Haru

Nope, I got it from Dreamspark, my university provides me with an account for.

Hey guys/gals, Long story short, with no discernable pattern windows 7 will randomly freeze on me. And I don't mean temporarily freeze and having to wait for everything to load, I've left it for a day without any response. I've actually encountered this before, but the problem dissapeared after I switched to windows 8. Now, for personal reasons I've reverted but I'm getting this issue again. It never happened when I had 8, so we can rule out a hardware issue, here's what shows up in my event logs from startup til it happens (from newest to oldest): The system has rebooted without cleanly shutting down first. This error could be caused if the system stopped responding, crashed, or lost power unexpectedly. The previous system shutdown at 10:42:55 AM on ‎1/‎27/‎2014 was unexpected. Event filter with query "SELECT * FROM __InstanceModificationEvent WITHIN 60 WHERE TargetInstance ISA "Win32_Processor" AND TargetInstance.LoadPercentage > 99" could not be reactivated in namespace "//./root/CIMV2" because of error 0x80041003. Events cannot be delivered through this filter until the problem is corrected. The driver \Driver\WUDFRd failed to load for the device WpdBusEnumRoot\UMB\2&37c186b&0&STORAGE#VOLUME#_??_USBSTOR#DISK&VEN_USB2.0&PROD_FLASH_DISK&REV_2.B0#Z1AHGQ5100807814&0#. Session "Microsoft Security Client OOBE" stopped due to the following error: 0xC000000D I'm running Windows 7 Ultimate 64-bit, my specs are on my profile, and I have the latest bios update.

As an enthusiest or a business, there's plenty of reason to start using fibre in home. As a normal consumer it may be best to stick with copper since it's so cheap right now. I would go with fibre if your house is going to have immovable walls/floors in the future. There's a nordstroms around where I live that has marble floors with 4MB token ring buried underneath, they HAVE to use wireless now. I'm not sure if they're using mobile data or a hidden wifi network, but either way it's customer data they now are trasmitting through the air. While you probably aren't a business, it may just be a good investment if you plan on having concrete walls or something, or if this is going to be a pain to setup in the first place. If a new standard comes around and you want that extra bandwidth all you have to do is upgrade the endpoint equipment. Anyways, I'm rambling.

I think people need to take a closer look at their anti-virus software choices now-a-days. This isn't the 90s/early 2000s anymore, virus ceators don't have as much of an edge as they used to, the best anti-virus software isn't nessisarily the one with the highest detection rates. I would go for less intrusive software even if it meant being unprotected against a certain exlpoit for a day or two longer than other AV software. Almost all anti-virus companies update their databases frequently enough to prevent your machine from being comprimised. The attacks that do get through are usually because of a missing update or because it's an advanced persistant threat. If you have have someone activley targeting YOU and not everyone they can get their hands on, chances are, they're getting into your box. You have to look at choosing an AV from an acceptable risk model, if all I have to do is change static IPs once every few months and make sure some punk didn't root any of my systems, then picking the least intrusive, cheapest AV software is fine with me.

Networking 101 is here: http://linustechtips.com/main/forum/...first-3-layers In this guide I'll cover the cables and standards that you need to know and quite a bit of history. Before reading this please watch Linus’ guide to Ethernet standards, I will be assuming you watched it during this write up. Older standards/history: In the year 1969 the first message was sent over ARPANET. All it said was "lo", pretty cryptic until you realize it was supposed to say "login" but UCLA's system crashed. At the time they had made custom interfaces to network these computer systems together since there weren't any standards for it (foreshadowing). In this period there were many custom connectors which didn’t really change until standards like X.25 came out. X.25 is more of a wide area network standard, so I’m not going to go into too much detail about it here. Wide area networks are for communicating outside of your own network, and considering the only people who had computers at this time were universities, using this standard sufficed. Fast forward to 1983 and the first standard for ethernet is written, this used what we call a category 3 cable. Category 1 and 2 aren’t really all that important to know about, which usually isn’t an excuse I give for not including a piece of information, but the fact of the matter is that I just don’t know any of the details about those two standards. In Linus’ video he only mentioned as far back as category 5, and category 5’s current standards, it was for good reason, you never really see them. The reason I’m including them, however, it because I have encountered them during work, so it’s important to note that some old stuff is still out there. The first well known Ethernet cable for computer networks was the cat3 cable, it was rated for 10Mbs. Ethernet uses the OSI layer model (yes, I’m implying there are other layer models out there), which means it identifies you by address (mac or ip) and it also has error checking and redundancy. Moving on to 1984 (I’ll get more into the layer model later) Token Ring was introduced, it was rated for 4MBs. “Why would anyone use it?†I hear some of you asking. In my networking 101 article I talked about collision rates. Briefly it’s when two packets of data hit each other and you don’t get your stuff. The way token ring works makes it so there isn’t any collisions, at all. Only someone who had the token could send a packet at any given time, when the packet gets delivered the token moves on to the the next person that needs data moved (the closest in proximity, not the device that’s been waiting the longest). That describes the token part of it, but the ring refers to the topology. Logically this kind of network looks like a ring where the token travels to every device on the network until finding the one it needs. Physically this might not actually look like a ring, you can have the token ring equivalent of a switch (called a media access unit) with a bunch of computers plugged into it and still have it be a ring network. I’ll cover Network topology in detail in 104 most likely. Copper standards: There are other protocols and cables that were used but these are the ones that were really historically relevant. Now to get down into the current and relevant. In Linus’ video he mentioned the speeds of cat5 and cat5e cables at being gigabit, this wasn’t always the case. Cat5 was originally rated for 100Mbs, the same with Cat5e (Cat5e improved the physical standard for the cable) but there was a drastic change in how data was sent over the cable. This was explained to me by saying that data is purposefully sent in both directions on the cable, and by subtracting the data that you sent from the collision ridden data that you get, you get what you originally wanted. Like sending cars down a highway in both directions and then magically coming out the other end okay. Cat6 is the only cable TRULY rated for gigabit as there is a key difference between 6 and 5/5e, 6 has a high gauge of wire of 23 where 5/5e is 24 (smaller number is bigger wire). So while cat5 and cat5e will do gigabit, they aren't guaranteed that speed at all times like 6 is even if your cable is in relatively good condition. It’s also the same with 6, which can do 10Gb but only up to 37 meters. Cat6a, the current standard being pushed is the only cable/standard TRULY rated for 10Gbs. (I'm currently writing up a guide for wireless and fiber, so keep watch of this thread.)

Wow, some stuff came up, I'll probably end up posting the next one tomorrow. Hint, it's about cable standards and topology.

I totally understand where you're coming from, I didn't get anything bawler until I was around your age, and that was with months of saved up money.

Thank you, kind sir~

Thanks, I like that spare server rig, though in my humble opinion it could use a little more punch in the processor department.

I thought it was a little long, but I tried to keep it in plain English the best I could.

Cranking another one out today. I've come to love the networking field more than hardware, it's a really good industry to get into.

Nononono, you have MY like.

I'm writing another one today, I'm going to try to be more active with this, but college is taxing right now.

I dunno about that, as a security buff I find there's fun things you can do involving all of the layers. In terms of ethical hacking that is.

Using MSE with windows firewall can be a problem. You really should replace windows firewall if you're not willing to set outbound rules.