Q: I occasionally lose the email connections on my two Samsung Galaxy S7 smartphones when they are connected to my home Wi-Fi network. The network has a Linksys EA7500 router and a Comcast internet connection, and serves the two phones, a PC and a 4K digital TV (another PC uses a wired connection to the router.) Recently, the phones couldn't connect to their email accounts, although the two PCs could. I rebooted the phones and again set up their email accounts, but it didn't help. Later, the phones reconnected to email on their own. What's wrong?
_Steve London, Plymouth, Minn.
A: You have too many data-hungry devices competing for too little internet capacity.
Streaming programs to your 4K TV is eating up most of the Wi-Fi bandwidth in your home. (For details on 4K TV, see tinyurl.com/jc5zygg.) Your two PCs are consuming most of the remaining internet capacity, via either Wi-Fi or cable. That leaves little Wi-Fi capacity for two phones to download email, even though mail typically doesn't contain much data.
You could either upgrade your Wi-Fi network, which can be expensive, or change the way you use your phones, which will cost little.
Upgrading: While you have a relatively new router, you might want to buy one that uses "802.11ac" technology, which will manage your existing Wi-Fi bandwidth more efficiently. Such routers cost $60 to $400 online (see tinyurl.com/8xjrafp). Alternatively, you could buy a faster internet connection, which in the long run will be more expensive than a new router.
Changing phone usage: The easiest solution is to let the phones update their email through the cellular network instead of connecting them to your home Wi-Fi. The small amount of information in email downloads isn't likely to overrun your phone data plan, and your Wi-Fi network will be free to perform its other tasks.
If you want to continue using the phones on the Wi-Fi network, you could minimize Wi-Fi data congestion by changing how often the phones download new email. For example, instead of having email updated automatically, you could set the mail app to update manually (only when you request it) _ then do it when the TV isn't streaming data. To alter the Galaxy S7's email update settings, see tinyurl.com/le328q5.
Q: My Dell Vostro 1520 laptop, which I bought in 2010, has been running Windows 10. But the PC recently was unable to complete three software updates (a cumulative update for Windows 10, and updates for a graphics card and a printer.) As a result, it keeps rebooting in an effort to install the updates. What can I do?
_Don Carvajal, New Orleans
A: Your seven-year-old PC should not have been upgraded to Windows 10 because of compatibility issues (see tinyurl.com/kjlgbea). While you were able to run Windows 10 initially, I suspect the latest updates won't work with your PC's hardware.
You can try to fix the problem by downloading Microsoft's "Windows Update Troubleshooter" program for Windows 10 (see tinyurl.com/jgkrtnd). If that doesn't work, your best options are to switch your PC to Windows 7 (still available online), or buy a new Windows 10 PC.
