Order Your Printer Supplies with the Click of a Button!

Did you know that you can order your printer and toner supplies on the Computer Works website? It is quick, easy, and you can be assured that you will receive the highest quality of supplies available.

To place your order today, visit www.computerworkstoledo.com/order.htm.

Top 10 Reasons to Try Office 2010

1. Edit and enhance photos in Word or PowerPoint 2010.

Put more visual impact in your documents or presentations with easy-to-use photo-editing tools that let you crop, control brightness and contrast, sharpen or soften, and add artistic visual effects without leaving Word 2010 or PowerPoint 2010.

2. Put your presentation message in motion with PowerPoint 2010.
Edit videos right in PowerPoint 2010, breaking longer clips down into shorter segments or reducing file size to make your presentation portable. Then dial up the visual impact by adjusting color, adding new video effects, and incorporating new dynamic slide transitions and animations.

3. Access, edit, and share from virtually anywhere with Office Web Apps on Windows Live SkyDrive.
Get things done when you’re away from the office, home, or school by creating documents in Office 2010, then posting them online to Windows Live SkyDrive to access, view, and edit - either alone or with others - with Office Web Apps from virtually anywhere you have Internet access.*
*An appropriate device, Internet connection, and Internet Explorer, Firefox, or Safari browser are required. There are some differences between the features of the Office Web Apps and the Office 2010 applications.

4. Organize all of your information in a single place in OneNote 2010.
Create a digital notebook in OneNote 2010 to capture and share text, images, video, audio — all your thoughts, ideas, and important information in a single, easy-to-access location.

5. Make presentations from virtually anywhere in PowerPoint 2010.
Broadcast your PowerPoint 2010 presentation through a web browser to a remote audience of one or 100 — even if they don’t have PowerPoint — with Broadcast Slide Show.

6. Take control of email conversations with Outlook 2010.
Track and manage your email easily with Conversation View in Outlook 2010, a feature that lets you condense, categorize, and even ignore lengthy email exchanges with a single click.

7. Analyze finances easily at home and at work with Excel 2010.
Use Sparklines in Excel 2010 to create small charts that make it easy to highlight trends in data at a glance, and highlight specific items in your data set with just a few clicks using improved Conditional Formatting.

8. Stay connected to your network with Outlook 2010.
The all-new Outlook Social Connector connects you to the social and business networks you use, including Microsoft SharePoint, Windows Live, or other popular third-party sites, so you can get more information and stay in touch.

9. Find the features you need fast and personalize your Ribbon.
An improved Ribbon lets you access your favorite commands quickly and customize or create tabs to personalize the experience to your work style.

10. Discover all the tools you need to work with your documents with the new Backstage view. 
The Microsoft Office Backstage view provides a rich full-screen environment for working.

10 Cool Things You Can Do With A USB Flash Drive

Transporting your data is probably the most common use for a USB flash drive. But there’s a world of other things you can do with these handy pocket-size drives. Here are 10 ways you can use that USB flash drive to do more than just move data.
(from http://www.techrepublic.com/)



1: Run portable applications

In addition to storing your data, you can run portable applications from a USB flash drive. For example, OpenOffice, which is a complete office suite that includes a word processor, spreadsheet, presentation tool, drawing package, and database, is available as a portable application. Mozilla Firefox and Thunderbird are also available as portable applications. When you combine the office suite with the ability to surf the Web and check email, you’ll be able to take your most vital computing applications with you wherever you go — right in your pocket.

If that’s not enough, you can choose other applications to install on your USB flash drive from PortableApps.com. You can even install an entire prepackaged suite of applications that includes such things as an audio player, games, an antivirus utility, and a handy menu system.

2: Boot an operating system
If you want to do more than just run your own applications, you might want to consider booting an entire operating system from your USB flash drive. You can boot either Windows or Linux from a USB flash drive; however, the process is not an exact science and you may be in for a technical adventure.

Fortunately, there are some guides you can follow. To learn how to boot Windows XP from a USB flash drive, see the article Creating a bootable USB flash drive for Windows XP. To learn how to boot a version of Linux from a USB flash drive, see the article Puppy Linux teaches an old dog new tricks.


3: Connect to a wireless network

If you have a wireless network, you can use the Wireless Network Setup Wizard in Windows XP or the Windows Connect Now (WCN) feature built into Vista to save wireless network configuration information to a USB flash drive. You can then use your drive to quickly and easily connect another computer or a WCN-compatible device, such as a router or printer, to your wireless network. To learn more about using the Wireless Network Setup Wizard, see the Help And Support Center, which is accessible from Windows XP’s Start menu. To learn more about using the Windows Connect Now feature, see Windows Help And Support, which is accessible from Windows Vista’s Start menu.


