Thread: Need a New Computer

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Originally Posted by Matt167

you might encounter that problem. it is because the boot sector sees that, you could trick it by editing the registry, but I would not attempt that. the easier fix is to remove all accessory drives, boot the system, make sure there drivers are removed ( if appicable ).. then boot the system once, it will recognize the boot drive as C:, reinstall other drives and they should go E:
and D: first

Matt,
I'm resigned to leaving it as (H) until I have to do something else inside the case but housecleaning. It's only semantics at this point

Hi Matt, I am speaking to you from "Chemwulf" using Ubuntu, although I only have the Master box running so far. I have had a LOT of help from various friends up to this point but I did put the four PC boxes together from components. I got three of them running myself but the fourth would not boot up and I pulled out the CPU from the socket with the fan attached because once the fan is attached the lever in the CPU socket is covered by the fan. Then I pulled out the motherboard and ordered a new CPU and motherboard. When a friend visited he said let's put it back together again. I doubted the CPU would work because the pins screeched when I pulled it out but we put it back together again and realized that one PC was the only one in which I did not use the tiny fiber washers on the motherboard so we put them on this time and to my AMAZEMENT it booted up. Now I am waiting for three SATA II 80 Gb drives to put one in each satellite box to run the parallel version of the free chemistry program GAMESS. Last Saturday I had a big dose of help when a "Pro" HPC Systems Programmer from VCU from whence I am retired but still "Emeritus" installed Ubuntu and the f77 compiler for me. He will return when I get the disk drives installed and install the Ubuntu-Server system on the satellites along with the GAMESS program. The hope is to run GAMESS for "fun" research AND to have this master box for the Internet. I have a lot to learn about administraitve LINUX but I am remembering a lot of the commands needed to compile f77 and run f77 jobs. In a sense I have achieved part of my goal to get this system running during the cold months before the warmer weather calls me back to the roadster in the garage, but I have had a LOT of help! I suspect DennyW still knows more about the hardware than I do but the assembly is pretty easy if you order the right parts.

Don Shillady
Retired Scientist/teen rodder

Don,
Congratulations on this accomplishment. My guess is that if more folks knew how easy it is to put a computer together after a (very) little bit of research, there would be a lot fewer Dells, Hp and similar hohummers out there. When I finally looked inside the old Dell (now in Midlothian, VA) the lack of quality surprised me - dinky and flimsy little mobo, itty bitty CPU, 1 fan for the whole thing and a tiny heat sink. I already have upgrade plans for this new one but may possibly never do more then add more RAM.

I amazes me how a simple thread started on 11/05/07 has grown in 4 months and the amount of information passed on.

IC2, Thanks, but I did buy a CD from the "PC Mechanic" and watched it five times! Unfortunately that CD did NOT show application of the thermal coating so when I tried to remove the CPU fan I was only able to "slide" the CPU off the bottom of the fan AFTER I pulled out the pins!

Matt, can you tell me anything more about Virus protection for a Ubuntu system?

Don Shillady
Retired Scientist/teen rodder

Originally Posted by Don Shillady

IC2, Thanks, but I did buy a CD from the "PC Mechanic" and watched it five times! Unfortunately that CD did NOT show application of the thermal coating so when I tried to remove the CPU fan I was only able to "slide" the CPU off the bottom of the fan AFTER I pulled out the pins!

Matt, can you tell me anything more about Virus protection for a Ubuntu system?

Don Shillady
Retired Scientist/teen rodder

you don't need virus protection in Ubuntu unless your dealing with Windows computers too, thru the network. the Clam is the virus scanner Ubuntu uses.. it dosn't scan for itself, it scans attachments and things for outgoing emails, and files going outside the computer thru the network..

are you running KDE desktop or are you running Gnome?

Hi Matt,
Gee I don't know. I/we loaded Gutsy-Gibbon Ubuntu 7.10 and so far my use has revealed that the anti-virus support only goes up to the F-Fawn release 7.04. All I know is I log on and go to "system" to select "Internet" and then to "Firefox" which gives me the latest BBC news (!) Then I can go to Google or Yahoo but not MSN. I can reach Hotmail from Google OK. I have a lot to learn but I was glad to be able to reach the Hot Rod Club Forum. I still do not know whether I can use my Master box for the Internet while running Chemistry calculations on the Beowulf setup but as far as I recall LINUX systems are true multiprocessing systems, we shall see! Any comments related to Ubuntu use will be useful at this point, thanks.

Don Shillady
Retired Scientist/teen rodder

nope.. go into Synaptic, update the database if you havn't arleady. type in Clamav, it is supported for 7.10... IDK what might be causing MSN not to work, cause it works for me... go into the terminal and type sudo gedit /etc/apt/sources.list it will open up the text editor.. paste in this thread it's context. I can make sure that stuff is all OK.. it could have an effect on what sites work

Matt, Just a few dumb questions. I visited my academic Systems Programmers today and they use Fedore Red Hat so they were not sure about your directions. Synaptic seems to be a free program site, right? Then I select ClamV and past it into my apt/etc/... right? They said there is an automatic update called "freshClam" but they are using Fedora. When you get a chance can you spell out the procedure in more detail?

