June 6, 2014
PC Community Main Meeting
7:30 - 10 pm June 6, 2014
Calvary Baptist Church 28924 Ruus Road, Hayward California
The meeting was called to order at 7:40 pm by President Chuck Horner. See Lola Hunter at the ticket table, for raffle tickets, door prize tickets, and 3" x 5" cards to write questions for discussion/answers at the end of the Meeting. Get at least one $5 raffle ticket for this month's raffle prize, Monster Green Power Center.
Note: the July Main Meeting will take place on the 11th.
The Southwest Computer Conference will take place in Ontario, CA, the last weekend of June.
We need people to help with programs and publicity.
Presentation: Member Andrew Tews shared The Joy of Building Computers. Don't wait until "the newest stuff" comes out: there will always be new stuff, and you'll wait forever. You can now get a phone that combines the function of previously "hot" devices, including pager, phone, GPS, camera. . . . What's the difference between the $288 computer at Fry's and the $6,000 model. If you want to just surf the internet, the low end computer will meet your needs. If you do a lot of graphics and music, you'll need more.
The best shopping sites are:
- Newegg.com
- Amazon.com
- Frys.com
- Centralcomputers.com
- Tigerdirect.com
- Bestbuy.com
These sites include buyer reviews and comments. The reviews can give you useful information, including whether or not problems others have had will even apply to you (e.g., the frame was larger than the space someone had for the new device).
Don Odle pointed out that it is important to look for items with more than 10 reviews so that you have some assurance that there are some that are not written by company employees.
The best tech review sites are:
- anandtech.com
- cnet.com
- tomshardware.com
- techwrapup.com
Andrew suggests starting with the case. He suggested one with double walls, for noise control. The new motherboards do not have pins, but are held down by the arm. His new fan comes already greased. If you get a fan without grease, you can add and distribute. An old credit card makes a good spreader; be careful not to get too much grease on the fan so that it doesn't get onto other components. Avoid the white stuff, which is silicon-based. It tends to 'migrate' all over the computer innards.
To compensate for relatively slow rendering speed, two graphics cards supply the display, one for the top half of the screen, the other for the bottom half.
NFC Express Bar turns on a computer with just a tap.
You can add an extra cooling fan. Be careful that the fan does not cover the first memory slot. If you have the space in your case, you can add a fanless cooler.
The best way to buy memory is in pairs. Memory cards are keyed, so they only go in one way. Be sure they snap all they down. Don suggests going to the Crucial site to load a small program that will analyze your computer, telling you the maximum amount of memory your computer can handle and which of their memory cards will work for your system.
Some CPU's have video built in. Otherwise you need to add a separate video card. The Haswell chipset will accommodate 3 monitors, for the multitasking user.
You may also need a separate sound card. If it has controls, be sure your case has an open bay so that you can get your fingers on them.
Andrew leaves the power supply for last. Once you have all your other components, you will need to calculate the size of power supply that you need. Input your components into the Extreme Power Supply Calculator site and it will calculate the power supply you need. Andrew suggests adding about 20% to the estimated power need so that as the power supply degrades over the years, it still will put out enough power. On the other hand, if your chipset does not put enough load on the power supply, it might not go on at all. Less expensive power supplies are generally less efficient.
You have a choice between a traditional and a solid state hard drive. RAID 0 does not really provide true back up. The RAID 1 back-up system writes to both hard drives at the same time. You'll probably want a DVD drive also. Blue-Ray and card reader are other drives. If the card reader has a plastic case, ground it to the case.
Door Prizes
| Arcsoft bag | Bill Huston |
| Kanex bag | Sally Holt |
| Plextor bag | Bayle Emlein |
| USF bag | Andrew Tews |
| OUSD water bottle | Diane George |
| GQ CD-R 50 disc stack | Joy Somerville |
| Vivante tee shirt | Bob Dunn |
| Photoshop Elements, from O'Reilly Press | Bill George |
| Windows 8.1: The Missing Manual, from O'Reilly Press | George Kornbluth |
Raffle Prize: Monster Green Power Center went to Michael Wong
Question: Screen resolution problem trying to increase resolution and it won't work, though it used to. It was suggested that the display probably has gotten changed from Mirror to 2 displays, and the computer is looking at the second display. This can be reset through the Advanced settings in the Control Panel.
Yorkman has a neighbor's Brother MFC with a paper jam. Sometimes it's easy to look inside. Don Odle suggested cleaning the drive wheels, the rubber wheels that pull the paper in.
On Monday, May 19 Yorkman got a call from a person named James who had a heavy Indian accent. "James" tried to get him to download TeamViewer and share his computer with "James." When Yorkman said he would call him back in the morning and got a call back number–--in Belgium. He did not pursue the conversation.
Thank you to George Kornbluth for taking care of refreshments and to Michael Wong for managing the signs.
Note: The July meeting is being moved to the 11th.
The meeting was adjourned at 9:50 pm.
Respectfully submitted,
Bayle Emlein, Secretary
