The Hunt for the Perfect Computer

While I was looking over the required reading for this week, I realized I know a whole lot less than I thought I did about computers. Wow! Yes, the reading was semi-boring and it took me a while to really get through it, but in the end I feel like I appreciate my operating system a heck of a lot more. The fact that the author reminded patrons to properly save their material was definitely a plus. I usually try to save my work every few minutes, but sometimes you get so caught up in it that you forget. I never use the computer during a storm in case the power goes out, but you can’t always control when that happens. But I’ve noticed that now my computer has autosave and when the computer is rebooted (at least in word) it will ask me to if I want to open any of the saved material. But again you can’t always trust that either. The autosave goes off, what about every five minutes. So from the time it saves until the next, your work could be in danger of being lost. This has happened to me a few times, but what can I say live and learn.
Another thing I learned from this week’s reading is about the different managing programs and how some computers have “single user/single tasking.” I am not sure how anyone could stand to have that type of computer. I know at the moment I have six word documents up and two web browsers. If I had this type of operating system I would never get anything done! I would be constantly going back and forth trying to do work. Luckily I do not have to deal with that, which is a blessing!
I really used to get annoyed with the little pop ups that occur at the bottom of the screen, letting you know that there are updates for your programs. I usually ignore them because I’m in the middle of something. Luckily my computer always provides the chance to update prior to shutting down, which makes updating that much easier.
My dad put Norton Antivirus on the computer to help protect it from potentially damaging programs. I think this is a good idea because otherwise my computer most likely would have crashed. But sometimes Norton gets a little confused and tells me some sites I use for school are not safe and it red flags them. The only other bad thing about Norton is that when it performs its weekly diagnostics test it makes my computer run slowly. We also use a pop-up blocker on the computer. This again is very nice to use and allows us to decide whether or not to allow pop-ups.
When we got our computer it had Windows media player already installed on it and every once and a while it opens when I place a CD in the computer. I still use it for watching videos, but for music I use iTunes.
I found this chapter to be extremely interesting and useful in learning about the different types and function of operating systems. This book is very easy to follow and understand and I like the review at the end of each chapter. These few pages give a brief overview of what was learned in each chapter and helps students to better understand the material that was provided.
I guess until next week, have a good weekend everyone!