Author Topic: Strange network connectivity issue (Read 12383 times)

KPT · « **Reply #25 on:** October 07, 2009, 11:58:52 PM »

Quote from: Brad Johnson on October 06, 2009, 12:17:26 PM

Plus, I dislike Vista even more than ME.

PLUS my machine won't take the hardware necessary to properly run Vista.

Get the picture?[/quote[

Uh I didn't say put Vista on it. I said 2000 or XP.

I've never liked vista either. I have 7 64 bit on my laptop and desktop, no complaints.

I think I've run vista longer than ME though. I believe ME lasted 4 or 5 days on my computer at the time before I realized what a POS it was. Vista might have lasted two weeks. Now with 7 I'll never go back to XP.

mtnbkr · « **Reply #26 on:** October 08, 2009, 06:11:47 AM »

For the small difference in price, get the Pro version, especially since you're are using it for work (better security model over Home, more features, etc).

In talking with people that run a 64bit Windows OS, your 32bit apps will run fine, but be a hair slow. The 64bit apps, as you get them, will be screaming fast though.

If you're installing this on an existing system, make sure it has a 64bit processor.

Chris

mtnbkr · « **Reply #27 on:** October 08, 2009, 06:15:01 AM »

Quote from: KPT on October 07, 2009, 11:58:52 PM

I think I've run vista longer than ME though. I believe ME lasted 4 or 5 days on my computer at the time before I realized what a POS it was. Vista might have lasted two weeks. Now with 7 I'll never go back to XP.

Yup. I totally skipped Win98 and ME. I either used NT4 or Linux after dumping Win95 until Win2k came out. Win2k and XP are fantastic, especially when compared to previous offerings.

I wasn't impressed with Vista, but I'd use it over 95/98/ME any day.

Actually, for someone who runs ME, 2000 would be the bee's knees. Any app that runs on ME would run on 2000, and the compatibility issues that caused me to dump 2000 wouldn't bother someone who's using ME.

Chris

Brad Johnson · « **Reply #28 on:** October 08, 2009, 09:57:11 AM »

64bit it is, then.

The machine is processored by a Kentsfield series 2.6 GHz quad-core unit so there won't be a problem with processor compatibility. It comes with 3 Gb RAM that fills all four slots. That's coming out in favor of a 4 Gb pair that only fills only two slots, leaving me room to upgrade. The machine takes PC2 6400 RAM. Any suggestions other than the PNY or Kingston I'm familiar with?

Brad

KPT · « **Reply #29 on:** October 08, 2009, 10:29:08 PM »

Quote from: Brad Johnson on October 08, 2009, 09:57:11 AM

Any suggestions other than the PNY or Kingston I'm familiar with?

I'm partial to Corsair. Haven't had any problems with the gig of DDR that's 5 years old or the 2 gigs of DDR2 in the HTPC or the 4 gigs of DDR2 in the server.

I'd avoid PNY. I have a gig of it out on RMA right now. Hopefully it gets replaced, their warranty reputation is horrible.

tyme · « **Reply #30 on:** October 09, 2009, 08:49:31 AM »

The last two batches of ram I've gotten have been Patriot and G-Skill. (2x2GB patriot in late '07, and 4x2GB g-skill early this year ). I'm about to get another set of 2x2GB Patriot for the 4GB machine. Haven't had trouble with any of the ram so far.

Thor · « **Reply #31 on:** October 09, 2009, 03:16:59 PM »

If you're into name brand RAM, Crucial is one of the best. I just installed 3 GB of PC2100 ECC DDR RAM into my nine year old machine. It's running quite well right now. It was marked as HP (?)128 x 72 density.

Brad Johnson · « **Reply #32 on:** October 10, 2009, 02:37:30 PM »

Woo HOO ... Things are better than I thought!

I was just going down the order sheet for the machine and it appears whomever set up the ad blurb on the Outlet Store web site made a boo-boo. The original item description doesn't quite match the shipping ticket. In this one instance, however, I am most definitely NOT going to gripe about it!

The original item description said core 2 quad 2.6 GHz processor, 1066 FSB. The OS was shown as Vista Home.

