Zxian

Right - radio transmissions frequencies are different than hardware support frequencies. It's the same analogy to being able to underclock your CPU while it still runs. You can buy a Pentium4 3GHz and run it at 2GHz... not that I know why you'd want to...

You answered your own question in the first post? Why not do things the simple way? I know that it is possible to have two independent cable internet modems on the same cable network, but most ISPs will require two separate accounts for this to work, meaning that you'll end up paying twice as much.

Ah... yes. I knew that Cat5e is designed to handle 100MHz, while Cat6 is designed for higher (500Mhz ?). Bulk Cat5e cable is dirt cheap anyways... 1000ft for $70 CAD? Connectors for $0.25 each? Can't really go wrong there...

@Skywalker - If you mail it to me, then I can host it for everyone else (unless it's a paid-for wallpaper). You can find my e-mail address in my profile.

You're probably better off buying it from a third party seller on sale. I know that here in Canada, I can purchase XP Pro OEM for $149 CAD. Have a look around online to see what kinds of prices you can get. The internet is my documentation. I rarely look at the built in Help in Windows, nor have I ever opened the manual that came with my install. You will be able to partition the drive if you format the drive that you're installing on. Windows does not support resizing of partitions, but you can format and create any sized partition you want during Windows setup. Back up all your important files and start from scratch. If you built the computer yourself, write down all the hardware components and the websites where you can download drivers for them (Google will help you find these). If the computer is pre-built, find the manufacturer's website and download all the drivers for XP and then burn them onto a CD or copy them to a USB key. Also, make sure that you have a proper anti-virus and firewall ready to install after you've installed Windows. If you don't have any, I recommend Avast Anti-virus and Kerio firewall. You can get both at www.filehippo.com.Next, physically disconnect your computer from the internet. This is important since an unprotected computer could get infected very easily. Once you've done that little bit of prep work, go ahead and install Windows. Make sure your computer is set to boot from the CD. This setting can be changed in BIOS (usually press DEL or an F-key when you first start your computer - before anything else loads). You'll have to dig around in the menus in BIOS to find the option (just a note - it's keyboard only here). Once you've got that done, put the CD in and restart the computer. From there follow the on screen instructions. There really shouldn't be anything that's too complicated during setup. You'll get the option to partition your drive during the initial setup, and then all the other settings after that. Once Windows is installed, install all your hardware drivers from the CD or USB key. Reboot whenever necessary. Then install your anti-virus and firewall. Connect your computer to the internet again, and then go to Start->All Programs->Windows Update. Install all the critical updates. Your computer will need to reboot after this. Repeat this last process until there are no more critical updates available. That's pretty much it! Install all your favorite software and you're good to go. Hope this helps!

From what I've read, the I6400 doesn't need a cooling fan. If you are really worried about cooling performance, I'd recommend a simple laptop stand like the Targus Podium Coolpad. I've got one at home, and it does a better job than most of the fan-based laptop coolers out there. I've recently moved up from the Coolpad to the RainDesign iLap. It's a little more fancy, but it's far more comfortable when actually using it on your lap. It's more meant towards Mac users, but the 17" version fits my Dell I6000 just fine.

Thread cleaned Like most people have said - purchasing a legit copy of XP Home seems to be your best bet. Prices have come down considerably (should be about 50 pounds for XP Home OEM) and you won't have to worry about such matters ever again.

Doesn't GigE require Cat6 cabling, while Cat5e is for 100mbps transmission?Quite a few laptop manufacturers are now supplying GigE ports on their models as well (Dell, Lenovo, and some others). It's becoming more common, since the controllers aren't too much more expensive compared to standard ethernet. Well, the need for more speed is one of the main reasons for 802.11n in the first place. Like you said, gaming with 16 people would be fine even over a standard 802.11g router (I've done 8 people - all wireless - with sub 10ms pings all around). My main point was not so much for common internet use - which doesn't tap the resources of any home network that you'd set up today anyways. I'm just wondering what's the point in improving a component that isn't necessarily a bottleneck in the first place.

I've been doing some reading on the draft 802.11n routers (I'm not quite planning on buying one until the standard goes final), but there's something I don't quite get... Why don't any of these routers have gigabit ethernet? Sure... you've just increased your total network through put to 100mbps now (limited by cat5e ethernet), but wouldn't it make sense to use the full potential of the wireless network and have gigabit for your wired connections? Also, from what I understand, it won't be possible to upgrade existing built in wireless cards in laptops to 802.11n, right? The new standard requires multiple antennae, which most current laptops don't have. Can someone let me know if I'm right on this one?

