Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Computing/2008 November 9

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November 9

3D Graphics Library

I'm looking into learning a 3D graphics library for Windows in order to ultimately create a game. What would be the best one for an amateur programmer? Currently, I'm leaning towards DirectX but OpenGL seems easier; however, am I correct in believing that OpenGL hasn't been updated for Windows since 1995? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.125.56.9 (talk) 00:02, 9 November 2008 (UTC)

OpenGL hasn't been updated? Of course it has: "OpenGL Now Natively Supported in Windows Vista" [1]. id Software has been using OpenGL for their games which run on Windows and GNU/Linux. --wj32 ^t/c 03:54, 9 November 2008 (UTC)

OpenGL has indeed not been updated by Microsoft since then - HOWEVER, OpenGL has a fancy extensibility mechanism that allows the device driver to offer features that the OpenGL library doesn't provide. This is a little inconvenient - but allows the hardware manufacturers to provide access to newer features despite Microsofts best efforts to kill OpenGL and thereby prevent anyone from doing 3D graphics that work on cellphones, PDA's, Linux, MacOS and Windows. In fact, since MS decided not to release D3D version 10 under Windows XP (you need Vista) - OpenGL is actually more powerful under XP than D3D is. There is no doubt that D3D is much more widely used under Windows than elsewhere - but OpenGL is the only 3D graphics API that runs on almost every 3D-capable hardware on the planet. Even if you're programming (say) a Nintendo DS - which has it's own weird and wonderful graphics hardware - the libraries that support it are sufficiently similar to OpenGL that you feel right at home. So I recommend learning OpenGL - but at some stage you may want to switch to D3D. It's not that hard to do because both API's are supporting the exact same hardware and the core concepts. SteveBaker (talk) 16:04, 9 November 2008 (UTC)

Converting XVid to DVD

Hello all,

I recently downloaded the Phillies World Series parade and celebration from Vuze bit-torrent. I would like to put this on DVD for a friend who could not see it (he is in Iraq). It is an XVid file extension. Is there a free program where I can transfer my download to DVD format? I have DVD-RW.

Thank you in advance

--72.78.20.45 (talk) 01:04, 9 November 2008 (UTC)

You will want to use iDVD to burn it to the DVD. You might already have it—check in your Applications folder. If iDVD can't take the XVid format, use ffmpegX to convert it to Quicktime. --98.217.8.46 (talk) 04:25, 9 November 2008 (UTC)

I don't have a MAC. --72.78.20.45 (talk) 04:58, 9 November 2008 (UTC)

Well OK. I assumed you did because I thought Vuze is a Mac-only program (I now see that it is not). In the future you might want to specify your operating system to avoid us having to guess and waste our time! --98.217.8.46 (talk) 14:57, 9 November 2008 (UTC)

Please excuse us. I am on a mac atm but it seems DVD_Flick might work for you. For a fuller treatment on the topic, please read DVD authoring. Hope that helps and I hope the rest of your weekend goes well,

Kushal (talk) 17:33, 9 November 2008 (UTC)

PS3 Maintenance Update

My PS3 suddenly decided to stop reading DVDs or CDs. The info box reads "Maintenance Update". I've tried searching to see what this means, but the garbage is overwhelming and I cannot find anything that even remotely relates to this problem. Does anyone know if this means the PS3 is actually broken and needs maintenance or is it stuck in some software update that is taking an eternity to finish? -- kainaw™ 02:31, 9 November 2008 (UTC)

Nevermind. It is under warranty, so I'm sending it in. -- kainaw™ 13:14, 10 November 2008 (UTC)

Deleting previous Windows installation directory

I'm wondering how to delete my Vista \WindowsBak folder, which I renamed (from XP) before reinstalling Vista. The folder is owned by "TrustedInstaller" and any attempt I make to delete it says that permission is denied. The folder is over 10 GB in size and just taking up space. Any advice? Thanks. Birchcliff (talk) 07:03, 9 November 2008 (UTC)

a) Start Command Prompt as Administrator, type:

cacls C:\WindowsBak /t /g Everyone:F

del /f/s/q C:\WindowsBak

rd /s/q C:\WindowsBak

Or b) If you have a Linux LiveCD (Ubuntu, for example), start the computer from it and simply delete the folder.

