re: Current security software available for Windows 98
Tuesday, November 17, 2009 at 11:15 am
Windows 98 Annoyances Discussion Forum
Posted by gewg_
(4444 messages posted)
Here's how your post looks:
http://www.annoyances.org/exec/forum/win98/1258477680
The first 2 paragraphs here are worth reading:
http://www.annoyances.org/exec/forum/win98/1217046552
Larry Godwin wrote:
|We computer users may prefer Windows 98
|to Microsoft’s newer operating systems in order to avoid an additional purchase,
|
Spending money on software in the 21st Century is unnecessary.
I would even go as far as to say it is FOOLISH
(payware these days comes with remote kill switches).
There is just too much Free(dom) Software available to even consider payware.
|or because our older platform makes DOS-based programs function more smoothly
|
...or because there aren't any remote kill switches in Win9x
--well, if you don't count the Windoze Product Key.
Linux doesn't have ANY of that and Linux is FREE.
The thought of having to buy new hardware to run M$'s latest junk is also abhorrent.
Linux will run on your current hardware.
...and DOSbox will run your old apps just fine under Linux. It is gratis and libre.
FreeDOS is superior to M$-DOS (e.g. USB support) and is also gratis and libre.
...and WINE runs Win9x-era Windoze-compatible software just fine under Linux.
There is no longer any need to run M$ software.
|However, finding security software that still supports Windows 98 is a challenge.
|Most leading antivirus programs,
|
AV is NOT "security" software; AV is a band-aid applied to a defective OS.
Linux doesn't need any of that nonsense and Linux is FREE.
Linux has ACTUAL security at the CORE of its design.
|[...]work with only the newer platforms.
|
Those who keep up with the tech press
will note that anti-virus / anti-spyware are increasingly ineffective.
The Black Hats are smarter than M$ and the anti-malware guys combined.
You and the AV guys are always playing catch-up
--and this ignores the times that AV updates break things.
|[...]I bought mine at www.amazon.com for $13.44
|
Spending money on software in the 21st Century is largely unnecessary.
95 percent of folks can get 100 percent of what they need FREE.
By selecting your Linux distribution carefully,
most folks can get all they need right out of the box.
...and spending money for band-aids for an obsolete OS
which has always been defective by design
shows a supreme lack of monetary discretion.
|Antispyware.
|
Start by not clicking on everything that pops up on your screen.
Don't EVER click links in email (no matter what OS you run).
The best anti-spyware is your own wetware (grey matter).
Of course, there are people too stupid to own a computer.
|Firewall.
|Both CA Personal Firewall and Panda Titanium 2007 support Windows 98,
|but each slowed down my machine so much it was all but inoperable.
|
That's right. Newer firewalls are BLOATED--and the bloat is quite unnecessary.
|My trustworthy computer technician assures me
|a firewall isn’t essential for this operating system
|because it’s not as vulnerable to hacker attacks as the newer ones.
|
Your guy is a moron.
Your firewall is the PRIMARY element in your defensive software plan.
If you aren't going to get a BETTER (read: non-M$) OS
(which COMES with a firewall),
then get the OLDEST free firewall you can from oldapps.com AND USE IT.
Having AV/AS apps running all the time as your **primary** defense
1) is stupid
and
2) slows down your box.
Again, Linux doesn't need this performance-draining junk.
|Browser. In early-2009 Mozilla still offered Firefox, Version 2,
|which works well with Windows 98 and is likely safer than Internet Explorer,
|but has withdrawn the free download.
|
I was fixing to call you an ineffectual Web surfer--but wow--
Mozilla's incompetent Webmaster has gone off the deep end.
I know that he depends too much on badly-written scripts to update his pages,
and that the FF2 links used to go to the wrong place,
but now he's committed the unpardonable sin WRT Open Source Software:
he's made an old version vanish from his site.
Not a huge deal:
http://google.com/search?q="firefox-2.0.0.20"
(For the adventurous, they are still doing nightly builds under incremental numbers.
For those who despise FF3's "AwesomeBar", those may be for you.)
...and Firefox 3[1] works under Win9x--if you install KernelEx
(and you can stand the "AwesomeBar").
The big point you've forgotten to mention is the lousy / non-existent support
that hardware currently being manufactured has for Win9x.
Need a new periphial? Look REALLY closely at the list of supported OSes.
OTOH, Linux has the best hardware support of *ANY* OS
and you can boot to a Linux CD to check the driver support
(it's compiled into the kernel).
Did I mention that Linux is FREE and that there is a distro for every user?
[1] ...and a whole bunch of other ostensibly NT-only apps.
|
All messages in this thread [show all]
 |  | re: Current security software available for Windows 98 (gewg_: Tue, Nov 17, 2009, 11:15 am) |
| |
| |
| |
Return to the Windows 98 Discussion Forum
|
|
