Root Access

Psycogeek

6:00 AM

i have seen systems so old, they had a hard time getting e-mail, but that is pretty much all the person wanted to do with it. get and print in plain text e-mails. Like getting a $600 smart phone and finding it better to text than to use the fancy real time audio it has Built In :-)

Journeyman Geek

@Psycogeek: if it works for you and you're happy with it, fine.

ekaj

tbh I'd still use my carrier pigeon but no one else knows how to use it

Psycogeek

They were happy, me having to work on it, was like watching a whole movie with the frame advance

Journeyman Geek

@Bob: Oh, its only from ~2002ish

and the last update for it is from 2007

Psycogeek

The worst part of it was , it really did exactally the thing they wanted it to do, given the whole day :-) so i couldnt really say "it doesnt work"

Journeyman Geek

6:05 AM

Its barely a museum piece ;)

ekaj

I'm on an IRC channel and a really opinionated and blunt girl is arguing about how the human body is hardware, and the mind is software, and religion is a flawed program etc etc.. it's amusing and annoying at the same time

Journeyman Geek

lol

I wouldn't argue its flawed

ekaj

oh you can't tell her that, you'll cause a war

Journeyman Geek

its just badly obsfucated and slightly corrupted over time.

ekaj

they've been arguing for 30 mins so far =p

and that's an interesting approach to it =p

Journeyman Geek

6:14 AM

Assuming there's a #deity, there's no obvious action in most lives

in many cases religion is used as a justification for aberrant behaviour, even when the 'word' says otherwise.

Reigion is also often a black box, since the original source code has been ported so many times, and occationally across cultures.

And the documentation occasionally is horrible XD

ekaj

agreed =p

Journeyman Geek

(pity my explaination of religion in terms of cookies is lost to the depths of time)

or more specifically why argueing over religion is stupid ;p

ekaj

I'm pretty ignorant in this; what is the main religion in Singapore?

Journeyman Geek

hmm

We have christians, buddists, taoists, hindus and muslims.

ekaj

I heard earlier English was a very common language there too

Journeyman Geek

6:27 AM

There's no real main religion...

ekaj

ah

Bob

@JourneymanGeek What, ISA?

Journeyman Geek

And there's a ton of variation within the religions we have here.

@Bob: 3x PCI

Bob

@JourneymanGeek I was talking about ISA :P

Journeyman Geek

@Bob: Was talking about this specific board ;p

Bob

6:30 AM

33 mins ago, by Bob

Next question will be looking for an ISA card.

Journeyman Geek

ahh

Anyone who wants to run 1080 on an ISA card is either a coding god, or on drugs.

Maybe both.

Tho

0

Q: MSI G41M P33 Combo motherboard beeps

I thought of upgrading my old desktop and hence bought MSI G41M P33 COMBO mobo and Transcend 4GB DDR3 RAM (JM1333KLN-4G) ram. However when I have installed this the motherboard beeps 3 times. So I put in the old DDR2 ram and it worked. I want to use the new DDR3 ram, so could any one suggest how...

This has me curious

ekaj

iit looks like they're just flipped..

Journeyman Geek

Yup

It has seperate DDR2 and 3 slots.

ekaj

msi.com/product/mb/G41M-P33.html#hero-specification

Journeyman Geek

When's hanukka? ;p

ekaj

6:33 AM

that's past isn't it?

Journeyman Geek

pity ;p

ekaj

it ended yesterday =p

Journeyman Geek

I might give that a bounty if its not answered

I'm curious

ekaj

cropping by Helen keller though

those images

Journeyman Geek

lol

Psycogeek

6:35 AM

I have had a transition board before, that hed 2 sets of ram slots, for the old and the new. it just worked, but you would never use both at the same time (cause it said that in the manuel)

The idea was , i could still use the old memory that i had laying round in the new board.

ekaj

I honestly didn't know such a thing existed

Journeyman Geek

da

Psycogeek

Obsolete, unless somone is dumb enough to start making ddr3 ddr4 combos :-)

Journeyman Geek

meh, not that obsolete.

Has PCIe, Sata....

ekaj

good Linux box at least

Journeyman Geek

6:38 AM

lol

My linux box is my most recent system

Cheap tho

Psycogeek

@JourneymanGeek thats not obsolete but XP is ? :-) ok i am easy Whatever works

Journeyman Geek

@Psycogeek: Its newer than XP

I think

ekaj

when did SATA ports start coming out?

