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I can understand the problem portability can be, but I really don't have to go anywhere so that doesn't bother me.
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Same for me, I don't typically go places for long periods of time, so desktops are fine for me.. however if I'm gone for a long while, then I will bring my laptop and just deal with the slowness of it compared to my desktop.
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Not sure whats going besides Laptor or Desktop? I used to prefer desktops, but now I just love my laptop, trackpad and all. I just keep my laptop plugging in for the majority. Mouses are weird to use now. |
Funny as heck, mobile SoCs are getting more and more powerful these days... while PC CPUs and chipsets are getting more and more efficient.
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I prefer desktops really, but this Lenovo IdeaPad with 64-bit Windows 8 is… sleek. Maybe it's just 8? It makes me reminisce of 16-bit Windows with its blockyness, and I love it :3
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I'm still waiting for Windows 9 before I decide to chain-upgrade.
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I personally found 8's interface to be pretty terrible; hope they make some fresh changes to it in Windows 9. It'd be quite epic if they could make it look something like this. :]
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Honestly I hate the windows eight interface.
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Is it going to be called Windows 9? xD
I find 8 to be tolerable. I never tried it yet on an actual tablet or touchscreen, but I heard it works a lot better than in laptops/desktops. |
I find it interesting that it's getting very hot with regard to the next version of Windows after the post-8.1 update in April will be going to be called Windows 9 and it will mark the return of the Start menu.
180°, anyone? It seems like they know 8 is a disaster. |
I guess I'll wait until April to get a new laptop then.. but then again, it's been quite a long time since I've used my laptop (because of my tablet).
I remember back then I used my laptop more than my desktop simply because my old desktop ran XP until I made it into a server PC, and got my current desktop running Windows 7. |
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In any case, I typically get my OSes from ..other.. sources, so it's not a big deal which one a PC comes with, since it costs me nothing to replace it. I like the "under-the-hood" improvements in 8 - performance has gotten quite a bit better, but I still hate the start screen. At the moment I'm using Start8 to disable it, works quite well. Quote:
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Either way, I suspect this is not a good time to buy a new laptop. Try waiting until later in the year, perhaps after July.
I noticed that I don't miss the AMOLED display of my old phone. Hmm... I think I'll probably wait until the third-generation Windows Phone 8 phones show up before I use my contract upgrade... if I even bother to do so. |
I guess we'll have to see what Microsoft does for the next generation of the Windows operating system now.. I would at least hope that the trend continues where the next Windows OS would be a better one than its predecessor.
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They can't exactly have two Mes/Vistas/8.xs in a row, can they? :P
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The next windows isn't set to come out until April 2015, though, I heard?
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Then again, curveballs. There are some things that are never set in stone. |
Either way, I really couldn't care less if I had a laptop then missed out on a major software update.. because then hopefully it would be really low-priced for upgrades like they did with Windows 8 Pro for its first three months of being on the market.
All I'm saying though: I need a newer, faster, and more-compact laptop this year. |
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I only want that Windows 9 allows for a direct upgrade path from Windows 7.
Even if it doesn't allow that, though, at least I can chain-upgrade from 7 to 8, then 8.1, and then 9, if I need to do exactly that, seeing as I have a proper 8 licence. Zach, when it comes to laptops, you don't want to get a bottom-barrel laptop. It's a very good idea to give it a lot of thought! |
Since we're on the topic of Windows, and imo, we could really use a topic to talk about here in this thread (and that's due to me being lazy making a thread about this), but I retweeted this a little while ago on twitter. Probs worth reading. http://t.co/QfWp251IfE
Can you say WAAAAAAKE UP CAAAALL? What does everyone think? |
That doesn't really surprise me at all.. after all, I remember seeing some desktops that were still coming with XP as late as 2009 or so, before the release of Windows 7, when Vista was still the newest stable OS around.
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I'm still on the fence with regard to Windows 8.x. It's a bit strange to know that I'm still running Windows 7 despite being able to upgrade to Windows 8 and 8.1 at any time I'd like.
