So I ordered...

a S6210 last night. I'm pretty excited - hopefully it'll get here SOON so I can start playing and get it figured out before school starts. I ordered from PortableOne and they were very nice and helpful over the phone answering my, I'm sure, silly questions.

Anyways, this leads me to a new question - is there anything I should know/do when it gets here to make sure I start out on the right foot with this thing (i.e. not kill my battery or any special formatting? I should do)? I have zero experience with a new machine, I just use the one at work and my old desktop was just a plug in and go thing that I didn't care about...just wanted to ask the question!

Thanks in advance! This place has been a HUGE help in deciding on which laptop to get (went between dell's and fujitsu's and this place swung me to a 6210...)

 

Ha! I'm glad we helped you make the right decision! As for what you need to know...not much really. The Fujitsu comes with a pretty clean slate, not much garbage from third parties. I'd get Norton AV set up right away and you might consider a personal firewall. Look at Zonealarm, they have a nice freebie.

Editor in Chief http://www.bargainPDA.com and http://www.SPOTstop.com

 

I just ordered a S-6210 from P1 also. As Brian said, the Fujitsu doesn't come loaded with a lot of extraneous programs. (My previous laptop was a Sony TR and it was choked with extra junk).

A few things I wouldn't do.....don't reformat the drive as some folks do to "clean" it up, it just creates a lot of driver hassles. If you don't need to, don't partition the drive (unless you plan on running a scratch disc for Photoshop or some other special requirement).

Things I would do.....get Norton AV up and running (I think it has a 90 free update) and subscribe to keep it running. As Brian mentioned, Zone Alarm has a free firewall program. (Although, I've bought and paid for it and run it on all of my PC's). I like ZA because it monitors outbound traffic also.....great for all the Trojan viruses out there. Also, it will tell you when someone is pinging you while you're in a Starbucks. Drive Image is a really good backup program....after you have your personal software installed, back up your HD. It shouldn't be much more than 5-6 CDR's. If you're thinking of running a wireless network at home....read all the posts here. There is a lot of good advice. One last personal preference.....ditch IE (Internet Explorer)....it is a big security headache. Give Opera a try, it's not a target and I like the interface. Just my 2 cents.

Me, I'm curious about the Lifebook Application Panel....those five buttons on the top. My last laptop was stolen and even though it had a Windows password, I realize now that is worth diddly. A lot of angst thinking of all the data on that machine. What attracted me to the Fujitsu was the apparent ability to use those keys to punch in a security code sequence to lock up your HD. We'll see once it arrives.

Again.....can't say enough about the guys at P1. Victor has given me a few calls to clarify and update my order. World class customer service.

R

 

Thanks for all the help - I'll definately look into the firewall and continue browsing these forums for wireless help (I'm mostly clueless there). Thats interesting about IE - I knew it wasn't the best. I'll look into Opera and I've also heard some things about Mozilla (?).

Ok...back to counting down the days and harassing my mailman...

 

Sadly, you won't be able to get away from IE entirely. The best alternative browser I've found is Mozilla Firefox.

Editor in Chief http://www.bargainPDA.com and http://www.SPOTstop.com

 

Check these out:

Internet Browser: Mozilla Firefox
Free Firewall: Sygate Personal Firewall
Free Anti Virus: AVG Anti Virus

Others:
SlickRun (highly recommended to all)
WeatherWatcher
Spybot
Ad Aware

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Fujitsu S6210: 1.6Ghz PM ~ 768MB RAM ~ 60GB 7200RPM Hard Drive
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I like the Sygate Firewall better than ZoneAlarm. It give me much more control than ZoneAlarm, and use much less resource. Unlike ZoneAlarm, which turning into something similar to NIS. But, I wouldn't recommend this Sygate software to just anyone, it doesn't offer much help, especially the advance function. It seem to works with stuff like VPN much better than ZoneAlarm. If you know your IP, and protocol, then this would be the one for you.
<blockquote id='quote'> quote:<hr height='1' noshade id='quote'>Originally posted by Run1track

 

first thing to do if format and repartition the hard drive. I;d suggest a 10-15 gig C partition and the same size last (E) partition and whatever is left leave in the middle as the D partition. 10-15 is plenty for windows and program files and you'll be able to ghost it to the E partition to keep a good backup. Use the D drive to store big data like mp3's and moviews and stuff.

Then do a fresh XP pro install.

For antivirus i'd suggest looking at NOD32 it's cheap and uses much less resurces than norton which has become quite the bloatware.

With regards to the security buttons they will do little good to save your laptop. Leave the sticker on the lid perhaps will fend off a geek but if someone steals your laptop they are not going to bring it back if they can't get it to work.

 

There is no right or wrong way to do partitioning. it's depend on the user needs. I got an 80GB HD for my S6210. And I have setup
4physical partition.
hda1. ext3 10MB Active for /boot
hda2. ext3 7GB for /
hda3. NTFS 10GB for Windows XP Pro
hda4. Logical Partitions
Then I setup 4 more partitions inside Logical Partition.
hda5. FAT32 40GB for DATA, mp3, music video, movies
hda6. Unformatted, 5GB for future use
hda7. NTFS 2GB virtual memory for WinXP
hda8. SWAP 2GB virtual memory for Linux
But then, I don't think most people will need to do like what I did.

<blockquote id='quote'> quote:<hr height='1' noshade id='quote'>Originally posted by Packrat

 

How do you use/setup the security code sequence?


<blockquote id='quote'> quote:<hr height='1' noshade id='quote'>Originally posted by Rich M

 

<blockquote id='quote'> quote:<hr height='1' noshade id='quote'>Originally posted by Packrat

 

I don't think it have to do with whether or not this is the first, second, third or last laptop. It's all have to do with user's comfortability about doing it. The need to do it and what's the benefit from doing it.
<blockquote id='quote'> quote:<hr height='1' noshade id='quote'>Originally posted by Rich M

 

Freeman do you know how to use the application panel as a security feature? Anyone else?

***************************************************
Fujitsu S6210: 1.6Ghz PM ~ 768MB RAM ~ 60GB 7200RPM Hard Drive
***************************************************

 

<blockquote id='quote'> quote:<hr height='1' noshade id='quote'>Freeman do you know how to use the application panel as a security feature? Anyone else?<hr height='1' noshade id='quote'></font id='quote'></blockquote id='quote'>

I'm kinda curious too.......here's what attracted me to purchasing a Fujitsu:
http://www.pc-ap.fujitsu.com/pdfs/security.pdf

Although I have no idea if it is available on the 6210.

 

Donno, never use it. Plus I don't have my S infront of me right now.
<blockquote id='quote'> quote:<hr height='1' noshade id='quote'>Originally posted by Run1track