Christianb

Hi Mr. Guvernment, I actually already have the Xvid codec. After running the GSport application Champion_R was nice enough to recommend it would seem I'm missing the Dolby AC3 codec. I wonder where I can download that. I guess I'll try dolby.com or something. Thanks for the help guys, Christian

Hi Gang, I wondering what the official term is for a DVD Jewel case. Are they called clam shells? Thanks, Christian Blackburn

Hi Alec, I can certainly understand your being worried data loss is never a laughing matter, unless you loose a DIVX video file of a spice girls concert. In which case you can just say I was going to delete it anyways . -Christian

Hi PatinSane, Did you try replacing your power supply and or returning the mouse and working with a different one? This sounds like an electrical issue? -Christian

Hi Adam, Don't you just love it when companies like Intel and Microsoft like to come out with these kinds of "Features"? :x -Christian

Hi Gang, This should prove interesting to all you XP users out there: http://www.betanews.com/article.php3?sid=1048644448. I guess MS has fixed the Intel Based slowdowns after installing XP SP1. However they haven't released it publicly. This may work out to more revenue for them. You'll have to write their support staff and ask for the fix. I've done this before and they gave me the file, I can't tell whether it counts as one of your 2 free support issues per product or not? So Long Guys, Christian

Ignore....Sorry I responded to page 2 (where my e-mail linked me to) and didn't see that Packman had finished his quest , because that bit of info was on page 3. -Christian

Hi Alec, It's been so long since I read about that issue. I'm starting to forget whether it was just a Windows 98 issue or if 2000 was affected too. The problem may have reared it's ugly head in both. Nonetheless it was probably 2 years ago I read about that issue. Fixes have long since been issued. Windows XP surely doesn't have that problem and Windows 2000 SP2+ shouldn't either. The Windows 98 SE update for that is available on Windows Update. I assume whatever flaws there were you have long since patched your way out of them . So Long Buddy, Christian

Quote: As far as I know, they are one and the same. I had actually pulled that link at one time from the MSDN site. Of course, the one on the website is the newest version, so there are bound to be a few improvements... Hi CUViper, It appears that you are exactly right. I was just tripping out, because the program names seemed to be different "Depends" vs "Dependency Walker". However on the MSDN site you linked to I see exactly what you are talking about Quote: Determining Which DLLs to Redistribute You can see which DLLs are dependencies of an application by opening the application using the Dependency Walker (Depends.exe). Visual C++ 6.0 shipped with version 1 of this utility, but at the top of this article, you will find links (Alpha and x86) to the latest version of the Dependency Walker. By using Depends.exe or the DUMPBIN utility with the /DEPENDENTS option, you can see a list of DLLs that statically link to your application and a list of the application's delay-loaded DLLs. To see which DLLs, such as Microsoft ActiveX® controls, are dynamically loaded, use the profiling feature of Depends.exe. Then, use the application until you are sure that all paths were exercised. When you end the profiling session, Depends.exe will show you which DLLs were dynamically loaded. As you use DUMPBIN or Depends.exe to view your dependencies, use the file list in Redist.txt to see which Microsoft-supplied DLLs are redistributable. When using Depends.exe, be aware that a DLL may have a dependency on another DLL or on a version of a specific DLL. You can use Depends.exe on either the development computer or on a target computer. On the development computer, Depends.exe will report the DLLs that are required to support an application. If you have trouble getting an application to run on a target computer, you can copy Depends.exe (and its required DLL) to the target computer and open the application in Depends.exe. Depends.exe will report which of the application's DLLs are either missing or present with an incorrect version. When you copy a DLL to another machine, copy the DLL such that it replaces the existing DLL. For example, on a Microsoft Windows NT® machine, the system DLLs are located in the system32 directory. Thanks a lot for letting me know about the updated version. I will download and try it out. -Christian Blackburn

Hi Alec, Thanks for the post. I'm sure DK users will appreciate that. I personally don't have a DK license so it's much a-do about nothing for me. Although I was just thinking earlier today about what a load of crap it is that Norton Calls their 2001-2002 (possibly 2003) scandisk product Norton Disk Doctor. Which is false advertising in my book. It should really be called Norton Scandisk UI or something else that reflects the fact that their application is nothing but a UI to the scandisk features already built into the OS. The reason I think they should divulge this is because what if you're having disk problems and you buy Norton Utilities or SystemWorks specifically, because you know they too have a Scandisk product and you're hoping that it might be the one that has the right features to fix the your problem. I think you'd be extremely disapointed to find out that it's nothing more than a significantly easier to use verion of the ScanDisk that comes with Windows. I think the interface is excellent and like the product just fine. I simply question the concept of making the functionality appear as their own. Adios Amigo, Christian

