PC Tech Thread

ipconfig /release and renew wont cause any damage at all - completely safe to give it a whirl. Also might not fix it but wont make it worse.

Has a device on the network been set with a fixed IP. Look at the router ip table.

my playstation 3 possibly ?

it's the only other thing i have connected up to the router

If its a duplicate IP Windows should tell you.
Reboot your router and when up reboot PS3 and your PC.
When it's all working drop into dos and do a "apr -a >arpGOOD.log" to record the MACs of your PC and PS3.
The "arp" table shows you all the devices it knows about on your network, incl MAC and IPs.
It will show all wireless devices, printers/smartphones etc.

When it goes wrong check it again with "apr -a >arpBAD.log" and then compare the GOOD and BAD logs.
If you only have 2 user devices (and a router) and nothing funny going on these MACs should be the same.

It's possible but unlikely that someone is nicking your broadband and could potentially also be (although more unlikely) spoofing your MAC address. I imagine your MAC will also be printed on the PS3 somewhere.
If it's not someone nicking your broadband, then it sounds like there's something wrong with the DHCP setup on the router.

That command "apr -a >arpGOOD.log" should be "arp -a >arpGOOD.log"

Got a new mouse today to Battlefield on after months of not getting around to it. Not too spendy but thoroughly impressed - Logitech G403 (wired version as I have an aversion to wireless mice).

I've had the same Razer Orochi for about 7 years and it's done me proud but recently buttons have been sticking or non responsive, the optical bit is all gummy and no amount of cleaning seems to want to get it back to peak performance. Was going to get another Razer but thought I'd chance a Logitech - worth it.

Button responses are lightning fast (not actually lightning fast but very fast for my needs), very comfy/ergo position. Not too many silly buttons. Scroll wheel is super smooth and feels really premium if a scroll wheel can feel such a way. Best of all is zipping around the screen very accurately - had a few runs on BF1 this morning and I'm sure it contributed to my highest KD ratio in weeks. Also found it great for editing (video and stills) on this iMac - darts around the screen but in a very controlled way - stops when and where (within a few pixels seemingly) of where I want it to.

44 quid well spent.

Funnily enough...

My mouse died this morning and an hour ago I took delivery of a G403 mouse (gotta love Amazon Prime same day delivery) and I also like it.

csb...

good psot @aggi

Looking to upgrade the ram on a 2008 iMac - Apple iMac "Core 2 Duo" 2.66 20-Inch (Early 2008).
Apple says you can install max 4GB Ram but others say you can actually install 8GB.
Did a quick read and Im thinking to upgrade to 2GB + 4GB to run photoshop, lightroom and potentially a few other photography programs at the same time while dealing with quite large files.

Not looking to spend much but would this upgrade be worth it for the cost? Any other help would be much appreciated

I think I've got 2x4bg RAM for a late 2011 MacBook pro in my drawer somewhere, if they're compatible you can have them for cheap-I upgraded to 2xgb a few years ago and they have been sat in a packet since.

Thanks for the offer, will have a look and find out if its compatible but have the feeling they prob wont be. This is the first time I've looked into ram and actual memory on comps so might take me a while to research specs

Need to purchase a laptop around 13" preferably i7 8GB+and enough juice to run my 2.5 hours each way on the train a day. One that'd play nicely with Linux would be nice too. Whatever i'll be ditching the HDD and popping a SSD in.

Second hand, what should I be searching eBay for?
Days gone by IBM Thinkpad would have been my go-to but i've been on a Mac since C2D were fazed out so i'm a little out the loop on things.

Bonus Q. Are there any small stripped out Windows distros these days?

5 hour commute every day????

Yes, unfortunately. But i'm a TWAT (Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday) so don't feel too sorry for me.
Monday and Friday 5 PM I'm out the door of my house and enjoy miles of country lanes without a traffic light in sight.

Figured I should use my time on the train to learn new skills, hence need for new laptop - work I don't feel would approve if I used theirs!

Thinkpads are still decent.

One thing to look out for, the older i7 laptops on ebay, although of a similar processor power to the newer ones, are much more battery hungry. Lots of the recent progress has been on making the processor use less power rather than go faster. You may be taking a gamble with an older i7 with secondhand battery as to whether it will last 2.5 hours.

My x220 with i7 and 16GB does still manage about 2hrs but that's about it (you can get expanded batteries though). It meets the criteria otherwise.

excuse the sales post, but I thought id try in here before eBay. Is anyone interested in these
MSI Radeon R9 270X 2Gb Twin Frozr graphics card £65
and
AMD Phenom II X4 955 3.2 GHz Quad Core Black Edition processor with stock amd cooler £35

all good working order with boxes

I was expecting surface pro 5, but this isn't too bad I like to think:

http://www.trustedreviews.com/news/microsoft-surface-laptop-release-date-specs-price-rumours-uk

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Oh Yeah.

Fixed my T7600 all by mesell.

(Was shot graphics card in end)

/csb

Which VPN's do people use? Was using ExpressVPN but its really been throttling the speed recently.

I get decent speed (150 Mbps) using Private Internet Access. Not much use for video though, a lot of sites like iplayer have it blocked.

I've got a laptop with a broken screen, ive connected it to an external monitor, but is there a way to get it to show the logon message on the external monitor?

Close the lid on the laptop?

ive moved on to a new issue - ive connected the monitor to a working laptop but cant get any output to the monitor - which is just displaying the Check Signal Cable floating text box

how to troubleshoot monitors?

What's the go with NAS units these days?
I think my HP has finally given up. It was shorting out the powerboard.
Or should I just push everything to the cloud since I already do this for some shit?

@moocher: Try a different video cable and different monitor. Check laptop docs for any external screen hotkey (e.g. Fn+F7 on my thinkpad toggles between off/mirror/extend)