welo

While it is still working I took the opportunity to run some speed tests. Again, this is supposed to be an 8MB connection...

I had better throughput for less money with my Maxnet Premier 3MB/1MB.

My subjective impression of browsing the Internet is that it is significantly slower.

Don't ADSL providers start at lower connection rates with newly setup lines and slowly increase speeds (over hours, days?) when the connection proves to be stable? Heard that somewhere but only have experience with 2MBit lines where the linespeed was always setup at maximum from the beginning.

On the other hand, if so, it should not have negative effect on the subjective impression when browsing the internet which is hardly limited by the local connection speed but by international bandwith.

welo

These are pics from less than a month ago at Panthip BKK when I was screening laptops for a friend.

I found merely 3-4 models below 15.000,-. See the pictures below. Maybe others can comment on the specs and the differences. Prices probably without 7% VAT.

I ended up buying a 2nd Hand Compaq V3400 (14" Core Duo @1.7Ghz, 120GB HDD, 1GB RAM, Geforce Go 7200, WLAN/BT, DVD-RW) for 10.000,- THB (starting offer was 12.000). Seemed to me like a good bargain at that time, since 4 year old 2nd Hand models with Pentium M 1.6, 512MB RAM, 40-60GB HDD and often worn out look were advertised starting from just under 8000 THB.

However, I nearly blew it off, recommending my friend to go with one of those new laptops on the pictures (maybe the eMachine?), having the advantage of a new battery and 1 year warranty (harddrive maybe even longer).

I would never recommend an inexperienced user to buy 2nd hand at Panthip. The laptop I bought had a faulty DVD drive which was not so obvious (could read and write CDs fine but not DVDs) and I had it replaced (before I bought). The shop offered a 1-month warranty but from how they struggled to accept the DVD drive as faulty and exchange it ('but it can read CDs can't it?') I would not expect much.

And I am still not sure whether the repair store at Panthip didn't replace the cells of my laptop battery with old ones when I had it in for fixing a broken LCD.

welo

It might be that many users who switch to Windows 7 experience a faster system not because of 64bit or the better OS, but because of the optimized performance a fresh install delivers, or because they upgraded the hardware at the same time.

Any speed comparison has to minimize impact of any other component involved but the one you want to test - here the OS - as best as possible. Otherwise the comparision is pretty much useless.

I further doubt that there will be any noticeable difference in applications such as web browsers or Office products. The common opinion (deduced from semi-tech articles on the internet) seems to be that applications might benefit mainly from two things:

• more RAM - which of course is not a direct performance gain, 64bit doesn't increase the efficiency how RAM is used (on the contrary it seems) it just allows the OS and applications to use more than 3GB RAM (efficiently).
  
• better performance for some applications that run intensive calculations on data (e.g. encryption software) and/or load really large files (>3GB) and which are optimized for 64bit architecture.
  

I think the wikipedia article really gives a good overview on a 32bit vs 64bit comparision (of course language is a bit 'techy'):

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/64bit#32_vs_64_bit

While 64-bit architectures indisputably make working with large data sets in applications such as digital video, scientific computing, and large databases easier, there has been considerable debate as to whether they or their 32-bit compatibility modes will be faster than comparably-priced 32-bit systems for other tasks. In x86-64 architecture (AMD64), the majority of the 32-bit operating systems and applications are able to run smoothly on the 64-bit hardware.

[...]

Speed is not the only factor to consider in a comparison of 32-bit and 64-bit processors. Applications such as multi-tasking, stress testing, and clustering [..] may be more suited to a 64-bit architecture when deployed appropriately. 64-bit clusters have been widely deployed in large organizations such as IBM, HP and Microsoft, for this reason.

[...]

The main disadvantage of 64-bit architectures is that relative to 32-bit architectures, the same data occupies more space in memory (due to swollen pointers and possibly other types and alignment padding). This increases the memory requirements of a given process and can have implications for efficient processor cache utilization.

So besides all this tech talk for most users it comes down to the point whether we 'ordinary users' benefit more from 64bit or 32bit Windows at the moment (and in the next few months).

