Airlink AP431W setup

To setup as AP client mode, you must configure the AP from the machine it intends to use. If you use from the other machine, it won't work (somehow it must tie the MAC address together).

don't use purevideo on Vista

clipped from www.avsforum.com One other thing that I've learned recently after playing around with a variety of video decoders on vista is that the default MS decoder allows hardware acceleration. Under Vista, the decoder basically passes the video information off to the display driver which is responsible for things like deinterlacing, denoising, et cetera. In my personal experience, I've had the best results with the MS decoder. In fact, according to MS, when you use the PureVideo decoder on Vista, it's actually doing a software-only decode. Here's a couple of links to posts by an MS employee about this topic on thegreenbutton.com: http://thegreenbutton.com/forums/pe...ead.aspx#199375 http://thegreenbutton.com/forums/pe...ead.aspx#174165

MSI 8500GT with HDMI

clipped from www.msicomputer.com NX8500GT-MTD256EH

Noise reduction between Nvidia and ATI

clipped from www.anandtech.com During the test, although noise is reduced using AMD hardware, it is not reduced to the level of expectation set by the visual explanation of the test. Based on this assessment, we feel that AMD noise reduction deserves a score of 15 out of 25. Silicon Optix explains a score of 15 as: "The level of noise is reduced somewhat and detail is preserved." In order to achieve a higher score, we expect the noise to be reduced to the point where we do not notice any "sparkling" effect in the background of the image at all. By contrast, with NVIDIA, setting the noise reduction slider anywhere between 51% and 75% gave us a higher degree of noise reduction than AMD with zero quality loss. At 75% and higher we noticed zero noise in the image with no detail loss until noise reduction was set very high. Tests done with the noise reduction slider at 100% show some detail loss, but there is no reason to crank it up that high unless your HD source is incredibly noisy (which will not likely be the case)

DVI HDMI cable

clipped from thegreenbutton.com There are 6 types of DVI.  DVI-A, DVI-D and DVI-I.  They come in single (up to 1080p) and Dual Link (over 1080p).  You need a dual link capable video card to use a larger than 1080p screen (common in the movie/broadcast industry as well as medical imaging systems).  Some of hte larger gaming screens are also over 1080p resolutions.  DVI-A is analog, pretty much identical to vga or component.  DVI-D is digital.   DVI-I can be either.  This is why video dvi-i is used on video cards.  It doesn't matter what the dvi type is on the other side of hte wire, it'll do all 3.   Now they do have different cables.  DVI-D cables have different pins then DVI-A.  DVI-I has both sets of pins but DVI-I Dual Link has even more pins.   I order dvi-i duallink cables to avoid the concern of what type of wire I need to have and prolong its life.

HD decoding

clipped from www.anandtech.com We are using PowerDVD Ultra 7.3 with patch 3104a applied. This patch fixed a lot of our issues with playback and brought PowerDVD up to the level we wanted and expected. We did, however, have difficulty disabling GPU acceleration with this version of PowerDVD, so we will be unable to present CPU only decoding numbers. From our previous experience though, only CPUs faster than an E6600 can guarantee smooth decoding in the absence of GPU acceleration. clipped from www.anandtech.com Remember that these are average CPU utilization figures. Neither the AMD nor the NVIDIA high end parts are able to handle decoding in conjunction with the old P4 part. Our NetBurst architecture hardware just does not have what it takes even with heavy assistance from the graphics subsystem and we often hit 100% CPU utilization without one of the GPUs that support bitstream decoding.

Processor Power Consumption

Prescott 560 3600MHz = 115W
C2D E6600 = 65W (up to E6800)
C2D Q6600 = 105W
AM2 3000MHz = 90 - 125W

Also, Athlon processor does not have SSE2 and SSE3, therefore, some hardware acceleration of h.264 may not work.

