Computing desk
< March 28	<< Feb \| March \| Apr >>	March 30 >

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.

March 29

Out-of-office auto-replies from people I've never emailed

Lately I've been receiving a lot of out-of-office auto-replies from people I've never emailed. I also receive tons of spam, btw, the spam folder contained more than 10,000 messages a while ago. I use a gmail account, and Windows XP most of the time, but have a couple of linux distros installed as well. Apart from these auto-replies, I have no reason to believe that my PC is malware-infested. Ad-aware and AVG report no problems. I've checked some of the auto-replies (from linux), and they appear to be genuine. So my question is, what's going on? Are spammers sending emails that appear to come from my email address? And if so, is there any benefit in using a real email address for spamming instead of a nonsense one? --NorwegianBlue^talk 12:06, 29 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, spammers are faking your address on their emails. They probably do find some advantage in using a real address, but they also know that the backscatter (undeliverables, out-of-office) goes back to a real address (you), and you're probably more likely to read an undeliverable-bounce, as you'd worry that it's a genuine one. To my mind email systems should be configured not to quote any (or at most a line or two) of an undeliverable message when bouncing it, but some quote the whole thing (which means they're essentially acting as unwitting spam relays). 87.114.147.43 (talk) 12:31, 29 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

There is a principle at the heart of this - which is that while email is not a reliable delivery mechanism. it shouldn't ever irretrievably lose a message. So it bounces the entire message back to you in order that you may re-send it without having to retype it. Of course that's a rather ancient principle - from back when people used the command-line 'mail' program in UNIX. These days, most (if not all) mail clients keep copies of outgoing mail - so (in principle) it could work as you suggest. However, if you are suggesting a new system, something with end-to-end permissions would be better - where in order to send someone a message, you first have to obtain revokable permission to do so (eg via a web site). SteveBaker (talk) 15:18, 29 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

A truly random "From" email address is very unlikely to be on a recipient's whitelist, and many people would potentially disregard random strings of characters (humans like to discern meaning); an actual person's email address is very slightly more likely to be whitelisted and conveniently avoids the "random nonsense filter" mentioned above. The reality is that it costs spammers almost nothing to use your email address in the "From" line, so from their perspective even a minute gain is worth it (this being an industry that defines a 1% conversion rate as "successful"). – 74 15:56, 29 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Resolved

Thanks, everyone! I did suspect it was like that, but it's nice to get my suspicion confirmed. --NorwegianBlue^talk 17:27, 29 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Sending SMS via the computer.

Cheers. I got a Motorola Razr V3xx here, and a MacBook with Bluetooth. I want to send SMS from my computer, via the phone, to the number i specify. I have goSerial installed (which let's me connect and send AT-commands to my phone), as well as the ruby lib's to make this automatic later on. When I understand how to.

I know there is this post ( http://wiki.riteme.site/wiki/Motorola_Phone_AT_Commands ) about how to do it, but it just won't work. I need to see a real example, perhaps I'm doing it wrong.

Thanks in advance for help. 81.231.234.120 (talk) 15:43, 29 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Screen savers and tooltips don't work.

I have a Dell Inspiron 1501 running Windows Vista Home Basic. For several months, the screen saver has not come on and tool tips will not work on several programs (most notably Windows Live Messenger and Pidgin, where they show up for about half a second before disappearing, and Opera, where they don't work at all). A few days ago, both of these things randomly started working again. I have no idea what changed, and today, neither the screen saver nor tooltips work. I think it has to be a problem with the keyboard or touchpad, because even when I just click "preview" on the screen saver, it disappears immediately. But when a USB mouse is plugged in (and the touchpad is therefore disabled), the same thing happens, so that just leaves the keyboard or something else really weird. Does anyone have any idea what the problem could be and how to fix it? I really don't want to reinstall Windows, but having the tooltips and screen saver back for a couple of days made me realize how much I missed them. 99.245.16.164 (talk) 17:54, 29 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

PC slowing down

I'm sure this will sound familiar to a lot of you and thought you might have some advice for the layman. My old PC was really slow by the time I got rid of it and when I got this new one I was happy with the way it just seemed to start up nice and quick and easy. But now I've had it for a couple of years, it seems to be getting really slow. I'm mainly talking about start up and login. Actual operation is not too bad, unless it's performing several tasks.

So I've tried 'disk cleanup' and 'defragging' but neither seem to make much difference. I'm still running it on the 512MB RAM that it came with so I've just ordered 2GB which will hopefully notice.

I've just gone through the 'add or remove programs' thing and have removed some stuff like all the Java updates that seem to have built up. I guess I've still got Java and if I need to get any new updates then I'll soon be informed? I was cautious about removing anything else as I'm not sure exactly what I'm doing. I've been into 'msconfig' and de-selected certain programs under the startup section, so it's not loading up my Kodak/iTunes/Quicktime at startup. But was unsure about changing anything else. Is there anything else I can try to clear it out a bit. Thanks.91.109.199.184 (talk) 19:22, 29 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

For most of three decades I have primarily been a Windows user (reality of work environment), and I've been amazed at what a difference a "clean install" can make - basically backing up data, ensuring that you have all of the licenses and preferred settings for important software, then wiping the hard drive and reinstalling Windows, applying all critical updates, installing needed software, restoring data, and setting preferences. It's a long process, but the detritus that accumulates over time really turns Windows to molasses. I've seen many people replace machines, only to find that the one they replaced is quite good once it's had a clean install. There is an (free) application called "Crap cleaner" (googling this yields the right thing: ccleaner.exe from filehippo) that has helped me reduce the accumulation of detritus in the registry, etc. ymmv --Scray (talk) 20:04, 29 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

