Posts tagged General
My internets down help me!
Mar 6th
Well if your Internets down you probably are not reading this. So you might want to save this page locally for a rainy day!
It will also give you a better understanding of what goes on behind the scenes that make your net work… (Get it?)
I need to give you a brief introduction to how your internet connection works. You get a cable modem or DSL Modem from your provider (ISP) that connects to their network either via coax (thick cable) or your phone line. That modem establishes a connection with the ISP’s network. That network has a DHCP server that gives your modem an ip address. That address is accessible from the internet (public IP. If you don’t know what I am talking about read this article on IP addressing first)
Now either you connect your computer wired or wirelessly to that modem or connect a wired or wireless router so you can share your connection to multiple machines/devices.
Are you still with me?
So if you are plugged directly into the modem it will give you an private IP address that is NATed out to the public ip.
If this is your setup it is pretty easy until you want to swap computers. Do to security restrictions you will need to restart the modem to give then next machine an ip address. We recommended getting a router. The router will allow you to swap machines and share net with multiple machines. Now onto how to troubleshoot.
Deep breathe…
What do you mean the Internets down?
So after you go through the normal steps of denial, rebooting, laying blame at your isp, rebooting, cursing…. Check out these steps:
1. Before you do anything else restart your modem wait for it to come back online and then restart your router.
2. If you don’t have a router reboot your computer and then the cable modem.
3.once all the modems lights are lit up and the activity lights are blinking you should have net. If all the lights do not come on, check that all your cables are secure and then call your isp.
4.open a new browser window and try to get to http://www.askTheAdmin.com. If it comes up your good if not continue reading for the command line nitty gritty.
5. Go to Start run and type in CMD
6. Type Ipconfig /all
7. Make note of your default gateway and dns servers.
8. Ping your default gateway. Do you get a response?
9 Ping one of the DNS servers. Do you get a response?
10 type ping www.asktheadmin.com. Do you get a response?
Using traceroute to see where you are getting stuck. We see a lot of network issues when there are two dhcp servers giving out ip addresses. If you have a router you want to make sure it is in the same internal range as the cable mode. If my isp router is 192.168.1.1 i make my router .2. I disable dhcp if possible on the original.
Are those late hours at the office causing your spouse to want to DOS your servers? (Humor!)
Mar 4th
All us Admin’s by profession know all too well how hard it is to balance a healthy, happy relationship and a demanding network (HA!) …
Remember, all those late nights might help you achieve those 6 9′s of up time but, they are making your spouse secretly hate you (Maybe not so secretly in some cases like the one below)…
Consider this a public service announcement for Admin’s world-wide…
Look at the above carefully and maybe next time you will settle for 5 9′s of up time… (Probably not!) Do you think she threw the rest of the letters out?? :)
[Via MakeUseOf's Geeky Fun]
I started writing for GeeksAreSexy.net today. The first article is entitled Recover your Windows Password – so go check it out at http://www.geeksaresexy.net/2009/03/04/how-to-recovering-your-windows-password/ show some love and tell them AtA sent ya!
We also just received a USB Docking station with VGA from StarTech.com it looks awesome. I can’t wait to mess around with it! This one will be given away as well. So let’s start hearing why you want it!
Im addicted to Googles Image Labeler Game – HELP ME!
Feb 23rd
It started, way back when, I read a Boing-Boing post about Google Image Labeler. It warned me about how addictive it is but I mean really who would think that:
- You would want to help Google and add labels to their images.
- You could easily spend HOURS on the site.
- You have more fun mocking other players then playing.
Well they are all true! You log in and Google finds a partner for you and they show you pictures one at a time. You and your partner only see the same picture nothing else. You need to match your labels with theirs. The more obscure the word is the more points you will get. I went into this thing laughing and walked away 5 hours later very serious and very solemn. I almost made the leader board! Wait – when did that become my goal of the day? What happened to my work?
I do find myself mocking the other players as I have already typed in 7 valid labels and then started with Idiot, moron, do you sense a pattern… Now why does that entertain me? Well you see everything your partner typed at the end of the round. And you know how we like to harass people :)
So in conclusion whatever you do DON’T play this game and when you do DON’T try and beat the high scores. I have a feeling that the top cats are playing this thing 10 hours a day. I got 11 images in the 90 seconds twice – if you do better then me…
I don’t want to hear it kids! It will keep me up at night. I don’t know if this will ever be as addictive as SNOOD but it is right up there.
(Note, this game is inspired by the ESP Game created by Luis von Ahn, and I believe Google licensed the game from Carnegie Mellon.) [Via Boing-Boing and MattCutts]
_TheTwitchingAdmiN_
Is there a way to Change the Pre-Login Background in Windows XP?
Feb 21st
I hate the default colors in Windows XP. Don’t get me wrong, blue is a fantastic color, and I certainly don’t want to offend anyone whose favorite color is blue. I just like to be different.
Changing the default color is pretty easy though. All it takes is a few changes in the registry. Of course to do that you need to be a local administrator. If you aren’t a local administrator, there are ways of becoming one. The quickest way to figure out if you are a local administrator or not is to right-click on the start button. If you see “Explore All Users” as a menu option, you are an administrator. If you don’t, well…you aren’t a local administrator.
For the sake of argument, and to move along with this article, lets say you are a local administrator. Click on Start > Run and type in regedit then click OK.
Before we go any further, I should probably CMA by saying that changes to the registry can seriously screw up your computer if you don’t know what you are doing. Pay careful attention to these instructions, and do not deviate from them. I will not be held accountable for mistakes you make when editing the registry.
Now with that little bit of unpleasantness out of the way, lets continue. So you have the registry editor open. Now you need to browse to HKEY_USERS\Default\Control Panel.
