No power to the PC? Here is a few tips before calling a computer technician.

  If you turn the power switch on and nothing happens, here is a simple process to determine if you need a professional to work on your computer. Keep in mind, this is for PC that have no power at all like no fans running, no lights or no activity at all. Sometimes people call me and tell me their computer has no power, when it's actually their windows OS not loading.

1. Make sure the power cable is plugged into an outlet.

2. Check the power cables connection to the back of the PC power supply.

3. Plug the power cable into a different working outlet.

4. Check to see if the power supply has an on/off switch and make sure it's placed on the On position.

5. If you have a spare power cable, replace it. Your monitor may use the game power cable, borrow it.

6. Call a professional PC technician, we are equipped with Power Supply Testers and can determine if it's your mother board, power supply or on/off button.

  Here at Exodus Technology Solutions, we do understand the costs of repair. Not just is our prices affordable, but if we can save you the call, we will provide information to remedy simple problems. Keep in mind if your power issue is involving a laptop, your battery or power jack may be the problem. Good luck and I hope this helps someome.

  PS: I would like to give a shout our to a few of our clients.

Lifescape Counseling LLC - Hypnotherapy and Psychotherapy in Garden City    Http://www.lifescapecounselingllc.com

Eric's Auto Service Center - Car and Truck Repair in Garden City                            Http://www.ericsautoservicecenter.com

Champion Martial Arts - Tae Kwon Do Family Center in Westland                          Http://www.champion-ma.com

Competitive Advantage Pro Shop - Bowling Balls/Services in Ann Arbor      Http://www.competitiveadvantageproshop.com

Photographic Visions - Christian Wedding Photography in Michigan                     Http://www.photographicvisions.biz

The Sikorski Law Firm - Bankruptcy Specialty Lawyers in Garden City                  Http://www.sikorskilawfirm.com

SEO Services With Customer Service Attatched

  I know it almost sounds unheard of, but it does exist. Many SEO firms charge an insane amount just to have a representative to speak with. Not like you get that agent from the lower packages either, you have to purchase the $1,000.00 a month or more accounts. Most professional page ranking firms have a top package that has that 1k to 1.5k a month rate. Obviously few companies could afford these costs and those ones usually receive high traffic volumes without SEO. No matter that your willing to pay for page ranking, you will never beat out certain companies. No matter my own firms talents are, we will never top Best Buy on search pages. So if your a small business, don't bother paying those costs when $100 - $400 packages would suit your need.

   Just because your whole business isn't internet based and you can afford 1k a month services, you still need SEO firms. Sure there is a lot you can do to help yourself, but real SEO takes more time and research then taxes. If time is money, then your still better off outsourcing this service. Granted there is many packages and firm who can increase your page rank for under $500, at least find one that will work with you. Many of my clients have never spoken with an SEO representative before and only get to a chart of how many hours a month they worked on your account. For all we know, they spent 3 hrs thinking of an article title that day. In fact, no one knows what forms of SEO or tactics they are using. If they only use one or two, that could hinder your site in the future. SEO is about diversifying the links and content. I personally use 5 or 6 tactics and have to research constantly.

   So shop around until you find reasonable prices with agents who will discuss your account and progress anytime you need. Most of Exodus Technology Solutions's SEO clients are charged $100.00 a month and get great customer service. If we offer this, all firms should be .

   Lastly, a shout to the Sikorski Law Firm. No other law firms charge only $1000.00 for bankruptcy and have payment plans. Visit them at http://www.sikorskilaw.com/ for more details.

 

Website Packages, good or bad?

   Welcome back to the Exodus Computer Blog. Today I want to discuss the pros and cons of web packages. I'm sure you see design firms who list 3-6 bundle options, each with a limit of pages and cost increases. Most of the time, the first package only includes 2 or 3 pages. That would make for a very plan site that you have no reason spending high costs for. Before you consider any package, you have some things to keep in mind.

   Here are some of the basic questions that you need to ask yourself before contacting a website designer.

1. Are you marketing a product? If you are, then you may need a shopping cart or multiple product pages. Or even a gallery showing everything you carry.

2. is your site meant to be more visual or display a marketing message? This could affect how the site is even built or how much text is the focus of the site.

3. How many tabs do you need? An about page? Product/services pages? Blogs? Contact us pages? Gallery or photos?

4. Do you already have most of the text ready for the site and how much text is needed on each page? This is very important for a lot of reasons. The more actually creative writing a company has to do, the more it will cost you. And you need to make sure your site text will have some keywords and full on useful information so help on the SEO side of things. If you have too much text for each product/service, you could drown out your message. More content is better, but it has to be managed properly and not condense too much into each page. A careful balance has to be obtained.

5. Does your site need to be edited often? If you have a site hard coded and built from scratch, you will need a programer to edit every aspect from text to photos. You will never be able to change anything yourself without help. Exodus Computer does prefer an easy to edit flash builder for some sites. Obviously, we can't do every site this way, but for basic business sites, it's a great option. This way the client can change colors, text, or photos with a few clicks.

   Now that we covered that much, you can see the most simple packages rarely fit your needs. How much will it cost you per additional page, to add links, to create site text and does that cost include keywords? It's not the first time that you expect a low cost package to cover your needs, but then have 10 things added to increase the costs. Try to plan out your site the best you can before contacting a design firm. Not all firms are either close enough or even willing to site down and help you plan your site. Packages are good for the programers so they have something to build off the initial costs, but can be deceiving to the clients.

