Gr☺uch☺: It depends on the AVI and how it was coded. Different programs use different "codecs" to encode the move in .avi format (or other formats). Some will play on Windows by default, while others will not.

Wiki page on Codec's: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Codec

Basicly - some codecs will make files smaller, while others may keep the audio beter, while others will keep the video better. This is at least how I understand it - at least without getting very technical and such.

BerniceC: Hopefully someone will jump on here to help better then me - I'm thinking for some movies, you need special codec's loaded to properly view movies. I had to load a lot a long time ago, and since then I have no problem playing just about any more - but I'm pretty sure it's because I loaded all the codec's that I needed.

Now I'm not 100% sure about this - but you may want to get this: http://www.free-codecs.com/download/K_Lite_Codec_Pack.htm

It's a pack with all of the most popular codec's on it - and says it will allow 99% of movies to play correctly. Again, not 100% sure about this so please don't get mad at me if this blows up your computer or something.

NOT a floosie: Overheating would be my other guess. Make sure the fan is going - not cloged up or anything like that.

NOT a floosie: Does the computer come on? Possible a stuck key on the keyboard?

Rose: Well I'm not sure - probable just 2 different projects being worked on by different people who both happen to be developing a browser?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_web_browsers - A comparison of many different web browsers. If I ever get more time, I would like to try out more different browsers.

I recently purchased a new USB thumb drive, but it seems to go a lot slower then my other ones.

I've looked on the stick, packaging, etc.. can not find if it is a 2.0 device or older 1.0 device.

it's a newer USB drive so I was assuming it was the USB 2.0 - but the speed I'm seeing is making me question.

Anyway, to my question - is there a way on the PC to see what speed a USB device is?

Binabik: You can export (save) your bookmarks in Firefox (and any browser)

I'm not sure exactly in the old version of firefox since I have 2.0 sitting here right now, but in 2.0, you go to Bookmarks, and choose orginize bookmarks - where then you can find a file, export to export your bookmarks. (Will export to a simple html file.) And then if you lose it again, you can import back in the bookmarks.

I've never lost my bookmarks - I just simple install the 2.0 version and it copied everything over to the new version.

Mr. Shumway: WOW, I already have FireFox 2.0 - I did not know about the ability to re-open accidentally closed tabs. I do that occasionally.

Now looking, if you right click on a tab, you have the option to undo close tab - and it brings back the closed tab. Very cool!

hexkid: I believe you could always by default close a tab by middle clicking on the tab - I never done that, which is why it was a pain when that right X was missing to close a tab.

What I love about Firefox - like in your screenshot, you have a lot of "empty" space next to the "File-Edit-View-....Help" menu - I've moved the back,forward,reload,...Home buttons up to the left of the menu, then moved up the address bar to the right of "help" (removed the search since I just go to google if I need to search) - and now everything is in one line, leaving even more room for the web page to display. (My screenshot - http://coan.net/screen.gif )

MadMonkey: Plus I found the answer to my other question

http://kb.mozillazine.org/Browser.tabs.tabMinWidth


Can change the width to fit more tabs in the tab strip before scrolling.

Setting of 50 is good (default 100) - instead of 12 tabs, I can fit 24 before scrolling - which occasionally when doing research, I can at times get up to that many tabs.

MadMonkey: Thanks - that helps. Now to search for how to increase the max number of tabs that show on a page before it starts to scroll.

This is why I like firefox - there are a few things I don't like about it, but I know there are ways to fix/change it. With IE, you will have to wait until the next version.

Well both new browsers are released.

I first used IE7, and I like the tabs & the tab preview page where you can see all the open tabs. But I hated that IE7 put other icons in the same row as the tabs, leaving less room for visible tabs - with a lot of "empty" above it, with no real way to move things around and make 2 rows of stuff, instead of 3 - to make more room for the page. So like the addition of tabs, but the setup bugs me.

Firefox 2 - I'm using it now, and cool - it has a spell check as I write, and it looks like I misspelled "visable" above - so I will correct it now by right clicking and choosing the correct one. Firefox allows me to move the menu & buttons all around - allowing me to have the menu, then next to that the "search" menu - under that the back,reload buttons - and then a longer address bar. I love how much control it has.

