Optimist. I suddenly realised. ----- If I put putty under the key the beggar will be more depressed than I am all the time !

Or should that be de-pressed?

You learn something every day. I also have an old Thinkpad and some old keyboards without windows keys, but I didn't know about about CTRL+ESC .

My old keyboard is carved out of stone and in Hebrew.

Thanks. Sorted

New problem.
When I insert a CD or a DVD in the D drive it opens as "Files currently on cd" They wont autoplay.Checked that this option is ticked in D drive properties,it is
Any ideas?

Uninstalled Google Earth, which was the only thing Id added prior to this. Ok now.

Bolshi, Do away with the stone keyboard and get one of these.

http://www.dabs.com/productview.aspx?Quicklinx=3V1N&CategorySelectedId=11117&PageMode=1&NavigationKey=11117,50550

Guvnor. Ooooooh! I like the look of that!

"The G15 also features a switch that turns off the 'Windows' key, so hitting that button accidentally won't end your game"

Thx for info. Now can I wait until Chrimbo?

Had a few weeks off for the summer. Now back but seem to have lost java. Anyone know which version, or what I need to down load.

Thanks in advance

Best to go through MoneyAM to get your Java.

Go to it via, eg, Stockwatch, for your download.

Funny, thats what I thought I'd done before. However it seems to have vanished from my stockwatch screen?

http://java.sun.com/webapps/getjava/BrowserRedirect?locale=en&host=www.java.com:80

I had to get rid of a small number of bad sectors a few days ago.

I am, touch wood, experiencing no current problems but my IT chappie feels it would be wise to swop my hard disk soonish.

A short while ago we discussed the various software alternatives that one could use to minimise the number of programs that would need re-installing from scratch. On a photographic forum that I follow someone has suggested:-

http://www.acronis.com/homecomputing/products/trueimage/

Has anyone around here used it?

EDIT. I now see that they do something more specific:-
http://www.acronis.com/homecomputing/products/migrateeasy/

And the alternatives? Ghost is often mentioned. One that someone around here mentioned was PC Relocator.

All suggestions welcome.

Rgds

TP

TP - I use Acronis True Image for regular backups to an external USB hard drive and it's excellent.

I looked at a lot of backup products in April after moving away from more manually-oriented DVD-RAM backups and although Acronis isn't the market leader (I'm sure Norton Ghost still will be) I was convinced it was the better product.

One small word of caution - I tried buying online from their website but it didn't go smoothly - although customer service was excellent and the screw-up was soon sorted. UK-sourced boxed version 9s used to be cheaper than downloading direct from Acronis US but now the dollar has gone down so much maybe it isn't any more.

edit: I'm not quite sure about what the Migrate Easy product does that True Image doesn't - since I can use True Image to copy the complete contents of one hard drive to another. Maybe it makes things a bit easier but I wonder if it is as useful as True Image in the long run?

And one word of warning about 'ghosting' one machine's hard drive to another machine with XP - most likely it will regard the new location as evidence of piracy and you'll have to phone Microsoft to convince them to give you an unlock code.

TP

If you want to copy your existing settup to the new disc, then most partition managers should do the job. I have used and can recomend Partition Magic, which is often availible free.

The other route that you could take is to do a fresh install and reinstall or import your existing applications. The problem with doing this, is that some programs will not transfer properly, and it will also transfer a load of unwanted settings and programs which tend to slow your machine down over time and you will therefore lose much of the advantage of a fresh install.

If you have a pre SP2 XP installation disc, you can't install it to a partion larger than 125GB although there is a workaround for this. Under no circumstances connect a pre SP2 system directly to the internet even to install security updates.

Actually Optimist, you've reminded me of something there. Although there is a patch for pre-SP2 XP installation discs (the so-called streaming patch IIRC), it doesn't work for Dell OEM XP discs because they aren't the same as standard MS XP ones. I think I read that the patch doesn't work for some other OEM XP discs as well.

There may be something to be said for partitioning large hard drives though. A failure I had earlier this year was caused by a corrupted partition record which, because it was a progressive failure rather than a sudden one, rendered it unrecoverable. Had I partitioned the hard drive, I wouldn't have lost the whole thing.

Optimist,

I thought the problem with copying to a new disk is that things like registry entries got muddled and the non-Microsoft progs usually did not run properly.

Kyoto,

Am I not right in thinking that your 'regular backups' are never used as a disk that boots and runs all the installed software.

I'm guessing that Migrate Easy might simply be a component of True Image.

However, you've both reminded me that I am still on Win 2000 with this office machine and now might be the time to move to XP - and take the hit of re-installing all the bits of third party software.

TP

TP - when I tested True Image, I copied my desktop hard disk to an external USB hard drive and then, using the floppy/CD boot-disk that the software can create, copied it back to an empty hard drive. It worked.

I needed a solution that would do this because although I'd been smugly backing up my data for years, when I lost my hard drive it took me about 12 solid hours to re-install and configure all my applications. It's the first time I'd lost a drive since using the dubious Doublespace application on Windows 3.1 (or 95), and I hadn't appreciated just how much work and frustration would be involved. I was determined not to go through all that again, which is why I made sure with True Image.

It's true that over time the hard disk and Windows Registry become full of crap and there's much to be said for a fresh install every time a new computer is bought, but I've used True Image to create a 'fresh-build' backup (in addition to weekly system backups) which I can go back to if I want to - although lots of subsequent patches would have to be installed of course.

On the subject of upgrading to XP - Windows Vista will probably be out in about six months although if your machine is old you'll almost certainly require a new one for that.

The workaround for installing pre SP2 to a large partition is to install it on a small one, install SP2 and then use a partition manager to enlarge it to the full disk size.

You can make installation easier by copying all of your installation CDs to a setup directory on your hard disk and installing the apps from there. This tends to be faster than a CD install and you don't have to remember what applications you had installed and where the disks are. It's still a pain though.

Vista will be a must have system, but its full functionality will not be availible for at least a year after the first release and there will be compatibility problems with older programs.

Speaking of Vista: I am thinking that when it is offered I might upgrade to Vista (I'm having problems with my XP Home Restore feature that I can't fathom out even with MS article 302796). It's got me a bit nervous and wonder if I'd ever manage a re-install with my pre-sp2 disk. However back to Vista.
I have downloaded Microsoft's Vista Upgrade Adviser and it's telling me that various drivers need updating which is simple to fix, BUT, it's also giving me a message that my USB Controllers need replacing."VIA Rev 5 or later Universal Host Controller" and "VIA USB Enhanced Host Controller".
This is somewhat worrying is it not? My machine is only 2 years old.