PC Astray

I am a fan of Mozilla Firefox too but I would prefer Opera if they have an ad-blocking feature. That's the only thing that's keeping me away from it and take note Netscape 8.0 users... No wonder I found them almost the same...

Tell you what...since you are confused over what forum software to use, try them all out if you have the time. If not, go Invision since you're impressed by it. That's all I have to say and it won't be very much of a help

Consider trying out all forum software before deciding which is the best. I like Invision Power Board myself and uses the trial version which is really nice, except for the limitations but there are also other forum software worthing noting, like phpbb, which has hundreds if not thousands of add-ons but it all depends on what you prefer. Invision Power Board 1.3 is the free version and add-ons for it can be found here. InvisionFree is the sized down version and if you're new or learning HTML, this is a good place to start.

Antispywares alone won't be effective. Enabling your firewall, real-time scanning for your antivirus/antispyware/anti-trojan, downloading the latest updates and using programs like Mozilla Firefox would be best. If you insist on using IE, I suggest you disable ActiveX controls or get an IE shell like Maxthon. You can also try using SpywareBlaster to immunize your computer against unwanted programs and a registry monitoring tool like Prevx Home or Spybot - Search & Destroy's built-in TeaTimer, if I'm not wrong.And remember to check if your antivirus has only viruses, trojans and spywares in its database. Some AV vendors only consider viruses as a threat and their antivirus will only do just that so get an anti-trojan/antispyware if that's the case.

MSN Messenger 6.2- Crashes less often now but I still use 6.2 since the BETA seems bloated to me. It is the only means of communications between me and the Girl Guide that I have a crush on Mozilla Firefox- My favourite secured web browsing tool with ad-blocking feature and mouse gestures. Ares Galaxy- The best P2P program I've came across so far. LimeWire is nice but it lacks certain features that I wanted. Microsoft Office 2003- I downloaded the trial version of Microsoft's website and entered an activation code I got from the net. I use this program since I'm always solo when doing projectwork. OpenOffice would have been my choice if it get rids of the bullet that keeps showing in Microsoft Powerpoint. Free Download Manager- For handling huge downloads. It is a freeware with more features when you actually compare them with commercial versions. Eraser- I use it to delete things since I can't stand the fact that programs deleted to the Recycle Bin can always be recycled. Paint Shop Pro 9- A program that has everything that you need for image editing.

From my personal opinion, you are better off using AntiVir Personal Edition as it has the highest detection rate and uses the least resources among all the freeware antivirus like avast! Home Edition and AVG Antivirus Free Edition. The interface has the Windows Classic look but it does pack the standard solid features of an antivirus. Consider getting another antivirus for on-demand scans too.I think my cousin mentioned this before since we share the same ideas.avast! uses as much resources as Symantec products.It does look professional but it depends on how much memory are you willing to spare.

I don't know where you come from but you may want to consider budget laptops from companies like ECS but the thing is that they are based in Taiwan and I don't know if they have any suppliers in your area.My classmate built his own G900 with the parts he bought from a local supplier and the setup was rather easy.It came with a Pentium 4 2.8GHz Processor, 40GB Hard Drive, 512MB RAM and so on at a price of S$2,399.Note that the cost of the OS is not included but he used Fedora Core 3.

When programs request for more memory, the memory manager will see if there is enough real memory available before doing so.If not, the memory manager will then scan the physical memory for items loaded into the RAM that hasn't been used and not critical to system operation and save the contents of these memory to disk.This process is known as swapping out which is where the orignial virtual memory term swapfile comes from.Doing this will free the RAM and when these swapped items are needed again, they will reload it to the physical RAM.In Windows XP, this swapfile is known as the paging file.It is held in the root directory of the current boot drive by default and when it is accessed, it isn't hard to see that having it on the same physical disk partition as your programs cause alot of lag.Moving your pagefile to another location will provide a performance boost but this depends on your PC's specs.If you don't have an extra hard drive available, you obviously don't have the option to do this but to create a parition on your hard drive specially for it, it will be much slower then having a second hard drive but it still beats than having none.You can force Windows to unload DLLs from memory after the applications using them are closed by making sure [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\AlwaysUnloadDLL] is enabled.

