The General "Computer Issues" Thread

[Rho]

For some reason, my iPod will NOT charge. The battery ran out of power the other day, and then I connected it to my computer to charge and whatnot... Left it in there for approx. 6 hours, nothing. I got an AC Adapter and charged it overnight, it charged it enough to survive for about 5 minutes. What is going on? No matter how long I charge it, It can't get back to green.. It's really irritating.

 

[En Sabah Nur]

For some reason, my iPod will NOT charge. The battery ran out of power the other day, and then I connected it to my computer to charge and whatnot... Left it in there for approx. 6 hours, nothing. I got an AC Adapter and charged it overnight, it charged it enough to survive for about 5 minutes. What is going on? No matter how long I charge it, It can't get back to green.. It's really irritating.

Your charging port could be dirty, try using canned air to clean it. Your charger cable could have broke, or worst case scenario, your charging port on your ipod broke.

 

[En Sabah Nur]

Yeah, I tried those things. It'll let me save at 72dpi, but not 300. I wonder if it was corrupted while I took the picture...

Most likely it was corrupted during transfer.

 

[Rho]

Dunno. It'll indicate that it's charging, but when I unplug it, it will have barely charged at all.

 

[En Sabah Nur]

Dunno. It'll indicate that it's charging, but when I unplug it, it will have barely charged at all.

Sounds like the battery needs changing, gotta send it to apple for that.

 

[Rho]

Is there any other alternative? From past experience, they wanted about $30 or so just for me to contact customer service, so sending it to Apple to get the battery fixed would be much more expensive.

 

[Mynd Hed]

Is there any other alternative? From past experience, they wanted about $30 or so just for me to contact customer service, so sending it to Apple to get the battery fixed would be much more expensive.

Buy your next mp3 player from a company that sells user-swappable batteries?

 

[En Sabah Nur]

Buy your next mp3 player from a company that sells user-swappable batteries?

Same goes for my iPhone, sure its a grat phone, until the battery dies. Then I have to deal with Apple and pay them half the cost of the phone to get my battery replaced.

 

[purplehairedwonder]

Is there any other alternative? From past experience, they wanted about $30 or so just for me to contact customer service, so sending it to Apple to get the battery fixed would be much more expensive.

I've had my iPod repaired twice (once was a battery replacement, actually) by Rapid Repair. While not exactly cheap, they're definitely cheaper than sending away to Apple and their service is reliable.

 

[En Sabah Nur]

I've had my iPod repaired twice (once was a battery replacement, actually) by Rapid Repair. While not exactly cheap, they're definitely cheaper than sending away to Apple and their service is reliable.

Thats a good alternative to apple. They are BBB Accredited and have a grade A in satisfaction. So if something happens to my iphone I can trust them to repair it. Thanks for the link.

 

[Prdgn]

Can someone tell me how generally reliable AVG is?

 

[En Sabah Nur]

Can someone tell me how generally reliable AVG is?

Are you talking about AVG Free or their paid software?
Im assuming that you are talking about AVG free one.
Maximum PC gives it 6 out of 10. It has no IM scanning, no Rootkit protection (major flaw) no firewall (biggest flaw possible) no identity protection, no spam controls, and no parental controls. And its a fairly big resource hog.
It can do basic virus scanning and removal, but its limited at that.

 

[Mynd Hed]

Are you talking about AVG Free or their paid software?
Im assuming that you are talking about AVG free one.
Maximum PC gives it 6 out of 10. It has no IM scanning, no Rootkit protection (major flaw) no firewall (biggest flaw possible) no identity protection, no spam controls, and no parental controls. And its a fairly big resource hog.
It can do basic virus scanning and removal, but its limited at that.

I haven't noticed any severe resource hogging issues compared to any other virus scanner I've tried, but then I'm running a decently powerful system.

It all depends on what you're looking to get out of it. It's definitely NOT an all-in-one security solution: as you say, it basically only does one thing, and that's scanning, removing, and providing realtime protection from viruses and malware.

Combine it with a good adware scanner (any number of free options), firewall (Zonealarm has a good free version, there are plenty of other options here too), and some common sense, and you'll be pretty well covered security-wise. It's a little more effort to assemble the bits and pieces of your security that way and deal with potential compatibility issues as they come up rather than just buy a package deal that comes with everything you need, but then, package deals tend to cost money. Oftentimes "free" can be worth a little extra effort. Also any given security suite will always have that one weak link that's not quite as good as the current leader in that area.

IM scanning? Don't accept files from anyone you don't trust. Rootkit protection? Get it from your adware scanner, or download a standalone rootkit scanner. Identity protection? Use common sense: I've never known a piece of software that could stop a truly stupid person from doing something truly stupid anyway. Spam controls? Your email client should have this built-in, and everyone nowadays uses webmail anyway. Parental controls? Not a selling point unless you're a parent, and no substitute for, y'know, PARENTING in any case.

