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Messages - Shades [ switch to compact view ]

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26
General Software Discussion / Re: Firewall Tester
« on: September 26, 2022, 06:25 PM »
For your purposes, 'cstatus' from a fellow DC member could fit the bill. On first glance it doesn't look like it, because the initial interface is for checking how fast (or available) your DNS servers are. But if you look a bit further, you'll see there are more tools included inside this one, including an IP check tool. When you open that section, you will see that it can check which IP addresses are available in a given range, but you can also check if ports are open on the machines that have an IP address inside the selected range.

27
If your vintage HiFi gear has an AUX button/switch, Chances are high that you'll have Tulip connectors at the back to connect your computer to. A CD-player or DVD player in your computer can deal with audio CDs directly (without that special audio cable).

Granted, I do not listen to music on my phone (or watch video for that matter), detest tablets and only use computers/laptops for audio entertainment. When still living in NL, I had a Sony 5.1 amp, where I had connected my Sony carousel CD player, my Sony Mini-disc recorder, my JVC VHS recorder, My Sony PlayStation 2 and Sony CRT TV, all daisy-chained with SCART cables. Each of these devices came with a remote control. But because of SCART, I could use each remote to control all the devices that were connected by SCART. 3 Sony satellite speakers and 2 Wharfdale speakers...so yes, I do know what vintage entails, hahahah.

Connected my computer to the AUX port of the Sony amp and that was how I listened to music. Even though the carousel CD player held 5 CD's, because I only owned albums I often had a lot of songs I didn't appreciate, hence the Mini-Disc recorder. Which was a really great device, but it always took forever to song titles from CD to Mini-Disc. Apparently I owned a lot of albums that didn't copy that info from CD automatically to Mini-Disc.

Would have repeated such a setup here in PY, but you can't get that type of HiFi equipment here, unless you import it yourself. Import fees at the PY border are a problem. People working there are very corrupt. And I have not seen any of that type of HiFi equipment in stores that sell electronics. The general populace here doesn't know or care about decent HiFi equipment. Vintage or otherwise.

Anyway, in my mind that is still the proper way to listen to music. Not sound bars, Bluetooth speakers or that kind of stuff.

28
There are still audio cards available with more different outputs that allow you to connect your (desktop) computer to decent HiFi equipment.

My needs are in principle also quite basic in this regard. The built-in audio card in my desktops and laptops is sufficient for me. However, I do have a small el cheapo 5.1 audio set which contains a FM radio, Bluetooth, card reader, USB A slot and tulip connectors to connect external audio to.

This el cheapo set produces quite some ruckus if asked and plays my MP3s and FLAC's stored in my local LAN very well (for my ears at least) and without hiccups. First tried to do this with Bluetooth, but even when there was only a meter of distance between audio set and laptops there would the occasional hiccup.

So I just went the old-fashioned way and used a 3,5" jack to tulip plugs conversion cable and connected that way. No worries about connection reliability, no extra noises or hisses are introduced. For me, it works marvelously.

29
As others said, you couldn't be farther from reality with SMTP and SFTP (or FTP/FTPS).

While Exchange setups for companies in Azure are often set for attachments greater than 10 MByte in total size (message + attachment), most Linux-based mail servers use the default of 10 MByte of total size (message + attachment). The attachment is less than 10 MByte actually, because the message part of an email contains much more data than most users realize. Add to that the default setting of HTML message content and even more data has to be reserved for the message part. As you most of the time do not know how mail messages are being distributed, most services still use the 10 MByte limit, just to be on the safe side.

Better use a 3rd party service for transferring files. WeTransfer is well known, at least in Europe. There are more of them, but that is the only one I remember, because I rather set up my own Google drive/OneDrive-like instance on my own web server. Well, if you are in complete control of your web server (and have a officially registered domain name or static IP-address that faces the internet) it takes hardly any effort to enable the WebDAV functionality that is baked into every web server software (Apache, NginX, IIS, LightHTTPd etc.), because it is part of the official HTTP protocol for many years already.

From your description I couldn't gather the following, so it likely does not apply to you. I'll add it anyway:
If you need to send/receive content to computers (plural) you own or at least manage, you can use simple executables inside the command-line to transfer content. In such a case, file size of the content is usually not a problem. Examples of such software: SCP (available in default Windows installations), WinSCP, CarotDAV. Not advised but the Windows command FTP is also still available.

