Ask DACS
April 2010

by Drew Kwashnak

Q:    Coupons printed by an inkjet printer are not scanning at the store.
A:    Inkjet printers shoot droplets of ink onto the paper to make the text, barcode, pictures or whatever.  The ink will bleed as it gets absorbed by the paper and this problem is more prevalent with general purpose paper.

It was suggested to either use premium paper, where it should bleed less, or reduce the amount of ink being printed so the bleeding will be less.

Another solution was to use a laser printer instead.  Basic laser printers are going these days for about $100 on up.  All-in-one printers may cost anywhere from $300 on up.  Many come network ready.

Q:     For the past month the system lags for about 30 seconds every day.  The system is a Netbook with an Atom processor running Linux and is connected to the internet over a cable modem.  The system routinely has multiple windows open and the lag occurs whether browsing the web or not.
A:    The only suggestions were to clear out the cache and temp files, try rolling back any recent driver updates, open the system monitor and try to find if something is spiking the CPU usage every so often, and to visit the Linux SIG to see if anyone there has any better ideas.  The Linux SIG meets on the 3rd Wednesday of the month at 7:30 PM.

Q:    What to do if you have a 5.25 in floppy disk?
A:    Hope to God you have a drive.

Q:    One laptop key sticks and I have already tried popping off the key and cleaning out from underneath.
A:     Try taking the "rubber spongy" (technical term here) off. It is a suction cup spring and if something got underneath, like a beverage, or it is otherwise sealed then that may be causing the sticking.

Q:    In a Mac and Windows environment, the computers do not show up in each others' network browser, yet are accessible by manually entering the computer's name. When the Mac boots into Windows there is no issue, only when it is running Mac and Windows.
A:    Windows uses what is called a Master Browser.  "The Master Browser is responsible for the browse list within its respective subnet and portion of the domain on its subnet." (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Domain_Master_Browser). The computer that gets the Master Browser is the one that has the highest ranking system.  When they are equal, the two systems fight for the position.

It is possible that the Apple machine running Windows has the Master Browser and when it is rebooted into OS X, the other Windows system doesn't re-assert itself and expects the Mac to be the Master Browser.

So the sugestion is to look in the Mac's Windows system under services for something like "computer browser" or "network browser" and turn that off.  See if the problem doesn't go away after a few days.  Also check to see if there are any firmware updates with the router.

Q:    The CT Film Festival is looking for 6 laptops and webcams to be used for 3 days for getting instant feedback after events.
A:    That all depends on you.  Although it was also recommended to check out I ComputerLand in Danbury as they refurbish computers and may have some for use.

Q:    When using an Apple computer in a public library, I keep getting a message like "lowmein is installing"
A:    No, this doesn't mean it is hungry for Chinese food!  The thought is that the message is "logmein" which could be the remote access program LogMeIn (https://secure.logmein.com/US/home.aspx).  It is possible the Library is using this for remote management of their computers, or that somebody is trying to hack the system.

Q:    Looking for a way to independently accelerate or overclock the gpu side of the processor in a laptop
A:     The first place to look at overclocking is Tom's Hardware (http://www.tomshardware.com).  Another possibility is to look at the graphic chip manufacturer's website for overclocking. If all else fails, google "nvidia overclocking" or "ati overclocking", depending on what kind of chip set to overclock.
An Update:     There was an update to the March DACS presentation on Backups regarding the online backup company CrashPlan (http://b2.crashplan.com/landing/index.html). 

CrashPlan offers unlimited backup space that either costs $60 per year or nothing, the latter being ad supported.  It is cross-platform (Windows, Mac, Linux and Solaris) and allows for backing up to a USB drive, another computer or to their online repository.  It also allows you to backup from multiple machines and even different operating systems to the same account. You are given a code which all of your computers use to backup to your account.

CrashPlan encrypts the data before it is sent to their online storage and retains changes between backups.  If you have a lot of data to back, for $100 you can send them a USB drive, CD or DVD and they will seed your backup.

One thing to keep in mind for enterprise users is that CrashPlan does not have an agent for SQL or Exchange servers.  In these instances it is recommended that you use the existing backup services and dump the backup into a directory which is being backed up by CrashPlan.

Product Overview:    Roxio and Nero are the most well-known CD/DVD burning programs.  An alternative which is small and free is CDBurnerXP (http://cdburnerxp.se/).  It may be simpler and not have all of the bells and whistles that Nero or Roxio has, but it was also noticed to have burned at the drive's actual advertised speeds.

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Disclaimer: Ask DACS questions come from members by email or from the audience attending the general meeting. Answers are suggestions offered by meeting attendees and represent a consensus of those responding. DACS offers no warrantee as to the correctness of the answers and anyone following these suggestions or answers does so at their own risk. In other words, we could be totally wrong!