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Started by Spalls Hurgenson
Wed, 17 May 2017 17:51
Mid-Month Ramble - May 2017
Author: Spalls Hurgenson
Date: Wed, 17 May 2017 17:51
Date: Wed, 17 May 2017 17:51
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Mid-Month Ramble - May 2017 Ha! You didn't believe me when I wrote that I intended to make this a recurring, monthly thing; well, I'm back. I honestly didn't think my last maunder was worthy of any responses, but I guess talking about the old times hit a chord; I'm not sure this month's blather will have the same success. Not that will stop me, of course; blather is my middle name... -------------------------------------- So this month, I'm talking upgrades; specifically, wedging on new bits of hardware to make your computer run better. It's on my mind because I just got a new video-card. There's a certain joy in getting new hardware and watching as your PC - seemingly slow and sluggish - is revitalized into a ravenous devourer of framerates. Even more than the practical effects, I enjoy the act of the upgrade: the study to determine if an upgrade is worth it, the anticipation of how the upgrade will reinvigorate the computer, the challenge of the actual installation, the worry that you may have fucked something up during the installation or wasted your money when performance doesn't improve, the joy when you realize performance /has/ improved, and even the eventual disappointment that - though framerates are smoother - the games are still pretty much the same. My first upgrade was adding a second hard-drive. No wait, that's not true. More correctly, a new hard-drive was the first upgrade to an *IBM/PC-compatible*; technically, my first hardware upgrade was adding a mouse to my old Apple ][c. Yes, back in the day, a new mouse was considered an actual upgrade. I don't even remember why I got the mouse; it was probably in response to hype about how mouse-driven computing was the new hotness. This was just after the first Macintosh computers were released, so Graphic User Interfaces were all the rage in tech-magazines and I am just as vulnerable to that sort of circumspect advertisement as anyone else. But I can tell you that the "disappointment" phase hit pretty quickly and pretty hard; the Apple II mouse was a clumsy, uncomfortable soap-bar with almost no application support and offered little improvement over the keyboard. There had been a vague hope I might use the thing to draw images directly in the computer - I'm a bit of scribbler in real life - but as anyone who has used MS Paint can tell you, any skill in sketching with pen-n-paper translates very poorly to mouse-n-screen. The mouse was quickly relegated to a dusty corner of the computer desk and rarely used after the first few days. My second upgrade - also to the venerable Apple - was in pursuit of a goal that has haunted me even longer than increased frame-rates: I needed more storage. Of course back then, storage was counted in kilobytes and utilized floppy-disks (except for those millionaires who could afford that rare beast, the mythical Hard Disk Drive). So in this particular instance, the upgrade was not directly adding storage - the Apple II didn't have any - but instead helped optimize access to said storage. More precisely, I added a second floppy-disk drive. Now /there/ was a worthwhile investment; file-copies became a thousand times more efficient; no longer did I have to alternately insert source and destination disks! Oh, and the joy of loading a multi-disk program; you could get into the program or disk in tens of seconds instead of the usual minutes (I'm thinking of you Ultima V; that sucker came on five double-sided disks!). These days I have a half-dozen external drives hanging off my PC and I think half the reason I do this is because it hearkens back to the joy I felt when my little side-car Apple II floppy-disk drive proved such an effective addition. After that, though, my upgrading days were on pause for a good while; the Apple ][c wasn't really meant to be upgraded, as it lacked the internal slots for new boards and there was only so much you could plug into the serial ports in the back. Oh, there was a printer (an ImageWriter II, a cranky beast with terrible output that served me well for ten years) and a disappointing joystick that never stayed center (a big black-n-red thing, it came with an autofire feature that didn't work in any of the games I owned and a little red screwdriver used to manually tighten its springs; though the stick is long gone, I still own that screwdriver to this day) but that's pretty much it. But then I got a PC. Coming from the Apple II, I had no issue with PCs of the late '80s and early '90s. Yes, compared to some of its contemporaries it lacked decent visuals and sound; yes, it had a gawd-awful memory system, and yes, its interface could make grown men cry. But pretty much all that could have been said about the Apple II too, so in every respect I saw my PC as a huge improvement. So I wasn't upgrading my PC because I saw it as deficient in anyway; I upgraded because - awesome as it was - I could make it better. And that was just an amazing and mind-blowing concept. I actually stated above that my first PC-upgrade was to add a second hard-drive. On recollection, I am not sure this is true (my memory is spotty). The first upgrade may actually have been the addition of a sound card; I'm not sure. But they came fairly