How to Speed Up Microsoft Word

How to Geek: How to Speed Up Microsoft Word 2007 and 2010

Is Word behaving sluggishly, slowing you down? There are a various reasons why Word may be slowing down, but you can easily change some settings to speed it up.

Turn off Background Repagination

The background repagination option allows Word to repaginate the document when the program is idle. This allows the page numbers displayed on the status bar to be updated and stay current. However, this can slow down other operations in Word. If Word seems to be slowing down, you can turn off background repagination.

To do so, you must first be sure Word is not in Print Layout view. Click the View tab and click Draft in the Document Views section.

To access Word Options in Word 2010, click the File tab and click Options in the list on the left. If you are using Word 2007, click the Office button and click the Word Options button at the bottom of the menu.

On the Word Options dialog box, click Advanced in the list on the left. To turn off background repagination, scroll down to the General section and select the Enable background repagination check box so there is NO check mark in the box. Click OK to save your changes and close the dialog box.

Turn off Word Add-ins

Microsoft Word is packed with features, including add-ins that come with the program. Unfortunately, a lot of these add-ins are ones you probably don’t use, but are turned on by default. These add-ins can slow down Word and make it harder to use.

Open the Word Options dialog box as mentioned earlier. Click Add-Ins in the list on the left.

A list of Add-ins displays in several groups. There are Active and Inactive Application Add-ins. There may also be Document Related Add-ins and Disabled Application Add-ins.

Note the type of the add-in that you want to disable in the Type column.

Select the type you noted for the add-in you want to disable from the Manage drop-down list at the bottom of the dialog box and click Go.

Because we selected an Action add-in to disable, the following dialog box displays. To turn off the desired add-in, select the check box for the add-in so there is NO check mark in the box. Click OK.

You may have noticed a Document Inspector type in the Type column, but no Document Inspector type in the Manage drop-down list. The Document Inspector add-ins are managed in a different location. These add-ins allow you to inspect the document for hidden metadata and personal information and are automatically enabled.

In Word 2010, click the File tab and then click Info on the left. Click the Check for Issues drop-down button and select Inspect Document from the drop-down menu. If you are using Word 2007, click the Office button, click Prepare, and then select Inspect Document from the submenu.

The Document Inspector dialog box displays. Select the items you want to inspect and click Inspect.

NOTE: The Invisible Content option is only available in Word 2010.

Click Remove All to the right of the inspection results for the type of content you want to remove from your document.

NOTE: Be sure you want to remove the content when you click Remove All. As noted on the dialog box, some of the content cannot be retrieved once you delete it.

Turn off Various Word Options

Turning off any one of the following options may not improve Word’s performance noticeably, but turning off a combination of them might help. To turn off these options, open the Word Options dialog box as discussed earlier in this article.

The Show text animation feature allows you to format text in your document using the animation effects available in Word. If you have used this feature and your Word is not responding well, you might want to turn off this feature, at least temporarily. To do this, click Advanced in the list on the left and scroll to the Show document content section. Select the Show text animation check box so there is NO check mark in the box.

Also, on the Advanced screen, is an option in the General section called Provide feedback with animation. This option allows you to send feedback to the developers of Word in the form of animation and sound. If you are not going to send feedback in this form or at all, you might as well turn off this option.

If you use AutoShapes, you might have noticed that when you insert one, you also get a drawing canvas surrounding the shape that is used to insert and arrange the objects in your drawing. If you only insert simple AutoShapes, one at a time, you may not need the drawing canvas. On the Advanced screen, in the Editing options section is an option called Automatically create drawing canvas when inserting AutoShapes. Select the check box so there is NO check mark in the box to turn off this option.

Another option on the Advanced screen (in the Print section) is the Print in Background option. This allows you continue to work while your document is printed. With today’s fast computers and printers, this option is generally not needed and can be turned off.

On the Proofing screen, there are options for checking spelling and grammar as you type. This can take up some resources as Word checks what you have typed in real time. If you feel you are a good speller and have good grammar, you can turn these options off. These options are located in the When correcting spelling and grammar in Word section. You can always manually check the spelling and grammar for your entire document when you are finished with it.

Word has the ability to automatically format your text in different ways as you type. Besides taking up some resources, although not much, to do this in real time, it also can be annoying. To turn off the AutoFormat options, click the AutoCorrect Options button on the Proofing screen.

On the AutoCorrect dialog box, click the AutoFormat As You Type tab. Turn off the options for items you don’t want automatically formatted and click OK.

