Recent Posts

6476

N.A.N.Y. 2010 / Re: NANY 2010 Release: Piggy Banks

« Last post by MilesAhead on December 18, 2009, 04:52 PM »

I'm not certain that the intention of this app is to be a hardcore planner or predictor of prices.  If the price of an item comes down, one can easily change the target goal amount, no?  Is this along the lines of what you meant?

-skwire (December 17, 2009, 10:26 PM)

What I meant was if the item price variation could be projected, then you could set it and forget it.  IOW, what's the point of having a planner where you keep adjusting the parameters?  Just use a calculator.   If the inflation/deflation factor is not predictable then 1.0 could be used. If you know HDTV sets are going to drop in price approx. 25% a year and it's going to take you 4 years to save up for it, why not have a way to program it in?
I just figured for long-term save-up it would make sense.

6477

Found Deals and Discounts / Re: Free 1 year license of Returnil Virtual System 2010 Home Lux

« Last post by MilesAhead on December 18, 2009, 04:44 PM »

I didn't realize that part.  To me, I wouldn't want to use the full version anyway.  I don't want to run an AV shield inside a virtual system.  That's like taking a shower with a raincoat on.  I mean, at some point some code has to run on some hardware.

To be honest, if Sandboxie worked on 64 bit I wouldn't even look at Returnil.  If you have to depend on the boot sequence then you are vulnerable.  That's probably why they are sticking av programs inside the envelope.  The malware that got me deleted partition C:.  Returnil woudn't have done me any good in that case.  I dunno', if I didn't already have image backups on external drives then I might try it.  But as it is now I'm not falling over myself to put it on the 64 bit machine.

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Post New Requests Here / Re: IDEA: easy toggle between Priority to Programs / Background Services

« Last post by MilesAhead on December 18, 2009, 04:39 PM »

They have their similarities and differences.  From what I understand AHK branched off from AutoIt2.  AutoIt3 got away from the comma syntax. AutoIt3 syntax is more like basic or Rexx and it's just easier for me to figure out how to do what I want with it.  AHK makes doing mouse hotkey stuff easier so I tend to use it when that need arises.  I just wish I could mix them easily. I'd love to use some of my AutoIt3 dialogs and functions in AHK.  But that would be cheating!!

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Post New Requests Here / Re: IDEA: easy toggle between Priority to Programs / Background Services

« Last post by MilesAhead on December 18, 2009, 02:24 PM »

(edit: hang on... got to debug this a bit.  Trying to open that tab in control panel applet with AutoIt3 script.)

Okay, I couldn't figure out how to jump to tabs using the keyboard so I extrapolated until I got relative mouse coords.  You might have to change the numbers for MouseClick depending on your screen res(I use 1280x1024.)  But see if this AutoIt3 works:

[Select]

AutoItSetOption("MouseCoordMode",0)
Run("RunDll32.exe shell32.dll,Control_RunDLL sysdm.cpl,,3")
Sleep(250)
Send("{Space}")
Sleep(250)
MouseClick("primary",102,44)

Also if the dialog opens but not to the correct window or tab try adjusting the numbers in the Sleep() call.  The number is milliseconds.  I'm using 1/4 second delay.  Seems to work for most windows on my machines.

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Post New Requests Here / Re: IDEA: easy toggle between Priority to Programs / Background Services

« Last post by MilesAhead on December 18, 2009, 01:10 PM »

Press Windows-Pause key.  Click Advanced System Settings.  At least that goes on Vista.

6481

Found Deals and Discounts / Re: Free 1 year license of Returnil Virtual System 2010 Home Lux

« Last post by MilesAhead on December 18, 2009, 01:05 PM »

The promo on the original site listed seems to have expired but this GHacks article has a link that is still producing license keys.  I just went through the ritual 20 minutes ago and it sent me a license(used a hotmail email address, no problem.)

If you still want to get it go through this link:

http://www.ghacks.ne...ystem-2010-home-lux/

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Post New Requests Here / Re: IDEA : complete command line app with all XP commands

« Last post by MilesAhead on December 18, 2009, 12:25 PM »

Have you tried auto-completion hitting Tab key?  May even be faster than using a drop-down box.

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Post New Requests Here / Re: IDEA: easy toggle between Priority to Programs / Background Services

« Last post by MilesAhead on December 18, 2009, 12:22 PM »

This freebie may be promising:

http://www.optionalr...orityControl_STATIC/

6484

General Software Discussion / Re: Minefield(Firefox) 3.7Pre seems to work

« Last post by MilesAhead on December 18, 2009, 12:12 PM »

Some things Opera has are really nice.  But stuff like clicking the mouse 4 times to copy a line of text to the clipboard just promotes CTS.  When I suggested an AutoCopy like FF has you'd think I advocated dissemination of small pox laced blankets.  I mean, it gets weird!

