Do you know hilary, I read through Greystone's problem and thought I had no idea. Since apparently I did suggest that to you in the past, then yes, it might be a good idea worth trying :-)

G, just wonder how old the laptop is? Older ones tend to be (heavily) modified bits of desktop kit whereas modern laptops are much more specifically designed to cope with the heat, and the older ones take quite a bit of hammer over the years. If the LAN port is duff it suggests to me that there may be other bits of the laptop that are becoming duff.

Or maybe it's something to do with those funny keyboards they have over there - I couldn't make sense of the Spanish keyboard I used last weekend ;-)

Seymour - Been much more stable today. Also the cleanest its been in ages. :-)

Its about 4 years old now, I guess. Was the top spec at the time and performs very well as a rule.

My main problem now is with performance through the MSI wireless router I use. The guys who installed my internet changed the settings to pick up the new feed and the responses via the internet are now terrible, although the satellite system feed comes out well when I test it via PC-Pitstop.

Or....maybe it is just telling me it is time to slow down a bit and take things easier. Now, there's a thought... ;-)

Laptop battery charging problems.........

In the last 5 months I have changed both the battery and charging unit on my laptop (about two years old) and both appeared to be working fine.
In the las 72 hours I ran the battery down to about 10% then pluged it back in to the mains as normall.The majority of time it runs on mains.
Since plugging it back in 3 days ago the power meter appears to keep getting stuck ie 42%, 57% and now 60%. The power lights indicate the battery is charging but it use to recharge to 100% in about 6 hours.
I have checked the cables, replaced the plug into the back several times and even shut it down for a few hours (but left it plugged in to the mains), but I can't get above 60% on the power meter.
Any suggestions greatly appreciated as I can see problems trying to get a replacement from the supplier of the new bits without having to send them off for testing leaving me with no portable power in the mean time. Graeme.
ps. The laptop is a Gericom running xp pro and P2.4, 60GB HD and 1GB ram if relevant.

GRAEME.A:

Lithium-Ion batteries really don't like being left on charge all the time. When your laptop is being used on external (mains) power mostly, it's better to run it with the battery out. Also, if you store a Li-Ion battery for any length of time (> 2 or 3 weeks), it's better to store it with about 50% charge.

The other thing that goes wrong is that the battery metering circuitry gets out of sync with the battery charge and ends up lying to you about the remaining charge. Some laptops provide you with a way of 'resyncing' the meter with the actual charge. Your instructions and mileage may vary ;-)

I would suggest running the machine on battery until it dies -- then charge the battery fully (by the suggested time of 6 hours or until the charge light goes out or whatever) and look for a power gauge reset option in Control Panel -> Power Options. If the battery is fully charged, there should be an option to allow you to tell the machine to show the power gauge as 100%.

Otherwise, another new battery may be required. Generally, power management with XP on modern laptops is pretty good.

Hope this helps.

MM

Since I installed Skype, the speakers don't work as it outputs via the headphones.

Is there a quick way to cure this?

And if so, how will I switch betweeen speakers and headphones?

TIA.

Thanks MM.
Will try the above now as I am out all day tomorrow (Sunday) so it wont cause any problems. GA.

Andy,

I asked this about a month ago for a chum.

Do a search. The answer is on this thread.

TP

Andy,this may help the Skype problem !!!

When Skype is installed, It changes the Windows default device. To Correct this -

Go;- , ,

Click the Tab at the top

In the "Sound Playback" section the Default device should be the name of the PC's Sound Card, Not the USB Device/Phone



Then;

Open Up the Skype Panel.

Go; , ,

Audio in, Audio Out and Ringing should be the USB Device

Ring the PC Speaker should be ticked.

Mega...

Can I acess my office network from my home Pc over the internet.

Hi.

How do I update my New Alert Window when I've added epics to my watchlist?

Thanks.

KD.

Laptop charging update.
Followed MM's sugestion and now established the following.
Battery charges as normal re time ect to 100% but only if laptop is turned off.
If the laptop is turned on (tried using and not using ,no difference) the lights and the battery meter box indicate it is charging but infact it is not.

Now the question is.........Should I be looking to replace the battery or the charger. Or does this indicate a problem with the actual laptop its self or a software problem.
I am not to bad on logic / problem solving but I do lack understanding on computer Tech. G. Thanks in advance for any help or advice.

