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3576
Living Room / Re: TrueCrypt is Now Abandonware?!
« Last post by Deozaan on May 30, 2014, 03:04 AM »
Then I think I still was mostly right, but somehow missed that important detail. I think the developer did what he felt was the morally right thing by making sure nobody would use his abandonware security software since security is an ongoing process and just the fact that it is no longer being developed will make it insecure relatively quickly.
3577
Living Room / Re: TrueCrypt is Now Abandonware?!
« Last post by Deozaan on May 30, 2014, 02:37 AM »
I don't get what the big deal is. It seems pretty simple to me:

1. The developer of TrueCrypt has decided it is no longer worth continuing development since every modern OS supports hard drive encryption natively, making TrueCrypt redundant. Use the OS's native encryption instead of TrueCrypt. That's what this means:

The development of TrueCrypt was ended in 5/2014 after Microsoft terminated support of Windows XP. Windows 8/7/Vista and later offer integrated support for encrypted disks and virtual disk images

To reiterate: It means that TrueCrypt filled a need in XP because XP didn't support encrypted disks (or at least not to the extent that TrueCrypt provided). But now that Windows XP is a "dead" OS, everybody (who uses Windows) should be on Vista or newer. Vista or newer all support encrypted disks, so use the OS's integrated encryption.

That's why it gives so much detail on how to enable encryption on the OS level (BitLocker or whatever it's called).

2. Since 7.2 is the final release of TrueCrypt, that means that this latest version (7.2) will be the last update of TrueCrypt that people will be able to find on the internet. As such, 5 years from now when 7.2 is still the "latest version" and security flaws are found or encryption breaking/cracking schemes advance enough to make breaking the encryption in TrueCrypt trivial, people should be aware that it is not a secure program. In other words, TrueCrypt is no less secure in 7.2 than it was in 7.1a. It just has a warning now about its inevitable insecurity in the future.

Or, in other words, to avoid having to release an update in a few years when TrueCrypt truly is no longer secure due to not being developed, the developer just put one in there right now so he can be done with it.

To put it yet another way, the developer can feel like he is being morally responsible by putting that warning in there now so that he won't feel accountable for the actions of some idiot who in X years tries to use it while thinking that encryption is magical security.

Of course, I'm no security expert. I could be wrong about all this. But that's how I see it from reading the warning.
3578
How does an alarm track the quality of your sleep?

How does the Fit Bit track the quality of your sleep?

From what I can tell, it just keeps track of how much/often you move in your sleep. Any pedometer/gyroscope/motion sensor can do the same thing.
3579
As far as I can tell, the Fit Bit really is just a pedometer with an alarm... And Bluetooth.

It's the bluetooth that allows it to be "a whole lot more" but not really. The "whole lot more" comes from an app on your phone or your PC. The Fit Bit is still essentially just a pedometer with an alarm.

And as I said, my smartphone can count my steps and wake me up, and track my elevation, and talk to an app to show me stats and record my movement and everything the Fit Bit can do.

And while your watch thing certainly looks like it does a lot more than the Fit Bit, I heard there was an update to iOS that made the iPhone waterproof (;)) so your purchase may have been in vain. :P
3580
http://www.fitbit.com/one

$100 for a pedometer with an alarm? :o

I already have a device that can do all that and more. It's called a smartphone.
3581
Living Room / Re: Programmers: What size monitors do you guys prefer?
« Last post by Deozaan on May 26, 2014, 01:43 PM »
My previous monitor is 25"-26" (I think it was advertised as 25" when I bought it but the model number (which often indicates the size) includes the numbers 266 in it) at 1920x1200, and I wish I had a little more space, so I'm not sure I'd be satisfied with a larger monitor (27") with a smaller resolution (1920x1080). That's why I'm thinking the 27" 2560x1440 monitors will hit just the right spot.
3582
Thanks for taking the time and effort to compile this newsletter!
3583
Living Room / Re: Movies or films you've seen lately
« Last post by Deozaan on May 26, 2014, 01:27 PM »
I recently saw (the last half or so of) War of the Buttons on Netflix. It's a French flick with sometimes humorous/confusing errors in the subtitles. The story takes place in France during the WW2 Nazi era and is about some kids from two small, neighboring villages who essentially have a relatively harmless "turf war" in which each gang of kids tries to prove the superiority of their village over the other by outwitting the rival gang.

