|
Front Range PC Users Group Newsletter k-Byte |
 |
|
| v. 20, n. 3/4 March/April 2003 | Users Helping Users |
|
Contents 1 State of the Group - Rick Mattingly 2 About k-Byte 3 February/March Meeting Reports - Jim Bragonier 4 April Hardware/Software Zoo 4 My Registry Is Dead 6 Great Bits Of Wisdom For Our Time 7 Filtering Spam in Outlook Express 8 Six Ways To Move To Windows XP - Gene Barlow 12 Windows XP Installation Tip - Rick Mattingly 13 The 10 Commandments of Email/Forwarding 14 Calendar of Events 16 April/May Calendars 18 Membership Application 19 Backing Up And Restoring The Windows Registry - Eric Moore 23 Speaker Noise - Rick Mattingly 24 Mdhub.com - Jerry Spitz, M.D. 24 Medical Information On The Internet 26 Copying Files To CDs 26 Telemarketers, Span, Junk Mail And Other Vermin 27 Choosing A Digital Still Camera - Ira Wilsker 30 Trading Post 31 FRPCUG Contacts State of the Group by Rick Mattingly My appreciation to Vice-President Don Anderson for taking over coordination of the March Meeting on short notice. I was scheduled for a trip out of state very early the following morning but a snow storm forced an earlier than anticipated trip to the airport in Denver. Thanks Don! Our sincere thanks also to Jim Bragonier, who has agreed to fulfill the remainder of the year in the position of Secretary. This position is required of our state non-profit incorporation. Besides, the Board really needs someone to tell us what we said last meeting! Speaking of the Secretary, you will note in Jim's meeting report for the February Board Meeting that the number of active memberships was a point of discussion. Presently, our membership level is down to 70-75. This is the lowest active membership has been for some years. We need to increase our membership. Please mention our organization to friends and neighbors. We need to let the community know we are here! Published bi-monthly, k-Byte is the official newsletter of the Front Range Personal Computer Users Group (FRPCUG): our mailing address is PMB 152, 305 W. Magnolia, Fort Collins, Colorado 80521. Opinions expressed in k-Byte are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect those of the group or its members. Publication of information in k-Byte constitutes no guarantee of accuracy. Use of any information found in this publication is at the sole risk of the user. Neither k-Byte, nor its officers, nor k-Byte, nor its editors or contributors assume any liability for damages resulting from use of information in this publication. Submissions Articles, letters and short items of interest on computer-related topics are welcome and encouraged. All items submitted for publication are subject to editing. Send your contribution to the editor via e-mail attachment or submit on disk. If you have questions about a submission, please contact the editor for information. Copyright k-Byte is copyrighted ©2003 by the Front Range Personal Computer Users Group. Unless otherwise noted, other nonprofit users groups may reprint or quote from any articles appearing in k-Byte without prior permission, provided that proper author and publication credits are given and that a copy of the publication in which the article appears is sent at no cost to k-Byte at the above mailing address. User groups wishing to exchange newsletters with FRPCUG are invited to send a copy of their newsletter together with an exchange request. IBM PC, OS/2, Compaq, MS-DOS, UNIX, Windows and other trademarks occasionally mentioned in k-Byte are registered trademarks of International Business Machines, Inc., Compaq Corporation, Microsoft, Digital Research, AT&T or their owners respectively. Neither FRPCUG nor its newsletter k-Byte are connected in any way with any manufacturer or seller. We, however, gratefully acknowledge sponsorship of our group by Data Service Center, Jim Becker, owner. Advertising Classified advertising is free to members for non-business ads. See “Trading Post” for pricing for camera-ready display ads. Charges for ad makeup from sketches, etc., are available on request. Deadline for camera-ready and classified ads is listed in the Calendar of Upcoming Events. Deadline for ad-makeup is the same as for articles. About FRPCUG FRPCUG is an independent nonprofit computer society, so incorporated with the State of Colorado and open to anyone interested in MS-DOS, OS/2, or UNIX microcomputers. Its purpose is to provide an educational and scientific forum of mutual benefit for members of the micro-computer community. FRPCUG holds a monthly meeting and conducts various special interest groups (SIGS) and seminars. Members have voting privileges, subscription to k-Byte newsletter, SIGs and selected seminars. Annual dues are $25 for individual/family membership and $50 for corporate/group membership. February Board Meeting by Jim Bragonier Present: Rick Mattingly, Bert Broekstra, Charles McJilton, Don Anderson & Jim Bragonier The Class Schedule of computer training courses for the Senior Center has been published and is part of the report of the March report of the Board. President Rick announced a scheduling snafoo at the Fort Collins Senior Center will change the May FRPCUG member meeting to May 13, which is the second Tuesday of May. A coordinator for door prizes is needed for the monthly meetings. Ample door prizes are on hand for the next five meetings. This is a chance to volunteer for the position made famous, and sometimes notorious, by the illustrious Will Horton. President suggested and it was agreed to post the K-Byte in PDF format on the club web site. Upcoming meetings: March meeting: Warren Ptacek, Batteries Plus April meeting: Software/Hardware Zoo, favorite software/hardware sharing May 13 meeting: Printer Technology June meeting: Virus/Spyware/AdAware July meeting: Open August: No Meeting March Board Meeting Report by Jim Bragonier Present: Rick Mattingly, Don Anderson, Jack Linder, Charles McJilton, & Jim Bragonier Initial discussion revolved around the upcoming Software/Hardware Zoo for the April members meeting. The following will be asked to present setups for their areas of interest. C. McJilton: Something Linux, communications and, perhaps, wireless B. Broekstra: DVD and CD ripping J. Bramblett: Astronomy, software and freebees R. Mattingly: Digital Cameras and editing software J. Bragonier: Digital Music, CD burning, virtual studio mixing Next newsletter deadline for submitting material is March 16, 2003. Again the search is on for a Door Prize Coordinator: among the four month supply of prizes is a copy of Microsoft XP Pro (requiring a newer computer system). Current membership of the FRPCUG stands at 70 - 75 active members. Without launching a major membership drive, it was conceded that more members are better than fewer and that new members will be considered an asset! Perhaps the MS XP-Pro should be held until we have 35 people in attendance at our meetings? At the rate we're going it would be way out of date by then! Maybe we need to work on membership….all of us. March Meeting Report by Jim Bragonier Vice-President Don Anderson presiding. Don Anderson administered the drawing for door prizes: 2003 Turbo Tax and MS Money software. Program: Warren Ptacek owner of Batteries Plus, 1107 W. Drake Road, Fort Collins (970-206-0206) Warren enthusiastically presented the latest current information about batteries for computers, personal digital assistants (PDA's), telephones, radios, MP3 players, etc. Three major battery categories are Nickel Cadmium (NiCd), Nickel-Metal Hydride (NiMH), Lithium Ion and Lithium Polymer types. The NiCd and NiMH batteries are rated at 1.2 Volts per cell and were invented in the late 1800's. The Lithium Ion batteries are rated at 3.6 Volts per cell and are less adaptable for the appliances that require 3 volt supplies. Warren passed around two Sealed Lead-Acid batteries (SLA batteries) which generate 2 volts per cell and