Ask MetaFilter posts tagged with PC

What program is playing music on my PC?

storybored — Thu, 08 Jan 2009 18:11:27 -0800

How do i find out which program is playing music on my PC? This has happened a few times - I'm in a situation that some application or perhaps a certain tab window in Firefox is playing music. What's the fastest way of finding out what that application is? I'm running Windows XP. If it's Firefox, what's the fastest way of finding out what tab it is?

Problem with LCD monitors & native resolution

4midori — Wed, 07 Jan 2009 21:25:00 -0800

Problem finding lower resolution LCD monitor. Hi,

I do web design & dev all day on a PC. My current setup is one 20" LCD as primary monitor, and a cheap 17" CRT as secondary.

Though the LCD's native resolution is 1600X1200, I run it at 1024X768 and it looks pretty good. No eyestrain. This allows me to fit a 960pixel-wide Photoshop image on the screen and work on it comfortably.

I just bought a 24" monitor, but its native resolution is 1900X1200. Running it that high makes everything TINY. I know I can change font sizes and edit other Windows settings, increase font sizes in Firefox, etc., but image editing and menu sizes are all WAY too small. For example, the File menu of applications is really tiny.

Two questions:

-Can I even find a 20" LCD monitor that has a 1024X768 native resolution?

-If not, what's the best solution here? I suppose I could just buy another 20" like I've got.

I have read through previous ask metafilter posts, but didn't quite find the answer.

Fixing fan noise and lowering overall computer noise...

Blazecock Pileon — Mon, 29 Dec 2008 20:12:23 -0800

Homebrew PC is making a lot of noise — advice on how I should fix this? My homebrew is making a lot more noise than it usually does.

1. I suspect that it is one or more of the three fans: One fan for the case, one for the power supply, and one for the CPU.

2. In the course of repairing this, I would also like to dampen as much noise as possible — it was making a fair amount of noise before this issue started, and I use this machine as a video jukebox.

I don't have a lot of spare parts, unfortunately, and the nearest parts shop is about a two-hour trip.

Question A. Is there a safe, easy and inexpensive way to figure out where the noise is coming from, without buying one of each part?

(I can't seem to unplug the case and CPU fans without the computer throwing up error messages on boot-up, and I don't know how to disable the power supply fan.)

Question B. Once I replace the bad part, how can I dampen noise coming from the case?

This is a micro-ATX case. If you have a recommendation for a replacement case that is built to reduce noise as much as possible, I'd appreciate your advice there, too.

Laptop friendly collaborative FPS?

bingoes — Mon, 29 Dec 2008 03:00:03 -0800

Game Filter: Please help this non-gaming lady find something to kill. I've never been a gamer, but a recent house sitting experience that involved an xbox 360, helped me develop a love for first person shooter type games. It's the collaborative play mode that really does it for me. I found the slaying of the flood and locust hordes in Halo 3/Gears of War with boy bingoes exhilarating. Romantic even.
Trouble is we can't really get an xbox or any other type of console at the moment. But we both have pc laptops.
So, dear internet strangers, I was wondering if you might be able to recommend games that suit my particular needs?
My criteria in summary are:
1) Collaborative mode (don't wanna be fighting each other)
2) Campaign (want there to be some purposeful warfare)
3) Networked PC laptop appropriate
This previous question is useful, but I'll be happy to hear about fresh games.

Maybe we should just throw this clunker out

curagea — Sat, 27 Dec 2008 23:58:40 -0800

Double whammy! Persistent "ghost" floppy drive, and slow, halting performance, all on my parents' PC. My parents' PC is an HP Pavilion a412n of 5+ years, on Windows XP Professional. It has enough problems for the past year or two, to warrant two questions:

1. Everytime it start it up, whether from a fresh boot, hiberation, or stand-by, I get "Floppy disk(s) fail (40)". Then, I have to press F2 to continue with the booting, which proceeds along fine.

The floppy drive is long gone already. "All right", I thought. "Let's just disable the floppy drive then in the BIOS." Did just that, reboot, yay, the message is gone!

Until the next time I boot it up/revive from hiberation. The message appears again. Then I go back into the BIOS to disable the floppy drive. Lather/rinse/repeat. A couple of times, I rebooted after disabling the non-existent drive, and it STILL gives me the damn message.