--grawity 12:11, 9 November 2008 (UTC)

Thanks grawity, but I still get an access denied message running cacls (or Icacls). I'll have to use the Linux method... Birchcliff (talk) 21:57, 9 November 2008 (UTC)

There's probably an Add/Remove Programs (called 'Programs and Features' in Vista) entry that would let you 'uninstall' it. This was what happened with Win98/2k upgrading to XP.

You could probably use psexec to run cmd as SYSTEM and try those commands again. --wj32 ^t/c 09:02, 10 November 2008 (UTC)

Does the at 12:34 /interactive cmd trick still work on Vista? (On XP, it starts cmd.exe with Local Service rights.) 78.56.68.25 (talk) 13:33, 10 November 2008 (UTC)

Wireless woes on Intel Macbook

Dear Wikipedians,

I use wireless service from a local provider. My friend can connect to the same router with the same SSID. I can connect to the router but I have no Internet access. Why is it so? I am on an Intel Macbook with 10.4.11 My friend is using an HP compaq prescario. The wireless network itself is not secured but presents an authentication web page before I can connect to the Internet. Any ideas? Kushal (talk) 16:23, 9 November 2008 (UTC)

I am online now. Weird. Kushal (talk) 17:29, 9 November 2008 (UTC)

Spending $50,000 on a Computer

Since buying a small supercomputer does not appear to be feasible for home use, I am looking to build a custom computer for less than $50,000 USD. I would be using the computer to play games, for video editing, 3D modelling, and bulk photo processing. I would like the computer to be as powerful as possible. It would be running Windows Vista Ultimate. Can someone provide me with a set of technical specs and the resulting component I need to purchase for the computer? Please note, the cost of a monitor and keyboard/mouse is included in there.

Thanks. Acceptable (talk) 18:28, 9 November 2008 (UTC)

$50,000 USD? My current computer, chosen from up-to-date parts, although not specially so with the graphics or sound cards, excluding monitor and keyboard/mouse, cost less than one-sixtieth of that. And I still believe I'm underusing its capabilities. A top-of-the-line gaming and graphics editing computer, considering you're only going to use it for your own personal use, will probably cost at least twice as much as mine, but I still have a hard time imagining it costing more than $3000 USD, monitor and keyboard/mouse included. The only way I could ever envision a personal desktop computer costing $50,000 USD is it either consisting mainly of industrial-grade 24/7 fault-tolerant hot-swappable components, or being made of platinum. What reason do you have for such an upper limit? JIP | Talk 21:26, 9 November 2008 (UTC)

Spending $50K on a gaming machine would just be stupid. --98.217.8.46 (talk) 21:36, 9 November 2008 (UTC)

You can buy a Dell Precision with two 3.4 GHz processors, two NVIDIA graphics cards, a 15,000 RPM hard drive and Vista Ultimate for about $12,000: http://configure.us.dell.com/dellstore/config.aspx?c=us&cs=04&l=en&m_11=VB31E&oc=bwdwjap&s=bsd .--Account created to post on Reference Desk (talk) 21:58, 9 November 2008 (UTC)

And even that... would be a bad investment of $12K. Computers deprecate in value too quickly to spend that kind of money on them. And you could probably build one of your own for a good deal less than that price. Honestly, you could probably get a top-of-the-line machine for $2K without too much difficulty, invest the rest, and then buy another $2K machine each year for the next 20 years. (Probably could sell off each old one for $1K or $0.5K at the same time.) You'd end up with a far better machine, and always be on top of the newest technology. When you blow your money on the latest technology, you're getting the latest technology of 2008, which sounds very nice and new until it becomes 2009, 2010, 2011, and it turns out that lo, there were far better ways of doing things that nobody thought up. Think about it this way: would you be happy today if you had spent $50K on a computer in 2004 or 2005? --98.217.8.46 (talk) 23:49, 9 November 2008 (UTC)