4: Create a password reset disk
A password reset disk can really come in handy if you forget the password to your user account on a Windows system that is not a part of a domain. If you find yourself in that situation, you can use the password reset disk to reset your password and quickly get back into your user account. In Windows Vista, you can use USB flash drive rather than a floppy disk as a password reset disk. For details on how to do so, see the article Create a Vista password reset disk using a USB flash drive.


5: Boost performance
If you’re running Windows Vista, you can use a USB flash drive to speed up your system with the ReadyBoost technology. ReadyBoost can use the storage space on a USB Flash drive as an additional memory cache to aid the memory cache on your hard disk. And because flash memory is more responsive than a hard disk, with its physical moving parts, the memory cache provided by ReadyBoost can significantly improve system responsiveness.

Using ReadyBoost is easy. You just insert your USB flash drive into your Vista system and follow the onscreen prompts to configure and use ReadyBoost. If you want more details, check out the article How SuperFetch and ReadyBoost work together.


6: Manage it
If all you really want to do with your USB flash drive is transport data, and you’re running Windows XP, you can do so more efficiently with the Microsoft USB Flash Drive Manager. Once you have installed this manager, you can easily copy files to and from your drive, back up and restore the entire flash drive to and from your hard disk, change the drive label, and even create an autorun.inf file to launch Drive Manager automatically when you plug in the drive. To learn more about and download the USB Flash Drive Manager visit the Microsoft TechNet Magazine site.


7: Use it as an MP3 player
Would you like to be listening to music when you’re using a computer at the office, but you don’t have an MP3 player? If so, you can use a USB flash drive as an MP3 player along with Windows Media Player and a set of headphones. Just copy your MP3 files to your USB flash drive, plug it into your computer, and direct Windows Media Player to build a library of the songs on your drive. You can use all of Windows Media Player’s playback features, such as playlists and favorites, to easily customize your music listening experience. And best of all, you won’t have to worry about running low on battery power.


8: Password-protect it
If you use a USB flash drive to transport sensitive data that you would prefer to protect from prying eyes, should you lose the drive, Rohos Mini Drive can safeguard that data. This security tool allows you to create a secret partition on the drive and then password-protect/encrypt that partition, thus protecting any documents you copy to that partition via the utility’s file manager. You can download (and read a review of) Rohos Mini Drive at Download.com.

 9: Run a Web site from it

If you are a Web developer, you may be interested to know that with Server2Go, you can easily run a Web server that supports Apache, PHP, MySQL, and Perl right from a USB flash drive. You can use Server2Go right out of the box without any installation. It runs on all versions of Windows, supports most common browsers, and is completely free. To a developer, the benefits of having a portable Web server on a USB drive are numerous. For example, imagine being able to carry a live Web site demo into a sales pitch meeting. For more information about this package, visit the Server2Go site.


10: Lock your PC
Have you ever seen a movie in which a person in some secret government installation simply inserts and removes a card to log in and log out of a PC? If you thought that idea was cool, you’ll definitely want to investigate Predator. Once installed and configured, this little freeware utility will allow you to turn a USB flash drive into a key you can use to lock and unlock your computer.

While the USB flash drive is connected to your computer, everything works as it normally would. Once you remove the USB flash drive, your computer is locked down — the keyboard and mouse are disabled and the screen darkens. To unlock your computer, you just plug in the USB flash drive and the computer will be unlocked and you can begin using it. To learn more about Predator, and/or to download it, visit the developer’s Web site.

5 Ways to Speed Up Your PC

By following a few simple guidelines, you can maintain your computer and keep it running smoothly. This article discusses how to use the tools available in Windows 7, Vista, and XP to more efficiently maintain your computer and safeguard your privacy when you're online.

1. Free up disk space
The Disk Cleanup tool helps you free up space on your hard disk to improve the performance of your computer. The tool identifies files that you can safely delete, and then enables you to choose whether you want to delete some or all of the identified files.

Use Disk Cleanup to:
• Remove temporary Internet files (take up a lot of space)
• Remove downloaded program files (such as Microsoft ActiveX controls and Java applets).
• Empty the Recycle Bin.
• Remove Windows temporary files such as error reports.
• Remove optional Windows components that you don't use.
• Remove installed programs that you no longer use.
• Remove unused restore points and shadow copies from System Restore.

2. Speed up access to data
Disk fragmentation slows the overall performance of your system. When files are fragmented, the computer must search the hard disk when the file is opened to piece it back together. The response time can be significantly longer. Disk Defragmenter is a Windows utility that consolidates fragmented files and folders on your computer's hard disk so that each occupies a single space on the disk. With your files stored neatly end-to-end, without fragmentation, reading and writing to the disk speeds up.

When to run Disk Defragmenter

In addition to running Disk Defragmenter at regular intervals—monthly is optimal—there are other times you should run it too, such as when:
• You add a large number of files.
• Your free disk space totals 15 percent or less.
• You install new programs or a new version of Windows.

