What Have You Done Today - (Computer Version)
- Thread starter tlowr4
- 4,223 comments
- 336,893 views
Door, Window, never mind...
- 6,041
- Puget Sound
- Crash852
My trusty MacBook Pro is slowly dying. When under load, the computer will freeze with the screen flickering and the image gets all distorted. When restarting, the display won't show up at all. I coaxed the on-board screen to work for a little bit longer, but now that won't even come on.
I can still plug it into an external monitor and use that, so for now, it is a desktop computer. I'll probably buy a couple of parts, crack it open, and see if I can fix it myself.
I can still plug it into an external monitor and use that, so for now, it is a desktop computer. I'll probably buy a couple of parts, crack it open, and see if I can fix it myself.
- 2,128
- Australia
- N/A
- N/A
Sounds like your graphics chip is on the way out. It could just be overheating since Apple don't know how to apply thermal paste properly. First I'd suggest changing the thermal paste (there's plenty of Vids on YouTube about it), then give it a boot. If that dosn't work then really I'm afraid there's nothing you can do unless you take it to men with white overalls in a white room...
What model do you have? Also, you've spooked me a bit since my girl is getting on a bit (3 years in April, bought it a month and 2 days before I joined GTP) and is really starting to be run into the ground. It gets hotter every day due to the thermal paste issue and my screen has come out of its runners, it's just being held on with one clip on the left side...
Yeah, Skype chews about 150MB for me on idle, in a call up to 500MB. Scary stuff (especially when you're only running 2GB in total).
- 465
- actionjeans
Like... with my home stuff? Or work?
Work I did a bunch of crap w/ "computers", setup a custom graph for a customer for their iSCSI traffic, sorta got working two mysql virtuals with HA failover (still need more testing, I suck @ mysql atm), more graphing with Munin for another customer, and built out 4 servers for a new customer (CentOS w/LAMP), a bunch of stuff with Nagios monitoring.
Home, I am in serious need of an upgrade for everything. I want a SAN (either want to build one, or more likely, get the Synology DS212J), I need a dedicated server running Xen, my gaming rig is now a joke (was only sorta ok when I first built it out of bargain crap, now is mostly crap, Saints Row the Third will run, but not at nice settings) - so will probably next paycheck be taking the leap - delegating my "gaming rig" to the role of a virtual host, buying new hardware (board, cpu, memory, ssd) to build/refurb a decent gaming rig, getting an unmanaged 1GB switch, and a SAN - then I should be good for awhile. Of course I say that knowing full well that the Fanatec CSR Elite is coming in any day now, and I really, REALLY want one of those...
So many things, only so much money... I also really wish HD prices would start dropping - I understand WHY their so high, but it's sad to price 3TB drives and realize these were half the price a year ago.
Work I did a bunch of crap w/ "computers", setup a custom graph for a customer for their iSCSI traffic, sorta got working two mysql virtuals with HA failover (still need more testing, I suck @ mysql atm), more graphing with Munin for another customer, and built out 4 servers for a new customer (CentOS w/LAMP), a bunch of stuff with Nagios monitoring.
Home, I am in serious need of an upgrade for everything. I want a SAN (either want to build one, or more likely, get the Synology DS212J), I need a dedicated server running Xen, my gaming rig is now a joke (was only sorta ok when I first built it out of bargain crap, now is mostly crap, Saints Row the Third will run, but not at nice settings) - so will probably next paycheck be taking the leap - delegating my "gaming rig" to the role of a virtual host, buying new hardware (board, cpu, memory, ssd) to build/refurb a decent gaming rig, getting an unmanaged 1GB switch, and a SAN - then I should be good for awhile. Of course I say that knowing full well that the Fanatec CSR Elite is coming in any day now, and I really, REALLY want one of those...
So many things, only so much money... I also really wish HD prices would start dropping - I understand WHY their so high, but it's sad to price 3TB drives and realize these were half the price a year ago.
- 2,128
- Australia
- N/A
- N/A
^^ Yeah, HDD prices are ridiculous, in and in all honesty, brands such as Western Digital, Seagate etc are milking it for as much as they can. There's no way in hell it's that bad at the moment, they're just using it to get more profit. It'll string on for another 6 - 9 months, until everyone starts waking up and sending messages. THEN we'll see a price reduction. Meanwhile, the 🤬 got away with thousands of dollars. Ugh, it makes me sick.
- 7,956
- BradleyH131
Ughhh....MySQL. May receive some hate on here, but in my experience, MSSQL is so much better when it comes to recovery/fallover. I actually administer systems on both MSSQL and MySQL and I find MSSQL a much better product all around.
Pretty extreme to have a SAN in a home environment!
- 6,041
- Puget Sound
- Crash852
Sounds like your graphics chip is on the way out. It could just be overheating since Apple don't know how to apply thermal paste properly. First I'd suggest changing the thermal paste (there's plenty of Vids on YouTube about it), then give it a boot. If that dosn't work then really I'm afraid there's nothing you can do unless you take it to men with white overalls in a white room...
What model do you have? Also, you've spooked me a bit since my girl is getting on a bit (3 years in April, bought it a month and 2 days before I joined GTP) and is really starting to be run into the ground. It gets hotter every day due to the thermal paste issue and my screen has come out of its runners, it's just being held on with one clip on the left side...
I have the Santa Rosa MBP (Pre-Unibody, Mid 2007). The problem isn't the thermal paste, the problem is with the graphics on the computer, which is a Geforce 8600. That generation of cards have had higher than average failures across all brands, so much so that Nvidia ponied up the money to allow computers with failed graphics cards to be fixed for free, even if out of warranty.