What's up here? Some mystery cable in the computer? I didn't think a floppy CABLE alone would cause the problem. Another drive messing with us? We have a ZIP drive and a dual-layer DVD burner (why, I don't know, my dad's stupid sometimes) with no problems. A faulty BIOS? I hate to think that's the case, since it might mean "just frickin' buy a new PC already", and money is tight these days. Help!

2. The PC is always "working". The hard drive light is always blinking/on, except after an HD defrag or when it's off. I've tried spyware scans, virus scans, defragging and Glary Utilities for the temp files and whatever. However, I don't use Glary's Registry cleaner, since from past experience, any Register cleaner eventually screwed up something that snowballs into a schizophrenic PC. Also, I've looked up on "unnecessary" Windows services and tweaked those too. Nope.

Surfing the Internet is sluggish too, but not bandwidth-wise. Usually, after clicking a link, the PC kind of lags before continuing on. This happens in IE7. I could try to get my mom and pop to convert to Firefox, but it's hard to teach these old dogs new tricks. They tried Firefox once and said they didn't like it *gasp*. I doubt they'll like Opera either.

FWIW, it's a Celeron processor, which I know is pretty weak to begin with. But in the PC's early days, it was preppy. Net surfing was a snap. Now, everytime I'm by my mom's side, she complains about how slow the PC is.

My parents do the most basic of computing basics: read email, write documents and spreadsheets, once in a while listen to someone's podcast or watch YouTube for business. No one else uses the PC. The HD is only a quarter full.

So, what's the verdict? Can I prep this old PC into shape again without reinstalling (did that once, didn't help matters)? What other cleanups am I missing, if any?

No "buy a new PC" or "get a Mac" or "get Linux" advice, please. Money's tight, and like I said: I can't teach those two old dogs new tricks.

New DVD box set won't play o DVD player but plays fine on my PC. Why?

GuyZero — Fri, 26 Dec 2008 19:02:40 -0800

New DVD box set (the Flintstones!). It won't play on my DVD player ("Incompatible disc") but plays fine on my PC. Why? Should I take them back? Are they bad? (I threw out the receipt, argh). I realize I can just copy them to DVD-Rs but I'm concerned that my DVD player is possibly dumb and/or outdated although it doesn't have these issues in general and I am loathe to replace it just to watch the Flintstones.

In search of my new best friend...

fogonlittlecatfeet — Sat, 20 Dec 2008 20:32:37 -0800

What New Laptop should I buy? I know there are probably a bazillion threads on this topic, so I apologize now for being redundant. But with the rate that technology changes and upgrades itself, I figure you can never be too up to date on this stuff and those other threads don't deal with what I want.
I am in the market for a new laptop. I am open to any and all ideas. I have about $1200 or so to spend. I would use it for your typical joeschmoe computer stuff: internet, digital photo and mp3 storage, and organizing simple documents and spreadsheets for work. I have been given the money as a gift "for a new laptop" so while i realize this is quite a bit of money for what I would be using it for, I might as well go all out.

I am currently using a mac and am enjoying it, and definitely see why some people won't use anything else. But, as of right now, I am kinda of leaning toward going back to Windows, since that is what I am most comfortable with. Anyone care to convince me otherwise?
What if I was dead set against a Mac? then what would you suggest?

Here are a few negotiable specs -
i don't want it to be too heavy as I take it everywhere. That said, I am not the most careful person. Gimme something that can take a licking.
I would like a nice big screen, but would rather it be light, and for it to fit in a backpack type computer bag.
I am tired of my cramped keyboard on my iBook. A nice big keyboard with back lit keys would be great.
I also HATE the speakers on my iBook. is there a laptop with good built in speakers?

Thanks in advance.

What should I look for in a laptop?

Caz721 — Fri, 19 Dec 2008 09:32:11 -0800

What sort of specs should I look for for my new (sub-$600) PC laptop? My old laptop has been giving me a lot of problems, and as it is nearly 6 years old, I think I'm ready to get a new one. However, I'm having trouble figuring out what specs I should focus on as I compare what's available. Any advice as to what to focus on or caution as to what to avoid would be appreciated. I'm not sure exactly what details are relevant, so I apologize for the length below. I have read the previous questions on similar topics, but none seem to fit exactly, so I hope someone will have some advice.

I use my computer for internet, Microsoft Office, Itunes, and digital photo storage. I'd like something that has adequate memory so I won't have to worry about storing music/pictures. Additionally, I'd like something that I can use when I work from home, instead of bringing my work laptop home. Working from home I connect to my office network through a VPN, and sometimes use document review and database programs, as well as Office programs. My work laptop is an 80 GB Dell Latitude and is 2 years old or so (running windows XP I think). I use a cable internet connection at home, if that's relevant.