are generally the batteries used in the uninterrupted power supplies (UPS) systems for our home and office computers. Sometimes an acid gel is used in lieu of liquid acid in these batteries. Warren suggested that users do not wait too long before replacing the SLA batteries in the UPS systems. If the batteries or the regulators develop faults, they can overheat and expand to the point of damaging the circuitry and even the case on the UPS. Warren discussed what is known as “memory effect”, a term he did not like because the batteries don't remember anything, but term describes the effect of batteries developing “dendrites” from overcharging. Overcharging can reduce the life of batteries as can discharging batteries repeatedly until they no longer drive the appliance. NiCd and NiMN batteries are considered discharged at 1.0 volts per cell and should be recharged rather than running them until “dead.” Are there brand differences? Warren said that the NiMH batteries were initially brought out at 1000 mah rating. Most today are 1800 mah rated typed on the case. He did not say anything that would rate the highly advertised brands over non-named brands. He passed around some “prismatic” cells, of the NiMH type which were made very small and flat. These appeared to be suitable for portable cellular/PCS phones. He also circulated “smart” battery packs which included a voltmeter circuitry in the pack to control overcharging by sensing heat buildup. Generally, NiCd batteries lose 20% of their charge in the first two hours after charging and 1% per day thereafter. Lithium batteries self-discharge about one-half as fast as NiCd batteries. The NiMH and Lithium batteries should be stored at low (40%) charge if they will be stored for a number of months. In wrapping up, Warren said that the charging of cigarette lighter adapters seemed to be faster than charging by 110V adapters, but the slower chargers tend to “deep” charge for better, longer service. Lithium-ion batteries can sustain about 300 cycles of use and recharge while the Ni-Cd batteries can sustain up to 1000 cycles. Hence, the NiCd has extremely wide acceptance and use. This was an informative and interesting program. Call for Volunteers! At the April 1st General Forum Meeting we will be holding a Software/Hardware Zoo. This is a round-robin display of interesting software applications and hardware. If you have something that you think others would find interesting please bring the items to this meeting for display. My Registry Is Dead! Occasionally, something happens to cause damage to your Windows 95/98 registry. As bad as this can be, there is some help. If your computer is completely dead, and it appears that the registry may be the culprit, shut down, or turn off your computer. Take a deep breath. Turn on your PC, and while booting, hold down the F8 button until the startup menu appears. Select the "Command Prompt" option. When the DOS appears, type SCANREG/RESTORE at the prompt. Press Enter at the MRC (Microsoft Registry Checker) screen to restore the most recent of the five backups that Windows creates. Now, reboot. If this also fails, you may have had a serious virus attack. Time to get the professionals involved. (1) "Instead of getting married again, I'm going to find a woman I don't like and just give her a house." * Steven Seagal (2) "The problem with the designated driver program, it's not a desirable job. But if you ever get sucked into doing it, have fun with it. At the end of the night, drop them off at the wrong house." * Jeff Foxworthy (3) "If a woman has to choose between catching a fly ball and saving an infant's life, she will choose to save the infant's life without even considering if there is a man on base." * Dave Barry (4) "Relationships are hard. It's like a full time job, and we should treat it like one. If your boyfriend or girlfriend wants to leave you, they should give you two weeks' notice. There should be severance pay, and before they leave you, they should have to find you a temp." * Bob Ettinger (5) "My Mom said she learned how to swim when someone took her out in the lake and threw her out of the boat, and I told her they were not trying to teach you how to swim." * Paula Poundstone (6) "A study in the Washington Post says that women have better verbal skills than men. I just want to say to the authors of that study: duh." * Conan O'Brien (7) "Why does Sea World have a seafood restaurant? I'm halfway through my fishburger and I realize, "Oh my Goodness. I could be eating a slow learner." * Lynda Montgomery (8) "The day I worry about cleaning my house is the day Sears comes out with a riding vacuum cleaner." * Roseanne (9) "I think that's how Chicago got started. A bunch of people in New York said, 'Gee, I'm enjoying the crime and the poverty, but it just isn't cold enough. Let's go west.'" * Richard Jeni (10) "If life was fair, Elvis would be alive and all the impersonators would be dead." * Johnny Carson (11) "Sometimes I think war is God's way of teaching us geography." *Paul Rodriguez (12) "My mother didn't want to move to Florida, but she turned sixty, and that's the law." * Mike Addante (13) "In elementary school, in case of fire, you had to line up quietly in a single file line from smallest to tallest. What is the logic? Do tall people burn slower?" * Warren Hutcherson (14) "Bigamy is having one wife/husband too many. Monogamy is the same."* Oscar Wilde (15) "Marriage is a great institution, but I'm not ready for an institution yet." * Mae West (16) "Suppose you were an idiot . . . And suppose you were a member of Congress. . . But I repeat myself." * Mark Twain (17) "Our bombs are smarter than the average high school student. At least they can find Kuwait." * Whitney Brown (18) "Ah, yes, divorce . . . from the Latin word meaning to rip out a man's genitals through his wallet." * Robin Williams (19) "Women complain about premenstrual syndrome, but I think of it as the only time of the month that I can be myself." * Roseanne (20) "You can say any foolish thing to a dog, and the dog will give you a look that says, 'My God, you're right! I never would've thought of that!" * Dave Barry (21) "If you can't beat them, arrange to have them beaten." * George Carlin (22) "When I die, I want to die like my grandmother who died peacefully in her sleep. Not screaming like all the passengers in her car." * Author Unknown (23) Advice for the day: If you have a lot of tension and you get a headache, do what it says on the aspirin bottle: "Take two aspirin" and "Keep away from children" * Author (still) Unknown (24) "Oh, you hate your job? Why didn't you say so? There's a support group for that. It's called EVERYBODY, and they meet at the bar. " * Drew Carey Friday August 2, 2002 Today's Internet tip: An easy way to filter spam in Outlook Express is to use Outlook Express' message filtering. To check this out, choose File|Folders|New. Select Local Folders and type "Spam" into the "Folder name" entry box. Click OK to continue. Now choose Tools|Message Rules|Mail. Click New and then select the check box labeled "Where the To line contains people". Next, select the check box labeled "Move it to the specified folder". Next, under Rule Description, click "Contains People" and then type in your e-mail address and click Add. Now click Options and select the radio button labeled "Message does not contain the people below" and click OK. Back in the New Mail Rule dialog, click "specified" under "Rule Description" and double-click your Spam folder. Now, click OK to close the dialog box. In Message Rules again, click OK to close the dialog and record your new rule. Outlook Express will now send all e-mail that arrives without your e-mail address in the To box to the Spam folder where you can check to see if you need it. - Sue Whitehouse - eMazing.com by Gene Barlow - User Group Relations Copyrighted February 2002 During