Series One Land Rovers

Many people often ask me what is the fascination with the Old Series One land rovers and indeed when I first bought my series one I used it almost daily in the summer with the hard top and door tops removed lots of people thought I was mad as I had a more modern car also at the time but it was a cheap way to own a convertible

The attraction to the Series 1 landie is simply from childhood a farmer friend of mine had a very early series one landrover with the 1600cc engine and the chain pull gearbox and I was always attracted to its fun drivable and its simplicity , I also like the quirky looks of the series one plus the shorter wheelbase and narrow track make it a very useful off roader

The spares are still very easy to come by and there are a lot of spares that are interchangeable with the Series 2 and Series 3 landrovers , most parts are cheap and there is a great dealer network around for these series spares including the excellent Paddock spares that are local to me

Also with all landrover owners there is a camaraderie and almost a feel that every owner of a land rover including the modern defenders are part of this club , often when driving my land rover defender 110 twin cab I get a wave from a fellow land rover enthusiast or owner there is no other vehicle that has this friendship experience , a good mk1 or Mk2 escort will attract similar respect from people but not to the level we see in the landie owners

They are so simple to work on and to keep running , this is a big bonus to anyone interested in mechanicing including youngsters that are too young too drive, as the Series one was conceived in the late forties and in real terms it was designed as an agricultural tool to replace tractors for a big export drive for the then Rover Cars it was built to be maintained in countries where there is not the knowledge or skill or even equipment and spares that were available in the UK at the time and so they are so good for car enthusiast learning there trade with the spanners

There are some statistic that land rover produced a few years ago that show that over 80% of land rovers ever produced are still on the road today no other car can boast those figure and the land rover also is the first car ever seen in over 60% of the developing countries of the world and has been voted in top gears poll as the greatest cars in the world

And this was all started by the stop gap filler Series One Land Rover

PC Security and Virus,s

How many people do you know that bought a PC that came with a limited virus package that have never paid for updates or have not even bothered to install and Anti Virus software on there PC,s at all

With all the Spyware and malicious Malware out the on the net now especaily as most people now how broadband access and as a result most PC's are left connected to the internet for long periods or indefinitely the chances of a security threat is now very common

When ever I am asked to help sort out a friend's PC, be it a simple windows problem or a complete reformat and reinstall of Windows. I always take along a CD with a couple of programs . One is Av Antivirus from Grisoft, the other is Microsoft Antispyware now called Defender both programs are FREE and so there is no excuse for not being protected at home

This is especially important if like me you have a home network that has several PC,s connected to it, as one infected PC will infect all others on the network very quickly. Often malicious code can be downloaded very easily from the internet with even knowing, one of the main areas for infecting your PC with Spyware is by the use of file sharing software (P2P peer to peer networking) and some freeware which can often comes bundled with Spyware that installs without informing you

This is especially important if the kids use your PC, or have there own linked to your network as kids often download and install stuff without thinking. That new tool bar that they installed because it gave them more emoticons to use in there MSN starts to hijack your browser settings. Suddenly your home page changes and despite having a pop up blocker you get regular timed pop up windows, some Spyware like this can be so difficult to remover

One other necessity has to be a pop up blocker and my personal favourite has to be the Google tool bar as it allows you to use the full search facilities and block pop ups very effectively

Windows XP has some good security features in the Service Pack 2 download (SP2) and includes a Firewall that is simple but effective to use , I keep SP2 on a CD for any reformats that I have to do as Microsoft is removing some of the downloads like this, especially if your windows is not a Valid Copy which can be a problem if you buy a secondhand PC

There is a great online tool from Norton that you can use to scan your PC for and security threats including virus's from Symantec Security Check page simply press the go button and let Symantec scan your PC for FREE