Network state isn't exactly preserved after resuming from standby or hibernate, but Windows will attempt to restore network connectivity after resuming. I definately wouldn't recommend running a bit torrent client or anything else that's heavy on connections while entering hibernation or standby, but an e-mail app or instant messenger should be fine. If the program has a problem with these powered down states, then it's their problem - not Windows'. As far as I understand it, a half-open connection is an unfulfilled connection - so why does it matter if it's closed? The limitation on half-open connections shouldn't impede regular applications. I can still browse the web and download off the internet just as fast as I could before SP2 (maxing out a 5Mbps connection is no trouble for me). You have some valid points here, and I wish I could answer them better for you. I use hiberation all the time on my laptop. I'll only reboot once a month, or when an application/driver installation requires it. I remember reading in a Microsoft article that even they recommend saving all open files before hibernating, in the event that something does go wrong. I know that I've had to jump up and run, hitting the power button (which hibernates the computer) without saving, and the documents were fine, but for my peace of mind, I try to save things as often as possible anyways. All in all - hibernation is still probably a better bet for mobile users than a full shutdown. It's a lot more convenient to start up your computer and in the space of 10 seconds have everything up and running. I have yet to see a laptop computer that can match this from a cold boot, and have all the apps that were running still open. @sogo - That's a whole can of worms that was opened (and closed) about a year ago. Disabling prefetch does not necessarily decrease boot times, and it actually hurts application loading times.

It's tomorrow? I'll jump tomorrow just for the hell of it... even though it won't do anything...

Did you bother to see if there are any other posts about this already? How about this one? It's right below yours...

#3 and #5 are my favorites. Good work!

First - no talking about keygens. It's illegal and will only get you in trouble if you keep talking about it here on MSFN. Second - did you bother to search before posting? There's this topic that's asking just about the same thing, and it's only 10 topics down the forums. Search first, ask second.

I'm not sure what the problem is with Nero 7... I've been running it for a long time now and I haven't had any problems. I've made one coaster with it, but that was because the ISO I was trying to burn from was corrupted, so I'm not going to lay the blame on Nero. If v7 is giving you troubles, try v6.

Just figured I'd give a little bit of an update. I'll keep it short though. Last Monday, I got a call from CyberGuys confirming the shipping cost, since it was going to be $0.83 more than what the original online esitmate had stated. I said sure and they shipped off the package. It arrived in the mail on Friday, but I've been away from home until today, so I wasn't able to use the cables. But yeah - the cables are wicked. I'll have to see if I can take some pictures of them with my hard drive and my new iPod as well. I will most definately be buying from them again. First impressions - nothing short of flawless. Edit - Here are a couple of pictures so you can see how nice and neat the cables make things. Link

it'd be hard to do what you ask, but I had something similar setup at my place. Go to the dollar store and buy a simple audio jack splitter. Plug your speakers into one output and your headphones to the other. Put the headset on and turn down the speakers when you're gaming/skyping, and then take off the headset and turn up the speakers when you're doing everything else. It's a lot simpler and cheaper than anything else out there, and it works just fine for me.

Actually... if you've got Service Pack 2, Spybot S&D, and SpywareBlaster installed you only need a little bit of common sense not to get into too much trouble with your computer. Disabling Java and ActiveX isn't necessary, since ActiveX controls now need to be confirmed before they're installed, and Java applets aren't really the method of choice to infect computers. Oh... and I just discovered Ewido Anti-Spyware... very very nice.

@TAiN - I already posted that link above... Edit - On a similar note... VMware Server Now Free. Now... if only VMware Workstation became free...

Why use the Google bar at all? Just type g Something to search for and you'll be redirected to your search. You can do this for any search engine you find on the internet by right-clicking on the search box and selecting "Create Search".

The easiest way to make things work is to get a router and use that instead of the cross-over cable. Have you made sure that regular network connectivity works between the two computers (i.e. can you ping from one to the other)? If you're using a cross over cable, you'll have to manually enter the network settings for each computer. Moved to Gamers Hangout

This is true... I remember some classmates blowing up various electronics components (MOSFETs in particular) by pumping too much current through them. "ok... let's try this again..." *flips switch* *nothing...* *BAM!* "crap..."

I'm wondering if anyone out there knows of a client/server type software that would automatically log your IP on a remote location. I'm just thinking about the possibility of having ones laptops stolen, and if you could easily go to your home computer and see where and when the last IP access was, it might help you track down the stolen laptop. There are theifs stupid enough not to wipe the hard drive when they first get the computer, so when they boot the computer and connect to a network, you'd get an entry in your log at home (or on some other remote server). Edit - After a little bit of digging (and chatting with the infamous jcarle), I've managed to find a solution. 1) Set up an account with www.dyndns.org 2) Download and install the DynDNS updater service and configure it to run as a service. Enter your account credentials as required 3) Configure the program to appear with some random keystroke that you wouldn't typically use (Ctrl+Alt+F12 or something like that) and then hide the tray icon 4) Configure service to send an e-mail to an account of your choice. I'm using my GMail account for easy "anywhere" access, but any e-mail will do. You'll need an SMTP server to use to send the e-mails (another plus for GMail). You're done! When you're finished, you'll get an e-mail in GMail that looks something like the following: IP and time, stored in a safe location.

Actually, most of the time when I move a post, I don't reply in it. If I close the post, it's for a reason, so I tell the user why it was closed. Heck - I've even got more posts than MartinL... so what? As for the original question... here's something that you might be able to try. Firefox is mostly standalone, so if you take a virtual machine (MS VPC is now free) and install a full Windows on there, get Firefox working with the WMP plugin, and then just compress the Firefox folder and copy that to your nLited install. I'm not 100% sure if it'll work, but it might be a starting point.

Microsoft Virtual PC is completely free - no twists, tricks, or other funny stuff. Download, install, run forever. This should definately be added to the Unattended Page.