[ekim68]

"From Mozart to Way Beyond", wow, that will keep your mind busy..Do you play the bassoon?

[aarhus2004]

Hello WinME users,

Here is a handy freeware.

The only limitation it has for WinME is that the choice made on installation can only be changed after an uninstall and on a re-install of the tool.

I attach an image of the GUI.

Cheers.

Ben.

Hi, Mike, the answer is no, but how I wish I could!

[ekim68]

Thanks for the attached, Ben.
This is creating a library for me.
Hmm. Another project.....

[aarhus2004]

Hello WinME Users,

In a couple of days I will offer another summary of what is available in this thread.

I will also be reporting then (at the end of the six month period) as to how I finally view my experiences in the area of security. I first mentioned what I was doing here.

Cheers.

Ben.

[Stoner]

Hi aarhus2004

Thought I'd let you know I installed Win Me on a backup comp just to see how it held up.
While my luck was poor with a factory instal on an HP laptop, the instal I did on a Celeron 500 with 256 mb memory and a common intel motherboard has been working out well.

[aarhus2004]

Originally Posted by Stoner

Hi aarhus2004

Thought I'd let you know I installed Win Me on a backup comp just to see how it held up.
While my luck was poor with a factory instal on an HP laptop, the instal I did on a Celeron 500 with 256 mb memory and a common intel motherboard has been working out well.

Hello Jack, you mentioned that was in prospect (I had to review - memory being less and less reliable). I imagine a 500 Celeron was power for the course in 2000 but 'they' weren't too generous with the RAM - 128 seemed to be the amount most ready mades offered - unless a customer had lots to spend! But todays specs are astronomical - gigabytes of everything.

I wonder now about deterioration, as time goes by, in a hard-working older computer. Chips, hard disks, fans, circuitry generally and so on. Something has to give eventually. Then what? But will the newest ones last as long? But I am resolved that this will be my first and last system. I catch myself staring at the monitor screen and wonder 'what the hell am I doing?'. The withdrawal symptoms will be acute when the day comes to change the habits of five years!

Cheers, Jack.

Ben.

[aarhus2004]

A Final Word on Security.

First of all I DO NOT advocate the position I have taken regarding security.

For the past six months I have used my computer without the variety of anti-virus freeware (or software) and all other wares associated with security.

It maybe argued that my use of online scanners constitutes a breach of the so-called minimalist position regarding security (this position is discussed by others in this thread and elsewhere in these forums) however I needed some assurance along the way. I am certainly not experienced enough to lay claim to being a 'true' minimalist.

I have kept - since the beginning - HijackThis and the MVP's Hosts file (read about that here). I regard these two tools as part of my maintenance routines which are daily events in my computing life. Something I enjoy.

I have been 'dismissed' from those forums (from which I learnt the little I consider myself as knowing in the earlier years of my five online - namely the Microsoft Community Newsgroups) for having trimmed Windows Millennium down to what was described, by a waggish habitue of those august(serious) groups as being, "nothing more than a version of Windows98". I can only hope this doesn't feed the fires that burn within the breasts of fervent Win98 users in these forums - and lead to a flood of comment in this thread!

Since the first week (Oct 2005), and reported in detail in the attached .txt file, I have found no malware (including viruses) in any of the online scans I had have done.

So what have I concluded? About security.

It depends entirely on how we use our computers and for what. I do not need security and have no intention of reverting to the time when it seemed to be a must and occupied my thinking quite considerably. I am very happy to be free of the need for it. But remember that is me - not you. It is a very personal decision.

Cheers.

Ben.

P.S. For those who didn't 'catch' my previous post dealing with this matter (or read the attachment therein) I attach it here.

P.P.S. I didn't mention firewalls specifically (for those who might wonder), I was using, not a firewall, but a router - and removed it for the second three months. It is now back in- line primarily because I paid lots for it (in 2000) and I like the way the Gibson Leak Test paints a solid green 'all service port' scan. That test available here.

[aarhus2004]

Here is a tweak which somehow was omitted. One which will raise your eyebrows. I found it several years ago on this website created by the friendly and interesting Gene Golding. I quote him:

"When you click the Start menu, there’s a brief delay before it appears.
You can change this to make the menu appear faster.

Here’s How:

Open Regedit, and go to:

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Control Panel\desktop.

Look for a value called "MenuShowDelay". If the value is not there, you can add it by right clicking the right window, and selecting New, String value.

If MenuShowDelay is already present, then the default value would be around 400. This is the number of milliseconds taken by the Start Menu to pop up. Reduce this number to the extent you want. You can even put in a 0 for no delay. I did this myself with a zero and I have to be pretty accurate with my mouse on the menus but I like the results of this setup.

Restart your computer to have the changes take effect."

