I wish M$ would just die...

Daqar · May 15, 2010, 11:52am

I’m sorry but I need to rant about something…

One day the screen on my windows machine went blank as the computer was stuck between sleep and hibernation. It was actually doing neither. The screen was just off and it wouldn’t turn on again. The power button just blinked. A quick reset fixed and I took care of the power settings, thus solving the problem…I thought.

A few days later I was doing a reboot, that happens with windows And all screen output was a clean, normal and dull as ever, even the splash screen! Right up until the log on screen. The screen’s power buttons starts blinking again, and the screen itself was black !!

Apparently everything works fine in ‘safe mode’. No hardware problems at least. I then reboot into normal mode. Later I learned I was lucky because the computer started up normally at that time.

I flushed the video driver and reinstalled it. That enabled me to boot my computer normally once per day. ONCE PER DAY !!! Any reboot, any turn off and turn on a little later wouldn’t work !! I’d be having a black screen with a blinking power button !!!

Today my computer will accept NOTHING but the default windows driver. Geez good luck playing Dragon Age with that driver !!

Yet again M$ has reduced my computer to a grossly overpriced paperweight !! And I have to pay for Windows on top of that !!!

And it costs between 110 to 180 € in Denmark !!!

I REALLY don’t understand why I have to pay for that !! Considering the stress I experience and the excitement over whether my computer works or not when starting up I should be payed using Windows. How come windows isn’t listed as a health risk the same way tobacco and drugs are?

…just needed to vent some steam before I’d break something valuable in my room…

Daqar

swerdna · May 15, 2010, 12:19pm

Well that’s a sad tale indeed. Just goes to show why you should install Linux.

But at least be consoled by the knowledge that your 110/180 euro goes toward the education, clothing, feeding and general well being of millions of ppl just like you. In fact if M$ “just died” instantaneously everywhere, society as we know it today would collapse. It’s a tough concept to come to terms with.

Daqar · May 15, 2010, 5:06pm

Indeed it is. Sadly I need to have a computer with Windows. This because I can’t get cubase to work in linux and I like to play video games. I’m not sure I can get Dragon Age and DLCs to work under linux…I feel like I’m trapped with windows.

I’m not sure I see how M$ provides feeding, education and wellbeing to people…

Best regards,

Daqar

syampillai · May 15, 2010, 5:34pm

I have noticed that many people can not leave Windoze because they like some Games available under Windoze only. I am not a game guy but my kids play a lot of games under Linux. There are so many and many times, I had to remotely shutdown their machines (after changing their passwords) to stop them. I think, there must be enough ‘addictive’ games under Linux too.

Daqar · May 15, 2010, 5:44pm

There is a lot of games for linux indeed. But most of the isn’t as graphicly pleasing as the windoze ones in my opinion. I’m a sucker for graphics.

But still there seem to be no way to make cubase run under linux. And I can’t really afford a mac. If I had money for one I’d probably spend those on a custom build guitar…or some other useful thing !! :P:P

Best regards,

Daqar

malcolmlewis · May 15, 2010, 6:07pm

Hi
That’s why I have an xbox… car racing and flight sims for me. I can
also stream videos/pictures/music etc with my NAS or using ushare.

–
Cheers Malcolm °¿° (Linux Counter #276890)
SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop 11 (x86_64) Kernel 2.6.27.45-0.1-default
up 1 day 21:16, 3 users, load average: 0.04, 0.12, 0.24
GPU GeForce 8600 GTS Silent - CUDA Driver Version: 195.36.15

DenverD · May 16, 2010, 11:44am

Daqar wrote:
> I feel like I’m trapped with windows.

use Windoze for games and Linux for necessary stuff like homework,
real work, etc…

growbag · May 17, 2010, 8:54am

Have you considered that it might be a hardware problem, or even a BIOS configuration mismatch?

Plus the obvious virus/spyware issues!

Try a clean install and see if that fixes it before doing anything else because Linux will also give you problems if there is an underlying hardware issue, and you will be back here complaining about how bad that is too :).

Daqar · May 17, 2010, 10:35am

I did do a complete virus/malware scan using two different programs: Bullguard and another one I don’t remember. I thought about hardware malfunctions, but since EVERYTHING worked in safe mode, I didn’t think it was a hardware or hardware configuration problem. When the screen goes blank like that, I’d suspect the graphics card. There was no graphical artifacts, at all. Not even when I played Dragon Age at full graphics. Not a hitch. Everytime I deleted the video driver, windows started up correctly again, but as soon as it had a video driver installed, it wouldn’t work. I’ve since reinstalled windows, and it seems to work now. Except for Dragon Age !! >:( I guess I just can’t have it all…

Best regards,

Daqar

techwiz03 · May 17, 2010, 1:40pm

I think you have missed the point of what safe mode really is. Safe mode loads the absolute minimum set of drivers in their simplest form so that you can effect repairs. When you go back to full normal mode windows loads the drivers as defined in the registry. Just deleting a driver and re-installing it will not always restore proper operation. If the registry has a conflictive entry that wasn’t removed with the driver removal (which often happens) then the new drive install can suffer.

This is the good part of Linux, no mass registry, you remove a package and it’s settings go with it IMC’s.

You may need to learn/use regedit to investigate this.

Daqar · May 17, 2010, 2:35pm

I tried to use driversweeper from guru3d to remove the driver. That didn’t help. I tried to repair the windows install using the windows install cd, that didn’t help either. Windows was somehow certain that there was no error at all. I had to a complete reinstall to solve it. But you might be right, its rare I venture into safemode, and even rarer I mess with the registry.

