Anybody know of a good place to take my pc in Albuq.? It has gotten terribly sluggish over the past year and I'm sure it needs to be checked out. Where's fast and affordable?

Not sure, but when my PC started acting slow, someone suggested I use the free "ad aware" software here http://www.lavasoft.com/ I ran the scan about a dozen times and finally it removed all the bad stuff on my PC.

Don't take it anywhere (professional techs will rip you off the same as crooked mechanics)- bribe your friend who knows about computers or read up on computer forums.

quote:

Originally posted by WebMonkey:
I ran the scan about a dozen times and finally it removed all the bad stuff on my PC.

It's never removed... Backup the data and format.

I agree - dont spend the money on a tech - such a rip off when you can do it yourself with some basic research. You-tube is a great place for tutorials on basic how-to's in regards to reformatting HDDs, OS installations, various part installations etc.

If your PC is sluggish, a few things can help improve performance quickly and for the same price or less as a visit to your local tech.

1. RAM - do you have enough? The stuff is cheap nowadays. For 50-100 bucks you can max out your memory with 2 or 3 gigs depending on type and your pc/motherboards specs. That right there is the cost for a couple hours of tech labour.
2.) defragment your HDD - it's free and built into a MS OS.
3.) Run Adware by lavasoft - it's free. It'll search out alot of the adware on your box.
4.) If you're having problems with viruses, download AVG antivirus protection. - Its free.
5.) Run Spybot S&D - it's also free and will search out all the malicious progs that Adware by lavasoft didn't find. In combination with Adware and AVG, the 3 are a very powerful anti spyware, bot, and virus suite ... and its very free.

6.) I really cant stress the importance of maxing out your box's memory. Its so cheap nowadays and it really helps in speeding everything up once you get all the crap cleared out with the above programs or ideally, a reformat and fresh install of whatever OS you're using. Yeah, you can You-tube RAM installation vids too ... about as painless of a job as one can do in regards to DIY computer upgrades and a great way to get your feet wet.


Best of luck to you. If you really want to take it to a PC joint, I have always heard good things about PC Magic on Eubank IIRC.

Yeah Ccleaner is a good choice as well it's a free prog too.

I'm glad I bought a mac. I used to have to do all those PC maintenance things. I spent more money, but I'm really happy with it's ability to handle all my stuff I use it for without it slowing down or spazzing out.

what rhian said.

PCs are tough to keep clean and healthy when you use them on the internet. Sad but true.

Terry's right on. A Mac is damn near impossible to get sick. The new Core Duo stuff is a little more iffy, but super-powerful. My money's still on a G4....you can get a great powerbook used for $500-800.

The problem with the G4s now is the latest operating system lepord runs badly on the G4 RISK processor. But I love those oldish things. Only 11 steps for a FLOP doubles the speed.

Why aren't there as many bugs for macs? Hackers don't like to hack macs or what?

quote:

Originally posted by Skreech:

Why aren't there as many bugs for macs? Hackers don't like to hack macs or what?

I think the main reason is that the market share for macs is much smaller than pc. It's not worth a hacker's time, they want to inflict as much damage as possible in one fell swoop. Also macs are built on Unix, which for some reason, is a more secure operating system.

Until the Core Duo was introduced, MACs were unhackable. They offered $10K to anyone who could do it about 2 years ago when the the Core Duo was introduced....some guy from Canada finally succeeded. I don't remember all the details, I'm sure Google knows.

The new operating system for Mac is still pretty shakey. Along the lines of Vista. Steer clear.

Im currently using a 1st gen 24" intel based 2.16Ghz core-duo imac running OSX 10.4.11 w/o any glitches. Totally rock solid as long as you keep it updated - an amazing quality machine Apple makes. I also run my fiances old G3 PPC imac ... 533Mhz running OS 9.2.2 IIRC and that thing is still chuggin along - albeit not nearly as fast but still a blast from the past to use - I love it for word processing & the classic OS is functional alotta fun.

I have another box running XP pro that I use for internet gaming and it is rock solid too but yeah, the vulnerabilities MS os's have are a real drag (Why I made the switch to Mac for most surfing). One other option I didnt post was going to the Ubuntu website and getting a free OS install disc of their latest os v8.10 (named interpid Ibex) IIRC. I like that os a lot - very intuitive, a lot of cool features and software that come with it, and although its not 100% hacker free (no os is not even mac os) it's extremely rare as the market share for boxes running linux based os's is not even a blip on the radar screen in regards to world wide MS os users.

quote:

Originally posted by mannydog:
The new operating system for Mac is still pretty shakey. Along the lines of Vista. Steer clear.

Vista? Not even close. I'm using a 24" Intel based 3.06 ghz Imac with the 10.5 leopard OS. I've had 0 problems with it. It comes with the bootcamp program, which allows me to partition the hard drive. Ii've got a 500gb hd, I partitioned 50gb and installed Windows XP on it (mostly for gaming). When I boot up I have the choice of either running the pc or the mac.

quote:

The new operating system for Mac is still pretty shakey. Along the lines of Vista. Steer clear.

WHAT??????? Along the lines of Vista??? No way my friend!!!!! Not even close. The new Mac OS rules. You are straight up wrong. Or was that a joke??

I have windows and Mac OS running on my mac as well just for checking websites in another horrible disaster... the Explorer browsers.

Cool. Maybe its great now. Had some hardware issues with audio stuff straight outta the gate with leopard on MacPro tower with 5 gigs of RAM. Shitcanned it and never looked back.

Well, I just bought a used I-Mac G5 for pretty cheap. I've been wanting to get a mac for a while, so hopefully problem solved. I thought about a mac book, but I need the extra memory and this was has a 600GB HDD. I won't have the time to get it all set up until later this week or next week, but I'll keep you all posted (as if you're interested...).

quote:

Well, I just bought a used I-Mac G5 for pretty cheap.

where?

quote:

Originally posted by mannydog:
Had some hardware issues with audio stuff straight outta the gate with leopard on MacPro tower with 5 gigs of RAM

you got a taste of the bleeding edge! good computer audio software(inc. hw drivers) is a specialty software, and sometimes abit behind the new OS.

i always prefer last year's OS :-)