General Music Chat

My PC is continuously being infected by viruses. I Mac any better? Worth the money?

HELLZ YEAH! THAT'S ALL WE USE IS MACS IN MY HOUSE...NEVER...EVER A VIRUS!

Mine, too, bob. i'm gonna be looking at Macs if I ever start making money again.

1) get some decent virus protection software (Norton, etc)
2) keep the virus definitions up to date
3) avoid downloading things from suspicious sites (i.e. don't download illegal music, movies, porn, etc)

HELLZ YEAH! THAT'S ALL WE USE IS MACS IN MY HOUSE...NEVER...EVER A VIRUS!

Thanks Crip. Love the Mugsy logo. Reminiscent of the Looney Toons Logo (Bugs Bunny). Maybe your band could make a Mugsy cartoon: Four tough guys go into town, kick everyones ass, then gigs at the local bar, and LEAVES.

My understanding is that Mac is the adopted "industry standard" or norm for musicians and artists (music apps and photoshop/graphics oriented types of development). Micro$oft is more for general office kinds of development - financial, word-processing etc.

Apple is less virus prone because it's not as widely used, and less used for financial kinds of operations so it is less targeted. Some would argue its architecture is also more secure, but that's based solely on what I've read from apple users - there's kind of a computer OS war between these major factions and the name-calling never ceases.

If you aren't tied to your computer because of already purchased software, then I'd go Mac myself for those reasons. But if you come from a windows background, there will be a learning curve. I remember my first Mac experience - to eject a disc you needed a fork to poke in a little whole, or drag your disc into the trash can. things have gotten better though, or so I hear

1) get some decent virus protection software (Norton, etc)
2) keep the virus definitions up to date
3) avoid downloading things from suspicious sites (i.e. don't download illegal music, movies, porn, etc)

right on - listen to the folks that work with computers.

now admittedly... mac will be unlikely to get virus's... and admittedly they tend to be more stable when doing music/graphics. but

A) you will pay thru your arse for software/hardware of equivalent spec
B) you will find yourself intimately familiar with file conversion
C) I've run some 30+ tracks on my 2.5ghz pentium and have NEVER seen it crash or even lag... so stability isn't really an issue.
D) if you follow the steps above - you won't have a virus...

so in short... virus is not an issue, stability is not an issue. price is an issue.

NO PORN ???

I've owned a PC since '96. I've built my own systems most of the time, but a couple times I had someone else build them for me. I have NEVER had a bad virus. But I've seen it happen to my mother, friends, neighbors, even my bassist. And it's all because they can't obey a few simple rules.

ColorsFade's Rules For A Good PC Experience:

(1) Norton is junk. Use free virus protection (AVG comes to mind). Spybot Search & Destroy is good too, because it will monitor your registry settings and detect changes.



(2) Single biggest thing you can do on your PC to avoid viruses: do NOT open attachments if you did not request it!


My parents, my friends, they send me stuff with attachments; they forward crap to me, and I just put in the bin. It goes straight to the garbage. Unless I specifically REQUEST for them to send me some pictures or a file, I don't open any e-mail with an attachment. There is NO EXCEPTION to this rule. So what if you missed out on a picture? You can see it later. There is nothing they can send you in an unannounced attachment that is more important than you keeping your system clean of their viruses.


(3) Don't use the default mail service you get with your ISP (CableOne, Wildblue, or whoever you're using). Just get a Gmail account. It will filter your spam and protect you from viruses by scanning attachments when you receive them. Let Google do the hard work for you. Let them worry about keeping virus definitions up-to-date.



(4) Keep your important files (pictures/photos, music you're writing, letters, documents, etc.) offline on a protected medium (burn to CD or DVD or store in a USB drive).

If you keep your system clean and backup your important files onto offline storage, then if you ever do get some kind of nasty virus you are literally moments away from formatting your hard disk and doing a clean install. With your data stored offline you can recover it quickly on a freshly installed system and be up in running in the time in takes to format the disk and reinstall Windows (and on my wife's new machine that I just built for her for $388, that was about 20 minutes total).


(5) Recognize potential harmful websites and AVOID THEM. Yes, I'm sure she's cute and has "hot" photos. But listen up - just like hot chicks have diseases, so do suspicious websites. The only way to stay CLEAN is to STAY AWAY. Don't be stupid about the websites you visit.




Bottom line:

MAC users and MAC marketing people like to us the virus scare tactic to tout their product. But I've used both Macs and PC's, and I enjoy the PC experience much more. If you want to use a PC because, like me, you find some aspect of it superior to the Mac, then use a PC. But be smart about it.

Because you cannot be a bonehead and be a PC user. If you are the type of person who can't follow a few simple rules, who can't recognize a potential harmful website when you see it, who opens every attachment everyone sends them, then you're destine for viruses, keystroke loggers and every other kind of malicious code someone can send your way.

And if that's the case, the Mac is definitely for you.

(3) Don't use the default mail service you get with your ISP (CableOne, Wildblue, or whoever you're using). Just get a Gmail account. It will filter your spam and protect you from viruses by scanning attachments when you receive them. Let Google do the hard work for you. Let them worry about keeping virus definitions up-to-date.

Now this some great advice. The rest too, but this one for sure.

1) get some decent virus protection software (Norton, etc)
2) keep the virus definitions up to date
3) avoid downloading things from suspicious sites (i.e. don't download illegal music, movies, porn, etc)

right on - listen to the folks that work with computers.

now admittedly... mac will be unlikely to get virus's... and admittedly they tend to be more stable when doing music/graphics. but

A) you will pay thru your arse for software/hardware of equivalent spec
B) you will find yourself intimately familiar with file conversion
C) I've run some 30+ tracks on my 2.5ghz pentium and have NEVER seen it crash or even lag... so stability isn't really an issue.
D) if you follow the steps above - you won't have a virus...

so in short... virus is not an issue, stability is not an issue. price is an issue.

I agree ...

I use several highend 3D CAD software (mech eng) and none of it will run on a mac. I upgrade my CPU and motherboard and video card every year or so, but don't upgrade the case and peripheral hardware .. which saves me money, can't do that with a mac.

I think NORTON is evil and don't use it, there are better AV software out there that is free and it doesn't try to take over your computer

Damn, CF.

Okay...I'm convinced...I'm a bonehead.

Why hasn't anyione ever told me there were RULES?!!!!

See...I just go out & buy the thing, take it home, use the most popular things like Norton, & never understand why I have troubles...

It's kinda like the way I approach everything else - with a lackadaisical "go along with what the regular folks tell me" system...but then I never wanted to spend the time to be all knowledgeable about it, cuz regular folks tell me that that's for nerds & geeks.

Gee...I wish I was a geek...but I seem to recall something about biting off chicken heads or something equally tasteless...

I need real help!

NO PORN ??

NO PORN ??

You just gotta know what to trust...



But I give no secrets away.

Thanks for all your advice. I put AVG free edition on my PC a few months ago and maybe by coincidence the viruses went crazy on the PC right after that. I have a contract with Geeks On Site for about $25 a month you can call them as often as you want and they remotely go into your PC and remove all the viruses. They spent about four hours today and cleaned it up. It got to the point that I couldn't even navigate WITHIN a website, let alone navigate TO a website.
There's got to be a lot of lowlife slimeballs who have nothing better to do with their time than put these viruses out there to make our lives miserable. We need to start finding them and put them in prison (make them work chain gangs dressed in nothing but pink underwear).