General Tech Weirdness

[9to5cynic]

I thought this could be a kind of cool topic idea. Basically post any weird things tech wise that have happened to you recently (or not recently). I am thinking this way, any weirdness you have could be posted here (especially if you don't feel like filling up the board with weird questions (like me)).


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I was booting a computer at school, beeped (no keyboard) then instead of going into windows it went to the unetbootin usb boot loader. I know nothing was plug into usbs because I just plugged in the keyboard. Also, these comps are not dual booting anything.

Anyone hear of anything like this?

 

[johnlgalt]

I lost all my HDs in one fell swoop to a lightning strike that seems to have corrupted the battery on my APC backup UPS as well as my old PSU....

All under warranty, so....

 

[andruoid]

Not really weird, more frustrating really.

I upgraded my Acer AO722 from the stock 2GB to 4GB. Last week I purchase a stick of Kingston DDR3 4GB and it was causing major issues, must have been a faulty unit as the netbook blue screened 8 times in 5 days. First time I have ever experienced a BSoD since Win2k (really!) so it was very surprising to say the least. I troubleshooted other possibilities just to make sure it was indeed the RAM. The HDD was flashed with new firmware as well so I thought that could have been it. Anyway, I returned the part and got some better quality G.Skill DDR3 4GB instead (this was my first choice but, it was out of stock the week before).

Booting fast and furious at 21secs now in a netbook with a hybrid drive.

 

[9to5cynic]

Here's something weird, I don't actually remember hitting 'post' on this topic, I remember typing it, but then I thought I closed the browser... hmm...

This one didn't happen to me, but in front of me:
My instructor couldn't 'copy' and 'paste' from a second partition in class. For some reason the windows 7 'copy here' feature wasn't working. Not quite sure why. He though maybe it was some weird process running... Eh..

 

[johnlgalt]

what was he trying to copy and paste?

 

[9to5cynic]

A VM. We had to set up some VMs in class today, and a couple of students and the instructor couldn't copy it using that particular method. As far as I'm aware, the ctrl c ctrl v worked.

That's what I did, I'm always controlling something.

 

[johnlgalt]

KB junkie from many days gone past here as well lol

BTW - did he happen to have the VM software running?

 

[9to5cynic]

Hmm.. I don't think so. It didn't error out or anything, it just didn't do anything.

 

[johnlgalt]

Right, he said the option was not there - usually the option is not available if the file cannot be copied for whatever reason.

 

[9to5cynic]

I think he was able to pick the 'copy to folder' option, but without any results... anyway..

That's about it for any weirdness on my front.

 

[andruoid]

Not really weird, more frustrating really.

I upgraded my Acer AO722 from the stock 2GB to 4GB. Last week I purchase a stick of Kingston DDR3 4GB and it was causing major issues, must have been a faulty unit as the netbook blue screened 8 times in 5 days. First time I have ever experienced a BSoD since Win2k (really!) so it was very surprising to say the least. I troubleshooted other possibilities just to make sure it was indeed the RAM. The HDD was flashed with new firmware as well so I thought that could have been it. Anyway, I returned the part and got some better quality G.Skill DDR3 4GB instead (this was my first choice but, it was out of stock the week before).

So I spoke too soon. The G.Skill RAM is now making my netbook BSoD. Me thinks I'm not meant to upgrade. The stock 2GB is fine for now. I even updated the BIOS last week to see if that was the issue. Nope. No worries, it'll go back and I'll get a better laptop bag. ;-)

 

[drdoom]

So I spoke too soon. The G.Skill RAM is now making my netbook BSoD. Me thinks I'm not meant to upgrade. The stock 2GB is fine for now. I even updated the BIOS last week to see if that was the issue. Nope. No worries, it'll go back and I'll get a better laptop bag. ;-)

Are the timings and voltages correct for the 4Gb stick? Can you go into the BIOS and make sure the voltages and timings are set properly?

 

[andruoid]

Are the timings and voltages correct for the 4Gb stick? Can you go into the BIOS and make sure the voltages and timings are set properly?

I tried 2 different sticks now, both compatible with the type of MB found in this laptop/netbook. The BIOS is a very basic one, not much info or customization.

 

[9to5cynic]

Okay, here is one. I am running Virtualbox 4.12. The gui doesn't work. XP SP3
I am able to run vms by using the command line. I can also open the gui, and press enter to launch the default VM, but I cannot interact with the gui via mouse at all (keyboard does work)

I have reinstalled it several times, but no luck. It is holding up my install of Windows 8.

 

[andruoid]

With the VM shutdown how much video memory are you giving the OS?

 

[9to5cynic]

? I with virtualbox off? When I launch vbox, the gui doesn't accept my mouse clicks. Depending on the guest, I vary the settings.

 

[johnlgalt]

Weird. Host?

 

[9to5cynic]

XP SP3. It's weird because I've been having the problem ever since the 4.1 updates, and eventually went back down to 4.0.X

But, I can control the GUI with the keyboard, so it isn't too bad. And I just VMware workstation from my school (which is what we use there), so I've been using that quite a bit too.

I remember I google'd it for a while when it first happened, and I haven't seen anyone else post something similar.


UPDATE:
Problem still exists with the 4.1.4 update.
On an unrelated note, I've started using vmware workstations much more now...