I have to agree on that but they'll force you to upgrade to MSN Messenger 7.0 once the Beta is over (not really force but the nag screens will prompt you to do so) so there is no point arguing over it unless you want to stick to Windows Messenger. *Sorry about that Jimbean but I am talking about the whole topic itself.You can't stop MSN from updating your IM client so well, the only option you have is to either opt out of it or use Windows Messenger.

I posted alot of this before that Microsoft is forcing themselves into the antivirus market aggressively by intergrating their security products into Windows Security Center and forcing everyone to update their computers to SP2 (which might not be true) but if they're doing it this way, it won't be fair to antivirus vendors.Microsoft can at least allow their users to opt out of it but this is a large blow to the antivirus market.Shares in Symantec have lost a third of their value from highs seen late last year, while McAfee's stock is down by a quarter.These are only two of the major players in the antivirus market and what will happen to other low profile vendors whom we like like AVG?

That will be one reason and you can find 1,640,000 more if you Google "Why I Hate Microsoft."If you ask me, I will stick to freeware antivirus since Microsoft has indicated it will charge users for its anti-virus software, but hasn't made clear whether users would pay a regular fee or pay once upfront.

To answer you question, I got my information from here, but I can't confirm whether it's true or not so I apologise for not stating whether it is a fact or not.

That's very obvious but Windows XP is way to go for home users as most programs are built to work with this OS.I agree that is built with many security flaws but Microsoft is taking measures to correct that but it is too late as they have already earned themselves a bad image in front of the world.They have entered the antispyware market by purchasing GIANT Antispyware, gave it a new name and interface and about to force their way into the antivirus market agressively by integrating both security software into SP2's Windows Security Center, which will benefit us but not antivirus/antispyware vendors.If you are still using SP1, April 12th will be the last day you can see it since Microsoft will be forcing all internet enabled computer using XP OS to be automatically updated to SP2 whether you want it or not.

I have to agree as it is obviously true.Opera does prove itself as a first class browser to the online community but it is not a freeware since the free version comes with text-based or graphical ads.Furthermore, it does not have many features when compared to Mozilla Firefox with plugins and the ability for Firefox to block ads with AdBlock makes it a superior freeware alternative to Opera. You can also try out Agnitum's Outpost Firewall which comes with an ad-blocking feature in both the free and paid version.

Google all the way! My reasons: Displays more search results compared to other search engines like Yahoo! (for example, search for NATO's Operation Rapid Guardian in Google and Yahoo! and Google will show you "Results 1 - 50 of about 349,000 for Operation Rapid Guardian. (0.45 seconds)" compared to Yahoo!'s "Results 1 - 10 of about 276,000 for operation rapid guardian - 0.08 sec."), no agressive advertising due to the fact only text based ads are used for their own AdSense, simple and user friendly interface and faster upload speed than other major search engines.

Both software has their own pros and cons but personally, I would prefer Invision Power Board 2 rather than phpbb2, the latter with more mods but I chose Invision because of its stability and features (without the mods).Also, you might consider trying out other online community software such as Beehive Forum .5 which is still in Beta development stage like myTopix and overshadowed by other open source forum software like phpbb.Beehive has an excellent interface but no official support as it comes in the way of informal community support.

I'm not sure if it happened to you but after installing the new MSN Messenger 6.2 with a security patch, it to crash and the same goes for Version 7.0 Beta too.My friends have been experiencing this problem too so I'm sticking to Windows Messenger for now.MSN Messenger 7.0 does have some new features that are not really necessary but I do like the fact that you can sign in with a status and see the actual display picture exactly the size that you uploaded.

It disables your Recently Used Documents in the Start Menu, which allow other users using the user account see what you have used.And no, this is not proxy stuff.Before you ask this kind of question next time, I suggest you should just try it out yourself before asking what it is.

Each antivirus program uses a different virus database, some containing more malicious signatures than others, meaning antivirus will have higher detection rates than others.They also have their own interpretation of what constitutes malware as some companies only want their product to target primarily viruses and worms, and to a lesser degree trojans, exploits, spyware, hijackers and adware so there is no guarantee which antivirus is the best.The best solution is to use multiple scanners; one for real-time scanning and also consumes low resources and the other for on-demand such that if this particular antivirus can't find this particular virus, the other antivirus will detect it (hopefully).