Messages

6051

Living Room / Re: Registry hack needed: Full date in the tray clock

« on: June 12, 2008, 11:10 PM »

By the way, I used Betaclock at work on Windows XP and it worked fine, but it doesn't seem to work on my Vista x64 home machine. I'm using t-clock at home, but it doesn't seem to support different font/color for time and date either.

-dominus (June 12, 2008, 09:17 PM)

The font color not working with T-Clock/Vista is (usually) due to the transparency of the systemtray letting anything behind it bleed through. There were some other issues with the clock text being fuzzy with certain video cards, and the clock would stop updating periodically, but they both went away after SP1

6052

General Software Discussion / Re: GloryLogic, you guys suck!

« on: June 12, 2008, 10:58 PM »

The only burning app I use these days is imgburn. I don't really need much fancyness when I burn individual files, and it does the job pretty well.

-f0dder (June 11, 2008, 06:05 PM)

Me too ... Small, Fast, Clean, it's an excellent piece of software. However I never can remember to turn off the default burn complete wave and it scares the crap outa me every time.

6053

Announce Your Software/Service/Product / Re: Hard Drive Serial Numbers

« on: June 11, 2008, 06:10 AM »

If you have the name (I suppose you mean the model) you can easily look them up on Google or your favourite search engine. And if they're still connected to the PC, well, Windows already know how big they are

-Lashiec (June 09, 2008, 06:59 AM)

Not to mention that if it's in your hand the size is printed on the case... Is it just me or does this thread have all the earmarks of a spam post setup line?

6054

Living Room / Re: Hosting options for new website

« on: June 04, 2008, 06:20 AM »

My site is fairly low traffic, so hosting it myself isn't an issue. I have however dealt with www.LunarPages.com several times in the past and found them to be an excellent host.

Good prices, no unscheduled downtime, informed about internal changes that will impact the site before they happen, repairs/changes/updates stay on schedule, etc.

6055

Living Room / Re: Why I could never buy a Dell or HP computer (rant)

« on: June 02, 2008, 06:21 AM »

Dell's Vostro line is one of the best stick-to-strictly-business machines I've seen; I've ordered several for clients with just Windows and actually received a machine with just Windows on it.

The consumer grade stuff (Zoiks!) I'm with ya 100% man, damn what a nightmare!

6056

Living Room / Re: What's Your Favorite Smilie?

« on: May 15, 2008, 06:20 AM »

this one gets used quite a bit...

-Edvard (May 05, 2008, 11:35 AM)

I have used that one at work more than once when responding to Email from a client...

6057

General Software Discussion / Re: Thorough harddisk checking.

« on: May 06, 2008, 05:58 AM »

I'll 2nd the vote for Hitachi Drive Fitness test. It works great for all brands of EIDE, SATA, & SCSI drives. It's been my kit for a while and it is indeed non-destructive( and reportless).

6058

General Software Discussion / Re: Is this the holy grail to solving windows-out-of-resources bugs?

« on: May 04, 2008, 10:55 AM »

I ran into this tweak awhile back and it fixed the (slightly different than stated here) issue I was having at the time. I frequently open dozens of browser windows when branching a research project each of which can have a dozen or so tabs open ... This habbit was causing major stability issues. There are two other related tweakable reg keys mentioned in the article that have made my box dead rock stable regardless of what I've asked it to do.

The original artical is no longer posted, but fortunately I'd ripped a copy to .pdf so I can still share it. This was originally written by Robert McLaws and posted on his Windows-Now.com blog.

http://www.stoicjoke...imits-in-Windows.pdf


Thanks to mouser for reminding me of this tweak as it works wonders for stabilizing Vista.

6059

General Software Discussion / Re: How do I delete big folders with ease?

« on: May 04, 2008, 10:02 AM »

NTFS file prrmissions are inherated by the targets permissions when moving files between partition. They are only copied if moving files within the same partition...So that's not the issue.

