Scrabble Game Software for Windows 8.1

 Scrabble Software

Earlier this year I purchased Scrabble software from Big Fish Games for my Windows 8.1 computer.  It runs great and I have been enjoying the game immensely.  It uses a North American version of the Scrabble Dictionary.

So if there are any Scrabble fans out there looking for a version of Scrabble that works with Windows 8.1 consider Big Fish Games.  I should also point out that they frequently offer a significant discount on your first time purchase so look for the discount code.  If I remember correctly I only paid $2.99.

How Long to Format a 1 TB External Hard Drive?

New 1 TB External Hard Drive (2.5")

I recently purchased a 1 TB Seagate Expansion 2.5" External Hard Drive (Model STBX1000101) and decided that I wanted to do a complete format. 

Although this unit is specified as being USB 3.0 compatible I was having problems using it with the front-panel USB 3.0 connections on my computer.  I still need to confirm whether the problem is with my computer or with this external hard drive. I plan on researching this situation further in the future.  This Seagate Portable Hard Drive works well when connected to my powered USB 2.0 hub and so for now I will just live with the lower speeds of USB 2.0.

Formatting Time Connected to USB 2.0

With the unit connected to a USB 2.0 port, the formatting of my new 1 TB External Hard Drive took about 6 Hours and 45 Minutes.  This was longer than I expected.  Keep in mind that this is a 2.5" drive and I would guess that it is only rated at 5400 RPM.

Our Story of Eczema Relief taking MSM or Culturelle

I am not a physician nor a medical professional.  Please read the following with that in mind.  I strongly recommend that you discuss the information below with your physician before taking any action.

Natural Solutions for my Daughter's Eczema

When my daughter was younger she suffered terribly from eczema.  It was very difficult watching her deal with the discomfort and itching.  She was taken to see both her primary physician and a dermatologist but unfortunately they were not able to provide solutions that provide much relief.

In my frustration with the doctors not being able to help much, I did some thinking and research and found two natural remedies that provide her with significant  relief.

MSM and Eczema

We already had MSM in the house and I knew that there was a lot of anecdotal evidence available that it was good for the skin.  I had may daughter start taking MSM daily.  It worked wonderfully and pretty quickly.  If I recall correctly she started seeing relief in a matter of days.  I want to note that in our case, she was not applying MSM lotion but taking it internally in pill form.
 

Culturelle and Eczema

The other natural remedy that worked for my daughter was a probiotic by the name of Culturelle.  During my research I read about the connection between eczema and the immune system.  I had also previously read about probiotics and how they can benefit the immune system.  So I thought perhaps if my daughter took a probiotic it might help her eczema.  We already had Culterelle in the house so I had her start taking it daily.  It also worked at providing her with relief.  If I recall correctly she started seeing relief in about a week or so.


Fortunately as my daughter has gotten older, her eczema symptoms have decreased significantly.  But during the years that her eczema was "active" it was a wonderful that we had found two natural remedies that provided relief!  It's a terrible thing to watch someone you love suffering from eczema and perhaps our story might help someone else (As stated in the beginning, I am not a physician nor a medical professional.  Please read the above anecdotal information with that in mind. I strongly recommend that you discuss this information with your physician before taking any action).

My Windows 8.1 Three Monitor Configuration

Three Monitors with Haswell i7 CPU installed on a Gigabyte GA-H87- D3H Motherboard

For many people the idea of having more than two monitors seems ridiculous.  However for some of us computer "power users" having as much desktop monitor space as possible is the goal. 

I have a Windows 8.1 computer that I built using higher-end components and usually I am running multiple programs at once and want to have them spread out over multiple displays without the windows being on top of each other.

My Specific Three-Monitor Setup

I recently upgraded my system from a dual-monitor setup to a three monitor set up. I did this using a Gigabyte GA-H87-D3H motherboard with an Intel i7-4771 (Haswell) processor installed.  I do not have a separate video card installed and use the integrated Intel 4600 GPU.  I have my main 27" monitor connected to the DVI port of the motherboard.  I have my secondary 23" monitor connected to the HDMI port.  The third monitor is an older 19" 4x3 monitor connected to the VGA port.  It works great and was easy to set up in Windows 8.1.

