Twokinds ARCHIVE Forums

Ask any computer/technology related question here. Anything that's been bothering you or that you'd just like to know is welcome. Of course, I can't answer everything, so feel free to try and answer someone else's unanswered question while you're here. Thanks to Takyoji for the idea. :D

Huh... I seem to be having aproblem when using php based forums with my Vista Computer

Whenever I type

? it comes out as É

I can still type the propler characters in any of my windows profgrams like notepad and copy them but it`s annoying.

< = '
> = .
? = É
/ = é
" = `` (only appears after hitting the button twice)
' = `` (only appears after hitting the button twice)
[ = ^^ (only appears after hitting the button twice)
] = ¸¸ (only appears after hitting the button twice)
{ = ^^ (only appears after hitting the button twice)
} = ¨¨ (only appears after hitting the button twice)
| = <
\ = >

it's probably an issue with the character set. I've seen that happen to other sites before. Just add the line between the head tags in the HTML.

Now, assuming that you can't actually change the characterset of the page (let's say you don't own the site), you can change the encoding in your browser until you find something that works. Under Firefox, it's in View->Character Encoding. In IE, it's under View->Encoding.

Thanks avwolf. I've gotta check that on my Vista machine, I think the IE settings are diffrient in it.

EDIT:
...ok it was working for Php based forums but now it's doing the exact same thing as before but in my windows programs! I can't write stories like this! :x

So the above problem somehow fixed itself. ( *Whatever* )


Moving on. When using 'save picture as' to save pictures from online the internet explored constantly trys to save to the My Pictures forlder or Vista equivilant.

I can save pictures to the same folder multiple times in a row if they are on the exact same page but not if I click a link of that page opening a larger version of the picture in a new window. This is especially annoying when viewing Deviant Art when I'll sometimes brows multiple pages simultaniously and save all of them to the same folder. This doesn't seem to work at all using Vista. (And it's annoying the hell outta me.)

Any options that anyone knows of? Other than having XP put onto this beast?

Get firefox? xP Seriously though, there might be a default download directory somewhere in the settings, but I don't use IE anymore so I'm not sure where.

Unlike Firefox, IE doesn't have a "default download" directory (personally, I prefer this to Firefox's "jam everything into one place without asking me" policy, but I've long been an opponent of the way Firefox handles downloads by default). Instead, IE usually remembers the last place you saved something, or defaults to some system default locations based on the file type, if it doesn't remember. That's why it tries to save all your images to the "My Pictures" equivalent. This "memory" is only accessible to other tabs/windows that are spawned AFTER the save, so if you spawn new tabs before saving the first image, I would expect that all of those tabs are going to try to save to "My Pictures" and there's probably going to be some confusion in the browser as to where things should go thereafter. Now, losing that when you click a link is a new one to me. I don't have that behavior (though I'm also on XP; I don't expect to have Vista until this fall). I don't see anything in the Advanced Settings or other options that cover that particular oddity. I'm afraid I can't offer you much help on that one. Maybe it's a Vista security setting, I don't know. Have you checked MS's website? They might know it's a problem and have a hotfix for it.

The problem for me in Vista is that any other Tabs or windows other than the origional itself all save back to the 'my pictures.'

Blegh. I didn't check the MS website yet because I got so mad at the time I just about went blind with rage for a few minutes. :roll:

...uh yeah, I think I have to talk to the doctor about something for that.

It would appear somone is getting closer.

(This is in response to editing the registry.)


I suppose it's a step in the right direction... sort of.


EDIT: Success!

I needed to delete some folders so that the computer would stop looking to save in them. :roll:

Computer Questions? Rly? I have a few now! (Most outta curiosity, I doubt that I am going to do something)

First I think I have Ultra ATA-33 Hard Drive Interface. (Any way of confirming that? k thnx) If I install two hard drives onto one ribbon and use Redundant Array of Independent Disks 0, will that increase performance?
Windows XP HE SP2 has no support for it right? Only pro supports it? Would that Include doing anything in the BIOS?
What would be a good way to backup a hard drive, fast (unto, like DVDs or Something)? If I am going to install a new Windows XP... which registry parts from the old Windows XP installation should I backup to move? Can I Actually install Windows on a Striped Partition? Do the hard drive partitions that I would like to stripe have to match in size? I have to create a separate partition for Windows XP for it can't be on a striped partition? So, where should I put the page after that?

