Personal Report: acquiring new hardware

[Mary Bull]

When it comes to computer hardware, one thing can lead to another. And I certainly experienced such a chain reaction in my own life yesterday.

My nephew had enough free time this weekend to set up my new Epson R800 printer. Instructions said to have the computer shut down for the first part of the install.

When the time came to boot the old custom-made PC--which had been properly shut down only 15 minutes earlier by Windows XP SP2--the on/off button on the tower refused to function.

My nephew then removed the side panel and tripped the internal switch. Nothing happened. Soon the situation was easily diagnosed as a power connection problem--so, ran down through connections, cable, power-supply box (bought a new power supply box). Still no joy.

Upshot: We jointly made the decision that I would buy a new computer and next weekend he would take the HD out of the old, hook it up as an external hard drive, and transfer the data to the HD that came with the new computer.

One thing led to another, and I am now posting on OPF using:

1) An HP Media Center PC model 7684n

2) A new Samsung monitor model 225BW [R]

The computer is fast, fast. I won't be using half its features, even, but that simply means I've gained in speed and storage space.

The monitor is unbelievably better than my 4-year-old LCD.

I'm no longer having contrast problems reading text on-screen. The colors are both brilliant and non-glaring and very pleasing to my taste.

The two front-side USB ports are accessible and functional (thank goodness) and I've already utilized one for my Lexar cardreader.

In a minute I'll have some DNG files in LightZone with which to bring up an image from which to print with the Epson R800.

First I want to put Qimage on this machine.

I should say that I've been putting evaluation copies of everything for use during the coming week, until I can get my old registered apps transferred from the old HD to the new. (Actually the two new HDs. This HP Pavilion is dual core.)

I'm pleased with my morning's work, so far, and just wanted to report in at OPF.

I would have put this in the Entry Digital Photography forum thread about choosing a printer (evolved out of choosing a printer profile),
http://www.openphotographyforums.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1146

in order to say that the Epson is up and running--except that the computer and monitor report would be a bit OT to that thread.

Mary

[Cem_Usakligil]

Hi Mary,

This is all great news, have a lot of fun with your new PC :-). Your nephew seems to have done a great job in helping you out.

I'm particularly glad to read that the text contrast problems have been resolved by the new monitor.

Cheers,

Cem

[Mary Bull]

Thanks for rejoicing with me, Cem.

I am lucky to have such a fine nephew, indeed.. We were up until midnight last night, just getting all the hardware peripherals tended to--drivers etc. Fortunately, I had those CDs filed quite accessibly.

Mary

[Ray West]

Hi Mary,

Nothing beats new toys. Just make sure the magic smoke doesn't escape. I'm not certain if your pc is supplied with two hdds, twin core processor, maybe.

Best wishes,

Ray

[Sean DeMerchant]

Upshot: We jointly made the decision that I would buy a new computer and next weekend he would take the HD out of the old, hook it up as an external hard drive, and transfer the data to the HD that came with the new computer.

One thing led to another, and I am now posting on OPF using:

1) An HP Media Center PC model 7684n

Looks like a nice system that should take good care of your for a while Mary

enjoy,

Sean

[Mary Bull]

Well, during set-up I was asked by the software whether I wanted to have duplication of the data, so that if one drive crashed the other would still have the data. I'm pretty sure it is two HDs. But I could always be wrong, of course.

Magic smoke blowing all around here.

Front label on the tower says: Hard Drive 10 TB (2 x 500 GB).

Mary

[Mary Bull]

Certainly hope so!

I've printed out a macro of a fall leaf, a view of the sky with some clouds above that turning maple-tree top, in which I accidentallly captured the moon, and a snapshot of my nephew.

The Epson R800 is awesome--remarkable fidelity to my eye's memory of the real-life colors.

