Sarasota PC Monitor
Tech Talk (06/02)
Points to ponder
by Brian K. Lewis, Ph.D.*
Member of the Sarasota Personal Computer Users Group, Inc.I had hoped to write this month's article on alternate operating systems, such things as Linux and FreeBSD.
However, there just wasn't enough time to complete my trials of these systems. I have been trying to experiment with Linux on a CD that supposedly will run on any Intel based computer system. Unfortunately, this DemoLinux won't run on my laptop. For some reason it doesn't like the PCMCIA software that is installed on it. I tried it on a Pentium II system with a serial mouse. During the bootup I thought it found the mouse, but when we finally got to the desktop, the mouse cursor was there, but there was no movement. I found out later that I entered the wrong video screen selection. The one I had chosen works only with a PS/2 mouse, not a serial mouse. Oh well, I'll just have to try again. Anyone who wants to try DemoLinux can download it free from http://www.demolinux.org/. You need a CD burner to transfer it to a CD after it is downloaded. That process is easy. Now all I need to do is to get it running on one of my computers.
Have you been bit by the worm_klez virus? I have received a number of emails containing this worm/virus. Luckily my A-V software was up-to-date and it caught it before it became a problem. Incidentally, if you have had to disable your POP3 scanning because it changed your Outlook setup to "localhost", Trend Micro now has a work around for this problem. It is in their "Solution 10700" document at: http://solutionbank.antivirus.com/solutions/solutionDetail. asp?solutionID=10700. I haven't tried it, yet, because I'm not having any problem with the way I'm currently handling email. However, this might help those getting their email through ComCast to re-establish the POP3 scanning.
Now for a few thoughts about XP and viruses, the big three anti-virus software makers all provide floppy disk versions of their software to allow for recovery when a virus gets through your first line of defense. These emergency rescue disks usually have some form of non-Microsoft DOS which is loaded from a boot floppy. These floppies work fine when you are using a FAT or FAT32 file system on your hard disk. However, none of the DOS systems that I am aware of, can read an NTFS volume. Trend Micro specifically states that you cannot create rescue disks that will read an NTFS volume. Symantec (Norton) has no information relative to NTFS or Windows XP rescue disks. So this is one downside to using an NTFS volume with Windows XP. It also points up the importance of keeping your A-V software and firewall working and up to date.
There is another consideration when using XP. The System Restore folder can become infected with a virus and it is more difficult to clean. Your A-V software may not remove a virus that has become lodged in this folder. However, both Symantec and Trend Micro have information on their Websites on the manual removal of viruses from the Restore folder in both XP and ME.
Although Microsoft includes a "Recovery Console" in the bootable WinXP CD, this can not remove viruses. It is used solely to repair problems with the XP software or other application software. XP also has a option in its backup program to create an automated system recovery disk (ASR). This option backs up your system files and creates a floppy disk. This floppy is not used to boot the system. Instead you must boot from the WinXP CD. After the CD is running you press the F2 key to start the recovery process. Now, to back up your system files you will need 2-4 gigabytes of storage space. When I started it on my computer the system files came to more than 4 gigabytes and the backup would not use a CD burner. It will backup to a hard drive, a zip drive or a tape, but not a CD. Keep this in mind if you want to make an XP recovery disk.
One of real problems that existed in all previous versions of Windows software was the limited amount of resource memory. This was a segment of RAM assigned more or less as a "scratchpad." This is where Windows could keep track of auxiliary files used by running applications. There is a "User" area that contained information on dialog boxes, dialog box controls and DLLs. The GDI area keeps track of things Windows uses to draw on screen. This includes the wallpaper, icons, windows, etc. For one example, every item you have on your desktop reduces your GDI free resources. Since these areas of resource RAM are fixed at about 128K, the more use your applications make of them, the greater the likelihood that you will run out of available space. Win98 improved the cleanup routine, which removes unused items that remain after an application is closed. However, it can not remove all of them. Some applications are noted for being very "leaky" and not cleaning up when they are closed. As a result, you can quickly reduce the available resources to the point that you start getting "out of memory" error messages or your system starts acting oddly or even crashes. The only option in these situations is to reboot the system to recover resource memory.
