Helpdesk by Jim Rossman

If AM strikes out, listen to Rangers via Internet<br><br>Q: I work in a building where AM radio is hard to receive, and I was wondering if the Texas Rangers baseball games are going to be broadcast online

Friday, April 7th 2000, 12:00 am

By: News On 6

If AM strikes out, listen to Rangers via Internet

Q: I work in a building where AM radio is hard to receive, and I was wondering if the Texas Rangers baseball games are going to be broadcast online this year?
- B.D., Arlington

A: Yes, baseball fans, the Rangers games will be broadcast online this year. Go to the Rangersâ€™ Web site at www.texasrangers.com and follow the Live Audio Game Link at the upper right of the Rangers home page.

Youâ€™ll need to download the RealAudio player to listen to the games, broadcast by Yahoo.

There is a link from the Rangers site to download the necessary RealAudio software.

Youâ€™ll obviously need a sound card in your computer and speakers or headphones to make this work.

If your office has high-speed Internet access, the sound will probably be better than what you can get on an AM radio. Thatâ€™s because the sound over the Internet isnâ€™t really broadcast but comes straight into your computer, meaning it can be less tinny. But streaming audio is far from perfect over a conventional modem.

While you are at the Rangersâ€™ Web site, stay and look around. The best thing Iâ€™ve found about it is that you can buy tickets to any Rangers home game.

Good luck, and I hope your boss is a baseball fan.

Q: I upgraded from an old 1.8-gigabyte hard drive a year ago to an 8GB hard drive, but it came partitioned into several 2GB drives.
This presented no problem until recently, when I ran out of space on the C drive and tried to move some programs out of C into D.

Big problems!

Why do drives come partitioned?
- P.G., Dallas

A: Chances are your drive didnâ€™t come partitioned from the factory. The act of formatting it in your PC took care of that.
Two-gigabyte hard drives were as big as you could get in Windows 95. So if you got a bigger drive, the only way to use all the space was to create partitions.

Later versions of 95, called Revisions B and C, allowed larger drives and partitions. I found the following information at pages.prodigy.net/jdjd/htm/partition.htm: "If your hard drive is larger than 2 gigabytes, the early version of Windows 95 will automatically partition it. The first partition (your C drive) will be approximately 2 gigabytes. The subsequent partitions will be either 2 gigabytes or the remainder of whatâ€™s left over, depending on the size of your hard drive.

"For example, letâ€™s say you have a 5.5GB hard drive. Itâ€™s your C drive. Windows 95 will set your computer up this way:

C drive: 2.0 gigabytes
D drive: 2.0 gigabytes
E drive: 1.5 gigabytes"

To know if you have a later version of Windows 95, right-click on the My Computer icon on your desktop and choose Properties. Under the General tab, there will be information on the Windows version.

If you have Windows 95B or C, you are in luck, and your hard drives and partitions can be larger than 2GB. If it says Windows 95 Original or Windows 95A, Iâ€™d consider upgrading to Windows 98.

Q: How can I print a copy of my e-mail addresses in Netscape Navigator?
- C.A., Dallas

A: Your address book can be exported as a text file and printed.

From the Communicator menu, open the Address Book. From the Address Book windowâ€™s File Menu, choose Export. The Export dialog box will let you choose the location and format of the exported address book.

Choose a suitable location and under the Format choice, try comma separated or tab delimited to keep the addresses from jamming together and save the file. Then in a text editor, such as Microsoft Word or Windowâ€™s Wordpad, open the file and print it.

You may need to manipulate the text a bit to get it into the format you want.

But you shouldnâ€™t have any problems.

Q: Several months ago, the CD-ROM crashed on my Hewlett-Packard 8240. I replaced it with a DVD-ROM drive. It reads CD-ROMs fine, but what is necessary to make the DVD part work on my computer?

If I might be so bold as to ask another question about this computer, I want to add more RAM to it, but I donâ€™t know what kind of chip to get. Can you tell me this information, too?
- G.S., Dallas

A: Out of the box, a DVD-ROM drive can read CD-ROMs and data DVD-ROMs, which are not to be confused with DVD movies.

Your computer needs a DVD decoder to play movies. If you bought the DVD drive by itself, it may not have come with a decoder.

The decoder can be hardware, like a PCI card, or it can be software. You need to check the disks that came with the drive, if there are any. Or check with the drive manufacturer to see what it recommends. Iâ€™m sure the manufacturer has a decoder that you can buy if one was not bundled with your purchase, which sounds like the case.

