Computer question

[extracheese]

<p>&nbsp;</p><p>Im in the market for a very simple laptop for word/excel/powerpoint documents and occasional web surfing. I like the Inspiron B130 for $ 499. As is common with these basic models no sofware is included.</p><p>Quesion 1: Which is the best firewall/antivirus/pop upblocker/ to get? there are so many - &nbsp;both free and for sale.</p><p>Quesion2: I have to get&nbsp; Word/Excel/Powerpoint added to the laptop. Other than paying $ 175 for it (bundled by Dell or&nbsp;aftermarket from Microsoft)&nbsp;is there a way to copy it from a friend or my own PC?</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>Thanks.</p><p>After posting i saw this - is it a good product?</p><p><a href="http://www.buy.com/prod/McAfee_VirusScan_Firewall_Bundle_2006_Minibox/q/loc/105/201854442.html">http://www.buy.com/prod/McAfee_VirusScan_Firewall_Bundle_2006_Minibox/q/loc/105/201854442.html</a></p>

<span class=post_edited>This message was edited by extracheese on 3-18-06 @ 3:28 PM</span>

[cupcakelove]

<span class="postbody">You'll only be able to use your friends copy of
Office if it is a much older, or a volume install distribution (which
isn't very likely). The newer versions require you to 'authorize' your
copy, and after that you can only reauthorize it on the same computer.
As far as the firewalls go, you really need to say how much you are
willing to spend, and if you want a hardware or software firewall. I
perfer hardware, but you can't get them for free.</span>



<span class=post_edited>This message was edited by cupcakelove on 3-18-06 @ 3:36 PM</span>

[PaulF]

<p>No, you can't just copy Office from an existing installation, and any version after Office 2000 requires activation through Microsoft for continued use. There are caveats to this, but look at the software list below.</p><p>For the love of God.... DO NOT USE MCAFEE!!!!! Besides their major F-up of last week in which one of the updates decided that certain Microsoft products were viruses, it just doesn't cut it.</p><p>BTW - I prefer Toshiba over the Dell, but if price is #1 concern, then get your best deal.</p><p>Software - here is the list of FREE software that does what you need:</p><p>OpenOffice 2.0 - <a href="http://openoffice.org/">http://openoffice.org</a>&nbsp; -actually better than MS Office at dealing with a variety of files. You can set it to use MS formats natively.</p><p>AVG Antivirus - <a href="http://free.grisoft.com/">http://free.grisoft.com</a> Great antivirus- use the free&nbsp;or paid versions on all my clients, friends and family computers.</p><p>Spybot Search &amp; Destroy - <a href="http://www.safer-networking.org/">http://www.safer-networking.org/</a>&nbsp;Use some the advanced features to keep your system safe.</p><p>Firewall - Windows Service Pack 2 has a built-in firewall that does a decent job, or you can use Zone Alarm&nbsp; <a href="http://zonelabs.com/">http://zonelabs.com</a> </p>

[newport king]

<p>Rather than start another new thread for a computer question, does anyone know how to fix this?</p><p>my son apparently hit something on my computer and now on like every webpage the fonts are about 3xs the size. this would be great if i was an old man and couldnt see anything but its driving me nuts, anyone know how to fix it?</p>

[Hottub]

<p>View</p><p>Text size</p><p>Medium</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>and </p><p>alt.warez.ibm.pc</p>

[TheRealEddie]

<p>&nbsp;</p><strong>newport king</strong> wrote:<br /><p>Rather than start another new thread for a computer question, does anyone know how to fix this?</p><p>my son apparently hit something on my computer and now on like every webpage the fonts are about 3xs the size. this would be great if i was an old man and couldnt see anything but its driving me nuts, anyone know how to fix it?</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>Try going to the VIEW pull down menu and go to text-size. See if adjusting that helps.<br /></p><p><br /></p>

[newport king]

thanks.

