Brian Frank

Another thing I though of is what about the Time Warner/AOL merger? WTF's up with that? "Lets go after MS, but Time Warner bringing us Looney Toons and AOL with proprietary features, sure they can merge. But now we've got to go after that evil Bill Gates and his company, because IE is better than Netscape." "Good Idea,boss, I'll talk to the lawyers." AOL sucks, we dropped it cause they were trying to double bill us. Earthlink was better, but now weve got a local provider for our DSL. [This message has been edited by Brian Frank (edited 01 March 2001).]

Yes, its somewhere in the MMC. Unfortuantely, I dont remeber where...

I havent heard of any newer versions, so you're probably okay.

Its supposed to be like that, live with it.

Clean your CD-ROM and defrag your hard drive if you havent. If that doent fix it, and youve tried the other suggestions, tough luck. I will agree that if a disk is only ment to be read at a certain speed, it will only be read at that speed.

If youve got your drive partitioned, use the command prompt and type x:\chkdsk, where x is the letter of the drive you want to scan. The only drive you will have to reboot to check is drive C. This is natural, so dont sweat it.

Yeah, trust me, you dont want to go trying to change your IRQs, unless you really want to reinstall Win2k. If everythings working fine, let it be. While you can change the ACPI computer to a stantdard computer in device manager, you wont have use of your keyboard or mouse--in other words, your screwed, please reinstall Win2k, have a nice life. IM WARNING YOU, DONT CHANGE THE IRQ'S.

Yes, you can install ME without having to reinstall Win2k, unless Win2k has become corrupted. It is advisable to have the whole hard drive partitioned to FAT32, because ME and the rest of the 9x line cannot read NTFS. After you install WinME, simply run the repair option off the Win2k CD (boot off of it and hit R instead of ENTER). This was in a MS IT book, and Ive tested it and it does work. Unless you want to buy another hard drive to do this.

Bingo.

There is absolutely no reason you cant get a decent video card for under $300. The first GF3s will cost an enormous $600, and they will probably go up(think about how much the GF3 Ultra will cost). The only piece of hardware that costs nearly the same is a new Pentium 4 1.5 GHz! You can buy a new computer at that price. Long live 3Dfx!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Alright Pimpin228, when I joined up in January, there was this @$$ who was gloating about how great his system was, and as a result got a whole load of people on his case. Be ready for a bashing if you dont watch it, cause this other character got dissed bad. You want specs, I know there are better systems out there, but as long as I can upgrade my systems, Im okay Here are my specs Main system: Asus A7V Duron 600@680 (6x113) 384 MB PC133 SDRAM Maxtor 20.4 GB 5400RPM ATA100 Samsung 48x CD-ROM Toshiba 12x DVD-ROM Voodoo 4 4500 AGP (overclocked to 176) Guillemot Maxi Sound Fortissimo SIIG 3-port Firewire D-Link DFE 530 TX NIC Zip650 4/4/6 CD-RW USB Zip100 USB Memorex Maxx Scan USB MS Intellimouse Optical Kleer 17" monitor Cambridge Soundworks FPS1000 Logitech Deluxe (thats right a DELUXE) 104 keyboard CoolerMaster Socket A HSF Antec 80mm case fan Antec 2 fan slot blower Antec HDD cooler for sucking in air 300 Watt PS all powered by Windows 2000 Test system: Tyan Trinity 400 Pentium III 667 192 MB PC100 (Ive underclocked this system so I could OC my other) Western Digital 17.2 GB 5400 RPM ATA66 Western Digital 2.5 GB 4500 RPM ATA33 Toshiba 6x DVD-ROM Voodoo 3 3000 AGP with TV/S-video out (overclocke to 182 MHz in ME only) SB 16 PCI OEM Realtek 10/100 NIC MS Intellimouse Optical HP 1280 17" monitor Generic 3-way speakers PC concepts wave ergonomic keyboard (I really should get a different keyboard, cause it sucks for gaming) Intel stock fan Slot blower fan 250 Watt PS running Win2k,WinME,Linux-Mandrake 7.1 I pity you, fool for the wrath this forum will bestow upon you. And the fact you dont have broadband. Sucker!

