Computer Info – 09/02/1998

Too Many Windows in Windows 95

    To reduced the screen clutter and prevent having to close so many windows – change your setting to Browse Folders By Using A Single Window. Open My Computer and select Options. Place a check by Browse Folders By Using A Single Window That Changes As You Open Each Folder and click OK. You’ll probably want to turn the toolbar on also. You will find this under the View menu and then select Toolbar if it’s not checked. This will allow you to use the icon for Up One Level in order so that you will not have to start opening windows again.

Software Bugs

    We just purchased the latest edition of Family Origins 7.0, only to find out that it would not run on our computer. We received the following error message. "The FOWIN32.EXE file is linked to missing export COMCTL32.DLL:InitCommonControlsEx." Visited their web site and found out that others were having the same problem. Visited the site again a few days later and found that a solution to the problem had been posted. They gave a web address where Microsoft had an updated version of the COMCTL32.DLL file that could be downloaded. It seems like the older versions of Windows 95 does not contain the latest version of this file. But downloading this DLL did correct the problem.
    Then reading in the October issue of Smart Computing, there was an article about stamping out software bugs (All programs have problems & It’s up to you to fix them). But the article stated that
    "Some bugs go unfixed because it’s not in a company’s best interest to repair them. Take, for example, the recent compatibility between Corel’s Quattro Pro 7 and Microsoft’s Internet Explorer 4.0. Users of Quattro Pro 7 discovered that the spreadsheet wouldn’t work on any system with Explorer 4.0 installed." Microsoft didn’t see any reason to correct the problem and Corel was about to release a new version, so they didn’t want to spend money on an older project. Quattro Pro 7 users were the ultimate losers because the problem was never resolved.
    What worries industry experts is that the problem of buggy software and hardware is getting worse.

Starting Your Computer Without the StartUp Folder

    Holding down the SHIFT key as soon as you see the blue sky Win95 opening screen (if your system has two separate appearances of that screen, wait for the second appearance before pressing SHIFT) and keep holding it until Win95 loads. Holding the SHIFT key keeps things in your STARTUP folder from starting automatically.

Non-Brand-Name Modems

    We found the following comment in the Smart Computing magazine. It is something that we have talked about many times so I thought I would quote it.
    "We can’t say non-brand-name modems are less reliable, but support/help and upgrades may be harder to come by. Especially if you buy off-brand, consider buying where someone will install it and test it for you by fully connecting to your service provider and say, downloading a small file. Otherwise you might spend weeks tinkering with it."