Views From the Top

By Mitch Webb, President

Views will hopefully return next month. At this time in the club's history we need to hear from the Top.

Go to the PC Club's Website

	From The Inkwell
Keith Wales, Sr. Welcome to the second edition of the Bytes & Bits On- Line. It is already May and spring is in full swing and very soon we will all be heading to the beach or the mountains, because we can. At our last Executive Board Meeting there seemed to be mass confusion on the NEW Membership Levels and what they cost. I will try to help work out the confusion in the next few lines. MEMBERSHIP 1. E-Member Dues None Privileges E Bytes & Bits only 2. Subscriber Dues $5.00 per year per person (No Special Family Rates) Privileges This will include an invitation to our holiday party, raffle tickets and admittance at all Special Interest Group (SIGs) meetings. These are the levels of membership similar to the old plan. SPONSORSHIP 1. Patron For $15 per year you become a you receive all the benefits above plus a link to your website. There are only 3 Patron memberships available. (See links at bottom of newsletter). 2. Silver Patron For $20 per year you will receive all the benefits of a Sponsor membership plus a display ad for one month in this newsletter. There are only 12 Silver Patron memberships available. (See LeConcierge Gifts ad in this newsletter.) 3. Gold Patron For $350 per year you become a you will receive all the benefits of a Sponsor membership plus recognition in every newsletter as a Gold Patron sponsor of this club. Only 1 Gold Patron membership is available. I hope this clears up some of the confusion between Membership and Sponsorship. Please let me know how you like this new format via email at editor@pc3.org. I am hoping we will have a great meeting in May and I look forward to seeing many of you there. Membership Levels "

	Don Talk 2003 by Don King
Don Talk 2003 This column is your PC3.org place to ask questions, which will not always get the thought they deserve. Technical data is usually gleaned from Internet experiences. It is usually written under duress because I hate deadlines. It lacks authority and research because I throw out all of my old PC Magazines. . Don, this is Jerry calling from Koppet Key. It was a great reunion we had while you stopped in during your February trip. Here is something you can share with your computer club. When we look at this we are reminded that those lost in space on the lost shuttles observed these scenes. Scroll down and click on the web site. The image is a panoramic view of the world from the new space station. It is a night photo with the lights clearly indicating the populated areas. You can scroll East-West and North-South. Note that Canada's population is almost exclusively along the U.S. border. Moving east to Europe, there is a high population concentration along the Mediterranean Coast. It's easy to spot London, Paris, Stockholm and Vienna. Check out the development of Israel compared to the rest of the Arab countries. Note the Nile River and the rest of the "Dark Continent". After the Nile, the lights don't come on again until Johannesburg. Look at the Australian Outback and the Trans-Siberian Rail Route. Moving east, the most striking observation is the difference between North and South Korea. Note the density of Japan. What a piece of photography. It is an absolutely awesome picture of the Earth taken from the Boeing built Space Station last November on a perfect night with no obscuring atmospheric conditions. Click on link at bottom of article. Here are actual error messages seen on the computer screens in Japan, where they are written in Haiku. Aren't these better than "your computer has performed an illegal operation"? 1. The Web site you seek Cannot be located, but Countless more exist. 2. Chaos reigns within. Reflect, repent, and reboot. Order shall return. 3. Program aborting: Close all that you have worked on. You ask far too much. 4. Windows NT crashed. I am the Blue Screen of Death. No one hears your screams. 5. Yesterday it worked. Today it is not working. Windows is like that. 6. Your file was so big. It might be very useful. But now it is gone. 7. Stay the patient course. Of little worth is your ire. The network is down. 8. A crash reduces Your expensive computer To a simple stone. 9. Three things are certain: Death, taxes and lost data. Guess which has occurred. 10. You step in the stream, But the water has moved on. This page is not here. 11. Out of memory. We wish to hold the whole sky, but we never will. 12. Having been erased, The document you're seeking Must now be retyped. 13. Serious error. All shortcuts have disappeared. Screen. Mind. Both are blank. Featured Link "

