The Elephant in the room

[sfisher973]

I can't believe how poorly this Microsoft support forum works! Its like the
Apple commercials come to life! Lousy response times, server timeouts and
unavailability’s galore. On the unusable threshold and falling. IMHO.

 

[Dirk Goldgar]

I can't believe how poorly this Microsoft support forum works! Its like
the
Apple commercials come to life! Lousy response times, server timeouts and
unavailability’s galore. On the unusable threshold and falling. IMHO.

I use the newsgroups directly, via Windows Mail, so I don't experience those
problems. But I know that MS are aware of the issues and are working to fix
them.

 

[-Steve]

Hi Dirk,

I would have replied sooner but it took something over 5 minutes to get your
message to display. I guess I'll dust off outlook express and see if I can
find the newsgroups through it.

 

[Dirk Goldgar]

Hi Dirk,

I would have replied sooner but it took something over 5 minutes to get
your
message to display. I guess I'll dust off outlook express and see if I
can
find the newsgroups through it.

The server name is msnews.microsoft.com, though I think news.microsoft.com
also works. No username or password is required.

 

[John W. Vinson]

I can't believe how poorly this Microsoft support forum works! Its like the
Apple commercials come to life! Lousy response times, server timeouts and
unavailability’s galore. On the unusable threshold and falling. IMHO.

That's why many of the MVP's and other frequent visitors rarely or never use
the forum.

The Microsoft webpage *is not the repository* for questions and answers. That
repository is the msnews.microsoft.com news server, which can be read and
written to from any Newsreader software - Outlook Express, Windows Mail, Agent
(my preference), dozens and dozens of others. You don't get the "rate answers"
or the cute MVP and bronze/silver/gold icons - but you do get exactly the same
answers, a lot faster and a lot more reliably.

Microsoft knows about the problems and have promised to make improvements.
We've heard such promises before, though...

Maybe it's just us oldtimers (who remember Usenet before there WAS a World
Wide Web or any web browsers!) who find it natural and comfortable, but
newsreaders and news servers *do* work. I wouldn't likely be here if they
didn't.

 

[-Steve]

Yeah, stupid me. Figured I could just do it via MS website and not have to
set up a news reader.

 

[MikeB]

Yeah, stupid me. Figured I could just do it via MS website and not have
to set up a news reader.

If you are trying to interact with the Web without using a desktop
application, be careful of what you wish for... clouds are brewing ;-)

 

[John W. Vinson]

Yeah, stupid me. Figured I could just do it via MS website and not have to
set up a news reader.

Well, let's call that *stupid Microsoft*. Your expectation was very
reasonable, and there are lots of forum websites out there, many of which
interface with NNTP for the benefit of us old codgers. Why Microsoft has been
unable (for several years now!!) to get a working web interface operational is
a bafflement and frustration to lots of us.