I find your (Beggar's) results pretty irritating and disappointing - I just recently installed 64bit Windows in the belief that, if it doesn't give me any speed advantage (yet), it will not give me any disadvantage either. This seems to be wrong, and if even a rather data/calculation intensive test such as compression and encoding does not benefit from 64bit, what does??

A few more thoughts:

• I assume that harddrive performance is an important factor in your benchmark, can you run a benchmark on that alone and see if it compares on both systems? What is your setup in regard to harddrives?
  
• Can you monitor RAM usage during the test, maybe the increased memory usage on 64bit outweighs the advantage in your scenario
  
• Can you run the test on smaller files (for the same reason - to eliminate a 'problem' due to limited memory
  
• Can the result be possibly due to a difference in quad core usage on 64bit? Not that this would be less disturbing, but it would be at least an explanation...
  

welo

I copied some AVI format movies from a external HD then fooled around a bit with free codec conversion programs to copy to a thumb drive in a format that my cheap indian DVD player (GEEPAS, purchased in saudi) with a USB port could accept. A bit of a hit and miss process as all the formats that appear on the player package box are not accepted...but works fine after the right conversion is selected...

seems to me that the same selection of compatible format would have to be done if burning to DVD...files on thumb drives can always be erased/copied over...

I think you are rather unfortunate to have a vidoe player with very limited codec support. It should not have problems playing standard avi files with xvid or divx video codec. That's what most movies from P2P networks are encoded with. It might have troubles with the AC3 (dolby surround) audio codec, but others should play fine. With the 700 THB BigC player I didn't have any troubles playing AVI/xvid files yet, however, it doesn't support MP4 though (H.264 codec).

Use GSpot to determine the video codec of any avi file, you should soon be able to figure out which codecs your player supports and which not.

welo

That's true with a lot of 'cheaper' electronic appliances, not just DVD's, but there's no reason to expect them to pack up after a short time.

I bought two cheap DVD's from Big C nearly three years ago and they're both still going strong.

my friend will be happy to hear that!

Checkout this article on Windows 7 32bit vs 64bit:

http://blog.tune-up.com/windows-insights/3...re-performance/

It shows that with 2 GB of Ram some applications run slower on 64bit Windows 7 compared to 32bit Windows 7. With 4GB 64bit usually outperforms 32bit. There is a WinRAR comparison, too.

This is due to the increased memory usage of Windows and Applications under 64bit (I think this is due to the increased minimum size of the smallest data unit (64bit compared to 32bit) but I might be wrong here.), which will cause 'shortages' when run with 2 GB only.

The main advantage of 64bit is not necessarily faster speed per se, but that the OS can address more than 4GB of RAM. With 32bit Windows the usable memory limit is somewhere at 3.5 GB (google for a detailed explanation).

The plain speed will improve only in data intensive applications that are optimized for 64bit since the CPU can work on larger data chunks at once.

Of course encoding tasks or compression tasks should benefit from 64bit.

So I assume that in your case the reason for slow 64bit performance is

• either a RAM shortage (do you have 2GB only?) or
  
• an otherwise not well configured system (driver issue?)
  

The difference in performance is rather extensive, much more than the any switch between 32bit and 64bit should cause.

A related question.

If you have one of those DVD players that will play most AVis, etc. by merely copying the file to a CD-R disk if 700 meg or under, can you merely COPY (rather than convert to another format) similar AVIs to a DVD-R disk and expect it to play on the DVD player? Or do you always have to run the bigger files through a conversion software program?

Most AVIs should play fine, but it depends on the specific video and audio codec used and if the media chip in your player supports this codec.

It is definitely not necessary to 'downsize' or convert movies to a specific format like you have to do with some mobile players (phones, PSP, iPod, etc). The 'el cheapo' chipsets from china are pretty powerful when it comes to that. I even managed to display Thai subtitles from a .srt file (downloaded from www.thaisubtitle.com).

Many players will also read DVD- or CD-RW (rewritables) and all should play movies larger than 700MB or multiple files on one CD/DVD.

