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Tech Support GAF Thread: No Case Too Big, No Case Too Small

K

-KRS-

Member
Professor Beef said:
Yeah, the firmware is up to date. How do I know which file to download? This is as far as I got before I started getting confused:

IMnka.png
Click to expand...

If it still has the original D-Link firmware from the factory, you need the factory-to-ddwrt-firmware one I assume. It even says special image for initial flashing. Then after that I'm not sure if that's all or if you need the other one as well.

I've never flashed DD-WRT onto a d-link before, but with the Linksys WRT54GL you first needed a so called "mini" version of DD-WRT because the original firmware only allowed firmware updates to be 2MB in size while the regular DD-WRT is 4MB. Flashing it with the 4MB one would cause the router to brick itself. After you put the mini version on there though, you could apply the full 4MB version if you wanted or you could just use the mini version since it has all the important things anyway. I assume this factory-to-ddwrt firmware is the same as the mini version, but I don't know because this factory-to-ddwrt file is bigger in size than the regular one...

But it's probably pretty safe to assume that the factory-to-ddwrt one is the one you want, going by the description.
 
Freshmaker

Freshmaker

I am Korean.
Two of my PC's have started getting random big CPU usage spikes. There aren't any processes going on, and I can't see malware hitting a brand new system and a laptop I barely use that fast. Could a router introduce some kind of problem like this?
 
S

SteveWD40

Member
Right, I have had my laptop for a while now and it's always bugged me that the HDD is partitioned off as some kind of "recovery" partition? (win7 64bit) Essentially giving me 288GB to use and 288GB being wasted as far as I can tell.

Is there anyway to remove the partition without clean wiping the HDD? I don't have the windows discs (at least I don't think I do, I could check the box I guess) but want to avoid a format anyway, I just want to do as you do when you delete a bootcamp partition on a mac and get the space back.
 
S

Strike

Member
I've been having this recent issue where my browser freezes every time I try to use the "Save target as" option. Antivirus software hasn't picked up anything. Any suggestions/ideas?
 
Jzero

Jzero

Member
Strike said:
I've been having this recent issue where my browser freezes every time I try to use the "Save target as" option. Antivirus software hasn't picked up anything. Any suggestions/ideas?
Click to expand...
Probably a browser problem then, try using another one and see if the same happens.


SteveWD40 said:
Right, I have had my laptop for a while now and it's always bugged me that the HDD is partitioned off as some kind of "recovery" partition? (win7 64bit) Essentially giving me 288GB to use and 288GB being wasted as far as I can tell.

Is there anyway to remove the partition without clean wiping the HDD? I don't have the windows discs (at least I don't think I do, I could check the box I guess) but want to avoid a format anyway, I just want to do as you do when you delete a bootcamp partition on a mac and get the space back.
Click to expand...
You have to go into Disk management by right clicking "computer" and clicking "manage" then "storage"
Then you just delete the partition you do not want and make a new simple volume.
 
C

Choppasmith

Member
Okay here's my problem GAF, it's Linux related and I'm totally lost.

I fixed up an old IBM Thinkpad and installed XBMC Live on it. Looks to be running great.

The laptop has two bays. One has a DVD drive, the other has a Hot swap SATA adapter with a 500GB drive in it. The laptop itself has a 20 GB Drive which I installed XBMC Live to. I was nearly positive it recognized the SATA drive during installation.

I took the SATA drive out, hooked it up to my Desktop via a SATA to USB adapter, copied my media to it, plugged it back in, and now I can't seem to "find" the drive anywhere.

Of course, I'm not used to Linux at all. All the commands ad folder names are a whole different language.

Can anyone help? I'd greatly appreciate it.
 
S

SteveWD40

Member
Jzero15 said:
You have to go into Disk management by right clicking "computer" and clicking "manage" then "storage"
Then you just delete the partition you do not want and make a new simple volume.
Click to expand...

Thanks, so it won't wipe my main C drive then creating a new volume? I just want one volume (the one I have now) but twice the size.
 
TheMan

TheMan

Member
Hey tech gaf, this issue is perplexing me.

