Recent Posts

4426

General Software Discussion / Re: Can we talk about mkv files here please?

« Last post by 4wd on January 13, 2011, 12:18 AM »

Thanks 4wd!  That's very helpful.  That's the way i do it also.

-superboyac (January 12, 2011, 07:19 PM)

I should have mentioned there's also hotkeys, the defaults are:

PgUp/PgDn - Step backward/forward through chapters
[shift] + A  - Step backward/forward through audio streams
[shift] + S  - Step backward/forward through subtitle streams
W              - Turn subtitles off

Hotkeys for moving the subtitles around, if nothing else, MPC-HC has a lot of configurable hotkeys.  

4427

General Software Discussion / Re: Let's try to create our own suite for internet security.

« Last post by 4wd on January 12, 2011, 06:24 PM »

Windows Defender is a Anti-Spyware program - not a firewall.

-4wd (January 12, 2011, 05:52 PM)

I know.  It was just a placeholder.  I'll clean it all up eventually.  Does Windows Defender even exist anymore?  I was under the impression that MSE superseded it.

-superboyac (January 12, 2011, 06:04 PM)

Sorry  

I think you could just put 'Integrated in Router/Gateway device' - just about covers all consumer stuff.  Unless you want to specifically recommend some device.

I think it still exists, at least I'm still showing definition updates for it in my Windows Update History.

4428

General Software Discussion / Re: Can we talk about mkv files here please?

« Last post by 4wd on January 12, 2011, 06:06 PM »

Well, for MPC-HC:

Next chapter using the Navigate menu or the Forward/Backward Skip buttons at the bottom:


Sorry, don't have any multi-audio MKVs on hand - just imagine a few more languages under the sub-menu and you'll get the idea
Audio using the Play menu, (if it's a DVD it shows up under Navigate IIRC):


Subtitles using the Play menu, (if it's a DVD it shows up under Navigate IIRC):

4429

General Software Discussion / Re: Let's try to create our own suite for internet security.

« Last post by 4wd on January 12, 2011, 05:52 PM »

Just a query about your list: you've got Windows Defender listed under Hardware Firewall.

Windows Defender is a Anti-Spyware program - not a firewall.

A Hardware Firewall is something you're going to find in your router device, be it a Linux gateway, an ADSL router/modem or dedicated piece of hardware, (eg. ZyWall devices) - about the only thing you can say in this category is to turn it on, (if it exists), and ensure it's configured correctly.

On a related note, what are some recommended on-demand scanning for antivirus, malware, etc.?

-superboyac (January 12, 2011, 11:59 AM)

How about JottiQ?

-Deozaan (January 12, 2011, 03:28 PM)

WRT on-demand scanners, can any service that won't work without an internet connection truly be called on-demand?

They should be called 'when convenient'.

The only anti-something service that can be truly called on-demand is something that will work offline as well as online.

4430

Living Room / Re: Aspartame: Sweet Misery - A Poisoned World (Wikipedia Abuse)

« Last post by 4wd on January 12, 2011, 06:53 AM »

I don't touch anything with Aspartame in it and haven't since an article in a newspaper, (or maybe TV/magazine), came out at the time of the Atlanta Olympics describing how Aspartame broke down at around 60deg C into formaldehyde and something else, (escapes me - was a while ago).

Whether it's true or not, I don't know, but I steer away from artificial sweeteners....mainly because I prefer the real stuff.   

The origin I was thinking of appears to be this: Dangers of sweetener aspartame

4431

Living Room / Re: DC Demographics

« Last post by 4wd on January 09, 2011, 05:40 PM »

Hahahahah~!

-Renegade (January 09, 2011, 05:35 PM)

Speaking of which, where's the link to your Vodafone rant
</offtopic>

4432

Living Room / Re: DC Demographics

« Last post by 4wd on January 09, 2011, 05:25 PM »

I'd like to help with the useless stuff if someone gets me the numbers at the end of the survey...  

