Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Computing/2009 April 1

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April 1

Power failure

A few years ago after a power outage, a desktop computer of mine refused to turn on. I've been leaving it in a garage until a week ago, when I decided to try to fix it. What is the most likely cause of the problem? I had no uninterruptible power supply and likely no surge protection. I've read a few blogs on the Internet that suggest the power supply unit may be fried. In that case, how hard is it to get a compatible new power supply unit? I think the one in this computer is quite unique; it connects to the motherboard with a twenty-pin connector, and the motherboard supplies the AMD CPU with power. --05:14, 1 April 2009 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 99.237.234.104 (talk)

So you're saying it looks like this? Then it's an ATX, and should be fairly easy to replace, unless it's proprietary. (Someone else may need to correct me, I've not dealt with hardware in a while.) But if it's been in your garage for several years, it could be numerous things that have either died completely (due to dust, heat, water, etc.), or will need a little work to get back to working order. –  LATICS  talk  05:52, 1 April 2009 (UTC)

Are you fixing it to retrieve data or to recover it as a functional pc? If just to recover data you will find life much easier by simply taking the Hard-drive out of that computer, setting it to 'slave' and adding it to your existing pc provided it has input for IDE hard-drives (i'm presuming based on the age it will be IDE rather than SATA). Alternatively you can find a product online that will be quite cheap that allows you to turn any hard-drive into a 'portable' hard-drive, though not sure what they call them. ny156uk (talk) 22:26, 1 April 2009 (UTC)

Both, actually; I want it to be operational, but if that were not possible, I'd be satisfied with data recovery. Thanks for the info!

About the power supply unit: No, it's not an ATX. Here's a photo: ftp://99.237.234.104/DSC_5408.JPG The medium-size connectors have 4 large pins each, and the largest connector (the one proving power to the motherboard) has twenty hole, each with a wire leading to the power supply unit. I think in an ATX, one of the holes is not connected to the power source. --99.237.234.104 (talk) 05:55, 3 April 2009 (UTC)

Take a look a ATX motherboard connector pinout here: http://skylab.org/~chugga/mpegbox/pictures/z_mbconatxmain.gif . As you can see, all the pins are connected, and the color coding matches that of your PSU. I'm pretty sure it's a standard ATX. 85.222.93.28 (talk)

The worm

Alright, I'm sure a fair amount of tech-savvy users around here have heard of the conficker worm. Here's want I want to know: First, why are they doing this on April Fool's Day, of all days? Second, why do they target Windows, as usual? Has there ever been a major worm or virus specifically targeted at Apple? I have all the latest updates installed, I have anti-virus software installed (Windows Live Onecare) and I even followed these instructions (I used Microsoft's Fix It For Me) via this blog, a link I clicked on through here. When they mention USB devices being used to pass around the worm, should one be worried when they connect a music device like an iPod to their computer? And I also read that merely googling 'conficker worm' can put you at risk, when will the danger pass? Will logging in to websites requiring email and password (such as this one) put you at risk? And how do you avoid having a panic attack, especially when you hear the French and Royal Navy have fallen victim to this?--Whip it! ^{Now whip it good!} 05:58, 1 April 2009 (UTC)

If your system is fully updated then your PC isn't at risk, but even if it wasn't googling would be safe, however clicking links from google might not be. The worm could easily pass from an ipod onto the machine, if the ipod is set to act as a hard drive. The worm targets Windows because it is the most popular OS, and since most of the security companies seem to think the worm is attempting to create a botnet they'd want as many machines in it as possible. As for the April First thing I have no idea.

