Ah my mistake I didn't think of spreadsheets.. Widescreen would definitely benefit those.
Installed the Medion machine I've been given, wasn't too hard but one old combined modem/TV capture card did pose some driver problems, the TV card bit did still have drivers from the original OEM, the modem part however was nowhere to find, the manufacturer long gone, after a while I found the Windows 98 drivers on the Medion site, from there I could make out who made the modem bits ( Creatix) and found a modem driver archive online, all good and well, there were hardly any names with those zrj and/or zip files so I downloaded 12 of them.. then update driver-tell the machine where to look-load-fail.. NEXT.. after 8 tries it found a working driver so sometimes the nuke-from-orbit approach does work..
There was a time I thought I would never need dual monitors. Then I had a job in receiving where I needed to use (literally) two different programs for the receiving process, SAP & MAXIMO. As comfortable as I am using Alt+Tab, two monitors sure made a hell of a difference there.
At home, one wide screen monitor is plenty. I don't PC game at this point, I'm only working from a docked laptop.
I suppose when/if I build another behemoth of a desktop computer, I will either have dual wide screens (if I can get edgeless) or a double wide curved screen.
At home, one wide screen monitor is plenty. I don't PC game at this point, I'm only working from a docked laptop.
I suppose when/if I build another behemoth of a desktop computer, I will either have dual wide screens (if I can get edgeless) or a double wide curved screen.
from comments I've read, the curved screens are of dubios benefits on a tv, but for a monitor they make sense because the bring the edges closer to the user which can be very helpful when you get above the 24-27" range.
Though whether we'd have gotten curved monitors if not for the curved tv screens I don't know.
For a TV, I reckon it would depend on how big and how close you are to it.
This picture I found a few years ago makes me really want a similar set-up, even though I can't think of a personal need for it. With that kind of wraparound, you're practically in VR territory.
I'd say they have a thing for simulators - or fly a drone going by the joystick.
except they haven't quite gone full 180 as the monitor on the right hand side is different.
But hey I wouldn't turn it down
I just installed a oracle virtual box on my ubuntu os and well found out I should of just installed the deepdream program directly. the reason I installed the Oracle VB. ;( has anyone worked with the deepdream virtual machine or the machine itself?
How do they do those large panels of screens that are made of individual panels without bezels? How does that kind of thing work?
Smallest one of those I saw once had like 4 panels across and 4 down making 16 panels.
Smallest one of those I saw once had like 4 panels across and 4 down making 16 panels.
No, but someone slipped me some LSD once - not something I want to revisit. Looked Deepdream up on Wikipedia - very trippy but not sure how one would apply it for any practical use. I assume its VM is actually some sort of thin app although not Windows-based, unlike VMware ThinApps.
ETA: Seems the VM is based on Ubuntu - I guess the reason for installing it as such is to ensure a degree of isolation from the host system. Cross contamination?
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Build a machine for a friend, based it on the last system I made a while ago, just changed the CPU for a A10 APU, the other one had a slightly higher clocked Athlon FM2+ chip, couldn't use it because this friend did not have a graphics card that fit the machine and I was on a budget.
So it's a standard black mid tower, Asrock board, FM2+ A10 APU 3.9Ghz 4.1 turbo clock IIRC, the thing had a Wraith cooler, pretty damn good if I say so, 350 watt PSU, chose an Antec, reviews were good, good voltage regulation and very low ripple, 60Gb SSD and a 1 TB HDD, 8GB RAM for storage, card reader and DVD writer, added an extra fan so it has an intake and an exhaust fan, this all for a few cents less than 400 Euro.
This and the previous machine I build are of course low budget machines but the machines they replace were mid to high end machines from about 7-8 years back, the difference in speed is still very large.
So it's a standard black mid tower, Asrock board, FM2+ A10 APU 3.9Ghz 4.1 turbo clock IIRC, the thing had a Wraith cooler, pretty damn good if I say so, 350 watt PSU, chose an Antec, reviews were good, good voltage regulation and very low ripple, 60Gb SSD and a 1 TB HDD, 8GB RAM for storage, card reader and DVD writer, added an extra fan so it has an intake and an exhaust fan, this all for a few cents less than 400 Euro.
This and the previous machine I build are of course low budget machines but the machines they replace were mid to high end machines from about 7-8 years back, the difference in speed is still very large.
might have been bad timing (or not depending on the budget). AMD have just release a slew of new APUs.
http://www.anandtech.com/show/11819/amd-bristol-ridge-apu-retail-available
What's the difference between an APU and CPU?
https://www.digitaltrends.com/computing/apu-gpu-wtf-a-guide-to-amds-desktop-processor-line-up/
Bit out of date, no mention of Ryzen, but the terminology is accurate.
They're still Excavator core chips so besides the memory controller (DDR3 vs DDR4) they're not all that much different as far as I can see, the more interesting bits will be Raven Ridge which will be Ryzen based, I assume these will be faster and with Polaris/Vega based graphic cores.
As for the machine I build, yeah.. budget was rather tight and all parts were directly available so I went for this particular build.
yeah the comments under the article where pretty much in line with what you've said.
So I just upgraded my desktop!
