'No Stupid Questions' (NSQ) Internet & Technology Edition

[Screw Danlon]

Is there a product (or a term for a type of product) that I can put around a cable to keep it from kinking? “Kink protector” only returns long curly things, but I need it to stay the same length.

The place where the cable attaches to my VR headset occasionally gets caught when I put it on and I’m worried about it breaking since it’s not one I can repair myself.

 

[RomanesEuntDomus]

A relatively simple solution would be using TeraCopy to move everything - including hidden and locked files - to the new drive then changing the letter assignment.

That should do the trick. It's kinda iffy to use some freeware to do this with my harddrive, so I really don't understand why Windows doesn't have a functionality for that kind of stuff...

Is there a product (or a term for a type of product) that I can put around a cable to keep it from kinking? “Kink protector” only returns long curly things, but I need it to stay the same length.

With spiral things you mean things like this:

?

Those cable spiral protector thingies should not interfere with the length of cable and ensure that the only kinky stuff is whatever's going on inside the VR set.

 

[Boris Blank's glass eye]

That should do the trick. It's kinda iffy to use some freeware to do this with my harddrive, so I really don't understand why Windows doesn't have a functionality for that kind of stuff...

Sadly there are many areas Windows is either lacking or actively regressing. I wouldn't recommend that software without using it myself, and it had worked for me so far.

 

[RomanesEuntDomus]

Sadly there are many areas Windows is either lacking or actively regressing. I wouldn't recommend that software without using it myself, and it had worked for me so far.

Yeah, you'd think it's a rather basic, potentially insanely useful(necessary functionality that's not hard to add into Windows at all.

 

[⠠⠠⠅⠑⠋⠋⠁⠇⠎ ⠠⠠⠊⠎ ⠠⠠⠁ ⠠⠠⠋⠁⠛]

That should do the trick. It's kinda iffy to use some freeware to do this with my harddrive, so I really don't understand why Windows doesn't have a functionality for that kind of stuff...

Teracopy is just a tool for moving files in a somewhat faster and less annoying way than the regular Windows copy commands.

If the drive is fucked, then you probably should manually move the most important stuff first (with Teracopy or no) and then move the rest wholesale. When you say this isn't the 'OS drive', I assume you mean your WINDOWS directory is on another drive. are your User folders on the same drive as the Windows directory or on this one? If they aren't on the failing drive, you don't really have to worry about any registry related issues, just file permissions issues, which Teracopy should transfer IIRC. If not, ROBOCOPY with the right set of parameters should do it.

 

[Screw Danlon]

That should do the trick. It's kinda iffy to use some freeware to do this with my harddrive, so I really don't understand why Windows doesn't have a functionality for that kind of stuff...


With spiral things you mean things like this:
View attachment 2005468
?

Those cable spiral protector thingies should not interfere with the length of cable and ensure that the only kinky stuff is whatever's going on inside the VR set.

Ok, they looked like a slinky in the photos, so I assumed the wire ran through them in that shape.
If that’s what a more ‘heavy duty’ one looks like, maybe they were just stretched out. Gracias.

 

[RomanesEuntDomus]

If the drive is fucked, then you probably should manually move the most important stuff first (with Teracopy or no) and then move the rest wholesale. When you say this isn't the 'OS drive', I assume you mean your WINDOWS directory is on another drive. are your User folders on the same drive as the Windows directory or on this one? If they aren't on the failing drive, you don't really have to worry about any registry related issues, just file permissions issues, which Teracopy should transfer IIRC. If not, ROBOCOPY with the right set of parameters should do it.

Yeah, that's what I meant. Windows and (afaik) all its components are on my SSD.
Might sound silly, but this is mainly about games and other software that is installed to that drive, I just don't want to go through the hassle of reinstalling all that stuff (though I might have to anyway with some stuff, depending on whether it is in the damaged parts or not...)

 

[Boris Blank's glass eye]

Yeah, that's what I meant. Windows and (afaik) all its components are on my SSD.
Might sound silly, but this is mainly about games and other software that is installed to that drive, I just don't want to go through the hassle of reinstalling all that stuff (though I might have to anyway with some stuff, depending on whether it is in the damaged parts or not...)

If you have every necessary file and fix the filepath issues it shouldn't be a problem.

 

[⠠⠠⠅⠑⠋⠋⠁⠇⠎ ⠠⠠⠊⠎ ⠠⠠⠁ ⠠⠠⠋⠁⠛]

Yeah, that's what I meant. Windows and (afaik) all its components are on my SSD.
Might sound silly, but this is mainly about games and other software that is installed to that drive, I just don't want to go through the hassle of reinstalling all that stuff (though I might have to anyway with some stuff, depending on whether it is in the damaged parts or not...)

Understood.

If the Users folder is on this hard drive, rather than the SSD, you might encounter some issues moving it, though it's probably possible to move them from a live USB or something. Otherwise, it should, as you say, be fine.. mostly. But remember that the drive can fail entirely at any time, so if you have stuff that isn't games, personal photos etc, that needs to go first.

 

[D_Tractor]

Is there a product (or a term for a type of product) that I can put around a cable to keep it from kinking? “Kink protector” only returns long curly things, but I need it to stay the same length.

The place where the cable attaches to my VR headset occasionally gets caught when I put it on and I’m worried about it breaking since it’s not one I can repair myself.

https://www.mcmaster.com/cable-strain-relief/

or just wrap several spiral layers of electrical tape around it

 

[Smaug's Smokey Hole]

Understood.