3. Detect and repair disk errors
In addition to running Disk Cleanup and Disk Defragmenter to optimize the performance of your computer, you can check the integrity of the files stored on your hard disk by running the Error Checking utility. As you use your hard drive, it can develop bad sectors. Bad sectors slow down hard disk performance and sometimes make data writing (such as file saving) difficult, or even impossible. The Error Checking utility scans the hard drive for bad sectors, and scans for file system errors to see whether certain files or folders are misplaced. If you use your computer daily, you should run this utility once a week to help prevent data loss.

4. Protect your computer against spyware
Spyware collects personal information without letting you know and without asking for permission. From the Web sites you visit to usernames and passwords, spyware can put you and your confidential information at risk. In addition to privacy concerns, spyware can hamper your computer's performance. To combat spyware, you will should consider using a spyware removal tool.

5. Learn all about ReadyBoost
If you're using Windows 7 or Windows Vista, you can use ReadyBoost to speed up your system. A new concept in adding memory to a system, it allows you to use non-volatile flash memory—like a USB flash drive or a memory card—to improve performance without having to add additional memory.
• Learn more about ReadyBoost in Windows 7.
• Learn more about ReadyBoost in Vista.

Citrix Synergy 2010

Where virtualization, networking and cloud computing meet

Citrix Synergy is the industry’s only conference focused on the growing convergence between virtualization, networking and cloud computing and how it can solve real business problems. It’s an open exchange of ideas, technology innovations and real-world experiences on how to deliver just about any desktop, application, media or service to any user, anywhere. As a result, Synergy provides the best value for your conference dollar by pulling together the foremost experts in virtualization, networking and cloud computing all in one event. You’ll return to the office knowing specifically how to build a simpler and more cost-efficient computing environment that will put your organization at the forefront of the coming on-demand IT services era.

Synergy 2010 is a global conference featuring a two-event structure to cover North America in spring and Europe in fall. The spring event will take place May 12-14 at the Moscone West Convention Center in San Francisco, California, a cosmopolitan city offering a wealth of cultural and recreational attractions.

We invite you to explore the complete Synergy site to learn more about the San Francisco event, including, agenda, session content, venue and special activities, awards, environmental initiatives, and money-saving offers and promotions.

If you can only attend one conference in 2010, Synergy is the one. Position your business to succeed in a rapidly changing world, and join us at Synergy.

For more information, or to register, go to http://www.citrixsynergy.com/

What is a Managed Service Provider?

A Managed Service Provider (MSP) is an IT consulting organization of diversely skilled technicians that can manage the cost effective maintenance of the clients IT systems through various custom tailored solutions. Typically, a Managed Service comes in the form of a Master Services Agreement with a Service Level Agreement that defines the coverage and associated fixed monthly fee. A client may choose to take advantage of multiple Managed Services from the same Managed Services Provider to cover all of their IT needs. An MSP manages successful business relationships with ethics, integrity, expertise, resources, and the trust of their clients.

Three key client benefits:

1. Proactive maintenance results in a quicker and sustainable return on investment for the clients by maintaining high standards for user efficiency and productivity in conjunction with extending hardware lifespan.

2. Both proactive and reactive maintenance can finally represent a tangible number in an IT budget where the traditional break/fix service model can lead to higher costs that are more difficult to predict.

3. A Managed Services Contract, as part of a Business Continuity Strategy, can lead to shorter meantime to resolution and controlled cost of downtime if a disaster recovery effort become necessary as a result of natural or man-made disaster or disruption

4 Must-Dos to Keep Your Printer Printing

1. Clean the ink nozzle
When using an inkjet printer, you’ll want to ensure that the ink nozzle stays clean and free of any obstructions. One easy way to do this is with the HP Deskjet Toolbox that was installed with your printer. For most printers, the Toolbox will have a "Maintenance" or "Printer Services" tab. Choosing this tab reveals a "Clean the print cartridges" option. Choose this option and follow the instructions presented. You may need to run the test multiple times.

2. Ensure printheads are aligned
This simple step will keep all the nozzles pointing in the right direction so that the ink gets to the right place. A hint that your printheads are misaligned: white repeating lines or a grid-like pattern on your printout. For detailed, step-by-step instructions on how to do this for your HP Deskjet, HP Business Inkjet, or HP Color Inkjet Printers, visit this HP support page.

3. Keep carriage rods moving smoothly
The carriage makes a chattering or grinding noise while travelling side-to-side across the rails of the HP Designjet series printers. While the exact steps are slightly different for various Designjet models, the basic idea is to clean and lubricate the printer's slider rods. To do so, turn the printer off, access the carriage assembly, and wipe the carriage’s rails with a lint-free cloth and warm water. Then dry all water from the rails, and apply one small drop of HP Synthetic Oil on the carriage rails on each side of the carriage. Using a lint-free cloth, wipe the lubricant along each side of the carriage rails.

