Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Computing/2013 January 28

Welcome to the Wikipedia Computing Reference Desk Archives
The page you are currently viewing is an archive page. While you can leave answers for any questions shown below, please ask new questions on one of the current reference desk pages.

January 28

How to update from WinXP to Win7 via Apple BootCamp?

Help! I'm a total newb regarding installation and updates of MacOS systems, but I kinda hesitate asking on any dedicated Apple forums because I'm afraid of getting flamed for using Windows on a Mac, or that they'll try selling me a wholly new machine.

Here's my problem: My machine here is a first generation (c. 2005-'06) Mac Pro with 2.6GHz, that years back upon purchase I installed WindowsXP Home on, using BootCamp. Back then, the brand-new Mac Pro seemed the most bang for the buck with a rather standard machine rather than having one customized utterly from scratch, especially because I got potentially two operating systems for pretty much the price of one. Just my luck, it was exactly that one year that Adobe had discontinued their entire support for MacOS (citing the reason that "hardly anybody's using Macs anymore, so we can't afford bi-platform releases any longer"), which was why in order to be able to use the Adobe Production studio, I had to go with Windows one way or the other.

Back then, I'd originally tried to install a copy of WindowsXP Professional 64bit freshly bought for just that occassion, but BootCamp refused to acklowledge it as a genuine Windows copy (maybe 64bit Windows was too recent to be included in that version of BootCamp?), so I could only install Windows XP Home 32bit.

I've only ever seen the MacOS screen for maybe 30 minutes back then, until BootCamp had completed the Windows partition, and that's the last time I've ever seen the MacOS screen on this machine.

Now that we're past faulty Windows Vista, with Windows7 around and obviously working quite pleasantly and reliably for me on other machines with required backwards-compatibility (after all, I certainly don't have the moolah at the moment to update my entire product line that back in 2005/'06 was bundled in Adobe Production Studio), and the latest BootCamp version obviously supporting Win7, I'd like to somehow update from WinXP Home to Win7 Professional 64bit, also to for the first time use all the CPU power my machine can give me.

So, how the Heck do I do that? I don't even know how to get back to the MacOS screen!

Also, I guess with all the mess this rather limited WinXP Home has been through throughout the years, I guess I'd like to make a clean sweep by backing up all my important data, then formating the C: drive, and only then I'd like to go back to MacOS somehow, as that's what I obviously gotta do to make the new version of BootCamp work.

And when I'm back on MacOS, how do I update the OS itself? Is it free, or as costly as most other Apple products? --85.182.140.98 (talk) 14:03, 28 January 2013 (UTC)

Hold option key during bootup. ¦ Reisio (talk) 16:22, 28 January 2013 (UTC)

Okay, been googling for a few hours now. I'd like to document my findings below for others in the same situation, and to submit it for review in case any experts are here to kindly inform me whether this roadmap below ain't quite functional or perfect yet.

Looks like what I need is OS X Lion or OS X Mountain Lion as the first MacOS's to support BootCamp 4.0 required to install Win7 64-bit. It also looks like either requires the 64-bit system support update[1] and the ATI Radeon X1900 graphics card 64-bit support update[2] prior to the new OS install. More updates required are the Graphics Firmware Update 1.1[3] required to install Windows7, plus the SMC Firmware Update 1.1[4] (seems there's no version 1.0, at least not as an update) and the SMC Firmware Update 1.2[5] to fix some fan issues.

I've also found out that obviously what I need to do during booting is keep the C button pressed until MacOS is gonna come up (but you say it's the option/alt key?).

Then, I'll have to update entire MacOS in order even just to install those updates on top of it. In consecutive order, I'll have to:

• buy the $29 Snow Leopard upgrade, run it, and install those 64-bit updates,
• get an Apple ID for AppleStore and download Mountain Lion for $19.99 which requires the above 64-bit updates to be pre-installed in order to install Mountain Lion, as it's required to run BootCamp 4.0 that I need in order to finally install Win7.

