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Source: (consider it)
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Thread: It's Geek to me: Translating computereze
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The5thMary
Shipmate
# 12953
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Snags:
Without wishing to start a fight, unless they've changed recently "Vostro" isn't the Dell business range (not in the UK, anyway). They slightly naughtily market it as for 'cost-conscious SMEs' and similar, but Vostro are generally the budget/entry level kit. Very cheap for what you get, and if you're the kind of person who's careful with stuff, could do you well.
The actual business class stuff is Lattitude/Precision (?) in the laptop ranges.
And I'd still get a ThinkPad ![[Biased]](wink.gif)
Well, for us, we had to get a laptop that we could make payments on and Dell was the company for us. Hewlett Packard had financing deals but only if you paid off the whole kit and kaboodle in 6 months and no way could we have done that. I placed my order this afternoon and am eagerly awaiting our new 17" Dell Inspiron laptop. I was only planning on getting a 15" but Dell had a really great deal on a 17" so that's what I chose. And being able to pay $40/month isn't too shabby, either.
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God gave me my face but She let me pick my nose.
Posts: 2794 | From: God forgive me, a red state! | Registered: Aug 2007
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Wesley J
Silly Shipmate
# 6075
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Posted
My desktop harddrive appears to have given up the ghost. It's 'only' 160GB, and came with my DELL Dimension 5000, from 2005 or 2006 I think. Interestingly, my DELL Dimension laptop from early 2004 keeps working very well (!), though of course that one's a bit slow now.
Luckily, I've backed up the entire machine shortly before it called it a day, so am bound not to lose too much data.
I'm planning to re-use the desktop machine, as I customised it with rather high specs - apparently with the exception of the HDD... ![[Paranoid]](graemlins/paranoid.gif) !
Any suggestions on what type or brand of new HDD to purchase? I guess I might go for bigger storage, like 500 or 750GB, if compatible.
Thank you. ![[Smile]](smile.gif)
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Be it as it may: Wesley J will stay. --- Euthanasia, that sounds good. An alpine neutral neighbourhood. Then back to Britain, all dressed in wood. Things were gonna get worse. (John Cooper Clarke)
Posts: 5687 | From: The Isles of Silly | Registered: May 2004
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jbohn
Shipmate
# 8753
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Wesley J:
Any suggestions on what type or brand of new HDD to purchase? I guess I might go for bigger storage, like 500 or 750GB, if compatible.
Thank you.
I've always had good luck with Hitachi and Seagate. We had a rash of bad Western Digital drives at work about a year ago- although I've used plenty of their drives that were just fine. (The bad ones were in a batch of iMacs ordered at the same time, so it could have been just a bad run. We order machines in truckloads, so we're kind of susceptible to that problem.)
Good on you for keeping complete, up to date backups. It saves a lot of heartache down the road...
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We are punished by our sins, not for them.
--Elbert Hubbard
Posts: 641 | From: East of Eden, west of St. Paul | Registered: Nov 2004
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St Everild
Shipmate
# 3626
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Posted
I've just heard a clip on BBCradio 4 from Francis Wheen, whose shed burned down on Friday night, loosing books, papers, records and CDs...he said that he had backed up hs work, onto a memory stick, which he had put into the drawer of the desk upon which his computer stood, in the shed...as a consequence he has lost the back ups as well.
How, and where, do other people organise their back ups?
I have organised my MacBook to back up via Time Machine to a 1 terabyte Wedtern Digital thingy...which sits on my desk next to the laptop, so I would have the same issue as Francis Wheen.
Posts: 1360 | From: Bethnei | Registered: Dec 2002
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Niteowl
Hopeless Insomniac
# 15841
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by St Everild:
I've just heard a clip on BBCradio 4 from Francis Wheen, whose shed burned down on Friday night, loosing books, papers, records and CDs...he said that he had backed up hs work, onto a memory stick, which he had put into the drawer of the desk upon which his computer stood, in the shed...as a consequence he has lost the back ups as well.
How, and where, do other people organise their back ups?
I have organised my MacBook to back up via Time Machine to a 1 terabyte Wedtern Digital thingy...which sits on my desk next to the laptop, so I would have the same issue as Francis Wheen.
I used to carry my Western Digital "Book" with me to work and kept it in my locked car in the separate garage at night. Am no longer working so am settling for different room than computer equipment kept in.