Word should respond more quickly to your commands now. Of course, if you discover you need to use any of the options you turned off, it’s easy to turn them back on.

How to Speed Up Microsoft Word 2007 and 2010 - How-To Geek

Republic Wireless–Unlimited Calls and Data for $19/Month

republic wireless - how it works

Newsflash: anything a cell network can do, the Internet can do better and cheaper.

So we think a truly smart smartphone should make a habit of using Wi-Fi for everything. Surfing. Texting. Sharing. And, yes, even talking.

There isn't an app for this.

And you definitely shouldn't have to download any special apps to get on the web instead of a cellular network. It should be automatic, built-in. You just use your phone.

Hybrid Calling^™ is just like a hybrid car, only traditional carriers are the oil companies.

And if there isn't any Wi-Fi around? No problem, your republic smartphone just switches itself over to cellular.

More details.

How do I make Wi-Fi calls?
Dial as you would any other call. There’s no app to open up or second number to manage. You don’t have to click a special button or take any special action. Instead, once you’re setup for a Wi-Fi network, your republic smartphone connects and routes calls over Wi-Fi automatically.

How can I make sure that I am connected to Wi-Fi all the time?
First, make sure you set up your phone to access the Wi-Fi networks you frequent. Your phone will remember those networks and connect to them automatically. Want to login to public hotspots? Download one of several apps available from the Android Market to automate that for you.

Can I bring my own phone?
No. The ultimate in smartphone freedom would be using the phone you want, on the network you want, whenever you want. We agree... and are working toward that ideal. For now, Big Cell makes the rules. Android phones, Wi-Fi and the Web fuel our optimism that the future could look very different.

Can’t I just download this to my current phone?
No. There are, however, many apps you can download to make VoIP calls over Wi-Fi using any Android or Apple smartphone. Some of them require you to manage a second number, pay for minutes or take special steps to use them. All of them require you continue overpaying for a cellular plan. Only republic wireless provides Hybrid Calling that’s not only built into the phone, but also into the price.

Only one phone? What’s that all about?
The LG Optimus is our first phone, and there will be more to follow. Affordable and well reviewed, we assure you this first phone is very well endowed with our Hybrid Calling technology and “Gingerbread,” Google’s code name for Android version 2.3. What phone should be next? Tell us with an email to yourvoice@republicwireless.com.

I have DSL at home.  Will it work on that or will I have to upgrade to something faster?
You need about 80kbps both ways to hold a call. The more bandwidth the better for improved call quality. Don’t forget that streaming video or downloading large files all use bandwidth, so your mileage may vary if you are trying to make or receive calls and watch Netflix at the same time.

6 Must Have Programs For Your Laptop

6 Must Have Programs For Your Laptop Or Netbook

• By Tina Sieber

Laptops offer many advantages compared to desktop computers. Most importantly they are small and portable. The convenient hardware features of laptops, however, also imply a lot of limitations, for example finite battery life, a smaller keyboard, or an irritating touchpad.

In this article I will introduce you to a selection of programs for laptops that address these hardware limitations. The tools in this list will make working with your laptop keyboard and touchpad more convenient and increase battery lifetime. And just in case someone takes advantage of its portability, you better had a tool installed that allows you to track your laptop.

TouchFreeze

One of the greatest annoyances on a laptop can be the touchpad. The most common issue is that the cursor is accidentally triggered and jumps to a random place while you are typing and gently brushing over the touchpad with your hands. This is especially common for people who touch type. TouchFreeze helps solve the issue by automatically disabling the touchpad while the keyboard is in use.

Unfortunately, it does not work on all hardware.

AutoSensitivity

Another tool that tries to deal with the touchpad dilemma is AutoSensitivity. The tool can be used to control the sensitivity of the touchpad and the mouse. A lower sensitivity basically means that the cursor will be less responsive or slower.

Unfortunately, my hardware doesn’t seem to allow separate settings for touchpad and mouse sensitivity and hence the tool did not work as expected. Note that AutoSensitivity requires .NET Framework 3.5 or 4.0.

Two-Finger-Scroll

Touchpads that only support the use of a single finger are utterly limited. Yet the hardware often is capable of interpreting the touch of two or even three fingers at once. This is where Two-Finger-Scroll comes in and taps into the unused potential of your touchpad.

It doesn’t exactly enable multi-touch features known from iOS or Android devices. However, it does enable some familiar behaviors. For example you will be able to scroll up and down when you swipe over the touchpad using two fingers, while using one finger will only move the cursor.

