Posted by kglee | Filed under Software Fixes
If you’ve worked with windows for 2 minutes you’ve probably been exposed to the Blue Screen of Death or BsD. Usually Blue Screens are rather harmless and go away after a reboot. But when they don’t, when they stick around and keep reoccurring after every reboot, then you have problems. The first thing you should do is try to boot into safe mode. You can do this by pressing F8 after you hear your computer beep while it is booting up. If it boots into safe mode all is well and good and you just have a start-up program gumming up your computer. (See my Spyware Removal Guide for information on how to manage start-up entries.) If safe mode generates the same blue screen you have more work ahead of you.
If you can’t boot into Windows XP, not even into safe mode, and you’re getting a message like, “unmountable boot volume” on the blue screen they a simple chkdsk might fix the problem. The tricky part is booting your computer so you can run chkdsk. The easiest way to do that is to use a windows installation CD. To do boot off of a CD you first need to configure your BIOS to look for an Operating System on the CD before it tries the hard drive. Usually this is done by pressing ‘del’, ‘F2′, or some other key to enter setup and adjusting the boot priority so that the CDROM is first. When Windows setup finally loads (it takes several minutes) all you have to do is press ‘r’ to enter the recovery console.
Sometimes it will prompt you for the administrator’s password. Most people I encounter don’t know this or think they don’t have one. See the Password Recovery Guide to find out how you can reset your administrator password.
Once you are in the recovery console you will be greeted with a friendly command prompt. The first thing you are going to want to try is chkdsk. Simply typing “chkdsk” should scan your hard drive and fix any problems it finds. Sometimes it is necessary to use “chkdsk /p” and if you want to be really thorough and have several hours to burn you can use “chkdsk /r” that causes it to do a surface scan of the disk. If chkdsk get’s hung up for more than an hour, as in the percent complete doesn’t change for a long time, there is most likely something physically wrong with your hard drive it will have to be replaced. Once chkdsk complete restart the computer by typing “exit” and see if windows will boot now.
Posted by kglee | Filed under Software Fixes
With Jumplist Extender, you can:
Add your own Program Tasks
You can add any action you want on your jumplist, provided it has a keyboard shortcut to your program. Make easy-to-access jumplist items for your everyday tasks! (Works with command line switches, too!)
Pin Any Type of File
Add ANY file and ANY folder to your jumplist — and even rename them on the list! Windows only allows you to add files assigned to (or “openable by”) the program — Extender bypasses that limitation.
Create Extensions to your Programs
Use AutoHotKey scripting to extend and add functionality to your programs, easily accessible from your own jumplist! Add a “Save to Desktop Notes” function to Notepad, or add “Snip and upload to ImageShack” to Snipping Tool!
Share your Jumplists with Others
Export and import your jumplists into “Jumplist Packs”! Upload your Jumplist Pack to the web, and enable others to download and enjoy your work!
Download
JumplistExtender_v0.1-C.exe (1.19MB)
Posted by kglee | Filed under Software Fixes
SARDU (Shardana Antivirus Rescue Disk Utility) is a small freeware utility designed to combine all of your bootable ISOs and turn them into a single ISO with a boot menu. You can either burn this ISO to a single CD/DVD, or you can get SARDU to create it for a bootable USB drive. Basically, this aims to eliminate the need to carry around heaps of different bootable CDs.
Despite having “Antivirus Rescue Disk utility” in its name, it is not limited to just running Antivirus boot CDs. You can also include other tools like GParted, Ophcrack, UBCD4Win and various Linux live CDs.
The creator of this application is also a member of the Technibble community so if you have any feedback or suggestions, he is likely to read it.
To use it, there are 4 tabs. Antivirus, Utility, Linux and PE.
Click on the tool you want to use and SARDU will take you to the download page of that tool. Once you have downloaded that ISO, you need to copy it to the “ISO” folder beneath the SARDU program folder. To make use of any of the PE enviroments (ie UBCD4Win), you will need to run the separate setup file for that utility which requires your Windows CD so it can generate an ISO. Once this ISO has been built you can then put it in SARDU’s ISO folder.
Once you have done that, press either the “Make ISO” or “Make bootable USB” button and it will check to see which ISO’s you have placed in that directory, then create a single ISO.
If you chose “Make ISO”, it will place the single ISO in a folder called “ISO created” below the application folder. If you chose “Make bootable USB”, it will ask which drive letter the USB drive is and place the files there.
Note: Due to the hacking nature of some of the rescue CDs you might download, they might set off your antivirus software. This is most likely a “false positive”.
Posted by kglee | Filed under Software Fixes
Windows 7 has got a super administrator account which, by default, is disabled. Such account is automatically created when Windows 7 boots up for the first time but, for security reasons, is hidden from view. Let’s see how to turn it on thanks to a simple query in the Command Prompt.
