Zxian

You might run into some interference problems, depending on the device, and what you're doing with it. I know that with my G7 mouse, the pointer would sometimes be slightly unresponsive or slow when I was doing lots of wireless data transfer. I've never had any troubles with cordless phones, but I know of others who have. The 2.4GHz band that these devices are given is actually a range of frequencies. With most wireless routers, you can select the channel (i.e. the frequency) that the device works on to minimize wireless interference.

In fact... every opinion is just as valid as any other. The number leaning to one side of the argument doesn't necessarily negate the validity of the other opinions. Some people like Norton, others don't. It's as simple as that. To the OP, you could install two anti-virus programs, but what for? In my opinion, an anti-virus program should be a backup to your own safe computing habits. If you're relying on it to keep your computer clean, then you need to re-think some of the things you do. I've been running all three of my Windows computers without any anti-virus for about a year and a half now, and I haven't picked up anything (short of a small piece of spyware on one machine, but that was my own fault). I think you're asking the wrong question here...

5566m... gah! This game... http://totebo.com/mko.php?c=qporrEosEouEFo...ttuuoxlZ3NoEqrq

Site and Forum issues is for problems regarding the forum itself. Your question is better suited to the Unattended Windows section, I think. Moved

It's a pretty big PITA that Diskeeper sells various levels of their product, and in order to get all of the "super-duper" features, you have to shell out an arm and a leg. I think DK might run into the same problem with customers as we're seeing with Vista - too many product lines leads to customer confusion. The average joe had to deal with two versions of XP - Home and Pro. With the move into Vista, it's now... seven?

Speed throttling? I thought you wanted a copier for higher speed...

I might have got a crappy model - who knows. All I remember is that any time I removed and reinserted the memory card, the camera chose the internal memory to be the default storage location. With the pictures on the internal memory, there's no other way to download them other than to use the cable. I also don't like using the cable that comes with the camera because of the horrible transfer speeds. I tested a Panasonic Lumix DMC-FZ50K the other day (horrible picture quality by the way...) and I didn't have a card reader in my computer. Ever transferred 600MB worth of pictures at 650KB/s? It's painfully slow...

Happy Birthday xper!!! Hope you have a good one!!!

Canon is a great company. I'd recommend them for the point and shoot as well. My main beef with Kodak cameras (at least the ones I've used) is that they always choose their internal memory (if present) over any cards, so you'll sometimes be snapping away, and after 10 pictures, the camera will say "out of memory". It also makes it a pain to transfer files, since you're forced to use their transfer cable/dock. I'll take a card reader over a camera's USB port any day.

That limit is also present within the forums themselves, IIRC. I'm not sure if it's an IPB setting, or a bug.

Right, we're talking about the same thing, but considering that my networking equipment is sitting on my desk, one of the two sides is going to be at the "front", leaving at least one cable poking out. I'd rather have all the plugs in the back, and status lights on the front (like traditional home routers mostly have), like you see below: Having a power cable or ethernet cables come out the front is slightly unfavorable, but if I were to install this in my basement or server room (which I plan on having one day... one day), then I'd probably go with something more like what you're talking about. The bottom two devices are old networking equipment. Below my current WRT54GL, is a dead WRT54G v2.2. It's not bricked, but dead. The power light won't even show up. I had added a 60mm fan to it, and I think the whole thing died one day when I flicked the power switch... The bottom DLink switch is my old DSS-8+. It still works, and I figure I'll keep it around in case I ever run off to another LAN party in the area and someone needs an extra switch. I personally find it a shame that Linksys changed the physical dimensions of their devices. It would have been really nice to find the modern equivalent to the EG008W (it didn't support jumbo frames) that would have fit underneath my WRT54GL. I just found it really slick how they stacked on top of each other so easily.

The speakers are really nice. Sadly, Altec Lansing stopped making them, and replaced them with a similar looking model. Apparently the new version has slightly lower quality tweeters, which is a shame. The day that these speakers kick the bucket, I'll probably pick up a nice pair from Logitech. That cable is actually pretty out of the way. It sits nearly flush with the side panel, and then routes over the rear fan.

@Punto - I used cat6 cables. I found that with Cat5e on the netgear box, it would occasionally drop me down to 100Mbps. I haven't bothered trying cat5e with the DLink switch. @cluberti - I had also heard good things about the pro lineup of Netgear switches, but I didn't like how the power cord is on one side, and the ethernet jacks are on the other. That doesn't really lend itself to a clean layout.

