New PC seem to work hard

[DOG MAN]

New Gateway PC 500GB Model GM5626.
First getting use to Vista and all it's security has been more than I thought it would be. This PC seems to be working most of the time. I can hear it cranking away all the time. Is this normal for a Gateway I have always had HP's and most of them seem to be quite all except for one that I had, had a noisy fan from day one. My Ram is 3G dual-channel Memory. This PC is one week old. Physical Memory is running a little high I think right now at 39% CPU Usage is low at 4%. Any ideas? I have gotten rid of a lot of the start up programs and the UAC is turned off.

Dog Man

[PRO151]

Downgrade the thing back to XP.

[Av8r1]

I hate Vista ! Any how I would do a scan for malware/virus. Your hard drive shouldn't be accessed that hard. Also defrag the drive.

[5H Outlaw]

I disabled the user account controls and it helped a lot.

[bosshog]

Downgrade the thing back to XP.

1 on that one.... i have tired VISTA and do not like it at all!! it takes up to much memory and requires a lot of ram to even operate to its fullest potential..

[SheepDog]

Just ditch MicroCrap altogether and get LINUX. I did, never looked back.

[Hard Drive]

What is LINUX?

[Phaze91460]

Vista is a serious memory hog. I have one machine running Server 2003, 5 running XP pro and one running Vista Ultimate.

In a word, Vista SUX.

Microsoft has change so many customizable options its not funny. Some options cant be accessed in Vista that you could in XP.

It does not require much processor speed to have the operating system up and running but it requires a huge amount of memory. How much memory do you have ?

I would recommend a minim of 2gigs, more would be better.

[Bozo]

Vista install in 2 minutes
[youtube]

YOUTUBE_ADMIN

YOUTUBE_ADMIN

[/youtube]

Downgrade the thing back to XP.

I would have to concur with PRO151. The best option is to go back to XP.

What is LINUX?

Linux is an operating system that was initially created as a hobby by a young student, Linus Torvalds, at the University of Helsinki in Finland. Linus had an interest in Minix, a small UNIX system, and decided to develop a system that exceeded the Minix standards. He began his work in 1991 when he released version 0.02 and worked steadily until 1994 when version 1.0 of the Linux Kernel was released. The kernel, at the heart of all Linux systems, is developed and released under the GNU General Public License and its source code is freely available to everyone. It is this kernel that forms the base around which a Linux operating system is developed. There are now literally hundreds of companies and organizations and an equal number of individuals that have released their own versions of operating systems based on the Linux kernel. More information on the kernel can be found at our sister site, LinuxHQ and at the official Linux Kernel Archives. The current full-featured version is 2.6 (released December 2003) and development continues.

Apart from the fact that it's freely distributed, Linux's functionality, adaptability and robustness, has made it the main alternative for proprietary Unix and Microsoft operating systems. IBM, Hewlett-Packard and other giants of the computing world have embraced Linux and support its ongoing development. Well into its second decade of existence, Linux has been adopted worldwide primarily as a server platform. Its use as a home and office desktop operating system is also on the rise. The operating system can also be incorporated directly into microchips in a process called "embedding" and is increasingly being used this way in appliances and devices.

Throughout most of the 1990's, tech pundits, largely unaware of Linux's potential, dismissed it as a computer hobbyist project, unsuitable for the general public's computing needs. Through the efforts of developers of desktop management systems such as KDE and GNOME, office suite project OpenOffice.org and the Mozilla web browser project, to name only a few, there are now a wide range of applications that run on Linux and it can be used by anyone regardless of his/her knowledge of computers. Those curious to see the capabilities of Linux can download a live CD version called Knoppix . It comes with everything you might need to carry out day-to-day tasks on the computer and it needs no installation. It will run from a CD in a computer capable of booting from the CD drive. Those choosing to continue using Linux can find a variety of versions or "distributions" of Linux that are easy to install, configure and use. Information on these products is available in our distribution section and can be found by selecting the mainstream/general public category.

