Experiences with non-techies

[cubercaleb]

As having used both Blender and 3DS Max I am convinced that Blender is easier to use. Although that is likely a result of me spending much more time using Blender than 3DSMax. I only use 3DS Max when I need to make custom collision meshes for clutter like items for Skyrim. (It seems like there's an easier way but I am unaware of it and this works ) While I use Blender for the actual modeling, UV mapping, vertex colours, etc.

 

 

Edit:

Inventor handles measurements very nicely but it pretty simplistic in how much you can edit a model. Don't get me wrong Inventor is still a great program and when I need to worry about exact measurements it's the go to program for me. (ie building any object that I'd like to 3D print later) But since most people don't try measuring the exact size of in game models (if you do that's crazy so stop it!) measurements are not as important when I'm making general models that will end up in a game.

 

That being said it's still possible to get exact measurements in Blender by typing in the value you want when you are moving the item you want. My general complaint about it's measurements is that the measuring tape doesn't snap to vertices like I think it should but it can still measure decently accurately if you just click on a face with it selected. And if you're wondering where the measuring tool is it's under "Grease pencil".

 

If you prefer Blender than so be it, you prefer Blender. However to me I am use to working with Autodesk applications such as Maya, 3DS Max, and Mudbox so I feel more comfortable creating something in them. Taking the time to learn a completely new program and one that is regarded as hard to learn for that matter would just be a waste of time and would hinder my workflow and productivity. 

 

Same thing applies with GIMP, I don't care if it's open source and someone likes it better. I think the UI is a mess and I can't be bothered to learn how to use it, If I need to create something I'll use Photoshop, Illustrator, or InDesign because I know the ins and out of those applications and can get work done more efficiently.

[cubercaleb]

Coming from Autodesk Inventor I find blender hard to learn although I want to give it another try.

 

 

I'm pretty good with inventor and I know a guy who's excellent with blender. From what I've seen him do I'd say there both very powerful programs. Also blender is open source.

 

It is somewhat subjective, personally I always found the UI for Autodesk applications be easier to understand, so I learned how to use those. Vue integration is also quite nice.

[Persona]

Back in the 9th grade 2 other buddies of mine and myself started our own school project. Our project was to dismantle a computer, make our own case, and assemble the computer inside the case we built ourselves. For the longest time a friend of mine had been saying that he knows pretty much everything about computers. Turns out he didn't know anything, but i'll get back to that.

I went to a very cheap-ass school, so there were always trouble with the infrastructure there, so as you probably guessed the computers at the school crashed all the time. Also note that all of the computers were "hooked up" for lack of a better term to ONE Server. This was a big school with around 200+ computers all hooked up to this one server. (Recipe for disaster). Since all of the computers were connected to the same server that would mean that if there was one single error on the server, then all of the 200+ computers at my school would simply not work.

These computers all went down the drain atleast twice a week making them completely and utter useless. And everytime the system went down the teachers always asked this friend of mine that thought he knew everything about computers. Let's call him Bob to make it easier to follow. Anyways, The teachers would always have Bob look at the computers, and tell them what was wrong. Ofcourse he didn't know what he was talking about, so he said the following: "Yeah, mhm, okay. Yes it seems that you have gotten a network system error inside the processor, it will be back up in an hour". Yes, that is ACTUALLY what he said, let that sink in for a moment. Oh, I totally forgot; The time he said that it was a "Network system error inside the processor". the teachers were trying to figure out why there was no sound from the speakers. Turns out the audiojack was not plugged in.

Anyways I got really off-track here. My friends and I were assembling the computer into the case that we had built ourselves. When suddenly Bob came by. My friends and I were kind of annoyed at Bob, so we asked him "which one of these components is the motherboard"? I bet anyone here on the forum would be able to point out which component in a computer was the motherboard, right? Bob pointed at the HDD, of course we all laughed, because this was proof that he knows nothing about computers, and was just spewing bullshit all the time. After we all calmed ourselves down, I said: "well surely you know this is the graphics card, right? (I pointed at the CPU). Bob said: "Yes ofcourse, how dumb do you think I am? That's when I almost broke out in tears laughing.

---

Since that event he stopped claiming he knew everything about computers and was an "IT-Guru". Anyways, my buddies and I delivered in our assignment, and got ourselves an A.

Cheers!

I'm literally tearing up from this.

[vt3c]

My mom's laptop has shortcutss on the desktop to open facebook, google, email etc and one day my sister accidentally deleted a few including sims 2 (my mom's cocaine). She freaked out and dragged me from my room and told me facebook was broken and she couldn't find it. 

