Claude Jones wrote:
On Wed April 18 2007, Robin Laing wrote:
You are a lucky person. In my limited experience with Windows, a
re-install has happened more than that. I did try the re-install but
that was useless due to all the secondary applications.
Heck, even Steve Ballmer, CEO for Microsoft needs to re-install Windows
when it gets to rough.
My biggest headache has always been registry problems.
But that is my experience.
You speak of "limited experience" - I deal with many Windows machines, all day
long, day in and day out, in a business environment. Maybe that's the
difference. We have an enterprise grade firewall behind the router. Each
Windows box runs its own personal firewall. Each machine also runs anti-virus
and anti-spyware. That's the price you have to pay - it costs money, and it
takes time - it stinks. But, safe practices over many years, and that's been
my experience. The only virus that ever got detected inside my company was
ironically caught by one of my machines - but I caught it right away, and it
hadn't activated itself. We've got one gal who just can't resist clicking
indiscriminately, and I've set up a vm for her on her box using the free
vmplayer and a vm built on our vmware workstation, and she's under strict
orders to do all her internet stuff from the virtual machine - ironically,
once we implemented that policy, she stopped having problems.
I prefer Linux but you can't tell me that Windows can't be run reliably - it's
just not my experience over many, many years. I don't think it has anything
to do with luck. The main problems I encounter again and again are with
clueless operators who've ignored repeated instructions about dangerous
surfing practices and clicking on attachments - those are the two most common
causes of problems - are they caused by the operating system? - one can argue
that it's the defective design of the system that allows clueless operators
to damage their system and I will agree. There are many things that can be
done cluelessly in life and will result in mayhem -
Speaking to the question about the problems encountered in recent weeks
regarding drivers and endless boot cycles, I would try a Windows repair; boot
from the installation CD, click past the first repair options and let it
continue past the checking the drives for previous installations of Windows
section, and after that check, it should find your damaged installation and
offer the option to repair the existing installation - if it doesn't, you're
borked. If it does, just let it do its thing - once completed, you'll have to
patch your system back up to current security patches and service packs, but
you'll have preserved all your settings and data. Make sure you have your CD
key because it will ask for it. If you've just had a bad event but your box
is stil able to boot you also have system restore function that often
works - if yo poke around the help files you can find a system restore
list that lets you roll back a system to a previous state - just had to do it
today when a Windows Media update failed in a state where I couldn't roll it
back - I picked a restore from last Sunday and afer a few moments, I has
restored the system to its sate 4 days earlier, and Windows Media worked just
fine.
Personally, I like playing with all operating systems - they nearly have
unique capabilities and features that are very good for doing certain things.
I still interact with a early nineties-vintage Dec-Alpha running VMS - it
does one task very well and requires little maintenance, running a
daybook/document management system for a publishing company that's never gone
down more than a half day - it's a terminal client system with all programs
being fun from the central processor. It's a bit weak in its word processing
feature set, but it chugs along, day in and day out. I've got an old Amiga
500 that still runs video titling software and lets us dedicate a work
station where we can produce custom titling for shows going out to specific
stations, destinations that require non-standard program ID's and such to be
overlaid on the video stream; we've got a Mac guy here who's into all the
whiz bang features of the Mac for his multimedia operations, and runs servers
out of his house via FIOS connection which are located miles away from his
home, and in some cases across the country.
Then there's me, the Linux guy - they like me because I can ask for an ip
outside the firewall using one of our assined ip addresses in our top range
and run my box completely outside the Symantec Enterprise Firewall - I'vd got
ssh runninng on that box and a second nic connected to a hub so people can
avoid the whole company network when they suspect theyr'e dealing with a
threat - I have an entierely independent lan behind that Linux box and I use
it for all sorts of stuff.. We can bring up a virus infected machine behind
my Linux firewalled box, and we know we don't have to worry about its getting
control over any other machines - we download pathes and utilities to clean
up the offending machine without having to worry about letting vermin in
behind our Windows Lan - since there is no direct connection between the two.
I even run a wireless access point for people who need to connect the net via
wireless connections - our lan is just of the picture and therefore remains
protected.
Jumping in, if I may. Fedora made some dramatic changes with FC5, I
think it was. Seems they revisited the standards issue, reminded
themselves of their beginnings as a distribution that faithfully
followed the idea that distributions need to adopt and use worldwide
standards. Why?
http://web.archive.org/web/20030207075039/http://www.pimientolinux.com/peru2ms/villanueva_to_ms.html
DR. EDGAR DAVID VILLANUEVA NUÑEZ
Congressman of the Republic of Perú
It's difficult to discuss the merits of a proprietary operating system
that seeks to control the IT industry. Even if the Microsoft operating
system were to somehow match the merits found in Open Source operating
distributions, there remains the Congressman's letter. So, we reread
his letter, and, collectively as a world community, we choose the
approach that best accomplishes the goals we want from information
technology. Today, given a clean slate, and the state of technology, it
would be an ugly site for sure, to watch which CD folks would pick up
off the table to put on their computers. My bet would be, that
Microsoft would be instantly out of business.
Thanks, Tom
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