Basically, IE can load pages but cannot display them. For example if I go to CNN.com, the webpage will be blank, but I can still click on the invisible links which will open new windows. At the top of the browser, I can see the name of the website, but again, the page itself is totally blank.

What led to this- yesterday, I was forced to restore my computer from a fresh image. That went fine. After the restore, I was able to load IE just fine, but after applying many windows updates the problem appeared. I was able to download firefox and that works, so the issue doesn't seem to be with connectivity.

Any suggestions?
(PS i know IE sucks compared to FF, but it bugs me that it doesn't work right. I guess I'm just OCD)
 
Jzero

Jzero

Member
SteveWD40 said:
Thanks, so it won't wipe my main C drive then creating a new volume? I just want one volume (the one I have now) but twice the size.
Click to expand...
Nope, when you delete a partition it only deletes the files and stuff on that partition only. When you delete the unwanted partition you then have to right click your C:// drive and click extend to put the Unallocated space in the C:// drive.
 
TheMan

TheMan

Member
TheMan said:
Hey tech gaf, this issue is perplexing me.

Basically, IE can load pages but cannot display them. For example if I go to CNN.com, the webpage will be blank, but I can still click on the invisible links which will open new windows. At the top of the browser, I can see the name of the website, but again, the page itself is totally blank.

What led to this- yesterday, I was forced to restore my computer from a fresh image. That went fine. After the restore, I was able to load IE just fine, but after applying many windows updates the problem appeared. I was able to download firefox and that works, so the issue doesn't seem to be with connectivity.

Any suggestions?
(PS i know IE sucks compared to FF, but it bugs me that it doesn't work right. I guess I'm just OCD)
Click to expand...

so I just solved my problem, thought I'd leave a solution in case anyone in the future comes across a similar issue.

Alt+T, internet options, advanced. Clicked box that said "use software rendering instead of GPU rendering." I suspect I need to update my GPU drivers, forgot that windows update doesn't handle that stuff.
 
C

Combichristoffersen

Combovers don't work when there is no hair
Freshmaker said:
Two of my PC's have started getting random big CPU usage spikes. There aren't any processes going on, and I can't see malware hitting a brand new system and a laptop I barely use that fast. Could a router introduce some kind of problem like this?
Click to expand...

Your router shouldn't affect your CPU usage. Are there any services running that might hog the CPU?
 
S

SteveWD40

Member
Jzero15 said:
Nope, when you delete a partition it only deletes the files and stuff on that partition only. When you delete the unwanted partition you then have to right click your C:// drive and click extend to put the Unallocated space in the C:// drive.
Click to expand...

Thanks again, just did it and it worked a treat. Why do they do this (manufacturers) in the first place?
 
C

Cigol

Member
What can I do if a laptop no longer recognises the windows 7 (home) installation and it's a HP with a recovery partition but no recovery disks?

Doing Windows startup repair (as it initially suggests on a boot) ends in a black screen and the recovery manager from within bios boot options doesn't recognise the windows installation or the windows partition so I can't access it anywhere except via a linux live CD (where everything checks out in terms of hardware but not, seemingly, for whatever reason windows).

Ordinarily I'd just chkdsk and/or fixboot (and failing that just format) but reading on the internet it says to be careful about it breaking HP installations because of the way they are setup by the manufacturer? It's not my laptop and there's stuff on there that would make a format unpleasantly long and boring so if anyone knows what the score is I'd be grateful. I also don't have a 32bit windows home installation disk, only a 64bit pro and I'm assuming it's not kosher to mix?
 
P

PaulLFC

Member
Hello GAF,
Just got an external HDD, and besides storing Steam games, I'd like to use it to back up stuff from my internal drive as well.

What's the best free backup software? Ideally something I can just point at my external HD, give it a list of folders to monitor and it just copies everything then sits in the background waiting for any additions/changes to these folders and copies them automatically - like a local Dropbox.

Failing that, a program I could give a set time to back up would be my next option.

Any ideas? Cheers :)
 
L

Lionel Mandrake

Member
I might as well post this here too...
Lionel Mandrake said:
Alright. I've been really wanting to play my SNES, but I've had no luck hooking it up.

