"Harry Krause" wrote in message
news:1102269099.4qsvEFS3LJXCi87mfPUrSA@teranews...
I fixed up my crashed server and also decided it was time to clean up my
main desktop machine, so...

I bit the bullet and did a clean install of WinXP Professional. It went
smoothly, with no error messages, and I've reinstalled the application
software I actually use.

I suppose this is only a sideways step from Win2k, which I had been
using on this machine. There are a couple of nice new features on XP
that weren't offered on Win2k, though. But not enough to induce anyone
to buy XP Pro. WinXP incluides a basic firewall which seems robust
enough to resist probes from the usual test sites.

FWIW, I've had XP Pro on this (the Florida laptop) for over three years and
have never had a problem with it. I prefer it to the older Windows
programs, although I've heard others feel differently. I keep it updated,
including the SP2 release.

Eisboch

I too have been running WinXP or a few years. Have had to re-install a few
times
but that's mostly because I do lots of development work, install and
uninstall all
types of software. I find a reinstall every 6 to 12 months to be a nice way
to clean
up the system. It's a bit of a pain but OK by me.

I like WinXP. Serice pack 2 certainly seems quite secure with it's firewall.
I used
to use zonealarm.

Computer Associates is giving a 12 month (12 month!) free trial of their
anti-virus & firewall software, so that's what I'm using there.

And a helpful site for WIndows fixes, etc.
www.Annoyances.org

Peace Out,
Gary

"Eisboch" wrote in message
.. .

"Harry Krause" wrote in message
news:1102269099.4qsvEFS3LJXCi87mfPUrSA@teranews...
I fixed up my crashed server and also decided it was time to clean up my
main desktop machine, so...

I bit the bullet and did a clean install of WinXP Professional. It went
smoothly, with no error messages, and I've reinstalled the application
software I actually use.

I suppose this is only a sideways step from Win2k, which I had been
using on this machine. There are a couple of nice new features on XP
that weren't offered on Win2k, though. But not enough to induce anyone
to buy XP Pro. WinXP incluides a basic firewall which seems robust
enough to resist probes from the usual test sites.

FWIW, I've had XP Pro on this (the Florida laptop) for over three years
and
have never had a problem with it. I prefer it to the older Windows
programs, although I've heard others feel differently. I keep it updated,
including the SP2 release.

Eisboch


We run XP Home on all 4 family computers and have not had any problems with
the application. We also installed SP2 when it was released this summer and
have seen no negatives as a result. The automatic update feature is also a
plus. As we run Zone Alarm Pro as our firewall and Avast Pro v 4.5 as our
anti virus we disabled the firewall and AV features on SP2.

A couple of anti spyware programs you should consider installing are
Ad-Aware Personal Edition (free at
http://www.lavasoftusa.com/software/adaware/ ), Spybot Search and Destroy
(free at http://www.safer-networking.org/en/index.html ) and Spyware Doctor.

The XP firewall won't stop a rouge program (or spyware, or virus) from
phoning home. It
only stop stuff coming from outside.


"Harry Krause" wrote in message
news:1102269099.4qsvEFS3LJXCi87mfPUrSA@teranews...
I fixed up my crashed server and also decided it was time to clean up my
main desktop machine, so...

I bit the bullet and did a clean install of WinXP Professional. It went
smoothly, with no error messages, and I've reinstalled the application
software I actually use.

I suppose this is only a sideways step from Win2k, which I had been using
on this machine. There are a couple of nice new features on XP that
weren't offered on Win2k, though. But not enough to induce anyone to buy
XP Pro. WinXP incluides a basic firewall which seems robust enough to
resist probes from the usual test sites.