We fix your tech problems
APC and its readers can be one giant helpdesk. If you have a technical problem, chances are one of us can solve it.
WINDOWS
LOCAL ACCOUNTS IN WINDOWS
With the recently released 1903 update, I decided to reinstall Windows from scratch. During the setup process I was only given the option to create a Microsoft Account using an email address. Has the option to create a local account on a PC been scrapped? Jay Derbyshire
The local option is still present in the 1903 update, and in fact is slightly easier to find now – when prompted to create an account, click ‘Offline account’ followed by ‘No’. Some PC manufacturers have hidden the option during the setup process – if you can’t find it, restart the setup process while disconnected from the internet to hopefully force it into view.
Similarly, the option for creating new local user accounts in Windows itself is buried deep: head to ‘Settings > Accounts > Family & other users’, opt to create another account and then click ‘I don’t have this person’s sign-in information’ followed by ‘Add a user without a Microsoft account’. It’s also worth remembering that attempting to sign into certain Microsoft services – such as downloading apps from the App Store – can lead to local accounts being converted to Microsoft ones. If this happens, you can try converting it back again via Settings > Accounts > Your info – click ‘Sign in with a local account instead’ and follow the prompts. We recommend taking a drive image before you attempt to convert it back – just in case something goes wrong.
ARCHIVE GMAIL OFFLINE
I’m running out of space in my Google account and realise I’ve got thousands of Gmail messages clogging up the system. Rather than deleting them all manually, is there some way I can back up them up offline and then delete them to free up space? Andrew Parkhurst
“attempting to sign into certain Microsoft services can lead to local accounts being converted to Microsoft ones”.
The solution lies in downloading and running MailStore Home (w w w. mailstore.com), a portable tool designed to archive email from a variety of email clients and online sources, including Gmail. After opening it for the first time, choose Archive E-mail and follow the prompts depending on your webmail address or email client. We recommend choosing to archive – and delete – all messages before a certain date. After you’ve run the task for the first time, you’ll be able to browse and search your archive for emails using the tools supplied, plus restore them to Gmail if the need arises. Be sure to add the MailStore folder, which contains your downloaded emails, to your backup.
Catherine Ellis
SECURITY
HOW DO I CHECK THAT MY MAC IS NOW SAFE FROM ZOOM?
I had the old vulnerable Zoom software installed. My Mac has now been updated to remove it. How can I be sure that it’s worked?
Tom Marchwood
Older releases of conferencing software supplied by Zoom and partners installed a web server in a hidden folder inside your Home folder. This proved a serious vulnerability, as it’s left behind even when the main app’s removed. Apple pushed three software updates to its Malware Removal Tool MRT to remove these. First check the version of MRT currently installed, either using a utility like my free SilentKnight from bit.ly/mf344silkn, or by selecting the app at /System/Library/CoreServices/ MRT.app in the Finder. It must be version 1.47 or later. Reveal hidden items in the Finder by pressing command-up arrow-. then select your Home folder in the sidebar, and look for a folder named .zoomus. Some methods of removing the web server replace it with a file of that name, and lock its permissions to prevent the folder from being reinstalled, so if you find a file of
that name don’t remove it. To remove it from Microphone and Camera lists in the Privacy tab of your Security & Privacy pane, install the current app (without a web server), untick it in those lists, then use the app’s uninstall command in the File menu to remove it again. Howard Oakley
RECOVERY
RECOVER FILES FROM DELETED USER ACCOUNT
After creating a new user account to fix a problem, I chose to delete my original user account, selecting ‘Yes’ when prompted to keep my files, being told they would appear
as a folder on my desktop. My laptop then froze – after 30 minutes I rebooted, but the files weren’t on the desktop and the original account has gone. How do I recover my files? Tom Hunter
It’s never wise to delete a user account without having backed up its files first – for the reason you’ve just encountered. Your chances of recovering all of your lost files are slim, but you may be able to get some back. Download the portable version of Recuva from www.ccleaner.com/ recuva/builds to anywhere but your system drive (a USB drive will suffice) to avoid writing to the system disk. Run this and follow the wizard to try and locate (and recover) the missing files – perform a slower, but more thorough, deep scan to maximise your chances of successful recovery. Carrie Marshall
HARDWARE
USB MUSIC FOR THE CAR WITHOUT A CD PLAYER
Most new vehicles no longer have a CD player. My car has a USB port into which I’m supposed to plug in a media device, controlling it with the media/music app on the dash console. I have dozens of CDs I wish to rip to a thumb drive to play them in my vehicle. I want to see the exact same design, background and playlist as though I were playing a CD in VLC on my PC. I need each CD to show up separately, so the tracks aren’t jumbled together. How can I do this? Gerald Gibson
