Home & Small Office Computer Guide

A major cause of computer failures is a little, but very expensive problem known as blown caps.

Capacitors (or caps) store electricity and they are used in that capacity in a number of locations on the mother boards that go inside your computer. Capacitors can last for many years and then again they can pop their corks in much less time … although it is unusual for that to happen too quickly.

In this photo you will see part of a motherboard and the capcitors are the tall cylindrical items circled in red and green.

The ones circled in green look quite good - the silver top on each of them appears to be quite flat. If you look at the ones circled in red you will notice that the silver caps are bulging - some perhaps more than others - and that is what a blown cap looks like.

A badly blown capacitor will be leaking brown corrosive fluide down the sides and onto the copper tracks but whether they are mildly blown or badly blown the result is still the same. The computer will begin to malfunction and the motherboard is ruined and needs to be replaced.

In the last week or so Dell announced that they were setting aside $300 million to cover the costs of replacing motherboards with blown caps in swome of their workstations. And now there is a report on Cnet that Hewlett-Packard, Apple and other brands that are using Intel motherboards are all facing similar problems.

I’ve just seen a report that suggests that AMD processors outsold their Intel counterparts in the US for the first time in October.

Sales of desktop computers and notebooks with AMD chips accounted for 49.8 percent of PCs sold in domestic stores compared to Intel’s 48.5 percent according to a report on Cnet.

I have to admit that I’m not really surprised because for some time now I’ve been hearing reports that the latest Intel chip runs HOT and no amount of cooling can keep it at a reasonable temperature. Hot chips tend to cause sudden reboots and that seems to have been the experience of many just lately.

On the other hand AMD manage to keep turning out chips that work and go on working and obviously the heat and reboot issue has caught up with Intel.

The last thing most of us think about when we’re sitting in front of our computers working hard is what processor is inside the computer. As long as it keeps working there’s no need to worry about whether it’s an AMD or an Intel.

And for most of us the processing speed isn’t going to be of great concern either because most of us won’t even notice any discernable difference in the speed between a high-end AMD chip and a low-grade Celeron.

The only time we are ever really going to ponder the question of what processor we want is when the time comes to buy a new computer and the salesman starts asking us for our preference.

At times like that we usually don’t want to appear dumb and we would sometimes like to dazzle the salesperson with our brilliance and so, with that thought in mind I offer you The Right Desktop Processor:CPU/Performance

You will find that it’s a lengthy and in depth look at a number of processors. and if you don’t have time to read everything let me tell you that the bottom line is that there is no definitive winner.

And my personal preference? Well we do a lot of graphical work, we regularly run programmes like Dreamweaver and Photoshop and we have a variety of AMD and Intel processors in our machines and we can’t tell the difference either.

Ask the computer guy who repairs our machines though and he has no doubt. When the customer has no preference he’ll install an AMD chip every time because the latest Intel chips run way too hot for his liking.

It seems that Asus is about to release a new video card that is fairly unique. The Extreme N7800 GT Dual is two Nvidia GeForce 7800 GT GPUs and a whopping 512 MB of RAM on one single board.

Basically that’s two PCI Express video cards in one package that takes up just one slot.

For more information check out the full report at Hot Hardware

Associated Press are reporting that Samsung, the world’s biggest maker of memory chips and other gizmos is about to be fined $US300 million for one count of a criminal anti-trust offence. It is understood that the company has agreed to plead guilty to the charge and further charges involving individual officers of the company could follow.

The charge relates to memory chip price fixing between April 1999 and June 2002.

Intel has now officially launched it’s first server chip that places multiple microprocessors on a single piece of silicon.

Intel claim that the dual-core technology used in the servers speeds performance while preventing overheating - a problem that plagues high-performance processors.

It’s reported thatboth IBM and Dell will use the new processors in new machines.

High-end technology like this does not come cheap and the new processors are said to be selling for $1043 each when bought in volume.

My thanks to Ployer.com for this story.

Looks interesting doesn’t it? It’s a USB thumb drive … but it’s different. This one has a brain … and can perform limited functions away from the USB port on your computer. It can connect to anything that has a USB port - including another Flashpoint thumb drive.

And when it’s connected it can exchange data with whatever it’s connected to. Got some great MP3 recordings you want to swap with your friend? If he has one of these units it’s a simple matter of connecting them together and the job’s done!

It’s small and lighweight and comes complete with it’s own rechargeable and removable battery.

It comes in five different sizes:

128 meg

256 meg

512 meg

1 gig and

2 gig

And all of them connect to a normal USB thumb drive as well.

You can order your very own right here

Sampotech have just released a 32″ Digital LCD TV. You can connect your DVD payer, digital camera, satellite or cable connection, gaming consoles and your PC to it and sit back for the experience of your life time.

They are available here in Australia from selected dealers. We saw a brochure at Fraser Coast Computers and for more information you can always check their website although the Australian dealers are not listed there.

I guess that if you’re desperate to buy one you could always contact Rick at Fraser Coast Comptuers.

I still can’t believe that something as simple as adding a dual-head graphic card to one of the computers in my office, plugging in a second monitor to that machine and moving everything from one side of the office to the other could take so much time!

These are the days of plug and play - surely the days of plug and pray have gone forever?

Alas it’s not the case. Oh the dual-head plugged in ok but when I switched the computer on it only saw one screen - a little bit of fiddling and I’ve got wallpaper on both monitors but no matter how hard I try I can’t move anything over to the second monitor … but wait … the light bulb is beginning to show some light.

Of course, I wanted the primary monitor in front of me and the only space for the secondary monitor was to the left of the primary one. So naturally, when I wanted to move something to the secondary screen I moved it to the left and nothing happened.

And just now a ray of light burst through the dark clouds of frustration and general grumpiness and I moved something to the right - away from the secondary screen … and of course it appeared.

Oh silly man that I am …

Of course, even the simple job of moving my desk from one side of the room to the other was not that simple. Cords, leads, surge protectors, phone line and all the other assorted junk takes time. But it’s done and now perhaps it’s time to sit back and blow my ears off with some Bond - played with a lot of bass.

Thank goodness Toni (my partner) doesn’t have it on her computer yet - with her six speakers and sub-woofer it’s likely to endanger the back wall of her office

ATP Electronics Inc. has announced the release of its USB ToughDrive. The ToughDrive is a high speed USB 2.0 flash drive sporting a stylish, yet functional rubber housing. Water resistant and extremely shock resistant, the ToughDrive also features a 30MB/s data transfer speed for faster file transfers and seamless multimedia streaming.

The ToughDrive was designed with the main goal of performance along with functionality for users in a variety of environments. Its robust, rubber housing offers protection from water and moisture, as well as shock absorption from accidental drops and other rough treatment. Grip lines along with this texture are intended to make the ToughDrive extremely easy to grip while maintaining a slim, compact size storable in any pocket or purse.

The ToughDrive has been designed with DuraSkin construction. DuraSkin is a protective compound layer which completely encompasses all internal components, offering a second layer of protection against extreme temperatures, and additional protection against the elements.

The ToughDrive data transfer speed of 200X or 30MB/sec is designed for high quality multimedia streaming and less lag time for file transfers. Using the same high quality flash components as ATP flash cards, the ToughDrive also offers a read and write lifetime ten times longer than other standard USB flash drives.

The ATP USB ToughDrive will be available everywhere in the capacities of 256MB, 512MB, 1GB, and 2GB in the middle of September. Look for a 4GB ToughDrive to be available soon.