The PC thread

[cramx3]

I really don't get the hype about windows 10, I've removed all traces of that dumb OS's offers from my laptop

Have you tried it?  And are you comparing to windows 7?  I think it's easier to call windows 10 dumb compared to 7, but 10 compared to 8 could then be genius with that thought process.  I really didnt mess around with it after upgrading my laptop, but it felt like a much better OS than 8 (which I really didnt enjoy).

https://lifehacker.com/what-windows-10s-privacy-nightmare-settings-actually-1722267229 for starters

So is Windows 10 the worst privacy killer in human history? Probably not, but there are some issues here—primarily:

Microsoft’s language on one or two settings is very vague, which means it’s hard to tell when it is and isn’t collecting data related to some settings. The “Getting to Know You” setting is particularly vague and problematic.
All of the settings are opt-out instead of opt-in, and there are very many of them. Most casual users will never even look at these settings.
However, at least Microsoft provides these toggles, which is at least a step in the right direction.

You also didnt answer if you have used Windows 10.  While there are tons of privacy issues, not a single one of those is concerning to make windows 10 "dumb".  You have the option to turn all of them off.  I think the only thing I do not like from what I have read is the forced updates.  I won't argue with your view if that is it, but I was thinking you might have had better reasons for having that view.

[Lucien]

I don't like companies profiting off information. You can encrypt your harddrive using Bitlocker, but Microsoft backs up the encryption key with them making the encryption worthless. Stuff like that. There are surely other things that you can't turn off. The fact that all these settings are default, and that you have to go out of your way to turn each of them off is concerning and annoying. And no, I haven't touched the OS.

[cramx3]

Sadly I don't think we can hide from this anymore unless we just stop using modern technology.  Even that article mentioned all these settings are practically defaults on any droid or Iphone.  Not to mention websites tracking you as well.

Some of those settings for collecting data end end up going to advertisers to therefore give you a better ad (targeted at your interests).  I work for an ad technology company so I can talk about this all day and how it is actually beneficial while being totally creepy on the surface. 

I was generally curious though about something actually wrong with the OS (like Cylcopss saying he can't get it to run).  Ive hardly used it but I liked what I saw and most of what I read had been very positive. 

[Cyclopssss]

I wonder if you have a hardware issue then.  Seems odd that you can't get either OS to work, but Im not sure how to help without more info.

I installed windows 10 onto my laptop, it was super easy and fast.  Then I sold my laptop.  So my PC is still on 7, but I thought 10 was pretty cool so maybe one weekend when I have no plans and am bored I will upgrade my PC.

Thanks. Yeah, that's what I'm thinking, that it's a hardware problem. I'm affraid I have an 'Alienware' Dell pc, (or piece of shit) and up until now it has performed pretty good. The last time I tried it I was able to revert to the an earlier reset point, or factory settings,  but somehow not this time. I can only boot from the dvd drive. 
The pc boots from the dvd drive with my windows 8.1 disc in it and I can install Windows 8.1 and then having to  go through the whole rigamarole of setting up a new acount, start up internet connection and having the start up menu, but the screen is totally screwed up. It has the basic Windows 8 screen with all the squares, but I can't open programmes from the backup 'Alienware'  screen. I am able to go on the internet, but I can't open different tab pages. Plus my dvd drive acts erratic when I try to remove the install disc and install a different programme or game.
The when I try to boot up again, I only get a basic colour screen and then nothing. I have to repeat the whole process of installing from the dvd drive again.

Really hope this gives a little more info.

[cramx3]

Do you have any other hard drives to use?  Maybe try installing on a different hard drive if so although Im not sure the extra info you provided is really pointing in that direction other than the fact you said you can only boot from the DVD drive.  You mention you have a Dell PC.  Alienware is better, but its still a Dell product I guess and I hate Dell hardware with a passion considering I fix Dell servers for a living essentially.

[Lucien]

A computer you build yourself with decent parts will always be better than a rip-off alienware

alienware are like the computer version of dr. dre's beats

[faizoff]

Microsoft has announced some amazing products today, Surface Pro 4, Lumia 950 & 950 XL and the new Surface Book. Frankly the phones are what impressed me the most, being able to use it a regular PC when connected to a dock is most impressive.

[Cyclopssss]

I'm sorry, should have updated earlier! After a week of total freak out, I managed to find the solution on the net.
Turned out to be so simple, it's frigging laughable!

Turned out, all I had to do was push the Windows button + P three times, then down arrow + ENTER.

That was it. Really. Booted up fine after that, changed my graphic chipset from AMD to the NVidea and eh presto.

Deleted all my files and music files though, and no 'Windows Old' folder to be found.

Thanks for the help!

[Orbert]

Turned out, all I had to do was push the Windows button + P three times, then down arrow + ENTER.

Okay, I'm missing something.  Since that's not exactly a key combination that anyone would do randomly, what did it do?

[BlobVanDam]

Judging by when I pressed Win+P, it looks like it changes the monitor output settings, intended for use with multiple displays.

[Cyclopssss]

it does. It seems the install switched the monitor output around or something. That´s the entire problem....

