Going from Dial-up to WIFI

I've found Norton effective but based on my own experience at home and at church, you may find 360 bogs your PC down noticeably. Good Luck.

If you're going to be running T:ANE you need to be able to at least see into your application data files. That's easy enough to arrange:
Open File Explorer
Pick the "View" tab
Click "Options"
In the Folder Options window pick "View"
In the "Advanced Settings" list find "Hidden files and folders" and select "Show &c."
OK your way out to desktop.​

At this point the AppData\ folder will show up in your user profile when you go there and you can find the T:ANE files in Local\N3V.

If memory serves you can also do that in 7 if you want, pretty much the same way.

:B~)
 
Almost finished

RHK and ColPrice, I am not running Trainz on this living room computer, but on a completely offline XP one. But thanks!

Hello again,

My experience with the Norton website was very non-user friendly.
Eventually,I found that the secure VPN was not installed on my computer.

To get to any kind of technical help from a human being, you had to hit a lucky page which listed a phone number on it. For an hour, a technician installed and reinstalled the program about 4 times, did all kinds of probes and finally informed me that the VPN doesn't work, buy a new computer, upgrade to Windows 10. Its supposed to work with 7 SP1, Oh well.

Like RHK said, I imagine if I install all the browser attachments, it will slow down my browsing. Well, for very little money for the first year it gives me some peace of mind.

I'm going to proceed with buying an external backup drive for an image. I imagine you can unplug these. One question being, is there a no-cost image maker (like the one in Windows 7) (I have also seen some names of image makers in another thread currently going on here). The question is, do they also copy all the empty sectors? That would make the image very big, requiring a bigger external drive.

Well thanks to you all, whether this thread goes on or not, I got some good ideas I used! (and some others I'll really keep in mind)!
 
I'm going to proceed with buying an external backup drive for an image. I imagine you can unplug these. One question being, is there a no-cost image maker (like the one in Windows 7) (I have also seen some names of image makers in another thread currently going on here). The question is, do they also copy all the empty sectors? That would make the image very big, requiring a bigger external drive.

Actually, Win 10 includes Win 7 Backup, which is what I use with my USB plug-in drive. You'll feel right at home.

:B~)
 
I've come in late with this but here are my thoughts.

I've used Trend Micro for several years and I'm happy with it. My monthly report just came in and I had zero attacks. My wife, however, has an active Facebook account and gets bombarded with crap.

The idea of a second router appeals to me although I don't have one. The problem is knowing how to configure it. I have a complicated network of physical LAN, WiFi, hubs, network drives, etc. Right now I'm trying to figure out how to configure a new NAS system with 16Tb of HDD that I got for my birthday recently (73).

I use Win10 Pro even though I think it is bloatware. I yearn for a stripped down/basic Windows without all the rubbish that MS think you simply must have.

I don't think viruses, as in the original form, are as much of a problem as they were. These days its identify theft and ransomware. Simple answer is not store anything, repeat anything, on your PC that you can afford to have stolen. By that I mean banking details, credit card numbers, etc. Who really cares if your Trainz installation or some other game gets locked out or trashed. You can always re-install it providing you have backups.

The Windows firewall is pretty good AFAIK but I can't recall what Win 7 had, if anything. These days you can configure Win 10 to look like Win 7/XP or even OS/2.

VinnyBarb, may he rest in peace, had a reasonably fast computer for Trainz that was totally disconnected from the Internet. All he had to do was connect it once a month to allow Trainz to "phone home" and validate his installation. I think he downloaded assets from the DLS on a connected PC. I miss VB. He was a PITA at times but an interesting PITA. :)

You may be analog old guy but I think of myself as a digital very old guy. Age is not an issue but my body is. :D
 
Back to you guys, and thanks for the extra input!

1. I understand your instructions to turn on the hidden folders, but have been so busy trying to get the VPN working.

2. There is now a (Norton VPN) link on my startup menu I have never seen before. But I expect the worst, clicking on that program about four times after downloading it four times, with the technician. (Long story, you click on it, and up pops a tiny Captcha, worst Captcha I have ever seen or heard), long story, I have so many Passwords written down for Comcast, Norton Help Forums, and temporary passwords they made up for me, (so many password attempts, so much failure)!

