GoRedwings19's Computer Help Hotline

Ok, so my apartment is theoretically wired with Cat 5e throughout. There is a Leviton enclosure in one of my closets. I currently use Verizon FIOS for my internet, phone, and TV. The Actiontec router that Verizon gave us sits outside the closet and is connected to one of the jacks in the apartment via coax. My mac is hardwired to one of the Actiontec's ethernet ports; the rest of the 'puters connect wirelessly. I want to light up some--if not all--of the ethernet ports throughout the house in case the wireless goes down. The problem is that none of the RJ45 jacks in the apartment are connected to the Actiontec router. I suspect that I need a switch (and a s…

According to MacRumors, it is a neutral time to buy a macbook. That said, with the release of Montevino last week, we can expect a macbook refresh relatively soon. I'm not really looking for answers here, but more of opinions: should I just grab a penryn macbook? Is it really worth the wait?

I'm stumped here and hoping someone else may have faced this issue before and solved it already. I'd like to burn some MP3 CDs for my wife's car so she can just put the changer on shuffle and have a decent amount of music on tap. (No, sadly it doesn't have an aux in.) Since I now keep my music in iTunes in lossless format, though, I haven't yet figured out a simple way to convert and burn a large playlist without subsequently ending up with loads of duplicate files needing to be purged from my library. Any thoughts?

Apple announces final MacWorld, Steve Jobs won't deliver keynote - Engadget

I've heard that one should avoid no-name flash drives because then they'll only last a couple of refreshes -- is that true? I was going to get one of the $10-ish 16G ones. Are there any brands I should avoid? Corsair, Kingston, OCZ, Patriot, Crucial, Transcend, IPSG, Lexar, Sandisk, etc.? E.G., I was told to avoid anything like these.

I was going to burn a copy of a commercial audio CD and could not get it to load. No messages, etc. It just makes some noise, then the drive ejects it. I tried some other audio CDs and they loaded fine... any ideas?

For quite some time now I've noticed that I'm constantly having to re-log in on certain websites. Head-Case is fine, but for example if I don't go to Head-Fi for 2 days when I do go back I'm logged out. There are at least 4 or 5 other sites that have been giving me this grief lately. I'm on Firefox 3.0.5 on a Mac. I'm the only one on this machine so I'm not worried about someone getting on and pretending to be me. This problem is really starting to annoy me. Any suggestions? I do periodically clear out private data minus Cookies, Offline Website Data, and Saved Passwords.

I have a bunch of flac files I want to convert to alac. I dl Max and it will transcode to aiff. It is asking me to choose linear pcm 8, 16, 24, 32 bit big endian integer. What should I choose?

Anyone know of a utility that can reset a USB port? Occasionally I will plug something into one of the keyboard ports that draws too much power and it will be disabled. I've also had the front USB port (PowerMac dual G5) be disabled (not sure what one of the kids did to this ), but a restart cleared it.

Ok, I'm real late to this one. But why is bittorrent useful to me? And is it easy to use?

So I got my Aura Note USB DAC/CDP/Integrated and it sounds great, but whenever I have it plugged into my computer via usb I get alot of noise. I assume it's related to the computer in some way, as more activity (scrolling, opening programs) directly affects the noise. It doesn't even matter if I'm using the usb input or not, I can be playing a cd and the noise will be there unless I unplug the usb cable. What should I do? Would a usb hub or something help? Or maybe a shielded cable? I'd appreciate any suggestions. Also, I've used a few other usb audio devices and never had this problem.

I'm looking into getting a 2560 x 1600 30" monitor or so -- what's the best place to look up these guys? I know how to google, but someone posted a couple of good sites to look up laptops, I was wondering if there was an equivalent site for desktop components -- Tom's Hardware? I mean, I know to look at things like contrast ratio and response time, but things like color temperature are so subjective, it'd be really nice to find a place where people have more experience with these things, because most of the local shops don't have much in the way of selection.

I have to get one of these to replace the latest one to die on me. I want something good that will last a couple years at least. For home use, kids and all, and color is a must. Any laser options for all in one? Please give me some ideas. Thank you.

I think the first time I noticed this was yesterday. Cog refuses to load any file into the playlist. Flac, mp3, nothing will play anymore. Any ideas?

So, either what's the best "value" keyboard that I should get, or how much should I consider spending, if they're all the same? Basically, I need to get an add-on for a laptop that I've been using more frequently, and everything I have is PS2. $10? $25? Should I get this? Or should I just get the cheapest thing I can find with full-size keys (currently, the price to beat appears to be US$10)? Or should I get one of those roll-away ones? I'm asking for experience from people who've gotten keyboards for their laptops as well as advice on price-setting.

