Research before you buy

The next time you plan to buy something (PC, digital camera, TV, etc), don't rely solely on the advice given by the salesperson. After all, it's their job to sell stuff, not to impart knowledge. Instead, get onto the Internet and look for realworld advice from specialist websites, blogs and forums (if you don't know where to start, just type in the product name in Google or any other online search engine). And if you're really careful, you can even find out about potential problems with the products — simply type the product's name followed by the words "problem," "faulty" or "not working" in any online search engine to find user discussion groups or official knowledge-based websites.

Speed up Windows XP

Windows XP keeps a record of all files on the hard disk and will regularly index them to improve search speeds by default. Unfortunately, this can sometimes lead to slower system performance. If you don't use the file search feature very much, or can live with slightly slower file searches, you can disable XP's indexing feature.
Open My Computer, right-click on one of your hard disk icons, then select properties. Uncheck the box next to "Allow indexing service to index this disk for faster searches," then click on Apply. A new window will pop up asking if you want to apply changes to all folders and subfolders. Click OK.