Christianb

Hi Gang, I have a client with an old Inspiron 6400 Laptop (maxed at 2GB of RAM) that is now running Windows 7. He will get out of memory errors if I don't enable a swapfile, but that swapfile will also wear out his internal 2.5" SATA SSD. What I'd like to do is one of these solutions to host the swapfile get a SD card reader that fits entirely inside the ExpressCard slot (so it can be left in all the time without anything protuding) use a fast SD card in the card reader slot (it won't support CompactFlash), but that will stick out a little use an external flash drive use an mSATA card (but not sure if his old Inspiron 6400 will support that, it doesn't have to boot off of it just needs to work in Windows) expresscard SSD Drive (these seem very expensive and therefore are the least appealing) I'm interested in an ExpressCard SD card reader, but I'm concerned some will mount as USB vs. PCIe. His laptop is only USB 2.0, which means that the speed of the SD Card would be limited to 40MBps. Does anyone know of an ExpressCard SD card reader that mounts as PCIe so that it can go faster than USB 2.0? Does anyone know of an expresscard reader that doesn't stick out? I'd like to solve this secondary flash storage solution for under $65 if possible. Is there ExpressCard RAM he can use instead, I know that the older PCMCIA spec allowed you to plug in more RAM, but I don't think that's possible today? Thanks, Christian

Hi Gang, I think this will probably come in handy for most technicians. MS just released (12/16/03) a 6 floppy bootable corrupt registry repair tool for Windows 2000 variants only: http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;EN-US;830570 Cheers, Christian Blackburn

Hi Gang, Are there any programs that can rip my CDs directly into wav files? I have this video series that's just talk and I'd rather listen to it while I ride my bike using my MP3 player. Thanks, Christian Blackburn

Hi DosFreak, It's my opinion, that the way the forum has been nested within the main website, makes it more difficult to use. It seems like it's better now, but I too have more or less quit using it. Cheers, Christian Blackburn

Hi Packman, I have burned 4.7GB DVD-Rs using Ghost 2003 on an ND-3520, so chances are your's will work too! Cheers, Christian

Hi Gang, I don't even have a modem in my desktop, but need to send out a 16-page fax. I know that's huge, but I'm contesting some charges and had to include a lot of different receipts, statements, and such. I have a good old 3Com/USR PC Card modem and Windows 98SE on that laptop. Is there a free hardware-based fax program for windows? If not is there a live linux CD that comes with a fax program, I can just print out a PDF I created in windows. Thanks, Christian Blackburn

Hi Gang, I'm trying to automate a number of different versions of Microsoft Excel. The good part is I'm more or less only working with the find and replace dialog. Can someone tell me the title of the Find and Replace dialog in Excel XP? If possible I'd be exstatic if someone posted a screenshot of the dialog itself. Thanks in Advance, Chritian Blackburn

Hi Jay, A boot disk isn't going to help you one bit on re-installing Windows 2000 Pro. I don't think the I386 folder is going to contain everything necessary for re-install either. My first suggestion is to just go into safe mode and then delete the enum key from your registry and restart normally. Also you can take your HD over to a friend's house and scan for malware. Another thing you should ask yourself (and probably did) is what did I do last to screw things up? If you just installed something try removing it from safe mode. On Windows XP it's HKEY_CURRENT_CONFIG\System\CurrentControlSet\Enum. Re-installing is rarely necessary if you know what your doing, and even if you don't it's still rarely necessary if you maintain good backups, I recommend buying an OEm copy of Acronis TrueImage for 30 bucks at NewEgg.com if you don't have one already. Good Luck, Christian Blackburn

Hi Gang, I'm about to lose my shirt yet again, by not setting a reserve price (lesson learned). My ASUS GeForce 2MX video card with an integrated TV Tuner (swheet!) is about to go for 1 dollar because I only got one bid. I can't believe that, but frankly it scares me. Please go check it out and place a bid. How can you go wrong? Thanks, Christian Blackburn

Hi Felix, Thanks for your suggestion, but I didn't think of that trick unitl I'd already gotten a bid, and then eBay wouldn't let me change any of the shipping settings. Thanks for your terrific advice though . Thanks, Christian Blackburn

Hi Gang, I'm about to lose my shirt yet again, by not setting a reserve price (lesson learned). My ASUS GeForce 2MX video card with an integrated TV Tuner (swheet!) is about to go for 1 dollar because I only got one bid. I can't believe that, but frankly it scares me. Please go check it out and place a bid. How can you go wrong? Thanks, Christian Blackburn

