Death of an old friend.....

[Dreadbelly]

Wow, is this some sort of weird coinkydink?

Who would have thought that so many Mac Users would also be kilt wearers?

We DO like to be comfortable don't we, on many levels.

[KiltedBishop]

Keep your macs...I enjoy actually being able to find software for my computer! LOL
Just kidding guys I know how sensitive your apple boys can be. hehehe
Linux rocks, but the problem is finding (or making) drivers for your hardware, you can probably find alot in the various groups, but it is true your machine would be wide open. A long time ago, in a galaxy far far away their used to be two different machines, PC and Mac. Mac the best for graphics and music, PC was a number cruncher. Now...well six of one half a dozen of the other. As for the security of mac? well tell you what guys, give me your IP and I will have some less than reputable friends I know show you there does in fact exist several viruses that are not OS specific. The nasty ones you hear about nowadays are trasmitted through loopholes in outlook. but the best security is to be smart. Don't download anything you don't trust implicitly, unless your willing to risk it. Don't let anything install without knowing who and what it is. and if you get an e-mail from anyone you don't know, delete it, don't open it. that has served this former hacker well for many years. BTW if you are broadband get a firewall, zonealarm makes a good free one.

and for the record I am still convinced Bill is working with the devil, but like I said I like having software availible. ;) hehehehehe

[Freelander Sporrano]

Browser wise I use Opera
http://www.opera.com/

It's great
And I use Zone alarm as firewall software and pest patrol as anti-spy wear

I find they work well
I also have mailwasher as a mail filter

[chasem]

First off, I'm relieved at the subject of this post after seeing the title!

Secondly, I use Symantec AV, along with Ad-Aware, and MS Antispyware, as well as the occasional full scan at http://www.trendmicro.com (Free online scan). With that, and Firefox as my browser, I have no spyware/adware/virus issues whatsoever.

Oh yeah, and careful browsing (no clicking what you don't know, etc).

[KiltedBishop]

as a note for those who haven't heard. A collegue at a Nuke plant said they were blocking access to orbitz because it installed spyware when you use it. Not sure if it is intentional or not, but you should be aware. Also realize nothing is free on the net. Those screensavers, and pointers, and such...nasty spyware!!!

[yoippari]

I have a windows box with spybot (something went screwy and it wont complete a search) adaware, symantec with most of the options disabled (I use it mostly to screen downloads) and I use opera for online sites I check often (forums, sites I should bookmark but don't, etc...) and firefox for general internet stuff. For e-mail I use thunderbird and while the junk filter only get about 25% of the spam it is easy to clean up the rest.

I tried linux but without good documentation I had a hard time getting it set up entirely. That and there was no good drivers for my video card (ati 9500 pro) when I was playing with it. I still want to build a beowulf cluster out of whatever spare computers I can get my hands on. Then I just need to find a program that will utilize a beowulf culster.

Just something to play with if you get board with windows is litestep. It is an explorer alternative. The shell can do anything explorer can and more, if you are confortable programming. It's kinda like linux, it is great, if you can manually set it up.

For the longest time I hated macs, in fact I have a old powermacII ram stick for the body of my keychain. But I have slowly realized that macs have their ups just like windows.

[Archangel]

going to disagree with Dread on the word only. there's a diff between spyware and virus. Yes, all levels do it.

Remember, everybody, the 'net was designed to be fully open, it's up to you to shut the door.

send me viruses? all twelve of them? ha, find me.

Mac viruses generally have one entry route. Shut off autoplay in QT and you're safe.

Probes have to get through router firewall and powerbook firewall.

Practical advice for Blu. Viruses/spam are stopped at two levels. My server, Primus.ca, catches them on the emails and notifies me. My email program, Mail, also is trainable to stop Spam but Primus does a very good job. Too good, my son's email was stopped as porn because he used Lolita and video in the same paragraph: there was no connection in context.

[auld argonian]

Total MacHead here...and when my Win-Tel friends complain about having to get a new machine every two years, I simply smile...I can usually get at least five or six years out of a Mac without any hardware modifications. It's never worth even trying to upgrade most any Mac...except for loading them with the max possible memory.

The usual complaints about the "high cost" of Macs is invalid: it's far offset by the years of service without hardware upgrades. The only place that they've got you nowadays is that Apple seems to be doing a major operating system upgrade every year. They have been naming these after felines: Jaguar, Tiger, Panther...we're now waiting for Ocelot, Serval and Garfield....possibly Bucky (if you don't get "Get Fuzzy" in your local paper, you are missing some really wry humor!). These usually empty about $100-120 US from your pocket but are generally very worthwhile.

best

auld argonian

[starbkjrus]

Kilted MAC-Head here :mrgreen:

20+ Years IT also though so Blu, you are getting some goodj windows advice. Use a software firewall (ZoneAlarm is good) and if you have broadband use a router with built in firewall (Linksys to name the brand I use). If the router has wireless get a copy of Networking for Dummies and set the wireless security levels at the highest settings. It can be a pain to generate and set up the security keys but it's worth keeping the kid next door out of your network.

On my windows machines I use SpyBot Search and destroy and Adware SE - Personal addition for spy / add ware removal. You'd be VERY suprised how much of that is out there. Firefox as a browser or Opera perhaps. My windows machines are all company owned so I have the company standard Norton Anti-Virus from Symantec so I can only say if you don't like Symantec then try McAfee.

Good Luck.

Wow......Auld A. Bucky Kat on a PowerMAC G5! That could be very scary

[Rob Wright]

Another MAc user here, an imac G5 for me and soon to be adding an ibook. I will never go back to windows ever.


Rob