Random Tech Questions you want answered.

I don't have the RCA sockets, but I'm thinking that I could use an RCA to 3.5mm cable and plug in to the mic input. Failing that, there's the headphone amp idea that Rykin suggested, though that does start to make things a little more pricey.

Hi. My Windows 10 gaming PC has started doing some weird stuff during the boot process, and I don't know how to get it to boot properly without a workaround.

If I let the PC boot normally, it shows a "Preparing Automatic Repair" message and then goes to a blue screen.

If I restart the PC and run the boot menu (by pressing F11 in my case), I get a list of boot devices:

Windows Boot Manager (the default)
Windows Boot Manager (listed again)
AMD-RAID Array
TOSHIBA HDWE140
Enter Setup

If I choose the *second* version of Windows Boot Manager, Windows boots fine.

The thing is, when I go into the BIOS/UEFI to tweak the boot options, only one item is labeled "Windows Boot Manager," so I can't just make an obvious change in the BIOS.

Any ideas on how I can get the correct version of Windows Boot Manager to be the default if I can't make a selection for it in the BIOS? Thanks in advance!

Hey all. I currently game on a laptop with an i5 7300, 1060 6GB, 60hz panel. My objective is to get a monitor so I have a larger screen to game on, and also take advantage of the FPS that my rig is able to generate. If I can find stuff that won't cost too much, it'd be nice if I can get a monitor now that I'd be able to use if I decide to build a gaming desktop in the future.

With these things in mind, what are the things I need to consider when choosing a monitor? Can my rig power a 120hz or even 144hz monitor? I have an HDMI port, which I assume is what I'll have to use to connect a monitor. Will that affect what type of monitor I can/should get?

Really hoping I can draw from everyone's experience here. Any and all input will be much appreciated!

I am just on a CPAP machine during sleep for three months. It gave me back my life! Inventor of this machine must get the Nobel prize in my opinion.

However, I keep wondering, what would happen if I would fill the waterreservoir with whisky... Anyone tried that one yet? Maybe it would make me sleep even better

bekkilyn wrote:

I have four slots and currently have two sticks of 2GB each. I've ordered two sticks of 4GB each. It's currently DDR3 and I've ordered DDR3.

This is what I have on order since these were on the list of the memory guaranteed to work with my motherboard:

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0...

I've read that having both my current and the new memory installed may or may not work. Some say it won't and I've heard others say it might and will just use whatever speed is slowest, so I may try it both ways and see what happens.

More RAM would probably make a bigger difference than faster RAM in your situation so I would leave the old RAM in their until you can replace it with another 8 gig kit. That said my old desktop from 2011 has 12 gigs and I have never felt like I needed more.

philucifer wrote:

Hi. My Windows 10 gaming PC has started doing some weird stuff during the boot process, and I don't know how to get it to boot properly without a workaround.

If I let the PC boot normally, it shows a "Preparing Automatic Repair" message and then goes to a blue screen.

If I restart the PC and run the boot menu (by pressing F11 in my case), I get a list of boot devices:

Windows Boot Manager (the default)
Windows Boot Manager (listed again)
AMD-RAID Array
TOSHIBA HDWE140
Enter Setup

If I choose the *second* version of Windows Boot Manager, Windows boots fine.

The thing is, when I go into the BIOS/UEFI to tweak the boot options, only one item is labeled "Windows Boot Manager," so I can't just make an obvious change in the BIOS.

Any ideas on how I can get the correct version of Windows Boot Manager to be the default if I can't make a selection for it in the BIOS? Thanks in advance!

What do you have in your MSCONFIG settings? Do you have more than one setting there? I'll spoiler what I'm talking about and how to get to it below, even if you know it it'll be good for anyone else that has a similar problem and finds the post.

Spoiler:

Press Windows key + R to bring up the run prompt.
Type msconfig
At the top, click on the tab that says "Boot"
Here you should see something that looks like this:

IMAGE(https://i.imgur.com/zfM9qCN.png)

If you only have one installation of Windows set to boot on this machine, you should only see one entry like I have above. If you have two, figure out which is valid and set it as the default, then reboot to make sure it boots properly. Once it does boot properly, you can either delete the other entry or just tweak the settings so it never bothers showing the two options.

PurEvil wrote:
philucifer wrote:

Hi. My Windows 10 gaming PC has started doing some weird stuff during the boot process, and I don't know how to get it to boot properly without a workaround.

If I let the PC boot normally, it shows a "Preparing Automatic Repair" message and then goes to a blue screen.

If I restart the PC and run the boot menu (by pressing F11 in my case), I get a list of boot devices:

Windows Boot Manager (the default)
Windows Boot Manager (listed again)
AMD-RAID Array
TOSHIBA HDWE140
Enter Setup

If I choose the *second* version of Windows Boot Manager, Windows boots fine.