close together in any event and I intend to discuss both. But first that hard-drive. That original PC had an immensely huge hard-drive; I forget exactly the size but was either 80 or 100 megabytes. Coming from a computer where I had to squeeze files onto 160 kilobyte floppy disks, this seemed an immense and endless space, one that I'd never manage to fill. I think it took me six months. At that point I was starting to archive stuff back to floppies, and I was like, "This is ridiculous; this is the sort of thing I would do on an Apple!". I concluded that I had to consider alternatives. My first option was just to buy a new computer; after all, that was the sort of thing you had to do in the '80s when your old machine no longer met your needs. But then I thought, "Wait, couldn't I just add another hard-drive?" I should mention that at the time I was technically inept. I had no experience and confidence with electronics; I dreaded working with the innards of any machine, much less anything as technical and cutting-edge as an early 90s computer! I am also the sort of person who invariably manages to touch a live wire, and I've had more than a few painful shocks that have made me wary of dealing with anything with current (to this day, I always double-, triple- and quadruple-check to make sure I've yanked all the power cords from a computer before I open it, and even then I might wait a few hours or days for the capacitors to drain first. Shock me once, shame on me; shock me twenty times, and I'm gonna start being really careful ;-). So installing a hard-drive seemed a daunting challenge, especially in the days before easy access to the Internet how-to videos. Plus, this was an era of DIP-switches, jumpers and where third-party interface cards were necessary even to plug in a hard-drive. But the box - big, red and with Maxtor prominently embossed on the front - promised it was an "easy upgrade", and - with some perseverance (and much swearing) I eventually doubled my storage capacity. I swore I'd never do THAT again. Ha. One more story; this one of my sound-card upgrade. This one was notable in that it was the first one I really planned, as opposed to doing almost on the spur of the moment. I did RESEARCH first, trying to figure out which was the best purchase and what exactly such an upgrade would entail. Of course, most of this research consisted on reading advertising copy in magazines and on the boxes in stores, but such was the time we lived in; no Internet, after all. Even more than the hard-drive, sound card installation was a trial. With the hard-drive, I could pretty much just blindly follow instructions to move DIP-switch #20 to position-1, but with the sound card - a MediaVision Thunderboard, an 8-bit knock-off of the original Soundblaster - I had to know and understand things like IRQ and DMA settings, not to mention brave the depths of CONFIG.SYS and AUTOEXEC.BAT. I probably learned more about PC architecture during that one installation than I have since. And ohmigosh, the results; music! Moreso, music that actually sounded like music; not the ear-piercing screeches that came from the internal 1-bit speaker. These days we're spoiled with digital recordings of real orchestras that sound better coming from our 7.1 speakers than they do in real life, but none of it compares to the magical tinny MIDI soundtracks that were being piped out of my $5 speakers that were originally used on my Sony Walkman. Here was an upgrade that was truly worth all the heart-ache. I hadn't fried my motherboard with some errant jumper setting, I hadn't electrocuted myself, I had installed the thing correctly and learned a ton about computers, and I considered not a dollar mis-spent in the purchase. It was the perfect install, with none of the disappointment that usually settles in later. (Well, at least not until I learned about the CreativeLabs SoundBlaster Pro. But by then I was not only confident I could install the damn thing, I was eager to do so). Later upgrades have sort of blended together and anyway, I don't want to bore you with a shot-by-shot recollection of every new device. For a good while, it was mostly new sound-cards and hard-drives, with the occasional modem or CD-ROM. In the mid-90s, video-cards started gaining precedence as the upgrade-to-have, starting with VLB cards and culminating in the 3D accelerators that drain our wallets to this day. Later I'd venture into the challenge of RAM, motherboard and processor installation, finally building my own computer from scratch. But even as I grew more comfortable with the art, it became less fulfilling, partly because maturing technology made it so much easier. Plug-n-play architecture meant I rarely had to worry that some new device was going to brick my precious device; better designs made it impossible to plug something in the wrong way (I'm still terrified - arguably without cause - of applying some inadvertent electro-shock therapy however). The sheer technical elegance and capability of modern machines also make upgrading less necessary; at the height of my fascination, I was probably applying some new upgrade every three months or so; these days I can go years before cracking open the case. So it's not really the same. Yet even today, when I install some new device, I can still recall the same frisson of excitement that has thrilled me since those heady days when a second floppy drive or a new sound-card was a monumental improvement.