Daft question?
Right clicking Desktop to select say properties has gone "inactive"
Any clues to reactivate?

Hi thanks for the help earlier apologies for not saying so earlier. But I am reduced to borrowing my neighbour's pc to send this now.
Force9 have upgraded my account unasked to 8Mbps from 2Mbps on 3rd May and rendered it totally useless, the say its my inside house cables because it works after a fashion when I put the pc next to the BT socket. I am using A PCI internal modem.

So either I have to get them to switch back to 2Mbps, install thicker cables or change ISPs. I have alread changed the MTU and Rec Window settings to no avail.

Apparently lots of people in our village have the same problem.

rpaco, changing ISPs will not help. The problem is a physical one in connecting to the BT exchange. Nor will MTU/receive window help, and 'install thicker cables' is a total red herring.

The 8Mb service is intended to run at the highest speed possible which works on your line (which might be 2Mb of course). It does try to find this speed, and there are automatic procedures built in to try an connect at a speed that works. You do need to leave the modem connected to the line and computer on for a few days for this to happen, even if it looks like it's not working.

First of all can you post up your modem statistics (attenuation and SNR or noise margin) if you know how to get them from your modem, ideally on the BT master socket and then on the socket you would like to use.

Does this link work and what rate does it show? https://portal.f9.net.uk/my.html?action=stable_rate

This is very hard to believe, but it seems to be working!!!!
My ADSL runner is connected at 6.2Mbps and the speed on the link you gave (yes it works)says 6000Kbps. I am surprised F9 did not show me this link they only gave me the BT speed test site

Hitherto I had problems when the line speed showed anything above 3.5Mbps.
Maybe BT turned the gain up of something. I do nto have a parameter entitled SNR I guiess it is called something else. I attach a jpeg of the parameteers from a direct BT socket connection. I am actually about 20m away in a shed (Ex coal house) on the end of the bungalow. Pls indicate which param I should be looking at for SNR. (is there really no way to insert an image except by adding it to my website then back down again?) Seems convlouted!

rpaco, I hope it wasn't working just because it was earlier on in the evening, in which case you won't be able to read this :-) A common syndrome in this sort of case is that the quality of the line decreases in the evening as noise from streetlights and AM radio broadcasts affects the ADSL. Since the speed of the line may have been chosen in the daytime under better conditions, the line stops working in the evening.

Your attenuation of 30.3dB is the amount the ADSL signal has decreased in reaching you and is related to the distance to the exchange and the quality of the wiring between the exchange and you. It's not bad at all. Mine is 27dB and I'm quite close to the exchange. Your SNR (signal/noise ratio) or noise margin is 10.5dB which is also not bad given that you are connecting at over 6Mb/s.

Basically the speed will adjust to keep the noise margin above 6dB initially. If the noise margin is lower the speed will decrease automatically and that will make the noise margin rise again at a cost of a slower speed. That happens in the first few days of getting 8Mb. If the procedure is unsuccessful then two things can happen: either the equipment starts doing the same adjustment at a higher noise margin, e.g. 9dB, and/or it can change from 'fast' to 'interleave' mode which can be more reliable. On one of your screens it will probably say whether you are using 'fast' or 'interleave'. These secondary adjustments take a few days to kick in so if your line is now sorted out that could be the reason. It could also be that BT have in the meantime found and replaced a faulty line card in the exchange of course!

The noise margin is dependent partly on streetlights etc. and partly on your internal house wiring, which is why connecting directly at the master socket normally yields better results. Without knowing what your wiring looks like it's difficult to advise, but it is often possible to improve on it.

Another possible avenue if you are still getting problems is to ask the ISP to ask BT to turn on 'interleave' and/or set the minimum noise margin higher than 6dB. These should happen automatically but it is possible to force the exchange hardware to do so.

Numpty needs help from techie!!!
I often get documents e-mailed to me as an attatchment. When I download them to my desktop it downloads a file with the documents in and another one that is a zip file.
The question is, Am I safe to delete the zip file they came in as my desktop is full of folders with a picture of a zip on and I am trying to clean my PC up.
Thanks in advance.
Alan

Alan, yes, if you've already saved the unzipped file. nEdit, if you're not happy with this create a new folder in my documents called zip files, the copy the zipped files into that folder then delete the origianl on the desktop.

Cheers SC.
Anything more than pen and paper gets me sweating about knackering up 1000 worth of kit and about 3 years work!!!
Alan