I had an Athlon II X4 630 which I have upgraded to an FX-8320. This necessitated a new motherboard, of course. I did not want to replace my RAM since I have 16GB that work fine and are totally adequate (and the expense of getting to 32GB was prohibitive). (The new motherboard even came with a PATA cable and port! I hope you like, @Santaman.
)
At this point almost everything in my 6-year-old desktop has been replaced. Video card has been upgraded twice (GeForce 950 now), RAM was bumped from 4GB to 16GB, got an expansion HDD in there, had to replace the boot HDD when it failed last year, PSU was upgraded with one of the video cards since the stock PSU just couldn't cut it. All that's really left of the original computer is the case, the SD card reader, and the DVD-RW drive. Guess it would be funny if I ever went to sell it and had to explain why it has virtually nothing of the original HP equipment left in it.
Sadly, I had to reinstall Windows, which I expected but hoped I could avoid. On the other hand, a reinstall means shedding all the cruft that accumulated over the past year or so. The way user files are stored means it's pretty easy to bring all of that back, at least. Just the tedium of reinstalling everything that gets to me. (Thank you, Ninite.)
The new CPU is quite noticeably faster for browser and media performance. The X4 was getting a lot of hangs and jitters in cases where GPU acceleration was not available. Even booting seems faster despite being stuck on a non-SSD drive. (Again, another expense I didn't want to incur just yet.)
I looked to see what the old CPU/motherboard combo might be worth on eBay, and it's less than $20.
Not sure it's even worth the attempt if that's all I can get out of it. Any recommendations on what to do with it? I might have enough parts laying around that I could cobble together a complete system out of it. I know I have a case, PSU, video card, and some other junk. Could always slap that together and give it to somebody who doesn't have a computer. Any other ideas?
I had an Athlon II X4 630 which I have upgraded to an FX-8320. This necessitated a new motherboard, of course. I did not want to replace my RAM since I have 16GB that work fine and are totally adequate (and the expense of getting to 32GB was prohibitive). (The new motherboard even came with a PATA cable and port! I hope you like, @Santaman.
)At this point almost everything in my 6-year-old desktop has been replaced. Video card has been upgraded twice (GeForce 950 now), RAM was bumped from 4GB to 16GB, got an expansion HDD in there, had to replace the boot HDD when it failed last year, PSU was upgraded with one of the video cards since the stock PSU just couldn't cut it. All that's really left of the original computer is the case, the SD card reader, and the DVD-RW drive. Guess it would be funny if I ever went to sell it and had to explain why it has virtually nothing of the original HP equipment left in it.
Sadly, I had to reinstall Windows, which I expected but hoped I could avoid. On the other hand, a reinstall means shedding all the cruft that accumulated over the past year or so. The way user files are stored means it's pretty easy to bring all of that back, at least. Just the tedium of reinstalling everything that gets to me. (Thank you, Ninite.)
The new CPU is quite noticeably faster for browser and media performance. The X4 was getting a lot of hangs and jitters in cases where GPU acceleration was not available. Even booting seems faster despite being stuck on a non-SSD drive. (Again, another expense I didn't want to incur just yet.)
I looked to see what the old CPU/motherboard combo might be worth on eBay, and it's less than $20.
Not sure it's even worth the attempt if that's all I can get out of it. Any recommendations on what to do with it? I might have enough parts laying around that I could cobble together a complete system out of it. I know I have a case, PSU, video card, and some other junk. Could always slap that together and give it to somebody who doesn't have a computer. Any other ideas?
PATA rules! 
I build my FX 8350 in 2013 (crap?! that long ago already?) to replace a Phenom II 955, the 8350 is about three times faster I gather from its behaviour, yeah, new mainboard usually means reinstalling Windows... and yes, it might be a good idea to do so, it clears crud and you'll have much more recent drivers to start with.
Building a second machine is a good idea, use it to backup all imprtant files onto it and you also will have a working machine if the main 'puter decided to blow up in your face..
I build my FX 8350 in 2013 (crap?! that long ago already?) to replace a Phenom II 955, the 8350 is about three times faster I gather from its behaviour, yeah, new mainboard usually means reinstalling Windows... and yes, it might be a good idea to do so, it clears crud and you'll have much more recent drivers to start with.
Building a second machine is a good idea, use it to backup all imprtant files onto it and you also will have a working machine if the main 'puter decided to blow up in your face..
PATA rules!
I build my FX 8350 in 2013 (crap?! that long ago already?) to replace a Phenom II 955, the 8350 is about three times faster I gather from its behaviour, yeah, new mainboard usually means reinstalling Windows... and yes, it might be a good idea to do so, it clears crud and you'll have much more recent drivers to start with.
Building a second machine is a good idea, use it to backup all imprtant files onto it and you also will have a working machine if the main 'puter decided to blow up in your face..
Maybe this is a good time to confess that my decommissioned Minecraft server is still sitting around, powered down and unused.
It's a respectable little machine, I just don't know what to do with it. It's a dual-core Pentium, 4GB RAM, 1TB hard drive. Perfectly adequate for a personal server. Maybe I should just use it for that.
That's a great idea. Drop it off at a local Good Will or Salvation Army. I doubt a flipper would seek to make any money off of it and it'll likely end up going to a poor family who could really use another computer.I looked to see what the old CPU/motherboard combo might be worth on eBay, and it's less than $20.