One of the two registry cleaners I use daily prior to the final maintenance of my computing day (for which I use ScanDefrag) is RegSeeker. For those who have a reluctance to edit the registry this particular tweak is one of several offered in a direct and straightforward manner by RegSeeker. By the way the second registry cleaner is the highly regarded jv16pt which, until its brilliant creator Junio began his career in software at his company Macecraft, was freeware. The last but one version of that freeware seems to be the preferred one, version 1.3.0.195 ( a modest 2.12MB in size). Anyone wishing to try this freeware could request an e-mailing of the executable file in these forums. I would undertake that too.

This thread will eventually be summarized in terms of the tips and tweaks offered.

Cheers.

Ben.

[aarhus2004]

For the SECURITY conscious.

This article from the BBC

Ben.

[GoJoAGoGo]

Originally Posted by aarhus2004

For the SECURITY conscious.

This article from the BBC

Ben.

Hi Ben:

Thanks for this link. I installed the SiteAdvisor on both my IE & Firefox browsers. We can never be too secure and should always seek more protection.

[aarhus2004]

Originally Posted by GoJoAGoGo

Hi Ben:

Thanks for this link. I installed the SiteAdvisor on both my IE & Firefox browsers. We can never be too secure and should always seek more protection.

Hello Joe,

I am gratified to learn you are still searching for and trying out the new and I am sure you do not confine yourself to security issues.

As the date approaches when Microsoft, the parent, tells its come-of-age child - WinME "you are on your own now kiddo" there is going to be less and less interest on the part of the creative freeware makers in designing stuff for this system. I had the strangest of messages on accessing a website recently - something to the effect 'You are using an out of date operating system and should seriously consider upgrading' - I didn't know whether outrage or laughter was appropriate. But the upgrading squeeze is on. 15GB of free HDD space the recommended minimum for Vista basic.

I am thinking of starting a thread in Random Discussion having to do with life before our computers and how we might view life without them. Is it possible that one day it might be a requirement-at-law we have a computer and to be without would have serious implications for us?

I was browsing this session in the Photo Album forum and found some rather lovely 'shots' of the almost natural world by someone whose immoderate comments in this thread had led me to think not so well of the person concerned. We are undoubtedly more than we sometimes seem and sometimes less than we think we are.

It is that time of night, Joe, when the ghosts and goblins run riot, and those of us past our use-by dates have time enough to join in the riots.

Cheers.

Ben.

[remaja]

ME has been the first operating system I ever use.

It has been giving me problems on the first day untill now

windows 2000 is very expensive here and XP runs slow on my PC.

I don't know anything about computers in 2001 and I suffered doing homework with ME

many people told me that ME is a very problematic OS. But why?

what happened to Microsoft that time?

[aarhus2004]

Originally Posted by remaja

ME has been the first operating system I ever use.

It has been giving me problems on the first day until now

windows 2000 is very expensive here and XP runs slow on my PC.

I don't know anything about computers in 2001 and I suffered doing homework with ME

many people told me that ME is a very problematic OS. But why?

what happened to Microsoft that time?

Hello remaja,

There are no easy answers to your question about what happened to Microsoft when it offered Windows Millennium (as a step-up from Windows98). I can only offer you my view of this.

If we think of Microsoft as a business, one which sells a product in order to make money we cannot deny that Microsoft is a hugely successful business. If your unhappy experience with Windows Millennium has convinced you that it was a flawed product and that you were unlucky enough to have bought it and that all these years after it was first issued you are still having problems with it I can understand your being convinced Microsoft must have made mistakes. Perhaps those 'mistakes' were deliberately made and had a great deal to do with business stratagems to increase sales of future product offerings. We, as consumers, cannot know. So you were just plainly unlucky, remaja.

It is interesting to me that you choose to post a question about what happened to Microsoft and its WinME in this thread because it suggests that you may wonder if there are answers other than the simply complex one of 'luck'.

However this forum, 'Tech Tips and Tricks', is not the place for a random discussion. So I finish this with a question for you, remaja. Has this thread convinced you that some people have Windows Millennium and have very few problems with it?

Ben.

[ekim68]

Originally Posted by remaja

ME has been the first operating system I ever use.

It has been giving me problems on the first day untill now

windows 2000 is very expensive here and XP runs slow on my PC.

I don't know anything about computers in 2001 and I suffered doing homework with ME

many people told me that ME is a very problematic OS. But why?

what happened to Microsoft that time?

remaja,

As you have access to this thread, then, you have access to many fixes for ME.
Have you read them? And, maybe tried them? Older systems have limitations and
you have to live with the OS that works...Try to fix yours, using some of the suggestions on this thread, or post specific problems in the Win 98, ME technical forums..

[remaja]

This Thread is a long one for me to finish it in one day.

and I love to read them because the helped me

but so far I am convinced that There are users that have little problem on their OS.

Yes ekim68 I have read some of the tips in this thread altough as a beginner There are things I don't understand clearly

I do have a second question. beside using NTFS or FAT 32 what the diference between 98, ME and NT, 2000, XP. I heard that NTFS are more stabil, can ME run NTFS?