It also supports different behaviors for tapping the touchpad. For example you can assign tapping with two fingers to activating the left and tapping with three fingers to activating the right mouse button. ‘One + one‘ or ‘two + one‘ means that you rest one or two fingers on the touchpad and tap with a second or third finger, respectively.

Whether or not these features will work for you depends on your touchpad. Unlike some of the other tools above, they worked perfectly for me, although it does take some practice to get the tapping just right.

Two-Finger-Scroll received thorough coverage here - How To Easily Activate Two Finger Scroll In Windows Laptops

SharpKeys

Laptops are small and so are their keyboards, hence the transition from a full-sized keyboard can be hard. Moreover, some functions require hitting several keys, which can be inconvenient. At the same time, there may be keys available that you never use.

If you want to put some of your unused keys to good use, try SharpKeys, an application that allows you to remap your keys by tweaking the registry. Apart from remapping keys, you can also turn keys off, i.e. disable them.

SharpKeys was featured on MakeUseOf along with two similar tools in this article: Remap Keyboard Keys with These 3 Free Apps [Windows].

Aerofoil

Aerofoil tackles the limited energy resources when your laptop is running on battery power. Once you disconnect from A/C power, Aerofoil will step in and optimize your Windows Vista or Windows 7 system for saving power. It does that by disabling Windows features like Aero Glass, muting the sound, or switching to a different Windows power plan.

Some sources claim that Aerofoil can extend your battery life by up to 25%. The tool runs on minimal system resources and all features are optional. Aerofoil is available for Windows Vista and Windows 7 in both 32-bit and 64-bit versions.

Note that if you get an error message saying msvcp100.dll is missing, you may need a Windows update. Details are listed on the download page for Aerofoil, below the download links for the tool itself.

Prey

Do you often work in public places and are you worried that your laptop might get stolen? Prey won’t protect your laptop from thieves, but if it ever does get taken away from you, you can use the software to keep track of its location and possibly get it back.

For a comprehensive introduction to Prey, check out this article - Track Down and Recover Your Stolen Laptop with Prey.

You may also be interested in similar tools, that we have covered in the following articles and Directory entries :

• Protect And Track Your Laptop In Case Of Theft
• Use LocatePC to Secure and Find Stolen PC for Free
• LockitTight: Helps to Locate Your Stolen Laptop
• ihoundSoftware: Find Lost Gadgets and Cell Phones

For more great applications specifically for your netbook, please check out these articles:

• The 7 Best Powerful Netbook Applications That Don’t Chug System Resources

• 5 Killer Optimization Apps To Maximize Your Netbook’s Potential

• Netbook Reader: Turn Your Computer Into A Library

What are your best tips and tricks for working with a laptop or netbook? Are there any gems you would like to share with us?

Image credits: Yuri Arcurs

iomega SuperHero Backup and Charger for iPhone

 

 

Review: iomega SuperHero Backup and Charger for iPhone

My iPhone and MacBook are constantly connected, and with the advent of wireless sync in iOS 5, even when they're not connected, my phone still stays in sync with my computer data, which would be a life saver if I ever -- horrors! -- lost my iPhone.

But most people who have iPhones don't sync very often at all, and a surprising number of iPhone owners have never sync'd their phone to their computer.

That's the old school vision of your cellphone as a standalone device that works or dies, and there's no way for you to interact with it on your computer or in "the cloud", so I completely understand people who go from a Motorola or a Nokia device to an iPhone and use it the same way.

The problem is, what if their phone gets broken or they lose it? What happens to the photos they took on the device? What happens to their contact list and address book?

Enter the simple, ingenious iomega SuperHero Backup & Charger for iPhone.

The $59.99 device (street price might be lower) primarily works as a convenient charging dock: mine actually lives in my kitchen and is almost always in use, between my iPhone, my iPods, my family's devices and friends phones that need a quick charge.

The magic happens when you also have the iomega SuperHero Backup app [iTunes link] on your iPhone before you drop it on the dock, because then the device automatically grabs a backup copy of your contacts and photos, saving it on a 4GB SD Card (included) that tucks neatly into the back of the device. And not just the iPhone 4 series, iomega specs it to include backup and restore support for the Apple iPhone 4, 3GS, 3G, and iPod touch (4th generation).

The key to getting that functionality work is to unlock your iPhone before you put it on the dock. It's something that makes sense from a security standpoint (no surreptitious backups, sorry Ethan Hunt!) but a tiny part of me wishes it just worked without any extra fuss. Still, not exactly onerous and you don't have to remember every single time you dock the device for a charge and, as you might suspect, it doesn't backup anything if you don't have the free companion app on the phone.

