Amiga.org
Amiga computer related discussion => General chat about Amiga topics => Topic started by: PGit on October 31, 2003, 10:42:18 PM
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Is it just me or is Windows awful?
and, on a completely different note, while looking through aminet I saw a file on the AGAExtender, has anyone built one?
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My windows XP folder size is currently 1.47 GB ! :-o How on earth is that possible? I dont have the nerves to try delete something :-o it might crash and burn like it has done so many times before :-(
Windows = Reformat, reinstall, retry...some of the words in the microsoft vocabulary :-(
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The good news about WindowsXP is that it's so bloated, it won't even fit on my PC's hard drive. So if for some crazy, substance-induced reason I decide I want to install it, I can't. :-)
AGAExtender sounds like a design similar to the Grafitti box. The readme mentions VisCorp and Amiga Technologies, so It's a pretty old design. I don't know how useful it would be today. Might be fun to play with, though.
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Lets see...
1) My XP boots dead slow novadays due to lots of installed software (my gf to blame), eventhough registry has been cleaned.
2) Documents and Settings-folder.. 656mb .. and I ain't got even one god damn document saved there. Thats loadsa settings.
3) Windows-folder is almost 2 gigs.
4) It's awfully slow in general use, one big reason being hd fragmentation. IE loads in about 5 secs or so
5) Swap is yelling for mercy eventhough I have half a gig memory
the OS is utter ####, when I first used it, it felt like a step forward .. but I don't know.
The only things gone forward is networking and hardware support.
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I'm using (well it's my dad's PC really) Windows ME which seems to be even worse than normal for Windows.
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>I'm using (well it's my dad's PC really) Windows ME which seems to be even worse than normal for Windows.
Oh yeaaaah.. ME...the worst of the Win-series. Anyone who bought ME should have had gotten their money back, thats how unstable it is.
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Is it just me or is Windows awful?
It is definitely not you.
Some versions is less awful than others though
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WindowsME should never ever have been released! Weird no one has sued microsoft for it, it is totally unusable and does not provide any new features from the previous version other than bloatyness and unstability
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It isnt just the windows OS thats the problem these days... there is a stiff competition between hardware companies(Asus, Logitech, Creative) so prices has been dumped, and so has the durability. :-(
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a firend of mine from the army, who is an IT specialist loves ME and says its never crashed in all the time he has used it. lol he dual boots with Linux also.... replacable harddrives and whatnot.
lol i made him install trillian and his whole machine became unstable. great ME
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Yes it is. My favorite part about Windows is that its stablitly changes everytime you install different software. Everything works fine until you get a new game or app and presto - BSOD or apps freezing or apps just bailing out. What a wonderful OS.
By the way my windows directory is around 1.50 gigs containing some 11,000+ files (I have Win2K), which leads to this; what files are needed in an OS to be called part of an OS and what stuff is fluff. Figure that out and you've figured out what M$ can get rid of to reduce the size of thier OS.
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i havnt seen a blue screen of death in 2 years. windows 2k and XP stopped all that. all i get now is unexpected rebooting
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I don't use windows anymore, Gentoo's the only thing I boot into on this machine.
It plays all the games I played in windows too, everything!
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@Hooligan:
The reason you have >600MB in your "documents and settings" directory and no documents is that this is where your temp files and IE cache live. Use the "cleanmgr" program (should live somewhere in your windows drawer) to get rid of those.
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My 2k side is pretty stable. I haven't seen a blue screen since before I started using 2k, which was 2 years ago. That's a nice feeling. My biggest gripe is how EVERYTHING is just THROWN in the Windoze directory. :-( I can't find anything, if I needed to find it.
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mantisspider wrote:
a firend of mine from the army, who is an IT specialist loves ME and says its never crashed in all the time he has used it.
This is almost my experience with WinME. On two different machines (an HP w/550MHz AMD K6-2 and a self-assembled AMD K7/800 on a Gigabyte mobo) I got uptimes in excess of 30 days on a routine basis. I also had ME on my Dell Laptop for several months. No problems these except for the lack of hibernation support.
The most problem-prone situation I had on ME was using Netscape 6. Everything else was great.
Now, I've moved everything to Win2k and WinXP. Despite my good luck with ME, I'm not looking back.
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PGit wrote:
Is it just me or is Windows awful?
Well, I never really liked the Win9x series, but I am pretty satisfied with NT4 and 2K. XP is not entirely to my liking and I also don't like the way MS has chosen for its future Windows & Office releases.
At the moment, I am carefully discovering Linux and expect to make a full transition for my maincomputer to Linux somewhere in 2005 (fundings in 2004 are almost entirely going to hard- and software for both my Amiga & Commodore 8 bit machinees).
I'm not very much into the latest & greatest and still am too satisfied with my K6-III/550 and Windows 2000 to replace it with something faster...
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PGit wrote:
I'm using (well it's my dad's PC really) Windows ME which seems to be even worse than normal for Windows.
ME is utter crap. I have several friends who once had it on their respective computers when they bought them, but it is notoriously unstable.