Mary

[Bev Sampson]

Hi Mary. This is all so exciting. Getting a new computer is a lot of work and being organized as you are certainly simplifies things a little. Every time I think about the time when I will need a new computer, I shutter. My Dell 8200 dimensions desk top is over four years old now and still runs remarkably well. My Dell Inspiron is over three years old and has never been a joy to behold. Still, I hope they keep pluggin along because I would like my next big ticket item to be the next Canon new 1 series if that EVER happens.

Your nephew is a gem.

Enjoy.

Bev

[Ray West]

Hi Mary,

Bit of a beast you got there. Hope you keep your seat belt fastened. If you have some reasonable speakers, I can give you some links, which you may not appreciate, but I bet your nephew will (Its aircraft - folks.) I mis-read your previous post, as you implying that dual core meant dual hdds.

re the magic smoke - it is nothing you would want to put in a pipe, but a technical term for what makes this elektrickery stuff work.

There are two types of magic smoke, although some say there are more. Both types are in your computer. If you don't have the right amount, if some is allowed to escape, then the computer does not work properly. One type, usually light blue, escapes quite easily, and pretty quickly, so quick, you often can't see it. It is sometimes associated with a fuse blowing. or a single component leaking it out. Sometimes, a small amount can leak out, but enough stays inside, keeping much of the system going. The other sort, (the power smoke), is often a brown colour (in UK it flows through brown wires, initially). That escapes more slowly, and smells pretty bad. Once its escaped, you can't easily get it back in again, and you usually have to get a new system, with a fresh supply of magic smoke. Occasionally, you can get away with getting a bigger power supply, this hopefully has enough smoke, maybe more than enough, which can allow some power smoke to escape, without having to replace the whole system next time.

Not many people understand this, and complicate it with unecessary theories. However, empirical testing has shown the above to be true.

(I think in the USA, you may have red wires. This is obviously because your magic smoke runs a 60Hz, whereas in UK it runs at 50Hz. Your power wires have to be red, since your smoke is running so fast, it can actually escape as flames. The Hz is a measurement of the sound it makes. If you get a good foggy day, and stand by an electricity pylon, you can actually hear it going "Hz, Hz, Hz".)

Best wishes,

Ray

[Mary Bull]

Bev, I think it's the luck of the draw how fast a computer wears out. So yours may last you a good long while more, and you can spend your money on that new Canon you're dreaming about.

Mary

[Mary Bull]

Ray,

I love your droll explanation of the mechanics of smoke, complete with color coding!

As to speakers, those and my HP scanner are the only pieces of hardware that I haven't replaced in the past month.

They're Altic Lansing, according to what it says on the front of the woofer. Pretty good decibel capability and fairly nice fidelity to pitches and harmony, so far as my ears go.

So send on your airplane link. My nephew will be working with getting my old HD's data transferred next weekend and he can have a listen. Should be back from Columbia, MD, this coming Friday p.m.--he's teaching CDMA classes for Sprint there this week.

Meanwhile, I've printed 9 extremely satifactory images from my G2, printing from LightZone. The Epson R800 color profile is awesome.

Mary
(the beast pilot)

[Erik DeBill]

Bev, I think it's the luck of the draw how fast a computer wears out. So yours may last you a good long while more, and you can spend your money on that new Canon you're dreaming about.


Yep. Luck of the draw it is, though you can stack the deck a little with a UPS and a vacuum cleaner. A UPS will protect (some) against power surges and similar problems. Keeping the area around the computer vacuumed will cut down on the dust that gets sucked inside and gums up the works.

I just decomissioned one of mine after almost 5 years. I'm pretty sure that all that's wrong is a dead fan, but I'd been meaning to replace the whole system for a year or so anyway.

[Dierk Haasis]

[...] what makes this elektrickery stuff work.

