Recent Posts

2476

Living Room / Re: Battery Backup - Get One

« Last post by Shades on June 07, 2009, 04:28 PM »

@westom:
After taking a look you were more or less right about reaction times, however I found a schematic (near the bottom of the page) which explains better what I meant. The page I link to is translated by Google, the original is in Dutch.

If you don't want to read, the best reaction time is 1.2 µsec, which is a lot faster than the values you suggest. Then again, in that region of Holland there were only two ways you were without electrical power:
1 - because of your own stupidity (creating a short)
2 - failing/forget to pay the bill

The electrical grid over there is great and is one I sure miss here in Paraguay (where the grid still uses 110 volt and people stare at you sheepishly when talking about grounding and 'noise-free' power without fluctuations). 

2477

Living Room / Re: Battery Backup - Get One

« Last post by Shades on June 07, 2009, 03:19 PM »

In Holland any electrical installation you can think of has to be grounded...by law. Insurance companies don't even pay if your house burns down because of an electrical failure if no proper grounding is in place.

Thunderstorms that form over land have trouble passing over a (significantly) large body of water. When I was living in Holland I leaved in an area with tall trees and three churches (300 meter radius) and next to a channel used as an international shipping lane. Although we didn't have that much storms, the ones that were there stayed for a long time (before those were able to pass over the body of water.

What I can tell you is the it is very impressive to see a church tower getting hit by lightning. One of the church towers was only 40 meters from my house. I cannot remember having any problem in any electrical equipment caused by lightning. And never used devices as UPS.

Now I have to say that electrical installations have circuit breakers that react when too much power goes through them, when they are used for prolonged periods at (near) max capacity and also when the "level" of the ground alters (for example: when you are making a short circuit, but also if the voltage level of the iron pole in the ground changes). The last trick is done with magnetism and works faster than any UPS, MOV or Protector without degrading. These breakers are expensive, will set you back 100 US dollar for a single line that carries 240 Volt and a max of 16 Amp. A house that is fitting for a standard size family in Holland has to have 5 of those (safety regulations).

Don't know if that kind of breakers are available and/or used in the US.  

There is quite some interesting material on the subject of grounding electrical installations from all different types and sizes. And they require quite some mathematical knowledge as well.

2478

General Software Discussion / Re: Can somebady help me with an ISO burning question?

« Last post by Shades on June 06, 2009, 12:07 AM »

Don't know if it is the tool or not, but I always use LCIsocreator to create iso's from (bootable) existing disks. It's a brilliantly simple and small portable app not bigger than 60Kbyte.

The resulting iso's I could burn with Nero 7 which came with my new SATA DVD burner without any problem. However I deinstalled Nero 7, because they didn't learn from the errors in Nero 6. Actaully, it is the same crap, only more of it.

2479

Living Room / Re: Good TV series. What do you watch? I used to watch Lost to unwind need successor

« Last post by Shades on June 05, 2009, 11:50 PM »

Maybe she should start playing different roles...in all the series she played in (that I know (Firefly, Sarah Connor Chronicles) she is a psychosomatic personality.

i think she is so good in that she chases even the "money men" away   

However, I love her work...Firefly FTW!

2480

Living Room / Re: Flight simulator site avsim.com loses 13 years of community data to hacker

« Last post by Shades on June 03, 2009, 08:30 PM »

@phitsc:
Actually, you shouldn't keep the two NAS systems literally next to each other...different parts of the house would be a lot better. What if the room that contains both NAS systems suddenly thinks it has to become an aquarium? No backup and mouser coming to visit and checking all those nice little 'fishies'....  

2481

Living Room / Re: DVD/Extracted DVD File(s) Heat Issue (?) Ack!

« Last post by Shades on June 03, 2009, 08:26 PM »

I would actually say that from all PC's I have repaired here, had problems because of the heat from the GeForce 5000 range. When I replaced the videocard on those machines with any model of GeForce (except the 5000 range) problems would disappear snow for the sun. Those cards are nice for standard office work, but nothing more than that.