There's also a deeper theme about the adults dealing with the German occupation of France and the anti-semitic behavior (even among the French), with Jews being hauled away or going into hiding. I wasn't aware that even the French were involved in hauling the Jews away, so that aspect of the history told in this story was new to me.

But it's actually somewhat of a heartwarming/endearing story by the end of it, with a slightly bittersweet ending.

I guess maybe IMDB is better at summarizing it than I am:

In occupied France, Lebrac leads a play war between two rival kid gangs, but his feelings for Violette, a Jewish girl in danger of being discovered by the Nazis, encourage Lebrac to face the reality of what's happening around him.
3584
General Software Discussion / Re: Ludum Dare topic for other games
« Last post by Deozaan on May 26, 2014, 12:01 PM »
I was actually intending the other LD29 thread I created to also include posts about other LD29 games, and not just my own participation in the event. But before I had a chance to make a post about some of the other cool games I'd found (since I basically slept for 36 hours after LD29 ended) you had already created this thread. (c:

All that to say that--at least in my opinion--I don't think it hurts to post a lot about Underminer here. Though I suppose it also wouldn't hurt to create a new dedicated thread to your analyses and tips and tricks for it either. :Thmbsup:
3585
Any update on this, mouser?

I've been experiencing the same issue on my single display setup since I switched to using a 4K TV as my "monitor". Somewhere during the process of having the display sleep and wake up, the resolution seems to get changed temporarily (I never see it lowered). So when the display wakes up, all my windows are crowded/resized toward the top left of the screen.

I'm connecting using HDMI.
3586
In-Home Streaming is now out of beta and available for everyone.

And if it wasn't mentioned previously, one of the nice additional benefits of the In-Home Streaming feature is that you can now be signed into your Steam account on multiple PCs at the same time. This means you can also download games/updates to multiple PCs at the same time.  :Thmbsup:

(Or you can just play remotely, so that you don't need to download the game(s) on the second PC at all...)
3587
Living Room / Re: Ladar Levinson article at the Guardian
« Last post by Deozaan on May 23, 2014, 05:42 PM »
It's a really scary story on many levels. )c:
3588
Living Room / Re: Programmers: What size monitors do you guys prefer?
« Last post by Deozaan on May 23, 2014, 05:26 PM »
with the new one being so large, do you find its like in your face?  which can be uncomfortable.

I did feel it was a little bit too close. I thought I had scooted it back as far on my desk as it would go (which isn't very far because my desk has a printer stand (or something) on it) but I just checked and I was able to move it a few inches farther back. It feels a lot more comfortable now, though I still turn and tilt my head slightly to see all the corners. (But I'm sure I'd turn my head if I had a dual monitor setup as well.)

This "problem" with having to turn/tilt my head is exacerbated somewhat by the fact that I am now far enough away from the screen that things start to get a little blurry. This means that I have to wear my glasses (which I usually don't wear at home, since most of the time when I'm at home I don't need to see far distances). So the top of the screen is not within the viewing frame of my glasses, so I have to tilt my head upward somewhat to see the top of the screen clearly.

I'm worried this might cause issues for me as I tend to get headaches when I wear my glasses for too long.

Basically, in order for me to sit far back enough for the TV to be a comfortable distance where I can view all parts of the screen by only moving my eyes instead of my head, I'm no longer close enough to comfortably reach my keyboard and mouse. This could be fixed with a different desk, or wireless keyboard and mouse setup, but those solutions each have their own drawbacks (such as cost or convenience) and I'd still need to wear my glasses while using the computer.

