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Archive for February, 2009

Using the SUMIF function in Microsoft Excel

February 18th, 2009
by Carol Alexander

Almost every Exel user has encountered the SUM function. It is one of the most widely used functions of the Excel functions. And most Excel users will also have used the IF function. SUMIF function is a combination of the SUM and If functions which allows us to calculate the total of all cells within a given range that match a certain condition.

For example, let’s say that, in a “Sales” worksheet, we have a breakdown of the sales of each individual salesperson. We then want to create a summary of these figures in a “Branches” worksheet in which we want to create a total sales figure for each branch; so our “Branches” worksheet would have two columns: “Branch” and “Total Sales”. We can use the SUMIF function to calculate the figures in the “Total Sales” column.

A good place to begin would be to create named cells so that we can refer to these names in our formula. To name a range of cells we begin by selecting the range then we click on the name box in the top left of the worksheet, enter the name then press the Enter key.

Once we have inserted the names of all the branches in the first column of our “Branches” worksheet, we would highlight the first cell in the “Total Sales” column, adjacent to the cell containing the name of our first branch; let’s say our first branch is “Birmingham”. When using functions for the first time, it’s always useful to use Excel’s Insert Function facility. To access this, click the Insert Function button on left of the formula bar. The SUMIF function is to be found in the “Math and Trig” category. Scroll down the list, highlight SUMIF and then click OK. Excel will then prompt us for the three arguments required by the SUMIF function.

The first argument is the range of cells that we want to evaluate. In our branch sales example it would be the column containing the names of the branches. If we have named this column, we can insert this name by clicking on “Use In Formula” in the Formulas Tab at the Excel Ribbon. This is a drop-down menu containing all the names in the workbook.

The second argument is the criteria we want to match. In our example, is simply the contents of the cell in the adjacent “Branch” column, which in this case contains “Birmingham”. We can click in the cell to pick up the reference.

The final argument is the SUM range; the column that contains the cells that we want to actually total; namely, the sales figures. Again, if we have named this column, we would click on “Use In Formula” and choose the name. Once we have specified the three arguments, we click OK and Excel creates the formula.

It’s now safe to copy the formula down. The cell reference of the adjacent column containing the branch name will change but the two named ranges will remain the same. To copy the formula down, simply position the cursor on the AutoFill handle in the bottom right of the cell and then either drag or simply double-click.

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How Do I Choose The Right All In One Printer

February 18th, 2009

Hp All In One Printer Video

Purchasing an all in one printer can be a great economical decision.  For the price of roughly one average model printer you can purchase a basic all in one printer that has three times the capabilities.  An all in one printer can offer a variety of different options in several different configurations.  In addition to printing they can also scan and copy documents as well as function as a fax machine.

What Can An All In One Printer Do For Me

Fax
Scan
Copy
Print

If you know you will be printing high volumes of paper you will want to select a device that offers high speed printing so you do not end up wasting time waiting for your printouts.  Laser printers are much faster than an inkjet device and the cost per page to print from a laser device is often times much less than an inkjet.  Laser printers are an especially great choice for those who only need to print black and white.  For a premium price you can purchase a color laser printer if that option is required and you want a faster device.

You can also save yourself some extra money in your budget by purchasing an all in one printer.  Not only will you save money by not having to purchase a fax machine, scanner, copier, and a printer individually but you
will save money by not having to purchase multiple types of toner, ink cartridges and ribbon as they will all share one common type of ink cartridge.  This is one more way to save a little extra space in your storage closet!

All in one printers are available in two main forms.  If you know your device will not be required to produce large amounts of volume consider
purchasing an inkjet all in one printer.  These devices are often times less expensive but tend to print slower than a laser all in on printer.  

By purchasing a laser device your upfront cost might be higher but the overall cost per page will be lower than an
inkjet in the end.  Also keep in mind that the majority of laser printers available only print in black and white.  As color laser technology becomes more popular more all in one printers of this design are entering the product market and the price is becoming reasonable.