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N.A.N.Y. 2010 / Re: NANY 2010 Release: Piggy Banks

« Last post by MilesAhead on December 17, 2009, 10:06 PM »

Actually I was only joking a little bit.  If it is to be a long range planner it might be a good idea to have a variable for projected price increase/decrease.  As in some items may inflate quickly whereas electronics/computers may have a predictable price drop over time.  There may be some index somewhere that has that kind of info for consumer items?

6486

General Software Discussion / Re: Backup Program: Completely Removes Files in Restore Point Before Restoring?

« Last post by MilesAhead on December 17, 2009, 05:05 PM »

If that program doesn't automate it, a work-around may be to mount a Macrium partition image backup file, delete the target folder, or all its contents, then just copy into it from the mounted image.  The mounted image lets you go into it with Explorer and copy files out(it's mounted as a read-only virtual disk.)  If the backed up folder has zillions of files you may need to use a program like RichCopy to copy the files from the image.  Thousands of files and Explorer will spend hours calculating how many files it's going to copy once it gets around to it.  RichCopy is a command line copy program with a Gui front end.  It's a freebie written by an MS employee.  Google should find it.

RichCopy will start the copy process right away.  No lag while calculating totals.  (I copied a Windows.old folder over the network to my backup USB external drive... over 200,000 files and folders without a hiccup.)

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N.A.N.Y. 2010 / Re: NANY 2010 Release: Piggy Banks

« Last post by MilesAhead on December 17, 2009, 05:00 PM »

Looks good skwire.  My only suggestion would be some projection for the average rate of inflation for that item.  As example, A Tank of Gas.  Your car holds how many gallons, gallon of gas currently costs $x,  seed money you start with as Mouser suggested.  daily/weekly/monthly chip in amount =   nevermind! I'm walking to work from now on!!

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General Software Discussion / Re: Video player: What's the quickest (fastest/lightest)?

« Last post by MilesAhead on December 17, 2009, 04:53 PM »

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General Software Discussion / Re: Video player: What's the quickest (fastest/lightest)?

« Last post by MilesAhead on December 17, 2009, 01:16 PM »

If anyone runs into a free Windows player that plays BluRay discs please post.

-MilesAhead (December 16, 2009, 11:34 PM)

I think if anyone were to come out with such a thing The Man would swoop down on them pretty fast. Licensing fees must be paid to Big Brother and all that, you know.

-Innuendo (December 17, 2009, 11:10 AM)

The whole thing is bizarre.  I remember there were big furors in the past with VHS and audio cassette.  Now if you tell someone there was a big resistance to recording songs off the radio using your cassette recorder they look at you like you're nuts.  Then again, with the younger generation it seems before the Garden of Eden was even created, there was cable TV(what do you mean it wasn't always there? You're crazy!!)

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General Software Discussion / Re: Minefield(Firefox) 3.7Pre seems to work

« Last post by MilesAhead on December 17, 2009, 01:08 PM »

I'm using 3.6 Beta 2.  Works fine.  Even the TV Guide descriptions work.  Every now and again I try 3.7 to see if it's any snappier.  But I guess once you have a version where JIT is activated then it's as snappy as it's going to get for awhile.

It is kind of funny how these browsers develop.  Like with Opera, it has built in media player so I use it to listen to clips on AllMusic.com.  But, they seem obstinate in their refusal to put a Stop Button on the toolbar like just about every other browser.  Once you start a clip or any other action with the thing, the only way to make it quit is either close the browser or go to another page.  I've suggested a Stop Button on occasion but then I'm immediately classified as among the barbarians.  Weird!

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General Software Discussion / Re: Video player: What's the quickest (fastest/lightest)?

« Last post by MilesAhead on December 16, 2009, 11:34 PM »

If anyone runs into a free Windows player that plays BluRay discs please post.

6492

General Software Discussion / Re: Minefield(Firefox) 3.7Pre seems to work

« Last post by MilesAhead on December 16, 2009, 11:32 PM »

3.7 still not ready for Prime Time.  The descriptions on TV Guide site open a blank box.  Looks like I'm sticking with 3.6 Beta 2 for awhile.

