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Popular Myths about Personal Computers May 2007
Confusion and misinformation are in abundant supply in the computer industry. The focus of this article is to settle some of the popular misconceptions that people have about their computer hardware and software. Hopefully this should put an end to all the ignorance of the past, and help you make informed decisions when it comes to your computer. If I Press The Wrong Button My Computer Will Explode. There is no way that the typical computer user can press any combination of buttons on the computer and end up with fire. Windows crashes and is unstable. A complete myth and legacy from the past when Windows 3.0 and 3.1 were the operating systems of choice. Windows 2000/XP/Vista virtually never crashes. With right drivers, service pack updates and hardware you shouldn’t have any Windows error messages, restarts or an unstable computer. Microsoft Products are Insecure. Microsoft vulnerabilities are more visible for a number of reasons. Microsoft software, of one form or an other, exists on over 90% of computers world-wide. People who promote alternative operating systems and software as being more secure ignore the fact that Microsoft's universality makes it a tempting target. Regardless of the security of any software this general rule of thumb applies: With sufficient incentive, if someone can make it, someone else can break it. When computers slow down, it means that they are old and should be replaced. It is possible that running newer or larger software programs on an older computer could lead to slow performance, but you may just need to replace or upgrade a particular component (memory, operating system, CD or DVD drive, etc.). Another possibility is that there are other processes or programs running in the background. If your computer has suddenly become slower, you may have Adware or Spyware on your machine. My computer is acting “weird”, it must be a virus. By far the most common PC myths concern viruses. Novice computer users are renowned for assuming that anything that goes wrong with their PC must be caused by a virus. Avoiding viruses is very simple. Use anti-virus software and keep it updated. You should always use a screen saver. In the early days of computing, monochrome monitors were quite susceptible to a phenomenon known as "burn-in" or "phosphor burn". An image shown on the monitor for a long time would burn in as an ghostly image. Some color monitors are still susceptible to this, but only if the image has been on the screen for a really, really long time. All you need to protect your screen is to turn it off. Internet Cookies Are Dangerous. An Internet cookie is a tracker that allows a website to "remember" you over multiple visits, maintaining personal preferences and giving you a consistent experience on each visit. Cookies cannot connect what you do on one website to what you do at an other website. Cookies can be disabled in most browsers if you are concerned about them but this is unadvisable as your ability to view content at many websites will be curtailed. A better solution is to periodically scan your system for spying cookies with a product such as Spybot Search & Destroy or Lavasoft's AdAware which can remove them while leaving your regular cookies alone. So there you have it, a little bit of condensed knowledge that should leave you a little bit wiser. If you have any other myths that you would like to clear, you can go right ahead and send an e-mail to us at info@integralcomputerconsultants.com.
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