This is a fairly old site, but may be useful nonetheless. As it's Win9x site, it does not apply directly to any version of NT, e.g. Windows 2000 (NT 5.0) or Windows XP (NT 5.1), but many topics are conceptually general to both platforms. However, * these pages are particularly Win9x-specific.
See also the main site, Tales from the Blog, and the blog itself.
General
user advice
(mild to moderate geekiness):
How to switch off your PC - but seriously, folks...
Safe computing 2000 primer; tres dated, but basics
still apply
End-user system maintenance what every user should be doing
Graphics primer for users new to scanning or digital
photography
Word processing tips about word processing, not word
processor products
Getting your email while away traveling and so forth
Background
issues (mild
to marked geekiness):
About software; manage it, assess bloat, read why it falls over
How malware works - know your foe
The startup axis * - from PSU to StartUp groups
Data management strategies * that may differ from what you've read
The MIME-spoofing risk * - this is one critical fix you really need!
The
secret life of email - some things have to be designed in
Windows 9x subversions * - don't mix 'em up
Windows
Millennium * - what is it, and should you
care?
WinME
SFP and System Restore * - friends like this need management
What do you mean, DOS? * - a guide to all the permutations!
Retrofitting
DOS Mode to WinME
*
- yes, it works
cleanly too
Long
File Names - and
the issues they can cause
Registry management * - editing, compacting, and backing it up
Troubleshooting
methods (mild
to marked geekiness):
Formal virus check - exclusionary scanning for
viruses
The
Stuffed PC - you'll
know it when you see it; "first, do no harm"
Before
you think... -
debugging preliminaries can save you hassles
Risk management how-to * - use small walls as well as big
fences
Getting
rid of Kak and
other embedded-script HTML malware
Living
with unknown Word malware; less common than in 1999
Drives are using DOS Compatibility Mode * and how to fix it
Managing DLL Hell - what DLLs are, how to approach
conflicts
Dial-Up Internet debugging * - don't dig in the wrong place
FATxx
data recovery topics (mild to marked geekiness):
Understanding ScanDisk * messages - what every user
should know
Understanding
FAT - what
every geek should know
Hard drive data corruption - what goes wrong, what it looks
like
Troubleshooting
FAT file system
- redundancy is your friend
Bad diskette data recovery - a standard approach
Data recovery from 'lost C:' hard drives (terse)
External
links -
Most Frequently Used:
Virus info: http://www.f-secure.com/v-descs
General search: http://www.google.com
External
downloads -
The CQ Non-Poo Software Awards:
Non-malware-gaping email - Eudora: http://www.eudora.com
On-demand and field virus scanner - F-Prot for DOS: http://www.f-prot.com
On-access virus scanner - AVG 6.0 for Windows: http://www.grisoft.com
Commercial malware killer - AdAware: http://www.lavasoft.de
Commercial malware killer -
Spybot: http://www.safer-networking.org
(...)
RAM tester - MemTest86+: http://www.memtest.org
RAM tester - SIMMtester: http://www.simmtester.com
Archiver, now command-line controllable - WinZip: http://www.winzip.com
Partition and boot manager
- Boot-It NG: http://www.bootitng.com
The perspective on all this is small, self-managed installations based around Windows 9x. There's plenty of large-installation and network-orientated stuff elsewhere; that's not my beat, and I'll leave that to others to cover.
You can also read some
navel-gazing about the philosophy of this site.
You can also mail me at cquirkesite@mvps.org.
(C) Chris Quirke, all
rights reserved.