Ray, I am not sure anybody but Britons and Germans of a certain age [around 40] will get that one. Curiously I got my DVD set just a few weeks ago - the German set is well designed. Unfortunately the original master seems to be in bad shape, particularly for the first series.

http://www.amazon.de/gp/product/images/B000B9PV6I/ref=dp_image_text_0/028-7178488-8974133?ie=UTF8
http://www.amazon.de/gp/product/images/B000BTJAV0/ref=dp_image_text_0/028-7178488-8974133?ie=UTF8

[Cem_Usakligil]

Ray, I am not sure anybody but Britons and Germans of a certain age [around 40] will get that one. ...
Well, the Dutch will get it too. My wife was particularly fond of him. Thererefore, she liked the passing reference by Ray very much when I mentioned it to her earlier :-).

Cheers,

Cem

[scott kirkpatrick]

is the sound you make when you touch live bare wires. It can hurt. And Americans, if I remember correctly have a whole rainbow of wire colors. But they only run 110 volts instead of 220, so perhaps they can get away with one wire where the Europeans need two.

Who is the comedian that Englishman of the right age all remember? I'm totally in the dark on that one (not being either English or 40).

scott

[Dierk Haasis]

Who is the comedian that Englishman of the right age all remember?

Not a comedian, a TV series from 1970: [i]Catweazle (see the two links I included to the German packages). He is a 1066 wizard trying to fly away from the Normans. Contrary to popular belief, even he always claims 'Nothing works ...', his spells do work, particularly the one "flying" him into the year 1970, where he encounters other strong wizards. Well, at least he sees the two boys he meets [one each series] as wizards since they can switch on and off miniature sunsusing 'electrickery', have power over roaring dragons, know how to operate 'telling bones' etc.

There's a certain resemblance to a then contemporary series from Czechoslovakia, Pan Tau, in which an immaculately clad, mute wizard of unknown origin helps out families in distress. In both cases we see the world through the eyes of an adult child.

I am not quite sure if Catweazle ever made it to the US, the second series was written with the US market in focus, putting in a Lord instead of a simple farmer. come to think of it, many brilliant British series have great trouble in the US - The Persuader, Dr Who (one of the few never making it in Germany, only a very late six-episode story was ever shown here), The Professionals, The Avengers (nothing to do with Marvel), Z Cars, Softly, Softly, The Sweeney ...

[Mary Bull]

This is the first I have heard of the series, but it sounds delightful.

And gives new meaning to Ray's cautions to me in re my new hardware.

Mary

[Ray West]

Personally, I have no idea about Catweazel. ( I do sort of know someone who was a Womble.) However, if you were referring to the the use of the word 'electrickery', then that was in common engineering usage way before 40 years ago, afaik.

Much of the magic smoke technology has been superceded, even improved, in particular the brown magic smoke. Specifically, the newer psu's (puff smoke units) have more colours, and few people know exactly how the purple smoke works on those. However all is not lost. A more recent invention being the usb2. This is similar to the slightly older 'universal smoking bit'. This gets magic smoke to external devices at a faster speed than the old, a good move, imho. USB has a conduit dedicated to transporting magic smoke, so it can be used to pump magic smoke into devices that do not have their own puff smoke unit. It can sometimes exceed the speed of the other less popular method - 'firewire'. Mac people prefer firewire, since a Mac is waterproof, so when they chuck their coffee over it, to put the fire out, the computer just keeps on going. PC users never want to waste their coffee, so firewire is not so popular for them.

There is a lot to this stuff, I'm finding out more each day. There is a related web site, in fact it is Sweden, (Yes, Sweden is virtual, not real - every body looks so good, they get snow in winter, the sea is clear, they never pay taxes, all this can't be true...) I went there once or twice, but some of the technerology was very advanced, even beyond me, and some of the suggestions were illegal, such as how to replace your insides without removing the warranty sticker. (No not my insides - the pc insides)

I think this may be getting a bit too advanced, unless you is a fully qualified elektrickery eginere, like wot I is. However, my qualifications was in HV (high volume) elecktrickery, and we took extreme precautions to prevent that quantity of magic smoke escaping. We used high security fences, special enclosures and the like, so I could be wrong about how this smaller stuff works. No, I'm an enginere, ergo I am never wrong ;-)

Best wishes,

Ray (perhaps we ought to get the moderator to move this important discussion onto a new thread, or perhaps he should keep this here, and move everything else, decisions, decisions, decisions...

