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Author Topic: The Generic Computer Advice Thread  (Read 483160 times)

wierd

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Re: The Generic Computer Advice Thread
« Reply #4980 on: January 23, 2023, 11:02:54 am »

Windows's IP stack can have malicious shit stuffed in it. It's not straightforward to diagnose either.

Consider running HijackThis! on the sick computer.
https://github.com/dragokas/hijackthis

You are likely dealing with a 'winsock LSP' item; that's a loadable software package. For reasons only knowable by microsoft, the IP stack (winsock) allows loadable software provider libraries to be chained in. Malware makes heavy use of this, naturally.


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delphonso

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Re: The Generic Computer Advice Thread
« Reply #4981 on: January 28, 2023, 06:40:44 pm »

I bought a SSD from an unknown brand in my area. The read/write speeds are around 350MB/s, pretty far below the standard 500+. Is that only because of a lack of DRAM cache or are there other reasons for a slow SSD?

For the price and the use, this is perfectly acceptable, but it just got me thinking.

wierd

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Re: The Generic Computer Advice Thread
« Reply #4982 on: January 29, 2023, 06:19:07 am »

Yes, especially if the filesystem is not really intended to be used with the larger block size of an SSD, (or if the SSD has a very large native block size.)

Busy/Wait state can take the theoretical max IOPS down real hard.

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Robot Parade Leader

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Re: The Generic Computer Advice Thread
« Reply #4983 on: January 29, 2023, 10:40:45 pm »

Just following up.

I installed malwarebytes, and some other things mentioned/including ISP materials, etc.

From what I can see, the issue may have resolved. I don't seem to have any issues presently and I appreciate the assistance. Thank you.
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hector13

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Re: The Generic Computer Advice Thread
« Reply #4984 on: February 02, 2023, 08:17:32 pm »

ehr mah gehrd.

I have a tiny SSD with my Windows install on it that is incessantly running out of space.

I did a teensy bit of reading and cloning the drive to my D drive, which is much bigger though is a hybrid SSD, seems to be my cheapest option currently, with a partition or something.

I imagine some of you may know better however, so... advice I guess on steps to take and what I may need to take them.
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Look, we need to raise a psychopath who will murder God, we have no time to be spending on cooking.

the way your fingertips plant meaningless soliloquies makes me think you are the true evil among us.

Starver

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Re: The Generic Computer Advice Thread
« Reply #4985 on: February 02, 2023, 09:10:11 pm »

edit: Slightly misread your situation, just realised... Spoilered my original reply. Some of which still applies.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

...right, so now I realise you have mini-SSD (for want of better description) as C: and maxi-SSD (the hybrid, actually) as D:, and you want to use space on the maxi for C:..?

For that, I'd still dig up the same Live tool (personally, as the one I had in mind for the above) to rearrange with. Only I'd probably have to deal with Primary and Extended partitions (and perhaps do some juggling/in-situ-Cloning to ensure C: and D: on the maxi-SSD alone do the job of C: on the mini- plus D: on the whole of the maxi-).

I know how I'd do it, to be safest, but my attempt to describe the steps, whilst covering all the possible permutations, got... Convoluted. And if you're not using the same tools as I'm imaging then I'm in danger of confusing the issue horribly. So... What's youractual  intended sequence of transfer/adjustment? And with what? I'm sure we can sanity-test your plan easy enough...
« Last Edit: February 02, 2023, 10:00:25 pm by Starver »
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Starver

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Re: The Generic Computer Advice Thread
« Reply #4986 on: February 03, 2023, 06:19:03 am »

Ok, I've slept and as nobody's responded I've got the inkling of how to reply properly. Still lengthy/convoluted, but not as lengthy/convoluted.
Let's use the following notation: [ Physical Drive ] ( Logical Partition = DriveLetter: ) and { Extended Partition }, with " > " showing nesting/containing and …Free Space… for (temporarily) unassigned areas of a drive.

A Physical drive should have a Primary logical partition on it, to boot from. Actually, up to four, but DOS doesn't recognise more than one, so I would avoid it on a matter of principle, even though this adds some complexity[1], here.

Additionally, an Extended partition can hold further multiple (non-booting) Logical partitions.

All logical partitions that Windows (or DOS) understands as standard will be given "DriveLetter:"s, which is normally automatic (you can do limited reassigning within Windows) in order of C:, D:, etc as needed. And it would be extremely useful not to have what is effectively on what logical drive change, between booting down in one configuration and booting up as the new one. (Windows can be a mix of awkward and 'helpful', when it boots up and finds things changed.). I'll use the drive letters how they theoretically would get 'picked up', at each point, not how you will use them.