BUT NO! Firefox has messed up the tabs (well at least for me). First the [X] to close the tab is now on each tab, instead of just 1 [X] to the right to close the open tab. I liked it before since it allowed more room on the tab to display the title.

BUT NO (part 2) Firefox has messed up the tabs by now not allowing a lot (about 20-25) to be shown, and now after about 15 open tabs, it starts to "scroll" them so you can see all the open tabs at the same time. I normally have between 12-15 open tabs at a time. But now when I open more, UGH - Just don't like it.

But with Firefox, hopefully there will be an add-on that will make the tabs look like Firefox 1.5x

OK, those are my opinions of the new browsers. Just thought I would share.

imsoaddicted: Strange.

Has anything else changed on the computer since the problem started? That is did you add anything else to it - either hardware or software?

Is the computer Windows XP?

imsoaddicted: Does the keyboard still respond? That is if you press the "num lock" button, the num lock light on the keyboard lights up?

I don't know.... just seems very strange - I rarely see a mouse that breaks, let alone 3 of them.... the only thing I can think of is a PC problem, but I'm not sure what it would be.

When it freezes up, after you reboot your computer do they work again for awhile or broke right away?

imsoaddicted: I rarely hear of a mouse that breaks - let alone 3 of them.

So hearing that you went through 3 of them, my guess there is something wrong with the PC side of it and not the mouse side of it. I'm not sure what the problem would be....

So when you say "just stop" - does that mean it does not move the pointer anymore on the screen? Or is it just very "buggy" when it moves?

Happy 50th Birthday Hard Drives!

1956: IBM ships the first hard drive, the RAMAC 305, which holds 5MB of data at $10,000 a megabyte. It is as big as two refrigerators and uses 50 24-inch platters.

And today, I have over a terabyte of storage on my main computer (not counting other computers in the house) - and I could use more!

Dolittle: My first thought would be to have them check to make sure all the cables & connections are connected firmly (nothing loose). Other then that, not sure myself since I've never used WebTV.

TeamBundy: Another thing which will make a PC "freeze" for short time is if your hard drive is fragmented a lot - so a good defrag always helps.

(For those that don't know - if a hard disk is not defraged, pices of data on the hard drive can be split up in many parts - which takes longer for the PC to read - which in turn, slows things down and can cause "freezes" when the PC can't get it's information fast enough)

TeamBundy: Sometimes you will be surprised on what is ran when a PC starts up (and continues to run in the background)

I use a program called StartupRun - http://www.nirsoft.net/utils/strun.html

It shows everything that starts at PC startup. (When I install a new PC for a user, I even run this). Things like Adobe has things running at startup to speed up their product (but if you rarely use their product, no point having it run in the background - just take the extra 2 seconds later when you do actually start the program).

Anyway, this program allows you to right click, and "disable" something from starting - Of course I guess I should also warn if you don't know what something is - it either means it might be very important where you don't want to touch it - or some kind of spyware messing things up. So be carefull when using it.

Oh, and more memory will always help. 512MB is not much anymore - if you can upgrade it at all - even to 1 GB, you will find it helping a lot.

gambler104: Plug it back in? I'm not sure what your question is.

WatfordFC: See if rebooting your computer helps - sometimes that is the best way to "reset" things which may get corrupted on the PC.

WatfordFC: "i opened it and all i got was a grey background and loads of little boxes, no actual pictures"

If you right click on the box, do you have the option to "Download pictures" or something like that?

I will have to think about this some more. BrainKing should not know or care what browser a user is using - and would either think Firefox is messed up for all sites you visit, or BrainKing is messed up for all browsers you use.

OR one other thing I thought about while I was trying this, go to Tools, Options - and the "Content" area.

To the right of "load Images", choose "Exceptions"

If Brainking is listed there, choose and REMOVE it.

Plus you may have already answered this, is it just BrainKing with Firefox that is not working, or do you see the same strange thing on other sites with Firefox?

Do you have any type of extension installed that blocks pop-ups or something (which may have gotten set to block images also?)

Since this is a strange problem, some sort of broken extension is the only thing I can think of.

In Tools, Extensions - you can right click, and DISABLE them. You may want to go through and disable some of them to see if any of them are causing a problem. (Then you can renable them after testing if they were not the problem.)