	Special Interest Group (SIG)
Special Interest Group The next week will be our SIG week and we will have several during that week. The schedule is as follows: Database/Graphics SIG -- aka PIG SIG Monday, May 12, 2003, 5:30pm Tryon House on Eastway at North Tryon Digital Camera SIG Tuesday, May 13, 2003, 7:00pm CompUSA, South Boulevard and I-485 PDA SIG (Formerly the Handheld SIG) Wednesday, May 14, 2003, 7:00pm CompUSA, South Boulevard and I-485 Internet SIG Thursday, May 15, 2003, 7:00pm CompUSA, South Boulevard and I-485 SIG Calendar "

	LeConcierge Gifts - 2 for 1
Le Concierge Gifts Thousands of Unique Gifts Le Concierge Gifts is proud to sponsor the Personal Computer Club of Charlotte's May Newsletter. Buy any item and receive an item of equal or lesser value free. The more you buy, the more you save! Shop Now! "

	SETI@Home
Dr. Paul Reiss A Very Different Screen Saver Paul has been a long time helper in the search for extra- terrestrial messages, those of us on his email list can attest to some of the extra-terrestrial things going on in his computer. But all kidding aside this is a way to help a good cause and your computer is there anyway. (Keith Wales, Sr. Editor) Since the beginning of the SETI Project in July 1999, almost 4.5 million "users" have gotten the software and (I think) downloaded at least one work unit of data. New people are still logging on. In a recent 24 hr. period, 2626 were counted. An active user is one who has returned at least one result in the past 28 days. Since the recent mass emailing informing people of the new software about to be released, the number of active users, which had been on a gradual decline in recent months, jumped to about 640,000. An amazing 852,598,167 work units comprising 1,423,823.585 years of CPU time have been returned so far. Do the math and that's about 14 hours 38 minutes per unit. Of course, your results may vary. My 1 GHz Celeron laptop takes 24 to 27 hr. per unit while my older machines take 60 to 85 hr. each. Intel processors are the most numerous of the types being used with Power PC's and SPARC CPU's in the next two positions. There are some PC's running AMD processors as well. If you want to join this long lived project and hope you are the one to hear from ET. The link below will take you directly to the download site. Download SETI@HOME "

	April Board Meeting Minutes
April Board Meeting Richard Kinkel, Vice President, called the meeting to order and distributed an agenda. Eric announced that Mitch Webb was not feeling well and would not attend. Members present; President - Past President - Eric Katowitz Vice President - Richard Kinkel Treasurer - Pam Wales Secretary - Don King Editor - Keith Wales, Sr. Bill Barnes Dr. Paul Reiss Dewey Williams Dr. Reiss discussed during dinner the status of the program for the May General meeting. He will Email the results of his selection of the program in the next few days, and the program will be announced at that time. The minutes of the March Board meeting were approved, and we thanked Bill Barnes for pinch hitting. The Treasurer Pam Wales reported $2,713 as our current balance. The SIGS will not have a budget for 2003-2004. The new dues structure announced by Mitch was discussed, and a schedule will be posted in the electronic News Letter. There was some discussion about determining membership based on electronic distribution of the newsletter. We are getting some feed back from Constant Contact and this will be studied further based on experience and weeding out process of bad Email addresses before coming to a conclusion about a membership number. During this discussion someone mentioned that IBM had indicated our club was among the top four clubs in the country! Kudos to Eric for guiding us to this high achievement. Keith indicated that the deadline for the News Items was April 26th. On a motion by Richard seconded by Don, Keith would be authorized to access Constant Contact. During the Webmaster's report, it was clarified that the SIG Presidents would be responsible for updating the Calendar and any other SIG information required. Don King will up date General Meeting and Board Meeting information just as soon as he refreshes his memory on how to do it. Don King, Secretary Membership Levels "

