Jump to content

PCs for dummies


Strangelove
 Share

Recommended Posts

  • 2 weeks later...

I have a question about downloading PC games. It's mostly for curiosity's sake but I'd like to know anyway.

 

So the system requirements for X-Com said it takes up 20 GB. I deleted some stuff to make some room for it and ended up with between 50-60 GB of free space by the time steam finished preloading it. Then when I unpacked it, my free space briefly shot down to 39 GB before it went back up to 49.9 GB. The final installed game is a little over 13 GB. So what's up with the extra 7 GB? Does the computer need 7 GB just to unpack it? Is that a figure they put in mind for future DLC? Do the devs just overestimate the system requirements to give themselves a buffer?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Windows also likes to have 15% of a hard drive as freespace too. But yeah it's mainly an overestimate so you have enough space. I wish steam would give a download size though so I know how much/little it'll need. Though I know it's an issue with Source games as they download different amounts depending on which you already have installed.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 4 weeks later...

well, I'm on my Mum's laptop because I tried to install Windows 8 on mine and it's completely borked.I bought the upgrade download from MS and I tried installing from a USB stick, did a custom install cos I wanted a fresh start.

 

It seemed to install fine and said it needed to restart, and I was really pleased how easy and fast it was, but then the Windows 7 bird startup screen showed and I thought, 'uh oh'. It said windows needed to repair itself, couldn't find a problem and should restart, and it just keeps doing that in a loop. The windows 8 repair on the insallation USB stick doesn't find anything either. All I can think to do now is reinstall windows 7 but I'm loathe to do that. :(

 

edit: If I choose to boot from my second hdd, it seems to be loading fine. The thing is, I don't and never have had an OS installed on my second HDD, so I have no idea why it would boot from that disk.

Edited by TheFlyingGerbil
Link to comment
Share on other sites

I didn;t the first time I tried installing it, I did the second time. It ended with the same result. I just need now to work out how to get it to load from my main HDD the OS is installed on and to stop it thinking i have three installs of windows 8.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 5 weeks later...

I was wondering:

 

As a Windows user, I format my drives in NTFS, including external Hard Drives. For the sole reason that they support files > 4GB (backup of Steam games, Movie rips, etc). Problem is, I have to move files to my other external drive formatted in FAT32 so I can plug it in to my PS3 or any other computer, using Linux or Mac.

 

Now FAT32 is supported by all, but why is it that we still have this 4GB file size limit? Actually, I don't really need to know the answer to that, it just seems to me that we should have something better than that by now. What I'd really like to know though, NTFS can be used in Linux, but what about on a Mac?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Oh. I got a Mac Mini for stuff I need to do. So in addition to having just the PS3 read my HD, I now have a Mac I have to consider when deciding how external drives are formatted, which got me to thinking why is there still a limit on a FAT32 drive and why is there nothing better than that that is universally supported.

 

I just want to format my hard drives in some universal format where I could store files > 4gb.

 

The PS3 reads only FAT32 disks, to answer the question. I solved that problem by just streaming stuff to it.

Edited by eleven
Link to comment
Share on other sites

It's a technical limitation of FAT32. And if I remember right, OS X can read a modern NTFS volume, but will not alter files on it.

If you're only storing large files, you could also split them up with various utilities such as archivers (WinRAR, probably 7zip) and just expand them to an NTFS drive temporarily?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Yeah, that's an option. It's useful for storing backups, but not media or disc images though, as you've said, for storing them only. But I guess those are uncommon enough. The thing is, I may have to reformat my drives, and I wanted to see if there is a better option than FAT32. I had hoped I would just be able to mount my NTFS drive on a Mac and I don't have to move my files around. It's not like NTFS is new. It's been around for a while there should be reliable solutions for it (I did search and it looks like there is one, but I don't know how reliable, as people are still saying you can't do that on a mac).

 

It's my fault for not sticking to the standard! Goddamn proprietary shit ruins everything I swear if I ever own a gadget like... oh wait nevermind.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

NTFS is owned by Microsoft, that's why it's not well-supported on other platforms.

 

Like fuchi said, the 4 GB file limit is a technical limitation of Fat32. It just cannot support larger files, and in order to do so we'd need a new standard. I don't know why there hasn't been one developed though.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

You could also partition a disk to have a bit of one format, a bit of another... I have one for instance that's 80GB of FAT32 to backup my PS3, and the rest in HFS Plus(?) for Apple's Time Machine backups. If you find an extension (is that term current?) to work with NTFS on your Mac, I don't see why it shouldn't work... I think it's pretty easy to port from Linux to OS X (BSD) as I understand it, and there are working Linux drivers that can manipulate NTFS. I used one just the other day to edit a Win7 registry file from a Linux boot disk.

Edited by fuchikoma
Link to comment
Share on other sites

I was going to mention partitions myself. It's really the only viable way to work with all of these different things at once without the limitations of FAT32. I used one of the NTFS writing apps a few years ago and it wasn't very good... but I'm sure they've improved a lot since then since it was on OSX 10.4 or something.

Edited by Faiblesse Des Sens
Link to comment
Share on other sites

FAT32s 4GB limit is right their in it's name, it's 32-bit. Same as 32-bit OSes only supporting 4GB's of RAM. It's in huge use because it's so old, and only recently been kinda less useful with the advent of large ISOs and HD video. Back when FAT32 came out 4GBs files were about as likely as we think of 4TB files today.

 

As mentioned NTFS is Microsoft's own format, though many Linux's have r/w of it. I would have assumed OSX does given it has Bootcamp (wiki implies recent versions of OSX have NTFS r/w capabilities but requires fiddling with non-trivial settings to enable..which sounds about right). I'm to understand ext2 is supported by most OSes, though that doesn't include PS3 (personally I have a 16GB pen drive for quick copies to PS3, and just stream everything else right from Windows PC. Format a hDD as n when I want to do a back-up of it). Which is the other option, get a NAS or something instead and then it won't matter what formats the computer system uses, the NAT should still dish it out.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 2 weeks later...

What difference does it make if you download a 64 or 32 bit version of a digital audio workstation (reaper)? Is it just the amount of memory it can use? It seems like there would be less problems with the 32 bit version in getting it to encode to MP3s just from a bit of reading, and I think he only has 4GB of RAM anyway, so is it safer to stick with the 32 bit version?

 

edit: never mind, think I'll stick with the 32 but version for him, it's most compatible with any add-ons he may want to try. It needs to be foolproof as I'm the best he's got to help if he runs in to problems, heaven help him!

Edited by TheFlyingGerbil
Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 2 weeks later...

So.. I plan on upgrading my mobo, cpu and ram

 

Current Specs:

CPU: Phenom X4 9850

Mobo: MS-7548 (Aspen)

GPU: XFX Radeon 6870

RAM: 8gigs

PSU: Antec EarthWatts 650W

Case: BitFenix Merc Alpha Black Mid ATX

 

to

 

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant / Benchmarks

 

CPU: Intel Core i5-2500K 3.3GHz Quad-Core Processor ($199.99 @ Canada Computers)

CPU Cooler: Zalman CNPS5X Performa CPU Cooler ($4.99 @ NCIX)

Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-Z77X-UD3H ATX LGA1155 Motherboard ($129.99 @ Canada Computers)

Memory: G.Skill Ripjaws X Series 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR3-1600 Memory ($34.99 @ Canada Computers)

Total: $369.96

(Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available.)

(Generated by PCPartPicker 2012-12-28 00:09 EST-0500)

 

Thoughts?

Edited by CrowKnow
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

 Share

×
×
  • Create New...