In most neighborhoods there are noise laws for this. In mine, if a car can be clearly heard from 50 feet there's a fine involved. Of course, police can't be everywhere.
I'm one of those guys with a loud system - inside of the car. Outside? No rattles and less noise than the engine idling. I feel no need to advertise my music to everyone, and I learned a long time ago that most everyone doesn't care to hear it anyways.
I bought an amd for my recent file server build. 120$ for chip + mobo (and integrated graphics, who needs a video card?). 35 watt tdp, and most of it's time is spent idling away.
I could have gone Intel - don't get me wrong, but a decent motherboard with all the features of the AMD I bought runs closer to 150 by itself.
I would say after driving in Germany for just 2 weeks, having a requirement of drive right pass left would be a GODSEND to the United States. Of course, there were a few cars in the travels that didn't particularly obey that, but overall the experience driving was night and day different.
I found two compounded issues when using an older chip/pc for a file server:
1. IDE. Suprising lack of higher capacity IDE drives, but that's technology for ya. 2. Bandwidth. Even though the A7N8X-E board has a gigabit ethernet port, getting the entire system to run >30mb/s wasn't happening.
I know, it's definitely an old chip (Athlon XP 2500+) and an old platform, but the speed I now get out of my relatively cheap AMD A4 "NAS" is blinding in comparison. Does it need the horsepower? Nah. But it is nice to be able to move things around at full gigabit speeds now.
1. I would strongly recommend an upgrade to Windows 7. If that's not possible (and I know the submitter didn't want anything but XP) then XP it is. 2. Install a router that has the ability to VPN in. Might require dyndns and knowledge of openvpn (dd-wrt user here.) There are other ways around this - port forwarding to the host machine and the like, but nothing short of being on the actual PC beats getting onto the same network as the affected PC. 3. Use some software to take a snapshot of the PC running in good condition. This might require running the PC for a few weeks so Mom gets everything right, then snapshot it. This would be the easy "remote fix" for a PC that is totally screwed and you have no other option. 4. Get a few backup drives and have Mom cycle them out. Once a week should be fine. Bonus points for getting them into either a safe or a safety deposit box. This fixes most lost file issues if #3 needs to be used to bring the PC back to life. 5. Run through a disaster program and have a document handy to cover #3 above. If all else fails, KNOW that Mom can walk through the document when you can't get to the machine at all without any bit of prodding. 6. Invest in good antivirus and anti-malware. I typically use Security Essentials, but I also know that they're probably the top target for malware - seeing as free guarantees a wide user base. MAB would help snare some things that good AV just doesn't catch.
If you truly don't have the time to invest, creating an alternative option to what you have now is going to be all the more difficult. I typically play clean-up on my parent's PC and network over the holidays when I visit, and can remote in when away - and they're fairly savvy. My most recent fix was a router that wouldn't maintain any user-side connections for more than 2 minutes - new router, problem solved; but I had to be there to see it. My parents just thought the internet was slow....
This isn't a plug for KVMs, but between my two windows stations at work - I have a laptop with 2 23" screens and a desktop with a single 22" (used to be 2, "upgrade" from the desktop side eliminated one due to graphics card incompatibility). I use Input Director to shift the main keyboard/mouse focus to the desktop and back.
I'd bet there's software out there for linux/windows hybrids etc to cover this. I gain the additional screen and resources of a second machine - while being able to display network stats etc constantly on the 2nd machine/3rd monitor without using any of my laptop's resources.
I do have a keyboard stashed close by in case something happens, but it's not required at all times.
If I had to look around on the road at the different cars around America, I'd say you're wrong. The only v8 engines that I know of in production cars are typically sport cars or luxury cars. Common family sedans here are i4 or v6 engines.
SUVs and Trucks? Another matter. But most of the affordable vehicles around in the SUV and Truck arena are switching to v6 and i4 configurations. It'll take time, but we're getting there.
In my five minute review of Bandcamp, it seems pretty awesome. My biggest issue when it comes to music sites like this is finding content - whether it be similar to another artist, or in a correct category (no "progressive" category, I noticed...)
I'll probably spend some more time with it later, but I haven't really found anything by randomly clicking around yet.
Typically at the end of a lease, you need to return the property to the owner or buy it outright. If we're going to compare apples to apples, the way the cell phone companies treat this is as a loan, similar to when you purchase a car and get a bank note for the balance.