I used to have a back up system that had data cartridges that one could remove and keep elsewhere. With the Digital Books it's rather inconvenient to do that for an individual. There's also Cloud storage available, though I'm still not trusting of their security except for non important stuff. I'm thinking of getting a 2nd WD "Book" that I can keep elsewhere for the crucial stuff.
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World Community Grid - Help Conquer Cancer
Ship's WCG Team
Posts: 2319 | From: U.S. | Registered: Aug 2010
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Snags
Utterly socially unrealistic
# 15351
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Posted
Wesley J - I'm not going to recommend specific brands, because that way madness lies (everyone has an opinion, and different experience to support it!).
However, if the machine does data from mid-2000s it would be worth popping the service tag into the Dell website and checking a couple of bits of info:
a) is the interface IDE or SATA? And if it's SATA, is it SATA or SATA2? Chances are it's SATA/SATA2 but it can save awkwardness to check ahead of time.
b) does the BIOS have a limit on the drive size it can recognise? If it does, there may be an update that will lift it, but your date estimate is roughly in a period where anything much over 500GB might give you trouble
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Vain witterings
Vain pretentions
Posts: 895 | From: just north of That London | Registered: Dec 2009
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Wesley J
Silly Shipmate
# 6075
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Posted
Thanks, all!
Snags, I've just purchased a 1TB Western Digital HDD - which the puter shop wizard chap said would still go with the motherboard; he checked on the DELL tech site. Although it's true what you're saying: I'll have to see about the BIOS. (I did check with the service tag myself.)
In the worst case, I'll slap the drive into an external HDD casing and so have extra storage, which I can always put to good use.
DELL have been helpful too - their European helpline is in Slovakia -, and are sending me a replacement Win XP Pro SP2 CD-ROM for a few quid, to I think about the same price as if I had ordered it together with the machine back then. This Windows is an OEM version and didn't come with a CD. - I can always upgrade to Win7 later, should I wish to, and had in fact already done the checks before.
As I was saying, the machine seems reasonably future-proof, and that's the way it was meant to be. I might buy a liddle upgraded graphics card at some point, which nowadays aren't that
expensive either.
Last, but not least: the puter shop chap doesn't sell canned air - much too expensive, he says - and he's certainly right! He suggested using a pump (bicycle pump?) from a sports shop, which he says does the trick just as well! That's really gonna save me a lot, if it works.
Will report back about progress of installation, cleaning and updating. Thanks for your encouraging words.
(Ya know, I'm glad I don't just have most of the deskie backups, but that I've also got 2 lappies to fall back on, the old 2004 Inspiron, and my nifty Alienware M11x from last year; though the later is more of a travelling machine for me. Some people may think you don't need 3 machines, but in a case like this, that's just the backup power you wish you had!)
[ 16. April 2012, 18:37: Message edited by: Wesley J ]
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Be it as it may: Wesley J will stay. --- Euthanasia, that sounds good. An alpine neutral neighbourhood. Then back to Britain, all dressed in wood. Things were gonna get worse. (John Cooper Clarke)
Posts: 5687 | From: The Isles of Silly | Registered: May 2004
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Wesley J
Silly Shipmate
# 6075
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by jbohn:
quote:
Originally posted by Wesley J:
Any suggestions on what type or brand of new HDD to purchase? I guess I might go for bigger storage, like 500 or 750GB, if compatible.
Thank you.
I've always had good luck with Hitachi and Seagate. We had a rash of bad Western Digital drives at work about a year ago- although I've used plenty of their drives that were just fine. (The bad ones were in a batch of iMacs ordered at the same time, so it could have been just a bad run. We order machines in truckloads, so we're kind of susceptible to that problem.)
Good on you for keeping complete, up to date backups. It saves a lot of heartache down the road...
Ta! Interestingly, the drive that died is a Seagate - somehow I always thought it was a Hitachi.
Re backups, and poor Francis Wheen: good thinking to not physically having them in the same place. Must give this some thought myself!
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Be it as it may: Wesley J will stay. --- Euthanasia, that sounds good. An alpine neutral neighbourhood. Then back to Britain, all dressed in wood. Things were gonna get worse. (John Cooper Clarke)
Posts: 5687 | From: The Isles of Silly | Registered: May 2004
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jbohn
Shipmate
# 8753
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Wesley J:
[Ta! Interestingly, the drive that died is a Seagate - somehow I always thought it was a Hitachi.
