Leapo
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Posts posted by Leapo
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screens? and resolution?
Three 22" widescreens running at 1680x1050 each (5040x1050 combined resolution)
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Yay panorama!
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Gaming PC:
CPU: AMD Phenom II X4 920 Black Edition (Quad Core, overclocked to 4GHz)
Motherboard: Foxconn Destroyer nForce 780 SLI
RAM: 6GB DDR2 1000MHz (2x4GB + 2x1GB) in dual channel mode.
Hard Disk 1: Two (2x) SATA Seagate 7200.10 320GB (in RAID1 as OS Drive)
Hard Disk 2: Two (2x) SATA Seagate 7200.11 1TB (in RAID1 as Storage Drive)
Optical Drive: LG 22x SATA DVD-RW Drive
Video Card 1: Nvidia GeForce GTX 260 896mb.
Video Card 2: Nvidia GeForce 8400GTS 256mb (integrated on motherboard).
Sound Card 1: SoundBlaster Xfi.
Sound Card 2: SoundBlaster Audigy 2.
Case: LianLi PC 65B (Fan holes increased in size to fit 120mm fans)
Case Fans: All fans are Yate Loon 120mm model D12SL-12 (black)
Power Supply: Corsair TX750 (750w).
CPU Heatsink: XIGMATEK HDT-S1284EE (Product Link)
Monitor 1: ASUS VW224U Black (22" wide screen LCD) on GTX260.
Monitor 2: ASUS VW224U Black (22" wide screen LCD) on GTX260.
Monitor 3: ASUS VW224U Black (22" wide screen LCD) on 8400GS.
Mouse: Microsoft Wireless IntelliMouse Explorer.
Keyboard: Saitek Eclipse II.
Speakers: Altec Lansing Model 221 (Stereo speakers + subwoofer, 2.1).
Gamepad: Wireless Official XBOX 360 Gamepad.
Operating System: Windows Vista Ultimate x64.
The integrated 8400GS on my motherboard handles my 3rd monitor; I decided to go this route instead of using my old 8800GTS for dedicated PhysX because it dumped a lot of heat into my case and went unused most of the time. In most games, I play across all 3 monitors using SoftTH to do the spanning to the 3rd monitor (the GTX260 does all the 3D rendering, the 8400GS is only used as an extra display head).
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Stop screwing with the school computers; if you really don't want to be monitored, bring a laptop from home and use that instead.
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You're John Oliver? The comedian / actor commonly featured on the Comedy Central's The Daily Show?
Somehow, I highly doubt that. Stop with the fake names, who the hell are you really?
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WTF?! ok. just came accross this and thought this was an astonishingly
dumndumb conversation peiceI don't know, looks a lot more comfortable than the desks we put up with at my college.
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What I don't get is how you can expect faster boot times from RAM when any memory that stores the OS is flushed on power-down. The OS would need to be reloaded to this special allocation of RAM from a hard drive before it could boot.
True, but Moonlit wasn't talking about a full power down, he was talking about a soft-reset (also known as a "warm boot").
the Amiga aOS had a RAD disk, which was a RAM disk that could survive a soft reset.This is a situation where the OS restarts but the computer itself stays running (POST and BIOS aren't re-run). The RAM never loses power, so the information stored there is preserved.
Similar functionality can be seen on modern hardware when dropping into ACPI mode S3 (suspend to RAM), though in the case of S3 mode, the OS is being suspended and resumed rather than restarted.
Edit: After some discussion with Moonlit elsewhere, it seems there's already a commercial product that does what he's after:
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In industry, if a RAM as in DRAM and SRAM is used as a disk, as in you can read and write to it like a hard drive, it is referred to a RAM disk.
Only if it's system RAM being allocated as a mountable volume via a software layer.
Wikipedia, which you seem to hold to a higher standard than your fellow community members, agrees with me by the way: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RAM_disk
If you'll notice, right at the top of the article, it even says "For hardware storage devices using RAM, see solid-state drive."
Whether it is on the motherboard as part of system memory or on a device like the ACard doesn't matter.It matters quite a bit, it completely changes the definition. A software solution involving RAM on the motherboard would be a RAM Drive, a hardware solution like the ACard counts as a SSD.
It is referred to as a RAM disk because of features of the RAM, like being volatile.As a whole, the iRAM is not volatile because of its battery. The type of memory modules used does not change the fact that, in this configuration, it is an SSD.
