Joel McNamara Learn to: • Compare features of these small, ultraportable computers to pick the one that works best for you • Set up a netbook and explore free online and downloadable applications • Play games, watch videos, and listen to music on the go with your netbook • Surf the Web and work online from almost anywhere Netbooks Making Everything Easier! ™ Open the book and find: • What to compare when choosing a netbook • The different operating systems that run on netbooks • The differences between netbooks and traditional laptops • Tips for making batteries last longer • The best accessories for your netbook • How to keep your netbook running smoothly — and quickly • GPS units that work well with your netbook Joel McNamara has been a computer aficionado since the dawn of the PC. He has served as a developer, technical writer, and manager in various high-tech companies. The author of GPS For Dummies and Secrets of Computer Espionage: Tactics & Countermeasures, he might be considered a Renaissance geek. Computers/Hardware/General $24.99 US / $29.99 CN / £17.99 UK ISBN 978-0-470-52123-6 Go to Dummies.com ® for videos, step-by-step examples, how-to articles, or to shop! Want to streamline your life with a netbook? Here’s what you need to know! What’s smaller than a laptop, bigger than a cell phone, and keeps you connected? It’s the netbook, and this “real” book tells you how to pick the right one; use it for work, school, and play; and add bells, whistles, and anything else you might need. The book also covers all the operating systems that run on netbooks, including Linux ® , Google ™ Chrome, Windows ® XP, Windows Vista ® , and even Windows ® 7. • Out of the box — set up your netbook, charge the battery, and sync it with your primary computer • Get connected — via Wi-Fi, 3G networks, Bluetooth ® , or Ethernet • Do some work — explore Microsoft ® Works, OpenOffice.org®, Google Apps™, and Zoho® productivity suites • Play time — discover free Internet radio, streaming video, and games you can play on your netbook • Keep up with your peeps — tweet and IM, keep up with Facebook friends, and make Skype phone calls • Even netbooks like accessories — check out ways to expand storage, protect your netbook with a case, and add a mouse • Safety first — find quality antivirus programs, firewalls, and encryption options • The maintenance mantra — learn about backing up and restoring your netbook, troubleshooting, and managing battery life Netbooks McNamara Spine =.76” Start with FREE Cheat Sheets Cheat Sheets include • Checklists • Charts • Common Instructions • And Other Good Stuff! Get Smart at Dummies.com Dummies.com makes your life easier with 1,000s of answers on everything from removing wallpaper to using the latest version of Windows. Check out our • Videos • Illustrated Articles • Step-by-Step Instructions Plus, each month you can win valuable prizes by entering our Dummies.com sweepstakes. * Want a weekly dose of Dummies? Sign up for Newsletters on • Digital Photography • Microsoft Windows & Office • Personal Finance & Investing • Health & Wellness • Computing, iPods & Cell Phones • eBay • Internet • Food, Home & Garden Find out “HOW” at Dummies.com *Sweepstakes not currently available in all countries; visit Dummies.com for official rules. Get More and Do More at Dummies.com ® To access the Cheat Sheet created specifically for this book, go to