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  • Unable to Mange DNS via MMC

    - by IT Helpdesk Team Manager
    When trying to access the DNS service on Microsoft Windows Server 2003 (Build 3790) domain controller/schema master via the MMC DNS snap in or locally via the DNS MMC from Administrative tools I'm getting a red "X" through the icon for the DNS Server. The inability to access DNS management via MMC happens on all domain controllers as well. We've looked at items such as the DHCP client not being started, incorrect DNS setup ( the machine points at itself and another DC ), the DNS service not running ( it is and all DNS queries via NSLOOKUP work correctly ), dslint returns the correct information and functions as expected. There is the following entry in the DNS event log: The DNS server could not initialize the remote procedure call (RPC) service. If it is not running, start the RPC service or reboot the computer. The event data is the error code. For more information, see Help and Support Center at http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/events.asp. 0000: 0000051b dnscmd fails with RPC server unavailable yet RPC is started: C:\Documents and Settings\Administrator.DOMAIN>dnscmd /Info Info query failed status = 1722 (0x000006ba) Command failed: RPC_S_SERVER_UNAVAILABLE 1722 (000006ba) DCDIAG /TEST:DNS /V /E produces the following errors: Warning: no DNS RPC connectivity (error or non Microsoft DNS server is running) [Error details: 1753 (Type: Win32 - Description: There are no more endpoints available from the endpoint mapper.)] Warning: no DNS RPC connectivity (error or non Microsoft DNS server is running) [Error details: 1722 (Type: Win32 - Description: The RPC server is unavailable.)] The DNS server could not initialize the remote procedure call (RPC) service. If it is not running, start the RPC service or reboot the computer. The event data is the error code. A DNS query for _ldap._tcp.dc._msdcs. returns the correct results. All domain and ADS related activities are working except that I can't manage my DNS via MMC or dnscmd. Any thoughts or solutions would be greatly appreciated. EDIT: Adding Registry export per request: Key Name: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Rpc Class Name: <NO CLASS> Last Write Time: 10/18/2012 - 2:29 PM Value 0 Name: DCOM Protocols Type: REG_MULTI_SZ Data: ncacn_ip_tcp Value 1 Name: UuidSequenceNumber Type: REG_DWORD Data: 0xb19bd0f Key Name: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Rpc\ClientProtocols Class Name: <NO CLASS> Last Write Time: 3/9/2007 - 12:11 PM Value 0 Name: ncacn_np Type: REG_SZ Data: rpcrt4.dll Value 1 Name: ncacn_ip_tcp Type: REG_SZ Data: rpcrt4.dll Value 2 Name: ncadg_ip_udp Type: REG_SZ Data: rpcrt4.dll Value 3 Name: ncacn_http Type: REG_SZ Data: rpcrt4.dll Value 4 Name: ncacn_at_dsp Type: REG_SZ Data: rpcrt4.dll Key Name: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Rpc\NameService Class Name: <NO CLASS> Last Write Time: 2/20/2006 - 4:48 PM Value 0 Name: DefaultSyntax Type: REG_SZ Data: 3 Value 1 Name: Endpoint Type: REG_SZ Data: \pipe\locator Value 2 Name: NetworkAddress Type: REG_SZ Data: \\. Value 3 Name: Protocol Type: REG_SZ Data: ncacn_np Value 4 Name: ServerNetworkAddress Type: REG_SZ Data: \\. Key Name: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Rpc\NetBios Class Name: <NO CLASS> Last Write Time: 2/20/2006 - 4:48 PM Key Name: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Rpc\RpcProxy Class Name: <NO CLASS> Last Write Time: 3/9/2007 - 12:11 PM Value 0 Name: Enabled Type: REG_DWORD Data: 0x1 Value 1 Name: ValidPorts Type: REG_SZ Data: pdc:100-5000 Key Name: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Rpc\SecurityService Class Name: <NO CLASS> Last Write Time: 2/20/2006 - 4:48 PM Value 0 Name: 9 Type: REG_SZ Data: secur32.dll Value 1 Name: 10 Type: REG_SZ Data: secur32.dll Value 2 Name: 14 Type: REG_SZ Data: schannel.dll Value 3 Name: 16 Type: REG_SZ Data: secur32.dll Value 4 Name: 1 Type: REG_SZ Data: secur32.dll Value 5 Name: 18 Type: REG_SZ Data: secur32.dll Value 6 Name: 68 Type: REG_SZ Data: netlogon.dll

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  • How clean is deleting a computer object?

    - by Kevin
    Though quite skilled at software development, I'm a novice when it comes to Active Directory. I've noticed that AD seems to have a lot of stuff buried in the directory and schema which does not appear superficially when using simplified tools such as Active Directory Users and Computers. It kind of feels like the Windows registry, where COM classes have all kinds of intertwined references, many of which are purely by GUID, such that it's not enough to just search for anything referencing "GadgetXyz" by name in order to cleanly remove GadgetXyz. This occasionally leads to the uneasy feeling that I may have useless garbage building up in there which I have no idea how to weed out. For instance, I made the mistake a while back of trying to rename a DC, figuring I could just do it in the usual manner from Control Panel. I found references to the old name buried all over the place which made it impossible to reuse that name without considerable manual cleanup. Even long after I got it all working, I've stumbled upon the old name hidden away in LDAP. (There were no other DCs left in the picture at that time so I don't think it was a tombstone issue.) More specifically, I'm worried about the case of just outright deleting a computer from AD. I understand the cleanest way to do it is to log into the computer itself and tell it to leave the domain. (As an aside, doing this in Windows 8 seems to only disable the computer object and not delete it outright!) My concern is cases where this is not possible, for instance because it was on an already-deleted VM image. I can simply go into Active Directory Users and Computers, find the computer object, click it, and press Delete, and it seems to go away. My question is, is it totally, totally gone, or could this leave hanging references in any Active Directory nook or cranny I won't know to look in? (Excluding of course the expected tombstone records which expire after a set time.) If so, is there any good way to clean up the mess? Thank you for any insight! Kevin ps., It was over a year ago so I don't remember the exact details, but here's the gist of the DC renaming issue. I started with a single 2008 DC named ABC in a physical machine and wanted to end up instead with a DC of the same name running in a vSphere VM. Not wanting to mess with imaging the physical machine, my plan instead was: Rename ABC to XYZ. Fresh install 2008 on a VM, name it ABC, and join it to the domain. (I may have done the latter in the same step as promoting to DC; I don't recall.) dcpromo the new ABC as a 2nd DC, including GC. Make sure the new ABC replicated correctly from XYZ and then transfer the FSMO roles from XYZ to it. Once everything was confirmed to work with the new ABC alone, demote XYZ, remove the AD role, and remove it from the domain. Eventually I managed to do this but it was a much bumpier ride than expected. In particular, I got errors trying to join the new ABC to the domain. These included "The pre-windows 2000 name is already in use" and "No mapping between account names and security IDs was done." I eventually found that the computer object for XYZ had attributes that still referred to it as ABC. Among these were servicePrincipalName, msDS-AdditionalDnsHostName, and msDS-AdditionalSamAccountName. The latter I could not edit via Attribute Editor and instead had to run this against XYZ: NETDOM computername <simple-name> /add:<FQDN> There were some other hitches I don't remember exactly.

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  • How to prevent delays associated with IPv6 AAAA records?

    - by Nic
    Our Windows servers are registering IPv6 AAAA records with our Windows DNS servers. However, we don't have IPv6 routing enabled on our network, so this frequently causes stall behaviours. Microsoft RDP is the worst offender. When connecting to a server that has a AAAA record in DNS, the remote desktop client will try IPv6 first, and won't fall back to IPv4 until the connection times out. Power users can work around this by connecting to the IP address directly. Resolving the IPv4 address with ping -4 hostname.foo always works instantly. What can I do to avoid this delay? Disable IPv6 on client? Nope, Microsoft says IPv6 is a mandatory part of the Windows operating system. Too many clients to ensure this is set everywhere consistently. Will cause more problems later when we finally implement IPv6. Disable IPv6 on the server? Nope, Microsoft says IPv6 is a mandatory part of the Windows operating system. Requires an inconvenient registry hack to disable the entire IPv6 stack. Ensuring this is correctly set on all servers is inconvenient. Will cause more problems later when we finally implement IPv6. Mask IPv6 records on the user-facnig DNS recursor? Nope, we're using NLNet Unbound and it doesn't support that. Prevent registration of IPv6 AAAA records on the Microsoft DNS server? I don't think that's even possible. At this point, I'm considering writing a script that purges all AAAA records from our DNS zones. Please, help me find a better way. UPDATE: DNS resolution is not the problem. As @joeqwerty points out in his answer, the DNS records are returned instantly. Both A and AAAA records are immediately available. The problem is that some clients (mstsc.exe) will preferentially attempt a connection over IPv6, and take a while to fall back to IPv4. This seems like a routing problem. The ping command produces a "General failure" error message because the destination address is unroutable. C:\Windows\system32>ping myhost.mydomain Pinging myhost.mydomain [2002:1234:1234::1234:1234] with 32 bytes of data: General failure. General failure. General failure. General failure. Ping statistics for 2002:1234:1234::1234:1234: Packets: Sent = 4, Received = 0, Lost = 4 (100% loss), I can't get a packet capture of this behaviour. Running this (failing) ping command does not produce any packets in Microsoft Network Monitor. Similarly, attempting a connection with mstsc.exe to a host with an AAAA record produces no traffic until it does a fallback to IPv4. UPDATE: Our hosts are all using publicly-routable IPv4 addresses. I think this problem might come down to a broken 6to4 configuration. 6to4 behaves differently on hosts with public IP addresses vs RFC1918 addresses. UPDATE: There is definitely something fishy with 6to4 on my network. When I disable 6to4 on the Windows client, connections resolve instantly. netsh int ipv6 6to4 set state disabled But as @joeqwerty says, this only masks the problem. I'm still trying to find out why IPv6 communication on our network is completely non-working.

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  • Failed Administrator login on WSO2 IS with external OpenLDAP

    - by Marco Rivadeneyra
    I have an installation of WSO2 Identity Server and I'm trying to make it work with an external OpenLDAP instance I have followed this guide: http://wso2.org/project/solutions/identity/3.2.3/docs/user-core/admin_guide.html#LDAP For the read-only mode. But when I try to log-in I get a failed login and the following error on the console: TID: [0] [WSO2 Identity Server] [2012-08-10 17:10:25,493] WARN {org.wso2.carbon.core.services.util.CarbonAuthenticationUtil} - Failed Administrator login attempt 'john[0]' at [2012-08-10 17:10:25,0493] from IP address 127.0.0.1 {org.wso2.carbon.core.services.util.CarbonAuthenticationUtil} Full log: http://pastebin.com/pHUGXBqv My configuration file looks as follows: <UserManager> <Realm> <Configuration> <AdminRole>admin</AdminRole> <AdminUser> <UserName>john</UserName> <Password>johnldap</Password> </AdminUser> <EveryOneRoleName>everyone</EveryOneRoleName> <!-- By default users in this role sees the registry root --> <ReadOnly>true</ReadOnly> <MaxUserNameListLength>500</MaxUserNameListLength> <Property name="url">jdbc:h2:repository/database/WSO2CARBON_DB</Property> <Property name="userName">wso2carbon</Property> <Property name="password">wso2carbon</Property> <Property name="driverName">org.h2.Driver</Property> <Property name="maxActive">50</Property> <Property name="maxWait">60000</Property> <Property name="minIdle">5</Property> </Configuration> <UserStoreManager class="org.wso2.carbon.user.core.ldap.LDAPUserStoreManager"> <Property name="ReadOnly">true</Property> <Property name="MaxUserNameListLength">100</Property> <Property name="ConnectionURL">ldap://192.168.81.144:389</Property> <Property name="ConnectionName">cn=admin,dc=example,dc=com</Property> <Property name="ConnectionPassword">admin</Property> <Property name="UserSearchBase">ou=People,dc=example,dc=com</Property> <Property name="UserNameListFilter">(objectClass=inetOrgPerson)</Property> <Property name="UserNameAttribute">uid</Property> <Property name="ReadLDAPGroups">false</Property> <Property name="GroupSearchBase">ou=Groups,dc=example,dc=com</Property> <Property name="GroupSearchFilter">(objectClass=groupOfNames)</Property> <Property name="GroupNameAttribute">uid</Property> <Property name="MembershipAttribute">member</Property> </UserStoreManager> <AuthorizationManager class="org.wso2.carbon.user.core.authorization.JDBCAuthorizationManager"></AuthorizationManager> </Realm> I followed this guide to configure my LDAP server up to Loggging: https://help.ubuntu.com/12.04/serverguide/openldap-server.html Could you suggest what might be wrong? The LDAP log is available at: http://pastebin.com/T9rFYEAW

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  • TV not detected by Windows/VGA - when there is a WHDI device in the signal chain