I've spelled out the distinction, if you refuse to acknowledge it then I can't help but pity you as you wallow in your own ignorance.
The reason why I quote the problem with the DMA, is that you can't use the RAM as a disk controller for the full performance, a disk controller uses DMA to transfer data to the processor. Disk controllers only use a small amount of memory because normally they are slow and the CPU will take the data before it has more to load. In this case it won't be, your bottle neck is now going to be waiting for the CPU to take the data before you can read any more data into system memory. You've now lost all the benefits of RAM disk beacuse your spending half your time waiting. This is why you need a huge DMA area, which is impractical.Erm, the faster the drive gets, the less important DMA buffer size becomes. Something as fast as a DRAM based SSD with a custom disk controller hooked up to PCIe would be fine on current average DMA buffer sizes.
All DMA is designed to do is keep the processor from getting hung up waiting for a disk operation to complete. A storage device as fast as the one we're talking about would render DMA nearly obsolete. If you were able to load up the SSD with RAM as fast as your system RAM and used a wide enough (as in bandwidth) PCIe slot, you could theoretically switch it over to PIO mode and not notice any performance impact.
This is why the Gigabyte iRAM and the ACard use the Sata interface, because people don't want to loose all of their system memory to a device which uses all the addressable space as DMA.Wrong again, they use SATA because it allows the device to use the controller of your choice. It takes supporting the wide range of existing operating systems off of their plate and leaves it all up to the SATA controller manufacturer. It also allows simple configuration of advanced drive setups like RAID.
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Actually the Gigabyte iRAM is a RAM Drive, if you hadn't noticed it is made up of RAM.
Incorrect, you're missing a key distinction...A RAM disk, in the traditional sense, is a software layer that enables applications to transparently use RAM (often a segment of main memory) as if it were a hard disk or other secondary storage. Quite obviously, this does not describe the Gigabyte iRAM.
A solid-state drive (SSD) is any data storage device that uses solid-state memory to store persistent data. DRAM is solid state memory, and is made persistent via the enclosed battery, ergo the Gigabyte iRAM is a SSD. Wikipedia calling such SSDs based on DRAM "RAM Drives" is a misnomer (Just as SSDs based on NAND Flash are sometimes refered to "Flash Drives" though they bear little resemblance to their tiny USB cousins).
If that wasn't clear enough, a SSD is hardware, a RAM Disk is software.
The only way aRAM diskDRAM based SSD is going to be useful now is if it transfers across the PCI-E bus, but the problem with that is that I believe for that your going to have to use Direct Memory Access, so what you could end up with is not having any system memory available as its all mapped to external devices. In fact I really wonder what happens with that? Hopefully the architects have been clever and said that a certain amount of system memory can't be mapped away.That part you got right, to take advantage of a DRAM based SSD you would need the speeds offered by PCI Express. I imagine a 4x slot would be adiquate to start seeing some serious performance gains.
As for the DMA problem, you're over thinking it. All the PCIe card has to do is represent itself to the OS as a disk controller (with an attached drive). Problem solved.
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ok...lets take that one line at a time...While I agree withmoonliteMoonlit,thatI think that the feasibility of this project is a bit questionable,.gigabyteGigabytedoes makemakes apciPCI card whichallowwould allow you to use some ram as a hard disk. http://techreport.com/articles.x/9312You could conceivably install
the osan OS on theram diskRAM Disk andthenconnect to it from afloopyfloppy or flash drive loaded with grub or lilo.Though, performance per dollar,
I would sayit looks to me as if it would be a better value to justtobuy araptorRaptor hard drive.
That's not quite what Moonlit had in mind, he wants to use main system RAM as a RAM Drive, not build a SSD out of yet more RAM.While I agree with Moonlit, I think that the feasibility of this project is a bit questionable. Gigabyte makes a PCI card which would allow you to use some ram as a hard disk. http://techreport.com/articles.x/9312
The Gigabyte iRAM is not a RAM Drive, it's a SSD (Solid State Drive).You could conceivably install an OS on the RAM Disk and connect to it from a floppy or flash drive loaded with grub or lilo.You also don't need any special bootloader setup for the Gigabyte iRAM to work either, it uses a trickle-charge from the PCI bus (which is available even wen the computer is off) as well as a battery pack (in case of power failure) to keep the information stored in the RAM alive, and it connects via SATA, so that it acts just like a regular hard disk...just a whole lot faster.