-timns (January 09, 2011, 05:15 PM)

To avoid all the work you could use what we used to call Rigger's Method.

ie. Just make up the numbers and base your conclusions on them.

The MPAA/RIAA use the same formula when calculating how many billions lost to pirating....so it must be valid.

4433

Post New Requests Here / Re: IDEA: Wireless sensor

« Last post by 4wd on January 09, 2011, 11:07 AM »

Is it possible to do that on XP, (have a webpage as a background on the logon screen) ?

-4wd (January 09, 2011, 10:52 AM)

The gist of the thread seemed to be that it would/did work before (with older OSs), but the OP was having trouble getting it to work on Server08 R2. So I'm hoping that doing it on XP wont be a wild goose chase.

-Stoic Joker (January 09, 2011, 11:00 AM)

I might have a look at bginfo, (and it's forums), then and see if anyone has run across/solved the same problem.

Thanks again.

4434

Post New Requests Here / Re: IDEA: Wireless sensor

« Last post by 4wd on January 09, 2011, 10:52 AM »

Okay, this is either the right answer, or the stupidest thing I've ever said...I'm not sure which (be gentile).

But, I ran across this: Displaying server/domain name on the logon screen.

-Stoic Joker (January 09, 2011, 09:05 AM)

A quick peruse of the thread seemed to indicate that someone wanted the same thing, (dynamically updated logon background), but there didn't seem to be an answer.  I'll have a more indepth peruse when I'm fully awake later today, (0334 here currently).

So if the service is creating a plain text file, why not have it create an .htm file, and set the logon screen's wallpaper to that. Assuming the page could be made to auto-refresh and display status changes it could work.

Is it possible to do that on XP, (have a webpage as a background on the logon screen) ?

I think Active Desktop provides this while a user is logged on, (not that I've ever used it), but from what I've looked at so far, the logon screen appears to be completely static with the exception of being able to put some text on it, the LegalNoticeText, which is also static.

I'm frankly amazed I was able to display something on top of it at the initial appearance, considering nothing I've tried following a user logoff seems to work - even when run as LOCAL SYSTEM using the AT command.

4435

Living Room / Re: Need a New Mouse

« Last post by 4wd on January 09, 2011, 03:55 AM »

That's what I've heard. They didn't have the HTC Desire HD when I wanted to buy, so I stayed with Vodaphone.

-Renegade (December 26, 2010, 09:23 PM)

Maybe you shouldn't have

Vodafone records leaked onto Internet

4436

Living Room / Re: Fast/Responsive programs: An official SuperboyAC list

« Last post by 4wd on January 08, 2011, 10:15 PM »

About Everything be sure you use latest version, not the one on frontpage. Check changlog at forum section "Announcement". . . One of those I wish would go payware to be honest.

-Bamse (January 08, 2011, 02:02 PM)

Thanks for this info.  From time to time I've simply used Everything's "Check for Updates," and I've always been told that the version I'm using (1.2.1.371) is up to date.  After reading your message, I went to the forum site and found a download for version 1.2.1.451a, but then I saw that it's an alpha (I normally avoid alphas) and it was released in November 2009!  So what's the story?  Is it stable?  Are they still working on it?  Like you, I'd gladly pay money for this program.  However, since that's apparently not possible, I'd just like to be sure that I'm not trading a stable version for one that still isn't even in beta.  

-cyberdiva (January 08, 2011, 07:08 PM)

FWIW, I've been using it since the alpha was available, (or very shortly after), and it has never been the cause of a problem on either XP when I was running it or Win7 now.

And it adds a few useful new features.

The author only works on it in his spare time and is doing a major rewrite of it AFAIK, it's an often asked question in the forum.

There's also a version available that creates static databases, good for when you want to catalog offline media.  Get it here.

4437

Living Room / Re: Fantastic Rant ...

« Last post by 4wd on January 08, 2011, 05:54 PM »

Personally I think the arm of the statue should be held aloft and the banker caused to adopt a fundamental position on that 

-cranioscopical (January 08, 2011, 02:39 PM)

That could imply that the banker are mere puppets - personally I favour drawn and quartering.