The detailed description on the shipping ticket says it's a core 2 quad 2.83 GHz 1333 FSB, and that the OS is Vista Home Premium 64-bit.

Not only is it faster, it also has an architecture that should allow me to eke an extra year or two out of it. To top it off I qualify for a FREE (!!!) upgrade to Win 7 Home Premium 64-bit.

Yes, yes... I know it's not Pro. But, hey, who cares! That upgrade can always happen later. I'm just thrilled to get into a 64-bit version of 7 at NO COST!

Yippee for meeeeeeee!!!

*edit to add* The shipping ticket also says it has a wireless keyboard and mouse bundle. Yippee!!, part 2.

Brad

Gewehr98 · « **Reply #33 on:** October 10, 2009, 03:33:36 PM »

Quote

I'm completely skipping Vista when my XP Pro is no longer viable as an OS.

I have the same plan as well.

Looks like our upgrade path from XP Pro to Win7 requires a clean install. That's normally what I would do, anyway, but I'll be damned if I buy Vista just to upgrade to Win7 via the normal upgrade path...

Brad Johnson · « **Reply #34 on:** October 10, 2009, 03:35:27 PM »

You can get 7 Pro 64-bit OEM for $139 through NewEgg. They already have it set up for pre-order.

Brad

mtnbkr · « **Reply #35 on:** October 10, 2009, 10:07:54 PM »

Quote from: Gewehr98 on October 10, 2009, 03:33:36 PM

Looks like our upgrade path from XP Pro to Win7 requires a clean install. That's normally what I would do, anyway, but I'll be damned if I buy Vista just to upgrade to Win7 via the normal upgrade path...

I would need a new computer to run either Vista or 7, so it's not a big deal to me.

Chris

mellestad · « **Reply #36 on:** October 10, 2009, 10:29:51 PM »

Quote from: Brad Johnson on October 06, 2009, 11:08:32 PM

Looks like the hardware has finally begun to show its age.

I pulled up a NIC out of a dead machine in the office. I was able to get it up and running, but not without a fight. Looks like there's a dead or dying circuit in the PCI bus that's goind to be more than a few scrounged up parts can fix. I could make it work but getting it up and running would take almost as much time as getting my apps migrated to a new machine.

AS for upgrading the old machine to run XP, well, the Dimension 8100 is saddled with a requirement for RDRAM. It was a great idea at the time, but has turned into an expensive nightmare when it comes time add memory. Upgrading to a mere two gigs would run almost $200. Given the age of the machine and the likelyhood that other parts will be failing soon, I bit the bullet and ordered one from the Dell Outlet. For roughly 30% more then the memory and OS upgrade would have cost I was able to get a new Studio mini tower, 2.6GHz quad-core, 3 Gb RAM, twin DVD-RW drives, and a Radeon 4350 dual-monitor capable video card. I even popped for a refurb Ultrasharp monitor.

I hated spending the money, but I am really pretty lucky. The machine was ten years old last May. I can rightfully say I got my money's worth!

I run regular backups so data integrity isn't an issue. Aside from the connectivity issue the machine is working fine. Unfortunately connectivity is an absolute requirement for my office machine so it's time to put the old gal out to pasture. I'll do a full backup tomorrow and run off the web-based side of our apps until the new machine arrives. I'll pull the drive from the old machine and install it in the computer I cobbled together at home as a redundant backup.

Now the big question, how many of you folks have played around with Windows 7 enough to recommend upgrading to it over Vista (the bundled OS with the machine)? I'm sorely tempted but would like to have some first-hand accounts before taking the plunge.

Brad

Windows 7 seems to be a very solid performer. It has the increased stability of Vista without the hassles most people dislike Vista for, plus it runs faster. I am going to start rolling it out at work for new systems once it hits retail.

I agree, if you have gotten ten years out of your machine, it has done its duty for king and country. You'll be able to get some nice deals on a Window 7 machine. If you want specific recommendations just let me know what your budget is, I buy a couple machines a month for work.