1. Click Start.
2. In the Search field, type CMD.
3. On the list of available programs, right click the Command Prompt icon and click Run as Administrator.
4. In the black window, type: net user administrator /active:yes
5. Press Enter.
6. The system should return you with the following message: The command completed successfully.
7. Now, exit the Command Prompt and click the Start icon.
8. Log off from the current account and in the Account window you should now see the Administrator account.
9. Done!
10. If you want to turn off the Admin account, type: net users administrator /active:no
Posted by kglee | Filed under Software Fixes
Is Windows 7 slow? Here’s how to clean out the clutter
There’s a lot to like about Windows 7, not least its many improvements over Vista: the new OS is faster, less demanding on resources, has better designed security and contains many new productivity-boosting features.
If you were an early Windows 7 adopter, though, you may already have noticed that one old problem still remains. The more you use your PC, adding and removing applications, the more junk builds up throughout your system, and the slower and more unstable it eventually becomes.
You need to treat the problem, detoxing your PC on a regular basis to remove the leftovers – but how, exactly? Which areas of Windows 7 are most susceptible to this gradual degradation? Are there any tools or benchmarks you can use to reveal problem areas? How much can all this clutter slow you down, anyway, and what’s the best way to remove it all and restore your system to its optimum performance?
As we researched this article, one point was clear. Windows 7 is very different internally to Windows XP, and we couldn’t simply assume that old tricks, like optimising services, would work in the same way. What we needed to do was design a test, something that would reveal exactly why Windows 7 systems slowed down over time, and help uncover the best way to restore that initial new PC performance. And so that’s exactly what we did.
Designing the test
We started our trial by obtaining a powerful new 3XS Intel X58 Core i7 PC from Scan Computers. The machine featured a quad-core Intel Core i7 920 (which was overclocked by 20 per cent), 6GB of RAM and a speedy SATA 300 Samsung hard drive. It was an excellent performer that we knew wouldn’t choke unless it was faced with a set of major performance problems.
When the 3XS PC arrived, we installed the latest Windows 7 (Ultimate Edition, 32-bit) and driver updates and then set about establishing baseline measurements of our PC’s performance. The best Windows boot time
Posted by kglee | Filed under Software Fixes
Internet Explorer 9 will not be supported by Windows XP. Period. Microsoft’s web technical evangelist Giorgio Sardo, speaking at the Web 2.0 Expo, has confirmed this. The reason given is that HTML5 and hardware acceleration require a modern OS.
Note: Interestingly, while XP users won’t be able to benefit from IE9, pirates will, as there will be no validation required.
But is this nothing more than a cunning ploy to make users upgrade the OS?
Let’s consider the evidence.
First, XP has a massive, entrenched following. It’s usage share is at 63.4%, while Vista holds a market share of 15.6% and Windows 7 an impressive 11.7%. Many XP users don’t see the need to upgrade because the OS does for them everything they need it to do. So it is in Microsoft’s best interests to come up with reasons for people to upgrade.
The there are the browser stats. Internet Explorer 6 has a greater market share (17.6%) than Firefox 3.6 (15.3%). Internet Explorer 8 enjoys an usage share of 24.6% while Internet Explorer 7 continues to hold its own with 12.5%.
What about other browser vendors, such as Opera, Mozilla and Google. Are these players abandoning XP? No. Here’s what Google Chrome developer Alex Russell had to say:
Posted by kglee | Filed under Software Fixes
McAfee has also released their official fixes here.
This is the fix we have been using on machines that were hit to get them back online; your mileage may vary, but it’s worked for us:
1. If your computer is forcing you to shutdown (you are getting an error with a countdown), go to Start – Run and type cmd. At the command prompt type ’shutdown -a’ without the quotes. [This will abort the Windows shutdown.]
2. Open up the McAfee console (Start -> Programs -> McAfee)
3. Disable Access Protection and On-Access Scanner
4. Double click your Quarantine Manager in that window, and restore the files there (right click on it and select restore).
5. Go to your services console (right click on My Computer, select ‘Manage’, and click on the services in the left pane). Make sure both RPC (Remote Proceedure Call) services are running.
6. Start (or restart if already running) the McAfee Framework service.
7. Back in the McAfee console, select Tools -> Rollback DATs (If this doesn’t work, chances are you need to mess with your network services to get a connection to your corporate repository. If you don’t know what I’m talking about, you probably shouldn’t try).
8. Reboot and you should be all set.
Posted by kglee | Filed under Software Fixes
AVG has recently changed their shareware Rescue CD into freeware, meaning anyone can use it to scan and clean virus infected machines without owning an AVG license. If you don’t know what is a rescue CD, it is a Live CD mostly used to recover a computer when the system cannot be loaded normally or will not allow normal operation, such as after an extensive or deep-rooted virus infection.
A powerful, free toolset for the rescue and repair of infected machines
The AVG Rescue CD is a powerful must-have toolkit for the rescue and repair of infected machines. It provides essential utilities for system administrators and other IT professionals and includes the following features:
* Comprehensive administration toolset
* System recovery from virus and spyware infections
* Suitable for recovering MS Windows and Linux operating systems (FAT32 and NTFS file systems)
* Ability to perform a clean boot from CD or USB stick
* Free support and service for paid license holders of any AVG product
* FAQ and Free Forum self-help support for AVG Free users
Key technologies
* Anti-virus: protection against viruses, worms and trojans
* Anti-spyware: protection against spyware, adware and identity-theft
* Administration toolkit: system recovery tools