All Issues
24,993 verified issues
Is turning off hard disks harmful?
I set Windows 7 to turn off hard disks after 20 minutes of nonuse, which it does a really good job at - it seems to turn off individual hard disks that have been idle for 20 minutes exactly. When I access a drive that I haven't used in 20 minutes, I can hear it firing up and it takes a couple of seconds to access it. Now Windows is turning off and turning on my hard disks several times a day. Can this on/offing be bad for the drives? The case is small and I'm trying to protect the drives from overheating really (they get VERY hot!). Edit: The accepted answer doesn't mention this explicitly, but from Minimizing hard disk drive failure Power cycling control Shutting down and rebooting a computer or resuming it from hibernation cycles the power to the drives in the computer. The spin-up operation performed by a drive after a power cycle is believed to place more stress on the drive than running the drive continuously for a long period of time. Based on professional experience of system a…
RSSI value of wifi connection - how to interpret?
In Mac OS X you can obtain the RSSI value of your by wifi connection by holding Alt and clicking on the Wifi-indicator icon. My questions are: What range of values can RSSI take? What RSSI ranges corresponds to "good", "normal" and "bad" connectivity?
How can I tell what RAM will fit my computer?
If I want to add more RAM to my computer, how can I buy something compatible? What kinds are there? How do I determine which kind my computer will accept and how much I can add?
Moving users folder on Windows Vista/7 to another partition
When I format the computer and reinstall Windows, my first step is move the folder to another partition. In Windows XP it wasn't enough because the desktop folder and another user folders was in the primary partition. Now in Windows Vista and 7 we can use junctions/symlinks to "move" the folder to another partition and Windows and another programs will think that the data is in the primary partition. What the fastest and secure steps to move the Users folder to another partition and to create the hardlinks correctly?
How to create a zip file compatible with Windows under Linux
I need to make a zip file available to all my Windows users visitors, so I naively produced a zip file with the Unix zip command (let's call it madeinlinux.zip). It opens successfully with WinRar or Winzip, but those of my users who are using the standard Windows zip file handling experience failure when trying to unzip it. (Windows XP) I compressed the same data using Windows built-in zip mecanism, and from a Linux point of view, I cannot see any difference in the file type: They're must be something specific to a Windows compatible zip file. Does anyone knows what?
Getting chrome to open "text" files in a tab
When I look at code samples on the web that are linked to as a .c, .cpp, .h etc file, chrome will download it for me as a file. Is there a way to get it to open the file (which is really just a text file with a different extension, and chrome does open text files in a tab window) in a tab window? I would rather not have my downloads folder littered with all of these small code files. I have looked in the chrome preferences, but have not found anything that relates to this. Running the dev build of chrome, but I would take the option in any current build of the browser. EDIT: Is there a way to change the way that chrome handles some mime types like or others?
Is there a Windows exe that does nothing?
Is there a "noop"-esque exe somewhere as part of the Windows installation? I'm preparing some batch jobs and scheduled tasks, and for a couple reasons I'd like to reference an executable that does nothing -- i.e. launches with no visible window, and quits immediately. Does such an executable exist in the usual Windows installation anywhere? or how can I come close? I do not want to have to depend on anything not already included in Windows.
How do I get Thunderbird to open an ICS attachment directly in Lightning's calendar?
I'm using Mozilla Thunderbird 9.0.1 with Lightning 1.1.1. Is there an easier way to import an ICS file attached to an email than saving it to disk, then in Calendar going to File --> Open? If I select "Open with Thunderbird" from the save dialog, it just opens a new mail message and attaches the file to it. (I did see this older question, but it refers to much older versions of Thunderbird and Lightning) Update: I've updated to 10.0 and 1.2, respectively and it still doesn't work right. Update 2: Bugzilla.
How to merge multiple PDF files onto one page with pdftk?
I have a range of PDF files , , etc. that I would like to merge into one file, with all the PDFs tiled on one page. Currently, I have tried to merge these files, but they are put on separate pages: Is there a way to, instead, tile the individual PDF files into one master page on ?
How can I merge two branches without losing any files?
I have two branches with the following files in there: branch a: branch b: I want to merge them, so that I get both files from a and b (and files that exist in both should normally be merged)! is that possbile?
Why does the Outlook taskbar envelope icon sometimes remain active, even if I have no unread email?
