Recent Posts

1626

General Software Discussion / Re: Affinity (Serif) goes head to head with Photoshop & (maybe) Illustrator

« Last post by tomos on December 08, 2016, 04:01 PM »

Seems that 'Photo' for windows is about to be launched. It's being offered for sale at any rate:
https://affinity.sto...s/buy/windows/photo/
(again at an introductory offer of 10$ less until december 22)

FWIW I downloaded the beta but never got to try it.

1627

Living Room / Re: Guide to Living with Introverts

« Last post by tomos on December 08, 2016, 03:52 PM »

I agree with this cartoon, and here's a way to see if someone is worth cultivating...

Me: Ask me if I'm a policeman
Friend Who Should Know Better:  Are you a policeman?
Me: No.
Friend Who Should Know Better:  Uh?
Me: [Hysterical laughter]

I've met about seven people in three years who understand that, so my circle of acquaintances is not large.

-fredemeister (December 08, 2016, 03:43 PM)

I'm possibly not worth aquainting then ;-)
although I'd ask 'Why?' rather than 'are you...'

1628

Living Room / Re: Monitors - Resources - Recommendations

« Last post by tomos on December 08, 2016, 02:00 PM »

2x Samsung 17" and 1x Sony 17" LCD 4:3 monitors still in service after 11 years. Also 1x LG 21" 16:9 in service for 9 years.

-Shades (December 08, 2016, 06:07 AM)

just checked: my Dell 2209WA is seven years old end of December. To my eye, looks as good as it ever did (which is very good, but with some uneven lighting at the edges if you look closely with a grey screen).

1629

Living Room / Re: Thank you Donationcoder!

« Last post by tomos on December 08, 2016, 01:56 PM »

Great 

1630

Living Room / Re: Monitors - Resources - Recommendations

« Last post by tomos on December 08, 2016, 03:42 AM »

sometimes things do go right (with computers). very glad to hear that you got a good piece of hardware, Innuendo.

-nudone (June 14, 2010, 04:35 AM)

Thanks for that, nudone. The monitor is always component I always have the most anxiety about when the time to replace comes. I'm still keeping a watchful eye as I hear sometimes dead/stuck pixels will develop in the first days/weeks of ownership.

-Innuendo (June 14, 2010, 09:24 PM)

came across this thread when searching for something else:
enjoyed re-reading your longer post above Innuendo about changing monitors -
and wondering what you're using today, six and a half years on

1631

Living Room / Re: Thank you Donationcoder!

« Last post by tomos on December 07, 2016, 02:53 PM »

Best of luck Josh!
(Lovely letter and cup)

1632

General Software Discussion / Re: should I be using a VPN? why? what about the recent deals?

« Last post by tomos on December 07, 2016, 09:05 AM »

Companies like Windscribe in Canada (a new company that made a splash) and VPN Unlimited seem to have specials along the usage of one year at $20 or lifetime at $40.

-Steven Avery (October 13, 2016, 02:20 AM)

happened across this offer on Techradar -- no idea if it still valid or not -- the article is 14 days old
Get 50GB free VPN bandwidth [Windscribe] every month for life
(Normally free version is 10GB)

1633

General Software Discussion / Re: New PDF editor: FlexiPDF from SoftMaker

« Last post by tomos on December 07, 2016, 05:10 AM »

^ Thanks Martin for clearing that up

If you don't like the EU VAT regime, we are the wrong place to complain about.

-SoftMaker (December 07, 2016, 04:36 AM)

I can understand you getting defensive about it, but Softmaker were logically the place to start. At least we now know how the system works, thanks to your detailed post
I dont envy anyone having to deal with all those different sales taxes...

1634

General Software Discussion / Re: desktop shortcut to execute a keyboard shortcut

« Last post by tomos on December 06, 2016, 02:38 AM »

This is so neat I may have to do a pictorial or a video.

-Steven Avery (December 05, 2016, 10:29 PM)

that would be great

1635

Living Room / Re: Interesting "stuff"

« Last post by tomos on December 06, 2016, 02:32 AM »

This tablet is perfect for paper lovers

-Arizona Hot (December 05, 2016, 09:59 PM)

Odd there's zero info in text form, (not even a name), and no links for the relevant tablet.
I see it only has 4 views. Is it your upload?

1636

General Software Discussion / Re: cursor over image makes image blank out...why?

« Last post by tomos on December 05, 2016, 12:36 PM »

Ctrl+Shift+A will show your addons in PaleMoon.

FWIW, videos not playing smoothly could also be related to your internet connection.

1637

Found Deals and Discounts / Re: Paragon Hard Disk Manager Pro 50% off at BDJ

« Last post by tomos on December 05, 2016, 11:44 AM »

. . . an intermittent motherboard problem forced me to replace my primary desktop system before I had planned to. Win7 Pro 64-bit to a VMware virtual machine. The whole process was point & click simple and worked the first time without a hitch.  I didn't even have to reactivate Windows in the VM, although that could be a fluke. My only complaint is that it didn't have an option for a split file VM, which I prefer for portability.

This is not the first time I have done a P2V with Paragon HDM Pro -- a few years ago, I converted my last working XP system to a VM, which I still use occasionally for some older software, but I was still surprised at how easy the whole process has become in the current version of HDM Pro.

A few years ago, Paragon changed their backup file format to a proprietary compressible virtual machine, which HDM PRo can convert to any of the virtual machine formats they support. That means that, if you regularly back up your system by imaging the system partition with Paragon software and save the backup files, you can, in theory, always resurrect a dead system or a previous version to a working VM in any of those virtualization environments.

