Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Computing/2008 May 10

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May 10

Router for PS3

What kind of router works best with Play Station 3? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.138.240.182 (talk) 01:13, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

Does it even make a difference? I am not sure if it does at all as long as you get one that is compatible with PS3 (such as 802.11 b/g wireless router). Cisco's Linksys Linksys WRT54G series is a good place to start looking. Thanks to Google for the search: Router problems with PS3 Kushal (talk) 07:20, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

The wheel ... invented. Kushal (talk) 07:23, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

I'd look at something that is capable of running DD-WRT or Tomato Firmware 206.126.163.20 (talk) 22:47, 11 May 2008 (UTC)

A question about Windows Paint...

I liked Windows Paint. I liked to draw on there and make pictures with that program. Another thing I liked to do with Windows Paint is that I can open pictures I saved in my Pictures folder and I can color them, change them to other colors, and other ways to manipulate the pictures. Now, here's the situation: I wanted to trace a picture with lines with Windows Paint, and then change the picture to blank, but also keeping the picture trace on the white background. Is it possible to do that? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Sirdrink13309622 (talk • contribs) 03:25, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

What you really need is a program with layers (such as GIMP). But, you can do what you want. It is just rather difficult (and I'm going from memory since I haven't used Windows since Windows 95 was introduced). The eraser has two functions. Left-button-dragging causes it to replace everything with the background color. Right-button-dragging replaces the foreground color only with the background color. So, you can use that to erase the colors you don't want. Still, it would be a hell of a lot easier to use layers. Just add a transparent layer. Trace the picture on it. Remove the picture's layer leaving the trace. -- kainaw™ 04:05, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

Or use Inkscape and Bézier curves to trace, you get way better results that you can scale to whatever resolution you want. --antilived^{T | C | G} 04:08, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

How to find IE Proxy Settings on a restricted computer

How can I find out what proxy settings Internet Explorer is using when I'm restricted from opening "Internet Options"? Many sofware have a "Use IE proxy settings" option which work well but it doesn't show the settings just uses them. I want to configure Firefox to use the proxy settings but I need to know them first and the owner of the computer would never tell me. I know they are in IE options but I'm blocked from looking in that. Please helps. Mr Beans Backside (talk) 09:04, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

Install Firefox, let it import IE's settings, then look in Firefox's options to see what it got 206.126.163.20 (talk) 22:46, 11 May 2008 (UTC)

We are not here to help you gain access to areas of a computer that you shouldn't. If you really want it so badly, why not talk to the administrator? As for the FireFox thing, if he is restricted then that likely will not work. It all depends on what sort of restrictions are applied. asenine ^{say what?} 07:08, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

Nvidia chip again

I posted a question asking if my laptop was any good for gaming as it claimed to have 'Nvidia graphics'. Someone told me to run dxdiag and after doing so I found out details of my computer and nvidia chip.

Model: Compaq Presario v3700 notebook

OS: Vista Home basic (6.0, Build 6000)

Processor: AMD Turion 64 X2 TL-60 Dual-core 2.0 GHz

RAM : 1982 MB

DirectX version : DirectX 10

Display device : NVIDIA MCP67M

Chip type: GeForce 7150M / nForce 630M

DAC type: Integrated RAMDAC

Approx Total Memory: 796 MB

So is my laptop any good for playing newer FPS games and other strategy games? Nvidiauser (talk) 10:32, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

The generic answer that your support personnel would give is "It depends on which games you want to play." Kushal (talk) 14:15, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

Unfortunately, no. The GeForce 7150M is an integrated graphics card, and therefore it is very weak.