4438

General Software Discussion / Re: remove objects from photos

« Last post by 4wd on January 08, 2011, 05:11 PM »

It's not clear what exactly they're doing (they dont give much details) - i- from the name, I would presume, as you do, that you need a few pics to work with.

-tomos (January 08, 2011, 12:16 PM)

Actually, it occured to me after I went to bed that what they've done is take 5 pictures of the same boy in different positions and then composited them to remove him.

I originally thought it was 5 different boys, (a bigger picture might have helped), dressed the same 

I still think it would have been better if they could have shown the originals and then the subsequent composite using a flash demo.

4439

General Software Discussion / Re: remove objects from photos

« Last post by 4wd on January 08, 2011, 06:47 AM »

They've chosen a very poor example to use as a demo, one photo with people and then one without - why go to the trouble of doing a composite?

If they'd demonstrated by using 10 pictures of Piazzo San Marco, Venice, taken at 5 minute intervals from 10am on a sunny morning that they could remove all the tourists......now that would be impressive.

4440

Living Room / Re: Can we stop with the diagonal screen length thing?

« Last post by 4wd on January 07, 2011, 11:12 PM »

In my experience, diagonal was all that was ever used for screens dating back to when the only thing they were used for was TVs.  It wasn't a problem then since all screens had the same aspect ratio, so the measurement was always pretty much apples to apples.

-mwb1100 (January 07, 2011, 10:37 PM)

The only extra information you used to see for monitors was 'Viewable Area' which gave you WxH because, (IIRC), the number quoted for diagonal was the size of the tube not taking into account the bezel surrounding it.

When LCD/Plasma came along the diagonal quoted was both size of the panel and viewable area because the bezel didn't exclude anything.

4441

Living Room / Re: Fast/Responsive programs: An official SuperboyAC list

« Last post by 4wd on January 07, 2011, 09:49 PM »

Notepad2 - Notepad replacement, standalone capable.

Even better is Notepad2-mod

Changes compared to the official Notepad2:

    Code folding
    Support for bookmarks
    Syntax highlighting support for AutoHotKey, AutoIt3, Bash, LaTeX, Lua, Ruby, Tcl, NSIS and Inno Setup scripts
    Improved support for NFO ANSI art
    Support for replacing Windows Notepad using a clean, unintrusive registry-based method
    Native x86-64 support
    Other various minor changes and tweaks

4442

General Software Discussion / Re: What is your preferred server OS for home use? And Why?

« Last post by 4wd on January 07, 2011, 11:34 AM »

@4wd - do you know if DataSafe also backs up servers: or just workstations from the server?

-40hz (January 07, 2011, 07:55 AM)

Do you mean does it work like rsync, where you need a client/server relationship?

Then no, it's more like your traditional Windows backup program, (ala SyncBack, etc), choose a source and destination, (which can be FTP, CD or Network Share), choose your options, (Full, Incremental, Differential, Mirror; Compression, Encryption, Versions, etc) and hit go.

If you choose a backup type of Mirror, then Hardlinks are enabled.

I haven't extensively tested it, (I've got a few small OS gremlins that I need a re-install to fix, eg. VSS isn't working), but it seemed to work OK.

eg.
1st Run - 472 jpgs/pngs (1.78GB) copied in 32s (HDD -> HDD)
2nd Run - no changes, 472 files copied in 4.5s via hardlinks  (2 or 3 seconds is because it tries to get VSS working)
3rd Run - Added another 51 jpgs, 523 files copied in 6.9s, 472 via hardlinks

Each backup run goes into it's own sub-directory named Jobname.backuptype.runnumber, (eg. Test.Mirror.00008), and then the full directory structure of what was backed up.

I haven't tested it to my FreeNAS shares, (UFS), might try that tomorrow, (technically already tomorrow here but it's 0433 ).

Update: Works fine to FreeNAS shares on UFS drives, happily creates hardlinks for unchanged files which reduces space requirements a fair bit.