>Finds sims 2 isn't on her screen
>She nearly breaks down crying saying it's gone forever
>Yells at me for 5 minutes

I showed her how to open facebook, and re-created a shortcut for sims 2 on the desktop. She stopped being upset, and just sat down in front of her laptop once more. Upstairs I can hear my sister laughing hysterically. 

[KemoKa]

My school is running pirated versions of Windows 7 Ultimate on old P4's..

Speaking of which

I walk into school one day, and I need to go to print something off. Now, for the longest time, the school has used these bought-en-masse mATX desktops running Core 2 duos. Not fast, not cutting edge but they were pretty reliable and good for what they were needed to do. I walk into the computer lab to find that all of the core 2 duo PCs (not the macs, my school has a mac fetish) have been replaced by old Dell Optiplex's running on PENTIUM 4s and WINDOWS XP. I know the P4 was an excellent processor that sent the business world raving mad, but that was ten years ago, they downgraded and regressed by 5 sodding years.

What continues to happen these days, from when I first started high school, is that whenever there is a computer class, everyone immediately goes for the iMacs, because they look better... They go for the iMacs, not the PCs... The PCs are slow, but nowhere near as bad as the ancient iMacs they have, I mean, come on.

This is why I was glad that I got my laptop, because it has an A10 that turbos to 3.2GHz, 8GB of RAM and an SSD. It is literally beefier, faster and more powerful than any computer in the school by at least five years. they are still using old Macbooks, running on Core 2 Duos and DDR2. I refused to use the computers in the labs ever again when I had my laptop on me. Why would I?

So, the moral of this story, ladies and gentlemen is that American public high schools are the worst luddite suckers for bad investments than anyone else.

[ShadowCaptain]

So, the moral of this story, ladies and gentlemen is that American public high schools are the worst luddite suckers for bad investments than anyone else.

 

Holy hell thats pretty bad

[Xquisite]

 old Dell Optiplex's running on PENTIUM 4s and WINDOWS XP.

That's exactly what I have! Literally!

 

 

So, the moral of this story, ladies and gentlemen is that American public high schools are the worst luddite suckers for bad investments than anyone else.

No, that applies here too..

+1 for effort. 

[KemoKa]

No, that applies here too..

+1 for effort. 

I am afraid not. I haven't gotten to the worst bit. I forgave them for the damage they did to those poor macbooks (not scratches, we're talking dented batteries and huge gashes on the lids)because frankly life's too short and I hate Apple anyway. I will not forgive them, however, and on the other hand, for spending literally tens of thousands of dollars on 2 30-piece carts of brand new Macbook Pros. They could have outfitted the school with super-powerful gaming laptops and SSDs for what they spent on those machines, but no, they had to go with those damn Macbooks.

But wait, I've not gotten to the deepest depths of darkness just yet. One lab had a reasonable arsenal of computers with perfectly alright 3.5GHz Pentiums (newer ones, you understand). The bastards replaced the entire thing with an old opteron server with 64GB of RAM split across 32 HP HTPCs with single-core Atoms. When I walked in, I almost cried. And not only that, but they did this

TWICE.

top that.

[Speedbird]

I am afraid not. I haven't gotten to the worst bit. I forgave them for the damage they did to those poor macbooks (not scratches, we're talking dented batteries and huge gashes on the lids)because frankly life's too short and I hate Apple anyway. I will not forgive them, however, and on the other hand, for spending literally tens of thousands of dollars on 2 30-piece carts of brand new Macbook Pros. They could have outfitted the school with super-powerful gaming laptops and SSDs for what they spent on those machines, but no, they had to go with those damn Macbooks.

But wait, I've not gotten to the deepest depths of darkness just yet. One lab had a reasonable arsenal of computers with perfectly alright 3.5GHz Pentiums (newer ones, you understand). The bastards replaced the entire thing with an old opteron server with 64GB of RAM split across 32 HP HTPCs with single-core Atoms. When I walked in, I almost cried. And not only that, but they did this

TWICE.

top that.

Wow, I think you just won this thread.

[Xquisite]

I am afraid not. I haven't gotten to the worst bit. I forgave them for the damage they did to those poor macbooks (not scratches, we're talking dented batteries and huge gashes on the lids)because frankly life's too short and I hate Apple anyway. I will not forgive them, however, and on the other hand, for spending literally tens of thousands of dollars on 2 30-piece carts of brand new Macbook Pros. They could have outfitted the school with super-powerful gaming laptops and SSDs for what they spent on those machines, but no, they had to go with those damn Macbooks.

