Re: Ok! I been and gorn an dunit now !!!!

"§ireßird & $ir Vivor" <sisuNOSPAM@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:44b0e654$0$17951$892e7fe2@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
On Sun, 9 Jul 2006 09:36:20 +0100, JoeH wrote:

LOL - your time will (might/maybe/perhaps) come! ;-)

No, it won't. I'll not use XP. It's taken Terry days (literally)
to get his PC set up.

Well yes!

*Any* Installation of *any* Operating System on *any* PC will always
take a fair amount of time to get how you want!!!

They all have various Options & Settings & the basic, Default Settings
will never be suitable (or desirable or best) for everybody.

Unfortunately, many people just accept what comes & don't change things
(thus actually having to put up with things which aren't actually as
good as they could be, for their circumstances) & when they then get
a different Operating System, they expect the new one to be the same!

That's not really sensible, (or practical) cos a lot has changed in
the (nearly) 10 Years since things like W98 & WinMe first came out.

... The colour scheme is garish;

That can easily be changed. - Have a (good) look through (all the
Options) on (all the Tabs) of the Desktop/Display Properties.

& make sure to look at all the Buttons as well - there are a lot of
Options available, which many people don't seem to find (or know about).

There are lots of Options which are there *specifically* so you can
Set things how *you* want! - & remember that what suits you won't
necessarily suit other people, which is why they give the *Option*
of changing it.
You'd soon be complaining if it *couldn't* be changed!
:-)

& if you don't like the Colors (Themes) that come pre-supplied with
WinXP, you can get plenty more.

Or you can do without the "Themes" stuff & revert to the previous
(Win98 & WinMe) way of doing it & specify whatever Colors you want.

... the icons are so titchy they're unrecognisable;

See above.

You can Change all that, if you want.
You can change them in several ways...

If you change the Screen Resolution to a higher Resolution than the
Default (which is 800 x 600 or 1024 x 768), which you *should* do,
if you're using an LCD Monitor, which needs to have the Resolution
of the Display Set at 1280 x 1024, then that will *obviously* make
the Icons look smaller!

So, have a look at the Options to change the Icon Size.

Display Properties>Appearance>[Effects...]
[/] Use Large Icons.

&
Display Properties>Appearance>[Advanced...]
Item: Icons
Size: (whatever you want)
Font: (whatever you want)

& you can also change the Spacing between the Icons (both Horizontally
& Vertically)

... the fonts so tiny they're unreadable;

So, change them to what suits you!

Again, when you Set the Screen Resolution to suit a Modern LCD
Monitor, (or a decent CRT Monitor), then all the things like Icons
& Fonts are *bound* to look smaller! - So there are Setting & Options
to change them to suit you...

Don't just use the "Large Fonts" or "Extra Large Fonts" Setting
on the main "Appearance" Tab - that won't always do what you want
(or expect) - you need to look on the "Settings" Tab & then Click
the [Advanced...] Button.

Try changing the "DPI" Scaling Setting there...
You can choose 96 or 120 DPI, or you can choose "Custom..." & have
whatever Size you want.

there are a load of completely unnecessary graphics and hand holding
pop ups;

OK, so if you don't like them, turn them off! [*1]
Remember, all those sort of things are *Options* - nobody is *forcing*
you to use them!!!

Have a look at...

Display Properties>Appearance>[Effects...]
& [Advanced...]

Also, make sure to have a look at the *System* Properties
On the "Advanced" Tab, in the "Performance" Section, on the
[Settings...] Button.

There is a "Visual Effects" tab, where you can choose which bits you
want & how you want things to show up.

[*1]
But actually quite a few of those (so-called) fancy bits *are* actually
quite useful, when you know what they are for & how to use them!
:-)

... it takes an age to find anything and longer to try to get it
the way the user wants it

Well, yes, surely, that's only to be expected?
To begin with...
After all, WinXP is a *huge* Advance on the ancient, creaking, old
Win98 & WinMe stuff, so there are *bound* to be differences.

... - *if* they can at all, settings don't hold.

Yes they do.

Please Post back with more specific Details about which Settings you
are having the prob with & we can Help explain how to use them.

It's a ghastly system. As far as I'm concerned it's totally unusable.

That's really only cos you haven't yet learned *how* to use it!
& you are starting off with a very Negative & Biased Viewpoint.

As it happens, I don't think that WinXP is particularly brilliant
& User Friendly, actually!...
But then I'm a very specific (& critical!) User!!!

But I've learnt that it *is* capable of being Set up to suit the vast
majority of people.

I won't be using Longhorn, that cowboy OS from the cowboy outfit
either. Oops sorry, Vista. That's even worse from the little I've
seen of it.

I haven't seen very much of it & I gather (from what I've seen) that
a lot of the original Features that it was s'posed to have won't now
be used in it.
:-(

I'm going over either to a Mac or to Debian.

Can you say why Debian in particular?
& what about all the various other Linux Distros?

I have tried Debian (& a quite few other Linux Distros, such as
Red Hat, Mandrake & their various Derivatives) & from what I was able
to see, they are *much* more Complicated & Confuzzling than windoze!!!

There are *many* more Options & Settings!!!
So if you complain about windoze & its Options, then surely you'll
find things like Linux even worse?

(or you'll end up making do with the Default Settings, which can't
possibly suit everybody, properly)

... For now ME is fine.

It may be adequate for most of the purposes you use it for.
But it's not very stable, is it?

I reckon (if you want my Opinion<g>) that actually the Apple Mac OSX
Operating System might suit you quite well!!!

It seems to have most of the Settings & Options that most people need,
yet is still (reasonably) usable by people (like you?) who don't really
want to have to find out about & learn the ins & outs of how to use it
for basic things (obviously for the more complex stuff, people *do*
still have to find out about it anyway.) & it (also* has plenty of nice
stuff to "Fiddle" with, when you *do* want to Faff around with it!
:-)

HTH

--
pmj


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