Digital*Impulse

So the other day a dude I work with, Sam, told me I should up the refresh rate on the 2nd monitor I have set up at work which I connect my Dell Inspiron 9400 17" laptop to. So, being the curious geeky always-wanting-better performance customizer that I am, I happily obliged. And all seemed well...

A few days later things started going south. After a few hours of normal use, the CPU use jumped up to 100% and didn't show any signs of subsiding. :ohnoes:

I fiddled around as best I could on a system running at top speed (which ironically slows it down to a crawl), killing processes and frantically trying to ascertain what could possibly be causing such slowdown but alas, I could find no reason or rhyme.
Looking through the Task Manager I could find no process using anywhere near 100% of the CPU so I figured it must have been something else. I even downloaded Process Explorer from Microsoft TechNet, which provides detailed information on processes and other information, but could still find no culprit! :S

After several days of this kind of behaviour from my computer and hours spent on troubleshooting, I remembered that I upped the refresh rate on the monitor and figured that could be a possible cause.
Turning down the refresh rate helped, but the PC continued to experience slowdowns. I got the bright idea to turn off the dual monitor support...

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Well... with this site finally nearing a somewhat stable usable form I guess it's time to begin the process of filling it with some actually worthwhile content and begin writing. I suppose I should begin with a somewhat brief description of how this site came about.

Creating Digital*Impulse

Design

Arriving at the look and feel for this site has been a somewhat arduous project but I think it's really turned out ok.  Finding a suitable layout that I actually liked and could use on a regular basis was a task in itself, what with the thousands of available themes and designs available freely.  I must've actually settled on a theme at least 4 or 5 times (many of which Steph hated :X )! I should mention from the outset that this entire site's design and not an inconsiderable amount of its construction were inspired and aided by the many talents and technical expertise of one Stephanie (a.k.a. BebiBulma).  Her help and support during this entire process (which coincidentally is still current and ongoing :whistle:) have been instrumental.  From getting me onto WordPress in the first place, then suggesting and setting up plugins, to positioning elements on the page for the notoriously design-unfriendly Internet Explorer and endlessly tweaking bits here and there, Steph's help has been crucial to the successful functioning of this site. Thank you, Steph, really.  :smitten: Read More »