But wait, I've not gotten to the deepest depths of darkness just yet. One lab had a reasonable arsenal of computers with perfectly alright 3.5GHz Pentiums (newer ones, you understand). The bastards replaced the entire thing with an old opteron server with 64GB of RAM split across 32 HP HTPCs with single-core Atoms. When I walked in, I almost cried. And not only that, but they did this

TWICE.

top that.

[Mooshi]

@KemoKa

 

I think that story gave me a legit headache...

[Ruostunut kokis]

@KemoKa

 

I think that story gave me a legit headache...

Did you facedesk so hard?

[Akolyte]

Speaking of which

I walk into school one day, and I need to go to print something off. Now, for the longest time, the school has used these bought-en-masse mATX desktops running Core 2 duos. Not fast, not cutting edge but they were pretty reliable and good for what they were needed to do. I walk into the computer lab to find that all of the core 2 duo PCs (not the macs, my school has a mac fetish) have been replaced by old Dell Optiplex's running on PENTIUM 4s and WINDOWS XP. I know the P4 was an excellent processor that sent the business world raving mad, but that was ten years ago, they downgraded and regressed by 5 sodding years.

What continues to happen these days, from when I first started high school, is that whenever there is a computer class, everyone immediately goes for the iMacs, because they look better... They go for the iMacs, not the PCs... The PCs are slow, but nowhere near as bad as the ancient iMacs they have, I mean, come on.

This is why I was glad that I got my laptop, because it has an A10 that turbos to 3.2GHz, 8GB of RAM and an SSD. It is literally beefier, faster and more powerful than any computer in the school by at least five years. they are still using old Macbooks, running on Core 2 Duos and DDR2. I refused to use the computers in the labs ever again when I had my laptop on me. Why would I?

So, the moral of this story, ladies and gentlemen is that American public high schools are the worst luddite suckers for bad investments than anyone else.

my school forced us to buy Windows RT surfaces...  

 

Worst.  School.  Ever.  

[Speedbird]

my school forced us to buy Windows RT surfaces...  

 

Worst.  School.  Ever.  

Original ones or Surface 2s?

[SpaghettiCarbonara]

I know I'm probably stupidly late to the party, but I'll share a recent one of mine.

 

I've been trying to talk my mum out of buying this stupid $108 phone for the last 3 or so months. Mum's reasoning for wanting it is "checking emails, checking facebook and uploading pictures to facebook" for when she goes overseas, which is like 2-4 weeks per year and she has no idea when she's going next or if she'll be going by herself. My argument was basically "wait. You don't need it now, so just save your money and see what comes out in the future when you need it (if she actually does)". Just the other night, my sister talked her into buying it. She just dropped $108 on a stupid little Samsung for that.

 

She does a bunch of the classic "old people" cliche stuff too.

 

I'm still a bit mad about the phone thing to be completely honest. Those two women never listen to a word I say..

 

A few nights ago, my sister asked me this:

 

"Hey SpaghettiCarbonara, how big is Linux?"

 

I don't even... wat

[Dude]

my school forced us to buy Windows RT surfaces...  

 

Worst.  School.  Ever.  

 

Mine is worse. We have machines designed for XP running pirated Windows 7 enterprise. All these machines are comically slow. They also bought immensely cheap and lousy peripherals that break if you do so much as touch them, they break. Think that's not that bad? Well, we also have internet filters which will block out innocent search terms and as such, many educational sites have been blocked with them. So when I tried to go to Backstreetmerch to look at the Slayer snapback I had noticed that the site had been blocked because it supposedly sold weapons... A site that sells band merchandise selling weapons? Really?

 

The security holes are massive. I have unblocked command line and was able to use netuser commands which would enable me admin access. I had also hacked the staff wireless network and when I point this out, they admit that they always knew about this issue and were just sweeping it under the rug. They get a lot of funding from the school and what do they do with it? They put it into buying projectors for rooms that can't physically make use of them due to their purpose or their lighting. Teachers, staff and students alike demand that they unblock sites such as YouTube and they never respond making negotiation completely and utterly pointless.

 

What about the laptops you ask? They are all at least six years old pieces of garbage which literally (not figuratively) fall apart on a regular basis. HDDs corrupt themselves, BSODs, missing keycaps and many more horrific problems. Did I mention the 5 - 10 minutes it takes to sign in? We all have these e-mail addresses which are never actually used and you have to very carefully word what you say otherwise you will be reported. For example, I once sent a friend a long word document and I got reported for sending viruses. Same thing happens if I receive an e-mail containing naughty words. And that's just the "big" laptops. They also have these other smaller Dell laptops, probably 8.5 inches or less in size. They have this awkward rubber padding and they all have broken fans on them. None of them can actually be repaired.