If the remote computer has access to SharePoint, you might as well use that. But if not, it is easier to install NextCloud on your web server, or a similar tool. Makes things much more configurable in a pretty nice web interface. With such a setup you can use your browser, a Nextcloud (or equivalent) app on your phone or computer, GUI tools like WinSCP and CarotDAV to connect to the remote server and transfer that way. Mind you, the command-line tools from the previous paragraph also work without problem with this setup. You can make things (much!) harder for yourself in case you also run your own DNS server. In that case you'll need to at least have configured "forward" DNS resolving correctly.

While your Google-drive/OneDrive-like setup will not be as fast as the Google/Microsoft service, it will not be much slower if your ISP provides a decent enough connection to your house. And you will feel you have accomplished something regarding networking. Never hurts to put that on a CV.

If you insist on using SMTP as a way to transfer files, you can automate a lot by using a command-line SMTP mailer on the source computer and the remote computer will need to use a command-line POP3 mail receiver if you use a 3rd party mail service. Again, you will need to have a correctly configured internet domain at the source. You will also need to have both "forward" and "reverse" DNS resolving set up properly. Then you'll need to configure DKIM + SPF + DMARC correctly as well, else the 3rd party mail service won't transfer your mail messages. Worse, they direct your messages directly to their thrash can and most of the time don't even inform you about this. All for valid reasons, but I digress.

Command-line SMTP mailers such as CMail and SendMail are surprisingly capable, if everything is setup correctly. Too bad the whole SMTP/POP3 story is such a pain to setup. Oh, and you are still bound by the 10 MByte limit, so don't go this route at all. I added it for completeness.

SFTP then. WinSCP can act as a SFTP client. If I remember correctly, it can also do FTPS. These two protocols share FTP in their name...and that is all they share. These are very different ways of transferring content. The FTP and FTPS protocols are akin. SFTP isn't alike at all. SFTP is however much safer than FTP and FTPS. FTP and FTPS are very old protocols and are deemed very unsafe to use. Actually, lots of modern browsers have stated that they won't support FTP(S) anymore at all.

There is actually one thing more SFTP, FTP and FTPS have in common. All require a client and a server to be setup, before transfer can take place. In my opinion, FTP and FTPS should have set out to pasture many years ago. While it is not difficult to acquire a free SFTP client, free SFTP server software is a lot more difficult to come by. You'll find a lot of "free" ones, but those are all trial-versions. And severely limited. And most of them are terribly expensive, if you wish to buy a license. You should think of 800 USD and up. So good luck finding a proper SFTP server you can really use for free.

A whole lot of words to say that it will be much easier to simply use a 3rd party service, like OneDrive/Google-drive/Dropbox/Mega and whatever else you can think off. Personally, I find the tool: CarotDAV very handy for setting up connections to my own WebDAV server, but also for Google-drive/OneDrive/Dropbox and many others. And it is usable with a GUI, as well as the command-line. And because it uses HTTP and can use parallel connections, it is actually pretty fast. Faster than FTP/FTPS.

Example: For my purposes there is daily need to push a set of about 300 Mbyte in severely compressed archives from one continent to another. When testing with FTP/FTPS on my on-premise server, this set needed almost 1 hour to transfer completely. Using the same Linux server and having WebDAV configured, that time went to slightly over 10 minutes for a complete transfer. For reference, I also tested with Google drive and a full transfer took around 8 minutes.

As we need to comply with wishes from customers who absolutely do not want their content to be transferred through any other servers than EU servers (GPDR demands strictness on their end as well), practically all 3rd party services are excluded from use for our purpose. But my boss isn't complaining, a difference of about 2 minutes and a lot less legal headache is totally worth it. Which was the reason behind the need to investigate what our options were years ago.   

30
DC Gamer Club / Re: Valve Announces Steam Deck: A Handheld PC
« on: August 29, 2022, 10:37 PM »
The script will be the most sure way of getting what you need done.

However, Samba on my Linux Laptop and now one of my desktops allowed me to auto-mount shared drives on both. Even did so with shared drives on Windows 11 and Windows Server 2019 computers. Besides turning the computers on, I don't have to do anything to access any of the shares from anywhere in my network at home.

Whether that is also the case with the SteamDeck, I don't know as I don't have access to one. But that option only being available in desktop mode on the Steamdeck would be a safe assumption.

