Bogbas

The method 2 is pretty much what I used to check the contents of the hidden partition. I had to use /dev/sda1 on mount though since this laptop has a sata hdd. As long as you don't change anything in the hidden partition you won't mess anything up. I'll explain briefly what the commands so that you can have an idea what they do: 1. "cd /mnt" , you change the current directory to /mnt (if you have ever used DOS or the command prompt this should be familiar. The directory structure differs from DOS, there are no c:\ d:\ etc.) 2. "mkdir acer" it creates a new directory to /mnt called acer. The path to the directory will be /mnt/acer 3. "mount -t vfat /dev/hda1 /mnt/acer" To be able to read the contents of the disk you need to mount the partition to the file hierarchy. The Unix file hierarchy is different to what you might be used to on windows. If you want to know more you should find some tutorials on linux. Using -t means that you will specify the type of the partition which will be mounted. vfat is the file system type. Then there's the device(/dev/sda1 or /dev/hda1) that is being mounted, and where(/mnt/acer) it will be mounted. 4. "cat /tools/aimdrs.dat" Simply put, this prints the contents of the aimdrs.dat file to the screen. On my laptop there wasn't such a file though.

I have an Acer laptop and I have noticed some things. I think the password might be set when you run the Acer eRecovery management for the first time. You can apparently create a recovery cd/dvd with it which restores the laptop to factory defaults. I couldn't do this though because it fails to do anything when I click on "create factory default disk" button. I think that it says in the manual that you should do that when you first boot the laptop. Doesn't really matter when it's done, just do it before the system becomes unbootable. Or in my case before installing other operating systems... I was able to see the contents of the hidden partition from linux (you can see them with any live-cd I think). But I couldn't locate a file that had the password. If you decide to try a live-cd, download the ubuntu live-cd and boot from that and it should allow you to see the contents of your hdd. Note that you don't need to install ubuntu, just boot from the live-cd.

Overall no, but amd's seem to be better than intel on the floating point test.

And that's a bad thing? Seriously, I'd pay extra to find a laptop here that doesn't have Vista. That looks like a good deal.

Well I've heard some bad things about PC world, but this pretty much is the most stupid thing I've heard. Ampere hours are used to indicate the capacity of the battery. According to that logic I would overload my car engine just by installing a bigger fuel tank Worst piece of hardware that I have used would be MSI motherboards. These ASUS boards I have now are much better.

You guessed that it might be something to do with directx, have you tried to re-install that?

If you want the xbox to connect to the internet through the pc, I'd use the wizard from control panel->network connections(or similar)->define a home or office network(the second item on the left bar) it should setup all the necessary stuff, you only need to know which connection is connected to the xbox and which connection is the internet connection. The translations might not be 100% accurate as I don't have an english version of the OS.

If the thing that provides the internet allows more than one public ip per a connection, then a switch should be enough. If it doesn't, you'll need a router. But a router should work in both cases. The difference between switch and a router is that a router is used to connect networks together (i.e LAN to internet) and a switch is used to connect computers together. The reason these get confused is that pretty much all routers that you buy for home have built-in switch as well. And any WLAN access point is essentially a 'switch' (or more close to a hub as all the traffic can be listened on). So if you have a laptop that can act as an access point then you can use it to connect other devices to the internet.

You could try installing hamachi and creating a network with that to which both of you connect. That way you should be able to play the game using the LAN option. https://secure.logmein.com/products/hamachi/list.asp

Look around the router settings it should be there somewhere. Personally I just turn the firewall off on the router I use. Because whenever I use bittorrent the router dies because it hasn't got the power to inspect everything that's incoming and thinks it's being hacked. Having NAT enabled on it and a good software firewall on the pc should be enough.

I'd guess that you have enabled uPnP on your router and those rules are set by windows live messenger that you apparently have on.

Yes you can have both OS on your system. I think it's pretty easily done with the ubuntu installer. The preparing (formatting/partitioning)of the hard drive(s) might be a bit confusing since in windows you have c:, d:, etc. and in linux it's /dev/hda, /dev/hdb and so on for different physical drives (or /dev/sda, /dev/sdb for sata drives) Partitions of those drives are then called /dev/hda1, /dev/hda2 etc. But I'm sure there's a tutorial on how to do it somewhere on the ubuntu website. And make sure that you install windows first.

It used to be a real problem when the first wireless keyboards came out. It might still happen if something interferes with the signal. Personally I think wireless keyboards are ok even for gaming. But the wireless mouse I had drained batteries very quickly so I switched back to wired mouse. Laser mice aren't as picky about the surface you use them on as optical mice are. So a good optical mouse is as good as a laser mouse in games. Many seem to like the logitech mx518. The logitech G11 and G15 keyboards have backlit keys which is nice if you use your computer in the dark.

Windows (at least xp, don't know about vista) firewall and hardware firewalls are pretty much useless if you get infected by some malicious software. That's why the best option would be to have both, hardware and software firewall. Comodo, sunbelt-kerio, and sygate are those that I have used. But it seems there isn't a vista compatible version of those. I have also tried jetico v1 as it's freeware, but that was really... "interesting" to configure.

It's like 2002 all over again... I assume your tv is a crt. If you have used PAL60 using the composite lead that came with the console, the image is worse than in 50hz mode. And the image will be better in PAL60 with the RGB cable. This comes from experience from the gamecube rgb cable, but I think it's the same with wii.