[Mary Bull]

Yes, we're way beyond the HP Pavilion now, Ray!

Mary
(no wiz at electrickery, herself)

[Ray West]

Hi Mary,

Believe it or not, I have spent a lot of time recovering the following link. It will be very useful to your nephew. I've gone straight the the section dealing with upgrading the video card, because I think you may at one stage wish to do that. It is the Swedish site (well he keeps mentioning Sweden, so maybe its Norway) to which I alluded, but the very useful users forum seems to have now vanished. However, for a change, much of it is translated into Japanese, instead of the other way round.

Best wishes,

Ray oops, yertiz - http://www.datadocktorn.nu/us_kortbyte1.php

[Cem_Usakligil]

HI Ray,

What can I say? This is really, really hilarious (still crawling on the ground laughing my guts out)....

Thanks a million times!!!

Cem

[Mary Bull]

Hi Mary,

Believe it or not, I have spent a lot of time recovering the following link. It will be very useful to your nephew. I've gone straight the the section dealing with upgrading the video card, because I think you may at one stage wish to do that. It is the Swedish site (well he keeps mentioning Sweden, so maybe its Norway) to which I alluded, but the very useful users forum seems to have now vanished. However, for a change, much of it is translated into Japanese, instead of the other way round.
< ... >
http://www.datadocktorn.nu/us_kortbyte1.php
Thanks a mil, Ray.

I've been out most of the day. Just now "playing catch-up" at OPF.

BTW, SOT: Did anyone else have impossibly slow servers this morning? Maybe it was only Comcast. I couldn't download my e-mail, I couldn't finish the transfer of FF zip, and I couldn't post, or even read very conveniently at OPF. This was from approximately 3:00 a.m. to shortly before 9:00 a.m. (U.S. CDT, GMT -5).

Mary

[Mary Bull]

Well, Ray, I wrote too soon--the server is slowing down again and doesn't want to show page 2 of the fine Datadocktorn instructions.

Do you know if there might be a PDF available somewhere? In case I'm having these slow-load problems on Friday?

(I had an e-mail from my nephew that he'll be flying in late Thursday night--barring airport problems--and so I need the info before Friday p.m.)

Mary
(who will never again thank someone for a link without first reading the offered website! < hanging head in chagrin >

[Mary Bull]

Cem,

Eek!

What can I say--I took Ray's message as a serious offer of help, at first.

Read your post, and immediately went to see what was so funny. (I already had the website loaded in a new window, but had barely glanced at it--just enough to see that there were graphic illustrations provided.)

Maybe page 2 will be loaded by the time I finish writing this.

And you're right--it's hilarious!

Mary

[Mary Bull]

Computer laparoscopy! He-he-he!

What a marvelous concept--I'm still laughing out loud.

The eccentric server finally decided to cooperate, and I saw pp 2-6 in rapid order, after waiting at least 3 minutes between 1 and 2.

(If I get many more of these slow-down strikes on-line, I'll be forced to speed-dial Comcast's customer service number! And that is no joke.)

Mary

[Ray West]

Cem, Mary, et al,

There used to be a forum their, I got hooked into it for a couple of weeks. It was so crazy. Half the people thought it was serious, half the people put up a big pretence of being serious, and the remaining 30% fed off of them, fed them, and each other. That was a few years ago - he refers to the dotcom crash, which dates it, if I could remember what year that was in. Could i ask you to email him, Cem, since I guess you can speak foreign, and ask what happened to the forums?

Talking about old comedy stuff, A UK guy, a goon, Spike Milligan, had a series of shows, q6, q7,q8 I think. He had an aerosol magic cure for everything - killed mosquitos, cured Lumbago, you could run your car on it, whatever. It was called Snibbo. About that time WD40 hit the UK Market. Every can in the labs at our college had nicely printed 'Snibbo' labels applied. Matey has the same idea, but a nice coloured can label.

