The Four-eyed Journal » Computers

Get advanced system information on your PC with PC Wizard

jhay — Wed, 10 Feb 2010 01:39:28 +0000

Being the resident techie in our household, I’m the one my relatives and even friends call on whenever they need something to be fixed or configured in their PC be it a desktop or laptop.

Things are a lot easier if their PC’s documentation (boxes, manuals, driver CDs, etc.) are still around especially when the work requires the PC have a clean and fresh start via a hard disk reformat. A re-installation of the OS is also easy, but the task of restoring the device drivers for the different parts of the motherboard comes and the driver CD is missing or damaged, it’s a complete nightmare.

Real technicians would know how to identify the motherboard via the BIOS information displayed upon start up so that the drivers could be downloaded from the web instead. I’m no pro so I have to use a tool that will give me that information, plus more, right away.

That’s where PC Wizard comes in. It’s a free and powerful tool that gives you advanced system information about the PC you’re working on.

It also has a suite of benchmarking tools that will do a performance test such as CPU performance, Cache performance, RAM performance, Hard Disk performance, CD/DVD-ROM performance, Removable/FLASH Media performance, Video performance, MP3 compression performance.

At present though, I’m planning to use this to identify the motherboard model of my cousin’s PC so that I could download its device drivers from the net. Unfortunately, they’ve lost the box and driver CDs that came with it so working on the PC is much harder. Hopefully though, the PC Wizard will give a lending hand in getting the job done.

Buying a new computer – laptop or desktop?

jhay — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 12:22:21 +0000

A cousin of mine, who’s currently a Computer Science freshman student has been meaning to buy a computer in the coming weeks has asked me a crucial question:

“Kuya, should I get a laptop or desktop PC?”

My answer was, “It depends on your needs.” Allow me to elaborate basing on my many years of using the personal computer, having started on a desktop PC and using a laptop computer at present.

Keyword is: Mobility

If you need to have a computer on-the-go whether be it for accessing email, writing, blogging, creating presentations, spreadsheets, doing some graphics work, etc for most of the time you’re awake then you go buy a laptop.

This could be broken down into what you’re mobile for?

If you need to have easy internet access for doing email, writing, blogging, listening to your mp3 collection where ever you are then get a netbook. The Asus Eee PC, Acer Aspire One, Lenovo IdeaPad S9/10, HP Mini Note and a host of other netbooks out there would do just fine. The price would easily fit your budget and your body would be spared from lugging around a heavier full-sized laptop.

For heavy graphics works, sound or movie editing, desktop publishing on-the-go, then get one of those full-sized laptops, like the Compaq c756TU I bought last May. Be prepared to shell out a lot more cash for this class of machines and don’t forget to get a nice bag to carry it around with you, something that will not take a lot on your body and provide good protection for your laptop.

If your needs are the opposite of those mentioned above, meaning you don’t need to do all of those where ever you are in the world, right there and then, go get a desktop PC instead. You could set it up any way you can, as long as you can afford it, and you don’t have to worry about carrying something valuable with you where ever you go.

I know you guys have an answer for this question as well. Do share them and help out not only my cousin, but anyone else who is also grappling with the same question.

RIP to my old PC – 2003-2008

jhay — Thu, 18 Sep 2008 04:15:04 +0000

What has caused me great stress this weekend was the untimely demise of my oldest desktop PC. I first bought that rig back in 2003 and up until last Thursday, it has given me more than the value of the money spent on it. Five solid years of good computing was given to me by that old desktop. Back then, it was the top-of-the-line with 512MB of RAM, an 80 GB hard drive, an NVidia GeForce 4 graphics card powered by a 2 GHz Pentium 4 processor. It was even run by a genuine Windows XP Home Edition.

Of course its five year existence was not without any hiccups, downtimes or hard drive crashes. The fact that I’m too much of a geek to troubleshoot it myself saved us a lot of service fees and really used up its parts and services warranties to the last day of eligibility. It wasn’t a kick-ass PC but it got the job done.

On it, I finished many games like the Call of Duty series, Star Wars: KOTOR, Formula 1, and FIFA games. And how can I forget the Ragnarok days, long nights of Gunbound matches and engagements in RF Online. My first blog was started up on that machine back when I was still using dial-up prepaid cards by Pacific Internet’s SurfMAXX brand.

I burned many CDs movies and music alike. It was my make-shift sound studio used for recording and re-mixing music for the many theatrical productions I’ve been part of this past years. Lots of school paper, albeit way overdue ones, were written on that PC. Of course, gigabytes of Naruto anime episodes, TV series, MP3s, movies and torrents were downloaded and stored using that old PC. I do confess that included porn. Nonetheless, that PC served our family for many many years.

Before I got to own my very first laptop, it was my second love. If I have nothing to do outdoors, I’d be locked up inside my room, online and playing games most of my waking hours of the day. My mother would always remind me that I spend way too much time on the computer I forget to take my meals or do my laundry. A statement I hugely contest.

Good old times were indeed made possible thanks to that old desktop. Now, all I have are those memories every time I get to see its old, worn out chassis. The only surviving part that continues to be of any good use is its 80GB Seagate hard drive which now serves as a backup device for my laptop. A proud legacy I suppose of a machine that was well built and well maintained given the years of abuse and repairs it went through.