If you're interested in learning about Linux, need help with some aspect of its use or are enthusiastic about it and want to help foster its adoption, you may want to get in touch with a Linux User Group in your area. There are groups in practically every country, region and city in the world, so there is likely to be one near you.

Each day, Linux use is increasing in every sector of our society. We have information about Linux deployments in government, industry and the arts.

Linux has an official mascot, Tux, the Linux penguin, which was selected by Linus Torvalds to represent the image he associates with the operating system. Tux was created by Larry Ewing and Larry has generously given it to the community to be freely used to promote Linux. More information on use of the image can be found on his webpage. More links to variations on the image and alternative logos can be found on our logo page

Many people are not sure of the pronunciation of the word Linux. Although many variations of the word exist, often due to native language factors, it is normally pronounced with a short " i " and with the first syllable stressed, as in LIH-nucks.

[Av8r1]

Linux is an open source (free) OS that's very stable and works well. There are many types of Linux OS systems. If you want to try an ez to use (GUI) windows style, try Noppix Live. Its on a cd and works completely off the disk.

[SheepDog]

I run UBUNTU and love it.

[Rex_foxhound]

I've got Vista on my new Dell laptop and I don't really have any problems with it. Once service pack 1 comes out, I'm sure a lot of issues will be cleared up.
Phaze is right, if you're gonna run Vista, have at least 2 gigs of RAM.
My laptop is a Dell Inspiron 1720 WUXGA 17" screen, Core 2 Duo 2.4ghz, 3 gigs 667mhz RAM, 320gb hard drive, Nvidia 8600gt, a few other goodies, and Vista.

[Hard Drive]

What store sells the CD or where I can order one?

[Bozo]

What store sells the CD or where I can order one?

Vista? To summarize this topic... There has been a lot of issues with this op system. You might want to reconsider, but if you want to buy it... try office depot, best buy

[PONY EXPRESS]

I've got Vista on my new Dell laptop and I don't really have any problems with it. Once service pack 1 comes out, I'm sure a lot of issues will be cleared up.
Phaze is right, if you're gonna run Vista, have at least 2 gigs of RAM.
My laptop is a Dell Inspiron 1720 WUXGA 17" screen, Core 2 Duo 2.4ghz, 3 gigs 667MHz RAM, 320GB hard drive, Nvidia 8600gt, a few other goodies, and Vista.

Nice laptop .We run the Dell E 1705 XP and use it only on vacation trips twice a year. My wife is a e mail junkie and wanted to be able to send emails and pics
So we have the E 1705 with 2.00 GHZ Dual Core 1 GHZ memory 17 inch WUXGA glossy screen that has been used 4 times in 2 years except when we open the bag up to update programs. Heck I might need to add maximum memory and make it 667 MHz instead of 533 chips.. before the chips stop being produced. I'm just now installing Windows Internet Explorer 7.0 as a update even as we type this message

[Pocono Redneck]

What store sells the CD or where I can order one?

If you mean a CD with Linux, you can find cd images on the internet that you can burn to a cd (and it's free)

Here's one --- Webpage Link - Click Here for UBUNTU (one of the more popular Linux distributions lately)

[DOG MAN]

After installing all my software and hardware so i decided to De-frag, It was fast, only took 4hr and 20 min. to do a de-frag but I have to say it no longer grinds on and on and runs smooth I would say. I guess I will keep the thing

[Hard Drive]

Hey Thanks! I give it a try.

[Merc1973]

Are UBUNTU and other LINUX OS compatible with Microsoft documents and files that are already on my computer. Or do i have to back them up?

[ice man]

Are UBUNTU and other LINUX OS compatible with Microsoft documents and files that are already on my computer. Or do i have to back them up?

LINUX (Debian, Ubuntu, Red Hat) and Windows (XP, Vista) have different file systems and are different OS so to install LINUX on a system that is running Windows you will need to format the HDD and that will wipe out the data on the drive. You can however dual-boot a system so both OS are on the same HDD but you can only boot into one OS at a time. Another option is to run a virtual machine emulating windows on LINUX, or the other way LINUX on Windows on either OS, but that can take quite a bit of configuration to get to run correctly..