Every time I power on I get this screen:
QItbm.jpg


I get it when there's a game in and when there's not. No sound either. This is on an LCD TV. Tried it on an old CRT TV, and got the same thing, except the lines moved up the screen.

Googling has been a mixed bag. Most of the sites I've found list similar problems, but few sounded exactly like mine.

Any ideas?
Click to expand...
 
P

PaulLFC

Member
Ugh, seems the external HDD from a couple of posts up is causing me more problems than it's solving.

I bought it to store Steam games, but it seems some of them don't work when launched from it because the drive (Hitachi Touro Desk 2TB) uses 4K sectors instead of 512B ones (as far as I can understand anyway, I might be wrong).

Is there any way to format it to or otherwise force it to use 512B sectors, or am I screwed? Some games work, but three out of five I've tried so far don't (Saints Row The Third, Just Cause 2 and Orcs Must Die).
 
K

-KRS-

Member
Lionel Mandrake said:
I might as well post this here too...
Click to expand...

Hmm, that doesn't sound promising. What are you using to hook it up? RF cables or composite/s-video/RGB Scart? It might be the port you're using that's broken or something. If you're using the RF out, try using the A/V out port instead and vice versa. That way you can rule out that being the issue. Though be aware that if the other port does work it might also be because the cable you use in the seemingly non-working port is busted.
 
K

KarmaCow

Member
I've run into a weird problem with the SD card reader in my laptop and my googling skills have failed me. Basically, it will work fine with the first SD card inserted after restarting, but after taking it out it simply does not recognize any SD card. It's not even a matter of not being able to read the contents of the SD card, my laptop doesn't even acknowledge that an SD card has been inserted.

Googling the problem usually ends up with person solving it by just starting fresh and reinstalling Windows. I don't want to do this, so I've tried redownloading the driver from the ASUS website but it doesn't fix the problem.

Since the reader works fine once after restarting, I would think it's not a hardware problem but I'm not sure what else to do.
 
Jzero

Jzero

Member
ChubbyHuggs said:
This is the one I have.
http://support.gateway.com/s/PC/R/10...09371sp3.shtml

This is the one someone gave me.
http://h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/d...t=3548185#N208

The only thing I know about computers is how to take out parts and put new ones in. So can anyone tell me which computer is better to put these parts in?

Video Card: Geforce 9800 GTX+
Ram: 4 gigs
Power: 500 Watts
Click to expand...
Well the HP has a bigger hard drive and more space for ram so i would definitely say the HP. The processors on both run at the same speed.
 
Jzero

Jzero

Member
ChubbyHuggs said:
What exactly does the cache do?
Because it's bigger on the Gateway, will I notice a difference with anything?
Click to expand...
It is used by the CPU to reduce the average time to access memory. You may notice a bit of difference but not much. The gateway supposedly only supports 2Gb according to that page so your 4gb would go to waste in the gateway.
 
C

ChubbyHuggs

Member
Jzero15 said:
It is used by the CPU to reduce the average time to access memory. You may notice a bit of difference but not much. The gateway supposedly only supports 2Gb according to that page so your 4gb would go to waste in the gateway.
Click to expand...

Okie dokie, thanks a lot for the help.
 
G

GorillaJu

Member
I'd love some help, advice, or anything if someone has some insight into what could be causing my performance issue.

I'm on a fairly old laptop with 2gb ram and a GeForce 8600m. It's a MacBook Pro, and I have Windows 7 installed to play games as the performance running in Windows is generally much, much better than through OS X.

The problem I have is that when there are a lot of objects on screen - essentially, when my computer has to work, I get an unusual slow down / speed up cycle. It's hard to describe, and the curious aspect of it is that it only happens on Windows. The framerate in OS X on Diablo 3 is abysmal, on Win7 it's fine, except for the unfortunate "flat tire" feel that makes it really tedious to try and play. Dota 2 is worse - I've just given up on that one entirely. Unplayable for me.

