Computer Questions Not Worth Their Own Thread II

[aimeeandbeatles]

I'm assuming 7 has the same copy handler as Vista - in which case, I'd highly recommend TeraCopy. If I'm understanding you right, it'll do what you want.

Does anybody know of a good free (or inexpensive, up to $30) three-pane outliner aside from KeepNote or SimBust Note Manager? This is something I've been struggling to search for because the vast majority of outliners are two-paned.

 

[PlutonianEmpire]

Ok, cool. Now another question. How do I download files en masse from my dropbox account onto my mobile device?

I would use the usb cord, but I keep getting a "device not recognized"/"device has malfunctioned" error from Windows.

 

[Zelig]

Install Dropbox app.

 

[PlutonianEmpire]

I have it, but I can't find any such option on it, which is why I asked in the first place.

Basically, I'm trying to get multiple files onto my device at once, including multiple folders.

 

[aimeeandbeatles]

Something happened a few months ago that I was curious about what happened:

Anyways, my video card started glitching up, freezing the screen and producing all sorts of weird graphical glitches (lines, dots, a few times completely garbling everything). Turned out that the capacitors on the video card had gone bad. I went to a local repair store and they replaced the card with a slightly nicer one and it didn't cost much either so it's good now.

First thing: The video card was overheating. Somehow I'd never even noticed it had a seperate fan. (This is because I'm smart.) I eventually found it but by then the card was probably gone.
Thing is, the computer had also encountered several unexpected shutdowns. There had been a storm a few days earlier that knocked the power out twice, and once the younger cat was walking across the computer and knocked the plug out a few time. I've since trained her out of that (whenever she went on the computer I just lifted her down and after a while she stopped).

So what is the most likely that happened here?

 

[timtofly]

Loosing power abruptly will not damage components, because the power supply acts as a buffer. Loosing power may result in corrupt data, but that is about it. Over heating is the probable culprit. Unless the computer is on battery back up or surge protection, turning it off before a thunderstorm is recommended.

 

[Mr.WorldWide]

If the tower is in close proximity to you when you are using the computer it's usually easy to identify an overheating problem due to the smell.

 

[PlutonianEmpire]

Ok, this next issue is my biggest pet peeve in graphics-heavy gaming that has plagued me literally my entire life.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/0xog5orulahan6f/Framerate_BS.mp4?dl=0

What's happening here is one of the repeated, endless chronic bouts of momentary plummeting in framerates, going from fps' in the 50's to below 10 fps. Here's the problem: This is a machine with 8 gigs of RAM and a quad-core processor totaling 2.7 Gigahertz, and the game is otherwise a piece of cake to run. And yes this is happening even with Game Booster's help. And I already got rid of McAffee weeks ago.

It's irritating, because they happen in 30 to 90 second intervals.

OS is Window 7 64-bit. Home Premium, unfortunately. I plan to upgrade to Pro as soon as my budget allows.

 

[aimeeandbeatles]

If the tower is in close proximity to you when you are using the computer it's usually easy to identify an overheating problem due to the smell.

The smell. Don't remind me of the smell.

Ok, this next issue is my biggest pet peeve in graphics-heavy gaming that has plagued me literally my entire life.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/0xog5orulahan6f/Framerate_BS.mp4?dl=0

What's happening here is one of the repeated, endless chronic bouts of momentary plummeting in framerates, going from fps' in the 50's to below 10 fps. Here's the problem: This is a machine with 8 gigs of RAM and a quad-core processor totaling 2.7 Gigahertz, and the game is otherwise a piece of cake to run. And yes this is happening even with Game Booster's help. And I already got rid of McAffee weeks ago.

It's irritating, because they happen in 30 to 90 second intervals.

OS is Window 7 64-bit. Home Premium, unfortunately. I plan to upgrade to Pro as soon as my budget allows.

Does anything of note happen in the Performance section of the task manager when the framerate drops? It may also be worth looking at the processes to see if something is eating the CPU cycles at those 30-90 second intervals. (Unless Game Booster kills all the processes, I could google it but I'm lazy busy.)

 

[PlutonianEmpire]

Yes, game booster kills tthe processes.

 

[bhsup]

PE, you mentioned your cpu and memory but not your video card. What have you got there? Also, I don't recognize that scene from Mass Effect...

 

[PlutonianEmpire]

That's the rather embarrassing problem with my new Win 7 laptop. No video card. The graphics is all done by the internal Intel chipset.

And that is from Sims 2, not Mass Effect.

 

[Quintillus]

aimeeandbeatles' suggestion is a good one - if there's something that periodically spikes the CPU, that could cause it. It's a little tough to evaluate, since you probably don't have Task Manager visible while in-game, but if you leave it up in the background, alt-tab to it after a frame rate hit, and see a spike to 100% CPU, then you've probably got something hammering the CPU and causing the drop.

