The Computer Problems thread!

[Sid]

[SARCASM]
Rowne, you should know that everybody speaking against StarForce is a member of an organized Pirate Ring. StarForce is the best software protection that never produces errors on computers. Ever. So your "proof" is of course absurd and flawed by design. I bet it's so silly that it doesn't even deserve an answer from them. Oh, and only those filthy mafia pirates spread lies about StarForce producing errors in the vain hope that producers abandon it.
[/SARCASM]

Ai keell ju-- oh, right, sarcasm.  You were only making fun of that kind of person.  *Cough.*  Okay.  Sorry, I find that my anti-apologist defenses act up and with all my exposure to those kinds of people, I'm even having trouble distinguishing between humourous and genuine statements.  I could weep openly, weep I tell you, weep!

Sorry about that ^^;
I would've tried to go obviously over the top to avoid silly Sarcasm-Tags, but I came up empty. With some of the official SF Statements out there, it's hard to come up with a weirder parody. ^^;;;

And yes, apologists suck. They think that The Corporation is right and good because The Goverment would never ever never allow them to do Bad Stuff. >_>;;;
Combined with the degree of "WTF?" the StarForce problem reports induce, it's actually somewhat hard to believe that this isn't some sort of bizarre campaign to hurt the "poor, poor SF dudes". I remember I didn't believe the first report about it I happened to read. But then the reports came in from everywhere... even from my friends... D:
So I guess that StarForce has a fair share of apologists. =/

[Sketchy boy]

http://www.walmart.com/catalog/product.do?product_id=4768254

Is this a good product? i found adaware.

[Aridas]

I'm going to try and run it without anything plugged in, so that it basically goes nowhere. Just have the motherboard powered with minimal required hardware and see if it continues to beep. Only thing is, I don't remember much of what can't be in a computer and still have it "run". I'd go by experience and say I need the processor...

EDIT + PROBLEM FOUND: For some reason, as long as the hard drive is powered, AKA, plugged into the power supply, the computer will beep like that. The floppy and DVD-ROM drives work just fine, even if I switch the cables they're using (AKA unplugging the floppy or plugging the power cable that was on the hard drive into the CD drive).

It's not the hard drive itself, as I've replaced it before on account of having misplaced the old one when I gutted it. So, the problem remains, what makes the thing decide to beep? During my steady unplugging of each bit of hardware, I did notice the beeps vary a little. One time, it was a simple quick "beepbeep", though still "vibrating" like that. The regular beeps that are supposed to happen sound normal, of course.

[Rowne]

Sid: It wasn't too bad at first, granted.  I was willing to give them the benefit of the doubt so I kept my trap shut and didn't say anything either way.  Then reports came in that provided evidence that StarForce did cause problems, that numerous people were seeing the same problems and further, that some folks (including myself) could prove without shadow of a doubt that the software was highly unstable and responsible for a good deal of inexplicable blue screens.

It only became bad after all this evidence became available because flying in the face of direct evidence and more proof than anyone should sanely need, the company and the apologists still ignored the fact that StarForce is very, very badly coded.  Not only that but generally speaking, it's not that hard to crack if you know where to look.  So it's a completely ineffectual system.

You know what I find funny?  That companies that don't bother to protect their software (Stardock) and companies that use more benign and obvious protection systems (Valve) have greater commercial success than those that do.  In fact, Ubi was so inclined to see the wisdom of this that some 30-odd of their upcoming games they were going to use StarForce on, they pulled and decided not to.  They've broken their contract with Protection Technology (the StarForce developers) even due to this realization.

I just wish companies would get used to the idea that protection is utterly pointless and the more arcane, system-controlling and 'Trusted Computing'-like they make their protection systems, the more they're going to alienate people.

Even companies that open source their products but keep their media licensed (a la Deadly Rooms of Death by Caravel) enjoy a nice slice of corporate success simply because two sets of people will buy the game, those that enjoy the game and those that support their stance.  I bought their latest game because I happen to fall into both of those camps.

Spiderweb Software even enjoy a deal of commercial success because the only lockout they use on their software is a serial and they provide huge, shareware-like demos of their works.  Personally I also own just about every Spiderweb Software game too.

I wish all companies like that, if all companies were, systems like StarForce wouldn't exist.

Rant over ... and I'm actually more airing my thoughts than directly replying here.  <.<

Sketchy: You don't need to buy it, a perfectly workable (and legal) free version can be found at this location.

Aridas: Ooooh, helpful!

And I have a hunch!  Ohhyes.

Could you list your computer components and the wattage of your power supply?  Like, are you running a 250W or somesuch?

[Aridas]

I'm not sure it matters what components I had, since I pretty much stripped the thing down to isolate the problem, leaving only the drive, 600 MHz P3, and 128MB of RAM in it.

