Random Tech Questions you want answered.

Manta, you might ask over in the general Questions thread or even the Parenting thread. Might get more views there.

LeapingGnome wrote:

Manta, you might ask over in the general Questions thread or even the Parenting thread. Might get more views there.

Will do thanks.

When you say photo frame, I think built in malware. That might have permanently scared a lot of people off?

I've had some bad experiences with 3rd party ink cartridges lately, for my HP 7520 inkjet. But those proprietary cartridges are horrendously expensive. Anyone know of good white label brands, or just in general what to look out for or to avoid?

I've been having DNS issues for the last few days now. My computers say they're connected to the internet, I can ping IP addresses, but pinging actual names doesn't work. nslookup doesn't seem to do anything on any of my computers (all Windows-based). Sometimes they eventually get some sense, but I've had to power cycle the router sometimes to fix it. It affects my wireless and wired computers.

Questions:

1. How can I get nslookup to actually do something on my Windows computers? Is it because Windows isn't handling any DNS responsibility?
2. How do I tell if the issue is my router or the DNS server of (presumably) my ISP? (My ISP is Optimum/Cablevision, FYI)
3. If the DNS is a problem, will changing it to something like 8.8.8.8 be okay, or is there another freely-available alternative I can consider?

Many thanks!

Yeah first thing to do is try to set DNS manually on your router/modem and your PC if you want. For what it's worth when I've had this problem before it is always a problem with the modem or ISP.

8.8.8.8 and 8.8.4.4 are ok (Google's DNS), or you can try OpenDNS also (208.67.222.222 and 208.67.220.220)

If you have the option, you can run your own DNS; any Linux box can do it. (Hell, a 386 can probably do it, it's an incredibly lightweight protocol.)

If you have a Raspberry Pi sitting around, those make dynamite little DHCP/DNS servers.

Thanks for the feedback! I switched my router to the Google DNS, we'll see if it helps. If that doesn't work, I'll try OpenDNS, then I can try a call to my ISP.

Malor wrote:

If you have the option, you can run your own DNS; any Linux box can do it. (Hell, a 386 can probably do it, it's an incredibly lightweight protocol.)

If you have a Raspberry Pi sitting around, those make dynamite little DHCP/DNS servers.

Does that actually run well on a Raspberry Pi? It seems like there must be a reason that more people don't run their own if it's actually that small/portable.

Does that actually run well on a Raspberry Pi?

Oh sure, absolutely. I run both on a Pi 2, and it's gorgeous. It would be fine on a Pi 1. Both protocols were invented in the 386 era, if not earlier, so they need very, very little CPU power to run.

It seems like there must be a reason that more people don't run their own if it's actually that small/portable.

Well, first you have to install Linux, and then you have to know what a DNS resolver is, and how to install one. (on debian, it's apt-get install bind9). Then you *might* have to configure BIND to answer queries from the local subnet, which would involve editing a text file.

Then you need to point your local machine at it, which can be easy if you do network configuration manually. But if you're using DHCP, then you need to tell your existing DHCP server (probably your firewall/router) to use your Pi's address. If you can't, then you need to turn it off, and install your own DHCP server on the Pi. This, unfortunately, can get a bit complex. The ISC DHCP server is the most common, and it's not hard to work with, but there are a TON of options. DHCP is lightweight computationally, but it's doing full network configuration, and that's got a lot of possible moving parts. I'd expect it to take ~4 hours to figure out, the very first time you deploy it.

You also probably want to configure Google DNS as the second DNS server, or else when you reboot your Pi, your whole network stops until it comes back up. You can also run DNS on a second internal machine, if you have one.

edit: I actually run it on three machines... my NAS, the Pi 2, and my firewall. As long as the firewall stays up, I'm good, but I also run it on the other machines because the firewall is less trusted than the internal hosts. They come first on the DNS host list, and the firewall is the final fallback. If that's down, my network is down anyway.

Whenever I update my nVidia drivers the screen goes black for an instant (which is understandable), but why does Windows also play the usb disconnect/connect sounds?

The only thing I can think of is because my wireless headphone dongle is usually inserted? Otherwise, I have no clue what it could be.

I definitely did not have my game controller and joystick plugged in this time. Next time, I'll unplug my headphones also if I remember to before updating.

PaladinTom wrote:

Whenever I update my nVidia drivers the screen goes black for an instant (which is understandable), but why does Windows also play the usb disconnect/connect sounds?

The only thing I can think of is because my wireless headphone dongle is usually inserted? Otherwise, I have no clue what it could be.

I definitely did not have my game controller and joystick plugged in this time. Next time, I'll unplug my headphones also if I remember to before updating.

Oh wow I just had a little bit of light bulb going off moment! I've noticed this problem when power off my Dell monitor as well but could never figure it out. But, the Dell monitor does have 2 USB ports on the side so I'm guessing when the power is turned off, Windows is effectively getting a USB Disconnected message from the USB Controller in the Monitor. Might kinda explain what's happening in your case as well.

Hmm. That makes sense, but I don't recall if my monitor has a usb hub built in or if I've plugged it in. I'll have to check it out when I get home today. Thanks.

A built-in webcam or speaker system might also cause that.

With my PC 10 feet away from the TV I use the most... Is a steamlink better or an HDMI cable? I want to play some games on the TV occasionally... hopefully getting the wife in on watching them.

