Search results

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    budget PC build

    :beer:Building a PC for my wife. She needs basic office applications, some web surfing, and some low-end games such as Sims 3. She wants a Shuttle case. She'll be using XP Home, may install Ubuntu later. I put the following together at NewEgg for about $450. The onboard graphics would be too...
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    building a simple (?) timesheet app with Excel

    I'm trying to put together a simple timesheet app for my office. It doesn't need to track payroll (that's covered on paper), but it will let the boss see what the clerks are doing during the day- ie, Bill spent four hours on project X, three hours on project Y, one hour filling out paperwork...
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    Funny Joke of the Day

    Oldsmoboat reigns supreme.
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    Man, UPS takes forever when I'm impatient

    My new components are coming from Newegg today. I've been clicking the package tracking link about every ten minutes. Athlon 64 X2 3.1GHz MSI K9N2 MB 4G RAM (OCZ Reaper) EVGA 9800 512M Raidmax Smilodon Zerotherm CPU cooler fans Gotta go check UPS.com again.
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    performance of huge files

    At my work, we have several huge Excel 2007 files that are used to keep track on inventory, sales trends etc. Under XP, one of these files takes around 20 minutes to load, on a good day. On a bad day, 45 minutes and/or locks up. The PC in question runs XP Pro. The /3G switch did not work so...
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    BSOD on startup

    My PC is crashing during or very shortly after startup. It gets a bluescreen and reboots after getting partway through Windows XP load. It has occasionally gotten all the way into Windows before it bombs. I've replaced the power supply with a known-good but I don't have any way to replace the...
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    heatpipe HSFs: effective in any attitude?

    As I understand the theory of why I should pay more for a heatpipe-equipped HSF, the heatpipes work by evaporating a liquid (alcohol?) at the bottom and condensing it higher up the heat pipe. This is great if you have a desktop case. What about the other 91.684% of us who use tower cases? Is...
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    What networking tools do I need?

    I inherited a disorganized network. Most things work, most of the time, unless a left-handed clown thinks of the color pink... it's a bit frustrating to try to keep it running. My toolbox is full of broken tools, incomplete tools, and imported crap with quality that would make Walmart blush...
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    I want to hook two cable modems to one firewall

    Hello- I'm adding a second cable modem to my network. I know that there is a device that will let me conglomerate the two modems so that my firewall (and, by extension, my users) gets to use all that bandwidth, but I am having a brain cramp and can't remember what the device is called.
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    seeking a cooking forum

    I've finally accepted that I'm the only one in my family that cooks. I mean, everyone can make a few things, usually reasonably well, but adventure is taboo in the kitchen. I like to try to make things that I can't pronounce. :) So, I'm looking for a forum where I can ask people about how...
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    time for a video card...

    My video card has gone the way of disco. I'd like to pick up a new PCI-E video card that has all of this: will have acceptable performance in GTA4 (which is rumoured to be coming out in October) Will have enough power to last through a motherboard and processor upgrade or two, so that it'll...
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    tracking down a trojan?

    I just took a job as sysadmin for a mid-sized comapny. Our mailserver cheerfully tells me that we've sent thousands of phishing messages for paypall. The mailserver is basically useless for tracking down which of my machines is trojanned. short of walking around to every machine and running...
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    cheap, high isolation headphones?

    I live in a noisy environment. A seven year old, two shrill birds, road noise... argh. I'm looking for a set of headphones that block out the outside world reasonably well without costing as much as a European vacation. Any ideas? Thank you.
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    Big quiet fans

    I'm seeking large fans with good CFM and low noise. Where's a good source? Thank you.
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    Current combat flightsims?

    I'm looking for a combat flight sim. What is out there these days?
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    who has a link to the Christmas story about the VW mechanic?

    There was a story posted here a year back about a VW mechanic repairing a VW bus driven by santa... long, well-written story. Anyone have the link. I googled but found lots of ads for places to repair my VW :P
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    HL2:E1: I'm stuck!

    I'm a bit stumped. How does one get through the water? There's one barrel to float on- not nearly enough.
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    Man, I hate ticks

    About the only good thing was that it was a large one, not the little ones that spread Lyme disease. He's tough, but what five year old is going to enjoy tweezers and pulling hair? Next guy out there who gets a scroll of genocide, ticks are a good choice.
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    Where can I buy a new car stereo faceplate?

    eBay has had them before- but not now. I posted in want it now. Google finds 1.729 billion ads for the radio and none for the faceplate alone. Alpine.com finds me a supplier that would sell them for a C note if they had any left. Help! Commuting with no tunes sucks!
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    Laptop battery questions

    Toshiba Tecra 8200 (P3-1000, 256M RAM, 40G modern HD, wireless network running) I just picked this up from a technically challenged owner. It has been treated gently but probably not with geeky care. The battery reads 100% at the start, and runs the machine for around ten minutes before...
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    Ghost 2003+ modern PC= toasted HD

    I took Ghost 2003 and tried to use it to back up my laptop. It requires that you run the software on the master and slave computers. My main computer (now known as a paperweight), an Athlon-64 3500 with XP home, ran Ghost 2003 with no problem. Start the program and it asks to reboot into...
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    recovering a laptop HD?