[Nick]

Microsoft has announced some amazing products today, Surface Pro 4, Lumia 950 & 950 XL and the new Surface Book. Frankly the phones are what impressed me the most, being able to use it a regular PC when connected to a dock is most impressive.

I'm at a decision point in the next few months. As an Android fan I really wanted to try out one of the Nexus phones, but each of the new models have little things I don't like about them. These phones look quite nice, but are Windows phones. Might just stick with my S5, we shall see.

[cramx3]

Bought a 5TB hard drive that was on sale.  My 2TB drive was full since now with phones recording amazing HD video and HQ pictures, my hard drive has filled up quickly. 

I had the weirdest issue.  It's an internal drive, but I popped it into my external mount to play with it first.  Disk manager shows it had two partitions, a 2TB and 2.5TB.  The 2.5TB was unformatable though.  I messed around formatting and reformating the 2TB partition and tried many ways to wipe the drive using diskpartition, could only get the 2TB partition to work and be allocated.  I thought maybe it had to do with my USB 3.0 external mount.

Took apart my computer and started using different motherboard SATA ports (this is what I intended to do anyway for permanent usage).  The EXACT same thing happened using different SATA ports (my motherboard has two different SATA controllers) the disk would now only show one partition and it was 561GB.  So weird.  Also my RAID controller detected it as a 4.5TB drive too.  I thought it could be a motherboard BIOS or maybe Windows issue. 

Couldn't find anything on the web besides one guy who had the same problem, but he upgraded his SATA controller firmware to fix it (mine was up to date, checked it immediately).  So I pull it out of the PC and normalize my PC.  Then I pop it back into my external drive... now it shows 4.5TB of unallocated space on a single partition.  Format it, stick it back into the PC, and now it's all good.  Currently copying data over.  No idea why this all happened or how it got fixed.

[BlobVanDam]

I just quickly Googled 2TB SATA limit, and it looks like it's something to do with how the old master boot record works, giving it a limit of allocating around 2TB, hence the fact the additional 2.5TB was unusable.
Glad you figured it out. I have a couple of 2TB drives (internal and external), but I don't have any beyond that yet. I was thinking of getting one soon, so hopefully I don't have any issues.

[cramx3]

Yea I thought it could be something like that, I know older systems had a 2tb limit, but I never actually changed anything to get it to work which I don't understand. Just moved it around between different ports and eventually it worked. 

[BlobVanDam]

That is weird. Maybe it's due to the driver difference between the SATA controllers or USB that allowed it to correctly detect and format it so you could use it properly? Computers can be funny sometimes.

I remember way back when I got my first SATA drive, and it was SATA2, while my computer was only SATA1, and my computer couldn't even detect the drive. Turns out it required a change of jumper settings to manually set it to SATA1 speed. Good times.

[cramx3]

That is weird. Maybe it's due to the driver difference between the SATA controllers or USB that allowed it to correctly detect and format it so you could use it properly? Computers can be funny sometimes.

Maybe. I agree I work on computer hardware and sometimes shit just works but Id love to know why. Your guess seems like a good one.  I bet it failed lol it transfered 1.25th before I went to bed and left another overnight 1tb to transfer as I fell asleep.

[MrBoom_shack-a-lack]

My PC died suddenly yesterday and I couldn't boot it up again. Absolutely nothing happend when I pushed the button. I tried to clean everything from dust, disconnected the PSU and let it rest still nothing. I researched a bit and come to the conclusion that the PSU was most likely broken. I bought a new one and installed it but still nothing although this time my CPU fan moved a bit so there's power atleast but it still wouldn't boot. I'm now afraid my motherboard or cpu has died.

Any ideas?

[BlobVanDam]

PSU would have been my conclusion too (as it has been the source of countless similar computer deaths for me).
I'd double check all of the connections to make sure it's not just a loose power cable or something. Assuming you've already tried that, I'd probably think motherboard. If it was CPU, I believe it would power on with the fans and lights, but simply do nothing.

You could try unplugging the drives and graphics card, maybe even RAM, and seeing if it reacts differently, gives you any beeps, but it doesn't sound like that kind of situation from my experience.

[Grizz]

Gotta love Intel Management Engine and Windows 10, working together to keep my monitor from awakening!

[MrBoom_shack-a-lack]

PSU would have been my conclusion too (as it has been the source of countless similar computer deaths for me).
I'd double check all of the connections to make sure it's not just a loose power cable or something. Assuming you've already tried that, I'd probably think motherboard. If it was CPU, I believe it would power on with the fans and lights, but simply do nothing.

You could try unplugging the drives and graphics card, maybe even RAM, and seeing if it reacts differently, gives you any beeps, but it doesn't sound like that kind of situation from my experience.

So i'm both happy and annoyed because it turns out it wasn't my PC it was the power extention cord that I hook every power cable to that has broken. The on/off light was flickering and when I turned it on it made a noise. So I plugged the PC directly into the wall jacket and my pc booted up as normal.
Stupid me for not thinking outside the box yesterday, was so focused on what was wrong with the pc. I even bought a new psu! 

[BlobVanDam]

Shame you didn't figure that out before buying the PSU, but at least you got it sorted.