    - by ashwalk
    I'm at my wit's end with this one... I had an EVGA GTS 250, and I used to plug it's HDMI out into a WHDI sender, which transmitted to its corresponding WHDI receiver 15ft away, which then connected to a Samsung LN40D LCD TV through another HDMI cable. PC/VGA < [hdmi cable] < WHDI sender <[air] WHDI receiver < [hdmi cable] < TV It was perfect, stable, no perceivable latency. I just plugged everything the first time and it worked instantly. It sent 5.1 audio, and Windows/nVidia Control Center detected the TV by its name. The WHDI device is this one: http://goo.gl/Q8iWI5 Now I bought an EVGA GTX 650, and WHDI doesn't work anymore. Both Windows and nVidia Control Center won't detect the TV, only the monitor that's connected via DVI. The TV screen shows "TX202913 connected. Check video signal." on top of a black screen. Though the device is not the problem itself, just the fact that it's not allowing direct connection between PC and TV. I would bet that if put an AVR in its place I'd also have this issue. The HDMI on this new card works with other monitors. If I put the older card back, WHDI works normally. I have googled this for 5 months on and off. Once I bumped into a page that showed how to force a display device to always-on through registry edit. Once I restarted windows, the Tv (through WHDI) displayed my expanded or duplicated desktop at 1024x768 ONLY, and listed the display as "digital display". I could not change the resolution and it wouldn't playback audio (although the option was available at nVidia Control Center HDMI audio options, but did not work). This proves that there is no conflict between the devices, except that software-wise, Windows cannot, for the life of it, understand that there's a TV there to send video/audio to. Since this won't do (no audio, poor video), I reverted this regedit. It's also not an EDID problem within the TV, since when connected directly it works. The last weird bit of this saga is that today, I reminded of Windows' "Add Device" dialog, gave it a go, and a "Samsung Generic UPNP TV" showed up, which I promptly installed the drives for, rising to a climax of... ...NOTHING HAPPENING. As far as I can tell, it really didn't change anything other than using up a few kb in my main disc. I should also say that I looked a LOT into handshake problems and nothing applied either. Do any of you have an idea of what may be going on? I can't stand the thought of having a us$200 device not working because of the addition of a newer graphics card, when the much older one had no issues. There is absolutely NO REASON for this to happen. There is NO documentation on WHDI online. Apparently no one buys this stuff. For the same reason, no one responded to this same plea for help on NVidia and EVGA forums. Worst case, this can be a warning about this setup for people in the future. Thanx in advance.

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  • SQLExpress service unable to start Error code 17053

    - by Chris Sobolewski
    A user was instructed by their software support to upgrade a program and install SQLExpress as part of the installation process. Since that time, the service has been able to start, citing error 17053, which appears to be an authentication issue. Here is the error log: 2011-01-11 13:17:45.50 Server Microsoft SQL Server 2005 - 9.00.3042.00 (Intel X86) Feb 9 2007 22:47:07 Copyright (c) 1988-2005 Microsoft Corporation Express Edition on Windows NT 5.1 (Build 2600: Service Pack 2) 2011-01-11 13:17:45.50 Server (c) 2005 Microsoft Corporation. 2011-01-11 13:17:45.50 Server All rights reserved. 2011-01-11 13:17:45.50 Server Server process ID is 3332. 2011-01-11 13:17:45.50 Server Authentication mode is WINDOWS-ONLY. 2011-01-11 13:17:45.50 Server Logging SQL Server messages in file 'c:\Program Files\Microsoft SQL Server\MSSQL.1\MSSQL\LOG\ERRORLOG'. 2011-01-11 13:17:45.52 Server This instance of SQL Server last reported using a process ID of 2332 at 11/10/2010 2:15:24 PM (local) 11/10/2010 7:15:24 PM (UTC). This is an informational message only; no user action is required. 2011-01-11 13:17:45.52 Server Error: 17053, Severity: 16, State: 1. 2011-01-11 13:17:45.52 Server UpdateUptimeRegKey: Operating system error 5(Access is denied.) encountered. 2011-01-11 13:17:45.52 Server Registry startup parameters: 2011-01-11 13:17:45.52 Server -d c:\Program Files\Microsoft SQL Server\MSSQL.1\MSSQL\DATA\master.mdf 2011-01-11 13:17:45.52 Server -e c:\Program Files\Microsoft SQL Server\MSSQL.1\MSSQL\LOG\ERRORLOG 2011-01-11 13:17:45.52 Server -l c:\Program Files\Microsoft SQL Server\MSSQL.1\MSSQL\DATA\mastlog.ldf 2011-01-11 13:17:45.52 Server Error: 17113, Severity: 16, State: 1. 2011-01-11 13:17:45.52 Server Error 3(The system cannot find the path specified.) occurred while opening file 'c:\Program Files\Microsoft SQL Server\MSSQL.1\MSSQL\DATA\master.mdf' to obtain configuration information at startup. An invalid startup option might have caused the error. Verify your startup options, and correct or remove them if necessary. 2011-01-11 13:17:45.52 Server Error: 17053, Severity: 16, State: 1. 2011-01-11 13:17:45.52 Server UpdateUptimeRegKey: Operating system error 5(Access is denied.) encountered. 4 Server Error: 17053, Severity: 16, State: 1. 2011-01-11 13:08:21.34 Server UpdateUptimeRegKey: Operating system error 5(Access is denied.) encountered. 12:47:20.85 spid5s SQL Trace ID 1 was started by login "sa". 2011-01-11 12:47:20.90 spid5s Starting up database 'mssqlsystemresource'. 2011-01-11 12:47:20.93 spid5s The resource database build version is 9.00.3042. This is an informational message only. No user action is required. 2011-01-11 12:47:21.21 spid5s Error: 15466, Severity: 16, State: 1. 2011-01-11 12:47:21.21 spid5s An error occurred during decryption. 2011-01-11 12:47:21.38 spid8s Starting up database 'model'. 2011-01-11 12:47:21.38 Server Error: 17182, Severity: 16, State: 1. 2011-01-11 12:47:21.38 Server TDSSNIClient initialization failed with error 0x5, status code 0x90. 2011-01-11 12:47:21.38 Server Error: 17182, Severity: 16, State: 1. 2011-01-11 12:47:21.38 Server TDSSNIClient initialization failed with error 0x5, status code 0x1. 2011-01-11 12:47:21.38 Server Error: 17826, Severity: 18, State: 3. 2011-01-11 12:47:21.38 Server Could not start the network library because of an internal error in the network library. To determine the cause, review the errors immediately preceding this one in the error log. 2011-01-11 12:47:21.38 Server Error: 17120, Severity: 16, State: 1. 2011-01-11 12:47:21.38 Server SQL Server could not spawn FRunCM thread. Check the SQL Server error log and the Windows event logs for information about possible related problems. One lead I had was to change the SQL logon account from "Network Service" to "Local System". Unfortunately, that is resulting in the error message The Security ID Structure is Invalid [0x80070539] Any help either uninstalling or getting SQLExpress running would be fantastic.

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  • SBS2003 to SBS2011 Migration - Installation Error

    - by Shawn Gradwell
    Microsoft Small Business Server 2003 to 2011 Migration. I followed the Migration Guide from Microsoft and the source server had no errors when running the various tests prior to the migration. I have completed the destination server setup using the Answer File and the server is up and running. It all looks good, I can access Exchange and AD and the only problem is the error message when you log in stating that the setup did not complete and to check the logs. Because all looks good I am continuing the migration to the destination server. I also have to state that this client does not use Sharepoint at all. Do I have to redo everything? Herewith the logs: [4992] 121016.225454.5905: Task: Starting Add User or Group access VSS registry. [4992] 121016.225454.7645: TaskManagement: In TaskScheduler.RunTasks(): The "ConfigureSharePointVSSRegistryTask" Task threw an Exception during the Run() call:System.Security.Principal.IdentityNotMappedException: Some or all identity references could not be translated. at System.Security.Principal.NTAccount.Translate(IdentityReferenceCollection sourceAccounts, Type targetType, Boolean forceSuccess) at System.Security.Principal.NTAccount.Translate(Type targetType) at System.Security.AccessControl.CommonObjectSecurity.ModifyAccess(AccessControlModification modification, AccessRule rule, Boolean& modified) at System.Security.AccessControl.CommonObjectSecurity.AddAccessRule(AccessRule rule) at Microsoft.WindowsServerSolutions.IWorker.Tasks.ConfigureSharePointVSSRegistryTask.AddUsersToAccessRegistry(List`1 names) at Microsoft.WindowsServerSolutions.IWorker.Tasks.ConfigureSharePointVSSRegistryTask.Run(ITaskDataLink dl) at Microsoft.WindowsServerSolutions.TaskManagement.Data.Task.Run(ITaskDataLink dataLink) at Microsoft.WindowsServerSolutions.TaskManagement.TaskScheduler.RunTasks(String taskListId, String stateFileName) [4992] 121016.225454.7655: Setup: An error was encountered on the TME thread: System.Security.Principal.IdentityNotMappedException: Some or all identity references could not be translated. at System.Security.Principal.NTAccount.Translate(IdentityReferenceCollection sourceAccounts, Type targetType, Boolean forceSuccess) at System.Security.Principal.NTAccount.Translate(Type targetType) at System.Security.AccessControl.CommonObjectSecurity.ModifyAccess(AccessControlModification modification, AccessRule rule, Boolean& modified) at System.Security.AccessControl.CommonObjectSecurity.AddAccessRule(AccessRule rule) at Microsoft.WindowsServerSolutions.IWorker.Tasks.ConfigureSharePointVSSRegistryTask.AddUsersToAccessRegistry(List`1 names) at Microsoft.WindowsServerSolutions.IWorker.Tasks.ConfigureSharePointVSSRegistryTask.Run(ITaskDataLink dl) at Microsoft.WindowsServerSolutions.TaskManagement.Data.Task.Run(ITaskDataLink dataLink) at Microsoft.WindowsServerSolutions.TaskManagement.TaskScheduler.RunTasks(String taskListId, String stateFileName) at Microsoft.WindowsServerSolutions.Setup.SBSSetup.ProgressPagePresenter._RunTasks(Object sender, DoWorkEventArgs e) [4956] 121016.225455.0685: Setup: _UnhandledExceptionHandler: Setup encountered an error: System.Reflection.TargetInvocationException: Exception has been thrown by the target of an invocation. ---> System.Reflection.TargetInvocationException: The TME thread failed (see the inner exception). ---> System.Security.Principal.IdentityNotMappedException: Some or all identity references could not be translated. at System.Security.Principal.NTAccount.Translate(IdentityReferenceCollection sourceAccounts, Type targetType, Boolean forceSuccess) at System.Security.Principal.NTAccount.Translate(Type targetType) at System.Security.AccessControl.CommonObjectSecurity.ModifyAccess(AccessControlModification modification, AccessRule rule, Boolean& modified) at System.Security.AccessControl.CommonObjectSecurity.AddAccessRule(AccessRule rule) at Microsoft.WindowsServerSolutions.IWorker.Tasks.ConfigureSharePointVSSRegistryTask.AddUsersToAccessRegistry(List`1 names) at Microsoft.WindowsServerSolutions.IWorker.Tasks.ConfigureSharePointVSSRegistryTask.Run(ITaskDataLink dl) at Microsoft.WindowsServerSolutions.TaskManagement.Data.Task.Run(ITaskDataLink dataLink) at Microsoft.WindowsServerSolutions.TaskManagement.TaskScheduler.RunTasks(String taskListId, String stateFileName) at Microsoft.WindowsServerSolutions.Setup.SBSSetup.ProgressPagePresenter._RunTasks(Object sender, DoWorkEventArgs e) at System.ComponentModel.BackgroundWorker.WorkerThreadStart(Object argument) --- End of inner exception stack trace --- at Microsoft.WindowsServerSolutions.Setup.SBSSetup.ProgressPagePresenter.TasksCompleted(Object sender, RunWorkerCompletedEventArgs e) --- End of inner exception stack trace --- at System.RuntimeMethodHandle._InvokeMethodFast(IRuntimeMethodInfo method, Object target, Object[] arguments, SignatureStruct& sig, MethodAttributes methodAttributes, RuntimeType typeOwner) at System.Reflection.RuntimeMethodInfo.Invoke(Object obj, BindingFlags invokeAttr, Binder binder, Object[] parameters, CultureInfo culture, Boolean skipVisibilityChecks) at System.Delegate.DynamicInvokeImpl(Object[] args) at System.Windows.Forms.Control.InvokeMarshaledCallbackDo(ThreadMethodEntry tme) at System.Windows.Forms.Control.InvokeMarshaledCallbackHelper(Object obj) at System.Threading.ExecutionContext.runTryCode(Object userData) at System.Runtime.CompilerServices.RuntimeHelpers.ExecuteCodeWithGuaranteedCleanup(TryCode code, CleanupCode backoutCode, Object userData) at System.Threading.ExecutionContext.Run(ExecutionContext executionContext, ContextCallback callback, Object state, Boolean ignoreSyncCtx) at System.Threading.ExecutionContext.Run(ExecutionContext executionContext, ContextCallback callback, Object state) at System.Windows.Forms.Control.InvokeMarshaledCallback(ThreadMethodEntry tme) at System.Windows.Forms.Control.InvokeMarshaledCallbacks() at System.Windows.Forms.Control.WndProc(Message& m) at System.Windows.Forms.NativeWindow.DebuggableCallback(IntPtr hWnd, Int32 msg, IntPtr wparam, IntPtr lparam) at System.Windows.Forms.UnsafeNativeMethods.DispatchMessageW(MSG& msg) at System.Windows.Forms.Application.ComponentManager.System.Windows.Forms.UnsafeNativeMethods.IMsoComponentManager.FPushMessageLoop(IntPtr dwComponentID, Int32 reason, Int32 pvLoopData) at System.Windows.Forms.Application.ThreadContext.RunMessageLoopInner(Int32 reason, ApplicationContext context) at System.Windows.Forms.Application.ThreadContext.RunMessageLoop(Int32 reason, ApplicationContext context) at Microsoft.WindowsServerSolutions.Common.Wizards.Framework.WizardChainEngine.Launch() at Microsoft.WindowsServerSolutions.Setup.SBSSetup.MainClass._LaunchWizard() at Microsoft.WindowsServerSolutions.Setup.SBSSetup.MainClass.RealMain(String[] args) at Microsoft.WindowsServerSolutions.Setup.SBSSetup.MainClass.Main(String[] args) [4956] 121016.225455.0865: Setup: Removed the password. [4956] 121016.225455.0905: Setup: Deleting scheduled task at path Microsoft\Windows\Windows Small Business Server 2011 Standard with name Setup [4956] 121016.225455.8055: Setup: Removed SBSSetup from the RunOnce.

