Microsoft Office 2000 is currently the standard on campus. Your daughter definitely needs to have word processing software. It would also be helpful if she had spreadsheet software like Microsoft Excel. While any popular word processing software is OK, compatibility with our on campus computers will not be an issue if you decide to purchase or have a Microsoft Product. Most new computers come with MS Office software included in the price, others do not.
Students trade disks and let their pals use their computers all the time.
This makes their machines easy prey for viruses, which can damage all of their hard work and effort and causes huge problems for the tech staff. Last year many students lost vital work due to this type of carelessness. We recommend either Norton Antivirus or McAfee Virus Scan because these software companies provide monthly updates of virus definitions allowing you to protect your computer for a very long time for a minimal charge. A network card is very different from a modem and will probably need to be purchased separately. We have used 3Com cards before on our network and they have worked very well.