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This is an odd problem I've been having for about 2 years now. I was hoping some of you hardware gurus could help me out with it. Here's the issue:
Whenever my hard drive starts to get full, like as in less than 10% free space left, the screen begins to randomly black out for a few seconds every ten minutes or so. It blacks out, turns itself back on, and then blacks out again, a few minutes later, over and over. Annoying as hell of course, when you're trying to get work done.
Now, I *know* it's a result of the full hard drive, because this only ever happens when the hard drive is full and it is fixed when the hard drive is emptied again. I'd thought it was viruses in the past, since the problem was fixed as soon as the thing was reformatted. I'd also thought it was maybe an overheating issue, or a powersupply issue. But now I'm convinced that it's a hard drive space issue. Why would the thing work fine again, with the exact same hardware running, once Windows was re-installed?
My only guess is that it has something to do with the lack of virtual memory space taxing the RAM, and in turn taxing the graphics processes enough to black the whole thing out for a few moments every 5 to 10 minutes or so. It seems to be worse with memory intensive programs running in the foreground.
I'd like to get this thing figured out without having to delete half my programs and files, or reformatting yet again. Hopefully there's a solution.
(I have 1GB Ram. Win XP. AMD Sempron processor (3000+, 1.8 ghz). The hard drive is 150GB, with about 9GB free. The display adapter is a GeForce 7600 GS. All drivers and programs have been updated and virus/spyware scanned--clean. Please help.)
"Go to, I’ll no more on’t; it hath made me mad." - Hamlet
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I thing you have it all figured out. However, 9GB should be enough to hold a 2 GB swapfile or something like that. You should consider letting Windows handle the swapfile, if you don't already, and maybe defrag the HDD (with swapping disabled, of course). Linux has a clever solution for those problems: It uses a dedicated swap partition, so no file fragmentation ever happens. You could simulate that by moving your swapfile to a separate partition.
Good luck!
Cheers,
Sebastian
--
"If it was two men, the non-driver would have challenged the driver to simply crash through the gates. The macho image thing, you know." - Marc Clifton
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That's serious overkill. Killing the old swap, defragging, and creating a new non-resizable swapfile will accomplish the same thing without complicating your filesystem.
It is a truth universally acknowledged that a zombie in possession of brains must be in want of more brains.
-- Pride and Prejudice and Zombies
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I disagree. He has had the problem several times, and I think that warrants a special setup.
However, for most people, it really IS serious overkill.
Cheers,
Sebastian
--
"If it was two men, the non-driver would have challenged the driver to simply crash through the gates. The macho image thing, you know." - Marc Clifton
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How do you create a partition without reformatting?
"Go to, I’ll no more on’t; it hath made me mad." - Hamlet
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Depends on the Windows version.
On Vista, Computer Management is capable of shrinking an existing partition, and adding one in the empty space.
On older Windows, you would need a utility, such as Partition Magic (AFAIK does not exist for Vista).
In both cases, the problem will be your current partition is quite full and fragmented, you can only shrink a partition with Vista for as far as it topmost part is empty (don't expect that). And the Windows defragmenter is crap, it does hardly move the files to the lower parts of a partition, all it does is concatenate file fragments. Again Partition Magic should solve that.
Whatever solution, be prepared to spend a couple hours.
Luc Pattyn [Forum Guidelines] [My Articles]
DISCLAIMER: this message may have been modified by others; it may no longer reflect what I intended, and may contain bad advice; use at your own risk and with extreme care.
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JKDefrag should take care of the fragmenting, any better PartEd-containing LiveCD (like Knoppix) should be able to do the resizing.
However, resizing is a delicate thing. It might fail, and leave you with no data, so you should backup you data before attempting to resize.
I've never had ntfs-resize fully fail on me. However, I've had my share of problems with it: I had to write down the new partitioning information and perform the repartitioning in GPartEd TWICE. Otherwise, there would be trouble with the partition's size information. Happened on all Dell-Laptops I've ever resized partitions on.
Just a suggestion for the original poster...
Cheers,
Sebastian
--
"If it was two men, the non-driver would have challenged the driver to simply crash through the gates. The macho image thing, you know." - Marc Clifton
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Okay, my theory is shot all to crap now. I wound up reformatting my hard drive due to some other on-going issues that I was tired of fighting with. Once everything was reinstalled, it started flashing black and coming back on again while running one of the two programs I had installed, other than the operating system and all my device drivers. There's now 127 GB free on the HD, and the virtual memory is coming off of it's own dedicated 5GB partition.
Strangely enough, the problem only occurs on certain programs. Even on resource intensive games like Sims3, it works fine. On the other program, Terragen2, it cuts out on virtually every click.
So basically I'm at a loss. It must be a hardware issue, with either the RAM sticks or the memory card.