Size and weight is less of a concern, because I don't travel with my laptop often. I've ruled out the little netbooks based on size however because I need a larger screen size when I work from home (I've considered the netbook + monitor, but I usually work on the couch in apartment, so I think that would be awkward). I think my current screen is 15" and it doesn't have to be exactly that, but in that range would be best.

I've recently heard/read here at AskMe that people seem to be unhappy with the current Dell laptops. Is this true? Is there a brand recommendation or should I concentrate more on a set of specifications? Which ones?

Thanks for all your help.

N64 controllers for emulators

scission — Thu, 18 Dec 2008 11:23:18 -0800

What's the best way to play N64 on your laptop? (Controllers question) I'm trying to buy my boyfriend two (or more) controllers for playing N64 emulators on his laptop. I believe he's running Mupen 64 Plus on Ubuntu, although he has a Windows partition that he could use if it's the best solution.

What's the best controller to get for N64 gaming, and how can I find out if it will work on his computer? He's definitely savvy enough to download drivers, etc. on his own, but I'd prefer something as simple as possible, since it's a gift!

I don't know anything about emulator peripherals, and I've only used Ubuntu for a couple months, so I feel way over my head in trying to sort through a lot of the forum results when I google this. Thanks in advance for your help! I've searched the archives, and it looked like it's fine if I ask about emulators and interoperability as long as I don't want anyone to help me find ROMs. Hope this question is okay.

Looking for a solution to finding and using special characters.

iamkimiam — Fri, 12 Dec 2008 11:25:05 -0800

What is the best, most efficient FREE way to get a bunch of people on the same page with IPA or special character fonts, across platforms? My fellow linguists and I are having a hard time figuring out the best way to allow ourselves to write our documents and papers containing special (IPA) characters. Some of us are on a mac, some PC, and we even have a Linux user or two. Most of us use Microsoft Word.

Keyboard shortcuts only take us so far, because crucial letters like Thorn and Eth are unavailable (as far as I can tell), but what is nice about the shortcuts is that you can pass the document around, change fonts, etc. and the characters are unchanged (epsilon still looks like epsilon in Times, Arial, etc.)

OR, using the SIL IPA fonts, requiring all of us to have them installed...I know the IPA special characters are included in the font of course, but how do we find/see them?* Does MS Word have a character map or keyboard shortcut feature that will let us see how to pick/make the characters we need?

What has worked best for you? Is there an industry standard method for this type of work/document creation?

I would like to figure this out, and then set up some simple step-by-step instructions for the rest of my classmates. Your help in understanding how this works is greatly appreciated!

*I have no problem seeing the entire glyph set in Adobe InDesign, so I know the characters are there, but nobody else has that program of course, and we need to be able to do this in Word. Typing alphabet strings while holding down various keys to map it all out is SILLY. Somebody has got to have already figured this out.

What PC most broadened the market relative to its time?

Joe Beese — Fri, 12 Dec 2008 09:12:35 -0800

What PC most broadened the market relative to its time? Commenting in an "old Radio Shack catalog" appreciation thread here, it occurred to me that while the Apple II is more affectionately remembered, that other alumnus of the Class of '77 - the unglamorous TRS-80 - may actually have introduced more people to PCs, relative to the number that were then using them. [While the IBM PC may have introduced more people altogether, it was starting with a wider base.]

Is my history flawed?

My Brand New Computer Won't Boot from the DVD Drive! Help!

adi — Wed, 10 Dec 2008 19:09:23 -0800

My brand new Core i7 computer will not boot from the DVD Drive to install Vista - please help me tell my bios what they need to know to make this thing boot! (screen shots included inside, along with full details) I have a Gigabyte GA-EX58-DS4 Motherboard, and the NEC DVD Drive is the only IDE connection I'm using. The jumper on it is set to Master, and I've tried two different IDE cables to no avail.