Other possibilities include:

- Overheating. It could be periodically throttling to keep the temperature in check; you could test this by leaving temperature-monitoring software like HWMonitor up in the background and seeing what the max temps are after a session. Some manufacturers do a really poor job with CPU paste, resulting in high temps even on modestly powered systems.
- Loading data from CD, if this is a CD install. Back in the day I'd have games freeze for a fraction of a second when the next song on the soundtrack was loaded from the CD.
- The hard drive getting hammered by something. If the pauses correspond with the hard drive light lighting up, this may be it. Heavy hard drive activity can bring computers to a crawl.

I don't think Windows 7 Pro would make any difference, although a re-install of Windows might if it's a software issue. Getting rid of McAfee couldn't have hurt; you know it's bad when the founder of the company advises getting rid of the product.

 

[Samson]

What is the best way to run a number of processes and when they all have finished run one final process? For example, if I wanted to dump 3 databases (which take 10 minutes each) then compress them all, I could do:

mysqldump database1 > database1.sql
mysqldump database2 > database2.sql
mysqldump database3 > database3.sql
tar cvfz databases.tar.gz *.sql

But this would take the sum of all the indavidual times, ie. 30 minutes. I could do all the dumps simultaneously:

mysqldump database1 > database1.sql&
mysqldump database2 > database2.sql&
mysqldump database3 > database3.sql&

and check when these finish and run the final command. This would only take 10 minutes, but needs human intercation.

I could write a bit of code to spawn a new thread for each process and then finish only when all have finished, but it seems like such a standard problem that there must be a standard solution. I have tried googling, but with no luck but I suspect I am missing a vital word that describes what I am trying to do.

 

[aimeeandbeatles]

Is it weird to email software developers just to tell them that I like this software they made? I do that on a semi-regular basis because it just gives me a good feeling inside and doesn't take up that much time.

 

[Zelig]

What is the best way to run a number of processes and when they all have finished run one final process? For example, if I wanted to dump 3 databases (which take 10 minutes each) then compress them all, I could do:

mysqldump database1 > database1.sql
mysqldump database2 > database2.sql
mysqldump database3 > database3.sql
tar cvfz databases.tar.gz *.sql

But this would take the sum of all the indavidual times, ie. 30 minutes. I could do all the dumps simultaneously:

mysqldump database1 > database1.sql&
mysqldump database2 > database2.sql&
mysqldump database3 > database3.sql&

and check when these finish and run the final command. This would only take 10 minutes, but needs human intercation.

I could write a bit of code to spawn a new thread for each process and then finish only when all have finished, but it seems like such a standard problem that there must be a standard solution. I have tried googling, but with no luck but I suspect I am missing a vital word that describes what I am trying to do.

https://stackoverflow.com/questions...subprocesses-to-finish-and-return-exit-code-0

So trivially, if you don't have other background stuff going on, this should work:

mysqldump database1 > database1.sql&
mysqldump database2 > database2.sql&
mysqldump database3 > database3.sql&

wait

tar cvfz databases.tar.gz *.sql

 

[Samson]

https://stackoverflow.com/questions...subprocesses-to-finish-and-return-exit-code-0

So trivially, if you don't have other background stuff going on, this should work:

mysqldump database1 > database1.sql&
mysqldump database2 > database2.sql&
mysqldump database3 > database3.sql&

wait

tar cvfz databases.tar.gz *.sql

Thank you very much, that works perfectly.

 

[peter grimes]

Is it weird to email software developers just to tell them that I like this software they made? I do that on a semi-regular basis because it just gives me a good feeling inside and doesn't take up that much time.

Speaking not as a software developer, but as someone whose job requires making custom solutions to specific user problems, it's *always* nice to hear positive feedback.

I work for theatrical designers and directors, but my physical results are used by actors. The actors we tend to work with are usually quite discriminating "clients". If something is a little wrong with, say, the squishiness of the sofa cushion, or the weight balance in a suitcase, or the clink of the ice falling into the glass, or the speed at which an umbrella unfolds, or the feel of the sheets on their skin, or the fact that the wicker chair arm can't support their weight when the try to sit on it - that's a crisis I have to solve.

That's my job, and it can be insanely annoying and petty sometimes.

But every now and then an end user acknowledges and thanks me for doing the job I'm expected to do. Those are the good people, and I'll bend over backwards to help them and work with them on solutions in the future.

But far too many actors act as though we're idiots because we can't simultaneously make something light, indestructible, within budget, that looks good, in the time frame allotted, that will withstand them throwing it at a wall 100 times without doing damage to the wall or falling apart.

Yes, nice notes are appreciated. There might even be a few taped up on someone's wall. I have several.

 

[shadowplay]

I have DSL. Should I rent the new modem they want to send me, or should I buy my own modem?

For the last month, my internet has been disconnecting frequently and randomly slowing to a crawl. I think the old modem needs to be replaced as it's pretty old.

Thoughts?

 

[timtofly]

You have to determine how long you are going to rent the modem, and weigh it against the cost of purchasing your own. Even purchasing your own modem does not mean that it will last, and you will have to keep spending money if you purchase a lemon. If you rent a modem, the cable company should replace it if it stops working. Seeing how it is DSL, and if you move around a lot, your DSL modem may not work if you move to a cable modem market.