Wired and Wireless together

clipped from www.ezlan.net It is very common in today computers (especially Laptops) to have Wired Network Card (NIC) as well as Wireless.  Often users end up in a conflict and they do not know how to control the system. Windows Network configures each card has it own TCP/IP  and the two can live together in peace and harmony provided they are configuring to work with Set Priority. 1. In Control Panel, double-click Network Connections. 2. Right-click a network interfaces, and then click Properties. 3. Click Internet Protocol (TCP/IP), and then click Properties. 4. On the General tab, click Advanced. 5. To specify a metric, on the IP Settings tab click to clear the Automatic metric check box, and then enter the metric that you want in the Interface Metric field. Looks like this. http://www.ezlan.net/network/metrics.jpg

Gigabyte P35C-DS3R

clipped from techgage.com One of the most important features of any motherboard is overclocking ability, and this is where the P35C-DS3R falls a little short. After a long overclocking session, I found 450FSB to be the highest the board would possibly go before becoming unstable. Compare this to the P5K boards that hit 475FSB, and even that is not high by todays standards. This board currently retails for ~$175, which to me is a reasonable price, if you plan on using the boards features to their full potential. This would include the E-SATA port, which will be appreciated by those who require it. It's a little different than most E-SATA ports, since they include a cable for power. If you have an E-SATA enclosure, you won't need the power cable, but if you have a spare S-ATA drive lying around, you will be able to hook it up to your PC without opening your tower.

HDCP Support 8500GT and 8600GT

clipped from forumz.tomshardware.com So far I have found two non-8600GTS cards which are positively identified by their manufacturer as having HDCP support (not the lame 'HDCP-capable' pasted verbatim from the Nvidia site by some makers and many resellers): - Gigabyte 8500GT (their 8600GT isn't HDCP-enabled): http://www.gigabyte.com.tw/Products/VGA/Products_Overview.aspx?ProductID=2516 - BFG 8600GT: http://www2.bfgtech.com/CMDocs/BFGTech/pro=112-8600GTOC_256_PCIe_SellPiece.pdf The Gigabyte card looks ideal for a HTPC, being passively cooled. I would have liked to see an inexpensive passive HDCP 8600GT, since the 8600GT is rated at 43W max, and the 8500GT only at 'a few watts less' (I'm assuming 35-40W). The other option is to wait for the Radeon HD 2400XT (35W, can handle 1080p unlike the 25W HD 2400Pro's 720p), which although saddled with a 64-bit memory bus, apparently sports built-in HDCP). Hopefully the Radeon HD's can also offload 100% of VC-1 off the CPU, not only H.264 like Purevideo HD.

Firefox Extensions

clipped from www.lockergnome.com 13 Awesome Extensions for Firefox 2.0.0.4 *Configuration Mania: This extension is accessible through your Tools menu, and has an incredible array of advanced settings. If you aren’t hip to tweaking your Firefox manually, this is the extension for you! *Sage: A handy RSS reader…simple, basic, and easy to use. *Tab Mix Plus: This is a feature I can’t imagine any Firefox user going without. Completely control how your tabbed browsing functions; one never could imagine so many possibilities! My family can’t stand how my tabs are set up…good thing they have their own computers! *UI Tweaker: This little gem allows me to configure my Firefox UI to my personal taste…which I will admit is quite complex! If you are picky, make sure you get this extension!

Another CPU Cooler comparison

clipped from overclockercafe.com LGA 775 CPU Cooler "Mega Test" 25 Coolers compared at Hexus.

Top Air Cooling HS

clipped from www.anandtech.com Top air-cooler performance solidly belongs to the Thermalright Ultra-120 eXtreme at 3.94GHz, with the Tuniq Tower 120, the regular Thermalright Ultra-120, the Scythe Ninja B Plus with SilenX fan, the OCZ Vindicator with SilenX, and the Scythe Infinity with dual push-pull Scythe fans all right behind and tied at 3.90GHz. This is a remarkable group of performers that definitely deliver value for your money. So far we have tested three down-facing designs - the Cooler Master GeminII, Scythe Andy Samurai Master, and Thermaltake MaxOrb. That's quite an illustrious group, but none of these three could really compete with our top tier of coolers.

