Techies, unite yesterday! [Computer Talk & Tech Help Thread]

[Aaron]

Naw I haven't used the phone she is talking about... I love my phone. Its the shit. being able to google anything and yell at my coworkers for being WRONG is amazing (the amount of weird random shit we talk of, its amazing to find out who is right/wrong about stuff.) And the voice search thing is also amazing. But ya, I love my phone. But I haven't ever used an Iphone. Well I played a game on it a year ago? So even then, nothing really new or current for the Iphone.

And my old phone was very basic and old school. It could flip and that was about all it could do... It was like going from Windows 95 to XP (I haven't used 7 yet.)

[r00]

being able to google anything and yell at my coworkers for being WRONG is amazing

funny you say that.  I saw some stand-up comedian on Conan the other day and part of his bit was talking about the current times and how having a phone that Google's is like "having a drunk know-it-all in your pocket at all times."  lolz

[Goose]

The Samsung Galaxy S was the first Android phone available out here (SaskTel has a real hard time getting good phones because the market is so small).  Its a bloody sweet piece of technology, and everything I've heard about the Galaxy S-2 just makes me drool even more.  Same with the HTC Incredible.  Almost enough to make me actually want to buy a cell phone (thank jeebus I can't afford one).

[r00]

It's not a Samsung Galaxy phone, but I have the Samsung Galaxy Tab and have been nothing but impressed with it.  When it finally gets the Netflix app, perfection is on the horizon.

[luna]

I've also heard that the galaxy is pretty awesome

[Static]

The Samsung Galaxy S was the first Android phone available out here (SaskTel has a real hard time getting good phones because the market is so small).  Its a bloody sweet piece of technology, and everything I've heard about the Galaxy S-2 just makes me drool even more.  Same with the HTC Incredible.  Almost enough to make me actually want to buy a cell phone (thank jeebus I can't afford one).

They're not the most creative people when it comes to product names are they!

[Aaron]

Ya I love my phone. Its the shit. And the amount of upgrade makes me love it even more. And my bill went up like 15ish bucks. And I can do a lot more so its all good.



I think I'm gona reinstall windows on my pc. Its getting laggy and just not running that great (It isn't bad by any means, just not as good as it could be.) I need to back everything up first. But that won't be to hard. Just start it right before I go to work, and by the time I get back its done. I think I would do a fresh install of wow thought. The folder is huge, and I don't really know what all I can get rid of and not fuck it all over horrible... (I have kinda stopped playing though. And I don't think I will start back up any time soon. With my guitar getting ordered soon (tomorrow, err later today. I think...)

[r00]

Don't bother going through the timely re-install and patching process for WoW.  Just back up everything but your interface and WTF directory and copy it over to your new drive.  That will be exactly the same as fresh install and will save you a ton of time.

[Aaron]

Oh snap. Sweet thanks. That will save me a ton of time downloading it all again. (I bought digital copies instead of disks...)

[Naylzie]

Having those discs is vastly underrated.  Beloved and I don't own install discs for vanilla, but we do have BC, Wrath, and Cata all in hard copy.  The reason?  When our computers go, they go up in flames (figuratively, of course).  Rarely have I had the opportunity to just snag my relevant folders and redistribute them, so being able to reinstall the games without depending on our shitty internet not to be shitty is both a huge time saver and a boon to my blood pressure.

I've reached the point of kicking around the idea of a new graphics card.  I discovered during my short trial that my onboard CANNOT run Rift in any practical sense of the word "run," and I've gotten to thinking that it might be nice to see what WoW looks like on Ultra.  Can anyone direct me to somewhere that puts the benchmarks into plain English?  I've tried looking at just the benchmark listings, but it kinda just tends to give me a headache.  If it can run "current" games on middling settings, I'll be happy.  I don't want to plan the rig around WoW and then have to buy a new card when I finally do quit because WoW is still the friggin dinosaur of the gaming graphic world and the card can't handle anything bigger.

[individualzero]

@Nayl: You won't have to have a particularly amazing rig to run Rift on even high settings as it seems to be optimized pretty freakin' well, from all I've seen.

I don't know what the rest of your computer is like, so posting information like the particular model and wattage on your power supply unit (if you know how; I'm assuming you do, and if not, we can help you there too!) will help us figure out what kind of graphics card you can/should pick up, as well as the ideal price you'd want to spend on a graphics card, will all help. Pretty much, just throw all the information you can at us; it'd be nice to know the specifics of your processor and RAM, as well, so you can avoid bottlenecking your newly-found graphical horsepower. Any information you can provide is important. Anything helps, like what kind of connectors your PSU totes to if your motherboard has PCI-Express slots, so tell us all you can!

tl;dr: if you can get us the approximate top end of moolah you want to spend on a graphics card and tell us all you know about your current setup, I'm sure the tech-heads here can find you the perfect card.


Just off the top of my head, I use a single GTX 460 and while I did tamper with the speed a bit, it runs Rift with every single setting maxed - in windowed mode - on a dual-core processor with 4GB RAM. You can also snag what is one of (if not arguably...) THE best GPU brands, EVGA, to pair with one of the greatest budget beast cards for all of $125 on sale, sometimes even less after rebates. Of course, depending on what the rest of your setup and your budget is like, there may be better deals. Keep us updated!

[Naylzie]

*snerk*  oh, no doy, it would help to know what kind of rig I'm putting it in, eh?

Don't cry, my more experienced techie friends, it does what I need it to do!  And quite well!  (Fair warning, it may look like a horrorshow to someone with a) a budget and/or b) more experience.  Building my own machines is still something of a learning experience.  This most recent one is MUCH better than my first attempt.)

Running on 4GB ram because it is still a windows box (XP 64 bit if that matters).  Processor is AMD Phenom 9450e Quad-Core Processor (4 CPUs), ~2.1GHz, but I believe it's only running on two because unlocking and overclocking push the boundaries of my computer knowledge a bit.  Using 2 cores is the default state, isn't it?  Power supply is 450W, and mobo is PCI Express x16 architecture (this critter, here).

Until my little run-in with Rift, the onboard graphics have been serviceable, though far from prize-winning.  As far as monetary restrictions, I don't really foresee them coming into play.  My rig probably can't accommodate the very tip top of the line right now, so I don't much imagine that prices for what will fit and do the job will push too far into the unreasonable, but I'm willing to throw down around $200, maybe a little more, depending on what else I'll get for spending the extra.

[kristin]

ended up getting the iPhone 4 for verizon and it's awesome.

[Goose]

Nayl, first thing you need to do is get off of XP 64-bit.  It was never supported properly, and next to no one wrote proper drivers for their hardware for it.  You have more than enough computer there to run Windows 7 64-bit nicely.

One thing you will need to find out is the amperage your power supply can put out, not the wattage.  That can be a little harder to find, but with the hardware you've got it may become a factor.  It did for me a while back when I wanted to upgrade my video card, and I found my power supply couldn't give it what it needed.

[individualzero]

What Goose said; if I were you, I'd take that $200 and order a copy of Windows 7 64-bit - you'll thank yourself in the first two minutes of booting it up - and then a graphics card like a a GTX 460 or even something a little less hefty (a 5770, if they sell them anymore.. I know they rebranded them as 6770s, which can now utilize DirectX11 - albeit at a higher price tag).

I also want to echo Goose again here and say that you should make sure that the amperage is solid, too. Your PC sounds like it's a little bit older and while I'm pretty sure that you'll be okay (450 watts is more than good enough for any of the above cards), it never hurts to be sure.