However if there is a file name legnth issue (very common with this type of "backup") then you will get tons of false Permissions errors due to the shell's inability to handle the length of the file names.

f0dder had most of the right answer, but didn't give all of the necessary syntax. I used this alot for clean ups back when hijacking FTP servers with hidden directories was popular.

rmdir  /q /s \.\\C:\[fullpath-to-target]

/q must be used or the delete will crash when it tries to display the "error"

the \.\\   fires from namespace root and guarentees no forgiveness.

rmdir & rd both work/will do the same thing, I just picked rmdir out of habbit.

Holding the Shift key will still get the shell involved, will try to echo the offending file name to the progress dialog, and will crash with false permissions error.

6060

General Software Discussion / Re: What is your boot time?

« on: May 04, 2008, 09:43 AM »

Well...
Microsoft Windows [Version 6.0.6001]
Copyright (c) 2006 Microsoft Corporation.  All rights reserved.

C:\Users\Stoic Joker>uptime
\\SPUNKY-V has been up for: 81 day(s), 12 hour(s), 26 minute(s), 21 second(s)


If I remember correctly it took a little over a minute to get going again last time I rebooted. That was an extra "Sanity Check" reboot after installing Vista SP1 RC1 to make sure nothing new & odd showed up in the logs.

6061

Living Room / Re: Windows XP SP3 due for release .... (don't hold your breath)

« on: April 23, 2008, 06:23 AM »

Hopefully they have sorted out the SP2 TCPIP.SYS stupid security fix (ie. limit outgoing TCPIP connections to 10). If not does anyone know if the widely available patch/hack works with SP3 too as without that it makes using Torrents pretty well  impossible?

-Carol Haynes (April 23, 2008, 06:10 AM)

The only time I've run into this as an issue was part of a network scanner I'm currently working on. If there were a block of dead addresses it would tend to stall for ~15sec about every ~20 Addys. I stopped doing a WSACleanup() on the dead socket (null...) instances and just set them to null. Not only did the problem go away but the app quit throttling the processor during the scan. Now it runs at a consistant speed on everything from Win2k all the way up to Server 2008.

6062

Living Room / Re: Windows XP SP3 due for release .... (don't hold your breath)

« on: April 23, 2008, 06:11 AM »

It's going to be downloadable from MS on the 29th so is there any point downloading a dubious copy from a dubious source ?

-Carol Haynes (April 23, 2008, 05:34 AM)

100% agreed

Incidentally when it is released can you slipstream it to an SP2 disc or do you need an original XP disc to slipstream?

I've found it to be a best practice not to slipstream an image twice. We've all heard the horror stories about bad disk image install failures. I always keep a vanilla image stored, SS it once, burn it slow (6x or less), and I've never had an image fail. <- Now watch me blow this next one...)

I've got MSDN access, so I can try to do some testing in VPC this weekend if I have time.
[/quote]

6063

Living Room / Re: Home Network Recommendations?

« on: April 16, 2008, 05:08 PM »

WHS works just fine for that, and is as close to a set & forget setup as you can get.

-Stoic Joker (April 16, 2008, 06:19 AM)

If you read the reviews at Amazon you will see that WHS is great when it works but the unfixed bug mentioned in the first MS KB article also affects the backup routine. I guess if you are lucky then it works fine but if you install it and find you are one of the affected people you have basically but a lot of rubbish (until it gets fixed).

The bug has been mentioned in these forums before but there is widespread dissatisfaction on the web with MS's response to the bug. In any other system it would be deemed critical and get fixed quick - even by their own estimates it is going to be at least 6 months from acknowledging the fault before it is likely to see a solution. Pretty indefensible in any operating system but for a server it makes it useless until it is fixed.

-Carol Haynes (April 16, 2008, 08:31 AM)

From the MS KB Article you posted.

Note Windows Home Server-based computers that have a single hard drive are not affected by this issue, nor are Windows Home Server Computer Backup and Restore capabilities, Health Monitoring, and Remote Access functionality. This issue is specific to Windows Home Server and does not affect other Windows Server-based products.

