Search results

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    Upgrade worthwhile?

    I'm looking to upgrade a 3-year old build and am trying to figure out what's worth while. Since I bought the machine I've started doing more programming, more photo/video editing, more complex spreadsheet work, and a whole lot less gaming (virtually zero now). So I really want to get 3...
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    Dead Hard Drive (Motor)

    GF's Hard Drive bricked last week...and of course her ph'd dissertation is on there. She does have an earlier draft, but has lost about 3 months worth of work. Anyway anyway does anybody have any experience with one of these hard drive recovery firms? Seems like the cheap ones are in the...
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    Bootloader options

    Not sure if this is even possible but can a bootloader change the under/over clocking and toggle video cards on and off? I've got a desktop that I want to use basically as a NAS in linux. Under this event I want to stay as low-power as possible. So underclocking my processor, and turn on my...
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    Need a Laptop

    My only requirements is that it's got to be less than 12.5" wide (so I figure 12-14" diag) and it's got to have at least the graphics power of the 6600GT I've got in my desktop...which I think means discrete graphics. That said there I'd really like AMD (they employ my best friend) graphics...
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    Cheapest Laptop with discrete graphics

    85% of what I want to do is office/surfing type of tasks. But I do want something that can handle vista and a few hours of wow. So I think its worth getting the discrete graphics (let me know if you think I'm wrong). Anyway what's the cheapest new laptop I can get with discrete graphics?
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    Best $100 CPU????

    I'm budgeting approx $100 for the next CPU upgrade. It's got to be 939, but thats the only restriction. After skimming newegg, it doesn't seem worthwhile to spend more than the $70-someodd for a 3200 venice...does that seem right? I've got a very small case (and only 300 watt powersupply)...
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    Cheap laptop help needed

    Basically price is the number one concern. A close second is battery life (needs to be able to take a couple of hours or typing and surfing at a coffee shop). Everything else isn't too important. It's going to be purely an internet, word processing, and spreadsheet computer, so I have very...
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    Lindsey Graham next VP candidate

    After watching this guy a few times on Hardball and Meet the Press, I've been very very impressed. He's a conservative, but he's got a very pragmatic (as opposed to ideological) tone. He's a future presidential candidate but I'm convinced that he's going to be the next VP candidate. He gets...
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    Ultra Low Power Server

    I'm looking to build an ultra low power server and Myth backend. Not too many requirements. Needs to have enough physical space and cooling for 5 hard drives, 3 tuner cards, a gigabite network card, and a video card (if not builtin). Aside from that price is my only real concern. Ideally...
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    Bush tackles health care costs..

    Apparently Bush is going to try and tackle the cost of health care in this country in his State of the Union. His method will be his old standby...tax breaks. The problem itself is incredibly important, just behind energy and just over social security (in my opinion). I mean we spend an...
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    Thunderbird to Outlook

    I've been using Thunderbird for close to 2 years, but I've got to go back to outlook. Anyway is there someway to export everything (at least all my messages) to outlook? This wasn't an issue last time becuase I was moving from webmail to thunderbird. I did a google search but no hits.
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    Anyone still use the original office products

    We've got a hurricane coming and I was just remembering the good-ole days, back in the DOS era...had a little nostalgia for these apps. I know wordperfect is still being developed though I don't know anybody who uses it. 1-2-3 and Harvard Graphics still exist but haven't heard of a new version...
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    IF Miers withdraws nomination

    I think most people agree Bush messed this one up, and is on track for a very bad year (Roberts nomination being the lone bright spot). As I said Miers in a previous post is not the constitutional intellectual the moderates wanted, nor the documentable constructionist the far right wanted. Of...
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    Cronyism

    I'm a republican, I was for Bush in 2000, and against Kerry in 2004. I'm Pro-Life, and have mixed feelings about Roe. I've been okay with Bush's cronyism, at least until Micheal Brown came to light. Harriet Miers is worse. Not because she is less qualified than Brown, but because she is a...
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    Linux Server Power Saving Ideas

    I've had my server (750GB) for about 6 months, and for the most part I'm happy with it. Mostly it serves as a Myth backend, recording TV shows. However I also use it as a fax machine, print server, network drive, and a router (I use a gigabit switch). Anyway the thing isn't the most power...
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    What do you call yourself

    It just occurred to me to make a poll like this. I was responding to another post, calling myself a Republican, but I'm everywhere on the map. I also remembered that most americans are actually registered independent (which is stupid unless your state allows independents to vote in primaries...
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    How do I disable the mouse from turning my pc on during standby?

    I always bump my desk and the computer comes back on. Just wondering if there is a way to turn off the mouse during standby mode? Oh I use an MX500. Thanks.
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    Sister-In-Law wants to have his Kid

    After work I usually go to this bar for a few drinks. Atmosphere is sort of a Cheers thing, except there are about 10 of us regulars. Anyway, of the group apparently I'm the psychologist and priest because I get a lot of stories thrown my way of people looking for advice. This one threw me...
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    Anybody know of a C3 laptop?

