“Giving advice to family and friends
about their PC problems over the phone isn’t easy. Soluto can help.”
Getting a phone call from my mum isn’t
unusual, but to get a call asking me to help her fix her laptop was a bolt out
of the blue. The surprise wasn’t that she asked me, it was that I thought she
never used her computer! I was wrong, but what she clearly hasn’t ever done is
taken the time to give her laptop a bit of TLC.
Soluto
is a program that would give you access to other's laptop
Her problem was that her laptop was running
really slowly and she was getting a message that 4oD (Channel 4’s on demand service)
couldn’t complete its download. Instantly I knew her hard drive was full, but I
wondered if it had a partition.
Unfortunately, as soon as I started to ask
her questions it was apparent that I was talking in another language. What I
needed was a program that would give me access to my mum’s laptop so I could
fix the problem. It would also need to be something that she could use. The
solution was a web-based service called Soluto.
Step-by-step: Help others with their PC
- Log in The
first step is to go to www.soluto.com.
You’ll need to sign up before you can use the service. If you have a Facebook
account, you can sign in using the same details, and it’s instant too. If
you’re not on Facebook then you can sign up using a valid email address.
You’ll need to activate your account by following the instructions
received in the email.
- Installation The next step is to download and install the software to your
PC. You can have up to five PCs listed here. Should you wish to have more
you can contact Soluto who may be able to help you. It’s also handy to
name the PC, especially if you have multiple computers. Now click
‘Download to this PC’. Soluto will take a few minutes to download and
install.
- Overview
Soluto’s interface is very simple and will be the same across any other
computer you use. Each machine is divided up into six main areas. These
include tools to help you delay programs that start when you turn on your
PC and find out of date programs and any potential problems with your
machine. On top of this you get an overview of your PC’s performance in a
handy timeline.
Soluto’s
interface is very simple and will be the same across any other computer you use
- Help someone To start helping a friend or relative, go back to your
account’s main page by clicking on the Soluto logo at the top of the page.
Below the area that shows you a list of your computers, you’ll see a
‘People I help’ window. Click on the ‘Add someone’ button on the
right-hand side and enter their email address into the field provided.
- Personal message Click the ‘Add this person;’ button. This will bring up a
small window with a short message addressed to the person whose PC you
want to access. You can edit the message should you wish to make it more
personal, which may be a good idea just in case they mistake it for junk
mail. Details are given within the email on what the recipient should
do next.
- Remote PC
Once your friend or family member has received the email and followed the
instructions, they will be asked to download the software. It’s
recommended they contact you to verify that you are ho you say you are, so
expect an email or a phone call. This is same program as installed in step
2, so there will be a short wait while the file is download and installed.
- Find the problem Once the program has installed on their computer, it will show
up in your account. If you’re thinking about helping out more than one
person then it would be wise to rename it just to make things clear. Click
on the icon in the ‘People I help’ window to view the other person’s PC.
Any potential problems are outlined underneath their description.
If
you’re thinking about helping out more than one person then it would be wise to
rename it just to make things clear
