• Clogged fan

The main device responsible for maintaining a constant temperature of your video card is the fan present in the processor. If this isn’t functioning efficiently it’s quite obvious that it would result in your video card overheating. If you don’t regularly clean your computer, it could be highly likely that your fan is clogged with dust.

This is one of the simplest causes of your video card overheating which can be fixed by simply cleaning your fan, preferably using a blower.

• Broken fan

A follow up of the previous point, in some cases your fan maybe malfunctioning or stopped working altogether. This could simply be diagnosed by switching on your computer with its cover open and checking if the fan is functioning. If it doesn’t happen to be working, you have your answer.

• Overclocking

Pushing your CPU to its limits by overclocking can cause your video card to overheat. This can seem fairly obvious too as if you find your video card overheating and if you’ve recently overclocked your CPU, it would explain it.

• Faulty Drivers

This is a rare cause, but depending on your video card’s brand a badly developed driver could also cause your video card to overheat. If you use an unusual video card with questionable reputation this could be the issue.

• Inefficient Airflow

While your fan maybe perfectly in tact and working, the location of your fan also matters. If there isn’t sufficient air flow to your video card it can also cause it to overheat.

Those are typically the 5 main reasons to your video card overheating. If you have any other points in your mind, feel free to share them below.

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There are numerous diagnostic tools available to diagnose your computer for different issues however most of these tools don’t specifically pinpoint the cause of the problems.

Soluto is a different kind of diagnostic tool. Uniquely promoted as an ‘anti-frustration’ software, Soluto is a free tool that monitors your system’s performance and activity and specifically finds the reason behind your computer’s lack of performance. It then provides details on how to fix these issues based on community feedback. For more information watch this video:

Soluto is totally free and can be downloaded from their home page.

For more extensive tips and information on how to speed up and improve the overall performance of your computer as well as fix any other issues, sign up for free tips and updates from Computer Realm.

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You might want to edit an animated GIF  for various reasons. Most forums online allow animated GIFs as avatars so you might want to personalize an animated GIF. That’s just a single example. A while back I should you how to split animated GIFs however the tool doesn’t really support extensive customization of the GIF.

If you are looking for more features, you can check out Ulead Gif Animator. It provides a multitude of features to edit your GIF files. The site contains a free trial which you can download here. For a completely free version you can download the older version of the application when it was freeware here (scroll to the bottom of the page).

Once you open the application you can create a file from scratch and add your frames or you may import an existing GIFs and add, modify or delete the frames depending on your requirements. If you run in to any trouble with the application, leave a comment below.

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Windows 7 has native support for automatically changing the wallpaper. Windows 7 also supports changing the logon screen without any third party application.

Logon Screen Rotator (Windows 7) is a great application that goes a step further and allows more functionality by allowing automatic change of the logon screen at user-defined intervals. You also have the option to revert to the default image whenever you wish to do so.

This application also provides other functions like the ability to change the username style shown in the logon screen.

If you are weary of using third party applications and don’t mind getting your hands dirty you can dive into the registry and modify the logon screen using a key.

• Open Registry Editor (type “regedit” in the Start menu) as administrator.

• Go to this key ‘HKEY-LOCAL-MACHINE/SOFTWARE/Microsoft/Windows/CurrentVersion/Authentication/LogonUI/Background’.

• Select the value ‘OEMBackground’, and change the value data to 1

• If the key does not exist, create a new DWORD as OEMBackground.

• Create this folder: /WINDOWS/system32/oobe/info/backgrounds

• Copy a JPG image smaller than 250kb and name it as backgroundDefault.jpg (The JPG is stretched, so you should resize it according to your aspect ratio)

Download Logon Screen Rotator

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The dangers that malware present are endless, and it is in your best interest that you ensure that malicious software never come your way. However, like everything else in life, to safe guard yourself and your PC from malware, you need to put forth a conscious effort. Leaving things to chance is something like going to war without ammunition.

The purpose of this article is to educate users by answering frequently asked questions related to malware issues.

How does malware gain entry into a system?

