Welcome to MasterD.Net

The Ramblings of Master D. Homie

Loose Ends

clock March 29, 2009 04:39 by author Master D. Homie

I have noticed I leave final updates out of my blog posts recently. Hopefully this post clears up some of that.

Vehicle Problems: Replaced the spark plugs & wires. – Let this be a lesson to you (and me), don’t drive a car 100,000 miles without replacing the spark plugs! Duh.

eVGA 6200 LE Display Adapter: eVGA replaced the card with the exact same model. I guess they had some in stock… no free upgrade :)

Rats: They went away… then came back. They don’t scratch around under the house anymore, but I know they’re still around cause something is getting into the garage and destroying plastic bags on the floor. Time for traps.

That pretty much wraps it up for now.



You’re Kidding … Right??

clock March 28, 2009 12:46 by author Master D. Homie

Zune is 2½ years old and doesn’t work with Windows Media Player? OMG Why!? The Zune software is terrible! You cannot search for songs by folder. This is what you call “Seamless Computing”, which William Henry Gates III has been talking about forever. Is this an anti-trust “hot spot” or something? I say “This is just dumb”.



GPT Disk??

clock March 22, 2009 23:49 by author Master D. Homie

After adding a hard disk to my computer today, I found out that you can't have more than four MBR disks in your Windows operating system (even x64 versions!) and that MBR partitioned disks have an upper limit of 2 Terabytes! Normal (x86 & x64) Windows operating systems (Pre-Vista SP1) cannot boot from GPT partitions. It is unlikely that the standard version (32-Bit) of Windows XP will ever boot from GPT partitioned disks.

What does this mean? Unless Microsoft fixes/patches this for Windows XP, your boot drive cannot be larger than 2 terabytes. Since this size of hard disk is already in the market, I found it interesting enough to comment on.

Resources Below:

Windows and GPT FAQ

Extensible Firmware Interface (EFI) and Unified EFI (UEFI)

Everything you want to know about GPT for Microsoft Windows with Itanium Processors



EVGA Update

clock March 6, 2009 19:29 by author Master D. Homie
After returning the 7600GS display adapter for repair, EVGA sent me a replacemnt. The replacement was a 9600GT! All the major vendors now have a lifetime warranty, but it still makes me happy. I just sent them an old AGP 6200 LE card for the same problem. Who knows what I'll get back :)


EVGA Explosion

clock February 10, 2009 21:19 by author Master D. Homie
My EVGA 7600GS PCI-E display adapter failed last Friday while I was at work. I have deduced that an explosion must have occurred because several capacitors have physically "popped". I have noticed this as a trend with EVGA display adapters in the last few months. I am happy to say that the display adapter that I won from Nvidia at the Microsoft/Intel Ready to Rock Roadshow will be replaced at no charge through EVGA's RMA program. Even though I got the card at no cost... I think I'm finished purchasing EVGA display adapters at work. We switched to XFX because all the major distributors stock XFX and they have the Double Protection Warranty.


Rodents & DRM... Gone too far!

clock November 22, 2008 23:54 by author Master D. Homie

Every time my computer booted after changing the mainboard I received the following message: "The Windows Media Player Network Sharing Service service terminated unexpectedly". That message was also entered into the Windows Event Log as Event ID 7034. Microsoft cannot even deal with their own licensing complexity in a reasonable manner. The action of changing the mainboard in my computer triggers an automatic denial of use? Give me a break Microsoft! Microsoft Article ID: 891664 (see below) explains what happens and why. Looks like they automatically assume I am stealing something so they just shut off the service instead of promting you with a question like... Did you just change your mainboard? Thanks for that.

Cause of the Problem - http://support.microsoft.com/kb/891664

This issue occurs because the Windows Media DRM system maintains information based on the hardware configuration of the computer. If certain components are changed, Windows Media DRM may not work because it may view the change as an unauthorized attempt to move protected content to another computer.

This issue may occur if you have made one or more of the following changes to your computer hardware:

  • You recently changed hardware components, such as the CPU or the motherboard.
  • You modified any one of your computer's Basic Input/Output System (BIOS) settings that affect hardware components, such as disabling CPU hyper-threading.
  • You moved the hard disk drive from one computer to another computer.

I found the answer to my problem here: http://thegreenbutton.com/forums/thread/251647.aspx. I decided to search for "C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\Windows\DRM" in Google to find more information. This led me directly to the Microsoft support article referenced above.

I have a negative opinion about DRM (Digital Rights Managment) because "they" do stuff like this.

As for the Rodents portion of my post. I have some (yes more than one). They MUST die! The things are under the bathtub or something scratching around. It's driving the cat (Nytro) crazy! Kinda fun to watch the cat, but not my idea of fun knowing that I have rats under the house. Must be that time of year... getting too cold to be outside for the poor little critters. Damn they're loud! Time to go watch some TV. I'll deal with the rats tomorrow. Bwuahahahah!

FOR THE LOVE OF GOD!!! STOP SCRATCHING OR YOU CAN DIE NOW!!! I DON'T EVEN WANT TO SEE WHAT THEY ARE DOING DOWN THERE!!!



Motherboard & CPU Update... Complete

clock November 16, 2008 03:26 by author Master D. Homie

Since Windows Vista is hardware agnostic, I thought any storage controller driver installed in the system by default would allow me to boot from it. Whoops! STOP 0x0000007B was the error of the day last weekend after installing the new mainboard. As Microsoft Article ID 922976 clearly states, I must enable AHCI prior to attempting to boot from a drive using an ACHI controller. So... Old board back into the machine... change the registry... new board back in... Re-Activate Windows... All good. The new CPU runs so cool that the front fan and rear fan don't even run when I'm not taxing the machine.



New Computer Time...Sort of

clock October 2, 2008 00:39 by author Master D. Homie
Today I received a new processor that I won from an Intel promotion! It's a Core™2 Duo E8400 (3GHz. & 6MB Cache, 1333MHz FSB, 45nm). Now I just need a new motherboard to complete the (new) part of my computer :)  I can use the "old" RAM/HDD/DVD/CHASSIS. Then to install the "old" motherboard & processor in the wife's computer.....