   This is the pros to the packages and why you will prefer this option. The next best choice for design quotes is based off labor per hour. Even if you get a programer claiming $20 an hr, he could easily set the project to 50 hrs of work. It may only take him 30 hours, but you have no idea. There isn't really a standard for this either, they all work at different paces. The other pro is you know what your paying for with package rates. If you only need two pages (not usually a good option), then that package will cover most of the costs. Honestly, if your paying to have a site built, shop around, ask questions, and get the best looking one you can get for the cost. Otherwise, your buying a plain template filled in and it looks out of date. Might as well not have a site if no one wants to visit it.

 

  Thank you for reading another installment of  the Exodus Technology Solutions blog. I know that I haven't been posting nearly enough as of late due to our recent location change. For those of you who do not know, we moved over one building and now located at 29215 Ford Rd. Just one block East of Middlebelt and on the South side of Ford Rd.

  One of the many things I would like to discuss to day is some signs you can trust a repair business.

Usually, a legitimate company will try to give you a real idea of the cost before leaving the shop. It's one thing to find more issues and it ended up costing more, but that's a rarity overall. Most cases I find it's either what I expected it to be initially or something more simple. At least half the repairs don't require a part replacement and the cost is all labor based. If it's a laptop about 4 yrs old and the motherboard is bad, it may not be worth repairing. I don't mind informing a client that a PC repair costs is close to the worth of the PC itself. But that means I won't push a $300 repair on a client and so far, I have only had one repair cost more then $250 (upgraded 3 parts). These are just some examples of the real cost a client should be paying, not $100 onsite fees just to show up (then a diagnostic fee before we even get to the repair cost).

  This is a strange industry with few standards on experience, ethics and price competition. I do hold some respect for a few competitors, but there are plenty who prey on clients who have no computer education. Between Craigslist technicians who work from home (no standard, no ethics and you can't hold them accountable) and the family friend who fixes everyone's PC, you have no idea what your getting. Are they really experienced? Will they use legimate software? Can they find you the best prices? Will they warranty their own work? Are they really using new parts or old ones? What's the chances you will hear from them again after you pay them? At least with a business, you can hold them accountable for bad work (usually they care since word of mouth is how we advertise best). Plus we usually have manufacturers and distributors to find us lower part prices then you can find on your own.

  The larger companies are a different issue all together. Instead of just being a repair shop first, they are a store with marked up prices. They would prefer you to buy something new or spend a lot of money per repair. Geek Squad for instance, most repairs are not competitive price wise at all. They would offer expensive warranties that don't cover nearly what they make it sound like. Then it's a $150-$300 repair charge with most PCs and $100 onsite fee just to come to you. No promises on how long it will really take to fix it nor will the technician be truly qualified. Many of the big companies that are getting involved in the computer repair industry are not offering an affordable services for what they offer. Just because they have an established name and money, doesn't make them a good source for technology services. If they are a store first, it's a conflict of interest overall and they have to charge more because of the huge overhead costs. My company has low overhead, therefor I can charge much less per repair job. 

  This week, I made a point to price shop my competitors again. We try to shop them every few months or so for comparison and to see if our prices have impacted their  business. Wouldn't be the first time that we lower our prices and force the competition to do the same. One company located right by us was one of these competitors. They gave us 4 different prices on virus removal that ranged from $30-$100. This doesn't include anything they would add to the bill such as virus protection, data transferring or a diagnostic fee. Another business near us tried to tell us the only way to remove a virus was to reinstall the windows operating system. This can be true with some viruses, but not the one we mentioned. We remove the FBI moneypak virus every week and it stays gone without having to replace an OS. Just something to be careful about and don't take your PC anywhere that doesn't have some kind of warranty in place.

Printer is printing HTML code when printing from a website. Solutions here!

Here is a step by step process to eliminate this problem.

1. Print something to word pad to make sure this only happening when printing from the web.

2. Try this:

    Close any open programs

    Click Start --> Run

    Type: regsvr32 /i mshtml.dll

    Press Enter on your keyboard

    Click Start --> Run Type: regsvr32 /i shdocvw.dll

    Press Enter on your keyboard

3. Uninstall the drivers and software for the printer and then reinstall them. Most likely, the updated versions of this are on the companies website. HP and many brands let you download this directly from them and it's very safe.

4. Follow these instructions:

    Open IE7

    Click on Tools > Internet Options > Programs.

    Under Default Browser, click on Make Default button.

    Open www.google.com and open Print Preview. You should now see the web

    page instead of the HTML codes.

5. You can go into your using internet explorer, try this:

    Click on internet options

    Click on advanced

    Then click on Restore Advanced Options

6. Finally, if none of this works, uninstall your web browser and reinstall it. I've seen IE cause this before and this was the solution.

I hope this helps, I went through this process this week until I got to number 6. All of these work and have solved this problem for different cases. If you need any help, call 734-238-2169. Http://www.exodustechsolutions.com

An honorable mention of great companies local to the Garden City area.

Http://www.patrickspizzeria.com

Http://www.ericsautoservicecenter.com

Http://www.bestwaytransportationservices.com

Http://www.lifescapecounselingllc.com

Http://www.sikorskilaw.com

Http://www.photographicvisions.biz

Http://www.miprorestore.com

Http://www.champion-ma.com

Http://www.exodusconsolerepair.com

Thank you again for reading and sorry there is so many of these great business services links. All of these have my sign of approval. Exodus Technology Solutions blog will keep posting useful clients and PC repair advice.