The computer and electronics super geek thread

[Roy Focker]

So only 3 more years until I have to retire my computer for good.

[JB0]

Spoilers: You don't have to stop using an OS because the manufacturer says it is dead.

[azrael]

Spoilers: You don't have to stop using an OS because the manufacturer says it is dead.

Yes. I hear some train station turnstile card readers still run Windows 2000.

[mikeszekely]

Spoilers: You don't have to stop using an OS because the manufacturer says it is dead.

My dad still uses XP. Don't know how much longer, though- I told him I'm not fixing that computer anymore.

[areaseven]

I got an Asus Eee PC from my old man that was running Windows 7 Starter, which was unbearably slow and even worse when it got upgraded to Windows 10. It literally took 2 minutes to open Firefox or Chrome. Seeing that it was pointless to reinstall Windows on an Atom-based netbook, I reformatted it to CloudReady, and now it surfs the web like a dream.

[JB0]

Yes. I hear some train station turnstile card readers still run Windows 2000.

And why not? It is the last good version of Windows!

True story: I'd be running 2K on something or other right now if I had a dang clue what we did with the CD and license key.

[azrael]

...I told him I'm not fixing that computer anymore.

Also my excuse. If I can't find readily compatible parts, don't expect me to fix it.

[TangledThorns]

Yes. I hear some train station turnstile card readers still run Windows 2000.

Pffft, our United States military still uses floppy disks.

http://www.cnn.com/2016/05/26/us/pentagon-floppy-disks-nuclear/

[azrael]

Pffft, our United States military still uses floppy disks.

http://www.cnn.com/2016/05/26/us/pentagon-floppy-disks-nuclear/

And for good reason and I have no problem with that.

[miles316]

Sorry for using a thread for somthing other than its stated topic.

Is the X-Box1 Blue Ray player able to play HD BR/4K disks.

[Tking22]

Sorry for using a thread for somthing other than its stated topic.

Is the X-Box1 Blue Ray player able to play HD BR/4K disks.

Only the new S slim model, I upgraded to one from my old one, worth it, cheapest 4K Bluray player on the market, plus HDR on my 4K TV looks awesome.

[Roy Focker]

I'm retiring my computer.

It is already 7 years old. It was pretty good for its time. I wanted it to have 5 years of use before it got too dated. 3 years ago the monitor started shutting off and on. This month it wouldn't load some websites on Firefox and would freeze on IE. Before all this it was starting to crash more often. Didn't have the money to buy a new computer 2 years ago when I wanted to. I have extra money for one now. Wanted to wait for the Christmas sales but ordered one early just incase my current computer dies completely before the sales start.

Guess I have to learn how to love Windows 10.

[Mazinger]

Guess I have to learn how to love Windows 10.

There are always the Mac and Linux options. They might not have the latest/greatest games, or even all of the 2012's latest/greatest games, but you get greater system stability and less virus infection worries.

[azrael]

I'm retiring my computer.

...

I'd look at Mac as well, if you spend more time doing work (i.e. Photoshop or media editing) than gaming.

[JB0]

As a bonus, the modern Macs can all run Windows since they're IBM-compatible!

[areaseven]

I'm retiring my computer.

It is already 7 years old. It was pretty good for its time. I wanted it to have 5 years of use before it got too dated. 3 years ago the monitor started shutting off and on. This month it wouldn't load some websites on Firefox and would freeze on IE. Before all this it was starting to crash more often. Didn't have the money to buy a new computer 2 years ago when I wanted to. I have extra money for one now. Wanted to wait for the Christmas sales but ordered one early just incase my current computer dies completely before the sales start.

Guess I have to learn how to love Windows 10.

CloudReady it.

[Roy Focker]

Already order a computer before I announced the retirement. Its another PC and not a Mac. Apple products always have a better rep but are always over my budget. I either have to pay more or give up some features. I plan on doing some more electronic upgrades this holiday season and didn't want the computer eating too much of the budget.

[Knight26]

Don't enter the mac cult, they are overpriced, underpowered, unable to be expanded, and extremely limited in what software they can run. Dual booting the machine with Linux isn't a bad option though.

[Mazinger]

And there's always the voodoo option:

https://www.tonymacx86.com

Not for the feint of heart.

[Roy Focker]

New computer woes.

I hate being force to upgrade all my programs because they decided not to support them anymore. I'm not using all these programs to run a business. I don't use them daily. I paid for an older version years ago and that one is good for me. Windows 10 allows me to install all my old programs but then doesn't recognize them. Now I either have to buy the latest versions, do complicated work around or use my old computer to run them.