Re: Mid-Month Ramble - May 2017
Author: Justisaur
Date: Fri, 19 May 2017 20:00
Date: Fri, 19 May 2017 20:00
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On 5/17/2017 10:51 AM, Spalls Hurgenson wrote: > Mid-Month Ramble - May 2017 > > Ha! You didn't believe me when I wrote that I intended to make this a > recurring, monthly thing; well, I'm back. I honestly didn't think my > last maunder was worthy of any responses, but I guess talking about > the old times hit a chord; I'm not sure this month's blather will have > the same success. Not that will stop me, of course; blather is my > middle name... > > -------------------------------------- > > So this month, I'm talking upgrades; specifically, wedging on new bits > of hardware to make your computer run better. It's on my mind because > I just got a new video-card. There's a certain joy in getting new > hardware and watching as your PC - seemingly slow and sluggish - is > revitalized into a ravenous devourer of framerates. Even more than the > practical effects, I enjoy the act of the upgrade: the study to > determine if an upgrade is worth it, the anticipation of how the > upgrade will reinvigorate the computer, the challenge of the actual > installation, the worry that you may have fucked something up during > the installation or wasted your money when performance doesn't > improve, the joy when you realize performance /has/ improved, and even > the eventual disappointment that - though framerates are smoother - > the games are still pretty much the same. > I've typically only upgraded when there's something I just can't play at all that I really want to. No support for my ancient computer... Or plays in a slideshow even at the lowest settings. > > My first upgrade was adding a second hard-drive. No wait, that's not > true. More correctly, a new hard-drive was the first upgrade to an > *IBM/PC-compatible*; technically, my first hardware upgrade was adding > a mouse to my old Apple ][c. Yes, back in the day, a new mouse was > considered an actual upgrade. I don't even remember why I got the > mouse; it was probably in response to hype about how mouse-driven > computing was the new hotness. This was just after the first Macintosh > computers were released, so Graphic User Interfaces were all the rage > in tech-magazines and I am just as vulnerable to that sort of > circumspect advertisement as anyone else. But I can tell you that the > "disappointment" phase hit pretty quickly and pretty hard; the Apple > II mouse was a clumsy, uncomfortable soap-bar with almost no > application support and offered little improvement over the keyboard. > There had been a vague hope I might use the thing to draw images > directly in the computer - I'm a bit of scribbler in real life - but > as anyone who has used MS Paint can tell you, any skill in sketching > with pen-n-paper translates very poorly to mouse-n-screen. The mouse > was quickly relegated to a dusty corner of the computer desk and > rarely used after the first few days. I don't even remember what my first was if you don't count just buying a new computer, though ever since I entered the PC market I've always built my own. I've got a receipt around for a 400MB HD for around $500 though. Mine probably was a HD for a real upgrade too. Or maybe a joystick. Perhaps you could count a notch cutter for 5&1/4" floppies so you could use both sides. Of course being a computer tech I've upgraded more computers than I can count, just most of them not mine. > > After that, though, my upgrading days were on pause for a good while; > the Apple ][c wasn't really meant to be upgraded, as it lacked the > internal slots for new boards and there was only so much you could > plug into the serial ports in the back. Oh, there was a printer (an > ImageWriter II, a cranky beast with terrible output that served me > well for ten years) and a disappointing joystick that never stayed > center (a big black-n-red thing, it came with an autofire feature that > didn't work in any of the games I owned and a little red screwdriver > used to manually tighten its springs; though the stick is long gone, I > still own that screwdriver to this day) but that's pretty much it. > That reminds me, the first computerish thing I ever fixed, was my mom's boyfriend's business' ball-head printer when I was 15. I don't remember what I did, probably saved him $500 to replace it. > > I should mention that at the time I was technically inept. I had no > experience and confidence with electronics; I dreaded working with the > innards of any machine, much less anything as technical and > cutting-edge as an early 90s computer! I am also the sort of person > who invariably manages to touch a live wire, and I've had more than a > few painful shocks that have made me wary of dealing with anything > with current (to this day, I always double-, triple- and > quadruple-check to make sure I've yanked all the power cords from a > computer before I open it, and even then I might wait a few hours or > days for the capacitors to drain first. Shock me once, shame on me; > shock me twenty times, and I'm gonna start being really careful ;-). > Funny, with all the computers I've been in, I don't ever remember being shocked. I've been cut by the cases and other