PCs For Dummies Quick Reference

by Gookin, Dan

• ISBN13: 9780470115268
• ISBN10: 0470115262
• Edition: 4th
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2007-04-23
• Publisher: For Dummies

Summary

All the PC essentials at your fingertips! If you like your answers quick and your information up-to-date, look no further. This concise, superbly organized reference walks you through setting up a PC, the new interface and features of Windows Vista, using basic applications, organizing your stuff, getting on the Internet, networking (wired and wireless), burning CDs, upgrading your hardware, revving up your PC for high-speed game playing, and much more!

Author Biography

Dan Gookin has been writing about technology for over 600 years. He has contributed articles to numerous high-tech magazines and written more than 100 books about personal computing technology, many of them accurate. He combines his love of writing with his interest in technology to create books that are informative and entertaining, but not boring. Having sold more than 14 million copies translated into more than 30 languages, Dan can attest that his method of crafting computer tomes does seem to work.
Perhaps Dan’s most famous title is the original DOS For Dummies, published in 1991. It became the world’s fastest-selling computer book, at one time moving more copies per week than the New York Times number-one best seller (although, because it’s a reference book, it could not be listed on the NYT best seller list). That book spawned the entire line of For Dummies books, which remains a publishing phenomenon to this day.
Dan’s most recent titles include Word 2007 For Dummies, Laptops For Dummies, 2nd Edition; Programmer’s Guide to NCurses, and many more! He writes a blog and maintains the Wambooli Forums on his vast and helpful Web page www.wambooli.com.
Dan holds a degree in communications and visual arts from the University of California, San Diego. He lives in the Pacific Northwest, where he enjoys spending time with his boys in the gentle woods of Idaho.