Hi Gang, I'm selling new and extra power supply tester I had on eBay and made the mistake of not setting a reserve price. If nobody else places a bid it'll go for $1, in 53 minutes. Please take a look at it and see if you're interested, you might find that it's something you want and that it's worth as much as $15 dollars to you, but you'll probably wind up getting it for some triffling amount like $2. Good Luck, Christian Blackburn

hi Char27, If your system is really behaving that strangely why don't you have a friend help you with this. Take your HD to their house or to work if your sysadmin is cool, plug in your HD as an additional (non-boot) drive. Run several up to date malware scanners on it. In the free category I recommend: 1. Trend Micro 2. Ad-Aware 3. SpyBot: Search & Destroy >no button works..not even caps or num lock It sounds like your definition of crashing is correct. Cheers, Christian Blackburn

1. Put up your shields: Install Service Pack 2 of windows XP. That's foolish to be running around on the internet without your system being protect from known exploits. You undoubtedly already have malware on your system, even though you just re-installed. They have found malware on unpatched windows 98 systems attached to the internet in as little as 5 minutes! Once you've installed service pack 2, enable the auto-up[censored] service and even let it auto-install. Then download Microsoft update so it'll keep your copy of MS office secure if you have one. Install all the updates. 2. Now that you're protected get the junk off your system: Try a free virus and spyware scan: www.TrendMicro.com RAM, shouldn't prevent crashing unless you have faulty RAM. This can be tested using the ultimateboot cd: http://ultimatebootcd.com/ However 256 totally sucks on XP. You should have at least 768, but preferably 1GB or more. Having insufficient RAM won't make your system crash it'll just go more slowly. Whoever mentioned upgrading the ram and that it prevent crashing that is probably for one of two reasons the old ram was faulty and was removed in order to put in the new stuff. The other reason it would crash less is you still had a memory leak it just took longer to become a problem, in which case you didn't really fix the problem, just made it more bearable. www.Crucial.com is the easiest place to order from, however they're expensive. It's a great place to determine how much ram your system can take, how many slots you have, and what kind of ram is supported. Then if you want you can either order from them or use froogle.com or pricewatch.com and find something cheaper. Disable Kaspersky and see what happens. If that doesn't fix it uninstall Kasperky and see what happens. Do the same for your antivirus solution. Do you have one? If not that's really irresponsible. You can get a good free one at grisoft.com/free. Repeat the process for your download managers. Does your ISP employ some kind of software? Like AOL or Yahoo DSL for example? Most of that stuff is absolute bullshit and is totally unnecessary. I use Yahoo DSL and I don't have one bit of their software installed. It just creates an additional layer of unstable software. Power Supplies: Nothing future proofs a system. However, yes if he ever uses SLI video then that wouldn't be a bad option. However, I suggest buying something more practical and if and when you decide you must have SLI then you could get something like that. For that kind of change you could buy a fanless power supply, which I think is a more reasonable desire for the average person, since everyone hates noise. CPU Usage: 100% CPU usage will not make your system crash. It will however make your system difficult to use. If that 100% or close to it process isn't the one you're trying or want to use you can terminate it from task manager. I think we should define crashing. According to Microsoft their OS has crashed when the numlock and or capslock keys can't be turned on and off on your keyboard. Using that as the rule, has your system truly hardlocked? If not then it could be as Yankee describes a particular process might be hogging your system resources.

Hi mjwebb007, Do you already have Windows XP x64? Have you already tried your games and ran into compatibility issues? To run Linux yes, you'll either need an emulator or to multi-boot (faster, but less convenient if you're like most people and are only truly efficient in Windows). Also before you waste a bunch of time on Linux, how much do you know about ReactOS, 0and that fact that the windows Open Source movement is growing rapidly? A lot of games require specific resolutions and color depths. Having no experience with 64-bit processors yet I can't comment on potential issues in that regards. If you have glide games then you might have more difficulty, because glide was made before 64-bit processors were a consumer phenomenon. Cheers, Christian Blackburn

Hi Gang, I'm looking for KVM recommendations. I have some pretty steep requirements being as I'm a computer repairman and I also want my home system connected to this KVM for normal use. I want a KVM that'll do VGA DB15, PS/2 keyb/mouse to workstations, USB keyb/mouse to workstations, RCA (that's the normal walkman type headphones connector) audio in/out (microphone/speakers) and preferably a USB hub, so I can share printers and scanners with all attached systems. All I've found that even comes close is offerings from Raritan, Belkin, and Avocent. Those may be the only decent options on the market. However, I'm interested in any other brands that might be work considering. I tried LinkSys and Tripplite and neither had anything close to what I need/want. From what I understand Raritan is the industry leader in the sector right? Thanks, Christian Blackburn

Hi Gang, I have decided to remove PS/2 from my requirement list. If a system needs that I'll use an adapter or plug-in directly. This IOGear KVM looks terrific. I'd much rather have integrated ethernet than PS/2 support. Cheers, Christian Blackburn

Hi Felix, While I'm sure they have nice stuff, I definetly won't be going with anything from Blackbox. I don't need a rackmount capable device and I'm certainly not going to pay for a wholely unecesssary luxury. Cheers, Christian Blackburn

