Im guessing that every project out there has some "Tips, Tricks & Tweaks". Be it an optimized app or config or what have you that improves the number crunching efficiency. Maybe some are closely guarded "trade secrets" or simply a specific order in which to start stuff.

And since this place is trying to consolidate the Canadian team in one place, maybe the same could be applied to the various "Tips, Tricks & Tweaks" for the various projects out there.

Just an idear.

Here's an excellent tip to save frustation. Not sure if it applies to every mobo.

Since changing Andrea's case over, she misses the front audio connection. No matter what I tried, I could not get it to work. So went to Asus support page & downloaded latest bios. While there, I noticed that there were upgrades for my other rigs. D/l'ed them & upgraded all bios on rigs.

That's when the problems started. Andrea told me that her rig kept freezing & unfortunately so was mine. Couldn't figure out why as the bios upgrades were not beta. About an hour ago, the answer hit me. It was one I used to use in the old days & completely forgotten about.

After bios upgrade, it's always best to pop cmos battery & reset. All rigs now running ok.

Yeah that would do the trick, I was taught that one in college on my degree course when I was building linux boxes, very handy

@ WERECHILD
AN EXCELLENT IDEAR. THERE ARE MANY TIPS AND TRICKS THAT SHOULD BE POSTED.
THERE HAVE BEEN TIMES WHEN I HAD TO GO LOOKING (FOR HOURS IT SEEMS) TO FIND OUT WHY SOMETHING ISN'T WORKING RIGHT.
AND WITH ONE SPOT TO POST TIPS AND TRICKS (LIKE HERE) IT WOULD BE MUCH EASIER TO FIND THEM WHEN NEEDED.

SO, WHO'S GOING TO POST THE FIRST TIP ?

@SIRIUS B
THAT TIP HAS SAVED ME A COUPLE OF HEADACHES. WHEN YOU REMEMBER IT !!! THATS MY PROBLEM.
I'VE BEEN CAUGHT BY THAT ONE BEFORE AND THE BATTERY WAS THE LAST THING TO TRY. AFTER MANY FRUSTRATING HOURS OF PULLING HAIR. ITS JUST NOT SOMETHING I DO OFTEN ENOUGH. ON MY AMD / GIGABYTE M/B I HAD TO LOOK FOR QUITE A WHILE BEFORE I FOUND OUT THAT IT IS THE RESET BUTTON ON THE FRONT PANEL HELD DOWN FOR 10 SECONDS. AND NOT A SMALL SWITCH ON THE M/B LIKE SOME OLDER INTEL BASED BOARDS.
THANKS FOR THE REMINDER TO UPDATE THE BIOS ON THIS THING. ITS BEEN A FEW YEARS SINCE LAST TIME.

I have a request for a tip. What should you use to dust out the inside of your computer case, especially when you're a novice and paranoid that you'll damage something?

I usually blow them out with a can of compressed air. It is important that you don't vacuum out the interior as this can cause a static discharge.

I LIKE A VACUUM WITH A 2" ROUND BRUSH ATTACHMENT AND A CREVICE TOOL ASSISTED BY A PAINT BRUSH.

FOR PLUG-IN CARDS LIKE VIDEO AND ETHERNET THAT START ACTING UP, PULL THE CARD AND USE A PENCIL ERASER TO SCRUB THE COPPER CONTACTS. IT SAFELY REMOVES ANY TARNISH.

EDIT :
OF COURSE YOU ARE RIGHT GRIZZ. I HAVE JUST BEEN LUCKY , MIND YOU I DO USE A WRIST GROUND STRAP.

Funny, took almost a year for someone to post in here

Remember nothing is 100% and you are still taking a risk.

I clean all mine by hand - no vacuum. I use a camera brush, it takes a bit of time but it does the job nicely. After brushing, I use cosmetic/baby wipes to clean all fans & case.

Your patience was outstanding! lol

Dumb idiot ot what?

Another good tip folks......

If using integrated audio on mobo & later decide to upgrade to a soundcard, remember to enter bios 1st & disable onboard audio. No wonder I kept getting the dreaded BSOD's with emupia2k.sys. I had both running.

I ended up using just about an entire can of compressed air and got about 80% of the dust out. Now my machine is running much quieter and cooler. It's not screaming at me anymore! Thanks for the advice. One thing that was frustrating though, it took me the better part of an hour to figure out how to open the case, then I realised I had to unscrew one screw and pull a lever, and out popped one of the panels. D'oh!