It's having other weird issues, and so far, it still sort-of works, so it may not be solely hardware related, despite my initial thoughts. I do still think heat plays a role in how well it works. I will have to play around with it more and do more diagnosis to see what's going on.
- 465
- actionjeans
Well yeah MSSQL IS way better, there should be NO ONE who argues that but... have you priced licencing for MSSQL? It is JAW DROPPINGLY expensive... whereas MySQL is free. And yes, I ughhh MySQL to...
These days, it seems like a slam dunk... SSD is fast, but small - so instead of weighing your computer down as a file server, offload that to a decent SAN - the DS212J does all sorts of cool stuff to; handles PS3 media streaming (or really ANY media streaming for almost every format), easy cloud storage, automated backup, download station (BT/HTTP/FTP/NZB/eMule), print server, uses very little power so I could leave it on all the time, and it's $199 minus the disks - it just would make my life so much easier - central repository for all my crap for all of my computers (3 laptops, 2 computers, 3 phones)? Yes please.
I thought about going with FreeNAS for ZFS support, but it seems like a pain to setup and manage, doesn't offer many of these features (easily, at least), and would cost me about the same amount of money.
- 465
- actionjeans
Sorry my bad - Network area storage, not storage area network, a SAN would indeed be massive overkill for my home network - photos unnecessary... I work with this stuff on a daily basis, we use a Netapp at our primary DC, and an HDS at our colo.
That last one isn't a SAN either. It's just a rack mount disk array which doesn't do anything without a controller (IBM from the looks of it).
This is what I consider to be a SAN:
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- 399
- Trolololololand
- Rufie_drunk
That annoys the hell out of me
I use Skype a lot too, not that it affects my current average system, but it still seems like overkill lolOn-topic: decided to install a PSX emulator last night to play Silent Hill again, got it up and running but still needs tweaking with the display, sound, keyboard settings
- 432
- United States
That annoys the hell out of me
On-topic: decided to install a PSX emulator last night to play Silent Hill again, got it up and running but still needs tweaking with the display, sound, keyboard settings
You can not post about emulation on gtplanet, there is a thread on that I thing in the tech section, if you do not own silent hill or the game you are emulating it is piracy, emulation is piracy.
- 465
- actionjeans
^Yeah, if he owns the game, it ain't piracy, matey...
- 432
- United States
Gee Wiz I know, there are just so many people who emulate games they don't own copys of so you don't know who to trust.
- 465
- actionjeans
Well you know what they say about the word assume...
- 12,299
- Ealing-London
Network Attached Storage
Umm, yes it is. Just because you can't see the backplane doesn't mean it's just disks.
That's just a bigger SAN.
- 465
- actionjeans
Unless that is your hardware, that looks identical to the ones we used at my old job - they don't do a thing without a controller. We've even used them where I used to work as extra attached storage for our finance DB servers (fairly ghetto, but it worked) via the fiber channel interface on the rear.
Maybe that's a different one with a controller/NIC built into it, but I've never seen one like that. That being said, we did use ancient, ancient stuff...
- 31,919
- Buckwheat City
- Dennisch
Installed Chrome on my desktop, because IE failed too many times now. And I don't even use the desktop. Only for downloading and streaming. My girlfriend always complained when I changed browsers in the past. But Chrome works so fast and easy for her, she now bitches about why I couldn't install it sooner. 
- 2,587
Installed Chrome on my desktop, because IE failed too many times now. And I don't even use the desktop. Only for downloading and streaming. My girlfriend always complained when I changed browsers in the past. But Chrome works so fast and easy for her, she now bitches about why I couldn't install it sooner.
Why couldn't you?
Anything in the world is better than IE, even Safari for the iPhone beats out IE. 
- 36,113
- Addison,Texas
- GTP_RACECAR
Just aquired this today:
Going to be recording some true HD videos as opposed to just stretching to HD in Vegas, I just need something to get what I see on my TV to show up on mah Laptop. I've installed everything as instructed and have a HDMI splitter dividing the signal, but I got nothing so far. Any Suggestions?.
Edit: I derped up and ended up finding a device that actually sends the signal of your Computer to the TV, not the other way around. Guess while I'm at it, anyone know the cheapest Video capture device I can find? I'd preferably like something not too big.
Going to be recording some true HD videos as opposed to just stretching to HD in Vegas, I just need something to get what I see on my TV to show up on mah Laptop. I've installed everything as instructed and have a HDMI splitter dividing the signal, but I got nothing so far. Any Suggestions?.
Edit: I derped up and ended up finding a device that actually sends the signal of your Computer to the TV, not the other way around. Guess while I'm at it, anyone know the cheapest Video capture device I can find? I'd preferably like something not too big.
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Copied my home music library to our school netbooks/notebooks/craptops only to find out that running any .exe's except for pre-installs is blocked and requires a format, which is also blocked on the software side 
I'm stuck with iTunes/Windows Media Player now, I miss Foobar 
On the plus side, the filter allows Formula 1 streaming, GTPlanet and some other forums I go on, so it sortof balances out
I'm stuck with iTunes/Windows Media Player now, I miss Foobar On the plus side, the filter allows Formula 1 streaming, GTPlanet and some other forums I go on, so it sortof balances out
- 9,256
- United Kingdom
- neema_t
To be fair to him, he was only trying to help you not get banned.
My computing life today has consisted of: Moving my PC between my TV and sim rig (finished to a useable state today) to do some, well, sim racing. It has been fun but now my eyes are killing me because this screen is so bright so it's time to get off of the internet, which is just so white...