All hardware sucks. Any mechanical device will fail eventually. I've certainly pulled plenty of dead Seagates out of machines over the years.
quote:
Originally posted by Wesley J:
Re backups, and poor Francis Wheen: good thinking to not physically having them in the same place. Must give this some thought myself!
Indeed. Offsite backups are our friends. Preferably several.
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We are punished by our sins, not for them.
--Elbert Hubbard
Posts: 641 | From: East of Eden, west of St. Paul | Registered: Nov 2004
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Niteowl
Hopeless Insomniac
# 15841
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Wesley J:
Last, but not least: the puter shop chap doesn't sell canned air - much too expensive, he says - and he's certainly right! He suggested using a pump (bicycle pump?) from a sports shop, which he says does the trick just as well! That's really gonna save me a lot, if it works.
After spending way too much money on canned air I purchased one of these on Amazon. MicroVac/Dustblower Works well on a lot of things and I've stopped the cash hemorrhage.
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World Community Grid - Help Conquer Cancer
Ship's WCG Team
Posts: 2319 | From: U.S. | Registered: Aug 2010
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Wesley J
Silly Shipmate
# 6075
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Niteowl2:
quote:
Originally posted by Wesley J:
Last, but not least: the puter shop chap doesn't sell canned air - much too expensive, he says - and he's certainly right! He suggested using a pump (bicycle pump?) from a sports shop, which he says does the trick just as well! That's really gonna save me a lot, if it works.
After spending way too much money on canned air I purchased one of these on Amazon. MicroVac/Dustblower Works well on a lot of things and I've stopped the cash hemorrhage.
That... just blows me away! ![[Cool]](cool.gif)
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Be it as it may: Wesley J will stay. --- Euthanasia, that sounds good. An alpine neutral neighbourhood. Then back to Britain, all dressed in wood. Things were gonna get worse. (John Cooper Clarke)
Posts: 5687 | From: The Isles of Silly | Registered: May 2004
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Latchkey Kid
Shipmate
# 12444
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Posted
I understand that HDDs that are apparently of the same type can be produced in various factories in varius factories and with very varying reliability.
It is my Seagates that have failed, but that is not a statistically significant sample.
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'You must never give way for an answer. An answer is always the stretch of road that's behind you. Only a question can point the way forward.'
Mika; in Hello? Is Anybody There?, Jostein Gaardner
Posts: 2201 | From: The wizardest little town in Oz | Registered: Mar 2007
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Zappa
Ship's Wake
# 8433
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Latchkey Kid:
It is my Seagates that have failed
There is help available, and I believe there are support groups out there
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sermons are back in fashion
Posts: 16530 | From: top dead centre | Registered: Sep 2004
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Wesley J
Silly Shipmate
# 6075
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Posted
Happy update: Ordered Win XP Pro OEM CD from DELL yesterday, got it today (!) by UPS, and it's XP SP3, which saves some time with the subsequent updates.
After some cleaning of the machine's somewhat dusty entrails, the new 1TB HDD was physically put into place (doesn't even need any screws!), recognised without any problems (!), and is being formatted as we speak! ![[Yipee]](graemlins/spin.gif)
Impressive!
Will keep you posted. ![[Big Grin]](biggrin.gif)
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Be it as it may: Wesley J will stay. --- Euthanasia, that sounds good. An alpine neutral neighbourhood. Then back to Britain, all dressed in wood. Things were gonna get worse. (John Cooper Clarke)
Posts: 5687 | From: The Isles of Silly | Registered: May 2004
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Amanda B. Reckondwythe
Dressed for Church
# 5521
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Wesley J:
Happy update: Ordered Win XP Pro OEM CD from DELL yesterday, got it today (!) by UPS, and it's XP SP3, which saves some time with the subsequent updates.
You'll find, though, that there are well over 100 critical updates post-SP3 and that multiple reboots will be required. Congratulations, though, for deciding to stick with WinXP rather than going with Win7.
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I sometimes wonder whether the reason that puritanical religious types are so keen on marriage is their certain knowledge that it's the one way to make sure that people get the least amount of sex. – Louis de Bernières, A Partisan's Daughter
Posts: 7057 | From: The Great Southwest | Registered: Feb 2004
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Wesley J
Silly Shipmate
# 6075
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Amanda B. Reckondwythe:
quote:
Originally posted by Wesley J:
Happy update: Ordered Win XP Pro OEM CD from DELL yesterday, got it today (!) by UPS, and it's XP SP3, which saves some time with the subsequent updates.