31
DC Gamer Club / Re: Valve Announces Steam Deck: A Handheld PC
« on: August 21, 2022, 06:32 PM »
Maybe the Deck is trying to do something weird. I'll have to experiment with other displays, cables, and my other hub in various configurations to see if I can single out the problem.

Are you by any chance running Skype or Teams on your Steam Deck (in the background)?
I have seen something similar happening on my Linux laptop (Gnome) when either Skype and/or Teams show notifications of incoming messages. Started happening about 3 months ago.

This doesn't happen when Skype/Teams are not running on my laptop.

32
Living Room / Re: No living room, ironically
« on: August 14, 2022, 01:35 AM »
Thanks.  It felt good to sleep in a bed and make my own meals(not simultaneously of course.).

Depends on your reach and where your bed is located... :P

Bad joke aside, it is good to read that you are ready again for 4 walls and a roof.  :Thmbsup:

33
Sounds to me like a case of not knowing how certificates work.

Very simply stated: Each certificate has a start- and end-date. After the end-date it automatically becomes invalid. Also, a Certificate Authority (CA) is used to verify the validity of a certificate. CA certificates have a start- and end-date too.

Operating systems always come with a set of those CA certificates and usually do not receive updates regarding those CA's.

Your old XP system will not have received many updates and if you didn't add updated CA's yourself, you will see many more browser messages about websites not being able to verify that they are safe to use. And if you need to resort to adding/removing CA's yourself, how sure are you that those updated CA certificates have not been compromised in any way? That's a rabbit-hole you hardly can reason yourself out of.

And you should also be worried that if you go to banking websites that still show up as safe in your browser. It means that these accept out-of date CA certificates as valid. That might make you "feel" safe, but in reality the banking info going through your system is open for 'man-in-the-middle-attacks' and all the consequences that come with that.

CA certificates are usually valid between 5 and 10 years. Certificates bought by users/companies are almost always 1 year valid. Free certificates are commonly valid for 90 days or less. There are good reasons to have validity period limitations. The main one is that shorter periods mean (much) more safety for the end-user.

Windows XP is falling dangerously behind the times. Not only because Microsoft doesn't make fixes for it anymore, not only because it's code-base is very well known in the wrong circles, but also because of a lack of updates on CA certificates.

Previous posters already said that every time you start up your XP computer and do anything on the internet, you are putting yourself at serious risk.
No matter how much you like XP, you should only run that operating system in a container (like a virtual machine) that is not allowed to go onto the internet. Even if a new system does not fit in your budget, An old Windows 10 system isn't too expensive for most.

Even though Windows 7 is also out of Microsoft support, it is still safer to use that than Windows XP. Windows 7 computers are practically given away nowadays. Donationcoder.com and its certificate aren''t the problem, your geriatric system setup is. Not by your fault, let me be clear. XP has out-aged the internet for quite a while now.

34
UrlSnooper / Re: Totaly fail....
« on: July 25, 2022, 08:19 PM »
I have managed to work out how to get streams but

I need to Register, and I cant Read Dutch, so I don't know what to click on !!
-ritchievalens (July 25, 2022, 07:02 PM)

Show me the texts that are presented to you, as I hail from the Netherlands and Dutch is my native language.

35
DC Gamer Club / Re: Valve Announces Steam Deck: A Handheld PC
« on: July 25, 2022, 03:12 PM »
Youtube channel: Linus Tech Tips has a new video about the SteamDeck.

In that video they are pimping their deck up with significant hardware upgrades that do not invalidate Valve's guarantee on the hardware.




* Edit: now that I have seen the whole video, there is one part that does invalidate Valva's terms of guarantee. At LTT they added previously a rather large external passive heatsink (for the SteamDeck). And now they rewired the internal cooling fan to enable an external cooling fan, turning their passive heatsink into an active heatsink. 

36
DC Gamer Club / Re: Valve Announces Steam Deck: A Handheld PC
« on: July 24, 2022, 12:19 AM »
As I understood (from a thread on the SlashDot website), FedEx is converting from having many aging parcel tracking servers on location to a centrally located server farm in the cloud. All while updating the parcel tracking software.

Not a rant against the cloud, more like not having (enough) people to handle this transition very well. Whether that is by happenstance, or unwillingness to fork over enough money to hire (a sufficient amount of) professionals?  Probably the latter, as the current CTO makes promises of 400 million Dollars US in yearly savings.

On a happier note:
It is nice to read about real hands-on experiences with the SteamDeck.

