PC ProSchools – TechTalk

Image: Salvatore Vuono / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

By David Adkins, former PC ProSchools Student and Help Desk Professional

I received a call today from a student. He was running into a problem installing Windows XP Professional on a Virtual Machine. When the Install reached the ELUA It required the user to hit F8 to accept. The Student proceeded to hit the F8 key on the laptop he was working on only to be met with disappointment that the Virtual did not accept the keystroke. Perplexed the student once again hit the F8 key. Again he was met with the same result. He was not about to let a simple thing like hitting a simple key keep him from installing the Operating System. Just to make sure he hit the F8 one last time. Nothing! The other option was to hit the escape key to return to the last screen. He hit the key and the virtual machine responded by returning to the previous screen as it was meant to. “What the Heck?” he asked himself. Why would it be that the program would recognize all my keystrokes up to that point? He wondered. Well at risk of feeling disappointed again he returned to the ELUA screen and hit the F8 key one more time. Again nothing! Well I’ll call Helpdesk at PC ProSchools for assistance.

I received the message about his problem and called him back. After he went through his frustrating experience with this process, I began to wonder my self. “Was the machine in the active window? He promptly responded to my question with “yes I made sure it was active.” This was defiantly a new problem to me, so I went to my favorite IT Tool, Google. There I found others with the same problem. Their solution was to hit the Function Key along with the F8. Once I instructed the student to try this he was very excited to report that he could now continue with the installation.

One thing I have learned from this job is that Google is hands down the best place to start with research problems.

Microsoft Outlook is used as an e-mail application. It can be used as a personal information manager because it includes a calendar, task manager, contact manager, note taking and web browser. As a Help Desk Professional, you may be called to fix problems with Outlook. Here is a list of problems and their solutions that you may find useful:

1. Microsoft Outlook Start Up Issues When you have trouble opening Outlook, you may have a start up issue. Microsoft provides you with common issues and their solutions.
2. How to reduce Outlook memory usage Outlook can start to get really slow and eat up a lot of memory after awhile. Help Desk Geek gives you 6 pointers to help make Outlook less of a memory hog.
3. Recovery Toolbox for Outlook Password When your users forget or loose their passwords for their Outlook mail account, you can use the Recovery Toolbox for Outlook Password to recover their passwords.
4. How to Manage Email Using Microsoft Outlook Rules Outlook allows you to manage your emails. Rules help you to organize and prioritize emails. You may need to troubleshoot this when a user can’t find their emails.
5. How to use the Inbox Repair Tools to recover email messages in Outlook When Outlook has a corrupted email messages, you can use the Inbox Repair Tools to fix the issue.
6. Fix “The add-in could not be installed or loaded” Outlook error message Outlook allows third party applications like Adobe and Google Desktop to install add-ins that enhance Outlook. Sometimes add-ins can cause problems in Outlook. Help Desk Geek walks you through two techniques for solving the error.
7. Troubleshoot 550, 553, and relay-prohibited errors When you send an email message and the email server fails to deliver the message, you may get an error. Microsoft helps you to troubleshoot common errors that can occur when the message fails to be delivered.

Bonus Tip

Cheat sheets or quick reference cards lists shortcuts and functions. Use a cheat sheet as a reference so that you work in Outlook faster.

Related Articles

• 7 Microsoft Word Tips For Help Desk
• Excel Tips For Help Desk

Infoworld.com posted the Top 11 Hot IT Skills for 2011. Help Desk/Technical Support and Networking are among the top 5 skills in demand. Gartner is predicts that there will be a shortage of IT professionals who can migrate companies to Windows 7.