[Tezterz]

Will games and other everyday programs that are designed for windows run on Linux?

[lonewolf]

I remember allot of people complaining about xp also when it came out. I have vista and i like it had no probs yet had it a yr now.

[BADGER305]

This is a long post, so bear with me. I'm not a person who has had a computer since they first came out. the first one I got was 4 yrs ago. It is a gatewaye450 made in 1999. My wife managed these apts. and someone skipped out and left in in there. It had windows 98se on it and I started tinkering around with it. We finally got internet in 2004 ( don't laugh, I saw no need for it ). the rest is history , I couldn't do without it now.
Anyway, I started learning about computers by reading articles on the web and trial and error. It didn't take long to figure out 98se would make you pull your hair out trying to get certain things to work on it, especially when it came to setting up wireless. ( yes, the computer bug hit, kind of like the radio bug, you know, first you buy a cobra 29, then you have to have a Gen. Lee and on and on ). I bought a new Dell desktop with MORE POWER and the wife needed a laptop for work. Both came with windows XP.
Now, I'm no geek, No offence, but I'll guarantee windows xp put a lot of computer repair shops out of business. gone were the problems loading programs, getting wireless adapters to work properly, and so on. I upgraded the old gateway to the fastest cpu I could find and bought a copy of xp upgrade and put on it. It works everyday in my wife's office and she loves it. And it's pretty fast on dsl.
That brings us to Linux. I have a copy of the latest edition I got from some place in the Netherlands. I've got an old comp. my sister gave me that I'm going to try this OS on. the comp. is about 3 yrs old and just needs a harddrive.
After reading articles about Linux written by the people developing it, I want to tell them that this OS is never going to be a major threat to Microsoft until they stop talking about how this kernel and that kernel will work with this program or that. I'm like 99% of the people out there are; I don't know what a kernel is and I don't want to know. I just want to click on a download and it goes into the bowels of this comp., goes where it is supposed to and does what it needs to.
When I buy a piece of hardware for the machine, I don't want to hunt this driver from this other device that will actually work with limited bugs on my device. That's the kind of info they talk about on the linux boards.
It seems that linux is a great idea, but it has fallen into hands of people trying to make money off of it or either they aren't in the real world with everyone else. It was supposed to be free.
Anyway, I'm going to try it, so if anyone has advice on which hardware works with it, please post a reply. I'm sure there are people on this board who understand all this tech talk about linux, so feel free to jump in.
Thanks for reading. Keith

[ice man]

Will games and other everyday programs that are designed for windows run on Linux?

No, software that was developed for Windows will only run on a Windows OS. Some thing that have been built for Windows have been modified with wrappers for LINUX, but that is mostly hardware drivers. If you want software that is meant to run on LUNUX for the most part you will need applications that were developed and compiled for that flavor of LINUX you are running. On the + side of that, most LINUX applications are free because the nature of LINUX is open source so development of applications for different LINUX platforms are open also. You need different installer packages for the different LINUX platforms meaning that a Read Hat .rpm package will not install on a Debian OS you need a .deb compiled package. Also a lot of things are compiled for certain kernel builds. This stuff is good if you like playing with kernel modifications and open source development stuff. The + thing about Windows XP is it is very easy to configure/setup with most hardware and most 3rd party software games and other applications free, or not are easily accessible...

[Pocono Redneck]

If you ARE going to run Vista on a machine you definitely want at least 2 gigs of RAM---if you don't have this much, buy more.

Why?...What happens from what I've read if you do not have that much memory Vista will constantly page stuff in and out of a segment of your hard drive that it sets as virtual memory. This constant disk access will contribute to premature failure of your hard drive as well as being plain noisy and slow.

As far as Winblows goes..XP is for me. All my webservers for my webhosting business run Linux...I would never trust Billy Gates with my livelyhood.