Computer General Discussion Thread

[Minoa]

Guys, i know what i am going to talk about is not related to computers - but i really need some help with my audio stuff!

(Image)

(the above pic is not mine, but i have the exact model as this)

It was my Aiwa Z-D9500M HiFi stereo system which refuses to play CDs - despite the CD player feature being not used for more than 6 years. I did try to put in my Norah Jones Feels Like Home CD (HDCD version) and it did detect all the tracks correctly, but when i hit play, it doesn't do anything rather than making motor noises. Does anyone on here.. perhaps an audiophile can give me a suggestion on how to fix this problem?

Hi, if it can play a normal audio CD but not a HDCD, then the AIWA Z-D9500M does not support the HDCD standard, which is a Microsoft proprietary technology. There have been questions about whether HDCD is really backwards compatible with ordinary CD players.

Source: http://www.audiomisc.co.uk/HFN/HDCD/Enigma.html

For the music thread, see viewtopic.php?f=19&t=280959, but the post is suitable for this thread because HDCD’s connection to Microsoft. And the software support: I remember Windows Media Player supporting it at one point but as a proprietary format, VLC has no official support.

[Corrian]

Anyone know any good tablets combined with keyboards (Because screw just typing without one), or just a kinda small (But not too small) light weight laptop? I want one that isn't 12 years old for traveling purposes and doesn't weigh 7 pounds.

[Imperializt Russia]

Anyone know any good tablets combined with keyboards (Because screw just typing without one), or just a kinda small (But not too small) light weight laptop? I want one that isn't 12 years old for traveling purposes and doesn't weigh 7 pounds.

A netbook could be a good call if all you want from it is forums, YT, IM and word processing?
Any decent tablet probably ships with (or offers) a folding keyboard by now, but I don't own one.

[Ardoki]

Anyone know any good tablets combined with keyboards (Because screw just typing without one), or just a kinda small (But not too small) light weight laptop? I want one that isn't 12 years old for traveling purposes and doesn't weigh 7 pounds.

Have a look at the Microsoft surface range. Though, they tend to be on the more expensive side.

[Cekoviu]

I downloaded Avast as normal but forgot that some of the preloaded software with my motherboard included Norton.

Avast is constantly identifying Norton files as "trojan horse viruses"

They aren't wrong tho

[Cekoviu]

I tried out the new Ubuntu 18.04 LTS under a minimum install, and that apparently removed the Amazon icon among other stuff that production servers do not use.

Also, welcome back GNOME.

I haven't used vanilla Ubuntu in a long time (I think the last release I touched was 16.something). I'm surprised that they really made GNOME the default again. Is it the old style or the new, mobile-esque style?

[Corrian]

Also for reference on the motherboard talk, I have this

[Cekoviu]

Also for reference on the motherboard talk, I have this

Whoa, you must have been using the same computer for a really long time if you have an LGA1366. Then again, homemade PCs tend to be durable and parts that break are easily replaceable, but still.

[Minoa]

I tried out the new Ubuntu 18.04 LTS under a minimum install, and that apparently removed the Amazon icon among other stuff that production servers do not use.

Also, welcome back GNOME.

I haven't used vanilla Ubuntu in a long time (I think the last release I touched was 16.something). I'm surprised that they really made GNOME the default again. Is it the old style or the new, mobile-esque style?

It is the new one, but Unity actually borrowed quite a lot from the modern GNOME (Shell) 3. The old GNOME 2 has been called MATE for sometime (since 2011).

Source: https://www.pcworld.com/article/3188190 ... thing.html

[Cekoviu]

I haven't used vanilla Ubuntu in a long time (I think the last release I touched was 16.something). I'm surprised that they really made GNOME the default again. Is it the old style or the new, mobile-esque style?

It is the new one, but Unity actually borrowed quite a lot from the modern GNOME (Shell) 3. The old GNOME 2 has been called MATE for sometime (since 2011).

Source: https://www.pcworld.com/article/3188190 ... thing.html

That says MATE is a fork, not actually the original GNOME 2. Anyway, I do like MATE quite a lot, and I've used Ubuntu MATE as my distro of choice for quite some time.
Does make sense that Unity was partially borrowed from GNOME 3, since they're sort of similar in function and default appearance. I hadn't put that together until now.