I tried to find a 4K 'rated' TV/Monitor like this one, locally, but the 'smallest' I found so far are 55". And Amazon doesn't ship this cutie to EU :(

@Deozaan:
I am a bit worried about the refresh/flickering at 30 Hz; is that in any way noticeable? I can be quite tiring if the screen is flickering, even when hardly noticeable.
Though technically our 50 Hz AC frequency shouldn't interfere in any way with the 30 Hz of the screen, I'm not convinced until it's actually tested and proven :huh:

I haven't noticed any flickering on the display at all. This was something that worried me as well, as I've been very sensitive to flickering on CRT displays in the past. Thought honestly, I can't remember if it was ever a problem for me on LCDs. But that could be because every LCD I've used had a good refresh rate, though I think perhaps it's a difference between the display technologies of CRT and LCD/LED.

But anyway, as I said, no problems at all with flickering at the lower refresh rate. And as I said before, the viewing angles are really nice. It's been a real pleasure to look at this thing. :-D

I recently had the 'pleasure' to use a 32" monitor from Dell that ran at 3840x2160 for a couple of days and I must say, I prefer to have multiple monitors.
Even though my RDP sessions at 1920x1200 only took up a quarter of the screen I just found it harder to manage my windows.
I seemed to just end up with everything on the either the left or the right (why doesn't windows 7 have a built in horizontal snap).
Plus I had to crank the DPI right up to the max to make the text bearable to read.

I'm experiencing some of these feelings as well. There is so much space that I almost don't know what to do with it. I'm still trying to tweak the settings to get things to display to my liking. I've had to go into accessibility settings to increase the size of the mouse cursor, because I'd have a hard time locating it, or I'd lose it while moving it across the screen. I also had to increase my mouse movement speed and acceleration settings so that it didn't take so long to get across the screen. I've also increased the text size for everything, and often press ctrl-+ in my browser to increase font sizes there as well. And I made the start menu/task bar larger (disabling the "Use small icons" option) for the first time in forever because it was a little difficult to accurately get my mouse over the right window. This somewhat defeats the purpose of all that extra room. What's the point of quadrupling the pixels if you also have to increase the size of all the text and windows and everything just to be able to see it?

As for window management, I've installed DisplayFusion which is an application to improve the multi-monitor experience--even though I only have one display connected to my PC right now. It has window management shortcuts and options that help with things, such as hotkeys that move and/or resize windows to certain positions or sizes. It also enables window snapping to the edges of the screen or other windows. I'm currently trialing the "Pro" version of DisplayFusion and I like it enough that I will probably buy it after my trial ends.

Sure, a lot of my previous posts about the TV were extolling its virtues, but to be honest, there are some fairly significant downsides to the TV as well. Some of them may be due to this particular model of TV I'm using (such as the 30Hz refresh rate at >1080p resolutions), or the fact that I'm using a TV rather than a display that was designed to be used as a PC monitor.

Some other downsides I haven't mentioned yet:

Because it's a TV, it's not designed to allow the PC to put the display to sleep after a period of time. That is, the display will sleep after some time when there is no signal to display, but it won't automatically wake up again once the PC starts sending a signal. The TV shuts off and I have to press the power button to turn it back on again. It probably takes the TV about 30 seconds or so from pressing the power button before it displays anything (not counting the Seiki splash screen).

This has the added detriment of repositioning my windows because somewhere along this process, it would seem the resolution gets temporarily changed. So all my windows that I had in the lower or right areas of the monitor are squashed up into the upper left section of the screen, and I have to move all my windows back to the positions I want them in. This is made somewhat easier with some custom hotkeys I defined in DisplayFusion, but it's still an annoyance that I have to face every time I come back to my PC after stepping away long enough for the display to shut off. This has caused me to actually enable a screensaver for the first time in years and leave the display on for a couple of hours before finally shutting off. Whereas in the past I'd often make the screen go blank after 5-10 minutes and have the PC actually shut off the display after another 5-10 minutes.

The colors are strange. The brights are really bright and the darks are really dark. I read in some reviews for the monitor that other people were complaining about the colors, they said that after some adjusting/calibrating the colors were fine. But I don't know exactly how to calibrate the colors. I don't have hardware or software for that. I just know that photos of people look... off. Everything looks a little cartoony or washed out or something.