Brad Johnson · « **Reply #37 on:** October 12, 2009, 03:24:51 PM »

Machine and monitor arrived this morning. Registered immediately for the Win 7 free upgrade. 8GB RAM is on the way and should arrive by week's end. I'm also upgrading my Office Suite (ptooi!) to 2007.

I'll truck along on the old machine until the OS upgrade gets here. I'll nuke the drive on the new machine and do a virgin install of 7. Then, hopefully, I'll be good for another 10 years!

Brad

Thor · « **Reply #38 on:** October 12, 2009, 05:31:04 PM »

Funny thing. My machine is nine years old last August. Abit KG-7 RAID Board that will hold 4 GB RAM (but only uses 3.5GB) It has an AMD 1.4 GHz Athlon processor. For the longest time, I only ran 512 MB of RAM. I upgraded the RAM a few years ago to 1 GB. I recently upgraded the video card from a GeForce 2 MX 400 (64 MB) to a Geforce 6200 w/ 256 MB and boosted the RAM again to 3 GB and was forced to purchase a new flat panel monitor (20" widescreen, HANNspree ). Since I don't game, it does everything I need. I even have a copy of Windows 7 that I'm contemplating throwing on it (secondary OS, just to learn it and play with it). I hooked the PC up to my TV last night and watched part of "The Stand" on the TV. It runs WAY faster than a P4 2.4 GHz PC that I have, even as old as it is.

Gewehr98 · « **Reply #39 on:** October 12, 2009, 07:05:29 PM »

Can you nuke the Vista install to upgrade to Win7, or does the Win7 upgrade need to see Vista's registration/activation code on the hard drive before installing itself?

Brad Johnson · « **Reply #40 on:** October 12, 2009, 07:37:01 PM »

Depends on what kind of media I get. I'm hoping it will be a recovery disk that will autonuke the drive. If not, I may have to dig around for a workaround. I've seen too many problems with "upgrades" over the years. It's going to be a virgin install or nothing.

Brad

tyme · « **Reply #41 on:** October 13, 2009, 06:42:12 PM »

Quote

I'm also upgrading my Office Suite (ptooi!) to 2007.

Yuck. You can't get away with OpenOffice?

Windows 7 runs pretty well in a VM with about 2GB.

Brad Johnson · « **Reply #42 on:** October 13, 2009, 10:08:25 PM »

I've messed with OpenOffice a little. S'okay, but there always seemed to be some strange little hiccup in the mix. Besides, I got a deal on a still-sealed Office Pro 2007. It was part of a huge network upgrade and ended up not being needed. The company who placed the order let the guy keep it as a tip because he came in way ahead of schedule.

Brad

Gewehr98 · « **Reply #43 on:** October 13, 2009, 10:40:59 PM »

Can't do OpenOffice. Tried, several times, the ick factor was just too much. I'd have preferred to stay with MS Office 2003, but the world moves on, and so I'm running Office 2007 now.

tyme · « **Reply #44 on:** October 14, 2009, 10:17:38 AM »

Â¿QuÃ© es este "ick factor"?

Lots of MS Office users claim that oOO has an "ick factor" or something equivalent, without giving any concrete reasons why. I'd like to think I've got a pretty good understanding of how 95% of people use Word and Excel, and Openoffice is more than adequate for that. Sure it has bugs, most often when importing between oOO and MS Office, but so does MS Office when importing to older versions. People work around bugs in MS apps, but one bug in an open source alternative and things fall apart. There's much screeching and rending of garments, and the most common response is to part company with the heathens and return to the church of Microsoft.

Talk about ick. Every time I open up a Microsoft Office app I feel like I've just been slimed.

mtnbkr · « **Reply #45 on:** October 14, 2009, 10:53:01 AM »

Let me tell you about my version of the "ick" factor with OO. First, let me preface this by stating I am not a Microsoft drone. I make my living with non-MS systems and use both Windows and Linux at home. When I had to rebuild my computer and couldn't find the CDs for Office 2000, I gave OO another chance (was a user since the German StarOffice days).

It works well enough for most things, and is stable, though a bit slow. However, I found that if I created a document and later tried to view it in Word, the formatting was frequently off. Sometimes by a very minor amount, other times significantly. I found I could not blindly author a document in OO, send it to someone using Word, and expect it to be right or even readable.

