Recent Posts

4176

Living Room / Re: Windows Install Date Thingie: I made it!

« Last post by Darwin on October 27, 2007, 09:34 AM »

Ever wonder when your copy of Windows was installed?  Me neither.

 

4177

General Software Discussion / Re: babylon: charging you $6.99 for retrieving your lost lincense ?!?

« Last post by Darwin on October 27, 2007, 09:30 AM »

Fargin' bastiches. I've never come across that one before, I admire its creatvity but from a consumer's perspective, that's pretty low. Thanks for the warning!

4178

Official Announcements / Re: Draw Cody competition - win incredible prizes!

« Last post by Darwin on October 27, 2007, 09:11 AM »

ROFLMAO João 

The dude on the left is clearly our very own Tomos!

EDIT: Fixed link.

4179

General Software Discussion / Re: What is the currently best Desktop Search software?

« Last post by Darwin on October 27, 2007, 09:09 AM »

As I love Archivarius and as there are features and changes that I'd love to see implemented, I will e-mail the author about this... Why? Because the more people buy Archivarius, the more time the author will be able to devote to developing it and implementing the changes I'd like to see. Oh crap. That would also mean the less time he will have for support and customer service!  Decisions...

4180

General Software Discussion / Re: Weird Issue with Roboform - Need Some Advice

« Last post by Darwin on October 27, 2007, 09:05 AM »

Glad you got that sorted out, Jim   and thanks for letting us know what you discovered.

4181

General Software Discussion / Re: Weird Issue with Roboform - Need Some Advice

« Last post by Darwin on October 27, 2007, 12:15 AM »

Hi Jim - mine's set to default browser, which in my case is Maxthon 2...

4182

General Software Discussion / Re: Share Usb Devices

« Last post by Darwin on October 26, 2007, 09:50 PM »

BTW, I still have a hard time figuring out how this feature would be useful... Unless, of course, your scanner can be setup somehow to send to specific locations on the network... Actually, I *guess* if you set the scanner to send to a folder on a server it would work. Anybody could scan with it and access their scans from their workstation. S'pose it makes sense in that light. I'm glad we've had this conversation. Yes, me too.

4183

General Software Discussion / Re: Weird Issue with Roboform - Need Some Advice

« Last post by Darwin on October 26, 2007, 09:47 PM »

I just had the same experience as edbro, Jim. Very strange - what version of RobofromPass2Go are you using at the moment (not that I've ever had that trouble and I *think* I've updated each time an update has become available). Having said that, I sympathise with your annoyance at being treated like a twit by support - this is common and drives me bonkers. While it is probably safe to agree that the vast majority of PC users don't know their ram from their arm, it strikes me as foolish to ignore what power users are trying to say... I suppose the counter-argument is that if support staff took the time to determine whether or not each user knew what they were talking about or not, it would waste far more time than they would gain by listening to the minority of callers that DO know what they're talking about...

4184

General Software Discussion / Re: Share Usb Devices

« Last post by Darwin on October 26, 2007, 07:04 PM »

  Yeah... that's how I found it! Note that Scannito hasn't been very well received in the Giveawayoftheday comments section, which doesn't bode well for BlindScanner Pro...

4185

General Software Discussion / Re: Share Usb Devices

« Last post by Darwin on October 26, 2007, 09:11 AM »

This thread is OLD but thought I'd update it - just came across Masters ITC BlindScanner Pro and thought of this thread. It is specifically designed to allow users to do what Earthcoder was asking about - share a scanner.

I've no interest in this functionality, so haven't tried the software. It advertises:

The BlindScanner Pro software will share and open access to a scanner on the local area network that is not directly connected to your computer, but installed on a computer located in the neighboring room, for example.

4186

Living Room / Re: OK - lets get to know each other... who are you, what do you do, where from?

« Last post by Darwin on October 26, 2007, 08:29 AM »

mouser for president.

Wonderful idea! Wish I'd thought of it... Welcome to DC Wolfgang, glad to have you here 

4187

Official Announcements / Re: Draw Cody competition - win incredible prizes!

« Last post by Darwin on October 25, 2007, 08:08 AM »

4188

Living Room / Re: HELP !!! Outlook corruption

« Last post by Darwin on October 25, 2007, 08:07 AM »

One newsgroup poster who did the reinstall got everything working again, then reported that the next day SP3 was back!  Automatic updates had helpfully downloaded & reinstalled the update, complete with a system reboot.

Could also be the installer lurking in a user folder somewhere and being set to run on restart. I've had this problem with other software packages - for example QuickTime and iTunes. You uninstall them and all is well, reboot and lo and behold their back! Creepy. Just a thought.

4189

Living Room / Re: these new cheap core 2 due laptops - any good?

« Last post by Darwin on October 24, 2007, 11:26 PM »

My notebook came with two batteries - a small one (6 cell?) and a larger one (9 cell?). When it was new three years ago, the big battery was good for 4-5 hours and the small one for about 2.5 hours. This spring the big battery was good for about 1.5 hours and the small one for about 45 minutes. I had the big battery rebuilt before going on a research trip in Belgium and it's good for about 3 +/- hours... Rebuilding it was *supposed* to make it last longer than new (ie longer than 5 hours), so I was a bit disappointed with the expensive rebuild. I bunged the smaller one in the freezer the night Ralf posted the tip (two nights ago?) and retrieved it last night. It's good for just over 2 hours... Works for me!