The thing is, when I go into the BIOS/UEFI to tweak the boot options, only one item is labeled "Windows Boot Manager," so I can't just make an obvious change in the BIOS.

Any ideas on how I can get the correct version of Windows Boot Manager to be the default if I can't make a selection for it in the BIOS? Thanks in advance!

What do you have in your MSCONFIG settings? Do you have more than one setting there? I'll spoiler what I'm talking about and how to get to it below, even if you know it it'll be good for anyone else that has a similar problem and finds the post.

Spoiler:

Press Windows key + R to bring up the run prompt.
Type msconfig
At the top, click on the tab that says "Boot"
Here you should see something that looks like this:

IMAGE(https://i.imgur.com/zfM9qCN.png)

If you only have one installation of Windows set to boot on this machine, you should only see one entry like I have above. If you have two, figure out which is valid and set it as the default, then reboot to make sure it boots properly. Once it does boot properly, you can either delete the other entry or just tweak the settings so it never bothers showing the two options.

Thanks for your reply. My MSCONFIG settings screen looks just the same as yours does. I have only one installation of Windows, so I'm not sure why I'm seeing "Windows Boot Manager" twice.

Do you have multiple hard drives?

Here's a weird one... My daughter's PC is having boot problems. If I restart/boot from shutdown, it gets to the windows (10) splash screen where the little twirly circle would normally start up, and just hangs indefinitely. However if I jump to bios, then exit (without any changes) it boots no problem. What in the name of all that is (un)holy could this be? I just did a fresh win10 install about a month ago, this only manifested in the past few days...

Might be a recovery partition that's showing up. Which wouldn't be good if there's a damaged recovery partition...

Old Man Pi wrote:

Here's a weird one... My daughter's PC is having boot problems. If I restart/boot from shutdown, it gets to the windows (10) splash screen where the little twirly circle would normally start up, and just hangs indefinitely. However if I jump to bios, then exit (without any changes) it boots no problem. What in the name of all that is (un)holy could this be? I just did a fresh win10 install about a month ago, this only manifested in the past few days...

I had this issue with Radeon setting the ULPS to enabled which caused Windows10 to take about a good solid 15 minutes to boot from an SSD for a while. Are you running an AMD graphics card?

PurEvil wrote:
Old Man Pi wrote:

Here's a weird one... My daughter's PC is having boot problems. If I restart/boot from shutdown, it gets to the windows (10) splash screen where the little twirly circle would normally start up, and just hangs indefinitely. However if I jump to bios, then exit (without any changes) it boots no problem. What in the name of all that is (un)holy could this be? I just did a fresh win10 install about a month ago, this only manifested in the past few days...

I had this issue with Radeon setting the ULPS to enabled which caused Windows10 to take about a good solid 15 minutes to boot from an SSD for a while. Are you running an AMD graphics card?

Nope, running a 980...

Rykin wrote:

Do you have multiple hard drives?

I do have multiple hard drives. It's one of GameGuru's specials. It has two SSDs in a RAID (where Windows is installed) and then two standard hard drives.

Old Man Pi wrote:

Nope, running a 980...

That's a pretty weird issue. Only thing I can find through Google probably wouldn't apply to you because you're getting to the splash screen. If the drive wasn't recognized at all it'd be worth switching the boot order and letting fail (No OS found) then switching it back, but I don't think that would change anything for you. Might be worth going through the Windows repair just to see if it picks up anything weird.

It might be worth turning on boot logging in msconfig to see if you can grab anything from the log file.

philucifer wrote:
Rykin wrote:

Do you have multiple hard drives?

I do have multiple hard drives. It's one of GameGuru's specials. It has two SSDs in a RAID (where Windows is installed) and then two standard hard drives.

The second entry may be from one of the non-boot drives. I have seen Windows do that before after an update for Gates only knows what reason.

Back before video went HD, I used to use a Canon GL1 DV camcorder for personal video projects and some light professional work. If I want to buy a modern-day equivalent to that, what kind of video camera do I want to buy?

Vargen wrote:

Back before video went HD, I used to use a Canon GL1 DV camcorder for personal video projects and some light professional work. If I want to buy a modern-day equivalent to that, what kind of video camera do I want to buy?

If you only want 1080p you can get a Canon has a bunch of models in the $200-$300 range. If you want something a bit more versatile you might look into entry level DSLRs that can do video like the Canon Rebel T6.

I bought a Panasonic HC-V770 a couple of years ago and I have been happy with it. It takes great video and I remember when I was looking it was rated the best camcorder for ~$500.

If you want to step up to a 4K one that is a bit bigger and more 'pro' they have the HC-VX870, looks like it is on sale right now for $600 at Best Buy.