[Corrian]

Also for reference on the motherboard talk, I have this

Whoa, you must have been using the same computer for a really long time if you have an LGA1366. Then again, homemade PCs tend to be durable and parts that break are easily replaceable, but still.

This was a computer we got from my dads work that was when they were getting rid of old hardware, so yeah, it's kind of old. However, it still accepted new graphics cards, so there's that. It may be old, but it seems pretty good for its age nonetheless. Still, there is a reason why I'm thinking of just getting a whole new thing. Trust me, this is leagues better than whatever I had before.

[Cekoviu]

Whoa, you must have been using the same computer for a really long time if you have an LGA1366. Then again, homemade PCs tend to be durable and parts that break are easily replaceable, but still.

This was a computer we got from my dads work that was when they were getting rid of old hardware, so yeah, it's kind of old. However, it still accepted new graphics cards, so there's that. It may be old, but it seems pretty good for its age nonetheless. Still, there is a reason why I'm thinking of just getting a whole new thing. Trust me, this is leagues better than whatever I had before.

Yeah, I was running on decades-old clunkers before I built my current box, which I've had for... I think it's two years now? It doesn't actually have a video card, but it's still leagues better than the 12-year-old XP machine I had in 2013 (!!!). I'm still using the monitor from back then; it was always pretty good and it's newer than the PCs it first ran on. Only problem is that it uses a VGA socket and those are becoming increasingly rare on motherboards, so I'm probably going to need to retire it if I ever upgrade my CPU and mobo.

[Minoa]

It is the new one, but Unity actually borrowed quite a lot from the modern GNOME (Shell) 3. The old GNOME 2 has been called MATE for sometime (since 2011).

Source: https://www.pcworld.com/article/3188190 ... thing.html

That says MATE is a fork, not actually the original GNOME 2. Anyway, I do like MATE quite a lot, and I've used Ubuntu MATE as my distro of choice for quite some time.
Does make sense that Unity was partially borrowed from GNOME 3, since they're sort of similar in function and default appearance. I hadn't put that together until now.

That’s the word I was looking for, as in using the layout of GNOME 2 as the underlying principle.

[Cekoviu]

That says MATE is a fork, not actually the original GNOME 2. Anyway, I do like MATE quite a lot, and I've used Ubuntu MATE as my distro of choice for quite some time.
Does make sense that Unity was partially borrowed from GNOME 3, since they're sort of similar in function and default appearance. I hadn't put that together until now.

That’s the word I was looking for, as in using the layout of GNOME 2 as the underlying principle.

Ah, I see.

[Imperializt Russia]

So, the monitor in my build came with a HDMI cable. When I was initially building the machine, it did not output a signal via HDMI at all. I had to buy a DisplayPort-DVI cable to get a signal to the monitor.
That was nearly 3 months ago.

Yesterday, I took the HDMI cable from my Xbox 360 (which I haven't used in about as long), and plugged that into my PC and monitor.
Works immediately.

So A, I now look like a twat, but B, I now have 75Hz Freesync and everything is beautiful.

[Nordengrund]

So my PC shut off randomly without warning. It wasn’t plugged up, so I don’t think it’s the power supply, and I still had plenty of battery life left. What caused this?

[Cekoviu]

So, the monitor in my build came with a HDMI cable. When I was initially building the machine, it did not output a signal via HDMI at all. I had to buy a DisplayPort-DVI cable to get a signal to the monitor.
That was nearly 3 months ago.

Yesterday, I took the HDMI cable from my Xbox 360 (which I haven't used in about as long), and plugged that into my PC and monitor.
Works immediately.

So A, I now look like a twat, but B, I now have 75Hz Freesync and everything is beautiful.

I thought my motherboard was broken when I was first building mine, but it turned out I just didn't plug the RAM in all the way.

So my PC shut off randomly without warning. It wasn’t plugged up, so I don’t think it’s the power supply, and I still had plenty of battery life left. What caused this?

Was there a BSOD? Do you have an antivirus?

[Welskerland]

So, the monitor in my build came with a HDMI cable. When I was initially building the machine, it did not output a signal via HDMI at all. I had to buy a DisplayPort-DVI cable to get a signal to the monitor.
That was nearly 3 months ago.

Yesterday, I took the HDMI cable from my Xbox 360 (which I haven't used in about as long), and plugged that into my PC and monitor.
Works immediately.

