How much space/room is left on any drive or folder?

Check your Computer Properties (determine how much space is used/ open) To determine how much space is used – unused on a computer (C Drive), or on a flash drive, portable hard drive or memory card, or in a specific folder –such a My Documents or My Pictures?

•  Open Windows Explorer – (Quick Access: Windows Flag Key + E) which is a 2 sided screen – whatever is highlighted on the left is what you are looking at on the right..…
• Hover your mouse over the Drive or specific folder you want to check
• When you do this, Right Click on the Drive or folder
• When the action list appears – find PROPERTIES at the bottom of the list
• Now Left Click on Properties

What is DropBox?

Dropbox, which started just 5 years ago in 2007 by 2 MIT Graduates who continually forgot to bring their flash drives to class, has a free service (as well as other monthly & annual fee programs) and their software works with Windows, Mac’s, Android and other operating systems…  Yes – this is a “cloud computer” service, similar to what emails users who have hotmail, live or msn with SkyDrive or what gmail users use with Google Drive to save their photos, documents and other files to share or access from anywhere they are..…

Check them out at www.dropbox.com

How to use DropBox:

Go to www.dropbox.com and download their free software to your computer or smartphone (or any other mobile device).

• Select a location on your hard drive to place the "Dropbox Folder."

• Drag and drop files you want to upload to Dropbox into the new Dropbox folder on your computer. You can also upload files directly to your Dropbox account using their website upload tools.

• You can now access your Dropbox files from any computer using Dropbox website or installing the software on that specific computer.

• Access your files on an iPhone or Android device using the mobile Dropbox application.

• Any adjustments made to Dropbox files will synchronize automatically.

If you need more help using this, visit www.dropbox.com which has an easy to follow tutorial on their website, or visit our two favorite websites for learning just about anything:

www.ehow.com or www.youtube.com

As of October 2011, Dropbox had more than 50 million users and recently announced (in April 2012) a new feature that allows users to automatically upload photos and videos from their cameras, tablets, SD cards and smartphones.  We’ve also heard that they are going to be giving users up to 3 GB of additional storage space for free, which some feel is to encourage users to use them, vs. Hotmails SkyDrive or Googles Drive for docs & photos… 

COPY FILES FROM COMPUTER TO YOUR FLASH DRIVE

With so many of our students preparing to return to "cooler climates" making sure you copy your folders of documents, music, photos, etc onto a portable drive or flash drive is always a good idea (great way to back-up just in case)... so here's a reminder on how to do that quickly and easily... Safe Travels....

• Open Windows Explorer/My Computer to see which drives are shown – easiest way to do this is hold down the Windows Flag Key + E .

• Insert flash drive in the USB port, it will appear as “removable drive” or indicate the company name (Removable Disk (G)

• In Windows XP - Open MY DOCUMENTS & Select the files or folders you want to copy to flash drive by left-clicking on them. To copy multiple, hold the CTRL key while you click & select all the files to save.

• In Windows Vista & Windows 7 - Open LIBRARIES; then Open Each of the Cabinets you want to copy –My Pictures, My Music, My Movies, My Pictures; Select the files or folders you want to copy to your flash drive by left-clicking on them. To copy multiple, hold the CTRL key while you click folders or files at random; Or hold the SHIFT key to copy GROUPS of folders OR hold the CTRL + A to copy all folders in the parent folder…

• Once highlighted…. RIGHT-CLICK on the folders you want to copy (or go to Menu Bar & Edit) and choose COPY.

• Go to “My Computer”; choose the correct Drive you want to copy your work/files/folders to; highlight that drive (i.e. "Removable Disk (G:),

• RIGHT-CLICK on the Drive (or go to Menu Bar & Edit); choose PASTE

• When the copying is finished, DO NOT IMMEDIATELY REMOVE THE FLASH DRIVE OR PORTABLE HARD DRIVE FROM THE USB PORT :
Always left-click on the REMOVE HARDWARE icon located in the System Tray to be sure it says: SAFELY REMOVE STORAGE DEVICE. 

