New "Recommendations" and "How To" sub-forum, your thoughts...

[Niall Fernie]

Based on an older thread from the tech support forum I'd like to start up a sub-forum here for free/cheap software recommendations.

Rather than just a free for all with threads all over the place I'd like to start threads on categories for discussion with a post from me listing the software recommended in that category.

i.e. I post a topic on anti-virus software which lists one or 2 off the top of my head and you guys discuss the pros and cons and recommend others. I'll edit my post to add the recommendations to the list.

If you think there is another/better way of doing this, feel free to suggest it.

I also thought that a "how to..." sub forum might be helpful, for example, how to defragment your hard drive, how to make your pc more secure, how to backup files to a usb stick. These could all contain more than one guide as we all know there is more that one way to skin a cat.

It might serve as a useful place to point users of this forum when they ask a common question.

Your thoughts are welcome.

[Stefan]

Sounds good.
I generally think we could do with more subforums.
Have asked month ago if we could have something for farmers to separate it from all the pet stuff. Never heard anything....

[Bobinovich]

I like it! There have been a number of times the same query has come up and I've had to go searching back through old posts to find a full solution I'd posted previously, so a 'How To' sub-forum would be great.

All I would ask of anyone posting a How To is that they are sufficiently detailed so that even beginners can follow the steps to sort the problem - don't assume they have a certain level of knowledge to start with!

A thread was started a while back along the lines of 'What free software do you use' which bought some great new packages to my attention, and certainly proved that, in many cases, paying out hard earned wonga was not necessary!

Go for it Niall :D

[Niall Fernie]

For the how to's, we could always have more that one in the same thread with perhaps another slant on the same issue or more advanced things you can do. For example, how to defrag your drive, how to schedule a drive defrag, how to defrag your registry, how to do some preparation before a drive defrag.

That way beginners and more advanced users can get something from the topic.