sharp points more times than I can count, and every single computer I've owned and upgraded. I've been mildly burned by overheating components too. > But even as I grew more comfortable with the art, it became less > fulfilling, partly because maturing technology made it so much easier. > Plug-n-play architecture meant I rarely had to worry that some new > device was going to brick my precious device; better designs made it > impossible to plug something in the wrong way (I'm still terrified - > arguably without cause - of applying some inadvertent electro-shock > therapy however). The sheer technical elegance and capability of > modern machines also make upgrading less necessary; at the height of > my fascination, I was probably applying some new upgrade every three > months or so; these days I can go years before cracking open the case. > So it's not really the same. Yet even today, when I install some new > device, I can still recall the same frisson of excitement that has > thrilled me since those heady days when a second floppy drive or a new > sound-card was a monumental improvement. > It was at least 7 years between my last 2 CPU upgrades, that's a really long time difference compared to previously, usually 2-3 years before it was hurting enough on new games to really need it. Those GPUs are still getting upgraded like clockwork every 2ish though. I haven't even bought a sound card in ages, the on board ones have been fine for me. - Justisaur
Re: Mid-Month Ramble - May 2017
Author: Dimensional Traveler
Date: Fri, 19 May 2017 22:41
Date: Fri, 19 May 2017 22:41
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On 5/19/2017 1:00 PM, Justisaur wrote: > On 5/17/2017 10:51 AM, Spalls Hurgenson wrote: >> Mid-Month Ramble - May 2017 >> >> Ha! You didn't believe me when I wrote that I intended to make this a >> recurring, monthly thing; well, I'm back. I honestly didn't think my >> last maunder was worthy of any responses, but I guess talking about >> the old times hit a chord; I'm not sure this month's blather will have >> the same success. Not that will stop me, of course; blather is my >> middle name... >> >> -------------------------------------- >> >> So this month, I'm talking upgrades; specifically, wedging on new bits >> of hardware to make your computer run better. It's on my mind because >> I just got a new video-card. There's a certain joy in getting new >> hardware and watching as your PC - seemingly slow and sluggish - is >> revitalized into a ravenous devourer of framerates. Even more than the >> practical effects, I enjoy the act of the upgrade: the study to >> determine if an upgrade is worth it, the anticipation of how the >> upgrade will reinvigorate the computer, the challenge of the actual >> installation, the worry that you may have fucked something up during >> the installation or wasted your money when performance doesn't >> improve, the joy when you realize performance /has/ improved, and even >> the eventual disappointment that - though framerates are smoother - >> the games are still pretty much the same. >> > > I've typically only upgraded when there's something I just can't play at > all that I really want to. No support for my ancient computer... Or > plays in a slideshow even at the lowest settings. > I just looked into some kind of hardware upgrade for my dinosaur of a computer and basically got told "too old". Its still XP and apparently you can't get new hardware that has drivers that will work with XP anymore. -- "That's my secret, Captain: I'm always angry."
Re: Mid-Month Ramble - May 2017
Author: Spalls Hurgenson
Date: Sat, 20 May 2017 13:23
Date: Sat, 20 May 2017 13:23
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On Fri, 19 May 2017 13:00:06 -0700, Justisaur <just...@gmail.com> wrote: >On 5/17/2017 10:51 AM, Spalls Hurgenson wrote: >> Mid-Month Ramble - May 2017 >Funny, with all the computers I've been in, I don't ever remember being >shocked. I've been cut by the cases and other sharp points more times >than I can count, and every single computer I've owned and upgraded. >I've been mildly burned by overheating components too. One of my earliest memories is of getting shocked. Yes, I was the sort of kid who jammed his fingers into an electrical socket. Many of you might be nodding and thinking to yourself, "Yes, that explains a lot." Later I had a similar experience when another outlet went bad and while I probably wasn't literally thrown across the room - in typical Hollywood explosion style - it sure felt like it. I also have an unnerving tendency to discover the hard way if a fence is electrified whenever I go hiking (e.g. around a cow paddock); that's happened three or four times. So it's not just computers; I seem to be unnervingly drawn to live current ;-) I can actually only think of TWO instances where I got shocked working on electronics, but that's because - or perhaps despite - the fact I try to ensure the electricity isn't flowing beforehand. Once was with a printer, the other time with a CRT monitor (only later did I realize how very, very lucky I was with the latter incident, since those old monitors store absolutely lethal amounts of current in their capacitors). Sadly, none of these accidents have left me with electrical super-powers.