www.dummies.com/cheatsheet/netbooks Spine =.76” Netbooks FOR DUMmIES ‰ 01 521236-ffirs.indd i01 521236-ffirs.indd i 9/18/09 10:38:25 PM9/18/09 10:38:25 PM 01 521236-ffirs.indd ii01 521236-ffirs.indd ii 9/18/09 10:38:25 PM9/18/09 10:38:25 PM by Joel McNamara Netbooks FOR DUMmIES ‰ 01 521236-ffirs.indd iii01 521236-ffirs.indd iii 9/18/09 10:38:25 PM9/18/09 10:38:25 PM Netbooks For Dummies ® Published by Wiley Publishing, Inc. 111 River Street Hoboken, NJ 07030-5774 www.wiley.com Copyright © 2010 by Wiley Publishing, Inc., Indianapolis, Indiana Published by Wiley Publishing, Inc., Indianapolis, Indiana Published simultaneously in Canada No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, scanning or otherwise, except as permit- ted under Sections 107 or 108 of the 1976 United States Copyright Act, without either the prior written permission of the Publisher, or authorization through payment of the appropriate per-copy fee to the Copyright Clearance Center, 222 Rosewood Drive, Danvers, MA 01923, (978) 750-8400, fax (978) 646-8600. Requests to the Publisher for permission should be addressed to the Permissions Department, John Wiley & Sons, Inc., 111 River Street, Hoboken, NJ 07030, (201) 748-6011, fax (201) 748-6008, or online at http:// www.wiley.com/go/permissions. Trademarks: Wiley, the Wiley Publishing logo, For Dummies, the Dummies Man logo, A Reference for the Rest of Us!, The Dummies Way, Dummies Daily, The Fun and Easy Way, Dummies.com, Making Everything Easier, and related trade dress are trademarks or registered trademarks of John Wiley & Sons, Inc. and/ or its af liates in the United States and other countries, and may not be used without written permission. All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners. Wiley Publishing, Inc., is not associated with any product or vendor mentioned in this book. LIMIT OF LIABILITY/DISCLAIMER OF WARRANTY: THE PUBLISHER AND THE AUTHOR MAKE NO REPRESENTATIONS OR WARRANTIES WITH RESPECT TO THE ACCURACY OR COMPLETENESS OF THE CONTENTS OF THIS WORK AND SPECIFICALLY DISCLAIM ALL WARRANTIES, INCLUDING WITH- OUT LIMITATION WARRANTIES OF FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. NO WARRANTY MAY BE CREATED OR EXTENDED BY SALES OR PROMOTIONAL MATERIALS. THE ADVICE AND STRATEGIES CONTAINED HEREIN MAY NOT BE SUITABLE FOR EVERY SITUATION. THIS WORK IS SOLD WITH THE UNDERSTANDING THAT THE PUBLISHER IS NOT ENGAGED IN RENDERING LEGAL, ACCOUNTING, OR OTHER PROFESSIONAL SERVICES. IF PROFESSIONAL ASSISTANCE IS REQUIRED, THE SERVICES OF A COMPETENT PROFESSIONAL PERSON SHOULD BE SOUGHT. NEITHER THE PUBLISHER NOR THE AUTHOR SHALL BE LIABLE FOR DAMAGES ARISING HEREFROM. THE FACT THAT AN ORGANIZA- TION OR WEBSITE IS REFERRED TO IN THIS WORK AS A CITATION AND/OR A POTENTIAL SOURCE OF FURTHER INFORMATION DOES NOT MEAN THAT THE AUTHOR OR THE PUBLISHER ENDORSES THE INFORMATION THE ORGANIZATION OR WEBSITE MAY PROVIDE OR RECOMMENDATIONS IT MAY MAKE. FURTHER, READERS SHOULD BE AWARE THAT INTERNET WEBSITES LISTED IN THIS WORK MAY HAVE CHANGED OR DISAPPEARED BETWEEN WHEN THIS WORK WAS WRITTEN AND WHEN IT IS READ. For general information on our other products and services, please contact our Customer Care Department within the U.S. at 877-762-2974, outside the U.S. at 317-572-3993, or fax 317-572-4002. For technical support, please visit www.wiley.com/techsupport. Wiley also publishes its books in a variety