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What an ordeal

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AweMan

AweMan

Jedi Knight
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Last week my P.C. started speaking aribic or maybe it was oriental Not sure which. In any case whatever it was Munched my H.D. {Whenever I try a reinstall it tells me there is an application thats using an invalid true type font and comes to an abrupt halt then reboots} I tried replacing the M.B.R., formated several times, deleted the partitions {Several times} even ran a H.D. utility on it that writes zeros to the entire drive. ALL to NO avail! Ended up buying a NEW drive. In any case, I`m sure NO one missed me /bcforum/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/lol.gif but ........ Im Back!!!
an YEA I HATE WINDOWS!!!!
An YEA last week was the pits, {Broken windshield on the M.H. + frozen copper pipe in lavatory, Ft. Brakes went kaput on my durango {New rotors, pads, & calipers} Luckily I can/did do the labor myself.
Some days it just doesnt pay to go outside /bcforum/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/lol.gif
 
AWWWW Mannnnn!
Well at least that should do it for the nasties for a while. You've used up your quota of problems for the month.
 
Now it's time fer me to say:
"LINUX! Load it, learn it, LOVE it!" /bcforum/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/devilgrin.gif

...no real advice for the Durango issue. /bcforum/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/smirk.gif
 
<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:]Some days it just doesnt pay to go outside /bcforum/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/lol.gif [/QUOTE]


Outside?

I've days when just getting out of bed was a gross error of judgement.... /bcforum/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/nopity.gif
 
/bcforum/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/iagree.gif
In fact,sometimes opening an eye is a mistake. /bcforum/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/jester.gif

So, Doc,you on a retainer from Linux?? Or is it really so much better? /bcforum/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/devilgrin.gif

Stuart. /bcforum/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/cheers.gif
 
It's stable, then OS behaves the same all the time. An application crashing, or install WON'T force you to reboot. The only thing that prevents me from migrating to 100% Linux on my home PCs is the fact that I like playing Windows based games when they come out.
 
Stability is everything here. I don't "game" and no "multi-media" need so I'm VERY happy to say "NO" to MS.
 
Come to find out the O.S. wasn`t the problem at all {NOT patting Win on the back here at all}. But rather either a M.B or chipset problem. Every drive I tried to use {Even a brand new 160 M.B. W.D.} in that P.C. was supposedly "Bad" Uhhhhhhhhh HUH!
I dragged my old 2.8 Mb Athalon out of the closet and chased the spiders off, instaled an old 3 gig segate drive I had laying around and an O.P. sys and she fired right up. So I tried some of the supposedly "Bad drives" {7 of em} with the same result.
Now I havn`t a clue what made the "Other" P.C. go south
Just one of those things I guess. Or maybe a viri got the chipset but I dont see how as I seldome ever download or browse any questionable sites. {coulda been one a tha kids tho} I run a software firewall and a good viri scanner {Norton}
Anyhow, thats two M.B`s gone south on me this year. grrrrrrrrrr.
 
Are you building these yourself? If you are, are you taking the necessary "anti-static" precautions?

Static electricity hasn't been much of a problem for me in ~most~ of the places I've lived, because ~most~ of those places were so humid that there was little chance of static building up.

Once I moved out here to California though, that all changed. Now, I ~ALWAYS~ make sure I have a discharge path to an outlet ground before I handle any of the my PC hardware. It took me 2 fried motherboards (seemingly out of the box) before I reinstated proper personal grounding techniques learned in the Corps.

The other thing, is whether or not you suffered your MoBo failures in association with power outages. I never personally suffered one from such an event, but I know of plenty of examples (from working as a PC Tech in the late 90s) to know that an Un-interruptible Power Supply (UPS) is a very good investment that offers up an unmeasurable amount of more protection than a "surge protector".
 