At this point I'm not convinced I'll really like using this display as a PC monitor, especially if I think about having to deal with the annoyances listed in this and previous posts on a daily basis for the next 5+ years. I'm going to give myself a few more days to try to get used to this display, and if I'm still unsure about it, I'll likely return it and look into getting one of these 27" 2560x1440 monitors, which should give me some extra space but also avoid most, if not all, of problems this TV has. This will also bring the cost of the new monitor back down to what I was originally hoping to pay for a 2nd monitor. And it has the added benefit that if I do need to get a new GPU, I can afford to buy both the 27" monitor and a new GPU for about the same price as this TV cost me.
3589
Living Room / Re: Programmers: What size monitors do you guys prefer?
« Last post by Deozaan on May 23, 2014, 03:08 AM »
What resolution are you running at, deo?

4K resolution, which is four times the pixels of 1080p. Or in other words: 3840x2160 (1920*2 = 3840 and 1080*2 = 2160)

At 39", it's basically like having a 2x2 grid of 19" 1080p monitors. :D

And don't ask me why they call it 4K. There's nothing 4K about it. IMO they should call it 2K since 2160 is just over 2K pixels and for HD they measured by vertical pixels when advertising 1080p.

Now you're going to have to find 4k resolution wallpaper that you like. :)

I already went to VladStudio.com to re-download the majority of my wallpapers at a higher resolution. Sadly, they aren't offered in 4K resolution. So for now I've resorted to the largest images I can get (2880x1800 which is 16:10) with the option to "fill screen but maintain aspect ratio" which means that parts of the images get cut off, but surprisingly they still look pretty good.

How does it work for gaming?  (you knew that one was coming...)

Even though my previous monitor was HD+ (16:10, 1920x1200), this is kind of my first HDTV. I bought an HDTV several years ago when the 19" LCD panels were still about $350. I wasn't willing to get one that small for that price, so I managed to find a fairly cheap CRT that was something like 32" (4:3) and could only handle 720p or 1080i at the best, so not fully HD. It worked alright, but honestly I never really tried much HD gaming on that TV until a couple of months ago when I got a WiiU and Monster Hunter 3 Ultimate. It was not a good experience because I couldn't read the text on the TV. It wasn't a matter of it being too small or me being too far away. It was literally illegible on that TV. So I did try that game again on this TV and even though technically it should look somewhat worse than on a 1080p screen due to having four times as many pixels (thus, the image is scaled at 2x which should result in more jaggies and artifacts, etc.), it's a vast improvement over my old TV and I thought it looked great and it was really nice, as this is also the largest screen of any kind I've ever owned. Console gaming on a big TV is really nice. It's no 70", but I'm perfectly OK with that.

My experience with PC gaming on this TV has been both glorious and frustrating.

The fan on my GPU started acting up a couple of months ago (actually it started acting up about a year or two ago, and only recently started failing almost completely), so it doesn't spin up properly and will often stop spinning entirely for a second or two before attempting to spin up, only to repeat the process again and again and again. This means that my GPU tends to overheat, especially when doing GPU-intensive things such as watching video or playing games. Combine that with the fact that the GPU has to work even harder to push 4 times as many pixels each frame, and it makes for a very hot GPU.

Honestly, I've been pretty busy this week and haven't done much gaming on it. But even before I got this TV I was having to drastically reduce graphical settings to keep games from making my GPU so hot (over 100 C) that my computer would shut down without warning. (I've since installed SpeedFan and set it up to beep at me when my GPU starts getting that hot, so I can alt-tab out of game, or move the camera somewhere less graphically intensive to let the GPU cool down a bit).

But the bad thing about this TV is that it uses an older HDMI standard (and no DisplayPort) which means that it can only run 4K and 2K resolutions at 30Hz refresh rate. This low refresh rate can cause some issues. I tried out CS:GO at 4K at max settings for a few minutes just to see how it ran. It was nice. But screen tearing always bothers me, so I enabled V-Sync (which limited the FPS to 30) and it made the mouse movement feel lagged. Even in the menu/UI, I'd move the mouse and wouldn't see the cursor update the position right away, so I'd often overshoot when going for a button on the UI, and go right past it. It was very difficult to play the game with that kind of delayed input.