Table of Contents

PC Overview	p. 1
What You See: Basic Hardware	p. 2
What You See: Console - the Front	p. 4
What You See: Console - the Back	p. 6
What You See: Console - the I/O Panel	p. 7
I/O Symbol Table	p. 9
The Basics: What Is a PC?	p. 11
Hardware	p. 12
Software	p. 12
You	p. 13
The Basics: Types and Models of PCs	p. 13
The Basics: Inside the Console	p. 14
The Basics: Adding Hardware	p. 17
Internal expansion	p. 17
External expansion	p. 17
The Basics: Windows	p. 18
The Basics: The Internet	p. 19
The Basics: Your Stuff	p. 20
Knowing about files	p. 21
Working with files in Windows	p. 21
Organizing files in Windows	p. 22
Connectinq Stuff	p. 23
About Computer Cables	p. 24
Audio	p. 24
Digital Camera	p. 25
Digital Media Player	p. 26
IEEE	p. 26
Joystick	p. 27
Keyboard	p. 27
Microphone	p. 27
Modem	p. 28
Monitor	p. 28
Mouse	p. 28
Network	p. 29
Optical Audio	p. 29
Power	p. 29
Printer	p. 30
S-Video	p. 30
Scanner	p. 31
Serial	p. 31
Speakers	p. 31
USB Port	p. 31
Wireless Gizmos	p. 32
Installing Hardware and Software	p. 33
The Add Hardware Icon	p. 34
Adding New Hardware	p. 35
Adding an external dialup modem	p. 36
Adding a non-USB joystick	p. 36
Inserting an Expansion Card	p. 36
Installing Memory	p. 40
Removing Memory	p. 43
Removing USB Storage Devices	p. 44
Software Installation	p. 44
Installing software from a CD or DVD	p. 45
Installing software you downloaded from the Internet	p. 45
Uninstalling Software	p. 46
The On-Off Thing	p. 49
Changing the Power Button's Function	p. 50
Changing the Start Menu's Power Button Function	p. 51
Forcing the Computer Off	p. 51
Hibernation	p. 52
Logging On and Off	p. 52
Logging in	p. 53
Logging off	p. 53
Locking the Computer	p. 54
Quitting Windows	p. 54
Restarting Windows	p. 55
Sleep (Stand By) Mode	p. 55
Putting your PC to sleep	p. 56
Automatically going into sleep mode	p. 56
Waking the computer	p. 57
Switching Users	p. 57
Turning the Computer System Off	p. 58
Turning the Computer System On	p. 59
The Uninterruptible Power Supply	p. 59
Popular Places in Windows	p. 61
Account Folder	p. 62
All Programs Menu	p. 64
Starting a program	p. 65
Popular menus on the All Programs menu	p. 65
The Startup submenu	p. 66
Creating a desktop shortcut to a program	p. 66
Putting a program on the Quick Launch bar	p. 67
Pinning a program to the Start menu	p. 67
Organizing the All Programs menu	p. 68
Computer	p. 68
Control Panel	p. 69
Desktop	p. 71
Network	p. 72
Notification Area	p. 73
Controlling the notification area	p. 74
Controlling the visibility of the notification area icons	p. 74
Recycle Bin	p. 75
Start Menu	p. 76
Changing the Start menu's look	p. 78
Configuring the Start button's menu	p. 78
Taskbar	p. 79
Locking and unlocking the taskbar	p. 80
Moving the taskbar	p. 81
Resizing the taskbar	p. 81
Setting taskbar options	p. 82
Other toolbars	p. 83
Quick Launch bar	p. 83
Moving a toolbar	p. 84
Removing a toolbar	p. 84
Disk Storage	p. 85
About Disk Storage	p. 86
Long-term and short-term storage	p. 86
Disks and media	p. 86
Saving and loading	p. 87
AutoPlay	p. 87
Bits and Bytes	p. 88
CD-ROM and DVD Drives	p. 89
Types of shiny discs	p. 90
Playing a music CD or movie DVD	p. 91
Drive Icons	p. 91
Drive Letters	p. 92
Disk drives A-B-C	p. 92
Drive D and beyond	p. 93
Drive Z	p. 93
Changing drive letters	p. 93
Ejecting a Removable Disk	p. 94
Ejecting a floppy disk	p. 94
Ejecting a CD or DVD	p. 95
Ejecting other media	p. 95
The Floppy Drive	p. 95
Formatting floppies	p. 96
Copying a file to Drive A	p. 97
Floppy do's and don'ts	p. 97
Hard Disks and Drives	p. 98
Inserting a Removable Disk	p. 99
Inserting a floppy disk	p. 99
Inserting a CD or DVD	p. 100
Inserting media into a card reader	p. 100
Putting a Drive's Shortcut Icon on the Desktop	p. 100
Types of Storage	p. 101
Working with Removable USB Drives	p. 102
The Stuff You Create	p. 103
About a File	p. 104
Describing a file	p. 104
Common file icons	p. 105
Viewing file details in Windows Explorer	p. 106
A file's Properties dialog box	p. 107
Creating Files	p. 109
Finding Lost Files	p. 109
Searching from the Start menu	p. 109
Summoning the Search window	p. 110
Finding a file when you know its name	p. 111
Finding a file when you just created it recently	p. 112
Finding a file when you know what type of file it is	p. 112
Finding a file when you know that it contains a specific word	p. 112
Managing Files	p. 112
Copying files	p. 112
Duplicating files	p. 113
Moving files	p. 113
Making file shortcuts	p. 114
Deleting files	p. 114
Permanently deleting files	p. 115
Undeleting files	p. 115
Recovering the previous version of a file	p. 115
Naming and Renaming Files	p. 117
The filename extension	p. 117
Renaming a file	p. 118
Filename wildcards	p. 118
Opening Files	p. 119
Pathnames	p. 119
Saving Files	p. 121
Saving for the first time	p. 121
