Thanks everyone. The more I learn the more uncertain I am. The Asus' sound good - and I know Raven loves hers - but when I look at the negative reviews (on varous sites), there seems to be significant quality control issues. Lots of lemons - and defects - and terrible cusotmer service. There's enough of that type of review that I hesitate to buy an Asus tablet. I saw a google nexus 10. I prefer it to have a microsd card slot - not have fixed storage like an ipad. It also just did not feel or look good to me. Genes - you may be right about not finding that kind of battery life for video play. I thought that ipads were (at least older generations) got 9-10 hours of video play. On the one hand, i would expect video to be one of the biggest battery drains. But perhaps surfing the web - downloading content, etc also consumes battery life. Urlee - I interpreted that quote about really killing the tablet - and what battery life it gets - to suggest that even using it to the max - he gets 6 hours - and thinks "regular?" use could get 10 hours. Of course, we don't know what "regular is". That kind of leaves the Samsung tablets - either galaxy tab 10.1 - or Note. The actual pen aspect of the note doesn't do anything for me (maybe I'd wind up loving it - but it's not on my list of desireable features). I just saw a refurbished note at Best Buy for about $330 (something like that - I had a small credit - and there was tax). 500-600. They're often closer to $So I decided to order it and give it a try. It's supposed to be fast - 2GB ram - with ICS. I have not seen one in person. This has just 16GB on board storage - but with a micro sd slot, that doesn't matter since I can add 64GB more. For some reason, this Note doesn't excite me in theory the way the Asus tablets did. But the relatively large number of complaints (and consistent complaints) on Asus have made me pause. Mike - I am aware that many international flights have power ports. But we have not been that lucky in our last international flights. These flights have been booked through an educational tour group - and therefore the airline has been very reluctant to give us any information. I know we're in a Boeing 777. But from Seat Guru it looks like there are 5 different versions. And the one that looks closest to the seating chart on Delta's website - does not have power ports in economy. One seating chart looked like it might. Another suggested just ipod/iphone charging in economy - no tablets or laptops. But none of the charts on seat guru quite match what's on Delta. If there were power ports, that would make this easy. But my experience is, don't count on power ports. First - they may not be in economy. And if they are, they may not be at every seat. And even if they're there, doesn't mean they're working. (Heck - 2 of the last 4 domestic flights I took - the readling light for my seat was not working - and the flights were full - no reading for me (this was before i had the Nook). If I could really count on power ports that work - I'd just bring my nook tablet for now. But it's been acting up in terms of battery drain lately - and I don't want to risk this as my only entertainment. I'll keep everyone posted. Thanks. Lynn.

good work! glad you got it all back to normal. and you are very welcome. remember that not just the pc has to be plugged into a surge protector, the router. modem, and telephone line if one is used or the cable itself if cable is used, the one I have has places to plug in a phone line, cable line, all the stuff that has to get plugged in to make the pc work, which is nice so when the weather gets bad I only have one switch to hit and one plug to unplug from the wall. Phone lines /dsl lines are great conductors for lightening. You can have a whole house surge protector added right at your service panel where your breakers are which is really nice.

Duhh...I realized my PC laptop was sitting just a foot or so away... First, I'm assuming Vista and NT aren't that different, which may be a mistake, but... 1) click START at lower left of screen 2) click on CONTROL PANEL 3) click on APPEARANCE AND THEMES 4) click on CHANGE THE SCREEN RESOLUTION 5) Under "Display", check that your monitor is listed -- select it. 6) Under that, move the slider toward MORE RESOLUTION. Also, check the COLOR QUALITY -- maximize that to whatever is listed. 7) Click OK, close APPEARANCE AND THEMES, and you should be good to go.

Amen to that, Elmer! There were certainly a lot of suggestions I found that I needed to weed out what might be useful and what not, but felt I was in over my head. However, desperation can make us try things that maybe we shouldn't. The return of the blurring of every picture in my computer, in addition to the ever-present font blurring, may ironically have been brought on by something I did, trying to fix things. By the way, I didn't get back to answering you before, but my computer is about 4 years old, whereas the tricky monitor may be 7 or 8. I know the monitor's age because when we bought my present PC, my husband (not needing the space I do for music and pictures) got my old one, bought in 2010, but I kept the monitor that had come with it. We got a new, much bigger one for him for his bad vision. I wonder, what is the average life of a hard-worked monitor? Andi: I am so pleased that my troubles ended up helping you solve yours! My husband has twisted eye nerves and glaucoma and his sight has been slowly declining for years; he uses a magnifying glass to read books now. I am so sorry you are suffering from macular degeneration; that is a horrible thing to have to cope with, and I hope you will be able to keep enjoying your computer for a long time to come. Rose: No worry, I can see the screen just fine now, without the distraction of those shadows. In youth, I had better than 20/20 vision. Now it's hard to thread needles and I need glasses to read the running news notices at the bottom of the TV (admittedly, it is the smallest Samsung we could find), as well as to drive and read signs, but not for computer things... Though if you see me at a distance on the street or in a store, don't be surprised if I don't recognize you until we get closer! Having reached 80, I am not complaining, so long as the rheumatism allows me to keep walking. A shout-out to everyone here who is standing up against the indignities and inconveniences of age! It was encouraging to know there are some other elderlies, as a foreign friend once called us, still keeping their joy in life. And to any young whippersnappers, you'd better hope you will be where we are one day, indignities and all, the alternative being.....you know! :-]