The specification "Nvidia graphics" should be taken as mere trivia, for it is meaningless as far as performance is concerned. A high-end GeForce 9800GX2 is roughly 20 times as powerful as a low-end GeForce 8400GS, both by Nvidia. And even the 8400GS is probably several times stronger than what you have. You can find some reviews of the card via A google search. -- Meni Rosenfeld (talk) 17:26, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

Forget newer FPS games unless you turn the resolution down and turn off most of the eye candy, as the specs of your notebook will make up for the lack of graphics power. As for strategy games - turn-based yes, others - it depends. Unfortunately if you want to play new FPS games as they were intended to be experienced, you would need a proper gaming machine. This would mean dual core cpu, ddr2 ram, 8800 or 9600+ nvidia card and a decent motherboard chipset. Lower these specs and you have to lower the resolution in games. 7000 series nvidia cards can play most FPS's just fine with lower settings. Sandman30s (talk) 23:58, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

I had a mobile Geforce 7400Go. It was roughly equivalent to an ATI Radeon 9700 (faster than a 9600, slower than a 9800 Pro). Meaning, Half-Life 2 would play on high without AA. C&C3 would play on low acceptably, though with many units or action onscreen the framerate would drop (maybe mid 20s, still acceptable but getting choppy). That was all at the LCD's native resolution of 1200x800; newer FPS and RTS games would be harder or impossible to run at that resolution, and even hard at lower resolutions. Now, the 7150M is even worse, so that gives you an idea. Older games might be okay, but it'll be rough on anything remotely recent. 206.126.163.20 (talk) 22:44, 11 May 2008 (UTC)

Something

Has anyone noticed that when using Google's Translate feature to translate from Japanese to English, it used to show unrecognisable words in small letters in brackets, but now it shows such words in all caps? Is there any way I can change it back to the old one? I do not like the new one because it makes me want to copy those all-caps words and add a swear word before them and a whole bunch of exclo-marks after them! Interactive Fiction Expert/Talk to me 13:56, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

Why don't these yahoo answers links work?

Why don't these yahoo answers links work? Is it because I'm Canidain? [1] [2] [3] [4] Mr Beans Backside (talk) 14:04, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

If it is because you are a Canadian (and I seriously doubt it), you need to sue Yahoo! Inc. for discrimination. It might be because you happen to be in Canada (and their service is down in Canada). However, I don't think Yahoo! would ever do such a thing as to discriminate based on nationality. --Kushal (talk) 14:12, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

Are you joking? Lots of very reputable web sites offer differing levels of service based on the nationality of the user. (For example, The BBC) There are a number of practical and legal reasons for this. You might also be shocked to learn that many movies only come out in certain parts of the world, and will not even work on DVD players from other parts of the world. APL (talk) 02:04, 11 May 2008 (UTC)

As far as I know, BBC is targeting content based on region and not on nationality. If a Nepalese national was in Manchester, I am sure he would get the same content as a British citizen. I can almost vouch that BBC would never discriminate based on nationality as far as serving content was concerned. Kushal (talk) 23:47, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

They don't work for me either and I'm from the US. And, since it's Canadian Yahoo, I'd expect it to work for Canadians in any case (why is there a seperate Canadian Yahoo answers anyway, do they substitute "oot" for "out" in all of their responses ?). I suspect the real issue is one of the 3 they list on the error page, probably the last one. StuRat (talk) 14:18, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

Yahoo is down in Canada? But people are still asking questions, I just can't access any of them. This happens ever day when I use this google search to find Avril related news from the past 24 hours [5] Mr Beans Backside (talk) 14:20, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

Specifically, I'd guess they archive their answers like we do here, with the consequence that the original links (which Google finds) no longer work after the archival. This seems to be a general Internet problem (links that "expire") which needs a general software solution. A partial solution would be for each site to provide redirects at the old location pointing to the new location when they do an archival. Of course, since this relies on each site to do something, it will never be 100% effective.

Another approach, which I'd like to see here, is for each site to put each question (or maybe each day's questions) on one permanent page to begin with, then provide temporary "transclusions" on the current questions view page. That means those questions and answers would appear on the current page, but would really already be on the permanent archive page. Picking on the links at the top of the current view page or "edit" in each section should then take you to the permanent page, where you would get the permanent link to that Q&A.