The color yellow is too strong. I've adjusted settings to lessen the impact of yellow. This fix pictures but in videos yellow is still too strong. Makes everyone look like Spock. Speaking of video my old laptop my screen was wrecked but I swear I had a better picture on video play back. HD doesn't look that HD as it did on my old one. This new one is suppose to have a better everything.

Let's talk about settings. It is so hard change settings on Windows 10. I don't find all these improvements to make your experience better to be that good. I keep looking at my computer and wondering why is it doing that and how can I disable that feature or find how to access a previous feature. I Google to see if there's a solution online. First I have to figure out how to convince Windows that I want to use Google and not Bing. On Google I find people like me with the same needs and people telling them that feature been replaced, you can't disable this new feature anymore because they removed that option or you need to go advance settings and start retyping code.

On the plus side this new computer is much faster but I'm wasting so much time trying to adjust this thing to my preferred settings and finding that I can't.

[mikeszekely]

So I, like most Americans, was totally unable to score an NES Classic Edition today. Instead of mope about it, I decided to build my own NES to play classic games. Here's my basic idea:

First, I'm going to start with an NES. It doesn't have to work (and if you happen to have a busted NES you want to unload, PM me). I'm going to gut it, and that'll be my case. Cuts will be made to the rear as needed, but the front shouldn't be changed.

Then, I'm going to need new guts. I'm thinking a Micro ITX board, probably an MSI H110I Pro, an Intel Celeron G3920 (and it's integrated HD 510 graphics), 4GB of DDR4, and a 120GB Kingston SSD I have lying around. I shouldn't need more CPU or memory due to the OS, nor will I need an optical drive, mouse, or keyboard.

I will, however, want Bluetooth and Wi-Fi, again due to the OS. So I'll probably add an Intel 7265 802.11ac/Bluetooth 4.0 M.2 card.

No way I'm going to fit a regular PSU inside the NES, so I'm planning on picking up Mini-box's picoPSU-150XT and a 150w AC Adapter. While I'm at it, I'm going to loot for a solution to use the NES's power switch for the PC guts. I'll either solder the NES's power switch to a mobo header, or buy a replacement desktop switch and header and jury rig it to the NES's button.

Then I just need to install an OS. I've decided to try Lakka, an extremely lightweight Linux-based OS that's really centered around RetroArch. Once booted, it's designed to be navigated with a controller. The interface is, more or less, Sony's XMB. It comes with a number of libcore's baked in, and out of the box it should work with a DualShock 3 wired or wirelessly (hence the desire for Bluetooth). It also works with Xbox 360, Xbox One, and DualShock 4 controllers wired. The DualShock 4 can be configured to work with Bluetooth, too, but it requires a bit of command line work (which is tricky in an OS that doesn't have a Terminal or work with a keyboard). All of those controllers work without having to remap buttons (although you can), and the Home button even pauses the emulator and brings you back to the the OS, where there are options for things like saving states and what have you. ROMs, BIOSes, and other files are pushed to the Lakka box from another computer on the same network (hence the desire for Wi-Fi).

I tested Lakka on a 4-year-old Acer Aspire One netbook with an AMD C60 and 2GB of RAM. This computer is so crappy that Lubuntu (a lightweight Linux distro) ran pretty slowly, but Lakka booted quickly, the interface was no better or worse than the PS3's, and I fired up a few SNES games that ran perfectly well, so I'm feeling like my planned build should be more than adequate. Plus, unlike the NES Classic, it'll have more than 30 games!

[JB0]

No way I'm going to fit a regular PSU inside the NES, so I'm planning on picking up Mini-box's picoPSU-150XT and a 150w AC Adapter. While I'm at it, I'm going to loot for a solution to use the NES's power switch for the PC guts. I'll either solder the NES's power switch to a mobo header, or buy a replacement desktop switch and header and jury rig it to the NES's button.

The NES power switch won't work as an ATX power switch, since the Nintendo used a toggle switch and ATX is a momentary switch.

But reset will work fine as an ATX power switch. Just swap the two switches around. I am totally in favor of preserving the original switches, as they are going to contribute to the finished product "feeling right". Cut the plug off the Nintendo switch and solder a motherboard header cable on if you have to.

As purely aesthetic advice, I'd try to snag a wireless controller receiver and attach it to the controller ports.

If you have an old NES Satellite laying around, the receiver module is chunky, but the lines are nice.