Logical partitions can also be ones not given drive-letters (see below for the type I might not be surprised to see), formatted differently from what Windows can (or wants to) give you access to. If you have ext3 or ext4 or anything like that when you start looking at partition details, rather than some 'FAT'-based name, then you probably should already know about them - if not, think back to whenever you or someone else decided to mess with Linux or something. I assume that no partition will bust the 'logical size limit' for whatever FAT-type it is. Only your C: will expand, and if that's a problem then you might have other issues to look at before adding the (usually available) FAT-type conversion into the process.

Currently, I understand your situation as:
[ Small SSD > (??) + ( System = C: ) ] + [ Hybrid SSD > (??) + ( Data = D: ) ]
...although there may or may not be a "( Backup/System/Recovery = n/a: )" sort of thing where I put the "(??)"s, depending upon what installed the original partitions and systems. If you have one on the Small SSD then it should probably be transfered alongside the C: onto the Hybrid. If there's one alongside the D: then maybe you need to shift-copy alongside D: unless you're sure you don't need it (remnant of older system install?)

But I'm going to do the following with just the Small SSD's initial "(??) +", just to cover that possibility...
N.B., I'm assuming that current D: is less than half full. If it's larger then it's not so 'simple' and you probably need extra storage space to backup/restore with.
...the end result should be
[ Hybrid SSD > (??) + ( System = C: ) + { ( Data = D: ) } ]

And if that's not what you're expecting then I've still not grasped your intentions, so ignore me entirely!

(Plus I still recommend various backup images, right at the start, but at modern disc sizes that can be difficult to organise. And if you can actually make backup images then you have another possible path to reshuffle things with.)


[1] The alternate method is of resizing primary D: down, flush to the RHS of the physical drive and creating space to the left sucficient to copy C: into as a new 'first primary', but... Can't guarantee the results so much. Modern versions of Windows might be happy with that, but it might totally mess things up instead. Hence my lengthy 'traditional' reshuffle version.
« Last Edit: February 03, 2023, 06:46:02 am by Starver »
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hector13

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Re: The Generic Computer Advice Thread
« Reply #4987 on: February 03, 2023, 09:39:00 am »

That sounds like complicated computer magic.

In saying that my D: drive has in total ~1TB but I think there’s only 300-odd GB of space left, whereas the C: drive is 120GB and is basically full, so I’m not sure the steps you suggest would work if I’m reading them correctly.

I might just have to buy a new SSD, clone the C: drive to that, and then format the old one for extra storage, or otherwise keep it as a backup, and just copy the important non-system files onto the D: drive so my wife doesn’t kill me.

Ah well, thanks for the help and walking me through things Starver, with the very limited information I gave you to begin with.
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Look, we need to raise a psychopath who will murder God, we have no time to be spending on cooking.

the way your fingertips plant meaningless soliloquies makes me think you are the true evil among us.

Starver

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Re: The Generic Computer Advice Thread
« Reply #4988 on: February 03, 2023, 10:28:40 am »

...yeah, a simple "chain" of actions, but I was still trying to cover variations/explain what (and for why) I was doing at each stage. Badly, I'm sure.

If you can afford to, cloning Small-SSD to New-And-Larger-SSD as direct replacement is probably the 'simplest' upgrade/rearrangement. As per the first instructions I 'wrongly' suggested. The gods know that I'm often far more restricted to disc space (of any kind) than I'd prefer to be... Expanding things to fill most of that available[2]. BTDTGTT-s.

Given the D: being ⅔rds full, there's shuffling data[1]. Or possibly the repartioner, which can often do "resize+move" for you in one go, has "make Primary-logical into an Extended's-logical" option. Or perhaps you have a 200GB+ swapfile (or other actual junk) on your D: that you can free up and delete to make it <0.5TB used and... as per my second take on the problem.

Loads of potential options. Some of which won't work for you, but giving some pointers to them anyway. And maybe probably there's even some better ideas that I never even consideredm


[1] Reduce primary-D: to minimum allowable, create the Extended>logical-E: drive as big as possible, move as much as you can into E:, go back and reduce down D: further and expand the area that Extended-E: uses into that space, ready for another fille-move. Rinse and repeat until everything (that you care about) is moved from D: is in E:... But watch out for hidden stuff, possibly keeping file-flags, may involve frequent reboots, consider using some form ofbl file-splitter utility on anything that road-blocks things by being individually bigger than the combined free space you can muster between both logical partitions..?