Here are five screenshots from the boot process:
http://twitpic.com/rt0v
http://twitpic.com/rt10
http://twitpic.com/rt1l
This is what happens past the bios:
http://twitpic.com/rt1w

And this is what happens when it tries to use the NEC DVD drive. Also noteworthy is that the green light on the drive only comes on when the machine is initially booting up, but not when it should be looking for the Vista boot disk:
http://twitpic.com/rt1y

Need to compare registry before and after an install and end up with a merge-able regfile

John Kenneth Fisher — Fri, 05 Dec 2008 11:41:42 -0800

I need to scan an XP registry BEFORE an installation, then rescan the registry AFTER the installation, and end up with a merge-able reg file that I can then apply to multiple computers via AD or startup script. Finding a program that simply compares before or after (like regshot), or exporting a text file before and after and comparing then via, say, Windiff, is easy. But with the results being in the many thousands, I need a way to end up not with a text list but an actual regfile that contains said changes.

If I may call upon a rather out-of-favor Mefi-ism, Administrators! Hope me!

WE HAVE COMPUTERS

djgh — Wed, 26 Nov 2008 16:57:38 -0800

Found an old computer in the basement. What steps should I go through to get it up and running? Seems a previous tenant left a computer tower in the basement. It's from, at the newest, 2003.

I plugged it into power, hit the on button, and stuff whirred, and green lights came on. It doesn't have any cables, mouse or a monitor, and my access to a monitor will be limited to what I can borrow off friends for short periods (have a MacBook, if there's some neat trick to be able to use it as a monitor...).

What can I do to get this up and running (thinking of installing Linux or BSD) - what bits will I need to scrounge, what should I do to check that everything's in place hardware-wise etc.?

And secondly, what flavour of Linux/Unix should I install, and how can I go about making this thing useful beyond being a pretty neat geeky playground?

Basically, what's the ABC of going from pile of junk to functional in this situation?

What is the best way to sync folders on a Mac to folders on a PC media server?

raddevon — Wed, 26 Nov 2008 06:48:14 -0800

What is the best way to sync folders on a Mac to folders on a PC media server across a network? I'm a recent Mac switcher, but I still use a PC media server in my home. I have a few folders on my Macbook Pro (running Leopard) that I would like to sync to folders on my XP-based media server across my home network. I have looked at a few options, but I haven't yet found one I like.

I tried creating a folder action, but that didn't seem to work very well. I wanted the action to connect to the server first in case I had been using my computer elsewhere and the share was unmounted. However, if the action tried this when the share was actually mounted, it crashed.

Lacie makes a program for syncing that should work, but I read a horror story about it (involving losing all data on the destination drive) and got a little scared to try it.

MS has FolderShare, but it has to run in the background all the time and places an icon not only on the menu bar but also in the dock. It is a beta so I imagine the service will either disappear at some point or become a paid service. I would prefer a software solution to a service-based one.

Any ideas? Free is good, but I would pay a little for a really slick solution.

Will my computer work when I put it together?

Grither — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 06:22:55 -0800

ComputerBuildingFilter: As my home PC just recently kicked the bucket, I'm looking into building my own PC for the first time, and I want to make sure the parts I'm looking at buying are compatible. So I want to put together a new desktop for myself, and for the first time I think I have the time and means to build my own. I basically used the Arstechnica guide to put this list together (but with a few changes from their guide) which led me to my question. My main concern is that the case is suitable for everything else I am putting there, I think the rest of the stuff is compatible. Is there anything totally wrong, or that I'm missing/overdoing? (Besides the obvious mouse, keyboard, monitor, and optical drive, I have all of those) Thanks in advance for any help!

Intel Core 2 Duo E8500 Wolfdale 3.16GHz LGA 775 65W Dual-Core Processor Model BX80570E8500

GIGABYTE GA-EP45-DS3L LGA 775 Intel P45 ATX Intel Motherboard

G.SKILL 4GB (2 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 800 (PC2 6400) Dual Channel Kit Desktop Memory Model F2-6400CL5D-4GBPQ

Creative Sound Blaster X-Fi XtremeGamer 7.1 Channels PCI Interface Sound Card

Western Digital Caviar Black WD1001FALS 1TB 7200 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive

RAIDMAX SMILODON ATX-612WBP Black 1.0mm SECC Steel ATX Mid Tower Foldout MB Computer Case With 500W Power Supply

DIAMOND 4870X2PE52G Radeon HD 4870 X2 2GB 512-bit (256-Bit x 2) GDDR5 PCI Express 2.0 x16 HDCP Ready CrossFire Supported Video Card

Need to simplify Vista. Please do not answer "get a mac."

hooray — Mon, 24 Nov 2008 15:49:00 -0800

What can I do to simplify my parents' new PC? I've never used Vista before. I'm home for the holiday, and my parents bought a new computer last month. It runs Microsoft Vista, and I'm kind of overwhelmed by all of the superfluous features. I only have experience with XP and previous generations, and I'm really not in touch with what's happening in the Windows world anymore.

