Mike is building a home entertainment system and asked for my input. He asks, “Can you tell me the basic computer parts I would need to complete a home entertainment system?” Mike, I’m assuming from our conversation earlier that you already have a television and audio receiver. I’ll outline a few common components and maybe a few not-so-common.
I think every entertainment center should have a file server to house your audio and video files. File servers allow access from any computer in the house including your video player. An inexpensive server uses an old PC with a couple decent sized hard drives. FreeNAS is free operating system software specifically for this kind of setup.
My own media center uses a small Mini ITX computer which acts as this primary video and audio player. I have a fairly inexpensive Media Center remote control which has all the functions of a computer mouse and DVD remote control. With it I can play all my media files through both my TV and receiver.
Most people don’t think of media center extenders when they think of building a media center. Basically a media center extender does just that – it extends media files into other rooms in the house where you may not have (or want) a computer. The device ties into your wireless network and acts similarly to a DVD player in that it plays files located on your server.
An odd device which is quickly gaining popularity is the Roku box. With a Roku, movies from Netflix – among others – can be played on your TV without the need of a computer. I personally use a Roku box on my TV in the bedroom. It looks like a little set top box and comes with a remote control. To watch a Netflix movie all I need to do is load it from a computer and it plays on my TV.
Jim has a question about Internet Explorer: “My Internet Explorer home page keeps changing, and most recently search results don’t seem to be relevant to what I’ve actually searched for. WHY?” You seem to be the victim of “browser hijacking.” I’ve been asked this question many times in the past but think it’s time to answer the question again with a few things you can try on your own.
At the shop we install A-Squared, Spybot and Malwarebytes (in addition to others) on every machine during routine service. You can download and install each of these from www.filehippo.com free of charge and use them for as long as you want. Once installed, each title is pretty simple to use and all function similarly. Prior to scanning with each piece of software you need to make sure they’re updated completely. I usually run each update twice to verify the software is completely up-to-date and run each singly using the ‘complete scan’ option in each piece of software.
Once each completes you may see a list of potentially bad malware, spyware, and viruses which need to be removed. Each of the three titles includes an automated removal utility which is initiated with a click. Sometimes the computer may need to be restarted to complete the process; however, most of the time the software will remove the infections without the need of a restart.
I am frequently asked why the installed virus software didn’t catch these or fix these problems in the first place. Virus software and those who create viruses are always playing a cat-and-mouse game to see who can outdo the other. In your case the authors of the virus (or viruses) won and you happened to be in the middle. Good luck and if you have questions please ask.
Tip of the week: I suggest using a software firewall such as Comodo to combat viruses and spyware as they enter your computer. Most current viruses enter your computer as seemingly legitimate pieces of software and are usually undetected by virus software. Although nothing is perfect, firewalls offer one more layer of protection.
(Jeromy Patriquin is the President of Laptop & Computer Repair, Inc. located at 509 Main St. in Gardner. You can e-mail him at Jeromy@LocalComputerWiz.com or call him directly at (978) 919-8059.)