Well in theory, you could put a much faster cpu in the board, however, you may not get it any faster than 700 MHz. Another consideration is the memory speed. If youve got PC66, youll have to get new memory, or there will most likely be problems. Also, that board probably wont support coppermine P3s or Celerons either. Your friend may want to consider a new board and processor. Yes, you can buy a PIII faster than 700 MHz, but there is no guarantee that the board will let you run it at its rated clock speed. 700MHz is fine, but if your gonna upgrade the procssor, might as well get a new board to go with it.

Also, if you dont want people changing stuff on your system, having a limited account is good too.

It sucked with a PII and 64 megs. Id be surprised to see it boot up in under half an hour with the minimum requirements. In the real world, you'd be an idiot to run Win2k on those anemic specs. Let me know how it runs...if it does. Hehehe

Here's my theory to why ME has ticked off so many people:Its "improved" stability is a problem, because its not totally free of dos, but doesnt have enough of a footing in dos. WinME will be a little faster than Win2k because of the cores the OSs are based on. Reportedly, ME has had more problems in the first 3 months than 98se did in its first year. I personally had more problems with ME than any other version of Windows. I had more crashing specifically a problem. I am in the process of testing it on my test computer, but I am still wary of this OS. I had my doubts about Win2k, but now IMO it is a very capable OS as far as gaming. Yes, there are problems, but the most excellent networking, stablility and absence of the bloated Media Player 7 and Movie Maker are reasons enough to stay with Win2k. Unless you really need dos, there is no reason to go to ME if your gonna upgrade from 98. Either stick with 98 or go to 2000. Unless the requirements for XP drop, I doubt I'll jump to that when It comes out. There is no reason why you cannot run an OS on 128 megs of ram or less. The NT core is heftier than the 98 core, but still that is no excuse to bog down the OS. Just because we have hardware to push around an OS, doesnt mean that the OS has to require a heavier hardware requirement. ME is bad, mainly because of the sheer number of programs that had to be updated just to work properly. That is unacceptable for users to have to deal with. Its like buying a car and having to "upgrade" you garage to accomodate it. ME does suck, and MS shouldnt have released it until they worked out more of these compatiblity bugs.

Yeah, get rid of stuff that you dont need on startup. One of the best tweaking utilities besides TweakUI is Xteq X-Setup. There's a lot of features in it to use, among them is the ability to disable and delete startup apps that you dont need. Stuff like anti-virus and a firewalls should be left to activate on startup. Disable some features, restart and see if everything still works okay. If you dont see any problems, you can delete those apps from startup. Also, if you dont have a lot of ram, get some, as that will help a lot.

Well you can just remove all the devices on your old board, but I'd really recommend against it. In the long run it is much better to do a clean install of any MS OS when upgrading to a new mobo. I didnt have any luck when I switched boards under Win2k. It would boot into Windows. Win2k is very touchy about hardware, but it is kind of a good thing, especially where RAM is concerned. You will know pretty quickly if Win2k doesnt like something. Unless you dont have the time right now to do a clean istall, just remove all the devices. But doing a clean install is the best in the long run. If you dont do it now, you will later on. The only OS that you can get away with a mobo change is Linux. At least it worked under Linux-Mandrake 7.1.

Okay, Im sick and tired of having to tell or see someone else tell people how to dual boot. So here is my guide to dual booting. It is helpful to have your partitions formatted to FAT32. The reason being that while Win2k can see FAT32 and NTFS partitions, the Win9x line cannot read NTFS without a utility, and that could be an inconvienence for many people. It shouldnt matter on which partition either OS resides, but it is advised to install Win9x first, then Win2k. Okay, youve already installed Win2k and dont want to start from scratch--understandable. If youve installed Win2k under a FAT32 file system, you just have to have a partition for Win9x. You will have to get a hold of a partitioning utility, unless you really feel like reformatting your hard drive, get partition magic 6.0. Even if youve got NTFS, you can set the new partition to be FAT32, but you cannot change the Win2k partition to FAT32 without a reformat to my knowledge. There may be a utility out there that can safely do this, but I havent heard of it. Once youve installed Win9x on your partition, youll notice you cant get into Win2k. This is easy to fix. Boot off the Win2k CD and choose the repair option on the install/repair menu. Choose the repair option that does NOT ask for a emergency repair disk. Choose the FAST repair option. Now you may have to make a change to be able to boot to either OS. In windows right click on my computer/properties/advanced/starup and recovery. There you can set whichever OS you want to be the default boot and the time till it will automatically boot to the default OS.