In this respect, if I don't owe the cell company anything at the end - I'd really consider it more of a loan than a lease. Especially with the early termination - they don't want the phone back, they just want their cut of subsidizing the phone. Therefore, I'm going to do whatever I want to it. Same with a car; if I am leasing a car there are certain restrictions put in place so that the bank/lending organization still has their "value" in their object. Purchased? Even with a loan, I can do what I like - and if I cause an issue, it's on me. One thing I do in a car is yank out the factory stereo and wire up a new one - that's typically not allowed on leases from what I have heard.
Path of least resistance at this point. What's easier, getting a malicious PAC script installed, or getting the same PAC script installed as well as having a user sign off on an invalid certificate?
Admittedly, getting someone to blindly click "yes" to accept the bad certificate isn't difficult, but if it doesn't pop at all - all the better for the malicious person on the other end.
You know what's sad? Why should you have to go to a break or conference room for a window? I don't know if it's 100% true, but co-workers I met in Germany state that when they build out cube farms/offices there, each person has to be able to see out a window. Natural light and all etc. Instead of huge walls walling off a support section, they had plexi/glass up so you had natural light and a view outside.
I once had a window cube; somedays I do wish I had that back.
From a media perspective, it's a pretty simple extender - in the same vein that DLNA is supposed to do most of this too. My issues:
1. I need to have a Windows machine on at all times I want to use the extender piece on the xbox because Windows Media Center has to be running to give the files to the machine. 2. Windows Media Center doesn't appear to convert a lot of things in my library to a format readable by the xbox; hence I never use the xbox as an extender.
I have had similar experiences on #2 for DLNA. Even trying to put together some of the applications (again, windows machine + transcoding is supposed to work here) DLNA just doesn't fit the bill. I have relegated myself to the fact that if I want to be able to play everything without messing around, a low-cost PC running media player classic is the way to go. Just built an i3 for my basement in fact because my old single core athlon couldn't decode anything higher than 720p without becoming a mess, even with hardware video decoding.
Honestly, I can't remember if I looked or not. I know I went through settings and so forth, and didn't see an option in the driver for this. So I chose the next best option - to just turn off the trackpad on the E6400.
I don't typically like trackpads; I was just pointing out that the solution (with defaults no less) provided in the E6420 was better than what I dealt with in the E6400.
And as far as "Everyone should know better - including you" - well, that's your opinion. I really don't need to defend my status against you or anyone who feels they're better than me just by being snide and aggressive on the internets.
Why does everyone have to be a dick? Seriously? I mention something I noticed and adjusted it to suit my needs... besides I didn't SEE that option in the Dell.
Dell on their E6400 laptops threw me into a fit. They put the trackpad right by the spacebar; so every now and again my mouse would either fly across the screen - or more annoyingly, select some text while I was typing and delete it, replacing it with my typing.
This is fixed on their E6420 series, when I type the trackpad is disabled for the duration of typing plus about half a second. It's just enough to where I haven't been forced to actually disable the trackpad in software on this one.
My problem is I use my xbox for primarily single player offline games, and probably once every two weeks fire it up for a 30 minute session. Pretty much every time I turn it on, there's an xbox update that HAS to run. And that makes me sad.
I get it, they need updates. But I would love to have a console that checked once a day or once a week for updates and just silently did it in the background. Similarly, I can "purchase" demos or full games on the xbox live site, but I have to turn on my console to start the download. The above "check in" once a day could eliminate that issue as well.
I've got a q6600 at 3ghz with 6GB of RAM. Have recently been eyeing SSDs - only downfall is running @ sata2 speeds, however the random access should work out nicely.
My biggest issue is I can't expand the memory much more without a much higher cost. DDR2 is expensive - almost 2x more expensive than the DDR3 counterparts. I recently rebuilt my file server from a lowly athlon-xp somthing-or-other to an AMD A4 - man, what a difference there. But I don't think I'll see too much improvement yet other than on handbrake for my q6600. Besides, from a memory standpoint, I'm rarely scraping at 4GB in use anyways.
Slashdot Mirror
In most neighborhoods there are noise laws for this. In mine, if a car can be clearly heard from 50 feet there's a fine involved. Of course, police can't be everywhere.
I'm one of those guys with a loud system - inside of the car. Outside? No rattles and less noise than the engine idling. I feel no need to advertise my music to everyone, and I learned a long time ago that most everyone doesn't care to hear it anyways.
