Tech/Computer advice from me

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tshile said:
I actually just deployed an os x server and bound it to active directory to try to solve all the problems of rouge macs on the network :)

I'm keeping instructions. When I'm done I'll let you know how it went and you're more than welcome to use the instructions :)
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Oh, you have to use osx server for them. It does enough, but still has issues regularly. There are some labs controlled by that.

I've had better luck not binding the Macs to AD, actually. Herding cats goes about as well :p
 
Chris said:
I'm simply a home user and truly enjoy the experience.

Thanks for your other advise!
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Absolutely. Like all things, find the flavor you like :)
Just remember that not all flavors go together well :D
 
So let's say I'm considering a new entry-level desktop in the $325-$350 range. All have more than I need across the board.

One is a Dell. One is an HP. Any recommendations out there for one manufacturer or the other? Is there another easily available brands I should consider?

Also, both come with Windows 8.1. Is that a good thing?
 
Chris said:
So let's say I'm considering a new entry-level desktop in the $325-$350 range. All have more than I need across the board.

One is a Dell. One is an HP. Any recommendations out there for one manufacturer or the other? Is there another easily available brands I should consider?

Also, both come with Windows 8.1. Is that a good thing?
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At that price range they are all about the same, and come with the same amount of bloatware. Main things to keep in mind is they cut corners on things like the power supply, which is the most likely thing to go out; and if you can get your hands on install media to just do a fresh install out of the box you get rid of the bloatware easily(I hate bloatware, and it must die painfully). As far as hardware reliability, ASUS is a brand has done pretty well, but I don't know what you can find in that price range for desktops. ASUS tends to focus on mobile more.

8.1 is fine, if you can stomach avoiding the Start screen. There are programs to give you the start menu back if it is important to you. Depending on what you do, it has a few quirks, but basically works like Windows. Pin the things you use to the taskbar or make icons on your desktop, set it to boot to desktop directly (next major update coming out in a month or 2 here is supposed to enable that on desktops by default), and use it just as you always have. If you use wireless networks, know you can't remove them without going to command line. Other than that, you should be okay with regular internet browsing use.
 
I have had bot Dells and HPs over the years. I personally hate Dells and I've consistently had issues with them. I've had better luck with HP. But I finally moved over to Lenovo and I have been really happy - we have 3 of them in our house and they are workhorses.
 
Chris said:
So let's say I'm considering a new entry-level desktop in the $325-$350 range. All have more than I need across the board.

One is a Dell. One is an HP. Any recommendations out there for one manufacturer or the other? Is there another easily available brands I should consider?

Also, both come with Windows 8.1. Is that a good thing?
Click to expand...

I hate dell. I used to love HP but they just made it so you can't download drive/firmware updates for your machine unless you're currently under an active warranty. Which is complete bullshit. So don't buy HP until they change their policy. Idiots.

Like boone I've switched to Lenovo. They're a chinese company that bought the ThinkPad line from IBM. Pretty solid computers.

Anyways. I think you're going to be better off running a virtual machine on your mac. Check your PM :)
 
Shi no Tenshi said:
At that price range they are all about the same, and come with the same amount of bloatware. Main things to keep in mind is they cut corners on things like the power supply, which is the most likely thing to go out; and if you can get your hands on install media to just do a fresh install out of the box you get rid of the bloatware easily(I hate bloatware, and it must die painfully). As far as hardware reliability, ASUS is a brand has done pretty well, but I don't know what you can find in that price range for desktops. ASUS tends to focus on mobile more.

8.1 is fine, if you can stomach avoiding the Start screen. There are programs to give you the start menu back if it is important to you. Depending on what you do, it has a few quirks, but basically works like Windows. Pin the things you use to the taskbar or make icons on your desktop, set it to boot to desktop directly (next major update coming out in a month or 2 here is supposed to enable that on desktops by default), and use it just as you always have. If you use wireless networks, know you can't remove them without going to command line. Other than that, you should be okay with regular internet browsing use.
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FWIW Asus boards have been coming back a lot more of late than they used to. I've been an avid user of their boards building machines over the years and while I haven't had any problems, the Microcenter boys say they are among the most returned brand right now. Gigabyte has some fantastic stuff and ironically a new company (ASrock) that is under the ASUS umbrella has outstanding bang for the buck boards. I go with ASrock boards whenever I can now, just great stuff. But of course this is all if you build your own machine. I wish we were close Chris, for approx 350 I can build a pretty nice machine these days, especially if I already have things like cases and optical drives etc.