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  • Outlook 2013 keeps freezing, semi-consistently

    - by AviD
    I have an oddity of problem with my Outlook's stability. It seems to be freezing up, not at random intervals, but based on a seemingly strange combination of configurations. I have been trying many different combinations, I've even devolved to "Cargo-cult" debugging, since I have no clue what is causing this... Here is my set up - since I don't know for sure which settings are causing the lockup, I'll probably mention irrelevant things: (relatively) clean install of Windows 8 (on hyper-v, if that matters) Clean install of Outlook 2013, fully updated 3 accounts configured: Hotmail account configured with ActiveSync Gmail account Large-ish account (several GB) connected with IMAP Only a few folders are subscribed in IMAP Outlook is set to only display subscribed folders configured to keep messages permanently Google Apps account, connected with IMAP Small account connected with IMAP All folders IMAP subscribed Outlook is set to only display subscribed folders configured to keep messages permanently Several Send/Receive Groups configured, to try different configurations of enabling/disable/partial the different accounts - with different send times, from 60 minutes down to 5 minutes. The problem is that at certain points Outlook completely freezes up and I have to kill it. This is not consistent - there are some things that cause it immediately almost consistently, there are some times that it just happens by itself after some period of time (sometimes a few moments, sometimes a few hours; sometimes while using it, sometimes after I've been away from it for a few hours). I have searched all over, and there seem to be many with similar (apparently) problem, and found numerous "solutions" (some even more cargocultish than mine), but so far none of them worked. I've removed all the accounts, both all together and one at a time, and re-configured them - eventually it freezes up. I've tried uninstalling Outlook, cleaning it up completely - removing files, app settings, registry keys, etc - then reinstalling - eventually it freezes up. I've only enabled the Hotmail account, disabling (but not removing) the Google accounts - apparently this does not lock up. I've enabled the Hotmail and the Gmail accounts, leaving the Apps one disabled - it seems like it does not lock up. With all accounts enabled, it locks up almost immediately after doing a send/receive. With only the Apps account enabled, it seems to not lock up. With the Hotmail and the Apps accounts enabled (Gmail disabled), it seems like it locks up after a random amount of time. With Hotmail enabled, and Gmail and Apps both enabled but set to receive only custom folder downloading (not all subscribed folders) - sometimes it locks up right after a send/receive, sometimes it goes for hours without locking up, and sometimes it only locks up when I send an email. I've tried switching the ports for the Google accounts (SSL/465 vs TLS/587), though I have no idea if this should affect, but no real difference. In short, I honestly have no idea what is actually causing Outlook to lock up, I might be completely barking up the wrong tree. At this point I don't really know what else to try, I'm flipping switches at random here. I would like to have all 3 accounts enabled, ideally in several groups (e.g. pull down only important folders in a group with short interval, and all other folders in a longer interval) - obviously without freezing up at all. I've tried putting in all the important details, if there is anything else important to add please let me know. Another issue that occurred to me might also be connected - the Google accounts don't always synchronize properly, even after a send/receive or "update folder". At least not consistently... though I haven't been able to find a significant connection between this and that.

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  • How to diagnose and solve an erratic "HDCP Support Required"?

    - by Jom Orgstrom
    I am playing a digital tv broadcast on Windows Media Center for Windows 7. I built this system so it works with HDCP, and in fact I have been able to watch tv and bluray before with this same computer. However, I suddenly started getting an "HDCP Support Required" error from WMC. The entire message is as follows: HDCP Support Required High-bandwidth Digital Content Protection (HDCP) may not be supported by the current video card. Use an HDCP-compliant display, video card, and video driver. Or, connect using an analog connection such as component or VGA. Relevant specs are: CPU: Ivy Bridge Core i7-3770 Motherboard: Asus P8H77-I Memory: 16GB DDR3-1600 Graphics: Radeon HD 7850 (Driver by AMD, version 8.982.0.0 built on 2012/07/27) Display: Acer P243w connected by HDMI Sound: Roland Quad-Capture (It complains even when I use the bundled VIA HD Audio) TV Tuner: I-O Data GV-MC7/HZ3 OS: Windows 7 Professional SP1, Windows Update enabled. All patched and up to date. As you can see, there is nothing weird or old about my setup. I am also not doing anything strange, not doing any overclocking, weird system changes and so on. One thing that does happen from time to time, is that the display goes black for a few seconds (sometimes when watching media contents, sometimes when just using photoshop or Visual Studio). This happened with my previous setup as well, so I'd be inclined to think it is a display or cable issue (apart from the BD drive, these are the only things I kept from my previous setup to this one). But being a digital transfer, as far as I know, these things either work or not. Never erratically or with decreased quality. The thing is that sometimes I can watch the TV, sometimes not. This happens with recorded programs as well, so it's not a per-program thing. Sometimes rebooting helps, sometimes it doesn't. Sometimes unplugging and plugging back the HDMI connector helps, sometimes it doesn't. Sometimes doing so doesn't even turn the screen back on, so I have to reboot. Unfortunately, WMC's error message is quite unhelpful. I'd like to know exactly where the problem is, so I can solve it. I don't want to buy a brand new display just to then find out it was a registry setting that was misconfigured. I've tried looking at the system event viewer, but these errors don't show up at all in there. Other people who have this problem seem to have a setup that is not HDCP compliant, so I turn to you guys here. Anybody knows how to diagnose this problem? Edit: So I got the Cyberlink Blu-ray disc advisor. I ran it and told me everything was okay, except for the Video Connection Type, which showed as "Digital (without HDCP)". I then proceeded to unplug the power cable from the monitor, plugged it in again, ran the tool again, and now it's "Digital (with HDCP)". Needless to say, I can watch my TV and recorded programs on WMP again. I'm guessing that at some point, something may be slightly wrong with the HDCP setup, and Windows decides to reset the entire content protection path (which leads to the screen blanking out). Usually the reset succeeds, but sometimes it doesn't, so Windows defaults to turning HDCP off. There's no way to turn it back on, except by doing a hard reset of the display. I really want to know what the exact error was, so I can fix it. Is it the cable? is it the display? is it the video card? the driver? Also, is there any other way to try and turn HDCP on again without having to hard reset the display? Oh, questions, questions...

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  • Windows 7 inbuilt and 3rd party (de)fragmentation related queries

    - by Karan
    I have a pretty good idea of how files end up getting fragmented. That said, I just copied ~3,200 files of varying sizes (from a few KB to ~20GB) from an external USB HDD to an internal, freshly formatted (under Windows 7 x64), NTFS, 2TB, 5400RPM, WD, SATA, non-system (i.e. secondary) drive, filling it up 57%. Since it should have been very much possible for each file to have been stored in one contiguous block, I expected the drive to be fragmented not more than 1-2% at most after this rather lengthy exercise (unfortunately this older machine doesn't support USB 3.0). Windows 7's inbuilt defrag utility told me after a quick analysis that the drive was fragmented only 1% or so, which dovetailed neatly with my expectations. However, just out of curiosity I downloaded and ran the latest portable x64 version of Piriform's Defraggler, and was shocked to see the drive being reported as being ~85% fragmented! The portable version of Auslogics Disk Defrag also agreed with Defraggler, and both clearly expected to grind away for ~10 hours to completely defragment the drive. 1) How in blazes could the inbuilt and 3rd party defrag utils disagree so badly? I mean, 10-20% variance is probably understandable, but 1% and 85% are miles apart! This Engineering Windows 7 blog post states: In Windows XP, any file that is split into more than one piece is considered fragmented. Not so in Windows Vista if the fragments are large enough – the defragmentation algorithm was changed (from Windows XP) to ignore pieces of a file that are larger than 64MB. As a result, defrag in XP and defrag in Vista will report different amounts of fragmentation on a volume. ... [Please read the entire post so the quote is not taken out of context.] Could it simply be that the 3rd party defrag utils ignore this post-XP change and continue to use analysis algos similar to those XP used? 2) Assuming that the 3rd party utils aren't lying about the real extent of fragmentation (which Windows is downplaying post-XP), how could the files have even got fragmented so badly given they were just copied over afresh to an empty drive? 3) If vastly differing analysis algos explain the yawning gap, which do I believe? I'm no defrag fanatic for sure, but 85% is enough to make me seriously consider spending 10 hours defragging this drive. On the other hand, 1% reported by Windows' own defragger clearly implies that there is no cause for concern and defragging would actually have negative consequences (as per the post). Is Windows' assumption valid and should I just let it be, or will there be any noticeable performance gains after running one of the 3rd party utils for 10 hours straight? 4) I see that out of the box Windows 7 defrag is scheduled to run weekly. Does anyone know whether it defrags every single time, or only if its analysis reveals a fragmentation percentage over a set threshold? If the latter, what is this threshold and can it be changed, maybe via a Registry edit? Thanks for reading through (my first query on this wonderful site!) and for any helpful replies. Also, if you're answering question #3, please keep in mind that any speed increases post defragging with 3rd party utils vis-à-vis Windows' inbuilt program should not include pre-Vista (preferably pre-Win7) examples. Further, examples of programs that made your system boot faster won't help in this case, since this is a non-system drive (although one that'll still be used daily).

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  • Unable to make the session state request to the session state server.

    - by Angry_IT_Guru
    For about 4-5 months now, I seem to be having this sporadic issue--mainly during our busiest time of the day between 10:30-11:45AM, where all my Windows 2003 web servers in a Microsoft NLB cluster start throwing session state server errors. A sample error is below. System.Web.HttpException: Unable to make the session state request to the session state server. Please ensure that the ASP.NET State service is started and that the client and server ports are the same. If the server is on a remote machine, please ensure that it accepts remote requests by checking the value of HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\aspnet_state\Parameters\AllowRemoteConnection. If the server is on the local machine, and if the before mentioned registry value does not exist or is set to 0, then the state server connection string must use either 'localhost' or '127.0.0.1' as the server name. at System.Web.SessionState.OutOfProcSessionStateStore.MakeRequest(StateProtocolVerb verb, String id, StateProtocolExclusive exclusiveAccess, Int32 extraFlags, Int32 timeout, Int32 lockCookie, Byte[] buf, Int32 cb, Int32 networkTimeout, SessionNDMakeRequestResults& results) at System.Web.SessionState.OutOfProcSessionStateStore.SetAndReleaseItemExclusive(HttpContext context, String id, SessionStateStoreData item, Object lockId, Boolean newItem) at System.Web.SessionState.SessionStateModule.OnReleaseState(Object source, EventArgs eventArgs) at System.Web.HttpApplication.SyncEventExecutionStep.System.Web.HttpApplication.IExecutionStep.Execute() at System.Web.HttpApplication.ExecuteStep(IExecutionStep step, Boolean& completedSynchronously) Now I'm using ASP.NET State service on a centralized back-end Windows 2003 server that all servers communicate to. I was originally using SQL Server state for a couple years as well prior to having this issue. The problem with SQL wqas that when the issue occurred, it created a blocking situation which essentially impacted all users across all servers. The product company recommended that I use the standard ASP.NET State service as that was what they technically supported. Why this would make a difference is beyond me -- but I had no choice but to try it! I have attempted to create multiple application pools, adding additional servers, chaning TCP/IP timeout from 20 to 30 seconds, and even calling Microsoft ASP.NET product support, with very little success. I even recommended that they review whether they are using read-only session state instead of read/write per page request -- as I understand that this basically causes every page to make round-trips to state server even if state isn't being used on the page. Unfortunately, the application is developed by our product company and they insist that it is something with my environment because other clients do not have these sort of issues. However, I've talked to other clients and they tell me when they've seen issues like they, they've basically had to create another web farm. This issue almost seems like I've simply reached some architectural limit within the application... Microsoft's position on the issue is that the session state needs to be reduced and the returncode being reported back from the state server indicates buffers are full. To better understand the scope of issues (rather than wait for customers to call and complain), I installed ELMAH and configured it to send me e-mails when unhandled exceptions occur. I basically get 500-1000 e-mails during the time period of high activity! If any one has any other ideas I could try or better ways to troubleshoot, I'd appreciate it.