The PC came with windows already installed so I don't have the original installation disks or anything. I guess that makes it hard to go down this route? Is there a way of manually removing the detritus? (apart from crap cleaner)91.109.199.184 (talk) 20:30, 29 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

If your machine came without install disks, and without a system restore disk, then it will have one of two other ways of doing a system restore. Either it will have an option to burn a system restore disk (Acers, for example, generally do this) or it will have a system restore partition on the disk (information about booting into that will be briefly displayed as the system boots). Note that such a system restore will blank your machine, so you'll need to take a backup first (but as your system is clearly in trouble, that should be your first order of business anyway). 87.114.147.43 (talk) 21:07, 29 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

One strategy here (for deskside computer at least) is to buy a cheap second hard drive. Make a system restore disk - take your old hard drive out of the computer and put it someplace safe - then put the new one in - then use the restore disk to install the OS utterly cleanly. Once you know it boots and everything works, you can plug in your old hard drive as the second (non-bootable) drive on the system and you'll have all of your files there (including all of the junk of course). If something horrible happens and your new installation doesn't work or the restore disk is faulty or something - then you can put the old drive back as the bootable drive again and be back where you were. Now you can transfer files across to the new drive at your leisure - and only when you are satisfied that everything is working - reformat the second drive. This creates a bunch of free disk space - but it's a much more relaxed process than the backup/reformat/restore approach - and you can take your time doing it, with the computer still usable throughout the process. Once you have a second drive - you can do this again at any time in the future. It's worth the $50 or so that low-end drives cost these days. Of course, if you have a laptop - it's not so easy. SteveBaker (talk) 22:33, 29 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

i think ccleaner will be one best option for ur problem.try this link to download this free software [1] also try start-run-%temp% &delete all unwanted temporory files.—Preceding unsigned comment added by Jawhar.vt (talk • contribs) 11:46, 31 March 2009

can my laptop write to dvds/cds

my laptop says it has "Variable speed Blu-ray Disc reader and CD/DVD multidrive" does this mean i can write to dvds and cds? or no?--Zcrazy0 (talk) 21:22, 29 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Usually "multidrive" or "superdrive" means it can both read and write CDs and DVDs. --98.217.14.211 (talk) 21:30, 29 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

ah sweet thanks! i wasnt given a burning program though, so i guess ill have to get one myself and try.--Zcrazy0 (talk) 21:32, 29 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Try InfraRecorder. 87.114.147.43 (talk) 21:41, 29 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Windows (at least XP and Vista) can burn CDs and DVDs for you. (If you want more options, however, then you need another application.) --Andreas Rejbrand (talk) 00:09, 30 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Hibernate

As far as I can tell when a computer is put into hibernate it doesn't use any power at all; everything in memory is put onto the hdd and the computer turns off completely. Hibernate, however, also allows the computer to start up much quicker than if you were to shut down. So my question is are there any reasons why you wouldn't/shouldn't just put your pc into hibernate instead of shutting down? (Apart from, of course, certain times when shutting down really is needed) --212.120.248.41 (talk) 22:40, 29 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

You are correct in your understanding on the way hibernate works and I see no disadvantage to using it as your normal power off mode. A big advantage is that you can leave your documents and applications open and running, although as a precaution I would suggest saving any work in progress. However, if you are using Microsoft Windows, it is also advantageous to occasionally do a full shutdown and restart. Windows has a reputation for not being a stable platform for long term continuous activity, except in limited one-application server type environments, so an occasional clean slate is good. I don't think this is needed for Linux or the Mac. -- Tcncv (talk)

So more reasons to switch OS? I've been quite fed up with how slow my computer has been lately (Windows XP, SP3), to the point I start cursing out Bill Gates each time it slows down or freezes on me. --Whip it! ^{Now whip it good!} 23:49, 29 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

That comment was slightly POV. To "compensate", I can tell you that my Windows Vista PC is almost never shut down, and it always works fine and responds fast. --Andreas Rejbrand (talk) 00:11, 30 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

This already was discussed right here. You have to reboot for updates and driver installs, otherwise it shouldn't matter. -- Consumed Crustacean (talk) 04:10, 30 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I have no malware or any suspicious software on my computer (at least that's what my anti-virus software and Spybot tell me) and everything is up-to-date. --Whip it! ^{Now whip it good!} 06:24, 30 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

And if you're in that situation but are still having slowdown, you've got some terribly written software on there. Either a driver, a service, or something else that tends to stay in memory. As I said in the last thread, even if there's a memory leak a modern OS frees the memory when the process is terminated. Simply leaving the computer on should cause no issues. I leave my computer on / sleep it, I leave the computer at work on, there've never been issues. -- Consumed Crustacean (talk) 02:34, 2 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I have a Macbook and when it isn't being used it's just closed, I can't remember the last time I turned it off. You open it and it works - sometimes it's a little sluggish for a few seconds, but a good 95% of the time it just gets back on with being a great little laptop. To be fair I don't ask a huge deal from what is quite a powerful machine (just internet browsing, music storage, photo editing and some basic word-processing/spreadsheets). It must take up power being in sleep-mode though as the battery does drain a couple of % overnight. ny156uk (talk) 21:51, 30 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]