Computer Questions Not Worth Their Own Thread II

Well yes, obviously wifi on and in use is going to use significantly more power, and you'll see variable use depending on the software stack - but you can get upwards of a month of battery life out of a tablet with wifi on if you don't turn the screen on.

Why does Windows 8.1 forcibly restrict my user login password length to no more than 16 characters, when I could have much longer passwords just fine in earlier versions of windows?

Because Win8 is the devil

Salvation lies only through 7

http://arstechnica.com/security/201...have-symbols-or-be-longer-than-16-characters/

You're using a Microsoft account. Don't use a Microsoft account and it behaves just like Win7.

Considering it forced me to get one in the first place, I had no choice.

It did not, you can set up Windows 8 without a Microsoft account, and you can disconnect your existing Microsoft/Windows accounts.

Perhaps this question is worth its own thread, not sure. Anyway, regarding GPUs: I've been checking my GPU's temperature when running Civ4, and it's approaching the maximum recomended temp of 98º C (it's a GT630). Fan speed seems to cap at 85%.

Now, I know these things are designed to work at high temperatures and all, but I also am aware that the higher the average temp, the shorter the lifespan of the GPU. So, my question is, would it make even a slight difference if the cooling fan was running at 100% speed? If so, how can I tweak the settings?

yes, there's fan control software available - should be able to bump up your fan speed to its maximum pretty easily with it.

jbp said:

Perhaps this question is worth its own thread, not sure. Anyway, regarding GPUs: I've been checking my GPU's temperature when running Civ4, and it's approaching the maximum recomended temp of 98º C (it's a GT630). Fan speed seems to cap at 85%.

Now, I know these things are designed to work at high temperatures and all, but I also am aware that the higher the average temp, the shorter the lifespan of the GPU. So, my question is, would it make even a slight difference if the cooling fan was running at 100% speed? If so, how can I tweak the settings?

Click to expand...

Sometimes it may be faulty sensors. I once had to turn off the warmth measurements for the CPU because the sensors falsely reported extremely high tempratures.

Does anyone know of a program that strips data from a picture of a graph? I have a bunch of line graphs with axes labelled etc, but I want to get the numbers behind the graph. So doing it manually, I'd be reading off the chart with some rulers and putting the numbers into excel manually. Is there any program that will do all of this for me?

These are line graphs, so I think it should be fairly straightforward to do programmatically. How easy is it to make such a program? All I really need are the X-Y co-ordinates of, say, the blue line on the image, then the red line, then the green line, etc. I can sort the scales out myself so that's not an issue. I really want a programme that will strip out the co-ordinates of those lines from a jpg/bitmap file.

HALP!!!!

EDIT: Okay, it turns out I was googling completely the wrong thing! There are a few programs that will do it it seems... I'll report back later in case someone else has this problem.

how poorly drawn are the axes?

The axes are pretty decent. Here is one of the graphs as an example (this is the neatest; the rest are messier!). I used PlotDigitizer in the end. You click on the axes to tell it a scale, then you click on the graph to trace the line. It's perhaps not as convenient as an automagical program that strips the coords of the colours out of the image, but it is at least reliable, easy to use, and relatively quick.

ah i see

My old macbook pro from 2006 has at last broken down completely. It loads, but the screen is now black and I can't get past it. Earlier I got to the logo and there seemed to be some activity behind it - I managed to log in somehow with the locked screen, but the situation seems worse now. I've tried to reset it to 'manufacture settings', but I get nowhere and has to hard reset it each time to turn it off. I've pretty much given up hope for it, but it's been time to get a new one for years, so anyway... here's a question:
I've regularly backed it up via time machine and saved the most important stuff on an external hard drive. Will I be able to retrieve this data if I buy a new macbook pro with a newer OS? Is there another way of getting hold of this data? I've got a windows pc too.


Edit: It seems I should be able to use the timemachine in a new mac. Not sure if there's another solution to this, but I doubt it.
Edit 2:
Is this wise to try?

Link to video.

