NWA-PCUG Newsletter Article, April 2003
Recap of March 2003 Q&A Program
by David Hinds, NWA-PCUG Vice President
dlhinds@cox-internet.com
(click to email author)


The Q&A session began with a discussion of some of the current hoaxes, scams, and viruses that are currently circulating the internet. One of the scams referred to as the Ethiopian scam attempts to get the recipient to send personal information including bank account number with the promise from an unscrupulous bank employee of splitting 10 million dollars from the account of a business man who died in the crash of an Ethiopian airplane and had no surviving relatives. Remember, if it sounds too good to be true, it probably is.

A question regarding how often a person needed to upgrade their anti-virus software was raised. In my opinion, as long as the virus patterns are up to date there is no need to upgrade. The need to upgrade should only be when it is cheaper to upgrade than to continue a subscription in order to keep current on the latest viruses or when changing operating systems that may require a later version.

Another discussion was about copying MP3 files directly. The latest Windows Media Players can be downloaded from http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windowsmedia/download/default.asp.

Don Boudeman had a question regarding an error message in Windows Me ('When I push START/SETTINGS/CONTROL PANEL/ADD/REMOVE PROGRAMS, then the WINDOWS SETUP tab, I get an error message: -- an error... rundll32...'). One of the possible solutions mentioned was to use SFC (System File Checker) to check for corrupt files; however, in the Me version, Microsoft decided not to include SFC. Maybe they thought Me files could not be corrupted.

A problem of some web sites having blank areas elicited a number of suggestions including the web page design, the number of calls the site was able to handle, and various other restrictions by the site designer, the user's Internet Service Provider, and the user's browser capabilities.

Backup was another topic discussed. The question of when and what to back up is almost as varied as the number of computer users; but in my opinion, the most important part of any backup schedule is to maintain an up-to-date backup of all data that you do not want to loose. Methods of backup will vary depending on the equipment you have available and the size of the files requiring backup. For some, backing up text files, will only require a single floppy, while for others who are working with large graphic files (photo albums, presentations, etc.) may require larger storage media such as CD ROM disks. For those who, like myself, are not happy with spending hours or even days reinstalling applications, a cloned hard disk containing all of the installed applications, and a zip or superdisk containing all of the data added since the hard drive was cloned is the preferred way of handling backups. (Remember, the hard drive that is cloned should be removed from the system or, at least, disconnected from the cables to prevent inadvertent contamination/destruction of the clone.) The main thing to remember about computers is that they WILL FAIL at some point in time, usually the most inconvenient time, and none of the media currently available is permanent under all conditions it may be subjected to.

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