    So, like most of you, I am the neighborhood geek. One of my wife's coworkers has a Tecra 8200 with a 20G Travelstar drive. The drive, like many of its brethren, died an untimely death. It took all her tax data with it. Symptoms: drive stops working midway through booting into Win98. I can...
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    Is this drive a decent one?

    I found it on Pricewatch. The description talks about near-line storage. Is this appropriate for my home machine? I was just looking for cheap, SATA, largish capacity and good warranty. Maxtor MaXLine Plus II 250GB 7200RPM 8MB Buffer SATA HDD (Drive Only)
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    Let's hear it for the freezer trick!

    My new 300G Western Digital drive made it to the venerable age of three weeks before failing- it stopped being recognized as a drive at all. Pretty shabby even for WD. Unfortunately it took some important stuff with it (my wife's writing, our tax records, etc). I had planned to back it up...
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    Anyone know a good sale/trade forum for mountain bikes?

    My local bike shops are pricy and ignorant, eBay is full of scammers selling crap from the eighties for top dollar, and google helpfully pointed me to some forums that haven't had any traffic for months. Anyone know of a good site where people buy and sell used bike equipment? Thank you.
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    replacement Northbridge cooler?

    So my fresh-from-RMA motherboard has an intermittent buzz like a coffee grinder. When I reach in and physicaly stop the northbridge fan, the buzz is gone. I don't overclock. I like silence. I may wind up watercooling some time but not yet. The board is an MSI K8N Neo-4 wearing an Athlon/64...
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    Advice needed- wife's graphics card

    My wife is inheriting the old system, an MSI K7D-Master L board which currenly has a really dodgy old MX440 (IIRC). She's not interested in FPS, racing, etc. She plays Sims 2 and Pirates. This board's manual tell me: What card would you get for this? I'm hoping for a card that will run...
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    How much raise should one expect at one year?

    I'm wondering what to expect for a raise for my one year review. I work for a small (30-40 employees) software company. My performance is fairly good, I'v taken on some major projects and done them well, and I fit in well. So, what is a customary raise?
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    Is it possible to RENT a big HD?

    I need to get at least 250G of storage for about six hours. Is there anywhere that would rent me a drive? Prices are low enough I may wind up just buying one but I'm trying to be good... also it would take me a month or two to stack up the money since I just spent the PC budget for a while...
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    Finishing a build- help me choose memory and vidcard

    Hello all- I'm in the process of building a new system. Drives, case, power and peripherals are all coming from my current system. I've purchased an MSI K8N Neo4-F and an AMD 3500+ NewCastle from this nice guy over in the For Sale forum. So now, I have to pick up memory and a video card. The...
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    Clever new Paypal scam

    I just got this reasonably sophisticated scam attempt: Dear PayPal member, This email confirms that you have paid LUXURYWATCHESINC (sales@luxurywatchesinc.com) $190.85 USD using PayPal. (etc) followed by a nice little link saying: If you haven't authorized this charge, click the...
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    Ancient hardware question

    I have a very old but still functional printer. I bought it because I have the need to print some massive print runs (just text, 300 pages duplex or so). Unfortunately, whenever I try to print anything large- ie PDFs, graphics, etc - the printer get s memory overload and freezes. How does...
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    What is the average hold-down force used for Athlon heatsinks?

    I'm contemplating building a awterblock. It will have a silver base. Since the ideal heat transfer requires as thin a base as possible but the base needs to support the full force that is holding the waterblock to the morthboard, I'm trying to find out how much force is applied to hold a...
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    Very slow DVD burner

    I have a MagicSpin 16x DVD burner. With Verbatim 8x DVD-R madia, it takes around two hours minimum to burn a data DVD with just over four gigs of data (multiple files, for backup). Where should I start trying to get this thing working at full speed? Thank you.
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    I need a diagram of a motherboard tray, with screw locations

    I'm looking for a diagram of an ATX motherboard tray- well, specifically, I need the mounting-screw patterns for the motherboard. Just putting a motherboard down on paper and tracing it will not be accurate enough, and I'm hoping to avoid the tedium of digging up my calipers and mapping it out...
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    DDR2: why, when, and how much?

    Is it worth holding out for DDR2 to become more widespread, or is fast DDR good enough?
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    how much force is needed to hold down a waterblock?

    I'm contemplating building a waterblock out of silver. I need to determine how thick the base needs to be in order to not crush under the force of the hold-downs. So, how much force, in inch-pounds or whatever measurement is convenient, is applied by a 'standard' four-spring hold-down for an...
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    random Physics question

    How would one determine how quickly a heated liquid will regress to its environmental temperature? If I put a mug of coffee in the freezer (thus avoiding paying Drunkin's four bucks for an iced coffee :) ) for an hour, there's going to be a predictable temperature loss from the 90C or so of...
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    Cheap system advice wanted

    I'm looking to build a system for gaming and general household stuff. I have gone AMD in the past due to pricing but I'm flexible. The games I play generally have modest video demands- right now I'm getting by with an old 8500. I'd like to keep around a gig of RAM, but that shouldn't hurt...
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    Broadvoice VoIP sucks

    I'd just like to pass along a warning- Broadvoice sucks! Broadvoice is a VoIP company based out of Lowell Massachussets. I chose them because they were cheap- $10 a month plus lots of tax. I took them about two months of my working with them every chance I got before the service actually...