You'll find, though, that there are well over 100 critical updates post-SP3 and that multiple reboots will be required. Congratulations, though, for deciding to stick with WinXP rather than going with Win7.
I'll live. With 2 other fully working machines, I'm not too much in a hurry - though the deskie has the most oomph.
Dunno about sticking with Win XP - the CD was cheap, and the support is still there for a few months. I don't see why I should spend a lot on Win7 (which is rather nice, I admit) if XP is still working, updated regularly and supported. But thanks anyway.
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Be it as it may: Wesley J will stay. --- Euthanasia, that sounds good. An alpine neutral neighbourhood. Then back to Britain, all dressed in wood. Things were gonna get worse. (John Cooper Clarke)
Posts: 5687 | From: The Isles of Silly | Registered: May 2004
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monkeylizard
Ship's scurvy
# 952
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Posted
Win 8 will be out soon anyway......
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The ultimate result of shielding men from the effects of folly is to fill the world with fools. ~ Herbert Spencer (1820 - 1903)
Posts: 2071 | From: Music City, USA | Registered: Jul 2001
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jbohn
Shipmate
# 8753
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by monkeylizard:
Win 8 will be out soon anyway......
And may be a functioning OS by a year later...
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We are punished by our sins, not for them.
--Elbert Hubbard
Posts: 641 | From: East of Eden, west of St. Paul | Registered: Nov 2004
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lilBuddha
Shipmate
# 14333
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by jbohn:
quote:
Originally posted by monkeylizard:
Win 8 will be out soon anyway......
And may be a functioning OS by a year later...
Optimist.
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Minds are like parachutes. Just because you've lost yours doesn't mean you can borrow mine.
Despair.com
Posts: 5951 | Registered: Dec 2008
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Jengie Jon
Semper Reformanda
# 273
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Posted
Yes
It is an even number, never a good sign with Microsoft.
Jengie
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"To violate a persons ability to distinguish fact from fantasy is the epistemological equivalent of rape." Noretta Koertge
my blog and thesis progress
Posts: 17648 | From: city of steel, butterflies and rainbows | Registered: May 2001
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ken
Ship's Roundhead
# 2460
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Posted
Ah, but Windows 7 is just a marketing name for NT 6 - so those even numbers get you both ways. ![[Snigger]](graemlins/snigger.gif)
(Windows 7 which works well is 6.1, Vista which didn't was NT 6.0, so presumably Windows 8 will be NT 6.2)
It has long been known that the first really working version of any operating system software is 2.2
When NT came out they called it 3.1 to make it look as if it was in step the with old-fashioned DOS-based Windows, rather than a completely different OS in some ways more similar to Unix.
So if we assume that the version 3 NTs were "really" version 0 (because they were incomplete, they did not yet have all the bells and whistles needed), then NT 4 is the first fully capable version which could have been called version 1, and NT 5.2 is the 2.2 of NT. NT 5.2 was sold as Windows Server 2003, and Windows XP 64-bit Edition. Yes, that's about right. They were probably the first seriously useful versions of Windows sold.
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Ken
L’amor che move il sole e l’altre stelle.
Posts: 38272 | From: London | Registered: Mar 2002
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Snags
Utterly socially unrealistic
# 15351
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Posted
XP 64-bit useful? Rare to catch you talking bollocks, ken
Granted it could have been useful, if there had been any driver/software support for it. As it was, it was more of a nod towards Win 7 coming good eventually.
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Vain witterings
Vain pretentions
Posts: 895 | From: just north of That London | Registered: Dec 2009
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ken
Ship's Roundhead
# 2460
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Posted
Driver software missing? Only if you wanted to play games. The only up-to-date drivers I needed for my servers were SCSI and network cards...
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Ken
L’amor che move il sole e l’altre stelle.
Posts: 38272 | From: London | Registered: Mar 2002
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ken
Ship's Roundhead
# 2460
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by ken:
Driver software missing? Only if you wanted to play games. The only up-to-date drivers I needed for my servers were SCSI and network cards...
I suppose what I really mean by "useful" was "robust". As in "If I go away for three weeks it'll still be running when I get back, nothing will be looping, and it won't have run out of memory".