I bought an amd for my recent file server build. 120$ for chip + mobo (and integrated graphics, who needs a video card?). 35 watt tdp, and most of it's time is spent idling away.
I could have gone Intel - don't get me wrong, but a decent motherboard with all the features of the AMD I bought runs closer to 150 by itself.
One would think the timing could be set... oh you know. to a standard....
I would say after driving in Germany for just 2 weeks, having a requirement of drive right pass left would be a GODSEND to the United States. Of course, there were a few cars in the travels that didn't particularly obey that, but overall the experience driving was night and day different.
Maybe the universe would collapse if you tried to grow a kidney in a kidney.
Well, it certainly looks like it's been in the same form for a long time, so I'd say we have a winner.
I found two compounded issues when using an older chip/pc for a file server:
1. IDE. Suprising lack of higher capacity IDE drives, but that's technology for ya.
2. Bandwidth. Even though the A7N8X-E board has a gigabit ethernet port, getting the entire system to run >30mb/s wasn't happening.
I know, it's definitely an old chip (Athlon XP 2500+) and an old platform, but the speed I now get out of my relatively cheap AMD A4 "NAS" is blinding in comparison. Does it need the horsepower? Nah. But it is nice to be able to move things around at full gigabit speeds now.
1. I would strongly recommend an upgrade to Windows 7. If that's not possible (and I know the submitter didn't want anything but XP) then XP it is.
2. Install a router that has the ability to VPN in. Might require dyndns and knowledge of openvpn (dd-wrt user here.) There are other ways around this - port forwarding to the host machine and the like, but nothing short of being on the actual PC beats getting onto the same network as the affected PC.
3. Use some software to take a snapshot of the PC running in good condition. This might require running the PC for a few weeks so Mom gets everything right, then snapshot it. This would be the easy "remote fix" for a PC that is totally screwed and you have no other option.
4. Get a few backup drives and have Mom cycle them out. Once a week should be fine. Bonus points for getting them into either a safe or a safety deposit box. This fixes most lost file issues if #3 needs to be used to bring the PC back to life.
5. Run through a disaster program and have a document handy to cover #3 above. If all else fails, KNOW that Mom can walk through the document when you can't get to the machine at all without any bit of prodding.
6. Invest in good antivirus and anti-malware. I typically use Security Essentials, but I also know that they're probably the top target for malware - seeing as free guarantees a wide user base. MAB would help snare some things that good AV just doesn't catch.
If you truly don't have the time to invest, creating an alternative option to what you have now is going to be all the more difficult. I typically play clean-up on my parent's PC and network over the holidays when I visit, and can remote in when away - and they're fairly savvy. My most recent fix was a router that wouldn't maintain any user-side connections for more than 2 minutes - new router, problem solved; but I had to be there to see it. My parents just thought the internet was slow....
I don't think it's been a seller's market for some time now.
It seems like there's enough other people who blame all of the US's problems on Obama, so there is the balance.
Ctrl-alt-insert triggers a ctrl-alt-del on the slave machine, even pre-login.
This isn't a plug for KVMs, but between my two windows stations at work - I have a laptop with 2 23" screens and a desktop with a single 22" (used to be 2, "upgrade" from the desktop side eliminated one due to graphics card incompatibility). I use Input Director to shift the main keyboard/mouse focus to the desktop and back.
I'd bet there's software out there for linux/windows hybrids etc to cover this. I gain the additional screen and resources of a second machine - while being able to display network stats etc constantly on the 2nd machine/3rd monitor without using any of my laptop's resources.
I do have a keyboard stashed close by in case something happens, but it's not required at all times.
If I had to look around on the road at the different cars around America, I'd say you're wrong. The only v8 engines that I know of in production cars are typically sport cars or luxury cars. Common family sedans here are i4 or v6 engines.
SUVs and Trucks? Another matter. But most of the affordable vehicles around in the SUV and Truck arena are switching to v6 and i4 configurations. It'll take time, but we're getting there.
In my five minute review of Bandcamp, it seems pretty awesome. My biggest issue when it comes to music sites like this is finding content - whether it be similar to another artist, or in a correct category (no "progressive" category, I noticed...)
I'll probably spend some more time with it later, but I haven't really found anything by randomly clicking around yet.