Essentially it goes into slow motion, then feels like it speeds up to make up for it. It really feels as though my computer has a flat tire. It's really hard to perceive if the speeding up bit is returning to a normal frame rate or if its actually going faster than normal, because it immediately slows down again, so I never really know what the base-line "proper" speed feels like.

Anyone with some insight?
 
L

LogicStep

Member
I need some help guys!

core i7 920
6gb ram
gtx 570
1tb hdd

So my computer has been crashing a whole lot lately and I don't know what's causing this. My friend tells me that my hdd might be dying. The computer crashes a lot while I'm playing WoW. The screen just freezes, the image just stays there. My CPU is not overheating and neither is my graphics card. After a crash, the computer starts to boot up, I get that prompt saying if I want to start windows normally or in safe mode and I just hit normally. Then the computer goes to the Windows logo and it either stays there and doesn't do anything else, it gets past this point and just stays in a black screen, sometimes the mouse cursor will pop up with the little thinking circle and it'll freeze there. Sometimes it will take 2 tries and other times it has taken me over 10 tries to get it to finally boot up. Sometimes it asks me if I want to run the start up checker or whatever it is and I do, all it offers is to do a system restore which I haven't done, and it just stays on that screen and doesn't do shit although admittedly I don't let it finish I just hard reset since it takes so long I just think it hanged.

Any ideas?
 
wolfmat

wolfmat

Confirmed Asshole
zazrx said:
I need some help guys!

core i7 920
6gb ram
gtx 570
1tb hdd

So my computer has been crashing a whole lot lately and I don't know what's causing this. My friend tells me that my hdd might be dying. The computer crashes a lot while I'm playing WoW. The screen just freezes, the image just stays there. My CPU is not overheating and neither is my graphics card. After a crash, the computer starts to boot up, I get that prompt saying if I want to start windows normally or in safe mode and I just hit normally. Then the computer goes to the Windows logo and it either stays there and doesn't do anything else, it gets past this point and just stays in a black screen, sometimes the mouse cursor will pop up with the little thinking circle and it'll freeze there. Sometimes it will take 2 tries and other times it has taken me over 10 tries to get it to finally boot up. Sometimes it asks me if I want to run the start up checker or whatever it is and I do, all it offers is to do a system restore which I haven't done, and it just stays on that screen and doesn't do shit although admittedly I don't let it finish I just hard reset since it takes so long I just think it hanged.

Any ideas?
Click to expand...

Well, you could go into the system restore console by booting from the Windows disk and picking the appropriate options. Once you're in the console, type
Code: 
chkdsk /h
to get the documentation for chkdsk, then apply your new knowledge and try to tackle the issue from that angle. I've had success doing that a couple of times.

However, I'd also consider the possibility that your RAM is broken. To check it, follow instructions on http://www.mydigitallife.info/check...s-7-and-vista-with-windows-memory-diagnostic/
There's also http://www.memtest.org/
 
L

LogicStep

Member
wolfmat said:
Well, you could go into the system restore console by booting from the Windows disk and picking the appropriate options. Once you're in the console, type
Code: 
chkdsk /h
to get the documentation for chkdsk, then apply your new knowledge and try to tackle the issue from that angle. I've had success doing that a couple of times.

However, I'd also consider the possibility that your RAM is broken. To check it, follow instructions on http://www.mydigitallife.info/check...s-7-and-vista-with-windows-memory-diagnostic/
There's also http://www.memtest.org/
Click to expand...

I ran the disck check from Windows by going to the drive properties, came out good. Said the drive didn't have any errors on them.

I went and did the memory test from Windows, restarted and did the standard test and it didn't show any problems. The PC went to reboot and I've had 3 failed boot ups so far.

This is what I'm looking at:
YeAFb


Would love to know what's busted so I can just replace whatever is broken.
 
C

Chris R

Member
So I got a new router and I'm having issues with it. 95% stock options, just changed the SSID and password on it as well disabling SSID broadcast. Thing is, my Xbox and Laptop will not connect to the network for roughly 5 minutes after turning on... After that they are mostly fine (I'm getting kicked off Xbox Live a ton though, think that might be a port issue though)

Any idea as to what the issue might be? It is a Buffalo router if that helps at all.
 