Thanks for the advice. I'll take a look at those.

I paid around $2000 for the GL1 and ultimately got my money's worth from it. I see Canon has quite a few cameras in that rough price range; I should probably investigate those. One of the things I loved about the GL1 was it had a good built-in microphone, a great lens with a 20x optical zoom, and good automation but with manual overrides for everything. I could shoot full-auto when I needed to. I could set everything manual if I wanted. I could even set one or two settings manually and have the automation adjust everything else accounting for that. That last bit came in especially handy for sports or dance or other high-movement subjects where I wanted a specific shutter speed but couldn't control the lighting.

Something the GL1 didn't have that would be handy is XLR audio inputs.

I guess the big thing I need to decide is if I need/want 4k. On the one hand, nobody actually needs 4k. On the other hand, future proofing. On the other hand, being able to crop and zoom in editing and still have a full 1080 result.

Maybe I just need to wait a few months and see what happens with the new Mac Pro and plan from there...

So more PC adventures today!

My new memory sticks came in just before the weekend and I got a chance to install them today. I took out the existing memory, put the new memory into the slots where the old memory used to be, and then put the old memory into the remaining slots. (Not sure if I needed to do that, but I figured the "best" memory should go into the original slots.) Started up the computer and it kept beeping. Found out all the memory wasn't snapped in tightly.

Then started computer again and it seemed to boot up BUT...the stupid monitor wouldn't come out of power save mode no matter how much button pressing, turning off and on, restarting, etc. I did.

Since it was misbehaving prior to the memory change, I went out and bought a cheap Wal-Mart monitor just to see what another one would do and the monitor worked just fine.

But then the computer wasn't booting up all the way. It would get to the point just before it would ordinarily get to the login screen when I got a WaCom driver message and then blue screen.

Booted in safe mode, did not get the driver message, but the same blue screen.

Took out the two older sticks of memory and rebooted, and now everything seems to be working just fine with the new memory.

I guess the computer doesn't like the mixture of old and new after all. Maybe I'll try it again just to see what happens, or maybe I'll just plan to get another two sticks of the new memory once I've had it installed for a while and know for sure that it's working properly.

But for now at least, I have 8GB instead of 4GB and a new monitor! (Since the old monitor is pretty old, the cheap Wal-Mart monitor might still be at least as good or better than the old one, and it's 22" instead of the 17" I had.) Maybe I can get the old one working again and use it as a second monitor or something like that. I know for a fact that it still works when it's not in power save mode. It's just getting it *out* of power save mode where the light turns yellow instead of blinking blue is the problem. Previously, I was able to turn off the entire computer and jar it out of power save, but since changing memory, that trick didn't seem to be working, so I don't know.

On the old monitor did you try it with different cables?

On the memory, some motherboards have more restrictions with 2 sticks instead of 4. Like 2 sticks will work fine, but if you try to use those same 2 sticks in a 4 stick configuration it doesn't work because using 4 requires certain timing frequencies or all of the sizes to match or whatever. You might find the manual if you can and it will tell you what types of memory work in 4 stick configs. That said, 8GB is probably enough for anything you want to do.

LeapingGnome wrote:

On the old monitor did you try it with different cables?

On the memory, some motherboards have more restrictions with 2 sticks instead of 4. Like 2 sticks will work fine, but if you try to use those same 2 sticks in a 4 stick configuration it doesn't work because using 4 requires certain timing frequencies or all of the sizes to match or whatever. You might find the manual if you can and it will tell you what types of memory work in 4 stick configs. That said, 8GB is probably enough for anything you want to do.

I didn't try different cables as I didn't have another set of VGA type cables and that's what it was using. Might try that if I can scrounge up some later, or if I find I do have another set somewhere after all.

Since the old and new memory are two different sizes, I'm thinking that's what it doesn't like, so if I put in all the same memory up to the 16GB max, it should be fine. Of course, maybe the 8GB will be enough until I eventually upgrade the motherboard, so I may just end up leaving it as it is until then unless I start running out of memory again like I was with just the 4GB.

bekkilyn wrote:
LeapingGnome wrote:

On the old monitor did you try it with different cables?

On the memory, some motherboards have more restrictions with 2 sticks instead of 4. Like 2 sticks will work fine, but if you try to use those same 2 sticks in a 4 stick configuration it doesn't work because using 4 requires certain timing frequencies or all of the sizes to match or whatever. You might find the manual if you can and it will tell you what types of memory work in 4 stick configs. That said, 8GB is probably enough for anything you want to do.

I didn't try different cables as I didn't have another set of VGA type cables and that's what it was using. Might try that if I can scrounge up some later, or if I find I do have another set somewhere after all.