Once you drop the phone on the SuperHero charger device, unlocked, it instantly launches the app and gives you 30 seconds to decide if you want a backup or not:

You can ignore it or just tap on "Start Now" to get going...

I have a lot of contacts, and a lot of photos. You can see the progress bar above on the backup. It takes about a minute for the SuperHero to grab everything on the device and ferret a copy away on the SD Card.

When it's done with the backup, the app sticks around in case you want to make any changes or -- most importantly -- restore from a previous backup because you've a new phone or your existing data has gotten corrupt:

Can you restore from the backup of a different iPhone? I asked the iomega team because that feature by itself would make this a terrific device to acquire for anyone about to jump from a 3gs to an iPhone 4, or a 4 to a 4s, and they said: "Contacts and photos from older model iPhones can be restored to brand new iphones (even 4s) or the same model iPhone without ever going back to the computer."

By default, the backups on the SD Card aren't encrypted, which is something you can, and probably should, change. That'd done with the Settings option:

With 550+ contacts and about 200 photos, my backup archive on the SD Card turns out to be about 250MB (simple to ascertain: I plugged the card into my computer). That means that the 4GB card included with the device should be able to handle over a dozen phones without breaking into a virtual sweat. If you have a dozen iPhones and iPods, then you're set! More seriously, it's a nice, compact format and that's a good thing.

After years of owning iPhones of various models, I've learned it's always smart to be charging your device whenever the opportunity arises, so I've had a charging dock on my kitchen counter for years. The fact that the new iomega charger also does instant backups of my contacts and photos is a big plus, and makes it well worth the $59.99 suggested retail. For comparison, the Apple charging dock is $29.99 and does nothing other than, well, charge your devices.

Iomega Superhero Backup Charger, rear view.
Note SD Card and plug for external power (required)

Truthfully, I really like these sort of gadgets. Smart, simple design and very easy to integrated into your daily workflow and life. A redundant backup of my address book is itself worth the money to me, but the fact that this is also a sleek, attractive charging dock makes it a must-have accessory for anyone who wants the peace of mind of knowing that even if their phone breaks or gets lost or stolen, they have all their precious data saved.

Review: iomega SuperHero Backup and Charger for iPhone :: Online Tech Support Help :: Ask Dave Taylor!®

What’s the Difference Between POP3, IMAP, and Exchange?

Email: What’s the Difference Between POP3, IMAP, and Exchange?

We send a lot of email these days—at work, at home, on our phones… But do you know what all the email jargon means? Keep reading to find out more about the difference between the various ways to receive email.

Whether you use Gmail, Hotmail, Yahoo mail, or email configured on your own website—there’s more to receiving email that it might seem like on the surface. Today, we’ll be focusing on some answering some of the most common stumbling blocks when it comes to setting up new email accounts, and explaining the difference in clear language. For our geekier readers that already know that stuff, feel free to join in the discussion—let us know how you explain to relatives and tech-challenged coworkers the difference in common email setups… or simply share this guide and save yourself the trouble of explaining it!

Email Clients vs Webmail

Before we explain the different protocols used to download emails, let’s take a few minutes to understand the simpler stuff—the difference between email clients and webmail. If you’ve ever started a Gmail, Hotmail, or other email account, chances are you’ve used webmail. If you work in an office and use a program like Microsoft Outlook, Windows Live Mail, or Mozilla Thunderbird to manage your emails, you’re using an email client.

Both webmail and email clients are applications for sending and receiving email, and they use similar methods for doing this. Webmail is an application that is written to be operated over the internet through a browser, usually with no downloaded applications or additional software necessary. All of the work, so to speak, is done by remote computers (i.e. servers and machines you connect to through the internet).

Email clients are programs that are installed on local machines (i.e. your computer, or the computers in your office) to interact with remote email servers to download and send email to whomever you might care to. Some the back end work of sending email and all of the front end work of creating a user interface (what you look at to receive your email) is done on your computer with the installed application, rather than by your browser with instructions from the remote server. However, many webmail providers allow users to use email clients with their service—and here’s where it may start to get confusing. Let’s run through a quick example to explain the difference.

We sign up for a new email address with Google’s Gmail and begin sending and receiving email through the webmail service. Google is providing two things for us—a web frontend, and a mail server backend for sending and receiving the emails. We communicate with the email server backend by using the webmail frontend. Through our pointing, clicking, and typing, we’re telling the email server who we want to send email to, and what we want to say.