Some models also have a USB connector and you can play movies from a thumb drive.

Interestingly there are many different models at different prices sold in BigC/Tesco/etc, however, my guess is that most times the only difference is the casing and the looks, but the electronics inside is very similiar. So just recently I bought just the cheapest for 700 THB for a friend and it works pretty well. I just expect the player to not last very longer than the 1-year warranty BigC offers.

Just put some movies on a DVD and go test it on the player you want to buy.

welo

Any update, dude?

My comments in blue color...

Anyway,went back & checked,& windows firewall is on,but i'm thinking that i should switch to "dont allow exceptions"???,as i'll hopefully be using wireless.

Enabling 'Don't allow exceptions' will lock down your network traffic completely (nearly). Hence it is not recommended. You could check your exception list and disallow (uncheck) everything but 'Firefox', especially you should uncheck 'File and Printer Sharing' when connecting to public networks (internet cafe).

Later you will probably have to allow other programs as well (e.g. Skype, Windows Messenger, etc) but for now that'll do it.

The firewall will be enabled for both 'wired' and wireless networks if you don't explicitly exclude one adapter.

I have service pack 2 on xp pro 2002

intel ® pentium ® m processor 1600mhz 221mhz,512mb

Just helped a friend setup a similiar system. This laptop is really OK for internet and office stuff, watch movies and listen to music. You might want to upgrade to 1024 MB RAM which should make it noticeably faster. But this can wait until later

When i search in windows it shows "virus protection not monitored",& says that i have no virus protection that windows can find,& i looked in "programs",& security & no virus protection was found.

Windows XP doesn't ship with an antivirus program. Checkout the links from my previous post for Avira Antivirus. This is among the best professional antivirus programs, and probably the best free one.

I don't recommend to get a pirated ESET NOD32 which is pretty common in SE Asia, it is not better in terms of detection rates or performance, but daily updates will most probably fail at one point and weaken your protection.

One thing i noticed but is probably ok is that under-Set program access & defaults-add or remove programs-choose a configuration ,i have 3 choices-"m windows","non microsoft",& "custom",& custom is used,with "use my current web browser" "enabled".

I noticed this on the web http://forums11.itrc.hp.com/service/forums...hreadId=1266812 (obviously not using my laptop) ,about driver for "base system device",which is one driver i need,& the following driver was given- O2 Micro cardbus adapter.Interested to note that somebody replied asking with the same question & problem as i,but not sure if the others were replying to his problem.

It's not a wrong thing to ask in the HP forums, I often found answers there when googling for HP related problems.

However, all drivers you need are on HP's driver page. It is only a matter of installing them. There's nothing wrong with your Laptop btw, it's pretty normal that after a fresh install of Windows XP you need to install drivers specific to your Laptop's hardware to make some components work in the first place and get the most out of others, since XP only brings basic compatibility drivers if at all.

(This is of course different if you buy a new Laptop or use a special Windows Recovery CD that already includes the drivers for your Laptop.)

What makes it a bit confusing in your situation is that HP shipped your Laptop in different hardware configuration, hence the three different drivers for the wireless adapter.

One option I didn't mention yet is to find a more specific model number at the bottom of your laptop. It should say mention something like 'service tag', 'model number' or maybe 's/n'. It will probably be a variation of nc6000, something like nc6xxx. You can then search for this model number on the HP page. Maybe this will point to a more specific driver download page.

Anyway i'll go with what you Both suggested,& i'll get back to you.

Thanks again.You have restored my faith in humanity.......well partly anyway.

Never give up hope

And don't forget to stop by one of the orphanages or charity projects if you are in Siem Reap.

Hmm... right. That makes sense. If uTorrent can use UPnp, then so can some malware. The site mentions that Adobe flash can do it from the browser, which is worrying. Even though I haven't heard of wide-spread outbreaks of Flash malware that does that, it could happen any day, and it could be used to open an attack vector for other software.

That makes UPnP much less attractive. Too bad, because I really loved how it works.