Hi Alec, Sorry for not replying sooner. I can't remember the exact differences between systemsuite and fix-it tools. I think you get PowerDesk Pro and their file archiving tool with SystemSuite and not with Fix it Tools. I'm still stuck on v3.0, but one of these days I buy an updated version. As for them being sold off to another company I think they moved to good hands. The company that aquired their assets is named V-COm and they make a multi-boot manager called System Commander it's the oldest and best known of it's breed. Recently they have started making a Partition resizing tool and a backup program. I think they have the right expertise to keep SystemSuite something worth using. As for Roxio vs Adaptec. Roxio is Adaptec! Adaptec created a solf-contained company called Roxio for whatever reason. I highly doubt any of the coders were changed during that process. It was a name change and not a modifcation of employees or locations AFAIK. As for what's become of the program I think Easy CD-Creator 5.X is a marked improvement over 4.X, especially where the stability of DirectCD is concerned. This is in part due to the integrated of Roxio technologies into Windows XP. Microsoft got the best burning technology and Roxio learned how to integrate with windows in a more stable and compatible manner. Any ways you look at this it was good for the users and both companies. Well Gotta Run. Cheers, Christian

Hi Hellbringer, I'm a little confused at first you were saying that none of the programs you tried can even see your drive and then you're saying one of them could. If the drive can be detected by your bios then you should be able to recover some of the files provided the drive is spinning and the head isn't stuck in it's current position. Whether or not a partition can be found shouldn't be an issue if the recovery software is good it'll just comb the whole drive and grab every file it can off of it and put those files on a working drive for you to analyze. Perhaps you should try another program there are plenty of them out there. So Long, Christian

Hi Ali, It sounds like the ram just wasn't seated correclty the first time you tried. In any event I'm glad to hear things are working for you. -Christian

I used to have SLI, but I gave one of the cards to my nephews and niece, because they still play games and I practically do not. -Christian

Hi Priv, I don't doubt that it may be "easier" than emulators, however the additional cable length and pass-through design will most likely dregrade your 2D performance and quality. Have you already bought one and are you experiencing any visual anomalies? I doubt something like 1600x1200x32bit would work in 2D passing through your Voodoo2. You should check one of those old Voodoo2 product spec sheets and make sure that it'll support your current resolution and color depth combo. Also I too have a voodoo2 in the closet for that very reason . Good Luck, Christian Blackburn

Hi Ali, Sounds good. Let me know how it goes. So you're from Canada eh? I used to live in the Seattle area and my parents would take my sister and I on vacation in Vancouver and Alberta from time to time. My favorite thing in Canada is Buchart Gardens, the likes of which I have yet to find an equal. Thanks, Christian Blackburn

I just carry around my swiss army Imax Theatre . You just never know when you're going to need some 360 degree television.

Hi Bursar, Thanks for letting me know. The issue is I bought a lot of 300 Imax: Africa the Serengeti DVDs and they didn't come with their appropriate cases. Rather they all came in non-airtight plastic sleeves. I would like to communicate this effectively to potential buyers on Ebay. By the way if anybody wants one or more for gifts they're 6 dollars. It's narated by James Earl Jones which is kinda cool. Thanks, Christian Blackburn

Hi Gang, I have removed an OSA.exe from my startup. I recall in the past having problems with office without it, but currently everything seems to be working fine. This isn't that stupid program that searches for Office documents when you're system is idle is it? Thanks, Christian Blackburn

