Quick [tech] Questions Thread

[Trippy]

I've been using my TV as a monitor, but its a 720p 32 inch and I can\t read shit on it, although the BF3 beta looks good. Windows sayings its outputting 1920X1080, but my native resolution is only 720p, I'm just curious what this means and if it is worth spending the dollars for an actual monitor.

I would assume your TV advertises that it accepts 1080p signals but then downscales them to 720p.

[Sky]

Yerp.

Give it a 720p signal if you want to read teh text, but the UI is usually huuge in 720p (my old "George" tv was 720p). 1080p is a mixed bag, even on a big monitor (65"), it's 95% awesome all the time, but there are the outliers where the text is just too damned small and a game won't let you scale the UI (pretty much Anno 1404, can't think of another).

[Engels]

So anyone own a TV for PC gaming that doesn't make fonts and so forth look blurry? I'm pretty picky, and that's why I've stuck with expensive 21-26" IPS panels, but I'm considering, vaguely, a thirty something TV if, and only if, it doesn't make PC output look like blurry ass.

[apocrypha]

I've got a 40" Bravia KDL 40W4500 that's great.

You have to tweak AA settings and resolutions on some games - main problem being that at native res (1080p) fonts are too small to read from normal TV viewing distance. Would be fine if I was 1m away but I'm 3m away usually. Games with a lot of important text I tend to crank the res down and play with AA options til they're readable.

[Sky]

I read f13 just fine from my sofa about 9' or 10' away (varies as I move furniture seasonally) at 1080p. Even the little "Hey, Sky, you have 4569 messages" is easily legible. It's a 1080p display, but has a bit of overscan, so the nvidia driver compensates making it 1824x1026, which hasn't been an issue with anything, really. Pixel perfect, sharp text.

http://www.amazon.com/Mitsubishi-WD-65638-65-Inch-3D-Ready-HDTV/dp/B003HIPKR0

(under a grand!)

[rattran]

I use a 40" samsung 1080p lcd tv I use as a monitor in Spring, nice and legible. I set it to 'just scan' and it looks great

[apocrypha]

For reading stuff out of games just crank windows DPI up to where you need it. Only problem with that is it fucks with lots of games, so you usually end up trying to find a "fullscreen windowed" work-around.

[MisterNoisy]

So anyone own a TV for PC gaming that doesn't make fonts and so forth look blurry? I'm pretty picky, and that's why I've stuck with expensive 21-26" IPS panels, but I'm considering, vaguely, a thirty something TV if, and only if, it doesn't make PC output look like blurry ass.

Almost any 1080p TV should be fine as long as it has a 'just scan'/no overscan setting (which almost any modern set does).  Just make sure that your TV and PC are set at 1920 x 1080 with no overscan and you should be fine.

[Engels]

Good info. Thanks all.

[Rendakor]

I'm having connection issues. We have two computers hooked up (wired) to our router. Mine is fine, but my girlfriend's has been losing internet connection periodically. We only really notice it when playing WoW, since that's all she really does on it, but it knocks her whole connection out (can't browse web pages, etc.) when it happens so I don't think it's a bad addon or something. Our router is only 6 months old so that shouldn't be the problem. My other thoughts were maybe the onboard network card is going; the PC is about 4 years old now. Not really sure what else it could be.

[NowhereMan]

I had similar problems a few months back, I kept network connection but lost internet connectivity. Turned out it was my wireless adapter acting up, replacing that sorted it out and if you're not having any problems with then her network adapter seems a likely candidate.

[Cyrrex]

New issue that has popped up on my PC over the last 3 days or so:  keep getting a warning that my 12v rail is only putting out something like 10.7 volts.  Not within normal spec.  Haven't noticed any adverse effects, other than a single shutdown.  I am trying to figure out what could be causing it by process of elimination...I don't think I have too many devices running on my machine for the PSU (nor am I sure that can even cause that problem).  Might have too many things plugged into the outlet?  That seems a possibility, but then I wonder why I haven't seen the problem before.  Are there any other explanations you guys can come up with, other than a bum PSU?

[Chimpy]

Too many things on an outlet should not have any effect on the voltage coming across. You may be severely under-voltage in your house as a whole, but if you were under-voltage enough for the transformer in your PSU to not output enough DC voltage you would notice it in other things like the lights being dim/flickering.

I am guessing it is either your PSU, or the sensor that is taking the reading.

[Yegolev]

It took me a while, but one Corsair HX750W PSU later my rig is again operational after... I don't know how many months.  Since the OCZ 750W works with my old mainboard setup, I think I'll put that into the old chassis and get it running.  Ubuntu, I guess.

[Hawkbit]

New internet setup issues:

We setup the new cable out here in Seattle through Comcast.  We are only using internet, no cable TV at this point.  Motorola Surfboard SB6121 and a router Medialink Wireless-N. 

Any device that is wireless can download and upload just fine, 20mb down, 2.5mb up.  That includes phones, PS3, two notebook computers. 

My PC, which is hard-wired to the router, can download just fine but when I try to upload anything (attach to email, speedtest, etc..) it fails and kicks only my computer off the network.  Then I have to reboot my system to get it to recognize the network again. 

I removed the router from the network and connected just the modem only directly to the PC and I'm still getting the same issue.  Comcast is saying that all is well on their side. 

Is this driver-related on my side?  Or where do I start troubleshooting this?  Thanks!

[Chimpy]

It is almost definitely an issue on your machine if you are not having issues using the connection through the router on other machines and your computer exhibits the same issue when connecting to the modem directly.

What OS are you running?

[Kail]

I'm having some kind of annoying video card issue on my laptop.  It's running an ATI Mobility Radeon HD 4200 card, and worked fine up until Rage came out, but then wouldn't run Rage.  Carmack says "update drivers, noob" so I do, but the thing still won't run Rage, and now I'm getting video issues with all my other games, too.  Mostly just extremely low quality textures on everything (regardless of what the video options are), but there's other weird glitches like objects flickering or framerate that's maybe 1/10 of what it used to be in some games.

I'm thinking this is a driver issue, but I've tried reinstalling them, uninstalling them, redownloading them, and every combination of the above I can think of and it's still a problem.  The way ATI is telling me to do this is to go into control panel, uninstall the video driver, reboot, and then reinstall it, but I've tried this a number of times and no dice.  Am I mucking something up in the installation process, do I have to wait for ATI to release a new driver, or does it sound like a problem with something else?  Anyone know?

[Hawkbit]

It is almost definitely an issue on your machine if you are not having issues using the connection through the router on other machines and your computer exhibits the same issue when connecting to the modem directly.

What OS are you running?

Win7 64 Pro.  I replaced the ethernet cable going from router to PC, no effect.  It's a four year old MB with integrated ethernet... I wouldn't think there was a newer driver for it, but that's the only logical thing.  I also tinkered with Windows firewall and my AV/AS programs, turning them off one-by-one, to no avail.  It's a confounding issue. 

[Chimpy]

What OS are you running?

Win7 64 Pro.  I replaced the ethernet cable going from router to PC, no effect.  It's a four year old MB with integrated ethernet... I wouldn't think there was a newer driver for it, but that's the only logical thing.  I also tinkered with Windows firewall and my AV/AS programs, turning them off one-by-one, to no avail.  It's a confounding issue. 

Couple things you may want to look at:

Go into your network and sharing center, click on the bench/house/office building next to your connection and in the Set Network Location window, click the "merge and delete multiple networks", delete all of them that are not listed as active.

Open a cmd window as administrator (Search: cmd, right click and run as administrator) and type in the following command "netsh winsock reset" . This will rebuild your Windows networking stack.

Those two usually resolve most odd network connection issues with Vista/7 if it is a windows problem. Your NIC might be the problem, might want to download the driver, uninstall it entirely and then re-install from scratch after a reboot.

[Hawkbit]

Well thanks for putting me in the right direction.  The first two didn't help, so I went diving for an updated driver.  Best I could find was a 2007 LAN driver for this board (again, it's 4 years old).  I DLd it and uninstalled the one that was in place, then rebooted.  Unfortunately, the driver wasn't recognized by Win7 when I tried to install it, so Win7 installed the Aetheros in its place.  For giggles, I tested it and it works perfectly. 

So it's a roundabout fix, but a fix nonetheless.  Thanks again.  I owe you a beer. 

[NiX]

Welp, I'm still having blue screens, though they're showing up less. I did happen to run CPU-Z and find that my DRAM Frequency is at 665. If my RAM is listed as 1333 MHZ, shouldn't the DRAM Frequency reported be that?

[Lantyssa]

I'm thinking this is a driver issue, but I've tried reinstalling them, uninstalling them, redownloading them, and every combination of the above I can think of and it's still a problem.  The way ATI is telling me to do this is to go into control panel, uninstall the video driver, reboot, and then reinstall it, but I've tried this a number of times and no dice.  Am I mucking something up in the installation process, do I have to wait for ATI to release a new driver, or does it sound like a problem with something else?  Anyone know?

Have you tried reverting to a previous version?  The new drivers might just be crap, in which case reinstalling them won't do much for you.

Welp, I'm still having blue screens, though they're showing up less. I did happen to run CPU-Z and find that my DRAM Frequency is at 665. If my RAM is listed as 1333 MHZ, shouldn't the DRAM Frequency reported be that?

That is a half-step.  Not sure if it's really running at that speed or what though.

[Sky]

Welp, I'm still having blue screens, though they're showing up less. I did happen to run CPU-Z and find that my DRAM Frequency is at 665. If my RAM is listed as 1333 MHZ, shouldn't the DRAM Frequency reported be that?

DDR-double data rate :) 665*2

[NiX]

DDR-double data rate :) 665*2

Well then, don't I feel stupid. Thanks!

In the process of looking into this I think I solved my own problem. Motherboard was auto setting the RAM voltage to 1.590 instead of 1.5. Googling tells me this RAM usually goes unstable after 1.570

[Sheepherder]

Well then, don't I feel stupid. Thanks!

In the process of looking into this I think I solved my own problem. Motherboard was auto setting the RAM voltage to 1.590 instead of 1.5. Googling tells me this RAM usually goes unstable after 1.570

DDR cycles at the high and low of the clock cycle, if you're at all curious as to why it's twice as fast as the clock.

Normally 1.5v is the design spec for DDR3-1333.

[Kail]

I'm thinking this is a driver issue, but I've tried reinstalling them, uninstalling them, redownloading them, and every combination of the above I can think of and it's still a problem.

Have you tried reverting to a previous version?  The new drivers might just be crap, in which case reinstalling them won't do much for you.

Yeah, thanks, that seems to be working better.  I didn't realize you could still get the old drivers!

There was some weirdness going on with everything running at sub-10 fps for a while, and then the card deciding to override the software video options to shift everything to low quality, but in a flurry of scrubbing, I think I deleted whatever was causing the major problem.

Rage still doesn't work, but I'm not poking anything for a while.

Thanks again :D

[Furiously]

I've set my forth mouse button to be my push-to-talk button in Teamspeak. It works great in games.

I start surfing and it becomes my page back and push-to-talk button. How do I make it not be a page back button?

[Sky]

Might have to install the mouse software? Is there a setting in the control panel for extra buttons? The driver probably auto-assigns them (thus needing the software to expose them if windows isn't).

I use the same button, but then I like to use the back and forward buttons in mmo for pet attack/back off...

[Yegolev]

Forth?

[Engels]

Forth?

Its the 'go forth and prattle on yonder TS server" button. Jeeze.

[Sand]

Okay downloaded Witcher 2 on Steam tonight. Tried to run it and my lap top threw a hissy fit.

I have a Lenovo T500 which according to manufacturer is supposed to have "switchable" graphics between a on board Intel chip set and the ATI Mobility Radeon 3650.
Checked hardware under control panel and ran dxdiag. Some how, some where the ATI 3650 has disappeared. And the ATI catalyst control center refuses to load since its not detecting an ATI GPU.

Any idea how to fix this or nail down if the ATI gpu fried itself at some point with out my noticing?


UPDATE
Edit: Nevermind fixed it. This is rich. Supposedly it shipped with these switchable graphics but neither the BIOS or Power Manager installed at shipment allowed you to actually switch to using the ATI gpu card. So after flashing my bios and updating the power manager and driver it seems I am actually using the gpu card for the first time in two years. Funny that the Intel IGA on the board handled past games like Dragon Age.  

[Vision]

I\ve finally gotten the energy to overclock my CPU after finding that my GPU wont unlock, much to my dismay.

Ive never overclocked anything before, so I was hoping there was some easy guide to doing it right. I\m on air with a zalman heatsink, and an Asus z68 board with an i5 2500k

[Sky]

I'm an MSI convert based on my P67 board. I was going to get into an OC on my i5 2500K, but it was late the night of my build. So I skeptically pressed their magic "OC Genie" button and booted into a stable 4.2GHz OC on a hyper212.

So you'll have a bit more tweaking to get there, but you should easily break the 4GHz barrier with a zalman.

A quick google pulled up this guide for the P67. Should be similar enough to get you going, or maybe dig a bit deeper for a Z68 article.

[Murgos]

I'm an MSI convert based on my P67 board. I was going to get into an OC on my i5 2500K, but it was late the night of my build. So I skeptically pressed their magic "OC Genie" button and booted into a stable 4.2GHz OC on a hyper212.

I remember having to set jumpers on the board in arcane sequences that denoted timing relationships between various devices derived from an incomprehensible table in the board manual.  That sounds much easier.

[MisterNoisy]

I'm an MSI convert based on my P67 board. I was going to get into an OC on my i5 2500K, but it was late the night of my build. So I skeptically pressed their magic "OC Genie" button and booted into a stable 4.2GHz OC on a hyper212.

So you'll have a bit more tweaking to get there, but you should easily break the 4GHz barrier with a zalman.

A quick google pulled up this guide for the P67. Should be similar enough to get you going, or maybe dig a bit deeper for a Z68 article.

Z68 should be practically identical since the UEFI for ASUS's Z68 boards is pretty much identical to the one used on their P67 boards.