Typically at the end of a lease, you need to return the property to the owner or buy it outright. If we're going to compare apples to apples, the way the cell phone companies treat this is as a loan, similar to when you purchase a car and get a bank note for the balance.
In this respect, if I don't owe the cell company anything at the end - I'd really consider it more of a loan than a lease. Especially with the early termination - they don't want the phone back, they just want their cut of subsidizing the phone. Therefore, I'm going to do whatever I want to it. Same with a car; if I am leasing a car there are certain restrictions put in place so that the bank/lending organization still has their "value" in their object. Purchased? Even with a loan, I can do what I like - and if I cause an issue, it's on me. One thing I do in a car is yank out the factory stereo and wire up a new one - that's typically not allowed on leases from what I have heard.
Path of least resistance at this point. What's easier, getting a malicious PAC script installed, or getting the same PAC script installed as well as having a user sign off on an invalid certificate?
Admittedly, getting someone to blindly click "yes" to accept the bad certificate isn't difficult, but if it doesn't pop at all - all the better for the malicious person on the other end.
Use robot shells with Chinese laborers inside?
Profit!
You know what's sad? Why should you have to go to a break or conference room for a window? I don't know if it's 100% true, but co-workers I met in Germany state that when they build out cube farms/offices there, each person has to be able to see out a window. Natural light and all etc. Instead of huge walls walling off a support section, they had plexi/glass up so you had natural light and a view outside.
I once had a window cube; somedays I do wish I had that back.
From a media perspective, it's a pretty simple extender - in the same vein that DLNA is supposed to do most of this too. My issues:
1. I need to have a Windows machine on at all times I want to use the extender piece on the xbox because Windows Media Center has to be running to give the files to the machine.
2. Windows Media Center doesn't appear to convert a lot of things in my library to a format readable by the xbox; hence I never use the xbox as an extender.
I have had similar experiences on #2 for DLNA. Even trying to put together some of the applications (again, windows machine + transcoding is supposed to work here) DLNA just doesn't fit the bill. I have relegated myself to the fact that if I want to be able to play everything without messing around, a low-cost PC running media player classic is the way to go. Just built an i3 for my basement in fact because my old single core athlon couldn't decode anything higher than 720p without becoming a mess, even with hardware video decoding.
Maybe he wanted someone to set up us the bomb.
Honestly, I can't remember if I looked or not. I know I went through settings and so forth, and didn't see an option in the driver for this. So I chose the next best option - to just turn off the trackpad on the E6400.
I don't typically like trackpads; I was just pointing out that the solution (with defaults no less) provided in the E6420 was better than what I dealt with in the E6400.
And as far as "Everyone should know better - including you" - well, that's your opinion. I really don't need to defend my status against you or anyone who feels they're better than me just by being snide and aggressive on the internets.
Why does everyone have to be a dick? Seriously? I mention something I noticed and adjusted it to suit my needs... besides I didn't SEE that option in the Dell.
Dell on their E6400 laptops threw me into a fit. They put the trackpad right by the spacebar; so every now and again my mouse would either fly across the screen - or more annoyingly, select some text while I was typing and delete it, replacing it with my typing.
This is fixed on their E6420 series, when I type the trackpad is disabled for the duration of typing plus about half a second. It's just enough to where I haven't been forced to actually disable the trackpad in software on this one.
My problem is I use my xbox for primarily single player offline games, and probably once every two weeks fire it up for a 30 minute session. Pretty much every time I turn it on, there's an xbox update that HAS to run. And that makes me sad.
I get it, they need updates. But I would love to have a console that checked once a day or once a week for updates and just silently did it in the background. Similarly, I can "purchase" demos or full games on the xbox live site, but I have to turn on my console to start the download. The above "check in" once a day could eliminate that issue as well.
I've got a q6600 at 3ghz with 6GB of RAM. Have recently been eyeing SSDs - only downfall is running @ sata2 speeds, however the random access should work out nicely.
My biggest issue is I can't expand the memory much more without a much higher cost. DDR2 is expensive - almost 2x more expensive than the DDR3 counterparts. I recently rebuilt my file server from a lowly athlon-xp somthing-or-other to an AMD A4 - man, what a difference there. But I don't think I'll see too much improvement yet other than on handbrake for my q6600. Besides, from a memory standpoint, I'm rarely scraping at 4GB in use anyways.