For the record, CNET gives AVG Free 5 of 5 stars, with an average user rating of 4 stars. Maximum PC tends to review from the point of view of the hardcore enthusiast, which is fine, since that's their audience, but it's useful to get other opinions, too. It's also very useful to check the date of any reviews, since stuff like virus scanners are updated (and hence, can change) very quickly: CNET's is only relatively recent (Nov. 9 2008). Most reputable sources update their security reviews / recommendations at least once a year, so I wouldn't be surprised to see CNET revisit it in the next couple months.

 

[Rook]

The thing about the FREE AVG is that it looses some of its supposed functions. For one, it doesn't actively pick up potential viruses. I actually installed Bitdefender and Avira and found a bunch of left over virus/backdoors floating about. Granted no ONE antivirus will pick up everything, but I would try Avira and Avast.

http://www.av-comparatives.org/home

 

[En Sabah Nur]

I haven't noticed any severe resource hogging issues compared to any other virus scanner I've tried, but then I'm running a decently powerful system.

It all depends on what you're looking to get out of it. It's definitely NOT an all-in-one security solution: as you say, it basically only does one thing, and that's scanning, removing, and providing realtime protection from viruses and malware.

It only detects basic viruses, nothing major or advanced that the internet is full of.

Combine it with a good adware scanner (any number of free options), firewall (Zonealarm has a good free version, there are plenty of other options here too), and some common sense, and you'll be pretty well covered security-wise. It's a little more effort to assemble the bits and pieces of your security that way and deal with potential compatibility issues as they come up rather than just buy a package deal that comes with everything you need, but then, package deals tend to cost money. Oftentimes "free" can be worth a little extra effort. Also any given security suite will always have that one weak link that's not quite as good as the current leader in that area.

Combining many software together could lead to instability, conflicts and too much resource waste. Getting a good all in one is always the best option. Free usually means very basic and ad-driven. Nothing fancy.

IM scanning? Don't accept files from anyone you don't trust. Rootkit protection? Get it from your adware scanner, or download a standalone rootkit scanner. Identity protection? Use common sense: I've never known a piece of software that could stop a truly stupid person from doing something truly stupid anyway. Spam controls? Your email client should have this built-in, and everyone nowadays uses webmail anyway. Parental controls? Not a selling point unless you're a parent, and no substitute for, y'know, PARENTING in any case.

Are you serious? If you get a virus through IMs it will always be from a person you know, always. It will always be something like a picture of you or a video of you from your good friend or something. because when your friends computer gets compromised, his friends list gets compromised as well. Rootkit detection is one of the hardest things to do. Only the most sophisticated software gets rid of the pesky rootkits. And its not adware, so adware scanners will not work for rootkits. Identity protection. Ever heard of Pharming? Where a hacker can infect an entire DNS server and redirect you to a website that looks similar to the one you type in your browser but isnt. Its huge and on the rise. Lets say you type in a bank site, if you are on a compromised DNS server, it will redirect you to a fake bank site and you will never know the difference. Norton Safe Web can alert you if the website is compromised or not.

For the record, CNET gives AVG Free 5 of 5 stars, with an average user rating of 4 stars. Maximum PC tends to review from the point of view of the hardcore enthusiast, which is fine, since that's their audience, but it's useful to get other opinions, too. It's also very useful to check the date of any reviews, since stuff like virus scanners are updated (and hence, can change) very quickly: CNET's is only relatively recent (Nov. 9 2008). Most reputable sources update their security reviews / recommendations at least once a year, so I wouldn't be surprised to see CNET revisit it in the next couple months.

Cnet did a test on the software alone, and its OK. But Maximum PC rated all of the top free and paid for services and then the outcome will be very different. When you have something a lot better to compare it to, you will realise that its just above average, nothing more.

 

[GWOtaku]

This is not actually a problem, but Windows Movie Maker won't let me save video in anything other than 4:3 aspect ratio. Is there some decent software that will let me do this, or some method that I'm not aware of?

 

[Mynd Hed]

I had the same problem with Ulead: it was just a feature I wanted that the software simply didn't have.

I'm much happier since I switched to Sony Vegas: it gives you a LOT of control over stuff like aspect ratios.

 

[Rook]

"Shrugs" After Effects

Adobe has every media handled short off being able to pull food out of your monitor.

 

[Mynd Hed]

Yeah, ultimately it's a feature any decent video editor should have.

Unfortunately "decent" video editors tend to start at a couple hundred bucks if you want to be a good citizen and buy a legit copy.

 

[Rho]

Oh, great.
My laptop was being rather slow today, and occasionally needing to be restarted. Now, if I restart it, it will seem fine, then stay at the blue screen that it goes to normally before loading the desktop. This is getting really irritating. The battery is fine.
Mac, by the way.