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ThunderTitan
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Unread postby ThunderTitan » 20 Apr 2015, 17:30

Nah, MS Office would be a requirement, so it would need to be a Win device...
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Unread postby Pol » 20 Apr 2015, 20:53

ThunderTitan wrote:Well the person i was asking for went with a 700W one, hope that's not a problem...


Also, i'm looking to get a cheap-ish laptop for word processing and net-browsing... Something under 500$ (even though that's still a lot since the $ went up so much lately).
That should be possible or definitively was some time ago.

Check Toshiba Satellite C50-B-143 or Toshiba Satellite C50-B-12L. Toshiba's builds were of decent quality. After installation remove bloatware. But the same pricinple can be applied for Dell and anyone behind..
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Unread postby GreatEmerald » 21 Apr 2015, 08:51

Hm, really? I have an old Toshiba L500, and its build quality is horrendous when it comes to the monitor cabling (the VGA/camera/mic cables go through the hinges at an extreme angle and thus get cut in half very easily just by opening and closing the lid).

Did they improve this aspect in current builds? Because from my own look through the available selection, I do like the current Toshiba laptop hardware...

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Unread postby mr.hackcrag » 24 Apr 2015, 17:01

Help! I need information about everything I need to do to establish an excellent connection for online gaming. I'm using this right now: http://www.belkin.com/us/p/P-F9L1002/

Teach me, oh wise ones. :hail:

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Unread postby GreatEmerald » 24 Apr 2015, 19:41

Hm? What do you want to know, then? Obviously it's best to have a wired connection, but in case you can't, just set your router to N mode, choose the least congested frequency, and that's that. Though it's pretty strange that you'd need an external wireless card these days.

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Unread postby mr.hackcrag » 24 Apr 2015, 19:56

GreatEmerald wrote:Hm? What do you want to know, then? Obviously it's best to have a wired connection, but in case you can't, just set your router to N mode, choose the least congested frequency, and that's that. Though it's pretty strange that you'd need an external wireless card these days.
How do I set to N mode and choose least congested frequency?

Well, I'm getting horrid lag in Mortal Kombat X and that may be largely due to all the talk about the PC port being done terribly with the net code and eternal post release patching.

In case it's something on my end, how do I figure out how to optimize it? Do I choose a different internet service or get new hardware/components or something else? I don't know how to isolate the cause of the problem and how to fix it.

I went to pingtest.com and I get a wide range of ratings. I'll do one more test right now and post results: http://i62.tinypic.com/2crq3rp.png

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Unread postby GreatEmerald » 24 Apr 2015, 21:56

Well, there's two kinds of lag due to two kinds of issues: throughput and latency. Latency is ping, that determines how long it takes for packets to get to the remote end. Throughput is speed, determines how many packets get there. In games your maximum throughput is never reached, but you can experience packetloss, where not all packets are received to begin with. Your case may be one, the other or both. Wireless, due to its nature, is not very reliable; packets do get lost more often when using wifi. When that happens, your PC might decide to either ignore it or retransmit it; if it's ignored, you get packet loss, if it's retransmitted, you get more latency, so most likely your problem is both.

The best way to diagnose it would be to connect using wired internet, of course. If not possible, just get the PC as close to your router as possible. (Distance from the router actually determines the maximum throughput, too; the wifi card may be capable of 300 Mbps, for instance, but will only give 11 Mbps at long range.) Also put the antennae of the router perpendicular to your wifi receiver (as in, not pointing towards it, but having their sides facing the receiver).

Then, for optimisation, it's really dependent on your router. Personally I always write DD-WRT firmware on all my routers, since it's very customisable and powerful. Stock firmware rarely allows to configure half the things that DD-WRT does. But either way, it should have the option to set the wireless mode and channel. Set mode to N only, and frequency to 5 GHz. Then for the best channel to use, optimally you'd do a site survey (test what other routers are around, their signal strength and band/channel, and choose a channel that is least used). Some routers have "auto" mode that does that automatically (although it doesn't always work as advertised). DD-WRT has built-in manual site survey functionality, and there is software to do site surveys on PCs too.

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Unread postby Pol » 25 Apr 2015, 13:02

GreatEmerald wrote:Hm, really? I have an old Toshiba L500, and its build quality is horrendous when it comes to the monitor cabling (the VGA/camera/mic cables go through the hinges at an extreme angle and thus get cut in half very easily just by opening and closing the lid).

