generally monitors don’t have that many diagnosable problems. Either they work and they work well, or they don’t work and you have to replace them. When working on a monitor you should never open them, they aren’t meant to be serviced and contain high charged capacitors that hold lethal doses of electricity. We wouldn’t want to read about a computer guy in the obituaries now would we?

Graphics Card

The glorious graphics card, it’s an amazing thing really. It makes all those pretty HDR (High Dynamic Range) pictures look just that good, it keeps your games running smoothly, and your videos in HD. Yet these things can be pains when they’re just not working right, because if something is wrong there’s not a strict hardware or software solution, you have to analyze the current situation to see what’s up.

First and foremost if you’re having any problems with your graphics card, probably the best thing to try to do first is see if there an updated driver for it at the manufacturer’s website that may solve the problem, or if there isn’t an update try uninstalling your graphics drivers and reinstalling them this little action can solve so many problems.

If there’s little jaggies or weird colorful mishaps known as artifacts appearing on your screen you may want to check the temperature of your graphics and make sure is getting enough cooling, and that the fan is working properly. If the cooling checks out okay you may also want to check your power supply ratings to see if it is giving enough juice to your graphics card. Nowadays most graphics cards need a lot of power on the 12v rails, make sure your power supply can give you that power that the graphics card needs.

Sound Card

Some of the typical problems people have with sound cards is either A) no sound or B) no sound. Sounds card typically aren't very expensive so having to replace one if the current one isn't working is no big deal. However, if you're one of those audiophile types who expect 100% original recording quality with your $300 sound card replacing one of those is as expected a lot more harder to do.

Sound Card Troubleshooting

Check speaker cables make sure they're all connected and plugged into the right spot on your sound card. Also check the speaker's power cables.

Make sure windows volume is turned up and the volume is not muted, also make sure that you have all the wave and playback volume turned up and not muted. If you have 'Digital Output Only' checked in your Advanced Controls for Playback Controls, try unchecking it to see if that solves your non-sound problem. I found that if I have that checked my sound card won't give me any sound.

Try reinstalling your sound card drivers, also try checking on the internet at the manufacturer's website for any updated drivers that may be available. They increase your sound card's compatibility with your system.

If the previous tips didn't help, then you may just have to replace your sound card, or atleast swap it out for another one to see if it might be a problem related to your sound card's connection to the motherboard instead.

Processor

The processor is the actual thinking part of the brain of the computer. It does all the calculations needed to make a computer run, and does them all in split second timing. It determines how fast your computer generally runs, and most of the time is a bottle neck for systems that have had everything upgraded except the CPU.

If your processor’s not working, it’s not the end of the world, generally most processors that work correctly for a few weeks, should work correctly for the rest of it’s lifespan, which varies from 5-10 years or so. As long as you’re not overclocking the processor or letting it overheat too badly your processor should be fine, and it could just be a BIOS setting that’s messed up, or a jumper setting, but for kicks just check to make the processor is seated properly and the heat sink is attached to the processor and the motherboard. The heat sink should be attached tightly to the motherboard and not have room to move about, you should be able to pick up your motherboard by grabbing onto the heat sink without any problems. Check in your motherboard manual to make sure all the jumpers are set correctly for your type of processor. Any jumpers set incorrectly can cause the processor to not work, or function correctly or at it’s optimal speed. Also check the heat sink to see if it is cooling off the processor, if it’s not doing a very good job you may want to look into investing in a better one that gets the job done.

by: Steven Stoddard

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Seven Service Principles Guaranteed To Create Raving Fans

“There is only one boss. The customer. And he can fire everybody in the company from the chairman on down, simply by spending his money somewhere else.”

Sam Walton, Founder of Wal-Mart

Sam Walton lived a life which displayed everything he believed in. Over the years, especially since Wal-Mart became a publicly traded company on the stock market, Sam’s vision and philosophy have slowly been forgotten. Although Wal-Mart may not offer the greatest customer service today, Sam’s words on the importance of customers to any business are timeless.

If business was to be compared to a car, customers would be the fuel. No fuel and the car cannot go anywhere. No customers and the business cannot go anywhere.

All businesses have some kind of customers. The philosophy behind the content in this article is just as applicable to personal relationships as it is to customer service in business. Although we are conditioned to believe our personal relationships are different from business relationships, in the end it is all the same; how you deal with people. Whether it is in your personal life or business, the principles shared in this article will benefit anyone who is willing to apply them in their situation.

Some have other businesses as customers, other have the general public as their customers. There are also internal customers and external customers. Internal customers are employees and external customers are those who your employees deal with. Keep your internal customers happy and they will naturally be compelled to do everything they can to keep your external customers happy.

This article deals with external customers and seven proven customer service principles which are guaranteed to create raving fans. Raving fans are customers who are so enthusiastic about doing business with your company that they become walking, talking billboards advertising and raving about your products and services to anyone in need of them.

The essence of creating raving fans out of your customers lies in going back to the basics. That’s right, simple strategies which are timeless and guaranteed to create astonishing results.

Also, it is crucial to realize that all successful businesses offer massive value to their customers. Creating products and services which efficiently and innovatively solve problems adds tremendous value to a person or business. This same value is what gets turned into an equivalent amount of profit.

Here are seven proven customer service principles guaranteed to turn the customers you have now and those to come in the time ahead into raving fans. This will naturally create an upward spiral of growth for your business since these very customers will happily share their great experience with your organization with countless others.