No version of Windows of any kind before XP really guaranteed that. And even XP sometimes went on walkabout if you were foolish enough to be using MS Word to edit more than one file on a network drive (that bug has been in Word since the day iot came out and they never fixed it yet, its just computers have noiw got so fast it only takes a second or two to recover instead of a few minutes)
Though, perhaps surprisingly, plain old DOS could be robust. We had an old Compaq machine with 10Mb hard disk and two large floppies that ran continually for well over ten years, night and day, without being rebooted once except for the day we moved office. Hell to pay when it finally died though. The company that supplied the application software it had been running had long gone out of business. Perhaps the worst three weeks at work of my life. I ended up being able to translate modem AT control codes in my head. From source code or the sound the bleeper made. Which as far as "translating compoutereze" goes is dam near as geeky as it gets.
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Ken
L’amor che move il sole e l’altre stelle.
Posts: 38272 | From: London | Registered: Mar 2002
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jbohn
Shipmate
# 8753
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Jengie Jon:
It is an even number, never a good sign with Microsoft.
It's made by Microsoft, never a good sign with an operating system.
quote:
Originally posted by ken:
I suppose what I really mean by "useful" was "robust". As in "If I go away for three weeks it'll still be running when I get back, nothing will be looping, and it won't have run out of memory".
That's what Unix/Linux/MacOS is for...
quote:
Originally posted by ken:
Though, perhaps surprisingly, plain old DOS could be robust.
KISS principle at it's finest. What kills Windows is the attempt to make it all things to all people, whilst maintaining backward compatibility with software that's grown a long white beard, all at the same time. The more complex the OS gets, the more it's doomed to fail. DOS is simple, but it does the limited number of things that it does really well. It's the same reason embedded industrial systems last forever- they only do one or two things, but they do them well.
quote:
Originally posted by ken:
I ended up being able to translate modem AT control codes in my head. From source code or the sound the bleeper made. Which as far as "translating compoutereze" goes is dam near as geeky as it gets.
![[Overused]](graemlins/notworthy.gif)
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We are punished by our sins, not for them.
--Elbert Hubbard
Posts: 641 | From: East of Eden, west of St. Paul | Registered: Nov 2004
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Snags
Utterly socially unrealistic
# 15351
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Posted
<Considers whistling innocently>
<Decides Heaven is not the place to induce flashbacks for ken>
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Vain witterings
Vain pretentions
Posts: 895 | From: just north of That London | Registered: Dec 2009
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Pigwidgeon
Ship's Owl
# 10192
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Posted
Just wondering if anyone has more information on this article that I saw in this morning's paper: Hundreds of thousands may lose Internet in July.
The Arizona Republic isn't my most trusted source of this sort of information. (I really do trust total strangers on the Ship more!)
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"...that is generally a matter for Pigwidgeon, several other consenting adults, a bottle of cheap Gin and the odd giraffe."
~Tortuf
Posts: 5366 | From: Hogwarts | Registered: Aug 2005
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jedijudy
Organist of the Jedi Temple
# 333
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Posted
My mom called me this morning worried about that very thing, Pigwidgeon. I am having email conversations with my friends about whether it's real, or a giant scam or what.
I'll be watching for our wise Shipmates' info along with you!
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Jasmine, little cat with a big heart.
Posts: 13986 | From: 'Twixt the 'Glades and the Gulf | Registered: Aug 2001
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Eutychus
From the edge
# 3081
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Posted
My uninformed take: if you are running up-to-date antivirus software you should have nothing to worry about.
Among those who think the site is legit, the consensus seems to be that you might still have more to worry about by visiting it than by not visiting it (depending on how evil and/or incompetent you think government agencies are)...
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home...
Posts: 8716 | From: 528491 | Registered: Jul 2002
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lilBuddha
Shipmate
# 14333
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Posted
The FBI links the site directly, so legitimate in that regard. Whether or not your trust them is a separate issue.
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Minds are like parachutes. Just because you've lost yours doesn't mean you can borrow mine.
Despair.com
Posts: 5951 | Registered: Dec 2008
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Jay-Emm
Shipmate
# 11411
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by ken:
Though, perhaps surprisingly, plain old DOS could be robust....
In the millenium problem hell thread, I mentioned that we had an oldish computer from 88.
The floppy disk drive it boots off is failing so that's now on perpetually to save the swapping. The software it uses relies on it's processing speed, so replacing it isn't going to be quick.