I advised them to go for Win2K and they're all happy Windowsusers now, able to do what they intended to do with their computers without any instablityproblems.
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Is it just me or is Windows awful?
Is it just me or is this the oldest argument/rant known to Amiga.org (except possibly anti-Atari stuff)...
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My windows XP folder size is currently 1.47 GB ! :-o How on earth is that possible? I dont have the nerves to try delete something
I'd suggest you take a look at XPlite (http://www.litepc.com/xplite.html)
It allows you to not only deinstall things like IE, Mediaplayer 6/7, soundfiles screensavers, but also the "File Protection DLL cache", "Pre Fetch Cache (Often used programs that only gets bigger), and the Windows tour (22Mb for something hardly anybody has seen...) ... A bit expensive, but it does help..
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My 2k side is pretty stable. I haven't seen a blue screen since before I started using 2k, which was 2 years ago.
When I worked at a news station we had Dell boxes all running Win2K. We would run AP-ENPS (which is the AP wire), Adobe Premier, and Pathfire. Along with Microsoft Office. BSOD were almost a daily occurance. It seemed the IT people were always having to re-install software or the OS. Granted AP-ENPS would have updates that would seem to mess up Windows so the IT guys would have to get Windows to work with the upgrade. This would screw up Adobe Premier. So the vicious cycle continued. That is until they shut down our news department. Corporate bastards! :-x
I was working in Photoshop at work one day and the computer went into the BSOD for whatever reason. The only thing I was running was Photoshop. :roll:
At home I have a Win2K/Linux Duel Boot (seperate hard drives) and the only problem I've had (so far) is that Win2K started acting screwy when I installed a Logitech Mouse and it's software. Turns out Logitech installed spyware with their driver installation and it was screwing with explorer.
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Turns out Logitech installed spyware with their driver installation and it was screwing with explorer.
This seems to be a natrual occurance nowadays. Correct me if I am wrong, but isn't that and ANY type of spyware in violation of the Internet Privacy Act of 1995, granted by President Clinton?
Granted, you have to FIND the damned sh!t, but still. I'm so F*CKING sick of spyware. I found over 70 different kinds on my roommates computer and it she just uses stuff like Soulseek, Trillian, etc. Spyware is getting as bad as Spam....
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Methuselas wrote:
Turns out Logitech installed spyware with their driver installation and it was screwing with explorer.
This seems to be a natrual occurance nowadays. Correct me if I am wrong, but isn't that and ANY type of spyware in violation of the Internet Privacy Act of 1995, granted by President Clinton?
Granted, you have to FIND the damned sh!t, but still. I'm so F*CKING sick of spyware. I found over 70 different kinds on my roommates computer and it she just uses stuff like Soulseek, Trillian, etc. Spyware is getting as bad as Spam....
No kidding. First of all, you would think that a hardware company would have made plenty of money via the price they sell there wares for. Why must they put this spyware crap in their software. To make more money selling other business my surfing habits, which in my mind is nobody's business. Sometimes I miss the days before the Internet got so big and wish the days of BBS's would come back.
As far as the Interenet Privacy Act goes, I am sure the Patriot Act made that a moot point.
Sorry to be Off Topic.
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Turns out Logitech installed spyware with their driver installation and it was screwing with explorer.
Really? First I've heard of it... using Logitech drivers here, no evidence of foul play... I haven't heard anything through the usual tech news channels either...
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Really? First I've heard of it... using Logitech drivers here, no evidence of foul play... I haven't heard anything through the usual tech news channels either...
It's called Backweb lite. When I installed the drivers it installed it automatically. Didn't ask me if I wanted it installed or not. According to the research I've done on the web it is supposed to be a simple, third party program that updates software. But it also displays pop-up ads.
Here is some more info about it. Link (http://www.pestpatrol.com/PestInfo/B/Backweb.asp)
Hope this helps.
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Since an auto-installer installed a new version of Internet Explorer, my computer crashes approximatly four times a day (not joking). Of course I cannot uninstall this.
I am a devoted supporter for human rights, but who made this deserves a headshot
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For me, windows is awful. On the other hand, and
unlike many people, seems, I never had to reformat,
reinstall, driver problems, speed problems, HD
problems, or whatever. It's stable, it's not so
multitasking but I never expected it to be, and
it REALLY makes a fine gaming machine.
The thing we should critisize isn't windows itself,
for it might be huge and all, it's still usable.
The thing I dislike is mostly political :
Windows is kinda the only path to most of the digital
information out there. Shouldn't the roads of
information be free? Isn't it dangerous to let private
societies, with consumerist objectives, control our
data? :)
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mikeymike wrote:
...using Logitech drivers here, no evidence of foul play...
Drivers for what? Mice appear to be affected, but my webcam isn't, for instance.
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Well either the lot of you have been the most unlucky windows users ever collectively or you havent a clue how to use windows.
I have Win XP pro on my current machine and its crashed less then ten times in the over 1 year that ist had XP pro on it. I have loads of software and games on it too. So much in fact that my 40 GB HDD is full.
