MeasurementBlog

As visitors know, we have a bunch of websites. We maintain and update several of them daily using both laptop and desktop PCs. Recently one each of our Windows XP machines went down..badly.

It was Windows or the Windows One Care Live to blame. Both happened after receiving notice of an update to Windows XP. Upon reboot neither computer would start Windows, even in safe mode!

Restoring Windows promised to erase all the files on the machines, some weren’t backed up, too! The apps would be easy, well, easier to replace, But the data was semi-priceless; hard to reconstruct.

So, we blame Microsoft; don’t care if it was even a virus. One Care was advertised as a fix-all/prevent all. Plus we were coming up on the one year anniversary of its installations.

Why am I putting this here, on my measurement blog? Well, because I can and because if anyone else runs into the same problem, be aware we have done it and we like the Ubuntu solution; it was quick and easy..and FREE.

Given Microsoft’s recent performance (our machines were up to date and we had backups-that was not enough) I’m sure there soon will be a few thousand or more in the same situation as us, if there aren’t already. (Wonder how many with MS One Care have been skunked?)

Don’t think everyone knows about the Ubuntu option; perhaps I can help inform some that don’t. We were lucky to already have a CD with Ubuntu on it!

It took about three weeks for whatever wrecked our Windows installations to repeat and now there’s an update notice on yet another machine, about one week after the second PC went down.

We’ll pass on that upgrade for now and will add Ubuntu before WinXP goes all silly on us.

I think I was lucky since it is also a lot easier to access and burn Ubuntu onto a CD before Windows XP exits this world. We had one.

Did I mention that Ubuntu is FREE!. Great for thrifty folks like me!

Bye-bye Windows, forever! It was almost fun while it lasted, but no longer - more than 12 years of fun & frustration ended in less than 3 weeks of goofups!

It’s Ubuntu with a Mac backup from now on for us! Or, maybe vice-versa-they are similar in many ways.

Needless to say, I’m selling my Microsoft stock, too! Time for me to invest in Apple and whoever does Linux and Ubuntu.

Ray Peacock
————————–
We think Windows XP and Windows One Care, and maybe even Windows are trademarks of Microsoft Corporation.

TEMPERATURES.COM, INC. publishes information about measurement devices and measurement on its websites. The sites have articles, directories and news to foster competent measurements & analysis in industry & science. Sites are free. Submissions by visitors are encouraged and reviewed. Sites as of August 2007 are: lehos tecHeadlines, measureNEWS, About Temperature Sensors, TempSensor Directories, TempSensorNEWS, Measurement Databases, (MeasurementBlog.com)MeasurementMedia.com and MeasurementDevices.com