DTV delay; hibernation vs. sleep
The government recently pushed back the scheduled end for almost all analog television broadcasts to June 12, but stations can still turn off their analog transmissions if they want to. Hundreds of them plan to do so, including two network affiliates in Baltimore.
People with analog sets will need to buy a digital converter box or a new TV to keep watching those channels, but if you've already taken either of those steps, you still have a task of your own waiting. You'll need to have the TV or converter rescan the digital airwaves to benefit from the upgrades these early switchers can make to their broadcasts after shutting off their analog transmitters. To do that, repeat the setup work you did after first powering up your TV hardware: Hit the remote's "menu" button and select an item labeled something like "scan for channels," which should have a prominent spot on the menu screen.
If your Windows laptop seems to take far too long to go to sleep, then wake up and get back to work, it may be set to hibernate. In this mode, Windows saves the state of your system to a file on the hard drive and then shuts down. This saves power sleep mode will eventually drain the battery, but a PC can stay in hibernation indefinitely but going in and out of hibernation takes much longer.
For everyday operation, sleep (called "standby mode" in Windows XP) makes much more sense. To ensure that the laptop sleeps instead of hibernates, right-click the battery-gauge icon at the bottom right corner of the screen (you may need to unplug it to see this icon) and select "Power Options." In XP, click the Power Options control panel's Advanced tab; in Vista, click that window's "Choose what the power buttons do" link. You'll then see a list of drop-down menus that allow you to set the computer to sleep or stand by, not hibernate, when you close its screen or press its power button.
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The Windows Registry -- a vast database of system settings that governs both Microsoft's operating system and programs running on it -- is at the root of many common Windows ailments. It can get clogged with references to old programs, corrupted entries can lead to mysterious crashes, and the cryptic, jargon-soaked entries that fill up the Registry are themselves largely unreadable to non-programmers. So it can be tempting to download a free program that claims to fix those Registry issues for free.
Problem is, not all of these repair tools work as advertised, some require a fair amount of computing knowledge, and a Registry fix gone wrong can leave you with a seriously damaged Windows system. So unless you see a Registry repair program recommended by a known and trusted source, don't even think about installing it. Meanwhile, keep this rule in mind: The simplest way to keep your PC running well is to be choosy about adding software to it in the first place.
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