The PSU says 120W output, but I've NEVER had a problem with it before. The PSU is designed a certain way (the psu's case is thinner and the fan is on the inside, outside of the PSU, there are only 3 screws and they're put in a non-standard position) so changing it is not an option.

[Rowne]

I'll still check with said friend but I have this nagging feeling that aside from it being malware (which seems less likely now), it could also be down to a failing power supply.  Now the thing is, that wouldn't stop your computer from working but in some cases, if certain components aren't getting a steady voltage, the computer will complain, functional or not.  It might be that every now and then, the PSU is becoming faulty and cutting out, not enough to cause the PC to shut down but enough to cause the voltages to vary enough to make the machine complain.

It's just a theory, anyway and those are the best I have to work with until I've gotten a more professional opinion on the matter (which I will soon).

[Nikki]

another HUGE problem...

My printer will NOT print!! ANYTHING!! it's all hooked up, full of ink, but it won't print! it says it's printing, but it isn't!! nothing's coming out!!

Our Printer/Scanner is an EPSON stylus CX5400 if that'll help any..

[Cvstos]

Actually OneCare is from Microsoft, and isn't free (though it is cheaper than most, but if anyone can pull off cheaper for that it's Redmond itself).  It's also very new.  Thank you for this information!

I was having trouble with the website recently, too, so I'm not that surprised you're having difficulty. I was hoping you'd fare better than me on that front, but I guess it's not just my weak wireless signal here.

[Rowne]

Cvstos: Yeah, the thing is, with Microsoft their software is very hit and miss (unlike their hardware, which they frequently do a good job of, their original professional natural keyboards were the best I used and the X-Box 360 has a great joypad).  Sometimes they'll make something good [such as Defender] and sometimes they'll make something that's so bad you might aswell not run it in the first place because it'll likely be more of a hinderance than a genuine protection tool [such as Windows Firewall].

That's why you can't really trust or dismiss Microsoft out of hand, I find that everything with them has to be taken on a case to case basis.  I'll check OneCare for you as soon as their archives are back up and good or bad, I'll report back to you, I'll pull down the test history in fact and that of the scanners I use most so you can see for comparison.

Xze: Unfortunately, I know next to nothing about printers.  One thing you can do though is to check your Services (Start > Run > services.msc) and make sure that all the printer related services found in this list are set to what the list says they should be.  If stuff like the print spooler and so on are disabled, then that's your problem.

Aside from that, can you find the latest drivers for your model of printer and have you tried upgrading to the latest drivers?  If you can't find those drivers, I'll try and help out, see if I can.

---- Results!

Okay, VirusBulletin's archives are back up and I'm in, okay ... looking over their archives, here are the current standings for a lot of the scanners mentioned.

Microsoft OneCare

1 Success
0 Failiure
45 No Entry

Eset Nod32

38 Success
3 Failiure
5 No Entry

Grisoft AVG

13 Success
21 Failiure
12 No Entry

Kaspersky Anti-Virus

33 Success
13 Failiure
0 No Entry

Symantec AntiVirus

33 Success
6 Failiure
7 No Entry

Alwil avast!

18 Success
19 Failiure
9 No Entry

McAfee VirusScan

26 Success
18 Failiure
2 No Entry

Make of those scores what you will.  If anyone wants me to pull any more of them from the site, let me know.

Here's the source site for those that want to see it (Login: bugmenot bugmenot).

[Cvstos]

Rowne: You're 100% right about Microsoft on that aspect (hardware and security tools).  Looks like OneCare did ok it's first time in.  We'll need to wait and see for it's track record (new product).

[Nex]

Xze-Xze: Make sure everything is absolutely plugged in. Power Outlet, Cable to the computer, everything.

If that isn't the case, then my recommendation is unplug everything, shut down the computer, replug, then turn back on. By that time, it should recognize the printer, and print whatever you need.

[Shadrok]

another HUGE problem...

My printer will NOT print!! ANYTHING!! it's all hooked up, full of ink, but it won't print! it says it's printing, but it isn't!! nothing's coming out!!

Our Printer/Scanner is an EPSON stylus CX5400 if that'll help any..

Xze-Xze: Make sure everything is absolutely plugged in. Power Outlet, Cable to the computer, everything.

If that isn't the case, then my recommendation is unplug everything, shut down the computer, replug, then turn back on. By that time, it should recognize the printer, and print whatever you need.

Let's hope for Xze-Xze's sake your right Nex.

Because I had a similar problem back at the first of the year with my Epson stylus CX4600 (except for the scanner problem only the printing issue).

In my situation I had it happen to me twice, the first time I had my printer off and my portable hard drive plugged into a spare USB port and working on something. I then turn my printer on and get ready to print, but when I look at the printed page it was all in magenta nothing else only magenta.