Hi Kharn, Why don't you just open the case and read the chips, one will say something like "sound", "audio", "aureal", "wave", "midi", "synth", "media" or something along those lines. Get the brand and model and then you can get yourself the drivers. Cheers, Christian Blackburn

Hi Scott, I can't be the only one that thinks it's rude to post the same question three times. That's like saying your problem is three times as important as anyone else's. Cheers, Christian Blackburn

Hi Felix and Jim, Thank you both for your suggestions. Those BlackBox devices are extremely powerful and extremely pricey. They cost about twice what everything else out there does. Now that being said it's certainly the only one that enables remote desktop access right through the KVM, however in order to do that you have to buy even more parts. I'm still thinking the Raritan is the best option. Any other suggestions? Cheers, Christian Blackburn

Hi Gang, Here's what I'd like to do, copy multi-cd audiobooks into one long, mono, low-quality MP3 file. However, I seem to have problems getting that to work using CDex. Seeing how CDex hasn't been updated for years I'm thinking that CD makers have found some way to distort their audio so it won't come out using CDex. Even when I choose extract to wav files using CDex I wind up with a n minutes long silent WAV file. What I have often had to resort to is using Audacity recording What-You-Hear, Saving that into a wav and then using WinLame to compress the result. Does anyone have an easier option. I really, really want to keep it in Mp3 format, because I like to share health-related audio books with my friends and WMA and OGG just aren't as good for that. I also think Mono is a reasonable requirement, when listening to books on tape there's just no need for stereo people almost never talk at once and even if they do I don't need seperate sounds in each ear. Thanks, Christian Blackburn

Hi Nick, I would try a few things at this point, since you've dealt with the RAM problem: 1. Clean the restore CD 2. Clean your drive with a CD lens cleaner (it's a special Cd with brushes and can be purchased almost anywhere). 3. Order a new copy of the restore CDs from Compaq 4. If you are a college student I wouldn't bother with a new set of the restore Cds just get a free copy from Microsoft. Ask your school's IT department or Computer teachers about MSDNAA. 5. Replace the drive, you can just borrow someone else's long enough to see if that's the problem. 6. You mentioned heat, that's a really common problem with laptops, make sure your fans are clean, get a can of air and blast them. Make sure all your fans are spinning. If the laptop is too hot to leave on your lap then you ought to buy a cooling pad. They have them at NewEgg.com or Fry's or many other places I'm sure. Just taking a stick or book and propping up the rear end of your laptop will help keep it cool, although it will be harder to type on, I'm sure. Good Luck, Christian Blackburn

Hi Scott, Did you try going into safe mode removing the USB controller and then letting XP redetect it? Did you try figuring out what USB Chipset you have and then going to the manufacturer's (typically not sony, but someone like VIA or ALI or something) website and looking for some drivers. Generally speaking USB controllers don't require drivers, but assumption is the mother of all screw ups. Also for 11 dollars you can get a Syba USB 2.0 controller with 5 ports on the back and 1 internal. It's an NEC chipset. That NEC chipset was the only chipset in existence while MS was writing their USB 2.0 interface, therefore it's the reference design. It works flawlessly in my experience. You could just disable or not use the onboard USB controller and go with one of those. However I don't know whether you have a desktop or a laptop so that Syba I'm talking about might not work. Also please note there are different syba USB controllers some are NEC based and others ALI (I think) so watch out and get the exact model I'm linking to. Notice the triangular shape of the controller. If it's a purely rectangular card, then it's not an NEC Chipset (from Syba anyways). Cheers, Christian Blackburn

Hi jmmijo, Thank you very much for your reply. I did figure out my problem. CDex has a bug whereby if you select "NEC" as the drive type, but have an NEC DVD drive (not sure which drives are affected by this actually, but my ND-3520A is) the audio ripping is completely silent. However, once you choose "Generic" everything works as expected. I thought I was dealing with some new form of copy protection, but it looks like it was a basic incompatiblity. This does make me miss my plextor a little since they have great software, but Plextor's usually (in my experience, 2 drives) have hardware that is unreliable. So in summary if you want to get a multi-cd audio book (book on tape) converted you can: 1. Use CDex to create wav files 2. Use Wavecat to combine all the wav files 3. Use WinLame to convert the one large wav file to a mono, vbr, 32kbps (or lower) MP3. All the programs I mentioned are completely free. I don't think WaveCat is open source though. It's too bad too it's a little cludgy. The problem with CreativeLab's bundled MP3 encoding software (last I tried it) is it doesn't support low bit rate MP3s. You don't need a lot of fidelity for human voice, it's just wasted space. 32kbps or even 16kbsp vs. the typical 128kbps for music is just fine with audiobooks. Cheers, Christian Blackburn