Firefox browser question

**scracha** · 20th September 2011, 18:57

Originally Posted by slofox

I dropped Norton years ago after running into endless problems with it. Had to take it to the PC shop to get it uninstalled - wouldn't allow uninstall on its own...shop (PB Tech) had a special program to uninstall it.

"Special program". Like the freely available "Norton Removal Tool" on the Symantec website? There's "special programs" I've had to use to remove AVG, Avast, Trend, Nod32, etc so in its defence, Norton AV/IS has been pretty damn good since 2009ish. Trend's in the naughty corner this week as their little blue "Free Upgrade to 2012" is popping up on lotsa computers and buggering some of them up good style.

Be warned that if your PC is old and shite it might not have SATA interfaces for new hard drives. Quick way to quickly reclaim disk space is to reduce the System Restore disc space from it's default 10%. Similar with the recycle bin (1% is fine lol!). You can also erase your temp folder contents (use crap cleaner if you can't do cmd prompt) and if you view hidden files you can erase most of the $NTUninstallKBblahblah files in the c:\Windows folder (do not erase $hf_mig$ though).

If you're really short of space, then you can change the default location of the "My Documents" folder (docs, videos, music, photos) to your external USB drive.
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/310147

Yeah...linux.....advisable if you're just surfing the web, word processing & email, especially on a shite old pc. However, if you're doing other stuff then there's just too much stuff it CAN'T do without a lot of shagging around (especially for the average computer user).

**steve_t** · 20th September 2011, 19:32

Originally Posted by scracha

Be warned that if your PC is old and shite it might not have SATA interfaces for new hard drives.

http://www.pbtechnz.com/?item=HDDWD1257

**scracha** · 21st September 2011, 07:05

Originally Posted by steve_t

http://www.pbtechnz.com/?item=HDDWD1257

I suspect that is no longer available. I normally use PCI->Sata as far better value + when PC shits itself you're still left with a working SATA drive. Remember to add SATA driver BEFORE cloning drive otherwise it's a PITA :-)
http://www.dove.co.nz/jump/4672

**Spearfish** · 21st September 2011, 07:27

Originally Posted by avgas

You can download it via here...
http://www.linuxmint.com/

Most user friendly linux out there with the exception of MacOS and Android.
Very handy to "XP/Vista" users. As many things are similar.

Is it similar to ubuntu?
I've tried a machine running "ubuntu"(sp?) still working passed its use by date (1998) because of the low resource requirements. Is mint the same thing different flavour? (no pun intended)

**avgas** · 21st September 2011, 08:02

Originally Posted by Spearfish

Is it similar to ubuntu?
I've tried a machine running "ubuntu"(sp?) still working passed its use by date (1998) because of the low resource requirements. Is mint the same thing different flavour? (no pun intended)

Yep. Same background, but better user interface. I never had to type a single line of code!!!!!
You want a new program - you go to the program library and download one, it installs itself like any windows PC. Has office/firefox etc already built in and setup. And its a piece of cake to install.
Everything is sort of layed out like XP too. You have a start menu, my documents, settings, programs etc
Also if you install 'wine' on it, you can run lots of windows programs quite well on it too.
Its a shame that none of my work programs operate on it otherwise I would have moved every PC and all the work PC's onto Mint. Its well....mint.
Download it, and put the CD into your computer - give it a trial run before installing it.

**slofox** · 21st September 2011, 09:03

Originally Posted by scracha

Norton AV/IS has been pretty damn good since 2009ish. Trend's in the naughty corner this week as their little blue "Free Upgrade to 2012" is popping up on lotsa computers and buggering some of them up good style.

I dropped Norton well before 2009 so don't know about recent iterations of it.

Trend is in my naughty corner too - for that very reason! Doubt I'll renew it again.

Incidentally, the external HDD works just fine on the machine in question.