Is there some way to monitor auction sites or forums such that when a particular product went on sale, you would receive an email or would otherwise be notified? For example, let's say I was in the market for another North Star. I could subscribe to the FS forums on HF, HC, etc. and get daily updates. Same with the 'bay. Not sure about the 'gon. But I'm wondering if there is some sort of service or feed or robot or spider or whateverthefuck that would monitor certain sites and notify me asap when something was posted for sale. Is this remotely feasible, or am I just being an assfacehole?

So I re-imaged my PC a week ago with a custom XP image with SP3 and everything works beautifully, but my usb ports are acting funny. So far, only one of the usb ports in the back seem to see my iriver H140 and H320 as well as my wife's ipod nano without any errors and run full speed 2.0. If I plug them into any other port (4 total in the back, 2 in the front) XP will come up with a message that the device is unknown (ie. I need to install a device driver) or that it could run faster if I upgraded my ports to USB 2.0 high speed (in the latter case I can access my mp3 players, but I ain't waiting 60+ mins to transfer what full speed does in 9 minutes). I installed w…

I have to unplug and reattach my iPod to the Mac several times before it registers in iTunes -- is this a common problem, is there a fix for it, or should I send it back for a replacement? I'm worried about killing the battery. The Mac is at 10.5.5, iTunes is at 8.0.1 (12), and iPod is at 1.1.2 Mac. (And no, I don't plug it and unplug it willy-nilly -- I give it a chance to register every time. One time it even caused iTunes to stop responding, and I had to reboot the computer.)

I went ahead and got a XFX GeForce 9800 GX2 Black Edition last week, but I discovered that I needed 1x 8-pin PCI-E connector and 1x 6-pin PCI-E connector to power this card. I'm not sure what type of PSU would be good. I have a 620W not-so-good PSU right now, and it's a single rail old design one (I have no idea what I'm talking about, I showed it to someone and they told me this rail thing.) Any recommendation for what PSU to get? I'm running 4 HDDs, but that is no problem because most of the newer PSUs have more than enough connectors. Does this look like a good PSU to purchase? Antec - Signature 850 or the 650W version... Antec - Signature 650 Pleas…

Sorry if I'm late to the party on this one, but just found this little hint: Use fine-grain volume control in 10.5 | Mac OS X Hints | Macworld

Meh, guess I'll try asking here. Does anyone know of software that can read the SMART data from drives in USB enclosures? Is it even possible? I would like to be able to check the fitness of a drive without having to plug it in directly, especially 2.5" drives. Another question: I am concerned about the fitness of my primary drive. The raw read error rate has been around 48 since I last started monitoring it, and it flits around between 48 and 49, sometimes going up to 52. This is a Seagate drive, and I assume 100 is the maximum value. Of course, I have no idea whether Seagate is doing some weird shit with the values. I compared my drive to another identical one and…

Someone please stop me from making a costly mistake by throwing my mac mini and Duet into the street and running it over with my Touareg. For the last month or two I've been getting drop outs that last a second to a few seconds. At first it wasn't that bad but now it's happening more and more. I probably shouldn't punish the mac mini and Duet for the problem. I have Comcast for internet which is faster then the ATT DSL I had before. My set up is that I have a Motorola Cable modem and router. I also have an Apple Time Capsule and use the router that is built in instead of the Motorola. I don't know if having them both at the same time is an issue. I connect my comp…

Hey gang- Having some really bad video issues. I've had this BFG 8800GT for a while now, and its been great. Last week I started having problems: yellow lines across the screen, random swirly blue dots showing up in any picture, and several minutes after these errors begin, my screen starts going black for several seconds, then flick back to normal for a second or two, then black, and so on back and forth, basically making it impossible to do anything with my computer. I haven't run any games in a while, this just happens when I'm browsing the internet. My quick resolution is to shut down the computer for a couple of minutes, then turn it back on. Everything works…

I use iTunes to manage my music collection. Its tagging capabilities leave a lot to be desired. I'm playing around with fixtunes to clean up some of the tags, but I was wondering if folks have any other suggestions about a good tagger that works with Mac and iTunes.

What's the best way to rip audio tracks from a DVD? Windows, Linux, Mac? The bonus tracks from my Depeche Mode DVD's are a pain since they're region ...whatever Europe is, but I'd like to have access to them, since some of my favorite tracks are there.