Computer Help Thread v4.0

If I disable the User Account Control in Vista (the thing that prompts you with warnings/confirmations/passwords whenever you try to edit anything in the C: directory), will there be any point in logging on as a Standard User anymore? Will my standard account then basically have administrative privileges?

I’m a freakin “power user” but for some reason or another I bought into all the advice about using a non-administrative account with UAC etc. etc. Back in my XP days I used a single administrative account. I guess when I bought all this pricey new hardware and Vista, I felt the urge to be extra cautious with it or something. I’m about out of that phase though lol, and UAC is starting to get pretty old.

No, disabling UAC would mean that the Standard User simply could not elevate and you would have to log over to an Admin User to continue.

What do you keep doing that is requiring admin rights?

Lots of things. Like I said I’m a power user so I’m in and out of C:/ all the time. Aside from installing and uninstalling things, which I seem to do a lot, I did these today:

Installed some fonts.
Drag/dropped some .dll’s in my foobar directory.

Both of which prompted for access, and since I was on my standard account it also prompted for my admin password. Then I was trying to customize something in foobar, and the effects wouldn’t remain if I restarted foobar. Wouldn’t even work on my admin account. On a whim, I decided to disable UAC and try it again from my admin account. This time it worked.

When I mess around in C, I get prompted. Fine I guess, but annoying. Apparently when an application messes around in C, it just gets flat out denied and I don’t get prompted. At least that’s what I assume was happening with foobar.

My bad i forgot to specify:

C743 zoom, i tried opening the vids with both wmp and gom but neither can find the codec needed to play the vids when i open it with wmp the extension (.MOV) isn’t recognized.

Well, yeah. MOV is meant to lock you into using the QuickTime Player. There’s QuickTime Alternative, but that’s not street legal, IIRC.

I would not buy a video camera that spat out MOV. (I probably wouldn’t buy one that spat out ASF either, but that’s because I love miniDV, and ADPCM-in-ASF is way outdated.)

Installing fonts should be a rare thing for most.
Foobar the app? Yeah, it should be locked down because it’s globally registered. You probably would not be doing this often.

Effects not sticking is a dumb bug in foobar that they should fix. This is a bug in foobar.

I don’t care about UAC either way, it’s just good to understand why you’re running into it. UAC should only be showing for stuff you’re not likely to be doing often. Knock on wood.

You’re right those things I did today aren’t something I’d do often. But it will be something different tomorrow. And something different the next day. I run in to UAC at least once a day on average, I’d guess.

And the preference change I made to foobar stuck when I made the change with UAC off. So it isn’t a bug in foobar, unless the bug is with how it interacts with UAC.

That’s 100% exactly what I’m saying the bug in foobar is: how it interacts with UAC. Ask them about it, it’s probably bugging other people too.

My PC’s been acting weird lately. Sometimes my mouse movements on my desktop and CS:Source get really laggy. My desktop usually only will have Firefox and a music player running if I’m not playing a game. I’m not sure if I need better cooling, if I have malware, or perhaps I need to defrag my HDD.

My CPU usage is usually around 10% on idle and I think about 75% of my RAM is available on idle.

I’m using a wireless Logitech Nano mouse. I’ve got an Athlon 64 3200+, 2 GB RAM, an 8600 GT, and I’m running XP Pro. I’m not really sure what’s going on. =( Any thoughts?

Try this: go to control panel/admin tools/local security policy/user rights assignment and add your username to “Impersonate a client after authentication”.
I’m not sure if this works the same way in XP Home. If not upgrade to Pro and do it. Alternatively, uninstalling SP2 should fix it but that’s not a good idea.

VLC will be able to play it I think.

It’s most likely the wireless mouse. Test with a wired mouse.

Something has been bugging me a bit lately…

It seems that when I move my mouse :df: very slowly, it’s not reading all the input properly and it kinda hangs or moves too slowly. Every other direction works fine. Only :df: does this, and only when moving very slowly. If I move fast, it seems accurate.

A way to easily demonstrate this is to put the pointer in the center of the screen and move my mouse about in inch :df: slowly, then an inch :ub: slowly. Repeat several times. Eventually the pointer will have worked its way to the top left corner of the screen. That shouldn’t happen.

My G5 logitech mouse did it in XP, my Razer mouse did it in XP, and my Razer mouse does it in Vista still with entirely new hardware. Two different OS’es, two different mice, two completely different hardware configurations. Do all mice work this way and I’m just nitpicky enough to be bothered by it? It only bothers me in photoshop, when I try to draw :df: lines.

I had this exact same problem when using a Razer Boomslang 2000 back in the day.

The thing is, though, the Razer Boomslang 2000 was a ball mouse, so there is absolutely no reason I can think of that you should be experiencing this on an optical/laser mouse.

Have you tried removing all mouse drivers/software (such as Logitech’s Setpoint, or whatever Razer uses), and seeing if it still has the same problem?

Also, have you tried using a different mouse pad?

Yep. Tried various mouse pads (and no mouse pads), as well as with and without drivers.

It’s either normal, or I have terrible luck with mice.

About the .MOV files, can’t you get something like quicktimealternative, so it’ll run in VLC, media player classic and such?

edit - my only problem is my keyboard. Some strokes don’t register (in this case, the R as of late) and it’s pissing me off. Fucken hardware lol.

i have mine on my desk… no mousepad

Are there any alternatives to the OG Ratpadz mousepad?

Mine is about to peace out…:sad:

Edit: n/m…I might get their newer model.

mine works in VLC without the qt codec… i dunno

as for an alt. to the ratpadz

everglide, imo, >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> ratpadz

it’s subjective though… they’re considered equal

MOV is a rat’s nest of a file format. It WILL work in QuickTime Player. Anything other than that, you’re gambling and really have to figure that out for yourself based upon the content you have. Apple has done cute things like the Sorenson codec license, so … bah. QuickTime Alternative at last check wasn’t legal. I don’t recall how VLC would be doing it. I imagine they’re simply supporting MPEG4 MOV or something like that.

Cool…just I’ve had my Ratdzpad for almost 10 years, and it’s been good to me.
And I just saw they brought back the OG design…I didn’t know that.

I use an icemat with my wireless optical. I had annoying problems like yours Geese, so I ended up buying a new mouse and the icemat which solved everything lol.