Random Question Thread: Tech

[Buffy]

I'd imagine ddwrt could do this for you. As far as stock firmware handling it, possibly. What do you have?

The new router/modem he purchased is a Motorola Model SBG6580: http://www.motorola.com/Consumers/US...-Gateway-US-EN

My router I would like to re-use to expand the # of ports available to me is a very common Linksys WRT54G.

[Purrrfect]

The new router/modem he purchased is a Motorola Model SBG6580: http://www.motorola.com/Consumers/US...-Gateway-US-EN

My router I would like to re-use to expand the # of ports available to me is a very common Linksys WRT54G.

Pretty sure I have wrt45g at home I can play with tonight.

[Buffy]

Pretty sure I have wrt45g at home I can play with tonight.

I found this thread, which seems to be some of the same things I'm talking about: http://www.tomshardware.com/forum/35...inksys-wrtg54g

From that, it appears that it should be a fairly straight-forward solution. I'm willing to mess with it until I get it right, too.

On a side note for those of you that do this sort of thing (like me). My idiot roommate (the one who bought the new router and is putting me through this drama) is currently trying to run Cat 5 cable under the carpet in the house. He's sitting outside my room trying to attach a ethernet plug to a spool of wire he purchased from some store.

Problems as I see them:

1. He's never done it before.
2. He has no tester to verify the connections are crimped properly.
3. Until I told him, he was unaware that both ends had to be crimped in the same order.

Other then that, what could possibly go wrong?

[TacoTaru]

This isn't necessarily a tech question, but it could soon be an internet related question. My cable/internet provider was just bought out by Time Warner and I don't know anyone who's ever had any experience with them. Can anyone here comment on whether or not this is a good/nothing/bad situation, and if it's bad why? I'm a little nervous as I'm currently enrolled with a 2 year contract with them and I'm not sure what to expect.

[Omniyoji]

It seems to me like it depends on the area TWC is servicing. Over here in the west coast they're fine. I currently have them and have had them for 2 years. I get my promised speeds and sometimes a bit more. Big ISPs tend to have for the most part crappy customer service. I just hope TWC gives you something similar to what you currently had with your previous ISP. Don't know how the situation in Indiana is tho. Heard a lot of people don't like them on the East Coast.

[Callisto]

It's more or less the same as Comcast in that, as stated above, different regions tend to have different issues. I know my girlfriend's family uses TW in Ohio and has had no issues, but friends of mine further east had major problems with them.

[TacoTaru]

Guess I'll just hope for the best then. If all else fails, I guess I can swap to the other regional provider we have even though their service isn't fantastic. <_< I guess a perk out of this is though I can now get service through HBO Go once the changeover happens.

[Heslon]

are android phones any good? thinking about buying a android phone (i like the new sony xperia mini pro, but didnt find any tests about it yet) for music/web/camera etc or keep my old phone and buy a ipod touch 4g (or wait for 5g if they release a new one this year) i know that the ipod touch doenst have mobil internet but not so important, i would mostly use w-lan at home

[Purrrfect]

I found this thread, which seems to be some of the same things I'm talking about: http://www.tomshardware.com/forum/35...inksys-wrtg54g

From that, it appears that it should be a fairly straight-forward solution. I'm willing to mess with it until I get it right, too.

On a side note for those of you that do this sort of thing (like me). My idiot roommate (the one who bought the new router and is putting me through this drama) is currently trying to run Cat 5 cable under the carpet in the house. He's sitting outside my room trying to attach a ethernet plug to a spool of wire he purchased from some store.

Problems as I see them:

1. He's never done it before.
2. He has no tester to verify the connections are crimped properly.
3. Until I told him, he was unaware that both ends had to be crimped in the same order.

Other then that, what could possibly go wrong?

That link's steps worked for me to use the router as a hub. just have to be sure you get the gateway address from the new router.

1) get teh gateway ip when connected to the new router's network, can be done with your pc or your roommates
2) connect your pc to the old router and go to it's setup ip (192.168.1.1 and admin/admin for user/pw by default)
3) check the disable next to dhcp server and set the ip a couple lines above that to the gateway ip + 1 (most of the dhcp's start at .100 and the gateway is usually .1 so most of the time .2 should be fine), save
4) connect the new line from the new router to the old router, do not use the separate internet plug (this means you will only be able to connect 3 devices to your router)
5) you may need to go to a command prompt and run ipconfig /release and ipconfig /renew, should pick up an address from the new router

At least that's how it worked here. I disabled wireless, so I dunno if that would work or not, but I wouldn't be too optimistic about it.

[Salodin]

are android phones any good? thinking about buying a android phone (i like the new sony xperia mini pro, but didnt find any tests about it yet) for music/web/camera etc or keep my old phone and buy a ipod touch 4g (or wait for 5g if they release a new one this year) i know that the ipod touch doenst have mobil internet but not so important, i would mostly use w-lan at home

IMO android phones are better the best smart phones on the market. The market place is huge and filled with so many awesome apps, and the phones are generally more powerful/more capable then iphones. Do yourself a favor and get one, you won't be disappointed!

[Mikus]

For the last week Dvd Shrink 3.2 keeps freezing during analysing. I've tried dvds that are newly released, 5 years old, to 10+ years old and the program just keeps freezing up. I'd like a different program to rip. I had dvdFab but the free version doesn't allow you to rip the menus/extras(unless I'm doing it wrong). Any suggestions for either a fix to dvd shrink or a free ripper I can download?

[Qeomash]

Question. I have a weird issue in Windows 7. I'm almost always in a skype call with all my friends and have been having issues with my mic cutting in and out. I finally realized what the problem is: anytime I hit the space bar, there is a delay in which I cannot talk for the duration of the "space" and then a 2-3 second delay after that that the mic just doesn't pick up sound.

It seems to me like a "touch to talk" button, but I honestly can't find what feature of Windows or Skype (the only audio program open) would be causing it.

[Kais]

so i switched to chrome because firefox kept crashing, it's pretty nice so far
however, is there a way to get my .torrent files automatically download in my .torrents folder? i know i did it with ff but i can't figure out how to do the same in chrome

[Caiyuo]

Well, you can set it up to open any of that particular file with a program of your choice, so like for .torrents you could say open with your torrent program, but as far as sorting a particular type of file into a folder besides your normal download folder, idk.

[Jojimbo]

I think uTorrent saves the torrent (look in pref in DL location) anyway so you could set Chrome to always open and uTorrent to save the .torrent somewhere.

[Kais]

set to auto-open, directories set in utorrent, but still downloads in the download folder

[Veikuri]

How do people go about buying a graphic card? How do you know what is good or bad? Its like hieroglyphics when I look at different brands/type.

I know 4 GB of RAM is the norm, but is there any benefit to get 6 or 8 gigs of RAM for normal gaming use?

[Jojimbo]

Different brands normally only differ warranty and what type of extra cooler they offer (the stock card's are pretty much all identical). EVGA (good warranty + step up program + good CS?) for nVidia and Sapphire/MSI etc for ATI are often recommended. XFX is notorious for bad CS. But at the end of the day, it doesn't matter *too* much who you go with.

A lot of people are building rigs with 8GB now, I think it's because it's getting affordable and it's nice to have that extra RAM plus 8GB (2*4GB) shouldn't need an upgrade any time soon and leaves upgrade option straight to 16GB rather than having to rebuy sticks. 6GB is only for tri-channel (X58 boards, 1st gen i7 900 series) and isn't worth considering if you are building new. But no, atm there isn't really a need for more than 4GB unless you do some video/photo/model editing on the side or want to be able to run tons of programs in the background/"future proof" your build

[Isiolia]

How do people go about buying a graphic card? How do you know what is good or bad? Its like hieroglyphics when I look at different brands/type.

I know 4 GB of RAM is the norm, but is there any benefit to get 6 or 8 gigs of RAM for normal gaming use?

Graphics card is not much different than any other part of the computer. You balance the performance/features you want or need with what you can accomodate in your PC and afford. If you game much on the PC, the GPU is probably the single most important thing to budget for.

You know what's good/bad by looking at reviews, benchmarks/performance, etc. Some sites have roundups or compiled benchmarks - Tom's Hardware's guide (which is gaming-specific) has suggestions for different price points, as well as a general tier list at the end.
Generally speaking you can tell the relative position of a graphics card, at least in the current lineup, in a similar way to German luxury cars. You've got a three or four digit model number. The higher the number the better the card. Between generations it can get muddier.

More or less you can have a fair bit of the decision-making done for you by settling on a price point and seeing what falls into it.

Do also keep in mind that graphics cards can require a lot of power (and their own power connection(s)), and may need a fair bit of space as well. If you're building those are just points to consider when shopping case/PSU. If you're looking to upgrade a machine, many Dells/HPs/etc come with meager PSUs and cramped cases that'd be hard-pressed to accomodate much more than an upper low end card.

Brand, as mentioned, doesn't necessarily mean all that much.


RAM...4GB is still fine. 8GB is common now because prices have gotten low enough that why not? Here's an article justifying some use for more than 4GB + additional tweaking.

[Qeomash]

Yay for 3 packs of RAM for 12GB!