Second Question, what is the best and most thorough program for determing Hard Ware? Ie, one that can tell me my CPU Inner Clock, Outer Clock, L1, L2, L3, extensions, Socket, ram type, agp port clock speed, motherboard type, everything Id ever want to know?

Off hand, I can't think of a way to check that, but you'd have to have pretty old drives for them to be ATA-33's. ATA-100 has been common for years now.


RAID 0 can improve I/O performance, but when your drives are on the same ribbon, you really won't end up with much of a performance boost. It probably wouldn't be noticeable. I'm not sure it's worth the risk of disk failure (which would toast the array) unless you get them onto separate controllers. Which is nontrivial for an ATA-based system: you'd need another I/O board if you want to build a RAID and still get to have a CD/DVD/Burner/Whatever.


AFAIK, XP has no software RAID support (at least I don't know how to enable it if it exists). That means you'd need a motherboard with onboard RAID (good luck finding one that does ATA RAID) or a RAID card (this one's possible, but it's getting harder as SATA continues to control the market). If you want to do RAID, you might be stuck replacing your hard drives with SATA drives. Fortunately Windows has terrific support for hardware RAID (unlike Linux, which has good software RAID specifically because their hardware RAID support is so poor). As for the difference between Home and Pro, I can't say for sure -- I've only ever used Pro; the networking headaches with Home aren't worth the price savings for me.


*sucks teeth* This can be complicated. You can use a Windows backup program (say, the Files and Settings Transfer Wizard) or some third party software (like DAR), but to drop things to DVD's is going to require you to have free space on the drives in the first place to save the information to before you burn it onto DVD. You can generally split these archives into sizes appropriate for burning to CD or DVD, but they can't be written directly (there are a few reasons for this, but they're technical and somewhat difficult to explain; I'd like to leave it at "this is just the way it has to work, as far as I know" if I can). As for what to backup, I don't know for sure. I usually just take files with me and start over on the registry (yes this means I usually have to reinstall all my software anyway).


Of course you can put Windows on a striped system. You run the risk of losing everything if the RAID breaks, but you can do it without any troubles. Your RAID partitions should match exactly. Down to the number of cylinders and sectors if you can; try to use identical drives in the array.

Personally (and this is what I'm considering doing on my new system, provided I can afford to do so), I'd run a RAID5 instead of a RAID0, that way there's some fault-tolerance. Hope this is a little help.

Huh... My PC is four years old, I think. Ofcource if it can go higher then that speed then, all problems are solved. I actually just read that when searching for "T3085 motherboard" on google... but then again, maybe that talked about the... 40 wire one for the CD and the DVD.... uhh.... yeah I think you are right about that...... But the again, aint it supposed to be blue or something...



As I read, having two drives on one ribbon doesn't slow anything down...


i think you can do Software RAID via Disk Management... I mean, that one time I did it like that... I don't remember the details though...

Also are there any (again outta curiousity and nothing else rly) PCI (NOT PCIe) cards that allow hooking up more hard drivess up?[/url]

EDIT: OF [censored], NOW I AM NOT GETTING VIDEO OUTPUT....

http://www.pxserver.com/WinAudit.htm << That's what I use.

The blue on the ribbon cable is just a convenient way to see at a glance that the ribbon cable has eighty wires in it instead of forty (the extra forty wires are all grounds, used to isolate the forty pins of the IDE channel to prevent parasitic noise).



Provided the drives are the same speed, yes (which is why we don't put hard drives and optical drives on the same ribbon -- it forces the hard drive to operate at the optical drive's much slower rate). The problem is that each ribbon connects to a single controller. Since the advantage of RAID 0 is about spreading I/O operations across multiple controllers, permitting semi-parallel operations, you don't get that benefit when the drives are on the same ribbon. Essentially, the controller can only access one drive at a time, so you really don't get a performance boost when both drives are handled by a single controller.


*shrug* I've never done it so I don't know. I know you can resize NTFS partitions on the fly too, but I've never done that either. I have done software RAID on Linux, but that's not useful to this conversation.


Yeah, I/O boards used to be very popular. They still are out there, they're just not always cheap. That's just an example, you can find quite a few useful boards out there if you look. Here's a PCI IDE RAID controller card, which is what I think you'd want to do this sort of setup.