[Death Metal Moe]

<p>Well extracheese, no one condones stealing around here, but there are other ways to get programs.&nbsp; I suggest you look into them.</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>IF I knew you I could help you out.</p>

[badorties]

<strong>newport king</strong> wrote:<br /><p>Rather than start another new thread for a computer question, does anyone know how to fix this?</p><p>my son apparently hit something on my computer and now on like every webpage the fonts are about 3xs the size. this would be great if i was an old man and couldnt see anything but its driving me nuts, anyone know how to fix it?</p><p>go to yahoo, or any page you're familiar with&nbsp;... hold down the <strong>Ctrl</strong>, and roll the scroll wheel on your mouse -- you'll notice the font size moving, play around till you find your comfort level</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>and for firewalls and anti-virus, your ISP (and new PC) will provide a (free) suite for you ... roadrunner offers a great CA suite, and dell has a whole norton package</p>

[LordJezo]

<p>Oh man get to Circuit City ASAP and pick up the Acer they have on sale this week for less than $500.</p><p>Don't remember the exact model but it comes with free memory upgrade to 512MB and is nice and light. Widescreen display, um, Pentium M with wireless built in.. etc, etc.<br /> </p><p>My dad picked one up over the weekend, I had a chance to check it out when I went over for dinner, and it's perfect for what you want. Don't know how long the sale lasts but you can't go wrong for what you want</p><p>I think it's this one but this is the online deal, not sure if in store is different:</p><p><img width="254" height="179" border="0" src="http://www.circuitcity.com/IMAGE/product/detail/aca/EC.ACA.AS3623WXCI.2.jpg" alt="Acer Aspire Notebook PC (AS3623WXCI)(ACA AS3623WXCI)" /> </p><h3 class="inline"><p><a href="http://www.circuitcity.com/ssm/Acer-Aspire-Notebook-PC-AS3623WXCI-/sem/rpsm/oid/146352/catOid/-12963/rpem/ccd/productDetail.do" target="_blank">Acer Aspire Notebook PC (AS3623WXCI)</a></p><p><font size="2">I<font face="times new roman,times,serif">t comes with Norton AV so you don't have to worry about that one.</font></font></p><p><font size="3" face="times new roman,times,serif"><font size="2">As for a firewall, do you have a router at home?&nbsp; If so then you have no need at all for one.&nbsp; If you don't have one, get one.&nbsp; It's the best way to protect yourself and your whole house's connections.</font><br /></font></p></h3><p> </p><table width="254" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" border="0"><tr><td height="31" colspan="3"><br /></td></tr><tr><td colspan="3"><br /></td></tr><tr><td height="30" colspan="3"><br /></td></tr><tr valign="middle" /></table><br /><p> </p><p>and 2) Screw MS Office, get <a href="http://www.openoffice.org/" target="_blank">Open Office</a>. It's the open source version of Office and does everything the $400 Microsoft product can do, except for free.<br /></p>









<span class=post_edited>This message was edited by LordJezo on 3-23-06 @ 12:02 PM</span>

[extracheese]

<p>&nbsp;</p><p>My DELL B130 came today, and well...its heavy and the plastic isnt exactly titanium, but what do i expect for $ 499?</p><p>I like the OPEN OFFICE suggestion. I looked on line and it appears to be a good alternative to Microsoft.</p><p>Now i have to decide on Firewall, Antivirus and Spyware. A search at PCWORLD and&nbsp; TOPTENREVIEWS.com clearly lay out which to get (Bitdefender, Zone alarm, and Webroot SpySweeper) all took top honors, but each one costs around 30 totalling 90 bucks! IVe used Norton before which for a single price give you all 3 products, however Norton was like 5th on the list.</p><p>They need to make ONE product that does all 3 of these things for a single reasonable price.</p><p>I like Google pop up blocker on my browser</p><p><a href="http://personal-firewall-software-review.toptenreviews.com/">http://personal-firewall-software-review.toptenreviews.com/</a></p><p><a href="http://anti-spyware-review.toptenreviews.com/">http://anti-spyware-review.toptenreviews.com/</a></p><p><a href="http://anti-virus-software-review.toptenreviews.com/">http://anti-virus-software-review.toptenreviews.com/</a></p>

[SatCam]

For spyware, get Spybot S&D and Ad-Aware (both are/have free version). There is also a free version of Zone Alarm.

As for anti-virus, if you buy something like Norton, you'll need to pay a subscribtion each month/year to keep getting updates. Also, often times antivirus programs will "take-over" your computer (use a lot of CPU, become almost impossible to get rid of). It's something you should research more before you buy.

[PapaBear]

<p>A good free anti-virus program is <a href="http://www.avast.com/eng/avast_4_home.html" target="_self">Avast</a>. The initial license is for 30 days, but once they send you the registration key, and you activate it, it will be good for one year. Then you just get a new key every year. I'm always impressed with how often Avast updates its definitions. It's usually 2 or 3 times a week.</p><p>You're right about Zone Alarm, Adaware, and Spybot. However, once you do the initial scan with Spybot, you may find that Adaware will find everything that Spybot does. The first time I used SB, it caught several things. I run the Adaware every day, and haven't caught anything with SB since.</p>