From: adam@address.invalid
Moe Trin wrote:
> On Wed, 12 Sep 2012, in the Usenet newsgroup alt.os.linux.mandriva, in
article
> , Adam wrote:
[/etc/mtab]
"stolid" has enough USB ports for now. I'll probably eventually put a
powered USB 3.0 hub into one of the two 3.0 ports. The OEM mouse is
already flaky (only three months). I went to Staples today but they
didn't have anything cheap, so I bought another Logitech cordless.
Later I stopped at Big Lots which did have cheap mice of unknown
quality, so I picked up a corded optical mouse which I'll add to my
collection as a future spare.
>> I suppose the code would run something like:
>
> the only thing I might consider is the media
> has a non-standard filesystem type.
Nonstandard but mountable? Wouldn't "ls $MOUNTPOINT >> file" succeed
with anything that's mounted?
[stolid memory]
>> Although the new RAM is 1600 MHz, the BIOS still reports 1333 MHz,
>> even when only the new RAM was installed, and there aren't any
>> relevant BIOS settings.
>
> Now you know why the over-clockers are unhappy?
Yeah, I remember when BIOS settings included all sorts of tweaks like
CAS cycles.
> I wonder if that is
> a motherboard jumper, or the speed is scaled from the CPU speed.
The motherboard jumpers don't quite match the motherboard spec sheet
layout. The motherboard spec sheet says:
Supports DDR3 DIMMs
PC3 10600 (1333 MHz)
PC3 12800 (1600 MHz)
PC3 14400 (1866 MHz)
but it doesn't say it'll actually run at those speeds.
That brings me to three questions to ask HP, all about the BIOS: Why,
after the BIOS update appears to install successfully, does the startup
screen still report the old version and date? (Firmware updates are one
reason for leaving OEM Windows on there.) Why is the BIOS reporting
that AMD-V (hardware virtualization) is disabled when I've enabled the
BIOS setting? (It's also reported as disabled when the BIOS setting is
"disabled" -- I already thought of that one.) And why won't it access
faster RAM any faster? (When I have only the 1600 MHz RAM installed,
that is. I understand that with mixed DIMMs, all RAM access is done at
the speed of the slowest one.)
>> Apparently the AMD CPU includes the "video card"; it's not a separate
>> chip on the motherboard like my previous two boxes with Intel CPUs.
>
> Which CPU?
"AMD A8-3820 APU with Radeon(tm) HD Graphics".
>> I also discovered that the "missing" amount varies with the distro and
>> OS in use, and also with the total RAM.
>
> That's bizarre - I could see differences between distributions, though
> I'd expect them to all report from the same starting point - but the
> change solely as a function of installed RAM makes no sense.
If it's using RAM to store some sort of paging table or cache table, I
think the size of that would increase with total RAM installed. Anyway
as all else seems OK, I'm not going to worry where < 1GB "went", nor if
all RAM access has to be done at the "slowest" speed.
>> In other computer news, for the first time since getting the UPS
>> (actually SPS) two years ago, there was a power outage long enough
>> (over 60") to trigger a shutdown.
>
> I've seen a few minor outages (less than a few seconds), but none
> longer.
We discussed this a while back, and agreed that an outage over 60"
probably means power will be out for a while. In fact, after about 20',
power came back on flickering incredibly, long enough for the UPS to
start up the computer again, then power was out for about two hours. I
see what you meant about allowing battery power for several starts. I
have to manually move the monitor and desk lamp plugs over to the
backed-up side of the UPS, but that's also a help with looking for the
flashlights. :-)
>> I know an 18 GB swap partition is overkill for a system with 16 GB
>> RAM, but I figure better too large than too small.
>
> Especially when that's a drop in the bucket on the installed disk
Even with that, stolid's internal HD (750 GB) is only slightly more than
half partitioned. OTOH my 1 TB external HD is completely allocated. As
I understand it, "suspend" and "hibernate" essentially copy all used RAM
(plus a little overhead) to swap space, so if I were actually using most
of my 16 GB RAM, then swap ought to be at least that large.
[loss of trademarks]
>> I learned that (nearly) every drug has at least three names: the
>> systematic one, the generic one, and the brand name(s).
>
> Unless you are looking at the package insert or magazine ads that
> include them, the systematic name is rarely mentioned. It's not in
> the PDR or various pill books either.
I had a copy of the patent for Zoloft, and that only used the systematic
name. Of course the patent only said "we invented this new chemical",
with nothing about uses for it, if indeed there turned out to be any.
> all of the scripts I get are marked as "Substitutes OK",
> so it gets filled as a generic.
NY State regs are that a prescription /must/ be filled generically if
possible unless the prescriber has written DAW ("dispense as written").
Unfortunately not all brands of generics work equally well. One of
the immunusuppressants I was originally on was Cellcept, but when a
generic became available, the transplant surgeons at Albany weren't
convinced it would work as well so they switched everybody to the
similar Myfortic, not available generically.
[auto transmissions]
> it's less likely now as nearly all new cars default to
> an automatic - you almost have to pay extra to get a manual.
When I took high school driver's ed in the late '70s, the cars were all
automatics (which had been all I'd driven up to that point). I asked
the teacher about standards, and he said we could spend one session on
the simulators set to "standard transmission", but a few days later he
told me that "standard" mode was broken on the simulators. I don't
think the school was in a hurry to fix it, either.
Adam
--
Registered Linux User #536473
--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)
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