FAQS! FACTS! FAX! 060 (27/05/97)

TREE SCANNER?

I have acquired an American software programme by Broderbund called 'Family

Tree Maker', to help me put my family history in some sort of order.  I would like to include some of the many photographs I have collected --mainly black & white or 'sepia' often on stiff card -- and copies of original letters etc.  Frequent visits to my local computer store are proving expensive and I wonder whether to purchase my own scanner. Our computer is an Apricot P75 with 8Mb of RAM.

B C.

A

The cost of flatbed colour scanners -- which look like small photocopiers -- has tumbled over the past couple of years and there are now some very good ones on the market, selling for less than £200. Cheaper hand-held scanners are more difficult to use and now virtually obsolete. There are a few points to watch out for. Firstly the type of interface, there are two sorts: SCSI (small computer system interface) and parallel port. You will need to open up your machine and fit a plug-in card into a spare expansion slot with an SCSI scanner. Parallel port scanners are usually a little easier to install, they just plug into the printer socket; there’s usually a pass-through socket on the scanner, so you can continue to use the printer. This type normally has a separate mains adaptor or supply.

Aim for an ‘optical’ resolution of at least 600 x 300 dpi (dots per inch). You will probably see ‘interpolated’ resolution figures of several thousand dpi. Treat them with caution, it’s basically a software trick, that uses guesswork to fill in the gaps between the dots that make up the image. Scanners are very demanding of a PC and you may find things happen quite slowly on your machine, at the very least you should think about doubling or quadrupling the size of your PC’s RAM

NET PHOBIA

Recently I downloaded a file from the Internet. When I came to open it my computer warned me that if I did so, I was exposing my PC to the risk of virus infection. How else can I tell if files that I get from the Internet are free of viruses?

Richard R Dolphin

A

Unfortunately there is no way of being one hundred per cent certain a file you’ve downloaded isn’t infected. Even the best virus checker is only as good as its library of known viruses and programming techniques, and that can never be completely up to date. You were lucky. However, whilst your experience clearly demonstrates that the risk exists, it’s nowhere near as prevalent as some newspaper stories would have you believe. Provided you continue to take sensible precautions, and only download files from reputable sites, you should be reasonably safe. 

ECONOMY DRIVE?

The hard disc drive on my Apple Performa 630 is rapidly approaching saturation point. Is it possible to replace it with a large IDE type hard drive, which would work out considerably cheaper than the Apple upgrade?

Bill Hedley, Sanderstead

A

In theory yes. Some Apple PCs -- notably the economy models -- do support IDE disc drive systems, but a number of compatibility problems have been reported. These include slow operation, restricted disk capacity, or that the machine simply doesn’t recognise the drive. It is far better to stick with Apple approved upgrades. Moreover the SCSI system is faster than IDE and generally very reliable. If you ‘chain’ a second SCSI drive, rather than simply replace the one you’re using, you will also be able to start from either hard drive, which could prove useful if one of them developed a fault.   

GETTING ORGANISED

What do you think about those pocket-sized ‘electronic’ telephone directories sold in the mail-order catalogues, that come with one’s newspaper; they all look a little fragile to me?  The moth-eaten address book I have been using since the year dot has now reached the end of its useful life. I don’t want an all-singing, all dancing model, just something that will keep all of my addresses and phone numbers.

David Lamont, Bordon, Hants.

A

Some of them are remarkably well-specified, able to hold hundreds or even thousands of names, addresses and phone numbers. You can get them with built-in calculators, currency-converters, alarms and expense managers. However, if you’re asking, would any of them survive a drop onto a hard-surface, or being trodden on, then the answer has to be, probably not. They’re handy little gadgets but clearly it would be unwise to entrust all of your personal records to one. They’re easily lost or stolen, they break down, and once that happens there’s usually no way to retrieve the data, unlike your presumably still readable low-tech address book. If you’re going to get one then make sure it has PC connectivity or some means of downloading data to a removable memory module or second databank, for safekeeping.