splat - seems for some reason you are struggling to download the applet - have you tried a restart on your machine?

Ian

Have restarted lots of times, Ian.

With Ian's, robber's and Spaceman's help, all seems to be sorted now. Thank you very much gentlemen! :-)))

DocProc and Optimist thanks for suggestions re buying XP on E-bay

My new PC has a very noisy fan, am considering buying a 'quiet' fan for a few 's or a fan speed controller for about 30 Any suggestions?

ilanderton

Be very careful! Especially if your machine is under warranty.

I always try to get my machines as cool as possible and do not worry about the noise but is you must make it quieter, look around for an especially quiet fan. There are some around with very large heatsinks on which are mounted large slow moving fans.

Check your motherboard manufacturers site and see if they have any utilities for displaying system temps.

Our work systems are about to give up and die. (Running a mix of Win 98 and 95) The fans are running strangely!! I need a new system with three PC's to start with at each of our three sites, increasing to about 7 eventually at the busiest place. Our software is presently a DOS based system, and in the next three months we will move to a Windows system.

Can anyone give any guidelines about what I need to look for. As I see it we are going to have to do the following:
Rewire the network - to take higher speed data transfer (only 10 Mbs at the moment)
Include wireless so my Partner's laptop can access the network
Include the option of having broadband later.

The only concrete requirements I can think of that will be needed are:
Windows XP Pro on each machine
Network router with wired & wireless networking - should give the option of having a VPN should we decide on that route.

What have I missed!!! I'm thinking of Dell as a one stop solution - have dealt with local manufacturers twice in the past and got poor machines - although to be fair these have lasted about 6 years.

SC

If your existing machines are sounding strange then you should buy some new fans and possibly a spare power suppy so as yo can keep them going.

Your best bet is to wire your building with CAT 5 cables running between fixed sockets and use patch cables between the sockets and computers/router. Put in plenty of extra sockets to allow for expansion and breakdowns. Remember that Cat 5 cable should not have any tight bends.

The Netgear DG834G is a good ADSL, Ethernet hub and Wireless router but although they say that it has a VPN connection It is not very good or secure. For this you will probably pay hundreds or you could run Smoothwall on one of your old machines.

Most wireless kit will now handle 802.11b & g but if you have any machines using the slower 802.11b then you have to use WEP security which can be cracked.

Consider using seperate Ethernet hubs ans Wirless accesss point incase the router goes down.

I find that the easiest way to run a small network is to set them up as Domains with a server to provide User security and possibly central storeage. The server does not have to be a high spec machine (I use a P2 ) but you would need one on each site.

I can't comment on manufacturers because I always build my own. Many people find Dell OK but they once lost a printer that I ordered. Their customer service is very shallow when things go wrong and I will not touch them again.

SC, if you're getting rid of your DOS system it might be worth replacing the typewriters at the same time, not to mention the coal fires :-)

Most/all network equipment will handle 10Mbps as well as 100Mpbs, so no particular reason to upgrade unless you need the extra bandwidth, or do it later when you need it.

The above advise from Optimist sounds good to me. I'll add that the comany I like best for network gear is called www.solwise.co.uk - they'll give you excellent advise and help over the phone, they've been in business for years and their products always seem to work for me.

On Dell - the machines are OK but a non technical lady i know bought a Dell, the internet connection stopped working after a couple of days so she rang their pay help line and hung on, and on - eventually a Dell engineer answered and a day and a half later he still hadn't fixed the 'fault'. She brought it round to my house and I ran a virus checker which cleared the fault, he'd never suggested that! The phone bill for ringing Dell, she later told me, came to 211.00

Thanks Optimist. Just the sort of answer I was hoping for (One that was slightly ahead of my understanding of networks!!).

The ethernet hub is a bit you stick all your cables from the machines into isn't it? And it won't really matter where it is in the building as long as all the cables run to it and it's accessible for maintenance. (I'm thinking of in the office rather than near Reception.
Don't want to spend a fortune. Only machine with wireless at the moment is a brand new Vaio laptop with "g".

We've always used peer to peer as it's one less machine and on the other two sites we're only likely to use two or three machines, very light use as well.

I am aware that Dell put some "unusual" components into their machines so you can't easily add non-Dell bits later.

Thanks for the tip re fans & PSU's. Will get that attended to.

SC

You ar correct, The ethernet hub is a bit you stick all your cables from the machines into .. The best place for this may well be the centre of the building where cable lengths can be minimised. The ADSL unit is best positioned where the BT line comes into the building.

Thanks everyone else as well. Kayak, you must have been to see us. We're also presently upgrading the lighting system as the lamplighter has retired. Seem to be shopping around for something called "bulbs".

Optimist , I am having yet another problem this time with my mail.

Yesterday I tried to attach files to my e-mail to send to SSRT as I was having some difficulties. Their IT specialist Melissa has been trying to help but I am unsure.

I know you are running BT Yahoo that is why I am asking the question. I have a @btinternet.com e-mail address went into the attach and saw

Attachment1 - browse files
attachment2 - browse files
etc

I highlighted the file I wanted expecting it to go into the attachment box but instead up popped a message saying "BTyahoo mail is NOT currently your default mail client"
and underneath a "do you want to change to BTyahoo" with a yes or no button.
So far I have not hit the yes button as I do not know what will happen to my current e-mail address nor where incoming mail will go.
My browser options state my e-mail setting as Use Yahoo Mail.
Does Yahoo mail not support attachments?
What will happen if I change to btyahoo mail?

If you have a moment I would appreciate clarification of what is going on .

Doc

Maddoctor

Although I use a BT email address, I only use it to forward to a normal email account. I don't use BT because they try to impose their way of doing things on everyone, as you seem to be finding out.

If you have tried clicking No and it does not let you send an attachment then you may as well follow their route and hope that it works. If doesn't then you may have to rconfigure manually.

Optimist , your a star for replying so quickly.

Melissa at ssrt is unsure as well and so am I , i hate clicking on buttons not knowing what the result will be.

doc

Maddoctor

I share your concern but you may as well play along with them. It may well work, and if it doesn't, it will be no harder to sort out.

SC, a couple of minor points to add to the above. If you do need to rewire then I would suggest that you use Cat 6 at least, you don't really need it now but its a higher spec cable and will be useful next time you upgrade your network.

Also I would avoid P2P in a business environment. Its harder to control and backup and with the amount of malware around now you need to have as much control as possible. However your main business application is important here, is it multi-user? where does it keep its data? how is the data backed up?

Re wireless make sure you implement as much security as you can.

Try and plan the upgrade for the whole company upfront even if you are not implementing it all at once. Working out what you want to do in advance will be worthwhile.

If your in Kent/Sussex, I could pop in and have a look and give some free advise if you want.

maddoctor, what mail client are you using? Outlook Express? Webmail?

Spaceman, thanks for the advice. Unfortunately I'm in Teesside so the offer is much appreciated but I won't be able to take you up. The application we use is a multiuser but simple one where the program and data are all kept on one machine and terminals can access it. I don't think it would cope with more than a two or three accessing it - however it'll soon be history anyway.

spaceman , I believe its webmail. In internet options OE is grayed out