The mentioned attack took advantage of a security issue in Adobe's Flash player that has been fixed since April 2008 (player version 9,0,124,0).

However, it is still possible for malware/trojans that has infected a computer on the local network to use uPnp to reconfigure the router. In such a case there are many different ways for malware/trojans to manipulate your computer (key loggers for instance). Even without uPnp it is easily possible for a trojan to establish a connection to a server on the internet and send data 'home'.

A personal firewall that filters not only incoming but also outgoing traffic (something that Windows Firewall does NOT do) can help to identify trojans in both such cases - whether they use uPnp or they just open a connection. For inexperienced users it might be difficult to identify illicit connections even with a Personal Firewall installed.

uPnp surely offers additional options to trojans that have successfully infected a computer behind a NAT router. I am no expert on trojans/malware to rate how widespread uPnp (ab)use is and whether under these circumstances uPnp should be disabled on the router or not.

welo

Jiu-Jitsu, please stay on board I see you are very knowledgeable and your advise is well needed!

You are absolutely right on the IntelPro drivers. There are laptops that use both Ethernet and WLAN components of the Intel chipset, and some that use only the WLAN module. My current laptop has an Intel WLAN but a Realtek NIC, but now that you mention it I definitely remember that I once worked on a Laptop which had both components from Intel.

Furthermore the driver I listed is for a Gigabit Ethernet which might be an optional component considering that the Laptop is 4 years or older.

I have no experience with the tool you suggested - I am a bit uneasy about all those driver tools since there is alot of malware out there espacially related to driver software to catch newbies and inexperienced users. The website you linked does not have a good rating on WOT for instance (http://www.mywot.com/en/scorecard/zhangduo.com).

However, the tool seems to do its job and is also listed on other reputable download sites (softpedia, download.com) so I suggest downloading from there:

http://www.softpedia.com/get/System/System...dentifier.shtml

Alternatively you can just install the IntelPro driver. It will either bring you a warning that no suitable hardware has been found, or install successfully without activating the hardware.

I recommend not to install the Intel Software/Utility, just the plain driver. (This is usually an option during the setup, but if you can't figure out howto deactivate the software part it doesn't matter to much - you will have to use the intel software to connect to a wireless network instead of the standard windows dialog).

It is also correct that the service pack and antivirus software are not absolutely necessary. What IS necessary is to bring up the firewall which is sometimes disabled after installing from modified Windows CDs that are available in Asia. You should assume that the PCs in the internet cafe are infected with viruses (pretty common), so I am pretty sure that any USB thumb drive you use for transferring files would bring a virus to your computer. With the CDROM you should be better off.

In the worst case the files that your transfer could be infected, too, but only the more aggressive viruses will infect any executable on the harddrive.

So for inexperienced users I would still recommend to install SP3 and the antivirus before connecting your PC to the internet, it is just to easy to do the wrong thing (download some infected app, visit the wrong website, etc). Firewall, SP3 and Antivirus will give you some protection against user errors.

Service Pack 3 should be one file named

WindowsXP-KB936929-SP3-x86-ENU.exe

Make sure you check whether SP3 is already installed as described in my previous post, then you don't have to go through the hassle downloading this huge file.

Transfer the file to your PC and run it (double click). Installation might take long (30min).

And again, make absolutely sure that your Windows Firewall is up and running!! Follow the guide I posted. If you can't figure it out, post again.

While waiting for the download to finish try the tool posted by Jiu-Jitsu to identify your network card. Try to find items that say 'Ethernet', 'Network', '10/100MBit', 'NIC'. I guess it would be either Intel or Broadcom.

Checking the driver page again I noticed that I found a different page than the one you posted. On the one I found there is the Broadcom Network driver listed that I mentioned yesterday, on yours not. The rest of the drivers seem to match.

http://h20000.www2.hp.com/bizsupport/TechS...vOID=1093#11395

So for the 'wired' network card I find only two options:

Intel: Intel PRO/Wireless Drivers 5.10 B 31 Aug 2006

Broadcom: Broadcom NetXtreme Gigabit Ethernet Driver 1.00 C 2 Feb 2005

All others look like WLAN drivers only

There are maybe more recent version available from the Intel resp. Broadcom website but those drivers should do it.