the past few months, I've seen a growing interest among user group members to adopt the Windows XP operating system. Questions about how to move to Windows XP are coming up more and more in user group meetings. This article briefly describes the six ways to move to Windows XP, so that you can determine which would best suit your personal needs. Families of Operating Systems: For the past several years, Microsoft has offered two families of operating systems to use on personal computers. For the home user, they provided the Windows 95/98/Me family of operating system. This operating system has included five major versions over the years - Windows 95, Windows 95B, Windows 98, Windows 98 Second Edition, and Windows Millennium. While it may sound like these are several different operating systems, in fact, they are different releases of the same operating system with different names. While end-users were using the Windows 95/98/Me operating system, businesses were getting to know the Windows NT operating system. This operating system included six different versions over the years - Windows NT, Windows NT2, Windows NT3, Windows NT4, Windows 2000, and Windows XP. While Windows XP comes packaged two different ways - a Home Edition and a Professional Edition - they are both the same operating system with slightly different features to meet the needs of their intended audiences. Microsoft has told us that Windows Me was the last version of the home operating system that they will release and that Windows 95/98/Me users are expected to move to the new Windows XP operating system for the most recent version of Windows. All future personal computer operating systems put out by Microsoft will be based on the Windows XP system we now have. This has prompted many users to take a close look at Windows XP and to determine when and how they will move to this new operating system version. Six Ways to Windows XP: A look at the documentation that comes with Windows XP will identify one or two ways to take when moving to XP. Upon closer inspection, there are actually three approaches that you can take to move to Windows XP plus a couple of options on each of these three approaches to give you a total of six ways to get to Windows XP. Let's briefly review the three main approaches and then look at the two options that make up these six ways to Windows XP. The first way to move to Windows XP is also the easiest way to get there - buy a new computer with Windows XP already installed on it. This saves you the expense and effort to upgrade your current computer to a level that will support Windows XP. It also saves you from installing the new operating system on your computer. All of this is taken care of for you by the computer manufacturer. Microsoft has stated that they expect 90% of their users to take this first approach. The second approach to getting to Windows XP is to purchase a Windows XP upgrade package from your software dealer and to install it on your computer replacing your current operating system. When you are done, you will have Windows XP on your computer and your old operating system will be gone. I find this approach a bit risky and do not recommend it to most users. If anything should happen while you are installing Windows XP, you might end up with a bad installation of XP and you may also destroyed your old operating system in the process. Select this option only if you have taken a full backup of your entire system before starting the installation. The third approach is to purchase a Windows XP upgrade package from your software dealer and to install Windows XP on your hard drive, side-by-side with your old operating system. When you are done, you have both your old operating system and your new Windows XP system on your computer. This approach takes a little more disk space to run and some partitioning utilities to set up the hard drive, but it is by far the safest way to move to Windows XP. You will also find that some of your hardware and software may not run at first under Windows XP. This side-by-side approach gives you the ability to continue to run these hardware devices and applications on your old operating system until you can get them to also work on Windows XP. Therefore, you can migrate your system slowly from the old operating system to Windows XP and still have all of your system working on one operating system or the other. Each of these three main approaches has two sub-options to choose from - a Clean install or an Upgrade install. This refers to how closely you connect to your applications and settings on your old operating system. A Clean install is a total replacement of your operating system with little connections to your past operating system. You will need to re-install all of your applications on your new XP system and then select all of your application settings again after they are installed. This approach may take a bit more work, but it promises you the most efficient system after you complete the installation. The Upgrade install retains as many links to your old applications and settings as it can. It is sort of a merging of the new Windows XP operating system with your old operating system, so that when you are done, your applications will run just the same as they did on your old system. While this may appear to be the easiest to do, it may take you longer overall to take this option. Not all of your applications will work under Windows XP and you may need to spend a great deal of time testing out your applications to make sure they work properly on XP. Which Way is Best for You: At first, all of these six ways may sound like they should work for you. Actually, it is a bit more difficult than that. Here are some guidelines to help you decide which of the six ways to move to Windows XP is actually the best one for you to follow. One of the first things to determine is if your computer hardware is powerful enough to support Windows XP. The Windows XP operating system is a robust and stable operating system, but it demands a more powerful computer to run on. As a rule of thumb, if you purchased your computer in the past two years, then it will probably handle Windows XP without too many equipment upgrades. If it is older than two years, then the cost to make many upgrades to the computer may offset the cost of purchasing a new computer instead. Take a close look at your computer hardware to make sure it has the following equipment on it: 300 Mhz Processor 256 MB RAM 1.5 GB of Available Hard Drive Space If your old computer is not up to these minimum specifications, then you need to buy what is needed to bring your computer up to this minimum level. The cost to do this may help you determine whether to spend your money upgrading an old computer or purchasing a new computer instead. If you purchase a new computer, you may be able to use most of your external devices on the new computer. For example, your display and printer may work just fine on your new computer, thus saving the cost to replace these devices, too. To be sure that your devices will work on your new Windows XP system, you can download a free tool from the Microsoft website and run it on your current system. This tool is called the Windows XP Upgrade Advisor. After you run the Upgrade Advisor on your current (nonWindows XP) system, you will know which of your devices may not work under Windows XP without obtaining new drivers for them. The next consideration you need to make is whether your applications will run on Windows XP or not. If you currently run an earlier version of Windows NT or Windows 2000 and your applications work ok on that operating system, then there is a good probability they will also run under Windows XP. If you are using a release of the Windows 95/98/Me operating system family, then some of your current applications may not work unless they are re-installed or new