Peggy Paperdoll

I've never heard of anyone having to associate anything when launching SL. Sounds like you have some corrupted or missing component of the SL program file. Try uninstalling SL again. Before reinstalling SL do a thorough search of your hard drive to find and manually delete anything related to SL.....you may have to show hidden files on your computer. I forget how to get to the file association utility in Windows but go to help to find out how.....unassociate that updater with anything it's not intended to update (that sounds like part of Google Updater to me). Some system specs would help out here. And the operating system you are using.........I've assumed it is one of the Windows systems.

Naaaaw............think I will take a look at the performance stats for the different hardware devices I want in my next computer. Those Windows Experience Scores will take care of themselves. I knew ahead of time my RAM was not the fastest available for DDR2 ram........my speed is 333mhz (sort of near the bottom). But I also knew it was good enough for my anticipated needs.....beats the hell out of any PC3200 chips anyway. Performance of any system depends on the installed devices.........not a score. Microsoft was hoping the software people would pick up on those scores to list in their minimum requirement specs. Some have, most have not. So now those scores are mostly useless..........except for folks like you who like bragging on their score. It's cool............no problems with that. Just don't try to tell me that they help in maintaining my system's ability to keep running grreat. My experience score has remained were it is since I installed my old nVidia 8600GT card the day I purchased this machine (my video card is now upgraded to a 9800GTX+). Beyond that initial test that score hasn't helped me one bit. I got a near perfect score........and I have $4.69. Going to go to Starbucks with that bit of information........wooo wooo, that score sure gets me a great deal, doncha know.

I understand computer performance just fine. I also know exactly what the Windows Experience thing is about.........and what it was designed for. It was not put there to measure how good your system is or how powerful you system is......it offers no insight into what anyone needs or might want to do to improve that score. It is to give some broad prediction about how well your system will run an equally broad range of computer software..........sort of like a numbering system to use in place of a "do I meet the minium system requirements" to run a software package. MS dumbing down a way to let the average Joe User know if he can run that software he's got his eye at Best Buy. So, tell me again how these scores make (and keep) my computer running great, longer. It's your thread...........so take it any direction you want. If it's about Windows Experience Scores then I've offered all I can to help you out.

All this Windows Experience score or indexing helps to keep computer running great longer.........right? Aside from putting faster RAM in my machine (which I ain't gonna do) is there a way for me get my score up to perfect? I mean every other component area is 5.9 (as hight a score as I can get with this Vista machine) except that one 5.4 score..........if I can get that up my computer will keep running great for longer. Is that how that scoring system helps me?

If you have the system RAM available (RAM left after all your operating system is runing. plus you background tasks) you can usually reduce your virtual memory and gain performance. When Windows uses virtual memory it just slams the data over to the swap or paging file.........it can land anywhere in that area of the HD reserved as the page file. The larger that file is the more time it takes Windows to find and retrieve the data when it needs it..........reducing that file increases the speed it takes to get the data back (smaller area to look for the data......seek time of your drive comes into play). I have 3 gigs RAM on my computer. Vista with all background services and programs running uses right at 700 megs. I have about 2.5 to 2.6 gigs addresable memory available (as explained by Rock). Average worse case I have 2.5 available. Discount the .7 my OS is using I have 1.8 gigs available for program memory requirements. A 2 gig (2000 meg) page file is more than enough to handle all my percieved needs for this computer (SL uses just at ,5 gig). I reduced my page file from Window's default of about 3500 (3.5 gigs) to 1500 (1.5 gigs). I had a huge speed increase. You have to play with it to get what's best for you system. Yeah, Vista Home Premium 32 bit. Ain't going Windows 7 till my next computer which I will home brew.........it will be the 5th one. This box is the first computer I bought off the shelf in years........and will be the last.

Rock, I'll agree with everything except the size of your partition for your operating system. 25 to 35 gig for Vista is not enough by a very short shot. Vista with all it's updates, SP's over time will fill nearly the entire partition with little room for swap/paging files.....your virtual memory space will be reduced to next to nothing which could slow your computer to slower than a crawl (maybe even bring it to a full stop). Windows creates restore points every time you get an update from Windows Update..........and Windows wants to devote up to 50% of the available space to use for those images. The use of a third party disk imaging program could make it safely possible to turn off restore point creations but then it becomes critical that you manually image yoru drive every time you make any significant changes to your system. And, even if it's not really that significant you would want to err on the side a caution. If you are going to partition your primary drive I would say allow a minimum of 100 gigs. You know many programs we all use will not install on any partition other than the partition the operating system in is on. Adobe Acrobat Reader is one such program............and you can't really get along without that free reader. Though I don't have my c: drive partitioned I think your idea of doing so for your operating system is a good one.........smaller physical space for fragmentation to occur. But then it's faster to reach that critical time to defrag........so, as always, it's a trade off. I think there is a validity to your thought on defragging. I used to defrag twice a week because I just wanted a nicely structured drive with a minium of allocated space sitting there all wasted for all intents and purposes.........shove all that stuff together and free up some usuable space at the end of the aisle. But then I started getting bad sectors on my drive after a couple years of use (I tend to put old drives from my previous computers into my new computers............a hard drive may be 5 years or older in my second drive bay). Asking around I was told that the bad sectors occur due to heavier write cycles occuring on the same sector. Defragging will do such a deed on your drive. I reduced the frequency of my defrags to only when I see the drive about 20% or so fragmented..........which is approximately once every other week (sometimes a little earlier and often a little later). I haven't seen a bad sector on the drive that is my secondary........it's almost 6 years old). Good advice, Rock.

