How does this apply? (Part 2)

I have been working a lot the past few days on three major projects.  I have looked at two alternative operating systems, made a presentation on pen drives and set up a plan to help avoid a disaster on my personal computer.  While all the projects were intriguing, I feel I learned the most from the disaster plan project.  This really made me think and analyze what I am doing right and what I need to improve when it comes to protecting my personal computer.  Presently, I feel I have done a fairly good job at protecting my computer.  I always keep an update anti-virus program on my machine (Microsoft Security Essentials, take a look at it, it's free!) and I try to back up my files with a large pen drive fairly often.  However, as I was making this presentation, I decided that I should use a better back up plan.  If something were to happen in my home, I could have a big problem if my computer and pen drive got destroyed. I am going to start saving work on Mozy.  It does cost some money, $4.95 per month, but that is a very cheap price to back up so much that is important to me.   It is also amazing because I could save an unlimited amount of files on Mozy, so I not only can save my personal files, I could save all my school files if I would like. 

Learning about the insides and workings of computers

The inside workings of a computer has never been something that interested me.  I have only really looked inside a computer a few times to either add a CD-R drive or air clean the insides.  I think the big reason why I never was interested with the inside of a computer was because I really did not know what the parts were and did not really care what they do just as long as they worked.  I never took a class like this that really opened my eyes to what some of the parts do and how being knowledgeable about them can improve my experience with using a computer.  As I said before, I did open my desktop to air dust it, but very rarely.  I found out this week that having dust build up can actually insulate the parts and keep the computer hotter, slowing the machine down.  Since finding that out on Tuesday, I have shared it with my family and have been telling some of my students to make sure they don't have dusty computers at home.  Another interesting thing that I learned this week and have been sharing with others is the importance of the fan in the computer.  I really had no idea that the fan was so important.  If the fan isn't working properly, your computer will overheat and you will have major issues.  I look forward to the next few weeks in this class and know I will be finding out more information about computers that can benefit me and others. 

Computer History for Bill Raudabaugh

I have been using computers since I was a little kid in the 1980's.  I remember the Apple computers with the large floppy disks and the green screen font on the monitors.  I also remember the first PCs that I worked with in high school and the first time I used a Microsoft Word program.  Although I had many experiences with computers in school, I did not have my own family computer until I was 17.  My parents did not have much money, so it took a while before we actually had a computer for our family.  The computer we eventually got was a Gateway.  I don't remember the model, but it was a pretty good computer for it's time.  It had Windows 98 and was connected to the Internet with dial up.  I recall setting up my first Hotmail account on that computer, an account I still use up to this day.  I used America Online on it often and would chat with my friends from out of state.  I also remember installing AIM instant messenger on that computer after I no longer used AOL.  My Gateway computer had a 10GB hard drive and I thought that was pretty large....now I laugh because the laptop I am now typing on is way smaller and has 160GB, and this is not even close to the max GB some computers have today.  Also, my Gateway  had this really nice 17 inch screen, but it was a big box monitor.  Funny how those monitors are a thing of the past!  I look forward to seeing my peers experiences, because I imagine theirs will be much different depending on when they first had their own computer.

Update to Social Bookmarking

Since my last post, I have changed my Social Bookmarking site of choice.  I started with Delicious, but when  I was looking at the other options, I decided that Diigo is the best fit.  It has a lot more options than Delicious in my opinion.  I was able to import all of my bookmarks from Delicious, so that was a perk.  I really like the ability to highlight the pages I visit and save the pages I visit right away.  The toolbar for Diigo is very handy.  I can click on it and go directly to my library.  Overall, I am glad I made the switch to Diigo.