Czuch Chuckers: I would also suggest trying to download the newest copy of firefox if you do not already have the newest version.

No, you should not lose any bookmarks. Some extensions only work for certain versions, but if I remember correctly, it will tell you if it does not work and will go search for newer versions of the extensions for you. (not 100% sure about that.)

Also, you can be safe and export your bookmarks first if you want to make sure you don't lose them. (in firefox, tools, bookmark manager - file, export - into bookmarks.htm - then if you need to, you can import them back - but again, they should copy over automaticly.)

Also, the newest version of firefox will keep itself updated, that is automaticly check for updates and give you options to update it when needed - which is always a good thing for a browser because new security issues for most browsers show up all the time.

anastasia: Well I now use Nero 7 for all my burning of movies.

There is an option to "Make your own DVD-Video" where you go and choose your video file (from .avi or other formats), it will let you make menues and such, and will do all the coverting & buring itself. It takes awhile, but I normally start before I go to bed, and in the morning it is done.

Before I started using Nero 7, I was using a few different programs for converting, and burning and such, and was getting to be a pain - and found Nero 7 a help - easy program to do all my burning & converting.

anastasia: It may also be the DVD player.

I have a very nice DVD 5-disc changer which will only play some of my burnt DVD movies, but I then also have a very cheap ($39) DVD Player from Wal-Mart which will play them all.

So you may be burning everything OK, just that your DVD player can't play them. (Not sure why, some are just more 'picky' then others.)

If I remember correctly, d-link has a lot of information on their website about how to make their product work with different connections and such.

http://support.dlink.com/

Place in middle of page to select your product, and go from there. I've had a few dlink products which have given me problems, but the one good thing about them is I've always found the answer on their website.

Pedro Martínez: Only Fencer can see the IP address used to access the site - which like Walter said is not always a good thing to look at since sometimes people on the same "system" will share "master" IP addresses, plus it is pretty simple to fake, or go through some sort of proxy server to hide the IP address.

Baked Alaskan: Do you have adblocks loaded? If so, try:

Tools > Adblock > Preferences > Adblock Options > un-check Obj-Tabs

(of course if adblocks is not loaded, you will not have that option)

You could also take a look at this which talks about what to do if Firefox stops working correctly. (I have not read it all yet, but hopefully it can help)

http://kb.mozillazine.org/Standard_diagnostic_%28Firefox%29

Summertop: Check out Linksys's website. (Easier to do with model # of router and such)

Like:

http://www1.linksys.com/support/support.asp?spid=103

But if that page does not help, continue to search Linksys's website - chances are someone else has had the problem and a solution should be there.

BerniceC: You can do a couple of things:

1) Turn off the new feature - go to Settings, JavaScript, and uncheck "Show context menu" [and your old right click functions will work]

2) If you use IE or Firefox browser, you can hold down the SHIFT key while you click on the link to open a new window

Antje: It is a new "feature" of BrainKing - kind of like "quick links" which you can customize.

Under "Statics", there is a + sign which will take you right there (or go to Settings, JavaScript) and turn it off there.

Groucho: I cut the end off of an old mouse (so he did not strangle himself with the long cord) to let my young one play with while I used the "real" mouse when he was younger....

AOL has a new "TV Station" which you can watch on-line for free (High speed internet connection needed) - Looks like they have 14 "channels" which different shows on. Only quickly glanced at it, but felt I would share it with others.

http://television.aol.com/in2tv/lol_tv

The In2TV channel on AOL.com was announced in November and began yesterday with 30 series, including "Growing Pains" and "Eight is Enough." The network will also offer games, polls and other interactive features.

The shows are free to anyone with high-speed Internet access. The network is supported through advertising.

Eventually the company plans to offer more than 100 series and at least 300 episodes per month to lure broadband users to the AOL Web site.

The company says the shows will be available exclusively online and not in reruns on TV.

If we are talking about hosting, I have used http://www.powweb.com for a few years, and LOVE it. They keep adding more space, more bandwidth, more of all kinds of stuff all at the same price. (current promotion is 6/14 months free if you buy a year/2 years)

Get 12 gig of space (WHICH IS TONS), and 300 GB bandwidth a month (10 gigs a day) (Which again is TONS) Cost $7.77 a month - but discounted if you buy a year or 2 years.