Yes, I'm aware this can happen between versions of Word. However, it's expected within versions of Word, but when the same problem crops up between OO and Word, the perception is that you lack professionalism or ability. Not fair, but that's what happens. I'm not enough of a zealot to feel comfortable risking my professional reputation to push open source software. I think I do enough of that with the multiple Linux servers and Linux-based appliances under my control.

If/when OO is able to keep up with MS in the format race, I'll give them another shot, but as long as I have proof each OO document in Word before sending it out, I'll just stick to Word.

Chris

Ben · « **Reply #46 on:** October 14, 2009, 11:26:51 AM »

Quote from: Gewehr98 on October 10, 2009, 03:33:36 PM

Looks like our upgrade path from XP Pro to Win7 requires a clean install. That's normally what I would do, anyway, but I'll be damned if I buy Vista just to upgrade to Win7 via the normal upgrade path...

That's what I'm doing too. I'm in need of a new desktop now, but am waiting till the end of the month so I can go straight to 7. I'm buying from www.pcusa.com instead of building my own this time (though technically I'm building my own as they let you spec all components). Years ago, before my work made us all buy only Dell, I built several Plain Jane computers for our admin staff via pcusa and all of them are still running to this day -- some better than older Dimension 2400s we have and not one of them has ever had a hardware glitch.

Having not even played with Vista, I'm not familiar with the versions, but I see that 7 is copying them. What is the difference between "Pro" and "Ultimate" besides the extra ducats?

mellestad · « **Reply #47 on:** October 14, 2009, 11:31:59 AM »

Quote from: tyme on October 14, 2009, 10:17:38 AM

Â¿QuÃ© es este "ick factor"?

Lots of MS Office users claim that oOO has an "ick factor" or something equivalent, without giving any concrete reasons why. I'd like to think I've got a pretty good understanding of how 95% of people use Word and Excel, and Openoffice is more than adequate for that. Sure it has bugs, most often when importing between oOO and MS Office, but so does MS Office when importing to older versions. People work around bugs in MS apps, but one bug in an open source alternative and things fall apart. There's much screeching and rending of garments, and the most common response is to part company with the heathens and return to the church of Microsoft.

Talk about ick. Every time I open up a Microsoft Office app I feel like I've just been slimed.

oOO: Clunky and ugly interface, slow, formatting problems, missing lots of functionality, especially compared to the MS stack (integration with SharePoint, Exchange, etc).

The main redeeming quality is that it is free. That does count for a lot though and back in my consulting days I never had a problem recommending it to clients on a budget.

Ben · « **Reply #48 on:** October 14, 2009, 11:52:17 AM »

Word for word, Chris' post details my reluctance to run OO exclusively at this time. The "every once in a while just enough to be annoying" formatting glitches make substituting it for MS Office too problematic for being able to work on work docs at home. Plus I get MS Office for 20 bucks through a work deal, so I might as well use that.

That being said, I do run OO on my netbook just to save space and resources and because I generally view, versus edit docs on it. Were I retired already, I would likely use OO for everything versus buying MS Office at full price.

Brad Johnson · « **Reply #49 on:** October 14, 2009, 12:02:50 PM »

Quote from: tyme on October 14, 2009, 10:17:38 AM

¿Qué es este "ick factor"?

... Sure it has bugs...

Ha respondido a su propia pregunta.

Quite often my income is absolutely dependent on someone opening a time-sensitive document, or a PowerPoint presentation prepared on one machine and presented on another. I don't have the time, patience, or desire to deal with a bunch of compatibility issues. OO is great if feel like sticking it to "Big Computer", don't have a business need, or just plain don't care that you will probably face a host of cross-platform compatibility issues. I value my time more than that. A few hundred spent on the real thing is nothing compared to what I would probably lose trying to cheap my way into it.

I used to work for a guy who had a great expression - If something doesn't work, free is too expensive.

As for the "importing to older versions" issue, well... the simple fix is to set the default save properties to Office 97. Older-version-compatibility-issues solved.

Brad

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Author Topic: Strange network connectivity issue (Read 12383 times)