What's New at PC Pitstop, July 2004

IN THIS ISSUE

• PC Pitstop Test and Score Changes
• Who's Funding Claria/Gator? Yahoo!
• Spyware Strikes Out with Major League Baseball
• Windows XP Hits 70 Percent Mark
• Beware of Fake Anti-Spyware Products
• Be a PC Pitstop Beta Tester
• Join the PC Pitstop Folding or SETI Team

PC Pitstop Test and Score Changes

Lots of changes are happening at PC Pitstop this month. We've made major improvements! There's a new disk speed test, better detection of CPU types and speeds, plus more detail on system configuration settings that can affect stability and performance. Run the full tests to see what's changed. We're still in the process of documenting all the new features, so if you have questions or problems be sure to visit our forums.

Who's Funding Claria/Gator? Yahoo!

There's a good chance that you have a copy of a Claria Corporation (formerly Gator Corporation) product on your system. And if you're like a lot of PC Pitstop visitors, you aren't quite sure how it managed to get there. We've written about all the reasons why we think that Claria/Gator products aren't good for your system. So why does this mediocre adware continue to thrive? One big reason is Yahoo's Overture group, which provides about one-third of Claria's income! There are several other big names behind this leading purveyor of pop-ups, see what they are and how you can stop them:

• Top 20
• Claria Yahoo

Spyware Strikes Out with Major League Baseball

Some big-time organizations can finally see the danger of spyware. In late June, Major League Baseball announced that all its partners must agree not to use spyware or adware for any commercial messages related to their baseball web site, mlb.com. The company has also sent letters to spyware makers that are targeting the mlb.com site. Let's hope more companies follow the example of this leadoff hitter.
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Windows XP Hits 70 Percent Mark

In June, 70 percent of all the PCs tested at PC Pitstop were running Windows XP. The number has been growing steadily for the past few years. The number two OS is still Windows 98 at about 18 percent. The other versions (95, NT, Me, 2000, Server 2003) make up the rest. Want to know more statistics about the systems we test? See our research section

Beware of Fake Anti-Spyware Products

Bad news: Unscrupulous companies are taking advantage of public spyware fears and creating anti-spyware products that don't work well, or may even contain spyware of their own. Another trick these scammers use is to SELL you a copy of a freeware or shareware product. We've seen several of these scams being operated through Google Adwords, using keywords that try to convince you they are related to products such as Ad-Aware or Spybot Search & Destroy. Our advice is to only download software from a trusted source. PC Pitstop is affiliated with Pest Patrol, one of the best spyware removers; you can buy the product through us using the link below. For help on fighting spyware and more legit sources for spyware tools, check out our forums.

Be a PC Pitstop Beta Tester

With all the changes coming at the site, we're looking for users to help us make sure all the bugs are ironed out. You'll also get an early look at the new features. Beta testers don't need the fastest or best PC on the block, in fact we'd prefer to have an assortment of PCs to make sure we aren't missing anything. It's easy to beta test, just go to the Beta Test section of our forums and read the posts there: Forums

Join the PC Pitstop Folding or SETI Team

Can a PC cure cancer? The Folding@Home project uses your spare CPU time to find proteins that might be useful in the fight against diseases. SETI@Home puts your computing power to work searching for messages in the signals we receive from space. Learn more and join the team at the Distributed Computing section of our forums! Forums

About PC Pitstop

PC Pitstop, LLC (http://www.pcpitstop.com) was formed in February 2000, and offers users a unique way to make sure their PCs are running fast, stable and secure--all through a free, Web-based interface.

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