It's quite amazing, (well to me who hasn't had experience with links), seeing six (6) backups of the exact same files and not see the available disk space drop.  Effectively, 2GB of space used to store 10GB of uncompressed data - very neat.


I think I've just created a conflict in my brain....I like the speed/versioning of DataSafe but I have SyncBack Pro

Must...resolve...conflict........aaarrgghhhh!  <- Brain implosion.

There is something called cwRsync that will allow you to easily integrate the rsync daemon with various flavors of Windows. Catch is the Windows rsync port requires Cygwin.

-40hz (January 07, 2011, 07:50 AM)

There's also DeltaCopy.

In general terms, DeltaCopy is an open source, fast incremental backup program. Let's say you have to backup one file that is 500 MB every night. A normal file copy would copy the entire file even if a few bytes have changed. DeltaCopy, on the other hand, would only copy the part of file that has actually been modified. This reduces the data transfer to just a small fraction of 500 MB saving time and network bandwidth.

In technical terms, DeltaCopy is a "Windows Friendly" wrapper around the Rsync program, currently maintained by Wayne Davison. "rsync" is primarily designed for Unix/Linux/BSD systems. Although ports are available for Windows, they typically require downloading Cygwin libraries and manual configuration.

DeltaCopy doesn't require CygWin, all Client/Server binaries are in the one installation binary and it's very easy to set up.

4443

General Software Discussion / Re: What is your preferred server OS for home use? And Why?

« Last post by 4wd on January 07, 2011, 07:31 AM »

I don't know a Windows equivalent, but rsnapshot is very nifty. It does incremental backups, but not in the traditional sense... take a look

-f0dder (January 07, 2011, 06:00 AM)

Dammit!  I'm positive I found one on the net recently that was based upon this blog article: An intelligent backup system for Windows (4 part article)

Do you think I can find it again....nope!

Found it: DataSafe Backup


Lucky I never throw away anything I download

4444

Living Room / Re: Need recommendation for wireless adapter

« Last post by 4wd on January 04, 2011, 05:25 PM »

I have 2 or 3 NetGear WG111 v1 and v2, (b/g), and they've never given any problems but this is on XP machines.  Not using them now since I've moved to Powerline adapters.

The N150, N300 and N600 USB adapters are their Wireless-n versions.

Overall, Netgear is one of the most reliable brands I've used but I've never used whatever software came with them other than the basic driver.

Newegg currently have a Recertified N300 available for $25, ($40-55 less than new).

4445

Post New Requests Here / Re: IDEA: Wireless sensor

« Last post by 4wd on January 04, 2011, 07:25 AM »

Thanks SJ, I'll give that a go first as it's easier to do than fool around with Scheduled Tasks.


Addendum:  That didn't seem to work, (no output to a logfile or any other indication it ran), so it's back to the Scheduled Task idea.

4446

Post New Requests Here / Re: IDEA: Wireless sensor

« Last post by 4wd on January 04, 2011, 06:29 AM »

Just to let you know what's happening:

1) Got a service that works and reports whether there's a connection or not, (just by setting/deleting a file - lo-tech approach but it works).
2) I can display the status on the initial logon screen.
3) I can display the status in the SysTray after logon.

The one thing that's screwing everything up is displaying something on the logon screen again after someone has logged off - Windows kills any program that's already running when the user logs off.

There's only one more thing I can try and that's setting a Scheduled Task to run at the next minute after logoff by calling the AT command, (or directly entering into the Task list), this way it should run as LOCAL SYSTEM account.

If that doesn't work then I'm fresh out of ideas and it'll be over to someone with more knowledge of Windows than I've got, (which wouldn't be hard).

4447

Developer's Corner / Re: Please explain FTP file permissions

« Last post by 4wd on January 03, 2011, 05:36 PM »

Regarding the 4096, here's the answer from the superuser site: Why is the size of a directory always 4096 bytes in unix?

But note in the comments that it is filesystem dependent, ReiserFS apparently reports the directory content size.

4448

Living Room / Re: Not backing up will cost you!