Don Shillady
Retired Scientist/teen rodder

Hi Matt, Well maybe I got it the easy way. I just went

Administration -> Synaptic -> Search -> klamav

When I entered "klamav" it loaded a lot of stuff (about 100 Mb) automatically and then I entered "klamav" again an got an update and set it for daily update, which I guess is what "freshclam" does so I guess I am as set as I can be for antivirus protection at the moment and it is all free! I would like to know how to make an icon if you can tell me but for now I know how to type "klamav" in the terminal command line. Thanks for your help. Sorry you are selling the Falcon, that is a light weight body that could be pretty peppy with an engine transplant, but I know how it is financially. I had to wait until I retired to afford a Model A roadster that I could have bought for $600 in 1960 but that was way to much for me then!

Best Wishes,
Don Shillady
Retired Scientist/teen rodder

Originally Posted by Don Shillady

Hi Matt, Well maybe I got it the easy way. I just went

Administration -> Synaptic -> Search -> klamav

When I entered "klamav" it loaded a lot of stuff (about 100 Mb) automatically and then I entered "klamav" again an got an update and set it for daily update, which I guess is what "freshclam" does so I guess I am as set as I can be for antivirus protection at the moment and it is all free! I would like to know how to make an icon if you can tell me but for now I know how to type "klamav" in the terminal command line. Thanks for your help. Sorry you are selling the Falcon, that is a light weight body that could be pretty peppy with an engine transplant, but I know how it is financially. I had to wait until I retired to afford a Model A roadster that I could have bought for $600 in 1960 but that was way to much for me then!

Best Wishes,
Don Shillady
Retired Scientist/teen rodder

I'm not sure how to create an icon like that w/ GTK as I use KDE and it's a little diffrent, but I know AVscan is a Clamav frontend which will put an icon in the utilities menu, just use synaptic to get it.. Fedora core is based on redhat, which uses RPM packages.. UBUNTU is based on Debian, which uses .deb packages. commands and stuff don't interchange between them.


I'd like to keep the Falcon, it dosn't need an engine transplant as I just recently rebuilt the 200 6cyl engine w/ a lot of speed parts and a turbocharger.. I'v just lost the interest and I can't let it sit, I see more potential in my '51 Chevy, so I'll fund that project w/ whatever I get out of the Falcon

Originally Posted by Don Shillady

Matt, Just a few dumb questions. I visited my academic Systems Programmers today and they use Fedore Red Hat so they were not sure about your directions. Synaptic seems to be a free program site, right? Then I select ClamV and past it into my apt/etc/... right? They said there is an automatic update called "freshClam" but they are using Fedora. When you get a chance can you spell out the procedure in more detail?

Don Shillady
Retired Scientist/teen rodder

get into Synaptic.. update the list, then search for Clamav.. double click on clamav and mark for installation.. click apply on the top.. then click ok... it will take care of the rest and install it. if you prefer the command line way, just type sudo apt-get Clamav

I figured I'd best dredge up this oldie - as I was having some problems with the computer freezing up solid - nothing. Mouse or keyboard - NADA. Ctrl - Alt - Del, same. Hit the big kill switch to shut it off. Reboots fine for a few minutes to a few hours, then all over again. I found a freebie registry repair site, Glarysoft Registry Repair. According to them, I had upwards of 200 software/hardware incompatibility problems that needed to be corrected - and were. Fingers crossed - so far, so good.

Originally Posted by IC2

I figured I'd best dredge up this oldie - as I was having some problems with the computer freezing up solid - nothing. Mouse or keyboard - NADA. Ctrl - Alt - Del, same. Hit the big kill switch to shut it off. Reboots fine for a few minutes to a few hours, then all over again. I found a freebie registry repair site, Glarysoft Registry Repair. According to them, I had upwards of 200 software/hardware incompatibility problems that needed to be corrected - and were. Fingers crossed - so far, so good.

Hmm, be careful with some of those registry repair programs, some fix for a while but there fixes actually do damage.. there are some really good 1's..


I do have 1 suggestion... Ubuntu 8.04 just came out and if you download it and rip the .iso to a CD, you can install Ubuntu 8.04 inside windows ( no partitioning nessasary ) using Wubi. I just did this with my Vista laptop and it's so much better than vista but... Vista is still usable and if I want to get rid of Ubuntu, I can uninstall it in windows... The Wubi option comes right on the disc, just put the disc in when windows is running, it will autoplay

Also, I got KDE 3.59 installed and KDE 4 installed along with Gnome that comes with it.. don't bother with KDE 4, it is still a beta release and it's buggy, and I cannot get it to correctly.

IC2 and Matt,

I tried using Ubunto v7.1 but ran into a steep learning curve and a non-compatibility problem with my video card so I switched to Centos so that I have the same system as my former university employer and can call on the System programmer there but then I ran into a problem with system lockup. "We" think it is a problem with a memory stick and we are in the process of testing the memory. My problem seems to be related to heat since it locks up faster when it gets warmer. I am going to check out the memory by replacing various sticks with a spare but I think I am going to have to put the whole unit in front of the air conditioner in that room. One of my cheapo 420 watt power supplies fried itself and has been replaced by a reliable 550 watt unit but the other problem seems to be related to the higher temperature in the Spring weather up in the attic so it looks like I will have to use the air conditioner. We are going to try one of the memory checking programs but I think the problem is too much heat even though the Bios says the CPU is running at only 41 degrees C. Maybe heat is a problem, IC2?

Don Shillady
Retired SCientist/teen rodder