MUST I use TWO Memory Sticks?

CRNG wrote:
On Thu, 06 Mar 2014 18:23:47 -0600, wrote in


Then again, if I was to buy a new computer, I'd likely buy a Macintosh.
I'm tired of trying to keep up with MS upgrades, and the OSs they quit
supporting.

That's what several people I know have done. They're happy with the
change.

Macintoshes use an "upgrade treadmill" as well.

Applications you run on them, only run on a limited
set of OS versions. Try and get Wireshark running
on your Mac, and figure out which version you should
download from the site, to run with your Mac.
(The Wireshark developers, don't tell you, requiring
a "test it and see" approach.)

A Mac can be just as much of a pain in the ass, as
any other computing box. It was a better platform
in years past, when they were the underdog, and were
doing stuff to keep people happy.

What's important for any computing platform, is whether
there are good "main" web sites, with immediate feedback
on problems. Sites like macintouch.com or xlr8yourmac.ocm
are example. These provide unbiased articles about
bloopers in your favorite OS, and how to fix them.
If you relied on Apple press releases or Apple forum
threads, you would be surely stuck. Before leaping on
a platform, see how users manage it for themselves,
and how much work it takes.

Paul (who owns three Macs, and the
G4 will be the last one I buy)

In ,
J. P. Gilliver (John) typed:
This (large netbook, SP3) came with 1G...

What kind of netbook is that John?

--
Bill
Asus EeePC 702 ('08 era) - OE-QuoteFix v1.19.2
Celeron 900MHz - 8GB SSD - 2GB - Windows XP Home SP2

In message , BillW50
writes:
In ,
J. P. Gilliver (John) typed:
This (large netbook, SP3) came with 1G...

What kind of netbook is that John?

Samsung NC20. I was given a long-service award for 25 years with the
company, and decided I'd bite the bullet and go XP (I was still on 98SE,
which I'd customised with lite, then), and also go portable; I took my
time deciding (not least because the award was in the form of a sort of
prepaid credit card which could only be used at a limited number of
places). As it was approaching its expiry a year later, I'd more or less
decided on the NC10, the ten inch model, which had the resolution I
wanted; when I got to Selfridges (one of the few places I could use the
card), they also had the NC20, which is the nearly 12" one, so (after a
couple of hours' thinking) I went for that. I'm glad I did, as the keys
are almost full size, which on the 10" netbooks they aren't.

On the whole, I've been very happy with it, and use it as my main PC,
for several hours most evenings. I thought I'd miss having an optical
drive (that seems to be what makes the difference between a netbook [and
now an "ultrabook"] and a laptop), so got an external one, but to be
honest I hardly ever use it: everything's online these days. The only
niggles I can think of: using the provided self-update eventually loaded
a video driver which was susceptible to making the whole thing freeze
(the excellent folk at sammynetbook showed which driver version to
revert to and it's been fine now for years): and, when I first started
using it, it managed Skype and YouTube perfectly well, but over the
years less so (more jerky - though the videos are fine if downloaded and
then played locally), which I think is something _I've_ done rather than
changes in S & Y, since S even struggles on audio-only. (In an odd way -
it's fine on first connection, then deteriorates over the course of a
few minutes.) But I find the NC20 an excellent XP machine - as do other
users, judging by what (last time I looked, I haven't recently) it goes
for on ebay (it's no longer available new).
--
J. P. Gilliver. UMRA: 1960/1985 MB++G()AL-IS-Ch++(p)Ar@T+H+Sh0!:`)DNAf

`A device called a transistor, which has several applications in radio where a
vacuum tube ordinarily is employed, was demonstrated yesterday.' - small
article
on an inside page of The New York Times, December 1947 (Computing 1999-12-16)

On Thu, 06 Mar 2014 18:18:02 -0600, wrote:


I do have a much faster machine to build up next. It's a 2ghz P4. It
was in a flood, so all the drives are shot, but the mainboard seems to
work. When I got it, it was all covered with mud. I hosed it really
well, and let it sit in the sun for a few weeks. I was rather surprised

Where do you have sun for weeks?

it worked at all. The bios works fien, but the HD is shot, as well as

No experience but still sutprised the HD is shot. They seem like they
are sealed, unless the computer was on when it was flooded?

Did the flood make the news?

the CD drive. There was no floppy drive in it, but I'll put one. I
cant have a computer without a floppy drive. It's needed to boot them

So far I feel the same way.

from Dos to get em' going. That computer has 4gigs of ram in it.
Just for grins, i ripped the CD drive apart, and hosed all the mud out
of it yesterday. After it drys for a week, I'll give it a try..... I
have my doubts, but it dont hurt to try....

micky wrote:
On Thu, 06 Mar 2014 18:18:02 -0600, wrote:


it worked at all. The bios works fien, but the HD is shot, as well as

No experience but still sutprised the HD is shot. They seem like they
are sealed, unless the computer was on when it was flooded?

The drive isn't sealed. It has a breather hole.
Conventional drives equalize to atmospheric pressure.
Say you pack a laptop in the car and take a trip.
If you drive your car to 10,000 feet above sea level,
the laptop hard drive "exhales" through the breather hole.
If you drive back down to sea level again, the
drive "inhales" through the breather hole.

The breather hole has a hepafilter on the other side
of the cover. That is supposed to reduce particulate
that could get through. It will not stop certain smaller
molecules, so it is possible something "corrosive" could
cross the barrier.

In addition, if you look at some of the older drives, they
have multiple silver sticks, which cover holes (like, the
servo write access port). If water or chemicals attack the
stickers, the stickers could come loose.