Installing a slim optical drive behind the cartridge cover expands your options a lot, as you now have an NES that can play back CDs and DVDs, which is a cool stunt. Unfortunately, I doubt you can fit a full-size drive in without serious aesthetic compromises, and last I checked slim drives were expensive. But imagine how cool it'd be to watch your Super Mario 3 or Captain N cartoon collections with your NES!

[mikeszekely]

The NES power switch won't work as an ATX power switch, since the Nintendo used a toggle switch and ATX is a momentary switch.

But reset will work fine as an ATX power switch. Just swap the two switches around.

Apparently the only difference between the power and reset switches in the NES is a small metal piece on the power switch. Remove it and it should spring back out like the reset switch.

As purely aesthetic advice, I'd try to snag a wireless controller receiver and attach it to the controller ports.

If you have an old NES Satellite laying around, the receiver module is chunky, but the lines are nice.

I don't have ANY old NES stuff lying around. I think I either gave away or traded my NES when I got a SNES. Right now, I have a bid in on a defective NES on Ebay. But I'll keep it in mind. Another thought I've had would be to dremmel out spaces in the controller ports, then get some USB extension cables and splice them to USB headers on the mobo. That way you could plug a USB controller into the modified controller port.

Installing a slim optical drive behind the cartridge cover expands your options a lot, as you now have an NES that can play back CDs and DVDs, which is a cool stunt. Unfortunately, I doubt you can fit a full-size drive in without serious aesthetic compromises, and last I checked slim drives were expensive. But imagine how cool it'd be to watch your Super Mario 3 or Captain N cartoon collections with your NES!

From what I understand, that's doable, but it's really unnecessary and will increase the load on the picoPSU. From a fresh install Lakka doesn't play DVDs or videos; it's really just mean to run RetroArch and make a hardware behave as little like a PC and as much like a console as possible. Even the PlayStation libcore wants bin files with cue sheets and not actual discs. Heck, Lakka itself doesn't support installation from a CD or DVD, requiring you to use a flash drive for installation. Of course, since Lakka is still Linux at heart I'm sure you could add DVD playback (I know it just takes some settings tweaks to get it to play back video files), but at that point why bother? Like I said, it's just going to increase the load on the picoPSU and add to the cost.

[JB0]

Apparently the only difference between the power and reset switches in the NES is a small metal piece on the power switch. Remove it and it should spring back out like the reset switch.

Very convenient!

Another thought I've had would be to dremmel out spaces in the controller ports, then get some USB extension cables and splice them to USB headers on the mobo. That way you could plug a USB controller into the modified controller port.

I would likely preserve the original controller ports. Wire USB lines to the existing pins, and make short USB-NES "adapters" out of old Nintendo controllers or extension cables to place between USB devices and the NES ports.

Actually, I think the 7-pin NES port is adequate for two USB ports, a USB and PS/2 port, or two PS/2 ports(shared +5v and ground, two unique data lines, so you only need six pins for two ports in all cases).

Alternatively, for safety, you could use the original NES 5V and ground pin locations, and place the USB data lines on D3 and D4, which a standard NES controller doesn't use.

That way if someone plugs a real NES controller into your emulation station, it doesn't have any way to damage anything.

Original pinout for reference:

From what I understand, that's doable, but it's really unnecessary and will increase the load on the picoPSU. From a fresh install Lakka doesn't play DVDs or videos; it's really just mean to run RetroArch and make a hardware behave as little like a PC and as much like a console as possible. Even the PlayStation libcore wants bin files with cue sheets and not actual discs. Heck, Lakka itself doesn't support installation from a CD or DVD, requiring you to use a flash drive for installation. Of course, since Lakka is still Linux at heart I'm sure you could add DVD playback (I know it just takes some settings tweaks to get it to play back video files), but at that point why bother? Like I said, it's just going to increase the load on the picoPSU and add to the cost.

That is fair. I like the idea, but can't think of a truly great reason to do it.

...

Maybe a cute LCD panel with system stats? It feels like a waste to not have something behind the cart door.

[mikeszekely]

It feels like a waste to not have something behind the cart door.

Depending on where exactly the motherboard sits (presumably as low as possible), maybe jury rig a cartridge into a bracket for the SSD?

[JB0]

SSD cartridge is also a good solution!

[mikeszekely]

CloudReady it.

So, the aforementioned netbook what ran even Lubuntu really poorly? The one I put Lakka one to test it? Yeah, Lakka works great as a console OS, but console seems like a poor use of a netbook. I think I've seen you mention CloudReady before, so I figured I'd look into. For those not in the know, CloudReady is apparently a commercial version of Chromium OS (Chromium OS being the open-source underpinnings of Google's Chrome OS), free for home use, so installing CloudReady on an old laptop is kinda sorta like turning into a Chromebook. Reported results are pretty good, and the particular netbook I have is on the list, so I'll give it a go.

