COMPUTER GEEKS, HELLLLLLP!

“i D/L'ed aol9.0. my whimpy system couldnt handle it, too big i guess. the graphics went all....weak...like the pictures are alot of dots, cant really tell what they are. i can't even look at the captain kangaroo porn site anymore...

i went back to aol6.0 but the graphics are still crap. i checked the setttings under display and it won't let me go any higher than 16 colors..


WTF! ! !”

“I'm hardly a Geek, but I've messed my system up enough and fixed it again to qualify as a beginner geek

AOL is like a worm or virus...it's almost impossible to remove...when you went back to AOL 6.0, I suspect that some things got really screwed up.

Have you tried to reinstall your video driver? You usually have to remove it completely before you reinstall it again.”

“Oh yea, what OS are you using? Win 98, XP or ME”

“You broke it. You deal with it.

Okay okay, you probably just need to redo your monitor driver. It's easy enough.”

“BTW, if you have AOL, they have tech support, you know.”

“its AOL, thats the problem.

AOL sucks, go cable man!”

“Second the video driver reinstall. Sounds like somehow your driver was replaced with another - probably the generic driver - and it doesn't recognize all the modes your video card can really support.

Before you do that, also check your "screen area" setting, right beside the color setting. Make sure it isn't set really low.”

“TnT, it is set the lowest but it won't let me change it.


i dunno why...

how do i reinstall the driver? i think that's the problem but....where is it? is it hardware?

thanks for the help guys...”

“CHECK THE TIME AND DATE!!!”

“AOHell”

“lmao scorchyhead, that's not the problem, bubbette”

“oh yeah, i have win98....”

“What video card are you using? That will indicate which drivers you need to reinstall. Then you can play around with that slider bar that isn't moving for you right now. You're probably stuck in straight 16 color VGA right now..

For instance, I have an Nvidia GEForce 3, so I'd need to reinstall Nvidia drivers and then reboot. I have no idea why AOL felt it was necessary to mess around with your video settings, but they've got a hand in every pocket and about five zillion fingers per hand - they're designed to screw up.

You'll probably either need to check with your computer's documentation to see what the video card is or what the onboard video chipset is. If you can't do shiat whatsoever then Windows may or may not tell you what kind of mess you're looking at, so I'd look at the book. Maybe you could post back here what video setup you have and an obligatory computer guy will point you in the right direction. Good luck dude”

“you are correct, i'm on 16 bit color

Damond compatable 9300K G2.2
Hitachi comp. 9300K G2.2
Trinitron comp. 9300K G2.2
NEC comp. 9300K G2.2
Mnb22g15
Mnb22g18
Mnb22g21
MnP22g15
MnP22g18
MnP22g21
Mnebug15
Mnebug18
Mnebug21
sRGB color space profile


does that mean anything to ya'll?

i got that from ; settings-control panel-display-settings-advanced-color management-add”

“Definitely sounds like AOL broke your video driver, which is hardly surprising. Fortunately, this can easily be remedied by reinstalling your video driver.

If you bought your video card as an upgrade for your computer, the driver can be found on the CD that came with your card. Otherwise, the driver would be on a "Drivers" CD from your computer's OEM (manufacturer) that would have shipped with your computer. In this case, most major OEM's (Dell, Gateway, HP, IBM, etc.) have a telephone hotline you can call for assistance if needed.”

“hmmm...well...i don't have that stuff. my company gave me this computer and i have nothing but the computer.

i'm screwed!”

“WHAT? THERE'S A CAP'N KANGAROO PORN SITE???”

“hmm...If you can see enough of the screen to get on the Internet, you may be able to download the video driver from the computer manufacturer's website -- it might be worth a shot.”

“If you have an AOL address, you have AOL support. Call them. They're paid to deal with computer users like you.”

“ok phaeddy, i'll try that.

thanls guys”

“phaedrus, i don't care what tom terrific says, you ARE the man!.....well....kindof.....

see , i called dell and the dell dood was great and told me , "no problem stratdewd, go to our website and typ in blah blah blah and click on blah blah blah and i'll have the driver file there for you and all you have to do is download it nad bingobangobongo, you're good ta go....


so i D/l'ed it and then....i went through the install thingy and it says.....insert floppy disk, unzip the file onto the floppy and then take it from the floppy to your C drive.....only problem is, i have NO FLOPPY disk port....or whatever you call it, there's not a hole for a floppy!

