Windows System Restore feature, -important step for Troubleshooting.

[Knowlege level: Beginner to Intermediate experience]

If you are a Windows operating system user (WinXP, Vista), you should be aware of an extremely powerful tool that can save you a lot of hassle. This tool is called “System Restore”. It comes standard with the operating system so you don’t have to spend extra money on any additional software.

We have found the restore feature extremely useful when troubleshooting strange behavior related to a recent driver installation, or computer running extremely slow (virus?)or popup ads making your life miserable. In many cases, it can happen because some registry (Window's database of configurations) get corrupted, or some malware etc. gets installed accidentally.

In such cases, the easiest troubleshooting method would be helpful shareware or free utilities like Adaware, Spybot,or Ccleaner first [I will post info about these later], but if these fail to resolve the issue -restoring the system to a date when you know things were functioning properly might do the trick.
*Note- this should not delete any files/documents etc. you have saved in your 'My Documents' folders, it will only 'undo' any installed software, and registry settings altered since your chosen restore point.

Here is the step-by-step to find the System Restore Feature:
Click All Programs => Accessories => System Tools (or sometimes something else) => System Restore. See the picture below from a Windows XP system.

To restore the system to an earlier date, activate the System Restore Tool and select the date to which you want to restore the system to. See attached picture of this in VISTA below:

That's it! Just follow the prompts, and Windows will begin the restoring. It takes about 5-15 minutes to complete the process, and will require an auto-reboot. See whether your issue is fixed. Many times it does, but if not - then click on the 'Forums' link on the sidebar, to ask your question there.

Why Windows 7 will be my friend. (and yours too!)

I can't wait for the final version to come out- sources say possibly by the holidays, or next spring if delayed.

That's right folks, love them or hate them, the big MS has moved in a wise step by significantly shortening the regular product lifespan of their last greatest crapperware of an OS...you know the one, it rhymes with 'Pista, and instead coming out with what we wanted in the first place:

A gamer AND business friendly OS that is as fast as XP, requires pretty much the same specs as XP [or even less on mobiles], is less buggy, and more stream-lined (and hopefully stable) as any apple MAC OS.

Just look it up and see for yourself, but even non-MS affiliated reviewers seem genuinely pleased by the early Beta results. It is also supposed to have a newer update to Direct X, 11.x or something in that ballpark. That bodes well for us, the gaming elite.

Micro$oft Win7 page

And if you are lucky enough to have gotten your hands on the BETA, here is a very slick and easy guide to multi-boot Win7 with Vista, and XP if you want....compliments of the sweet and helpful dudes over at Tweaktown.

Click here for link to Guide

The countdown begins!

LED Sheep-Pong! No, for real...!

I don't care who you is..that right der' is funneh'!

Hello! Portland Computer is now live!

This will be my sister site to my first blog, "mobias" [which I mostly use for blabbing about all things at random]. This space is in the early stages of its design, so bear with the construction. :)

It will be focused specifically on a helping, assisting, advising, recommending, consulting, troubleshooting all things PC related. That's right folks, anything you wish to ask me, I will do my very best to respond in a timely manner, with an honest effort to help you with whatever your situation.

Yep, I am a bit of a jack-of-all-trades, master of more than just none. So ask away! I'm excited to begin a new chapter, and will be setting up a good forum in the future as well, so stay tuned.

(To celebrate my first post, my graphic gives props to a hilarious and inspiring salute to British Sit-com "The IT Crowd" -which I highly recommend checking out)

Eventually, I will get to offering a Custom Gaming Computer 'build' service as well.

Send me a request and let's get started!