Incidentally I'd suggest ditching Live Onecare, as it isn't actually very good at detecting viruses. The big 3 free antiviruses ( AVG, Avast!, and Avira) generally score better on detection rates and similar. If you want a paid for anti virus I'd highly recommend NOD32 Gunrun (talk) 10:26, 1 April 2009 (UTC)

A source on my claims about onecare by the way. Gunrun (talk) 10:29, 1 April 2009 (UTC)

I have to say that I too do start to panic when I read that military forces depend on Windows. -- Hoary (talk) 15:35, 1 April 2009 (UTC)

I would say that April Fools is the absolute best day to do it. It makes warnings seem like hoaxes. Not that the day matters too much. APL (talk) 17:38, 1 April 2009 (UTC)

The danger from USB devices comes from AutoRun, a huge security hole in the default Windows install which has been used over the years as a vector for all kinds of malware. You should disable AutoRun on all Windows machines you administer, then you won't have to worry about plugging in USB devices any more. As far as I can tell all that's happening today is that existing Conficker "installations" are switching to a new mechanism of random domain name generation. The worm has been around for months, and this change doesn't make it suddenly more dangerous. If you can access www.microsoft.com, you're not infected. -- BenRG (talk) 17:57, 1 April 2009 (UTC)

Conficker file size

How big is the Conficker worm? Dismas|^(talk) 10:42, 1 April 2009 (UTC)

According to this page one version is 58,368 bytes. -- BenRG (talk) 18:44, 1 April 2009 (UTC)

Thanks! Dismas|^(talk) 00:45, 6 April 2009 (UTC)

Where to purchase/Improvise a missing jack for a DVB-T stick?

I recently won a DVB stick in an ebay action. It seems to be in a good condition except the fact that a small jack that connects antenna jack to the stick is missing. Please have a look at this image from an online shop where I have marked this part: http://img24.imageshack.us/img24/8384/r970.jpg.

The diameter of the antenna jack is about twice the size of the DVB female as seen in this photo:http://img6.imageshack.us/img6/9960/42761281.jpg . If you could please suggest a way to connect these two it would be nice.

131.220.46.25 (talk) 10:56, 1 April 2009 (UTC)feld

It's hard to tell from the photos, are you looking for something like his? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.43.88.87 (talk) 17:27, 1 April 2009 (UTC)

Conficker-generated domains

OK, so I did a Google search on something, and some results come from domains that have a random number, e.g. "foo.bar.345.pl". Are these the Conficker-generated domains the article is talking about? Blake Gripling (talk) 12:05, 1 April 2009 (UTC)

No, Conficker uses long domain names that change every day. -- BenRG (talk) 16:49, 1 April 2009 (UTC)

To expand a bit on this, Conficker used to generate 250 unique domain names per day and now generates 50,000 per day, or around 18 million per year. I don't know how long they are but it must be more than 3 digits in order to produce that many unique names. I'm sure the names include letters as well as digits. Also, those domains aren't registered by Conficker. Rather, whoever's controlling the botnet registers a domain when they want to send instructions to the botnet. Only a few will ever be registered, and even those won't show up on web search results (since they won't be hosting a public web site, I would assume). -- BenRG (talk) 18:17, 1 April 2009 (UTC)

Need a redirect or new article/section for premium rate SMS

I'm hoping somebody here will have an answer. Basically I'm looking for the correct article to redirect the above red link to. Value-added service seemed promising, but there is no mention of VAS SMS's being charged at a premium (probably not all VAS's are charged at a premium in all countries/networks). I'm talking here about services like SMS-in competitions (Idols (South Africa)), as well as airtime recharging and other payment and subscription services (e.g. ringtone and wallpaper downloads) that are conducted by sending "premium rate" SMS's as payment. Any ideas? Is "premium rate SMS" the correct term for this concept, or should it just fall under value-added service? Is there even a standard name for this animal internationally? (In South Africa all such adverts and services are required to carry the disclaimer "SMS's charged at VAS rates".) Zunaid 12:15, 1 April 2009 (UTC)

Premium SMS redirects to Short Code, so I'd suggest you do the same thing. There is a section SMS#Premium-rated short messages, but Premium SMS and Premium rate SMS are so similar it doesn't make sense to redirect to different things. --Maltelauridsbrigge (talk) 13:41, 1 April 2009 (UTC)

Short Code doesn't provide any information on the topic, so redirecting to it would be incorrect. SMS#Premium-rated short messages comes closest, so a redirect there would seem to be best. – 74  19:31, 1 April 2009 (UTC)

Networking

Hi just let me know which one to opt is it MCSE or CCNA. which is good in IT field.

