TITAM - Technical issues that affected me

Problem: Per title.  Affected was Kodi Leia, but can happen to any Kodi.  May also happen to other media players.   Explanation:  This is a manifestation of the ED ID issue (also known as the "quarter screen issue") where: •  Windows is losing the EDID for the display device (TV, projector) when the display is shut off or disconnected. •  Windows then resizes the screen resolution to the "default" display device, which forces Kodi to resize as well.  This usually makes the Kodi display lower resolution (i.e. smaller). •  When the display is turned back on / reconnected, Windows re-acquires the EDID and changes back to the original resolution.   Kodi does not handle this gracefully.   The result is that Kodi gets "stuck" in the lower resolution, which manifests itself as a smaller (i.e. lower-resolution) window at the top-left corner of the screen.   Some people find that although Kodi is resized, it is still responsi...

Problem:  PC becomes virtually unresponsive at about the same time each week.  You can move the mouse fine, and possibly Alt-Tab around a bit.  Doing anything else results in a hang that lasts 5-15 minutes, at which point the PC will "unfreeze" for 10-15 seconds, then go back to being unresponsive. Debugging is almost impossible since the computer only works for a few seconds every 5-10 minutes.  Meaning you cannot realistically look at Task Manager or any other program to identify the offending process.  This particular bug can take hours or days to sort out, 15 seconds at a time. What you can do: 1.  Set the following programs running while the computer is still responsive: -  Windows Task Manager (Ctrl-Shift-Esc) -  Resource Monitor (run "resmon.exe") -  Process Explorer Also:  -  Set Task Manager to "Processes" and "Show processes for all users". -  Set all programs to order processes by CPU time If you c...

I've had to pore through a lot of gobbledygook as to what the "Maximum Frequency" number really means in the Windows 7 Resource Monitor. What is means is:  How fast your CPU is physically clocking, compared to how fast it could be clocking. What it does not mean is: -  How much load your CPU is actually experiencing.  This is shown by "CPU Usage". -  How much load your CPU has been experiencing, i.e. a historical or "peak hold" value.  This is not displayed in Resource Monitor. This figure might be less than 100% if the system is dynamically changing CPU frequency to save power.  So Maximum frequency might be more or less than 100%, depending on how your system behaves and how much power it is trying to save.  This is expected behavior. Examples: -  For a desktop, maximum frequency might stay at 100% permanently.  This is because the system has no need to reduce CPU frequency to save power.   -  For an overclocked" p...

In my case the unit was working fine one day, the next day it would hang on the "Gigabyte Ultradurable" BIOS splash screen. Chances are you have a broken USB device plugged in.  The BIOS attempts to enumerate the bus, gets an error code, and just sort of stops there.  Why there is no error message is beyond me. It seems to continuously retry, since if you unplug the offending USB device, it will continue as if nothing had ever happened.  You don't even need to reboot.  So, start unplugging USB devices one by one until it magically restarts, and you've found the culprit.  In my case it was a bad receiver for a Mele air mouse. 50/50 chance that Windows complained at least once about the offending device when you first installed it.  So start with the one that originally gave you driver errors just a short while ago.

Symptoms:  You try to shut down Windows 7, and it pulls up the black-background "programs need to close" screen.  You try to press either "Force restart" or "Cancel", but you can't - neither your keyboard nor your mouse will actually let you click either button. Fix:  Try hitting Ctrl-Alt-Del to interrupt Windows and get to the logoff / shutdown screen.  The mouse and keyboard should be working then, in which case you can return to the previous screen, click "Cancel" and shut down the offending program properly.  Alternatively, you may be able to force a restart from the new screen.