WI-FI WHY SO?
In your March Wi-Fi Wonder
article (page 38), you had a
section on how to logically
troubleshoot your Wi-Fi
problems. Keeping your
firmware up to date is often
a good idea, but would you
actually go through the whole
process of upgrading the
firmware before first trying any
of your other suggestions? It
seems illogical to suggest the
more complicated, lengthy, not
to mention potentially risky
step as the first thing to do
when you are trying to logically
troubleshoot something.
—DANIEL ZIEMINSKIEDITOR IN CHIEF GEORGE JONES
RESPONDS: On more than one
occasion we’ve spent hours (and
even days) configuring and recon-
figuring a setup in order to find
the answer to a Wi-Fi problem,only to discover that, much like an
updated videocard driver, a simple
firmware upgrade fixed the problem
in minutes. This is especially the
case with older routers. With this
said, your point regarding the risk
involving firmware upgrades is
well taken. It’s extremely important
to double-check that you have the
proper firmware for your router
before installing it, or you could
permanently damage it.WI-FI QUICK FIX:
D-LINK ROUTERS
While your Wi-Fi Wonder
article contained a lot of good
information, you left out one
important troubleshooting step
that seems to come up with D-
Link routers. I recently set up a
friend’s D-Link router, and while
the wired computer worked,
my laptop couldn’t connect to
the router. A quick check onGoogle revealed that the default
preamble setting for some D-
Link routers is “short preamble.”
Switching it to “long preamble”
immediately fixed the problem.
—ROBERT J. FUNCHESWERE MY RIGHTS VIOLATED?
After reading your article on PC
Rights (February, 2004), I was
wondering if you would be able
to respond to a problem I had.
I attend a private university
that provides a LAN for the
students. I was using Kazaa and
unintentionally sharing my files
last semester. The connection
hogged too much memory, so
I closed it. An hour later the
IT Dept. knocked on my door
and wanted to know who I was.
Then they proceeded to tell me
that my roommate and I were
using an unusually high amount
of bandwidth, the highest oncampus. They told me that was
all they knew, and then they
shut off our ports so we were
unable to access the Internet.
They were not able to check our
computers at that time because
I had class. But when I returned
from class they were sitting in
my desk chair demanding to get
on my computer. My question
is, did I have the legal right to
refuse access to my PC? Did they
have any right to demand access
at all? Were my rights violated?
Of course I was in the wrong,
but they had no way of knowing
that. Therefore they did not
have probable cause; they just
had a guess that I was uploading
too much content.
—RICK W.MAXIMUM PC FEATURES EDITOR
LOGAN DECKER RESPONDS: As we
found out during the development of
both our PC Rights stories (JanuaryWINDOWS TIPS
WINNERS!
In our massive Windows tips story in the
February issue (“Energize Windows,” page
26), we launched a two month search for
the finest reader-submitted Windows XP tips
on the planet. We received more than 1,
submissions, and after digging through them
all, the results are finally in! One is a pure play
for power on low RAM systems; the other a
simple tweak that optimizes downloading in
Internet Explorer.
Here are the winning entries, hand-picked
by our lab experts:ENABLE WINDOWS TO AUTOMATICALLY
REMOVE UNNECESSARY DLL’S FROM
CACHE MEMORY
Sometimes XP keeps DLLs in cache
memory even when the program that
required them is no longer running; this
can cut down on the memory available to
other applications, particularly with low
memory systems. This simple Registry hack
allows XP to automatically remove these
DLLs from cache memory.
Run the Registry Editor and go tothe following key:
HKEY_LOCAL_
MACHINE\
SOFTWARE\
Microsoft\Windows\
CurrentVersion\
Explorer.
Create a new
DWORD value named
AlwaysUnloadDll, and
give it a data value of 1.
Exit the Registry and
reboot for the new setting
to take effect. Note that this
setting may cause problems
with some programs. Some
Windows programs—especially older and
16-bit programs—may issue error messages
with this setting in effect; so if that
happens, delete the new key or give it a
value of 0.
—JOE KANEEDITOR IN CHIEF GEORGE JONES RESPONDS:
For this performance-inducing tip, Joe receives
a brand-new Audigy 2 ZS Gamer soundcard.
Thanks, Joe!INCREASE THE MAX NUMBER OF
DOWNLOADS IN IE
Frustrated by IE downloading restrictions
and slowness? This will increase the max
number of simultaneous downloads you
can perform in Internet Explorer to 10. Start
Registry Editor
Locate the following key in the
Registry: HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\
Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\
Internet Settings
On the Edit menu, click Add Value and
then add the following Registry values:
“MaxConnectionsPer1_0Server”=Dword:
0000000a “MaxConnectionsPerServer”=Dw
ord:0000000a
—TERRENCE HOEDITOR IN CHIEF GEORGE JONES RESPONDS:
For submitting the number two tip, Terrence Ho
receives an ATI Radeon 9600XT 3D videocard.
Thanks, Terrence, and thanks to everyone who
submitted tips to the contest.
To read more of our favorite reader-
submitted tips, check the web site at
http://www.maximumpc.com.all, the results are finally in! One is a pure playHere are the winning entries, hand-pickedgive it a data value of 1.reboot for the new setting
to take effect. Note that this
setting may cause problems
with some programs. Some6 MAXIMUMPC APRIL 2004
In/Out You write, we respond