You could also install the Intel chipset driver before installing the service pack and antivirus (or at any time after). This might speed up the process since it contains updates to the system's core components and harddrive controllers, maybe improving performance. If not, it will not do any harm though.

Download the most recent version from Intel, not from HP's driver page:

http://downloadcenter.intel.com/Detail_Des...16〈=eng

Good luck!

welo

Hello Welo & thanks for taking the time.Yes i have been hooking up a line in internet cafes via what i believe would be adsl.I'm in cambodia.

I forgot to mention that i have windows xp pro on the laptop,& also firefox,& as i mentioned before i bought it in the uk (used).

I'll do what you suggested before i do anything else.Is it quite straight forward to transfer the service pack 3 from cd to laptop?

All the best.

I wouldn't recommend that sequence of events, but you seem to have made up your mind who to follow, so I'll leave you to it.

It seems Port Forwarding is possible on a Prestige P-660H-T1, I guess you guys are aware of this guide?

http://portforward.com/english/routers/por...T1/Utorrent.htm

There are reports of successfully port forwarding on a P-660H on this thread.

However, as tigerbeer stated in his comment and what is also my experience with a different Zyxel (WLAN) router (P-320v2), the Zyxel software implements a rather powerful firewall software in terms of features that is a lot less powerful when it comes to handling a high number of connections.

A high number of connections is very unique to bittorrent/P2P software, most programs (web browsers for isntance) just open only a handful of connections simultaneously. So whereas the port forwarding should be possible to setup (green light) it might as well be that the connection/router stalls within the first 5 minutes when more connections are established.

The problem of too many connections is not limited to a specific bittorrent client, however, default connection limits might differ between utorrent and vuze which might make it look like it is.

Try to find the setting for the maximum number of connection ('global') and limit it to 100. Download speeds might remain low but the router should be able to handle it. Also look into your routers log whether you find something like 'exceeded maximum connection session limit'.

It might be possible to configure the Zyxel to perform well with higher number of connections, I just didn't bother to find out yet since my SpeedTouch modem/router performs well without any tweaking and I use the Zyxel as Wireless AP only.

I also wonder about the information given by True support that port 3+4 is reserved for ISP use only. That might either be just bogus information or the router's firmware has been heavily modified for True (well, I will not mention what seems more likely to me...)

This thread is never going to die, is it?

welo

Well, the answers are all here... but since the driver installation stuff seems pretty new to you I guess it might all be very confusing.

You said your Laptop is not connected to the Internet right now. Can you provide more information on how you connect to the internet, WLAN hotspot, wired connection to a network or to a ADSL modem?

Obviously there have been different versions of the nc6000 built with different WLAN components, this is why there are several different WLAN drivers on the driver page (Broadcom, Intel, Atheros). If you don't find any sticker on your laptop hinting to which brand/model is built into your laptop you will have to try all one by one, but let's deal with that later.

First try to get your 'wired' Ethernet driver running, I see only one driver, that is:

+ Broadcom NetXtreme Gigabit Ethernet Driver (sp29697.exe)

Install this driver and you should be able to connect to your ADSL router with an Ethernet cable.

But BEFORE you connect your laptop to the internet you should make sure that

- Windows is upgraded to at least service pack 3

- the Windows Firewall is up and running

- an antivirus program is installed and you did a full system scan

This is especially true when you share the internet connection with other users (e.g. in an internet cafe, at work,..) otherwise your computer might get infected with a virus before you have even started.

Check the service pack level of your Windows installation (right click on My Computer, select Properties and right there on the General tab or follow the guide here).

If you don't have service pack 3, download service pack 3 from microsoft here:

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details...;displaylang=en

It's a 300MB download so it may take a while.

For virus protection I recommend the free Avira Antivir, download here:

Program: http://www.softpedia.com/get/Antivirus/Ant...l-Edition.shtml

Latest virus definition upate: http://www.softpedia.com/get/Others/Signat...le-Update.shtml

Use the 'manual update' function from the Update menu (make sure you have restarted your computer at least once after program installation and before the manual update, otherwise it will fail).