Oh, I also have EI installed, and for some reason it takes 35 seconds from the time I open the browser to the time it loads Google. I know. I timed it. I have no idea what's going on there, on a brand new OS install. Surely there's no viruses or spyware already. 
"Go to, I’ll no more on’t; it hath made me mad." - Hamlet
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Yup. It's the RAM. I checked the mem usage of Terragen 2, and there was a huge amount of objects loaded. Once I deleted the population of objects, it quit blacking out. Go figure.
So how do I fix it?
"Go to, I’ll no more on’t; it hath made me mad." - Hamlet
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What is your OS? how much RAM is present?
Is your memory running low?
Was there a lot of disk activity, i.e. memory being swapped out to the page file?
Check Task Manager, Performance, Physical Memory, Free
if low, and you are below the max RAM your system could hold, add 1 or 2 GB.
If that is not possible, try freeing some memory by terminating/not starting apps & tools you don't need at the moment; reduce file system caching; ...
Luc Pattyn [Forum Guidelines] [My Articles]
DISCLAIMER: this message may have been modified by others; it may no longer reflect what I intended, and may contain bad advice; use at your own risk and with extreme care.
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If it's low memory, add more. YOu should test that your memory is actually good though with www.memtest86.com/ [^] Burn the CD, let it run overnight. Any errors reported mean your ram is faulty and needs replaced.
It is a truth universally acknowledged that a zombie in possession of brains must be in want of more brains.
-- Pride and Prejudice and Zombies
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At first, I suspected the built-in disk cleanup wizard. The wizard could be kicking in, and you have a buggy cleanup extension installed. But I don't see how that would affect the video.
The video driver could be crashing. IIRC starting with XP SP2, the system can recover from a crashed video driver without bluescreening. (I know Vista does this, I'm not positive but I think XP can too.) Update the video driver and see if that helps.
--Mike--
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Hah that is strange - I have experienced almost every kind of computer problem - except yours.
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I am creating a program for a children's ATM for the local kids museum, and I'm having problems sending data to the machine (over RS232). I am using a .dll supplied by the manufacturer that is used to interface the dispenser with a computer. I think the problem is in sending the hex characters to the machine. I open the port find (according to the generated log file), but then I send and don't recieve the ACK. here is the pertinent part of the code. thanks for any help
#include "stdafx.h"
#include <windows.h>
typedef struct
{
unsigned int uiPort; //communication port
unsigned char ucDataBits; //Data bit
unsigned char ucParity; //Parity bit
unsigned char ucStopBits; //Stop bit
unsigned long dwBaudRate; //Baud Rate
HWND hwnd; //Parent window handle
unsigned char ucCommandType; //command type(1: ezCDM-1000 )
}SETINFO;
typedef unsigned int (*EZLINKOPEN)(SETINFO* setInfo);
typedef unsigned int (*EZLINKCLOSE)(void);
typedef unsigned int (*EZLINKPATH)(PCHAR pcMessage);
typedef unsigned int (*EZLINKSEND)(DWORD dwCmdExcuteTime, PUCHAR pcMessage, UINT uiCmdSize);
typedef unsigned int (*EZLINKRCV)(PUCHAR pcMessage, UINT *piRspSize);
int _tmain(int argc, _TCHAR* argv[])
{
//Loading dll------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
HINSTANCE hdll = NULL;
hdll = LoadLibrary(TEXT("ezlink")); //load the dll
if (hdll == NULL)
{
printf("Didn't load dll\n"); //tell me if it failed
}
//Mapping the dll's functions--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
EZLINKOPEN ezLinkOpen;
EZLINKCLOSE ezLinkClose;
EZLINKPATH ezLinkPath;
EZLINKSEND ezLinkSend;
EZLINKRCV ezLinkRcv;
ezLinkOpen = (EZLINKOPEN)GetProcAddress(hdll,"ezLinkOpen");
ezLinkClose = (EZLINKCLOSE)GetProcAddress(hdll,"ezLinkClose");
ezLinkPath = (EZLINKPATH)GetProcAddress(hdll,"ezLinkPath");
ezLinkSend = (EZLINKSEND)GetProcAddress(hdll,"ezLinkSend");
ezLinkRcv = (EZLINKRCV)GetProcAddress(hdll,"ezLinkRcv");
//handle the error
if(!ezLinkOpen) //end program if dll mapping fails fails
{
FreeLibrary(hdll);
printf("Failed to map open function!\n");
return -1;
}
else //otherwise, lets send some commands
{
unsigned int result;
//Setting the log path--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
char message[] = "C:\\Documents and Settings\\august brower\\My Documents\\Visual Studio 2008\\Projects\\cash machine";
result = ezLinkPath((PCHAR) &message);
printf("Result of Path: '%i'\n", result);
//Opening the port---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
SETINFO pSetInfo;
pSetInfo.uiPort =3;
pSetInfo.ucDataBits = 8;