Since the old and new memory are two different sizes, I'm thinking that's what it doesn't like, so if I put in all the same memory up to the 16GB max, it should be fine. Of course, maybe the 8GB will be enough until I eventually upgrade the motherboard, so I may just end up leaving it as it is until then unless I start running out of memory again like I was with just the 4GB.

Different sizes shouldn't be an issue, but different timings could be. If you get another 8 gig kit of what you bought you should be good unless there is an issue with one of the slots being bad. Might also be something in BIOS that could be tweaked to get your old sticks working with the new sticks.

Slots sometimes matter and sometimes don't. Was a little weird when I built my last system that it wouldn't boot with the RAM in slots 1A and 1B and then I read in the manual that it expects the RAM to be in slots 2A and 2B when using only two sticks. I usually like to use the slot closest to the CPU cooler first as it can be harder to reach later on.

Rykin wrote:
bekkilyn wrote:
LeapingGnome wrote:

On the old monitor did you try it with different cables?

On the memory, some motherboards have more restrictions with 2 sticks instead of 4. Like 2 sticks will work fine, but if you try to use those same 2 sticks in a 4 stick configuration it doesn't work because using 4 requires certain timing frequencies or all of the sizes to match or whatever. You might find the manual if you can and it will tell you what types of memory work in 4 stick configs. That said, 8GB is probably enough for anything you want to do.

I didn't try different cables as I didn't have another set of VGA type cables and that's what it was using. Might try that if I can scrounge up some later, or if I find I do have another set somewhere after all.

Since the old and new memory are two different sizes, I'm thinking that's what it doesn't like, so if I put in all the same memory up to the 16GB max, it should be fine. Of course, maybe the 8GB will be enough until I eventually upgrade the motherboard, so I may just end up leaving it as it is until then unless I start running out of memory again like I was with just the 4GB.

Different sizes shouldn't be an issue, but different timings could be. If you get another 8 gig kit of what you bought you should be good unless there is an issue with one of the slots being bad. Might also be something in BIOS that could be tweaked to get your old sticks working with the new sticks.

Slots sometimes matter and sometimes don't. Was a little weird when I built my last system that it wouldn't boot with the RAM in slots 1A and 1B and then I read in the manual that it expects the RAM to be in slots 2A and 2B when using only two sticks. I usually like to use the slot closest to the CPU cooler first as it can be harder to reach later on.

I noticed the sticks were in something like slots 1A and 2A rather than side by side, so I made sure that the sticks in 1A and 2A were matching and then matched the other two in the remaining slots. Maybe with all four filled, it works a bit differently, but I didn't really spend too much time researching that part. It's VERY possible that the old and new have different timings.

Yeah it sounds like with your monitor the most likely culprit is the cable. If you want to try to resurrect it I would start there and see what happens.

Anyone here familiar with Teamviewer? I've got my network of PC's that I'm trying to set up so that I can remote in without needing to know the password. With my PC (Veloreyn-PC) this is easy because my user account is an admin, so Easy Access always works. However, on my kids' computers (Sabastian-PC and Tristan-PC) I keep them on standard user accounts so that I can have the parental rights time limits set without them just turning it off.

Unfortunately this comes with the side effect that I can grant Easy Access while in the admin accounts for those computers, but not the standard user accounts, which means I have to have a randomly generated password to connect. I tried running Teamviewer as admin within their standard accounts but it doesn't give me access to the Easy Access settings. Does anyone know a way around this that gets me access without a password without having to give my kids admin rights?

bekkilyn wrote:

I noticed the sticks were in something like slots 1A and 2A rather than side by side, so I made sure that the sticks in 1A and 2A were matching and then matched the other two in the remaining slots. Maybe with all four filled, it works a bit differently, but I didn't really spend too much time researching that part. It's VERY possible that the old and new have different timings.

Matching sticks should never be side by side. Different manufactures use different labeling and some even just use color coded slots, but alternating slots in modern dual channel setups is what nearly every manufacturer does.

As usual reading the instructions will help. Find the motherboard manual and it will tell you what slots to put the RAM in.

Rykin wrote:
bekkilyn wrote:

I noticed the sticks were in something like slots 1A and 2A rather than side by side, so I made sure that the sticks in 1A and 2A were matching and then matched the other two in the remaining slots. Maybe with all four filled, it works a bit differently, but I didn't really spend too much time researching that part. It's VERY possible that the old and new have different timings.

Matching sticks should never be side by side. Different manufactures use different labeling and some even just use color coded slots, but alternating slots in modern dual channel setups is what nearly every manufacturer does.

Seems like I did that part right then just basing it on how it was configured before!

Stele wrote:

As usual reading the instructions will help. Find the motherboard manual and it will tell you what slots to put the RAM in.

But that would have made things less exciting.