Computer lifespan

[scruffy]

Bird, you may consider uninstalling WINME, and installing your WIN98SE if you still have the cd. IMO, ME is not a stable O/S. At least by doing it now, you save the hassle of trying to do the same down the road, after you've gotten it personalized with additional software and files you want to save.

 

[Bird]

Whew, Scruffy & GlueGuy, you fellers talk way, way over my head./w3tcompact/icons/wink.gif I'm hoping the problems with my computer yesterday were just the result of my tinkerin'.

I had downloaded and installed the trial version of Screen Shot, but yesterday I "uninstalled" and deleted it. I guess it's a good program for some for $46, but it has too many features for me. I used to have an older version on the other computer and all I wanted it to do is make the "Print Screen" key work. Is there a simple way to do that?

Then I set up the MSN Messenger Service and got it working.

And the SystemWorks that I've ordered is "Norton SystemWorks 2002" and their web site says it's for "Win XP Home/XP Pro/2000 Pro/NT WS/Me/98" so I hope it runs on this machine all right.

I don't know enough to do the "fixes" that are described in technical bulletins. When I install a new program, I usually just let it use its defaults. And of course, that doesn't always work. I had to download and install the software for my TrippLite Internet Office UPS that I've been using the last 3 years on the old computer, and sure enough it didn't work until I called the company and made one change to the settings (had to call them when I installed it on the old computer and make one change that was different from the change I had to make this time)./w3tcompact/icons/frown.gif


Bird

 

[StoneHeartFarm]

Bird,

Don't feel bad about system hang ups, its kind of a learning process, and as in most cases there's a curve. (MY curve seems to have curved into the dumpster /w3tcompact/icons/laugh.gif). I installed the latest version of my business software last week. Yesterday morning, I finally got past the system crashes and can reliably get on the net. But not until after I bought a new hard drive and another 256 megs of ram. I kept getting the message :MCSCAN32 etc., more and more frequently. Went to the MS website and searched their knowledge base for the mcsan file. Turns out it was the McAffee Virus scanner. Hit McAffee's website and couldn't find a fix, so I'm now cruising with Norton. Don't know if my business software interfered with the McAffee or what.

I agree with everybody else. The hardware usually goes down in the first 30 days or so. I've been lucky and it usually either works straight out of the box or it doesn't.

One problem I've found with windows programming is DLL files. All programs use these files, and most programs share the files back and forth. Windows, however doesn't like to reload the same file. So, if you have a program that loads a file say Tractor.dll (Version1) and then another program loads that also requires Tractor32.dll, only version 2, you have a problem. I've been clearing out the old DLL files for about a year now and it seems to have stabilized the system quite a bit.

Do NOT run without virus software and a personal Firewall. The free tools available on the net to every teenage wanna be hacker can let them enter your computer easily. Identity theft is the least of your worries. Why do kids break into houses? Beacuse its fun and easy. Why do they break into your computer? I also don't leave my machine attached to the net and unattended. Just my paranoid side coming out, I guess. But, I figure when kids break into houses they look for empty ones. An idle computer connected to the net is kind of like an empty house. A nice inviting target.

Virus software can save you headaches and money. I also feel it's kind of a personal courtesy to everyone in my address book. Its like covering my face when I sneeze or cough. A few months ago one of our friends got a virus and did nothing. His sister was scamming addresses off of forwarded emails and she also got the virus. HE took care of it. SHE we are still getting hokey emails from. /w3tcompact/icons/crazy.gif. (And we've never even met her.)

I can't tell you much about the 98/ME debate since I'm still running 98. I can tell you that 98 will load with a lot of outdated DLL's, and agree that software is usually the culprit.

BTW, I did download IE 6.0 and its running great on my 98 based system, slightly faster than the 5.5.

SHF

 

[CVHoss]

Bird,
For a "Quick & Dirty" print screen function, this is what I do. When you have a screen showing what you want to capture, hold down the Alt key and press the PrintScrn key. It appears that nothing happened. For a quick printout, start up WordPad, right-click in the page and left-click on paste. This pastes an image of the screen into the page. If you left-click in the image to select it, sizing blocks will appear at the corners. You may need to left-click-hold on one of these and resize the image to get it to fit on a single page. If the screen shot contains text, this has the disadvantage of blurring the text somewhat. The second disadvantage of using the alt-printscrn method is that it doesn't actually take a shot of the entire screen, it takes a shot of the active window, so depending on what you're after, it may not produce the results you want. If you want better quality from the finished product, paste the copied screen into a photo editor instead of WordPad and edit it like any photo. Hope that helps some.

Hoss

 

[ERNIEB]

Thanks Scruffy, I'll print that out, so it will be handy/w3tcompact/icons/wink.gif

Ernie

 

[Bird]

Thanks, Hoss. I just got back from town (wife had to go shopping) and I bought a book at Wal-mart: Dan Gookin Teaches Windows ME. The main reason I bought it was because when I picked it up it fell open to "Printing a Snapshot of the Desktop." It says just to hit the Print Screen key (nothing happens), start the Paint program, maximize it, press Ctrl+V to paste it, etc. Sounds like a similar method; haven't tried either one yet. But it beats spending $46 for a program that does a lot of other things I don't need./w3tcompact/icons/wink.gif

Bird

 

[CVHoss]

Bird,
Here I am tryin' to help ya out and ya go and teach me something I didn't know about. Just tried your books method and it works like a charm. Had always used the alt-printscrn through don't know how many versions of Windows. Don't know if they changed it before or if it's new in ME, but thanks for the tip. Save me some "finger-stretchin' "

Hoss

 

[Bird]

Hoss, I guess I better read the rest of that book; just read the first chapter and the fellow seems to be an entertaining author at least./w3tcompact/icons/smile.gif And his experience with ME sounds like a lot of others. He'll tell you how to do something, then admit it may not work./w3tcompact/icons/frown.gif

I had already tried that little crescent moon marked key on this keyboard without knowing what it was. Took a awhile to find out that's supposed to put the computer to "sleep." This author says it sometimes puts it in a coma, too, and you have no choice but to turn it off and back on./w3tcompact/icons/laugh.gif

Bird<P ID="edit"><FONT SIZE=-1>Edited by Bird on 08/30/01 03:49 PM (server time).</FONT></P>

 

[scruffy]

SHF, I did not mean to make it sound as if not running without antivirus is a GOOD idea, but that it can be done, and you still have some sort of method to check your machine out.
A good firewall is a must! Particularly if you are running a cable modem with a 'constant' connection.
ZoneAlarm is a good 'free' firewall, and the ZoneAlarm Pro is even better. Which one is best, toss a coin.
The problem with IE v6.0, is NOT that it runs faster, etc, but that it gives Micro$haft too much access to your system, and actually lets them control your privacy. NO thanks! I prefer taking care of that data myself. XP carries that step even further.

 

[jimmoore]

Gosh, I guess I am just brush league. I have a 1996 Packard Bell pentium 200 mhz, 32 mb ram, video mem 2 mb, cache memory 256 kb, hard drive 2559.8 mb
The school has some 700mhz computers and mine is just as fast on the internet as they are, due to the phone lines. This old junk heap gets me on TBN just fine!

jim