Though most malware use the Internet as a medium to spread themselves, their exact modus operandi may differ.  Listed below are common techniques that malware, such as d.exe use to infiltrate a computer:

• E-mail attachment – Malware becomes active when you open the email attachment to which it is stealthily attached.
• Dubious websites – Certain websites, when you visit them, infiltrate your PC with malware, such as spyware and adware.
• Freeware – Many freeware programs come bundled with spyware and adware programs which become active once you install the freeware program.

What are the symptoms of a malware infection?

Sure signs of a malware infection are:

• Inconsistent performance of your computer.
• Frequent system freeze ups.
• Slow system startup or shutdown process.
• Frequent system errors

And in more severe cases:

• Missing files
• Unquenchable applications
• In ability to get even a single task done on the system

What problems do malware may pose if they happen to breach a system’s security?

Once inside your computer, malware may do all kinds of malicious activities to wreak havoc on your PC.  Depending on the nature of the malware, you may find yourself battling with one or more of the following problems:

• Identity theft – Many malware are notorious for stealing users’ confidential information for misuse.
• Slow computer speed – Malware-related processes eat into your computer’s resources resulting in painfully slow computer speed.
• Random error messages – Malware programs may delete or alter important files and generate errors.
• Corrupt registry – Malware programs bombard the registry with harmful entries and at the same time may delete essential registry entries.

Can malware programs use the same names as genuine processes?

Yes, they can and in fact many do. Various malware masquerade themselves as genuine processes to escape detection.   For example, consent.exe and smss.exe are two genuine and very important processes on a Windows computer, but malware are known to name themselves as consent.exe or smss.exe to escape detection.

How to solve computer problems related to malware

Problems related to malware that you face are the symptoms and not the disease. To fix the issue, you need to remove the malware from your computer. To do this, run a malware scan on your entire computer using an advanced antimalware tool. It is recommended that you run the scan twice to make sure no malware escapes detection.

This guest post was written by James Ricketts of Instant-Registry-Fixes.org, your complete resource for Windows related tips, tools, tweaks, and general computer error help.

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While some PC errors can never be permanently resolved, you can carry out the following steps to ensure that their occurrence is minimized:

• Malware removal – Malware programs are responsible for a majority of Windows PC troubles. If you have been getting the c000021a error frequently, it is very likely that your system is riddled with malware infections and one or more of the critical system-processes such as the winlogon.exe process or the csrss.exe process have been compromised. To combat malware effectively, you should install the latest protective software. These tools include anti-virus, anti-adware, anti-spyware, etc. It is a good idea to shop for these products individually rather than go for an all-encompassing software that may not turn out to be so effective.

• Registry cleanup – Just like your hard disk and other system components, the registry also needs to be taken care of regularly. Faulty entries in the registry may give rise to a plethora of computer problems. Out of these, the most notable ones are: crashing of critical system processes, DLL errors, missing system files, device errors, slow system, and so on. To prevent as well as resolve these issues, you should invest in a good registry cleaner from a trusted vendor. A good registry cleaner will not take more than a few mouse clicks to fix and optimize the registry. A healthy and compact registry will not only improve system performance, but will also plug a lot of holes, making your PC more secure against possible attacks.

• Program management – While talking about computer errors and performance, one also needs to look at the various programs installed on the computer. For instance, if you keep getting the error code 81000306, it means that the Windows Messenger program has not been functioning properly. You can try to resolve this error by downloading and installing the latest version from the internet. You should also check your internet connection to see whether there isn’t a huge response-lag present. At the same time, you should realize that long-abandoned programs are a burden on system resources and should be done away with post-haste. You can achieve this by uninstalling them either from the Control Panel, or by using a third-party uninstaller tool.

This article shows that you can deal with the majority of PC errors on your own, even though you may not be a sophisticated or advanced computer user. No matter what your skill level, you can always tackle these problems by working with the right tools and following the above mentioned maintenance activities.

This guest post was written by James Ricketts of Instant-Registry-Fixes.org, your complete resource for Windows related tips, tools, tweaks, and general computer error help.

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SetFileDate (Windows) is a great freeware application that allows you to do this. It comprises of a simple interface with an easy file explorer (heads up, hidden and system files are shown!) to easily adjust date and time stamps of any file. There are quite a few others alternatives available in software indexes but SetFileDate is pretty much what you are looking for.

If you are a Mac user you might want to check out this post to achieve this. If you are aware of any software alternatives to edit date stamps on Mac operating systems, please share it in the comments.