versions of them have been obtained and installed. Low-level utility software is almost certain not to run on Windows XP without a new release of the utility. The Windows XP Upgrade Advisor mentioned above should also tell you which of your applications will work on XP and which ones may not work for you. This information is good to know in advance so that you can be prepared by obtaining the latest versions before you install Window XP. Tools to Help you Move to XP: Perhaps the best tool you can use to help you move to Windows XP operating system is PartitionMagic by PowerQuest Corporation. Version 7 of this excellent partitioning utility is designed to work with Windows XP as well as other common operating systems. PartitionMagic will let you create multiple primary partitions in which to install your new operating system. With the BootMagic utility, which comes as a part of the Partition-Magic package, you can switch between your new Windows XP system and your older operating system as mentioned in the third approach above. This is one tool that will make the process of moving to Windows XP so much easier for you to accomplish. Don't attempt this move without PartitionMagic. The second tool that you should have is Drive Image v5, which also works with Windows XP. Making changes to your operating system is a serious undertaking that you don't want to attempt without a full backup of your current system before you start to install Windows XP. Drive Image is one of the best backup utilities on the market and one that you really need to have to accomplish this project of moving to Windows XP. Finally, I have just completed an educational CD entitled, "Discovering your Hard Drive" that contains all of the detail steps of these six ways to move to Windows XP. This CD will guide you through the steps of each of these six approaches, besides providing many additional topics to help you better understand and organize your hard drive. This information is difficult to find in other sources and many of the ideas covered on the CD are only found in this one source. This is a must to help you get to Windows XP. How to Order Products: User group members and guests can order PartitionMagic v7, Drive Image v5, and the "Discovering your Hard drive" CD at a significant discount off the list price of these products. PartitionMagic and Drive Image have a list price of $69.95 each, but the user group price for these excellent utilities is only $35 each. That's the best price you will find on these quality products. Likewise, the "Discovering your Hard Drive" CD is available to user group members and others for only $20. With a $5 shipping fee, the total price for these three items is only $95 delivered to your door. To order the products, access our secure web site at www.ugr.com/order and complete the order form. Enter the special price code of UGEM02 on the form where required. You can use your VISA, MASTERCARD, or Discover Card to purchase the items or complete the form and mail it with your check or Money Order. As soon as we receive your order, we will ship it via US Priority Mail and your products should arrive at your door in less than a week's time. If you are not happy with your products, you may return them within 30 days for a full refund of their purchase price. I hope this has helped you think about when you need to move to Windows XP and how to do it. I plan to write other such technical articles in the future that you can watch for. Thank you for your interest in hard drives and PowerQuest's products. Columbia Baltimore User Group Inc, Bugletter newsletter, November, 2002 by Rick Mattingly If you are installing Windows XP, Professional or Home Edition, and your system is equipped with an Iomega ZIP drive - pay attention! In some cases, the Windows XP installation process may confuse the ZIP drive configuration and reassign it as the C: boot drive! This event may occur whether the XP installation is a new install or an update of Windows 98. I have witnessed this situation twice now and it is quite frustrating. You complete the lengthy installation process only to discover that the hard drive has mysteriously becoming something other than Drive C:. The recourse? Temporarily disconnect the ZIP drive and completely redo the Windows XP installation - profane language optional. After the Windows XP installation is complete, reconnect the ZIP drive and reboot. The operating system will then see the ZIP drive and properly assign a drive letter for it. If you have a ZIP drive installed on your system, avoid this potential problem altogether by disconnecting the ZIP drive before commencing the Windows XP installation! Microsoft has acknowledged this problem with issuance of "Microsoft Knowledge Base Article 304776." Thou Shalt include a clear and specific subject line. Thou Shalt edit any quoted text down to the minimum thou needest. Thou Shalt read thine own message thrice before thou sendest it. Thou Shalt ponder how thy recipient might react to thy message. Thou Shalt check thy spelling and thy grammar. Thou Shalt not curse, flame, spam or USE ALL CAPS. Thou Shalt not forward any chain letter. Thou Shalt not use email for any illegal or unethical purpose. Thou Shalt not rely on the privacy of email, especially from work. That which thou findest hateful to receive, sendest thou not unto others. The 10 Commandments of Forwarding: Thou Shalt never forward anything that contains the words, "AOL and Microsoft" in the same sentance. Thou Shalt always verify "rumors" or "hoaxes" before forwarding them to others. Thou Shalt remove all < from the beginning of each line before forwarding. Thou Shalt make use of the bcc: feature to send blind carbon copies. Thou Shalt recognize that if it sounds too good to be true - it is. Thou Shalt utilize the cut & paste features instead of forwarding headers and a list of previous recipients. Thou Shalt not feed the spam monsters with your friends' email addresses. Thou Shalt not forward just for the sake of forwarding. Thou Shalt not forward email attachments that have not been virus scanned. Chose wisely that which you forward. - IMPORTANT NOTICE - FRPCUG meetings are held at the Fort Collins Senior Center. Check below for directions to the Senior Center. April General Forum Meeting We will meet at the Fort Collins Senior Center on Tuesday, April 1 at 7:00 pm. Meeting Agenda 7:00 - 7:15 Announcements 7:15 - 8:00 Open Forum 8:00-8:15 Break 8:15 - 9:30 Software/Hardware Zoo - A round-robin demonstration of interesting software and hardware applications. May General Forum Meeting We will meet at the Fort Collins Senior Center on Tuesday, May 13 at 7:00 pm. Note the special meeting date! Meeting Agenda 7:00 - 7:15 Announcements 7:15 - 8:30 Printer Technology - New printers and printer related software. 