37
DC Gamer Club / Re: Valve Announces Steam Deck: A Handheld PC
« on: July 19, 2022, 08:35 AM »
I don't think you will have a hard time selling your Steam Deck, in case you decide it is not for you. Maybe it is useful to you as content for your youtube channel. It's form factor might be handy for you when shooting new video content. Perhaps you could give it away as a prize and monetize it that way. By doing that you might even be able to write it of as a business expense.

38
Free mail client? JBMail. But you won't like it.

Windows roaming user profile. That would take care of your personal Windows and Office settings, no matter which computer you log into. But comes at cost, especially if we're talking about an on-premise setup. You will need licensed copies of Windows, one computer will need to act as a domain server for the AD environment. While an AD environment is not too difficult to setup, it will require knowledge and given your questions on this forum, I get the impression that the gaps in your knowledge will make this a difficult task. Difficult enough that it would be better if you paid someone to do all the legwork.

Microsoft nowadays uses their cloud offerings to create your personal profile on their servers and applies settings to each device that logs into your account. While you don't have to pay for that, it is for personal use only. And Microsoft uses that information to create an extensive user profile they monetize. It ain't money, but you are paying.

Two-finger gestures? If you don't have hardware to support 2 (or more) finger gestures, you won't be able to use (any) software to make that work. While most new laptops have a trackpad that supports more than one finger, enough old laptops are still in use that do not have support for that.

Sharing content of a variable between applications? That is usually done through an API. You could try using JSON or SOAP. At work we use a tool called: SOAPUI (Java-based). Whether that is even an option for use with PowerBI, I don't know. It might give you more/better ideas for your own Google/Bing research.

39
'Self-signed'
That is the term to focus on.

In general, there is nothing wrong with them, they function the same as a certificate you would procure from a certificate authority. And yes, it is very likely a .x509 certificate.
However, because you are the self-signing party, there is no tool/company, who would trust this type of certificate. And that is a very big part of the encryption process. Why this lack of trust? You are are unknown as a certificate authority. How reliable are you, as in will you be in business long enough to validate a certificate you authorized? What is the business plan? You will never be able to satisfy each of the users, so you won't be able to satisfy the need of any user. That renders them in essence useless.

Or do they?
Well, it isn't hard to install yourself to the list of parties that the operating system trusts as certificate authority. You can repeat that procedure on every computer and now you can use your own self-signed certificates as completely valid. But it will be be for your own network, nowhere else. If this satisfies your use case, then there is no real problem using self-signed certificates.

But, sooner or later, your use-case is likely to change and you wish to share your encrypted zip file with someone outside your network for whatever reason. Well, now you have a big problem. That external user won't install your self-signed certificate, they will likely also have their doubts about possible corruption during transport of your self-signed certificate. So this encrypted date will remain hidden for that external user. Now we're back to your certificates being useless to anyone but you.

And that is kinda the point of certificates, it is intended to be a secure way of transporting trustworthy data between parties that are not part of the same network.

Procuring a certificate from an organization like Let'sEncrypt is usually without cost. But these certificates are 90 days valid and very likely configured for encrypting HTTP connections and nothing else. You can buy certificates for different purposes. Those are usually valid for 1 year, but, depending on their purpose(s), pricey. As in more than 1000 USD per year. But, as you now use a commercial certificate authority, your computer/phone/tablet/etc. will be able to establish a secure communication channel without manual interaction on your end or on the 3rd party's end.

Then there is another problem. But related to certificates in general, not specifically self-signed certificates.

When certificates are generated, there is a validity period involved. The end date of that period...can have some unintended side-effects. Say, you have photos from a closed bedroom event. While those were created with consent of all parties involved, those should never be publicly available. So you use certificates to encrypt the archives from these photos. All is well and good. Until you wish to open those archives for purpose of reminiscence on any date after the certificate's validity period. Chances are that your archived data became unavailable to yourself as well.

You will now keep track of certificate validity periods and re-create archives using updated certificates. If you think making backups of unencrypted data is already a hassle...you'll open Pandora's box when introducing encryption to those processes.

Sure, you can set very long validity periods (10 years is the maximum, if memory serves), but with such a long validity period, you'll undermine the security aspect of certificates in a very big way. One year is about as long as any certificate should be valid. But shorter periods are usually better.

40
General Software Discussion / Re: CMD SFTP from Windows syntax
« on: June 23, 2022, 03:20 PM »
A graphical client, like FileZilla, is out of the question? Or WinSCP, which can be used as a graphical client, but also through the command-line?