While many all in one printers offer fax capabilities several of the entry level products do not have this functionality.  Make sure you choose accordingly if this is an option you will want to take advantage of.

 

The Xerox Phaser 8860 Printer Is Easier And More Efficient Than Comparable Models

February 17th, 2009

Phaser 8860 solid ink utilizes brand new technology that makes it efficient for both home or office use. This printer boasts the use of Xerox technology.  The superior ink and new technology adds to it’s already amazing clarity and efficiency. This is unlike any other printer you have ever had.

With this printer, you know you are getting your money’s worth with its efficiency and power. For both business and individual use, the speed of this printer will blow you away: a color page with 2400 FP resolution prints in just five seconds. The printer works with both Mac and Windows formats and is able to store a large amount of paper.

The Phaser 8860 is a printer that is useful in many different ways, from print jobs that are laden with color to those that are black and white and are needed as quickly as possible. Wireless capabilities are also offered with this model, which will help you keep in sync with your printer even though you are out of a wire’s reach.

Besides the superior performance aspects of the printer, the technology behind the printer is even more amazing. The ink that is used in this printer is of the newest technology Xerox employs in its printers. Phaser 8860 solid ink is implemented in this model and is unique compared to other printers because it is cheaper and better for the environment.

The Phaser 8860 ink are resin-based sticks of ink that are safe for your clothes and make up to 2300 pages per stick. The product is like a crayon that writes in both color or black and is also safe to handle, for both writing and replacing the ink. You can put in 5 sticks of solid ink each time and in each color to cut down on time spent replacing ink. The combination of the solid ink sticks collaborate to produce a stunning appearance of what is printed.

The Phaser 8860 solid ink is a low cost high tech method that makes it a cut above the rest. Whether you buy a printer that sports efficiency and clarity, or whether you are more inclined to buy a printer with less mess and maintenance, the Xerox solid ink printer is the answer for anyone.

-Ben Pate

Tips for Finding The Perfect Notebook

February 17th, 2009

If you’re in the market for a brand new laptop, you’ll definitely want to scout around and find the best computer hardware for your needs. Although laptops  come in all shapes and sizes, the following tips should guide you well enough to make a smart purchase.

The “tech specs” of your laptop is perhaps the most important consideration. Nothing more, nothing less; exactly what you need to match your activities. For example, you need totally different system if you’re just planning to use it for work purposes, as opposed to letting your notebooks be your entire home entertainment system.

Different applications need different type of notebooks, and getting more than what you need is literally a waste of savings. On the other hand, getting less than what you need will just frustrate you and waste your time.

The first thing you need to consider is the Central Processing Unit or CPU; it is the “brains” of your notebook. Generally speaking a faster CPU is better as it will eliminate a lot of loading and processing time, but there is a choice between Intel processors, or others.

The overall size, weight and dimension of your future laptop is just as important as anything else. If you like to keep it light and portable choose thinner ones that weight less than 1.2kg – these are usually on the higher price range but it will be worth the money, and the lack of back aches!

Equally important is the warranty length, and additional service details. Generally speaking most laptops come with standard one-year warranty, but manufacturers like Sony also include “extended” three-year versions and on-site repairs. If you get this as an option, it means that when your laptop breaks down you get someone come over to repair it at your place. Expect a premium for the “on-site” repairs, but extended warranties are quickly becoming standard items and you should kep your eyes open for laptop models that offer them at no extra cost.

As for personal choice, I prefer Lenovo brand of laptops, especially the Lenovo Thinkpad series that is both affordable and sufficient for high-end processing. Ideally, your future laptop should be able to get you through the next four years before you invest on a new one. Not many laptops live up to that promise though, so shop for your notebook wisely!

