..::THE COMMUNITY TECH THREAD No. 96::.. : Othor Games

» Tue May 17, 2011 6:17 am

I'm planning on finally upgrading from Windows XP to Windows 7. I can choose between the Professional and Ultimate edition, with the Professional one being a bit cheaper. I'm only using this PC to play games and do basic homework and stuff like that, is there anything important I would miss out on if I went with the Professional edition?

» Tue May 17, 2011 7:27 am

I'm planning on finally upgrading from Windows XP to Windows 7. I can choose between the Professional and Ultimate edition, with the Professional one being a bit cheaper. I'm only using this PC to play games and do basic homework and stuff like that, is there anything important I would miss out on if I went with the Professional edition?

I personally use Ultimate but I've used Pro as well and you won't notice any differences on a daily basis (atleast I didn't) so really if you can find Pro 30 dollars/euros cheaper than Ultimate you could just buy it :shrug:

» Tue May 17, 2011 3:05 pm

I'm looking to build a new computer. I already have a case, DVD burner, mouse/keyboard, and monitors.

Right now I'm looking at http://img96.imageshack.us/img96/8509/computerbuild2.jpg and it has to fit into http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/searchtools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=2337810 case. Any suggestions?

I would buy on Newegg, but then I would have to pay tax.

Edit: Oh and for the budget, ~$700. The less the better of course.

» Tue May 17, 2011 7:50 am

I'm planning on finally upgrading from Windows XP to Windows 7. I can choose between the Professional and Ultimate edition, with the Professional one being a bit cheaper. I'm only using this PC to play games and do basic homework and stuff like that, is there anything important I would miss out on if I went with the Professional edition?

http://windows.microsoft.com/en-US/windows7/products/compare.

Personally, I upgraded from Vista Home x64 (:yuck:) to 7 Professional x64...eh, about a year ago now. Pro's never given me cause to complain or make so much as an annoyed noise at it. I love it, and dare I say it's been great for gaming. (Even retro games, and I've never touched the XP mode Professional's supposed to have. I knew Win7 and I were going to get along great when Baldur's Gate worked with it right out of the box.) Although that may be Vista Refugee Syndrome kicking in there.

Anyway, it looks like you won't be missing out on much, features-wise, so I'd say go with the cheaper option.

» Tue May 17, 2011 6:01 am

I'm planning on finally upgrading from Windows XP to Windows 7. I can choose between the Professional and Ultimate edition, with the Professional one being a bit cheaper. I'm only using this PC to play games and do basic homework and stuff like that, is there anything important I would miss out on if I went with the Professional edition?

You wouldn't even miss out on anything if you were using Home Premium. There is really no reason to get Ultimate pretty much ever. All it is is bloated.

» Tue May 17, 2011 4:58 am

Got my CR-48 today

» Tue May 17, 2011 8:18 am

Can't really go wrong with WD Elements and Seagate's FreeAgents drives. These are nice:
http://www.amazon.com/Western-Digital-Elements-Desktop-External/dp/B002QEBMCI/ref=pd_cp_e_1

Well, very important is what sort of ports do you have? An enclosure with the fastest port you have would probably be nice to have for doing large backups. eSATA? USB 3.0? Does it also need to have something universal like USB 2.0 so that any computer absolutely can put things on an off of it? Do you actually need external, or is it just for backing up one computer, and you can just pop another HDD in your case?

Anyway, the Spinpoint F4 is one of the few 2TB HDDs I'd recommend. It doesn't really appear to have the same terrible failure rate of many 2TB drives.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822152245&nm_mc=OTC-Froogle&cm_mmc=OTC-Froogle-_-Hard+Drives-_-SAMSUNG-_-22152245

As for the enclosure, Rosewill has one that I would really recommend that comes is quite a number of configurations as far as ports. It's not exactly pretty, but it has something important for longevity: a fan.
Black USB 3.0 (which is backwards compatible, so the whole USB 2.0 being compatible with every computer thing is taken care of)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817182210
Silver USB 3.0
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817182211
Black eSATA & USB 2.0 (if you don't have USB 3.0, but you do have eSATA, this would be your best bet)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817173042

Thanks for the replies.

Yes, this would be for backing up only one computer. So I could just put an internal drive in my computer.

As for external ports, I have eSata and USB 2.0.

How much difference would there be between USB 2.0 and e-sata? The Samsung Spinpoint F4 and the black USB + eSata would only be $15 more.

» Tue May 17, 2011 11:20 am

Thanks for the replies.

Yes, this would be for backing up only one computer. So I could just put an internal drive in my computer.

As for external ports, I have eSata and USB 2.0.

How much difference would there be between USB 2.0 and e-sata? The Samsung Spinpoint F4 and the black USB + eSata would only be $15 more.