8:30 - 8:45 Break 8:45 - 9:30 Open Forum NOTE: Revised meeting dates month of May only! NOTE: Due to a scheduling conflict at the Fort Collins Senior Center in May, the General Forum Meeting and the Board Meeting both will be moved forward one week - this month only. See you at the meetings! Up-Coming SIG's, Seminars and Meetings Board Meeting FRPCUG's executive board meets on Wednesday of the week followingthe General Forum Meeting at 7:00 p.m. All members are welcome and are encouraged to attend. These meetings are held at the offices of JYM Information Systems: 311 S College Avenue in Fort Collins. New Directions SIG The LINUX SIG and the Telecommunications SIG have been combined to form the new Advanced Systems Support SIG. This SIG provides advanced support for all PC-related operating system and telecommunication issues. The meetings are held at 7:00 PM on the third Thursday of each month at the offices of JYM Information Systems: 311 S College Avenue in Fort Collins. For more information contact Chuck McJilton at 493-2987 or email telecomsig@jymis.com. Northern Front Range Netware Users Group NFRNUG meets at 5:30 pm on the second Wednesday of each month at the U.S. Fish & Wildlife building, 2101 Oakridge Drive in Fort Collins. NFRNUG meetings are open to any users that are involved with Novell networking products and integration of other networking products into the Novell environment (Unix, NT, Mac, etc.). Contact Jim Stephens at 303-541-3376 or jcsteph@concentric.net or contact Chuck Kluko at 970-663-4770 or c.kluko@ix.netcom.com for further membership information. Yearly dues are $000.00 (yes, FREE) with pizza and pop served at 5:00 pm prior to meeting. Saturday labs and training sessions open to NRFNUG members only, space is limited. Rocky Mountain Internet Users Group Meets on the second Tuesday of 'odd' months at NCAR in Boulder. Meetings start at 7:00 pm, but members are encouraged to arrive at 6:30 pm for informal networking and refreshments. NCAR is located in Boulder at 1850 Table Mesa Drive. For more information see the RMIUG Web site at: http://www.rmiug.org/. Web Design SIG If you're an HTML author/WEB page designer, or would like to learn, contact SIG coordinator Doug Boicourt at 495-6949 or e-mail db@jymis.com for the date and location of the next SIG meeting. Upcoming FRPCUG Meetings Along with presentations of new hardware and software, we will certainly continue to present tips, hints, solutions, as well as what is new with Public Domain and Shareware offerings. If you have ideas for presentations which you would like to see at future General Forum meetings or seminars, please let us know. We would appreciate the input and opportunity to improve your meetings. Know of a another computer related meeting in our area? Please let us know so we can post it here. 1 FRPCUG General Forum Meeting 7:00PM April Fools Day 6 Daylight Savings Time Begins 9 FRPCUG Board Meeting 7:00PM NRFNUG Meeting 5:00PM 17 New Directions SIG 7:00PM 18 Good Friday 20 EasterMay 2003 11 Mother's Day 13 FRPCUG General Forum Meeting 7:00PM 14 NRFNUG Meeting 5:00PM 15 New Directions SIG 7:00PM 17 Armed Forces Day 21 FRPCUG Board Meeting 7:00PM 26 Memorial Day by Eric Moore Introduction The Windows registry is a special database that contains the configuration settings needed by Windows programs and hardware. It contains information about your screen colors, wallpaper, hardware devices and associated drivers, settings for your programs, and much more. It is (ideally) the repository for all information that was saved in .INI files in the versions of Windows predating Windows 95. Many Windows problems are the result of invalid or otherwise problematic settings in the Windows registry. Such problems may be fixed by manually modifying the registry with Microsoft Registry Editor. As a general rule, you should not attempt to modify your registry unless you are instructed to do so by a trustworthy source, such as a tech support agent you call for help, or a technical article on a vendor's web site. Making changes to the registry can create problems ranging from slowed performance, to programs that will not run, to Windows to starting at all. Nonetheless, if you are instructed to make changes to the registry, it is a fairly straightforward and safe process if you are careful to follow instructions correctly. The one important thing to remember before making changes is ALWAYS BACK UP YOUR REGISTRY. The following sections explain how to back up and restore your registry for the various 32-bit versions of Windows. Since not every solution is applicable for every version of Windows, I have included information about which solutions are applicable for which versions. This information is not intended to be exhaustive, so for more information on using any of these programs to back up your registry, I recommend consulting Windows Help (Start > Help). I also recommend Microsoft's online knowledge base at http://support.microsoft.com. The knowledge base contains a large amount of information about the registry for every version of Microsoft Windows. Solution #1: Microsoft Registry Editor Applicable To: Windows 95 Windows 98 Windows Me Windows NT Windows 2000 Windows XP The Microsoft Registry Editor or “RegEdit” is a very straightforward program to use for exporting and importing the registry. To start RegEdit, click the Start button and select Run. For the name of the program to open, type RegEdit (capitalization does not matter to Windows) and click OK. When RegEdit opens up, you will see a window with two panes. The left pane shows the main registry keys, all beginning with “HKEY”. These are conceptually like folders which contain sub-folders and data stored for use by Windows. The right pane shows the contents of the currently highlighted key. If no key is highlighted, the right pane will be blank. Do the following to export your registry: Click on the Registry option on the menu bar Select Export Registry File Be sure the All option is selected under Export range Type a name for the registry file and select the folder where you wish to save it Click Save RegEdit will then create a registry file with the name you selected and the .REG file suffix. I suggest using a descriptive name such as the current date so you can remember when and why you created the file. An example would be the name 09-14-02 for a registry backup created on September 14, 2002. In the event that something goes wrong when you modify your registry, I highly recommend saving the registry file to another drive when possible. Since the Windows registry is usually quite large, the registry export file will probably be several megabytes in size and will not fit on a floppy disk. I suggest saving it to another hard drive or partition or to removable media such as a Zip disk or CD-RW. Later on if you should need to return to your previous settings, you can import the registry in one of three ways. First, before importing your registry, consider the following: any changes that you or any applications made subsequent to exporting your registry may be lost when you import from a registry file. The two easiest ways to import the registry are: Open RegEdit and select Import Registry File from the Registry menu. Then change to the folder where the file is located, select the file, and click Open. Using Windows Explorer, change to the folder where the file is located and double-click the file. Note: Always be cautious about double-clicking a registry files especially if you do not know what it contains. Depending on the contents of the file, importing it could create problems by overriding your current Windows and program settings. In the event you cannot boot into Windows, you can also restore the registry after booting into DOS mode with a system disk. (If you are running Windows NT, 2000, or XP, you will not be able to use this solution if Windows is installed on an NTFS partition.) Do the following to create a system disk in Windows 95 and 98: Open the Control Panel and double-click Add/Remove Programs Click the Startup Disk tab Insert a blank disk and click Create Disk For other versions of Windows you may create a system disk by doing the following: Open Windows Explorer Insert a blank disk Right-click the floppy drive icon and select Format Select the option to create an MS-DOS startup disk Once you have booted to a DOS prompt, you will import the registry. Assuming the registry was exported to the file named REGISTRY.REG in the folder, D:\RegBack, type each command followed by the ENTER key at the DOS prompt: C: CD \WINDOWS REGEDIT D:\RegBack\registry.reg This will start the process of importing your old registry. Depending on the size, it could take thirty minutes or longer to complete. Solution #2: Windows Registry Checker Applicable To: Windows 98 Windows Me For Windows 98 and Me, the Windows Registry Checker is automatically run when you start Windows. It serves two purposes: 1) it checks the registry for