[Kosh]

You forgot FSO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 

[karajorma]

You forgot FSO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 

Don't need to reinstall that. It's on a seperate drive. All I need to do is run the launcher again

[Descenterace]

My recommendation: switch to linux and keep Windows around in seperate hard drive for gaming.

I fully endorse this suggestion, on the condition that you can be bothered to set it up. Also, reinstall Windows BEFORE you install Linux, or WinXP will do nasty things to the bootloader.

[Roanoke]

Don't use it myself but lots of people recommend GIMP for graphic tomfoolery (if that's yer thing)

[karajorma]

I fully endorse this suggestion, on the condition that you can be bothered to set it up. Also, reinstall Windows BEFORE you install Linux, or WinXP will do nasty things to the bootloader.

I have my main HD on a rack. I've been meaning to install Linux or BSD for a while and have a good play around with it but I need to actually buy a second HD before I do that

[Kamikaze]

you forgot mIRC

Ewww. XChat FTW.

BTW: OSSWin is a nice site for this sort of stuff too.

[WMCoolmon]

MP3? Yuck. dBpowerAMP can rip to MPC/OGG files (Among many other plugins), a much better open-source file format.

ogg is only usefull if you havent been pirating music for 10 years. also transcoding between lossy formats is a good way to loose even more fidelity. the only thing i have against the new formats is id like to keep my archive all in one format, something mp3 player compatable. sence there arent many of those that support ogg, theres no reason to convert.

Ripping from a CD to OGG is not transcoding between lossy formats any more than ripping to an MP3 is.

And even though there aren't many MP3 players that support OGG, it's not that hard to find them.

[Polpolion]

Powerdesk is the best. get it.

[Flaser]

**** get rid of media player all together and install winamp. ive been using it ever sence it came out and ive never found anything better. it has the best damn media library of anything ive tried to use before. also id get the serial to unlock advanced features. youl probibly also want the lame out plugin, for transcoding mp3 files.

I hope you are aware, that what you said is pretty much shooting through your own foot.
Winamp, AFAIK, simply uses the directshow player; which is the very same thing as Media Player.

Uninstalling media player xx will merly remove the shell from your system.

Media Player classic on the other hand is a very trim and neat way to play files.
If you need a player that plays everything, I recommend the following:

http://www.mplayerhq.hu/

It is the ultimate player in terms of compability (and also has an impressive performance). The downside is, that as it is a 'nix program, the windows port runs only in console not with a GUI. (Though there ARE third party GUIs you can use.)

[Nuke]

MP3? Yuck. dBpowerAMP can rip to MPC/OGG files (Among many other plugins), a much better open-source file format.

ogg is only usefull if you havent been pirating music for 10 years. also transcoding between lossy formats is a good way to loose even more fidelity. the only thing i have against the new formats is id like to keep my archive all in one format, something mp3 player compatable. sence there arent many of those that support ogg, theres no reason to convert.

Ripping from a CD to OGG is not transcoding between lossy formats any more than ripping to an MP3 is.

And even though there aren't many MP3 players that support OGG, it's not that hard to find them.

ripping from cd to ogg, thats not transcoding. but converting mp3 to ogg is and you do loose more fidelity. im not gonna transcode 5000 mp3s to ogg just so i can use ogg, and im not gonna start using ogg cause everything else is mp3.

**** get rid of media player all together and install winamp. ive been using it ever sence it came out and ive never found anything better. it has the best damn media library of anything ive tried to use before. also id get the serial to unlock advanced features. youl probibly also want the lame out plugin, for transcoding mp3 files.

I hope you are aware, that what you said is pretty much shooting through your own foot.
Winamp, AFAIK, simply uses the directshow player; which is the very same thing as Media Player.

Uninstalling media player xx will merly remove the shell from your system.

Media Player classic on the other hand is a very trim and neat way to play files.
If you need a player that plays everything, I recommend the following:

http://www.mplayerhq.hu/

It is the ultimate player in terms of compability (and also has an impressive performance). The downside is, that as it is a 'nix program, the windows port runs only in console not with a GUI. (Though there ARE third party GUIs you can use.)

i dont much mind the direct show api and player, thats just the bare minimum to play files. the shell handles all the display and meta data, and in a couple cases viruses got into my computer through the shell. now the winamp shell isnt as stupid, it doesnt try to execute your tags and just displayes them. and so the winamp shell is much more secure. and i already stated the main reason i like winamp is cause it has one of the best media librarys out there. the fact that its more secure than what comes with windows is just extra brownie points.

[Windrunner]

I would also recommend the  free version of Sygate firewall. Its not a resource hog like most of the other Friewall apps

[Colonol Dekker]

Wasn't there a frick the system thread about somewhere?

[CP5670]

That was years ago. I barely remember it now.

[Geezer]

I would also recommend the  free version of Sygate firewall. Its not a resource hog like most of the other Friewall apps

IIRC, Sygate was acquired by Symantec and the free version will only be supported until the end of this year.

[Fury]

Yep. Sygate is out of the game, actually it has been out of the game quite some time now because it has not been updated since october 2004. That makes it two years old.

Kerio also announced they will stop development of their Personal Firewall, however it was later aquired by Sunbelt and has been rebranded as Sunbelt Kerio Personal Firewall. The free version of the now Sunbelt Kerio Personal Firewall offers more limited functionality than the full version, but it is still better than WinXP, ZoneAlarm or Sygate firewalls. http://www.sunbelt-software.com/Kerio.cfm

If you're still using either Sygate or Kerio firewalls, you should get Sunbelt Kerio Personal Firewall instead.