Author: Computer Repair Categories: Computers Tags: , , ,

How to purchase toner cartridges in Toronto

February 14th, 2009

Laser toner cartridges are used in laser printers, fax machines and copiers to produce a large volume of legible hard copies. Laser toners are available in various colors though black is the most common since colored toners are slightly more expensive than black toners. There are several types of toner cartridges; they include remanufactured cartridges, OEM printer cartridges, compatible toner cartridges and toner refills. They all have their advantages. Remanufactured toner cartridges are professionally made and also meet all the requirements in quality and reliability. When working on a limited budget a person can invest in these cartridges, which may not be brand new but produce almost similar results to new cartridges. Not only do remanufactured cartridges save the user a major amount of funds but are also, friendlier to the location, since the procedure of remanufacturing remains the cartridges free from landfills.

Laser cartridges are appropriate for busy offices since they facilitate the user to print more copies compare to other cartridges. They can be used on most if not all types of printing papers.  Laser cartridges are economical since they last long and buying them together with remanufactured inkjet and printer cartridge recycling or refills allows the buyer to save at least 50%. Photocopier and fax suppliers are also offered at very reasonable prices.

There are several advantages of buying Toronto laser toner cartridges, fax supplies and other cartridge related supplies directly from the internet. Primarily, the quality of the cartridges is guaranteed to perfectly meet or even exceed its requirements. They provide quality products whether they are remanufactured toner cartridges or brand new. Most online suppliers back up their products with warranties and a complete customer satisfaction guarantee. Online dealers also offer major discounts and the user accumulates even more when purchasing black or colored toner cartridges. A person can actually reduce cost further by buying refill kits. Online suppliers also have a wide variety of refill kits and cartridges from most of the major brands and a user is not likely to miss whatever selection they are in need.

The convenience of buying replacement cartridges and having them delivered is part of the excellent service received from online suppliers. If a user is not satisfied with the performance of a Toronto laser toner cartridges or any other supplies he or she can return them for a new one. This also concerns to those that purchase cartridges that have been remanufactured. If they find that they do not perform to the standard of original brand products they are required to return them and acquire a replacement. Online supplier’s advice their buyers on how to buy products from different brands in the right combinations and provide general information on which cartridges are suitable for particular printers. Suppliers of Toronto laser toner cartridges advice their clients on the cartridges that have the ability to print more papers, the ones that use more ink and need regular toner replacement or refills. Finally they notify the buyer on behavior they can extend the life of their cartridge and save money in the procedure.

Mp4 Touch Screen Meida Players

February 14th, 2009

Competition seems to have reached incredible peaks with the rush for better working products in all the sectors of national economies.

Advertising sells well no matter the kind of activity, particularly since everyone claims to have the best products ever.

Not only do producers MP4 touch screen manufacturers try to push their products upfront but there are also different analysts and ordinary people – consumers who come up with their own classifications of the different products on the market.

This obviously occurs in the field of Touch Screen MP4 Player and computer components too. For one interested in classifications, the Internet is the best source for information on Touch Screen MP4 Player.

It is evident that each individual has his/her own preferences when it comes to a Touch Screen MP4 Player. Therefore, you will find different top 10 Touch Screen MP4 Player classified on the basis of the various criteria that people refer to when judging Touch Screen MP4 Player  sound quality.

The size is an important criterion since people with jobs that require travel need small, light designs, even the tiny ultra portable ones like the Sumvision Ice 1000 4GB. Other buyers closely investigate the storage capacity or the memory extent, yet the higher the memory size.

Last but not least, touch screen resolution is one final element to decide whether an item deserves to be part of the top 10 Touch Screen MP4 Player chart or not. To give an example of what top 10 Touch Screen MP4 Player lists should be like, we suggest that you take a look at the next compilation that presents the products in crescent order from the first to the tenth: {Sumvision Ice, Mobiblu T30 4GB, Samsung YP-T10JAB/XEU, Samsung P2 touchscreen, LG FM37, Archos 605 WiFi, AMG 4GB, Creative ZEN X-Fi} . Such lists are compiled using the technical data posted on the official Internet pages of each and every producer.

Ten Ways To Boost Windows XP

February 12th, 2009
by John Jones

Many people are interested in making the most of their hardware. So here are 10 simple tips on how to make your Windows XP computer run faster without having to purchase additional hardware.