I'm sorry, but the Gigabyte iRAM wins "Performance per dollar" hands down, you would need a pile of Raptors in RAID to match it across the board.Though, performance per dollar, it looks to me as if it would be a better value to just to buy a Raptor hard drive.Now, capacity is another matter, a Raptor offers a lot more space per dollar than the iRAM.
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3x 22" widescreens with a total resolution of 5040x1050. Finding wallpaper that wide is a pain
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a pic if you haven't seen this done before.
Great technique for building silent computers.
That's actually very bad for the drives. A condition known as "the wobbles" can occur where the drive rhythmically wobbles in a circular pattern. This puts stress on the platters and can make it harder for the read heads to track properly (which may, in the worst case, result in write errors). The effect is usually not very pronounced and takes careful watching while the drive is in operation to see, but it does have an effect on the drive nonetheless.
I know I'm going to get responses like "I've been doing this for years and my drives are fine". Good for you, but I can assure you you're probably shortening the lifespan of those drives by putting undue mechanical stresses on them.
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Driver is hosted right on Microsoft's website:
http://www.microsoft.com/hardware/downloads/default.mspx
Here's the direct link for the Windows XP 32bit driver for the wired Xbox 360 gamepad:
http://download.microsoft.com/download/0/0...ox360_32Eng.exe
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Make sure your audio and video drivers are up to date, make sure the game is fully patched, try again.
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OCZ ROADSTER is half the size of that
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GASP! You managed to crash a beta release of an operating system!
...what exactly is the point of this thread?
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Option A:
Leave "Microsoft Windows Vista Home Premium" selected when you order the laptop. There's only laptop from Dell comes with Ubuntu by default, and it's not the one she ordered. This is fully her fault for selecting that OS.
Option B:
Order a Windows disc off the internet for $89 (Product Link). This would have solved the problem she created quickly and cheaply.
Option C:
Stick with Ubuntu, spend a few hours on the phone with Verison so they can walk you through getting online. Look more into OpenOffice to see if it will work for you college classes or install Microsoft Office under WINE. (yes, this involves actual "work", but it is an option).
Option D:
Blow the situation way out of proportion; don't go online looking for solutions, call the local news crew and blame Dell for something that is clearly your fault.
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Ok guys, got a break from college work this weekend, I'm going to take a crack at getting these issues fixed in the next couple of days. Sorry for dropping off the radar for a few weeks, but shit happens.
Stay tuned...
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*Leapo starts a slow clap for Moonlit, the entire IRC joins in for a standing ovation*
BRAVO! BRAVO! ENCORE!
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A premade ISO is included with v0880, why are you trying to build a new one in the first place?
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Geeze guys, I'm not dead! I'm busy during the week and i work on my payload on the weekends.
I'll see what i can do about squashing some bugs in the morning, we should have a new release out by Sunday afternoon. Just sit tight
Edit: One more thing, anybody joining the The IRC network, please go to #usb-hacks instead of #hak5 to discuss the switchblade. USB hack discussion isn't allowed in the main #hak5 channel.
Netgear WNDA3100 driver: No XP x64
in Questions
Posted
You can't really blame them, Windows XP 64bit has always been an under-supported OS, and there are a number of reason why.
The first issue is that Windows XP 64bit isn't Windows XP at all, it's Windows Server 2003. Instead of doing major revisions to the Windows XP codebase, Microsoft build Windows XP 64bit on top of Windows Server 2003 since it already had a working 64bit variant. This means Windows XP 64bit doesn't even use the same kernel version as Windows XP 32bit, which can cause driver programmers some serious headaches.
This leads up to issue number two, a lot of licensed software sees Windows XP 64bit as Windows Server 2003 and refuses to install because their licensing conditions don't cover server operating systems. This is especially common with Antivirus software.
The biggest reason is that Microsoft did not require OEMs to produce drivers for both 32bit and 64bit versions of Windows XP in order to slap the "Designed for Windows XP" logo on the box.
When Microsoft created Windows Vista, they based both the 32bit and 64bit on the same codebase and kernel version, which helps resolve the first two issues. Microsoft now also requires all OEMs to produce drivers in both 32bit and 64bit flavors before they're allowed to put the "Certified for Windows Vista" logo on the box. This has lead to nearly all new devices supporting both 32bit and 64bit Vista.
In short, Windows XP 64bit is not a great choice of operating system. If you want to make the jump to 64bit, I recommend you use Windows Vista or Windows 7 for compatibility reasons.