When building a machine yourself, I do not feel it is best to try and spend as much as possible. When I decided to build a 500G fileserver for home use, I looked online and found some 500G network drives for around $500. So, I spent a couple months monitoring parts, rebates, and such. I only built it myself because I was able to get it all done for $300 - even after spending more than I needed on a cool case. So, look for what you want and then see if you can build it for less - if not, just buy it. -- kainaw™ 00:07, 10 November 2008 (UTC)

this is realy not the forum to find this kind of help. if you want help spending more than $20000 on a computer, you'll need better contacts than you would find here. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.124.214.224 (talk) 01:40, 10 November 2008 (UTC)

But please come back and tell us of this $50k mega beast when you build it... Booglamay (talk) - 02:27, 10 November 2008 (UTC)

Mac Pro with Intel Xeon processors at 3.2GHz (8 cores), with NVIDIA Quadro FX 5600 and Boot Camp [2] --wj32 ^t/c 08:51, 10 November 2008 (UTC)

You can get a high-end Mac Pro for USD 26,689.00 or an Xserve server for 39,194.00 (without software support for OS X server). Why would you want to run Vista on it? Just to prove its scalability (or lack thereof)? Kushal (talk) 12:17, 10 November 2008 (UTC)

Since it seems like you want to blow some cash on unneccessary parts of a megabeast computer (which you should DEFINITELY build yourself, Dell or anyone else will kill your price with a dagger made of lava)... I recommend getting liquid nitrogen cooling, 10GB RAM or better, 5TB SSD or better, 3 insane processors, a really insane case like Alienware or something (but not an actual Alienware case because then people will think that it's an Alienware, when it's actually way better), install XPSP3 and Vista SP2 (bribe Microsoft) and Win7 (bribe them even more). After that's all done, you can pay some ubernerd to make it all fit into a laptop. flaminglawyer^c 23:47, 10 November 2008 (UTC)

Use solid state drives. For $500, you get 32 GB. For 1 TB of storage, you'll need 32 of them, thus using around $16,000, which means you will only have to spend $34,000 more to meet your objective of a $50,000 computer. Did I say this config is insanely fast? Rilak (talk) 11:25, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

If you want to game for the love of god don't go with a Quadro graphics card. Stick with either Radeon or GeForce. The Quadro cards (and ATIs FireGL) are for rendering and are really terrible at the sort of demands a game will request. Gunrun (talk) 11:27, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

The problem is that to get a REALLY fast machine - you've got to get away from standard software environments. You can't play games on these super-computer gizmos. Most of the time they don't run Windows - and if they do, probably only one of the CPU's is actually going to do that for you. Getting speed by making the CPU run faster would make your games run faster - but stacking in more and more CPU's and cores will pretty soon give you zero improvement because most software can't take advantage of more than a handful. Plus (as others have explained), your $50,000 will MAYBE get you a machine that's 4x faster than a $5,000 computer - but Moore's law being what it is, that'll only be 2x faster in 18 months time - and in three years - your $50,000 machine will be looking slow compared to the thing your buddies are using. You get MORE overall speed by upgrading your PC regularly than you do by buying a honking great monster box on a less frequent basis. Save your money - go to Alienware - buy their fastest and coolest box - spend maybe $5k - expect to upgrade it every 18 months to stay ahead of the curve. SteveBaker (talk) 02:00, 12 November 2008 (UTC)

Alienware? Meh... Get a BOXX APEXX8 with eight quad-core Opeterons, 128 GB of memory, two ATI or nVidia graphics cards and 15 15,000 rpm SAS drives. The price? I have no idea, the APEXX8 is so exclusive the price is not made public, although I have heard rumors that a maximum configuration costs in the region of $80,000 USD. Rilak (talk) 08:39, 12 November 2008 (UTC)

Incredibly aggressive virus telling me I need to protect against viruses

Not sure where I got infected from but my computer is being attacked by a virus that every few seconds tell me "I have a security problem" and wants me to scan my computer and download "Antivirus 2009" and when I try to open any new webpage (any at all: this one, Google etc.), I get redirect to a page with the following text:

Internet Explorer Warning - visiting this web site may harm your computer!   
Most likely causes: 
The website contains exploits that can launch a malicious code on your computer 
Suspicious network activity detected 
There might be an active spyware running on your computer 
What you can try: 
Activate Antivirus 2009 for secure Internet surfing (Recommended).  
Check your computer for viruses and malware. 
More information

Just typing this message has been laborious as every few seconds I get a new task bar popup which takes my cursor out of this screen. They resemble official warnings from my computer and have the same type symbols. I am aslo getting a screen (not web-based, which says "security center" and looks also like it's my computer but it canlt be; I also just got a popup saying "We have det4ected 43 viruses! download antiviurs 2009 now! Please tell me what it is and how to uninstall or give me a link for uninstall instructions.--19:05, 9 November 2008 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 151.202.35.71 (talk)

Here are instructions on how to rid yourself of this rogue. Fribbler (talk) 19:12, 9 November 2008 (UTC)

Cool, they use Malwarebytes. I use it at least once or twice a week to clean up variants of that virus. SuperAntispyware tends to be a faster scan, with Malwarebytes being excellent at cleaning up the final dregs (which I say because SAS tends to run faster and cleans out the main components with higher frequency). It's main problem is being Windows Installer-based, which is somewhat trivial to block an install, and you can't install it in Safe Mode.

Most of the time, though, you'll need to double-check that you clean out your Temporary directory to ensure it doesn't come back. Also a liberal use of 'msconfig' to remove any extra startup entries it'll include —Preceding unsigned comment added by Washii (talk • contribs) 03:14, 10 November 2008 (UTC)

I tried to use that program but then I slapped my forehead and said to myself "why don"t I just try a system restore first?" So I did and that worked great without having to worry about cleaning up any dregs. You have no idea how annoying that virus is. It took me twenty minutes to type the OP with my cursor being taken out of the screen approximately every second letter! Thanks for the advice. (Yes, same guy, different computer as you'll note from the change of IP). --71.247.252.78 (talk) 15:31, 10 November 2008 (UTC)

Linux problem and Hotmail problem

I recently had a break in my Internet connection, and was forced to use Mozilla Firefox and Evolution in off-line mode on my Fedora 9 Linux system. Now the break is over, and the Internet connection works fine. The problem is that Mozilla Firefox and Evolution still insist on starting in off-line mode. I can turn them into on-line mode manually, and they work fine, but I want them to get into on-line mode automatically. How can this be done?

Microsoft recently updated their Hotmail service. I don't know what they thought actually needed updating, but they managed to completely break it for me. I can only receive e-mail now, not send it. Well, actually I am able to send e-mail - if people are happy with empty messages. The Hotmail web page no longer accepts any input into the actual message contents. The only way I am able to actually write any e-mail from my Hotmail account is by using the Mobile Hotmail service, which works OK from a normal desktop computer too. Is anyone else having this problem, and does anyone know if it's going to be fixed? JIP | Talk 20:12, 9 November 2008 (UTC)

For the Firefox things... no idea. But for the Hotmail thing, I reccommend Mozilla Thunderbird, thereby eliminating all the browser problems. flaminglawyer^c 21:00, 10 November 2008 (UTC)

possibly helpful: https://answers.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/firefox-3.0/+question/31925 and http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=866872 . I don't know about hotmail; I've never used it. Dar-Ape 20:41, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

XWIS online (Red Alert 2)

I don't understand how to login to XWIS, so as to be able to play Red Alert 2 online. Can someone please help me? --AtTheAbyss (talk) 20:59, 9 November 2008 (UTC)

Do you already have an XWIS login? If not, do double-check you've got any entries it needs (I don't particularly remember if it needs anything). For your first XWIS login, enter the username and password you want to use in the username and password fields. Afterwards, keep using that username and password you set up.