Gerald and his wife have two relatively new 4x4s, both of which have touchscreen displays and accept voice commands. With this in mind, the best approach to take when preparing music on a USB thumb drive is to stick to some universal rules that should work across these and other similar vehicles. For use in a car, format the USB thumb drive in FAT32 format, and avoid using sticks that are larger than 32GB – Windows doesn’t like formatting larger drives to FAT32, and the cars might not read them. Second, check your owner’s manual for compatible file formats. If in doubt, be sure to rip your CDs to MP3 format. If your files are already in another format, use MusicBee’s conversion tool (browse to the parent folder, then select MusicBee > Tools > Convert Format to convert to MP3). Voice commands also rely on music files being correctly ‘tagged’ with metadata – Windows Media Player and MusicBee should add this while ripping, but you can verify and edit metadata using MP3Tag (www.mp3tag.de/en/) if necessary. Nick Peers
HARDWARE
VIRTUAL MACHINE HARDWARE UPGRADES
I’m looking to purchase or upgrade my PC specifically for the purposes of running a couple of virtual machines so I can continue to run older applications. What sort of hardware spec should I be looking for? Pete Stuart
There are three critical components: processor, RAM and storage. Look for a processor offering at least six cores, such as the latest AMD Ryzen 5 or Intel Core i5. If your budget stretches to around $500, look at the AMD Ryzen 7 3700X chip, which offers eight cores – enough to run two dual-core virtual machines while retaining four cores for your main Windows installation. When it comes to RAM, install as much as you can afford: 16GB would give 4GB to each virtual machine while reserving 8GB for your main PC, but 32GB would obviously double those figures.
Finally, purchase SSD storage (512GB can be had for under $120) to ensure your VMs can run at maximum speed. Mayank Sharma
“When it comes to RAM, install as much as you can afford: 16GB would give 4GB to each virtual machine while reserving 8GB for your main PC”.
MAC
SLEEPING WITH AN EXTERNAL DISPLAY
When my MacBook Pro sleeps connected to an external display, it has trouble waking up, sometimes requiring a restart. How can I fix this?
Duncan Brack
With any sleep problem like this, the first step is to reset the System Management Chip (SMC) and the Non-Volatile RAM (NVRAM, formerly PRAM). In many cases, that should restore normal function, but running some versions of macOS makes specific models prone to sleep and wake problems, particularly MacBook Pro models connected to external displays. This probably relates to the EFI firmware supplied with that release, and updating to the latest version can fix it. Apple now only provides those firmware updates as part of macOS and its security updates. There’s a list of versions for recent models at bit.ly/ mf344efi. Another cause is an incompatible kernel extension. Those are harder to address, though most third-party extensions should now be installed in /Library/Extensions – check through that for anything old and unneeded.
Howard Oakley
WINDOWS
WINDOWS SPOTLIGHT SCREEN STUCK
My Windows 10 laptop used to rotate the picture that showed on the lock screen on an occasional basis, but for the past few weeks it’s been stuck on the same screen. How do I fix this?
Lena Howard
This could be down to several things – first, take a trip to Settings > Privacy > Background apps and confirm both Background Apps, and more specifically Settings, are both allowed to run in the background. If this is the case, head over to Personalisation > Lock Screen and verify Windows Spotlight is selected under the Background drop-down menu. Assuming it is, type “powershell” into the Search box and click Run as administrator. Now type the following command – all on one line – and hit Enter:
Get-AppxPackage -allusers *ContentDeliveryManager* | foreach {Add-AppxPackage “$($_.InstallLocation)\ appxmanifest.xml” -DisableDevelopmentMode -register }
This will reset Windows Spotlight. Restart and it should hopefully start working again. Carrie Marshall
WINDOWS
SHARE YOUR PC START-UP ROUTINE WITH OTHERS
I believe a start-up item is causing my PC problems. How can I diagnose this with someone else’s help? Karen Fraser
Autoruns is our go-to tool for getting a complete overview of what’s starting with your PC. You can also use it to compile a report when asking for assistance.
Download Autoruns from https://bit. ly/autoruns. After downloading, right-click Autoruns.zip and choose Extract All > Extract. The Autoruns folder will appear after the files are extracted. Double-click Autoruns64.exe.
Wait while Autoruns scans your system – this can take up to a minute or so. Once scanning is complete, switch to the Logon tab to get an overview of what starts with your PC. You can also disable or delete start-up items from here.
If you need to share your start-up entries then choose ‘File > Save’ to save a report to your Documents folder. Again this can take some time, so be patient. Once done, close Autoruns.
The uncompressed file is rather large – locate it, right-click and choose ‘Send to > Compressed (zipped) folder’. Once done, open your email client and attach the zip file to your message asking for help. Nick Peers