So for test #2, we’re opening eight tabs in each browser! And we’re getting rid of Safari and Outlook, because frankly — who cares? To be fair, I opened the same websites in each browser, which were:

1. Google
2. ESPN
3. download.com
4. eBay
5. Lifehacker
6. ign.com
7. Wikipedia
8. Facebook

So will Firefox remain the king of bloat, as we saw the first time around? Or will it be succeeded by a surly rival?

OK, you’re sick of drama. Without further ado, here is the memory usage of each browser, all of them running with eight tabs open for about 15 minutes:

The facts:

• Firefox used 197,812 KB or 263,412 KB (193 MB – 257 MB), depending if you count the plugin-container.exe that it seemed to spawn (when I killed Firefox, it went away).
• Internet Explorer 9 gobbled up 419,568 KB (410 MB) (!) when running with eight tabs open.
• Chrome consumed 300,572 KB (294 MB)

My, how the tables have turned! The trend reverses, and IE9 becomes the memory hog, and Firefox becomes the most “lean” by a long shot!

Contrast this to the chart from Part 1 (remember, this was 32-bit Windows):

So what does this mean? One of two things:

• Browser memory usage is wildly different on 32-bit Windows vs. 64-bit Windows
• Firefox is much more efficient when the amount of tabs increases

I’ll let you draw your own conclusions! If I do another test, I should definitely stick to either 32-bit or 64-bit, to remove that variable. What do you think? Has your experience of the browsers’ memory usage been consistent with my test, or different?

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1. Firefox vs. Internet Explorer 9 vs. Chrome vs. Safari vs. Outlook memory usage (Windows 7 32-bit), part one

So which browser is the ultimate memory hog? Is Outlook really as “bloated” as everyone complains it is? Is Chrome as lightweight and fast as it claims to be? I dunno…let’s find out!

Here are the rules:

1. Each browser had only 1 tab open to google.com; Outlook had no child windows opened.
2. I fired up each browser/application, waited about 10-15 seconds, and then took a screenshot of task manager.
3. I tested in the latest versions as of this writing, which are: IE9, FF9, Chrome 16, Safari 5.1, and Outlook 2010 w/ service pack 1 applied.

First off, the qualitative results. IE9 and Chrome launched the fastest, coming up almost instantaneously (I couldn’t tell which was first, so I’m calling it a tie). Safari came up second, and Firefox dead last (for the browsers) by quite a long shot. Outlook pretty much tied with Firefox for last, coming up just after Firefox loaded.

Now for the good stuff — memory usage.

The facts

1. Firefox was by far the most bloated, weighing in at 110,288 K (108 MB!). In Firefox’s defense, I do have about 5-6 plugins installed. I need to re-do this with a clean install, but I’d guess most people have a plugin…or five.
2. Safari used the second-most memory, at 53,984 K (53 MB). Safari spawned WebKit2WebProcess.exe, if you’re wondering where I got my number.
3. Internet Explorer and Outlook practically tied for third-most memory used, at 37,456 K (37 MB) and 37,012 K, (36 MB), respectively.
4. Chrome used the least memory at 33,224 K (32 MB).

Observations

This wasn’t a very scientific test. I should have done more testing with multiple tabs, a clean install of Firefox, let them all run for some time, etc. But it does shed some light on how these applications use your system resources. The biggest surprise  — to me, anyway — is how little memory Outlook uses compared to the browsers (side note: I have seen Outlook consume closer to 90 MB after it’s been running all day, but I’ve also seen Firefox push upwards of 200 MB or more).

It is surprising how much memory Firefox uses, but I’ll be honest — it doesn’t matter all that much. Most machines have plenty of free RAM these days, and unless you’re running hardware that’s more than 5 years old, I don’t think it’s going to affect you very much. Firefox is still my browser of choice, although the snappy loading of Chrome is IE9 is nice. And Safari on Windows…meh.

So the King of  Bloat award goes to Firefox; Outlook wins the Scapegoat Award. IE9 and Chrome both get the Snappy Award.

Oh, and Safari gets the Who Cares award.

Update: I’ve added a part two: testing with more tabs.

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1. Mozilla Firefox vs. Google Chrome vs. Internet Explorer memory usage (Windows 7 64-bit), part two

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No amount of fiddling with the security/permissions/owner would bring it back, either.

This fix is to use the “icalcs” tool to reset the drive’s permissions. To do so, follow these steps:Launch the Command Prompt as an administrator (Start > Search for “cmd” > Right-click on “cmd.exe” and select “Run as Administrator”)

1. Switch to your drive that is having problems (replace H: with your drive letter): CD /D H:
2. Type: icacls * /T /Q /C /RESET
3. Wait for a while. Mine took about 10-15 minutes.

When it’s done, you should be able to access the drive as normal.

Sources:

http://lallousx86.wordpress.com/2009/06/14/resetting-ntfs-files-security-and-permission-in-windows-7/

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/318754

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• Common sense
• Grasp of elementary school concepts
• Disregard for any sense of etiquette

…that occurs during most craigslist transactions. While this post is targeted at the annoying things buyers do, there are plenty of annoying sellers, too. So, here are my top five pet peeves about craigslist buyers, in no particular order of annoyance.

