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October 5, 2007
Dear CNET members,
Happy Friday folks! I hope this newsletter finds everyone well! For those of you who are new subscribers to the newsletter, I welcome you. Now before I start off on this week's topic on tips on how to stop and prevent spam, I wanted to let you know that each week I receive well over a hundred e-mails from members requesting that their question be presented for the Community Help & How-to Newsletter. However, as much as I'd like to present them all, I can only present one question a week. And for those questions that come to me in urgency for help, my biggest recommendation for you is to post your question in the CNET forums. In our forums, we have hundreds of helpful and knowledgeable community members and many volunteer moderators willing to spend time to give advice and help give you direction on your problems. These forums were created for you to use and share your knowledge by helping one another out. So give the forums a try. Now let's tackle some spam issues!
Oh boy, do I hate spam! But over the years, I've grown to tolerate it much more. Even being as careful as I am, it is almost inevitable to stay clean for long, as e-mail spammers get more and more sophisticated. I've done a simple test in the past where I created an online e-mail account, never used it once, and over a period of time spam still found its way to the in-box. Yes, it's frustrating, but the good news is that now there are many more antispam tools readily available at our disposal: tools and filters from our ISPs, free or paid utilities, spam filters in Web-based e-mail clients. However, beyond all of the tools available to block and filter out spam, I think the most important aspect of spam prevention starts with educating ourselves by not being placed in a position where we will be the target of spammers in the first place. And in my book, a good rule of thumb is to treat your e-mail address as if it was your home address. If you don't want people to find out where you live, don't give it out.
But I'm going to stop right here with my half-cent worth, because this week our members came through in a big way with more than 150 contributions and tips, ranging from how to prevent e-mail spam to recommendations on utilities to lessen the amount of spam received. It's all good stuff! Here are a few selected answers to start you out with. And if you have any additional advice for our members, post it in this week's discussion thread. Have a wonderful weekend everyone!
(BTW folks, I'm sorry about the confusion over last week's hard drive poll. I goofed and published the wrong poll question. Anyway, to make up for it, I have included the poll again in the newsletter. Again, my apologies.)
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Member Question of the Week
I'm not what you would call an experienced user, and this is
the first time I've encountered this problem. Is there any
way that I can get rid of a whole list (was recently on
holiday for a month and there were 350 of these!) of spam
from people (all seemingly with real names!), wanting to
increase the size of my xxxxxxx, give me my winnings from
lotteries, sell me cheap pharmaceuticals, give me a new
mortgage--and a whole lot of other stuff. I delete them
without opening them and wonder if I shouldn't open them to
find an unsubscribe button? Is the only solution to change
my e-mail address? I've had this one for a long time, and
that might create some interesting glitches. It's only within
the past couple of months that these delights have been
showing up, and it seems to be increasing at a horrifying
rate! How did this all start? What can I do to stop it? Any
suggestions? Thank you!
Submitted by:
Jo B.
Vote for the most helpful answer
 Below are the answers we've selected for you to vote on. Click on the title to read the answer by the member.
Here are the selected submissions grouped in one post.
Time to vote! Now that you've read our members' answers, which would you consider the most helpful? Click on the button to weigh in on the decision.
(Note: Below is the section to vote, please read the individual answers above before casting your vote below.)
 Vote for answer by Wolfie2k5
Vote for answer by waytron
Vote for answer by Uncle Buck
Vote for answer by redking44
For the member whose answer was voted the
most helpful by our community, we will send
this member some cool CNET branded gear.
 Previous week's Q&AThe votes are in! Below is the answer voted most helpful by our community to last week's question.
Hello, I am not what you would call a computer geek by any
means, but I'm also not afraid of the computer and love to
learn about its inner workings. I installed a second hard
drive to my new computer (the second drive was from my old computer,
5 years old). I made it the slave drive and reformatted it. I
just wanted to use it for backing up. My problem
is...sometimes when I turn the computer on, I can see it as
the "E" drive and I can access it. Other times I turn the
computer on and it isn't visible to me so I can't access it.
However when I use a program like Winaudit or Fresh Diagnose
it shows up in there. I also have an external drive, and it
always appears visible. What could be going on--I need to see
the drive. My computer is an E-machines T6216 with XP Home.
Thank you!
Thanks to all who contributed!
Community Buzz
 Each week we take a look at topics discussed in the forums.
Have fun and enjoy!
More from the forums
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Check out next week's question:
Hi, I have a question for you guys. I am not sure which model of Panasonic plasma HDTV I should buy with Viera line. The 50 inches with 1080p (TH-50PZ700) or the 50 inches with the 720p (TH-50PX75). Will I see a difference in screen quality from the 720p to the 1080p if I only use the HDMI cable from a regular DVD player 480P to upconverting the signal?
I know for sure that with a Blu-ray or HD DVD the difference will be day and night but like I said if I only use the 480p DVD player will it be worth to spend that money on 1080p.
Since I am not going to buy a Blu-ray or HD DVD player soon because I don't know know which format will survive. I am only going to use a DV with the HDMI connection to upgrade the signal from a basic 480P DVD player to hook up my plasma TV. Any help here is appreciated!
--Submitted by:
Yves L.
We feature a new question every Friday, and if you have the answer for our member, you can submit it above. If your submission is picked by our members as the most helpful answer, you'll receive some cool CNET branded gear.
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