1. Defrag Disk to Speed Up Access to Data – One of the factors that slow the performance of the computer is disk fragmentation. Disk fragmentation really can slow down your computer. Just go to accessories and find a dusty fragments are and let that run. It might take all afternoon, but it should speed up your machine. There are also several paid apps available as well.

2. Detect and Repair Disk Errors – Over time, your hard disk develops bad sectors. Bad sectors can severly hurt disk performance. To detect and repair disk errors, Windows has a built-in tool called the Error Checking utility. It will meticulously search the hard disk for bad sectors and system errors and repair them for better performance.

3. Disable Indexing Services – Indexing Services is a little application that uses a lot of CPU. It’s very annoying. It also doesn’t work as well as Google Desktop for searching your files. Disable it fast and speed up your machine.

4. Optimize Display Settings – Windows XP is a looker. But it costs you system resources that are used to display all the visual items and effects. Windows looks fine if you disable most of the settings and leave only a few necessary bells and whistles. Use a simpler theme or turn off some of the destop effects. Another option is to run fewer programs that are graphically intense.

5. Speedup Folder Browsing – You may have noticed that everytime you open My Computer to browse folders that there is a little delay. To fix this and to increase browsing speed, you can disable the “Automatically search for network folders and printers” option. Most of us don’t have network drives and network printers attach your computer. Anyways. So these options are completely useless.

6. Disable Performance Counters – Windows XP has a performance monitor utility which monitors several areas of your PC’s performance. These utilities take up system resources so disabling is a good idea.

7. Optimize Your Pagefile – You can optimize your pagefile. Setting a fixed size to your pagefile saves the operating system from the need to resize the pagefile. Windows XP sizes the page file to about 1.5X the amount of actual physical memory by default. If you have less than 512MB of memory, leave the page file at its default size. If you have more than 1GB of memory, you probably can set the page file at 512MB or 1GB and that is more than enough.

8. Remove Fonts for Speed – Fonts, especially TrueType fonts, use quite a bit of system resources. For optimal performance, trim your fonts down to just those that you need to use on a daily basis and fonts that applications may require. Unless you are a gfx designer, you shouldn’t need 1,000 fonts. That’s just silly.

9. Use a Flash Memory to Boost Performance – To improve performance, you need to install additional RAM memory. It’ll let you boot your OS much quicker and run many applications and access data quicker. On vista you can use a program called ReadyBoost to do this, on XP programs like eBoost can help. unfortunately, while there is some benefit from what I’ve read, this is not going to give you a huge boost in speed or performance. Built-in RAM is usually going to help more, up to about 2GB, after that you see diminishing returns.

10. Perform a Boot Defragment – There’s a simple way to speed up XP startup: make your system do a boot defragment, which will put all the boot files next to one another on your hard disk. When boot files are in close proximity to one another, your system will start faster. On most systems, boot defragment should be enabled by default, if not, enable it.

I hope this article help you improve your computer’s performance. Even just a little. here’s a bonus tip for you if you browse the web or a lot, you should check out Google’s new browser is the fastest browser currently available and could really speed up your Web applications as well.

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Where To Find A Data Recovery Service

February 12th, 2009

 

There are many ways that you can save your data in your PC. You can either invest on an external drive, burn them into CDs or use flashdrives. But you can never tell what can go wrong, right? And the last thing that any PC user can think is to lose their data. It’s okay to lose software or programs. You can always install them it anytime you want. But your data? No, it’s not that way. If you lose your data and you didn’t made a backup of them, you lose your digital life or you may have a backup but you’re not really sure if they are intact. If you are getting paranoid of losing your data, why not avail a data recovery service instead? You can find a lot of these services spread all across the country. If you want to know if there is one or two near your area, you can find all these data recovery services and you will not only enjoy backing up your data. You will also get some other features aside from data services [like for example:like] Server Installation and Support, Anti-virus and Internet Security Solutions, Managed Services, Data Backup and Recovery, Website Design and Hosting, Technology Consulting, Troubleshoot and Repair, Software Training, Remote Managed Services, Network Monitoring and Management, Remote Data Backup, Computer and Network Security, Shared Internet Office Solutions.