Anyhow, once I'm at Mountain Lion, it seems I'm supposed to go to Finder, choose Help > Help Center and search for "upgrade Boot Camp" and "upgrade Windows" in order to get a free copy of BootCamp 4.0 and instructions on what to do for a Windows "clean install". Probably it'll include using DiskUtility to erase the faulty Windows partition (normal boot process still has me choose between a forever borked WinXP Professional setup and the working WinXP Home system).

On the other hand...some updates for BootCamp 3.x are telling me I only need WinXP and some version of BootCamp 3.x in order to install Win7 64-bit. Hmmm...guess I'll just try updating BootCamp to 3.x with 64-bit Win7 drivers in my Tiger first before coughing up 50 bucks just to install Win7 64-bit on this machine via two other MacOS systems that maybe I don't even need.

Anyway, even way before all that, I'll make sure if I'll still get my c. 2006 Adobe Production Studio to install and properly register (or else I won't be able to use it) by trying to install Photoshop. The last time I tried that I had no internet connection to register, the given hotline for phone registration only had a tape running, telling me that this number had been discontinued years ago and I should call regular support, which had another tape running saying they only operate on weekdays from noon to 4pm or something. --85.182.140.98 (talk) 18:53, 28 January 2013 (UTC)

Oh joy! Windows 7 Upgrade Advisor now tells me there's nothing I really gotta do other than buy a new HDD to fit both Win7 64-bit and my software on it together! Still, I'll first try updating my BootCamp in Tiger and see if I can get the additional updates installed there, just to be on the safe side. --85.182.140.98 (talk) 19:05, 28 January 2013 (UTC)

You know you can run Windows 7 in a VM within Mac OS, for no additional cost over that of Windows itself. ¦ Reisio (talk) 19:23, 28 January 2013 (UTC)

And did you know that you can get free technical support for your Apple computer at any Apple retail store? If you're having trouble with this process, the in-store assistants can walk you through the entire process and answer your questions in-person. Nimur (talk) 16:19, 29 January 2013 (UTC)

The IP of the question locates to Hamburg; here is Jurnfergstieg and Alstertal; both look very scenic and have a Genius Bar in-store. Nimur (talk) 16:27, 29 January 2013 (UTC)

Well...thanks for the links, but I remember talking to an Apple customer support person in a dedicated store a few years ago when I was in need of a VGA adapter, and they had no idea what a Mac Pro even was. They kept trying to tell me that there's no need for a VGA adapter on a laptop such as the MacBook Pro, while I was trying to explain to them that I was just plainly talking about my Mac Pro, successor to I think the old G5. When they understood at last that I was really talking about "something with a tower", they just handed me the right thing.

By now, I think I'll just buy a new 126GB internal HDD, boot into my MacOS Tiger for the first time in more than 5 years, update BootCamp to the latest 3.x version with 64-bit support via internet and check what else of the above update drivers listed above will properly install, and then I'll use BootCamp to install Win7 on the new HDD. --85.182.140.98 (talk) 11:12, 30 January 2013 (UTC)

Calendar appointments

In MS Outlook, when an appointment is on a recurring schedule, it is possible to drag its instances to other dates without affecting the recurring schedule. However, whenever the schedule itself needs to be changed (even if it's only adding an end date to it), all previous exceptions are lost and moved to their default dates. This has been driving me mad for years, and I'm curious if anyone knows a workaround or can suggest better software that handles this kind of thing properly. Years ago, on a Palm Pilot, it was possible to change a recurring schedule without affecting all previous instances (i.e., a user had a choice between changing the whole schedule or only a part of it from some point onward). I refuse to believe that there is currently no software which can do what Palm Pilot could do in the last century :)—Ëzhiki (Igels Hérissonovich Ïzhakoff-Amursky) • (yo?); January 28, 2013; 16:14 (UTC)