3. Now that I have settled down and found a Norton Control Window that has lots of information on what is wrong, one thing is, my Windows 7 is up to SP1, but it needs to go all the way to SP2.

4.It also mentions that my Pnp is not detectable ...(Which the Shields Up GRC website scan said is is a good thing).

5.There is also Black web protection, which needs to be set up by me. But also must involve all the signing in with the right password, and the Captcha again. (They are so darn paranoid)!

What else? The Windows firewall, when I go to it says it is being controlled by Norton...

I've got you beat on the age pcas. Ha,ha, I'm just about 77. Yes, I do worry about stuff on my computer especially my password manager, if I open it, will they see all my passwords? NOW I am paranoid!.

I've been shopping for a backup drive, and kind of like the reviews and price of the Seagate Plus Slim 1 or 2 Tb. Now, I am ignorant on these external ones.. I think that it is a hard drive, and it runs off the USB? USBs only put out so little power. So little time, so much confusion!

Also, I am starting to dislike a lot of the sliding, dimming out ads I've been seeing. I know what is meant about the HOSTS file and ad removing software....

So much blabber by me,so little brainpower !! I'm off for now! Bob P.
 
Back to you guys, and thanks for the extra input!

1. I understand your instructions to turn on the hidden folders, but have been so busy trying to get the VPN working.

2. There is now a (Norton VPN) link on my startup menu I have never seen before. But I expect the worst, clicking on that program about four times after downloading it four times, with the technician. (Long story, you click on it, and up pops a tiny Captcha, worst Captcha I have ever seen or heard), long story, I have so many Passwords written down for Comcast, Norton Help Forums, and temporary passwords they made up for me, (so many password attempts, so much failure)!

3. Now that I have settled down and found a Norton Control Window that has lots of information on what is wrong, one thing is, my Windows 7 is up to SP1, but it needs to go all the way to SP2.

4.It also mentions that my Pnp is not detectable ...(Which the Shields Up GRC website scan said is is a good thing).

5.There is also Black web protection, which needs to be set up by me. But also must involve all the signing in with the right password, and the Captcha again. (They are so darn paranoid)!

What else? The Windows firewall, when I go to it says it is being controlled by Norton...

I've got you beat on the age pcas. Ha,ha, I'm just about 77. Yes, I do worry about stuff on my computer especially my password manager, if I open it, will they see all my passwords? NOW I am paranoid!.

I've been shopping for a backup drive, and kind of like the reviews and price of the Seagate Plus Slim 1 or 2 Tb. Now, I am ignorant on these external ones.. I think that it is a hard drive, and it runs off the USB? USBs only put out so little power. So little time, so much confusion!

Also, I am starting to dislike a lot of the sliding, dimming out ads I've been seeing. I know what is meant about the HOSTS file and ad removing software....

So much blabber by me,so little brainpower !! I'm off for now! Bob P.

I seem to recall to use Windows backup the external drive must be larger than 1 gig. My personal preference would be a WD external hard drive, although I do have a couple of HGST external drives that are similar quality that staples had for a very reasonable price.

If you read through the companies who look at hard drive failure rates WD in general are on the lower end of the scale. In theory a USB port outputs power, I have devices that are supposed to power of the USB port but they only work when plugged into a powered USB hub. The usb ports on my computers do not all meet the USB standard for power available. My Samsung external SSD however works with just about anything. Currently it is plugged into a Raspberry pi which thinks it is a NAS device.

I actually use a Ugreen external hard drive case for an internal hard drive with a WD blue drive inside 4 Tb seems to be the sweet point on price / capacity. You don't need 7200rpm , 5400 is fine. The advantage is it has a power switch so you can turn it off when you aren't doing a backup. Useful if you get malware that encrypts your disk drives. At least you have something to restore. Newegg.com have hard drive enclosures with power switches.

Cheerio John
 
As far as Anti virus goes I've been using Kaspersky Total Security on 3 PC's for about 5-6 yrs now and never had a problem
haven't had a virus since I started using it
Usually pick up a key on ebay ( 1 device / 2yrs ) for about Aus $20 not bad for $10/yr for full protection
 
As far as Anti virus goes I've been using Kaspersky Total Security on 3 PC's for about 5-6 yrs now and never had a problem
haven't had a virus since I started using it
Usually pick up a key on ebay ( 1 device / 2yrs ) for about Aus $20 not bad for $10/yr for full protection

That's the one the US government has banned on it's machines as presenting a security risk.