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I could easily upgrade my desktop to Windows 8.x as well, but then that would mean I'd have to buy a separate activation code xD
In fact, my desktop is already running a non-stock OS.. it runs Windows 7, when it's only supposed to be running Windows Vista. But it's just as stable on 7 as it would be on Vista. :3 |
I even have an upgrade key!
It's sitting unused. |
I have a copy of 8 as well that I installed on a test partition just to play around with, but I'm just keeping Win7 on my desktop. I just don't see the point of upgrading, right now at least. Metro is clunky as all hell, and even now that you can boot straight to the desktop in 8.1, you still have to search for everything or create shortcuts.
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What's up with this message when I try to get to Pokecommunity IRC? I'm probably missing something simple but I haven't found a solution yet.
http://i40.*.com/mrpmz4.png |
I just updated it before trying to use it.
This is what shows up when I press "Ignore" http://i40.*.com/2wmzvqd.png |
Clearing your cookies/cache usually clears up that error. If all else fails, try reinstalling the java plugin.
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I've never seen that type of error with Java O_o
Then again, I don't really use java applications anymore.. and even after all the security flaws that were revealed last year about java, I've still left it enabled. |
I'm stuck with Java because at least four applications that I use on my laptop need it. That includes Minecraft, but there's also a bunch of diagram creation programs that rely on it.
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We have a link to #tradecorner in trade announcements. |
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I'm a total IRC geek lmao
I have my own IRC server, I use mIRC with various scripts, and I use an IRC bouncer allowing me more than one connection with the same nickname |
I'm not too into IRC scripting (unless you count TwigBot which is derieved from Dragobot) :P
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I run and actually own mIRC and I absolutely love it. Mibbit is a nice tool for on the go. I use xchat2 on my Linux.
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Windows 9 could reach RTM as early as October as a leaker says...
Looks like 8.x just crossed the Vista threshold. |
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I can't even start my computer on windows 8 now so I have to use safe mode for now. I'm uninstalling it and "upgrading" to windows 7 today.
Windows 8 giving blue screen on startup has been a rarely occurring problem that didn't really bother me, but today it decided to be a jerk and kept giving me blue screen every time I tried to start up for 3 hours this morning. I've had it. |
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That's what I tried to do for hours, only to fail.
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I believe it was something like DRIVER_IQRL_NOT_LESS_OR_EQUAL or something like that, but regardless I'm probably going to back up my data and reinstall windows 7.
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I've heard of cases where drivers can be at fault of things like this in Windows 8 and even 8.1, so hopefully a downgrade to Windows 7 does well.
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The problem seems to be that since resetting a Windows 8 PC is essentially reinstalling Windows 8 from a blank disk and/or reimaging it with a recovery image, I suspect something deeper is afoot.
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Only thing I'll probably miss is the slightly faster boot time.
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Speaking of boot times, I would not ever want to think about going with a normal HDD again ever since I've went hybrid...
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So as soon as I booted up my laptop this evening, I saw this little gem pop up...
http://i.imgur.com/vrrcbAu.png |
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It's one of these nice things added in Windows 7. When a battery has worn out severely, the battery warning appears. Looks like you are going to have to plan for a laptop soon. |
One thing I definitely plan on doing when I get back from school this afternoon is just reinstall Windows 7 on my laptop. However, since I have a Windows 7 install disk, I'm not sure if I should install it back to manufacturer's state, or install it from scratch with the Windows 7 install disk. If I install from scratch, I'd at least not have to worry about bloatware, but then I have to worry about reinstalling drivers. I'll probably take a system image as well before I reinstall.
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Either way, both couldn't hurt - I think I'm more of a fan of restoring from a factory image, then uninstalling anything you won't miss. |
Crap, now I wonder if my laptop's hard drive is starting to show its age. I'm currently reinstalling Windows right now, but it's going at a slow pace. I wish there was a way in the BiOS to check if it's got any issues like on my desktop.
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There probably is, and the almighty oracle Google can show you how to do it.
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Right now I'm running a CHKDSK scan on my laptop to scan for bad sectors and whatnot. And now I'm curious to see how the results are going to look.