Posts: 878 | Registered: May 2006
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ken
Ship's Roundhead
# 2460
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Pigwidgeon:
Just wondering if anyone has more information on this article that I saw in this morning's paper: Hundreds of thousands may lose Internet in July.
Its a bit of a scare story. I mean its true, but not that dangerous if you are looking after yout computer properly. This sort of thing goes on all the time. It would only be bad if the fake DNS servers were still up.
Assuming that is you clear up the trojan, which as others said you can do with pretty much any current set of security software. That's vital - but if you are infected by it and don't get rid if it then you don't deserve to be on the Internet anyway. Its like driving cars without insurance or MOT. You would be a danger to others.
If you were infected by the trojan and have got rid of it but still have a problem all you need to do is fix the DNS settings of your computer. And your ISP should have given you the information you need to do that as part of the instructions for connecting to them. Its trivial to do yourseof but you probably don't need to because if your home computer signs on directly with the ISP then its usually done automatically by DHCP. (And if not, for example if you have a wireless router between your computer and the Internet, then presumably you set it up yourself and still have the information that tells you how to do it...)
If you are paranoid about believing and FBI site, there are non-American news items about it here, and in links.
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Ken
L’amor che move il sole e l’altre stelle.
Posts: 38272 | From: London | Registered: Mar 2002
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lilBuddha
Shipmate
# 14333
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by ken:
then you don't deserve to be on the Internet anyway. Its like driving cars without insurance or MOT. You would be a danger to others.
After the initial "Yes, yes! By all that is sacred YES!" I realized I would then need to tell my father he was no longer allowed a computer. That would be sad. Those "you will not believe what they are doing now" e-mails are not going to forward themselves.
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Minds are like parachutes. Just because you've lost yours doesn't mean you can borrow mine.
Despair.com
Posts: 5951 | Registered: Dec 2008
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Zappa
Ship's Wake
# 8433
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Posted
Okay. So I've downloaded Endnote, following all instructions. It's disappeared. What the hell do I do next?
(The same applied to Adobe Acrobatty Whatever ... which tells me daily I can download a new thingy, and i do, and i never see it again, and then it tells me the next day i can download a new thingy, and i do, and i never see it again, and ....)
[ 24. April 2012, 06:08: Message edited by: Zappa ]
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sermons are back in fashion
Posts: 16530 | From: top dead centre | Registered: Sep 2004
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Lothlorien
Ship's Grandma
# 4927
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Posted
Zappa, there are heaps of free programs much better than Norton. My computer guru sons have always called it crap, as do very many other compute people. Someone here can probably suggest what would be better for your machine as I'm out of touch with Windows computers. It doesn't do a good job of blocking rubbish and it does nasty things in the background of your computer.
Posts: 5505 | From: girt by sea | Registered: Aug 2003
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jbohn
Shipmate
# 8753
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by lilBuddha:
[After the initial "Yes, yes! By all that is sacred YES!" I realized I would then need to tell my father he was no longer allowed a computer. That would be sad. Those "you will not believe what they are doing now" e-mails are not going to forward themselves.
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We are punished by our sins, not for them.
--Elbert Hubbard
Posts: 641 | From: East of Eden, west of St. Paul | Registered: Nov 2004
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WhateverTheySay
Shipmate
# 16598
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Posted
OK this is really annoying me. Firefox upgraded itself today, but I have a change that is absolutely driving me up the wall. I'm wondering if somebody can help me undo this one change.
I have an old laptop and my scroll wheel does not work any more. So I use the scroll bar on the right of the screen. It used to only move by about a line of text if I clicked on the downward scroll button at the bottom right of the screen. But since upgrading to the new Firefox it jumps a few lines when I just click once on the button. The result is that what I see is too jumpy and feels really out of control. Holding onto the blue bar in the middle of the scroll bar on the right is ok when it is big, but some sites I want to view (including SoF) the blue bar is so small that it is impossible for me to make really small movements.
So can anybody help me get my scrolling back in control and not jumpy. Because this is something that is really annoying me.
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I'm not lost, I just don't know where I am going
Posts: 872 | From: Lost in Space, without a map | Registered: Aug 2011
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Eutychus
From the edge
# 3081
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Posted
The following, gleaned (and edited) from a Mozilla forum, may or may not work:
1) In the location bar type about:config and hit enter.
2) Bypass the warning by clicking the button that says "I'll be careful, I promise!".
(At this point make sure you note down what the values you are about to change are. If the worst comes to the worst, simply return them to the original settings afterwards, in which case you'll be no worse off than you are now.)
