Mar 19

Switching gears, technologically speaking

Things have been moving right along at Tidbits for Techs, quite literally! Toward the end of February, we got word that a rental home was available. We were living in an apartment that was just too small for our family of four, and the house was big enough and then some. The price was right, and everything fell right into place. We had to pack our home and be moved and out of the apartment inside of FOUR days! We worked tirelessly, but we got it done!

A major consideration for the move was that the broadband speed in the neighborhood of the new house is 1.5mbps DSL. No cable, FIOS or other technology. Just DSL with 2003 speeds. We decided that it would be enough for our needs (including my full time work-from-home job) and we took the plunge.

I can say that going from 30mbps Cable to 1.5mbps DSL was not easy. We went from high speed to high latency! Comcast’s latency was only 10ms, and now CenturyLink’s DSL is 60-80ms most of the time.

In an earlier post, we were going to capitalize on the high speed cable we had in order to bring a VPS home and run a Minecraft server ourselves with our own extra computer. With the DSL we can’t do that! But, we are still using that computer to run a Minecraft/Bukkit server just for our own use, and we are also using it to optimize our Internet connection. How?

Well for one we’re using the Squid web proxy server. It caches everything that goes through it. It helps when we use the same things. For example, my wife downloaded a PDF file and then sent me the link for it. It took some time for her to download, but because of the proxy server, I downloaded it instantly. Web sites load slightly quicker too and it uses a bit less bandwidth, leave more for other users on the network (sometimes we’re all four on our computers at the same time.)

Second, we use ad blocking software. Less content to load means less bandwidth used and quicker page load times.

We’ve also learned to be OK with watching youtube videos in 360p. Anything else just takes too long. Being patient helps, and lowering our expectations has been a huge help. It is NOT high speed broadband like we’re used to- but its enough.

I’ll detail our digital adventures as I refine things and let you all know how its going. And this, to the right, is what we gave up high speed for. An acre of land, a rushing river behind it, peace and quiet and room to breathe. Aaaaahhh…

Feb 15

How to Fix: Internet Explorer has stopped working

“Internet Explorer has stopped working“. Look familiar? Another common one as of late is “[Object Error]” that just won’t go away. This bit of nastiness can be a real pain when someone is just trying to check their mail, Facebook, or read the news. The fix is pretty easy, most of the time.

First, you need to understand that Internet Explorer is a stable program. It does not just randomly stop working. Something has introduced instability in Internet Explorer. It doesn’t matter if its IE6, IE7, IE8, IE9 or IE10. And really, the same goes for Firefox and Chrome too. They are generally stable. If they are crashing, something is causing it.

The number one cause of “Internet Explorer has stopped working” is Add-Ons. Toolbars. Extensions. Junkware. Spyware. Viruses, even. Sure, you can often fix many problems by simply doing a reset on Internet Explorer. But that doesn’t get rid of the addons, it just disables them. And sometimes, that isn’t enough.


The first thing you need to do is to remove the programs that supply these addons. Refer to my post “Junkware and Adware: Identification and Cleaning” and remove everything that you find.

In any version of Windows (XP through 8)
1) Press the Windows Key and R
2) Type appwiz.cpl and click OK
3) Get busy uninstalling junk that matches my list above.

Next, download and run Malwarebytes’ Anti-Malware. Get the free version. There’s no compelling reason for the pro. It’ll get rid of anything else that you missed.

Last, press Windows +R and again and type in “inetcpl.cpl” and click OK or press Enter. Go to Advanced, then click on “Restore advanced settings” and then click on “Reset…” and then Reset again. Now click on Close, then restart Internet Explorer.

Another thing you’ll need to do while in  Internet Properties is go to the Programs tab and click on “Manage add-ons”. On the left side under “Add-on Types” look at “Show:” and make sure you disable all unneeded addons (see the junkware list for details) in each catagory: All Addons, Run without permissions, and Downloaded controls. If you don’t do all three, you might not be successful.

Close Internet Properties and restart Internet Explorer. Now, the error “Internet Explorer has stopped working” should be fixed. If it is not, then go through Add/Remove programs again. Remove anything that resembles anything else on my Junkware list. A good trick also is to sort by installation date (Vista/7/8 only) and remove the most recently installed programs and see if one of them is the culprit. Try them one by one.

Attention Internet Explorer 10 (IE10) users: Go to appwiz.cpl, click on Installed Updates and then in the top right where it says “Search Installed Updates” search for KB2670838 and remove it if you have it. If not, that’s fine. Clear the search bar and instead just uninstall Internet Exlorer 10.

If you have further trouble, leave a comment below and I’ll help as soon as I can.

Now you should have a nice new shiny Internet Explorer that doesn’t crash when you look at it. Enjoy!

Feb 10

Home Server vs. VPS – a quick Cost and Performance analysis

Which is cheaper: Running a server from home, or renting a VPS (Virtual Private Server)? We’re trying to pinch pennies where we can, and my son Derrick suggested upgrading an extra PC we have and running his Minecraft server at home. Would it save enough money to be worth it? I didn’t know the answer. The first task is to find out the cost of every little thing.

In one corner, we have the VPS at MyHosting.com. The VPS is an eight processor (its a VPS so its not counted quite the same as an 8 core processor) with 3GB ram and 20GB hard drive space. This is sufficient for the Minecraft server that my son Derrick runs. It costs $27.15 per month.

In the other corner, we have a Athlon 64 X2 4200+ (2.2 GHz dual core processor) with a 160GB SATA hard drive, and 3GB ram. To upgrade it from the 1GB to 3GB will cost $25. The next thing I had to figure out- how much will it cost to run?

I did some research, and came up with the following:
1) A system such as this one takes roughly 150w of power to run, at the most.
2) My local utility charges 6.6 cents per kilowatt/hr.

So, take those, and what do you get? Math.

Watts  x  Hours Used
—————————-   x  Cost per kilowatt-hour = Total Cost
1000
(Borrowed from http://michaelbluejay.com/electricity/computers.html)

So, plug in the numbers. There are 730 hours in the average month. Take 730 times 150 watts, divide by 1000 and you get 109.5 killowatt hours used, and at 6.6 cents per kw/hr that’s 722.7 cents, or $7.23/mo.

VPS: $27.15/mo or $325/yr
Home: $7.23/mo or $86.76/yr

Extrapolate that into a year, and that’s $238/yr saved! For that money, I can afford to replace the power supply or hard drive in the home server if it dies. Its a LOT cheaper.


Things not taken into account: If our home power or internet goes down, so does our server. Also, home IP numbers are prone to change now and then. For the simple gaming server, we can deal with that for $238/yr savings. On the other hand, my business website can’t afford to go down, and so a simple VPS with 512mb ram is plenty to run that. Those generally cost about $6/mo and are well worth the price.

Overall it is VERY cost effective for us to run the home server. Do some of the math and see- it just might be best for you too!

Not too long after this article first appeared, we had a change of plans! We moved to a new home that only has 1.5mbps DSL, and its not very fast… So what did we do? Check out this post, it goes into more detail.