of electronic formats. Some content that appears in print may not be available in electronic books. Library of Congress Control Number: 2009935829 ISBN: 978-0-470-52123-6 Manufactured in the United States of America 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 01 521236-ffirs.indd iv01 521236-ffirs.indd iv 9/18/09 10:38:25 PM9/18/09 10:38:25 PM About the Author Joel McNamara started using computers in the early Cenozoic era of personal computing (1980 to be exact). If NorthStar Horizon, ARPANET, PDP-11, Kaypro, and Apple Lisa ring a bell (when dinosaurs roamed the earth), like in the movie Zelig, he was there. Over the years, Joel has worked as a programmer, techni- cal writer, and manager for a number of companies in the high-tech sector. Joel currently consults and writes on things he nds interesting. Living in an undisclosed location somewhere in the Paci c Northwest, he likes boats of all kinds and is fond of old-school technologies such as celestial navigation and Morse Code. Joel is also the author of ASUS Eee PC For Dummies, GPS For Dummies (1st and 2nd Editions), Geocaching For Dummies, and Secrets of Computer Espionage: Tactics & Countermeasures — all brought to you by Wiley Publishing, Inc. 01 521236-ffirs.indd v01 521236-ffirs.indd v 9/18/09 10:38:26 PM9/18/09 10:38:26 PM Start with FREE Cheat Sheets Cheat Sheets include • Checklists • Charts • Common Instructions • And Other Good Stuff! Get Smart at Dummies.com Dummies.com makes your life easier with 1,000s of answers on everything from removing wallpaper to using the latest version of Windows. Check out our • Videos • Illustrated Articles • Step-by-Step Instructions Plus, each month you can win valuable prizes by entering our Dummies.com sweepstakes. * Want a weekly dose of Dummies? Sign up for Newsletters on • Digital Photography • Microsoft Windows & Office • Personal Finance & Investing • Health & Wellness • Computing, iPods & Cell Phones • eBay • Internet • Food, Home & Garden Find out “HOW” at Dummies.com *Sweepstakes not currently available in all countries; visit Dummies.com for official rules. Get More and Do More at Dummies.com ® To access the Cheat Sheet created specifically for this book, go to www.dummies.com/cheatsheet/netbooks Spine =.76” 01 521236-ffirs.indd vi01 521236-ffirs.indd vi 9/18/09 10:38:26 PM9/18/09 10:38:26 PM Author’s Acknowledgments Thanks to ASUS and Dell for loaning me a few of their latest netbook models. And much gratitude to the talented folks at Wiley for transforming a collec- tion of ideas and words into a real, live book — speci cally acquisitions edi- tors Katie Mohr and Tiffany Ma, project editor Chris Morris, technical editor Jim Kelly, copy editor Virginia Sanders, and anyone else who was involved with this title that I didn’t have a chance to virtually meet. It’s always a plea- sure working with pros. 01 521236-ffirs.indd vii01 521236-ffirs.indd vii 9/18/09 10:38:26 PM9/18/09 10:38:26 PM [...]... 