Yes Size Matters - What are Bytes, KB’s, MB’s, GB’s, TB’s, PB’s or EB’s?

What do all these “measurements” mean that we see for both RAM (Random Access Memory) or the space on a hard drive, portable hard drive, flash drive or memory card/stick?
The smallest unit of memory storage is called a BIT. A bit either contains a ONE or a ZERO. That's it.
• Eight bits is one BYTE ("bite"). That's enough storage for about one letter of the alphabet.
• 1,024 bytes is one KILOBYTE (KB) or about one page of text.
• 1,024 kilobytes is one MEGABYTE (MB) or about 1,000 pages of text (short novel).
• 1,024 megabytes is one GIGABYTE (GB) or about 1,000,000 pages of text (pickup truck filled with books).
• 1,024 gigabytes is one TERABYTE (TB) – and that is equal to about 50,000 trees made into paper and printed
Today, the most popular form of measurement that we hear about is Terabytes (TB) but on the horizon and in some publications we are already hearing about PETABYTES (PB) and EXABYTES (EB) - we've come a long way baby since the Commodore 64's....and we wonder where it will end..

To give you an idea of how much data a TB is or how much it can hold based on a document: It is said that The U.S. Library of Congress Web Capture team claims that "As of April 2011, the Library has collected about “235 terabytes of data" and that it adds about 5 terabytes per month.

Error Message: Windows-No Disk

Question: I am getting a error message a lot lately: “WINDOWS-NO DISK” pops up on the monitor and it makes no difference what I’m working on or have open and it happens several times a day…

Answer: Tech support forums and sites (including Microsoft) indicate that this is common (more so with Windows XP & Vista) than Windows 7. THe following is the solution, copied directly from Microsoft’s website at the following link:

http://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/forum/windows_xp-system/windows-no-disk-exception-processing-message/b1a67525-d5e8-46ae-9801-6b169547e656

"The answer lies in the words "Windows: No Disk", your PC is looking for a USB device - e.g. a USB stick or a cell phone - that you've recently plugged in and have removed without using the "remove hardware safely" option in the right hand bottom corner of your screen. Put the last USB device you used back into the USB port and then use the "remove software safely" option.

The pop up message will disappear."

In my case, I didn't have to plug the USB device in, I just needed to click on the "Safely Remove Hardware" icon in the system tray, and tell it to remove the device that is no longer plugged in.

BACKING UP YOUR COMPUTER AND INFO

It's very important to back up your computer as well as your important files - documents, photos, music, videos and movies - often. Today more and more of what we do is on our computers and we want to be sure we don't "lose it all" if our computers crashed...

When you back up your files - you can use a CD, Large Flash Drive, Portable or External Hard Drive or a company such as Carbonite.com; Mozy.com or your Internet provider (many offer back-up services)

Backing up on a regular basis is critical – especially for those of us with older computers or if you have large document folders, photo, music or other media files… If you use one of the services – remember to ask how much space is included and what the charges are for additional storage (personally that’s why I like carbonite.com-it offers unlimited)

External Hard Drives-Such as Office Depots “Clickfree" HD1035 Backup External USB Hard Drive, 1000GB”, which Automatically backs up your computer without any confusing software to install - These allow you to back up your computer in just 1 step ~ No software to install or set up and incremental backup lets you save only the files changed since the previous backup – About $135.00

Or use a company, such as Carbonite.com,which is easy and has great advantages..
Once you install Carbonite, future back-ups are done each time you are on your PC/Internet, so you can relax and you can Restore lost files easily and you will have Remote Access to the data on your computer...