But it seems odd to me the that problem could somehow arise from nothing…

Daqar

DenverD · May 17, 2010, 4:44pm

i understand being neighborly and etc…but, i’m not sure we here in
this ‘community’ ought to be giving good advice and instructions to
folks needing help with Red Hat, Ubuntu, OSX, Windows etc etc etc…

especially not in this NO SUPPORT Soapbox…

just my penny worth…

til Daqar: meget godt at du har found Linux…huh?

Daqar · May 18, 2010, 12:15am

Jeg har haft nogle start problemer med linux, men ikke, slet ikke i samme stil som med windows. Linux er nok bare bedre til det seriøse !!

Daqar

ken_yap · May 18, 2010, 12:24am

I’m more than happy to help people make Windows die.

Just boot with the install CD, choose use whole disk and install openSUSE.

lol!

swerdna · May 18, 2010, 12:36am

…chill dude, what’s it matter?

DenverD · May 18, 2010, 8:46am

swerdna wrote:
> …chill dude, what’s it matter?

i am SO chilled it is unbelievable…

the matter is that once registry tips are embedded in soapbox they are
findable by google, and more folks wanting such help may FIND them
and add their questions/tips to the thread…happens all the time in
soap, chit, news etc…

and, should we also answer car tuneup questions asked here?

Jonathan_R · May 18, 2010, 12:24pm

There are two ways to look at this. You make a valid point, but lets look larger.
We are a computer forum that specializes in Linux, and further specializes in openSUSE. Now we could, and have historically keep that limited to just openSUSE. We have, on occasion strayed from this and given Windows support.

The other way to look at this is that we could look at ourselves as part of a much larger community. A community that are part of computer enthusiasts. If we look at it this way, then it would be normal and acceptable to be willing to help. Now notice, I am not suggesting that it should be expected of us. But there is certainly nothing wrong with offering help. Especially if one knows the answer.

See, it could lead away from bashing, and develop and foster respect and show why we left Windows and why we consider openSUSE superior.

Just something to think about.

techwiz03 · May 18, 2010, 1:47pm

I’m with Swerdna and jonathan_r for general chit chat and Soapbox

Until the Linux/openSUSE DT matures such that it can properly and reliably handle audio / video / usb devices / and most desired apps including games, people will be stressing about dual boot issues.
We all know here how a system can be problematic when M$ is involved. The Linux part of the system can become hosed by trying to fix the M$ part.
You may be stressing about me advising a poster learn/use regedit as a way to prevent going down the path of re-install & hose the Linux GRUB or worse yet wipe the whole partition including Linux. Being Soapbox “Strong opinions about most anything”, I felt an offer of where to look to prevent damaging Linux was a better attitude than to rain on his/her parade.

Let’s say he/she hoses his/her system. No Windose, No Linux, all for a preventable registry error. He/She can re-install Windose and re-install Linux (probably loosing settings and data) and comes back here to vent about his/her troubles trying restore things (both the windose part and the Linux part). Is he/she now deserving of more objections?

Maybe Linux needs to go down the path of M$ and say “we will be the only OS on the system”? No more dual-boot, No more wine, No more VirtualBox, or VMware, and a dwindling community.

I’m glad you work only in Linux, and are a Linux guru that never has problems, and can entertain yourself with your xbox. I apologize that my attempt to offer the person a clue offended you ok.

DenverD · May 19, 2010, 10:15am

techwiz03 wrote:
> I apologize that my attempt to offer the person a clue offended you
> ok.

i must admit i see it as a slippery slope if our fora become ‘known’
as a good place to find straight answers and good advice on the deeply
technical details of both Linux and Windows…

on the other hand, i know all we do to help the multitudes of “ms
certified” administrators learn how to properly administer their
back-office Linux servers is good for the community…

so, i see the benefits of helping, but also the downside…if you [and
the community] don’t agree with the downside, that is okay with
me…if you go back and read my post it is not so much condemning
[you should not help them]! as questioning *…

see, some months back i put in filters so i could automatically mark
as read posts with subjects including things like samba, wine, vista,
win7, windows, game, dual boot and xp…i did that because i’m pretty
much unqualified to try to help with most of those questions…

but, from time to time i’d turn off all fitering and i noticed that
there were a surprising number of post that i could contribute to
because they included ‘tips’ that the questioner may have had faulty
install media, misuse of root powers, repo overload and those kinds of
things which didn’t require any real knowledge of Redmond software
workings…

anyway, no apology is needed since i was not, and am not
offended…only wondering out loud if we ought to be doing it in the
help forums–i do think we should not give windows, linux, mac or
wood working tips in the non-help fora… [that said, i know you can
find examples of me giving help/advice in (probably) every forum
here…because i STILL have not trained myself to be mindful of the
forum, prior to pressing send–and, not (for example) answer a
hardware question in chit, soap, news or applications]

that honey just draws flies via google…

by the way, i have no xbox.

hendersj · May 19, 2010, 4:57pm

On Wed, 19 May 2010 08:15:08 +0000, DenverD wrote:

> i must admit i see it as a slippery slope if our fora become ‘known’ as
> a good place to find straight answers and good advice on the deeply
> technical details of both Linux and Windows…

That’s not a particularly bad thing. Over in the Novell forums it’s also
not uncommon for people to ask questions about Windows - and when asked
why they’re asking there, they say that they get better answers there
than from Microsoft’s forums.

Personally, I don’t see it as a problem here. A friendly community is a
strong community, and if we can lure a few Windows users over by being
friendly (instead of coming across as being mean to people who are in a
position of having to use Windows for some reason), that will help us
overall in creating a good impression among the larger community of
“people who use computers”.

Jim

–
Jim Henderson
openSUSE Forums Administrator