Saving after the first time	p. 121
Closing a document	p. 121
Selecting Icons	p. 122
Selecting a single icon	p. 122
Selecting all icons in a window	p. 122
Selecting more than one icon	p. 122
Lassoing a group of icons	p. 123
Selecting all but a few icons	p. 123
Grabbing a range of icons	p. 123
Selecting two ranges of icons	p. 123
Deselecting an icon from a group	p. 123
Organizing Your Stuff	p. 125
About Folders	p. 126
About Windows Explorer	p. 126
Around the Windows Explorer window	p. 126
The Address bar	p. 128
Managing your favorite folders	p. 129
The tree structure	p. 130
The toolbar	p. 130
Compressed (Zip) Folders	p. 131
Making an empty compressed folder	p. 132
Adding files to a compressed folder	p. 132
Making a compressed folder from one or more files	p. 132
Extracting files	p. 133
Directories	p. 133
Folder Options	p. 134
Choosing a folder template	p. 134
Adding a picture to a folder's icon	p. 135
Changing a folder icon	p. 136
Folders for Your Stuff	p. 136
Managing Folders	p. 137
Making a new folder	p. 138
Renaming, copying, moving folders	p. 138
The Root Folder	p. 138
Subfolders	p. 139
Printing	p. 141
Adding a Printer	p. 142
Finding a home for the printer	p. 142
Connecting the printer	p. 142
Printer software setup	p. 143
On and selected?	p. 143
Setting up a USB printer	p. 143
Forcing Windows to recognize the printer	p. 144
Adding a network printer	p. 145
Adding more than one printer to a single PC	p. 146
The Default (Favorite) Printer	p. 146
Envelopes	p. 147
Configuring your document as an envelope	p. 147
Printing on an envelope	p. 148
Ink and Toner	p. 150
Ink cartridges	p. 150
Toner	p. 150
Ink and toner tips	p. 151
Paper	p. 151
Buying paper	p. 151
Adding paper to the printer	p. 152
Paper tips	p. 152
The Printer's Control Panel	p. 154
Print Preview	p. 154
Printing	p. 155
The Print command	p. 155
Choosing a printer	p. 156
Printing multiple copies	p. 156
Printing a single page or range of pages	p. 156
Printing the Screen	p. 157
Printing a Test Page	p. 157
Stopping the Printer	p. 158
Turning the Printer On and Off	p. 159
Types of Printers	p. 159
Inkjet printers	p. 160
Laser printers	p. 160
Uninstalling a Printer	p. 160
Networking	p. 161
About Networking	p. 162
Accessing a Shared Folder	p. 162
Accessing a Wireless Network	p. 163
Adding a Shared Folder to Your Disk System	p. 164
Mapping a folder to a disk drive	p. 164
Unmapping a folder	p. 165
Checking the Network Connection	p. 165
Checking the Network window	p. 166
Checking the Network and Sharing Center window	p. 166
Using the little networking guys	p. 166
Connecting to a Network	p. 166
The NIC	p. 166
The network cable	p. 167
Configuring the network	p. 167
The Network and Sharing Center	p. 167
The Network Connections Window	p. 169
The Network Window	p. 169
The PC's IP Address	p. 170
The PC's MAC Address	p. 171
The PC's Network Name	p. 172
The Public Folder	p. 173
Sharing the Public folder on the network	p. 173
Unsharing the Public folder	p. 174
Repairing a Network Connection	p. 174
Sharing a Folder	p. 175
Making a folder on your PC available to the network	p. 175
Unsharing a folder	p. 176
Sharing a Printer	p. 176
Using a Network Printer	p. 177
Which Folders Are You Sharing?	p. 177
Workgroups	p. 177
Creating Your Own CDs and DVDs	p. 179
Checking to See Whether You Have a Recordable Drive	p. 180
Creating a Musical CD	p. 180
Destroying a Disc	p. 182
Disc Formats	p. 182
Disc Types	p. 183
The CD-R, DVD-R, DVD+R	p. 184
The CD-RW, DVD-RW, DVD+RW, DVD-RAM	p. 184
Erasing an RW Disc	p. 185
Writing to a Disc in Windows	p. 185
Initializing a recordable or rewritable disc	p. 185
Working with a Live File System disc	p. 187
Working with a Mastered disc	p. 187
The Keyboard	p. 189
Accessing Menus with the Keyboard	p. 190
The Any Key	p. 190
Controlling a Window with the Keyboard	p. 191
Dead Keys	p. 192
The Help Key	p. 192
Keyboard Basics	p. 192
Keyboard layout	p. 192
Shift keys	p. 193
Lock keys	p. 194
Keyboard Shortcuts	p. 195
Keyboard Types	p. 197
Keys for Editing Text	p. 198
Names for Funky Keys	p. 199
Setting the Repeat Delay and Repeat Rate	p. 199
Special Keys	p. 200
The Mouse	p. 201
Basic Mouse Activities	p. 202
Changing the Double-Click Rate	p. 203
Connecting a Mouse	p. 203
Extra Mouse Buttons	p. 204
Increasing the Mouse Pointer Visibility	p. 204
Left-Handed Mouse	p. 205
The Mouse Pad	p. 206
Mouse Pointers	p. 206
Making the pointer go faster or slower	p. 206
Choosing a new pointer	p. 207
Using an animated pointer	p. 207
Loading a set of pointers	p. 207
Saving your own set of pointers	p. 208
Mouse Types	p. 208
Air mouse	p. 208
Mechanical, or ball, mouse	p. 208
Optical mouse	p. 208
Trackball mouse	p. 208
Wireless mouse	p. 209
Glossay: Tech Talk	p. 211
Index	p. 221
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