There's a pretty huge difference in speed between USB and eSATA. eSATA is essentially the same speed as an internal hard drive.

» Tue May 17, 2011 1:04 am

Looking for a sandy bridge CPU cooler, as my LGA775 one doesn't fit anymore.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835103055

» Tue May 17, 2011 6:08 am

You wouldn't even miss out on anything if you were using Home Premium. There is really no reason to get Ultimate pretty much ever. All it is is bloated.

Alright, thanks guys. The store I'm looking at (which has a discount for students) doesn't have Home Premium, otherwise I probably would've picked that. The DVD version of Windows 7 Professional 64-bit is € 56,50, the Ultimate edition is € 79,75. Pretty sweet.

» Tue May 17, 2011 1:30 pm

So, after trying (and failing) to fix my BSOD's, I've decided to turn to you guys for some rudimentary help in diagnostics, seeing as my diagnostic skill can be summarized pretty much like this: http://xkcd.com/627/

So, bluescreens. I've had about 7 of them when posting, the first I just hoped was a random one, the error message seemed "friendly" enough: "A process or thread crucial to system operation has unexpectedly exited or been terminated." The result afterwards always seems to vary; sometimes it just restarts happily, sometimes I get a message of "Disk read error" and have to restart, once it needed System Repair. At my 6th though the error message changed:

KERNEL_DATA_INPAGE_ERROR

I found this concerning that error message: http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc957628.aspx but I'm having trouble dechipering it... I'm running a full system scan at the moment with Avast!, but stuff like

If the I/O status is C0000185 and the paging file is on a SCSI disk, the disk cabling and SCSI termination should be checked for problems.

is just confusing... What does it even mean? Should I open up the case and check for loose cables?

I'm guessing my questions are:
- Can you with this limited information judge if my PC is moments from crashing and should I in panic back-up all semi-important data that hasn't been back-uped yet?
- (I guess this is a long-shot...) Anyone happens to know if there's something "standard" that usually causes this error to occur?

Other than that, I guess I'm back to reading and deciphering other online tips. Oh joy!

» Tue May 17, 2011 1:49 am

So, after trying (and failing) to fix my BSOD's, I've decided to turn to you guys for some rudimentary help in diagnostics, seeing as my diagnostic skill can be summarized pretty much like this: http://xkcd.com/627/

So, bluescreens. I've had about 7 of them when posting, the first I just hoped was a random one, the error message seemed "friendly" enough: "A process or thread crucial to system operation has unexpectedly exited or been terminated." The result afterwards always seems to vary; sometimes it just restarts happily, sometimes I get a message of "Disk read error" and have to restart, once it needed System Repair. At my 6th though the error message changed:

KERNEL_DATA_INPAGE_ERROR

I found this concerning that error message: http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc957628.aspx but I'm having trouble dechipering it... I'm running a full system scan at the moment with Avast!, but stuff like is just confusing... What does it even mean? Should I open up the case and check for loose cables?

I'm guessing my questions are:
- Can you with this limited information judge if my PC is moments from crashing and should I in panic back-up all semi-important data that hasn't been back-uped yet?
- (I guess this is a long-shot...) Anyone happens to know if there's something "standard" that usually causes this error to occur?

Other than that, I guess I'm back to reading and deciphering other online tips. Oh joy!

Before you start troubleshooting it is wise to backup any important data, in case the problem gets worse.

BSoDs (STOP Errors) are notoriously vague. As the Microsoft Technet site stated it could be: A faulty I/O controller, faulty RAM, a faulty (corrupted) hard drive (where your page file is located), or a virus. 90% of all BSoD are caused by any of those components. Usually you start with easiest thing to check. I would start with the RAM. Get a memory diagnostic tool (ie Memtest86+) and make a bootable CD/DVD with the iso and check your memory. ANY errors indicate a problem with the RAM and/or the memory controller (motherboard). Sometimes reseating (re-positioning) the memory module can fix this issue, if not, you need to replace the memory.

If the memory checks out, then I would starting check the hard drive. First, in what configuration in the hard drive (the one with the page file) installed to? Is it in a RAID (mirror or stripe) configuration? Does it use a integrated controller or a separate controller (PCI or PCIe, etc...)? Download a hard drive (S.M.A.R.T.) diagnostic tool for your respective hard drive and run a full test. Any errors (namely bad sectors and/or unrecoverable errors) or if the hard drive fails the S.M.A.R.T. check then you need to replace the hard drive. Even if test passes the hard drive controller could still be to blame. Pinpointing the problem with a controller is difficult. I suggest that you remove any RAID and/or AHCI settings and revert to IDE legacy mode if possible.