To set up the three monitors in Windows 8.1, I right-clicked on the Windows desktop and selected "Screen resolution" from the context menu that appeared.

Intel HD Graphics 4600 and Black Levels - HDMI vs DVI

Late last year I built a new Windows 8.1 computer with an Intel i7-4771 processor installed on a Gigabyte GA-H87-D3H motherboard with 16 GB of RAM.

 

I originally had a dual-monitor set-up with a 27" Viewsonic VX2770Smh-LED monitor connected to the HDMI port and a 23" LG Flatron IPS236 connected to the DVI port.  Please note which monitor is connected to which port.

When I compared the black levels and colors between the two monitors I was really impressed with those on the LG monitor (connected to the DVI port) but really disappointed with the black levels and colors displayed on the Viewsonic (connected to the HDMI port).  Images and videos looked more washed out on the Viewsonic and the black levels were very noticeably different.  I spent a lot of time adjusting settings on the Viewsonic monitor itself and in the Intel HD Graphics Control Panel software.  I was never able to get satisfying results.  My first thought (turns out incorrect as explained below) was that the Viewsonic monitor was simply not able to produce satisfying black levels and colors.

I did some research online about the Intel HD Graphics 4600 GPU and was surprised to find that others had experienced problems with black levels on the HDMI port vs those produced by the DVI port.  I decided to switch the connections to the monitors.

DVI  Black Levels vs HDMI Black Levels - Intel 4600 GPU

 

This was the problem!!  Now that the Viewsonic VX2770Smh-LED monitor was connected to the DVI port, it was displaying superior black levels and colors compared to the LG IPS236 monitor connected to the HDMI port.  I am quite surprised by this and would have expected that the HDMI port and the DVI port would have produced the same quality image.  Although I have not tested it out yet, based on information I quickly read on the internet, I am suspicious that the VGA port would also produce better black levels than the HDMI port (but this is only speculation and I have not verified this suspicion).

Intel HD Graphics 4600 GPU - Monitor Connection Advice

For single-monitor setups: Connect your monitor to the DVI port and not the HDMI port of the Intel 4600 GPU.

For dual-monitor setups: Connect your primary monitor to the DVI port and your secondary monitor to the HDMI port.

One caveat to remember is that only the HDMI port carries audio information.  So if your monitor has speakers you are planning on using then this may effect your decision.

Cannot Open Project in TMPGEnc Video Mastering Works 5

Because of Microsoft no longer supporting Windows XP, I recently built a new Windows 8.1 computer and am in the process of moving software and files to the new computer.

I edit and encode video files using a program from Pegasys entitled TMGEnc Video Mastering Works 5.  I had no problem loading and running this software on my new Windows 8.1 computer.  However when I tried to open certain Video Mastering Works 5 projects on the new computer an error message was displayed stating that "This file is not a project file generated by TMPGEnc Video Mastering Works 5".  Below is a screen image that I captured of the pop-up error window:

I was perplexed but did find a solution.  After loading the software on my new computer I noticed that whenever I ran it I would always be shown an error message about problems related to Apple QuickTime.  I always ignored this message because I did not think I worked with files related to QuickTime.  I had not yet loaded QuickTime yet on my computer (in fact I did not plan on loading it ever as I really never used it on my old computer.....or so I thought).  However after researching the problem and determining which files were causing my projects to display the above error message, I became suspicious that I needed to load QuickTime.  Why did I have this suspicion?  Because on the "problem" video files I saw that they had Quicktime related parameters when I used MediaInfo to display technical and tag data related to these files.

My Solution

I loaded Apple QuickTime (as documented in a previous post on this blog) and I was able to now open all of my projects without any problems and without displaying the "This file is not a project file generated by TMPGEnc Video Mastering Works 5".

QuickTime and Windows 8.1

Quicktime Installation on Windows 8.1 64-Bit

I just downloaded and installed QuickTime on my 64-Bit Windows 8.1 computer.  The installation went smoothly and everything appears to be running well.  Specifically I loaded QuickTime Version 7.7.5.

On Apple's download page it only shows support for Windows 7 and other earlier versions.  No mention is made of Windows 8 or Windows 8.1.  Although I have not extensively tested the program, I was able to play a variety of movie samples that I downloaded from Apple.