Loppan Torkel said:

My old macbook pro from 2006 has at last broken down completely. It loads, but the screen is now black and I can't get past it. Earlier I got to the logo and there seemed to be some activity behind it - I managed to log in somehow with the locked screen, but the situation seems worse now. I've tried to reset it to 'manufacture settings', but I get nowhere and has to hard reset it each time to turn it off. I've pretty much given up hope for it, but it's been time to get a new one for years, so anyway... here's a question:
I've regularly backed it up via time machine and saved the most important stuff on an external hard drive. Will I be able to retrieve this data if I buy a new macbook pro with a newer OS? Is there another way of getting hold of this data? I've got a windows pc too.


Edit: It seems I should be able to use the timemachine in a new mac. Not sure if there's another solution to this, but I doubt it.
Edit 2:
Is this wise to try?

Link to video.

Click to expand...

Are you able to get a picture on the external monitor? If you can, it's the monitor that's gone out, and you need a new screen to repair it. If you cannot, then it's the graphics card.

As for the video, that is not a good idea to try. First, it assumes the GPU is the problem, and you should test with an external monitor first to figure out if that really is the problem. But even if it is, the problem is you have very little idea of the actual temperatures with a hair dryer. It might be too low to help; it might be too hot and melt anything together; it's very imprecise. If you do wish to try that sort of a fix, you should bake your GPU in your oven instead. A guide for it is here. Note that while many people have had success with the more-precise baking method, it is indeed no guarantee (and a temporary fix even if it does work). Also, if you have to put the whole mobo in (if the GPU is not detachable), be sure to remove the CMOS battery. It would be a very bad thing if it exploded.

(I actually am serious about the baking thing - while I surprisingly haven't had to do it myself, I've read about enough people doing it, and the principles of reflowing the solder are solid enough, that I'd recommend it as a considerably better option than hair-drying)

I did try connecting it to an external monitor, but it was the same. I assume something other than a black screen automatically would appear on the functioning screen on start up.

I've heard about the baking and I've seen multiple youtube videos about 'reflowing the solder'. It's a nutty thing for me to do, but I may give it a shot. There's no point in letting a professional repair it since it would cost more than the worth of it. I'm not comfortable removing stuff from the mobo, so baking in oven is not an option.

Not sure yet, but I've made a purchase-list:
Flux
Thermal paste
Heat gun
Torxbits
Alcohol

I've got tin foil already.
Am I missing anything to do this?


Another thing. The first lock up was when I used it - the screen just froze and there was nothing else to do than force-shut down. Then I got to the logo, in which it froze - force shut down, a couple of times, sound and some buttons at the top working for sound adjustment, etc. After 'flushing the RAM' and manufacture reset, I once was able to log in for a minute, then it froze up completely again, and the screen has been black ever since. No sound at start up or anything, but the processor running like it's doing something. You hear it process some other route when starting in fail-safe mode, still with a black screen. I'm guessing it's the GPU, but could it be the RAM or does it sound like something completely different?

Is VideoLAN or VLC considered some sort of encoder pack? Because I was instructed by someone elsewhere online to obtain an encoder pack to be able to record some videos of a specific format.

What do you mean by "flushing the RAM"?

If it is only the GPU, it should theoretically be possible to get some sound working. It might take waiting for it to boot, hitting the mute and sound up buttons, hard resetting, and rebooting, or perhaps waiting for it to boot and putting in an audio CD if that will auto-play. If it's not feasible to get the sound working blind, perhaps observing the hard drive light activity will provide some clues as to whether it appears to be booting normally or not. Although if there's no good alternative, it may be worth trying the baking even if it's unclear whether the rest is working - it may be that the GPU is causing BSODs or something, so booting cannot complete.

I don't know much about non-oven-based repairs, however, so I'm going to have to recommend doing independent research there. Although based on the list, the one thing that stands out as missing is a thermometer, if the heat gun doesn't have one built in. Not going too high on temperatures is very important.

VLC includes a number of codecs with its download, so by installing VLC you can also play many types of media automatically. However, there are surely some formats that it won't support and for those a separate download would be required.

Yes, but is it an encoder of any sort? This is so I can record videos using the ingame video recorder in Space Engine.

I'm not sure about that; I've never tried to encode anything through it. Hopefully someone else here will know.