Re: Mid-Month Ramble - May 2017
Author: Xocyll
Date: Mon, 22 May 2017 14:55
Date: Mon, 22 May 2017 14:55
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Spalls Hurgenson <spallsh...@gmail.com> looked up from reading the entrails of the porn spammer to utter "The Augury is good, the signs say: >Mid-Month Ramble - May 2017 > >Ha! You didn't believe me when I wrote that I intended to make this a >recurring, monthly thing; well, I'm back. I honestly didn't think my >last maunder was worthy of any responses, but I guess talking about >the old times hit a chord; I'm not sure this month's blather will have >the same success. Not that will stop me, of course; blather is my >middle name... <snip> >My first upgrade was adding a second hard-drive. No wait, that's not >true. More correctly, a new hard-drive was the first upgrade to an >*IBM/PC-compatible*; technically, my first hardware upgrade was adding >a mouse to my old Apple ][c. Mine would have been adding a used harddrive to a PC-XT class computer - all of 5 or 10 megabytes it was - old enough you were supposed to use the park command before shutting down the computer to make sure the drive heads were clear of the disk before powering off (otherwise they could score the discs when you powered up again. Something like that.) Couldn't tell you the brand name, or the interface it used (fairly sure it was NOT IDE - came with a special controller card.) I still remember the first floppy disk I bought: 5.25", single sided, 160kb capacity for $10 And now you can buy 32 gigabyte USB thumb drives at the grocery store checkout for about twice that price. 2x the price 200,000x the capacity, what a difference 35 years makes. >Yes, back in the day, a new mouse was considered an actual upgrade. A mouse, sheer luxury! Didn't have one of those until a couple years later when I built a 386. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xe1a1wHxTyo Xocyll -- I don't particularly want you to FOAD, myself. You'll be more of a cautionary example if you'll FO And Get Chronically, Incurably, Painfully, Progressively, Expensively, Debilitatingly Ill. So FOAGCIPPEDI. -- Mike Andrews responding to an idiot in asr
Re: Mid-Month Ramble - May 2017
Author: Toby Newman
Date: Thu, 25 May 2017 08:21
Date: Thu, 25 May 2017 08:21
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On 2017-05-19, Justisaur <just...@gmail.com> wrote: >> I should mention that at the time I was technically inept. I had no >> experience and confidence with electronics; I dreaded working with the >> innards of any machine, much less anything as technical and >> cutting-edge as an early 90s computer! I am also the sort of person >> who invariably manages to touch a live wire, and I've had more than a >> few painful shocks that have made me wary of dealing with anything >> with current (to this day, I always double-, triple- and >> quadruple-check to make sure I've yanked all the power cords from a >> computer before I open it, and even then I might wait a few hours or >> days for the capacitors to drain first. Shock me once, shame on me; >> shock me twenty times, and I'm gonna start being really careful ;-). >> > > Funny, with all the computers I've been in, I don't ever remember being > shocked. I've been cut by the cases and other sharp points more times > than I can count, and every single computer I've owned and upgraded. > I've been mildly burned by overheating components too. I've never considered the guts of a PC to be hazardous (as long as you don't open the PSU cage) because it's only 12V, but I guess that doesn't account for faults in the PSU, so it pays to be careful. CRTs are a different matter, of course. I guess if the PC case has sharp edges you could bypass your skin's resistance and disrupt your heart like this poor guy, who killed himself with a 9V battery: http://www.darwinawards.com/darwin/darwin1999-50.html -- -Toby Add the word afiduluminag to the subject to circumvent my email filters.