Oh and FWIW, add me to the HP list (although tshile makes a good point about warranty). On that end I've been VERY impressed with their customer service til now, if their policies for coverage are changing that's unfortunate. I've had nothing but good stories to tell about dealing with them for warranty returns for myself and others. Although I've put a few folks including my wife into Dell laptops recently and they've all been very happy.
 
I love HP products and their customer support (though my experiences have only been with business support) and their server lines were second to none (in the small to medium size business markets)

But not allowing you to download firmware and driver updates for hardware you pay a premium for unless you pay additional money to extend your warranty?

Absurd. They're using Cisco as their role model and Cisco has gone down the shitter over the last 5 years hard core. Looks like HP is determined to follow them.

Good riddance. HP's been a complete cluster F over the last 4 years. CEO change-overs, failed webOS purchase/execution, one CEO threatened to sell off their consumer products line because well why the **** not sell off your most profitable division for no reason other than someone decided they wanted to be like IBM?

Oh well. They were awesome for a good 5-6 years there for a while. Guess you can't be at the top forever. Going ot be interesting to see who takes their place. Dell is in a very, very interesting position after going private and focusing on building quality products again instead of meeting shareholder expectations...
 
Many thanks to all of you who provided assistance! What a valuable resource we have here!

t- your virtual box suggestion really does seem to be the most simple and cost efficient way to meet my needs. If I have a software program that installs from a cd, I can load that into my MBP and install?

Sounds like cats and dogs living together. (Not that there's anything wrong with that!)
 
Yup, you can pass through devices from the host machine to the guest machine quite easily. Just open up the guest machine and you'll have a menu at the top, it says devices or something like that. It'll give you a list of devices on your host machine (the mac) and when you select them virtualbox will pass it through to the guest machine.

You may need to install the VirtualBox Guest Additions first. Doing that is really easy. Go to the devices menu and at the bottom it'll say 'Install Guest Additions'. WHen you select it your XP machine will show up a CD rom drive, you can install from it like anything else. Reboot the XP machine and you're good to go.

You can do this with any copy of windows, you'll just have to purchase it. Not sure if you're limited to XP or if windows 7/8 would work.
 
Fiance's computer is going into blue screen if death over and over, even in safe mode. Thoughts? Strategy? Halp!

Sent from my XT1060 using Tapatalk
 
Ran a system restore, hopefully that works.

Sent from my XT1060 using Tapatalk
 
Seems to have worked out...

Sent from my XT1060 using Tapatalk
 
Lanky Livingston said:
Fiance's computer is going into blue screen if death over and over, even in safe mode. Thoughts? Strategy? Halp!

Sent from my XT1060 using Tapatalk
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If you have a chance to see what the blue screen says, if it lists an error message/code, there might be something more to do than a restore. Could be a bad update, maybe a bad driver, maybe something else.
 
Shi no Tenshi said:
If you have a chance to see what the blue screen says, if it lists an error message/code, there might be something more to do than a restore. Could be a bad update, maybe a bad driver, maybe something else.
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Didn't pay much attention...I honestly thought all blue screens of death said the same thing. :)
 
tshile said:
I must have read your post too quickly.

This is your problem. 384 MB memory just doesn't cut it. XP SP2 minimum recommended is 512 MB memory without antivirus, 1GB (1024 MB) with antivirus. My personal recommendation would be 1 GB (1024 MB) without antivirus and 2 GB (2048 MB) with antivirus.

Modern graphics cards have their own memory banks to save consuming main memory and run faster. 0 chance your graphic card has that, and in addition to it you're running super low main memory.

Give me your service tag, I'll find some cheap memory for you. < $50 should make your computer run significantly faster. Significantly.
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and more if the advice is to run VMs as well! no one talks about it....but these can really slow a machine down w/o adequate memory (despite what the promo stuff says) for the VM file, snapshots, etc. Virtualbox did a number on my MAC until I adjusted config.
 
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