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Speaking of laptops and formatting them, I'm still waiting for my laptop to recover. Eugh. Turns out trying to install from a setup disc is not a good idea.
4 DVDs for a recovery image restoration feels... like when games had to come in multiple CDs :) |
I can't write write-once DVDs twice, can I? They stay the same as long as they aren't too scratched up.
One errant format is all it takes for an external HDD to lose everything (without data recovery). At least I didn't write them as CDs. That's like asking for the floppy days! |
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IE9 holds up surprisingly well on today's web sites. Hmm... |
That reminds me, I really like how efficient IE 11 is when it comes to playing flash content. In Chrome and Firefox on my machine, playing any sort of flash content causes quite a bit of CPU to be used, while in IE, hardly an CPU is used when I watch flash content.
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Have you tried watching Youtube in IE yet? Is it much faster/less consuming on your CPU? |
I haven't noticed any CPU issues with YouTube and Chrome... of course I have a Core i7... maybe that has something to do with it?
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Yeah, probably :P
All I have on my desktop is a Pentium dual core, but the desktop is also from 2008, which was before Intel came out with the i3/i5/i7 processors. |
Have you guys also checked whether YouTube is in HTML5 mode in IE9+, too? If done properly, both HTML5 and Flash content should be efficient enough for it to not matter.
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The beauty of GPU acceleration. Most of the time, it's faster to just use your otherwise idling GPU to do stuff that used to be done on the CPU. How times have changed :)
I like how IE9 was a wake-up call for browser makers to start thinking seriously about GPU acceleration and frame times on the Windows desktop browser market. |
Hmm, so do Chrome and Firefox use GPU acceleration or CPU acceleration then? I'd assume the latter, because I do have an external GPU after all, but I'm just not too sure -_-
But yes, HTML5 in IE is also smooth, and I'll continue to watch Youtube videos in IE until Chrome allows for less CPU usage with flash content. |
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Google Chrome doesn't accelerate much on Windows PCs, though, when it comes to general web content (2D Canvas and WebGL are another thing). Firefox should do it the same way as IE does on Windows Vista and newer, utilizing Direct2D on supported hardware, and hopefully can achieve parity with regard to performance. The fun thing about GPU acceleration is that browsers do have to have a CPU fall-back just in case the GPU is unusable. GPU accelerated browsing can be finicky since GPUs aren't exactly designed to display web content - they usually operate on complex 3D scenes. Chrome and Firefox fall back to GDI+-based rendering (not accelerated at all since Vista; although it's accelerated in XP, it's going to be slower than Direct3D or Direct2D), while IE uses WARP (a software DirectX 10+ rasterizer, effectively providing a "GPU" without a compatible GPU). You probably won't notice GPU acceleration unless you have a relatively slow CPU. That's when the benefits of GPU acceleration work its magic - even slow, out-of-date single core smartphones can handle desktop sites just fine as long as it's not running out of video and/or system memory. Google Chrome uses its own Flash player; sometimes, this Flash player can get buggy. |
Has anyone here done or know someone who have done a Computer Science degree, preferably in the UK? I'm heavily considering taking that path and would love to know any first hand experience on the stuff taught in the course and any other related things. Cheers!
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I'm also undergoing a computer science degree. Just be prepared for lots of math courses and science courses all throughout your track towards getting one.
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Intel's Next Unit of Computing has me interested. That's a lot of power in a tiny box! If only I could get a Celeron kit where I live, then I'd only need to find laptop RAM, stick my laptop's old disk drive, and have a Linux box.
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Earlier this morning I installed Windows Vista into a VirtualBox VM for the hell of it, and I got Aero running on it with 1GB of RAM to the virtual machine. Doesn't run too badly at all.
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Sometimes I feel spoiled by 8 GB of RAM on my laptop. |
I wish I had an 8GB machine :P but then again, my main goal this year for a gadget is to get a new laptop, one that is more portable and more powerful. I know I've said in the past I'd like to have a larger resolution, but I don't really care at this point. I just need a new laptop period.
