Cloudeight InfoAve Premium - A weekly computer publication featuring tips, tricks, website & freeware picks, answers to your computer questions and more!

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Terry really likes Recuva but has some questions
Earlier this summer you turned me on to Recuva software. It worked great! Got all my photos back on my PC again. After that, another issue reared its ugly countenance. Most of the images have a large blank space below the picture. I have been editing the unwanted portion from each picture but it's very time-consuming. Do you have a quick way for me to end up with just the original image? Perhaps some software or a volunteer you know of?

Thanks again for all you do. It's brilliant! Looking forward to hearing from you.

Our answer
Hi Terry. Thanks! Sorry, we have no magic elixir for you. When you delete a file, it is not really deleted, The space it occupied is marked free to use by Windows and therefore shows up as free space. As long as nothing else is written to that free space the files you deleted will be fully recoverable. But once data is written to that space the files may be mostly, partially or completely unrecoverable. The faster you try to recover the files after you recognize a problem, the better.

There are programs made that will make deleted files(nearly) unrecoverable - by overwriting the free space on the hard drive with gibberish many times so that any data is completely obliterated and unrecoverable. These programs are made to prevent data recovery.

It appears that the files you're trying to recover were deleted and some data was written to the space those files occupied, and there's no way so go back on undo it.

The best way to protect data you don't want to or can't afford to lose is keeping good backups. If the data is valuable and irreplaceable - such as precious photographs - then you might want to keep 2 backups - one in "the cloud".

Recuva is not meant to be used as replacement for good backup strategy - and it's something you should not be using very much. Since you're using Windows 10 - all you have to do is turn on File History and your pictures, documents, music, etc. will be automatically backed up to an external drive. And if you ever accidentally delete important photos, music, documents, etc. you can recover them exactly as they were. File History is not an image backup, but it's far better than relying on Recuva to recover deleted files. To learn more about turning on File History and how to use - see this page.

Hope this helps you in the future.

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Nick says one of his email addresses has been breached
Thanks for the article on Phishing is the Internet's Most Successful Con. I read it through and in one part it suggest a site called Have I Been Pwned. I tried it and it says that one of my email addresses was breached. It asks me to "subscribe" . Need your trusted advice on this. Thanks, Nick

Our answer
Hi Nick. We featured "Have I Been PWNED" in our newsletters and on our InfoAve website before. See this article.

Just because your email address was found on the dark web, or anywhere else, doesn't mean it was breached or compromised. "Have I Been PWNED" is a legitimate site, but we don't see any advantages of subscribing unless you want to receive mail from them.

If you suspect one of your email accounts has been compromised, the best thing you can do is change your password and makes sure it's a strong password. We offer password advice in many tips, here is our most recent one.

Strong passwords are the key your security. They are just as important as your security software... maybe even more. If your passwords are weak - or worse - if your passwords are weak and you use any of your passwords on more than one site, you're just asking for trouble.

Our advice: Change your password right away on the account you think might have been compromised... and make sure you use a strong password. And then even if it was breached the hackers/criminals would no longer be able to access it.

Hope this helps.

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Brenda asks about Scanguard
What is Scanguard that is advertising at safewebuser.com/pc/wins. Is it safe to use?

Our answer
Hi Brenda. It looks like Scanguard is rearing its ugly head again! Our InfoAve site has many of the articles we write and publish in our newsletters. We have written about the Scanguard scam several times - here is one of those articles.

You can do a search at our InfoAve Website and find more

We hope this helps you.

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Several Ways to Close Your Browser Quickly
Windows 7, Windows 8x, Windows 10
Chrome, Edge, Internet Explorer, Firefox

Darcy reminded me of something today … as she always seems to do. And that reminded me to remind you how to close a browser that has become unresponsive or when you click something malicious and suddenly you’re faced with a tech support scam popup or other malicious popup.

We’ll do the easiest one first. If you just want to close the current tab (the one you’re viewing), just press CTRL+F4. This is a quick and easy way to close the tab you’re viewing. This may come in handy if you can’t close the tab normally.

If your browser is frozen or you have run into malicious scam popup, you may not be able to close the tab. In this case while you’re browser is open and you’re looking at it (it’s in focus) try using ALT+F4

If neither of the above work for you try opening Task Manager (CTRL+SHIFT+ESC) and look in the processes tab. You can right-click on any browser process and choose “End process”. Keep in mind there may be several processes running for the same browser. You need right-click on each and choose “End process”.

— On Windows 7, type CMD in the start menu search and click on CMD when you see it appear at the top.

— On Windows 8, right-click on the start button and click Command prompt.

— On Windows 10, type CMD in taskbar search and press Enter.

At the prompt in the Command prompt window, type the following (remember these commands must be typed exactly as far as spacing goes – they are not case sensitive though).