Now, I look forward to the next purchase of a new desktop. Just fifteen days to go and I’ll be out there again, looking for good and worthy replacement for my old desktop.

Joining the Windows Vista bandwagon

jhay — Mon, 11 Aug 2008 15:07:08 +0000

After four months of resisting the evil, albeit necessary, I’ve finally switched to Windows Vista just this last Friday. The upgrade took place in the midst of a roller-coaster weekend hence my recently prolonged absence from blogging.

What finally made me decide to upgrade to Windows Vista?

Windows XP has been crapping out on me lately, for some strange reasons, my laptop suddenly lost the ability to detect any Wi-Fi signal it was exposed to, my home network, Burger King’s free WiFi and DLSUD’s own WiFi network, were all of a sudden undetectable by my laptop.

I tried out everything short of taking it to the service center because I knew it had nothing to do with any hardware damage, hence it was something related to a driver issue and knowing that this Compaq c756TU laptop wasn’t optimized for Windows XP that could be very well the culprit.

Rather than prolonging my disrupted work flow by taking my laptop for service, which could take a week or a month, I decided to take the plunge and had Windows Vista installed and up to now, it has been quite smooth though without some annoyances that makes me miss Windows XP.

I opted to purchase and install a licensed copy of Windows Vista Home Basic edition since I’m not really interested in getting the fancy-shmancy graphics of Windows Aero and all the other unique features of Vista Premium, I just need to get the Compaq c765TU’s full hardware features working smoothly. Right now, I control WinAmp via the keyboard with shortcuts and the notebook’s sound levels using the hotkeys. Plus, the I/O ports and jack for the audio components are also now fully functioning saving me from strenuous mice movements. Lastly, I’m beginning to appreciate the Sidebar were some gadgets are indeed useful and worth the strains on the system resources.

Speaking of which, I also upgraded the laptop’s memory from the standard 1GB to full 2GB of RAM. The performance has been so satisfactory for the last three days. What’s more amazing is that most of the software tools and productivity apps have been working fine on Windows Vista. Then again, this is a good opportunity to learn new things and discover and compile all the neat apps we could find that makes using Windows Vista a little bit easier.

That’s it for now, I’ll back once things have settled down and I get to fully get the hang of using Windows Vista.

Asus Eee Box or Dell Studio Hybrid?

jhay — Thu, 31 Jul 2008 00:15:17 +0000

Since late last year, I’ve been mulling over the idea of getting a new desktop PC. Specifically, I’m looking for a new gaming rig, not something that at the top of the line as it will break my budget and force me to drop from school for a semester but something in the middle-range of what a good gaming PC should be.

However, upon doing a lifestyle check, I figured that a gaming rig might disrupt my current workflow and be the end of me as I was once a true-blooded gaming addict who’d spend a minimum of 14 hours a day playing games on the PC. (Curse Diablo II, Sim City 4, the Sims and Ragnarok) So it’s not hard to see myself completely abandoning my workflow and spend hours upon hours playing Call of Duty 4, Civilization IV, the Prince of Persia, RF online while waiting for Diablo III to come out.

So for now, I’ve been keen on just getting a new desktop PC to replace the 6-year-old system now used by my younger sisters. Not a day goes on without them hinting or complaining to me that the old box is now a living relic of the computer world and as slow as a land tortoise.

With a tight budget, the new mini PCs like the Asus Eee Box and the recently released Studio Hybrid from Dell has become attractive choices for me. Still raving for a Mac Mini but that tight budget just kills it.

Anyways, what would I be getting from the Asus Eee Box?

Asus Eee Box PC

OS: Microsoft Windows XP Home
CPU: Intel Atom N270 (1.6 GHz)
Chipset: Intel Chipset
DIMM: DDR2 SO-DIMM 1 GB
HDD: 80 GB
Card Reader: SD/SDHC/MS/MS Pro/MMC
WiFi: 802.11n
LAN: 10/100/1000

It sells for Php17, 500 and it comes bundled with a small 16? LCD monitor. However, Yuga drives home a good point that for that same price, one could get a better spec’d PC because the Asus Eee Box has become quite expensive.

As for Dell’s Studio Hybrid, one would be getting the following specs:

Dell Studio Hybrid

Intel Dual Core 1.86GHz to Intel Core 2 Duo 2.6GHz
1GB – 4GB 667MHz Dual Channel DDR2 SDRAM
160GB – 320 GB Serial ATA Hard Drive (5400 rpm)
6x – 8X CD/DVD Writer
Intel GMA X3100
Gigabit Ethernet LAN
Wi-Fi 802.11n (built-in, optional)
5 x USB 2.0
IEEE 1394a port
HDMI/DVI video connector

This one sells for roughly Php19, 000.00 and comes with Windows Vista Home Basic. I’ll have to purchase a separate display which would push up the total cost to somewhere near Php25,000.00 but just like with the Asus Eee Box, I could get the same specs but for a lower price tag and the video card of my choice if I were to build a custom system myself. I’m sure the good folks over at PC-Gilmore could do wonders for me.

So what would it be? The Asus Eee Box is now officially off my list, and it looks like it’s the Dell Studio Hybrid against a custom-built clone PC. Then again I might just spend my money on a Nikon D40. LOL