If both the hard drive and RAM check out then you may have a virus. Scan the computer and attempt to clean the system. If you cannot clean the system then you'll need to reformat.

» Tue May 17, 2011 8:05 am

Looking for a sandy bridge CPU cooler, as my LGA775 one doesn't fit anymore.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835103055

Eh, it's overpriced for what it gives. I wouldn't bother tbh.

The Cooler Master Hyper 212 Plus has been quite the talk for bang-for-buck coolers in overclocking forums for SNB chips. I've seen some take the chip up to 5GHz with it. It costs half as much too:
http://www.amazon.com/Cooler-Master-RR-B10-212P-G1-Universal-Heat-Pipe/dp/B002G1YPH0/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1297495620&sr=8-1

Alternatives:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835185142
http://www.superbiiz.com/detail.php?name=FAN-MEGAHA&title=Prolimatech-Megahalems-REV-B-CPU-Cooler

EDIT: looks like newegg is having 15% off coolers for today only. Code: EMCYTZT289

» Tue May 17, 2011 10:56 am

I believe my wife's laptop backlight just went. I can connect it to my monitor, which is a 40' samsung lcd tv, using a dvi cord and it will work on my samsung but I still get a black screen on her laptop.

So here are the questions I have.

1. Is it the backlight? I believe it is not a mobo/ram/video card problem since I can hook it up to my samsung and it works fine, I have done a little reading about what the problem is with her laptop and it does sound like the backlight, can anyone confirm this or suggest what I can do to check.

2. I also tried to set up her laptop to another monitor which is a 19' dell monitor and I get nothing but a black screen on that one, any idea why?

I really need some help with #2, I don't know why it would work on my samsung and not work on the dell. I have read on some forums about trying to push fn=f1-f9 and that could help but it has not.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Edit: I assume it has something to with the resolution... I started her laptop in safe mode and that DOES work on the dell, but once I restart I get the windows initial load up page and then black screen again. I have tried setting it up to my monitor, the samsung which it works on, and adjust the resolution to 800x600(lowest) to 1200x800 and still nothing when I switch the dvi to the dell.

Edit #2: Another thing about the backlight, on the laptop when I switch the dvi cord from dell to samsung durring testing I will occasionally get the mouse pointer with the circle loading thing by the mouse on the black laptop screen.

» Tue May 17, 2011 2:01 pm

Is there any way to prevent the mouse wheel button from opening links in a new window in Chrome? I can't find anything in options.

» Tue May 17, 2011 12:37 pm

How many bits of color should an HDMI cable have? Because mine is 8-bit.

» Tue May 17, 2011 10:25 am

Hey guys I'm a newbie when it comes to PC's and have always been a console gamer, but I would like to start gaming on my PC when Skyrim comes out because of all the different mods you can do and the overall better quality. I can give you a list of my PC's specs and hopefully you can tell me what I will need to buy or upgrade to so I can have the best possible experience while gaming. Money isn't a huge factor for me but I'd still like to keep this relatively cheap like under $600 if possible.

But here's the specs::

Operating System
MS Windows Vista Home Premium 64-bit SP1
CPU
AMD Phenom X4 9750 38 °C
Agena 65nm Technology
RAM
8.0GB Dual-Channel DDR2 @ 400MHz (6-6-6-18)
Motherboard
MSI Aspen (Socket AM2 ) 100 °C
Graphics
HP w2338h (1920x1080@60Hz)
512MB GeForce 9500 GS (MSI) 54 °C
Hard Drives
732GB AMD 1+0 RAID Ready SCSI Disk Device (RAID)
Optical Drives
HL-DT-ST DVD-RAM GH40L SCSI CdRom Device
Audio
Realtek High Definition Audio

Any help at all would be greatly appreciated. Thanks guys.

» Tue May 17, 2011 2:43 am

As almost always, the most important upgrade is the graphics card. That card is both old and comparatively weak even in its day. However, there's like 9 months to Skyrim and AMD is bound to release something new in that time, so for that upgrade you ought to wait for Skyrim to be released.

Plus, you can't really upgrade the graphics card without double checking that your power supply (which you haven't posted) can handle it.

» Tue May 17, 2011 9:50 am

A friend of mine has a rig that he's been having problems with. I'm not sure how long he's had it(he said gaming rig, so I doubt it's been long at all), but he says that he's been having problems installing an OS. He said he was trying to install XP(which he may or may not have gotten legally) and while installing it said "corrupted .dll's" or something along those lines. My first thought was that the copy he had wasn't reliable, but he said it worked on his Notebook. He also explained that Ubuntu had similar errors and he couldn't install. He purchased a new 500GB HDD the other day, so he's tested two. Not the HDD. I asked him about his ODD, but he's tried both a new Sony dvd drive and an older one of his. So it's not that, either. I'm not positive of what else it could be, really. Any help would be much appreciated.