Hi Alec, Thanks for the quick reply. I need to fix my YahooPops setup. For some reason it's not working right now. I had 0.40 and it quit working after some change was made to yahoo. The SourceForge project messageboards said that 0.39 was working, so I reinstalled that and it still isn't working. So I will have to try again later. Basically the two guys who wrote it are on vacation together and the project isn't being maintained while they're gone. YahooPops emulates a POP3 server for Yahoo Mail accounts via the System Tray. Typically I only check for e-mail using Outlook Express and since my NT Compatible account forwards to MyPurchases@Yahoo.com (designed for junk mail and receipts resulting from online purchases!) I haven't been checking my messageboard replies a lot lately . I don't like using web mail interfaces, because they're slow and lack a considerable ammount of functionality. I wish someone would make a good web mail service in Java. CNET just came out with a new junk mail free (well almost) service I wonder if it uses Java rather than HTML. That's funny that your unemployed right now. I am too. I'm sorry to hear that . Enjoy it while you can though. Can you recommend a good Delphi book or a series of Delphi books that are considered to be the best? As for Delphi vs PowerBasic. Yes I'm pretty darn sure it was faster. The smallest compiled .exe you can create in Delphi 6 that includes a form is about 256KB. In PowerBasic it's about 8KB! So yes, I think it's faster. The apps practically flash onto the screen. They even have a text editor clone that started up microscopically faster than notepad! It's hard to be faster than Notepad! Course Notepad isn't a Delphi app either. On the PowerBasic website there are tons of examples of compiled applications with source code. Since you know C++ I think you'd get a lot more out of PowerBasic than I could since my Windows API knowledge is accordingly lacking. I do know a considerable ammount of Windows API for a VB programmer, but that doesn't mean squat compared to the average C++ developer . There were probably three sample apps I really liked one of the was called PB Mine, and is a minesweaper clone, the guy who wrote it dedicated it to his deceased father, who hopefully didn't die working with mines. Nonetheless, I sure think it's a sweat gesture for him to have written a program in his honor. The biggest disadvantages of PowerBasic are: #1: No user base: no stores carry their product, and there almost aren't any open source projects in it #2: The UI development tool isn't integrated into the Coding Environment, in fact it's a separate product altogether. #3: The coding environment is 200 dollars and it's another 100 if you want the UI Dev tool. #4: There is no trial or demo version (aside from a version 3 dos compiler, and the windows version is 7.0!). They just want you to buy it and they give you a 30 day money back guarantee. Personally, I consider that a high risk evaluation, the kind that an unemployed person probably isn't going to take part in . However on the bright side they do host a number of freeware UI editing tools and have links to alternative UI creation tools from a variety of vendors. You might like XBasic, I will probably play with that more and I'm joining the open source project to make my own edits. I'm going to remove the Case-Sensitivity of the language as much as possible. I don't know C so I can't mess with the compiler so I was thinking I'd just have the text editor fix the source automatically once a user moves to the next line like VB does. The other things I hated about XBasic were: #1: that the menu bar didn't document the keyboard shortcuts. #2: the menu bar is all lower-case and not all of the menu items have hotkeys #3: the menu bar's hotkeys don't work if you maximize the program, but once you return it to it's medial state they work fine. Go Figure! #4: the application will never start maximized and when you do maximize it the keyboard shortcuts don't work. #5: the console (basically the immediate window, except you can prompt users too, kinda cool really) starts up on top of the main program rather than behind it or in a specific portion the work area. Instead of having it's own place it simply blocks a good portion of the screen. #6: the online help is pitiful. #7: there isn't a category at PlanetSource.com for XBasic #8: okay I'll quit, but you should give it a try some time and see if you like it or would get a kick out of working on it with me. Project Page: http://sourceforge.net/projects/xbasic Yahoo Group (not unlike phpBB that we're using right now with NT Compatible, course phpBB is ten times better, but heh who's counting 1, 2, 3, 4..... ): http://groups.yahoo.com/group/xbasic/ Also here are all the bugs I wrote: 13 or 14 I think! It's not my fault that there's a lot of room for improvment. http://sourceforge.net/tracker/?group_id=1657&atid=101657 So long buddy I gotta get cracking, Christian Blackburn

Hi Ali, Legally you could put it on their computers if you put it on them before you sold it to them. Also I'm pretty sure you'd have to include it in the fine print of your customer service agreement. However, disabling the single most popular piece of software for the windows platform doesn't strike me as a winning business practice. You'll just have to explain to them that they need to close Kazaa and that just because the window isn't visible doesn't mean it isn't running. If you want a program that'll detect and close Kazaa and or remove it from startup, or uninstall it altogether that's fine, those are quite easy. Also yes I can make this application run at startup from the registry and I can also make it invisible and formless so it doesn't show up when you press alt+tab. I'm pretty sure it could also be made to run as a service. Let me know if you're still interested. If not no big deal. An application that would either remove KaZaA from startup or uninstall it would be considerably less expensive/time consuming. The problem is some users have add-on applications like Diet KaZa or KaZaA Lite that may take over the startup of Kazaa so I could write an application that would remove kazaa from startup, but if some other application is in startup and that's starting Kazaa those application would need to be supported too! I could write an application that autoruns when they insert a CD and gives them the option of closing Kazaa, removing kazaa from startup, and or uninstalling it via three radio buttons. The primary time consumer with that would be making sure it works with all versions of Kazaa, Kazaa Lite, and Diet Kaza (asuming that you want that latter two supported). Let's call each of those features 15 dollars: -Giving users the option to Close Kazaa on demand (without any kind of file name, date, size, CRC verification) -Giving users the option to uninstall Kazaa -Giving users the option to remove it from startup Adding support for Kazaa Lite to any feature 15 more dollars per feature. Same applies for Diet Kazaa $15 more. Christian Blackburn

