Re: Mersenne: 40th Mersenne Prime Found (probably)!

[Brian Dessent]

George Woltman wrote:
> 
> At 08:20 PM 6/1/2003 +0100, Daran wrote:
> >I presume you're doing an unofficial DC on it right now.  Can you give us
> >some idea when this will be complete?
> 
> I wasn't going to do one but Ernst has started his and suggests comparing
> residues every 1,000,000 iterations.  A good idea, so I've just begun my test.
> 
> Ernst will finish his official test in the June 20-21 time frame.  I should
> finish
> sometime on the 11th.

Anyone want to submit this to e.g. slashdot?

Brian
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Re: Mersenne: christmas computer system?

[Brian Dessent]

John R Pierce wrote:

> > >  $83  Teac CDW540E 40/12/48 cd-rw burner
> >
> > Seems a bit expensive. There's little point in going for superfast
> > write/rewrite performance; either you can't get media much faster than
> 24xW /
> > 8xRW, or you can't justify the price premium.
> 
> those are very fast CD readers too... I dunno CD-RW, never had much use for
> them, but the bulk TDK blanks I get at Costco seem to burn 100% AOK at 40X,
> and you can make a 700MB data backup in just a couple of minutes.

I just wanted to point out that if you live in the US and are looking to
get a CD-RW drive and/or media, do your shopping on Black Friday (the
Friday after Thanksgiving.)  For example, Best Buy will be offering a
48x12x48 for $9.99 after several mail-in rebates, and a bundle of 150
40X speed CDR blanks for free after mail-in rebate ($26 before rebate.) 
Other stores are having similar deals, Staples, Office Max, etc.  Lots
of stuff really cheap (especially DVD-ROMs / CD-RWs / media) or even
free after all the mail-in rebates are applied.

Brian
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Re: Mersenne: Slow Pentium 4 question - status report

[Brian Dessent]

John R Pierce wrote:

> I'd like to know the source of this story  Sounds like urban folklore to
> me... The OEM Windows license is bundled with and tied to the hardware and
> automatically transfers with it.   Now, if these recycling projects were
> taking bulk OEM CD's purchased off the grey market, and bundling them with
> recycled hardware without having a redistribution agreement, thats another
> story entirely.   Ditto, if the EULA for the original system was lost and
> not kept with it when the system was recycled...

I think the problem stems from the fact that most donated PCs with MS
OSes do not arrive with the full documentation of the original OS
license.  Organizations who accept and use these PCs without all the
proper paperwork could technically be found in violation by MS or its
BSA goons.  Hence they are hesitant to accept any donations without all
the paperwork.  Since the OS is tied to the machine, the donating
company cannot reuse the OS license if they donate the machine.  This
further complicates things since the donating company must prove that
they have transferred all the licensing paperwork, unless they wipe the
drives of every machine.  If the donating party does not buy new
licenses for the machines that replace the donated ones, or they fail to
transfer/destroy all of the bits relating to the donated machines, then
they are in violation as well.

By making it hard on both the donating and receiving parties, MS ends up
selling new licenses to everyone, which is probably a contributing
factor to why they're stinky filthy rich.

Brian

>From 

Q. What does the donor need to do to donate a PC with the operating
system? 

A. PC owners have to transfer their license rights to the operating
system to your school along with the PC. They may do so as specified in
their End-User License Agreement (received at the time of purchase) as
part of a permanent sale or transfer of the PC.  

Q. What if the donor can't find the backup CDs, End-Use License
Agreement, End-User manual and the Certificate of Authenticity? Can they
still donate the PC and operating system? 

A. Microsoft recommends that educational institutions only accept
computer donations that are accompanied by proper operating system
documentation. If the donor cannot provide this documentation, it is
recommended that you decline the donated PC(s).
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Mersenne: Re: Mersenne Digest V1 #919

[Brian Dessent]

> I'm sorry to trouble GIMPSers with what might be more of a computer question. I 
> am using an Athon Thunderbird 1.3GHz and 256 MB of 133 MHz (DDR) Ram.
> 
> My computer has always emitted a high pitched squeaking noise when processes 
> like GIMPS start, and also when I do things like use the scroll wheel of my 
> mouse etc. Recently the computer started hanging randomly on certain tasks (not 
> GIMPS). After having taken the RAM down to 100MHz the high pitched squeak and 
> the hanging has stopped.

I would guess power supply.  Switching power supplies operate the
transformer in the tens of kilohertz range, and when driven hard
magnetostriction can cause the iron core to be mechanically coupled to
the electrical signal in the windings, hence the high pitched squeal. 
This is also why TV sets (especially older ones) emit a high pitched
whine that to some is almost unbearable while going unnoticed to
others.  By declocking your RAM you reduced the load on the power
supply.  The fact that you were experiencing instabilities further
indicates an overworked or poorly designed power supply.  If it's a
cheap or underpowered unit, I would try replacing it and see if the
noise continues.

Cooling fans can also do this, since the 12V output of the power supply
is poorly regulated.  When the FPU powers up to run Prime95, the current
draw from the PS increases and the 12V supply droops, and you can often
hear the fans' speed change.

Brian
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