[Nazareno2012]

So, the aforementioned netbook what ran even Lubuntu really poorly? The one I put Lakka one to test it? Yeah, Lakka works great as a console OS, but console seems like a poor use of a netbook. I think I've seen you mention CloudReady before, so I figured I'd look into. For those not in the know, CloudReady is apparently a commercial version of Chromium OS (Chromium OS being the open-source underpinnings of Google's Chrome OS), free for home use, so installing CloudReady on an old laptop is kinda sorta like turning into a Chromebook. Reported results are pretty good, and the particular netbook I have is on the list, so I'll give it a go.

You can try LXLE as well, though it is just a tweaked version of Lubuntu. Operating systems using the XFCE desktop environment could also run fast on a netbook, though not as fast as the LXDE desktop environment. I have installed Ubuntu and Debian with XFCE desktop environment on netbooks and they run quite fast, faster than Windows 7 Starter originally installed on the netbooks.

[mikeszekely]

You can try LXLE as well, though it is just a tweaked version of Lubuntu. Operating systems using the XFCE desktop environment could also run fast on a netbook, though not as fast as the LXDE desktop environment. I have installed Ubuntu and Debian with XFCE desktop environment on netbooks and they run quite fast, faster than Windows 7 Starter originally installed on the netbooks.

I'll keep it in mind.

Cloudready runs fairly slowly on this netbook. It actually took so long to boot I thought maybe something had gone wrong with the installation. Maybe I'm not used to running an OS off of a spinning platter on low-end hardware anymore, or maybe there's something wrong with the computer (I actually got it from a friend's mom after it gave her grief and she was unable to get Windows 7 to reinstall on it). Once it's booted, though, I guess it's acceptable if all you want to do is run a browser.

[kajnrig]

Hey all. Maybe you can help me out. I mistakenly bought a 140mm cpu fan with a 4-pin PWM connector. I want to use it as a case fan (front intake, in place of my empty 5.25" bays) and have no spare 4-pin slots on my mobo. How can I adapt this fan to run? Maybe forego fan control, power it at full blast if necessary?

[technoblue]

Hey all. Maybe you can help me out. I mistakenly bought a 140mm cpu fan with a 4-pin PWM connector. I want to use it as a case fan (front intake, in place of my empty 5.25" bays) and have no spare 4-pin slots on my mobo. How can I adapt this fan to run? Maybe forego fan control, power it at full blast if necessary?

Right, 4-pin PWM fans connected to 3-pin headers will be locked at full speed. If that ends up being too loud, you can add a resistor to manually slow the fan down too. You shouldn't have to adapt anything else unless your motherboard has unique requirements for its fan connections.

[azrael]

How can I adapt this fan to run? Maybe forego fan control, power it at full blast if necessary?

If the noise is really bothering you, then do technoblue's suggestion. 4-pin PWM fans are designed to work with 3-pin headers. You just lose voltage control without the 4th wire so it runs at full speed. Another option is to get a fan controller and place that in one of the 5.25-slots and plug your fan into the fan controller.

[kajnrig]

Hmmm... Mobo doesn't have any remaining 3-pin headers either. The one it does have is being used by the rear exhaust fan. I want to avoid getting a splitter or other extra hardware, but maybe that's the only option left? Would a local Best Buy/electronics store have something for that, or will I have to shop for something online?

[technoblue]

Hmmm... Mobo doesn't have any remaining 3-pin headers either. The one it does have is being used by the rear exhaust fan. I want to avoid getting a splitter or other extra hardware, but maybe that's the only option left? Would a local Best Buy/electronics store have something for that, or will I have to shop for something online?

Oh! Understood. In that case, azrael's suggestion might work out better for you. You can get a fan controller and place it in your spare 5.25" bay and connect the fan directly to that. I don't know how easy these parts are to source from brick&mortar type stores today, but you will find plenty of options available on-line. There are also adapters that you can use to plug your PWM fan directly into a spare power supply cable.

[azrael]

Hmmm... Mobo doesn't have any remaining 3-pin headers either. The one it does have is being used by the rear exhaust fan. I want to avoid getting a splitter or other extra hardware, but maybe that's the only option left? Would a local Best Buy/electronics store have something for that, or will I have to shop for something online?

If there is a Fry's or Micro Center near you, they should have fan controllers. Best Buy might have 3-pin to Molex adapters.