Did they improve this aspect in current builds? Because from my own look through the available selection, I do like the current Toshiba laptop hardware...
I seen some newer Satellites and they were really decent compared to Acer/Asus. Haven't honor to check out venerable L500.


@mr.hackcrag
I don't know any easy way how to help you. For analyze you may try InSSIDer. Maybe some older versions, I don't check it frequently.

Some routers have "auto" mode that does that automatically (although it doesn't always work as advertised). DD-WRT (Note: check compatibility of your router here.) has built-in manual site survey functionality, and there is software to do site surveys on PCs too.
Otherwise this is actually most exact reply.

Apart from frequency bands, sometimes helps to get stronger antenne. I used for a long time 5dBi one and that succesfully cleaned my signal. :D
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Unread postby GreatEmerald » 25 Apr 2015, 14:05

Actually, for DD-WRT compatibility, you want to check the wiki first:
http://www.dd-wrt.com/wiki/index.php/Supported_Devices
And then the forums (use search):
http://www.dd-wrt.com/phpBB2/index.php
...because the main page with the router database is actually quite outdated.

If your router is supported, then you'd also want to read at least the last 5 pages of the device thread of the forum to see if your router has any quirks to keep in mind, and which builds are most suitable. One can never be too careful when it comes to installing custom firmware.

And yea, inSSIDer, that's one of the site survey programs I was thinking of.

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Unread postby mr.hackcrag » 25 Apr 2015, 18:47

So if router is on 1st floor of house and wireless usb for pc is on second floor of house, I'll presume that's one of the biggest problems. Hmm, I'll have to think about how to resolve this. :thinking:

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Unread postby GreatEmerald » 25 Apr 2015, 20:06

Yeap, definitely. Same issue in my home, actually. We solved it by wiring things to the second floor (both routers can be set to the same SSID and password for "roaming"). Alternatively, one could use a repeater somewhere in the middle, although that's not quite as effective.

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Unread postby mr.hackcrag » 26 Apr 2015, 03:04

Would buying a wireless router be helpful for me? Something like this: http://www.linksys.com/in/p/P-E1200/

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Unread postby GreatEmerald » 26 Apr 2015, 10:35

If you can get the Ethernet cable wired to the second floor, then yes, definitely. Otherwise it could only work as a repeater.

Also, note that how we have it set up, and how you'd want to have it set up too, is like this:

Code: Select all

Second floor router | WAN ← LAN | First floor
                 Internet → WAN | router
In other words, the ISP cable plugs into one router's WAN port, then a cable goes from that router's LAN port back into the wall, goes up to the other router and plugs into its WAN port. You'll also want to set the second router to Switch mode instead of Gateway mode, so that the two don't interfere with one another. (Gateway means the router employs a firewall and a DHCP server, which you need only once per LAN, and Switch means it's just passing everything along without touching it.)

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Unread postby mr.hackcrag » 27 Apr 2015, 20:20

Will I need to communicate with the internet service company to do this?

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Unread postby GreatEmerald » 27 Apr 2015, 20:43

No, just with people who do the wiring, i.e. an electrician; what you need is just an Ethernet cable connecting your two routers. (Unless, of course, you want to have the Ethernet cable going outside the walls, in which case you can do it all yourself; but that usually isn't very pleasant-looking :creative: )

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Unread postby ThunderTitan » 01 May 2015, 12:03

Hey, Pol, what do you think of this one: http://www.pcgarage.ro/notebook-laptop/ ... 400-black/
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Unread postby Pol » 01 May 2015, 19:25

ThunderTitan wrote:Hey, Pol, what do you think of this one: http://www.pcgarage.ro/notebook-laptop/ ... 400-black/
That is good computer for Office work & net browsing, if it's having good price - I wasn't recalculating.

Only possible disadvantage is lack of 1GB LAN support.
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Unread postby ThunderTitan » 13 May 2015, 15:04

How about this one: http://www.emag.ro/laptop-asus-cu-proce ... DR7GRBBBM/

I think my brother wants one that cam play games too... so maybe he'll pony up some dough too...
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Unread postby Pol » 13 May 2015, 15:44

@TT
No Windows, no performance for gaming - that nVidia card is weakling.
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Unread postby ThunderTitan » 13 May 2015, 17:23

Well windows isn't that much of a problem, as long as it's not a laptop i can't install it in. ;)


And i don't need performance for gaming really... but a dedicated card is better then none, right?

And the price is around 480€...
Disclaimer: May contain sarcasm!
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