Rider, when you get your new pc contact me, i’ll get you all the software you’ll ever need for free. And you wont have to worrie about getting virie over p2p networks, also if your going to run xp, I recomend disabling internet explorer, and running only firefox, otherwise your computer will get raped via cat 5.
(To disable IE go into the options, and go to lan, say you want a proxy server, then set the proxy server as a noneexistent address, I find this gets rid of 90% of spyware.
Or you could just run linux! I recomend Debian, Mepis is a very nice Debian distro, comes with alot of stuff and is very user friendly, only downfalls is it uses KDE, and has a ugly UI, but you can clean that up.
Also DONT buy a mac right now, bad idea, they are going to go x86, (in lamens, the same proccessors as all other computers use) once they do there will be a HUGE jump in performance, and after a few years you’ll probably loose software support through mac, if your still using the old IBM Power pc chip, and since it looks like you tend to hold onto your pc’s, that would probably be a bad move.
Skip the shop, and just build it yourself, its a very easy proccess, and you can save BIG Money making the pc yourself, especialy if you use a free OS, or pirated version of XP.
building pc’s used to be difficult 10 years ago, its quite easy now, and even someone with zero knowledge can do it with just a few simple tips, I recomend going to a place like Frys electronics if you have one near by, the people there will be really gracious in helping you find all the hardware you need, and will even give you tips on how to put the thing together when you get it home, also frys will build pc’s, for much less then a local shop would.
Also I like to build pc’s so I don’t have all that extra crap OEM’s like to put on the pc’s they build, I don’t need AOL, and Musicbox, thank you very much.
To steal something is to take something from someone else, freely copyable information should be just that free, legaly it IS wrong, but moraly?
The Nuremberg trials dictated that there was a moral bassis beyond that of goverment, because the nazzi’s belived they had done nothing wrong, in torturing the Jews, since it was legally exepted within there goverment.
If you could freely clone food, would it be fair to let the rest of the world starve just because your goverment said it was illegal to create copys of the food?
By forcing people to pay extrodinary amounts of money for software, hurts buissnesses, and the economy, if all enterprise software was abolished, then open sorce software would take over, and move forward faster then that controled by monoplys Coughm$cough
Sorry for stealing the thread, I just hate it when people think that information shouldn’t be free.
Commercial software is not freely copyable. When a company releases a copy of a piece of software to you, there is an agreement that you can not freely copy it.
Why should a company spends thousands of hours and expense in research and development to write a piece of software, if it needs to then be given away for free? Should they not be compensated for that R&D? Do they actually have incentive to produce it in the first place if they won’t be compensated?
Food is not the same as software. If you buy livestock from someone, that’s part of the license, so to speak, of being able to produce offspring from it. Same thing with seeds. I’m not aware of anything that could result in food being magically cloned at no expense though.
If you don’t want to pay the cost of what the people that put the expense into making it are asking for it, then use a competing product that fits what you want to pay. No competition available? Then write your own, create that competition. Nobody is forcing you to pay extraordinary amounts of money for software. If it was so extraordinary, then you’d write your own or hire it done for less.
If you think software should be free, then only choose those products that support that model. By instead choosing to steal the commercial software against the agreement of those that produced it, you are just hindering the development of the free software. Use the free software, and contribute to it by submitting bug reports, feature requests, or even code if your ability permits. Let competition and the market decide what is best.
One of my favorite sources for IT and computer related links is the List of Lists. Lots of quality links about computer security issues and software utilities and such.
AntiVirus Tools: I’ve used both Avast and AVG and a few others. Avast and AVG are both free for home use.
Firewalls: There are free software firewalls too. I’ve used Sygate Personal Firewall and ZoneAlarm. There are other free software firewalls as well.
There is no need to buy a security package like Norton that the stores will try to push on you cause it’s another sale for them. There’s freeware stuff that will do the job.
If you’re on a broadband (cable or DSL) connection I’d also suggest getting an external router that can act as a basic firewall. Something like a LinkSys that includes basic NAT firewall features. They’re in the $50 range. It helps filter your computer from the nasty traffic that’s on the internet.
I wouldn’t worry about that too much now. Most (all?) motherboards allow you to disable the built-in functions (like video or sound or network). You can disable them either through the BIOS or a jumper on the MB. So, for example, if the built-in video goes bad you can disable it and plug in a regular video card and be good to go again.
Some info on optimizing Windows XP services for your new computer. Services are system level things that run in the background and hopefully do useful things. Some you need for the computer to manage itself and others you don’t. These two guides tell you which ones you need and which ones you can disable.
This is a silly argument. Microsoft doesn’t make anything that you require to survive in the world. Furthermore, not all information is free. Taking software that someone has made an effort to develop without their permission is hands-down, completely, utterly and 100% WRONG, morally and legally. It even goes against the spirit of open source software. Your words do not change this, and your actions are not justified.
If you like open source software, use it - the point is that everyone has permission. Most of it makes a great alternative to the corporate offerings. But don’t be spouting crap about how stealing from any individual or corporation is morally right - it isn’t, and it can get you into a lot of trouble, some of which could make future jobs incredibly difficult to obtain.
In my humble opinion, if you’re not into gaming, get yourself a mac mini, plug in your existing keyboard/monitor/mouse and you’re set (with more than one mouse button! Yes!) If you need Windows, have a local shop build your new computer, and then install Windows 98 on it. Unless you need games, in which case XP has better support, but if you don’t need games, don’t worry. People say XP is better than '98, and in some cases it is, but it also suffers less from virii (Still install AVG though!). Currently both my girlfriend and her sister are using '98, with no problems from USB drives, mp3 players, burners, printers or digital cameras. The only XP box on our network is mine, and that’s because my gf and her sister NEED Sims2, and only my computer supports it (even if it’s in Linux most of the time).
If you feel the need to try Linux, knoppix is great for playing around with it, and Ubuntu is a good distro to try out. Linux is great, but it’s different, so you’ll need to learn new stuff.
Mac OSX is cool, purty, and I like it. As Apple says “OSX: Because it’s easier to make Unix user-friendly than it is to debug Windows”
And if you’re about to tear your hair out over Windows/Linux/Mac… use BeOS
If you only have to transfer the old data from the old harddrive and don’t need to keep it in the computer, I wouldn’t worry about the cable. If the new computer’s cable only handles one drive, use the old one to move the data over, and then switch back. If you need to keep the old drive in the new computer, the new cable might not matter anyways, I believe (though not sure) that it will default to the speed of the slowest drive on the cable, meaning the old one.