Okay so it is a change.........Windows 7 I guess. I didn't know that since I use Vista and that highest possible is 5.9. My base score is pretty good too for a slightly modified off the shelf nearly 3 year old Lenovo Desktop business machine...........5.4. The base score is determined by my not so fast DDR2 RAM (the 5.4 score). All other results are 5.9 (max). And all that plus $4.69 will get you a cup of house blend coffee at Starbucks........big deal, huh? The topic of this thread is how do you keep your computer running great. Not what is your Windows Experience Base Score.

Unless Windows Experience has changed the maximum score is 5.9...........where did that 6.2 and 6.7 come from?

Actually Windows machines are better at video and graphics than Macs are. Mostly due to the software available for Windows platforms that are not available for Macs. Years ago, Macs had that edge........but Uncle Bill caught up and passed Cousin Steve a few years ago. Each platforms have their issues about gathering garbage that slows them down over time. And, to he honest, Windows tend to need more attention to maintain that speed than Macs. The basics for maintaining one can be applied to manintaining the other. It's what the individual wants, likes, preferrs or is comfortable with......not really which is better. Better is not an absolute.........it's determined by you and how you decide which is best. Besides we were talking about maintaining Windows machines..........unless "PC" has come to include Macs too.

Just be careful with that high pressure Hotsy!! That 150 psi nozzle pressure play hell with computer innurds. Good advice.......and also something I do regularly, though probably not weekly. Heat kills computers. Dust traps heat and blocks escape routes for heat. It also slams shut entrances for fresh and cool air. I need to figure out how to quote a post with some consistancy...........this sometimes works and sometimes doesn't don't get it. I was attempting to quote Kat's post.

Ain't nuttin' wrong with being rude..........I've been accused of that a few times. Now obnoxious.........hehehehe. Guilty of that too on occassions.

My method of keeping my computer running great (which to me means fast and virus.mal-ware free) is not really complicated or even that envolved. Being an almost exclusive Windows user from the beginning of my computer use I've learned that keeping the useless, resource robbing garbage at bay is the key to maintaining the speed and error free experience I need and want. I turn off everything that serves no useful purpose for my normal activities while using my computer. I can turn on Adobe Acrobat Reader when I need it......there's no reason for it to launch (or initialize at boot up). The Aero features of Vista and Windows 7 may be pretty or "cool" but I can live without 99% of it........shut it down. I watch what "bloatware" wants to install when I install programs......decline the offers (do I need Google's toobar? How about that RSS feed?). I keep just the essentials...........I can launch the other stuff when I need or want them. One spin off of my "lean and mean" strategy is the programs I keep in my machine......if I already have a program that does whatever the program does to my satisfaction I usually avoid having another that does the same thing (I'm not talking about having Windows Media Player and Quicktime.....those do not serve the same purpose. But that nifty mp3 or mp4 player might fall into that bracket.....those functions are available already in both Media Play and Quicktime). As to maintenance. I do not defrag on a specified schedule. I check about weekly (depends on my recent usage of my system) and defrag when the fragmentation gets above about 15% to 20% fragmented.......and defrag accordingly. It usually winds up being about once every 2 weeks for me. I manually update every security program I use on my computer (anti virus, mal-ware, Windows Update, etc). None of those programs are set to auto update........though Windows Update and my anti virus (AVG) are set to check but not install upon boot up (but I usually beat that auto check with my manually checking). Complete virus/mal-ware scans are done weekly (approximately.........those are not scheduled) or when I see something I don't like happening on my computer (those programs are two of the few background programs I keep running at all times). My firewall is active all the time too......and manually updated daily. One thing I have found that helps maintain performance is to reduce the size of my swap or paging file........Windows defaults to an reserved space that is about twice what I need. With 3 gigs of RAM and Vista requiring about 700 megs of that my system RAM can deal with most of my usage......reducing that swap file makes accessing it faster when Windows needs it. That is where most of fragmenting occurs under normal usage.......reduce the space where fragmentation happens any you reduce the fragmentation. Clearing your system of accumulated garbage about every other day helps.........I use both Windows built in utility, Disk Cleanup and Piriform's CCleaner. Which comes to one more major thing I do regularly. When you do a Disk Cleanup using Windows there is a tab for freeing up more disk space after the cleaner finds the temp files and stuff that can safely removed. You can delete old System Restore images of your hard drive. I do that about once a month. I see no reason to have a restore point beyond the most recent that allowed my computer to boot normally and correctly.........Windows create a new restore point every update..........that can add up to gigs of wasted space on your hard drive. It's not unusual for me to free up 20 gigs of space by deleting those restore points (that gigs, not megs!!). My method has kept my computer pretty darned fast and trouble free for years. It's hard for me to judge if it's just as fast as the last time I reinstalled Windows because I now dual boot with Linux Ubuntu..........that boot loader takes up a lot of the boot time. But once I reach the loader and choose Windows I'm booted and ready to go in about 15 seconds. That seems about what this computer did when new and after I shut down all the glitzy Aero and bloat ware. It all sounds complicated and a bother but my thinking is that it's my responsibility to maintain this machine..........not some software doing it all in the background or automatically. Everything the software does takes resources from the machine..........everything I can do saves resources for the machine. It ain't that hard either.

If the account is delinquent the live chat option may not be unavailable. I beleive there is a set time frame to get your account settle if it's a matter of owing LL real money.....otherwise the account gets deleted, all items in the inventory, land, etc are repossessed. Don't wait for that to happen.

I'm too tired to try any of this........but I will. That and all this fancy font stuff, format style..........and of course the italic. I'll be so cool (errr......kewl).