12 3 Music to My Ears 12 3 MP3 mania 12 4 Streaming audio 12 6 Viewing Videos 12 8 DVDs 12 8 Ripping movies 12 9 Streaming video 13 1 Shall We Play a Game? 13 4 Netbook limitations 13 4 Internet resources for netbook gamers 13 6 02 5 212 36-ftoc.indd xiii 9 /18 /09 10 :39 :16 PM xiv Netbooks For Dummies. .. Mouse GPS units 17 2 Bluetooth GPS 17 3 Selecting Map Software 17 5 Street maps 17 6 Topographic maps 17 7 Satellite images 17 9 Charts 18 0 Making the Connection 18 1 Protocols 18 1 Virtual serial ports 18 3 Putting it all together 18 3 02 5 212 36-ftoc.indd xiv 9 /18 /09 10 :39 :16 PM Table of Contents... .13 7 Keeping Viruses at Bay 13 8 Zapping Spyware 14 1 Ad-Aware Free 14 1 Spybot-S&D 14 1 CCleaner 14 1 Focusing on Firewalls 14 2 Windows Firewall 14 2 Firewall alternatives 14 3 Evading Evil (with Encryption) 14 4 Finding out about TrueCrypt 14 5 Creating a TrueCrypt volume 14 6 Opening a... Exchanging e-mail 10 1 Connecting remotely with Ultra VNC 10 2 Sharing files on a Windows network 10 5 Chapter 7: Netbooks at Work 10 9 Working with Microsoft Works 11 0 Managing Microsoft Office 11 2 Considering the OpenOffice Option 11 4 Going Online with Google Docs 11 7 Getting in the Zoho Zone 11 9 Chapter 8: Netbook... 15 8 Social Networking “Friend” Sites 15 9 Going inside Instant Messaging (IM) 16 2 IM networks 16 2 IM clients 16 3 IM basics 16 4 Getting the Scoop on Skype 16 5 Chapter 11 : Netbook Navigators 16 9 GPS in a Nutshell 17 0 Surveying GPS Receivers 17 0 Handheld GPS receivers 17 1 Mouse... 10 9 Chapter 8: Netbook Fun and Games 12 3 Chapter 9: Better Safe than Sorry: Security 13 7 Chapter 10 : Staying in Touch: Twitter, Social Networking, IM, and Skype 15 3 Chapter 11 : Netbook Navigators 16 9 Part III: Netbook Add-On Accessories and Hardware 18 5 Chapter 12 : Carrying Your Netbook 18 7 Chapter 13 : Powering Your Netbook 19 7 Chapter 14 : External... Accessories and Hardware 18 5 Chapter 12 : Carrying Your Netbook .18 7 Case in Point 18 8 Sleeves 18 8 Soft carrying cases 18 9 Hard cases 19 3 For the Do-It-Yourselfer 19 5 Sew it yourself 19 5 Modify an old planner 19 5 Wrap it in bubbles 19 5 Pad it with an envelope 19 6 Chapter 13 : Powering Your... screen savers 210 Use a wired Ethernet connection 210 Know what activities drain batteries 211 Single task 211 Chapter 14 : External Storage 213 SD (Secure Digital) Cards 213 Cavalcade of cards 215 Ins and outs 216 Formatting SD cards 216 Booting another operating system 217 USB Flash Drives... 21: BIOS Basics 307 Part V: The Part of Tens 317 Chapter 22: Top Ten Internet Netbook Resources 319 Chapter 23: Ten Cool Hardware Hacks 325 Index 335 02 5 212 36-ftoc.indd ix 9 /18 /09 10 :39 :16 PM 02 5 212 36-ftoc.indd x 9 /18 /09 10 :39 :16 PM Table of Contents Introduction 1 Who This Book Is For 2 Setting Some Expectations 2 How This Book... Netbooks 7 Chapter 1: Everything You Need to Know about Netbooks 9 Netbook Nuts and Bolts 10 Picking the Perfect Netbook 11 Getting Started with a New Netbook 14 Netbooks and Networks 15 Business or Pleasure 15 Business sense 16 Fun and games 16 Better safe than sorry 18 Going places 19 Accessorizing and . 5 212 36-ffirs.indd ii 9 /18 /09 10 :38:25 PM9 /18 /09 10 :38:25 PM by Joel McNamara Netbooks FOR DUMmIES ‰ 01 5 212 36-ffirs.indd iii 01 5 212 36-ffirs.indd iii 9 /18 /09 10 :38:25 PM9 /18 /09 10 :38:25 PM Netbooks For Dummies ® Published. 5 212 36-ftoc.indd ix 9 /18 /09 10 :39 :16 PM9 /18 /09 10 :39 :16 PM 02 5 212 36-ftoc.indd x02 5 212 36-ftoc.indd x 9 /18 /09 10 :39 :16 PM9 /18 /09 10 :39 :16 PM Table of Contents Introduction 1 Who This Book Is For 2 Setting. to www .dummies. com/cheatsheet/netbooks Spine =.76” Netbooks FOR DUMmIES ‰ 01 5 212 36-ffirs.indd i 01 5 212 36-ffirs.indd i 9 /18 /09 10 :38:25 PM9 /18 /09 10 :38:25 PM 01 5 212 36-ffirs.indd ii 01 5 212 36-ffirs.indd