Tip of the Day


If connecting 2 or more computers together through a router & then deciding to add a switch, remember........

PORT 1 of Router to PORT 1 of Switch.

saves a lot of hair-pulling

Another one for those who are forced into doing a fresh clean install...........Only works if nothing added since original installation, even then it can be worked around.

On every installation I do, I DO NOT activate over the Internet, I activate over the telephone.

As you activate, you are given an installation code - write this down along with the product key.

Once done, Microsoft will provide the activation code - write this down as well.

Once you copy has been activated, create a log sheet with the following:-

Product key
Installation code
Activation code

Followed by the hardware installed. So whenever you have to reactivate this rig, as long as nothing's changed, you do not need to go to MS to activate.

After building a rig & installing the O/S, there have been occasions where I added more HD's & when forced into reactivating, just leave the power cables off those drives & once activated, reconnect them.

Got given a good tip by my brother yesterday. Sysinternals. It was bought out by Microsoft & the site has numerous tools & utilities. It's worth checking out.

I've been using them for years. Several of the tools have "native" equivalents now in newer windows builds (although named differently...), but the I still use the "originals" as I'm used to their command line switches. For application issues filemon, regmon and process explorer can really help nail down where things are failing.

Another tip........golden but oldie. When using IDE, ensure Master/Slave is selected correctly.............

& one I'd forgotten

As downloading MAPS would take a considerable time (& still not d/l'ed them all yet), Andrea & I decided to go shopping & enjoy the hot weather. on arrival home, noticed that workstation had rebooted. logged in & re-entered MS partner page & continued d/l'ing, however, it came up with an error & refused to continue.

Decided to go to folder & copy to disks what files were done. No IDE drives whatsoever, so rebooted & no ide's shown in bios - Oh no, not my favourite mobo dead? spent several hours on the problem & couldn't find a solution, but thought maybe heat, dust bunnies?

Stripped rig down, cleaned & rebuilt - noy joy.

Aha, bad ribbon cables? changed & still no joy - started taking out the various drives & before I could continue with them, wondered what if? Stripped down the Lian Li HD Caddy & thought.............rebooted & hey presto all ides back online. great.

To use the last remaining slot & also last bay on Coolermaster, added a IDE HD Caddy, but no drive as yet as I have none spare. Without a drive, it was automatically recognised as master. so was DVD-RW

Here's a question about a trick:

I have been a Team Canada member for some time on other projects I work with. I'm joining Team Canada for projects with which I have had no prior team affiliation...

Will any stats I have collected prior to joining Team Canada Project (x) be added to Canada's tally for that project? Basically, is there any retroactivity in stat counting in a case such as mine? Thx...

As far as I know, no there won't be any retroactivity. The credits you score from now on will add to the team's total, but not the credits you won in the past.

Corrupt IE in Win 7

In the past, when browser got corrupted, the easiest way to recover was to reinstall a clean copy. This worked great for all versions of Windows & all versions of IE until now. With Win 7, IE 8 is automatically installed & attempting to download a fresh clean copy is not allowed by MS, it will keep telling you that it is already installed.

For over a week, all my rigs(with the exception of servers) were taking ages to access the net - White page for approx 50/60s then a further 20s or so once the site page had come up. A further 20s or so taken every time a link was tried. This was getting very frustrating & visited the MS forums - apparently, this is not that uncommon - thank you MS...

Managed to find the solution (& once reading it, tried looking in all the Win 7 books I have & no mention of that, again thank you MS Press)

Solution: -

Regardless on whether or not IE accesses the web: -

Open IE
Go to the Tools menu
Select Internet Options
select the Advanced Tab
& click on Reset (NOT "Restore Default Settings" tab

restart IE & it'll be back to the day it was 1st installed (note: - any bookmarks/favourites saved WILL not be lost).

However, all passwords will be lost, so unlike me make sure you have them to hand to reuse)

Yeah, I know, don't use IE but firefox/safari etc. this is for those that do use IE. I've been using it since IE4 & until now, never had any serious issues with IE.

thanks for the tip!

Your welcome. I'm finding that tips/tweaks section on personal forums are much better than many of the so-called offical forums.

AS O/S's get more bloated/complicated, the simplist of tasks get forgotten about & when needed, are unable to be found.

I think that everyone who uses computers (who belong to a forum) should post any tips they come across & not feel silly that they're posting a useless tip/tweak.

No matter how experienced one gets with computing, they will always throw one a curve.

Thanks for sharing.