C

Combichristoffersen

Combovers don't work when there is no hair
Sup techgaf.

Years ago I bought a region 1 DVD of Neil Gaiman's MirrorMask since I thought it wouldn't get an official region 2 release here, which it ended up getting a few days after I bought the US DVD. My PAL PS3 obviously won't play US DVDs, so I want to rip the DVD to an .mp4 file. What program would you recommend for doing this? I'd also like to hardcode the subtitles into the video, since PS3 doesn't support .srt files and such. How can I do this for the .mp4 file?

Edit: Also, the PS3 self cleaning trick to make the fans go in reverse, could this be harmful to the PS3 or is it OK to do this trick?
 
N

neos

Member
I don't know if this thread is appropriate, however,

I have a Canon Pixma P495 printer which is telling me that some paper is stuck in, but there's absolutely no paper around (i opened it).

THe user manual doesn't help, the online support is broken (internal server errors).

Any advice?
 
L

LogicStep

Member
wolfmat said:
Do you have error messages in your event logs? Go through those and try to make sense of them.
Click to expand...
I didn't get to see them. I will try the other memory test you linked. But it seems like it's a heating issue... As soon as I put a huge house fan blowing air into the open computer case it didn't crash and I played for hours....
 
D

Deadly Cyclone

Pride of Iowa State
Alright, got one for you Tech support Gaf.

For the past 3 weeks I have been having trouble with my internet connection at home. At random times and frequency my internet will just hang for up to 2 minutes. Some of the times my modem reboots completely, and some of the times it's like I'm in limbo.

For instance I will be playing Halo online and it will happen, I'll go into the black screen, and a few minutes later I'll be back in the game, or the game will end with me as the only participant, but the internet is back up and running. Occasionally it will drop me from XBL altogether. At this same time I won't be able to load web pages on my iPad.

I called Mediacom, my service provider, and they sent a tech out yesterday. He tinkered with the modem for 25 minutes and eventually came to the conclusion that the coax cable had some corrosion on it, as did the connection point with the modem, he cleaned that and said everything looked good. 2 hours later, my internet started hanging again.

Any ideas here? My last effort was going to be to buy my own modem, and all new coax just in case. This is driving me insane though, and it happens randomly. Could be once then 3 hours later again, or once every 10 minutes for 2 hours. Help?
 
C

Combichristoffersen

Combovers don't work when there is no hair
neos said:
I don't know if this thread is appropriate, however,

I have a Canon Pixma P495 printer which is telling me that some paper is stuck in, but there's absolutely no paper around (i opened it).

THe user manual doesn't help, the online support is broken (internal server errors).

Any advice?
Click to expand...

Is the printer itself telling you there's a stuck paper, or is it the Windows software?
 
K

Kong Fisso

Banned
I have the exact same problem as this dude: http://www.overclock.net/t/282293/ati-installer-doesent-install-ccc-and-display-driver

When I launch the Ati installer and go "custom install" it only lets me install HDMI / that app sdk and the install manager. I am given no option to install a graphics driver. So i'm stuck on windows ati drivers (v 8.something), and i think those have terrible performance.

I've tried running driver sweeper, reinstalling, reinstalling the ms c++ distributables, but nothing work.

Does anyone have any ideas? help would be greatly appreciated.

My card is a 6770m, running win 7 64 bit through boot camp

update: randomly and desperately fiddled around with safe mode, driver cleaner, uninstalling, reinstalling, rinse repeat. suddently it worked and my windows performance index jumped 0.5 pts. nevermore am i fucking around with my drivers like this
 
H

Happypwnstar

Banned
Question my pc has been acting up the ram had to get new sticks. (problem solved)

Then had issues with the video card it artifacting and being retarded a quick restart would fix the problem I have recently put more thermal paste on it and it hasn't in a month or so.(problem temporarily solved)

My case has a pretty bad electrical charge coming off it all the time.

Could my power supply be messing with my pc or am i just having bad luck and the the charge is somewhat normal?
 