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  • Clarification On Write-Caching Policy, Its Underlying Options And How It Applies To Hard Drives And Solid-State Drives

    - by Boris_yo
    In last week after doing more research on subject matter, I have been wondering about what I have been neglecting all those years to understand write-caching policy, always leaving it on default setting. Write-caching policy improves writing performance and consists of write-back caching and write-cache buffer flushing. This is how I understand all the above, but correct me if I erred somewhere: Write-through cache / Write-through caching itself is not a part of write caching policy per se and it's when data is written to both cache and storage device so if Windows will need that data later again, it is retrieved from cache and not from storage device which means only improved read performance as there is no need for waiting for storage device to read required data again. Since data is still written to storage device, write performance isn't improved and represents no risk of data loss or corruption in case of power failure or system crash while only data in cache gets lost. This option seems to be enabled by default and is recommended for removable devices with no need to use function of "Safely Remove Hardware" on user's part. Write-back caching is similar to above but without writing data to storage device, periodically releasing data from cache and writing to storage device when it is idle. In my opinion this option improves both read and write performance but represents risk if power failure or system crash occurs with the outcome of not only losing data eventually to be written to storage device, but causing file inconsistencies or corrupted file system. Write-back caching cannot be enabled together with write-through caching and it is not recommended to be enabled if no backup power supply is availabe. Write-cache buffer flushing I reckon is similar to write-back caching but enables immediate release and writing of data from cache to storage device right before power outage occurs but I don't know if it applies also to occasional system crash. This option seem to be complementary to write-back cache reducing or potentially eliminating risk of data loss or corruption of file system. I have questions about relevance of last 2 options to today's modern SSDs in order to get best performance and with less wear on SSDs: I know that traditional hard drives come with onboard cache (I wonder what type of cache that is), but do SSDs also come with cache? Assuming they do, is this cache faster than their NAND flash and system RAM and worth taking the risk of utilizing it by enabling write-back cache? I read somewhere that generally storage device's cache is faster than RAM, but I want to be sure. Additionally I read that write-caching should be enabled since current data that is to be written later to NAND flash is kept for a while in cache and provided there is data that gets modified a lot before finally being written, holding of this data and its periodic release reduces its write times to SSD thereby reducing its wearing. Now regarding to write-cache buffer flushing, I heard that SSD controllers are so fast by themselves that enabling this option is not required, because they manage flushing. However, once again, I don't know if SSDs have their own onboard cache and whether or not it is faster than their NAND flash and system RAM because if it is, keeping this option enabled would make sense. Recently I have posted question about issue with my Intel 330 SSD 120GB which was main reason to do deeper research having suspicion of write-caching policy being the culprit of SSD's freezing issue assuming data being released is what causes freezes. Currently I have write-cache enabled and write-cache buffer flushing disabled because I believe SSD controller's management of write-cache flushing and Windows write-cache buffer flushing are conflicting with each other: Since I want to troubleshoot in small steps to finally determine the source of issue, I have decided to start with write-caching policy and the move to drivers, switching to AHCI later on and finally disabling DIPM (device initiated power management) through registry modification thanks to @TomWijsman

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  • I am starting to think that Prevx.com isnt a legit site...but heres my long-winded question

    - by cop1152
    I apologize in advance for the long-winded post. I posted it all because I believe its informative and may be useful. Also, I posted my question at the end. Moments ago I was RDC to a file server in my home (from inside my home). I had opened Firefox and Googled for a manufacturers website. Immediately after clicking the link, Firefox abruptly closed. This seemed odd to me to so I checked the running processes and discovered d.exe, e.exe, and f.exe running. I Googled these processes on a different machine and found them belonging to a key-logger/screen-capturer/trojan called defender.exe, which according to the Prevx lives in c:\documents and settings\user\local settings\temp. (Prevx link http://www.prevx.com/filenames/147352809685142526-X1/DEFENDER32.EXE.html) Simultaneously, an obviously-spoofed Windows Firewall popup appeared on the server asking me to click ‘yes’ to update Windows Firewall. At this time I ended all rogue processes, emptied the temp folder, removed defender.exe from startup, and checked my registry and a few other locations. Before deleting Defender.exe I noted that it was created moments ago, just before Firefox crashed. I believe that I was ‘almost’ infected with this malware. I believe that it needed me to click the phony popup in order to complete infection because it wasn’t allowed to execute processes from the temp folder. After cleaning the machine, I restarted it and have been monitoring it for over an hour. I am debating on whether or not to restore the Windows partition (a separate physical drive from the data) or to just watch it for awhle. I should mention that, because of the specs on this machine, I do not run antivirus software, but I know it well and inspect it regularly. It is a very old Compaq with a 400mhz processer and 512mb of ram. I have a static IP and the server is in the DMZ running an FTP client and some HTTP server software. All files transferred to and stored on this machine are scanned for malware before transferring. Usually the machine only runs 19 processes and performs pretty well for its intended purpose. I posted the story so that you could be aware of a possible new piece of malware and how it acts, but I also have a question or two. First, over the last few months I have noticed that PREVX is listed at the top of most of my Google searches when researching malware, especially for new or obscure malware…and they always want you to purchase something. I don’t think they are one of the top AV companies, so it seems odd that they are always the top Google result. Does anyone have any experience with any of their products? Also, what sites do you rely on for malware researching? Recently, I have found it difficult to find good info because of HijackThis-logs and other deadend info cluttering up my searches. And lastly, besides antivirus, third-party firewall, etc, what settings would you use to lock down a machine to make it more secure in instances where a stubborn admin like myself refuses to run AV? Thanks.

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  • Windows 7 disk errors after a few hours of runtime

    - by GFK
    I'm having trouble understanding what is going on with my work PC. Whenever I boot it, it runs fine for a while, then starts to randomly show disk errors. The displayed error often contains the message "not enough storage is available to process this command", although depending on the application that fails it can be different. This has happened for weeks now and is getting worse. This is what troubles me: It never seems to impact critical parts of the system (no BSOD, no freeze). Only some applications seem impacted, refusing to function correctly after a while: Outlook 2010 cannot download RSS feeds anymore, Firefox 6 or IE9 cannot download anything bigger than 3MB without failing, Windows Update fails, all msi installers fail, Visual Studio 2010 starts failing in weird manners... It only happens after a while using it (typically 3 hours, but it seems that installing a program or compiling several times makes it shorter) Rebooting solves it (temporarily). The system: The OS is Windows 7 Pro Spanish SP1, 32 bits The system is an HP Compaq 6000 Pro with 4 GB memory (only 3.4GB usable since the system is 32bit), one 500GB hard drive. Installed applications include: Visual Studio 2010, SQL Server 2008 R2, VMWare Workstation 7, Microsoft Security Essentials, Office 2010. Shutting down all related services and processes doesn't seem to change anything. The diagnostics I've run so far: Hard drive : 465GB, 165GB free Process Explorer : physical and virtual memory seem ok (pagefile is 5.3GB, physical memory usage 70%, system commit 39%) Windows Memory diagnostic tool: OK CHKDSK returned: 488282111 KB total disk space. 281668248 KB in 265779 files. 150188 KB in 62949 indexes. 0 KB in bad sectors. 571755 KB in use by the system. The log file has occupied 65536 kilobytes. 205891920 KB available on disk. For non-spanish speakers, that means all ok. SMART diagnostic tools (DiskCheckup) report all values normal. temperatures are in the normal range (HWinfo). The event viewer doesn't seem to contain any significant message. ran CCleaner 3, without any noticeable effect. I was thinking about some file number limit (between Visual Studio projects and other applications, there are around 300.000 files on the hard drive), but I couldn't find any. It's possible there is something related with the use of the temporary folders (it's the only explanation I have for why applications fail but Windows doesn't), but I cannot confirm that. Only thing I cannot find out is if chkdsk reporting 65MB for the log is normal. It seems since Vista it always reports this. Any other cleaning/diagnostic tool you might know of? Edit: I ran several other tools since I first published the question: Seagate SeaTools (the HD manufacturer's analysis tool): complete test run OK. Intel Rapid 10.1 (the HD controller manufacturer's troubleshooting tool): the HD's ok. Microsoft Desktop Heap Monitor: Desktop Heap Information Monitor Tool (Version 8.1.2925.0) Copyright (c) Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved. Session ID: 1 Total Desktop: ( 46464 KB - 11 desktops) WinStation\Desktop Heap Size(KB) Used Rate(%) WinSta0\Winlogon (s1) 128 3.6 WinSta0\Disconnect (s1) 64 3.8 WinSta0\Default (s1) 20480 3.0 msswindowstation\mssrestricteddesk (s0) 1024 0.2 __X78B95_89_IW__A8D9S1_42_ID (s0) 1024 0.2 Service-0x0-3e5$\Default (s0) 1024 0.6 Service-0x0-3e4$\Default (s0) 1024 0.3 Service-0x0-3e7$\Default (s0) 1024 2.1 WinSta0\Winlogon (s0) 128 1.9 WinSta0\Disconnect (s0) 64 3.8 WinSta0\Default (s0) 20480 0.0 All ok, desktop heap usage < 5% Edit 2: I tried totally resetting my account by creating a new one, logging under this new one and delete the first one (local rights and files), then logging back with this deleted account (it is a domain account). No luck. Also, I found out often the error is "not enough storage is available to process this command". Searching on the internet, I found an old troubleshooting tip (setting a registry key to raise the IRP stack limit, whatever it is) which did not change anything.

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  • My PC suddenly doesn't detect the primary drive (SSD)

    - by smoth190
    My computer has been working fine for months, and it worked today, but tonight I went to start it up to find that my OCZ Vertex 2 isn't being found. When I turn on my computer, the loading screen gets stuck at "Detecting IDE drives...". After a while, it keeps going and lists the drives it finds. The first one in the list should be my Vertex 2, but it just says "None". The computer proceeds to get stuck on "Loading operating system...", which is understandable because the drive with the OS is "gone". My first thought was drive failure, but every time drives have crashed on me, they're still detected--they just don't work. This drive is an SSD, it's pretty new, and I had no problems beforehand. I find it hard to believe it failed. I'm sure it's possible, but I hope this isn't the case. There has been nothing strange going on at all with my PC, it's been running perfect until now. I was just about to do my monthly dskchk and defrag today. I popped in my Windows 7 Home Premium disk and booted from it. When I launched the repair tool, it didn't list any operating systems (because the drive is 100% missing...). When I've had disks crash before, it still listed the OS, you just couldn't do anything with it. I tried to restore from an image, but I don't have any of those, either. I opened the command console and listed the drivers with wmic logicaldisk get name. Only C: and D: came up. C: was my 1TB storage driver (luckily, all my stuff is here--only the OS is on the SSD!) and D: was the disk driver. So I still had an MIA drive... The SSD didn't come with any driver disks, so I can't install drivers. If there's a way to do this from a CD I can burn with my other PC, please let me know. What the heck do I do? Although only the OS is on my SSD, a new SSD is expensive. I'll probably also have to buy a new copy of Windows (an upgrade would be nice, though...) because I've found it eats my registration key when my PC crashes (and my thousands of dollars of Adobe programs, I'll be on the phone with tech support for a week to get those keys back). And I'll lose my registry, all my settings, all sorts of other stuff that I'll spend weeks restoring. My computer is a pain in the butt to take out and open up, so if I can't fix it, I'll try fiddling with the plug or putting it into a new computer, but not right now. Any help is greatly appreciated! The day when they make crash-less drives will be the day I live without worry.

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  • Hard drive write speed - finding a lighter antivirus?

    - by Shingetsu
    I recently have been getting a lot of system lag here (for example, the mouse and the display in general take about 15 seconds to react in the worst cases). After a lot of monitoring the resources, I found that the problem mainly happens when too much Disk I/O is being done. Three culprits have been identified: My browser had the highest write I/O with 35,000,000 I/O Write Bytes. Steam had the highest read I/O (when IDLE!!!) with 106,000,000 I/O Read Bytes. My antivirus (in both cases I will soon mention) was the runner up in both cases with: 30,000,000ish write and 80,000,000ish read. The first AV I had was Avast! which I had liked on my previous system. After noticing it taking so much I/O I switched to Panda (supposing it wouldn't use TOO much during idle phase). However it only used a bit less I/O. Just a lot less memory and cpu and somewhat more network. My browser at the moment is Maxthon 3 (which I like a lot). Before this I was running chrome which had similar data and much higher cpu when running in the background was enabled. I'm not going to be running steam all the time and there aren't many alternatives to it. I like my browser very much, but I AM willing to switch if there's an obvious problem (I'm in programming, however I'm not a very good sysadmin, especially not when it comes to windows). Finally, my system almost stops lagging when I turn off the antivirus (and preferably steam) (some remains but once in every 5-6 hours for a few seconds so it isn't a big problem). My question (has a few parts): Is it possible to configure steam to lower it's I/O usage? (and maybe network while we're at it?) Which antivirus (very preferably free) uses lowest I/O while idle (I leave PC alone during active scans so that isn't a problem). Is there an obvious problem with my current browser and, if so, is there a way to fix it or should I switch and, if so, to what? (P.S. I've been on FFox for some time too). Info on system: Windows 7 (32 bit T_T, I am getting a new one in a few months but I want to keep using system during that time though). Hard Drive (main) is a Raid0. (Also have an external 1TB one which contains steam (and steam alone). As such it doesn't get used by much anything other than steam and isn't a very large problem. However steam still uses some I/O of registry) CPU: Intel(R) Core(TM)2 CPU [email protected] RAM: 6GB (3.25GB usable) (this and CPU have little effect as shown in next section) Additional info: Memory usage during problematic times: 44% CPU usage during problematic times: 35% Page File: main drive: system managed. 1TB drive: none. The current system I'm using is about 6 years old and is mainly a place holder while I await the new one in a few months. Final words: this is my 1st post on Super User (this question wouldn't feel right on Stack Overflow where I usually stay). If it doesn't have it's place here please tell me. If anything is wrong with it, same. Edit Technically I'm looking for a live thread detection program with minimal IO usage. I already have good active scan capability: Kaspersky (the free scanner uses the paid database) and MalwareBytes. Edit 2 Noticed another one, it seems that windows media player has been using stuff even when off! Turning it off and restarting now. If the problem is fixed I'll tell you guys. The reason I didn't notice it before was because I didn't have resource manager in front of me at the MOMENT of the problem. Now I did and it was at the very top of the list!

