Announcements

 We Have Mice!

They’re back!

We weren't expecting to get any more of these, but when our supplier contacted us and said he had more, we jumped on 'em! The first time we had these, we sold 300 of these by 2:30 PM EST. So, we ordered 400 and ran this again. That time, we sold out by 11:30AM EST! The last time, we only had 130 and they were gone within 2 hours of sending the newsletter!

Well, we've purchased another batch of these - probably the very last batch - and they're up for grabs. Note that this time we only have around 200, so if you're interested you'd better jump on this last chance ASAP!

Isn't that cool? Want one too? Well, we made a special purchase and have 'em in stock!

How much? Well, as you know, a good optical mouse will normally cost you anywhere from $25.00- $50.00. Well, how about an optical mouse for only $14.97?! And yes, US shipping is still FREE!

Now, don't go thinking this is some junky little rodent. This is just as good as any Logitech or MS mouse I've played with. In fact, I was using a Logitech mouse, but found that I liked the feel of this one better.

Oh, and yes, in addition to being an optical mouse, it's also a wheel mouse. If you're still using a wheel-less mouse, now's your chance to upgrade. Trust me, once you have one of those wheels, you'll never (ever) want to go back.

Since it's optical, it tracks along your screen very smoothly - no more bouncing around or getting stuck. Oh, and since it doesn't have a ball, you don't have to worry about cleaning out dirt and grim from its nasty little innards!

So, if you're still using an outdated non-optical mouse - or worse, one without a (gasp) scroll wheel - this is an offer you should jump on. Trust me - you'll enjoy your computing experience a whole lot more with a quality mouse :-) Here's the link:

http://www.worldstart.com/store/optical-mouse.htm

And don't worry - this still has our 30 day satisfaction guarantee - if you're not happy with it, send it back for a fast, courteous refund! Nothing to lose, but for $14.97 these are not going to last!

Computers 101

Q:
I was burning a CD-R the other day and got a "buffer underrun" error. The CD was useless and I had to start over. What causes that?

A:
The short version: Your computer didn't send information to the CD-R fast enough.

The long version: CD-R drives put information from your hard drive into a "buffer" (i.e. memory area) before they write (copy) it to the CD. The idea behind a buffer is to maintain a steady flow of information to the unit.

When you burn a CD, it's done on the fly. The CD-R drive tries to keep its buffer full (or close to it) at all times. As long as there is information in the buffer, the CD-R drive can write to the CD.

If the buffer gets emptied out and not refilled (usually due to the computer being busy with something else) the CD-R drive has nothing to write to the CD that's spinning inside of it. Unfortunately, a CD has to have information on every section that's written, so you end up with the buffer underrun error and (in most cases) a CD-R disk that's as worthless as a 286.

To help prevent this problem, don't mess with your computer while it's writing to a CD (you may want to disable your screen saver too).

~ Steve

Have a question for the newsletter? Submit it at the link below:
http://www.worldstart.com/submitquestion.htm

Tip of the Day

E-mails are a few of my favorite things...

Have you ever been surfing the web and had a sudden urge to send an e-mail to someone? Maybe you just stumbled upon a really cool page or some awesome information that you just gotta share.

Whatever the reason, wouldn't it be cool if you could compose an e-mail without launching Outlook Express, fiddling around in the address book, then finally starting the message?

Well, where's there's a geek, there's a way!

Here's the newest idea I had. Why not put the people you frequently send e-mail to on your Favorites menu? That way, if you see something you need to tell them about while surfin', you can click their name in the Favorites menu. Outlook Express will start a new message already addressed to them and all you need to do is put in a subject and a message. I know you’re saying, “Whoa, Steve, you’re getting crazy… E-mail addresses as a Favorite?!?”

Well, check this out:

First, Internet Exploder, err, I mean, Internet Explorer is not really designed for this trick, so you'll need to add e-mail address to it in a round about way:

1. First, start Internet Explorer, hit the Favorites menu, Add to Favorites. Don't worry about the address, we just need to create a new favorite.

2. Now, name the favorite with the person's name. If you were going to add my address, you would type "Steve" in the description box.

3. Hit OK. Now, we need to adjust that "Steve" favorite so points to my e-mail address and not to whatever page to which it's currently assigned. So, hit your Favorites menu, and right-click the "Steve" favorite, then select Properties from the resulting menu.

4. A nifty little screen will pop-up. Where it says "URL," delete everything in that box and change it to: mailto:steve@worldstart.com

Hit OK and you're finished. Follow the same procedure for any address you want to add, just replace the "steve@worldstart.com" part after the "mailto:" with the proper address.

Cool huh?

~ Steve

Have a tip for the newsletter? Submit it below:
http://www.worldstart.com/writers-guidelines/index.htm

Amanda's Cool Site of the Day

Freeze - A New Degree of Free

Welcome to Freeze - a site full of coupons, free stuff, screen savers, fonts, and more. They have a lot of categories at Freeze. From Business to Webmasters Tools, you’ll enjoy browsing through these freebies.

I especially loved their Autumn screen saver. Fill out their survey, input your e-mail address, and you are on your way. A fun, free site. Enjoy!

http://www.freeze.com

Do you have a cool, non-commercial site that you want to share?
Send it to Amanda at amanda@worldstart.com