Journeyman Geek

late model PIVs

ekaj

03

XP was 01?

because I thought early versions of XP had sata driver issues

Journeyman Geek

6:41 AM

Yeah they did

They lacked ahci drivers

ekaj

so the mobo is newer than xp

Journeyman Geek

so you needed legacy mode or to slipstream the drivers in

Psycogeek

"This board is from the early days of DDR3 and offers very limited compatibility with current sticks especially if considering high density modules of 4GB. The Kingston is the only one tested and verified. With other modules it is a gamble. In addition GSkill sticks are known to work badly on MSI boards. Try Corsair, Kingston or Crucial. Also be sure to use the latest bios for the board."

Journeyman Geek

Where did you see that?

Psycogeek

Thats pretty much it, if they go off and buy some crap ram from the bargain basement , it might become a PITA. we just tossed in some minor speed kingston value ram that was close to what was seen on the compatability list

@JourneymanGeek The search ? google.com/… there is tons of data on doing what the guy wants to do, just like everyone else didnt do thier research

Journeyman Geek

6:46 AM

Ahh ;p

I googled what you posted and commented. Interesting

I think the spammers cottoned on to the fact that fake american sounding names are obvious. I just nuked someone whose username looked like a cat tapdanced on his keyboard.

And what about all the people who won't be able to join the community because they're terrible at making helpful and constructive co-- ... oh.

Dear spammers ^

Psycogeek

Intel G41 does not support 512Mx8 chips, yea those were the days, when the chip size on the module , not just the overall gig of the module had to be watched out for.

ahh most of that stuff is in the manuel nobody reads or keeps where they can find it , because you can always ask on the web :-)

Journeyman Geek

;p

We don't/

We still have the manual for a TV we threw out 20 years ago, and VCRs ._.

Psycogeek

I got 2 of them file folder drawer things full of manuels, all sorted by type, couldnt find one in there if i wanted to still :-)

So the MB and software manuels for the computer, live next to it instead.

amazon.com/Whitmor-6551-372-5-BLK-Organizer-Collection-Magazine/… in these things

At least he has indicated that he removed the DDR2, so he must know some info, from somewhere. the modules he has just do not work. I do not think there was anything in the bios that would specifically Switch the thing. (but the bios update would be a given)

user285oo6

8:05 AM

Hi

why am i getting Failed reading data from redis connection socket error on opening a page

in mozilla firefox browser

is this a browser issue or OSproblem

i tried google but itinstead loads some git hub page with code in it

Bob

server error

redis is a cache used on the server side

I don't think any browsers use it

user285oo6

8:35 AM

so it means that the webiste has crashed or is facing issues to serve the browser

Journeyman Geek

8:52 AM

essentially kinda sorta

You can't really fix it at your end

user285oo6

@jour thanks for the info

its becuase after reading news on pirate bay i opened the site

and it shows some weird behaviour like a timer sorts on some sites there was this above error

so i thought the browser/Os had some issue

Journeyman Geek

Might have helped to google the error is it isn't everything

If everything fails you can't google, but that would be a wierd error.

HackToHell

9:49 AM

Bleh corrupted windows

I should not have stopped the installation of Windows 8.1

Psycogeek

11:07 AM

HackToHell

2:30 PM

►

^^ sucks

2012,2011's was better

Hennes

5:15 PM

Installing windows 8.1 from a freshly download (from ms) iso: IRQL NOT LESS OR EQUAL.

HackToHell

@Hennes Downloading an esd with the updates is a better idea

Bob

What on earth are you trying to install it on? o.O

Hennes

A brand new laptop with the HDD replaced by a SSD

"with instal disk" ... but no DVD in the box it came with

Bob

Brand? More specific hardware details? In EFI mode?

Hennes

I just removed the extra memory I installed. Maybe it has issues with that.

Now back to 4GiB (which it shipped with)

Max supported is 8GiB

Bob

5:27 PM

Also: see if you can get the minidump, rhat can be a wealth of info

I'd bet it's related to either the wlan card or video card

At what stage of the installation did this happen?

Hennes

It is an Medion Akoya 15,6 Inch Laptop

SoC.

aka tablet in laptop form

Bob

Medion? o.O

As in, Aldi?

Hennes

ibood. But yes. also (and mainly) aldi

With the 'free' version of windows 8.1

aka "windows 8.1 with bing" which is the same as windows 8.1 core,
But te OEM is not allowed to replaced the default search engine

Bob

Again: do you know if it has a separate wlan card, and what that one is?

Hennes

The OEM key is in the BIOS and does not work when installing.
So I googled around for a generic install key with the goal of instaling and then changing the product to the correct one after the OS is installed.