So A, I now look like a twat, but B, I now have 75Hz Freesync and everything is beautiful.

I thought my motherboard was broken when I was first building mine, but it turned out I just didn't plug the RAM in all the way.

So my PC shut off randomly without warning. It wasn’t plugged up, so I don’t think it’s the power supply, and I still had plenty of battery life left. What caused this?

Was there a BSOD? Do you have an antivirus?

No BSOD. It was working perfectly fine, but then the screen just immediately shut off and the system stopped running. I rebooted it and it shut off again after a few seconds, but it appears to work fine when the power supply is plugged and n.

I have Malwarebytes as my anti-malware program.

EDIT: This is Nordengrund. I just forgot I was using an alt when I posted this.

[Cekoviu]

I thought my motherboard was broken when I was first building mine, but it turned out I just didn't plug the RAM in all the way.


Was there a BSOD? Do you have an antivirus?

No BSOD. It was working perfectly fine, but then the screen just immediately shut off and the system stopped running. I rebooted it and it shut off again after a few seconds, but it appears to work fine when the power supply is plugged and n.

I have Malwarebytes as my anti-malware program.

EDIT: This is Nordengrund. I just forgot I was using an alt when I posted this.

What version? Some don't offer real-time scanning, so you may want to consider getting a real-time antivirus like Avast. Also, how many programs were you running at the time? RAM overflow, CPU overload, and overheating can occur if you have lots of programs or tabs open.

[Nordengrund]

No BSOD. It was working perfectly fine, but then the screen just immediately shut off and the system stopped running. I rebooted it and it shut off again after a few seconds, but it appears to work fine when the power supply is plugged and n.

I have Malwarebytes as my anti-malware program.

EDIT: This is Nordengrund. I just forgot I was using an alt when I posted this.

What version? Some don't offer real-time scanning, so you may want to consider getting a real-time antivirus like Avast. Also, how many programs were you running at the time? RAM overflow, CPU overload, and overheating can occur if you have lots of programs or tabs open.

I had about four or five tabs open. I have the Premiuk version of Malwarebytes. I used to have Avast, but Ingot rid of it because I thought it was redundant and I found Avast to be kinda annoying.

[Cekoviu]

What version? Some don't offer real-time scanning, so you may want to consider getting a real-time antivirus like Avast. Also, how many programs were you running at the time? RAM overflow, CPU overload, and overheating can occur if you have lots of programs or tabs open.

I had about four or five tabs open. I have the Premiuk version of Malwarebytes. I used to have Avast, but Ingot rid of it because I thought it was redundant and I found Avast to be kinda annoying.

No other programs? I'm inclined to believe the problem is the battery if it works fine when plugged in, then, though I'm not exactly an expert on laptops.

[Minoa]

No BSOD. It was working perfectly fine, but then the screen just immediately shut off and the system stopped running. I rebooted it and it shut off again after a few seconds, but it appears to work fine when the power supply is plugged and n.

I have Malwarebytes as my anti-malware program.

EDIT: This is Nordengrund. I just forgot I was using an alt when I posted this.

Depending on how long you had the laptop for, it is either the battery needs charging, or the battery pack is reaching the end of its life.

[Nordengrund]

Alright, I’m trying to clean up my C drive since it is almost full. I tried a disk cleanup but that didn’t seem to do anything.

[Cekoviu]

Alright, I’m trying to clean up my C drive since it is almost full. I tried a disk cleanup but that didn’t seem to do anything.

Try restarting the computer after doing Disk Cleanup. I've found that that can free up gigabytes of space on occasion. Also, move as many files from your Documents, Music, and Pictures folders to a secondary drive as you can, and delete your old downloads.
And did you do the "Clean up system files" option? That'll get you a few extra gigs.

[Hirota]

Yesterday, I took the HDMI cable from my Xbox 360 (which I haven't used in about as long), and plugged that into my PC and monitor.
Works immediately.

So A, I now look like a twat, but B, I now have 75Hz Freesync and everything is beautiful.

I thought my motherboard was broken when I was first building mine, but it turned out I just didn't plug the RAM in all the way.

Oh I bet we all have stories like this!

My own personal favourite of self twatishness was when I was building my new pc, but my new graphics card, an 8800, simply would not display.

Two weeks and an rma later,I discovered that some graphics cards needs a pci-e power supply.