Voila, you're done. Washii (talk) 03:21, 10 November 2008 (UTC)

Where do I enter the username and password. I clicked on internet on the RA2 main menu, but when I try to open anything (profile, quick match, etc.) it says it needs a patch, and then can't find it. I already have RA2 1.6. Do I need a different, custom patch? --AtTheAbyss (talk) 05:24, 10 November 2008 (UTC)

XWIS says that all you need to do was what I provided you (except the exactly 8 character password requirement. I don't remember that). Take a look at the Help Forum linked on that page. Washii (talk) 05:56, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

higher-end graphics cards and PCI-Express versions

I recently upgraded my graphics card to an Nvidia GTX 260 and found that the 3dMark06 score is scarcely higher than my old card, which was in the Nvidia 8800 series; and the score is nowhere near the charts on Tom's Hardware. So I upgraded my power supply, which had been underrated for even my old card, hoping that would solve the problem. It improved the score by a few hundred points, still far short. Now I'm realizing that there is a version 2.0 of PCI-Express and my PC (unexpectedly) seems to be 1.0. Would this be a significant limiting factor in getting the expected performance from a newer card? What a disappointment if I have to upgrade my motherboard too. I need to know not if PCI-e 2.0 "might" help, but indeed if it's a "no-brainer" improvement, almost a requirement for this card, from someone with experience. (The CPU is a Q6600, shouldn't be a factor.) Thanks! Birchcliff (talk) 22:09, 9 November 2008 (UTC)

If you had one of the faster 8800s (an 8800GTX or 8800 Ultra, for example), there's not much speed difference between it and a GTX 260. And no, upgrading from PCIe 1 to PCIe 2 won't make a bit of difference: either version is faster than a single graphics card needs. One thing to check is to make sure that the card is plugged into an actual PCIe x16 slot. Some motherboard manufacturers cut corners to save money and only connect half or a quarter of the signal lines, making it effectively an x4 or x8 slot. --Carnildo (talk) 22:49, 10 November 2008 (UTC)

I'd bet good money that your PC is being bottlenecked by something else. Either your processor or ram. Any chance you could post the rest of your system specs? Gunrun (talk) 11:26, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

Yeah - I agree. Probably your CPU isn't fast enough to stuff data into the new card - possibly not even fast enough for your old card either! It's possible that it's the PCI-Express bus - but I doubt it. I'd also warn you against chasing the benchmarks - they rarely mirror practical performance in real applications. You might not be bottlenecked in the benchmarks - but when you use the card in a computer game (for example) all of the other things the game does OTHER than graphics might slow the CPU down to the point where it can't keep the graphics card busy. It's also possible that some of the clever tricks that games programmers use to squeeze the last drop of performance might result in games running better than the benchmarks predict. There is no simple way to know in advance. SteveBaker (talk) 01:53, 12 November 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for the perspectives. Some more experimentation seems to show that I shouldn't put much stock in the 3dMark06 test. I benchmarked my old card (8800 GT "OC") against the EVGA 260 in both 3dMark06 and the newer "Vantage" which was a free download with the new card. The "3DMark06" frames per second in its four main tests hardly changed; all but one increased by no more than one FPS. In "Vantage", however, there was a real difference in its two (presumably more advanced) GPU tests: 14.9 vs 24.8, 15 vs 24.2. And in general use the better performance is apparent. Birchcliff (talk) 05:13, 12 November 2008 (UTC)

rapidshare contradictions

Why rapidshare has limits on uploader side like max file size and deletion of files and at the same time has limits on donwloader user side like max parallels donwloads and resume of downloads???

I mean, who will pay and use the rapidshare to be their place to upload their thinge to others peoples download, if people that would be downloading their files would be a hardtime to download her files or some restricions???

On the other side, who would pay to downloads more files at the same time, get better download speeds, if the uploaders of the system have many restrictions on how they will upload their files, make more diffilcult to find some kind of files??

What is the idea behind limiting both sides???? WOuldnt be a better idea to choose just one side and limit his actions??? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 201.79.104.214 (talk) 22:31, 9 November 2008 (UTC)

Well, you're right. But I don't see why you would pay at all, when there are things like SkyDrive and FileDen. flaminglawyer^c 22:46, 10 November 2008 (UTC)

Or Mediafire... SF007 (talk) 00:34, 11 November 2008 (UTC)

@SF007, it seems Mediafire has a non-pro limit of 100 MB per file. Rapidshare is 200,I believe. However, it looks pretty good for files under 100 MB. Kushal (talk) 00:05, 12 November 2008 (UTC)