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  • Connecting PC to TV via HDMI/DVI: Windows XP doesn't allow the appropriate screen resolution

    - by Jørgen
    I have a computer that is connected to the living room TV (a Panasonic) via HDMI. There is no other monitor connected. My problem is that the computer, which is running Windows XP, does not allow me to set the proper resolution for the TV. Both the graphics adapter and the TV should support the 1280x720 resolution, but it cannot be selected - the only available options are 1280x600 and 800x600, both in the "native" Windows dialog box and the custom Intel graphics options dialog box. Do anyone have a suggestion for a solution for this? Things I've thought of: Setting the resolution directly in the registry (where?) Installing some "custom" monitor driver (the TV manufacturer does not appear to provide any, currently the "generic" one is used) Details on the setup: Connection: DVI output on the computer via a passive DVI-HDMI adapter to the HDMI input on the TV, audio is run on a separate link, the TV is able to combine video and audio without any problem, the problem is there regardless of whether or not the audio is connected. The connection is several meters long through some walls, for this reason using a VGA cable instead is not an option. Note that the report explicitly says that the TV supports 1280x720. Still, I am not allowed to select it in Graphics Options, only 1280x600 and 800x600 is available. For 800x600, there's a lot of black around the edges; for 1280x600, the screen is "zoomed" so the edges of the monitor image (like the taskbar) is not visible. Other: The computer is running Windows XP. More recent versions of Windows are not an option (I have no licence). Linux is probably not an option (some of the video streaming sites I plan to use do not support it, I think) I wrote the rest of the details below. Thanks for any help!! TV: Panasonic TX-L32X10Y, European version; a 720p 32" quite "regular" LCD TV. Allowed resolutions according to manual: Signal name: 640x480 @60HZ Horizontal frequency: 31.47 kHz Vertical frequency: 60Hz Signal name: 750/720) /60p Horizontal frequency: 45.00 kHz Vertical frequency: 60Hz Signal name: 1,125 (1,080) / 60p Horizontal frequency: 67.50 kHz Vertical frequency: 60Hz (this is exactly how the manual presents it. PC via D-SUB (VGA cable) and "regular" HDMI have more alternatives.) Messing with the "zoom" settings on the TV does not affect the available resolution options on the computer. Computer: The following is a printout from one of the graphics adapter option pages. I think it covers most of it. The computer is a Dell. INTEL(R) EXTREME GRAPHICS 2 REPORT Report Date: 04/17/2011 Report Time[hr:mm:ss]: 20:18:02 Driver Version: 6.14.10.4396 Operating System: Windows XP* Professional, Service Pack 3 (5.1.2600) Default Language: English DirectX* Version: 9.0 Physical Memory: 1021 MB Minimum Graphics Memory: 1 MB Maximum Graphics Memory: 96 MB Graphics Memory in Use: 6 MB Processor: x86 Processor Speed: 2593 MHZ Vendor ID: 8086 Device ID: 2572 Device Revision: 02 * Accelerator Information * Accelerator in Use: Intel(R) 82865G Graphics Controller Video BIOS: 2972 Current Graphics Mode: 1280 by 600 True Color (60 Hz) * Devices Connected to the Graphics Accelerator * Active Digital Displays: 1 * Digital Display * Monitor Name: Plug and Play Monitor Display Type: Digital Gamma Value: 2.20 DDC2 Protocol: Supported Maximum Image Size: Horizontal: Not Available Vertical: Not Available Monitor Supported Modes: 1280 by 720 (50 Hz) 1280 by 720 (60 Hz) Display Power Management Support: Standby Mode: Not Supported Suspend Mode: Not Supported Active Off Mode: Not Supported (disclaimer: this question was also asked at the Wikipedia Reference Desk some time ago and might show up in a Google search. I got no useful answers there.)

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  • How To Start Your Own Professional Blog with WordPress

    - by Matthew Guay
    Would you like to start your own blog or website?  With a free WordPress  account, it’s free and easy to get started creating your own professional quality blog site. This is the first part in a series on how to create your own professional quality blog site. No, we’re not talking about some cheapo looking blog from Blogger or something on Facebook, but creating a quality blog you can be proud of and present to millions of readers online. WordPress is one of the most popular blogging platforms, powering hundreds of high-profile websites and blogs around the world.  It’s both powerful and easy to use, which makes it great whether you’re just starting out or are a blogging pro.  To start out with your blogging project WordPress is completely free, and you can use the online interface or install the WordPress software on your own server and blog from there. Getting Started You can start a blog in just a few minutes.  Head over to WordPress.com and click Sign up now on the right-hand side of the main page. Enter a username and password, check that you agree with the legal terms, select the “Gimme a blog” bullet, and click Next. WordPress may inform you that your username is already taken, simply choose a new one and try again. Next, choose a domain for your blog.  This will be the address for your site, and cannot be changed, so be sure to choose exactly what you want.  If you’d prefer your address to be yourname.com instead of yourname.wordpress.com, you can add your own domain for a fee after your blog is setup…but we’ll cover that later. Once you click signup, you will be sent a confirmation email.  While you wait for the email to arrive you can go ahead and enter in your name and a short bio about yourself. When you receive your confirmation email, click the link.  Congratulations; you now have your own blog! You can view your new blog immediately, though the default theme isn’t very interesting without your content and pictures. Back on the page you opened from the email, click Login to access your blog’s administration page and to start adding stuff to your blog.  You can also access your blog’s admin page anytime by from yourname.wordpress.com/admin, substituting your own blog name for yourname. Enter your username and password, then click Log in to get started. Adding Content to your WordPress.com Blog When you sign in to your WordPress blog, you’ll first see the WordPress Admin page.  Here you can see recent posts and comments, and you can see stats of how many people have visited your site.  You can also access all of your blog tools and settings right from this page. To add a new post to your blog, click the Posts link on the left, then click “Add New” either on the left menu or on the top of the Edit Posts page.  Or, if you want to edit the default first post, hover over it and select Edit. Or click the New Posts button on the top of the page.  This menu bar is always visible whenever you’re logged in, so it’s an easy way to add a post. The editor lets you easily write anything you want in a Microsoft Word-style editor.  You can format your text, add lists, links, quotes, and more.  When you’re ready to share your content with the world, click Publish on the right side. To add pictures or other files, click the picture icon beside “Upload/Insert”.  Your free blog account can store up to 3Gb of pictures and documents which will definitely give you a good start. Click Select Files, and then choose the pictures or documents you want to add to your post. When the pictures have uploaded, you can add a caption and choose how to position the picture.  When you’re finished, select “Insert into Post”.   Or, if you want to add a video, click the video button.  You have to add a paid upgrade to upload videos directly, but you can add YouTube and other online videos for free. Click the “From URL” tab, and then paste the link to the YouTube video and click Insert into post. If you’re a code geek, click the HTML tab in the editor and edit the HTML of your blog post the geeky way. Once you’ve added all your content and edited it the way you want, click the Publish button on the right of the editor.  Or, you can click Preview to make sure it looks right, and then click Publish. Here’s our blog with the new blog post containing a picture and video.  While you’re getting to know you’re way around the controls in WordPress, the Preview feature will be your best friend while you try to organize the content to your liking.   Conclusion It only takes a couple minutes to get started blogging at WordPress.com. Whether you want to write about your daily life, share pictures of your children, or review the latest books and gadgets, WordPress.com is a great place to get started for free.  But we’ve only covered a small portion of the WordPress features…but this should get you started. Check back for more WordPress and blogging coverage coming up soon! Links Signup for a free WordPress.com account Similar Articles Productive Geek Tips Add Social Bookmarking (Digg This!) Links to your Wordpress BlogHow-To Geek SoftwareProtecting Your WordPress Admin Panel From Hackers With .htaccessMake a Backup Copy of your Production Wordpress Blog on UbuntuLinux QuickTip: Downloading and Un-tarring in One Step TouchFreeze Alternative in AutoHotkey The Icy Undertow Desktop Windows Home Server – Backup to LAN The Clear & Clean Desktop Use This Bookmarklet to Easily Get Albums Use AutoHotkey to Assign a Hotkey to a Specific Window Latest Software Reviews Tinyhacker Random Tips DVDFab 6 Revo Uninstaller Pro Registry Mechanic 9 for Windows PC Tools Internet Security Suite 2010 Awe inspiring, inter-galactic theme (Win 7) Case Study – How to Optimize Popular Wordpress Sites Restore Hidden Updates in Windows 7 & Vista Iceland an Insurance Job? Find Downloads and Add-ins for Outlook Recycle !

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  • The Complete List of iPad Tips, Tricks, and Tutorials