If the Users folder is on this hard drive, rather than the SSD, you might encounter some issues moving it, though it's probably possible to move them from a live USB or something. Otherwise, it should, as you say, be fine.. mostly. But remember that the drive can fail entirely at any time, so if you have stuff that isn't games, personal photos etc, that needs to go first.

If windows gets bitchy about permissions there's always the ole' Linux on an USB stick.

Macrium Reflect is also really good if you want to straight up clone a drive with a couple of button presses. You can easily clone the Windows drive itself to a new drive, resize the partition(useful when going from a smaller SATA SSD to a larger NVME one), then boot straight off of it. Most of the time! Always keep the original drive around until it boots, I've had some issues where the MBR seems to have gotten borked so I had to repeat the process once more, thankfully SSDs are very fast so it doesn't take long.

 

[Disco Inferno]

Is there a benefit of getting/learning how to use a Raspberry Pi? My (probably autistic) coworker won't shut the fuck up about it. Keeps saying that learning how to use one will open up employment opportunities for him.

 

[Vecr]

Not really, it's just a somewhat slow computer that runs Linux. Or other things, I guess, but that's less common.

 

[Never Scored]

Is there a benefit of getting/learning how to use a Raspberry Pi? My (probably autistic) coworker won't shut the fuck up about it. Keeps saying that learning how to use one will open up employment opportunities for him.

It won't open up employment opportunities, but they are very useful for some applications. There's a pretty good ad/tracker blocker called pihole for example. You just run a script and it sets itself up. You could put in on a Raspberry Pi Zero W, point your router at it as a DNS server and you've blocked ads and trackers network wide for like $20. It's a good little computer to hook up to your TV and play old games or stream media from a desktop PC elsewhere on your network as well.

 

[jimsterlingspronoun]

Is there a benefit of getting/learning how to use a Raspberry Pi? My (probably autistic) coworker won't shut the fuck up about it. Keeps saying that learning how to use one will open up employment opportunities for him.

Had to attend an interview where this old bloke kept going on about tinkering with pi as if it made him some hacker and an obvious attempt to make it look like he kept up with modern tech.

We just ignored it, all we were interested in was his industry experience and C++ skills.

 

[gangweedfan]

Whats the best phone plan if I just want to use my phone as a portable hotspot for my chromebook? I dont care about texting or stuff like that.

 

[Stasi]

Any audio nerds here? I have a bluetooth question. Got a wireless headset but having pretty bad sound lag/delay on my windows machine (like 0.5s to 1s), don't really care with music but watching video or gaming is almost impossible. I don't think its the headset because I have no lag on my phone, linux laptop or other windows laptop. Looking up online all I get are the same copy pasted articles from Pajeets suggesting disabling Windows audio enhancement or reinstalling drivers which does nothing.

I suspect the wireless/bluetooth card in the machine (realtek) is the issue but don't want to shell out for a new one on a guess.

1. Any suggestions for troubleshooting this in Windows/any settings I can fuck around with to try to fix it?
2. If the realtek card is the problem, any suggestions for a replacement or a USB dongle? (its a small form factor PC so takes a laptop size card)

This is the headset btw: Amazon

 

[Disco Inferno]

Any audio nerds here? I have a bluetooth question. Got a wireless headset but having pretty bad sound lag/delay on my windows machine (like 0.5s to 1s), don't really care with music but watching video or gaming is almost impossible. I don't think its the headset because I have no lag on my phone, linux laptop or other windows laptop. Looking up online all I get are the same copy pasted articles from Pajeets suggesting disabling Windows audio enhancement or reinstalling drivers which does nothing.

I suspect the wireless/bluetooth card in the machine (realtek) is the issue but don't want to shell out for a new one on a guess.

1. Any suggestions for troubleshooting this in Windows/any settings I can fuck around with to try to fix it?
2. If the realtek card is the problem, any suggestions for a replacement or a USB dongle? (its a small form factor PC so takes a laptop size card)

This is the headset btw: Amazon

Gut feeling says there's some sort of interference. Have you tried disconnecting other blue tooth devices? One of them may be causing the problem.

 

[Dick Justice]

Any audio nerds here? I have a bluetooth question. Got a wireless headset but having pretty bad sound lag/delay on my windows machine (like 0.5s to 1s), don't really care with music but watching video or gaming is almost impossible. I don't think its the headset because I have no lag on my phone, linux laptop or other windows laptop. Looking up online all I get are the same copy pasted articles from Pajeets suggesting disabling Windows audio enhancement or reinstalling drivers which does nothing.

I suspect the wireless/bluetooth card in the machine (realtek) is the issue but don't want to shell out for a new one on a guess.

1. Any suggestions for troubleshooting this in Windows/any settings I can fuck around with to try to fix it?
2. If the realtek card is the problem, any suggestions for a replacement or a USB dongle? (its a small form factor PC so takes a laptop size card)

This is the headset btw: Amazon

Troubleshooting 101 would be to identify if it's bluetooth itself. Do you have any other bluetooth peripherals you could use to check to see if they also have latency? Can't you run a liveCD linux off your main machine and see if that still has the issue?

 

[Stasi]

Gut feeling says there's some sort of interference. Have you tried disconnecting other blue tooth devices? One of them may be causing the problem.

Have a controller paired, tried disconnecting but still same issue. Out of interest tried using both at the same time and the controller has massive input lag (works perfectly fine without the headset paired). Tried the same combo on my windows laptop and works fine.

Troubleshooting 101 would be to identify if it's bluetooth itself. Do you have any other bluetooth peripherals you could use to check to see if they also have latency? Can't you run a liveCD linux off your main machine and see if that still has the issue?

Thats a good point, I'll try a live linux distro, at least that will confirm if its a hardware issue or a windows/settings issue.