The Windows command line is usually not that great for file transfers with FTP.

Side note: sftpserver.com is a domain that gets forwarded to the website of titanftp.com, a company that provides (S)FTP servers on Azure, AWS and also on-premise.

Anyway, command line (S)FTP clients mostly require a text file that contains the file names to be transported. But also your login information.

For example:
you create a file, called: files_to_transport_with_sftp.txt
In that file you add a line that opens the connection, like so:
open sftp://user:[email protected]/ -hostkey="ssh-rsa 2048 xxxxxxxxxxx..."

You will need to fill in the content of your 'publickey.pkk' file where the 'xxxxxxxxxxx...' are shown in parameter '-hostkey'. You are likely needing to change the 'ssh-rsa 2048' part as well, with what was used to generate your key.

The next line in the files_to-transport_with_sftp.txt should be something similar as:
put C:\<path>\<to>\<your>\file.txt

On the destination FTP server your user account will have a default folder assigned. The line above will store the file into that default folder.

The next line in the files_to-transport_with_sftp.txt has to be:
close

You need to tell the FTP server to close the connection.

The final line in the files_to-transport_with_sftp.txt has to be:
exit

You'll need to exit the sftp software and give control back to the command-line interpreter you are about to use to start the FTP session.

In the command-line interpreter, you can now use the line:
sftp -b <path>\<to>\files_to-transport_with_sftp.txt

Why use the batch file method? You can generate such files pretty easily execute them and then remove them (or keep them around for auditing purposes, if that is something to you). The separate generation of such files makes FTP transfers easier/simpler/more secure. And much more fit for automatization. However, the above also should show you that any form of FTP transfers are severely outdated by now. And other methods of file transfers, like WebDAV, are much more secure and most of the time dramatically faster.
 

41
But it wouldn't boot to XP or 7 desktop on a dual boot.

Somewhere in your hardware specification report I saw that there was only support for the PCIe 1.0 standard. I suspect that your USB 3.0 card is a card that needs PCIe 2.0 (or better).

Before the operating system is started on any computer, there is another (much more basic) system that checks if all the hardware in your computer is registered properly and responds as this system expects it to. Putting more/extra hardware in a computer, which is not registered or tested properly, (in the best case scenario)  will slow down your computer before and possibly after the operating system has started. But, more often than not, the extra hardware prevents that basic system to complete all checks and test and your computer won't boot into anything.

Worst case, you actually fry your motherboard, the extra hardware or both.

From your post I understand that the extra hardware simply blocks that basic system to do its checks and that you stops it from booting any of the operating systems. So, try to flip the USB card to recuperate some of the costs and put that money towards buying a new motherboard, CPU and RAM. You can keep the rest of your hardware...although I would spend also money on a new and proper power supply (Corsair, EVGA, Silverstone are brands that have very decent power supplies). Doesn't have to be a 'heavy duty'-one, if you do not have lots of hard drives or discrete video card.

AMD and Intel provide CPU's which have a video card built into them and those will "steal" from the system memory to provide you with video. Older generations of such CPU's are fine for most intents and purposes, except for gaming, CAD and video editing. However, AMD appears to be making headway with that type of CPU in their latest generation that will come out this year and you will be able to play modern AAA game titles at a reasonable resolution in medium settings, not the lowest resolution in low settings as is currently the case.

42
Living Room / Re: Whole Room Watercooling
« on: June 18, 2022, 08:07 PM »
Has Linus learned nothing?

If it gets him a new video, then no.  :P

Kidding aside, water-cooling your solar panels makes them a lot more efficient. Unfortunately those get hot when exposed to sunlight and that drops the effectiveness of solar panels drastically. Not only short term, with a drop in efficiency, but also in longevity. That is one of the reasons why you don't see solar panels being deployed en masse in desert environments. Water-cooling panels is therefore not a bad idea. For example, here in Paraguay the summer sun turns the temperature up (at street level) to 50 degrees Celcius (or 122 Fahrenheit for the non-metrics amongst us). Putting solar panels on your roof where the panels catch sun-rays that brutal for 14 to 16 hours per day...those panels won't last you 10 years, a period which for most will just be the time those panels hit the ROI point.