    - by Ross
    The Apple iPad is the latest new toy, and we’ve put together a comprehensive list of every tip, trick, and tutorial that we could find to help you get the most out of it—and we’re even giving one away to one lucky reader. So read on! Note: We’ll be keeping this page updated as we find more great articles, so you should bookmark this page for future reference. Want Your Own iPad? How-To Geek is Giving One Away! All you have to do to enter is become a fan of our Facebook page, and we’ll pick a random fan to win the prize. Win an iPad on the How-To Geek Facebook Fan Page Disable the “clicking sound” on the iPad Keyboard Does the clicking sound when you tap the iPad keyboard bother you? Thankfully it’s easy to disable with a couple of taps. How to disable the “clicking sound” on your iPad’s keyboard Enable and add bookmarks to the Safari Bookmarks Bar on your iPad By default, Safari doesn’t display the Bookmarks Bar. This tip shows you how to change that. How to enable and add bookmarks to the Safari Bookmarks Bar on your iPad Clear the Cache, History and Cookies in Safari for the iPad You’re probably used to clearing this kind of data right from within the browser. Not so with Safari on the iPad – but here’s how you can. How to clear the cache, history and cookies in Safari for iPad How to add more Apps to your iPad Dock The iPad has four icons in its ‘dock’. Did you know it can hold 6? How to add more Apps to your iPad Dock Convert PDF files to ePub files to read on your iPad with iBooks ePub is the format that iBooks are in. So for those of you with large eBook collections in PDF, here’s how you convert them to read in iBooks. How to convert PDF files to ePub files to read on your iPad with iBooks How to force your iPad to restart Has an app caused your iPad to freeze up, and you can’t escape? This tip shows you how to force your iPad to restart. How to force your iPad to restart How to export Keynote for iPad presentations to your Mac or PC Exporting Keynote presentations from your iPad to your Mac or PC isn’t as straight forward as you might have expected. This tutorial shows you how. How to export Keynote for iPad presentations to your Mac or PC How to import presentations to Keynote on your iPad Having trouble getting your presentations onto your iPad? How to import presentations to Keynote on your iPad How to import documents to Pages on your iPad This guide shows you how to transfer documents (MS Word or Pages) from your Mac/PC to your iPad. How to import documents to Pages on your iPad How to insert photos in a Pages document using iPad and share it as a PDF Want to spice up that doc with a picture you just took? This tutorial will show you how – and how to export that document as a PDF. How to insert photos in a Pages document using iPad and share it as a PDF How to lock your iPad If you have kids or co-workers/friends who think it’s funny to mess with your iPad – lock it. How to lock your iPad How to remove the “Sent from my iPad” signature from outgoing email on your iPad Does everyone need to know you just sent that email from your iPad? Probably not. This guide shows you how to remove the “Sent from my iPad” signature and replace it with your own (or none). How to remove the “Sent from my iPad” signature from outgoing email on your iPad How To Sync Multiple Calendars to the iPad With Google Sync This tutorial will show you a workaround on how to sync multiple calendars on your iPad using Google Sync. How to Sync Multiple Calendars to the iPad With Google Sync How to determine the MAC address of your iPad If your network restricts connections via MAC address – this guide will show you how to determine what yours is. How to determine the MAC address of your iPad How to take a screenshot of your iPad Do you need to take a screenshot of your iPad? This quick tip shows you how to do just that. How to take a screenshot of your iPad How to delete apps from your iPod Touch, iPhone or iPad Anyone who had an iPod Touch or iPhone before they had an iPad won’t need this tutorial. But if you’re new to the experience, this one will help. How to delete apps from your iPod Touch, iPhone or iPad How to determine the iPad ECID on Windows and Mac iPadintosh shows us how to determine the iPad’s ECID code – something you’ll want to have come Jailbreak time. How to grab the iPad ECID in Windows or OS X iPad Apps: Twitter and social networking essentials Enggadget has you covered with reviews of the first slew of iPad specific Twitter and other social networking apps. iPad Apps: Twitter and social networking essentials What does your website look like on an iPad? iPad Peek is a web based tool that allows you to enter any given URL, and it will display that page the same way Safari on the iPad does. Great for web site owners who don’t have access to an iPad. iPadPeek Stream Music and Videos to your iPad Gizmodo reviews the iPad app StreamToMe, which allows you to stream media from your Mac to your iPad across your local network. Their feelings in a nutshell – worth the $3, but not perfect. Review: StreamToMe for the iPad Apple iPad : Change links in Google Reader to point to full HTML webpage How to change links in Safari for iPad so that Google Reader points to a full HTML webpage How to connect an iPad to your existing wireless keyboard This video will show you how to connect your iPad to a wireless keyboard if you’re having any problems – and from the sound of things, quite a few folks are. via TUAW How to get started with the iPad Mashable has a very entry-level guide that will help you set up your iPad for the first time. Mashable’s Guide to Setting up the iPad Essential iPad Apps Downloadsquad gives mini-reviews to 8 iPad apps that you should install as soon as you get your iPad. iPad App Buyers Guide: Essential Apps you should get on day one Videos: The Official iPad Guided Tours From none other than Apple! Great getting started videos for all the included iPad apps. The Official iPad Guided Tours The Official iPad Manual When you buy an iPad, you don’t get a manual. But that’s not to say there isn’t one. Apple provides a 150 guide for your iPad in PDF format. The Official iPad Manual (pdf) How to print from your iPad Sure, it’s actually just an App (PrintCentral – $9.99 USD), but as of right now, it’s the only way. PrintCentral How to make your own iPad Wallpaper A perfectly detailed tutorial on how to make your own wallpaper for your iPad. The author also provides a really nice sample wallpaper, published under the Attribution-Noncommercial 2.0 Generic license. How to make your own iPad Wallpaper Got any more tips? Share them in the comments, and we’ll update the post with the links, or just the tip itself. Similar Articles Productive Geek Tips Want an iPad? How-To Geek is Giving One Away!Why Wait? Amazing New Add-on Turns Your iPhone into an iPad! [Comic]Clear the Auto-Complete Email Address Cache in OutlookAsk the Readers: Share Your Tips for Defeating Viruses and MalwareStupid Geek Tricks: Tile or Cascade Multiple Windows in Windows 7 TouchFreeze Alternative in AutoHotkey The Icy Undertow Desktop Windows Home Server – Backup to LAN The Clear & Clean Desktop Use This Bookmarklet to Easily Get Albums Use AutoHotkey to Assign a Hotkey to a Specific Window Latest Software Reviews Tinyhacker Random Tips DVDFab 6 Revo Uninstaller Pro Registry Mechanic 9 for Windows PC Tools Internet Security Suite 2010 Are You Blocked On Gtalk? Find out Discover Latest Android Apps On AppBrain The Ultimate Guide For YouTube Lovers Will it Blend? iPad Edition Penolo Lets You Share Sketches On Twitter Visit Woolyss.com for Old School Games, Music and Videos

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  • OCR anything with OneNote 2007 and 2010

    - by Matthew Guay
    Quality OCR software can often be very expensive, but you may have one already installed on your computer that you didn’t know about.  Here’s how you can use OneNote to OCR anything on your computer. OneNote is one of the overlooked gems in recent versions of Microsoft Office.  OneNote makes it simple to take notes and keep track of everything with integrated search, and offers more features than its popular competitor Evernote.  One way it is better is its high quality optical character recognition (OCR) engine.  One of Evernote’s most popular features is that you can search for anything, including text in an image, and you can easily find it.  OneNote takes this further, and instantly OCRs any text in images you add.  Then, you can use this text easily and copy it from the image.  Let’s see how this works and how you can use OneNote as the ultimate OCR. Please Note: This feature is available in OneNote 2007 and 2010.  OneNote 2007 is included with Office 2007 Home and Student, Enterprise, and Ultimate, while OneNote 2010 is included with all edition of Office 2010 except for Starter edition. OCR anything First, let’s add something to OCR into OneNote.  There are many different ways you can add items to OCR into OneNote.  Open a blank page or one you want to insert something into, and then follow these steps to add what you want into OneNote. Picture Simply drag-and-drop a picture with text into a notebook… You can insert a picture directly from OneNote as well.  In OneNote 2010, select the Insert tab, and then choose Picture. In OneNote 2007, select the Insert menu, select Picture, and then choose From File.   Screen Clipping There are many times we’d like to copy text from something we see onscreen, but there is no direct way to copy text from that thing.  For instance, you cannot copy text from the title-bar of a window, or from a flash-based online presentation.  For these cases, the Screen Clipping option is very useful.  To add a clip of anything onscreen in OneNote 2010, select the Insert tab in the ribbon and click Screen Clipping. In OneNote 2007, either click the Clip button on the toolbar or select the Insert menu and choose Screen Clipping.   Alternately, you can take a screen clipping by pressing the windows key + S. When you click Screen Clipping, OneNote will minimize, your desktop will fade lighter, and your mouse pointer will change to a plus sign.  Now, click and drag over anything you want to add to OneNote.  Here we’re selecting the title of this article. The section you selected will now show up in your OneNote notebook, complete with the date and time the clip was made. Insert a file You’re not limited to pictures; OneNote can even OCR anything in most files on your computer.  You can add files directly in OneNote 2010 by selecting File Printout in the Insert tab. In OneNote 2007, select the Insert menu and choose Files as Printout. Choose the file you want to add to OneNote in the dialog. Select Insert, and OneNote will pause momentarily as it processes the file. Now your file will show up in OneNote as a printout with a link to the original file above it. You can also send any file directly to OneNote via the OneNote virtual printer.  If you have a file open, such as a PDF, that you’d like to OCR, simply open the print dialog in that program and select the “Send to OneNote” printer. Or, if you have a scanner, you can scan documents directly into OneNote by clicking Scanner Printout in the Insert tab in OneNote 2010. In OneNote 2003, to add a scanned document select the Insert menu, select Picture, and then choose From Scanner or Camera. OCR the image, file, or screenshot you put in OneNote Now that you’ve got your stuff into OneNote, let’s put it to work.  OneNote automatically did an OCR scan on anything you inserted into OneNote.  You can check to make sure by right-clicking on any picture, screenshot, or file you inserted.  Select “Make Text in Image Searchable” and then make sure the correct language is selected. Now, you can copy text from the Picture.  Simply right-click on the picture, and select “Copy Text from Picture”. And here’s the text that OneNote found in this picture: OCR anything with OneNote 2007 and 2010 - Windows Live Writer Not bad, huh?  Now you can paste the text from the picture into a document or anywhere you need to use the text. If you are instead copying text from a printout, it may give you the option to copy text from this page or all pages of the printout.   This works the exact same in OneNote 2007. In OneNote 2010, you can also edit the text OneNote has saved in the image from the OCR.  This way, if OneNote read something incorrectly you can change it so you can still find it when you use search in OneNote.  Additionally, you can copy only a specific portion of the text from the edit box, so it can be useful just for general copying as well.  To do this, right-click on the item and select “Edit Alt Text”. Here is the window to edit alternate text.  If you want to copy only a portion of the text, simply select it and press Ctrl+C to copy that portion. Searching OneNote’s OCR engine is very useful for finding specific pictures you have saved in OneNote.  Simply enter your search query in the search box on top right, and OneNote will automatically find all instances of that term in all of your notebooks.  Notice how it highlights the search term even in the image! This works the same in OneNote 2007.  Notice how it highlighted “How-to” in a shot of the header image in our favorite website. In Windows Vista and 7, you can even search for things OneNote OCRed from the Start Menu search.  Here the start menu search found the words “Windows Live Writer” in our OCR Test notebook in OneNote where we inserted the screen clip above. Conclusion OneNote is a very useful OCR tool, and can help you capture text from just about anything.  Plus, since you can easily search everything you have stored in OneNote, you can quickly find anything you insert anytime.  OneNote is one of the least-used Office tools, but we have found it very useful and hope you do too. Similar Articles Productive Geek Tips Add or Remove Apps from the Microsoft Office 2007 or 2010 SuiteRemove Office 2010 Beta and Reinstall Office 2007How To Create and Publish Blog Posts in Word 2010 & 2007How To Copy Worksheets in Excel 2007 & 2010Add Page Numbers to Documents in Word 2007 & 2010 TouchFreeze Alternative in AutoHotkey The Icy Undertow Desktop Windows Home Server – Backup to LAN The Clear & Clean Desktop Use This Bookmarklet to Easily Get Albums Use AutoHotkey to Assign a Hotkey to a Specific Window Latest Software Reviews Tinyhacker Random Tips DVDFab 6 Revo Uninstaller Pro Registry Mechanic 9 for Windows PC Tools Internet Security Suite 2010 Using TrueCrypt to Secure Your Data Quickly Schedule Meetings With NeedtoMeet Share Flickr Photos On Facebook Automatically Are You Blocked On Gtalk? Find out Discover Latest Android Apps On AppBrain The Ultimate Guide For YouTube Lovers

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  • Add keyboard languages to XP, Vista, and Windows 7

    - by Matthew Guay
    Do you regularly need to type in multiple languages in Windows?  Here we’ll show you the easy way to add and change input languages to your keyboard in XP, Vista, and Windows 7. Windows Vista and 7 come preinstalled with support for viewing a wide variety of languages, so adding an input language is fairly simply.  Adding an input language is slightly more difficult in XP, and requires installing additional files if you need an Asian or Complex script language.  First we show how to add an input language in Windows Vista and 7; it’s basically the same in both versions.  Then, we show how to add a language to XP, and also how to add Complex Script support.  Please note that this is only for adding an input language, which will allow you to type in the language you select.  This does not change your user interface language. Change keyboard language in Windows 7 and Vista It is fairly simple to add or change a keyboard language in Windows 7 or Vista.  In Windows 7, enter “keyboard language” in the Start menu search box, and select “Change keyboards or other input methods”. In Windows Vista, open Control Panel and enter “input language” in the search box and select “Change keyboards or other input methods”.  This also works in Windows 7. Now, click Change Keyboards to add another keyboard language or change your default one. Our default input language is US English, and our default keyboard is the US keyboard layout.  Click Add to insert another input language while still leaving your default input language installed. Here we selected the standard Thai keyboard language (Thai Kedmanee), but you can select any language you want.  Windows offers almost any language you can imagine, so just look for the language you want, select it, and click Ok. Alternately, if you want, you can click Preview to see your layout choice before accepting it.  This is only the default characters, not ones that will be activated with Shift or other keys (many Asian languages use many more characters than English, and require the use of Shift and other keys to access them all).  Once your finished previewing, click close and then press Ok on the previous dialog. Now you will see both of your keyboard languages in the Installed services box.  You can click Add to go back and get more, or move your selected language up or down (to change its priority), or simply click Apply to add the new language. Also, you can now change the default input language from the top menu.  This is the language that your keyboard will start with when you boot your computer.  So, if you mainly use English but also use another language, usually it is best to leave English as your default input language. Once you’ve pressed Apply or Ok, you will see a new icon beside your system tray with the initials of your default input language. If you click it, you can switch between input languages.  Alternately you can switch input languages by pressing Alt+Shift on your keyboard. Some complex languages, such as Chinese, may have extra buttons to change input modes to accommodate their large alphabet. If you would like to change the keyboard shortcut for changing languages, go back to the Input Languages dialog, and select the “Advanced Key Settings” tab.  Here you can change settings for Caps Lock and change or add key sequences to change between languages. Also, the On-Screen keyboard will display the correct keyboard language (here the keyboard is displaying Thai), which can be a helpful reference if your physical keyboard doesn’t have your preferred input language printed on it.  To open this, simply enter “On-Screen keyboard” in the start menu search, or click All Programs>Accessories>On-Screen keyboard. Change keyboard language in Windows XP The process for changing the keyboard language in Windows XP is slightly different.  Open Control Panel, and select “Date, Time, Language, and Regional Options”.   Select “Add other languages”. Now, click Details to add another language.  XP does not include support for Asian and complex languages by default, so if you need to add one of those languages we have details for that below. Click Add to add an input language. Select your desired language from the list, and choose your desired keyboard layout if your language offers multiple layouts.  Here we selected Canadian French with the default layout. Now you will see both of your keyboard languages in the Installed services box.  You can click Add to go back and add more, or move your selected language up or down (to change its priority), or simply click Apply to add the new language. Once you’ve pressed Apply or Ok, you will see a new icon beside your system tray with the initials of your default input language. If you click it, you can switch between input languages.  Alternately you can switch input languages by pressing Alt+Shift on your keyboard. If you would like to change the keyboard shortcut for changing languages, go back to the Input Languages dialog, and click the “Key Settings” button on the bottom of the dialog.  Here you can change settings for Caps Lock and change or add key sequences to change between languages. Add support to XP for Asian and Complex script languages Windows XP does not include support for Asian and Complex script languages by default, but you can easily add them to your computer.  This is useful if you wish to type in one of these languages, or simply want to read text written in these languages, since XP will not display these languages correctly if they are not installed.  If you wish to install Chinese, Japanese, and/or Korean, check the “Install files for East Asian languages” box.  Or, if you need to install a complex script language (including Arabic, Armenian, Georgian, Hebrew, the Indic languages, Thai, and Vietnamese), check the “Install files for complex script and right-to-left languages” box.   Choosing either of these options will open a prompt reminding you that this option will take up more disk space.  Support for complex languages will require around 10Mb of hard drive space, but East Asian language support may require 230 Mb or more free disk space.  Click Ok, and click apply to install your language files. You may have to insert your XP CD into your CD drive to install these files.  Insert the disk, and then click Ok. Windows will automatically copy the files, including fonts for these languages… …and then will ask you to reboot your computer to finalize the settings.  Click Yes, and then reopen the “Add other languages” dialog when your computer is rebooted, and add a language as before.     Now you can add Complex and/or Asian languages to XP, just as above.  Here is the XP taskbar language selector with Thai installed. Conclusion Unfortunately we haven’t found a way to add Asian and complex languages in XP without having an XP disc. If you know of a way, let us know in the comments. (No downloading the XP disc from torrent site answers please) Adding an input language is very important for bilingual individuals, and can also be useful if you simply need to occasionally view Asian or Complex languages in XP.  And by following the correct instructions for your version of Windows, it should be very easy to add, change, and remove input languages. Similar Articles Productive Geek Tips Show Keyboard Shortcut Access Keys in Windows VistaKeyboard Ninja: 21 Keyboard Shortcut ArticlesAnother Desktop Cube for Windows XP/VistaThe "Up" Keyboard Shortcut for Windows 7 or Vista ExplorerWhat is ctfmon.exe And Why Is It Running? TouchFreeze Alternative in AutoHotkey The Icy Undertow Desktop Windows Home Server – Backup to LAN The Clear & Clean Desktop Use This Bookmarklet to Easily Get Albums Use AutoHotkey to Assign a Hotkey to a Specific Window Latest Software Reviews Tinyhacker Random Tips Revo Uninstaller Pro Registry Mechanic 9 for Windows PC Tools Internet Security Suite 2010 PCmover Professional Make your Joomla & Drupal Sites Mobile with OSMOBI Integrate Twitter and Delicious and Make Life Easier Design Your Web Pages Using the Golden Ratio Worldwide Growth of the Internet How to Find Your Mac Address Use My TextTools to Edit and Organize Text

