Troubleshooting and Maintaining Your PC All-in-One Desk Reference For Dummies [Paperback]

Dan Gookin (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: March 9, 2009 | ISBN-10: 0470396652 | ISBN-13: 978-0470396650 | Edition: 1

Maintaining a PC is important, and troubleshooting a PC can be a challenge. Dan Gookin is great at explaining how to handle common PC problems, and he’s provided a complete, plain-English manual in Troubleshooting & Maintaining Your PC All-in-One For Dummies.

Liberally laced with Dan’s famous humor and clear instructions, Troubleshooting & Maintaining Your PC All-in-One For Dummies is divided into six minibooks covering hardware, software, laptops, Internet, networking, and maintenance. Each one gives you some background on what causes common problems, to help you understand what’s wrong as well as how to fix it. You’ll learn to:

• Troubleshoot both Windows XP and Vista
• Solve e-mail and Web woes, makes friends with ActiveX, and protect your system from evil software and viruses
• Resolve router problems, reset the modem, delve into IP addresses, and find the elusive wireless network
• Investigate startup issues, battery quirks, and power problems
• Travel safely and efficiently with your laptop
• Perform regular maintenance and keep good backups
• Solve problems with disks and printers
• Find missing files, successfully restore files if something major goes wrong, and pep up your PC

Troubleshooting & Maintaining Your PC All-in-One For Dummies is tech support in a book!

Note: The Kindle edition of this book does not include any CDs or DVDs.

--This text refers to the Kindle Edition edition.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

What the book covers: Most troubleshooting books concentrate on upgrading--and usually hardware at that. This book concentrates on solving problems--whether they are software, hardware, or operating system problems. In addition, Dan offers tools and advice on maintaining your system to maximize its life. Seven minibooks cover
* Hardware
* Software
* Laptops
* Internet
* Networking
* Maintenance
* Useful Tools

* Series features: The book will reflect the handholding, clear explanations, and light humor that are hallmarks of the For Dummies style.

From the Back Cover

Who needs tech support?

Amaze your friends and fix it yourself!

When your PC goes rogue, having this hefty volume at your elbow is the next best thing to having a personal PC genie. Got a problem? Look it up in one of these handy minibooks to learn a bit about what might have caused it as well as how to solve it. When you understand what's wrong, it's easier to fix it now and prevent it from happening again.

• The Zen of fix-it — find out what's behind common PC problems and why the same solution may work in several situations

• You haven't got mail — solve e-mail and Web woes, make friends with ActiveX®, and guard against evil software

• When it's the network — resolve router problems, reset the modem, delve into IP addresses, and find the elusive wireless network

• That ever-lovin' laptop — investigate startup issues, battery quirks, power problems, and laptop travel woes

• Like getting an oil change — perform regular maintenance and get serious about backups

Open the book and find:

• Tips and solutions for both Windows® XP and Vista

• What happens when your PC performs basic functions, and what could go wrong

• Startup and recovery options

• Strategies to find missing files

• Fixes for unhappy disks and balky printers

• Tools for keeping out viruses and malware

• Ways to pep up your PC

• Secrets for successfully restoring files

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 768 pages
• Publisher: For Dummies; 1 edition (March 9, 2009)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0470396652
• ISBN-13: 978-0470396650
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 7.4 x 1.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.5 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (13 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #373,517 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #40 in Books > Computers & Technology > Hardware > Maintenance, Repair & Upgrading

More About the Author

Dan Gookin has been writing about technology for over 20 years. He combines his love of writing with his gizmo fascination to create books that are informative, entertaining, and not boring. Having written more over 120 titles with 12 million copies in print translated into over 30 languages, Dan can attest that his method of crafting computer tomes seems to work.

Perhaps his most famous title is the original DOS For Dummies, published in 1991. It became the world's fastest-selling computer book, at one time moving more copies per week than the New York Times #1 bestseller (though as a reference, it could not be listed on the NYT Bestseller list). From that book spawned the entire line of For Dummies books, which remains a publishing phenomena to this day.

Dan's most popular titles include PCs For Dummies Word For Dummies, Laptops For Dummies, and Droid X For Dummies. He also maintains the vast and helpful Web site, www.wambooli.com.

Dan holds a degree in Communications/Visual Arts from the University of California, San Diego. Presently, he lives in the Pacific Northwest, where he enjoys spending time with his sons playing video games inside while they watch the gentle woods of Idaho.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

11 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Repairing My Own Computer, May 30, 2009

By 

GK "Dummy Book Dummy" (Rocky Mountains) - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Troubleshooting and Maintaining Your PC All-in-One Desk Reference For Dummies (Paperback)

This book and others I have received from Amazon, have saved me many dollars. The book covers most of my computer problems and I have diagnosed two of my fiends computers and fixed the problems. Saved us all big bucks.

13 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Troubleshooting my PCS, April 6, 2009

By 

William Richard Evans "Web Developer, Writer,... (Sautee Nacoochee, GA USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Troubleshooting and Maintaining Your PC All-in-One Desk Reference For Dummies (Paperback)

After buying my tenth PC with five used currently and having some system trouble hardware related it was time to learn about repairing my computers. I have already used the book and found it very useful. My money was well spent.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Troubleshooting pc, October 11, 2009

By 

E. Murray (CA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Troubleshooting and Maintaining Your PC All-in-One Desk Reference For Dummies (Paperback)

Helps those of us who are not computer literate. It doesn't have EVERY situation but what book would be able to fit everything. But it is great for covering a lot of situations. Easy to understand. Love that it comes with a disk too.