I'm currently running the same version of DrinkingBuddies 1.0 forever as my primary application and all the GirlFriend releases I've tried, have always conflicted with it. I hear that DrinkingBuddies won't crash if GirlFriend runs an emulation program and the sound is turned off. Unfortunately, the DrinkingBuddies emulation for GirlFriend never seems to work and I'm embarrassed to say that I can't find the switch to turn the sound off. I just run them separately and it works ok.
I probably should have stayed with GirlFriend 1.0, but I thought I might see better performance from GirlFriend 2.0. But after months of conflicts and other problems, I consulted a friend who has the experience with GirlFriend 2.0. He said, I probably didn't have enough cache to run GirlFriend 2.0 and eventually it would require a token ring to run properly. He was right - as soon as I purged my cache, it uninstalled itself.
Shortly after that, I installed GirlFriend 3.0 beta. All the bugs were supposed to be gone, but the first time I booted up, it gave me a virus anyway. I had to clean out my whole system and shut down for a while.
I very cautiously upgraded to GirlFriend 4.0. This time I used a SCSI probe first and also installed a virus protection. It worked okay for a while until I discovered that GirlFriend 1.0 was still in my system. I tried to run Girlfriend 1.0 with GirlFriend 4.0 still installed, but GirlFriend 4.0 has a feature I didn't know about which automatically senses the presence of any other version of GirlFriend and uninstalls itself, then shuts down the system.
The version I have now works pretty well, but there are still some problems. Like all versions of GirlFriend, it is written in some obscure language that I can't understand, much less reprogram. Also to get the best result with your hardware, you usually have to use gold-plated contacts. Also I've never liked how GirlFriend is totally "object-orientated".
Some time ago, a friend of mine upgraded his version of GirlFriend to GirlFriendPlus 1.0, which is a Terminate & Stay Resident version of GirlFriend. He discovered that GirlFriendPlus 1.0 expires within a year if you don't upgrade to Fiancee 1.0. So he did, but soon after that he had to upgrade to Wife 1.0, which he describes as a huge resource hog.. It has taken all his space, so he can't load anything else. One of the primary reasons he decided to go with Wife 1.0 was because it came bundled with FreeSexPlus, particularly the new plug-ins he wanted to try. On top of that, Wife 1.0 must be running before he can do anything. Although he did not ask for it, Wife 1.0 came with MotherInLaw, which has an automatic pop-up feature which he can't turn off.
I told him to try to install Mistress 1.0, but he said he heard that if you try to run it without first uninstalling Wife 1.0, Wife 1.0 will delete MSMoney files before doing the uninstall itself. Then Mistress 1.0 won't install anyway because of insufficient resources.
It appears that GirlFriend 1.0 is still one of the best products on the market, especially just after installation. Though not as much as OneNightStand 63.8 for the power user, it remains relatively reliable and easy on system resources. The timeout feature of GirlFriend is the major problem, and in severe cases force the user to upgrade to Wife 1.0 with the dire consequences on system health.