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  • Scan a Windows PC for Viruses from a Ubuntu Live CD

    - by Trevor Bekolay
    Getting a virus is bad. Getting a virus that causes your computer to crash when you reboot is even worse. We’ll show you how to clean viruses from your computer even if you can’t boot into Windows by using a virus scanner in a Ubuntu Live CD. There are a number of virus scanners available for Ubuntu, but we’ve found that avast! is the best choice, with great detection rates and usability. Unfortunately, avast! does not have a proper 64-bit version, and forcing the install does not work properly. If you want to use avast! to scan for viruses, then ensure that you have a 32-bit Ubuntu Live CD. If you currently have a 64-bit Ubuntu Live CD on a bootable flash drive, it does not take long to wipe your flash drive and go through our guide again and select normal (32-bit) Ubuntu 9.10 instead of the x64 edition. For the purposes of fixing your Windows installation, the 64-bit Live CD will not provide any benefits. Once Ubuntu 9.10 boots up, open up Firefox by clicking on its icon in the top panel. Navigate to http://www.avast.com/linux-home-edition. Click on the Download tab, and then click on the link to download the DEB package. Save it to the default location. While avast! is downloading, click on the link to the registration form on the download page. Fill in the registration form if you do not already have a trial license for avast!. By the time you’ve filled out the registration form, avast! will hopefully be finished downloading. Open a terminal window by clicking on Applications in the top-left corner of the screen, then expanding the Accessories menu and clicking on Terminal. In the terminal window, type in the following commands, pressing enter after each line. cd Downloadssudo dpkg –i avast* This will install avast! on the live Ubuntu environment. To ensure that you can use the latest virus database, while still in the terminal window, type in the following command: sudo sysctl –w kernel.shmmax=128000000 Now we’re ready to open avast!. Click on Applications on the top-left corner of the screen, expand the Accessories folder, and click on the new avast! Antivirus item. You will first be greeted with a window that asks for your license key. Hopefully you’ve received it in your email by now; open the email that avast! sends you, copy the license key, and paste it in the Registration window. avast! Antivirus will open. You’ll notice that the virus database is outdated. Click on the Update database button and avast! will start downloading the latest virus database. To scan your Windows hard drive, you will need to “mount” it. While the virus database is downloading, click on Places on the top-left of your screen, and click on your Windows hard drive, if you can tell which one it is by its size. If you can’t tell which is the correct hard drive, then click on Computer and check out each hard drive until you find the right one. When you find it, make a note of the drive’s label, which appears in the menu bar of the file browser. Also note that your hard drive will now appear on your desktop. By now, your virus database should be updated. At the time this article was written, the most recent version was 100404-0. In the main avast! window, click on the radio button next to Selected folders and then click on the “+” button to the right of the list box. It will open up a dialog box to browse to a location. To find your Windows hard drive, click on the “>” next to the computer icon. In the expanded list, find the folder labelled “media” and click on the “>” next to it to expand it. In this list, you should be able to find the label that corresponds to your Windows hard drive. If you want to scan a certain folder, then you can go further into this hierarchy and select that folder. However, we will scan the entire hard drive, so we’ll just press OK. Click on Start scan and avast! will start scanning your hard drive. If a virus is found, you’ll be prompted to select an action. If you know that the file is a virus, then you can Delete it, but there is the possibility of false positives, so you can also choose Move to chest to quarantine it. When avast! is done scanning, it will summarize what it found on your hard drive. You can take different actions on those files at this time by right-clicking on them and selecting the appropriate action. When you’re done, click Close. Your Windows PC is now free of viruses, in the eyes of avast!. Reboot your computer and with any luck it will now boot up! Alternatives to avast! If avast! and a liberal amount of Googling doesn’t fix your problem, it’s possible that a different virus scanner will fix your obscure issue. Here are a list of other virus scanners available for Ubuntu that are either free or offer free trials. See their support forums for help on installing these virus scanners. Avira AntiVir Personal for Linux / Solaris Panda Antivirus for Linux Installation and usage guide from Ubuntu F-PROT Antivirus for Linux ClamAV installation and usage guide from Ubuntu NOD32 Antivirus for Linux Kaspersky Anti-Virus 2010 Bitdefender Antivirus for Unices Conclusion Running avast! from a Ubuntu Live CD can clean the vast majority of viruses from your Windows PC. This is another reason to always have a Ubuntu Live CD ready just in case something happens to your Windows installation! Similar Articles Productive Geek Tips Secure Computing: Windows Live OneCareHow To Remove Antivirus Live and Other Rogue/Fake Antivirus MalwareUse the Windows Key for the "Start" Menu in Ubuntu LinuxScan Files for Viruses Before You Download With Dr.WebAsk the Readers: Share Your Tips for Defeating Viruses and Malware TouchFreeze Alternative in AutoHotkey The Icy Undertow Desktop Windows Home Server – Backup to LAN The Clear & Clean Desktop Use This Bookmarklet to Easily Get Albums Use AutoHotkey to Assign a Hotkey to a Specific Window Latest Software Reviews Tinyhacker Random Tips DVDFab 6 Revo Uninstaller Pro Registry Mechanic 9 for Windows PC Tools Internet Security Suite 2010 The Ultimate Guide For YouTube Lovers Will it Blend? iPad Edition Penolo Lets You Share Sketches On Twitter Visit Woolyss.com for Old School Games, Music and Videos Add a Custom Title in IE using Spybot or Spyware Blaster When You Need to Hail a Taxi in NYC

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  • Our Look at Opera 10.50 Web Browser

    - by Asian Angel
    Everyone has been talking about the newest version of Opera recently but perhaps you have not looked at it too closely yet. Today we will take a look at 10.50 and let you see what this “new browser” is all about. The New Engines Carakan JavaScript Engine: Runs web applications up to 7 times faster than its predecessor Futhark Vega Graphics Library: Enables super fast and smooth graphics on everything from tab switching to webpage animation Presto 2.5: Provides support for HTML5, CSS2.1 and the latest CSS3 standards A Look at the Features Available If you have installed or used older versions of Opera before then the default look after a clean install will probably seem rather different. The main differences in appearance are mainly located within the “glass border” areas of the browser. The “Speed Dial” setup looks and works just as well as in previous versions. You can set a favorite wallpaper or image as your background and choose the number of “dials” using the “Configure Speed Dial Command”. One of the “standout” differences is the “O Button”. All of the menus have been condensed into this single access point but it only takes a few moments to find what you are looking for. If you have used the style before in earlier versions of Opera some of the items have been moved around. For those who prefer the “Menu Bar” that can be easily restored using the “Show Menu Bar Command”. If desired you can actually “extend” the “Tab Bar” downwards to display thumbnails of your open tabs. Just use your mouse to grab the bottom of the “Tab Bar” and adjust it to suit your personal needs. The only problem with this feature is that it will quickly use up a good sized portion of your available UI and browser window space. The “Password Manager” is ready to access when needed…the background for the button will turn a shiny metallic blue when you open a webpage that you have “Login Information” saved for. One of the new features is a small “Recycle Bin Button” in the upper right corner. Clicking on this will display a list of recently closed tabs letting you have easy access to any tabs that you may have accidentally closed. This is definitely a great feature to have as an easy access button. For those who were used to how the “Zoom Feature” looked before it has a new “look” to it. Instead of the pop-up menu-type listing of “view sizes” present before you now have a slider button that you can use to adjust the zooming level. For our default setup here the “Sidebar Panels” available were: “Bookmarks, Widgets, Unite, Notes, Downloads, History, & Panels”. Additional panels such as “Links, Windows, Search, Info, etc.” are available if you want and/or need them (accessible using the “Panels Plus Sign Button”). The “Opera Link Button” makes it easy for you to synchronize your “Speed Dial, Bookmarks, Personal Bar, Custom Searches, History & Notes”. Note: “Opera Link” requires an account and can be signed up for using the link provided below. Want to share files with your family and friends? “Unite” allows you to do that and more. With “Unite” you can: “Stream Music, Show Photo Galleries, Share Files and/or Folders, & host webpages directly from your browser”. We have a more in-depth look at “Unite” in our article here. Note: Use of “Unite” requires an Opera account. Got a slow internet connection? “Opera Turbo” can help with that by running the web traffic through their “compression servers” to speed up your web browsing. Keep in mind that “Opera Turbo” will not engage if you are accessing a secure website (i.e. your bank’s website) thus preserving your security. Note: “Opera Turbo” can be set up to automatically detect slow internet connections (i.e. crowded Wi-Fi in a cafe). Opera has a built-in “Private Browsing Mode” now for those who prefer anonymous browsing and want to keep the “history records clean” on their computer. To access it go to “Tabs and windows” and select “New private tab” or “New private window” as desired. When you open your new “Private Tab or Window” you will see the following message with details on how Opera will handle browsing information and a large “door hanger symbol”. Notice that the one tab is locked into “Private Browsing Mode” while the others are still working in “Regular Browsing Mode”. Very nice! A miniature version of the “door hanger symbol” will be present on any tab that is locked into “Private Browsing Mode”. If you are using Windows 7 then you will love how things look from your “Taskbar”. Here you can see four very nice looking thumbnails for the tabs that we had open. All that you have to do is click on the desired thumbnail… The “Context Menu” looks just as lovely as the thumbnails and definitely has some terrific functionality built into it. Add Enhanced Aero Capability If you love “Aero” and want more for your new Opera install then we have the perfect theme for you. The theme’s name is Z1-AV69 and once you have downloaded it you will need to place it in the “Skins Subfolder” in Opera’s “Program Files Folder”. Note: For our example we used version 1.10 but version 2.00 is now available (link provided below). Once you have restarted Opera, go to the “O Menu” and select “Appearance”. When the “Appearance Window” opens click on “Z1-Glass Skin” and then click “OK”. All of a sudden you will have more “Aero Goodness” to enjoy. Compare this screenshot with the one at the top of this article…the only part that is not transparent now is the browser window area itself. Want even more “Aero Goodness”? Right click on the “Tab Bar” and set “Tab Bar Placement” to “Left”. Note: You can achieve the same effect by setting the “Tab Bar Placement” to “Right”. With the “Speed Dial” visible you will be able to see your wallpaper with ease. While this is obviously not for everyone it does make for a great visual trick. Portable Versions Perhaps you need this wonderful new version of Opera to go with you wherever you do during the day. Not a problem…just visit the Opera USB website to choose a version that works best for you. You can select from “Zip or Exe” setup files and if needed update an older portable version using a “Zipped Update Files Package”. If you are updating an older version keep in mind that you will need to delete the old “OperaUSB.exe. File” due to changes with the new setup files. During our tests updating older portable versions went well for the most part but we did experience a few “odd UI quirks” here and there…so we recommend setting up a clean install if possible. Conclusion The new 10.50 release is a pleasure to use and is a recommended install for your system. Whether you are considering trying Opera for the first time or have been using it for a bit we think that you will pleased with everything that the 10.50 release has to offer. For those who would like to add User Scripts to Opera be certain to look at our how-to article here. Links Download Opera 10.50 for your location (Windows) Get the latest Snapshot versions for Linux & Mac Sign up for an Opera Link account View In-Depth detail on Opera 10.50’s features Download the Z1-AV69 Aero Theme Download Portable Opera 10.50 Similar Articles Productive Geek Tips Set the Speed Dial as the Opera Startup PageSet Up User Scripts in Opera BrowserScan Files for Viruses Before You Download With Dr.WebTurn Your Computer into a File, Music, and Web Server with Opera UniteSet the Default Browser on Ubuntu From the Command Line TouchFreeze Alternative in AutoHotkey The Icy Undertow Desktop Windows Home Server – Backup to LAN The Clear & Clean Desktop Use This Bookmarklet to Easily Get Albums Use AutoHotkey to Assign a Hotkey to a Specific Window Latest Software Reviews Tinyhacker Random Tips Revo Uninstaller Pro Registry Mechanic 9 for Windows PC Tools Internet Security Suite 2010 PCmover Professional Make your Joomla & Drupal Sites Mobile with OSMOBI Integrate Twitter and Delicious and Make Life Easier Design Your Web Pages Using the Golden Ratio Worldwide Growth of the Internet How to Find Your Mac Address Use My TextTools to Edit and Organize Text