« Last post by 4wd on December 30, 2010, 08:25 PM »

I do have a question, how do all these individual drives connect to the server?  I can't imagine there's 16 SATA cables coming out the back plugging into the motherboard?  Does it use a CAT5?  Is something going on inside the box which combines it into one SATA or eSATA cable?  How does this work?

-superboyac (December 30, 2010, 07:56 PM)

Port Multipliers - one eSATA port into 4 or 5 SATA drives, or Infiniband - 4 SATA ports into one cable and then back to 4 SATA drives, (maybe even 20 drives if you can tack Port Multipliers on the end).

Addonics, (yes, them again ), sell Port Multipliers.  The 5-Port HPM-XA on a PCI bracket will give you access to 5 SATA drives over 1 eSATA cable.

If you will be going to move most of the drives out of your system box into an external enclosure then that will free up more internal SATA connectors to be used as eSATA ports or a couple of Infiniband ports.

The Norco case you seem to have chosen allows for the installation of a motherboard and since you're going to connect the drives to a network for house-wide access which would require a PC anyway, (or some form of SATA->Network interface), then you may as well install a motherboard and create a NAS, (using whatever OS tickles your fancy - XP Pro, WHS, etc for simplicity of filesync software or eg. FreeNAS for full-blown NAS).  This will give you lots of SATA ports, (whether onboard or PCIe cards), and the Gb interface.

Addendum: If you were going to go for the NAS thing, then possibly a motherboard with multiple Gb ports that allows 'Teaming', (ASUS term, Gigabyte use something else), this would reduce any bottleneck from the network.

4449

Living Room / Re: Not backing up will cost you!

« Last post by 4wd on December 30, 2010, 07:27 PM »

Actually, aren't there are two definitions for JBOD? One where data is spanned across the disks as you describe; and the other where a virtual disk manager is put on top of the "bunch of drives" but where each physical disk operates independently of the others?

-40hz (December 30, 2010, 07:03 PM)

The spanned version is more properly called SPAN (DOH!) or BIG now, with JBOD correctly being just individually addressed drives.  However, even some company descriptions seem to get it wrong.

eg. Some of Addonics products refer to JBOD (Concatenation), which I would have thought would really be SPAN or BIG, which they refer to on others.  Some have JBOD (Individual) and BIG.

If I recall correctly Goolge's Greyhole Project utilizes the second approach, but goes it one better by providing for data replication in software. Doing that makes Greyhole act much like a RAID-5 combined with an extremely flexible drive concatenation capability. This is similar to the 'Drive Extender' feature Microsoft just removed from their new Home Server release.

That looks very interesting, kind of like a combination of AFS, ZFS and RAID-5 

4450

Living Room / Re: Not backing up will cost you!

« Last post by 4wd on December 30, 2010, 06:59 PM »

I see.  Yes, i'm probably misusing the term.  I figured JBOD meant exactly what I thought, but it's not.

-superboyac (December 30, 2010, 06:34 PM)

No, it might just be me.    As I said, generally JBOD has implied what is really meant as SPAN when people talked about it.  But JBOD really means what you have stated, Just a Bunch Of Drives - each individually addressable.

So your use is correct, however specifying JBOD still implies no data redundancy.

What's the difference between what I'm describing and Raid-1?

With RAID-1, one HDD is mirrored to another - they both contain exactly the same data, ergo they, (AFAIK), have to be the same capacity.  It's also taken care of by the controller, no user interaction, (apart from initial setup), required unless one HDD dies.

File syncing requires that the user run additional software, (and makes sure it's running), and action any errors, eg. files locked, permissions, etc, however the HDDs can be different capacities or the same HDD but different partition.

Incidentally, following on from worstje and JJ above, if you were going to try RAID-1, (even if only on a pair of your HDDs), I'd suggest using two different manufacturers, eg. WD 2TB and a Samsung 2TB, you'd be unlikely to end up with two HDD from the same batch.  Also, it would probably be better to use Enterprise class HDDs instead of Desktop class.