A comprehensive solution would be for Google to not only provide a link to each page, but to copy the contents of the page as well. This is currently prohibitively expensive due to the cost of storing that much data and may stay that way as the amount of data on the Internet (current and former pages) may grow faster than the cost of storage goes down. Also, there might be copyright concerns with such a system. I believe that Google does cache some popular pages currently, but certainly not all of them. StuRat (talk) 14:22, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

I see. So they die after a certain amount of time? Thats a real bummer because there isn't a google cache link to view. Mr Beans Backside (talk) 14:27, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

Slow computerr

Why is my computer being so slow? and it does not have a virus, for example, when i close a window, it takes a long time for that window to close down. how can i fix this? Mr Beans Backside (talk) 14:45, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

(See my response below, to your follow-on question. StuRat (talk) 14:57, 10 May 2008 (UTC))

Well, the most likely diagnosis for a slow computer is not viruses or malware, but instead exactly that - a slow computer. Have you considered upgrading? asenine ^{say what?} 07:06, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

If your hard drive is almost full you amy be experiencing a slowed rate. Try a disk cleanup. Also, you may have cache problems. There are ways to fix this, but for me, when my computer is running slowly, I think the most effective fix is to do a system restore. This will set your system back to how it was when you bought it. Just be sure to save any important files first, as everything gets deleted, but this will definetly speed things up.

I took the liberty of editing what was written above (in italics), so that the browser would not go on for a great width. I'm using Firefox, note you. 213.161.190.228 (talk) 07:33, 16 May 2008 (UTC)

Strange application

There is a strange application running on my computer when I look under task manager called "Deepfreeze". It is a virus? How can I get rid of it I did not install it and it won't go with end task? Mr Beans Backside (talk) 14:46, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

This sounds like it might be related to the above "Why is my computer so slow" question. It does sound like a virus to me. First off, do you know that using the Task Manager (at Control-Alt-Delete) a second time to try to close an application will force it to close ? Try that. Unfortunately, many viruses will then just restart a new process. If you have an anti-virus program, try running that. Also remove any registry entries that sound related to "Deep Freeze" and do a "find files" on files that contain that phrase to see if you can track them down and delete them (save a backup copy somewhere in case those files did something important before the virus got to them). If you've done a system save recently (but before this virus appeared), you also may want to do a full system wipe and restore. StuRat (talk) 14:55, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

Perhaps this: http://www.faronics.com/html/deepfreeze.asp. --— Gadget850 (Ed) ^talk - 15:00, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

I should probably say that it is not "my" computer. This relates to my earlier question "How to find IE Proxy Settings on a restricted computer". Mr Beans Backside (talk) 15:02, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

I thought DeepFreeze was a data backup program. Useight (talk) 15:59, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

Why, it certainly freezes . Scaller (talk) 17:59, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

new ram not working

a freind recently brought some new ram and i installed it in his pc, the thing is windows pro sp2 wont recongise that it has the extra ram, i know windows 32 bit is limited to 4 gig, which is the total now in there but its only showing 490 mb, even when i remove the new ram, which should leave 2 gig, though my friend seemed to think its always been round there. I've updated the bios and the bios recongises that there are 4*1 gig ram, even beeps at me when i dont pair them correctly. I used memtest and that showed no errors. windows wont boot when i haaave only the new stuff in but does boot when it only has the old stuff or the old and new ram. i think the motherboard my be. the ram is PC3200 and its a D865GLC intel board. i'm thinking the boards broke, though it still works fine any ideas?--86.20.169.136 (talk) 15:34, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

Maybe it's your motherboard. Motherboards can only support a certian amount of RAM. It sounds like an old computer. Try to find its max RAM capacity or get a new motherboard. --Randoman412 (talk) 20:25, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

intels website says it can handle 4 gig ram, guess its a new motherboard--86.20.169.136 (talk) 22:04, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

I also think it is probably a problem with the motherboard. It may also be the RAM. While most RAM is tested before shipping, defects still can make it through the system. I would also check that before buying a new motherboard. However, if you do get the ram to work, and Windows only displays 2.5 GB, that is an issue with Windows XP Pro. Windows Media Center Edition will display it correctly, but XP Pro will not. Leeboyge (talk) 03:35, 11 May 2008 (UTC)