6493

General Software Discussion / Re: Minefield(Firefox) 3.7Pre seems to work

« Last post by MilesAhead on December 16, 2009, 04:39 PM »

Thanks for the heads-up.

https://addons.mozil...addons/versions/7403

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General Software Discussion / Re: Minefield(Firefox) 3.7Pre seems to work

« Last post by MilesAhead on December 15, 2009, 07:00 PM »

Now ain't that the strangest thing!!!  I just tried Minefield nightly build.  Got the same thing where it put the default skin on and killed my AddOns.  Then for chuckles I used FEBE to just restore my GradientICool theme, and Bingo!!! My AddOns now work!!!!

I don't care why it works at this point!! I'll take it!!

6495

General Software Discussion / Re: Alt-tab replacement ?

« Last post by MilesAhead on December 15, 2009, 01:52 PM »

Final version 1.1.0 of VistaSwitcher was just released. Seems to be very good.

-yksyks (December 15, 2009, 08:18 AM)

Just updated.  I usually forget all about Alt-Tab.  But I like VistaSwitcher better than the default.  Nice freebie.  I've been using the beta, and now this latest release, on Vista64 and W7.  Haven't noticed any problems.

6496

Living Room / Re: Recommend to me the BEST USB stick to get

« Last post by MilesAhead on December 14, 2009, 07:03 PM »

I got this Verbatim 16GB since it was reported to have good write speed and I saw it for $35.

http://ecx.images-am...FL._SL500_AA280_.jpg

I copied a 1.4GB file onto it.  It wrote at a steady 10 MB/sec.  Only thing is it's the type with the plastic slide and feels really flimsy.  I'll just have to wait and see how well it holds up to plugging and unplugging.  The A-Data rubber coated jobs feel very solid and seem to be rugged, but they only write at half the speed of this one.

edit: I formatted it to NTFS.  Crystal Disk Mark shows about 11.14 MB/sec sequential write.  More than twice as fast as my A-Data rubber coated ones.  I just hope it holds up.

You can't tell.  I read some customer reivews of the A-Data rubber coated ones that said they fell apart after a couple of uses.  The rubber gives it weight, cushions shock, and gives it a solid feel.  But, if the glue gives out, it gives out.



Edit:  I notice good prices on this USB here and there.  But, even though the write speed and cost are both reasonable, I don't really like it and wouldn't buy another one.  Plugging and pulling from the USB connector is tight, which makes it a struggle.  You have to jam your thumb against the little stop on top of the slide to plug in. Then when you pull it out, that stop is pulled by the slot in the plastic housing.  I know this thing won't stand up.  There's no way the innards can have that stress put on it and the thing last.  They should have put the electronics in a unit with no moving parts. So far that's USBs with sliding bodies purchased, 2, USBs with sliding bodies that I liked after I got 'em, 0.

6497

Post New Requests Here / Re: Electronic relay control program with web interface

« Last post by MilesAhead on December 13, 2009, 03:42 PM »

I would check into web cam security software for USB.  Most off the shelf machines now don't even have a parallel port or serial port anymore.  If it has to be for those then your hope would be some retro software.

You might check for Win98 freeware sites with old versions of programs.  When the webcam craze was first kicking in there were lots of sites with web control for aiming the cameras. There must be software out there already debugged.

6498

General Software Discussion / Re: Minefield(Firefox) 3.7Pre seems to work

« Last post by MilesAhead on December 13, 2009, 03:32 PM »

I think they must be doing something in the beta code.  If it was the AddOns themselves I don't see how they could not work for a bunch of daily builds, then all of a sudden they all work again on the same new build.  There must be some code they are disabling, then enabling for some reason.  I have version checking off in about:config and also use Mr Tech Toolkit.

Doesn't make sense all AddOns would break and fix at the same time. It has to be FF build code.  Maybe they use some compile option on milestone builds or something.

Whatever it is, so far other than Windows7 Jump List, I haven't seen a single new feature in 3.7pre anyway.  So there's no impetus to use it.

6499

Found Deals and Discounts / Re: Free 1 year license of Returnil Virtual System 2010 Home Lux

« Last post by MilesAhead on December 12, 2009, 12:57 PM »

Just wanted to add that if you follow the process on the promotion page link above, you will get a license key in your email.  No need to install right away such as in GOTD downloads.

I'm not using Returnil yet but I've been looking at it.  I signed up just in case I want to install.

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Living Room / Re: How would you improve a standard PC keyboard?

« Last post by MilesAhead on December 11, 2009, 06:23 PM »

Not a good idea to be running a virtual reality session as the machine may spray you with water vapor.