But, we might decide that we don’t like Google’s new look for Gmail, so we decide to switch to an email client, like the free program Thunderbird. Instead of using our web based client (Gmail’s web interface) to interact with Google’s Gmail servers (the mail server backend), we use a program installed on our computers (in this case, Thunderbird) to contact the mail server backend ourselves, and sidestep webmail altogether. Google (and other webmail providers) offer all of these products, including the web frontend and the mail server backend. You can use both of them or only the mail server backend and still be using “Gmail.” And with that confusion dispelled, let’s take a look at the common email protocols you’ll run into using email clients or mobile phones.

POP3, Post Office Protocol

POP, or Post Office Protocol, is a way of retrieving email information that dates back to a very different internet than we use today. Computers only had limited, low bandwidth access to remote computers, so engineers created POP in an effort to create a dead simple way to download copies of emails for offline reading, then remove those mails from the remote server. The first version of POP was created in 1984, with the POP2 revision created in early 1985.

POP3 is the current version of this particular style of email protocol, and still remains one of the most popular. Since POP3 creates local copies of emails and deletes the originals from the server, the emails are tied to that specific machine, and cannot be accessed via any webmail or any separate client on other computers. At least, not without doing a lot of email forwarding or porting around mailbox files.

While POP3 is based on an older model of offline email, there’s no reason to call it obsolete technology, as it does have its uses. POP4 has been proposed, and may be developed one day, although there’s not been much progress in several years.

IMAP, Internet Message Access Protocol

IMAP was created in 1986, but seems to suit the modern day world of omnipresent, always-on internet connectivity quite well. The idea was keep users from having to be tied to a single email client, giving them the ability to read their emails as if they were “in the cloud.”

Compared to POP3, IMAP allows users to log into many different email clients or webmail interfaces and view the same emails, because the emails are kept on remote email servers until the user deletes them. In a world where we now check our email on web interfaces, email clients, and on mobile phones, IMAP has become extremely popular. It isn’t without its problems, though.

Because IMAP stores emails on a remote mail server, you’ll have a limited mailbox size depending on the settings provided by the email service. If you have huge numbers of emails you want to keep, you could run into problems sending and receiving mail when your box is full. Some users sidestep this problem by making local archived copies of emails using their email client, and then deleting them from the remote server.

Microsoft Exchange, MAPI, and Exchange ActiveSync

Microsoft began developing MAPI (sometimes called Messaging API) not long after IMAP and POP were first developed, although it has uses beyond simple email. Thoroughly comparing IMAP and POP to MAPI is pretty technical, and out of scope for many readers of this article. Simply put, MAPI is a way for applications and email clients to communicate with Microsoft Exchange servers, and is capable of IMAP style syncing of emails, contacts, calendars, and other features, all tied into local email clients or applications. This function of syncing emails is branded by Microsoft as “Exchange ActiveSync.” Depending on what device, phone, or client you use, this same technology might be called any of the three Microsoft products (Microsoft Exchange, MAPI, or Exchange ActiveSync), but will offer the same cloud-based email syncing as IMAP.

Because Exchange and MAPI are Microsoft products, only companies that own their own Exchange mail servers or use Windows Live Hotmail will be able to use Exchange. Many clients, including the default Android mail client and iPhone, are Exchange ActiveSync capable, giving Hotmail users IMAP style cloud-based email, despite Hotmail not offering true IMAP functionality.

Other Email Protocols

Yes, there are other protocols for sending, recieving, and using email, but most of us that are using plain old free webmail and mobile phones will be using one of these three major ones. Since these three technologies cover the needs of nearly all HTG readers, we won’t be spending time today talking about the others. If you have any experience using email protocols not listed here, we’re interested to hear about it—feel free to discuss them in the comments.

In Short: Which Do I Use to Set Up My Email?

Depending on your personal style of communicating and whom you prefer to get your email service from, you can pretty quickly narrow down how you should use your email.

• If you use check your email from a lot of devices, phones, or computers, set up your email clients to use IMAP.
• If you use mostly webmail and want your phone or iPad to sync with your webmail, use IMAP, as well.
• If you’re using one email client on one dedicated machine (say, in your office), you might be fine with POP3.
• If you have a huge history of email, you may want to use POP3 to keep from running out of space on the remote email server.
• If you use Hotmail or an Exchange Server Email, MAPI or Exchange ActiveSync will give you similar cloud-based syncing, like IMAP.
• If you don’t use Hotmail and you want email sync, use IMAP. If you do use it and want email sync, use MAPI/Exchange ActiveSync.