It has a very small WLAN card (I can see it when I open the laptop

Bob

5:31 PM

I'd seriously be willing to put money on the wlan card being the culprit

Hennes

However atm it is closed (and trying to install)

Bob

try pulling it before install

(that's what happened with my 8 => 8.1 attempt... eventually replaced the Ralink card with an Intel one)

Of all possible fucked up drivers, WLAN and GPU are the most common.

Hennes

This one came with 8.1 preinstalled. I guess it should just work.

All I did was make a backup of the OS disk (took 6 hours for a 1TB HDD).
Add a second SoDIMM (now removed)
.... and it was unstable as hell.

Might crash while booting

might work for a few hours, then suddenly blue screen and reboot a few dozen times

Bob

I'm surprised they put a HDD in a tablet form factor.

Then again, at least you can swap it for an SSD.

eMMC is just crap

Hennes

This 'CPU' is a SOC (quad core celeron-ish)
5 Watt TPD.
But rather than put it in a tablet they put it in a full sized laptop.
15" screen. Real keyboard. Numpad.

Which is slow, but it is replacig a old laptop with a single core pentium M 740 (1.7GHz P3-ish with quad 2GHz)

That should make it fast enough for web browsing (which is all the laptop will be used for

Bob

5:36 PM

Oh, the Akoya I found was a convertible.

Hennes

Add an SSD (faster, more shock resistent).
Add 4GiB RAM
and it should last enough 10 years

oh. installing at 8%.. furthest I ever came

9% !

I just hope I get a stable system without bloatware

The original OEM install came with:
ashampoo applauncher
ashampoo burning studio
ashampoo core tuner
ashampoo getbackphoto
ashampoo hdd control
ashampoo music studio
ashampoo photo commander
ashampoo photo optimiser
ashampoo slidehsow studio
ashampoo snap
ashampoo uninstaller
ashampoo video styler
ashampoo winoptimser
mcafee livesafe
Microsoft office
simplifast
nitropro 9
quicktime
apple application support
apple software update
cyberlink home cinema 10
cyberlink labelprint
cyberlink power2go
cyberlink powerdirector

Deinstalling that crap used to take quite some time.
I know it is my imagination, but the old single core Lenovo 3000 C100 felt faster.

Also 35% !

81 %

hmm, it now boots to the BIOS screen
(first experience with an UEFI system)

Bob

5:56 PM

@Hennes Did you install it in EFI-mode?

Hennes

Yes, I think I did.

Bob

@Hennes How did you launch the installer?

Hennes

Because at first it complained that the disk was in MBR mode and I needed to wipe it and create a artition in GPT mode.
And then it created several GPT partitions

I booted the windows 8.1 instalation DVD

Bob

@Hennes IIRC you're supposed to load the Windows EFI file from the EFI menu...

Could be wrong though.

@Hennes thomas-krenn.com/en/wiki/Installing_Windows_in_UEFI-mode

Hennes

I have no EFI though, just the BIOS (unless the BIOS is doing a very good job of imitating a classic laptop BIOS)

Bob

6:00 PM

@Hennes You do not have a "BIOS".

Hennes

The only boot option is the DVD. No UEFI shell

Bob

You have UEFI firmware which can emulate a legacy BIOS.

I could s/EFI/(U)EFI/ my previous messages if that makes you happier.

Hennes

Boot option #1: UEFI: TSSTcorp CDDV...
(sole option)

A very good emulation: "BIOS version 6.13"
I guess that is the UEFI version

Bob

@Hennes If it was prefixed with UEFI, you're probably safe.

@Hennes They still refer to it as a "BIOS" in many locations, but technically "BIOS" should refer to a specific set of firmware compatible with the original IBM PC that UEFI replaced.

Hennes

aye.

BIOS is just one older form of firmware.

But the medion coders still use that term.

Your PC ran into problems and needs to restart. Just one second we are collecting some ...reboot

OK, that reboot happened a lot faster than with the HDD

(With HDD it took a minute, with the SSD about 5 seconds)

Bob

6:08 PM

@Hennes Grab the minidump.

Chuck it into Windbg.

Hennes

Yes, after dinner.
I will need to remove the drive from the laptop and build it into the other laptop

Hennes

6:19 PM

cms enabled. Now it boots (and crashes) into win8

Bob

6:29 PM

A really good read: happyassassin.net/2014/01/25/…

@Hennes cms?

Hennes

6:41 PM

For backwards compatibility, most of the UEFI implementations also support booting from MBR-partitioned disks, through the Compatibility Support Module (CSM) which provides legacy BIOS compatibility.[32] In that case, booting Linux on UEFI systems is the same as on legacy BIOS-based systems.