Rob:
Yea I build my own P.C.`s. Having said that, I built this particular one {the one that just went south} eons ago. There has been no power outtages here in a while, and when there was previously they never effected my computers. This P.C. locked up on me while browsing a website {a questionable one at that, which I seldome do}. That is when all the trouble started! On reboot, immediately all the fonts were in arabic or oriental {not sure which}. Then it just got worse from there, thats when I decided to do a restore {winxp pro} taped f11 on reboot {grrrrrrrrrrrr} no dice! Then resorted to a format and reinstal {format seemed to go just fine} On reinstal, chipset kept telling me fat32`s didn`t match { which seemed parcular to me cause I only knew of having one fat partitoin at that time. SO I tired another dirve SAME SAME. So I went and bought a NEW W.D. drive SAME SAME. I played with the dang thing for about three days straight before I got sick of it and went and dragged this Athalon out of mothballs and instaled one of the very small {3 Gig} drives I had laying around, instaled win98 on it, it fired right up. Then I tried all of the drives that were supposedly having problems on the other P.C. All reported correctly, O.P. sys instaled on every one of them and they all ran just fine.
I hate running this Athalon on the net cause it has my EXTENSIVE .MP3 collection on it { 30,000+ tunes}. So I guess I`ll be purchasing a NEW M.B. in the real near future to rebuild one of the other machines that are on vacation. And YES I am aware that I need to use the GND strap here in Utah {it`s very dry here}
Like I said previously, the kids may have done a NO NO but you think there gonna tell me, Harummmmmmmph.
The last P.C. to go south was a gigabyte M.B and a 2,200 Athalon chipset, not fancy not new but when it ran, it ran sweet.
I do run a software firewall {Sygate} but may need to look into the one the Doc. mentioned.
Kerry
 
I'll not go thru the Mac rant, not relevant here.

But I WILL say using a software firewalling scheme is less-than effective. An ~appliance~ is what should stand as gatekeeper. A Linux kernel hardened for the task is ideal. The guys who sell "Watchguard" and its "plan" are using a Linux kernel for the job. I went to one of their intro "seminars" here when they were pushing it hard... sat and listened to the pitch, they lower'd th' lights, started th' presentation, showed the GUI manager... "someone" inna crowd shouted: "They're just usin' a hardened LINUX KERNEL!!"

...the guffaws and laughter and the "He's RIGHT!" agreements were gratifying. /bcforum/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/devilgrin.gif

I didn't sign up to be one of their "distributors".
 
/bcforum/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/iagree.gif
My kid put together a Linux proxy server for me after I got hacked. It now sits between my home office network and the internet. NO problems at all now. I'm not the computer-security geek (I'm a different kind of geek), so I'm not entirely sure what he did--but I understand it's Debian Linux with a different, tweaked kernel. It runs on an older Dell PC that I bought used for $50. And, I can actually use it for doing real work, on occasion.

Thanks for the link to Smoothwall. I'll ask my son about it. I'm sure he's familiar with it.
 
The thing is bulletproof AFAIC. Baby-poo simple to set up, configurable from any workstation on the LAN (with a GUI front-end), Has provision for about anything you want: VoIP, VPN, etc. Turn it on, walk away. Longest up-time so far personally was 250+ days. That'n was on a UPS but a five hour power outtage took it down. <shrug> "Florida Flicker 'N Flash" power company. /bcforum/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/smirk.gif


If he's not familiar with it, he should be. Whole lot better'n hand knitting a kernel for the purpose. I've been using it for years (started with the v1.0, dial-up), have many of 'em "out there". It even spoofs its own MAC addy: "00:00:00:00:00:00" ! /bcforum/images/%%GRAEMLIN_URL%%/laugh.gif
 
Even someone that isn't computer savvy can have a Linux proxy server/internet gateway setup in their homes very quickly these days...

Some of the better known brands in the home networking/home office arena are embedding Linux in their routers these days. And doing smart things like allowing configurations to only be changed from a physical connection to the internal LAN ports. Some even allow you to get as specific as ~WHICH~ computer on the LAN is allowed to make the changes.

Either way, the next best thing to a Linux box between you and the 'net (broadband or not) is a Network Address Translating Router. I haven't seen a new one that DIDN'T come with an integral firewall in the past few years.
 
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