As far as I know MCSE you have to complete 6 or 7 exams to get it but with CCNA it is 1. They are both entry level if you are looking for a job in the Networking field I would say in my country Ireland that CCNP is the qualification that is most in demand. BigDunc^Talk 18:25, 1 April 2009 (UTC)

You'll obviously need to make your own decisions on this, but ... you may want to consider the A+ certs as well. — Ched :  Yes?   : ©  05:55, 2 April 2009 (UTC)

Autorun file

Hey guys

I no guru I just want to know what exactly a autorun file and what it is made of Please show where I can find the most thorough info about it

Sorry for the trouble and tanks for your time —Preceding unsigned comment added by 196.210.196.121 (talk) 15:01, 1 April 2009 (UTC)

See AutoRun 87.115.166.150 (talk) 15:11, 1 April 2009 (UTC)

Visual Studio: Convert or include C# form for VB project

I'm using Visual Studio 2005. I accidentally created a project as a C# rather than Visual Basic project, and built a form in it. How do I either convert the form into VB or allow a VB project to use it? NeonMerlin 22:34, 1 April 2009 (UTC)

Maybe try here and here. --Whip it! ^{Now whip it good!} 22:44, 1 April 2009 (UTC)

Keeping two time machine backups

I want to keep two Time Machine backups because it is more reliable. What are my options for doing so? For example, synchronisation software might be able to keep both of the backup drives up to date. If it does, then I need it to be able to keep the entire drive synchronised - the backup only comprises one of several partitions on the disc.--78.33.187.186 (talk) 23:07, 1 April 2009 (UTC)

Put it another way, could I use RAID 1 to routinely backup to either disc; and then maybe once every day or two, plug them both in by which point Leopard would automatically synchronise them? I think. I don't know much about RAID, I'm guessing :-) I have actually read the article, but it's quite a confusing concept to a newcomer. --78.33.187.162 (talk) 20:25, 2 April 2009 (UTC)

Why does Linux need a higher desktop system specification than Windows Millenium?

Especially it seems regarding graphics - see here for Ubuntu: https://help.ubuntu.com/community/Installation/SystemRequirements

The graphics on my old WinMe computer were perfectly adequate and high definition, why does Linux require more resources? Only a cut down version of Ubuntu would work on that computer according to the link above - why? What does Linux do that requires more resources? As far as I recall it even requires more than my current XP desktop computer.

Wouldnt it be sensible for Linux to get out of the loop of the rat-race of demanding greater and greater specifications for computers? 89.242.107.39 (talk) 23:37, 1 April 2009 (UTC)

The 'absolute minimum installation' at the bottom of that page has similar requirements to WinMe. If that's not small enough, then there are plenty of other Linux distributions to choose from. Ubuntu is designed to run on fairly high-end machines, but Damn Small Linux, for example, has very low requirements. Algebraist 23:47, 1 April 2009 (UTC)

Ubuntu needs a relatively recent graphics card for its "visual effects", which I find pointless and distracting (example). If you turn that stuff off, it should run on the same graphics cards as WinMe. -- BenRG (talk) 11:11, 2 April 2009 (UTC)

Also, you do realize that Ubuntu's first release came 4 years after Windows ME's release, right? To properly compare whether Ubuntu is getting itself out of the rat-race of demanding greater and greater specifications, you'd need to compare it a more recent OS like Windows XP. While not requiring the latest and greatest components seems to be wise for Ubuntu, you have to assume that the average consumer's computer is going to increase in power (measured in virtually every important metric). Thus to make a comparable OS, you will need to increase the minimum requirements. BenRG's comment about turning off the visual effects is also important. If your computer has unusual requirements (like being underpowerwed or requiring extra security), then customization is going to be required for virtually any OS.--droptone (talk) 11:46, 2 April 2009 (UTC)

Not Windows! It'll remain reliably slow and insecure no matter what customization you perform! (j/k) – 74  01:59, 3 April 2009 (UTC)

What an utterly bizarre claim! Linux excels at running on vastly older, simpler hardware than Windows. Especially for graphics - Linux still runs just fine on machines with no graphics cards at all! My family file server sits in my garage - it has no graphics, no keyboard or mouse whatever - an ancient 600MHz CPU and runs OpenSuSE 10.3...no problems. SteveBaker (talk) 01:52, 3 April 2009 (UTC)