I've already installed Firefox, made default fonts bigger and switched back to the XP theme, but I don't know what else to do. It's primary used as an e-mail checking machine with very light web browsing.

Can I trust the Windows Firewall? What's the best virus protection? How do I get Vista to stop asking me for confirmation anytime I want to do something? Is there any benefit to keeping Norton, and if not, what is the best alternative? Any essential software recommendations or links to similar questions are appreciated.

Building a uber powerful gaming pc, need your help

spinko — Sat, 22 Nov 2008 15:03:44 -0800

Building a uber powerful gaming pc, what parts to buy as I don't want to be a sucker. Need your help. Intel Core i7 I currently own a Mac (macbook pro 4gb) for business, even through it is fast in bootcamp. I want better for MMO's and FPS games. This is strictly a gaming machine, and needs to be future proof. I haven't built a computer in 2 years, so I have gone abit rusty.

My budget is £2000 (~$3500) just for the box. I already have a 30inch Cinema display, so I want to play games at the natural resolution (2560 x 1600) with a good 60+ fps.

Here is my list of what I want.

CPU:
Core i7 940 (2.93ghz quad + hyperthreading) ~£470
I want to overclock this cpu as much as I can. I have seen this processor get to 3.4ghz with no problems. I will need a good Motherboard or fan to do this.

The extreme version, is it worth it?

Should I wait for a faster processor coming out in a few months?

HDD:
Raptor 300gb (10k rpm)
or
SAS Hdd's (15k rpm) I dont know too much about this, is it worth it?

Is their any benefit of having a solid state hard drive for bootup OS?

Im not too bothered about size, I don't need 1tb as I only need it for games (300gb max)

PSU:
750, 1000 or 1500 watt? do I need more power for overclocking? or is it just money down the drain.

Video card/s:
The new cards confuse me

SLI cards x2: Does this actually improve gaming performance, or shall I keep with a single 1gb graphics card? Nvidia or ATI?

Others:
Need a good Motherboard, memory (to match the mb) and video card.

Motherboard needs to be good for overclocking.

Also, I may go with Vista 64bit dual boot with XP 32bit. I have heard about something better than software dual boot. Cannot remember what it was.

Memory is limited to 3gb on XP 32bit, however can handle more that 3gb on Vista 64bit. Is it worth going for 64bit Vista for gaming or stick to 32bit non dx10 XP? (I went over to Mac due to Vista, last year for business).

Memory will have to match the top FSB if possible. Unless you cannot see any difference.

Anything extra that will improve performance?

Instead of building my own, could you recommend a pre-built spec. I live in Spain but go to the UK frequently. I know Falcon NW will ship to Spain for $400, but the benefit is the warranty, negatives are the power supply. However building it myself each equipment piece has warranty.

Thanks if you can help.

Colonization: Lost in Space?

Iosephus — Fri, 14 Nov 2008 17:38:50 -0800

YAWWTPCGQ (yet another "what was that PC game?" question) I haven't seen this one on abandonware sites, but if I'm wrong please point me to such a link for extra kudos... It went sort of like this: you are the captain of a second human colony ship, just arrived to some extrasolar system. You were supposed to find the first ship waiting for you or at least a message, but nothing is in sight. You can defrost your people and build colonies on the several planets and moons to get needed supplies, do fixes and all such. While exploring the local system, ruins abound, and depending on how you interact with them different things and game-lines unfold. I recall that trying to mine the upper atmospheres of the gas giants, for instance, caused some creepy psi message from a jovian species, which in part explained where the first ship went wrong. At some point the local star did a mininova, pretty much ruining all your supply gathering and ship fixing. This was more or less the point at which I always got boggled and failed to forever find out what happened. I recall having played the game around 1995, and it had pretty good graphics for its time (VGA?). Triple kudos if you can tell me the end!

Fletcharr!

popcassady — Fri, 14 Nov 2008 16:34:54 -0800

PC repair people, how do you deal with difficult screws? Despite its siblings undoing without a fuss, there's always one -- invariably, the tiniest screw in the most awkward of places -- that will refuse to budge. No amount of effort will prevent the screwdriver from slipping. Too much effort and the head will wear away so that there's no place for the screwdriver to grip.