    I'll basically be running Office applications so I don't need power, less than 1Ghz is fine. I do need light, (pref <4lbs) and cheap. So I was thinking a C3 would be a perfect solution, but apparently there is no market. Just wondering if you all know anything?
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    CPU temp

    I'm running a Semp 3100+, getting ready to OC it in the near future. Anyway right now there is no OC and the temp looks a bit high. 35C at idle, goes up to 42-43 under load, with a Zalman 7000B attached to the mobo (no fanmate). Now I think it might be the monitoring circuit. I keep the...
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    Anti-Virus suggestion

    I have a subscription to PC-Cillian 2005, and Zonealarm Security Suite 2005. Between those and the free alternatives (firewall and antivirus) which is the one with the lowest resource rate. I'm not too worried about detection rate, everything seems to be in the same ballpark.
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    Problem with my PCIe 6600GT

    So I got too comfortable building computers, and I took a shortcut. Basically I decided to replace the std cooler, with a VF700 before testing it. Well it may be faulty. Basically it distorts the image, at times it's the whole image, at other times its just lines. I can work because I have...
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    linux raid question

    I have 5 drives. 1 200GB PATA, 2 250 GB SATA, and 2 400GB SATA. 250GB need to be mirrored. The 1TB can be stripped, or o/w just combined into a massive volume as it will just be used for tv and HD recordings. What I need to know is what is the best way of doing this? How would having...
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    Palermo Semprons

    Just checked the pricing engine and all they have is this sku SDA3100AIO3BA. I thought the revE's would be BO, but now I think I'm wrong since they aren't out yet. Can anyone tell me with reasonable certainty which is the rev E, the nonexistent BO or BA? Just to prove my point googling...
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    Converting NTFS to ext2/ext3

    At some point here I'm going to change another computer to a Linux. However, this is the first time I want to keep a partition. The XP partition is gone, but my files need to stay. I don't want to do a 100% backup on DVD, but that would be my only choice if there isn't a utility that can do...
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    Palermo's Price Jump

    I'm very happy with my 3100 Palermo, and I recommended it to a friend. But he was having trouble finding it, then I saw why. Seems like they are pretty much unavailable at any spped, the ones that are out took a $10-15 jump in the last few days. Any news on production problems or official...
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    Is there such a thing as an external RAID cage?

    Basically I am looking to have about 1TB (so at least 4 hard drives), in a RAID1 array. They would be hooked up to a SFF, so obviously would have to go outside the case. Doesn't matter the interface (SATA or PATA), though PATA is a slight preferance becuase of cheaper drives. The only...
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    Which programs will let me rotate an mpg file?

    I have a few small mpg files that my daughter took on her digital camera. The thing is she filmed them lengthwise so when you play them on the computer their heads are all to the left. I need to rotate the videos 90degs but I don't know of a freeware program that will do this. Any help would...
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    Enermax cases

    Was just surfing the Enermax site and they have a lot of different cases. I've never used one, was just wondering was people think of them. As good as their PSUs?
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    Mark Felt vs Linda Tripp

    It's an interesting comparison of the two, mostly because I could not think of one thing in common. Here is the best I could do: Felt was a disguntled FBI man. Tripp was disguntled with her personal apperance. Felt trusted the Washington Post. Tripp was trusted by national inquirer...
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    Palestinian Contigous State

    So I've heard Bush talk about how any Palestinian state should be contiguous. I've been looking at population distribution maps, and I wonder if it is possible. It certainly doesn't look like it with neither population distributed in a contiguous section. Anybody more familiar with the...
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    Monitors Dropping Dead

    I had a 17" CRT monitor for about 4 years that died last December. It started by shaking along the edges. Within a few weeks the whole picture would distorted and resize. This would happenonce every minute or so. For about 2 months I was using a spare 15"CRT, then I bought a Samsung 997DF...
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    Audio Players

    I've been using Media Jukebox for the better part of 6 years. At this point its kind of like my wife, she won't do everything I want but I'm comfortable with her. Anyway I'm sure there are some programs better, but I'd like something that would make the transition easy. I have well over...
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    How important is L2 Cache??

    http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/cpu/print/sempron-2600.html It's a couple of months old but the results surprise me. I always thought that for some things like gaming and video encoding L2 makes a huge difference. Video encoding being the most important CPU intensive process I do. Did I...
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    Dual Channel RAM

    So here I am thinking that dual-channel ram doesn't work on socket 754 CPUs, then a friend of mine says it has nothing to do with the socket type only the chipset. He says in my case since I'm getting an NF4 4x socket 754 I would be able to take advantage of it. I still a little...
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    Palermo 3100 vs Newcastle 2800

    For the last month I've been telling myself I'd buy a 3200 Venice. But the market is changing too fast to justify that expense (introduction of dual cores). So I'm going cheap. I'm trying to decide between these two processors based on encoding performance. Why? I figure the two will perform...
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    My energy plan

    1) Increase Supply (esp domestic) - This is a mid-term fix, 5-years before you see any effect, 10-years before full effect. 2) Decrease Electricity's Oil Demand - This means a lot more nuclear, which is a good thing. Also they are the only way to efficiently make hydrogen. Other processes...
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    CPU Recommendation

    I was planning to buy a 3200 Venice, probably still will. But for under $200, what is the best option? I spend many more hours doing video encoding than gaming, but I also do some music mixing and various engineering application. Should I wait for a pentium dual core?
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    How hard is it to fix a power switch on a laptop

    I'm considering buying an laptop Duron 700MHz 256MB RAM, $100. It works fine, except the power button requires an act of god to turn on. Intermittent short I figure. Anyway how hard is this to fix?
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    Recommended 2.1 Speakers sub-$200

    A friend of mine recommended JBL which is what I'm leaning toward but both the Creature and Encounter look sort of strange. I'd like to know if anybody has another recommendation. Oh and of course I open to spending less that $200, that just my ceiling.