HELP !!!

[Nathan Hallworth]

Hi
Sorry if this is in the wrong section.
I really need some help, I have a lot of problems and I need to fix them
fast. All my problems started after I unistalled a trail version of McAfee. I
am using Vista Ultimate 32-Bit. Please don't tell me to phone Microsoft,
because I'll just end up losting my temper with them. I don't see why I
should have to pay for support, Microsoft have lots of money already.

First Problem
Internet Explorer 7 is not displaying Flash or JavaScript. I have the latest
version of Flash and JavaScript is enabled. Firefox works perfectly, the
problem is just in Firefox.
---------------------------------------
Second Problem
The sidebar has stopped displaying gadgets. The sidebar will open but
gadgets will not work.
---------------------------------------
Third Problem
When I view my picture, and click on the fullscreen button, the viewer goes
into fullscreen mode but the picture doesn't appear. Then when I close
fullscreen mode the picture has changed. Its like the slideshow is playing
but the pictures doesn't appear.

 

[philo]

Hi
Sorry if this is in the wrong section.
I really need some help, I have a lot of problems and I need to fix them
fast. All my problems started after I unistalled a trail version of McAfee. I
am using Vista Ultimate 32-Bit. Please don't tell me to phone Microsoft,
because I'll just end up losting my temper with them. I don't see why I
should have to pay for support, Microsoft have lots of money already.

First Problem
Internet Explorer 7 is not displaying Flash or JavaScript. I have the latest
version of Flash and JavaScript is enabled. Firefox works perfectly, the
problem is just in Firefox.
---------------------------------------
Second Problem
The sidebar has stopped displaying gadgets. The sidebar will open but
gadgets will not work.
---------------------------------------
Third Problem
When I view my picture, and click on the fullscreen button, the viewer goes
into fullscreen mode but the picture doesn't appear. Then when I close
fullscreen mode the picture has changed. Its like the slideshow is playing
but the pictures doesn't appear.

Now you see why most eveyone suggests NOT using McAffee.

At any rate, just use system restore and roll the machine back to a date
*prior* to having installed McAffee.

As to MS having "lots of money"...that's absurd...
last I heard, Gates was down to his last 5 billion dollars or so

 

[Nathan Hallworth]

Now you see why most eveyone suggests NOT using McAffee.

At any rate, just use system restore and roll the machine back to a date
*prior* to having installed McAffee.

As to MS having "lots of money"...that's absurd...
last I heard, Gates was down to his last 5 billion dollars or so

Hi philo
The system restore worked perfectly.
Bill must be worried, only 5 billion left. How will he cope ?
Thanks for the help !

 

[Nonny]

As to MS having "lots of money"...that's absurd...
last I heard, Gates was down to his last 5 billion dollars or so

58 billion. And he lost his #1 position and is now only the 3rd
richest man in the world.

 

[Just.some.guy]

58 billion. And he lost his #1 position and is now only the 3rd
richest man in the world.

Yeah...some Mexican guy is the richest in the world now. But back to
Gates...he does have $58 billion, but even if it was only $5
billion...wouldn't that be enough?

 

[Adam Albright]

Yeah...some Mexican guy is the richest in the world now. But back to
Gates...he does have $58 billion, but even if it was only $5
billion...wouldn't that be enough?

The vast majority of Gates' wealth comes from Microsoft stock. He is
in the process of funding his trust fund that continues to give
billions away ahead of his death at which time most of his money will
be given to various charities and other worthwhile causes. His wife
and kids assuming they survive him get next to nothing on a percentage
basis. They will have to scrape by on maybe a billion or two. Last
time I read about it Gates was planning on giving each of his kids a
mere ten million in his Will.

Warren Buffet is pretty high up on the list too and recently gave most
of his vast fortune to Gates to manage from his Trust also for
charitable endeavors. Good for both of them!

As far as MS as a corporation having lots of money that's relative to
how you make the calculation. It's market capital or what the
outstanding stock is worth varies with the current stock price.

As of last Friday, there were 9.3 billion shares common outstanding at
a value of $29.24 giving Microsoft a market cap of 272.2 billion. If
you look at their Balance sheet they have roughly 63 billion in assets
compared to 32 billion in Liabilities as of end of 2007. Microsoft has
ZERO long term debt and is one of the most cash rich corporations in
the world, meaning the money ISN'T returned to the shareholders with
Microsoft paying a relatively cheap 1.5% yield or a cheesy .11
quarterly divided.

 

[C.B.]

Yeah...some Mexican guy is the richest in the world now. But back to
Gates...he does have $58 billion, but even if it was only $5
billion...wouldn't that be enough?