I can't answer the question itself, but would like to say that new is not necessarily better, in software as in other technology. For a simple example, VHS video tapes allowed you to play, copy, and record from any device and used a pretty much universal format. DVDs/Blu-Rays, on the other hand, make it quite difficult to copy some content and use multiple formats, including Digital Rights Management software which can block you from viewing your movie. Yes, they had reasons for doing what they did, and the new formats are superior in other ways. Still, something was definitely lost. StuRat (talk) 14:46, 29 January 2013 (UTC)

how can i transfer data from a clipper application to SAP

I HAVE A Clipper application. how can i transfer the database(dbf format) to SAP — Preceding unsigned comment added by 117.199.0.68 (talk) 17:10, 28 January 2013 (UTC)

Clipper, wow, that's a blast from the past! :) The easiest way to do this is probably by opening the .dbf file in Excel, saving it in a delimited format (.csv), and then importing that to SAP (or it may even be possible to import it in the Excel format; I don't remember). Of course, if you also have memo fields attached or some other bells and whistles, you might need to look for other ways. Cheers,—Ëzhiki (Igels Hérissonovich Ïzhakoff-Amursky) • (yo?); January 28, 2013; 17:30 (UTC)

Burning to and ripping from a CD and changes in audio quality

Some time ago, I ripped some songs from a CD at 320 kbps and burned one of the songs into another CD. Later, I ripped that song also at 320 kbps from that CD and burned it into yet another CD. Then I ripped the song from that CD into my computer again at 320 kbps. I noticed that the song that was ripped from the original CD in the beginning sounded like it had a higher audio quality than the song that was ripped from the last CD and that the song had less audio quality than that song that was ripped for the second time and the song that was ripped the second time had slightly less quality than that song that was ripped the first time. I then tested this observation on a music editing software called Sony Acid Pro to see if it was true and saw that it was true based on the wavelength details. Why is it that if I repeat burning a song from a CD and then ripping that song to the computer, the song loses more quality each time even if it is burned at ripped at 320 kbps every time? 71.98.163.183 (talk) 17:58, 28 January 2013 (UTC)

When you ripped a song "at 320 kbsp", you actually used lossy mp3 compression, which always leads to a loss in quality. To avoid any loss in quality you should use either no compression at all or some lossless compression (Monkey's Audio for instance). Ruslik_Zero 18:55, 28 January 2013 (UTC)

Time to get a digital audio player. ¦ Reisio (talk) 19:00, 28 January 2013 (UTC)

I use Windows Media Player whenever I rip songs from a CD. So, how would I use no compression in Windows Media Player to rip songs from a CD in order not to loose any audio quality? 71.98.163.183 (talk) 20:29, 28 January 2013 (UTC)

Windows Media Player could rip to WAV, last time I checked; you’ll have to look around in its preferences. As Ben says below, it won’t necessarily be a perfect copy regardless of the format you rip to, but it’s incredibly unlikely your ears will notice at all unless the disc is actually physically good and well scratched. Once you have it in WAV, if you’d like to store it digitally, convert it to something like FLAC to reduce its size without losing any quality. You could also just take care to always burn new CDs from the original MP3s, instead of MP3s transcoded from MP3s, etc.. ¦ Reisio (talk) 00:03, 29 January 2013 (UTC)

I have a few different comments. 1. It's really easy to fool yourself when it comes to audio quality; many people think they can hear differences between certain setups (e.g. CDs with green marker and without) but completely fail blinded tests. 2. You will always see differences in the wave form after lossy compression and decompression, but that change is probably not audible. Lossy compression is designed to discard parts of the signal that humans can't hear anyway. At low bitrates it will discard audible information but at 320k it shouldn't. Repeated compression discards the same information, which was already gone, so it won't make the quality much worse. 3. Repeatedly encoding and decoding in any lossy audio format will gradually degrade the signal because of roundoff error ("generational loss"), but I'm not sure how many iterations it would take to be noticeable. This is an interesting experiment which would be easy to do (and which someone has no doubt done). There is a paradoxical effect wherein the generational loss can be worse at higher bitrates, so it's possible you may really be hearing something. 4. Ripping a CD even without compression is far from trivial because CDs have weak error correction and not much synchronization information. Writing a CD also won't perfectly write every bit. Exact Audio Copy has a reputation for doing a good job of reading (I don't know if the reputation is deserved) and it will let you rip to lossless formats like WAV or FLAC. It can also burn CDs, but no more accurately than any other program since there's no way to improve that in software. -- BenRG (talk) 20:47, 28 January 2013 (UTC)