B

Betta Lines

Member
Soo I turn my PC on today and Dropbox warns me that my Dropbox folder is missing. I check My Computer and find that my second hard drive isn't accessible. There's an icon, but it doesn't show the usual used/free space underneath.

My PC is running Windows 7. The C: drive is a 120GB SSD, with the OS and all software installations. D: drive I believe is a 1TB Western Digital Caviar Green SATA II HDD, where I keep all my large documents and media, including my Dropbox folder.

Any reason why this would suddenly happen? It's been a rock solid drive for over a year... I hope it hasn't died... all my data is on that drive :(
 
S

suaveric

Member
My graphics card bit it last week so I decided to just build a new computer. One thing I didn't really take in to account was buying a new copy of Windows. What I have for my old computer is a legit Upgrade version of Windows 7.

I've done some looking around the the net and it seems like I should be able to transfer my activation key over to my new computer. I've also found some weird (and apparently legal) ways of installing this upgrade version of 7 without having an old version of Windows installed though changing the registry.

My question is, will I be able to do both? By messing with the registry stuff once I've installed the upgrade version, it looks like the last step is activating it with my key, but I know that will not work without calling Microsoft and having them ok it. Is that going to work?

Is there some other, more simple way around this that I can't see? Thanks.
 
C

Combichristoffersen

Combovers don't work when there is no hair
suaveric said:
My graphics card bit it last week so I decided to just build a new computer. One thing I didn't really take in to account was buying a new copy of Windows. What I have for my old computer is a legit Upgrade version of Windows 7.

I've done some looking around the the net and it seems like I should be able to transfer my activation key over to my new computer. I've also found some weird (and apparently legal) ways of installing this upgrade version of 7 without having an old version of Windows installed though changing the registry.

My question is, will I be able to do both? By messing with the registry stuff once I've installed the upgrade version, it looks like the last step is activating it with my key, but I know that will not work without calling Microsoft and having them ok it. Is that going to work?

Is there some other, more simple way around this that I can't see? Thanks.
Click to expand...

AFAIK you can do a clean install from your upgrade disk, but you'll need to call MS cutomer support regarding transferring the license/CD key from your old PC to your new PC.
 
S

suaveric

Member
Combichristoffersen said:
AFAIK you can do a clean install from your upgrade disk, but you'll need to call MS cutomer support regarding transferring the license/CD key from your old PC to your new PC.
Click to expand...

So I should be able to skip the whole messing around with the registry stuff? I'd prefer not to have to screw with that.
 
R

_RT_

Member
Need some help with Mom's computer.
I used TeamViewer to get control (awesome program by the way).

Running Internet Explorer and all images look low-res. Going to gmail and gmail says it looks like the page is running in compatibility mode (confirmed it's not).
Loading chrome, and images are just as bad. Checking cnn and pics are all still low res.

Updated graphics driver from intel page. I let the page check for the appropriate driver itself so that I could confirm the right one is loaded.

What am I missing?
 
H

Hieberrr

Member
I have no idea why this happens, but I can't seem to see any comments on blogs on my W7. It happens with all the browsers on this computer and this computer only. I've tested the same blogs on my W7 laptop and my Ubuntu 12.04 install and both work.

It's driving me nuts. It happens on Engadget, etc... or even this: http://omgubuntu.co.uk/2012/05/ubuntu-12-10-quetzal-logo/#disqus_thread

What can I do? :'(
 
F

Feep

Banned
Well, this is a weird problem.

My internet service from Charter (15mbps) was just fine for a month or so. But recently, my desktop has had severe trouble maintaining a steady connection. It cuts in and out with ridiculous frequency, and is notably slow even when the reading is "connected".

The weird thing, though, is that my laptop (and my roommate's laptop) connect to it just fine, with proper speeds and no connection issues. Moreover, when I try to connect my PC to another network (specifically, my 4G wireless tethering app via my Galaxy Nexus), that seems to work fine as well. It's only the specific connection between my PC and my home network. Power cycling the router did nothing.

Any ideas? Should I try calling Charter?
 
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