Likely your card is passively cooled (without rotating fan), combined with high ambient temperature and reasonable heavy duty processing the card becomes a baking plate in seconds.

Spent some cash and buy a new or secondhand GeForce from the 6000/8000 range or go for ATI Radeon cards. Those are cheap and have quite some 'punch' for their price.

2482

Living Room / Re: Google demonstrates new communication platform "WAVE": mail, chat , wiki, ..

« Last post by Shades on June 01, 2009, 10:08 PM »

After seeing the demo/youtube video, it didn't look that difficult. And I know the real hallmark of a professional is to make whatever he/she is doing appear to look easy...but still.

Concept wise it looks and feels easier in day to day use than having to "get" a mail program in combination with a word processor (or any other part of an office suite)...but that could be me. Then again, some time ago I did spent 2 hours (at least!) to let people grasp the concept of a virtual drive together with their PC game. And those were 16-year old's I'm afraid to add. Some people just don't want to "get" anything more from a computer than the bare essentials required for their work or game. 

2483

General Software Discussion / Re: DVD to iPod Touch in 48 hours

« Last post by Shades on May 31, 2009, 04:07 PM »

From the first day I installed the beta version, Handbrake's conversion worked as expected/advertised. Since then I tried almost each new beta after that and no problem occurred while its functionality increased with each build without sacrificing ease of use.

Super is also very able but if I had to choose...Handbrake FTW!

2484

General Software Discussion / Re: computer repair software

« Last post by Shades on May 28, 2009, 08:47 PM »

I don't know about the amount of PC's it can handle, but the free version of SpiceWorks seems to be a good solution for your problem. As far as I know you can keep a hardware history from each of the PC's that SpiceWorks monitors.

2485

Living Room / Re: Help me build the ultimate metal playlist

« Last post by Shades on May 26, 2009, 10:02 PM »

For speedier metal you could try some songs from 'System of a Down'

Marylin Manson's "Slut garden" is a song with a nice ring to it   ...but it is far from speedy.

Ah well, more of a gothic fan myself (After Forever, NightWish etc.).

Come to think of it, the song "Transitory" from 'After Forever' is kinda speedy.

EDIT:
added song title.

2486

General Software Discussion / Re: Photo Scanner Software

« Last post by Shades on May 24, 2009, 01:46 PM »

There is the problem, there is very little available and most of these option carry a hefty pricetag.

VueScan:
http://www.hamrick.com/vsm.html

PaperPort:
http://www.nuance.com/imaging/products/paperport.asp
Years ago I got an older version (six, I believe) from this software for free on a PC magazine and that worked well with my scanner, YMMV though.

QQScan2Disc:
http://www.topshareware.com/QQScan2Disc-download-61878.htm

SilverFast:
http://www.silverfast.com/

Scanitto:
http://www.masterslabs.com/en/scanitto-pro.html

More alternatives:
http://www.scanhelp.com/


Here is some freeware that may do the trick as well:
FreeKapture:
http://www.freewarefiles.com/FreeKapture_program_32165.html

Scan & Sorteer:
http://www.retsoft.nl/producten.php

EDIT:
Added freeware options

2487

General Software Discussion / Re: Photo Scanner Software

« Last post by Shades on May 24, 2009, 12:48 PM »

Look up your scanner on the VueScan site. And I do understand your pain from using the default HP software.

I used to work with a similar sized and shaped model some 14 years ago. The software was a simple executable which had a basic looking layout and was fast. You could by a hardware device for it in which you could bundle a set of photographs, set the software settings up and the only thing you had to was pushing the start button and wait a little bit.

It was expensive and I don't know if HP still sells such devices for their current crop of scanners.

The funny thing is that my Windows installation is "nLite'd" and internet explorer has been removed. None of the current HP scanning software works without IE, I can tell you that much.

[rant]
Also why an update for scanner software has to be 124 MByte? And the work flow of the HP software has been "stupified" too such a degree it is not funny anymore and there is no option to turn this behavior off. Besides that, the result of scan is stored in several obscure places before it is stored in the default location. After it is copied the file is deleted from the previous storage location.