Hi Andy2k, USB doesn't have IRQ conflicts between itself and other connected USB Devices. USB has exactly enough addresses that you can attach up to 128 devices to a single hub without running out of unique addresses, thereby avoiding conflicts. My motherboard has 4 USB hubs so hypothetically I could connect 512 devices without issue. It is true however that he could have problems with the actual USB controller taking an IRQ from other sytem devices and that the USB controller (not it's attached devices like your mouse) could conflict with another device. However USB controller support IRQ sharing so the only way you could have a conflict is if the motherboard/bios put the USB controller on an IRQ with an ISA device. A PS/2 mouse port is a perfect example it's an ISA interface or device. ACPI typically uses IRQ 9 and yes it won't share with other devices. This is by design, because ACPI is supposed to be able to facilitate power management functions and for whatever reason the designers felt that giving it it's OWN IRQ was the best solution. It may be that systems would have to lend CPU time to every device on the IRQ if ACPI allowed IRQ sharing, whereas right now the only device that'd get CPU time if IRQ9 remained awake would be the ACPI controller. A working USB Controller costs between 7 and 20 dollars for USB 1 and 2 respectively. You might just buy another USB controller plug it in and see if that was your problem. YOu could pick on up at compusa and return it saying oops you didn't have PCI slots or something funny like that . Good Luck, Christian

Hi El Vago, You're welcome for the help both with Hotmail and English. . Per your request I have typed in a few minor revisions to what you said. Quote: Hey ChristianB, thanx a lot, I really *aprecciate* (I dunno if it is spelled right) your advices. ...thanks a lot, I really appreciate your advice. Note: advice is always singular. Quote: My critical problem with english, sometimes happens when I'm trying to connect phrases, sometimes I can't get the syntax very well. My biggest (major, or primary issue with...) problem with English happens, sometimes, as I'm trying to connect phrases. Sometimes I can't create the syntax correctly. Quote: And about some words, like "diferent".... , hehe, just keyboards's stuffs. And about words like "different", ha that's just keyboard stuff. Ha is a single giggle, HaHa is laughing, and HeHe is kind of an evil snicker . Don't ask, I don't make the rules, cartoons and comic books do . Quote: Thx a lot again, and feel free to correct me, because it helps to be better. Thanks a lot again and feel free to correct me, because it'll help me to improve. Note: you don't need a comma between "and" when you're only separating two terms, but once you have three then it becomes necessary. Well see you around the MessageBoard, Christian Blackburn

Hi Ali, There is a way to make it so that every time they start an .exe that matches the name of one of KaZaA's installation files it's close it. This would of course prevent the application from running until they renamed it. At which point you would have verify file size, modification date, and perhaps even CRC Values. The cheapest way would be to prevent them from visiting Kazaa.com and creating a security policy that prevents them from running kazaa.exe. I can write an .exe that'll close any process named Kazaa.exe or a program that'd close every .exe that matched the file size, and or date of the current Kazaa versions 1.72 - 2.02. This would take me more time than what I was offering Brian Frank. If you want me to verify the .crc values that could be done as well, though it would slow down the users's system noticibly the first time they ran an .exe that matched one of the flagged file sizes. I could even have it log attempts to run Kazaa.exe so certain employees could be asked not to run it. I presume you've already given a company-wide warning not to run file-sharing applications on your company's network. One of us would also need to create a system policy in the registry to prevent users from forcibly closing my memory resident application. If you're a network admin and or already know the exact location for these settings then it would be more time efficient for your to do it, otherwise I could research that feature of Windows and how to impliment it on different platforms. What operating systems would you need supported? How much are you looking to spend? Obviously, the more detailed the solution the more time consuming it would be and therefore the more it would cost to impliment. I could write a reasonable solution in a day. I'd do that for $160 bucks. Let me know what you think and if you'd like to view some sample applications or my resume. Thanks, Christian Blackburn

Hi Guys, I too distribute a little bit of MS Software that is also not comercially available nor was it ever. It's a Dos based console application that saves Fat12,16, and 32 partitions. However, it can't restore if you resized the destination partition. It is however wonderful for saving floppies which is what I use it for regulary. To Save a Windows Entertainment Pack 3 Floppy I typed: RawRead A: WEP3.img /a /b /c /v /a - saves only allocated clusters /b - checks for bad clusters /c - compressed /v - verifies To Restore the floppy image you'd type: Rawwrite Wep3.img A: /v /V - verfies All switches are case insensitive. To get a copy of Rawread just download this zip and extract it's contents into your path or the folder you want to save images to. Adios Amigos, Christian