Win 2K and XP are allright. ME is sh1t. 98SE was OK. NT4 was adequate. Anything else was utter ####e.
Oh and 2k and XP are faaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaar more stable then I ever Remamber AmigaOS ever being.
Kepp things in prespective guys. I have afeeling that pretty much all of the people left on here see Amigas and related stuff through rose tinted glasses, otherwise you'd have left the scene ages ago.
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Is it just me or is Windows awful?
:lol: .... it's just you. .... :-P
;-)
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redfox
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AmigaOS never crashed on me... Third party software messed things up.
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Damn!!!! I FINALLY got my Amithlon up on the net and IBrowse moves faster than IE or Mozilla. :D
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1) My XP boots dead slow novadays due to lots of installed software (my gf to blame), eventhough registry has been cleaned.
Well, install one more piece of software: AutoRuns (http://www.sysinternals.com/ntw2k/source/misc.shtml). Use it to see what the heck is being loaded at boot up and elimiate what's not needed. How do you know what's needed or not needed you ask? That's easy, check with this site: Start Ups (http://www.pacs-portal.co.uk/startup_pages/startup_full.htm). Then check your services. A good guide for that can be found at Black Viper's (http://www.blackviper.com/) web site (look for Windows XP Services). Be sure to disable the Indexing service as it's pretty useless and resource hungry.
2) Documents and Settings-folder.. 656mb .. and I ain't got even one god damn document saved there. Thats loadsa settings.
Yeah, lotsa software likes to store stuff there for you (isn't that thoughtful). I suggest moving the My Documents folder to another partition (can't remember how to do that, but there's a way, I'm sure you can find it if you search for it).
3) Windows-folder is almost 2 gigs.
Well... there's System Restore which can use up a lot of disk space, plus all the Windows patches you install store uninstall information as well. It's easy to see how things can add up when your system stores backups on everything you touch!
When I install Windows on a machine (and I've been doing that often for friends and family as of late) I always setup three partitions: C: OS only, D: Apps only, E: Data (aka documents, files, mp3's, etc), including temp files and swap file. If you like you could also make a 4th partition just for the swap file and temp internet files. Seperating the temp files from the OS and Apps really helps reduce the fragmentation. Data on the otherhand tends to change anyway, so there's less harm in mixing temp files with the data.
4) It's awfully slow in general use, one big reason being hd fragmentation. IE loads in about 5 secs or so
There's many things that can cause that, not just fragmentation. Check out this link for some things to try: TweakXp - Performance Tweaks (http://www.tweakxp.com/performance_tweaks.aspx). Good luck!
5) Swap is yelling for mercy eventhough I have half a gig memory
Well, if you really do have lots of memory (like more then a gig) you CAN shut off the VM if you like. It's easy, just go into the VM settings and set the swap file size to 0 on all drives. Even if you don't shut it off, you should NEVER allow windows to automatically manage your VM. Pick a large partition and use it to store the swap file. The min and max file size should be identicle. A good rule of thumb for your swap file size is around 1.5 times your actual memory, but I use a 1:1 ratio. If you have a gig or more you might wanna go less.
There are also tools out there that can defragment your registry files. Defragmenting your swap file isn't that hard, simply set you VM to 0, reboot, defragment your drives and then reset the VM and a new swap file will be created. Hopefully you'll have enough contiguous free space to keep it all together.
Make sense? Ah nevermind, just reinstall everything, that always works! ;-)
-- Mike
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It's called Backweb lite. When I installed the drivers it installed it automatically. Didn't ask me if I wanted it installed or not. According to the research I've done on the web it is supposed to be a simple, third party program that updates software. But it also displays pop-up ads.
Drivers for what exactly? I have MouseWare and their WingMan software, and ZoneAlarm has yet to notify me of anything trying to call home to Logitech or Backweb.
Btw, I suggest anyone who runs any version of Windows should install ZoneAlarm Pro. It's far better then the standard WindowsXP firewall. I run ZA even though I'm behind a hardware firewall/router - no such thing as too much security! ;-)
- Mike
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You guys should sheck your settings.
By default, Windows XP tries to allocate 10% (:-o) of your HD-space for recovery states, of whatever they're called. Also, IE will use 1-2 gigs for it's cache.
This can easily beef your system folders up to several gigs.
In general, I'd recomend some tweaking and installing Cacheman...
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re: logitech "spyware"
Drivers for what? Mice appear to be affected, but my webcam isn't, for instance.
Does anyone else find it a little ironic that someone is complaining about spyware when they have a webcam? :-)
Ok, so what spyware is supposedly in the Logitech webcam software?
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Also, IE will use 1-2 gigs for it's cache.
Only very temporarily, if you're transferring 1 - 2 gig size files with IE. Otherwise it sticks to the quota you set.
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mikeymike wrote:
Only very temporarily, if you're transferring 1 - 2 gig size files with IE. Otherwise it sticks to the quota you set.
Windows default quotal is BIIIIG!
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Does anyone else find it a little ironic that someone is complaining about spyware when they have a webcam?
:lol: