Quick [tech] Questions Thread

[Viin]

To be fair, I just cleaned out 2GB of old Nvidia drivers the other day as well.

Anyway, I just bought a SSD to replace my grinding, ten year old HDD. Is there anything pertinent I should know for setup/general use specific to SSDs?

I did a clean Windows install on my SSD then moved the Users folder to a non-SSD drive (this has My Pictures, My Documents, My Music, etc in it). PITA, but probably worth it since most of my editing is done in those folders - including Dropbox syncs.

Probably would have moved Program Files too, but that's a big mess I didn't want to deal with. So far my 120GB SSD is enough for Windows and my installed programs, with games installed on my 1TB RAID array (Users is here too).

[schild]

And ayup, all my computer issues are gone. Yay cureall fix.

[Yegolev]

I think checking for firmware updates on any SSD might still be a great idea.  It was definitely a great idea two or three years ago.

[Hawkbit]

7" tablets, discuss.

We bought a fire for my kid two years ago and returned it because it just didn't have solid parental controls.  Now she's 8 and my folks want to buy her a tablet so she can Skype/Netflix and a few games on it.  Thoughts on the different models?  The $200 price point is fairly compelling to us.

[Trippy]

Dunno about the parental controls but there's a Nexus 7 model that's $199.

[Salamok]

I have a rev 2 nexus on the way ask me again in a week.  IIRC I saw some other higher end Asus tablet coming out soon that had a micro SD slot!

[MisterNoisy]

7" tablets, discuss.

We bought a fire for my kid two years ago and returned it because it just didn't have solid parental controls.  Now she's 8 and my folks want to buy her a tablet so she can Skype/Netflix and a few games on it.  Thoughts on the different models?  The $200 price point is fairly compelling to us.

Sold my G1 Nexus 7 for the G2 model.  Build quality and speakers are both much better than the first gen model and the screen is gorgeous.  Outstanding little widget.

[Raknor]

I know this is the "build a PC" thread. But does anyone have any recommendations on a wireless router around $100? Ours seems to be having issues since the last electrical storm. I don't mind spending a little more if I can future proof myself a bit.

Looking for gigabit wired ports (4) and connecting 6 apple devices to the wireless. We stream a fair amount of netflix movies/shows. Our condo isn't huge so I don't need a ton of range. 

I hate shopping for routers. Half the reviews are glowing and the other half seem to label them as complete junk.

[Trippy]

Well your budget makes it hard to recommend something since I wouldn't recommend anything that wasn't at least dual-band 802.11ac capable and those are more expensive. The TRENDnet TEW-800MB AC1200 has those features plus 4 Gigabit Ethernet ports for $99 at Newegg but I have no idea how good it is.

[Salamok]

With so much apple going on you might consider an AirPort Extreme although it is double you stated budget.  I wonder how well the beam forming works with 6 devices connected simultaneously. 

I too would opt for something that supports wireless ac, unfortunately this is at odds with my mantra of don't spend more than $100 on a wifi router as all the consumer grade ones seem to melt themselves to death within 2 years.

[Shannow]

Hated the idea of opening a thread so I'll ask here. Anyone have any contacts or tips on getting to someone useful inside of EA customer service?

Further proof that Origin is the tool of the devil: While setting up my son's Xbox account for FIFA 14 Ultimate team to be linked to the web app and mobile app I had to create an origin ID for him...once we linked the accounts EA decided it would then reset my son's FUT accounts...effectively zeroing them out (on both FIFA 13 and 14 actually) This meant removing all cards, players etc and resetting him back to level 0. As you can imagine after he just dumped 75 bucks into buying packs on FUT he is rather...distraught (actually imagine the wrath of a 13 year old...it's kinda scary really).....Traditional methods of opening a ticket through the website seem to be about as useless as tits on a bull so I thought I would ask here.
Thanks.

[MisterNoisy]

Hated the idea of opening a thread so I'll ask here. Anyone have any contacts or tips on getting to someone useful inside of EA customer service?

Good luck - I'd be surprised if such a thing exists.

[Soln]

Set top box advice?

Have an early Roku and considering a Roku3, but primarily we'd like something that will include YouTube along with Amazon, Hulu, Netflix etc. and also allow for offline storage (so we can stream videos from it).  Does not need to be a DVR.  Thanks Friends!

[Chimpy]

Roku is probably the best box for the commercial streams you mentioned. If you are looking for streamable offline storage why not buy something like a Synology and then have the Roku connect to it?

[Der Helm]

Has chrome shat the bed lately or something ? I actually liked it very much until a few days a go strange things started to happen. I keep getting "This Webpage has a Redirect Loop" errors, youtube, gmail, facebook and chrome are having issues staying logged in and every once in a while I can only access the main page of a website. Clicking on any podcasts on stuffyoushouldknow.com would redirect me to www.stuffyoushouldknow.com. If I copy/paste the same link from chrome into firefox it works like a charm.

What the fuck google ? Interestingly enough, if I search for solutions to this problems, the links I can click all get the redirect loop error. Haelp!

[Miasma]

Some sort of addon that is screwing up after chrome auto updated itself maybe?

[Der Helm]

I found some task bar software and some anti-phising software from panda media installed when I checked under "programs and features" (I hate windows 8 btw). the name of the anti-phishing software appeared in the url of some of the strange redirects I had been seeing.

Time to change my passwords, I guess ? 

[Miasma]

Never heard of that, depends on if these panda people are legit or not I guess.  One way to prevent phising would be to change all links to first go to their site to check whether or not they are valid and if so redirect.  Cure sounds kinda worse than disease though, I wouldn't use something like that.

[Chimpy]

Pando media shit is usually tied to their "media accelerator" or whatever they call it. It is used as the downloader for a number of games that have launchers/downloaders (I think LotRO was the last game I installed that had it?). It is usually games that you download a small 5MB or so "installer" that all it does is install the Pando stuff and then kick off a download of the actual game/content.

[rattran]

Yeah, Pando is pretty much a craptastic torrent client for ftp games, which floods your connection randomly.

[Strazos]

Soooo, I'm finally going to be upgrading my phone after many many years. While part of me wants to get another cheapie flip-phone out of spite for all the folks who are just constantly glued to their stupid phones, I don't think it's going to happen.

SO, what I'm looking for is:

What sorts of opinions do folks have of the Android phones offered by Verizon (my legacy plan is with them)? I would very much not like to get an iPhone, just because everyone and their mother has one it seems. Also, do the non-iPhones offered by Verizon generally have the capacity to accept other sim cards? This is a big deal, as I;m only in the US for another 7 months or so before heading off to Mexico, and I'd rather not have to buy Another phone to use there.

[Trippy]

Get a Nexus 5. Oh wait that doesn't support Verizon

I believe all of Verizon's LTE smartphones also include GSM sim slots for international use but you would be stuck with a 2 year contract on those (unless you cough up the extra money). Their prepaid phones (with no contracts) are really sucky.

Shopping for a phone that you plan on using internationally gets even more complicated cause the 3G/LTE data bands that are used in other countries typically differ from the ones used here in the US so if you wanted the fastest data speeds in Mexico you would need to choose your phone carefully.

[Strazos]

The 2-year contract doesn't actually bother me, as I still share the account with family.

Anyway, if I want to be sure that I'll get full functionality from my phone in Mexico, what do I need to be looking at?

[Trippy]

According to the Wikipedia page if you want LTE support in Mexico you need something that supports LTE band 4 (aka AWS-1). The US GSM carriers (AT&T, T-Mobile) use that band for their LTE phones and Verizon has just started supporting it though Verizon phone support is spotty since the service is only apparently available in NYC right now. The Verizon Galaxy S4 supposedly now supports band 4 with its Android 4.3 update.

[Shannow]

Hated the idea of opening a thread so I'll ask here. Anyone have any contacts or tips on getting to someone useful inside of EA customer service?

Good luck - I'd be surprised if such a thing exists.

Well it only took 7 weeks but EA finally fixed the problem..:P Their 'game advisers' are actually easy to contact and quite nice (especially the Irish dudes) the problem is they are completely unable to help you and have to escalate everything up to the black hole that is the 'studio'.

[ezrast]

I'm tired of fan noise and want to take the plunge (har har) into liquid cooling. Which is completely unnecessary for my modest setup where higher-quality silent fans would probably do the trick, but I want to learn something new and I don't have much else to splurge on on Black Friday. Anything I should know beforehand that Google won't tell me? Brands to avoid?

[Miasma]

Any advice people would offer probably involves "don't do that" .  Most liquid cooling still uses fans, to cool the liquid, then you also get water pump noise.  I don't think people do it for silence, they do it so they can overclock more than is possible with just fans.

Which fans are causing the noise?

[ezrast]

That is probably good advice. I think it's the CPU fan that's the worst, so probably a decent aftermarket solution would be a more practical and less exciting course of action.

[Chimpy]

Disable all fans. Dip the whole computer in a vat of mineral oil. Problem solved (sorta ).

[Strazos]

Soooo, friend offering me a new iPad Air 32gb for $500 - worth it?

I'm not even sure what I would do with it since I have my PC and laptop, but if it's an actual good deal I'm sure I could find something to do.

[Trippy]

If that's a WiFi model (no cellular data option) that's just $100 off retail price. Apple is also having a Black Friday sale today with a free $75 gift card with iPad Air purchases so you are really only saving $25 assuming you made the deal today.

[Ironwood]

My GTX 660 Ti OC has now taken to crashing the driver every 2 minutes.

Anyone had any useful experience of this ?  So many theories on the internet, Power Management being the main finger pointed.

I'm going to reformat this whole fucking thing today to see if it helps, but I'm tearing my hair out here. 

[Trippy]

Did you install a new driver recently? I would do a custom / clean install of some WHQL drivers before reformatting. Is the fan working?

[Ironwood]

Aye, when the driver crashes, fan drops to zero, but I can set it to 100% and watch them buzzing away. The temps on the card are fine (barely above freezing for fucks sake), so I hve no idea what's going on.

Johnny Internet says this is hugely common, but all of them reccomend different drivers that 'work for them'.

I've cleaned it oot - it was a good suggestion I was already in the process of - and it's a little more stable, but some of the games handle the driver crashing and some just die.

I'm too old for this shit.
 

On a related note, you should get paid for these threads.

[Strazos]

According to the Wikipedia page if you want LTE support in Mexico you need something that supports LTE band 4 (aka AWS-1). The US GSM carriers (AT&T, T-Mobile) use that band for their LTE phones and Verizon has just started supporting it though Verizon phone support is spotty since the service is only apparently available in NYC right now. The Verizon Galaxy S4 supposedly now supports band 4 with its Android 4.3 update.

Thanks again, buddy - just picked one up and it seems very fancy so far. It's going to take some time to start typing things efficiently and really making proper use of the phone. Even if it is complete overkill for my purposes.