So... a bump to this thread with a bit of an update. As a foreword, I've been testing my network with two methods. First is by using a tool called iperf. You copy the executable to somewhere in your path (I put it under system32), and then run the following commands: On the server: iperf -s -D -w1m On the client: iperf -c <server_address> -w1m -i1 -t30 The -w switch is key - it sets the TCP window size to 1MB in this case. The default 8K window is simply too small to make use of a gigabit network. The second testing method is by copying files over a network share using TeraCopy. I typically used a 8MB buffer size, since I found that this often gave me the highest speeds. I made sure to get devices that supported jumbo frames, since every document I've read indicates that 1500 byte frames are simply not enough for gigabit networks. To enable jumbo frames, you'll need to set this in the device properties page, as well as in the TCP stack. I followed the instructions found here, but used 513920 as the value for the TCP Window sizes (both regular and maximum). I've got two new systems, both with gigabit, and both with crazy fast hard drive subsystems (as far as most computers go anyways ). I had bought the Netgear GS605, which in the end turned out to be a piece of crap. Using iperf, I was getting about 700mbps on a good test. I swapped this for a DLink DGS-1005D and found that network performance was actually what it should have been - 990mbps. I managed to find another store that sold the DGS-1008D (the 8-port version of the same switch) for the same price, and speeds were the same. With my TeraCopy testing, I copied files to/from my RAID0 (2xWD3200AAKS on ICH8R) array on my one system to my RAID5 (4xWD5000AAKS on 3ware 9650SE-8LPML) array on the other. Copying from the RAID5 to the RAID0, I'm disk limited by the write on my RAID0 array - I get about 75-80MB/s average speeds when copying a 1.4GB XviD rip. Going the other way I think I'm network limited, since I get about 110MB/s average transfer speed. Before anyone asks, yes, both drives are defragged regularly by PerfectDisk. One last thing I noticed... transferring this much data requires quite a few CPU cycles. My file server (the one with the RAID5 setup) is based on an Intel E2160 CPU at stock speeds. When running the iperf test, the overall CPU usage was around 18%! Just a word of warning for others who might try this with a less powerful single CPU system - you might be limited by your CPU's capabilities. Long story short - don't buy Netgear's "consumer" lineup, and make sure you've got jumbo frames enabled for maximum network throughput.

Very nice, to both of you! I think I'd need a second opinion on which we take to be the official logo (I don't want to be impartial...).

I just got the mousepad today, and I needed it because my mouse kept on falling off my old mousepad when I moved from one end of the screens to the other. It's not one of those "super-glide" mousepads, but I don't particularly like those anyways. It's got a good level of feel, without making the mouse feel heavy. Yea... yea... that remote has been there for ages. I honestly don't remember what device it's for... *checks* Ah... that's why I haven't needed it. It's for my VCR. I haven't touched that thing in ages.

I don't think I've posted any of my new systems here, so here's an update! Here's my main desktop: Intel Q6600 @ 3.0GHz - 1.2Vcore ASUS P5B Deluxe 2GB OCZ Platinum DDR2-800 EVGA Geforce 8600GT OC 256MB 2x WD3200AAKS (RAID0) Corsair HX520 ThermalRight Ultra 120 Extreme w/ Scythe S-Flec E fan ThermalRigth HR-03 Antec 900 Case 2x Yate Loon D12SL-12 And... on the desk: 2x Acer AL2016W Altec Lansing APT3 Speakers (5 years old, and still going strong!) Logitech MX3200 Wireless Keyboard and Mouse Steelpad QCK mousepad Hope you all enjoy!

Intel Q6600 @ 3.0GHz with 1.2Vcore.

Get the Corsair HX520. Even if it is "overkill", it's an excellent PSU. Top notch efficiency, noise, and stability. You can't go wrong. It's powering my Q6600 based system without a hitch.

Not quite so... -Source I highly doubt that you'd be able to make a Celeron 400 series based system drop as low as 30W on idle. The motherboard alone would draw at least 20W. The lack of expandability isn't too big of a problem, since this is a basic web server and gateway, lots of storage isn't needed. A basic 2.5" hard drive will do just fine. Also, there are people who have been able to use dual-CPU configurations for ClarkConnect (just check the forums). I'm sure that you'd be able to run it on dual-core CPUs as well.

As for hardware - a single ethernet card and a single wireless card with a high gain antenna should do the trick. You'd only need one of each, and then tie the ethernet card into a simple switch. Internet->onboard ethernet->system->PCI ethernet->switch->network replace the PCI ethernet and switch by the wireless card, and you've got the same kind of configuration, but wireless. As for wireless speed - you're never going to get 50mbps on 802.11g cards - even with a dedicated wireless router. Your actual throughput will be about 24-25mbps on a good day, but that's overall wireless throughput. If you need speed, there's no better way than with a cable. What you gain in portability, you lose in speed - it's as simple as that. For a basic gateway/firewall configuration, you might want to look at ClarkConnect. It's a linux distro aimed at doing just that with minimal technical knowledge (although, if you have technical knowledge, you can make it that much more powerful). The only thing I'm unsure about is whether or not the Intel board supports shared IRQ addresses - there's only one PCI slot on the board AFAIK, so getting two cards to work might be tricky. You could skip the internal wireless card and get a dedicated WAP instead. So... total parts list: Intel D201GLY2 motherboard/CPU 1GB PC2-5300 RAM 2.5" 80GB hard drive (Seagate momentus will do fine) PCI ethernet card - I prefer Intel cards, but any should do. mITX case - you can find many to chose from here. Make sure you chose one with a built in PSU - you'll probably want about 60W.

Here's a picture of my file server's desktop. I use this machine to rip my DVDs to XviD as well, hence the tools on the desktop. I also managed to get a simple Samurize taskbar configuration going, just for the important stuff. 1440x900 And... for my desktop - I decided to go back to looking at the beautiful Billie Piper. 3360x1050

You can do exactly that, but I'd suggest the mITX boards from Intel instead of VIA. They're MUCH cheaper, and do the trick quite nicely. Intel is releasing a new version of it's D201GLY board in a few months. Initial reports have suggested that a system built around that board/CPU would draw no more than 30W at load. You could add a PCI network card and make your own router/gateway box very easily.

You do a lot of PHP web development. Start coding in ASP.NET using VS2005 and you'll quickly realize that you're using more RAM than a few instances of notepad uses up (which is all you need for most PHP programming). Add that to Photoshop and some other tasks... and we're back to the original statement.

http://www.xkcd.com/323/ Enjoy everyone...