With Windows XP, the system has changed. System Resources no longer refers to areas in RAM. Instead, in all my XP references, including the Help files, it refers to hardware devices. So what happened to the resource memory? XP assigns each application its own FOUR gigabytes of RAM. Now I know that my computer certainly doesn't have that much RAM available and yours probably doesn't either. XP combines "real" RAM with virtual RAM, on the hard disk, to create this 4 gigabyte memory space. Two gigabytes of this space is assigned to the operating system so each running application seems to be running in its own private computer. Everything that an application uses is placed in this memory window. Everything that used to be in resource memory is now in this four gig address space. With the newer 64 bit processors that Intel has in preparation, the program space will eventually be expanded to 16 terabytes of virtual memory!
Windows XP uses a Virtual Memory Manager to keep track of the memory space and the running applications. All of this means, that you can run multiple software applications at one time without them stepping on each others memory space. This is also a reason why you want a fast CPU to run Windows XP. Each application that is running is sharing CPU time. In XP this is a pre-emptive multitasking system that is controlled by the operating system. The OS assigns priorities to each running application and forces them to share CPU time. The time slice for each application is measured in milliseconds. Since newer CPU's can process millions of instructions per second, this time division allows the application to proceed without any apparent slowdown being noted by the user. This system also allows the OS to shut down a "locked-up" application without affecting other running applications. Providing that the failed application isn't a system application like Explorer.
In previous versions of Windows, the three finger salute (Ctrl-Alt-Del) brought up a Close Program Window. In XP, this same three-key operation opens a Windows Task Manager. This contains much more information than did the old version. The XP version shows you the applications you are running; the processes running along with their memory usage; a performance window that shows CPU usage, physical memory and other system information. At this moment I have three applications running, 36 processes and CPU usage is running from 0 to 5%. If you have a misbehaving application you can shut it down from the Task Manager. Also, if you have a networked computer, the Task Manager shows network usage and the users logged onto your system. All of this information can be useful in diagnosing some system problems.
One last item on using Windows XP, since there is no DOS boot-up disk for XP and you can't boot to DOS, you have to use a different system to prepare a second hard drive in your computer. With previous versions of Windows, you would first partition the new drive with Fdisk and then format it. Windows would never recognize the drive until it was partitioned. In XP, you have to access "Disk Management" from the Control Panel. If the BIOS has identified the drive, then you can select the drive to "initialize" and format. (Initialize is apparently the new terminology for the process formerly carried out by Fdisk.) At the time of initialization you can partition the drive into more than one partition. When you format the drive, you are given the option of formatting it for FAT, FAT32 or NTFS. I would ignore the FAT choice and select either FAT32 or NTFS. The overall process worked very smoothly, once I found the Disk Management window. XP sure does have a steep learning curve!
For those of you who have switched to XP, I hope these random thoughts will have given you some new information. For those who are thinking about switching, ponder the pros and cons before deciding to make a change.
*Dr. Lewis is a former university and medical school professor. He has been working with personal computers for more than twenty years. He can be reached via email at brian_klewis@hotmail.com or voice mail at (941) 925-3047. :
Copyright 2002. This article is from the June 2002 issue of the Sarasota PC Monitor, the official monthly publication of the Sarasota Personal Computer Users Group, Inc., P.O. Box 15889, Sarasota, FL 34277-1889. Permission to reprint is granted only to other non-profit computer user groups, provided proper credit is given to the author and our publication. We would appreciate receiving a copy of the publication the reprint appears in, please send to above address, Attn: Editor. For further information about our group, email: admin@spcug.org/ Web: http://www.spcug.org/The Sarasota Personal Computer Users Group, Inc. has 1,300+ members and was established in 1982. We are members of the Assoc. of PC User Groups (APCUG), the Florida Assoc. of PC Users Groups, Inc., and we are members of the America Online Ambassador Program.
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