RTFD (Read The Freakin’ Description)

What is wrong with this scenario?

Item title: Black and White Wing Back Style Recliner – $135

Buyer’s email: How much for the chair?

(Note: if you can’t figure it out, you’re probably an avid craigslist buyer)

Keep in mind that this buyer was so lazy that he didn’t even finish reading the item title. Oh no, he didn’t even have to delve into the description for this – it was right there in the title!

I tried to sell an iPhone recently. I can’t tell you how many people asked me if the charger was included. Now, granted, this juicy tidbit was in the description, which is a lot of work to find.

Here is another lame-brained inquiry about the iPhone:

Title: iPhone 3G; 16GB; requires AT&T sim & activation – $75

Buyer’s question: Will it work on T-Mobile?

Blerg! How are you still in the gene pool? But my favorite idiotic craigslist inquiry went like this:

Hey what are you selling???

Maybe this one was some kind of scam / phishing attempt. I hope so. If not…there are no words. You just randomly clicked an item, clicked the email address without reading anything, and asked what I was selling?

So to sum it up (if you’ve gotten this far, chances are you don’t use craigslist): Read the description before sending an email (if you really have A.D.D., at least read the title). It makes you look like a moron if you don’t.

Lowballing in a passive aggressive way

This one really irks me.

Let’s be honest – we’ve all made a lowball offer on an item at some point in our lives. So if I’m selling Modern Warfare 3 for $50, and some kid offers me $10, I’ll politely tell him “No Thanks” and we’ll both be on our merry ways.

But have you ever gotten this one? This is an actual email I received from a buyer on craigslist regarding a chair my wife and I were selling:

What would your bottom $ on this be?? thanks so much.

So in other words, this person was too timid to make a lowball offer, and instead wanted me to name a bargain bin price … on my own item! Argh, grow a pair and make the lowball offer yourself. If I listed a chair for $75, it means I want to make $75. I might entertain a reasonable offer – say $65 – but I’m not going to name a ridiculously low price for you.

Buyers expecting sellers to meet ridiculously far away

OK, so you’ve weeded through the idiots and you’ve actually found someone who can craft simple sentences, operate a phone, and read at a 2^nd grade level. Congratulations!

Now comes more frustration: they want you to drive halfway across your state to meet them so they can buy your $25 pillow.

If I am selling an old phone for $40, I am not going to drive from Minneapolis to Duluth to meet you. That was a joke; sorry non-Minnesotans! That’s a three-hour drive. I once asked a guy if he could pick a place to meet between my city and his, and he named his own city. Apparently the concept of “between” was not taught in some grade schools.

Note: if it’s a large-ticket item and I stand to make a good chunk of cash, this doesn’t apply – I’m definitely willing to make the drive on bigger sales.

Being snarky with a seller who won’t budge

Here is a fun conversation about a chair I was selling for $150:

Buyer: Would you take $75 cash for the chair?

Me: No, sorry. I am pretty firm on the price and $75 is much lower than I intend to sell it for.

Buyer: Ok thanks for the reply. FYI…Its probably an old chair that someone bought fabric for and re-upholstered. Good luck getting $150

Me: It was new when we got it. It was from a model home. They are selling the chair for new on overstock.com.

This scenario ties into an aforementioned irritant, which is buyers not reading the description. If this buyer had read it, she would have learned that it was actively being sold on overstock.com and was not a re-upholstered chair, as she so snarkily implied. Instead of just walking away, she had to taunt me a bit. Sore loser!

Random “call me” emails with no context

If someone is selling a $40 phone, please don’t send them an email like this:

Hi can you pls call me at XXX-XXX-XXXX?? Thanks!

Um, no. Make an offer. P.S., do you notice how double punctuation is a sure indicator of a dufus?

So there you have it. I hope you are as agitated as I am when I try to sell stuff as craigslist (I am not normally this irritated!). In summary, if buyers could just do the following, craigslist could be a cool & groovy place:

• Do read the description, or at least the title if you are really that lazy
• Don’t be too wimpy to make an offer and expect the seller to suggest a bargain bin price
• Don’t expect a seller to spend more in gas driving to meet you than the item is worth
• Don’t be snarky when a seller doesn’t give in to your crappy lowball offer
• Don’t send random (and creepy!) “call me” emails with no context

I could have gone on and on, but keep in mind my target audience here.

So what agitates you about craigslist transactions? (buyers or sellers, doesn’t matter – I’d love to hear your angst-ridden stories either way)

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1. Get yourself a SATA/IDE to USB adapter, like this one. It makes this so much easier.
2. Get yourself a copy of Acronis True Image Home 2012.
3. Install Acronis True Image Home 2012; reboot.
4. Plug the new hard drive (the one you want to clone to) into the USB adapter, and connect the adapter to one of your PC’s USB ports.
5. Make sure your PC recognizes the hard drive attached via USB.
6. Fire up True Image, then click the “Tools & Utilities” tab. Click “Clone Disk.” The program walks you through the next steps. You may have to reboot to complete the cloning process.
7. When the cloning process is complete, power down your PC, then remove the old hard drive and put the new hard drive in its place.
8. Turn your computer back on.
9. Optional: If you replaced a drive that contains Windows (assuming Vista or 7), your computer may not boot properly. Never fear! Just pop in your Windows disc, and choose startup repair. It should automatically fix the problem.

