Question: Having recently returned home from school I dug out my three-year-old Gateway Desktop PC and installed Windows XP on it. However, soon after the installation I noticed that the clock was slow by about 20 minutes, I adjusted it to the correct time but since then I have had to reset it again a few times as it continually runs slow. I have all my Windows Updates and I keep a virus checker up to date as well, but it is really annoying that the clock doesn't keep the correct time. I also wonder what's causing this and if it's a sign of something going wrong with the computer?

Answer: The reason that the clock on your computer is running slow and will no longer keep time is very likely that you have a rundown CMOS battery. CMOS stands for complementary metal oxide semiconductor. CMOS chips need relatively little power and function to provide the small amount of memory needed to hold the date, time, and system setup parameters even when your computer is not plugged in.

If you open up the computer and look on the motherboard, that's the largest circuit board that all the other smaller boards are clipped onto at right angles, you'll see a round silver watch-type battery clipped into a holder somewhere there.

As with any other battery sooner or later it has to be replaced, especially if the computer has been out of use at some point.

Make a note of the number on the battery and get a new one in town at a watch repair shop or at Radio Shack but don't pull the battery out of its holder just yet.

Removing the battery to replace it will in all likelihood completely wipe your BIOS settings and they'll reset to the default positions.

The BIOS settings are the ones you see briefly when you first turn on the computer before Windows logs on.

Before you carry out the otherwise simple maintenance task of changing the battery make a note of your BIOS settings by writing them down so you can set them back again after the new battery is in place.

Once you've carried out the replacement and you're back to your Windows desktop, if you're using Windows XP, you can set the clock to synchronise with an atomic clock on the Internet. Here's how; Go to Start / Settings / Date and Time.

On the Date and Time Properties screen there are three tabs, on the Date & Time tab, set the date and time.

On the Time Zone tab set the Time Zone to Atlantic Time (Canada), that's us too. On the final tab, Internet Time, put a tick in the 'automatically synchronise with an Internet time server' box. Go online and click on the Update Now button and your PC will be the most accurate timepiece in your house at least for a while.

Question: I'm always trying to find ways to block spam e-mail on my computer at home. My e-mail client is Outlook Express 6. Recently I read your article about how to change the default setting in OE6 to stop it from preventing attachments to e-mails being received, even legitimate ones. I wondered whether my OE6 was currently allowing me to receive attachments and so I sent myself an email which included one.

When I pressed Send and Receive the email went out OK, almost immediately the tone sounded to indicate that I had received e-mail but nothing appeared in my Inbox.

However, I looked in my Deleted items box and there it was.

Apparently at some point I must have added my own address to the blocked sender's list! Please tell me there is some way to edit that list and remove my name.

Answer: Don't worry, redemption is at hand, this is an easy one to fix.

In the main Outlook Express toolbar at the top click on Tools, Message Rules, Blocked Senders List.

When you find the tab labelled Blocked Senders, scroll down the list of addresses you have already decided you no longer wish to receive e-mails from, find the address you want to unblock, highlight it by clicking on the actual address, click on the Remove button, a box will come up saying 'are you sure you want to remove the sender?' Click on the 'Yes' button and click OK.

Question: Several times every week I need to take data files prepared on my office computer to my home computer to work on. Our company computer policy does not permit employees to e-mail documents even to ourselves at home.

However, they have no objection to removable media being used but the only option seems to be CD-R's. I wondered if there were any easier way to regularly take a couple of spreadsheets and Word documents back and forth?

Answer: There are many ways to move a relatively small amount of information back and forth between computers. Nowadays e-mail is the obvious answer but in your case that has been ruled out. I wish you had told me more about the hardware on both of the computers you wish to transfer the data between since I don't know what kind of recordable drives are available to you.

If it's really the small amount of information that you described in your question then maybe it will fit onto a couple of old-fashioned but ubiquitous, floppy disks.

For reliability the old 100MB Iomega Zip disks were hard to beat, however the later developments of 250mb and 750MB Zip drives don't seem to have really caught on, so unless you have already have Zip drives at both ends of your journey that probably won't work for you.

If you have a CD recorder at home you could carry a simple 700MB recordable CD back and forth and, providing you have a CD recorder on the PC at home, it would be a simple matter to update or create new disks. CD-RW's are even better as they are erasable so you could use the same one over and over.

I think recordable CDs are probably still the cheapest form of media for data storage and transfer, but that's what you're using now at work and you seem to want another option.

The coming thing and sure to supplant all the older technologies eventually are solid-state flash drives.

I've talked about these before. They need no independent power supply, are about the size of a disposable plastic cigarette lighter and plug into a USB port where they're recognised as a separate drive.

With modern operating systems they don't even need any specific driver and will be recognised for what they are as soon as you connect them.

I would love to own a large capacity one but the 2GB gigabyte flash drives are still a bit expensive.

However, that hasn't stopped them from selling in town for $1200 each.

If that price puts you off you can get them in much smaller capacities for a fraction of that price and that might be the answer to your question.

At PC Parts on Church Street you can even buy a very sporty USB flash drive unit with a 128MB storage capacity built into a very reasonably priced wristwatch.

If you don't mind being correctly identified as a geek while you're wearing this wristwatch, you can plug it directly into any USB port, download or upload your information and it will allow you to carry back and forth the equivalent of 88 floppy discs worth of data. Amazing.

Whatever method or device you end up using make sure that you don't transfer a virus from your home to your work system or vice versa.

One last thing, this week's Straight Talk About Computers should prove to those who might think otherwise, that I can get through a whole column without once mentioning the word 'spyware'!

James W. Lapsley of ComputerWorks, specializes in PC repairs, upgrades and advice for the home and small office user. ComputerWorks welcomes your questions and comments. Send your PC questions by e-mail to computerworks@logic.bm or by phone to 293-0992.

Copyright 2004 James W. Lapsley