Keep in mind when you close your browser using ALT + F4 or Taskkill, when you reopen your browser, most browsers will attempt to restore the tabs that were open when the browser was forced to close. If you’re trying to get away from a tech support scam or other malicious popup or advertisement, the last thing you want to do is let your browser restore the tabs that were open. If you allow that, you’re likely to find yourself caught in a never ending circle. So don’t allow your browser to restore the tabs that were open when your forced your browser to close.

Finally, you always have the option to restart your computer if you run into something bad on the internet. That will close all open programs. Again, remember, if you force your browser to close or you restart to get away from a problem you’ve run into on the Web, don’t allow your browser to recover the pages that were open when you forced the browser to close or restarted your computer to force the browser to close.

Now you know what to do the next time you run into a tech support scam popup that tells you your computer has 9 million viruses and if you close the scam ad all your files will be erased – and telling you to call 1-800-XXX-MMMM to fix your computer. You will know what to do — right?

Underlines: They are there for a reason!
Written for Windows 10 ( but underlines work the same way in any version of Windows)

We all like to save time. And most of us are in a hurry too much of the time. So, here’s a question for you: Have you ever noticed the underlined items in some Windows menus? You did? Well, you are in the minority. Most of us don’t notice them, or if we do, we don’t pay any attention to the. But today, you’re all going to notice them and learn what you can do with them, as we are going to show you what you can do with them.

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Above (I hope), you can see what is known as the Win Key + X menu. It’s the menu you see on Windows 10 when your press the Windows Key + the X key.

If you look closely you’ll see every item on that menu has one underlined letter]. So, what you do think will happen if you press the letter on your keyboard that corresponds to the underlined letter in that menu? Yes, EB? RIGHT! It opens the item. For example you can see one of the underlined letters I’ve circled is the letter “O” in Power Options. Now if I have this menu open and I press the letter O on my keyboard, voila! Power Options opens.

Now, EB smarty pants… what if I have this menu open and tap the letter “A” on my keyboard. RIGHT AGAIN, EB. A command prompt with administrator privileges (elevated command prompt) opens.

A lot of menus have items with underlined letters in them. Look at the Firefox “Tools” menu (below).

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So, EB, what happens if I open that menu in Firefox and tap the “A” key on my keyboard? Right! The Add-ons dialog open. And if I press the "D" key while this menu is open? Right - you're a smart cookie - the Downloads folder will open.

Now everyone knows what these underlines mean and that they can save time by jumping to a menu item by tapping the letter underlined in the menu on the keyboard.

That’s what I call fun with underlines!

Note for those of you still using Windows 10 Version 1709 (Fall Creators Update)

You may not see underlines on your right-click start menu (the menu you see when you right-click the start button or press Windows Key + X). But you can turn on underlines this way:

1. Open Settings
2. Click on Ease of Access
3. Click on Keyboard
4. Under “Other settings” turn the switch under “Enable shortcut underlines” to ON. See screenshot below:

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Bonus tip! Want to get to the Ease of Access settings more quickly? Hold down the Windows Key and tap the U key. U are there!

Save Your Desktop Icon Layout With ReIcon
Windows 7, Windows 8.1, Windows 10 (all versions)

ReIcon (Restore Desktop Icon Layouts) is one of those really easy to use freeware programs that does a simple task, perfectly You don’t have to install it – just download it, unzip it and run it. A click a button and your desktop icon layout will be mapped and saved so that the next time Windows (for whatever reason) messes with your desktop icon layout, you can restore it exactly the way you want it – with just a click of a button. The program lets you to store multiple layouts, so you can save several different icon layouts, if needed.

Here are some screenshots that will show you how easy ReIcon is to use. You can see from the screenshots how to save, rename, and restore desktop icon layouts with just a few clicks.

The program’s website has lots of useful information about the program, but the download link is not so easy to ferret out. But don’t worry: At the end of this article, we’ll give you a simple, “you-can’t-go-wrong” download link. However, we do recommend you visit the program’s website as there is some very helpful information there.

If you’re tired of Windows rearranging your desktop icons then ReIcon might be just what you’re looking for. Visit the author’s page here... and download the program zip file here. The zip file contains both a 32-bit and 64-bit version of ReIcon. No installation needed… just unzip and click the program file to run ReIcon.

How Long Has Your Computer Been Running ?
Windows 7, Windows 8.1, Windows 10 (all versions)

How long has your computer been running since you last restarted it? We leave our computers running 24/7. If you asked us how long it’s been since we last restarted our PCs, we couldn’t tell you without looking at our up time. If you’re like us, you probably don’t know how long it’s been since you rebooted either.

So, how long has your computer been running since the last boot? If you want to know how long your computer has been running since the last time you started or restarted your PC (your PC’s “up time” ), there are many ways you can find out. We’re going to show you two ways. The first way, not only shows you how long it’s been since you last started or restarted your computer, it also shows when your current version of Windows was installed. If you’re using Windows 10, you’ll see the date of the last major (version) update.

Open a Command Prompt.