So a single disk system wil work just fine, and the reviews at Amazon are writter by End Users ... and should therefore be taken with a grain of salt. I'll wager that over 90% of the ones that "Lost all their files", caused the problem by panicking. <-I see this kind of crap in the field daily...)

6064

Living Room / Re: Home Network Recommendations?

« on: April 16, 2008, 06:19 AM »

I don't use WHS currently, but I was in on the Beta testing.

Any time you are sharing files, you have a chance of running into file locking issues. So it really depends on how you use WHS as to whether or not that bugg applies.

If all your files are centrally stored, then you must have a fast network to access them at anything other than agonizingly slow. On the other hand, if they're on your local machine's drive access is quite zippy (can't get any faster than right there)...and backups are the only issue. WHS works just fine for that, and is as close to a set & forget setup as you can get.

6065

General Software Discussion / Re: Vista Aero vs. Linux Compiz

« on: April 15, 2008, 05:32 PM »

Christ on a cracker ... I'm not even sure what topic to stay on at this point.

However...

As I'm apparently the only truly happy Vista user in the thread, I do have to say that Compiz win the eye-candy contest IMO.

But the purpose of the Vista desktop is not eye-candy, the purpose is that each rendered window is a independent 3D object that can be loaded, unloaded, manipulated & rendered in any size or location without affecting the underlying application. The pre-Vista bitmap rendered windows are/were nowhere near as forgiving or flexible. The eve-candy in Vista is just there to entertain the "kids".

I'm still doing battle with Slackware (sound) amongst other projects, because I see value in being familiar with thing *niX ... but I'm a Windows guy with no intention of switching.

To zridling I say thank you for sharing an interesting bit of information that I enjoyed.

6066

Living Room / Re: Do you collect anything?

« on: April 09, 2008, 06:21 AM »

Hm... (no particular order):

Guns
Knives
Stuffed Animals (as in teddy bears, not things that have been killed)
Applications
Operating Systems
Source Code
"art" (as zridling mentioned)
Computers (Captain Obvious strikes again...)
Misc Junk (We just moved, so I'm a bit low...)

That's all I can think of at the moment.

6067

Developer's Corner / Re: Latest Jeff Atwood (Coding Horror) Column: UI-First Software Development

« on: April 08, 2008, 05:57 AM »

I'm going to add that I suggest using Mockup Screens for the same reason as the developer.

"2. Why does MockupScreens create sketches instead of "real" screens?

Showing the life-looking prototype to the customer or managers can spell disaster. They will percieve "almost finished" application and you can't say or do anything to explain otherwise. The easiest way to avoid this is to have mockups that clearly don't look even close to the real thing."

-Mockup Screens - Frequently Asked Questions

-tinjaw (April 04, 2008, 05:34 AM)

I've gotten burned on this one myself.  Just because it looks like a duck, walks like a duck, & quacks like a duck ... Doesn't mean it's a complete duck.

6068

General Software Discussion / Re: Evaluate Server 2008 Enterprise for 240 days

« on: April 07, 2008, 10:20 PM »

(Installing a server OS as a workstation is not for me, but... aren't people aloud to experiment? Didn't you, ahem, install Slackware recently... Complexity for the sake of itself spinning out of control? And, well if the 240 days are too long of a trial, well it's not any body's fault, it's MS's. It's not piracy AFAIC. Or is it? Sheesh.)

-Armando (April 07, 2008, 07:00 PM)

Am I experimenting with Slackware? Yes, it's a workstation OS and I'm exploring it as such. I've also connected it to my Server 208 Server ... Which is a server OS that is running as a server. If people want to experiment with a server OS then they should try to figure out how to use it properly in the function it was designed for.  Instead of trying to Monster Garage it into something it was never intended to be.

Slackware only appears complex because it's unfamiliar, however it is being used for its intended purpose. I was merely agreeing with f0dder that licensing for server apps pointlessly over complicates their usage as a workstation.