Here's another good reason to hate Rambus. Rambus is suing memory manufacturers Hyundai, Infineon, and Crucial becuase they wont pay royalties to them. Rambus claims that theyve patented certain technologies in SDRAM and DDR memory processes. If they win, we're gonna be paying more for RAM. Im guessing that since everyone really doesnt want RDRAM-because it serves no use, other than to jack up PC prices-Rambus just want to get our money anyhow. Why else would theyve waited this long if the technology was theres in the first place?

If you want a dual boot system, its easiest to leave all the partitions as FAT32. That way, you can see data on both partitions from either OS. The formatting utility that comes with a Maxtor drive is great. Just have a Win98 startup disk handy. Install Win98 first-if not run the repair option off the Win2k CD-then install Win2k. Win98 cannot read NTFS, so it is to your benefit to have the win2k partition as FAT32 instead of NTFS. As for the 98 partition, if I were you see if someone will let you hook up that drive to their computer and suck your data off it. Then install 98 and 2000. Then go burn the data off the persons computer, or stick one of your drives back on it and take back the data.

Yeah, every OS has its own share of problems. Even though MS does do a thorough check of their OSs before offically releasing them, they'll still have some sort of problem. Id say its just due to the fact that Windows is the most prominant OS along with MS being the biggest software company. People probably hacked it just for the thrill of hacking Microsoft. I like Linux and all, but the networking is a snap on Win2k. Plus, Linux requires a bit more knowledge of the OS. When Linux gets to a place where it is much easier to use as a home OS, things might go the way of the Penguin. However right now MS has a the upper hand by a lot. Lets face it, I havent really seen to many programs out at Best Buy for Linux. Ive seen about the same amount out for the Mac too. When Linux gets to a point where there is an entire aisle set aside for Linux software, then we'll talk about the superior OS factor. Linux may be more stable than any of MS offerings, but pick any Windows version and it will be easier to use than Linux. Most computer users wont care about the OS on their PC as long as it lets them do their stuff. For us techno geeks and nerds, we do. But we're not the majority of the population.

Well I just got an e-mail letter from PCWorld today. Maybe theyre a little slow on this info. Ive heard that DDR is about the farthest SDRAM can be taken, but Ive also heard Al Gore invented the internet. Intel really screwed themselves when they did an exclusive with RAMBUS. I dont think anything is wrong with a new type of memory, but when the main reason for the high price is royalties, look elsewhere. I was in the process of giving Rambus a second chance, but after what I read from PCWorld and your update, Im beginning to think Rambus is in the running for communisim as far as ram is concerned. That and the fact that Intel is (sorta) backing them. Rambus really just needs to crawl back where they came from, and then stay there until they can be good and come up with something that we all wont hate.

I leave both of mine on all the time except when i go on vacation. So theyre off for two weeks or less during the year. Rebooting, I do when Im testing stuff or switching to another OS on my test system. But they're on 24/7 for the most of the time.

If you want 1GHz, you could wait until a mobo with the AMD 760MP comes out with support for the new core and get an AMD smp system. Otherwise the Asus A7V133 might be pretty good if you can make use of that stupid AMR slot. Ive got the original A7V rev.1004, its pretty good, and stable. Plus its got an extra pair of ATA100. The A7V133 has a RAID controller. I also have heard good things about Tyan boards. I have one in my PIII system and have been very impressed with them. I have had zero problems with the board. If you want to do overclocking, look elsewhere though. They have a board based on the KT133 chipset--I may have gone with that one had it been available in my town. Tyan is very good to my knowlege. Id highly recommend a Tyan board.

I gawked at the price of the non-existant V5 6000: $500. Now weve got the GF3 thats gonna cost $600. Folks, you can buy a new pc for that price. IMO $300 is too expensive for one addon card. I know the vid card is important, but give me a break-$600 for one piece of silicon? No thank you.