4. Keep drivers up to date
Regularly making sure you have the latest printer driver is one of the easiest things you can do to keep your printer in top working order. Updating your driver will help you avoid or eliminate printing problems, take advantage of your printer’s latest features, and ensure maximum print quality. Even better, these driver updates are free to download from HP; if you have subscribed to HP Driver and Support Alerts, you’ll receive the latest driver updates automatically into your inbox. To install the latest driver:

1. Go to the Support & Drivers page.
2. Select “Download drivers and software (and firmware).”
3. Enter your product number. (This alphanumeric code is usually found on the front or top corner of your printer. If you aren’t sure of your product number, click “How do I find my product name/number”, then click on the “>>” button.
4. Select your operating system, such as Microsoft® Windows Vista® or Windows® XP, from the list of options.
5. Select the basic driver or a driver and software bundle from the list of options. Usually, the first choice is the most basic driver update.
6. Click the “Download only” button.
7. You will see the message “Would you like to save this file?” Click “Save File”.
8. Follow any on-screen instructions to finish your installation.
9. Restart your computer once the installation is complete.

7 Reasons to Upgrade to Windows 7

1.  Simplified Networking:  These days, work doesn’t just happen at the office. Windows 7 features let you move from your work network to home network with ease.

• Location Aware Printing can detect whether you are at work or at home and can automatically send your documents to the right printer.
• HomeGroup lets you share files and printers across computers, even without a server. With Windows 7 Professional networking is simple saving you time and money.

2.  Carefree Mobility:  Work from virtually anywhere—you can connect to and manage wireless networks without having to spend a lot of time configuring them.

• Remote Desktop Connection means you can access documents and programs on a remote PC with just about as much effort as logging on to your laptop.

3.  Comfortable Continuity:  Most applications and devices are compatible with Windows 7, but for the applications that aren’t, Windows 7 Professional also comes with Windows XP Compatibility Mode. You can run your Windows XP-compatible applications right in Windows 7 Professional.


4.  Improved Efficiency: Everyone loves shortcuts, which is why Windows 7 Professional has them built right in.

• The Aero Desktop feature lets you snap open Windows or documents into place side by side.
• The Windows Taskbar and Jump Lists puts the documents and applications you use most right at your fingertips and make it easy to see what you have open.

5.  System Safety: Keeping your information and systems safe is easier than ever.

• Advanced Backup helps safeguard your data by backing it up automatically to a network location or local drive so that you can restore your information should the worst happen.
• You can also encrypt files and folders easily with just the click of your mouse.

6.  Smarter Search: Find information quickly and easily the first time you search for it.

• Windows Search even finds applications, anywhere on your computer, fast.
• The Libraries feature lets you view groups of related files in one place, making them easy to find even when you’ve stored them in different folders or on different PCs.

7.  Reduced Costs:  Windows 7 Professional actually helps older hardware move faster. Plus, better power management features can extend the battery life of your laptop, helping you stay productive and up and running.


For a limited time, you can upgrade to Windows 7 for 50% off of the Open Value Subscription price for one year! Contact us at 419-534-3010 or via email.

Microsoft's Big Easy Offer 4.0

Microsoft’s Big Easy Offer 4.0: Build a solution that fits!

The Big Easy Offer gives you choices on Microsoft products and solutions that fit your needs. For every qualifying product you purchase, Microsoft pays you partner subsidy funds that can be used with a Microsoft Partner of your choice to help with the implementation of your Microsoft solution including software, hardware and services.

What is a Subsidy?
A subsidy is a check made payable to the Microsoft partner of your choice. This subsidy can be used to enrich and implement your Microsoft solution. The subsidy allows you to purchase additional products or services from the Microsoft partner of your choice thus lowering your Total Cost of Ownership.

Want More?
You can increase your subsidy by choosing:
• Products from more than one product group.
• Licenses with Software Assurance.
• Advanced or Enterprise Editions.


How do I take advantage of the Big Easy Offer 4.0?
• Make a qualifying purchase between January 3, 2010 and March 31, 2010.
• Redeem your purchase within 30 days of purchase date at http://www.microsoftincentives.com/BigEasy4/redeem.aspx.
• Receive your partner subsidy check from Microsoft.
• Spend your subsidy funds with your Microsoft partner upon receipt. Please note that subsidy funds expire after 90 days of the check issue date.

Click here to find included products, estimate your subsidy & watch a video


Take advantage of this great offer by contacting a Solution Advisor today! You can reach us by phone at 419.534.3010, via email, or at www.computerworkstoledo.com