CMS for booting an UEFI partition?

Bob

@Hennes CMS != CSM

@Hennes Read the post I linked above for what the CSM really does.

DragonLord

7:48 PM

troubleshooter

1

bios charging motherboard rom usb windows windows-xp

There goes another sneaky spammer.

It's these kinds of spam other miss that I'm good at finding :-)

@fixer1234, I rolled back your edit because I've identified this user's posts as spam. Examination of the linked content in both answers shows that the pages have similar layouts. — DragonLord 5 mins ago

fixer1234

8:34 PM

Hi there, DragonLord

DragonLord

@fixer1234 Hello

Spam has actually been getting sneakier the past year or so

I've seen quite a few spammers cloak themselves by using different domains to promote their products

fixer1234

Maybe start with a definition of spam so we're on the same page.

DragonLord

@fixer1234 Spam is the posting of links to external content primarily for promotional purposes without disclosure of affiliation

It's often done to boost their website SEO

However, some just do it to drive traffic and get people to download files with adware or other malware

My experience shows that spam can be far sneakier than you think and you need to be vigilant for any "hidden agenda" behind posts

fixer1234

It seems like there are degrees of spam. Ignoring the blatant, irrelevant stuff, I see some that is shameless plugs for software. The two in question here appeared to be relevant posts by an enthusiast. How do you differentiate that from spam and how do you identify the spam?

DragonLord

@fixer1234 Similar page layouts on websites with seemingly unrelated domain names

On all or most linked pages, layouts that appear "messy" or otherwise unprofessional

Actually, both pages seemingly went to different utilities but are actually the same download

VirusTotal identified the download as containing adware

virustotal.com/en/file/…

(I voted the file malicious on the grounds that it was linked to by a spammer)

fixer1234

8:48 PM

A lot of web sites are created from templates using the same software so they look similar, and a lot of amateurs create crappy web sites. You went the extra mile on this to connect the dots on the download. You've got good radar.

Since those links are known bad, did you delete the two posts?

DragonLord

@fixer1234 The posts were automatically deleted.

I'm not (yet) a moderator and can't delete them directly

(10K users can see deleted posts)

One post of this kind and I might let it pass, but two posts containing links to an untrusted external site and I investigate it more closely

I actually didn't look into the download until after the posts were deleted, I only examined the pages

The fact that both pages used tables for downloads with "Mirror 1, Mirror 2" was one tell-tale sign that they were written by the same person(s)

fixer1234

It's a good thing you're minding the store. Thanks for the heads up.

DragonLord

Closer examination in the right sidebar clearly indicates Crack Unlimited is run by the same entity as the one running Softlink

fixer1234

It takes some basic knowledge to know where to look. Think about putting together a how-to guide for sniffing this stuff out.

DragonLord

Sneaky spam has been my specialty for a long time here.

The key is to look for hidden relationships between the posts

Different URLs in different posts by a new user should be investigated as an evasive attempt to spam

in Ask a Super User Moderator, Mar 15 '12 at 2:39, by DragonLord

Nothing escapes the Dragon Lord's eyes... ;)

Mar 2 '13 at 5:44, by DragonLord

I have a great eye for spam--these kinds of users aren't going to evade the Dragon Lord. :p

Look at the transcripts for context.

fixer1234

9:01 PM

I'm not a web site guy and I'm probably not alone. I wouldn't know what to look for (although after you described what you did it makes sense). You can hog the glory as the resident spam sniffer or educate others and delegate.

DragonLord

@fixer1234 Start by looking for new answers to old questions by new or low-rep users

When you see a post with a suspicious link, look at the user's profile

If there are any posts, look at them and open any links in a Private Browsing or incognito window

If, upon deeper inspection, they look like spam (e.g. similar unprofessional page layouts, VirusTotal finding adware, indications of affiliation, pages having the same author, etc.), flag all posts linking to the sites as spam.

It takes experience and a investigative mindset to do well

Psycogeek

2

New hat just for DragonLord "Eager Beaver"

2

DragonLord

I've been one of the resident spam hunters here on Super User almost since I started here, and I have more than 250 helpful spam flags under my belt.

I'm proud to have caught some of the sneakiest cases of spam Super User has ever seen

fixer1234

I don't have an incognito window or sandboxed browser, but I'll have to check out virustotal (wasn't familiar with that). It sounds like flagging posts as spam isn't enough; they need to be flagged specifically to your attention (and what are the odds that you haven't already found it).

DragonLord

@fixer1234 lol

fixer1234

9:15 PM

Thanks for the education. I'm going to sign off.

