Nigel Powell
Win tickets to the ATP finals
Q Is there a simple computer program that can remind me of important things each day?
LM, London
A You have two main options, the first of which is to sign up for a free, web-based calendar service, such as the excellent Google Calendar. With this, once you have entered the details of any upcoming appointments online, it will remind you as these events approach, and will do so at the interval of your choosing. You can set these reminders to appear in the form of a pop-up box within the calendar itself, as e-mails, or even as SMS texts on a mobile phone, if that’s more convenient.
The alternative is to use a piece of software installed on your computer to do the same job. If you don’t have a calendar feature in the software that’s already on your PC, such as Microsoft Outlook, you can easily add one. Try the basic, but very effective ToDo Reminder, which is available free from bit.ly/13yypG.
Q On some websites there is no icon to print out a page, so what is the best way to do this?
BK, Bromley, Kent
A Many websites have a link that will reformat the page you are viewing into a version more suited to being printed. On those that don’t, simply select the Print function within the File menu (if you select File, then Print Preview, you can see what the page will look like first). Alternatively, you can highlight the web-page text that you want, then copy and paste it into a word-processing program, although the results may not look great. If you use the superb Firefox browser (free at www.getfirefox.com) add the ScrapBook plug-in, as this makes it easy to copy web pages for offline viewing or printing.
Q My 15-month-old TV has a fault. The retailer I bought it from wants me to pay for any repairs, as it is out of warranty. However, I’ve heard that new European Union legislation has extended the guarantee on electronic items beyond 12 months. Is this true?
JM, Surrey
A Not exactly, but you may well still have a case. The UK Sale of Goods Act was indeed amended by an EU directive that came into force in 2003. This introduced new remedies for consumers who purchased goods (of any type) that proved not to be “of satisfactory quality”. Your claim would be on the reasonable grounds that a television should last longer than 15 months. Bring this to the attention of the retailer and ask for a repair, a replacement, or maybe just a partial refund. Read more at this legal-advice website: tinyurl.com/npctlj.
E-mail your technical queries to dontpanic@sunday-times.co.uk
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