I did the trouble shooting (yeah big help it was ) did the print head cleaning and alignment, even uninstalled the printer and it still printed in magenta. It ended up about three days later clearing up and printing right.

The second time it did this was again when I was working with my portable hard drive. I was about to hit the printers power on when I caught myself and disconnected my portable hard drive. Once it was disconnected I turned the printer on and guess what... No not magenta, Cyan. So I went through the same steps of print head cleaning, aligning, and uninstalling , even changed the ink twice and the only change was it went from cyan to nothing. It would go through the actions of printing but wouldn't print. I even e-mailed Epson about the problem and all they could say was "Buy more ink", even after I told them "Did it, done it, didn't work."
In the end I ended up having to buy another printer.

Also when it happened the second time it was a week before I had to move out of my house for a while and the printer was unplugged for a day during the move.

[Tiger_T]

I've just got a question.
I thought about getting more RAM for my computer. Where can I look up how much RAM it can handle?
Also: Will I have to change any settings or just plug it in?

[Netami]

RAM is a beautiful thing! You can tweak the system settings to get the most out of speed and certain settings, but for the most part all you REALLY need to do is find the right kind of RAM and plug it right in.

http://www.crucial.com/systemscanner/

Crucial makes RAM. They have that scanner there, it looks at your system and motherboard for you and tells you how many slots you have (and which are empty and being used) and then advises you a type of RAM to buy. DDR2, DDR, SDRAM (older computers), RDRAM (hopefully not), etc etc.

EDIT: It also tells you what kind of video card you have... Don't worry, that has nothing to do with RAM. Didn't want you to get confused.

[GabrielsThoughts]

I had to crack out the laptop because my main system (low end five year old e-machines 5500 windows XP)  kicks me to this other clockwork mansion from a little over a month ago(jul. 7th) everytime I try and reach the current  clockwork mansion.  I've tried deleting the cookies on the other computer along with temporary internet files.  The problem started at around 5:00 PST when I was attempting to comment on shadrock's art thread.  Any suggestions would be helpful.

[Rowne]

Hm, on this occasion, Netami and I think alike.  I would've recommended Crucial's system identifier thingydoofer and their actual RAM too, I've been a fan of Crucial for years, just like I've been a fan of Seagate drives (with the latter I'd say that's because I have two Seagate drives that are seven years old and as healthy as the day I bought 'em).  I suppose when one has something that works and the price is reasonable, it's logical to stick with it.

GT: What browser are you using?  I'm not going to push propoganda on you, it's just that about two years back, a friend of mine had exactly the same problem, I'm trying to pin whether the source is the same or not.

[GabrielsThoughts]

GT: What browser are you using?  I'm not going to push propoganda on you, it's just that about two years back, a friend of mine had exactly the same problem, I'm trying to pin whether the source is the same or not.

I use Internet Explorer, I have firefox, but I rarely use it unless I'm doing webpages.

[Rowne]

Yeah, I figured.  He used Internet Explorer too.  The thing is, it's actually hard to get the cache cleaned when that happens, it's a bug.  Chances are you'll either have to delete the contents of 'Temporary Internet Files' (there's actually a directory named that which contains the cache files) from DOS or another OS (Windows is IE, as soon as XP boots, IE is in memory, so that's a problem) or you'll have to snag a third-party program which boasts being able to definitely clear out the cache.

If you're using IE though because you find Firefox to be too big for what you want a browser to do, have you tried K-Meleon?  K-M is a very speedy loader (faster than Fx) and it's lighter on resources than Fx too.  I use Fx myself because ... yanno, extensions but if light-weight is what you're after, try K-Meleon.

If you don't want another browser (and that's your choice), simply try what I've mentioned above.

(Edited to add a bit more info.)

[bill]

The great thing about Microsoft is that it's software can fail in such wonderful ways. For some odd reason, Helpsvc.exe  likes to take up 100% CPU and about a gig of RAM when it sometimes pops up. Ahh, Microsoft.

[Rowne]

Heh, agreed Bill.  I just don't like forcing propoganda on people, it's their choice what they use.  If a person prefers IE for whatever reason then so be it.  Just as you said though, it can fail in truly absurd ways, such as the cache being locked out and unclearable. 

That's why said friend made the jump from IE to Fx actually, he'd had enough of the fatal bugs.  *Shrug.*

For some people though, Fx is just too big to serve as a browsing application, that's why I wish K-Meleon was more known.

[bill]

I use Firefox for the tabs, and the large user base. When IE7 comes out of beta, I likely will switch over.