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A high resolution display on a Windows laptop means nothing if the apps aren't designed to take advantage of it. This is especially important if you see yourself spending a lot of time in non-Microsoft and non-Windows Presentation Foundation/Direct2D/Direct3D apps on the Windows desktop. This pretty much means anything that comes with Windows, most modern Microsoft apps, games, Firefox, and... well, not much else.
I'd be more concerned on how the display looks. Is it bright enough? (Most should be able to go neon indoors with showroom at the very least.) Does it look mottled? (Thankfully, only Acer can produce screens this atrocious.) Colour calibration issues can be fixed easily after purchase using either Windows or the graphics driver's colour (management) settings. The funny part is that DPI scaling has been there in Windows since forever. It was on Windows XP; heck, it might have been in as far back as Windows 9-freaking-8, though DPI scaling as we know it was introduced in Windows Vista. (It looks like Vista was just too far ahead of its time in terms of hardware.) If I were to rank what's most important in terms of a system's performance these days, I'd advise that you put more weight on the storage. Most non-bottom-feeder laptops should have both "fast enough" CPU and "roomy enough" RAM; you should check out on what features the laptops offer, the connectivity options, the display, and, most importantly, the storage medium the laptop uses. Try to go hybrid at the very least - you'll be thankful that they exist, even if they are caching-based. I don't miss traditional HDDs after moving to a 8GB/1TB hybrid. I'm glad that I got the Surface RT instead of the Acer Iconia something. The latter's display is a horrorshow! |
The fun part is probably the Surface RT was priced to sell. Semi-fire sale, anyone?
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Maybe it's just me, but I've never bothered to take notice with DPI scaling :P
One thing that I find weird though is how TV screens have good upscale on monitors. I remember back in high school one of my teachers' classroom had a spare TV set, and they used it as their computer monitor. The resolution was still at 1024x768 and it was a 32" LCD TV, and the scaling was done just fine. Most computer monitors make things blurry when they upscale lower resolutions. |
TVs usually have extensive processing chips and circuitry inside that can upscale pretty much everything. Heck, they can insert frames!
The only price? Input lag. You may or may not notice it, though - some TVs are pretty fast even with these processing going on. "What The Tech" is also the name of a real podcast by Paul Thurott ;) |
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How I got into Paul Thurott's SuperSite for Windows is a mystery to me at this point.
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Sorry for pulling the subject back to Comp Science but I was very busy yesterday so I couldn't get on PC at all, and seeming as some of you guys are doing Comp Science right now I'd really love some insight.
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It depends on how complex your program will be.
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I put Adobe's version of Flash Player 12 (not the built in version) onto my Chrome install today and so far I've noticed barely any lag in it when watching Youtube, except until I begin to do background tasks. However, I really wish that Youtube didn't force the HTML5 player to Chrome users, because that's still rather laggy.
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It looks like SkyDrive is going to get its name changed very soon... and there seems to be something new in store..
Can't wait. As a SkyDrive user since, well, forever, I look forward to new things to play with. |
Skydrive getting a name change sounds pretty interesting.. wonder why they're making that decision.
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I'll learn more programming language(s) this semester as my class requires me to, though it's one of the more obscure ones. To be honest I forgot what it's even called. |
I believe I'm going to learn C in fall '14 as part of assembly language course as well, but C and C# is different. (Though I heard prior knowledge of C helps to learn C#)
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Finally got a smartphone!
But because I only had 50 Euros to spend, I bought a used Xperia Mini from way back in 2011. Its basic, Adreno 205 and only 512mb ram, but its good enough till I save up cash for something more.Small screen rocks btw, even though I prefer the 4-4.5 inch range. |
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I'm actually writing C code now. Funny how I got from C++ to C, but we had to because we're now going... uh, lower. |
Yeah I love em too, that's what I'm saying. But because I only had 50 bucks, I bought that which has a 3 inch screen, where the problem is. Otherwise the 5MP camera is great, good radio, and it can run temple run 2 pretty well.
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Hey, a smartphone is a smartphone, so remember that.. :)
Of course though my first smartphone is something less then a year old. |
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