And that’s all there is to it. I know this isn’t the free route, but it’s the most painless. I’ll look into posting a free solution if people are interested.

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1. Suddenly can’t access USB hard disk in Windows 7: how to fix (reset permissions)

Step #1 — Create a new text document on your desktop, then rename it to cleanup.bat (or a name of your choosing, but keep the .bat extension). Note: you need file extensions enabled to do this…My Computer > Organize > View tab > uncheck “Hide extensions for known file types.”

Step #2 — edit your new file (right click and choose “Edit”) and add these commands:

@ECHO OFF
rmdir %TEMP% /q /s
mkdir %TEMP%

rmdir %WINDIR%\TEMP /q /s
mkdir %WINDIR%\TEMP

rmdir %LOCALAPPDATA%\Microsoft\Windows\Temporary Internet Files /q /s
mkdir %LOCALAPPDATA%\Microsoft\Windows\Temporary Internet Files

Don’t forget to save your file!

Step #3 — create a shortcut to the file in your startup menu. Or since it’s so tiny, you could just move the file into your startup folder.

Step #4 — enjoy as temporary files are cleaned each time your system boots up.

Notes:

• You can also add the batch file as a scheduled task, if you’d like to change the conditions that cause it to run (at a certain time, for example). Press Window key + R to bring up the run menu, and then enter taskschd.msc /s.
• CCleaner is a great program that really scrubs your system for unneeded/unwanted files.

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1. Suddenly can’t access USB hard disk in Windows 7: how to fix (reset permissions)

Do any brave souls out there have Windows 7 Home Premium, and want to try one of the methods mentioned here?

I would but I do not have that flavor of Windows 7. Let me know in the comments below!

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The ultimate solution for me was to put my XBOX 360 on my router’s DMZ (De-Militarized Zone). Keep in mind I’m running DD-WRT, so your settings might look a bit different.

Here’s how:

1. Make sure you manually assign your XBOX an IP address via your router’s DHCP interface. Again, do not manually assign the IP address on the XBOX itself, but use the DHCP settings in your router to assign a static IP to your 360 (EDIT – actually, this doesn’t matter. Either way, manually assigned on the console or via DHCP, works).
2. Go into the section of your router where you can assign an IP address to the DMZ. In DD-WRT, it’s in NAT / QoS -> DMZ. Click “Enable” next to “Use DMZ” and enter the XBOX 360′s IP address. Click Apply Settings to save your changes. Here’s a post how to do it on the vanilla Linksys firmware.

Aaah, no more friggin’ annoying Moderate NAT warnings! Now keep in mind, putting something on the DMZ is the same as having no router in front of it, so be sure you’re aware of the risks (in my estimation, it’s not a big deal on the XBOX, but I would NEVER do that on one of my PCs).

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• WRT320N (running DD-WRT): Handling DHCP; running 5GHz wireless N-only network
• Airport Extreme: Access Point; running 2.4 GHz N/G mixed network

Here’s how I did it. First I changed the WRT320N to broadcast 5GHz + N-only, and I appended “-5ghz” to the SSID (so it reads like network-name-5ghz). Only a few of my devices can take advantage of that, but I mostly wanted it for faster wireless gaming on my XBOX 360.

Then I got the airport up and running as an access point. Here are the key settings to do that. You first need to download and install Apple’s Airport Utility (the latest version is 5.5.2, as of this writing). Once you’ve added the device to your network and the Airport Utility recognizes it, go to Manual Setup, which is a button at the bottom. Note: If you need help with the initial setup, here is Apple’s user guide.

AirPort section

• Wireless tab: Create a wireless network here. In my case, I set the Radio Mode to “802.11n (b/g compatible)”. This allows all of my non-N and/or non-5 GHz devices to access a wireless network. I gave it the same name as my 5 GHz network, except I dropped -5ghz off the end.

Internet section

• Internet connection tab: Connect Using should be set to “Ethernet” and Connection Sharing should be set to “Off (Bridge Mode)”.
• TCP/IP tab: I did configure IPv4 “Using DHCP” but you can manually assign an IP address, too (My WRT320N hands out IPs, some of which I make static for port forwarding purposes).

That’s it! This should allow you to have your Airport Extreme act as an Access Point, and broadcast a second, uniquely-named wireless network. I’ve noticed a significant reduce in lag and latency using 5GHz for XBOX Live, and since the networks are on different frequencies (5GHz vs. 2.4GHz), the signals don’t interfere with each other.

Note: My iPad and Gateway laptop are the only other devices that can “see” my N 5GHz-only network. A lot of wireless N adapters can only do 2.4 GHz, sadly, so they get relegated to the AirPort’s mixed network.

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