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  • Week in Geek: FBI Back Door in OpenBSD Edition

    - by Asian Angel
    This week we learned how to migrate bookmarks from Delicious to Diigo, fix annoying arrows, play old-school DOS games, schedule smart computer shutdowns, use breaks in Microsoft Word to better format documents, check the condition of hard-disks using Linux disk utilities, & what the Linux fstab is and how it works. Photo by Jameson42. Random Geek Links Another week with extra news link goodness to help keep you up to date. Photo by justmakeit. Report of FBI back door roils OpenBSD community Allegations that the FBI surreptitiously placed a back door into the OpenBSD operating system have alarmed the computer security community, prompting calls for an audit of the source code and claims that the charges must be a hoax. Fortinet: Job outlook improving for cybercrooks In an ironic twist in the job market, more positions will open up for developers who can write customized malware packers, people who can break CAPTCHA codes, and distributors who can spread malicious code, according to Fortinet. Enisa: Malware for smartphones is a ’serious risk’ Businesses and consumers are at risk of data breaches through smartphone use, according to the European Network and Information Security Agency. The trick with the f: Google and Microsoft web sites distribute malware Last week, Google’s DoubleClick advertising platform and Microsoft’s rad.msn.com online ad network briefly distributed malware to other web sites in the form of advertising banners. New scam tactic: Fake disk defraggers It would appear that scammers are trying out new programs to see which might best confuse potential victims and evade detection by legitimate antivirus software. Microsoft closes IE and Stuxnet holes As previously announced, Microsoft has released 17 security updates to close 40 security holes. All four Windows holes so far disclosed in connection with Stuxnet have now been closed. Microsoft Offers H.264 Support to Firefox on Windows via Add-On The new HTML5 Extension for Windows Media Player Firefox Plug-in add-on from Microsoft offers users that are running Firefox on Windows 7 H.264 support for HTML5 video playback. Google proclaims Chrome business-ready Google has announced that Chrome is ready for corporate use. Microsoft Tells Exchange Customers to Think Twice Before Opting for Google Message Continuity This week, Microsoft is telling companies still running Exchange 2010’s precursors that they should carefully consider the implications of embracing Google Message Continuity. Who Google has in mind for its Chrome OS users Steven Vaughan-Nichols explains why he feels that Chrome OS will be ideal for either office-workers or people who need a computer, but do not know the first thing about how to use one safely. Oracle takes office suite to the cloud Oracle has introduced Cloud Office 1.0, a cloud-based version of its office suite, which is aimed at web and mobile users. Mozilla pays premiums for reports of vulnerabilities The Mozilla Foundation has followed Google’s example by expanding its rewards program for reports of vulnerabilities in its Web applications. Who bought those 882 Novell patents? Not just Microsoft The mysterious CPTN Holdings — the organization that bought the 882 Novell patents as part of the terms of the Attachmate acquisition of Novell – has been unmasked (Microsoft, Apple, EMC and Oracle). Appeals court: Feds need warrants for e-mail Police must obtain search warrants before perusing Internet users’ e-mail records, a federal appeals court ruled today in a landmark decision that struck down part of a 1986 law allowing warrantless access. Geek Video of the Week What happens when someone plays a wicked prank by shoveling crazy snow paths that lead to dead ends or turn back on themselves? Watch to find out! Photo by CollegeHumor. Janitor Snow Shoveling Prank Random TinyHacker Links The Oatmeal on Cat vs Internet What lengths will our poor neglected kitty hero have to go to in order to get some attention? Guide On Using JoliCloud With Windows JoliCloud is a nifty operating system that’s made for people who need a light-weight OS that’s mostly cloud based. Check this guide on using it with Windows. Use Cameyo to Easily Create Portable Programs Here’s a nifty tool to make portable apps out of programs in Windows. Check out the guide to do it. Better Family Tech Support A nice new site by Google to help members of family understand how computers work. Track Your Stolen Mobile Phone With F-Secure A useful anti-theft tool for your mobile phone. Super User Questions Another week with great answers to popular questions from Super User. What Chrome password manager fits my requirements? What’s the best way to be able to reimage windows computers? Could you suggest feature-rich disk-based personal backup program for linux (and I’ve seen a few)? What is IPv6 and why should I care? Is there any way to find out what programs are trying to connect to Internet on windows? How-To Geek Weekly Article Recap Here are our hottest articles full of geeky goodness from this past week at HTG. 20 OS X Keyboard Shortcuts You Might Not Know Microsoft Security Essentials 2.0 Kills Viruses Dead. Download It Now. Is Your Desktop Printer More Expensive Than Printing Services? Ask the Readers: Would You Be Willing to Give Windows Up and Use a Different O.S.? The Twelve Days of Geekmas One Year Ago on How-To Geek Enjoy reading through our latest batch of retro-geek goodness from one year ago. Macrium Reflect is a Free and Easy To Use Backup Utility How To Turn a Physical Computer Into A Virtual Machine with Disk2vhd How To Restore Windows 7 from a System Image How To Manage Hard Drive Space Used by Windows 7 Backup and Restore How To Manage Hibernate Mode in Windows 7 The Geek Note That is all we have for you this week, so see you back here again after the holidays! Got a great tip? Send it in to us at [email protected]. Photo by mitjamavsar. Latest Features How-To Geek ETC The Complete List of iPad Tips, Tricks, and Tutorials The 50 Best Registry Hacks that Make Windows Better The How-To Geek Holiday Gift Guide (Geeky Stuff We Like) LCD? LED? Plasma? The How-To Geek Guide to HDTV Technology The How-To Geek Guide to Learning Photoshop, Part 8: Filters Improve Digital Photography by Calibrating Your Monitor Deathwing the Destroyer – WoW Cataclysm Dragon Wallpaper Drag2Up Lets You Drag and Drop Files to the Web With Ease The Spam Police Parts 1 and 2 – Goodbye Spammers [Videos] Snow Angels Theme for Windows 7 Exploring the Jungle Ruins Wallpaper Protect Your Privacy When Browsing with Chrome and Iron Browser

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  • Create a Bootable Ubuntu 9.10 USB Flash Drive

    - by Trevor Bekolay
    The Ubuntu Live CD isn’t just useful for trying out Ubuntu before you install it, you can also use it to maintain and repair your Windows PC. Even if you have no intention of installing Linux, every Windows user should have a bootable Ubuntu USB drive on hand in case something goes wrong in Windows. Creating a bootable USB flash drive is surprisingly easy with a small self-contained application called UNetbootin. It will even download Ubuntu for you! Note: Ubuntu will take up approximately 700 MB on your flash drive, so choose a flash drive with at least 1 GB of free space, formatted as FAT32. This process should not remove any existing files on the flash drive, but to be safe you should backup the files on your flash drive. Put Ubuntu on your flash drive UNetbootin doesn’t require installation; just download the application and run it. Select Ubuntu from the Distribution drop-down box, then 9.10_Live from the Version drop-down box. If you have a 64-bit machine, then select 9.10_Live_x64 for the Version. At the bottom of the screen, select the drive letter that corresponds to the USB drive that you want to put Ubuntu on. If you select USB Drive in the Type drop-down box, the only drive letters available will be USB flash drives. Click OK and UNetbootin will start doing its thing. First it will download the Ubuntu Live CD. Then, it will copy the files from the Ubuntu Live CD to your flash drive. The amount of time it takes will vary depending on your Internet speed, an when it’s done, click on Exit. You’re not planning on installing Ubuntu right now, so there’s no need to reboot. If you look at the USB drive now, you should see a bunch of new files and folders. If you had files on the drive before, they should still be present. You’re now ready to boot your computer into Ubuntu 9.10! How to boot into Ubuntu When the time comes that you have to boot into Ubuntu, or if you just want to test and make sure that your flash drive works properly, you will have to set your computer to boot off of the flash drive. The steps to do this will vary depending on your BIOS – which varies depending on your motherboard. To get detailed instructions on changing how your computer boots, search for your motherboard’s manual (or your laptop’s manual for a laptop). For general instructions, which will suffice for 99% of you, read on. Find the important keyboard keys When your computer boots up, a bunch of words and numbers flash across the screen, usually to be ignored. This time, you need to scan the boot-up screen for a few key words with some associated keys: Boot menu and Setup. Typically, these will show up at the bottom of the screen. If your BIOS has a Boot Menu, then read on. Otherwise, skip to the Hard: Using Setup section. Easy: Using the Boot Menu If your BIOS offers a Boot Menu, then during the boot-up process, press the button associated with the Boot Menu. In our case, this is ESC. Our example Boot Menu doesn’t have the ability to boot from USB, but your Boot Menu should have some options, such as USB-CDROM, USB-HDD, USB-FLOPPY, and others. Try the options that start with USB until you find one that works. Don’t worry if it doesn’t work – you can just restart and try again. Using the Boot Menu does not change the normal boot order on your system, so the next time you start up your computer it will boot from the hard drive as normal. Hard: Using Setup If your BIOS doesn’t offer a Boot Menu, then you will have to change the boot order in Setup. Note: There are some options in BIOS Setup that can affect the stability of your machine. Take care to only change the boot order options. Press the button associated with Setup. In our case, this is F2. If your BIOS Setup has a Boot tab, then switch to it and change the order such that one of the USB options occurs first. There may be several USB options, such as USB-CDROM, USB-HDD, USB-FLOPPY, and others; try them out to see which one works for you. If your BIOS does not have a boot tab, boot order is commonly found in Advanced CMOS Options. Note that this changes the boot order permanently until you change it back. If you plan on only plugging in a bootable flash drive when you want to boot from it, then you could leave the boot order as it is, but you may find it easier to switch the order back to the previous order when you reboot from Ubuntu. Booting into Ubuntu If you set the right boot option, then you should be greeted with the UNetbootin screen. Press enter to start Ubuntu with the default options, or wait 10 seconds for this to happen automatically. Ubuntu will start loading. It should go straight to the desktop with no need for a username or password. And that’s it! From this live desktop session, you can try out Ubuntu, and even install software that is not included in the live CD. Installed software will only last for the duration of your session – the next time you start up the live CD it will be back to its original state. Download UNetbootin from sourceforge.net Similar Articles Productive Geek Tips Create a Bootable Ubuntu USB Flash Drive the Easy WayReset Your Ubuntu Password Easily from the Live CDHow-To Geek on Lifehacker: Control Your Computer with Shortcuts & Speed Up Vista SetupHow To Setup a USB Flash Drive to Install Windows 7Speed up Your Windows Vista Computer with ReadyBoost TouchFreeze Alternative in AutoHotkey The Icy Undertow Desktop Windows Home Server – Backup to LAN The Clear & Clean Desktop Use This Bookmarklet to Easily Get Albums Use AutoHotkey to Assign a Hotkey to a Specific Window Latest Software Reviews Tinyhacker Random Tips Revo Uninstaller Pro Registry Mechanic 9 for Windows PC Tools Internet Security Suite 2010 PCmover Professional New Stinger from McAfee Helps Remove ‘FakeAlert’ Threats Google Apps Marketplace: Tools & Services For Google Apps Users Get News Quick and Precise With Newser Scan for Viruses in Ubuntu using ClamAV Replace Your Windows Task Manager With System Explorer Create Talking Photos using Fotobabble

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