I also noticed that some of the songs that are up on the Internet or on file sharing software at 320 kbps seems to have higher quality in terms of wavelengths and audio quality than if I rip such songs from a CD. Why is that the case? Are some of those high quality songs up on the Internet ripped in a certain way or come from the original source? 71.98.163.183 (talk) 03:01, 30 January 2013 (UTC)

Remove Proxy Server without Password

I have a used laptop that has a proxy server installed and I do not know the password. Can I just purchase a new copy of windows and reinstall? Yes Window 7 is installed with a proxy address and I do not have the permission to change.

Bit confused about the quetion, do you mean that internet explorer settings has a proxy address set up and you do not have the permissions to change it? What version of windows is installed? ---- _nonsense ferret 20:59, 28 January 2013 (UTC)

MP3 Format Error

I bought some 4G IRULU MP3 players before Christmas to make my nephews a best-of selection of my music. I was able to use Windows Media Player to download a few dozen MP3's as a test, they worked fine. When I finalized my playlist it was well under 4G in size, so I downloaded it. A good third of the songs were left off as too much data when I synched the list.

I cut this down and erased the original synchs be deleting them from the drive to through windows (Computer from the F drive at the Start Button in Windows 7) to make space for them. Once I got the new playlists synched in full I played the drives. Both played about 2-3 dozen songs in order alphabetically from W through A and the showed "Format Error" on the MP3 window once they got to the B songs.

I tried repeating the process, erasing the existent playlist from the drive through windows, removing even more songs from the playlist, resynching. I still get the same "Format Error" warning on the MP3 player screen once it gets into the B songs.

What might possibly going wrong, and should I look for or try as a fix? Thanks. μηδείς (talk) 21:35, 28 January 2013 (UTC)

Well seems a bit obvious to say, but I guess either:

i. is there any possibility that some of the file name or file meta properties (like album/artist) in those problem files might include characters from a non-latin character set which might be tripping up the player? I've certainly seen this sort of problem

ii. the files have been mistakenly converted to a different file format or using incompatible settings for the B songs that are different from the A songs - you can check this by looking at the file properties in windows explorer.

iii.there was some sort of file corruption in the copying process, so delete and recopy.

iv. there is a fault with the player, kind of unlikely given it was the same for both drives (although I have heard of some scams that involve the sale of wrongly labelled flash memory so can't absolutely exclude this). ---- _nonsense ferret 22:35, 28 January 2013 (UTC)

All the songs are in the same format, MP3, and some of the songs that begin with a B played before when I made the test recording but don't know. My gut feeling was that the original memory wasn't erased--in which case I would need to fully erase the MP3 players. Or that for some reason the playlist was too big or not well formatted. I don't thing cover art is the issue, but I will check. So, in the meantime, how do I make sure the players are really truly blanked? μηδείς (talk) 22:44, 28 January 2013 (UTC)

AFAIK if windows says they are all deleted, then they are all deleted and barring hardware faults should be successfully overwritten - I would have done exactly what you did. Are you able to play songs individually without using a playlist (I amn't familiar with that brand of player). ---- _nonsense ferret 22:56, 28 January 2013 (UTC) Oh and not all MP3s are equal - there are a few possible parameters that could be different such as different static bit rates, or variable bit rates etc ---- _nonsense ferret 22:58, 28 January 2013 (UTC)

I haven't found a way to play individual songs of the MP3 drive through the computer, if that is what you mean. The playlist itself on the PC is fully playable from the PC. As for the player, just the entire library is available as one long list. μηδείς (talk) 23:12, 28 January 2013 (UTC)