Re: Mid-Month Ramble - May 2017
Author: Spalls Hurgenson
Date: Thu, 25 May 2017 13:07
Date: Thu, 25 May 2017 13:07
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On Thu, 25 May 2017 09:21:36 +0100, Toby Newman <goo...@asktoby.com> wrote: >On 2017-05-19, Justisaur <just...@gmail.com> wrote: >>> I should mention that at the time I was technically inept. I had no >>> experience and confidence with electronics; I dreaded working with the >>> innards of any machine, much less anything as technical and >>> cutting-edge as an early 90s computer! I am also the sort of person >>> who invariably manages to touch a live wire, and I've had more than a >>> few painful shocks that have made me wary of dealing with anything >>> with current (to this day, I always double-, triple- and >>> quadruple-check to make sure I've yanked all the power cords from a >>> computer before I open it, and even then I might wait a few hours or >>> days for the capacitors to drain first. Shock me once, shame on me; >>> shock me twenty times, and I'm gonna start being really careful ;-). >>> >> >> Funny, with all the computers I've been in, I don't ever remember being >> shocked. I've been cut by the cases and other sharp points more times >> than I can count, and every single computer I've owned and upgraded. >> I've been mildly burned by overheating components too. > >I've never considered the guts of a PC to be hazardous (as long as you >don't open the PSU cage) because it's only 12V, but I guess that >doesn't account for faults in the PSU, so it pays to be careful. CRTs >are a different matter, of course. It was never an issue of lethality; I mean, there was always the potential for serious harm, but I never thought I was risking my life (not even when I first fiddled with a CRT, although I was terrified when I read of their deadly potential later). But electric shocks HURT and I seem to attract current like honey to a bear. But hard as it may be to believe, even I can eventually learn and so I take extra care these days to avoid the danger. Is that cable really yanked? Yes? Am I sure? Let me check again :-) >I guess if the PC case has sharp edges you could bypass your skin's >resistance and disrupt your heart like this poor guy, who killed >himself with a 9V battery: Sharp edges were another bane of upgrading, although one I took much more in stride. In later years I did much to mitigate the threat by buying the largest towers I could find; the sharp edges were still there but because there was so much more space inside it became much easier for me avoid them. It did make it difficult to squeeze the beasts beneath the desk though... but no more ripped up hands makes it all worth it. ;-)
Re: Mid-Month Ramble - May 2017
Author: Xocyll
Date: Sun, 28 May 2017 10:27
Date: Sun, 28 May 2017 10:27
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Toby Newman <goo...@asktoby.com> looked up from reading the entrails of the porn spammer to utter "The Augury is good, the signs say: >On 2017-05-19, Justisaur <just...@gmail.com> wrote: >>> I should mention that at the time I was technically inept. I had no >>> experience and confidence with electronics; I dreaded working with the >>> innards of any machine, much less anything as technical and >>> cutting-edge as an early 90s computer! I am also the sort of person >>> who invariably manages to touch a live wire, and I've had more than a >>> few painful shocks that have made me wary of dealing with anything >>> with current (to this day, I always double-, triple- and >>> quadruple-check to make sure I've yanked all the power cords from a >>> computer before I open it, and even then I might wait a few hours or >>> days for the capacitors to drain first. Shock me once, shame on me; >>> shock me twenty times, and I'm gonna start being really careful ;-). >>> >> >> Funny, with all the computers I've been in, I don't ever remember being >> shocked. I've been cut by the cases and other sharp points more times >> than I can count, and every single computer I've owned and upgraded. >> I've been mildly burned by overheating components too. > >I've never considered the guts of a PC to be hazardous (as long as you >don't open the PSU cage) because it's only 12V, but I guess that >doesn't account for faults in the PSU, so it pays to be careful. CRTs >are a different matter, of course. It's all relative; Back in the day, if you built your own PCs, some of the cases you could buy had really crap quality internals; cheap steel, lots of sharp edges, no smoothing done whatsoever and would eagerly take blood. Not something you got if you bought a brand name computer (for a lot more than it was worth) and then upgraded it, or bought an expensive case. But a starving-student building their own on a budget, you bought a no-name cheapie case, because ultimately, it's just a box and styling etc made zero difference to function. Until processors and video cards got fast enough to generate serious heat, air-flow rates and such weren't really an issue and most of those cases - the only fan moving air was the one in the PSU. Even opening the PSU isn't a problem if you're careful - I once changed out the PSU fan while the machine was running. (A. uptime and B. I was in the middle of rendering something at the time and didn't want to start over (far enough back that it took hours to render.) The original fan had worn it's bearings down to the point it was constantly rubbing against the outside of the PSU with an infernal squeaking sound, so I just removed the PSU, set it on some boxes, opened it up, unscrewed the fan and replaced it with a standard 80mm case fan, with one of those pass-through connectors and just ran the wire outside the PSU and plugged it in, then put everything back together and back in place. No biggie. >I guess if the PC case has sharp edges you could bypass your skin's >resistance and disrupt your heart like this poor guy, who killed >himself with a 9V battery: > >http://www.darwinawards.com/darwin/darwin1999-50.html If this is true at all - the Darwin awards has historically listed quite a few things that are utter bullshit and even the page you listed says it's unconfirmed. Hasn't been confirmed after 18 years? - yeah I'd have to call bullshit on it. Xocyll -- I don't particularly want you to FOAD, myself. You'll be more of a cautionary example if you'll FO And Get Chronically, Incurably, Painfully, Progressively, Expensively, Debilitatingly Ill. So FOAGCIPPEDI. -- Mike Andrews responding to an idiot in asr
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