Then run a full scan of your computer. This will take 2-4 hours. You might be tempted to skip this step but again, I don't recommend.

Check if Windows Firewall is enabled:

http://www.ehow.com/how_4525376_enable-dis...s-firewall.html

If you are willing to go that way I will provide further instructions once you've accomplished the steps outlined here.

welo

There are multiple levels of vulnerability in a scenario where you share a network with other supposedly 'unfriendly' computers, a so-called 'untrusted network'.

1.

A severe misconfiguration of file sharing might open your computer's files to everyone on the network. A misconfiguration might be a weak administrator/user/share password, enabling of the guest account, etc. This would be very easy to exploit but is also easy to avoid/fix by gathering enough knowledge on windows file sharing and basic security measurements (Firewall, strong passwords, etc).

2.

Any traffic (data) sent over a WEP secured network can be read by other users on that network with the help of special software (packet sniffers). This affects not only your file shares but any communication that your computers send over the network, e.g. any passwords sent in clear text without any additional encryption. For instance, if your email client is setup to retrieve emails via POP3 without SSL your password can be easily stolen.

In addition, WEP is considered unsecure for years now because the WEP key can be easily obtained/hacked to get access to the network.

Btw, WPA is a major improvement on protecting the users on the network from those outside, but it is still possible (though harder) to sniff traffic when you have access to the key/network (with WPA-PSK).

3.

Since your computer is directly exposed to an unfriendly network you are much more vulnerable to direct attacks than compared to a normal home setup where there are no 'unfriendly' computers on the network.

Of course, most of the security risks laid out here still require a person with the intention to break in/attack. Just don't rely too much on the absence of motivated criminals

welo

I just found out that it must be a problem with a sound codec.While I was playing a sound file using mediaplayer 11 my mouse cursor moved slowly but my keyboard was almost useless.When I reduced the volume to zero in mediaplayer everything came back to normal.So how do I find out which codec is the trouble maker?

So it's more that playing the file causes full load on your cpu/system and hence your mouse stops working. The codec is not directly interfering with your mouse driver which seemed quite a bit unlikely anyway.

Does the problem also occur when using a different player such as winamp. This way you could determine whether it's a faulty codec or some problem specific to WMP.

GSpot will tell you the codecs used in video and audio files. It's a tool I mainly use for video files, but I think it works with audio files, too.

welo

Thanks for the link. Unfortunately my model is not included and the maximum 'number of connections' in the tables are not accurate since there seems to be an issue with the software used for testing ("The maximum possible number of connections is 200 due to IxChariot license limitations.").

Even 200 connections would be too view for my requirements anyway.

Whatever, the Speedtouch is doing fine, I was just disappointed cause I always thought of Zyxel as a quality brand, but it seems their home user products are underpowered for their router/firewall software (or at least the one I have) when it comes to P2P.

welo

If you have a setup where you share the wireless network with other non-trusted users you should protect your computers as much as possible. This is very different from typical home user setups where computers on your LAN can be considered 'friendly' and your computers are secured from direct attacks from the internet by your router.

In your case you should make absolutely sure that your Windows Firewall is up and running. You should further enable as few open ports (exceptions) as possible. Enabling file sharing will 'open a door' that - if misconfigured - can be abused to attack your computer.

Of course the possibility that somebody from another room wants to attack you is minimal (well, depends on the business that you are in ), so in reality the biggest threat will come not from intentional attacks but from other computers that have been hacked or infected with a virus.

However, if you are an experienced user and you misconfigure file sharing you might as well end up with your files being fully accessible without password (in the worst case). Another 'curious' user might then be tempted to poke around and see what you have there.

If you are in control of the network setup you might think about setting up 2 (wireless) networks, one for you and one for your customers. But this is definitely not a job for a common home user

welo

1.

