By October 1 we were parked at our 'home' park, Paradise Island in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. Our next rally is the Datastorm Users rally in Tampa, Florida Nov 9-15. And,we will be doing another of our Post-Rally Computer Boot Camps.

While we're parked here, Jim is 'work camping' in the office and I am spending time 'sharpening the saw.' I'm working on the website. Learning more about WordPress and making better use of our WiFiSavvy.com to make all our articles searchable by category or tagged keywords. We've also decided to graduate to a new software, Camtasia, for making our tutorial videos. The 'zoom in and out' feature allows me to make smaller videos for the web and still allow you to read the small print. And, I'm working on getting www.GeeksOnTour.com a little more organized. And, of course, we did go kayak diving!

In this newsletter

• What's different in Picasa 3?
• How to make Vista Better
• Did you know?

What's Different in Picasa 3?

I am currently working on a series of new tutorial videos on Picasa 3. But the old videos will stay in place because they are still valid. The features that existed in Picasa2 are still there and work pretty much the same, even though the button may look different.

When you edit a photo, in Picasa2 you see the buttons on the left below. In Picasa 3 the buttons are shown on the right. Notice that all the buttons on the left are also on the right, just in a different layout. The difference is that there are 2 new buttons, "Retouch", and "Text." These two new features are a wonderful reason to upgrade to Picasa 3. And, you don't have to worry. Everything you already know will still work. For a complete overview of Picasa 3, watch this month's free featured video on GeeksOnTour.com - Picasa 3 Overview.

The buttons on the bottom are also basically the same with a couple new ones added. Here's Picasa 2:

In Picasa 3, they look a little different and there are more. Web Album has become 'Upload', 'Order Prints' has become 'Shop.' The 2 new buttons are 'Movie' and 'Geotag.'

A lot of people have asked me if it is safe to upgrade to Picasa 3 since it is a 'Beta' version. I believe it is. I've been using it for a couple months now and have had no problem. Most people think of the term 'Beta' as a software development stage where the software company releases the product privately to a few named people who agree to test it. Picasa 3 has been released as a 'Public' Beta. This means that Google thinks it's safe for the public to use, but there might be some situations where the fancier stuff will have some problems.

Are you a Member of the Geeks on Tour classroom (GOT Class?) Join today so you can learn from all the 'Show Me How' tutorial videos. It's only $39 for a whole year of access to over 100 videos. And, you'll be able to ask questions in the Class Q&A Forum as well.

Making Vista Better

Although we do think those 'I'm a Mac / I'm a PC' ads are brilliant and hilarious, we also think they've gone too far in giving Vista a bad rap. Every new operating system has it's problems. People groaned about Windows XP when it first came out, but the sheer number of people using computers has risen exponentially since then, so we're hearing a lot more groaning now.

We think Vista is a good operating system. It does have it's problems, but they're normal. XP was criticized for being too vulnerable to attack. Vista addressed that problem by adding a LOT more security. Now Vista is condemned for being too cumbersome due to the security.

One thing that is very true about Vista is that it is a resource hog! My computer came with 2 Gigabytes of RAM memory and I was definitely grumbling about Vista. Jim upgraded it to 4 Gigabytes of RAM and it erased 90% of my complaints.

We bought the RAM memory chips online at Kingston.com. You'll need to know your computer's make and model in order to get the right memory module. We paid $30 each for 1 Gigabyte modules. Then you can install the memory yourself. For $60 I got a *much* better computer. To show you how to install the memory (its' really quite easy), I found this video on Youtube. There are plenty more, just Google for 'install memory on laptop.'

There are lots of tutorial videos about the new features of Vista on Vista: What's New page. Some of these are free, like the "#1 Favorite Feature" video. For others, you need to be a member.

Did you know?

When you start filling in a form on the web, it displays a list of choices from times that you've typed something similar. Many a time, I've selected one of the options that looked good, only to be locked out because the selection actually had a typo that I didn't notice. Did you know that you can remove that erroneous option from the list by pointing to it and pressing the Delete key?

That's all for now. Thanks for reading. Your next issue will be next month. Any questions, please email us. If you like this newsletter, please forward it on to your friends! If you received this issue forwarded by a friend you can subscribe to get your own copy delivered to your in box - it's free. To see the archives of past newsletters, go to www.geeksontour.com/newsletters.

Chris Guld
www.GeeksOnTour.com