Cooling solar panels is therefore a necessity here in these parts of the world. Water-cooling is therefore not that bad of an concept. And with that water flow you can transport the heat to locations where it is needed. And if you have a pool available, it isn't that bad of an idea to use a closed loop system in your pool and heat up the water inside the pool that way. But you could also use that heat and the closed loop to warm up water for showers, the dishwasher, the laundry machine and whatever else you think you'll need warm water for.

Of course, it isn't cheap and requires a lot of thought beforehand, but it will pay off in the long run. So if you build a house you plan to pass onto your offspring, they will absolutely benefit, but even you yourself will see ROI in your lifetime. It also makes you less dependent on combustibles that other heating methods require. And with energy prices gauging high these days, that will be reducing a burden in your mind as well. And, in essence, such a cooling system could also be used for heating. Even if that is only a backup method for heating, you will see a reasonable reduction in heating bills and you'll have 2 separate methods of heating.

There are many reasons why central energy production is a great concept. But those systems can financially hurt you too. And even with central energy production (and delivery) systems in place, in lots of residential dwellings you still need to have a backup generator, just in case. If you have the funds and ability, ideas like Linus' showed in his videos are not always nearly as silly as he sometimes portrays them to be.

Being more efficient in all energy-consumption aspects, will have (steep) upfront costs, require much thought and probably result in more maintenance chores in the house. But those will pay themselves off, especially in times where costs of energy production and delivery is becoming much more variable. All extra 'head-ache' you could do well without.

43
Are you sure that you will get USB 3.0 speeds with such a card in anything less than a 16x PCIe slot? Chances are very high that your dual core processor is stuck on a time-period related motherboard. Which will have support for the PCIe 1.0 standard. That is a serious handicap for getting the maximum speed out of those USB 3.0 ports. And there is another thing to consider, even if your motherboard has enough PCIe "lanes" available, how sure are you if your CPU has support for all of those? And if the CPU has support, what other devices are connected to those lanes?

These are all specifications that the manufacturers of your motherboard and CPU provide on their web-pages.

And even if they can connect initially with USB 3.0 speeds, can the computer/CPU maintain those speeds? Dual core processors are not a good fit in this regard. Such processors are already busy enough with the workload of your processes and whatever the operating system needs to do in the background. If your computer had an quad core CPU in it, I would have much less reservations. You are likely able to connect the card into your computer, but it will behave barely better than USB 2.0. USB devices do negotiate their maximum transmission speeds, so the box of the expansion card may say USB 3.0, in reality you should be happy if your USB devices can manage USB.20 speeds (sustained).

Nothing mean is intended. A computer like yours is still running in my network, but only as a bare metal Linux server without any GUI. In such a setup, computers like yours are still pretty usable for light server duties that can take their time. I use it to create daily incremental and differential backups from 12 other servers and 17 workstations (using Bacula). And for that purpose a machine like yours is still of any use.

For 250 USD you should be able to get a much more modern motherboard (with 2 to 4 actually working USB 3.0 (or better) ports), support for the PCIe 3.0 standard or better, a 10th generation Intel CPU and 8 to 16GByte of DDR4 RAM. Windows 7, but also Windows 10 or Windows 11 will work perfectly fine on such a machine. You can still use your old case, monitor expansion cards, keyboard and mouse, if you so desire. But by changing the innards of your system, you will have actual hardware progress. A more worthy investment of money than an expansion card that may or may not work (well) in your current hardware. Your current computer may still be of use to you, but it is getting old. While the CPU in your machine will manage quite a few more years of service, I'm not so sure about the capacitors on your motherboard. Once those start to "pop", it will be over very quickly.

A mid-range (or better) motherboard pretty easily lasts 5 to 10 years without risks, if it was always connected to a high quality power supply, was never overclocked, always in a good power grid and periodically cleaned properly (dust, hair, lint, etc). Use it longer and you are essentially are starting to gamble with your data.
 

44
Living Room / Re: Best forums for consumers and online buyers ?
« on: June 10, 2022, 03:11 AM »
My guess: Reddit.

But I don't really follow any forums or communities like that.

There are not so many 'gems' on there as there used to be. At least not in the reddits I follow there.

45
General Software Discussion / Re: The End of the Atom Editor
« on: June 10, 2022, 01:40 AM »
In my search for an AsciiDoc editor at the time, Atom was one of the candidates. I really didn't like it from the get-go. Was the 'Brackets' text editor not based on Atom? That one had a better interface for editing AsciiDoc, but I got tired of that one after a few hours of editing.

