Computer questions

Check in preferences. You may be able to override this.

Google seems to be trying to monetize their browser, so they collect all manner of information. But the browser does work pretty well, by most reports.

You can have any number of browsers, and do not have to uninstall one to have another. In each browser's preferences, uncheck the box about checking for or being the default browser, so they won't fight for dominance.

Firefox works pretty well, and is what I usually use. There is no risk to trying it. Firefox is not really a newsreader, and so will not replace Outlook Express, which has many problems.

But there are many newsreaders, so you ought to be able to find one that you like. The best approach is to try a few of them, as there is not one best newsreader. While you can have multiple newsreaders, some may conflict if downloading news simultaneously, so make downloading manually triggered until you settle on one.

The big thing to look for in newsreaders and email clients is how well filtering works, so you can automatically ignore most spam and scams, and bozos.

Joe Gwinn

What is the reason you don't ask your computer related questions in a forum that has nothing but computer geeks / computer experts in it?

This is the best forum I know of:

Uh, I don't know. Why do you talk politics here?

You have to turn off the notification for IE to tell you it has to be updated. That should be in the tools /internet options/ advanced section. Just turn off the selection for "automatically check for IE updates"

Then download FF17, install the following add-ons

ad block+ (blocks 99% of the adds and pop up crap on web pages. Can be disabled on individual sites as needed)

Image Zoom (allows you to right click an image and view just the image, or zoom in/out on images easily)

Download helper (allows you to very easily download videos/music and other stuff with a couple clicks)

I also install a couple appearance items to make the background nicer.

Thunderbird has a good newsreader in it. BUT the newer versions are somewhat of a PIA. You can find the older versions on

Or kill it.

Might be helpful to mention the OS version you're using and how old the IE is...in the proper browser newsgroup. Sometimes, it's helpful to upgrade IE even if you don't use it. Sometimes, it makes things worse. Other programs use dlls that get installed with IE. YMMV.

You can't do Winodws Updates with an out of date version of Internet Explorer.

BTW, Steve posts through a well known troll server, (Aioe.org NNTP Server) and has a Gmail address. Neither of which speak well of him.

Sure you can. I have IE 6 and the only thing it does for updates is check for the windows installer package. You can't use a different breed of browser though, without a few add-ons.

The latest and greatest sometimes really sucks. Win 8 is a perfect example.

Who was nagging you? A website? Microsoft did not tell you to download Google Chrome.

of it, as it takes me

It takes you to Bing? What is "it"?

So, your computer takes you to Bing... Who's in charge, if you aren't doing it?

No. Because, like Chrome, it won't have "gone in".

You can't uninstall IE.

Not for you there isn't.

installation of Firefox fix all

OE is s*it. You can keep it.

the curtain.

This is what you need.

It won't offer you all of the updates, just some.

Thunderbird has problems with really large newsgroups (my newsserver keeps over a decade of old messages on these groups) and limiting the history didn't seem to work. So, I now use knode on Linux, but I'm pretty sure they also have a Windows version. It is lightning quick, and the historical horizon does work.

Jon

I use Giganews as well, and one newsgroup had over a million messages since 2003. I had to download the headers in groups of 10,000 with Netscape 4.80, but got them all.

This is what Ive been using for over a year so far and its very very good.

Gunner

The methodology of the left has always been:

1. Lie
2. Repeat the lie as many times as possible
3. Have as many people repeat the lie as often as possible
4. Eventually, the uninformed believe the lie
5. The lie will then be made into some form oflaw
6. Then everyone must conform to the lie

I tried Thunderbird, but didn't much like it. Merging handling of email and newsgroups doesn't actually work that well - each has its own metaphor.

I prefer MT Newswatcher on the Mac, but Newswatcher has been getting a bit long in the tooth, not having been updated since 2006, and has been developing some weird little problems. Currently, I'm playing with Thoth.

Joe Gwinn

It gives you the updates for everything MS you have installed. Plus any hardware driver firmware updates, what's left?

It also shows IE security/version updates. Which I don't install because I don't run IE.

Never noticed it, but the servers I use don't keep messages that long.

It won't let me install .net updates without the current version of IE. All the computers at a local business need .net to run Quickbooks. Also, some updates were corrupt, but claimed to install OK. That caused problems installing other updates. Until those were fixed, over 70 other updates weren't offered. I had to remove .net from one computer and reinstall it because of a corrupt update. Then I had to reinstall the updates it affected. It took six hours to download and install everything, but their XP Pro was finally up to date.

Hmm. Never seen that. .net seems to update just fine. I wonder if it isn't something to do with QB causing the problem?

No, I found the information on the Microsoft support website. A bad update was loaded to their servers, and later replaced with the files fixed. They had updated three computers that day, and all three had the same problems. Only two were confgured for Quickbooks.

A LOT of sites are now using html5 - which is not supported by IE8 - and IE9 will not work on XP