As for the RAM, your HP uses 168-pin SDRAM. You should buy it from a reputable dealer that guarantees its products and asks you what kind of computer you have before blindly giving you what you ask for.

You can go to an electronics shopping site and follow the links on buying memory. For example, at www.warehouse.com, you can follow the Memory link from the front page, then enter your computerâ€™s manufacturer and model number. The correct memory choices are then displayed.

Q: I have a couple of problems with my computer.

First, in the lower right-hand corner of my screen, there is a yellow icon of a printer that reads "automatic receive disabled."

Second, while installing AOL 5.01, a box appeared with a heading that reads "America Online installation." The note below that heading reads: "An error was encountered during installation. The copy of America Online cannot be installed because the installation file is damaged." What does that mean?
- R.J., Dallas

A: On the printer icon, you apparently have fax software installed, which is launching at start-up. The entry in your system tray - that row of icons on the lower right of your screen - is showing you the status. If you launch the fax application and enable automatic receive, your PC will be ready to answer the phone to receive incoming faxes. So this is really not a problem at all.

Your second problem is exactly what it says. The actual installer file for AOL is bad.

If you downloaded the installer from AOL, delete the installer and download another from www.aol.com. If you are working from a CD, then trash it and find another. They seem to be available at local bookstores free at the cash register and, as always, packaged in most PC magazines each month.

I throw away about five of these a week, but they never seem to be around when I need one.

Q: Periodically, my e-mail just wonâ€™t come in. By this, I mean it takes forever - up to hours! - and often cuts off. I get the message that my server has not responded or that the connection was unexpectedly terminated.

I have corresponded with Internet America via e-mail and then, finally, called and uninstalled the dial-up configuration, checked all the numbers, reinstalled a new configuration, but the problem remains. Internet America said to call Microsoft. I think it could be the phone line, and I guess I will have to have that checked.

Do you have any ideas? It is really annoying.

It doesnâ€™t happen every time, which makes it even harder to figure out. I also cannot get on the Web when this happens. I can get to Netscape, but the search page wonâ€™t come up.
- C.H., Dallas

A: I get this from time to time on my digital subscriber line, so I tend to think itâ€™s an Internet service provider problem.

Everyone has experienced this at one time or another. You try link after link, and you seem to get nowhere.

Every once in a while, I will be reading a Web page and click on a link or bookmark only to get the "Contacting www.dallasnews.com â€¦" message.

Your computer is still connected to the ISPâ€™s server, but your calls to other Web sites just arenâ€™t getting through. There is no way to jog your Internet connection while you wait seemingly forever. So you can do what I do: Disconnect and reconnect.

For dial-up users, this means redialing your ISP. For DSL and cable modem users, quitting your browser or e-mail program and resetting the modem power switch should do the trick.

You can take this as a sign from the Internet gods to get up and stretch. The exercise will do you some good.

This nonresponse can be found if your TCP/IP or PPP control panel, which tells your computer how to connect to the Internet, is not correctly configured for your ISPâ€™s server addresses. You can connect to its modems, but then canâ€™t get out on the Net. Your machine needs directions to find that on ramp.

Because you get this sporadically, you can assume your settings are correct. But new users who can dial in and connect to their ISPs but then canâ€™t surf should check the setup.

Q: I live in far northwest Plano, Texas.

Southwestern Bell is my phone company.
The best transmission speed for the Internet I can get through landline - a standard phone line - is 26,400 bits per second.

Southwestern Bell tells me that I am too far from its switch to obtain 56Kbps or to get DSL.
ATT Cable does not provide @Home in my neighborhood.

Do you know of any way that I can obtain high-speed access to the Internet? Are any wireless data companies active in my area?
- J.H., Plano

A: An alternative for you would be DirecPC from Hughes Network Systems. Thatâ€™s the same company that brings us DirecTV.

DirecPC allows you to access the Internet at speeds up to 400 Kbps through one of those cute little 18-inch satellite dishes. Service starts at $30 per month, but access is limited and you still need a modem because the dish only receives - it doesnâ€™t send. So any upstream transmission, such as sending e-mail, is done through the phone. Surf on over to www.direcpc.com for all the info.

Also, AT&T is introducing local wireless service for home users in which the phone signal is beamed to your house, not carried through a physical wire. High-speed Internet access is included in this service, so maybe you can keep an eye out for that. It is not offered in many neighborhoods yet.

The Dallas Morning News: Jay Carr