Cheerio John
 
Now Maybe my HP Hard Drive ...

Hello ...

I think I have found something wrong with the hard drive in my computer.

It always has been very slow booting compared to the my old XP Pro with two old WD Blue's that are in my game computer.

I said, holy cow, Windows 7 is so slow to boot up.

Then eventually,my ACER monitor started displaying the ACER logo once as it booted up. Just last month, it started showing the logo a couple of times. Now, in the last two days, I can see maybe a connection to the hard drive.

Shows the logo 2 times with dim screens in between. Then it gets to the first black Windows screen with the small white revolving circle.

Then it goes back to the ACER logo then to the Windows colored flags then (I couldn't believe it) it goes back again to the Acer screen then returns to boot up completely.

I always thought this was the monitor's problem, but not now. First, I set the display and the hard drive to both turn off for 15 minutes in the power settings. When moving the mouse, the monitor goes back to the logo screen and then the whole long reboot routine happens again.

When I set the display and hard drive to never turn off. I can leave it off forever, when I move the mouse, the perfect desktop is there. No reboot.

i would appreciate any ideas on this. (probably time to buy a new computer) Thanks. Bob P.
 
Hello ...

I think I have found something wrong with the hard drive in my computer.
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.
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i would appreciate any ideas on this. (probably time to buy a new computer) Thanks. Bob P.

You are probably right -- it's hardly worthwhile trying to put a new drive in a PC that old. Sorry 'bout that. A new one would save a lot of time over trying to dink with antique hardware, and time is ... irreplaceable.

You were talking earlier about getting an external hard drive. By all means get a 2Gb or larger -- the price difference is small and the extra room gives you all sorts of usefulness.

:B~)
 
You are right, RHK, I am truly wasting a lot of time and effort. I'm going to buy an external Seagate today probably 2 TB, they are at a low price.

John, I tend to agree with you about WD"s being better. (although I had a WD Blue fail on me quickly on the other computer). The replacement WD has been working fine for maybe 5 years.

All the internal WD hard drives at Staples right now are real cheap, like sixty dollars... But they are all are that at that 6 Sata ?? plug-in level. The Seagate Portable drive model is high rated by some fairly reliable websites.

I don't need much storage space. Right now, the current drive has 918GB with 797GB free. I still might try the error-checking on Win 7. I know it might screw up everything. Also I know there was a Linux based Boot Sector Checker you burn to a CD and it checks the drive before windows boots up.

I am fairly low income and try not to spend big money when not necessary. Although I'll say that people don't like stress as they're getting older. Well, I truly appreciate all you guys helping. I'll post back here to report how things work out!

Ok, bought the Seagate 2TB Backup Plus Slim at Staples, $63.00
 
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It is fine to run Windows 7, although it is not getting more updates soon. As long as you keep it from being infected, it will work fine for a while. I would advise to get another drive, and setup Windows 10 on it, sometime this year or next.
 
Thanks John, I did a scan with Hard Disk Sentinel, and now we have some information. (this is a shortened version I made) I could post the whole version but it is pretty big....

-- Physical Disk Information - Disk: #0: ST31000528AS --

Hard Disk Summary
-------------------
Hard Disk Number . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . : 0
Interface . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . : S-ATA II
Disk Controller . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . : AMD SATA Controller (AHCI) [VEN: 1002, DEV: 4391] Version:

1.2.1.238, 10-8-2010
Disk Location . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . : Bus Number 0, Target Id 0, LUN 0
Hard Disk Model ID . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . : ST31000528AS
Firmware Revision . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . : HP35
Hard Disk Serial Number . . . . . . . . . . . . : 5VP737SL
Total Size . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . : 953867 MB
Power State . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . : Active
Logical Drive(s) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . : C: [OS] D: [HP_RECOVERY]
Current Temperature . . . . . . . . . . . . . . : 32 °C
Power On Time . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . : 916 days, 22 hours
Estimated Remaining Lifetime . . . . . . . . . . : 751 days
Health . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . : ##################-- 91 % (Excellent)
Performance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . : #################### 100 % (Excellent)

There are 6 bad sectors on the disk surface. The contents of these sectors were moved to the spare area.
At this point, warranty replacement of the disk is not yet possible, only if the health drops further.
It is recommended to examine the log of the disk regularly. All new problems found will be logged there.
No actions needed.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