Why is this mess necessary?

Now I really want to know what the guys and girls and HP were smoking when they created this, maybe then I can see some fun in using their software.
[/rant]

Maybe you can find here what you are looking for:
http://www.twain.org/
http://www.dosadi.com

With the first link you can get a free TWAIN development kit, which includes a very basic tool (Twack) to scan with. But the software is old...to say the least.
The last one is far from free, but it supports script based ADF (Automatic Document Feed) when you have such a unit attached to your scanner.

Both links are more intended for programmers but with a little bit of luck all the tools you require are already there.

2488

DC Gamer Club / Re: Game endings (no spoilers)

« Last post by Shades on May 17, 2009, 04:40 PM »

For me the ending of 'Syndicate' (another ancient game) was the biggest letdown.

Who remembers still how the tube of a CRT television "dies" (especially black-and-white ones) when you turned it off? That is exactly how that game ends. Just a black screen with a fading white dot in the middle.

People that create games should be utterly ashamed for even entertaining the thought of such an ending!!!

2489

General Software Discussion / Re: What's your favorite computer game from when you were young?

« Last post by Shades on May 16, 2009, 01:19 PM »

Myself, I was always amazed about the quality of Turrican (C64) and R-Type (C64). I Spend a lot of time playing those. There was also one game on the C64 that allowed you to command a team of persons (each with different spec's) and fly away into space. Ships you encountered could be fought/traded with/entered etc. Planets and it's cities + houses could be entered and could result in trade, fighting, missions etc. Besides, you could also (strip) mine planets for resources.

2490

Site/Forum Features / Re: Do you know about the Unreplied Topics page on the DC forum?

« Last post by Shades on May 15, 2009, 09:22 PM »

Henceforth...let the 'thread necromancing' begin!!!   

2491

General Software Discussion / Re: Win7, disk imaging, vmware

« Last post by Shades on May 15, 2009, 01:46 PM »

@4wd:
The thought behind my suggestion was that the Paragon software is not required (at least for VMware) to create a VM from a physical PC. So the Paragon software is only useful when converting the other way. To me it seems that the usefulness is kinda limited.

Having said that, what is the major advantage from the 'VM to real' conversion against a fresh install? Pre-installed software like an office suite for example? Or just because one can do it?

Above reasons are perfectly adequate and as long as you have fun with it, what\s the problem?   I'm just curious, because I have found out that it can be real lengthy crime sometimes to find and/or get the correct drivers from older hardware (from people who archived their driver CD's into oblivion).

2492

General Software Discussion / Re: Win7, disk imaging, vmware

« Last post by Shades on May 14, 2009, 11:06 PM »

@4wd:
Probably a year ago I downloaded and used a free tool from VMware that is able to take a normal PC and turn it into a virtual machine for VMware. The wizard that comes with this software really works. Would you be able to tell me which are the possibilities of conversion from the Paragon suite?

Since my experience with Virtual PC's is not that extensive and most of that knowledge is based on the (free) VMware server product, I cannot say if the VMware alternatives also supply a similar product or that these alternatives can convert/read a VM created by a different VM manufacturer (although I keep hearing good stories from VirtualBox).

[rant]
By the way, do not try the free VMware server 2.x, I did and besides losing 150MByte of RAM just to run the web-based server interface (thanks to Java's http server: Tomcat) it also states that if you change existing VM's to a higher version, rendering these VM's useless on anything lower than VMware server 2.x!  Although this VM "upgrade" is not required, it is recommended by the software.

None of my 8 perfectly functioning VM's (in VMware server 1.x) was able to initiate using VMware server 2.x. [/rant]

2493

Found Deals and Discounts / Re: Get a free copy of Speedball 2

« Last post by Shades on May 13, 2009, 12:01 AM »

Back to the Amiga days...:-)

At least there is where I encountered the game for the first time in a top down view to kick some ass and play with the balls of steel, listening to sounds the characters and the ice-cream vendor in the public.  Ice cream!!!  Brilliant comment in this game. Don't know how it is with this version but we will see after the download.