any problems, and 2) it backs up the registry. Although it does not allow you to specify a name for the registry backup, the Registry Checker is easier to use than the Registry Editor. Do the following to back up your registry: Click the Start button and select Run. Type ScanRegw and click OK After checking your registry, Registry Checker will ask if you wish to back up the registry again. To restore a registry backup created with Registry Checker, you will need to boot into DOS and then type the following command at the DOS prompt: C: CD \WINDOWS SCANREG /RESTORE ScanReg will display a window with a list of recent registry backups and the dates they were created. Use the arrow keys to move up or down to highlight the backup to restore from and press ENTER. If you wish to cancel press the ESCAPE key. One disadvantage to using the Registry Checker is that it automatically discards the oldest backup every time it is rerun. If you wait to long, an older version of your registry it may be deleted before you have the chance to restore it. Solution #3: Microsoft Configuration Backup Applicable to: Windows 95 In addition to the Registry Editor, Windows 95 has a registry backup tool called Configuration Backup. It is not included with Windows by default, but must be installed manually. If you have the Windows 95 installation CD, do the following to install it: Create a new folder for the program. Insert the Windows 95 CD and go the folder called x:\Other\Misc\CfgBack (where x represents the letter of your CD-ROM drive) You will see two files in the CfgBack folder. Drag the two files from the CD to the new folder you created in Step 1 To run the program, double-click the blue, yellow, and red icon. To read information on how to use the program, double-click the file with a book icon. When you run the program, it will walk you through the steps to back up your registry. The options to back up and restore the registry are accessed from the same window in Configuration Backup. To create a backup, type the name you wish to use and click Backup. (I suggest using a descriptive name such as the current date so you can remember when and why you created the backup.) To restore a backup, click to highlight the particular registry backup you want and then click Restore. Solution #4: Emergency Repair Utility Applicable to: Windows 95 Windows 95 has another program called the Emergency Repair Utility (ERU) which can backup up the registry and other critical files. The program is located on the Windows 95 CD in the folder, x:\Other\Misc\ERU (where x represents your CD-ROM drive letter). If you right-click the file named ERU.INF and select Install, ERU will be installed to your hard drive. When you run ERU, you may save the backup to a diskette or to a folder on your hard drive, a Zip disk, or a writable CD. Since the registry files may be several megabytes in size, the backup will probably not fit on a diskette. Solution #5: Microsoft Backup Applicable To: Windows 98 Windows Me Windows 2000 Windows XP The Microsoft Backup program has the ability to back up the registry along with other files on your computer. Although it does offer the option to back up only your registry, it is good practice to use the program regularly to back up your registry and other files that are important to you. The Microsoft Backup program is not installed with Windows by default. If you do not find listed under Start > Programs > Accessories > System Tools, you can install it as follows: Insert the Windows setup CD Open the Control Panel and double-click Add/Remove Programs Click the Windows Setup tab Scroll down the list of components and double-click System Tools Click to place a checkmark next to Backup Click OK Windows 98, ME When you create a backup, be sure to go into Options, click the Advanced tab, and select the option to back up the Windows Registry. Windows 2000, XP In Microsoft Windows Backup for Windows 2000 and XP, the left pane displays the contents of your computer. Below the list of drives installed on My Computer, you will see an option for System State. Check this option when performing a backup to save your registry and other critical system files. Solution #6: System Restore Applicable To: Windows XP Windows XP includes a new tool called System Restore which allows you to save your registry and other system information. You may launch System Restore by selecting Start > More Programs > Accessories > System Tools > System Restore. When the program opens, do the following to create a restore point: Select the option to create a restore point and click Next Type a Restore Point Description (such as today's date) Click Create To view the saved restore points, click Home or go back to the beginning and select Restore my computer to an earlier time. Do the following to restore: Click the calendar button and navigate to find the restore point created for a particular day. When a day is selected on the calendar, any restore points created for that day will be listed to the right of the calendar. If none were created the list will be blank. Select the restore point and click Next to complete the restore. Be sure to shut down all programs and save any open files, as Windows will shut down and restart after restoring. Computer User Group of Greeley newsletter by Rick Mattingly Virtually all PC systems now come equipped with multimedia capabilities, including a set of speakers. Occasionally, you may experience annoying errant noise from the speakers when no sound should occur. This noise may be exhibited as hissing, ticking, growling, etc. First, check the cabling to the speakers. Reposition both the power and data cables to the speakers. Try to position these cables so that they lie close to ninety degrees to other adjacent power cables. Quite often this will stop the errant noise. One other source of this problem is also one of the most obvious but overlooked. Is your system also equipped with a microphone? If so, check the microphone for a on/off switch and make sure the mike is tuned off. If the microphone is left on it can pick up background noise and cause irritating noise from the speakers. If the microphone does not have a hardware on/off switch, do the following. Open Volume Control from the Start Menu or Task Bar (Speaker Icon). Check the resulting menu to see if MIC Volume is present. If it is, make sure to check the Mute option at the bottom of the microphone column to disable the microphone. This should then stop the background noise from the speakers. In this case, remember to reverse the Mute setting whenever you actually want to use the microphone in the future! I am a practicing physician and the founder of www.MDhub.com, a free service that allows anyone to send an Internet message to their doctor. I thought the members of the Front Range PC Users Group might find this web site both interesting and useful. Since most doctors do not yet use the Internet in their practice, your message is automatically delivered to the doctor's FAX machine as well as online. With nearly 400,000 physicians available, MDhub includes virtually every doctor involved in patient care in the US. Every practicing physician's web site is already up and running waiting for patients to send messages online instead of having to use the phone. MDhub.com is a free service. All messages are encrypted for security and privacy. There is no advertising and no data is collected. Most people find reaching their doctor to be a very frustrating experience, with busy signals, waiting on hold, press 1 for... press 2... and telephone tag. MDhub is a solution to this problem. I hope you will let your members know about MDhub via your web site and newsletter. If you have any questions, please feel free to contact me directly. Thank you. Jerry Spitz, M.D. Founder, The Little Blue Book Companies Medical Office: 860-525-3434 MDhub: www.MDhub.com/8605253434 