Best wishes,

Ray

[Mary Bull]

It's all wonderful, Ray.

And WD40 will really cure almost everything, except creaky old human knees and squeaky wooden human brains. LOL

Mary

[Ray West]

Hi Mary,

I think wd40 may help with squeaky knees, but I am in no way advising it.

On a more serious pc tack, the following site download may highlight isp problems. http://www.broadbandspeedtest.net/

I have used it, found I had to change my network card, when I was complaining about speed isues a few wekks ago. I think it runs OK in USA - I say that because it 'pings' different isp's, so local timings may need setting up. Nothing to do with magic smoke, honest, (nor table tennis).

Best wishes,

Ray

[Mary Bull]

Hi Mary,

I think wd40 may help with squeaky knees, but I am in no way advising it.

And creaky brains? What do you recommend for creaky brains?
On a more serious pc tack, the following site download may highlight isp problems. http://www.broadbandspeedtest.net/

Thanks a mil! And I'm not blowing smoke here, either. That's that coal-fired train engine's leavings you're noticing on the horizon, not any exhaust from Tennessee.

I have used it, found I had to change my network card, when I was complaining about speed isues a few wekks ago. I think it runs OK in USA - I say that because it 'pings' different isp's, so local timings may need setting up. Nothing to do with magic smoke, honest, (nor table tennis).

I believe you. I have the download page up now, and am about to proceed.

Although, so far today, life for me on the Internet is pleasingly rapid.

Mary
(who lives dangerously and trusts her smoky Brit guru)

[Mary Bull]

Ray wrote about my slow server experiences of the past week:
On a more serious pc tack, the following site download may highlight isp problems. http://www.broadbandspeedtest.net/
So I've downloaded, installed, and run it.

It found everything acceptable except amount of packet loss.

So, to get a little further handle on it through the extra features offered by registering, I've registered the app. Just waiting now for the registration key to arrive in my e-mail.

After that, I'll have something to back me up when I complain to Comcast--which is not only my ISP but my IP for the e-mail account I'm presently using.

I'll have my G-mail account back functioning in a few days. Just can't seem to get the settings and ports configured correctly on this new machine.

But help approaches, in the form of my nephew the data-transfer whiz, on Friday. And I am completely serious when I call him a whiz. He is meticulous when it comes to looking after my electronics.

I'll report back when I have more to tell about my packet loss statistics.

Mary

[Ray West]

Mary,

I had it showing packet loss, too. Sometimes, may be 2%, maybe 6%. Everything I found said contact your isp. However, I did not get packet loss on my old notebook, with a wireless link. I changed the network card in the desktop pc, but after a few days, I was getting packet loss again. I replaced this second cabled network card with a wireless one, packet loss is more or less none existant now. Now the wireless stuff runs a bit slower, probably more checking takes place, etc.

I do think there are currently problems out on the net. There has been a tremendous increase in spam, world wide afaik, in the last few weeks, which tends to clog it up a bit. My isp, like others seem to be continuously upgrading. I can imagine my poor little packet routing it way to Newcastle, via China and Iceland, then someone on the way pulls there server off line to upgrade, and my packet is completely lost, so I got to send another one. This one goes via Japan and S Africa, and back, but gets through.

Of course, it maybe the software shows a packet loss, to get you to buy a packet find kit - simply changes the red to green, and prints out 'everything fine'

Best wishes,

Ray <hoping someone else will chime in, I don't know enough about magic smoke rings to make networks network>

[Mary Bull]

Things are still running satisfactorily fast, today.

I really don't think it's my machine, because my nephew's wife was complaining about long minutes of waiting for e-mail and for pages to reload on the Internet. She was blaming her anti-virus program--AVG.

I recommended to her to ditch that--such a large footprint on hard disk--and get what I use, NOD32.

They are also Comcast customers, but in no way networked with my own machine.

Well, I shall just muddle along and try to muddle through.

Thanks a million times for all your interest and help.

Mary