How do you undo difficult screws? Is my miniature screwdriver set no good? How can I avoid stripping the heads? Is there a wonder tool that will solve this problem at once and for good?

After the restoration

Sara Anne — Fri, 14 Nov 2008 11:48:37 -0800

A couple of weeks ago I had to do a System Restore on my PC, after which I had to reinstall Microsoft Office (2007). Ever since, every time I I open an office program like word or Excel, the program has to go through a long configuration process. This is only true for Microsoft Office programs. I'd like to figure out a way to make this stop.

Help me play Left 4 Dead 4 Cheap

bettershredder — Wed, 12 Nov 2008 12:54:07 -0800

What is the cheapest pc gaming rig you can come up with that can run Left 4 Dead at a playable and decent framerate? here's what i came up with.. though i'm thinking this PSU will probably crap out in a couple months and it'll probably be worth it to invest in a better quality one.

-CPU- AMD Athalon 64 X2 5000+ 2.6ghz $60 - http://tinyurl.com/33auhu
-GPU- EVGA 8600GT 256MB $40 (rebate) - http://tinyurl.com/57s4ep
-RAM- Corsair 4GB (2x 2GB) DDR2 800 $24.99 (rebate) - http://tinyurl.com/3rm25d
-HD- Seagate 80GB 7200RPM $38.99 - http://tinyurl.com/2kkm9j
-CD/DVD- Lite-On 20X Super Allwrite $21.99 - http://tinyurl.co/39wk6l
-Mobo- BIOSTAR nForce 520D $33.99 - http://tinyurl.com/5podvh
-CASE- Linkworld /w 400W PSU $36.99 - http://tinyurl.com/5hcjo6

total = $256.95

lemme know what you guys think!

Production values are overrated

aspo — Wed, 12 Nov 2008 12:06:39 -0800

For the past 6-7 years I've owned a mac and therefore paid very little attention to the indie freeware/shareware pc games scene. Recently I got a copy of crossover for my macbook and I'm looking for good places to find small, quality, non resource-intensive games to play. In the past I've really enjoyed games like Dwarf Fortress or Dominions, games that were built by one or two guys on their off hours as a labor of love.

Now that I've got crossover, I've not only been playing some of great abandonware games of my semi-youth, I've also been having a blast staying up way past my bedtime playing old pc games like Space Empires 4 and Slay. But where can I find more games like these? Especially with 5+ years old games it seems really hard to find the gems out there.

Why does sound playback "drag" sporadically on my PC?

steeb2er — Thu, 06 Nov 2008 07:03:07 -0800

Why does sound playback "drag" sporadically on my recently built (decently powerful) PC? In the spring I built a new PC. I'm using the on-board sound card. Specs below:

- GIGABYTE GA-P35-DS3L LGA 775 Intel P35 ATX All Solid Capacitor Intel Motherboard
- EVGA 256-P2-N768-A1 GeForce 8600GTS SSC 256MB 128-bit GDDR3 PCI Express x16 HDCP Ready SLI Supported Video Card
- Intel Core 2 Duo E4600 Allendale 2.4GHz LGA 775 65W Dual-Core Processor Model BX80557E4600
- Western Digital Caviar SE16 WD2500KS 250GB 7200 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive
- CORSAIR XMS2 2GB (2 x 1GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 800 (PC2 6400) Dual Channel Kit Desktop Memory Model TWIN2X2048-6400C5DHX

When I playback basically anything (MP3s, DVDs, Youtube videos, Myspace music) the sound has a tendency to drag. I'm not doing any intense processing (90+% idle) or hardcore downloading. Its not my internet connection, since it happens with MP3s on my comp as well. There doesn't seem to be any connection to activities (ie. the dragging happens randomly, not while opening a new browser window or something along those lines).

I've updated the driver (the latest is from 09/2008). I'm running XP Professional SP3. Firefox 3.0.3. Windows Media Player (same problem in iTunes and WinAMP).

Any suggestions?

I'm hoping for a free answer (not "buy a new soundcard"). Thanks!

How to Troubleshoot Intermittent Network Problem

aereoperro — Wed, 05 Nov 2008 16:02:22 -0800

I have a new pc hooked up and it gets the Internet all the time, no problem checking e-mail, surfing or pinging anything on the WWW. However, I have intermittent problems remotely logging into that machine, either via ssh or vnc. If I ping the machine for long intervals of time, I've seen packet loss of around 90%. Does anybody have a good idea of where to start diagnosing this problem?