To simply change the background color, go to HKEY_USERS\Default\Control Panel\Colors. Find the background string and double click on it. The three numbers in there are a RGB color code. You can find a list of RGB color codes here: (RGB Colors). Change the number to your corresponding color code. I like mine black, so I changed mine to 0 0 0 (All zeroes).
For an even cooler look, you can set your favorite wallpaper as the default background. The login wallpaper must be in BMP format for it to work when you boot your computer up. If you use a jpg, or gif or something else, it will only kick in after you login and log out once. To set an image as the background, go to HKEY_USERS\Default\Control Panel\Desktop. Find the wallpaper string and double click on it. Enter the full path to your wallpaper. I like to put my wallpaper in c:\windows so that it also shows up in my wallpaper list. As an example, my string says c:\windows\wallpaper.bmp.
To check if everything worked fine, simply log out. If all went well, you will see your changes right away!
Written by El Di Pablo of Bauer-Powe.
How can I tell if my ISP is flucking with my BitTorrent downloads?
Feb 17th
Going back as far as 2006 I have been hearing the word BitTorrent flying around the media like it was a four letter word.
Do you hear Mission Impossible theme music playing while you hunt your torrents down?
Shortly after the man (Pictured Left) had his way and the fall of the first generation of File Sharing applications came and went, the ISP’s have taken it upon themselves to throttle down BT related traffic.
Hey we know the media industry has been messing with our torrents via ZipTorrent or Media Defender but now a lot of ISP’s are flucking up your BT downloading ability. We have also see that almost 70% of ALL Internet traffic is P2P. But what is the ratio of legal vs. illegal content?
Even when there are companies using BT for good rather than evil like Azureus and its VUE network they still get throttled down with the common criminals! Now is this fair? Hell no!
How do you know if your ISP is doing you dirty?
Check out this plug-in... NOW! It plugs into Azerus and tells you how many times your connections are interrupted while doing the BT thing.
Author’s Description:
Help Azureus (Vuze) gather data on Internet traffic throttling.This plug-in works with your Azureus (Vuze) application to gather information regarding interference with your Internet access and send it to Azureus (Vuze).
Specifically, this small piece of software monitors your network connections and every ten minutes measures the number of interrupted connections (called reset tcp connections) and then displays the results to you. By selecting the share results check-box you can also share these results with our central server, which enables us to then aggregate the results and compare them with customers of other ISPs. We strongly encourage you to mark the share results setting.
Sharing this data with us does not involve disclosure of any of your personally identifiable information. Azureus (Vuze) may aggregate the data collected and talk about it or disclose it publicly, but no data about any specific user will be disclosed. Use of this plug-in has a negligible impact on your network usage.Right now the plug-in only works on PCs, not Macs, but we are actively working on future versions. Users from all countries are welcome to participate. Alternatively, if you rather install the plug-in using the plug-in wizard built into our application, go to our Wiki to learn how to do that.
Thank you for your cooperation in this research. We hope that contributing more complete factual data to the debate over appropriate network management will lead to better regulatory solutions.
Is your ISP trying to bend you over with out taking you for dinner? Find out now and come back and let us know! I love BT for all sorts of stuff including downloading of HUGE LEGIT files. Do you hear me Cablevision? The latest Red Hat Distro is legit and distributed this way among others…
_TheShiverMeTimbersAdmiN_
How to Rip DVDs with ImgBurn.
Feb 11th
A previous article explains how to use the awesome VLC player to rip a DVD to an MPEG-1 file. Technically, it gets the job done, but there are other options. Storage is dirt cheap so why not retain the full image quality and size as well as all the menus, languages, subtitles and bonus material from the original DVD. Using ImgBurn you can rip the entire disc to an ISO file and then use the VLC player to watch the DVD just like you had the physical disc in your drive.
After downloading and installing ImgBurn, a wizard will offer a few choices.
The one you want to choose is Create image file from disc.
Before we start ripping, we need to prevent ImgBurn from splitting the file into multiple parts since we want to end up with a single ISO file of the entire disc. Go to Tools > Settings and click on the Read tab. Under options, change the value of File Splitting from Auto to None. Click OK to go back to the main screen.
The main screen shows everything you would want to know about this disc. Under Destination, click the folder and navigate to a location where you want to store the image file. Be sure you have enough space. Look in the window on the right, the value for Size is how many bytes the disc contains (this disc is 4.6 Gigs).
When you are ready, click the button at the bottom with the green arrow. The ripping process will begin and the screen will give you a progress indicator including the estimated time remaining.
Go do something else while this runs, it’s going to take a while. A dual layer disc can hold more than 8 Gigs and you should rip at the lowest speed you can bear for best results.
When it’s done you will have a file called ‘Name of the disc’ .ISO.
Now, start VLC player and select Open > File. Navigate to the ISO file and select it. VLC player will start playing the file and the result will appear just like you were playing the physical disc.
Now you can enjoy the full quality and functionality of the DVD without having to lug around all those discs.
ImgBurn is a very powerful piece of software that does a lot of other things, including burning image files to disc, and it is completely FREE (I know the Admin loves free). It runs on all versions of Windows, including Vista and all 64-bit versions of Windows.
One thing ImgBurn will NOT do is rip encrypted discs (discs with CSS and/or Macrovision). For that task you need a tool called DVD Decrypter. The developer of DVD Decrypter is no longer working on the software due to issues with the Macrovision corporation and the obvious DMCA violations the product allows. It wouldn’t be proper to advise you on how to rip protected material or commit DMCA violations, but if you do happen to obtain a copy of DVD Decrypter, you will see that its interface and operation is very similar to that of ImgBurn.