 

My School's IT Department are pure EVIL.

[juretrn]

Speaking of which

I walk into school one day, and I need to go to print something off. Now, for the longest time, the school has used these bought-en-masse mATX desktops running Core 2 duos. Not fast, not cutting edge but they were pretty reliable and good for what they were needed to do. I walk into the computer lab to find that all of the core 2 duo PCs (not the macs, my school has a mac fetish) have been replaced by old Dell Optiplex's running on PENTIUM 4s and WINDOWS XP. I know the P4 was an excellent processor that sent the business world raving mad, but that was ten years ago, they downgraded and regressed by 5 sodding years.

What continues to happen these days, from when I first started high school, is that whenever there is a computer class, everyone immediately goes for the iMacs, because they look better... They go for the iMacs, not the PCs... The PCs are slow, but nowhere near as bad as the ancient iMacs they have, I mean, come on.

This is why I was glad that I got my laptop, because it has an A10 that turbos to 3.2GHz, 8GB of RAM and an SSD. It is literally beefier, faster and more powerful than any computer in the school by at least five years. they are still using old Macbooks, running on Core 2 Duos and DDR2. I refused to use the computers in the labs ever again when I had my laptop on me. Why would I?

So, the moral of this story, ladies and gentlemen is that American public high schools are the worst luddite suckers for bad investments than anyone else.

Where's the logic of going from Core 2 Duos to Pentium 4's?

I'd love to hear your school IT's reason for this.

Or are they just complete morons?

[Guest andyysplash]

Where's the logic of going from Core 2 Duos to Pentium 4's?

I'd love to hear your school IT's reason for this.

Or are they just complete morons?

Probably some 'secondhand car dealer' equivalent offering it for a price that filled the rest of their budget which they have to spend because apparently management don't understand that some years departments don't need much but other years they do.

[DigitalHermit]

-horror story for a techie-

 

I can somewhat relate...

 

When my team was restoring a computer laboratory for the university, we found a live rat inside one, cockroach infestation in another and literal garbage in a few of the units...

Spiders were also common, but most species here are harmless so elimination is easy...

 

Marked those units as either dead or Biohazardous Material...

 

At least they got the 'upgrade' part right which replaced the slow P4s with more tolerable Atoms...

 

You can read on what else I did in the lab a few pages back...

[ShadowCaptain]

Cant remember if I told this story on here before, it just popped into my head

 

I was sat in IT in high school (many years ago), the cable of the mouse I was using was coming away, bare wires showing, I pulled it a little and the cable broke free from the mouse

 

For some reason, I wanted to see what happened when I touched the bare wires into another usb port..... the entire PC went POP and I just sat there holding this frayed usb cable..

 

The teacher was like "did you just do what I think you did"....I just said yes, and he just went "oh well move to another PC" 

 

Yeah pretty retarded

[Dude]

I can somewhat relate...

When my team was restoring a computer laboratory for the university, we found a live rat inside one, cockroach infestation in another and literal garbage in a few of the units...

Spiders were also common, but most species here are harmless so elimination is easy...

Marked those units as either dead or Biohazardous Material...

At least they got the 'upgrade' part right which replaced the slow P4s with more tolerable Atoms...

You can read on what else I did in the lab a few pages back...

This is like the song 'Angel of Death' but for Techies.

[Dude]

I can somewhat relate...

When my team was restoring a computer laboratory for the university, we found a live rat inside one, cockroach infestation in another and literal garbage in a few of the units...

Spiders were also common, but most species here are harmless so elimination is easy...

Marked those units as either dead or Biohazardous Material...

At least they got the 'upgrade' part right which replaced the slow P4s with more tolerable Atoms...

You can read on what else I did in the lab a few pages back...

This is like the song 'Angel of Death' but for Techies.

[DigitalHermit]

Was looking through my phone and found this:

 

That's a fire hazard right there...

 

Pic was taken in the lab that my team was in charge of...

[The Gaige]

Why dose it seem that your family is the worst to talk to about tech?

[WinNut]

Was looking through my phone and found this:

-snip-

 

That's a fire hazard right there...

 

Pic was taken in the lab that my team was in charge of...

We have plenty of those in school, most of the time I just push it in.