Joyfully interesting graphical glitch

There seems to be something wrong with my old computer (running Win XP SP2). What programs and not have been installed (so as to give a clue for cause, eg through malware), I can't quite tell you. What I do know is that when I open the Control Panel task for installing/uninstalling software, the list of installed programs goes on perfectly as normal... until near the end. What takes shape is an enormous (likely 650x14,000 pixels, by eye measure and memory) rectangle. It is like a pyramid, if you'd like: First layer is black, then comes white, then comes black, then perhaps grey, then black and then white again. It is quite the interesting sight, and has not been seen in any other list on the computer (I searched rather exhaustively). It can be scrolled through just fine, but not selected. After it comes a few more listings of software. I am planning to reformat said computer, but would like you lot to have a go at this first. I would be able to produce a screenshot, had I not been impaired in access to the computer. So there'll likely be a chance at solving the mystery again, in summer, if anyone needed a screenshot for their diagnose. Scaller (talk) 17:56, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

If you could get your hand on a video camera, you could upload the entire episode to the Internet. Kushal (talk) 22:59, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

re kushal - Or FRAPS for that matter. asenine ^{say what?} 07:04, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

3D modeling software

Hi all, I know there isn't a definitive answer but I've tried some relevant forums and I seem to be getting biased replies so I hope you can point me in the right direction...

I'm a freelance graphic designer and most of my work is for print/web. Occasionally I have to do basic 3d work (eg. boxes, cylinders) to show how the finished products will look. I've been mainly using Bryce_(software) and a couple of free programs but over time I'm being asked for increasingly complex 3D work which I have to outsource as Bryce isn't really created for this type of work.

After trawling google, forums and looking through the 3D_computer_graphics_software I'm just confused so can anyone suggest a solid, easy-to-learn package please? I don't need anything ultra-powerful like film/games studios use. I'm not creating 'organic' scenes, most of my modeling would be based on combining primitives or 'lathing' (I forget the correct term), but if I could model things like this [6] and this [7] that would be great! And I do like the 4-window interface (X/Y/Z/perspective) that the likes of Anim8or use.

Oh, and I'd prefer to stick with something at £800 tops! PC or Mac! If there any designers out there who have made the move from Adobe-type products to 3D I'd particularly appreciate any comments you have!

Thanks in advance, Mike --87.114.18.154 (talk) 19:01, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

Yeah thats the thing with 3D graphics programs - there can be a bit of a steep learning curve initially. Blender is powerful and free, albeit can be difficult as the rest - but theres a lot of documentation and wikis on it - and if you're gonna be using it a bit in the future, may as well dive in? Boomshanka (talk) 22:08, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

Three cheers for Blender ! Hip hip hurray! Kushal (talk) 22:29, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for quick replies! I know there's going to be a learning curve, I spent weeks playing with 3DS at college (this was about 10 years ago) and managed to create a box with a spotlight lol, I just want something fairly basic and easy to learn. Do either of you have any samples of your own work in Blender? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 87.114.7.177 (talk) 23:10, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

Forgot to sign the previous comment, i was me! Mike 87.114.7.177 (talk) 23:14, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

Forgive me if this sounds obvious, but have you thought about just working through one of the many Blender tutorials on the web? (I don't use it but I worked through part of one years ago.) I've found that's often the best way to dive into something relatively unknown and with its own particular interface paradigm and etc. Just going through the motions can give you a lot of insight, more than tinkering with something pre-made. --98.217.8.46 (talk) 23:58, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

Art of Illusion. I have Bryce too and use Art of Illusion to make more complicated models. It has a lathe function and is very easy to use. AND ITS FREE!!!!! :-) Ilikefood (talk) 00:23, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

Version Control System

Now that there are 4 coders and 2 designers in my company we have started thinking how we need some kind of version control system (yeah, I know, we should've thought of that before). Nobody has any experience with any VCS, so we are free to choose the best tool for the job. But, the big question is should we use SVN or get some kind of distributed system? Also, does anybody have some suggestion where we can learn this, and some best practices? Especially problematic is the fact that all of us use Dreamweaver, and while coders could switch to Eclipse or some other tool that has good integration with version control systems, designers certainly cant. And besides the split Design/Code view is damn useful. So, any tips regarding VCS and web development? If we go SVN how would we accommodate the existence of devel and live servers? — Shinhan < talk > 19:41, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

