What you should do and not do when you get it!

Man, Open and play

It is there, and you aren't using it. What is wrong with you man??????
Spend a couple of days just getting familiar, installing some benchmark software, and maybe a game or two. Figuring out the OS features, looking into upgrading some of the drivers, figuring and writing down any other details, preferences you come across.
Then, delete everything, reformat your hard drive, repartition it in any way you need, and do all of this again, this time, only using what you want and need (from you own personal list). That is my advice. You will want to have your own personal final setup, and I suggest you decide what that will be based on your own by just playing around with some stuff for a while. Just my thoughts. Have fun.

Load the OS

Load the drivers and get them working

Load the applications software

NEVER!!!!

Never turn it off that way you will be voiding the warranty

and never do work on it

I'm doing exactly what shlo-mo advised with my 5670.

I have windows 2000 for now and I'm fooling around a bit with different software and programs, then I'm burning the stuff onto cd-r's. I really regret not spending th eextra cash to get a DVD-R and HT cpu!

Tomorrow I am getting my hands on XP Pro from school and I will hope that it goes in faster than 2000 did b/c I have exams in Microbio, Path, and Pharm on Wednesday

I like foolinga round with stuff on my own becasue this way you learn and you don't feel like a moron everytime you ask the simplest questions like how do I insatll OS......I did that

Anyways, enjoy your Sager and have fun. They rock dude.
I played BF 1942 and Mechwarrior 4 plus I added Xbconnect.com so I played Halo online for the 1st time....way cool.

Some guy at school advised against partitioning the HDD because he said you lose some space and sometimes they crash. Anyone hear of this???

Avoid the new Kazaa (KMD) and Lite stuff. I have heard from2 sources that the older Kazaa is better and that the new version causes many ssytems to crash a lot. I like using ad-aware to remove all the fricken gator junk!

Anyone have a good recommendation for stopping all the damn pop-ups???

kazaa lite works fantastic for me--no problems ever

you ought to try it yourself


Disclaimer: Brad does not condone the use of p2p software for the purpose of piracy.

get popup stopper pro, works wonders... no more ads on any sites unless you allow.

if using xp pro, go to administrative services and turn indexing service to manual from automatic, if using norton speed disk set on manual too. I found both used quite a bit of resources.

What does Indexing Service do? Anyone know?

its constantly indexing each file that's created so that you can find them when you use "search".

It may shave a few seconds off the search by having it on automatic.

A few seconds? Sheesh, try a few MINUTES if you have enough files and data!

I know for many gamer-types who do not have gigs of documents, photos, and what-not, turning it to manual is a boost. But for me, I cannot be without it, as I have tens of thousands of files that I search through somewhat regularly.

RICKO:

WinXP installs and loads up INCREDIBLY faster than 2000 ever thought of. That's it's main redeeming quality, in my eyes (especially after installing both 2000 and XP on so many machines).

I'd also stay away from anything Symantec/Norton. Known resource hogs.

Hold off on all the DirectX stuff, too, until you absoloutely need it (i.e. stick with 8.1 if you can).

-myrkat

Myrkat, so if you don't use Symantec corporate edition or Norton Antivirus what do you use for virus protection. I do download a lot of stuff so how can I protect myslef from downloading junk off the web?

IOE what do people recommend using ast virus protection, my school gives us norton 2003 and symantec. Do you recommend I use both, one over the other, or something else?

Adam, what do you recommend for the 5670?

www.grisoft.com for AVG anti-virus protection (it is free, as well). I have a 20-license business version as well running at my work, and it's put McAfee to shame (businesses don't run Norton AV, typically). Was $500 for 20 licenses, but there are no subscriptions to renew (a HUGE plus). Gets updates regularly and integrates with Outlook (and OE, but who uses that?).

Norton is Symantec. Same company. Peter Norton who started Norton, sold it to Symantec. I've heard he now wants his name off of their product (can't blame him, Norton Utils is not what it used to be).

AVG is a great AV program, and System Suite is a good utilities suite (if you really need one of those). Utility suites are so 90's, though.

-myrkat

sweet

thanks for that link to the antivirus freeware myrkat. I have been happy with ZoneAlarm as my free firewall. others might recommend something different. I have used AdAware for cleaning off the crap. I recommend you make a boot disk early in the process, so if you ever get a bad virus infection, you can get in clean and fix things.

Did you make the boot disk from bootdisk.com? I have a floppy but it is for windows 98.
Wil that still work. Thanks for the link myrkat

Norton not used by Business????

Im not sure where you got the idea that Norton isnt used by business myrkat. Mcafee is a dog and always has been, but here in Chicago in the last 3 years I have personally installed over 40,000 seats of Norton AV 2002 and 2003, at Molex, Kraft, Kemper, Bank One, Sears, Abbott Labs, and Williams Electronics/Midway Games. Its a stable, easily updated, easily managed virus program, and is THE standard AV product here in the Midwest.

Now on the other hand, Norton System works, with speed disk, PC doc and all that crap is a major resource hog, and really doesnt do that much for you anyway.

I use Diskeeper for disk defragmenting, it works flawlessly.

Just remember ANY virus package is better than nothing at all.

Re: Norton not used by Business????

Well, the businesses in the know that I see out here in CA tend to shy away from Norton AV; and it is more resource-hungry than even McAfee, in my experience, and AVG is very tightly coded - the only time it impacts your system is when it's scanning everything (but then, they all do when that happens).

As for Norton, with those 40,000 seats installed, think of all the money you could have saved your clients using AVG and it's non-subscription updating... But I suppose the "security" in knowing Norton vs. not knowing Grisoft was worth the money; I see that a lot.

When McAfee called and asked why we weren't upgrading out 20 seats for $1800 in annual subscription fees, I told him we've tested Grisoft's AVG (priced at $500 for 20 seats and no subscription) and the McAfee guy chuckled and said, "You're going to trust your company to them? I've never heard of them!" - I then listed the viruses McAfee let slip through while the AVG-protected machines stopped them cold. He had no further comment.

This is my one microscopic experience of AVG vs. McAfee. Don't have one for Norton, as I haven't used their stuff in a while, and my assumptions are based on what I've read and heard from collegues who use it.

I would agree with your closing statement: ANY AV package is better than none.
-myrkat

I had to share my thoughts about AVG. It is extremly fast. I had virus on network and all computers had a NAV or McAfee. Neither of them had detected virus so fast as mine with AVG. NAV and McAfee are using too much resources, slowing down computer (good advice is to shut down AV when gaming). With AVG, you can forget when he is a running.

I hate other AV, because they are constantly asking something upgrading, patching... I just wont to forget about viruses, and do my work. I don't want AV software to be part of my life. And AVG answered on all my needs.

When we are talking about freeware, take a look on this diagnostic tool. It might help you to get known better your computer, it is amazing and free!

http://www.aida32.hu/

Re: Re: Norton not used by Business????

I wasnt in disagreement with you on AVG being a better package, in speed, or agressivness in catching bugs myrkat. The fact is I have virtually no experience with AVG, but based on your comments I will give it a shot when I get my new 5670 tomorrow.

I was just commenting on the fact that my experience is contrary to your previous statement about business not using Norton. Norton is BIG in the Fortune 500, as much for the name and brand recognition as anything else, I suppose. Like you said these are the companies that only buy Compaq, or IBM hardware because they feel service is better with the big name (Cough), and I suppose it probably is since they are buying a million + dollars a quarter in hardware.

So you say AVG is free? Im assuming its at www.avg.com?