3) In the Filter box, copy and paste the preferences below (this means the three-part code names) and change their respective values by right-clicking on each and selecting Modify:
mousewheel.withnokey.numlines to [x] (set "x" to a smaller number than it is when you get there and proceed by trial and error)
mousewheel.withnokey.sysnumlines to False (I'm not sure what this does but I think that setting it to False it stops the scrollbar jumping by a default number of lines)
No liability accepted, your warranty is void, your lifejacket is under your seat, please return your tray table to the upright position.
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home...
Posts: 8716 | From: 528491 | Registered: Jul 2002
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WhateverTheySay
Shipmate
# 16598
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Posted
OK thanks. I have tried that but it seems to make no difference, even if I close FF and restart it.
Maybe I will just have to get used to this?
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I'm not lost, I just don't know where I am going
Posts: 872 | From: Lost in Space, without a map | Registered: Aug 2011
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Jengie Jon
Semper Reformanda
# 273
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Posted
The upgrade may be what caused probs at work. Assuming that you want a way to scroll more slowly, I often use the up and down arrow for scrolling through a page if I am reading.
If typing in like this one the tab button will take you to the next place on the form.
Jengie
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"To violate a persons ability to distinguish fact from fantasy is the epistemological equivalent of rape." Noretta Koertge
my blog and thesis progress
Posts: 17648 | From: city of steel, butterflies and rainbows | Registered: May 2001
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WhateverTheySay
Shipmate
# 16598
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Posted
Makes a lot of sense. Thank you. I am stupid when it comes to computers.
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I'm not lost, I just don't know where I am going
Posts: 872 | From: Lost in Space, without a map | Registered: Aug 2011
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Sparrow
Shipmate
# 2458
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Posted
Can anyone recommend a free, idiot-proof (ie simple to use) software package for applying different effects to photographs - e.g. watercolour, oil painting and so on? I've tried Gimp but I just can't get on with it. Any other suggestions?
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For I am persuaded that neither death, nor life,nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, will be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.
Posts: 2619 | From: Bottom right hand corner of the UK | Registered: Mar 2002
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Drifting Star
Drifting against the wind
# 12799
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Posted
Serif's Photoplus does those things pretty well, and they offer a starter version as a free download here.
I should say that I have a full version, and I don't know whether the artistic effects are included in the starter version, but it's worth looking!
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Since I can never see your face, and never shake you by the hand,
I send my soul through time and space, to greet you. You will understand.
~ James Elroy Flecker
Posts: 2534 | From: Floating in the blue. | Registered: Jul 2007
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balaam
Making an ass of himself!
# 4543
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Posted
Serif Photoplus is good, but you need the manual to get effects right. Otherwise like GIMP it's all trial and error.
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We have a new Vicar
Posts: 6363 | From: 76 Totters Lane | Registered: May 2003
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Snags
Utterly socially unrealistic
# 15351
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Posted
Not sure it's idiot-proof as such but the effects bit seems fairly straight forward: Paint.Net is a kind of "I wonder if we can write Photoshop from scratch" thing which is rather handy.
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Vain witterings
Vain pretentions
Posts: 895 | From: just north of That London | Registered: Dec 2009
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Firenze
Ordinary decent pagan
# 619
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by shamwari:
Anyone on the Ship invested in an Asus Transformer Prime?
Any good?
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Renoir with needles.
Posts: 12353 | From: Edinburgh | Registered: Jun 2001
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balaam
Making an ass of himself!
# 4543
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Posted
When I start up my netbook I have to wait for Skype and Spotify to load up.
I don't use either programme all the time, but want to keep them both, but I don't want to have to wait for a program to load if I'm not using it.
Is there a way to stop them loading when I boot the computer?
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We have a new Vicar
Posts: 6363 | From: 76 Totters Lane | Registered: May 2003
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Drifting Star
Drifting against the wind
# 12799
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Balaam:
Serif Photoplus is good, but you need the manual to get effects right. Otherwise like GIMP it's all trial and error.
The 'Help' facility within the program is very good. I don't think I've ever used the Photoplus manual, and I, too, couldn't get to grips with GIMP.
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Since I can never see your face, and never shake you by the hand,
I send my soul through time and space, to greet you. You will understand.
~ James Elroy Flecker
Posts: 2534 | From: Floating in the blue. | Registered: Jul 2007
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