I understand, I wrongly thought when you said playlist on the device you meant that you were using a separate 'playlist' file on the device along with the mp3s, rather than just allowing the device to find and play all the mp3 files itself ---- _nonsense ferret 23:16, 28 January 2013 (UTC)

The red flag for me in your question is that you say you're using Windows Media Player, which is capable of doing some weird things with Digital Rights Management, and has been known to screw up mp3s so they can't be played on some devices. There may be a better way of doing this, but here's how I would go about eliminating WMP as the source of the problem:

1. Transfer all the mp3s to a removable device like a USB stick or an SD card. Verify they're safely copied, then remove the device.
2. Remove the files from your PC.
3. Using another media player (WinAmp, MediaMonkey or Songbird (software) are all free and should work fine), open the mp3s from the removable device. Check they all play as expected. Note any error messages that occur.
4. Assuming no errors, if possible transfer the files directly to the MP3 player. You may need to copy them to the PC first, but you might be able to get away without it.
5. Play the files on the MP3 player.

I will warn you that, if my hunch about DRM is correct, it might be possible that by deleting the files from your PC you may break the link between the files and your rights to play them - I believe some files have some sort of 'copy count' built in to prevent you sharing them widely. So, if you follow my instructions, you do so at your own risk. Sorry. - Cucumber Mike (talk) 23:50, 28 January 2013 (UTC)

But should digital rights management be relevant here? All but some five or ten of the songs were uploaded to my computer from compact disks, not itunes or amazon. μηδείς (talk) 20:38, 29 January 2013 (UTC)

Ah, my apologies; I took 'downloaded' to mean 'from the web' - I see what you meant now. You're probably right - it is unlikely to be a DRM issue (although I think CDs do have the possibility of inbuilt DRM that could be being transferred). Nonetheless, I have experience of WMP sucking with regard to transferring files to MP3 players, so if these were my files, I'd still be tempted to try a different method of transfer. YMMV. - Cucumber Mike (talk) 21:58, 29 January 2013 (UTC)

I just tried clearing one of the MP3 players then resynching with WMPlayer, and now it gives a format error after even fewer songs. It seems to start playing from the beginning of the unproblematic files, as if it knows where in the synch list to start. I am curious what other program I should try ysing to synch it besider Windows Media Player and iTunes? Thanks. μηδείς (talk) 01:35, 30 January 2013 (UTC)

Let me clarify. Is there some other program I might already have like media player I can use to synch, one that would have come with the laptop? I am loath to download anything at this point. μηδείς (talk) 03:27, 30 January 2013 (UTC)

If it was me, I would just be manually copying the mp3 files into the drive through windows explorer. The only way to work out what is going wrong is the scientific method: to clear the mp3 player drive and then copy one unproblematic file and check it plays, then clear the drive and copy one problematic file and check it doesn't. Then look for differences and try other files one at a time to see what they have in common - still my best guess if there isn't a hardware fault (which seems unlikely as both players give identical results?), is either some unusual character contained in the name (accented letters, foreign character set, hyphens, percentages or meta-properties of the mp3 file), or the format of the file itself is somehow different. ---- _nonsense ferret 14:56, 30 January 2013 (UTC)

I'll try copying them manually from windows explorer to the drive. Just to clarify, there is no "problematic file". The files are all fine when played from the PC in any manner. When they are synched to the MP3 player, they are in alphabetical order. Once I get to the bees, I get a format error when trying to play that song and all those following back to the beginning of they play list. I'll try the manual copying after dinner. μηδείς (talk) 19:32, 30 January 2013 (UTC)

Okay, what i have discovered is that (1) even though the player claims to be wma compatible it isn't, (2) playlists that do not indicate they include cover art and other non-music files actually do, and (3) manually copying MP3 files from the computer hard drive to the MP3 player outside of any file structure (i.e., individually or as a list selected by ctrl A) will transfer and play properly! Yeah. Thanks for the help! μηδείς (talk) 04:13, 31 January 2013 (UTC)