Whether you need help coping with a medical condition, or you're interested in prevention, the Internet can help. Several sites offer general health articles and the ability to research specific diseases. For starters, there's the Mayo Clinic, http://www.mayoclinic.com, site, which is associated with the Rochester, Minn., organization. Go here to look up a disease or condition and get a collection of information and tools to manage your condition. Covering cancer, middle ear infections and hormone replacement therapy, the site's health decision guides will help you choose which treatment is best for you. WebMD, http://www.webmd.com, also offers free information on a wide range of conditions and diseases. MEDLINEplus, http://www.medlineplus.gov, is run by the National Library of Medicine and the National Institutes of Health. It has distinctly non-commercial feel. This site offers a long list of diseases and conditions and an extensive list of drugs. A complete site for the elderly is Health and Age, http://www.healthandage.com. It includes nutrition advice and information on a wide range of diseases and conditions. Another site offering health information for the elderly is the National Institute on Aging, http://www.nia.nih.gov/health. The American Heart Association, http://www.americanheart.org, offers information on heart disease, a risk assessment and cooking tips. Help also is offered by the American Stroke Association, http://www.strokeassociation.org, and the American Cancer Society, http://www.cancer.org. There are many other sites that offer more specialized advice. The federal government operates a database, http://www.healthfinder.gov, with links to a number of organizations. If you need a specific medical question addressed, try Med Help International, http://medhlp.netusa.net. Medical professionals (doctors or nurses, usually) answer each question. People who also have the condition chime in, offering encouragement and experience. If you are struggling with a condition and feeling isolated, try Med Help. A second service, Ask A Doctor, is misnamed--it provides opinions from three doctors. It charges $16.95 per question. Ask A Doctor, http://www.askadoctor.com, says it has thousands of board-certified doctors available. Every question is answered by e-mail, not via message board. Ask A Doctor says that in most cases, answers arrive within an hour. The money is split among the doctors who answer the question and the Web site. As the site points out, the charge is less than most co-pays. Planning a trip overseas? Check sites run by the State Department, http://travel.state.gov/medical.html, and the National Center for Infectious Diseases, http://www.cdc.gov/travel. The latter is more user-friendly. Among other things, it contains information on problems at various destinations, outbreaks around the world, data on specific diseases and recommended vaccinations. The State Department site is bare-bones, but it has links to many other useful sites. It also contains information on how travelers can access consular help if they fall ill. Finally, don't forget about medical trials. These involve experimental drugs or procedures, and are usually free. Check CenterWatch, http://www.centerwatch.com, and ClinicalTrials.gov, http://www.clinicaltrials.gov. As you explore these medical sites, keep this in mind: Self-diagnosis can be dangerous. Or, you could convince yourself that you are ill when you are not. Don't substitute the Web for a visit to your doctor. Kim Komando Show Home Page: http://www.komando.com Most third-party CD-burning programs let you select the files you want to burn, then they copy those files from the existing locations during the burning process. But when you drag and drop files to your CD-RW drive in Windows Explorer, Win XP actually copies the files to a temporary directory. This is handy, because you can burn the files to a CD later, even if something happens to the original. On the other hand, it means that you must have up to 700MB of free space on your hard drive to hold the copies of the files you want to burn. But that's only half the story. If you watch the CD Writing Wizard while it's in action, you'll see that during the first several minutes, nothing is being written to the CD-RW drive, and the displayed message reads Adding data to the CD image. Before burning a CD, Win XP creates a complete image of the final CD on your hard drive. The good news is that this should help prevent the timing problems that can cause CD burn errors, because the disk heads won't have to bounce around to find your files. The bad news is that another 700MB of hard drive space will be used. Putting those two parts of the process together, if you decide to drop a full CD's worth of files onto your CD-RW drive, you need to make sure you have 1.4GB of free hard drive space. PC Magazine I suppose some degree of commerce would grind to a halt if telephone solicitors weren't able to call people at home during dinner hour, but that doesn't make it any more pleasant. Now Steve Rubenstein, a writer for the San Francisco Chronicle, has proposed Three Little Words, based on his brief experience in a telemarketing operation that would stop the nuisance for all! time. The three little words are: "Hold On, Please"... Saying this while putting down your phone and walking off instead of hanging up immediately would make each telemarketing call so time-consuming that boiler rooms would grind to a halt. When you eventually hear the phone company's beep-beep-beep tone, you know it's time to go back and hang up your handset, which has efficiently completed its task. This might be one of those articles you'll want to e-mail to your friends. Three little words that eliminate telephone soliciting. Do you ever get those annoying phone calls with no one on the other end? This is a telemarketing technique where a machine makes phone calls and records the time of day when a person answers the phone. This technique is used to determine the best time of day for a real sales person to call back and get someone at home. What you can do after answering, if you notice there is no one there, immediately start hitting your # button on the phone, 6 or 7 times, as quickly as possible. This confuses the machine dialed call and it kicks your number out of their system. Since doing this, our phone calls have decreased dramatically. When you get ads in your phone or utility bill, include them with the payment and let the companies throw them away. When you get those pre-approved letters in the mail for everything from credit cards to 2nd mortgages and junk like that, most of them come with postage paid return envelopes, right? Well, why not get rid of some of your other junk mail and put it in these cool little envelopes. Send an ad for your local chimney cleaner to American Express. Send the pizza coupon to Citibank. If you didn't get anything else that day then just send them their application back! If you want to remain anonymous, just make sure your name isn't on anything you send them. You can send it back empty if you want to just to keep them guessing! Eventually, the banks and credit card companies will begin getting their junk back in the mail. Let's let them know what it's like to get junk mail, and the best of it is that they're paying for it. Twice. Let's help keep our postal service busy since they say e-mail is cutting into their business, and that's why they need to increase postage again. Thanks to Bert Broekstra by Ira Wilsker Digital cameras have become one of the most popular new consumer items. As is common for many high technology items, the price of digital cameras has fallen, as the technology improves. The dramatic increase in sales of digital cameras is mostly due to their “instant gratification” by eliminating the cost and inconvenience of film and processing. Another advantage