I played an older game called Majesty 2 at full settings (with shadows turned down one notch, since somehow that made things go from super choppy to super smooth even though I couldn't tell any visual difference between the two settings). It's pretty awesome to see it so big and pristine. But there was one big problem! The UI didn't scale with the resolution. So all the UI seemed super tiny on the borders of the screen. It plays like an RTS, so unit information will be at the bottom, with action/build shortcuts in the bottom right corner, minimap and related functions in the bottom left corner, some special use items in the top left corner, and game speed controls and menus in the top right corner. They were so small, it felt like a real chore having to move my mouse cursor all the way across the screen to press the icons. It made me really wish there were more hotkeys for all the different actions.

Here's a screenshot of what I'm talking about. It's hard to even see any UI on the top of the screen of the smaller preview of the image.

It's hard to express it properly. The UI actually isn't tiny. It's the size it always was on my 1920x1200 monitor. But it is tiny relative to everything else. And there's so much space between everything, there's so much distance that my mouse or eyes have to travel to see or click the pertinent information that it's kind of annoying. I'd rather it all sort of hug the top center and bottom center of the screen instead of being docked to the corners.

I've also been playing a lot of Dungeon Defenders lately, and... I have to say that local multiplayer is where this thing really shines! As I said, it's like having four 19" 1080p monitors. So 2-4 players on the screen at once, splitscreen, is awesome! (Interestingly, I have VSync enabled in DD as well, but I haven't noticed any input lag)

Or if the game can be played well entirely with a controller (such as Dark Souls), the cable on my Xbox 360 Controller (for Windows) is so long that I can go sit or lay on my couch and play. It's essentially the console experience of playing with a gamepad on a big screen but with the benefits of the PC experience such as mods or graphics/texture fixes/improvements, etc.

But like I said, I've been pretty busy this week and haven't had much time to do much real gaming on this thing yet. And that combined with my dying GPU fan means that I've testing some things out for a few minutes here and there, but I'll probably need to either find some aftermarket cooler for this GPU or buy a new GPU entirely.

Speaking of which, can anybody help me find an aftermarket cooler for the XFX Radeon HD 6870? So far I've found:


I'm still very happy with the graphical processing capabilities of my current GPU, and I feel like the only time I should have to upgrade my GPU is when I need more graphical capabilities out of it, not because it's impossible to keep cool (or impossible to repair/replace the fan)! It's so infuriating that they don't just use a regular fan mount bracket thingy so that I can buy a $10 replacement and fix it!

Hmm... Actually I just went to the NewEgg listing for the card (since I can't even find the card on XFX's website) and saw others complaining about the fan dying, with a response saying to contact their support for a free replacement fan. Technically it should still be under the original 3 year warranty, but I don't think I "registered" the product and the 3-year warranty only applies if you register within 30 days of purchase or some such nonsense. I've sent them an email and hopefully they'll fix it for free.

^ and how about viewing angles?
(so long as they're okay when you look from your 'fixed' sitting position)

Viewing angles seem pretty good to me. Probably even better than my previous monitor. On my old monitor I could tell a difference in the color from the top and bottom of the screen, even from my "fixed" sitting position. The way I have things set up in the summer is my desk is in the living room, so if I'd have company over for a movie or whatever, we'd usually pull the couch out from the wall and put it in front of the computer since my monitor was better quality than my TV. But if I laid down on my couch without adjusting my monitor's tilt, the screen could appear pretty dark and hard to see the details.

But I'd guess this TV has about 160-175 degree viewing angle. As I move to the side while looking at it, there's a point at which it appears to darken slightly, then it stays at that same level of brightness and clarity until I'm almost completely at a 90 degree angle to it. And just to test, I move my office chair to the side and laid down on the ground (so, lower than the couch would be) and I could still see the screen just fine. In fact, just today my girlfriend and another friend and I watched a movie on Netflix on this thing. We were all tired since we'd just gotten back from hiking for a couple of hours around the mountains nearby, so my friend laid on the floor while watching, and my girlfriend and I were on the couch and we all could see it just fine from our various odd angles. I didn't even realize how that would not have worked well at all on my old monitor until you got me thinking about it just now. Cool!