There is a brand new drive, which is completely sealed.
It is the first of its kind. It will start shipping in
the summer. That's the Hitachi 6TB "Helium" drive, where
the HDA is filled with helium gas. The HDA must be sealed,
to keep that gas in. Whereas conventional drives are just
filled with breathable air. That's the drive you want to buy,
if living in a flood zone :-) At a price of perhaps $1400
each, I don't think they plan on selling very many.

Paul

In message , Paul
writes:
[]
There is a brand new drive, which is completely sealed.
It is the first of its kind. It will start shipping in
the summer. That's the Hitachi 6TB "Helium" drive, where
the HDA is filled with helium gas. The HDA must be sealed,
to keep that gas in. Whereas conventional drives are just

So it will have a finite lifetime even if unused and sitting on a shelf:
Helium molecules are the smallest there is (smaller than hydrogen
molecules), and _very_ good at passing through things (they'll even pass
into solid platinum).

filled with breathable air. That's the drive you want to buy,
if living in a flood zone :-) At a price of perhaps $1400

I thought at first you meant the sort that's filled with breathable air
so that you could breathe it if submerged (-:

each, I don't think they plan on selling very many.

Paul

Wouldn't ordinary dry nitrogen be better and cheaper?
--
J. P. Gilliver. UMRA: 1960/1985 MB++G()AL-IS-Ch++(p)Ar@T+H+Sh0!:`)DNAf

"I'm a paranoid agnostic. I doubt the existence of God, but I'm sure there is
some force, somewhere, working against me." - Marc Maron

J. P. Gilliver (John) wrote:
In message , Paul writes:
[]
There is a brand new drive, which is completely sealed.
It is the first of its kind. It will start shipping in
the summer. That's the Hitachi 6TB "Helium" drive, where
the HDA is filled with helium gas. The HDA must be sealed,
to keep that gas in. Whereas conventional drives are just

So it will have a finite lifetime even if unused and sitting on a shelf:
Helium molecules are the smallest there is (smaller than hydrogen
molecules), and _very_ good at passing through things (they'll even pass
into solid platinum).

That's what I thought too. Hydrogen will also pass through
metals, but at a slightly elevated temperature.


filled with breathable air. That's the drive you want to buy,
if living in a flood zone :-) At a price of perhaps $1400

I thought at first you meant the sort that's filled with breathable air
so that you could breathe it if submerged (-:

You'd be in serious trouble, if that's all the air you had
with you.


each, I don't think they plan on selling very many.

Paul

Wouldn't ordinary dry nitrogen be better and cheaper?

The thermal conductivity looks pretty good. I know about
the thermal conductivity, from a hint on a National Geographic
special involving deep diving submersibles. The claim there
was, the operator of the sub breathed a helium mixture,
and the operator also tended to freeze to death. So you have
to dress warm, if the walls of your sub are ice cold, and
the boat is filled with helium. (The viscosity listed
here isn't a factor.)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helium

Thermal conductivity 0.1513 W·m−1·K−1
Viscosity (1.013 bar and 0°C (32°F)) : 1.8695E-04 Poise

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nitrogen

Thermal conductivity 0.0258 W·m−1·K−1
Viscosity (1.013 bar and 0°C (32°F)) : 1.6629E-04 Poise

*******

Helium and hydrogen have another interesting property,
but unrelated to the hard drive application. When you
let Helium out of its compressed tank at room temperature,
the gas gets hotter.

"Thus, helium and hydrogen warm up when expanded at
constant enthalpy at typical room temperatures. On the
other hand nitrogen and oxygen, the two most abundant
gases in air, have inversion temperatures of 621K and 764K
respectively: these gases can be cooled from room
temperature by the Joule–Thomson effect.[1]"

I think it even raises the possibility of a leaking hydrogen
tank, igniting the gas. There's an analysis here of all the
myriad conditions under which it can happen. The pressure in the
tank has to be a little too high, for the heating gas
to self-ignite purely from the temperature. I've been burned
by hydrogen (and been close to a decent sized explosion) - it's
one of my favorite gases. I can't wait for hydrogen powered
vehicles to show up :-)

http://www.eng-tips.com/viewthread.cfm?qid=51712

Hydrogen storage at one time, was proposed in tanks with
something like a zeolite filler, which limits the rate
that the gas can come flying out of the tank. Again, thanks
to the wonders of TV, we had an experiment years ago, where
a rifle is fired at a zeolite hydrogen tank, and the leaking
gas only creates a small flame (which helps prevent a
catastrophic explosion from the leaking gas collecting).
I don't know if they'll use zeolite tanks for cars in
the future, or they have something better by now.
(Mr.Google helped me find this.)

http://www.nasa.gov/vision/earth/eve...r_zeolite.html

These things are great, when somebody else uses them :-)

Paul

On Mon, 10 Mar 2014 23:12:07 +0000, "J. P. Gilliver (John)"
wrote:

In message , Paul
writes:
[]
There is a brand new drive, which is completely sealed.
It is the first of its kind. It will start shipping in
the summer. That's the Hitachi 6TB "Helium" drive, where
the HDA is filled with helium gas. The HDA must be sealed,
to keep that gas in. Whereas conventional drives are just

So it will have a finite lifetime even if unused and sitting on a shelf:
Helium molecules are the smallest there is (smaller than hydrogen
molecules), and _very_ good at passing through things (they'll even pass
into solid platinum).

filled with breathable air. That's the drive you want to buy,
if living in a flood zone :-) At a price of perhaps $1400

I thought at first you meant the sort that's filled with breathable air
so that you could breathe it if submerged (-:

No, you want helium so you can use it as a floatation device.




each, I don't think they plan on selling very many.

Paul

Wouldn't ordinary dry nitrogen be better and cheaper?