EDIT: http://a7.sphotos.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-ash1/181933_1427716632844_1830673358_799921_6092596_n.jpg That's what his live session of Ubuntu looks like. The line in the middle is like random colors and the like. Can't install, either.

» Tue May 17, 2011 10:24 am

I'm having a little trouble with my games lately, the framerate is a bit jittery at times when it definitely should not be (like when playing Majesty 2 today). I think maybe it has something to do with my SSD, I don't really know how to maintain them or use TRIM, and I've installed and uninstalled a lot of games on it.

My other specs:
------------------
System Information
------------------
Time of this report: 2/13/2011, 22:50:32
Machine name: DEVIN-PC
Operating System: Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit (6.1, Build 7600) (7600.win7_gdr.101026-1503)
Language: English (Regional Setting: English)
System Manufacturer: INTEL_
System Model: DP67BA__
BIOS: BIOS Date: 10/19/10 20:02:30 Ver: 08.00.10
Processor: Intel® Core™ i5-2500K CPU @ 3.30GHz (4 CPUs), ~3.3GHz
Memory: 4096MB RAM
Available OS Memory: 4076MB RAM
Page File: 2056MB used, 6093MB available
Windows Dir: C:\Windows
DirectX Version: DirectX 11
DX Setup Parameters: Not found
User DPI Setting: Using System DPI
System DPI Setting: 96 DPI (100 percent)
DWM DPI Scaling: Disabled
DxDiag Version: 6.01.7600.16385 32bit Unicode

---------------
Display Devices
---------------
Card name: ATI Radeon HD 4800 Series
Manufacturer: ATI Technologies Inc.
Chip type: ATI display adapter (0x9460)
DAC type: Internal DAC(400MHz)
Device Key: Enum\PCI\VEN_1002&DEV_9460&SUBSYS_20071787&REV_00
Display Memory: 2798 MB
Dedicated Memory: 1016 MB
Shared Memory: 1781 MB
Current Mode: 1920 x 1080 (32 bit) (60Hz)

» Tue May 17, 2011 8:04 am

I'm having a little trouble with my games lately, the framerate is a bit jittery at times when it definitely should not be (like when playing Majesty 2 today). I think maybe it has something to do with my SSD, I don't really know how to maintain them or use TRIM, and I've installed and uninstalled a lot of games on it.

If you think it's the SSD:

- SSD performance gets dramatically worse as it fills up. If you have less than 20% free space, look into emptying it some

- Just removing data is not enough, it also needs to be reclaimed as programmable. TRIM does this automatically, and Windows 7 is supposed to always enable TRIM whenever it is supported, but also check the SSD maker's website for a wiper tool/info on TRIM implementation.

» Tue May 17, 2011 2:50 pm

If you think it's the SSD:

- SSD performance gets dramatically worse as it fills up. If you have less than 20% free space, look into emptying it some

- Just removing data is not enough, it also needs to be reclaimed as programmable. TRIM does this automatically, and Windows 7 is supposed to always enable TRIM whenever it is supported, but also check the SSD maker's website for a wiper tool/info on TRIM implementation.

What's a safe way to format it and reinstall everything?

» Tue May 17, 2011 12:58 am

Gentleman,

I'm going to be buying a new GPU and PSU here very soon, and I wanted to check a couple of things here.

First, what are your opinions on my selections. Keep in mind that my budget is not very big, and I'm really not looking for TOO big of an upgrade. http://secure.newegg.com/Shopping/ShoppingCart.aspx?Submit=view

Second, how can I be sure said components are gonna fit in my PC? Main concern is the PSU, as I have no idea. GPU should fit, as it's the same PCI Express thingy as my current GPU. :lol:

So yeah, any words of advice are welcomed.

:foodndrink:

» Tue May 17, 2011 11:50 am

That page you linked to doesn't link to your shopping cart, it links to the shopping cart of the person who clicked.

» Tue May 17, 2011 1:02 am

I'm having a bit of trouble with my laptop, and was hoping you guys could point me in the right direction. Just starting yesterday Windows has been giving me an error that says something like "graphics driver has stopped responding and has recovered" and when this happens my screen flashes black a few times then goes back to normal. A few times after this happened yesterday I received a BSoD with the Stop:0x0116 error.

It appears the BSoD was pointing to a video problem since it listed something from the Nvidia drivers (NVCPL.dll or something like that). I went ahead and did a clean install of the newest Nvidia drivers (used Driver Sweeper and all that) but the problem is still happening. The strangest part is that the problem is mostly just happening when I'm browsing the internet or the laptop is not doing anything.

So does anyone have any idea what I can do, or how to read the BSoD or anything? Any help would be much appreciated.