IT guys - networking

[MDV]

Sweet, cheers again mate.

[dave_mc]

Oh dear god NO! :lol:

Nothing against IT innately.

Hate IT departments.

Despise business/management jargon.

hehe

[MrBump]

It's an interesting point about the crippling of work PCs, Mark.

I spent years in PC support, providing support for users, but also "crippling" their PCs, mainly to protect them from themselves.  One of the biggest gripes from users has always been locking down data transfer - disabling floppy drives, CD/DVD burners, USB ports etc.  That really got peoples back up.  But working in the financial sector meant that there were some very serious directives from the FSA about the movement of data for banks that had to be implemented.  Same with restricting web access and email - that really pissed people off too.  But when I was and Exchange adminstrator, it was easy to see the damage that viral emails and spam could do to a system.

However, now I work for a much larger British bank, and am classed as "management" rather than "techie", and it's easier to see the restrictions as a pain in the @rse!

Mark.

[MDV]

Fair points. It still irks me though. I've never networked PCs, for instance, so I figured I'd ask, knowing there are IT guys here, but as far as the average day to day (month to month, year to year) operation and maintenance of a PC goes, I can handle it, and its annoying that we're treated like kids that cant use a pc. Maybe my company is particularly bad for it - you cant even change the desktop or get in the control panel on computers at my work!

If the powers that be think we're all retarded and IT-illiterate, they should get us macs!

/mac user baiting.

[Roobubba]

Look like a couple of nice rigs, there!

I'm in the process of planning my next upgrade. I'm still using DDR1 on socket 939 because I've had a whole load of DIY to spend my disposable income on, so the next rig will be i7-based, too. I did manage to get my hands on an Intel X25-M solid state hard disk (80Gig version), which I'm currently using. I have to say, it's incredible!! The difference it makes to game loading times is phenomenal, even/especially in a old system like mine. Everything in windows feels very snappy indeed. They do cost a lot (although the new 34nm version costs a fraction, so these are rapidly becoming very viable). If you can possible stretch to it, that is the one upgrade I would absolutely recommend to anyone. Do beware of other manufacturers' disks, though. The new Intel SSDs are blindingly good, and don't have some of the issues that "budget" SSDs have once they're full (the OCZ Vertex range is a suitable alternative, although the new pricing structure makes these not worthwhile, now - at least until the new OCZ prices come into effect).

Whoa, that was only going to be a short response!

Roo

[MDV]

Yeah, I looked at some SSD stats - stupid stuff like cutting boot time by a factor of 10. They look great, especially for audio, with the reading of huge wavs (or LOADS of them in the case of using something like DHF - you bounce a modest track of that down and with all the mic bleeds and all the rest of it they end up drawing from something stupid like 10,000 wavs).

But thats something for a later date. They're the future, theres no doubt, but I dont feel the need to be on the edge of the envelope with that when by the time my next upgrade comes along (3 years or so, if history is any guide) they'll be the top end of standard issue.

[Roobubba]

Yeah, I quite agree with Anand's assertion that once you've started using an SSD, you will never, ever want to go back. Sadly, this can be expensive! The price will definitely be coming down fairly quickly (as we're seeing already), which ois good news. The other bonus here is that you don't need to upgrade the whole machine, it's a drop in replacement for any machine (and machine with SATA, of course).

Roo

[MDV]

Thats what I'm worried about (buy it, cant go back), and thats the plan, too (upgrade later; at least the data drive)