Until someone comes here to actually answer the question, please feel free to browse List of revision control software. Thanks. Kushal (talk) 22:28, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

I think for the size of organisation you are talking about there is not much advantage to a distributed system. A good place to look for best practice documents are the Perforce White Papers, start with the High Level Best Practices guide. These are generally applicable, not just to perforce - though they are more applicable to a branch based system (like SVN or Perforce) more than a label based system (like MS VSS). When our organisation looked at revision control, systems we came down to two SVN with the tortoise-svn client or perforce. We ended up going with the commercial perforce because it had a slightly better merge facility and our ITT manager is "nervous" about software that does not come with support - I.E. he likes to pay for things!

We decided to use the separate interface rather than eclipse integration, as with trials with the eclipse plugins we found that some users found it harder to control check in-outs and to ensure that only "working" builds were checked in to the mainline. We have about 20 programmers, ranging from mediocre to excellent, and if all your programmers are high-end this may not be an issue. -- Q Chris (talk) 07:07, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

My experience of version control systems is not broad - I used CVS in the past and now use CMVC for my day job and SVN on a side project. So while I can't advise on GIT, Bazaar, and so on, I can say that you won't go too far wrong with SVN. Sometimes there are benefits to following the herd :-) . I've found the Eclipse plugin for SVN to be adequate but not stunning, so don't worry too much that you won't all be able to use it. TortoiseSVN seems to be the standard standalone app for Windows, but (the herd thing again) I'm sure there are numerous alternatives.

With regard to your processes (the live/devel question) that's something can't really be answered without a lot more information about how you currently work and what you want to do (feel free to provide that information; I'd certainly be interested). As well as not knowing your approach, I've also never done any serious Web development, so please don't take the following suggestion as authoritative. That said, perhaps you could arrange for the current latest code to be extracted from SVN onto your devel server - either upon each commit or, if that integration is a little too continuous for you :-) , each night. SVN provides "hooks", places where you can script what you want to happen, and extracting the code in order to build it, test it, run metrics on it etc is perfectly normal. Then you have a second, manually-triggered script that extracts the code (in exactly the same way, otherwise the configuration is untested) onto the live server when you want to do an upgrade. You might also want to tag the tree as part of that script - that way you can roll back to that version if a subsequent one turns out to be bad. 81.187.153.189 (talk) 23:06, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

Processor Compare

Is there any website where you can compre computer prossesors such as Intel to AMD or ATI to Nvidia? I mean this in terms of specs, power and price etc. --Randoman412 (talk) 20:23, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

Try Tom's Hardware [8], Anandtech [9] and CPU benchmark [10]

Mike 87.114.18.154 (talk) 20:30, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

Sisoft SANDRA can do this in real time (your processor vs. other processors), if that's what you want. asenine ^{say what?} 07:03, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

How can I make my computer run faster?

When I play a game its really slow. It can be fast actually at around 70 frames per second, but while I'm playing sometimes my computer just starts suddenly making more noise and i have like 30 fps. Theres probably something running in the background thats making it slow. How can I fix this? I'm playing and then randomly it slows down and once in a while it pauses for half a second or so. I want to know if theres anything I can do to make it clean and fresh again without completely reinstalling everything on my computer. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.187.116.121 (talk) 23:48, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

Try a clean boot [11] or the program CCleaner. I can attest to both of those, and perform them whenever needed. Good Luck! Hpfreak26 (talk) 01:45, 11 May 2008 (UTC)

With CCleaner, go to Tools > Startup and remove anything you don't need. This can dramatically increase the speed of your computer, but be careful when removing entries when you don't know what they do. Usually if you search for the name on Google you can find out what a startup process does. asenine ^{say what?} 07:00, 12 May 2008 (UTC)