I'm not criticizing any of these posts but I have a question. Why do so
many people make all these comments about the billions of dollars some
individuals possess without making comments about the billions of dollars
they give to charity and other organizations that help needy people
worldwide?
I'm well aware that they receive tax credits for these contributions
but the fact remains they did not have to give the money. The money they
have given has improved the lives of millions of people worldwide and has
eased the suffering of millions more.

C.B.

 

[Just.some.guy]

I'm not criticizing any of these posts but I have a question. Why do
so many people make all these comments about the billions of dollars some
individuals possess without making comments about the billions of dollars
they give to charity and other organizations that help needy people
worldwide?
I'm well aware that they receive tax credits for these contributions
but the fact remains they did not have to give the money. The money they
have given has improved the lives of millions of people worldwide and has
eased the suffering of millions more.

C.B.

And *you* just said in your post so no one else had to

 

[John]

I'm not criticizing any of these posts but I have a question. Why do so
many people make all these comments about the billions of dollars some
individuals possess without making comments about the billions of dollars
they give to charity and other organizations that help needy people
worldwide?
I'm well aware that they receive tax credits for these contributions
but the fact remains they did not have to give the money. The money they
have given has improved the lives of millions of people worldwide and has
eased the suffering of millions mor

I completely agree. I put Mr. Gates on par with Carnegie regarding his
philanthropic efforts. I do wish everyone would stop pooring money
into third world countries though. Also, if they (MS, Dell, HP, etc.)
would stop off-shoring our works, it would be greatly appreciated.

JD

 

[Adam Albright]

I completely agree. I put Mr. Gates on par with Carnegie regarding his
philanthropic efforts. I do wish everyone would stop pooring money
into third world countries though. Also, if they (MS, Dell, HP, etc.)
would stop off-shoring our works, it would be greatly appreciated.

JD

Obviously you know nothing about how businesses work. Companies,
especially public ones traded on stock exchanges are accountable to
shareholders who can vote the current board of directors out of office
when they are perceived as not running the company well enough to
generate the profits shareholders demand.

Accordingly most companies will go off shore to cut costs. It makes
little sense to pay a worker $25-30 or more a hour to do what's really
menial, often semi-skilled at best work. Not when somebody living in a
second world county will do it happily for $10 or less an hour. Then
there are third world counties that will do it for less than a $1 an
hour. Welcome to the new "global" economy.

 

[Nonny]

I'm not criticizing any of these posts [snip]

Yes you are.

 

[Just.some.guy]

I'm not criticizing any of these posts [snip]

Yes you are.

Lol...that was funny!

 

[xfile]

Also, if they (MS, Dell, HP, etc.)

would stop off-shoring our works, it would be greatly appreciated.

My 2 cents,

Not all offshore outsourcing are "purely" for saving labor costs and many
include the following considerations:

(1) to sustain a non-stop operation: when one region's working hours is
ceased to operate, other region(s) can pick up the service and/or production
operations;

(2) to serve the close-to-market demand: it will be way too expensive to
ship from only one location to all other markets around the world, and for
products with a short product life cycle and low profit margins (e.g.
computer components), that means to give up other markets is better than
doing from only one location with all involved costs and support and RMA;

(3) to develop the local market both in long- and short-term: this involves
local trade regulations, visible and invisible trade barriers, cost of goods
sold, consumer acceptance, and so on.

Of course, not *all* companies will include those considerations (and more
are skipped) and many are doing it just to follow the trend without knowing
for why. In any case, not ALL offshore outsourcing are bad and many have
their necessities, and if they don't do it, they probably cannot sustain the
domestic operation neither.

As always, my 2 cents.

 

[Nonny]

Also, if they (MS, Dell, HP, etc.)
would stop off-shoring our works, it would be greatly appreciated.

My 2 cents,

Not all offshore outsourcing are "purely" for saving labor costs [snip]

So... you're saying that if shifting offshore is gonna be MORE
expensive, companies would still do it?

BOOLA SHEET!

 

[xfile]

Expensive in terms of???

Labor cost? But that also includes quality of work vs. wages. Or include
current and potential sales opportunities or support cost or customer
satisfaction level or...??

So what do you mean by expensive?

And what I said, essentially, is that cost saving (even that has different
factors) is not the only consideration.

Also, if they (MS, Dell, HP, etc.)
would stop off-shoring our works, it would be greatly appreciated.

My 2 cents,

Not all offshore outsourcing are "purely" for saving labor costs [snip]

So... you're saying that if shifting offshore is gonna be MORE
expensive, companies would still do it?

BOOLA SHEET!

 

[John]

My 2 cents,

Not all offshore outsourcing are "purely" for saving labor costs and many
include the following considerations:

Sorry but we're going to disaree here. I've been working in the tech
industry since 1981 and everytime a job was sent outside the US it was
inevitably about cost.

(1) to sustain a non-stop operation: when one region's working hours is
ceased to operate, other region(s) can pick up the service and/or production
operations;

This would seem reasonable however most companies have 24 hour centers
be they tech support or production.