Check if flash player is installed correctly and report the version:

http://duber.com/LetsTalk/playerCheck.html

http://www.shingoprize.net/courses/require...heck_flash.html

The 'captchas' used on message boards and other sites sometimes use Flash to display the letters/picture. Some use plain images or other techniques. So if your Flash player is not installed correctly then the ones using Flash will not display correctly (actually not at all.).

If your friend's webbrowser has problems displaying normal images this might point to a more serious problem - not very common but possible.

Goto firefox.com and compare your friend's screen with the screenshot below. The site doesn't use Flash, if any images are missing this points to a problem beyond the Flash plugin.

2.

Double clicking a file will open the application associated with this type of file - or in case the file is an application/executable (exe, com, bat, ...) the program itself.

I assume that the files you downloaded are some kind of audio file and the file association is messed up. Try to find out the file type / extension and report back to us to get further instructions.

You can always open the application (e.g. Windows Media Player) first and then use the File / Open menu to open that file.

Another work around is to 'right'-click the file and use the 'Open with...' menu to open the file with a specific application. (Use the 'Always use this application to open files of this type' to fix the double click.

3.

Check your friend's computer for viruses, always a good thing to do in case the computer shows weird behavior

welo

I've got a Zyxel Wireless Router (no modem support) and the TOT Speedtouch 536v6, using the Zyxel just in Wireless AP mode.

Just recently I changed my setup to enable the router part of the zyxel and use the Speedtouch in Bridge mode in order to enable the advanced features of the Zyxel such as Guest WLAN, Firewall, etc. After just 2 days I changed back to the previous setup because the Zyxel just couldn't handle the high number of connections that certain download clients use. I tried to tweak the settings, increase the session connection limit, disable the firewall, checked the connection timeouts on the cli, etc. No success.

Do you have a similiar experience? What Zyxel router do you have, mine is a P-320W v2.

welo

Go fit a 150w converter then, I await the crying thread for when you toast your lappy.

Why would a 150watt inverter fry your laptop?

Don't get me wrong, I am the last person who would advise against a quality inverter. However, I would rather go with a stabilized 150watt quality inverter than with a 500watt cheapo (like mine - just didn't have the choice when I bought mine).

But I am no expert on this and always willing to learn.

welo

Quick guess. Go to c:/Documents and Settings/

Good advise.

How did you rename the user account? If you used the Windows User Account panel to change your name (where you can also change the small picture displayed on the login screen and the start menu), then this should not affect the file system at all. It only changes the display name assigned, the system user name remains the same.

If you explain what you did maybe we can figure out what happened.

welo

Sure it makes sense. There is a huge carPC community out there, just have a look at mp3car.com - though this page can be overwhelming. Or check out this article here for an introduction.

And just a view ideas what you could do when putting a PC in your car:

• Audio: Mp3, iTunes,
  
• Video: Analog and HDTV, DVD, DIVX
  
• Gaming: PC, Xbox, PS2, Emulators
  
• Wi-Fi and Bluetooth Connectivity, internet
  
• GPS: Navigation
  
• Rear View Camera
  
• Sensor Monitoring/Integration: Digital Gauges (Temperature, Fluid Level, Pressure)
  
• Onboard Diagnostic System (OBD-II) Monitorin
  

A laptop is surely a good choice since it will ease the hardware setup considerably. You will need a power source (inverter or DC-DC converter) and a place to mount the laptop. Many people try to fabric a small TFT touchscreens into their dashboard, but this requires time, dedication and some talent (and money).

There are several CarPC software products available (free and non-free) that usually rely on a touchscreen for input - since you don't really have time to use mouse and keyboard while driving.

A remote control would maybe work, too, or you just rely on your co-driver to control the PC.

If you get a Pentium M at 1.6Ghz or similar this would be up to the task. I've seen those at Panthip (used) for around 7000 THB (starting price). Not that I would recommend to buy there, and this is Bangkok anyway.

Or consider a netbook which is a lot easier to fit (new from 12.000 THB) which are comparable in performance. There are also touchscreen kits available on ebay for those.