is the ease of editing digital photos. The increase in sales of digital cameras has often more than offset the decline in sales of film cameras and accessories. Also, digital photography has in some cases, replaced film photography in many professional applications. According to Olympus, one of the leading digital camera manufacturers, the high-end digital cameras are now used by many professional photographers for weddings and other events. Many newspapers and magazines are now employing digital photography, which bypasses the darkroom, and allows the input of images directly to editors. For home users, digital cameras range from very inexpensive (under $30, often before rebates) point and shoot models to sophisticated models that rival 35mm SLR cameras, including accessory lenses and peripherals. The potential resolution of digital cameras is measured in “pixels”, a condensed term for “picture elements”. Pixels are basically the little colored dots that compose an image. More pixels in an image mean that a larger size picture can be printed or viewed, but increases the amount of storage or memory necessary to hold the image. Contrary to popular belief, more pixels are not necessarily better. Consider that a typical 14” monitor has a resolution of 640x480 pixels, which is about 300,000 pixels. The unedited image from a digital camera with a 300,000-pixel resolution will fill the screen of that 14” monitor. My 17” monitor is currently set at a 1024x768 resolution; a digital photograph of about 740,000 pixels would fill that screen. Many digital photographers take their photos at the highest resolution, which is often unnecessary, and a waste of memory and time. If the image is to be emailed, or posted to the web, the image will likely have to be substantially reduced in size to be practical. Using good quality photo paper and a photo-grade color printer, an 11x14 inch image will require about 4 million pixels (4 megapixels) to approximate the quality of a 35mm print. An 8x10 inch print will require about 2 megapixels. An inexpensive 1-megapixel camera is quite capable of producing satisfactory 5x7 inch photos. The least expensive digital cameras on the market, sometimes under $20 (I recently paid $19 for one), can easily produce a printed picture in the common 35mm print size of 3.5x5 or 4x6 inch sizes. Some digital cameras, such as one of the Olympus CamMedia series, can print directly from the camera, using Polaroid film, or conventionally export images to a computer. Digital cameras need something to hold the images until they are downloaded to a computer, or printed directly. Various types of non-volatile memory cards, typically compact flash, smart media, or memory stick formats, are used to store images. Currently, these cards are available in capacities up to 1 gigabyte (about 1 billion bytes), with 16meg (16 million bytes) to 128meg being both common and relatively inexpensive. The cards are reusable as images are erased from the cards. The contents of the cards can typically be transferred by the camera to a PC or Mac via a USB connection, or read directly by a card reader. Other popular cameras, such as some of the Sony Mavica series, use common 3.5” floppy disks. These floppies, each holding about 1.4 megabytes, can be read directly by a computer, as the images are written directly to the floppy. Some more advanced (and expensive) digital cameras can write to mini-CD discs, which can hold well over 100 megabytes, and can be read on any CD drive. Generally, the more storage of any type available in a camera, the better. Many digital cameras also have the ability to record short movies, sometimes with sound. The length of the movie is only limited by the memory or storage available in the camera. For most common movie capable digital cameras, the length is typically measured in seconds, or a few minutes. Zoom is another feature often available. With the traditional film cameras, optical zoom is used. The zoom on digital cameras can be optical, digital, or a combination of both. In terms of image quality, optical zoom is superior to a digital zoom, with the same magnification. One digital camera I tried is advertised as having a 20x zoom; 4x optical, and 5x digital. At 20x (combining the digital and optical zoom), the images were quite grainy, but at 4x (optical) they were very sharp. The same image at 4x digital zoom was visibly grainy, especially when enlarged. If a choice is available, optical zoom is superior to digital zoom. Convenience factors, such as size, weight, flash, and battery capacity are often a matter of personal choice. Many digital cameras utilize the common AA size battery for convenience. Disposable alkaline batteries become expensive, if many pictures are taken, as they have a relatively short useful life. Rechargeable Nickel Metal Hydride (NiMH) batteries are much more expensive to purchase, but the better ones have a capacity of two to four times the photos as alkaline batteries, and can be recharged around 1000 times. In the long run, NiMH batteries are far less expensive to use than alkaline. Select the NiMH batteries by comparing their capacity, typically 1200 to 1800 mAh (milliamp hours), the more the better. Another factor to consider is the viewfinder. Many digital cameras have a conventional lens type viewfinder, while others have a small LCD screen that is a “what you see is what you get” view. Some cameras have both. Many users have found that it is harder to aim a digital camera using an LCD screen than a viewfinder, but others prefer to see the exact picture on the LCD an instant before the image is captured. Almost all digital cameras come with either an integral flash, or some sort of “hot shoe” or plug for an external flash. Some digital cameras combine their still function with a live video function, as they can also serve as webcams, sending live video over the net. Digital photography can be both money and a time saver for many users, and should be strongly considered for that next camera purchase. Golden Triangle PC Club From the August 2002 issue of the I/O Port Newsletter FOR SALE: Gateway 800C Desktop w/Monitor, 20GB Hard Drive plus Epson Stylus Color 777 printer. Less than one year old. Only $600 complete. Contact Frances in Fort Collins at (970) 224-0776. FOR SALE: FUJI MX-1700 Zoom digital camera. 1.5 MP with 3X digital zoom and 2" LCD monitor. Like-new condition in box with manual, cables, software and two Smartmedia cards. This subcompact digital camera has it all and takes gorgeous vivid color photos - $250. Contact Rick Mattingly at (970) 223-6618 or email rmatt@jymis.com. FOR SALE:Computer - $75.00 or $100.00 delivered and installed. Pentium 166mHz, 64MB, 2 drives - 6GB & 8GB, CD player, 2 serial, 1 parallel, 2 USB, 250w power supply keyboard, Kensington wheel mouse, speakers, Win 2000 Pro, Office 2000 Pro, McAfee antivirus, case looks like it's been through 2 wars, but it's served me well for a long time, still works fine, just not real fast. 19" monitor, 1 year old, works great - $100.00 Also 2 hubs: Asante 10 Base-T 12-port w/manual - $20.00 HP J3300A Rackmount 10 Base-T Hub-12 w/manual - $35.00 Contact Calvin Cline - 970-669-4183 or Calvin@Cline.nu About Trading Post k-Byte runs classified ads in Trading Post for three consecutive issues. Trading Post ads up to 10 lines (or 70 words) long are free to FRPCUG members: $5 for non-members. To place an ad in Trading Post contact Rick Mattingly at 223-2154 or email rmatt@jymis.com Commercial Advertising Specifications (Monthly rate) Full Page (8 1/2” X 7”) $30 Half Page (3 1/4” X 7”) $20 One Third Page (3” X 4”) $15 Business Card (2 3/4” X 1 1/2”) $ 5 We offer a substantial discount for repeat ads and continuing contracts. For additional charge, we will design your ad for you. Contact Will Horton for information on this service at 223-2154 or email whorton@willsigns.com. |