Chit-Chat: Developers, developers, developers, developers

[Tsutarja]

Technology & Internet Daily Chit Chat

Welcome to the all new Technology & Internet DCC! This thread will be for discussions on all sorts of technology in general! Just be sure to follow the guidelines below and have fun!

Guidelines

► Please follow all PokéCommunity Rules.
► Do not use this thread to ask for CSS help. We have the CSS Help & Resources thread for that.
► If you have a technology-related issue, please do not post in this thread! Please create a new thread within the section instead, and use the provided [Help] prefix.
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► You may double-post in this thread if it's been dead for over 24 hours.
► Have fun talking tech!

Have a question? Always feel free to send me a PM by clicking here!​

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[Squirrel]

So loads of people here seem to be really into computers and technology and yet I don't understand a thing of it - searching for a new laptop was painstakingly hard and as far as computers are concerned I have 0 idea on anything technical about them. So my question to start off this thread is; what got you interested in technology?

 

[Tsutarja]

I think my story is rather interesting.. so in late 2009 I had a teacher who was into technology and if it wasn't for him, who knows where I would be in the world of tech. He helped me get a computer of mine that had been attacked by a virus with Windows XP restored, and if it wasn't for that, I would have no idea on what to do with computers. I began slowly building my knowledge up on computers from processors, RAM, GPU, etc and it's just stuck around me.

 

[TY]

I was fascinated by technology since i was a kid. I always knew how to use certain programs which my fellow classmates on elementary school had no idea about its existence.

 

[Starry Windy]

I'm interested in technology when I was a kid, I remember I was using my relative's computer for fun, and after I'm given a computer of my own, I started to taking more interest in it, and buying some magazines of that, since then, I'm starting to know about RAM, Blu-ray drives, Harddisks, how to prevent viruses, and anything technology.

 

[Hybrid Trainer]

I've always been interested in technology. I was a bit of an avid gamer when I was little and when I'd stay at my grandparents place I would play games on their old computer.This computer was ancient, so I was limited to CD-Rom games and floppy disk games. Anyone who has ever tried playing a floppy disk game on a windows 95 at the age of six knows it can be pretty bizarre and complicated to load the game, but once I'd gotten the hang of it I felt like a genius. I wanted to learn more and seem like I was some sort of wizkid with computers.
Fast forward a couple of years, I got a laptop for my birthday after saving up for a while and I had free reign with what I could do. Over the next year or so I started to delve into how computers work and programming languages, trying to make my laptop better without spending much money basically.

After that I started to take computer and ICT classes, and teacher other kids how to do things on computers that weren't taught in class and now a few years later I'm still learning about computers at university and teaching teenagers how to use computers safely and efficiently in a secondary school

 

[Cordelia]

I grew up with tech and my mom has always worked in tech so she helped expose me to everything. I just love it... I'm always available to help people choose new laptops, desktops, mobile phones and etc irl and online. It's just a passion. :)

 

[Aeroblast]

I'm more of a programming guy than a hardware guy, though I do know enough about PCs.

 

[Tsutarja]

I'm not much into programming sadly :[ though I really wish I was, and I'm probably going to take classes on programming once I start my degree into Computer Science for sure.

 

[Andrew]

It's funny, because what actually got me started on learning more about PCs is Pokémon. I really wanted to play Pokémon Emerald one day, but all I had was a DSi so I couldn't play it on my DS. So naturally, I turned to google and managed to find an Emulator. I thought it was the coolest thing ever.

From there, I just grew more and more interested on how things worked, or trying to find ways to make things more convenient. I started discovering cool software that I would use a lot back then (like userbar generators), and my passion kept growing.

Last January, I sold an old Xbox I had and combined it with my Christmas money. I had about $550 and decided I wanted to build a Gaming PC. I started looking around on Newegg, chose my parts (after scrutinizing the entire build to make sure the parts were all compatible), and eventually I had built myself a PC (with some help from my dad). I feel, I don't know, I guess happiest when I'm working with my computer. Something about it is just fun to me and it felt awesome when I finished my build.