.... in case anyone was wondering. :-)

Doris: When you say freeze up, are you saying you have to reboot each time - or does it just get REALLY sluggish every few minutes.

Other things it might be is spyware/virus that is slowing things down. Too many things that auto-start with the computer could be another.

What I use to do is make 1 CD backup/archive of my pictures/data that I have, and place it in a fire proof safe - which then after some research learned that even though it is a fire proof safe, it is not rated to keep CD's and such safe - meaning it would probable get warm enough to melt things - but not burn. I had since made 2nd copies of all CD backups, taking the second copy elsewhere out of my home.

I have not actually looked at any of those CD's to see if any of those have gone bad, but recently I opened a pack of CD's that I purchased many years ago, and there were a few brand new ones (few years old) that you could already tell was "going bad".

I'm going to have to dig out the old CD's to take a closer look at them here soon since I'm kind of curious now.

harley: CD's can go bad - mostly CDr's, rarely professionally pressed CD's. Depends on the quality of the CDr's that you buy - how much stress is put on them (like when they are in the case and you push down in the middle to get it out - it also puts "stress" on the disc which can cause the glue between the layers of the disks to start to give out.

Couple stories about it:

http://www.usatoday.com/tech/news/2004-05-05-disc-rot_x.htm

Plus a story which tries to paint a beter picture:

http://www.mscience.com/faq30.html

My opinion: I would rather be safe then sorry with my archived data.

Hrqls: I've used HJSplit before - very helpful when all I had was a CD burner and still have some files too big. Of course since then, I have learned about WinRar and would probable use that if I needed to. Of course since then I now have bigger USB memory sticks which can hold most files. Of course I also have a 200g Maxtor OneTouch II drive attached to my computer that always stays hooked up. I have a 100g drive that I hook up to backup all my pictures to now (since CD Backups will only last a few years before the CD's start to go bad!) - then I stash the 100g drive elsewhere for safe keeping.

Windows XP with Firewall: http://coan.net/bk-smile/cartoons2/post-3-10997024840.jpg

(wanted to throw in a quick joke on the subject)

ali: If you have money to purchase something, I VERY HIGHLY recommend Trend Micro PC-cillin Internet Security.

Trend Site: http://www.trendmicro.com

PC-cillin site: http://www.trendmicro.com/en/products/desktop/pc-cillin/evaluate/overview.htm

Plus I'm not sure if this is still valid or not since it still says version 2005 on this page (2006 is current version), but it allows you to get 50% off the price. (So instead of around $50, it would be around $25): http://www.trendmicro.com/offers/ms-wsc/english.asp

Not only is it an anti-virus, but also a firewall, spam filter, spyware protection, etc... I love it. New updates for it almost daily (which it will find & update itself), and never had any problems with viruses/spyware getting on my PC while I had this loaded.

Eriisa: Go to Tools, Extensions.

Choose one, and click unistall.

I have always had trouble when trying to use CD-RW's I messed with them for a long time, then figured out it was much simpler and even cheaper to just burn it to regular CD-R, then burn a new copy if needed and throw the old one away.

Looks like Firefox 1.5 is now released.

playBunny: Ugh... I need to learn more about CSS - I feel like I'm getting really behind in my web designs since I know almost nothing about it....

Eriisa: It is actually because Firefox is quicker to load pages then other browsers which sometimes mess up BrainKing a little.

Since Firefox will start showing a page before it is completely loaded, what it does first is show the left column, then it load the middle column (moving over the far left column), then it will load the right column (again, moving over the other 2 columns) - causing it to look like the screen is "jumping" around.

Only sites like BrainKing which use columns will you see this. Plus if you are on a fast enough connection, you rarely see it.

Antje: I have not tried Netscape 8 yet - The features I really like on Netscape are also on Firefox also. I will probable try to load it - always nice to have multiply browsers to test things. (And I do not use RSS so that is not a problem for me). Plus Firefox will continue to be my main browser of choice

Rose: I was thinking that the PC's had this ability too with Adobe Distiller - which I thought use to be free. Was looking now, and it is only available with the full (paid) version of Adobe.

It works pretty cool - in a word (or whatever) file, go to print, print it to the adobe distiller, and it would save it as a PDF - so not really "edit" PDF's, but would let you create documents in other formats and save as a PDF.