Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Computing/2007 April 10

= April 10 =

14 inch widescreen or 14" ordinary resolution
I mostly use the laptop for reading only. should I go for a 14" widescreen laptop or should I go for ordinary resolution (1024 * 768) 14" laptop? which would be conienient for me? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 59.92.124.223 (talk) 04:13, 10 April 2007 (UTC).

Normal. Trying to find applications that work well with widescreen displays is really hard, and 1024*768 is the standard for computing, although 1280*1024 will work too.


 * What are the resolutions? If the widescreen one is 1280&times;800 then get that since it got more pixels, but don't decide on laptops only by their screens though. --antilivedT 11:57, 10 April 2007 (UTC)
 * It depends, you really should try to see the screen with something you would normally read on it. A widescreen typically is better for viewing movies BUT on a good widescreen you can actually view a text document two pages side by side at the same time, which I personally LOVE but a few people I know think the text is too small when you do that. So it really is a personal preference thing. No one can tell you which is better. Vespine 22:49, 10 April 2007 (UTC)
 * My widescreen monitor is good. It's 15.4 inches though. It's great for movies as said above. --TeckWiz Parlate Contribs@(Lets go Yankees!) 00:07, 11 April 2007 (UTC)

Processor comparisons
When I try to compare processors (CPUs and GPUs), their properties are listed as 'clock speed', 'L2 Cache' and 'FSB', none of which allow direct comparison of calculation power. Is there anywhere I can read the average Floating Point Operations Per Second or equivelant measure for current CPUs and/or GPUs? 81.157.191.238 10:24, 10 April 2007 (UTC)


 * Toms Hardware Guide is usually my first port of call for comparing CPUs or GPUs. That link is for CPU comparisons and if you change the benchmark to 'SiSoft Sandra Arithmetic MFLOPS' you should get what you're looking for. I haven't seen this metric used for GPUs though. If you want to test on your own machine you can download SiSoft Sandra here. Johnnykimble 11:34, 10 April 2007 (UTC)


 * I find that comparison has a strong bias towards Intel CPUS, as it says that a 2.8Ghz Prescott is faster than a 2.8Ghz Athlon64. I would refrain from using theoretical benchmarks and use real-world benchmarks instead (eg. games, apps etc.) that relates the closest to what you do (or gonna do) with the processors. --antilivedT 12:01, 10 April 2007 (UTC)


 * Yes, but does that 'bias' not just mean the Intel CPUs have a better instruction set architecture/physical architecture to carry out the floating point operations? Johnnykimble 13:09, 10 April 2007 (UTC)


 * SiSoft Sandra is pretty biased to Intel. In its test, the measly Penitum 4 520 Pescott 2.8Ghz is slightly better than the Athlon FX-57, also 2.8Ghz. And yet, in the 3DStudio Max test, where floating point is also critical, the FX 62 wastes the 520, being one of the best single cored CPU. Time 3:09, it's almost 2 minutes faster than 20 at 4:53; The SiSoft Sandra heavily uses SSE extensions, which of course Intel processors are going to win. Also, you will find that floating point artihmics are not very useful in real world applications unless you're trying to run a rendering farm or something, so you shouldn't use it to compare CPUs, and is in fact more influenced by the optimisation of the software than anything else. --antilivedT 00:27, 11 April 2007 (UTC)


 * CPUs and GPUs are fairly different machines. The former is usually intended for general-purpose computing (though they are often optimized for a special application), while the latter usually excells at certain types of vectorizable problems.  You can try to compare them on a per-application basis, but be careful about attributing more significance to such comparisons than is appropriate.  A friend of mine did some research in solving partial differential equations (Poisson's) numerically with GPUs, and in his demonstrations the GPU could solve the equation sets an order of magnitude or two faster than a C program on a late CPU.  However, he also pointed out that the GPU is impractical for code that branches (conditionals, complex loops) since it isn't designed for general purpose program execution. -- mattb


 * That's a lot like asking "which automobile has the highest RPM or horsepower?" You can get an answer, but it's unlikely to be useful:  How many passengers and how much cargo should it carry?  What kind of suspension (off road or maglev)?  Is the engine installed in a go cart, or NASA's shuttle ground transporter?  The advice to try whatever it is you want to run on the candidate processors is the best and most reliable indicator of what performance you can expect.  —EncMstr 16:12, 10 April 2007 (UTC)

That's a good site you recommend kimble sadly to me it's very PRO Intel, if you haven't been able to tell by the Ad's or the store. The problem here is not what is better, but what kind of use am I going to be using it for. For example I'm not going to build a computer with AMD, ATI, and then play one of those games that has a nVidia sticker on it, it's not optimized for that. unfortunately many things in the computer world are biased when it comes to this. I don't like Mac's but I do know they're usually better for graphics and art use. Work with what gives you results, not what works for another person or a program that might have been optimized for better use with different technology, that's my 2 cents. 200.12.231.42 18:51, 10 April 2007 (UTC)  Ag for MemTech


 * I don't know what the all this talk of bias and pro-Intel is about. Are you suggesting they have fabricated the SiSoft Sandra figures for their processor benchmarks? I was simply responding to what was asked for in the original question, namely something that showed the FLOPs metric for CPUs, and I consider SiSoft Sandra a reliable program for doing that (and the Toms Hardware site has those benchmarks). I didn't read any more into the question than that. I'm in full agreement with everything else that has been said here, which means I agree that relying on the opinions from a single site is a bad idea. But then that's one of the advantages of benchmarks, you don't have to take someones word for it. Johnnykimble 19:06, 10 April 2007 (UTC)