[Rowne]

Yeah, I doubt I'll switch to IE7, I'm too much of an advocate of Free software, ActiveX scares the hell out of me and with Slogger, I can log the internet (and I continue to do so).  I am, however, happy that Microsoft is finally putting out a decent browser product, it's about bloody time and I can certainly understand the desire to switch over to it.

GT: If you need help booting into DOS and clearing out that directory, let me know, I can point you at a site that has boot disk images and if we work together (so I can get some info off you), I can write you up a batch file to wipe the contents of that folder out.  I won't need anything personal for it, though.

[Tiger_T]

Thanks.

[llearch n'n'daCorna]

Oddly enough, I would have pointed out crucial as well.

Only not the system scanner, since it never works on linux, and hence I haven't used it. Usually I supply the make and model of the motherboard or the system, and it runs from there. Usually, however, I can tell you how much ram is in, and how many slots are used, and often the max ram that will work... just not which type, precisely, you have to buy. :-)

[Rowne]

Crucial's definitely been a good make to use over the years, I've tried a number of RAM manufacturers over the years and I've never had a dead or bad stick from crucial, nor have I had a stick go bad in a short amount of time, despite the fact that my computer is passively cooled.  I suppose this is why I like them.

There are some companies whose RAM can't stand more than a week or two in my machine, so I always have to find hardware built of sterner stuff.

As for the identification thingydoofer, whilst it isn't really all that helpful to the more hardcore hardware builders out there, it can be helpful to the neophytes who're just starting out and need that kind of information and that's exactly the kind of service it provides, a person can go there, follow the instructions and buy their RAM with confidence.

If only all hardware manufacturers had stuff like that on their websites.

[Netami]

I've never had issues with any RAM I've ever purchased, so I dont have a favorite besides the fastest for the cheapest. I love the idea of a green little rectangle fitting into your computer and making it go faster. Brilliant.

[Rowne]

Oh, I have.  Kingston RAM for example has been notoriously bad when it comes to farting out in a less temperate environment.  Like I said though, most people don't put their hardware through burn like I do, I really find out what temps hardware can take.  Usually, it's funny what temperatures most hardware can take if it's built well.  Heat is the ultimate decider between good/bad hardware.

RAM is grand though, not so long ago I upgraded from 512MeB to 3GiB and my reaction was something along the lines of "Buh?".  Primarily because half hour loading times in Unreal Tournament 2006, City of Heroes, Everquest II and so on became 30 seconds and less.  Grand.

[Nex]

I use 1 GB of RAM, and it works well enough for me. My only problem is internet speed. Wireless broadband sucks, don't ever get it.

[Cvstos]

Rowne:

I upgraded form 1GB to 2GB and saw similar results.  My score in the HL2: Lost Coast demo went from 5fps to 50fps (full HDR), and I can now play Generals with Hard 7 AIs in skirmish with full resolution and detail without worry too much about slowdown.  It still does slow down somewhat, but not to .3fps like before.

And you're right about about Kingston and Crucial.  The only two brands of RAM I'll use in my PC are Crucial and Corsair.  I've heard good things about Patriot, but... can't say from personal experience.  Are you using entirely passive cooling in the whole system?

[Rowne]

I've been meaning to say for a while that I really quite like the avatar you have there.  Harper's always been the best of the televised Sci-fi engineers (and that includes Firefly), primarily because he's an amusing little ferrety-guy who never runs out of bad jokes or the wrong thing to say at the wrong time.

They did a great job with Harper's character in Andromeda.  Then again, I liked that show full stop.  I had good expectations even when I first heard of it and spotted Captain Haircut (Kevin Sorbo, going from Hercules to Dylan Hunt).

That aside, not entirely, no.  I do have two fans sitting around in there that actively do something but it's mostly passively cooled.  I learned early on and through much research what kinds and types of hardware are butch enough to take a certain level of burn.

In fact, I think I'll offer up a general rundown of my PC's innards.

To mention them again, Seagate drives amaze me.  I've had two Seagate drives now for six/seven years and I have them in quietdrive enclosures too, which silences their noise whilst increasing their base operating temps and they haven't failed on me.  Not a single bad sector.

I've also learned that AMD processors tend to stand burn better than Intel ones do (from research and personal experience), AMD procs can run at hotter temps and better voltages usually and they handle it well, that's why I've stuck with them.

Graphics cards?  I've always relied on Sapphire, truth be told, at least for as long as I've known about them.  They make a good ATi card and their cards are designed to work in a passively cooled environment.

As for my motherboard, it's an ASUS, I can't say much about their PR or customer relation skills (lots of horror stories there) but their hardware's good.

Finally, possibly the most important thing is my case, I use one of these efficient little buggers: Antec P180 Series.

My PC is quieter than my Playstation 2 as is and that's a wonderful, wonderful thing.  I find that the need to supercool hardware is usually just an excuse to deal with poorly built hardware.