S.M.A.R.T.
------------
No. Attribute Thre.. Value Worst Data Status Flags


1 Raw Read Error Rate 6 117 99 0000080F98E1 OK Self Preserving,

Error-Rate, Performance, Statistica..
3 Spin Up Time 0 94 94 000000000000 OK (Always passing) Self Preserving,

Statistical, Critical
4 Start/Stop Count 20 93 93 000000001F4D OK Self Preserving,

Event Count, Statistical
5 Reallocated Sectors Co.. 36 100 100 000000000006 OK Self Preserving,

Event Count, Statistical, Critical
7 Seek Error Rate 30 84 60 00000FF31D48 OK Self Preserving,

Error-Rate, Performance, Statistica..
9 Power On Time Count 0 75 75 0000000055F6 OK (Always passing) Self Preserving,

Event Count, Statistical
10 Spin Retry Count 97 100 100 000000000000 OK Self Preserving,

Event Count, Statistical, Critical
12 Drive Power Cycle Count 20 97 97 000000000F9F OK Self Preserving,

Event Count, Statistical
180 Vendor-specific 0 100 100 0000698B51C5 OK (Always passing) Self Preserving,

Error-Rate, Statistical, Critical
183 SATA Downshift Count 0 100 100 000000000000 OK (Always passing) Self Preserving,

Event Count, Statistical
184 End-to-End Error Count 97 100 100 000000000000 OK Self Preserving,

Event Count, Statistical, Critical
187 Reported Uncorrectable.. 0 100 100 000000000000 OK (Always passing) Self Preserving,

Event Count, Statistical
188 Command Timeout 0 100 100 000000000000 OK (Always passing) Self Preserving,

Event Count, Statistical
189 High Fly Writes 0 100 100 000000000000 OK (Always passing) Self Preserving,

Event Count, Error-Rate, Statistical
190 Airflow Temperature 45 68 62 000020140020 OK Self Preserving,

Statistical
194 Disk Temperature 0 32 40 001100000020 OK (Always passing) Self Preserving,

Statistical
195 Hardware ECC Recovered 0 45 26 0000080F98E1 OK (Always passing) Self Preserving,
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Event Count, Error-Rate, Statistical
196 Reallocation Event Count 36 100 100 000000000006 OK Self Preserving,
(IT DID MOVE SOMETHING TO THE SPARE AREA)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Event Count, Statistical
197 Current Pending Sector.. 0 100 100 000000000000 OK (Always passing) Self Preserving,

Event Count, Statistical
198 Off-Line Uncorrectable.. 0 100 100 000000000000 OK (Always passing) Self Preserving,

Event Count
199 Ultra ATA CRC Error Co.. 0 200 200 000000000000 OK (Always passing) Self Preserving,

Does it look like the hard drive is possibly pretty good. It could be the fault of the monitor. It could be the fault of a pop-up menu that Norton put on my computer to remove and reinstall. The technician who helped me did this remotely about four times.

The program looks like it is working properly. It has updated a few times, it checks on download automatically. I have enabled extra features included with it. I sent a message back to them about getting rid of this popup (with gonging bell sounds).

See you later, and Thanks! Bob P.
 
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The drive looks like it's okay. It is old though so I would be more inclined to backup stuff more often. I have used drives with a lot more hours on them and even took one that with may more hours hours on it and relegated it to a lesser position for temporary storage, games I didn't care about, and other stuff I wanted to do but not fill up my main drive with. That drive continued to soldier on for another 3 years before it finally crashed. I then pulled it apart and removed the magnets and those have use in the workshop to clamp things in place. You have to watch out for them because they can pinch, but anyway, that drive lives on in a different form.

Reallocation events such as the one you witnessed are not unusual as drives age. I would check this periodically and if the number increases, I would be more concerned. This means that more and more of the sectors are failing and it's time to replace the drive. The reallocation too can lead to worse performance as the data has to be remapped more often. If the drive gets to that point, I would definitely consider a replacement.

The other stats look good and it appears you keep your computer cool inside, which is the biggest problem with the components.

I'm glad I could help.
 
I might be inclined to drop in a new hard drive. Newegg.com have a WD black 6 tb for $170 or a gold for $198. Both have 5 year warranty and both have a nice 256 mb cache on them and with multiple platters it means the head doesn't need to move very much.

