Town of Braintree

Windows Updates.....

Hi Bill,

While you're on the line here, I'd like to ask you a question.

As for those Windows Updates, I have noticed that there are 8 other noncritical updates listed on the Microsoft site after the update has performed it's scan of my pc.

I've looked at each one of them, but I cannot determine if each one of them applies to me.

I cannot remember all 8 of them, but two come to mind.
Outlook Express.
Yeah, I use that, but it's working fine.
I cannot tell from the problem description if I need that.
The other, Active Directory update/fix.
I only have a small peer to peer network here at home. Do I need to install that fix ?

But a better question for you readers, is how does an updater know if he needs these other non-critical updates ?


By Kompooter DIY'er

Rule of thumb

Would be:
apply the critical patches;

review the hardware patches to see if there is a patch for a component on your computer that you are unhappy with the performance of or is showing symptoms;

apply other updates that directly address your environment.

For example, if you use Windows Media Player a lot, you might want to update it when they become available.





By techie

I agree with the Techie


The scan used by Microsoft is typical to that used by Kids Hacking ..
open ports etc. You prob. should apply the Critical patches

You will notice the others say recommended in some cases.Take those and apply

There is a HELP and FAQ on left hand side of update page that is a good place to start.

Also there is one last option overlooked. There are (last I heard) 18? unpatched hacks when using IE. That's why the kids all use Firefox available at Mozilla.org

: )

Active X info is at - http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=&oi=defmore&q=define:Active+X

a ton of it..



By Bill

spyware

Our computer was hijacked by a home page hacker and it was the most frustrating thing ever. I finally ended up dumping everything and reinstalling windows. The best thing ever is Ad-aware by Lavasoft.com. It is free and it really does a good job of filtering out spyware. I run it at least once a week along with Mcafee antivirus and no problems since.

By halo