50 Skills Every Real Geek Should Have
Posted 12/08/08 at 12:00:00 PM by The Maximum PC Staff
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Wire Your Home with Ethernet Cable
The future may be wireless, but in the present it’s still very handy to have your house wired with Ethernet cable. Unfortunately, if carpentry isn’t really your strong suit, the job of running thousands of feet of cable through your walls, floors and ceilings might seem a little bit daunting. But take heart in the fact that Maximum PC EIC Will Smith didn’t get scared when faced with the same challenge, and everything worked out fine.
Know the 6 Most Important Linux Commands
Want to use Linux? While it’s not strictly necessary anymore, knowing these TK Linux commands will help you in your quest to attain ultimate nerdiness.
* cd – used to navigate to different directories on your system, cd .. takes up up one directory, while cd / takes you to the root of the drive, and cd with no arguments takes you to your home directory
* ls – like dir on DOS, ls lists the contents of the directory you’re currently in
* cp – used to copy files to a new location on your hard drive cp /home/wsmith/test.txt /home/bjones/text.txt
* mv – used to copy a file to a new destination, then demolish the old one. Uses the same syntax as cp
* mkdir – makes a new directory at your current location
* rm – deletes the files specified. With the -r option, it also deletes subdirectories.
Rip Your CDs to FLAC
Everyone knows how to rip a CD to MP3 using iTunes, but if that’s the way you convert your tunes to a portable-friendly format, you’re doing your ears a disservice. While MP3 and other lossy formats sound OK on tinny earbuds and portable players, hook them up to a true audiophile rig, you’ll be disappointed. Ripping your CDs losslessly gives you a bit-for-bit identical audio file at a fraction of the size of an uncompressed CD. Of course, if you still insist on ripping to MP3, you can use EAC and LAME to do that too.
Stream Your Movies, Music, and Photos to Any TV in Your House
You’ve taken the time to rip and transcode hundreds of DVDs for playback on your iPhone, PSP, or other digital media player. You also have a current-gen gaming console—an Xbox 360 or PS3—hooked up to a giant TV in your living room. Right now, you have everything you need to stream your high-quality DVD rips from your computer into your living room using TVersity and our handy how-to guide.
Install and Configure a Virtual Machine
Using virtual machine software you can install multiple OSes on one machine and switch between them, without rebooting! You can use VMs to do everything from run servers to setup a sandbox for testing potentially infected files and applications. Getting started is as easy as downloading virtual machine software, installing it and creating your first machine, then installing Windows, Linux, BSD, or pretty much any other OS on it. Want to move your VM to another machine? That’s easy too, just copy the file that contains your VM to your other machine, install the virtual machine software, and you’re ready to go.
Run Multiple Monitors Like a Pro
There’s no better way to assert your geek ascendancy than to load your desk to the buckling point with multiple monitors. But any old layman can plug an extra monitor into the back of his box and extend his desktop onto it in the display options menu, a poweruser knows that to unlock the full potential of his many displays, he needs a software solution like Ultramon. If you’re unsure about shelling out the 40 bucks for Ultramon, check out our guide on the app and its alternatives.
If you want to take multiple displays to the next level, consider using multiple computers, connected with a virtual KVM switch like Synergy. Now that’s sure to impress the kiddies.
Hack Firmware on a Router
Navigating through a router’s multitude of menus and configuration settings can be confusing, especially given the obtuse documentation typically bundled with the device. That’s why we prefer third-party open-source firmware, which not only streamlines a router’s graphical user interface but also adds robust functionality. For Linksys routers, our firmware of choice is Tomato (www.polarcloud.com/tomato). As with all third-party firmware upgrades, installing Tomato does come with a slight risk of damaging your router. While we’ve never had any problems with this software, it’ll definitely void your router’s original warranty. Read our guide here!
Haha! Its official I am a
Submitted by sandra34 on Mon, 11/16/2009 - 3:18am
Haha! Its official I am a real geek cos I have done all of those! :)
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Submitted by punksnot19 on Sat, 12/20/2008 - 12:58pm
What about nunchuck skills? Chicks like guys with nunchuck skills...
Submitted by adeletwo6789 on Tue, 09/29/2009 - 11:20am
wow…nice dress up! Well I can only
identify the superman, batman, and the Spiderman… may be my 6 yearsassignment | assignment
help | assignment
writingold nephew will able to identify all of the characters. He is always.
