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General discussion

Which AOL version?

by grandpaw7 Dec 24, 2003 11:40PM PST

Whenever I mention AOL, the immediate response is, get rid of it. I don't like it; in fact, I hate it. But I am financially stuck with it for about 12 more months, having bought my computer on one of these three year reduced price deals. (That's history, so no lectures about that, please.)

Now, to my problem. I now have AOL 8.0. I have been told it takes up a lot of resources. So I want to see about "downgrading" it to a lower version which takes up less resources because I only use AOL to connect and I then go to IE, and thus I have no interest in any AOL bells and whistles.

I would like to do this from a CD rather than online to save a lot of time. I've been told that any AOL CD will have all (or maybe most) of the prior versions on it in hidden files. I've been told just to go to the menu and click edit and I will get to a place for showing hidden files.

But when I open the 9.0 CD, there is no menu at the top. There is no edit or any other button.

So I'm wondering if I just got incorrect advise or if indeed the CD will contain prior versions in hidden files, and, if so, there is indeed some way to open these hidden files.

If you can help me with that, Merry Christmas to you. If you can't, Merry Christmas to you.

grandpaw7

PS. A site I found shows these Win98 requirements for different versions:

8.0
RAM 64MB min
Space 244MB
6.0
RAM 16 MB min
Space 113 MB

4.0
RAM 16 MB min
Space 30 MB

I wonder if I would experience any significant increase in performance by going from 8.0 to either 6.0 or 4.0?

I have Win98SE, 1000 speed, 375 Ram, and, right now, 4279MB of 6169MB free space on drive C.

sorry to have so many questions; I'm just glad I finally know enough to ask them.

Discussion is locked

7 Posts
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Re:Which AOL version?
by Willy Dec 25, 2003 12:10AM PST

Geeeeeeeeezzzzzzzzzzzzz.....

Leave it be is the best advise I could give you. You start playing around in AOL setting you could get stuck having to do a whole install all over again just to get back to where you were.

BUT, I suggest you want to start from scratch again, use AOL6.0 or AOL7.0 for the best of both worlds. You have to take the whole package as it were but during the install if there's an "optional" setting do it then not afterwards, but in some cases that may not even be presented, so go with the flow.

good luck -----Willy

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AOL Sticks Around
by nworley Dec 25, 2003 2:09AM PST

I am with Willy!

If it is working, then don't do anything that will upset it.

One thing, while you are on line if you are downloading or just surfing, then the modem and browser are using most of your resources.If you switch to I.E, then that is using your resorces, and AOL is just a place holder AOL takes up space on your disk, but if you have the space, don't be concerned.

AOL has lots of bells and whistles, but they only come into play when you use them.

I can't begin to count the number of times that I have fixed friends and neighbor's computer when they tried to delete AOL. It takes a lot of Registry hunting to remove all of the files that interfere with a reinstall of AOL after it has been busted. If you must, then use the uninstall feature that comes with AOL, and then be prepared to go Registry Hunting.

Norm

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Thanks to both of you
by grandpaw7 Dec 25, 2003 7:58AM PST

A couple more questions.

Would it be problemsome to keep aol8.0 and also install 6.0?

And would I get any significant improvement in performance by using 6.0 insead of 8.0?

Thanks and I hope not to bother you further.

grandpaw7

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Re:Thanks to both of you
by BobH Dec 25, 2003 10:14AM PST

I'll add my two cents worth. Leave AOL8 alone. If you try to install AOL6 with AOL8, I don't think it will let you as that is a backward move and as mentioned before AOL is very fussy about changes. Just bide your time and change to someone else when your able to get away from AOL.

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Re:Thanks to both of you
by Willy Dec 25, 2003 10:37AM PST

It's been my experience that AOL when a new install is done makes the old install(provided you didn't delete it) numbered as AOL.001, AOL.002, etc. It supposely uses the latest install and it should see the old install and "ask?" if you want to keep it or something like that, but it may not, so many bells and whistles. That's why I do a manual delete of all AOL and then proceed to install. You can see how it can get hairy, so unless you know what you're doing, you're asking for problems and guess what, AOL tech support will mentioned, a "re-install" sooner or later to correct the problem. Now you know why after awhile old AOL users become either entrenched with AOL or hate it.

Happy good luck -----Willy

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Re:Thanks to both of you
by nworley Dec 25, 2003 11:20PM PST

I have never helped anyone that wanted to go back, once they put AOL 8 on the machine. I ask the question of them if they like AOL 8, and there reply is that they are happy that it works. Most of them had a bad experiences when they tried to download and install AOL 8, as glitches happen with downloads. AOL's help line made the problems larger as the previous poster indicated. This is not to say that the mail disks did not cause problems, because it does from time to time. Another problem comes when AOL downloads ADs to your hard disk, and they jam up the works. Their software is designed to keep you within the AOL computer system, so that they can blitz you with ads, as does other ISPs, but as you said, you switch to I.E. just as soon as you boot to the site window, so you bypass these site ads, many kudos to you.

In my opinion AOL 6 is neither better or worse than 8, or for that matter the "New AOL 9.0 optimized"

Norm

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Gentlemen (and ladies?) thank you; I'm keeing AOL 8.0 till I can dump it
by grandpaw7 Dec 26, 2003 12:19AM PST

That is, when I have finished the three years I have paid for, which is about a year away.

I am grateful for you're having stuck with me. Thanks for the Christman present. I hope your willingness to help others willbring good things to you this coming year.

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