(2) to serve the close-to-market demand: it will be way too expensive to
ship from only one location to all other markets around the world, and for
products with a short product life cycle and low profit margins (e.g.
computer components), that means to give up other markets is better than
doing from only one location with all involved costs and support and RMA;

This would seem reasonable however most of the areas these centers are
located in are surrounded by a population that can't afford their
products.

(3) to develop the local market both in long- and short-term: this involves
local trade regulations, visible and invisible trade barriers, cost of goods
sold, consumer acceptance, and so on.

Of course, not *all* companies will include those considerations (and more
are skipped) and many are doing it just to follow the trend without knowing
for why. In any case, not ALL offshore outsourcing are bad and many have
their necessities, and if they don't do it, they probably cannot sustain the
domestic operation neither.

As always, my 2 cents.

Offshoring American jobs is always a bad choice. From inept and
incapbale to inconsiderate and simply stupid, the only result of
off-shoring are customer frustration and increased employer expenses.
One company I know of closed its call center in Bangalore for
relocation over a weekend and routed all calls to their American
centers. What they found is that call volume dropped 75% for the two
days they Indian center was offline.

JD

 

[John]

So... you're saying that if shifting offshore is gonna be MORE
expensive, companies would still do it?

The thing is these foreign governments have learned the game of
getting corporation to setup shop in their area from the US states.
Look at Canada who gave millions to companies like Dell to setup shop
in Ottawa only to have them bail when the average wage got too high.

JD

 

[xfile]

Sorry but we're going to disaree here.

No worries, we are just exchanging thoughts, and more or less, it's like the
Vista adoption that it's the reasons for doing so (or not) that is more
interesting than the final decision. So I am not trying to convince you or
anyone to change, and instead, I am just sharing for why would some have to
do so.

This would seem reasonable however most companies have 24 hour centers
be they tech support or production.

It won't be a practical nor cost-effective solution for having your
customers around the world to place an international call and to demand them
to speak only American English even you have a 24-hour tech support or
service center. You simply can't do that.

I already covered some of the reasons for why is that a local production is
needed for which I have not included the consideration for localized
variants. With everything considered, it's much easier to simply abandon
the foreign markets because it's impossible for doing so from only one
location.

Offshoring American jobs is always a bad choice. From inept and
incapbale to inconsiderate and simply stupid [...]

Speaking as an American with a few years of international experience, I
could agree with you. But then I have to also agree with people in other
countries who think alike for refusing to buy American products and brands
with their hard-earned money and GDP without supporting their local job
opportunities and economy.

At the end of the day, we are all back to the closed and isolated market era
and we should have learned from history, it's going to be a loss-loss
situation for everyone.

[...]the only result of
off-shoring are customer frustration and increased employer expenses.

I am reluctant to say that it is the ONLY result, but of course, this is one
of the often seen adverse results from a not-so-well planned offshore
outsourcing.

One company I know of closed its call center in Bangalore for
relocation over a weekend and routed all calls to their American
centers.

This is just one of too many failure cases for which I mentioned
previously - many are doing it just to follow the trend without knowing for
why. They didn't even consider the quality of work vs. wage for the labor
cost, and turned out, there are too many hidden costs that they didn't see
when they made the decision. It's good for them to fail as they are the
ones who deserved the outcome.

What I'm trying to say is that not all offshore outsourcing are equal and
many are doing it to expand their markets not just for saving the labor
cost.

My two cents for your reference.

 

[Charlie Tame]

Also, if they (MS, Dell, HP, etc.)
would stop off-shoring our works, it would be greatly appreciated.
My 2 cents,

Not all offshore outsourcing are "purely" for saving labor costs [snip]

So... you're saying that if shifting offshore is gonna be MORE
expensive, companies would still do it?

BOOLA SHEET!

I think the poster was referencing the cost of labor only, not overall
cost.

There is a bigger problem with outsourcing.

Take for example the various boards in your PC. Anything made in USA?
Most likely not. So there went the manufacturing jobs.

However the plant to manufacture them with has also gone away, so we
can't go back to making this stuff because we don't have the equipment.

But worse still we gave away the designs for the plant, and now the
competition do not need our ideas because we taught them how to design
the plant, and they have our experience of getting it wrong a few times
so they mostly have brand new plant that is designed better and more
efficient than we ever had.

This is fine at the moment but what happens in a crisis? War is a pretty
good crisis, in WW2 the UK, USA and Germany who had manufacturing
capability turned those plants into munitions factories. It doesn't take
a big modification to change a machine over from bolts to bullets. But
things have changed, the machines we need these days are not so easy to
convert or to make from scratch. Can we really keep up with (Say) the
engineers at NVidia when we are not actively doing the work ourselves?