TriCor

clipped from bl101fd.blu101.hotmail.msn.com There are also potential concerns over its #4-selling TriCor fat-reducing drug: A March study by Dr. Steven Nissen showed that 19 patients (38%) in a control group that took fenofibrate (its generic name) saw their creatinine levels rise above the upper limits of normal, which could reduce kidney function and increase cardiac events. Nissen, who previously raised concerns over Glaxo's (GSK) Avandia Merck's (MRK) painkiller Vioxx, says he will not prescribe the drug.

Windows Utilities

Autoplay Repair: www.snapfiles.com/get/autoplayrepair.html
Startup Cop Pro 2
FEBE for firebox backup
Myaboo: sharing web links.
TweakUI: tweak windows interface.
TweakVI: tweak Vista Interface

FEBE Firefox utility

Other utilities: Myaboo: sharing web links urls

clipped from www.pcmag.com Ever since I started using Firefox and adding extensions to it, I've been waiting for this tool. FEBE (Firefox Extension Backup Extension) backs up your extensions (plus profile info, themes, bookmarks, saved passwords, even cookies if you want) for easy restoration and transfer to other PCs. The files aren't tiny: My 50 or so extensions and themes, plus bookmarks and user preferences, added up to nearly 7MB. But even if I'd had to use floppies to propagate the extensions to my other Firefox PCs, I'd still have saved a tremendous amount of time.

6600gt quadro fx 540

clipped from forums.guru3d.com "Extended GeForce to Quadro PCI DeviceID mapping lookup table for NV40 and NV43 graphics processors (for AGP models only). Now all NV40 / NV43 based display adapters are converted to Quadro FX 4000 / Quadro FX 540 when automatic Quadro PCI DeviceID programming mode is used." I read this in the new release text and the 6600GT is a NV43 chip. Yes I tried the thing with "unlocking Professional acceleration" and it works, but i want that my 6600GT is identified as a quadro. Maybe there comes more bandwidth because the similiar quadro have much more. :) hi guys 6600 AGP(HSI PCI-E->AGP ) is a very special case , PCI Device ID of this card is not software programable . that's the reason why this card always be identified as a 6600GT (00F1). but fortunately the "unlocking Professional acceleration" works . So don't worry about the name , Quadro feature is there and you can install the MAXTreme for 3DMAX .

AVI Trimmer

clipped from www.free-codecs.com AVI Trimmer 1.4 final Updated: 20 Apr 2007 | Freeware | 1.61MB | Downloads: 19258 Solveig Multimedia AVI Trimmer is a useful tool to enable a very fast trimming or cutting any necessary part of the source AVI file of any size without quality loss. The trimming process is much faster than a real time playing since the core trimming technology doesn't use any decoding/encoding process. A distinct feature from others similar products presented on the market is that Solveig MM AVI Trimmer operates with AVI files of any video and audio content.

Stream Cutter

clipped from www.free-codecs.com Stream Cutter is designed to cut portions of a predefined size or duration from an MPEG-2 file. Simple interface and straightforward logic add value to this handy tool for video editors. IFrame Transport Stream Cutter: is a video editing software for cutting segments from transport stream (.ts) video files, and writing the output to an .mpg file. - Cuttermaran: is a cut program for MPEG1 or MPEG2 video streams. - AviSplit Classic: is an application for cutting and rejoining AVI/DivX files. AviSplit can split a large AVI file into more convenient pieces (you set the size), rejoin those pieces or extract...

DDR3

clipped from www.anandtech.com Official JEDEC Specifications   DDR2 DDR3 Rated Speed 400-800 Mbps 800-1600 Mbps Vdd/Vddq 1.8V +/- 0.1V 1.5V +/- 0.075V Internal Banks 4 8 Termination Limited All DQ signals Topology Conventional T Fly-by Driver Control OCD Calibration Self Calibration with ZQ Thermal Sensor No Yes (Optional)