I’ve just updated my GEEK! post that included the driver for the PEAK 100417AGPK dual TV tuner. This being because I’ve found the driver disk and have uploaded the official driver for consumer use!
If you need a copy of the driver yourself, please see this post. Leave a comment and let us know how you got on!
(Alternatively, if you know what you’re doing and would just like the download – click here)
Well, GEEK! is just over three years old now; and during that time I’ve written over 400 posts. So, while I don’t really want to add anything too new to GEEK! while I get my backup system finalised, I thought now would be a good time to run over some of the posts have brought the most traffic to GEEK!.
By far and away, the most popular post on GEEK! is the “Get the old Windows Live Essentials back“. So many of you were fed up with the poor functionality of Essentials 2011 (including me), so I linked you up with a download and instructions to get the old 2009 version back.
Next up, it’s the tool I found that allowed you to find the biggest files on your hard drive. The tiny tool quickly locates the files that are occupying the most space on your drive, allowing you to delete anything you see as unnecessary.
My review of the Samsung N145P netbook brought the next largest amount of attention to GEEK!. A fully comprehensive review that details everything you needed to know.
Not too far behind, my finding of TVCatchup back in mid 2009 provided Freeview TV access over the internet (in the UK). I still use the site regularly when I’m on the go, as it provides live TV without a bombardment of adverts.
Last in the top five, it’s my iPod touch 4G review. Simple and sweet – it explains all the new features that were (and still are) great additions to the iPod range.
And that’s it – a round-up of the top five biggest posts on GEEK!. Normal service on GEEK! will resume soon, but I’m just optimising the backup process on my new VPS!
Right – I literally just upgraded the motherboard on my computer and then reinstalled Windows. Rather stupidly, I didn’t think to check I had all the driver disks for my USB devices – and nonetheless I since haven’t been able to get a driver for my USB TV Tuner.
It’s a PEAK USB Dual Tuner DVB-T, and I had it running perfectly on my original 32-bit Windows 7 Home Premium. However, I’ve now moved over to 64-bit Windows – which is great, but I can’t for the life of me find the stupid mini-CD that came with the device to install the driver.
Even more annoyingly – the company’s website (PEAK) is no longer working (www.peakhardware.com), and there aren’t any drivers on any public driver site – so I was absolutely stuck there.
Thankfully, I had a eureka moment and realised that I’d, in the past, also installed the tuner on my netbook. Whilst I couldn’t use the driver on that (because it is 32-bit), I was able to identify the name of the driver used and get a copy online (much more readily available).
Anyway – if you’re having the same problem as me – it uses a driver called the AF9015 BDA Device – and luckily enough, I have a driver for you!
UPDATE: I FOUND THE DRIVER DISK! While digging through my drawers, I found the driver disk. So, to make things simple – I’m going to simply upload the driver directory of the disk to GEEK!. All you need to do is unzip the file and run /DVB-T/Setup.exe. 32-bit and 64-bit drivers for XP, Vista and 7 are included.
Hopefully, that should solve the problem!
It doesn’t bite – why is everyone panicking?
Last night I watched a programme on BBC Two called “The Virtual Revolution”, which was based on the “cost” of free facilities on the internet. It can be watched here (in the UK) on BBC iPlayer until next Saturday.
Basically it was talking about how we pay for free facilities on the internet (such as Google, YouTube, Facebook etc) with our identity rather than our hard earned cash. The programme was explaining to us how companies make vast amounts of money by providing services on the internet for free.
I believe that the main point that the programme was trying to put through was that the internet follows us and that it makes money from whatever information we feed into it. However, in some respects, I fail to see their argument.
With advertising, for example – they were talking about web sites using “cookies” to track what our interests are and to use them to follow all the details of our lives and stalk our personalities. However, that just isn’t true. None of the information collected by these sites is personally identifiable – websites aren’t allowed to collect data that might be identifiable to us without our permission. All the “cookies” do is make sure that what gets advertised to us is more of what we like. Besides, if you don’t like the idea of websites storing data about our interests – well then just turn “cookies” off. You can do that in all browsers and it will stop any data being collected.
I do, on the other hand, understand what they mean about this data problem in terms of social networking. People don’t understand what information they are putting on the internet – their photos, their interests, their friends. By posting this data on the internet, it is being archived for life – and possibly any longer. Social networking sites, such as Facebook, can keep personal data on their servers for as long as they want (I’m pretty sure, anyway) – unless people such as the Police or any other respectable authority deems otherwise. However, I totally agree with what Stephen Fry said – that we try to control the risks and use the free facilities to our advantages.
Nevertheless, I do think that people are overreacting to the internet. Internet advertising is something that has to be done for people to make money and using “cookies” to make advertising that little more pleasant is not a crime.
And the argument about “personal recommendations” just makes me laugh! I often walk into a shop and think, “wow, I wish this shop was a bit more suited to my taste”. With the internet, that can be done for me. I can log onto Amazon and have the website how I want it to be – with my stuff that I buy. Not the bestsellers or the hits – I just want the shop my way. I don’t care what everyone else buys.
So in summary, I think people should calm down a bit and realise how useful the internet is. Yes – there are a few risks with it – but as long as we understand the risks then there isn’t any problem. It’s like saying “I won’t drive my car because there’s a risk I might crash” – but you still drive it.
A new feature in Windows 7 Media Center that enhances it’s power saving!
One thing I used to find really annoying about Windows Media Center in Vista was that if you wanted to record a programme, the system always had to be in either awake mode or S1/S3 standby mode.
This has changed with Windows 7 Media Center and Microsoft has finally solved the issue.
With Windows 7 Media Center (providing your motherboard supports it), you should be able to hibernate your comptuer – and Windows will wake your computer approximately 10 minutes before a scheduled recording. It should then return to hibernate shortly after a recording has finished.
This is a really big advantage. No more wasting vast amounts of electricity by leaving your computer in standby. I can finally leave my computer over a weekend and come back knowing that the system has done all of my recordings and hasn’t cost the Earth in electricity!
So incase you weren’t already aware of this – next time you need to leave your computer to record TV while you are away, put the system into hibernate.
Hibernate works differently to standby. When you hibernate a system, the entire contents of the RAM is saved to a big file on the hard drive. The system can then fully shut down. When you wake the system, it will transfer all of the RAM contents on the hard drive back to the RAM, and your system should be able to just return to its previous state.