So, where can you find the best data recovery service? What if you can’t find a data recovery service near your area? What if you’re not contented with what you have found? Will you go through a lot of these regular drive and /or leg approaches again and find more choices for data recovery services? Well, you don’t have to succumb yourself to tedious “shopping spree” for data recovery services. What you do is to go to this review site where you will find all the best and popular services available. This way, you don’t have to make things hard for yourself. You just find one that is near your area or the one which you think can offer more than you can expect and select immediately from there.

You can see from this professional data recovery review site that they got down the list of services from New Mexico, Philadelphia, Illinois, New York and Florida and even as far as Canada. Your data is the most important thing in your digital life today so don’t waste any more time securing and protecting them. Get to this site for reviews now and find the best data recovery service today.

Tips on How to Fix Xbox 360 three Red Lights

February 10th, 2009

It is only a recent achievement that a gamer can have the solution for the Xbox three red lights fix, as on a regular basis you would have sent the console to an authorized service and waited weeks for the repair. Presently, an entire series of guides and ebooks have been created to facilitate the easy repair of the game console. Most of these guides also come with videos that help you to clearly find out what is actually wrong with your console and how to fix this in a step by step manner.

There lack of cooling that is actually necessary for the console is the main cause for the Xbox 360 problem. You can avoid this failure from happening the first place by analysing if the device has enough cooling devices and proper ventilation necessary to run smooth. The 3 red lights is thus an indicator of a internal fault inside your xbox 360 console. The immediate consequence is the shutting down of the Xbox as a means of preventing further damage from occurring.

Why not send the Xbox to Microsoft?

One solution you have for the Xbox 360 3 red lights fix is to send the console to the manufacturer, in this case, Microsoft. With the expenses required to ship the xbox to Microsoft, not to mention the possible damage during transport and time it takes for repairs, most xbox 360 users do not consider this an affordable solution.

When Microsoft admitted the fact that over heating was the most obvious cause of the issue for this problem, the geniuses in the technology industry decided to come up with their own alternative quick fix solutions to the Microsoft warranty. Usually these solutions can be found online at a very affordable price range of $20 to $30. These files are available for instant download. You can access these instructions in many formats, mostly as a PDF ebook, pictorials or detailed video instructions showing exactly everything from A-Z on opening the console to closing the console after the fix.

Downloadable Games For Wii – Find Out Where To Get Them!

February 10th, 2009

Are you looking for downloadable games for Wii, especially for free? Well, to be really honest with you, as a professional Wii gamer myself, especially in the gaming industry, nothing else in this world can be gotten free. You can definitely go do a quick search in Google on the spot, dig out a bunch of free downloadable games for Wii, but don’t come back asking me why they won’t work? Or say, can you be sure that these downloadable games are risk free – without Viruses or trojans that will damage your computer?

Nope, I do not really suppose so, yeah? What I’m trying to get across, if your intention is to get unlimited downloadable games for Wii, “free” so to speak, then my friend, you’re left with one definite option. Which is to sign up for a reliable Wii games download site.

There are many different types of free Wii games download sites out there in the internet, which claimed to be of “very” high quality, but if you’ve noticed many of them charges by pay per download system, that means you’ll have to pay them everytime you download a Wii game. However, for more avid games I would suggest you choosing Wii games download sites that charge you a one time fee with no hidden charges, so you can get downloadable games for wii that you like with just a cheap price.

Furthermore, in most cases, a pro-claimed good Wii games download sites will also offer you a range of downloadable medias for you to choose from, not only games, there are movies, musics, TV shows and more. Find Out Where To Get Downloadable Games For Wii Here.

If you’re already fed up of spending all your wallet in the local Wii stores for your gaming addiction. Try taking a look into Wii Media Downloads Review to find a really good bargain on “Free” downloadable games for Wii!

Gabriel Fox