Submitted by martin0641 on Tue, 02/24/2009 - 6:53pm
Not only were the 'Chux ignored, but all 50 of your "skillz" were childsplay for me. Please hire some real editors who do more than spit out dribble for script kiddies that wanna think their 1337.
Real IT is hard, avoiding outages, perfecting performance, operating at the Enterprise level, satisfying customers who don't care what kind of array your using.
I don't expect much since your money comes from load-spewing teenagers, but the occassional recognition of the people who actually know what their doing would be nice.
Also, this is 2009, everyone can read leetspeak. It's not cool anymore, get over it.
Try and offer a real how-to every once and awhile as well. People know how to o/c videocards, see if they can perfect failover on 50 servers 100 miles apart.
Submitted by Antoros on Fri, 02/27/2009 - 10:50pm
You are skilled at IT work and yet you consistently make two of the most basic mistakes in written English. Please proofread before you post arrogant messages.
Ya i agrree with you dew is
Submitted by TheKhaos24 on Thu, 12/18/2008 - 7:33pm
Ya i agrree with you dew is the best. I just wanted to let you know you can hide your files quite easily for free all you have to do is open up system tools and alt code everything that is what i do
Submitted by EyesSewnShut on Wed, 12/17/2008 - 3:27am
Both Señior Pibb and Dr. Pepper suck. Real nerds and geeks alike drink the DEW!
Do the DEW
Submitted by Glycerin on Wed, 12/31/2008 - 5:21pm
Thank you at least someone agrees with me!
Seriously, who still uses IE?
Submitted by AndyYankee17 on Fri, 12/19/2008 - 5:24pm
yeah because nerds and geeks don't need the sperm count anyways
I count this as a waste of space.....
Submitted by ghot on Wed, 12/17/2008 - 2:18am
You publish a magazine that is supposed to report on computer hardware and software and do it fairly and reliably.....quit wasting space with this cr*p. Oh yeah, add to that the wonderfully enlightening screwdriver article....like anyone can't buy a screwdriver without direction.
Submitted by gordonjc on Mon, 12/15/2008 - 2:57pm
i only count 46, not 50
Submitted by Silentblaze513 on Mon, 12/15/2008 - 4:17am
There's about 80% more yet to be said in this article
Submitted by sixbit on Wed, 12/10/2008 - 7:43am
lame article....
Submitted by sixbit on Wed, 12/10/2008 - 7:42am
lame article....
The hyperlink for Portable
Submitted by yugiah on Wed, 12/10/2008 - 6:51am
The hyperlink for Portable apps aint there :P Fix pl0x?
Submitted by okoureia on Tue, 12/09/2008 - 10:43am
I can't wait to get off of work so I can try tinkering around with that virtual machine.
Submitted by AndyYankee17 on Tue, 12/09/2008 - 12:41pm
I don't know which one they mention in the article but my favorite is Sun's Virtual box
Submitted by that Linux guy on Tue, 12/09/2008 - 8:13am
Best... Article... Ever.
Submitted by Sharkky9 on Tue, 12/09/2008 - 3:23am
I would like to point out that this article misuses the phrase "liberal arts." Liberal Arts are those pursuits which are not applied. For example, Physics, English, and Mathematics are all liberal arts. What this article is trying to say, is that any good geek should be able to explain relativity to, for example, a humanities major. Subjects in the humanities include english, philosophy, religion, and history.
As a liberal arts major(mathematics) i am proud to note that understanding of general and special relativity is an important part of my curriculum.
Sincerely,
A Pretentious SOB
Submitted by anonuser on Tue, 12/09/2008 - 6:35am
Gadzooks, you're right. I never knew, theoretical physics IS a liberal art. Also, you didn't make any spelling mistakes in your post, AND you were the first commenter. Nice job, fellow geek!
Submitted by steventhebrave on Tue, 12/09/2008 - 2:39am
NT Pass Reset is a bootable CD for resetting windows passwords. You should give that a go before trying a crack CD.