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This is mainly due to poor programming with the uninstall program or the programming behind the software itself and it usually occurs in software that integrate heavily into the OS and in custom written install programs. (unlike using popular install programs like NSIS or Inno Setup) There are tons of uninstall programs that is just a sorry attempt by a newbie programmer that lists all the install programs and uses the default uninstaller in the application to get rid of the software, however Revo Uninstaller does more than that.

Revo Uninstaller (Windows) is a free (and paid) application that makes an extra effort to make sure you have a clean uninstall of a program. It scans your computer for remaining bits and pieces of the uninstalled software after the standard uninstaller does its job and makes sure the program has been completely removed. In addition it includes a few other tools meant to clean your hard disk of unwanted files from previous installations and otherwise.

The free version of the software provides the former features mentioned, the pro version (around $40 for 1 computer) provides a few more features, according to their website, it provides more ‘advanced’ algorithms for scanning for remains of previous installations (something tells me that ‘feature’ is a marketing stunt for the most part) as well as more visual customization and tracking of system changes during installation of software. View the complete feature comparison here.

Checkout Revo Uninstaller.

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It is undeniably true that blogging revolves around great content. Forget about SEO and other promotion methods, what you need is great content to attract readers which will soon be your followers and subscribers.

In line with this, here are some basic elements of blogging which you cannot live without:

1. Write Attractive Headlines/Titles

People looking for information do not have time or do not want to spend much time browsing through all the words in your articles. The truth is, they will go for the title and decide whether they will read the content or not depending on how they like it delivered. Making your headlines/titles appealing will ensure that those who can read them will most likely read the rest of the article.

2. Make your First Paragraph Factual

People who are searching for information want to be sure that what they are reading are facts and not just the result of human imagination. And fact is, they will read the first paragraph as if they can find all the information they are looking for. You may think it is impossible to congest a 500-word idea into one paragraph, but anyone can do it; simply present the very core of the information you want to convey in the first paragraph as a sort of introduction. If you can do that, end the introduction abruptly to raise curiosity.

3. Always Make Your Content Physically Beautiful but Informative

Did you know that most of the people do not want to read plain texts? In this case, the physical structure of your article should be:

• Readable – always use easy-to-understand words and present your ideas in the simplest way possible.

• Scannable – most of the readers love to browse the whole article before reading it. Thus, if you have to present multiple ideas, use the following:

Bullet Points – best used in presenting 3 or more ideas in a row
Numbered List – best used in conveying step-by-step instructions
Bold Text – obviously used for emphasizing points within paragraphs
Good and Clean Spacing – there should be enough spaces between lines and words

4. Use Photos and Videos if Necessary

If a picture is worth a thousand words then what’s the use of writing when the picture you are presenting says it all? The thing is, do not overdo the use of these as it will make your post messy for your readers.

5. Keep It Simple and Brief

If you can present all your ideas in a 400-word article then there is no need to write a 700-word article which says of the same thing. Expressing your ideas in a “Simple Way” will always lead to brief content. It is important to note that readers always look for concise yet straightforward content.

6. Conclusion

You must end your article in a way that you started it. If you use a question in the opening, present an answer to your readers at the end of your article, if you present an argument then conclude it.

This post was brought to you by Computer Tips

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Surprisingly, with all the above advancements, one of the things that reminds us that there are indeed limits are email attachments. IMO, it still makes me wonder why there’s a such a limited cap on attachments. Gmail allows only attachments of size 25MB or less (other popular services like Yahoo and Live are similar), by today’s standards that’s hardly enough. With the abundance of memory, virtually all file types are more detailed and occupy more memory so it is possible to find yourself struggling to deal with the 25MB attachment limit every once in a while.

That’s where transferbigfiles.com comes in. Transfer Big Files (self explanatory but still…) is a simple service that lets you upload files of up to 1GB in size and mail it to a recipient. The file will be uploaded to one of their servers and a direct link to download the file will be emailed to the recipient, while the idea is quite ordinary, it is a very handy one indeed and deserves a bookmark somewhere on your browser just in case. There are a number of similar services but transferbigfiles.com is sufficient and gets the job done.

Of course, if there any alternatives you swear by feel free to leave a comment.

This post was brought to you by Computer Tips

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