-xtabber (December 05, 2016, 07:10 AM)

thanks for that
sounds good

Probably means a new version is about to come, usually happens just outside the 3 month free upgrade period they give 

-4wd (December 05, 2016, 12:10 AM)

so it'll probably be full price or more in the end. How to get hooked in...

1638

Found Deals and Discounts / Re: Paragon Hard Disk Manager Pro 50% off at BDJ

« Last post by tomos on December 04, 2016, 11:59 PM »

Anyone with expereince of P2V:
would I be able to create an image of my current install (Windows 7) and add it as a virtual machine to another machine, say when I move to a new one, say with Windows 10?

-tomos (December 04, 2016, 02:30 PM)

It was long enough ago that I'm not sure what Windows versions were involved (though I can guarantee that the new host for the VM was not Win 8 or newer), so I'm not sure how relevant my experience would be today.  But I did this kind of thing and it worked well enough.  I think the machine I turned into a VM was a WinXP machine.  I am sure it didn't have GPT partitions, just MBR partitions.

Again - it was long enough ago that I wouldn't feel right saying you'll have no problems. But it did work for me.

I'm sure that it goes without saying that you should not decommission the old machine until you've verified that things are working...

-mwb1100 (December 04, 2016, 11:32 PM)

thanks

I invested in the end:
machine getting older, windows 7 still running very well though, with some very old software. So the P2V might be worth a try at some stage.

1639

Found Deals and Discounts / Re: Paragon Hard Disk Manager Pro 50% off at BDJ

« Last post by tomos on December 04, 2016, 04:44 PM »

Never mind, got it working [user error ]

-tomos (December 04, 2016, 04:34 PM)

it's one of those nights:
got the paypal button working, but now BDJ are insisting I give their password, with no option for reporting lost password.
Just ignore me ;-)

I give up -- I dont remember this being so difficult before (I've no login info in lastpass for BDJ), but it's late and I tired, and their 'or' choices are confusing.

1640

Found Deals and Discounts / Re: Paragon Hard Disk Manager Pro 50% off at BDJ

« Last post by tomos on December 04, 2016, 04:34 PM »

Tomos - I had to use Internet Explorer to get the link to work. Then I washed my hands.

-x16wda (December 04, 2016, 04:32 PM)

hmm, thanks, unfortunately didnt work in IE, FF or PaleMoon here...
Never mind, got it working [user error ]

1641

Found Deals and Discounts / Re: Paragon Hard Disk Manager Pro 50% off at BDJ

« Last post by tomos on December 04, 2016, 04:31 PM »

BDJ seems to be broken :-/
Paypal button doesnt work in three different browsers.
Unable to login with facebook. I appear to have registered at some stage, somehow got logged in with no password, maybe lastpass did it, but have it setup to not login automatically. Weird.
Giving up (sleep calls / up early)

1642

General Software Discussion / Re: cursor over image makes image blank out...why?

« Last post by tomos on December 04, 2016, 02:59 PM »

with which software? and OS info might be helpful

1643

Found Deals and Discounts / Re: Paragon Hard Disk Manager Pro 50% off at BDJ

« Last post by tomos on December 04, 2016, 02:30 PM »

Anyone with expereince of P2V:
would I be able to create an image of my current install (Windows 7) and add it as a virtual machine to another machine, say when I move to a new one, say with Windows 10?

1644

General Software Discussion / Re: Affinity (Serif) goes head to head with Photoshop & (maybe) Illustrator

« Last post by tomos on December 01, 2016, 02:21 PM »

The 40 euro (€39.99) offer for Affinity Designer (vector software), ends in about two and a half hours.
This not a recommendation (read thread above if you're unsure, but considering).
Goes up to 50 euros (49.99) after that. Not sure of US$ prices.

1645

General Software Discussion / Re: Total Commander v9.00 Public Betas

« Last post by tomos on November 30, 2016, 02:30 PM »

A developer with serious ego problems, I might add.

-Tuxman (November 30, 2016, 12:42 PM)

if you want to stir the shit like that, please do it elsewhere

1646

Living Room / Re: silly humor - post 'em here! [warning some NSFW and adult content]

« Last post by tomos on November 29, 2016, 02:05 PM »

I've never actually listened to this entire song or seen the entire video, but someone said it sounds like she says "Do you think you're better? ROFLOL!" and now I can't hear anything else:

-Deozaan (November 29, 2016, 01:47 PM)

thanks Deozaan, I finally know how to pronounce that

1647

General Software Discussion / Re: Total Commander v9.00 Public Betas

« Last post by tomos on November 28, 2016, 04:49 PM »

Still ugly as fuck.

-Tuxman (November 28, 2016, 04:34 PM)

if that's your only complaint, we'll take it as highest praise ;-)

1648

Living Room / Re: This time of year I'm reminded how thankful I am for you folks

« Last post by tomos on November 27, 2016, 01:56 PM »

thanks mouser

1649

Living Room / Re: Why Does Everything Have To Be Video?

« Last post by tomos on November 24, 2016, 03:43 PM »

^ hah

wanted to say TL,DW,
but I managed it

1650

Living Room / Re: Why Does Everything Have To Be Video?

« Last post by tomos on November 24, 2016, 02:46 PM »

I think like everything, they have their place - they work someplaces, like app's example above.

Where it gets me is when you're trying to find out about a software, and *all* they offer on the home page is a video after a brainless mini bulleted list. Offering a video is fine, but no reasonably detailed list of features I find terrible. That's usually where I leave the website. I'll come back if someone highly recommends it, or I know I need it.
But I resent watching every minute of that pesky video -- nah :p in fairness watching the video is can be informative, it's just you're not able to pace how fast you take in the info, quickly search for that feature you need.

Once I know I want the software, then videos are really helpful for figuring out the gui etc.

PS thanks mouser for the new thread