Suggestions on what to install on a newbie's PC?

[Evadman]

I would get Kazza lite assuming it is still around. I hate kazza with a passion, but n00b's seem to love it. I would install the non spyware verrsion for him/her.

I would also install some kind of office suite. Weather it be microsoft office if you have a licence, or if you are looking for free stuff, use 602 office suite. Works great and is easy to use. Can even read and write to office format, such as Excell and Word.

 

[Dark4ng3l]

Norton ghost so you wont have to re install everything every single week when they crew up their computer.

 

[RossMAN]

Originally posted by: billgates380
Finally, don't spend too much time as they're going to end up F'ing it up anyway.

P.S. - Change your phone number!

LOL That is so true, I know that will happen. If/when it does they have the eMachines recovery disk and can re-install everything themselves or at least buy dinner for my wife and I.

Fortunately they don't have my phone number, just my voice mail number.

 

[Harvey]

Install Zone Alarm and Ad-Aware. Safety first... and free! Everytime I run Ad-Aware on a machine that's been near places like kazaa, I find over 200 pieces of spyware. :disgust:

Originally posted by: Dark4ng3l
Norton ghost so you wont have to re install everything every single week when they crew up their computer.

And buy a second hard drive and a moblie rack (pluggable bay for the drive). It takes me ten minutes to ghost my drive before I install any new app.. It's really great when you're first building a system. If you ghost after each install, the worst that can happen is, the next one screws the pooch, and you can go back to your last good setup.

BTW, ludite that I am, I'd go for Win98 SE (with all critical updates). I still think XP blows chunks, and I really don't like the thought of having to ask Uncle Billy for a new set of house keys because I add more RAM or another drive.