	Spring Tuneup From AOL
Dr. Paul Reiss As you know, when you own a car, you are supposed to do regular maintenance, such as change your oil and rotate your tires. Computers are a lot like cars, they need regular maintenance too. Here are a few tips that will keep your computer in its best possible shape. If you like, you can print this, and keep it near your computer. Below is a quick list of a few things every PC and AOL user should do at least once a month. If you suspect that your computer may be experiencing some difficulties, these steps should be run immediately. Detailed descriptions on these maintenance procedures are included below. Every Month: 1. Run a thorough ScanDisk and run Defrag. 2. Back up your AOL Personal Filing Cabinet (which contains Favorite Places, your addressbook, and saved mail). 3. Empty your AOL browser cache or Internet Temp files. Computer Issues: Run ScanDisk and Defrag Over time, your hard drive will become disorganized as programs are added, moved, and removed, and as you browse the web. This can cause your computer to slow down, and also to "crash" more often. Please take the following steps to run ScanDisk and Disk Defragmenter (*see Note below for Windows 2000/XP users): 1. Exit the all running prgrams. 2. Click on the START button, select PROGRAMS, then ACCESSORIES, then SYSTEM TOOLS, then select SCANDISK. 3. Select the options for a THOROUGH scan and to AUTOMATICALLY FIX ERRORS, and click on START, this may take a while. 4. Once the ScanDisk is finished, click on the START button, select PROGRAMS, then ACCESSORIES, then SYSTEM TOOLS, then DISK DEFRAGMENTER. 5. Select your hard drive, and click on OK. 6. Once Disk Defragmenter has finished, restart the computer again. *Note: Please do the following steps for Windows 2000/XP instead of the steps above: To check the hard disk drive integrity in Windows, follow the following steps: Double-click My Computer and select the hard disk drive you want to check. Use the mouse to point to the selected hard drive and click the right mouse button. Select Properties and click Tools. In Error- checking, click Check Now. Once that is done, continue with the following steps: If the Disk Defragmenter tool is not already running, click Start, point to All Programs, point to Accessories, point to System Tools, and then click Disk Defragmenter. Click the volume that you want to defragment. Click Defragment to begin the operation. Review the progress of the operation in the Defragmentation Display window. Fragmented files on the disk appear in red, contiguous files are blue, and system files are green. The goal is to eliminate most of the red in the window. FOR AOL MEMBERS America Online Issues for 4.0, 5.0, 6.0,7.0 and 8.0: Back up your Personal Filing Cabinet (PFC) The PFC is a file that contains the address book (AOL 6.0 & 7.0 stores the address book on the AOL system, so it does not need to be backed up), Favorite Places, and Personal Filing Cabinet (PFC) information. If you make a copy of the PFC, and save it somewhere other than the AOL folder, you can always restore your Address Book and PFC should the originals develop any problems. You can also put a copy of the PFC on a disk and move it to a new computer. . Please click on this link for information on why making a back up is a good idea. Here's how you back up your PFC: Please sign off from and close America Online. Reboot your computer, to be sure that no AOL files are running. Then open the MY COMPUTER Icon on the desktop, then open the C:\ Drive Icon Locate your America Online folder on the left side of the screen and double-click on it to open it (AOL 7.0 is located in the Programs Files Folder) . On the right hand side of the screen you'll see an Organize folder. Please double-click on that folder to open it. Inside that folder you will find your PFC files(s). Each PFC is simply a file named after one of your account screen names. Locate the file that has the same name of the screen name (there may be several that have your screen name, select the one without the file extension) that you want to copy the PFC from and click once on that file to highlight it. Click on Edit at the top of the Explorer window and choose Copy. Now select Windows Desktop from the left side of screen by clicking on it once. Then right-click on the Windows Desktop icon and choose Paste from the menu. That will place a copy of the file on the desktop. You can also put a floppy disk in your A: drive, then right-click on the A: icon and choose Paste from the menu. This will put a backup copy on a disk, so you can keep it off the computer, or copy it to another computer if you like.

Support Our Club and Its Members

Club Officers Web Hosting and Design Internet Backup Service

Member's Network Computer Consulting CompUSA - Hosts our SIGs