If, for some natural crisis or some kind of conflict we suddenly need hi
tech manufacturing plant we are in trouble. Hell we may even have
forgotten how to make it.

Now I am not paranoid, don't expect another world war any time soon and
I don't "Hate foreigners", but I do see a trend toward the West losing
out. The best paid jobs will go from the US economy, leaving only those
jobs like mine that require a physical presence at some location - I
work on buildings - I can't do that from China, but my Boss can
supervise from Alabama which may as well be China for all the physical
work he could do on our buildings in Iowa. He can of course do the work,
but not remotely.

So I am pleased to see Microsoft stay in the USA, and Google, and Sun
etc. And I am pleased that the USA takes defense technology seriously,
at least that does force them to keep some hi tech capability onshore,
but when only the military can get the supplies then martial law is not
far behind.

So for me the issue is not the jobs that HAVE gone, it is those in the
future that will never be here.

 

[xfile]

You mentioned one of the most important elements of maintaining competency
and that is: know-how vs. know-why, which can be translated to how to design
a product vs. how to make a product.

Using your example of PC boards,

Anything made in USA?

Probably not many, but can they be made and operated without the critical
components and design guidelines from Intel and AMD? I guess the answer is,
No. This is where we can see the line between know-why vs. know-how.

However the plant to manufacture them with has also gone away, so we can't
go back to making this stuff because we don't have the equipment.

I will have to say that it's not that we "cannot" make it, but for various
of reasons, it is not economic for doing it including but not limited to
those reasons for which I've mentioned in another post. The path is to move
on to those even higher level of skills and knowledge, such as how to design
products and services.

Also using PC as an example, despite the fact that nearly 80% of components
are outsourced but guess what are the most popular brands globally? I guess
no one will object for me to say that it's the American brands? Why?
Configure a system isn't just to put components together and it's much more
than that, and I am so sure most of you will agree. Another example of the
difference between know-how and know-why?

Now I am not paranoid, don't expect another world war any time soon and I
don't "Hate foreigners", but I do see a trend toward the West losing out.

I agree with you but we have to ask ourselves, are we doing our jobs for
keeping up with the world?

Why is not that 24-hr customer service center mentioned in another post
feasible? Another reason is that multilingual isn't exactly one of the
American workforce's strengths, so how could it be possible to serve a
multinational company's worldwide customers with the majority employees that
can speak only one language?

So for me the issue is not the jobs that HAVE gone, it is those in the
future that will never be here.

A more important issue is to create additional jobs that can sustain a
higher living standard instead of holding on those that are no longer
adequate. This is the area that many should think about for how to move on,
not just for an OS.

After all these discussions, can we agree on that MS should give us an easy
to use OS so we can focus more on our business instead of dealing with all
these issues?

Also, if they (MS, Dell, HP, etc.)
would stop off-shoring our works, it would be greatly appreciated.
My 2 cents,

Not all offshore outsourcing are "purely" for saving labor costs [snip]
So... you're saying that if shifting offshore is gonna be MORE
expensive, companies would still do it?

BOOLA SHEET!

I think the poster was referencing the cost of labor only, not overall
cost.

There is a bigger problem with outsourcing.

Take for example the various boards in your PC. Anything made in USA? Most
likely not. So there went the manufacturing jobs.

However the plant to manufacture them with has also gone away, so we can't
go back to making this stuff because we don't have the equipment.

But worse still we gave away the designs for the plant, and now the
competition do not need our ideas because we taught them how to design the
plant, and they have our experience of getting it wrong a few times so
they mostly have brand new plant that is designed better and more
efficient than we ever had.

This is fine at the moment but what happens in a crisis? War is a pretty
good crisis, in WW2 the UK, USA and Germany who had manufacturing
capability turned those plants into munitions factories. It doesn't take a
big modification to change a machine over from bolts to bullets. But
things have changed, the machines we need these days are not so easy to
convert or to make from scratch. Can we really keep up with (Say) the
engineers at NVidia when we are not actively doing the work ourselves?

If, for some natural crisis or some kind of conflict we suddenly need hi
tech manufacturing plant we are in trouble. Hell we may even have
forgotten how to make it.

Now I am not paranoid, don't expect another world war any time soon and I
don't "Hate foreigners", but I do see a trend toward the West losing out.
The best paid jobs will go from the US economy, leaving only those jobs
like mine that require a physical presence at some location - I work on
buildings - I can't do that from China, but my Boss can supervise from
Alabama which may as well be China for all the physical work he could do
on our buildings in Iowa. He can of course do the work, but not remotely.

So I am pleased to see Microsoft stay in the USA, and Google, and Sun etc.
And I am pleased that the USA takes defense technology seriously, at least
that does force them to keep some hi tech capability onshore, but when
only the military can get the supplies then martial law is not far behind.

So for me the issue is not the jobs that HAVE gone, it is those in the
future that will never be here.