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Pastimes : Auto Repair & Maintenance Tip -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Cheeky Kid who wrote (61)	11/5/1999 1:16:00 AM
From: WTMHouston	Respond to of 134

<<BUT cars are like computers, you always need, or perceive you need the new gimmick advertised to make your computer / car run more efficient or increase performance.>> Cheeky: Virus protection programs have broken me of the need for the newest gizmos/software. The current puter is nice (P-II-450 lots of RAM). Never had ANY problems with it until I installed some virus protection software (McAfee) along with Guard Dog (which I should have known better than to do in the first place). Within one week, registry problems, get booted from ISP, lots of hangups. In fact, just finished fixing some registry problems before I could log on right now. Would not have suspected the Virus software except that I have had the same problems on several puters at the office after adding it. Sometimes, I think the potential viruses would not be as bad. Glad that Win98 has an Uninstall function, even if it does not work worth carpola either. The same thing with car repairs. I stick with the adage: if it ain't broke, don't fix it. My 89 BMW 525i with 200K+ miles still runs like a top and all I ever fix is what needs fixing -- except for the oil, which I'll change every 3-6K miles, when I get the chance. The only other exception to my general rule is the timing belt, which I'll replace about every 60-70K miles. Since I can't see it, I can't know for sure if it is about to cost me a bundle. It costs about $150 to replace it, but will cost $3,000+ if it carps out and junks the engine. But, when something needs fixing, I'll fix it right without much concern for price, which may be the best overall thing I can do. Most "preventive" maintenance, whether for cars or puters or anything else, is just marketing gimmicks to get us to spend money before we need to do so. Personally, I'd rather keep my (mostly) hard earned money in my hands rather than someone else's as long as I can. Troy PS - I'm now really disappointed that SI's spell checker thinks that "puter" is misspelled. Glad the puter on my car knows better. :)