How To Contact Amazon Support Customer Service Damaged Gift Card

My son had an Amazon gift card that was damaged and part of the claim code couldn't be read. I wasn't sure if anything could be done, but figured it was worth a shot to contact Amazon. Finding contact information for Amazon is not the easiest.

To locate Amazon's contact information, load the Amazon home page, scroll to the bottom and click on Amazon Assistant.
Scroll down to the Need Help section and click contact us.
A contact page will open with options to open a chat window or have Amazon call you.

I used the chat feature and it worked out great. You actually chat with a real person. I had to give the person I talked to the card number and the pieces of the claim code that I could read. He somehow looked it up and was able to add the gift card directly to my account. The whole process took about 15 minutes.

I was originally going to email Amazon, but articles said it's a slower process. The chat option worked just fine and was quick.

These are the Amazon email addresses I found. I don't know if they actually work.
Account issues: cis@amazon.com
Other issues: primary@amazon.com


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Computers and Accessories

How To Fix Windows 10 Wifi Card Not Working

My son's computer suddenly had problems showing the available wifi networks. The computer is new and running Windows 10. Doing the following is what fixed the issue:

Press the Windows key + X
Select Device Manager
Click Network Adapters and expand the list
Find your wifi card in the list - it will probably contain the word Wireless
Once the wifi card is found in the Network Adapters list, select it and then right click it
Click Properties
Select the Driver tab
Click the Disable Device button
Click OK
Click the Enable Device button
Click OK

If all goes well, the wifi networks should now show up.


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Computers and Accessories

How To Redirect HTTP to HTTPS With Hostgator

For security purposes, all websites should use https rather than http. Normally, this can be done by editing the .htaccess file, which is located in the root directory of your website.
The following should be added to the .htaccess file to redirect to https:

RewriteEngine On
RewriteCond %{SERVER_PORT} 80
RewriteRule ^(.*)$ https://www.example.com/$1 [R=301,L]

Just replace www.example.com with your website domain.


Unfortunately, this wasn't working with HostGator. What did work, was making redirect changes within the HostGator account control panel.
This can be done by:

1. Log into your HostGator account control panel
2. Click on Domains in the left hand column
3. Click on Redirects in the Domains section
4. a. Under Add Redirect, Type, select Permanent (301)
b. Select the domain name from the list that you would like to redirect to https://. Optionally, also enter a subdirectory path
c. Under Redirects To, enter the https://domainnametodirectto.com
d. Select Redirect with or without www.
5. Click the Add button

Try it out by going to the https:// version of your domain name.



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Computer & Technology Books

How To Add the Google Play Store to Kindle Fire 7 5th generation

I just added the Google Play store to my old Kindle Fire 7 5th generation. It was super easy and it actually worked!

Here's how I did it:

Make sure you have a Kindle Fire 7 5th generation by going to Settings, Device Options, Device Model

If Device Model says Fire(5th Generation), then do the following:

Go to Settings, Security & Privacy, click Apps from Unknown Sources to allow the installation of non Amazon appstore apps

Open the Silk browser

Click on this link to download and install the Google Account Manager APK

When that is finished,

Click on this link to download and install the Google Services Framework APK

When that is finished,

Click on this link to download and install the Google Play Services APK

When that is finished,

Click on this link to download and install the Google Play Store APK

For each of the above links, click the Download button on each page. The apk will download. Click the Open button. Click Next until you get to Install. Click Install. The APK will then install. Proceed to the next link and do the same thing.

When all 4 APK's have been downloaded and installed, there should be a Google Play Store app on your Kindle.

You will have to log in to your Google account. After that you can download apps like you would on an Android device. This works because the Kindle's Fire operating system is based on Android.

So far I have installed Ebay and Etsy on my Kindle Fire 7. They both work great!


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More Kindle Fire

How to Fix Jar Not Recognized Error On Windows

The other day I was trying to view the contents of a jar file by entering this on the command line:

jar tf jarfilename.jar

I got the following error:

'jar' is not recognized as an internal or external command, operable program or batch file

To fix this error:

Make sure a JAVA_HOME environment variable is set to the location of your Java installation, such as C:\Program Files(x86)\Java\jdk1.8.0_25

Then add the following to the PATH environment variable to include the Java installation's bin directory: %JAVA_HOME%\bin


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More Java

How To Send a Fax for Free

Every once in a while I have to send a fax, so I've always bought printers with fax capability. The last printer I bought doesn't have a fax capapbility, but it does scan. There are a bunch of websites out there that will fax a document for you. Most of them have a cost involved though. There is a website called gotfreefax.com that is completely free. I've used it a bunch of times and it works great. You fill out a form with your information, the receiver's information and fax number, upload the file or enter text data and hit send. There is an option of adding an ad free cover page. You can send a max of 3 pages and 2 faxes per day. There are options to send more pages for a price. The largest plan is 30 pages for $2.98, so it's pretty reasonably priced, if the free plan isn't enough.


Fax Machines

How to Fix Verizon Jetpack MiFi 8800L Dropping Connections

I recently upgraded my Verizon 7730L jetpack to the Verizon mifi 8800L jetpack. I've been a little reluctant to do so because it has such bad reviews on the Verizon website. A few months ago the reviews were great. Recent reviews are terrible though. They all talk about how the device randomly drops connections. Well, my 7730 was doing that too. Pretty annoying, but it sounded like the 8800 was even worse. I did some research and came across this youtube video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oCRjj6lT1cA. It talks about how there is a setting called Sleep Mode. The default value is 5 minutes. I took a look at my 7730 and sure enough it also has a sleep setting and it was set to 5 minutes. What this setting does is put the device in sleep mode if there is no internet activity after whatever the sleep mode is set to. If the setting is set to 5 minutes and you walk away to go get a snack and are gone for at least 5 minutes, when you come back, the connection will be dropped. I keep my jetpack plugged in all the time, so I think this setting is relevant when running only on battery in order to conserve battery power.
I changed the sleep setting to never on my 7730 and have not had any issues since. With this great result, I took a chance and upgraded to the 8800. Sure enough, the sleep setting was set to the default of 5 minutes. I immediately changed it to never and it has worked great. The 8800 is actually a pretty big improvement over the 7730. My son's Fortnite ping has dropped from 60 - 70 to 30, which is good. The lower the ping, the less lagging.