[MrBoom_shack-a-lack]

Was a bit quick again because everything did boot up as normal except I didn't have my gpu connected, as soon as I plugged that in I couldn't start the system again, the cpu fan moved a bit then nothing. Seems like my gpu is overloading my psu or something.

[MrBoom_shack-a-lack]

Tried booting up with my old gtx 460 and it worked which sadly confirms it's my gtx 780 that's causing this. Tried again with my current card and it didn't boot infact I couldn't boot without waiting a few minutes. It seems like my gpu is pulling to much power and overloads the system. As I said everything works great with my old gpu or without a gpu but as soon as I plug in my current gpu I can't boot up. Has to be my current gpu causing this right?

[Tiko]

Tried booting up with my old gtx 460 and it worked which sadly confirms it's my gtx 780 that's causing this. Tried again with my current card and it didn't boot infact I couldn't boot without waiting a few minutes. It seems like my gpu is pulling to much power and overloads the system. As I said everything works great with my old gpu or without a gpu but as soon as I plug in my current gpu I can't boot up. Has to be my current gpu causing this right?

How many watts does your PSU have?

[Dimitrius]

^That.

Maybe your PSU doesn't have enough wattage to power the new card.

[MrBoom_shack-a-lack]

Tried booting up with my old gtx 460 and it worked which sadly confirms it's my gtx 780 that's causing this. Tried again with my current card and it didn't boot infact I couldn't boot without waiting a few minutes. It seems like my gpu is pulling to much power and overloads the system. As I said everything works great with my old gpu or without a gpu but as soon as I plug in my current gpu I can't boot up. Has to be my current gpu causing this right?

How many watts does your PSU have?

I have a XFX 1050W PSU but it's cool I figured that it had to be the GPU because everything worked without it plugged in. I bought a new GPU that I found for a reasonable price and now my PC boot as normal.

^That.

Maybe your PSU doesn't have enough wattage to power the new card.

I've had the "new" card with my 1050W PSU for more than two years and i've used it pretty heavily so i'm not that surprised even though it's annoying. Even though it's a bit expensive I rather switch for a new GPU than a new motherboard given you most likely also need to buy a new CPU to match the socket atleast on new MoBos given my CPU is over two years old and it's also a bit of a hazzle to install.

[Chino]

I'm definitely buying one of these to keep permanently docked to my big screen.

https://gadgets.ndtv.com/laptops/news/infocus-kangaroo-launched-as-worlds-smallest-portable-windows-10-pc-757595

$99

[Orbert]

So basically, you hook it up to a monitor/TV via HDMI, and a keyboard+mouse via USB, and you're ready to go?

[Chino]

So basically, you hook it up to a monitor/TV via HDMI, and a keyboard+mouse via USB, and you're ready to go?

Yep.

I'll get one of these to replace my laptop which I currently have to constantly connect and disconnect from the TV. I have one of these already and basically have a PC with a 55" screen that I operate from my couch.



I don't don't need anything powerful as I still have my laptop. This will mainly be for torrents and going to websites like like AMC, FX, or Discovery to watch their online episodes that aren't available through third parties such as Hulu.

[Calvin6s]

Do those tests to run Full HD files mean a bare OS or with Anti-Virus running?  Something to consider if you plan to use it for torrents.

[Chino]

Tests?

[Calvin6s]

The article claims the PC can handle HD files, but don't expect it to run anything more (mainly games).  That suggests a serious limitation that means if the *test* to run the HD file was done without real time AV, then it might not do it with.

And if you are doing torrents, that adds a whole new dimension.  I suggest repurposing an old PC that just downloads those files and checks them for viruses.  It is also good for testing out new software because nothing is worse than trying a new program, not liking it, uninstalling it x1000 and eventually you have to reformat-reinstall so it feels like a new PC again.  And if that software comes from torrents, even worse.

[Chino]

Ahhh. I get what you're saying. That's where I thought you were going with it. 

[cramx3]

Tried booting up with my old gtx 460 and it worked which sadly confirms it's my gtx 780 that's causing this. Tried again with my current card and it didn't boot infact I couldn't boot without waiting a few minutes. It seems like my gpu is pulling to much power and overloads the system. As I said everything works great with my old gpu or without a gpu but as soon as I plug in my current gpu I can't boot up. Has to be my current gpu causing this right?

Nice, almost the same GPU upgrade path.  I had a gtx460 then went gtx 770 and was just telling my bro I will need to upgrade to gtx 1080 next when its out lol

That is weird. Maybe it's due to the driver difference between the SATA controllers or USB that allowed it to correctly detect and format it so you could use it properly? Computers can be funny sometimes.

Maybe. I agree I work on computer hardware and sometimes shit just works but Id love to know why. Your guess seems like a good one.  I bet it failed lol it transfered 1.25th before I went to bed and left another overnight 1tb to transfer as I fell asleep.

And I never updated with regards to my 5TB hard drive situation, but the drive did in fact completely fail after transfering data for over 24 hours lol Best Buy accepted the return so while I wish I had my time back, Im glad I at least got my money back.  Decided to hold off maybe until christmas for a new hard drive.