If you do decide to go with a new drive Newegg's sale ends very shortly.

Cheerio John
 
I had, still have one drive a WD 500GB that relocated a few sectors, that was 5 years ago and it's still fine, not using it for anything important though as it was moved to an old PC I use for streaming video, the other side of coin was one that lasted a couple of weeks after relocating a couple sectors, it just died motor failed that was a Hitachi it was getting on a bit though.
Point being it may never get any worse or it may not last long, that's why backups are important, in fact I back my backups as well in case a backup drive fails, never happened here but it might, so pays to keep multiple backups.

The only problem I have ever had with hard drives was with the 2002 20GB Fujitsu hard drive fiasco where I had two in a raid configuration both failed after a few weeks with faulty controller chips which seriously overheated, there were around 300,000 recalls. They don't make drives any more thankfully!
 
Hello Fellows, many thanks for the opinions on my situation here,

Remember, I am talking about using this computer to go online with WIFI. This is not my Trainz computer. I've been online with dial-up since Windows 98 days, right up until I signed up for low income WIFI from Comcast in December ! The technician hooked it up last week.

I went and looked at those WD Blacks, but the price! And mainly they have 6Gb SATA connectors (I think). I am on a fixed income from social security. I am always scrounging. I have used this HP Desktop inherited from a friend, for two years now, on dial-up.

Well, I can say that this hard drive still has the symptom of multiple trys to boot up, (going back to the monitors' Logo four times in between)! During this past summer, it was going back to the monitor's Logo screen only once or twice. Now it is up to four times.

I bought a brand new 2TB portable backup drive this week as recommended here. Haven't formatted it yet.I'll try to put the image on it. I do have a used Seagate 1TB hard drive I took from a $7 HP Slimline computer.That computer worked quietly and perfectly and was running Windows 10..Long story here.. I'll skip it.

If this current drive fails, I will probably try to format that drive and see if the image can be put on it. This sounds like a failure proposition!! All my stuff is already backed to memory sticks and DVD's. HEY! Maybe i could pay a guy to do it for $100 !! That's a great idea!! :udrool:

Comcast makes a computer with monitor available for $150 dollars. However they are refurbished. and are old Duo Core 2, from what I have seen.

If all fails, I'll buy the cheapest new computer I can find. Walmart sells a tiny one for $300. Half of the gov Stimulus check!

Thanks, all of you! Keep enjoying Trainz!
 
Basically if your existing hardware is still running then keeping it running is the cheapest bet.

The refurbished machines are usually office ones which means they don't have the power supply or room for a reasonable GPU. You're looking at $150 for a GTX 1050 at newegg by the way.

You should be able to pick up a new hard drive for $40 from newegg.com.

Cheerio John
 
No, no John, my internet computer is not refurbished, yet it still has a measly 250 watt power supply !!!!

And now, The NEWS ...

Reporting on my progress...

I plugged the 2TB backup drive in, followed the instructions, which was surprisingly easy using the Windows 7 disk management.

Formatted it to NTFS. Then used the backup feature of Windows 7. It just asks a few simple questions about what I wanted to include in the image. And where do I want to put it, DVDs or Drive E (the backup drive).

Surprising to me, (a little), was that it also copied the the HP Restore partition and the full OS partition.

What is a little unsettling is that Windows says the backup drive now has 1.72 TB free out of 1.81 TB. Maybe this is one of those Windows odd calculations.

Went to a computer repair shop and asked him how much it would cost to check that second used 1TB drive.. $25. To also reformat it clean..$10 dollars more.

Do all that and put the drive into the computer and restore the image? (He doesn't do images, he installs Windows, goes get the drivers for my computer). Along with a 500 GB hard drive (i think used) Errr...$189. I told him that is getting close to the cheapest new computer Walmart sells, $300.

Do I know how to screw in a hard drive and plug the cords into it, I think so? I saw "new" Seagate 1TB drives on EBAY ..New? $70.
It was hard for me to find 1TB (SATA 2 or 3) on Newegg. Newegg is tricky for me.

I'm not sure if the image can be installed onto different sized hard drives. I read that the Windows image is based on a file system method, maybe it skips all the empty sectors.

Over for now. Best Wishes, Robert
 
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