But I use mainly Notepad++ for most of my text editing, a far distant second editor for me is VSCode, quickly followed by AsciiDocFX. Lately I'm far more busy with databases and use the text editor that comes with the management software for Oracle, SQL Server, PostgreSQL and Apache Cassandra. And as I am using Linux more and more at home: Notepadqq, which looks and feels a lot like Notepad++ on Windows and MCEdit (part of Midnight Commander, an essential tool for any version of Linux).

There was a while where I used Sublime text editor. Very capable, but Notepad++ is just a tad faster and you can create your own syntax highlighter with it. Something I used for a scripting language that we created for the European energy market.

46
Living Room / Re: 3D Printing - General Discussion
« on: June 10, 2022, 01:13 AM »
A tip which is nothing to snout at.

47
General Software Discussion / Re: Looking for Volume Booster
« on: June 08, 2022, 07:15 PM »
Free ones I am not aware of.

But you are not alone in being unable to always hear what is said. And the last few years that has been a problem, which is mainly caused by audio mixing in Hollywood and improper mapping of audio. For instance, a movie is recorded with Dolby Atmos equipment. Then it gets packaged into a file for distribution to your system. And you are not playing this file with Dolby Atmos equipment, but something much simpler.

It can then happen that all the audio is getting mixed wrong in your setup, because of improper mapping of audio channels to play the Atmos content properly over a stereo setup. Against that a volume booster will not be nearly as helpful as you expect it to be.
Just used Dolby Atmos as an example, there are more technologies that do similar things. Unfortunately this is also not limited to audio, but applies to HDR video content as well. Especially if that content is watched on tv/monitor/beamer that does not natively supports those technologies.

48
Even though we are talking about laptops, which by definition are moveable, you should not move them unless you absolutely have to. Ergonomics is a very good reason, and it avoids cable entanglement.

I assume every laptop you move only uses 1 screen? Any KVM switch that supports HDMI and a extra screen might be helpful. As most laptops have a HDMI output connector to support a second screen, you could use those outputs in combination with the the KVM switch which you connect to to the extra screen.

Whatever content you need to check on each laptop, if you move that to the second screen on each laptop, you can now easily check on the extra screen. That will reduce your need to move laptops to practically zero. However, KVM switches are not cheap and often also reduce the refresh rate of the screen output. Granted, not such a big issue, unless you have gaming laptops (with 4K screens and 120Hz refresh rate or higher). And there is a need for a separate screen, which requires desk space and solutions for that are heavily depending on your setup. Such solutions may cost a significant sum as well.

But what Target says: much more detail is needed for better answers than the generic ones you are getting till now.

49
Living Room / Re: How to fix a keyboard with catchy keys
« on: June 04, 2022, 04:12 PM »
Which is why i blow away excess graphite. The graphite that 'lubricates' the key(s) practically doesn't fall down and whatever does manage to fall, lands on a rather thick rubber membrane. This membrane does have 2 holes to keep it aligned with the keys. but those are in locations that are no cause to worry.

No, there are 2 reasons why these keyboards fail. One is the age of the electronics inside. These are USB units and from several the controller simply died. And sunlight, which can be quite strong, even before it sets. And it is downright brutal in Paraguayan summer. Discolouration happens quick here. Some (minor) buckling too, if a keyboard happens to catch some rays from the early morning sun....or the setting evening sun.

50
Living Room / Re: How to fix a keyboard with catchy keys
« on: June 03, 2022, 11:47 AM »
Is it a full mechanical keyboard? Or is it one that uses a rubber mat inside to spring the key back in position?

I have bought almost 30 keyboards using the latter 17 years ago. About 20 still survived till this day, and those got really used pre-pandemic. As you can imagine, I have needed to clean and repair many of those to keep these keyboards going. Sticky keys I usually fix with graphite, the core of a pencil, but ground to a powder. I sprinkle it between the moving part of the key and the keyboard, usually on all sides that can cause friction and make the key stick.

In my case I can remove the top of the keyboard as a whole unit. Then I can turn it upside down, do the sprinkling, and use the sticky key to make sure the graphite gets distributed along the surfaces that can cause friction. I keep doing that for a while until the key drops down again by gravity. Whatever graphite is left I blow away. I can then reattach the top with the base of the keyboard again and the keyboard is operational again.

I use these keyboards (Amazon, because it has a picture). While these are not mechanical keyboards, they are great to work with. And have endurance as well.

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