Many of you have probably encountered a situation where your antivirus software, against your better judgment, thought this file or that download was some sort of nasty infection. This tends to happen to me frequently with certain kinds of Windows utilities.

The reality however is that there really are lots, and lots, and lots of actual threats out there so any warning from your antivirus program should at very least make you step back and reassess what it is you're downloading or executing.

Mary Landesman, the About.com Guide to Antivirus Software, has a great piece on this that I'm sure you'll find helpful:

Six Easy Ways to Tell if a Virus Really is a Virus

From OldDogNewPC (nice handle) in the PC Support Forum:

"I had been successfully using a 19" Optiquest LED plugged in to an older laptop (HP, running Win XP, AMD Athlon) when I heard a sort of 'click' and my secondary (Optiquest) monitor went black. Power light was/is still on but screen is dark."

OldDogNewPC continues with lots of really great troubleshooting but just can't figure this one out. Any thoughts? Head over to the forum post and teach this old dog some new tricks.

I ate my last turkey sandwich yesterday but Keith Ward, the About.com Guide to Windows, has a few more turkeys you can feast on:

"I'm speaking, of course, about lousy software products -- half-baked ideas that should have never made it off of the drawing board. Microsoft has spawned a number of these fowl creatures over the years, and in honor of Thanksgiving, we hereby present this list of memorable Microsoft turkeys on which to feast yourself."

You can even add your own favorite Microsoft Turkey:

7 Microsoft Turkeys

I received this email a few days ago from M Kendrick:

"Hi Tim - quick question. I can't find BIOS anywhere. I know I need to open it to change how my computer looks at my DVD drive but I can't find the program anywhere. Is there something I need to type to open it? I had to do that once with another program I had. Can you help??"

and here's what I told him:

"M, BIOS isn't actually a "program" in the typical sense. It's not located inside Windows at all. In fact, you don't even have to have an operating system installed to use BIOS. BIOS is actually software that's stored in a chip on your motherboard and you can access it immediately after your computer turns on. Here's some more info: How to Access BIOS."

Confusions about what BIOS is and how to get to it are common among computer users that haven't yet had the opportunity to work with PC hardware.

Anyone else have any other questions about BIOS?