Techies, Please Help.

[lxskllr]

infact 1-2 cores are still just fine for gaming .. the SSD drives the Ram and the Video card are really what makes the difference these days

Depends... I almost said that, but I think 4 cores gives good insurance. I had some issues with Unreal engine 3 games, where it would max out both cores, and there wasn't enough resources left for system properties. I had to limit it to one core for smooth play. I think a quad core would have helped a lot.

[deadohsky]

That's what i was thinking as far as the six cores. I have run into issues where i just can't run a game and it's only due to my CPU. GPU and RAM are all capable at the moment, not ultra high settings on the newest games or anything but they still run great with no issues. A better dual core might help, but as lx said, one of the reasons i want quad is the insurance of it. As far as i understand, a high fraction of current applications don't utilize multiple cores, but the industry is moving in that direction. I'd like to not have to worry about upgrading my CPU for a while after i get new one.

[Owens187]

I feel for you, I just went through this. Got a virus so bad I ended up having to wipe the drive and start over. And I can usually get ANY virus out.

[deadohsky]

I feel for you, I just went through this. Got a virus so bad I ended up having to wipe the drive and start over. And I can usually get ANY virus out.

Yep, that's exactly what i had to do, it's a pain. Although after i got it up and running again, a few months later i wiped it again for a clean install of windows 7 64bit lol. The second time wasn't as bad since i didn't have everything re-installed yet.

[devilock76]

I just don't understand people that have so many virus problems. And no I am not just talking about being a Linux user. But I have had many Windows boxes that survive a long time without any major virus issue.

Here are some simple rules to not get a virus on your windows box:

1. Anti-virus/spyware/malware detection, most do this so call it step one.

2. A firewall, personally I think Windows built in firewall is crud so I tend to opt for ZoneAlarm, granted I also have a firewall on my router. Still one on the machine that is better than the built in windows one is a must.

3. Don't log in as admin all the time. From Vista on you actually can run a process as admin if you need to while not logged in as admin. Prior to that just switch if you must install something. Something requesting admin privileges other than a program you are intending to install should immediately raise warning flags, and you won't get that warning if you are always logged in as administrator. This is common sense from the *nix world but not so much in the Windoze world, however especially since Vista and 7 allow run as administrator from limited accounts it is less intrusive to set up your machine like this and well worth it. XP and Prior, yeah it is a pain, but less of a pain than removing a bad rootkit virus, trust me.

4. partition, Partition, PARTITION!!! - Ok this is a pain, as most OEM installs only halve two partitions, the windows install and of course a smaller recovery partition containing backup info. If you get a bad enough problem that requires a reinstall of windows, the partition you reinstall on will be formatted, and you lose everything that was on there. If you repartition then not a problem. You should not keep your persistent data on the same partition/drive as your OS and programs. Again a common sense bit from the *nix world, not so much in the Windoze world. Now repartitioning and not losing the OEM install is a pain to the non tech user but worth asking your computer geek friends to help you with. If you just got the computer build the install disks and then reinstall with a partitioned drive (granted harder to do on Windoze install than most Linux installs, but worth it) or another approach, especially if you already have data on there, download a Gparted ISO image, burn it to a CD, and boot from that CD. It will allow you to resize existing partitions to make room for a new one. Re-partitioning could be a manual in itself and there are other programs than Gparted.

5. Don't DOWNLOAD porn or gambling software. Seriously, stream it or use ones that run in a browser. If you must for some reason do this, or install other types of shady programs, turn on a registry alarm program (like the one included in Spybot) so you can keep an eye on what is being done to your system. These are common sources of embedded trojans.

6. The above applies to torrents and other types of illegal or gray area legal acquired files and programs.

7. The above can apply to lots of free software if you do no acquire it from the respected sources. Like take OpenOffice, you should only download that from Openoffice.org or maybe CNET or Tucows. Even with the last two make sure you are downloading a well rated and reviewed source.

I think that is enough for now. Some of those are more complicated than simple but they will pay off in the long run.

Ken