The meeting opened at 10 a.m with 29 members in attendance.  Techie Bob showed a video something about a Fox Hat.  Everyone seemed to enjoy it as there was a lot of laughter.  Hmmm.  John Barker then asked if anyone had questions regarding their computer  

A suggestion was made that members should check the Mail washer web site, a reliable anti-spam and spam blocker software, protects your computer from unwanted email spam.  Controls spam and stops viruses before you download them and it is free.

11:00 Coffee Break

For the second half of our programme, Helen Gordon gave a PowerPoint presentation from Microsoft Mindshare, entitled Windows Genuine Advantage, in a box with several items to be used as a raffle along with a Cd Rom disk offering different presentations regarding Windows Genuine Advantage.  Helen used the WGA PowerPoint presentation to introduce the programme to the computer club members.  It showed step by step how to validate a Windows programme. In the presentation 3 web sites were mentioned to visit for those wanting further information.  

Helen suggests visiting each of the web sites for more information.  While viewing the sites make sure to explore the contents listed on the left-hand side menu—in particular Support area by left clicking the site & going to that web page.  On the left-hand side of the page you will see a list of Top Solution Centers.  which offer further assistance for Internet Explorer 6.0, Windows XP, and windows 98 etc  If you want further web sites of information then left click more solution centers.  For instance go to Digital Image Suite to obtain further information on the various Microsoft Digital Image programs.

At the www.microsoft.com/genuine web page scroll down to view the various free offers.  One area of interest is Video Tutorials:  Using Windows XP offers a series of 12 short videos designed to help you with various tasks .

There was some questions regarding Motherboards.  The following site should be of some help in this regard: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motherboards.

Anti-Virus Software Tips & Tricks

If you use Windows on the web, you will eventually be infected by one or more of the following:

• Viruses - A virus is a small piece of software that piggybacks on real programs. For example, a virus may attach itself to a program such as a spreadsheet program. Each time the spreadsheet program runs, the virus runs too, and it has the chance to reproduce by attaching to other programs or wreak havoc.
• E-mail viruses - An e-mail virus moves around in e-mail messages and usually replicates itself by automatically mailing itself to dozens of people in the victim's e-mail address book.
• Worms - A worm is a small piece of software that uses computer networks and security holes to replicate itself. A copy of the worm scans the network for another machine that has a specific security hole then starts replicating from there.
• Trojan horses - A trojan horse is simply a computer program. The program claims to do one thing (it may claim to be a game) but instead does damage when you run it (it may erase your hard disk). Trojan horses have no way to replicate automatically.

You know you are infected when your system slows down or crashes or worse, your hard drive is formatted.  Spyware may also be responsible for some of the slow downs, but we’ll discuss this in a later tutorial.

They get on your computer through an insecure (no firewall) internet connection, from opening Email attachments or file sharing networks, to name a few.  We’ll also discuss the use of firewalls in a later tutorial

In order to find, remove and protect your computer from viruses you need to install a single Anti-virus program.  The challenge is to find the best program for your needs.  Look for these symbols to ensure the quality of programs.

Examples of anti-virus software:

Commercial Programs	Free Programs

I wanted to focus on AVG Anti-virus version 7 because it is the most popular free application and is available from www.free.grisoft.com.

Once downloaded and installed, the first step is to configure AVG.

To configure AVG, open the AVG Control Center by right-clicking on the AVG Icon, in the system tray (next to the clock).  You should see something like this:

Each item in the main window is a component.  Click on the component to see additional actions below the main window. Click on properties button...
Then click on 'Configure'
Check “With attachments only” to speed up your system.  Click “OK” until you return to the Control Center screen.
Uncheck “Scan floppy drives” and “Scan Email files” because they are redundant.
Then, click on the “General” tab and check the “Only when a faulty condition exists”.
This hides the component in the main window as shown. Once configured, you can hide Scheduler, Shell Extension and Virus Vault as they don’t change much. Let’s set up the Scheduler next. Click on “Scheduled Tasks”…
Click on the first line in the list.  Select an appropriate time to do the tests and check the “If missed” box also to run the tests on boot up if the scheduled test time has passed. Click on the 2nd line in the list and repeat to set scheduled updates and set the time to at least an hour before running tests.  Click “OK” until back at Control Center.
Press the “F8” key to open Program Settings and set the number of days to 10 or less in all three boxes, then choose ascending or descending.   Click “OK” until back at Control Center.
Manually, click on the Icon next to “Check for Updates” and update as required. Then, click on the Icon next to “Scan Computer” to run the tests. Tip:  Use “Scan Selected Areas” to do custom scans.
And just a reminder to right-click on all downloads and downloaded Email attachments and scan with AVG before installing or opening.

NOTE:  Viruses and Spyware are two totally different animals.  Next meeting we will rip
Ad-Aware Personal Edition apart.