Outlook has a nice envelope icon that displays on top of the taskbar icon when I have new mail. Sometimes this icon comes up when I get a new message, but then doesn't go away when the message is marked as read. The only ways I know of to get rid of it is to close and reopen Outlook, or get a new email. Although sometimes if I'm unlucky the same thing will happen with the new email. Here are two screenshots of what I'm talking about. You can clearly see the new mail icon along with an empty inbox. (Click image to enlarge) Just to be clear, there really isn't any unread email (none in other folders, junk etc.). How can I get Outlook to actually recognize when I have no new mail?
Compare two video files to find out which has best quality
Suppose I have same video material encoded in two (or more) files. I'd like to run some utility on them which groundly pointed out which file is "best" in quality. "Groundly" means that I'd like to get report which compares different aspects (e.g. video resolution, video bitrate, audio sampling rate, audio bitrate, etc., etc.) one by one, and then some integral score which accounts for all of them. That's about the functionality, but for that utility to be actually usable, it should be open-source and command-line.
How do I perform a case-sensitive search in Google Chrome?
Possible Duplicate: Case sensitive searches in Google Chrome Hitting brings up the search box but a "case sensitive" option is nowhere to be found. Does the feature exist at all in Chrome?
My computer freezes irregularly
My computer started to freeze at irregular times for 3 weeks now. Please note that this question change with each things that i try. (For additional details) What happens My computer freezes, the video stops. (No graphic glitches, it just stops) Sounds stops too. Sometimes, randomly, the screen on my G-15 keyboard flickers and I see characters not at the right places. Usually happens for about 1-2 seconds and a bit before my computer freezes. I have to keep the power button pressed for 4 seconds to shut my computer down. I still hear my hard drives and fans working. Sometimes it works with no problems for a full day, some other times it just keeps freezing each time I restart my computer and I have to leave it for the rest of the day. Sometimes my mouse freezes for a fraction of a second (Like 0.01 to 0.2 seconds) quite randomly, usually before it freezes. No errors spotted by the "Action center" unlike when I had problems with my last video card on this system (Driver errors). My G-1…
Why do 7-zip / WinRAR unzip files to "temp" before moving them to their destination?
Why do 7-zip / WinRAR unzip files to "temp" before moving them to their destination? I do not see any advantage against just directly unzipping to destination. It is really irritating, especially for large files (as it is now!). Edit: Please explain why they are not done in place.
Change permissions upon uploading with scp
I am uploading files to my shell account using scp. As I need different permissions on the server than on my computer, I'd like to have a way to easily change the permissions upon upload without needing to ssh to the account and change them manually.
My webcam just came on "out of the blue"
I have a Microsoft LifeCam HD sitting atop my monitor. Today, completely out of the blue, its light came on -- I was simply browsing the web (in Chrome) when it happened. After about 5 minutes the webcam turned off. Naturally, I immediately suspected my ex-wife (when in doubt, I always suspect her), but she isn't computer savvy enough. I looked over the process list and didn't see anything suspicious. I am running a couple of open source projects and free apps (e.g., greenshot, powermenu, supertray), but I've had them for years. Autoruns reports nothing suspicious in the startup and neither does Windows Defender. Anyways, what could it be? What should I look at next?
How do I set Google Chrome to not allow javascript to hijack my right click menu
I despise web sites that hijack my right mouse button via javascript. Other browsers ( like firefox) allow me to block sites from doing this. Does chrome have such an option, or does it leave me at the mercy of annoying web site designers? I don't want to turn off javascript completely. I just want to block javascript from taking over my right mouse button. Firefox lets you stop javascript from doing specific things like this. I am trying to find out if Chrome does as well. I am going to assume it does not at this point.
Formula for updated currency exchange rates in Excel or other spreadsheets?
What kind of spreadsheets support a formula like the following: The result should be 3000 USD exchanged into Euros. Possibly a date could be provided for a historic exchange rate. Alternatively, the average for the last month or so. I would use such a feature all the time and it has to be relevant for so many other users. I prefer working in Excel, but online spreadsheets like Google or Zoho is also fine.
Why can I ping an IP address but not 'traceroute' it?
I can ping an IP address, but I can't traceroute it. How could this be? The fifth IP address in the traceroute isn't the same as at the "ping CENSORED.CENSORED".