Keeping your word is where it all begins

When you say you were going to do something, customers expect you will do it. Since it is the norm for companies to make promises and not keep them, any business which is adamant about keeping their commitments to their customers is warranted to stand apart from the herd. So next time you are telling one of your customers you will do something, make sure that you do it no matter what happens.

Keeping your word with the customers allows them to be able to trust you. Trust is the essential ingredient to any successful long term personal or professional relationship. It is the foundation upon which everything else is built upon. Not just in business, but in general in relationships in life.

Always be honest and tell it like it Is

Your customers are people just like yourself and have more common sense than most businesses are willing to admit. By being honest and telling your customers the truth, you are much more likely to get a positive response to any situation. Given the current technological dynamics of our existence, a customer or client can very easily interact with others and get to the bottom line quickly.

The Internet is and has been changing the way business is conducted around the world. If you say your pricing is the cheapest and customer service the best, it is only a matter of minutes before this can be verified by interacting with others in a global economy. A prospect can do five minutes of research on Google and find out if you are telling the truth or just blowing smoke.

Always think proactively, looking around the corner

Everything in life is a dual creation. What that means is first we create any idea, service, or product in our mind. Once that is done, we then create its physical manifestation in the physical world. Thus it is totally accurate to say that if we wish to change our physical reality, we must first change our mental reality.

Thinking proactively when it comes to customer service boils down to addressing concerns PRIOR to you having to hear from the customer that something needs to be done. A simple example is an Internet Service Provider informing their clients that a necessary upgrade to computer services infrastructure will temporarily disable Internet access on x day at x time. It is simply amazing how much thinking proactively can benefit the bottom line of any organization not just when it comes to customer services, but also business strategy in general.

Deal with problems as best you can yourself, never passing the buck

My greatest mentor once told me that he met a billionaire, that’s right, a billionaire, who shared with him that “until a person realizes problems are a normal state of affairs, they have not even begun to mature yet.” Whether you wish to admit or not, problems in life are just as much a part of reality as eating, breathing, and walking. A person can certainly structure their life in such a manner that they can minimize those problems; however when the problems do arise they must be dealt with.

The best way to deal with any problem is THROUGH IT. What that entails is when problems arise; you simply stop and evaluate what is happening. Based on your evaluation, the problem is then to be addressed according to a chosen plan.

When a customer calls or walks in with a problem, it is an absolute opportunity to solidify their trust in your organization and prove that they can count on you to get it fixed. The first step is simply clearing up the facts and getting to the bottom line of exactly what needs to be addressed. Once the problem is clearly understood, it can be eradicated. The more authority your employees have to address customer problems, the better it is since nothing upsets customers than being passed from department to department when dealing with a problem.

There is no point in arguing with a customer because it is a lose/lose situation

The best way to deal with an argument is to downplay its confrontational aspect and direct all energy and attention towards a solution. What can be done to make the customer feel happy and cared for.

A customer can totally be wrong; however most of the times they simply need education to better understand the situation at hand.

It is also very important to separate an objective argument from a personal attack. If a person is frustrated because a product or service has not lived up to its standard, it is essential for your company’s representative dealing with the customer realize that the customer is upset at the situation and not at them personally. Often arguments turn personal when the people involved had nothing in the creation of the problem being argued about to begin with.

Accept your mistakes, learn from them, and do not repeat them

My greatest mentor, who is a professional drag racer at heart, also shared with me that in professional drag racing “the one who makes the least mistakes wins.”

We all make mistakes. Some of us accept that we made a mistake, evaluate the situation, learn the lesson and move on, while others get stuck in a never-ending state of denial. “What did I do wrong? I am not responsible for it!” is a common theme in their life.

Acknowledgment always precedes resolution. When a company’s customer service representative is dealing with a situation where a mistake has been made by the company, the best thing which can be done is taking ownership of the issue at hand. The anger and emotion around any issue can be minimized by admitting fault and diverting all energy towards a resolution. Customers are normal people just like the rest of us and when they hear that a mistake was made, and that you apologize for it and focus on the solution, the energy balance shifts from being upset to feeling content that the issue at hand will be professionally addressed.

You may have heard before “when you lose, don’t lose the lesson.” There is always something to be learned from any situation in life. Your general attitude will determine how you look at life, which will bleed into any business you are a part of. With each mistake, it is essential to realize what went wrong, how it went wrong, and most importantly what can be done in the future to prevent the same situation from occurring.

Consistency is the name of the game for lasting success

If you do something once, great. If you do it twice, awesome. If you do it three times, brilliant. And if you do it over and over, consistently, congratulations my friend, if you happen to be doing things the right way, you are officially a success.

Repetition is a common theme for most of what we do in life. When the six customer service principles discussed above are practiced consistently, customers realize over time that the integrity of how you choose to run your business is unable to be compromised.

Always remember, people buy more so because they want to, than they need to (Why do you think the average family in the west has so much debt?). Similarly, customers do business with companies because they WANT to do business with.

If your customers truly believe that your company can be counted upon, not in times when everything is fine but in times where there are problems and challenges, they will choose to do business with you because they know that no matter what you will get the job done.


About The Author
Imran Rahman is a young entrepreneur, inspirational speaker, and author living in Tampa, FL. His deepest passion in life is to share the exact science of creating results and achieving dreams. He currently writes for http://www.dreammanifesto.com weekly on success and finances.

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