My windows 7 (64) is acting weird.

Seems like every other boot locks up after I log onto windows while the desktop is loading. A few icons on my desktop load up, but then It locks. If I move the mouse down into the task bar it shows the spinning circle. Anywhere else its the regular pointer. The shortcuts that do load on desktop I can click to highlight but I can't actually open anything.

I've booted into safemode.. taken a look at autoruns to get a good view of all of the startup processes... but there's a lot of stuff there. I've turned off some items, turned them back on.. but the only consistent thing is that its basically every other reboot. When I do make it to windows, I don't notice any performance or other problems.

Is there some software that monitors boot so I can see what is the offending driver/software? I've done a boot log, but that doesn't seem to show me anything worth using.

I can't think of anything I did or installed that would have caused this. I first noticed it about a week back after I cleaned/dusted out the chassis.

Carlbear95 wrote:

Is there some software that monitors boot so I can see what is the offending driver/software? I've done a boot log, but that doesn't seem to show me anything worth using.

I've often found Microsoft's Autoruns utility useful for investigating this kind of problem.

Check the seating of all your cards and cables maybe?

Try testing your memory.

I'd also give the hard drive a full scan, including bad sectors.

Defniitely using Autoruns. Because windows boots into Safe Mode with no problems and always gets past the logon screen I'm presuming its software, not hardware related. I did double check HD and other connectors.

Because its happening after logon, i'm looking specifically at the "Logon" tab in autoruns. Assuming the order of loading is consistent with the order on that tab, it looks like its choking about halfway down my list of programs. The only way I guess that is a little icon shows up in my tray for something I always run on startup, but no icon follows that one.

Seems like every other boot locks up after I log onto windows while the desktop is loading.

The fact that it's every other boot nudges me toward hardware as a possible issue. Have you checked the system event log? Right click My Computer and click Manage, or go to Control Panel/Administrative Tools/Computer Management. Go to the Event Viewer category and expand it, expand Windows Logs, and click on System. There will be a huge list of things -- look for red icons indicating problems. It's sorted by date/time, with the newest entries first, so you don't have to go too far in the list to get an idea of what's going on.

Another possibility would be some network service that's failing to contact the mothership (perhaps even malware); it might be interesting to try booting without the network connected a few times to see if anything changes.

Is there a malware detector more preferred than others? I have malwarbytes and it's showing clean.

mwb does a decent job, if I suspect something might be hiding from that I'll sometimes give a run through trend micro housecall, and maybe something rootkit specific like sophos anti-rootkit scanner

of course all such things require being kept up to date since there are constantly new threats out there.

Ugh.. ok. rebooted 2x with no networking and no problems.. so that means something is trying to contact the mothership..which is.. concerning.

Again MWB doesn't show anything. What else should I be trying?

if you have a home network probably best to leave that infected machine disconnected for the time being, try getting some portable options via a clean machine to run on the infected machine in safe mode;
spybot search&destroy portable
perhaps

Well i take that back.. i just booted no networking and still hung.. first time I've ever been relived that my computer didn't succesfully boot to windows.

I'm going to give myself the benefit of the doubt and presume I did not install something unwanted.. as crazy as that may sound. I'm really very careful with this machine, and I have no kids or anything that could mess with it.

I ran trend and MWB again, nothing.

As far as system event log goes, there are some errors.. but its the same 2 or 3 recurring errors that have been occuring as far back as 2 or 3 months ago and this problem just started happening.

but its the same 2 or 3 recurring errors that have been occuring as far back as 2 or 3 months ago and this problem just started happening.

What are the errors? There's a ton of data in most of those logs... you can probably ignore most of it. Just tell us enough to give us a clue what the system is complaining about.

Basically, the big first question that needs to be resolved is this: are you having a hardware problem, or a software one? Once we can nail that down, proceeding from there will be much easier.

is there a dust and dirt proof keyboard or keyboard cover that still provides a decent typing and input experience?

Well, the Topre mechanisms are extremely dirt-resistant and durable, because they're basically super-cool rubber domes with springs underneath. As I understand it, the keyboard underlay is a single solid sheet of thick rubber. You press down on the rubber domes, which compresses the springs, triggering a capacitative sensor. There's no direct coupling between the crud on the top and the sensor mechanism underneath, so to whatever degree a keyboard can be dirt-proof, the Topre is probably it.

The Topre Type Heaven is the cheapest option I know of, at about $150 on Amazon. You can spend as much as $300 on the better models; the higher-end ones come with variable keystroke weights, PBT keycaps, and are incredibly solidly constructed. I don't think you can buy those on Amazon, though, you have to chase them down at specialty keyboard retailers.

Banks often use Topre mechanisms for their teller stations, because they're just so crazy durable.

Note that they take awhile to break in, about a month or so. They start out feeling kind of nasty and uncomfortable, but after awhile the rubber breaks in, and they start making this very characteristic "thwock" sound. They get very comfortable to type on, super easy on your fingers for the marathon sessions. The springs give them a nice bounceback at the bottom of the stroke, so your fingers aren't slamming into the board in the same way. This isn't something you notice right away, but after you've been typing for thirty minutes or an hour, your fingers being more comfortable than usual will creep into your awareness. (at least, it does for me.)