NOW WHAT!?!??!

PLEASE PLEASE HELP IF U CAN!”

“Fascinating...

OK, if the instructions eventually say to copy the file from the floppy to the C: drive, then skip the floppy step altogether and just unzip the file directly to the C: drive, and see if that will work.”

“is that possible?

the thing is, i get a prompt type message, looks like dos....it says, something like...in order to contiinue, you'll need a floppy disk in yer.....diskhole....and then if i try to skip that the computer has a big hissyfit and that's NEVER a good thing....

lemme try again.”

“try telling the machine that the file is located on the hard drive and not on a floppy, you know, wherever you saved it to when you d/l'd the file from the dell dude.”

“The Dell guy made an extract executable to do the work for you. Call him back and tell him you don't have a floppy drive and he can make another.”

“yeah phaed, he zipped it...i'll try calling him back, thanks bruh...”

“why don't you have a floppy. what would you use if you need to reformat or do a reinstall. I have not have had a computer yet that I did not have to do a complete recovery.”

“A lot of the newer computers don't come with a floppy drive. It's an add-on. It's possible now to make a bootable CD that you can rebuild from, so most PC companies are going that way.

For transferring files, people are going to those little USB flash drives now. Floppies have been too small to do any useful data transfer for about 5 years now anyway.”

“bigpoppa this is not the place to tell people that you are floppy.”

“those little flash drives rock!”

“stratdewd, send me the zip file the Dell guy made for you and I'll create a zip file that you can unzip to your hard drive and then execute the file. Send it to the address in my profile. If you don't see this until Monday, post a message here and I'll send it to whatever e-mail address you want it sent to.”

“No response from stratdewd, yet.”

“wow, ok ski, will do, thanks. just send it to stratdewd@aol.

here comes!”

“stratdewd-

Unfortunately, Microsoft Outlook 2002 automatically blocks attachments with an exe file extension. Rename the file to Atia00.xex and resend it.”

“startdewd, you have e-mail.”

“thanks ski, could you resend that last one, i lost it because i have no graphics”

“I just use system restore. That feature is awesome. Whenever I f*ck something up I just set it back to what it was before I messed around. works every time.”

“stratdewd, will do.”

“thank you kind sir......”

“hey, i'm making a new site/switching hosts and i need to choose:

do i want a dedicated IP for $24 / year ?


what's a dedicated IP about ?”

“It means you always have the same IP address, regardless of how many times you connect/reconnect. Are you hosting a webpage from your home machine? If not, don't worry about static IP.”

“thanks bit.

you're a good man.”

“Concur with bitpusher.

Keep in mind that if you get a "variable" IP, it still may not switch often. I host several sites from home w/o a static IP, and my IP rarely changes.”

“well since i've got the two of you...

http://imhosted.com/compare_plans_detailed.shtml

has been recomended to me. any thoughts ?”

“Hang on just a second...I want to clarify something.

When you were talking about dedicated IP, was that for your home computer, or for the web site you want them to host?

It would be strange for a web host to charge you more to assure that their server always had the same IP...I just want to make sure of what you're talking about here.”

“And on the competing plans thing, I don't have enough info. How big is your site, how much data do you expect to serve, do you have more than one site, etc. If you're working on just a personal site with your blog and some pics, then the minimum seems like it would be plenty. If you're planning on doing e-commerce, or hosting a site like this one, You need to go for more bandwidth and storage.”

“umm. i dunno.
i just went to the website above and clicked on "sign me up" and chose the "starter" version

then it asked me if i wanted a dedicated IP for 24/year.”

“I don't see any mention on that page about IP addresses, and I would be VERY surprized if a host didn't have static IPs for their customers. But this can be a strange world, so who knows...

Sacco, if you want a cheaper way to "host", check out http://www.redirection.net ($15 a year includes domain registration). I've used them for 4 years now and they are reliable. They don't host, but their parent company does if you really need it. They just do internet address and email forwarding. But if you already have access to web space with your internet provider, you can use redirection.net's service effectively.”

“this is my current page:

http://www.cnybulldogs.com


it's very limitted in size (like 10 megs) and sites ( i can only have 5 sites)

i don't plan on doing any commerce or forums or anything, but i want much more space for pics, additional sites, a much bigger mailbox, some cooler features to help me make a better site.

what do you think ?”

“I looked in their FAQ and found this:

Do I need a static/dedicated IP address?”