EDIT: removed a split infinitve. It's a generational thing, I suppose, but a split infinitive is worse than fingernails on a chalk board. Whoops! I guess that idiom has been relegated to the history pile as well...

4190

Living Room / Re: these new cheap core 2 due laptops - any good?

« Last post by Darwin on October 24, 2007, 09:34 AM »

One trick I've used to bring a dead battery back to life: wrap it in a zip-lock baggie and stuff it in the freezer overnight.  Take it out the next day and allow a few hours to reach room temperature.  Charge as normal.  For some reason this seems to reset balky batteries, at least the ones I've tried it on.  I've no idea as to the physics behind this...

Thanks Ralf! That worked  To think I had battery re-cored in the spring for $170... Wish I'd tried this trick first. Live and learn...

4191

Official Announcements / Re: DC-IRLDD #2: DonationCoder Real Life Dinner+Drinks, Sat 7/14, Champaign Illinois

« Last post by Darwin on October 23, 2007, 08:25 PM »

Yup.  Unofficially 

-Veign (October 23, 2007, 07:13 PM)

Vaguely conspiratorial... "I could tell you about it, but then I'd have to kill you"-esque. And don't even get me started about the mystery camera-person. Yup, conspiracy written ALL OVER IT (but I'm not paranoid...).

4192

Official Announcements / Re: DC-IRLDD #2: DonationCoder Real Life Dinner+Drinks, Sat 7/14, Champaign Illinois

« Last post by Darwin on October 23, 2007, 07:01 PM »

I wish I could go to one.   Maybe one day.

-Veign (July 15, 2007, 11:25 AM)

Mission accomplished, eh? Unofficially, of course!

4193

Living Room / Re: "HDD Not Included"

« Last post by Darwin on October 23, 2007, 06:55 PM »

I like the look of it and must have one! Looks from the piccies that there is a sliding cover that protects the interface when there're not drives "inserted" (Darwin smirks chlidlishly...). Like Chris, I can really appreciate that this kind of interface will make swapping HD's around for backups and data access much more convenient. Begs two questions though, how does one store the drives when not in use and, following from some other comments in this thread, how long will one have to wait for a drive to cool down?!

I like the idea of the drive being air cooled like this - I have numerous 2.5" drives that I attach via USB enclosure. I've had three of them develop tics (you know that annoying grinding clicking sound) and faults from being left attached to my notebook on warm and humid days...

4194

General Software Discussion / Re: The great defrag shootout

« Last post by Darwin on October 23, 2007, 02:46 PM »

Hmmm... Diskeeper 2008 is out. Downloading it now to take it for a spin (I think - my "Diskeeper Machine" is having the cooling unit replaced under warranty - I'm not sure I want to mix PerfectDisk and Diskeeper on my primary notebook...).

4195

Best E-mail Client / Re: How to accurately block junk mail? (The Bat and other clients also)

« Last post by Darwin on October 23, 2007, 01:37 PM »

Big SpamBayes (FOSS) fan here... use it with Outlook 2003 and only ever see junk mail when I open the folder to check for false-positives. Haven't seen one in months, though I get 20 or more spam e-mails a day over the four pop3 e-mail accounts that I use Outlook to check). SpamBayes also works with other pop3 clients, though I've not tried it with anything else.

4196

General Software Discussion / Re: The great defrag shootout

« Last post by Darwin on October 23, 2007, 12:38 PM »

Hi Donn - welcome to DC! Hope to see more of you around the boards. Thanks, too, for the shootout  I use both Diskeeper and PerfectDisk but agree with your conclusions. There ARE reasons to like Diskeeper 2007 Professional Premier (not necessarily in preference to PerfectDisk, mind) but the price difference between it and PerfectDisk 8 are so great that it's a no brainer which way I recommend my friends to jump (OK that should read "would recommend" as the vast majority of the people that I know are happy with XP/Vista's built in defrag utility)...

4197

Official Announcements / Re: Mouser Sabatical from DC Coding for 3 of months - Your Help Requested Please

« Last post by Darwin on October 22, 2007, 09:13 PM »

Jesse - I'd like to echo Josh's sentiments - ask and I'm there. Other than that, I too will do whatever is necessary!

Enjoy the reprieve!

4198

Living Room / Re: The ugly truth about beauty

« Last post by Darwin on October 22, 2007, 09:11 PM »

Excellent - thanks for sharing it, Josh. I just forwarded it to my dad. Very funny and sadly close to the mark, I think.

4199

Living Room / Re: OK - lets get to know each other... who are you, what do you do, where from?

« Last post by Darwin on October 22, 2007, 07:45 AM »

Welcome to DC, masha! 

4200

General Software Discussion / Re: What is the currently best Desktop Search software?

« Last post by Darwin on October 22, 2007, 07:41 AM »

I've written to the author about the index size estimate. I pointed out that this may well be costing him customers who see the estimate and don't even try the software! Until Dormouse pointed it out, I'd forgotten that I very nearly didn't try it myself for that reason.