I was not criticizing the software but the website, tom's hardware is usually PRO Intel, and you're correct benchmarks do show the read deal of a system, but if you're not going to buy the exact same setup as the test system...then i would just recommend you always do a personal setup to best fit your needs. not really trying to argue kimble like i stated before..just my 2 cents and answering the question the program CPU-Z is also a good info tool, concise and small but good also take into consideration that calculation power is not based on FLOPS you have a lot of latency between memory and MoBo and diff technologies that the processors have for example SSE,MMX,3D NOW depends on what you're calculating... 200.35.168.129 22:34, 10 April 2007 (UTC)  Ag for MemTech


 * Just to throw something else about benchmarks into the mix... A while back there was some controversy when the maker of 3D Mark claimed that nVidia were cheating in the benchmark by modifying their drivers so that they'd perform well. I don't think anything came of it in the end, but it goes to show that, moreso with graphics cards, benchmarks can be cheated above the hardware level, althought it would obviously be seriously bad form for a company to do so. Johnnykimble 08:17, 11 April 2007 (UTC)


 * Yeah i heard something similar, i do believe ATI at an opening event demonstrated with a nVidia how it would process faster than ATI in 3d Mark but not in the actual game reading FPS jaja xD   200.12.231.42 21:50, 11 April 2007 (UTC)   Ag for MemTech

Installing GCC
Hi, VP's! My name's felix. Well, I downloaded the GCC compiler 'cause I'm interested in programming though I'm no computer GURU. I opened the "installation" files... Now, that's all I could. I mean I GOT A HELL OF A PAIN IN THE @&!%*$!!! UNDERSTANDING WHAT THE WHOLE THING WAS ABOUT!! I just cannot get the GCC stuff installed... Can someone Be an angel and HELP me.... —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 41.207.126.37 (talk • contribs) 2007-04-10T00:53:54 (UTC)
 * It would help a lot if you mentioned the operating system and GCC distribution you're using. Are you trying to build GCC, or is it a binary distribution ready for your OS + CPU?  Are you trying to establish a cross compiler environment?  What have you tried and specifically what does it say in response? —EncMstr 15:55, 10 April 2007 (UTC)


 * I would guess you are using GCC in windows, as most other OS'es that use GCC will have GCC pre-installed. This is probably what you want: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cygwin I suggest reading the documentation. Glover


 * Or read DJGPP. --Wirbelwind ヴィルヴェルヴィント (talk) 04:45, 11 April 2007 (UTC)


 * MinGW is also worth a look. DJGPP (mentioned above) is for MS-DOS but works very well for text and some graphics but won't use the Windows API. A good place for advice (other than here, of course ;-) is the help files for the Allegro library and allegro.cc. --h2g2bob 18:35, 12 April 2007 (UTC)

Print Screen
My print screen button is not working on my keyboard. It is a fairly new keyboard that is wireless. Is there another way to print screen shot and paste to a word document? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 68.120.225.24 (talk) 17:11, 10 April 2007 (UTC).


 * You can download a freeware utility designed for taking screenshots. I use Gadwin PrintScreen. Johnnykimble 17:16, 10 April 2007 (UTC)


 * I use Capture by George, can capture the screen, individual windows, or a delimited part of the screen. Not free but very cheap. --Dumarest 00:55, 11 April 2007 (UTC)


 * Some keyboards have a function lock key or a special shift key, you may want to check this Glover 04:30, 11 April 2007 (UTC)

LINUX O/S
SIR. I AM NEW TO PCS, CAN YOU ADVISE CAN LINUX O/S BE USED INSTEAD OF MICROSOFT WINDOWS WHOM I DESPISE !!! —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 172.141.23.34 (talk) 17:29, 10 April 2007 (UTC).


 * It can, depending on your needs. However if you are, as you say, "new to PCs", you may want to stick with Windows for simplicity. -- mattb


 * And for group support. You're more likely to have friends who know Windows than who know Linux—Unless your friends are artists, in which case they probably know Macs better. —EncMstr 17:56, 10 April 2007 (UTC)


 * As has been said, it depends on what you will be using the computer for. If it's just for email, web browsing or writing documents then there'd be no problem in going for Ubuntu. It has a huge community, and is really, really quick and easy to install. Johnnykimble 18:12, 10 April 2007 (UTC)


 * Ubuntu is a good call especially as the most recent versions allow you to run what's called a Live CD on you PC giving you the chance to play with the OS to see if you like it before you have to install anything. Elaverick 21:51, 10 April 2007 (UTC)

restoring Firefox bookmarks
My XP computer died and I had to buy a new one with Vista (Home Premium). I reinstalled Firefox, and would now like to restore the previous bookmarks I have. I have a complete backup of my old drive C: and have found an html file which contains all the Firefox bookmarks. Is there a way I can use it to restore my Firefox bookmarks? --Halcatalyst 20:06, 10 April 2007 (UTC)


 * Hopefully this tip can help. --LarryMac 20:14, 10 April 2007 (UTC)
 * Et voilà! What could be simpler and easier? Unlike some of the travail I have been through the past few days. It worked! Thank you very much! --Halcatalyst 21:11, 10 April 2007 (UTC)

Benefits of SL Island for a University
What are some of the benfits a university can get from purchasing an island in Second Life? Gohaf 20:16, 10 April 2007 (UTC)

For a university? lol is this a school essay? um well all i could imagine is the advertising aspect of SL. Hmmm and maybe in the future when SL is more advanced giving remote lectures? Damn that would be cool.