One more thing about screens: DVD players usually have TV displays that are not really comparable to high resolution TFT screens used for PCs, but since their main purpose is to watch movies this doesn't matter. (Just in case you think about connecting one of those screens to the laptop.) Reflection and daylight readability is also a big topic with carPCs.

welo

Just found out about 'Aero shake'.

Grab a window at the title bar and 'shake' it a bit. All windows but this one will be minimized.

Not sure whether I really need this but it's kind of cute

welo

Buy a 500 watt power inverter from Amorn electrical in the basement of Tukom, bout 2000b from memory.

500 watt is overrated as a laptop charger! Have a look at the label on your laptop charger, I guess it will be rated at 70 watt or something. Even if you consider that the input power will be slightly higher due to the conversion process inefficiency (like 10% if I remember correctly) 500 watt is still far too much.

Not knowing all of this when I bought my inverter I got a '500watt' inverter too, with '400 watt continuous output power' and 1000 watt maximum (peak). Mine costed 900 THB in Chantaburi and I later saw exactly the same at Panthip for 750 THB (starting price). The case is solid aluminum. Of course the electronic parts inside are more important and will distinguish good from bad quality. Mine is surely not the best quality, cheap China stuff I didn't have any problems so far, but don't use it very often.

One nice thing about a stronger inverter is that you can connect other appliances, too, your phone charger, maybe even a small cooling box. One time I used a small rice cooker to warm the food. But be careful, most cooking appliances will draw more power than 400 watt! The fuse in your device will blow in such a case, protecting you from more harm.

Btw a higher rated inverter will still draw only the power drawn by the connected devices, not more. So if you don't mind the money...

If you go with a stronger inverter you have to make sure that the cabling is done properly. You cannot connect the inverter to the cigarette lighter outlet. You must pull a cable directly to the battery. Use an automotive cable that is suited for the watt power, and protect it by a suitable fuse next to the battery. With fuses bigger is not always better, the fuse protects the cable from overheating and your car from cable fire when too much power is drawn (for whatever reason). If the fuse is too big for the cable size it is useless, since the cable might burn before the fuse blows up. It is also advisable to protect the cable with an additional fuse even if the device itself already has a fuse.

You will also have to think about whether you want your inverter automatically switched off with the ignition or not ('unswitched'). Unswitched setup is easier but bears the risk that you discharge your car battery if you forget to turn it off when a appliance is connected. On the other hand, an unswitched setup will give you more flexibility.

If you really want to charge only your laptop you can go with a smaller maybe 150watt inverter. It might be safe to connect this to your cigarette lighter outlet, but it depends on the cable/fuse size used in your car.

You could also go with a DC-DC converter that plugs directly into your laptop and bypasses your laptops charger. DC-DC is more efficient since a power inverter will first convert the car battery's DC to AC, and your laptop charger converts back from AC-DC.

In the car PC community DC-DC converters are favored for that reason, but an inverter is often the cheaper and simpler solution.

Yeah, I know, this wasn't really your question, was it

welo

I have a new HP Laptop with 4 Gig RAM

The Performance with Vista Home was so slow, that some advised me to upgrade to Windows 7 Starter Edition

A "new HP Laptop with 4 GB RAM" and factory-installed Vista is maybe not a perfectly smooth running system, but should definitely not be 'so slow' that you start complaining. That said I assume that a Laptop that comes with 4gigs Ram is also equiped with a state-of-the-art CPU and video card.

Was Vista preinstalled, and by whom? 32bit or 64bit? What is the exact model (sticker on the bottom of the laptop). Is it really new or 2nd hand?

If the clean re-install doesn't solve the issue you might consider a hardware problem. Bad blocks on the harddrive might bring a system to a crawl for instance (usually before symptomps get worse).

Downgrade to XP could prove difficult for inexperienced users since you'll need to find the XP drivers on your own (HP will probably not list them on their website for newer laptops). Windows 7 is the way to go.

Don't forget to go with 64bit (Vista or 7) otherwise the OS cannot use the whole 4 gigs. You cannot upgrade from 32bit to 64bit btw, this requires a re-install.

welo