I'd love to go to college for something with computers. I was thinking programming but my past experiences with coding weren't all that great (basically I sucked at it :P), so I'm not entirely sure at this point. ¯\_( ^ . ^)_/¯

 

[Aeroblast]

Coding is about using your imagination in many ways. You do have to apply math, which is pure logic, but you have to be creative with using that logic to apply to a game, application, or whatever you plan to program.

 

[Tsutarja]

I've come up with a few PHP pages (not from scratch though, but a lot of code is from scratch by me) that required a lot of coding to do, and luckily for me when I coded the pages, it was on a local machine that ran PHP so that I wouldn't have to use FTP just to check my mistakes. v_v

 

[Purple Materia]

I've decided that I NEED to upgrade my desktop.

Intel Core i5-3570K
ASRock Z77 Extreme4
CORSAIR Vengeance 8GB 1600 DDR3

Can't wait! The rest of the components will be salvaged from my current system.

Seagate Barracuda 1TB 7200 RPM
Rosewill Challenger (LOVE this case by the way)
Antec VP-450
MSI Radeon HD5770 (Might upgrade this come November)

You guys think I should upgrade the PSU though? I think this rig might need a bit more juice.

Speaking of programming, I start my Java programming class in a few weeks and... I'm pretty excited :D

 

[donavannj]

I'd upgrade that PSU to at least a 550 or a 600. Might be sucking down more power, but for the life expectancy of your components, it's always better to have a higher wattage than you need and one that's higher than you anticipate any future upgrades needing in the future. Do make sure it's one with a reputation for pushing through consistent voltage, though, otherwise you'll fry your components because of more frequent voltage surges.

 

[Purple Materia]

I think I might go with the XFX Core Edition PRO then.

 

[Megan]

I don't care what's build into my Laptop. I buy it and hope that it simply works xD

Of course that means I'm getting into trouble really fast. For example the last Linux update destroyed my Bumblebee setup (again) which is mainly caused by NVIDIA (again). I know they make good graphics cards but their whole NVIDIA Optimus stuff and the newest driver getting in conflict with the newest Linux kernel only get me to hate them more and more (especially since propably 99% of my trouble in the past was caused by NVIDIA stuff; did I mention that I hate NVIDIA? xD).

I know some things about programming, but my main problem is that I'm not good at thinking logical ^^"

 

[Legendary Silke]

I don't care what's build into my Laptop. I buy it and hope that it simply works xD

Of course that means I'm getting into trouble really fast. For example the last Linux update destroyed my Bumblebee setup (again) which is mainly caused by NVIDIA (again). I know they make good graphics cards but their whole NVIDIA Optimus stuff and the newest driver getting in conflict with the newest Linux kernel only get me to hate them more and more (especially since propably 99% of my trouble in the past was caused by NVIDIA stuff; did I mention that I hate NVIDIA? xD).

I know some things about programming, but my main problem is that I'm not good at thinking logical ^^"

I think your life would be easier if you had picked an operating system that works well with the hardware in question. Linux and NVIDIA Optimus tend to not be the best partners around. If you have NVIDIA Optimus, it's best to stick to running Windows, and leave Linux and other OSes on a VM.

NVIDIA is at fault here, though - I do remember Linus Torvalds being mad at them, even dropping the f-bomb in an interview or something about NVIDIA Optimus.

I don't have much luck trying to install Linux distributions on my laptop, either. Either some weird thing doesn't work, it never gets registered in the bootloader, or the laptop display backlight is turned off by the OS during setup. I ended up relegating Linux to Hyper-V VMs (seeing as I'm running Windows 8 Pro right now).

 

[Purple Materia]

Don't even get me started on installing Linux on laptops.

Although my old Dell laptop worked flawlessly with Ubuntu...

 

[Legendary Silke]

One thing I can say is that if a laptop comes with Windows, don't even think about installing any other OS that isn't "a newer version of Windows". Leave these to VMs.

Or get a laptop that comes with some Linux distribution from the get-go. Linux hardware support tend to pale Windows in certain cases.

 

[Tsutarja]

I haven't used any Linux distro in a while now, and I can certainly relate to the fact that Linux distros don't have the best compatibility in terms of hardware. Safe to say, on both laptops I own, whenever I've used Ubuntu on them, the speakers tend to output low-quality sound compared to Windows, and I also don't have the best of luck with the touchpads either.