pSetInfo.ucParity = 2;
pSetInfo.ucStopBits = 0;
pSetInfo.dwBaudRate = 9600;
pSetInfo.hwnd = GetActiveWindow();
pSetInfo.ucCommandType = 1;
result = ezLinkOpen(&pSetInfo);
printf("Result of Open: '%i'\n", result);
unsigned char response[20] ;
UINT *rspSize;
rspSize = (PUINT)malloc(sizeof(UINT));
//Sending commands
unsigned char command[6] = {0x01,0x30,0x02,0x50,0x03,0x60};
unsigned char command9[1] = {0x06};
unsigned char command1[12] = {0x01,0x30,0x02,0x4B,0x42,0x32,0x42,0x32,0x42,0x32,0x03,0x0B};
unsigned char command2[7] = {0x01,0x30,0x02,0x42,0x21,0x03,0x53};
PUCHAR cassette; //check cassette
PUCHAR ack; //acknowledge
PUCHAR bill; //set bill dimensions
PUCHAR dispense; //dispense 1 bill
cassette = command;
ack = command9;
bill= command1;
dispense=command2;
//--get cassette info-------------------------------------------------
result = ezLinkSend(4000,cassette;message,6);
printf("Result of Send: '%i'\n", result);
result = ezLinkRcv(response,rspSize);
printf("Result of Receive: '%i'\n", result);
result = ezLinkRcv(response,rspSize);
printf("Result of Receive: '%i'\n", result);
result = ezLinkSend(4000,ack,1);
printf("Result of Send: '%i'\n", result);
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Did you get a solution to the issues you have been having with the EZCDM1000.
I am looking to control it through VB.net also.
Any tips ?
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Hi,
I installed the above printer a month or so ago connecting it to my wireless hub via a cable. I printed out the printer n/w setup and it gave its n/w id as 192.168.2.20. I then installed the PC driver s/w. For a month or so all was fine. Whenever I wanted to print, my laptop was able to communicate with the printer.
Last week the laptop could not communicate with the printer and on using a printer key-combination I printed out its setup and the I/P address now ends .21 rather than .20 So I eventually reinstalled the driver, it found the printer, got its adress and all was OK for a day or so.
But now the PC can't find the printer again. I pinged it to find the printer I/P adress has gone back to ending .20
I assume I either need a constant printer I/P adress or the Samsung driver should be able to detect the printer adress.
Any help appreciated.
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Is the printer using a static IP or is it setup to use DHCP to get it's address? If DHCP, then change it to use a static address.
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Hi Dave,
You're right it was set as DCHP, I've now found how to change it to STATIC and hopefully it will be OK now. Thanks for the help.
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Scenario:
I have a USB RFID card reader. It pretends to be a keyboard (HID Keyboard Device) and when a card is swiped, it 'types' the card serial followed by return in to whichever application has focus.
I need to capture the serial coming from the reader so I can store arrival and departure times of cards in a database. I have been given 2 (two) days to come up with a demo of this technology for one of our customers!
Possible Options:
1) win32 api calls to hook keypresses: I have this working, globally, as I would like it to, but has the disadvantage of capturing keypresses from the standard keyboard - I'm assuming this is not at a low enough level to distinguish between PS/2 and USB keyboards.
2) wmi calls to access the usb device directly: I'm not really sure where to start with this - My language of preference is C#, and it looks like it might be a lengthy task to wrap these calls
3) fake it! Make sure that my demonstrator (a colleague) knows to ensure that the 'scanner' app has focus, and that he should not touch the standard keyboard. I can use standard winforms key events, and even fake the back end DB if necessary.
Any suggestions, pointers to tutorials gratefully received!
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Thanks for this - I had a look and decided it was a bit too involved for a demo - I've gone with option 3 (fake it!) for now, so I can get back to my main project!
Cheers,
Al
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Hi
I am developing ndis 5.1 miniport device driver. I want to receive data from BULK IN pipe with continuous reader.
I configured pipe with WdfUsbTargetPipeConfigContinuousReader but when I call WdfIoTargetStart, continuous reader fails and EvtUsbTargetPipeReadersFailed callback functions is called from framework.
Do you have an idea what may cause this problem?
Ridvan Tekdogan
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Member 2932293 wrote: Do you have an idea what may cause this problem?
What are the values of the NTSTATUS and USBD_STATUS[^] in the callback function?
Best Wishes,
-David Delaune
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NTSTATUS 0xc0000001
USBDSTATUS 0x0
Rıdvan Tekdoğan
Department of Computer Engineering
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