6069

General Software Discussion / Re: Evaluate Server 2008 Enterprise for 240 days

« on: April 07, 2008, 06:02 PM »

I still wonder if there's much use in doing the server->workstation thing, though.

-f0dder (April 06, 2008, 09:54 AM)

I quit wondering about that after I decided it was a completely retarded excuse to pirate an OS that no one in their right mind would pay $700 for just to run it as a "Workstation".

Also keep in mind that some products require more expensive licenses if you want to run them on a server OS, and some of the free antivirus products will refuse to install.

Complexity for the sake of itself spinning out of control, etc, etc, etc.

...I honestly cringe every time I see this brought up.

6070

Living Room / Re: Flash Animation - Walk in the Woods

« on: April 05, 2008, 11:11 PM »

*Shrug* ...I laughed.

6071

General Software Discussion / Re: Linspire Inc. (Rant) [Explicit Language]

« on: April 04, 2008, 06:13 AM »

You could set up a filter that reacts to their emails by automatically sending 101 separate support request every time it arrives. Point out that they will be unsubscribed from your replies when they cut out their emails.

-Carol Haynes (April 04, 2008, 05:30 AM)

Now that sounds joyfully evil...

He should make sure it's a reply so their current news letter is "attached" as proof of receipt and CC the whole shebang to any and all Email address that can be culled from their website.  That should provoke a response of some kind.

I once used a caller ID program with a block list to allow my modem to answer any "marketing" calls I got tired of. While the company still wanted me called, their staff got tired of the carrier signal through a headset earpiece game (it held the line open for 30sec) and removed me for them...

6072

General Software Discussion / Re: Memory Address Space

« on: April 03, 2008, 06:21 AM »

May not be exactly what you're looking for, but this might be close.

http://www.tmurgent.com/Tool_ATM.aspx

6073

General Software Discussion / Re: How to kill Vista's search indexer and save your HD

« on: April 03, 2008, 06:17 AM »

Sick of your HD spinning and churning nonstop day after day, driving you nuts?

-zridling (April 01, 2008, 01:04 PM)

I would be if it happened, but I've yet to see it. After the initial install Vista will have to build the indexes from scratch and that can make for a rather active period, but once it's done it's done. The index updates are reasonably transparent...unless you're fixated on the HDD activity light willing it to stay off. There is no constant thrashing of activity.

On machines with slower disks, if there is a lot of file movement/changes/updates it could leave the indexing service playing catch-up on a regular basis ... but that's not Vista or the indexing systems fault.

I've seen performance tweaks involving either tuning or disabling the indexer as far back as Win2000, and I've plaved with most of them. However I've yet to see any of them produce a noticable impact on performance.

6074

General Software Discussion / Re: Cause of Vista crashes

« on: March 31, 2008, 10:17 PM »

If you don't have any problems with your current WHQL Certified driver ... you don't need to update. Let the hard core gamer crowd play at the razor edge of frame rates and the like, I don't have time for that kind of silliness.

6075

General Software Discussion / Re: Cause of Vista crashes

« on: March 31, 2008, 06:57 PM »

Stoic Joker: remember that SATA supports hot-plug... that's why the drives are added there. Might not be the smartest thing in the world, but lots of stuff isn't . I think intel drivers used to do it, too, but my drives aren't listed in the safely-remove list now, so perhaps I was wrong, or it has auto-"fixed" itself.

-f0dder (March 31, 2008, 06:34 PM)

Hm... I was under the impression it was more of a SCSI style hot swap-able type of affair. I hadn't realized they went the USB style hot plug route with it (Shit what a nightmare...).

Never the less, there's no right way to eject the C: drive while the machine is running. Unless you're trying to crash the machine for fun ... which I tried (successfully...) on some of the boxes that came through the shop.

I got an Intel ICH8 RAID5 controller on this board (Asus Commando) and I've never seen the eject the USB device Drive C: message on it. Or any other SATA RAID configuration except for the nForce stuff. Perhapps nVidia is just a bit to gadget-tastic for their own good?