If you need more information about the TV, you can check the specifications here on the Amazon listing (where I bought it) or from Seiki's own website. But I don't see any viewing angles listed anywhere in there. . .
3590
Living Room / Re: Programmers: What size monitors do you guys prefer?
« Last post by Deozaan on May 20, 2014, 04:07 PM »
It arrived, and I just got it set up. I gotta tell you I'm definitely in love with the extra space already!

Here are some screenshots (resized to 25%) for comparison:

Screenshot - 14-05-20, 14-58-32.png


Screenshot - 14-05-20, 15-00-00.png


And when I really need to have more context in some code I'm working on:


Screenshot - 14-05-20, 15-08-46.png
3591
Living Room / Re: Programmers: What size monitors do you guys prefer?
« Last post by Deozaan on May 20, 2014, 12:13 PM »
My current monitor is a 26 or 27 inch 16:10 (1920x1200) monitor. I really like the 16:10 aspect ratio, but it seems to have pretty much gone the way of the dodo shortly after I ordered this thing a few years ago.

I've been wanting to get a second monitor for a few years since my last one died, because I feel there's just not quite enough space for coding efficiently on this monitor. It's nice to be able to see a lot of code, and also see a lot of info in a web browser or chat room at the same time, for reference or questions, etc.

I finally saved up enough money to buy a second monitor, and after looking at my options, I decided to spend a little extra and order a new 39-inch Seiki SE39UY04 4K (3840x2160) LED TV to use as a monitor, since with that resolution it's basically the same thing as four 1080p monitors in a 2x2 grid.

It should arrive today. I'm pretty excited. :)
3592
Developer's Corner / Re: Ludum Dare 29: April 25-28 Weekend
« Last post by Deozaan on May 20, 2014, 11:54 AM »
3593
Up until a few days ago you could make calls using Google Voice through data using an app (such as GrooVe IP). But Google just changed it so you can't hook into the service anymore. So now I need to figure out how to make calls again, because I've been using a phone with only WiFi service (no plan with a cellular carrier) to make calls since I'm almost always connected to a WiFi AP.

Maybe I'll have to start using Skype again.
3594
Mine is also a MSI Wind, but it's a U120. I just installed Linux Mint Petra XFCE on it a month or two ago when XP was officially unsupported. It seemed to run really well for a day or two, but now is sluggish even though I don't think I installed anything since when it was still running pretty well. So maybe I'll try this Linux Lite as a Live USB.
3595
Thanks!
3596
A requirement of 1024x768 rules out my netbook. )c: It's a measly 1024x600.
3597
General Software Discussion / Re: Sell your MS Office 2010?
« Last post by Deozaan on May 14, 2014, 03:21 PM »
You can also try LibreOffice, which is free. :Thmbsup:
3598
Living Room / Re: Animal Friends thread
« Last post by Deozaan on May 14, 2014, 03:17 PM »
That cat did a full flying kick into the dog!

Wow! Impressive.
3599
Some DVCS sites such as BitBucket and Github allow you to run a repository as a website.

You can then set up a custom CNAME for your domain to point to the DVCS, which makes it look like you've got the content hosted on your domain.
3600
A computer will automatically try to join a homegroup during the installation of the OS (at least on Windows 7) if it detects one on the network.

If you want a Windows 7 computer to leave a homegroup it is a part of, follow these instructions:

1. Press the Windows button on the keyboard (or open the start menu) and type "HomeGroup" (without quotes) and press Enter.

HomeGroupStep1.png

2. You will see a window that looks like this:

HomeGroupStep2.png

3. Click the "Leave the homegroup..." button. You'll get a popup asking you to confirm, at which point the computer will be removed from ALL homegroups it may be connected to.




And finally, you may want to click on the "Change advanced sharing settings..." on the HomeGroup screen. The bottom section of the advanced settings is related to HomeGroup connections. Changing that to require accounts and passwords rather than HomeGroups may solve the problem of these computers mysteriously re-joining the Homegroups again.

HomeGroupAdvancedSettings.png
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