On Windows 7, type CMD in the start menu search, click on CMD when it appears at the top of the search results. On Windows 8.x, press Windows Key+S and type CMD into the search box and click on Command Prompt when it appears in the search results. In Windows 10, type CMD in the taskbar search (Cortana) and click on Command Prompt when it appears at the top.

In the Command Prompt, at the prompt, type

systeminfo

And press Enter.

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You’ll see the last time you booted or rebooted your computer. As you can see, mine was restarted on 8/15/2018 at 2:06 PM. Also note that above it you’ll see “Original Install Date”. I did a reset on this laptop on July 15, 2018. July 15, 2018 is not the date that Windows was originally installed on this computer. So, why do they call it "Original Install Date"? We don't know - you'll have to call your uncle Bill and ask him. Even EB doesn't know!

If you’re using Windows 10, another way to see how long your computer has been running since the last reboot is to use good old Task Manager. And no matter what version of Windows you’re using, you can open Task Manager by using the keyboard shortcut CTRL+SHIFT+ESC. So, open Task Manager and then click on the “Performance” tab, then click on “CPU” and look near the bottom:

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You’ll see under “Up time”, it has been 35 days, 21 hours, 51 minutes and 25 seconds since I last restarted my computer. Wow! That's a long time :)

So… what’s your up time, we asks ya?

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Brain Age Games

How Old Is Your Brain?

People keep trying to tell me I’m getting old… especially EB who constantly tells me I have memory issues. I don’t, but she thinks so. Actually, I have selective memory – I weed out most of the stuff she tells me. Heaven knows, it’s a hard row to hoe trying to work with her. Moving right along…

Cloudeight Site Pick Being that the weekend is once again upon us, I decided to find something fun and useful to write about today. Off I went into the infinite cyber land with my old and muddled brain… and that’s when I stumbled upon Brain Age Games.

Being one who has to try everything I recommend – I recommend chocolate malts too – I took several of the tests that Brain Age Games offers and I’m happy – no actually I’m THRILLED to tell you (and EB) that my brain age is 35 – which is just about half of my physical age. This just proved to me, once again, that EB doesn’t always know what’s she’s talking about. I bet when she reads this she scurries to Brain Age Games and takes the tests and then calls me to tell me her brain age is 9. You know what? I would not doubt that!

Seriously, this site is fun – and maybe even useful, especially if you’re sixty or older. I’m sure a lot of young folk look and me and say: – “Hey look at the prune with legs!” They might say that, but inside me ticks the brain of a 35-year-old, I tells ya! (I also ventured to the sister site of Brain Age Games called Biological Age and found out that even though I may well look like a prune with legs, my biological age is 50 – or much younger than my actual age (sticking my tongue out at EB!).

Enough! On with the show, I tells ya! Here are some words from the developer to give you a little background on Brain Age:

"About Brain Age

I have been interested in Brain Science (esp. in the area of cognition) ever since I left my Bio-technology degree in the 90’s to pursue my interest in web technology. There have been so many exciting breakthroughs especially in the awareness of neuroplasticity. I have a real passion for the field as I grew up on a small farm in New Zealand I am a big believer in personal change.

However I am not a neuroscientist – I am sure this site would look quite different if I was :-). And you should not take your brain age too seriously.

If you enjoyed this site you might also want to click here to find out your Biological Age.

Brain Health

Diet is the other half of optimum brain health. Keeping your weight down is important. A long-term study of 1,500 adults found that those who were obese in middle age were twice as likely to develop dementia in later life. Those who also had high cholesterol and high blood pressure had six times the risk of dementia.

This just to hand: Professor Levi-Montalcini puts her mental vigour down to regular doses of nerve growth factor (NGF) – the discovery that made her famous. She just turned 100!

I recommend a vegetarian diet but there is significant evidence that omega-3 fatty acids are beneficial, I get mine from flax oil. Nuts are a useful part of your diet; almonds, pecans and walnuts are a good source of vitamin E, which is great antioxidant.

Brain biochemistry can be modified by nutrition and experience. Computerized cognitive training can provide positive training experiences. Playing Brain Games should not increase your IQ, practicing IQ tests can help you get better results in IQ tests but IQ has been shown to be almost 100% genetically determined (“Nature Via Nurture” by Matt Ridley)…"

It’s the weekend. If you have some extra time and you’re over fifty-five years of age, you should now be chomping at the bit to find out just how old your brain is. And you can do that by going to our site pick Brain Age Games right now . It’s free and no signup or log-ins required. You can even drag your friends into the Brain Age rage. I hope you are thrilled when you learn that brain is younger than you ever expected and not disappointed that your old brain is just withered shadow of its former self.

And if you like what you see at Brain Age, take a side trip to Biological Age to find out your true biological age – you may be decades younger than you feel – or look.

And whatever you find out, it’s all in fun. I am not sure any of this stuff means much… but it sure was fun to tell EB my brain age is 35. So much for my rotting brain, EB!

And now EB, it’s your turn so be honest: tell us how old that creaky old brain of yours REALLY is!