[2] Just yesterday, I transfered GBs of stuff to a USB stick I happily discovered to be half empty, to prevent a "Low disc space" condition on a computer's main drive. That computer having a few TB of external-HDD semipermanently connected as well as its internal HDD, but that being also stuffed to the gunnels and yet I needed to keep a few hundred GB free on that for something else planned. But I'm a bit of a packrat...
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hector13

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Re: The Generic Computer Advice Thread
« Reply #4989 on: February 03, 2023, 10:46:03 am »

T’be fair there’s a lot of stuff in the D: drive I don’t actually need so can delete.

I would personally hope there isn’t 200GB of stuff I don’t regularly use though…

Also I just noticed your edit to your original reply with questions, sorry heh.
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Look, we need to raise a psychopath who will murder God, we have no time to be spending on cooking.

the way your fingertips plant meaningless soliloquies makes me think you are the true evil among us.

dragdeler

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Re: The Generic Computer Advice Thread
« Reply #4990 on: February 04, 2023, 05:54:51 am »

Hey so I created a W7 install medium with NTlite IIRC, the advice can only be a few pages back.

I have been pretty satisfied, but whenever I needed usb3 drivers during install, I used to just hook up a sata drive containing the pertaining files. But I'm at this ultrabook and I can't / don't want to figure out how to get access to the HDD.

There was some issue that prevented me to create my boot medium under W7, so back then, I just grabbed the first w10 laptop at hand to create my install medium, that computer has since been given away.

So if I can, I would very much prefer not to create a new bootable stick, they'll make me register their software and give up an email adress for 30 days of service IIRC, any way to add files to a bootable stick?

Also, while we're at it: are there any ways to just clone the bootable drive onto a smaller stick? I have found one that's just the right size so I could free up the bigger one that serves me currently.




edit: In the end I just found a way inside the hardware, that was simpler.
« Last Edit: February 06, 2023, 04:34:38 am by dragdeler »
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Schmaven

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Re: The Generic Computer Advice Thread
« Reply #4991 on: February 16, 2023, 06:02:18 am »

So I've deleted my browser history on the computer, and as it turns out, do not remember my Bay12 forum password.  I have it saved on my phone, so I still have some account access.  The forgot password link claims to have sent something to my email, but there is nothing in the spam folder nor any of the other various buckets that collect stray emails.  I gave it 12 hours or so, and tried multiple reset requests, and still nothing.  It turns out saving password is really bad for memorizing passwords... 

I suppose I could create a new account, and just be sure to remember my password next time, but I sort of like this account.  I'm probably just being impatient.  I'll give the reset email a few more clicks and a couple more days to arrive.
« Last Edit: February 16, 2023, 06:05:28 am by Schmaven »
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Starver

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Re: The Generic Computer Advice Thread
« Reply #4992 on: February 16, 2023, 06:54:36 am »

Been there, done that (in your manner, elsewhere, and in a variation thereof actually in Bay12).

It helping a great deal that you can still access here, I would say send a simultaneous forum PM and a direct email to Toady, each clearly referencing the other, asking for direct help. Wait (he might be busy!), perhaps answer questions he might have, and get it manually reset.


(I know that on this phone (well, tablet) I can wrangle access to view saved passwords on both of the two 'major browsers' I use. Though on an older one the 'default system browser', less featureful, seemed not to have this. Perhaps we can get you recovered, otherwise?)
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Schmaven

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Re: The Generic Computer Advice Thread
« Reply #4993 on: February 16, 2023, 07:03:46 am »

I wouldn't want to distract Toady from his main work.  I just have the forum itself remembering to keep me logged in;  I always decline browser attempts to save passwords for me, which is probably why deleting cookies logged me off at the computer.
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Starver

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Re: The Generic Computer Advice Thread
« Reply #4994 on: February 16, 2023, 08:46:29 am »

I wouldn't want to distract Toady from his main work.  I just have the forum itself remembering to keep me logged in;  I always decline browser attempts to save passwords for me, which is probably why deleting cookies logged me off at the computer.
(Sent PM. (Including 'funny' anecdote about remembering/not-remembering passwords. :P ) Not to dissuade anybody else from chiming in, just not wanting to pollute open forum with my own rather long-winded response. (And anecdotes!))
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