DragonLord

See ya.

@fixer1234, one more thing:

108

A: Recent Mass Football Spam

I've decided to attack the problem at the root, shutting down the spam blogs themselves. The secret here is to run Google searches using queries like site:blogspot.com watch football (the site: operator as used here limits the search to the blogspot.com domain), click on and examine any suspicio...

Psycogeek

cool, hit em where it hurts

Bob

@Psycogeek There's one problem: this doesn't really hurt them :\

Psycogeek

9:31 PM

eventually they would get tired of signing up for accounts , and having them obliterated daily, then they get a real job :-) In that fantasy world where anyone would hire them

DragonLord

@Psycogeek It's only a matter of time before these spammers get jailed

It's probably organized cybercrime

Psycogeek

Resume:
Skills Pissing off people for most of my life
Job Position: Possible manager

DragonLord

@fixer1234 If you find anything that looks like spam but you're not sure, be sure to bring it up in Ask a Super User Moderator—t‌he mods and I will look into it.

Bob

@DragonLord Spam-posting on various websites is not illegal.

While their behaviour on those websites themselves might be illegal, tracking down the operators is difficult at best.

And that's a good thing as far as general internet privacy goes.

DragonLord

@Bob The content in question is often illegal—pirated video streams, adware and malware, etc.

Psycogeek

9:49 PM

Unfortunatly adware is not illegal, and unlikely for ads in any form in the US to be illegal because they dont make anything anymore just cross sell stuff to eachother

fixer1234

@DragonLord - I may need to develop better radar. Recall that I argued about the two posts today looking like legit posts. There is a level of sneaky that still gets by my "spidey sense".

DragonLord

@Psycogeek Depends on the jurisdiction

fixer1234

I'll keep the Ask a Super User Moderator in mind for when I actually recognize something questionable.

DragonLord

California and Nevada (and possibly other states) have "computer contaminant" laws

Psycogeek

like the method of delivery, comming in virus like , no notification, FTC legality where disclosure of the actual product and all that stuff, making it actually malware, not a legit product with ads crammed in it

legit things with ads crammed in dont often survive well either, as they get rejected by users, hacked to remove the ads (often spending more time figuring out how to remove the ads , than it would take to buy the product with a job)

ekaj

10:12 PM

The west coast is under a DoS?

(heard from another network) - would lend credit as to why I can't load 1/2 my websites today

Psycogeek

no that is just me , i had to re-download the web :-)

ekaj

ah apparently PSN and XBOX are

Psycogeek

Ohh, i didnt know theregister.co.uk/2014/12/22/… <--north Korea is said to have gotten some activity on 22Dec theregister.co.uk/2014/12/24/… <-rackspace looses DNS for a while on Dec 24 craveonline.com/gaming/articles/… <-- X-box Lizard squad attacks on X-mas

ekaj

I knew about the first two.. figured out the lizard guys a min ago

Psycogeek

They just all got on the web at the same moment :-) after 5 minutes all christmas gifts loose thier GeeWiz factors and go back to normal :-)

I have always wondered, seems like nothing is worse for an overloaded server(s), than millions of people pushing retry buttons , or software retrying over and over again. When stuff gets slow, seems like it gets crippled way more by the users.

DragonLord

10:24 PM

@Psycogeek I got an SSD for Christmas

ekaj

I got a surface pro 3 - didn't expect that at all

Psycogeek

The average websites you push a button and some data moves, then you sit there reading and watching for quite some time. But if the data doesnt hop right in, you reload the page 50 times until the entire user base, has destroyed it

So when a website starts getting slow, and people are complaining , and it did not have an excess of ability to cope with the requests, it always seems like it goes completly belly up after that.

The rest can probably be put into a math formula Where AS= attention span of humans , RA= retry ammount L=Load

C= complaint traffic T= time and G=percentage of people who will finnaly give up completly for the whole day

Psycogeek

10:53 PM

Because of that My AS=0 , RA=~2 , G=100% , and tomorrow is a better day to go there.

Journeyman Geek

11:09 PM

@fixer1234 This happens to all of us ;p

I had ~2K flags, most of which were spam before I became a mod and I still occasionally am unsure of a few

Psycogeek

11:30 PM

superuser.com/questions/856883/change-dual-monitor-behavior <--- this question would not be so bad, if the title was better (like align monitor Top Bottom or something?), and the actions the user did in the answer was outlined the tiniest bit in text.

Psycogeek

11:52 PM

How about "Align dual monitors in windows vertically , one on top, one on the bottom"

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