Submitted by MAJORzer0 on Wed, 12/17/2008 - 5:04am
You never realize how easy it really is to crack XP. We have a few different tools here at the office to force our ways on simple minded computers. A good (or bad depending on how you look at it) thing is that alot of old programs still work just as well on a fully updated XP. We don't have to deal with VISTA though so I don't know how well any of my tools will work. Alot of them are unix/linux based programs that simply open up and attach itself to your OS and let you change anything you want(even the registry and master boot record of your hard drives). It keeps the button mashers here from totally killing us on reloading the machines because they played with something they shouldn't have.
Submitted by Boogster on Mon, 12/08/2008 - 8:15pm
I only built one computer four years ago (this one). And even then I had to read up on it for six months beforehand. This shit fascinates me though. The little bit I've learned has helped me a great deal where I work as some of the CNC machinery I use has been retrofitted with PC Controls (replacing punched tape readers). It's pretty cool.
Submitted by Queenof1 on Mon, 12/08/2008 - 3:14pm
I'm pretty disappointed that MPC would mention mooching of neighbor's wifi. Whereas needing to crack a Windows password for YOUR system that you can no longer get into is valid, there is no reason to steal bandwidth from your neighbor, even if they aren't geek enough to secure their network.
Pitcher's ERA? Please...
Submitted by DelandSIV on Mon, 12/08/2008 - 12:26pm
I'll take your pitcher's earned run average, and raise you a quarterback's passer rating.
Submitted by AndyYankee17 on Mon, 12/08/2008 - 12:40pm
yeah that's what I was thinking, ERA's simple, real geeks can compute pass ratings to 4 significant digits.
mentally.
official
Submitted by GreenTurtle on Mon, 12/08/2008 - 12:14pm
It's official..... I am a geek.
Submitted by G33k on Mon, 12/08/2008 - 8:57am
Hey, i'm the real geek! i have A+, Net+ Linux+, and i'm doing ccna. I run 64-bit ubuntu on my laptop ( with 32-bit skype ).
GEEK FTW!
Submitted by killerxx7 on Mon, 12/08/2008 - 7:47am
This is def a geek list not that much maths involved lol
Submitted by lostcause64 on Mon, 12/08/2008 - 7:51am
The only difference between a Geek and a Nerd is that Geeks have at least occassional intimate contact with members of the opposite sex. Having done most of these things myself already, and being a grandfather of three, leaving this a Geek list is very important!!
John
Try to be smarter than the object you're working with! It will make things easier, and might just save your life...
Submitted by Digital-Storm on Mon, 12/08/2008 - 3:50am
Change the title from Real Geek to Uber Nerd. Please!
Exactly, I agree with you.
Submitted by maniacm0nk3y on Mon, 12/08/2008 - 7:09am
Exactly, I agree with you.
Submitted by scuzzo on Mon, 12/08/2008 - 12:43am
In order of the pictures is it
DDR Memory
Dual Channel RIMM
PCI Express Connector
Nicely done!
Submitted by willsmith on Mon, 12/08/2008 - 11:16am
Nicely done!
Nice article.
Submitted by dankers on Mon, 12/08/2008 - 12:31am
Nice article.
Submitted by yugiah on Mon, 12/08/2008 - 12:05am
Quite the list :o
Submitted by maniacm0nk3y on Sun, 12/07/2008 - 11:57pm
Half of these I have already did but most are useless to me.
I probably will get another moniter when I get a degree for web design. I will be building a linux media center, checked it on my laptop (and checking off a number here by having a dual boot) soon. Everything else is not for me.
Well done...
Submitted by horzo on Mon, 12/08/2008 - 12:42pm
Let me know when you find a Linux app that:
a) does transcoding
b) is DLNA compatible
c) is free
Submitted by pRtkL xLr8r on Tue, 12/09/2008 - 1:55pm
I have it running on Gentoo Linux and can now share my hi-def movies from my Linux box to my Xbox 360 and PS3...
Submitted by anonuser on Mon, 12/08/2008 - 10:36pm
Oh you mean like Fuppes?
http://fuppes.ulrich-voelkel.de/
Submitted by chat1der on Mon, 12/08/2008 - 6:07am
Submitted by maniacm0nk3y on Mon, 12/08/2008 - 7:08am
Why?
* Edit: Oh so I have a syntax error and maybe some grammatical errors as well. I wrote this at 2.am after finishing a program (final) that is for class the next day(which is today).
Even the stuff that is useless should be standard for any new techie. All of this should be standard, they should have included more "high profile" skills. When I hear about this over and over it seems that it should just be the norm.
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