Thanks gexecuter....come to think of it, lose th g from your forum name and you have a good character name for this game 

2494

Living Room / Re: 'PortableUbuntu for Windows' question

« Last post by Shades on May 11, 2009, 10:23 PM »

Finally!!! My other partitions are accessible as well. 

Stupid mistake on my side with reading too quickly...but I am happy that it works now.

2495

Living Room / Re: 'PortableUbuntu for Windows' question

« Last post by Shades on May 11, 2009, 08:03 PM »

Super fast it isn't, but it runs ok on my P4 3GHz 1GByte RAM SATA2 harddrive. Especially when going full screen the speed drops. It is very handy when you have a virus that is not deletable in Windows...PortableUbuntu does not care and will remove the file no matter what. For that reason alone it should be in every computer technician's digital toolbox.

For me it is mainly a test environment...to see if I really like Linux enough to jump that ship or continue on the ship with so many leaks that it should be called a submarine. (on my desktop, I mean.) 

Till now the experience is actually good, except that I cannot access any of my Windows partitions (except for C:\) through any of the file-managers in Ubuntu.

2496

Living Room / Re: 'PortableUbuntu for Windows' question

« Last post by Shades on May 10, 2009, 09:50 PM »

To answer my own question:

'sudo passwd root' in a console did the trick of changing the root password, which in turn allowed me to login as root and I was able to edit the fstab file. 

But somehow I couldn't get my other partitions mounted. Because this piece of software is based on co-linux I decided to visit their forum as well. The PortableUbuntu forum is mainly filled with questions without answers and following the examples from the co-linux forum one didn't result in me being able to mount different partitions. 

Ah well, we learn as we go... 

2497

Living Room / Re: partitioning first time - checklist (cleaning, backup, tools, etc)

« Last post by Shades on May 10, 2009, 06:03 PM »

Not really (wikipedia)

2498

Living Room / Re: My (Somewhat Realistic) Dream PC - Is it necessary?

« Last post by Shades on May 10, 2009, 05:59 PM »

Don't know for sure as I do not speak of experience, but when comparing with 7200RPM drives, do 10000RPM and/or 15000RPM drives generate a lot more noise? Or a higher pitched noise (more "penetrating" effect)?

2499

Living Room / 'PortableUbuntu for Windows' question

« Last post by Shades on May 10, 2009, 02:26 PM »

Hello all,


After seeing this PortableUbuntu software on LifeHacker I downloaded it and am a happy user since.

However, I am moving to a new hard drive which has 12 times the capacity of my old one...and I decided to partition the new drive into 5 pieces. Partition C is dedicated to contain 'Windows' and 'swapfile', partition D is for all 'Program Files', partition E is for data like 'Documents and Settings' etc.

PortableUbuntu sees only the first partition (C:\) and the Ubuntu forums tell me that I have to edit the 'portable_ubuntu.conf' file first and 'fstab' file second. Editing the conf file was not a problem, the fstab file is. Since this file is stored in an image file, PortableUbuntu has to run and locks it. Now I thought to use 'su' and 'sudo' to upscale my rights to root level to see if I had any possibility to override/disable/sneak past the lock.

There seems to be no root level or I am already on it. PortableUbuntu has only one user defined (pubuntu) and it is not possible to add one (using the GUI at least). When I open a console the text before the cursor shows which user is logged on and that is (by default) pubuntu. The forums tell me that this pubuntu is a user with root privileges.

My question is, how do I change the fstab file?

2500

General Software Discussion / Re: RAMdisk on XP 32bit - brainstorming!

« Last post by Shades on May 08, 2009, 11:13 PM »

Was there not one that came with Windows XP itself?

It seems there is, but its limited to 64Mbyte. However following this link will lead to a blog describing a much nicer (free) product without limits and working on any version from Windows 2000 and up. So does this link but then from another product.

Ooops, just saw that 4wd was faster than me with posting.