On Sat, 27 Jul 2013 18:55:28 -0400, Stormin Mormon wrote:

Saturday July 27, 2013
Last week, one of my computer programs wasn't working right. Short form,
is that I find out MS doesn't support XP anymore, and I can't get the
computer working the way it used to. The way I liked.

There is a ton of XP information and support on the web without
needing Microsoft. Win7 and up are very much Android copy cats for
social networking and entertainment media. They are not very friendly
to commerce and industry which is hanging on to XP. Lots of info out
there.

Wipe the disk (I assume you have your data backed up), and reinstall
XP. Outlook, sad as it is, is part of that. It will be just as it was
the first time you opened it. If MS has stopped authenticating new XP
installs (I'd be surprised) there are quite a few pirate applications
out there that will do it without even going on line. You did realize
your XP would be obsolete some day and make provisions, didn't you?

======

The process going forward.

Get two hard drives. Either new or toughly wiped. XP stashes stuff in
a small hidden partition at the end of the drive and format doesn't
touch that. You can delete all the partitions (FDISK) and recreate
them which will kill Gate's little stash.

Put one as your system hard drive.

Partition, format, and install your OS as per normal. Probably your
install CD will do all that for you.

Install and configure all your applications the way you want it. Not
your data, just runable applications.

When that is to your satisfaction, clone it to the second drive and
put that away. HD Clone is one of several applications that do this.
The free version is intentionally slow, it's an overnight or next day
project, but it gets the job done and the price is right. You can run
it from a floppy (or I think, a USB stick) so you don't need to put it
on your computer. There are other similar programs.

If your drive takes a dump just put in the back up. Replace - don't
add- or the infection might spread. If the old drive if physically
good - just logically screwed up - go through the process to make it
the backup clone. If it's physically toast, buy a new drive and do the
same.

You always have a hot spare ready to go.

======

If you want a modest sized system there are several pages out there
telling how to install XP to a flash drive. It's not simple because XP
doesn't want to allow that, but the instructions are clear. That lets
you plug your stick into any computer that boots from USB and run it
like a "live CD". And your apps will look and act the same way
regardless of computer. USB sticks are getting cheap enough, several
can be your second and third backup.

This new
Thunderbird isn't very easy to use, at least compared to OE. I tried
downloading a service pack from a non MS website, and got some kind of
malware, that really made a mess of my drive, and my slave drive.

Why? You can still get service packs from MS.
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/322389

Good idea to have them stashed locally too. Think EMP event (or
terrorist hack) that takes out the internet for a year.

Each of my computers backs up a different computer so I can always get
at what I need to fix the one in trouble. Which hasn't happened in
lots of years. Another thing I do is all my install files are on both
a set of DVDs and a backup drive that normally lives in a drawer.
Complete with text files with username, S/N, and various other things
the install will ask for. I can install my whole suite to a virgin
computer from either without recourse to the network.

Ended
up buying a new drive, and I'm in the process of reformatting the drive
I'd been using. Still can't get Outlook Express to work. Lost a lot of
files, data, and thousands of old emails that were either not backed up,
or can't be read with the new email program.

Just reminding y'all to make CD, DVD, and external drive backups of
anything you consider valuable.

See above. Good advice but I personally have everything covered with a
triple backup. I learned my lesson long ago when the computer took a
dump.

That was long before the last time you told us about losing everything
to a virus problem and advised us to backup. Don't read your own
posts, I assume.

By the way, that virus you got a couple years ago was from a website
that someone had posted a link to and it turned out the website was
compromised to push malware. I got the same thing you did and fixed it
manually after about 15 minutes googling for info. You claimed it
physically destroyed your HD and bought a new one. Stop bitching about
MS (as much as they richly deserve it) and practice safe computing.

I like XP and I ain't changing come hell or high water until it's
unavoidable. I assume computers will divide into personal
entertainment machines and server based commercial operations. That
means the generic desktop will likely cease to exist. Word to the
wise.

I assume I will be abandoned and on my own by MS and all the
applications vendors and have provided for that. It has to happen
someday.