What Carbonite is – and what it isn’t: Carbonite offers unlimited backup of the irreplaceable files on your computer. That said, your Carbonite subscription does NOT include some services often confused with backup:

• Online/offsite file storage: Carbonite is NOT a place to move files from your hard drive, to free up space on your hard drive. If you remove any file from your hard drive, they wait 30 days for you to recover it, and then they delete that file from their servers also.
• Program or system backup: Carbonite backs up the irreplaceable files on your computer – user-generated content such as photos, documents, music, etc. They do not back up software programs, temporary files or system files.
• External Hard Drive backup: Carbonite consumer product does not allow you to back up your external hard drive, unless you purchase their external hard drive support with as a small business.
• Archiving: Carbonite does not keep every version of every file you’ve ever created. Their PC product offers versioning, which allows you to recover some versions of your files, going back up to 90 days
• Carbonite costs $54.95 per year-check them out at http://www.carbonite.com/

What are computer Drives

Drives are the “hardware/equipment” that read and write the information the various disks.

Disc drives rotate the disk very fast and have one or more heads that can read and/or write data to them..

When “drives” are put into the computer, the computer assigns them a “letter” making it easier to identify them to then be able t see what is stored/filed on the specific drive, such as:

• "C" is typically the Hard Drive on almost all computers is
• "D" is often times the CD or DVD Drive
• "E" or "F"- when you put your flash drive in the USB Port in one computer it might be the “E” Drive – in another computer it might be the “F” drive..

The "letter" the computer assigns, allows you to know where things are..

There are different types of disc drives, but the common ones that we work with are:

• CD-Rom can read audio and data CD discs
• CR-RW drives can read and record (burn) audio and data CD discs
• DVD-ROM drives can read CD and DVD discs
• DVD+RW+R Drives, can read and write (burn) CD and DVD discs
• COMBINATION DRIVES, combine the functions of 2 rives into one-either a DVD+RW/+R drive and a CD-RW drive or a DVD-RIM drive and a CR-RW drive
• Flash/jump drive and read and write to a flash/jump drive
• Hard disk drive (HDD) reads and writes hard disks (can be internal or external or totally portable)
• “6 in 1” - “50 In 1” Memory Card Readers – allows you to read from the memory cards of digital cameras and other media devices

Disk drives can be either internal (housed within the computer) or external (housed in a separate box that connects to the computer)

NAMING & SAVING WORK

NAME YOUR WORK AND SAVE IT OFTEN

• When you open a document in Word, Works, Excel, Power Point or any type of “creation’ application software – they will have a document or project number until we give them a name of our choice
• The more “new documents, spreadsheets, power point slide show presentations” you open” the higher the numbers get all day
• You want to ALWAYS name your document, spreadsheets, power point slide show presentations, ASAP, so you can find it
• To name to the document to the Menu Bar (or the office button in the newer Office 2007 products) Choose File – Save As – It will open “My Documents” , and either choose or create the folder you want to save your work in
• In class – if you also want to save it to your Flash/Memory stick, repeat the process and once you choose “Save As” remember to go to “My Computer” and find the DRIVE that your flash/Memory stick is on–now open “My Documents” and either choose or create the folder you want to save your work in
• NAME THE DOCUMENT so you can find it in the future – Click Ok or Save

TIPS:

• Once your work is saved – in the future – you can simply click on the SAVE ICON often which will save your additions and changes to the named document you have
• If you are creating a second document, then you would repeat the steps above, giving this work an entirely new name

COPY, PASTE & HIGHLIGHTING TIPS

COPY AND MOVE FILES & FOLDERS:
Cutting, copying, and pasting are essential techniques in working with and organizing files and folders. There are several ways to copy and move objects in Windows Explorer (AND TO OPEN WINDOWS EXPLORER-USE YOUR WINDOWS FLAG KEY + E)

• Copying a file or folder by using the Standard Buttons Toolbar
• Copying a file or folder by using the Menu
• Copying a file or folder by dragging

COPYING A GROUP OF DOCUMENTS, PHOTOS OR MUSIC:

• In the left pane, choose/highlight the drive you want to add items to: C Drive; Removable Drive or CD/DVD (to see what's on it); Right click on it – choose PROPERTIES on the menu list to see how much space is used/available
• Point to the drive you are taking the work/photo’s from, "C" drive, "My Documents", "Your folder".. On the right pane you will see all the sub-folder, highlight the folder/folders (see highlighting tips noted below) you want to copy, Activate COPY command
• In the left pane, Add/create a new folder for the items in the Drive they are going to
• Once created, point/highlight the folder the work is being sent to
• Now activate the PASTE command – you will see them flying over!!
• On the left pane, highlight the new folder and you will see all the work that’s been added on the right pane

To Copy documents from one folder to another, you can select all the documents by either holding down the shift or control buttons, then holding down the left mouse button and dragging the documents into the correct folder.

HIGHLIGHTING TIPS:

• JUST ONE ITEM: Simply left click on it to highlight it
• RANDOM: To highlight “random documents, files, pictures etc.: Hold down your CTRL key on the keyboard, then left click/choose the files you want
• GROUP: To highlight “group of documents, files, pictures, etc” Left click/choose the first picture or file in the group; hold down the SHIFT key on your keyboard, then left click/choose the last photo or file in the group
• ALL: To highlight all of the documents, files, pictures, etc. at once, simply use hold down your CTRL key and the letter A (CTRL+A) or go to the Menu Bar, File, and choose Select All.

HOW TO CUT/COPY & PASTE:

1. Select /highlight what you want to Cut or Copy
2. Then activate CUT or COPY (any of 5 ways)
3. Go to Where you Want what You’ve Cut or Copy to GO-be sure to choose the correct drive, folder and or sub-folder..
4. To find your travel drive-Open my computer & find the right drive Then activate PASTE (any of 5 ways)

WORD: SAVE A DOCUMENT TO YOUR FLASH/MEMORY STICK

When you save documents to your Flash/Memory Stick – you need to know which DRIVE your Flash Memory Stick is on - So when you plug it in watch for the "info box" that will appear telling you which drive letter it has been assigned... When you plug it into the USB port, it will tell you

• Word 97-2003: Go to the Menu Bar, File, Save As, My Documents (icon on left bar) is what may appear
• Word 2007: Go to the Office Button, Choose Save As, Choose 97-2003 document, the My Document folder will open (icon also appears on the left bar)
• Now to find your flash drive - use the drop down arrow beside “My Documents” and choose the correct drive for your Flash/Memory Stick (could be Drive E - F – G – H ??)
• Select or create a folder to put your work in
• Name your Document, when you are done typing use the enter key on your keyboard OR left click on the SAVE button

COPY FILES FROM COMPUTER TO A FLASH DRIVE

Copy and Paste is the same whether you are copying an article in the paper or an email you've received or from one page in word to another page or another document... Steps are:

1. Highlight what you want to copy
2. Give the command to Copy
3. Go to where you want to put the item
4. Give the command to Paste...

So you do the same thing when you are copying a folder, group of folders or various files to and from your flash/removable drive...

1. Open My Computer to see which drives are shown.
2. Insert flash drive in the USB port, it will appear as “removable drive” or indicate the company name (Removable Disk (G)
3. Open MY DOCUMENTS & Select the files or folders you want to copy to flash drive by left-clicking on them. To copy multiple, hold the CTRL key while you click & select all of the files you wish to save.
4. RIGHT-CLICK on the folders you want to copy (or go to Menu Bar & Edit) and choose COPY.
5. Go to “My Computer”; choose the correct Drive you want to copy your work/files/folders to; highlight that drive (i.e. "Removable Disk (G:),
6. RIGHT-CLICK on the Drive (or go to Menu Bar & Edit); choose PASTE

When the copying is finished, DO NOT IMMEDIATELY REMOVE THE FLASH DRIVE FROM THE USB PORT - Left-click on the REMOVE HARDWARE icon located in the System Tray to the far right of your Task Bar on the bottom of your monitor screen, to be sure it says: SAFELY REMOVE STORAGE DEVICE.