The Knowledge Base Document Table of Contents
SITES ON THE NET ...... 7
REFERENCE ...... 7 My virtual reference Desk...... 7 Martindale’s Reference Desk...... 7 Suite 101...... 7 LIBRARIES ...... 8 Libweb ...... 8 The Australian Libraries Gateway ...... 8 Internet Public Library Reference Center ...... 8 WRITING AND GRAMMAR ...... 9 Onelook Dictionaries ...... 9 Dictionary.com ...... 9 The elements of Style ...... 9 The Quotations Page ...... 9 ENCYCLOPEDIAS’ ...... 9 The electric Library Encyclopedia ...... 9 ASTRONOMY ...... 9 Ben’s Web site...... 9 VIDEO RESOURCES ...... 10 FLASH SITES ...... 10 AWARD BIOS MANUALS ...... 10 HELP SCREEN ...... 11
STACK OVERFLOW ...... 11 BACKUPS ...... 12
TOOLS ...... 12 CHECKLIST ...... 12 TEMPORARY INTERNET FILES ...... 13
MAIL ...... 15
OUTLOOK EXPRESS BACKUP ...... 15 OUTLOOK PST REPAIR ...... 16 HARD DRIVES AND OPTICAL DRIVES ...... 17
MAXTOR HARD DRIVES ...... 17 SCANNING ...... 18
HOW A SCANNER WORKS ...... 18 HORSES FOR COURSES ...... 18 SCANNING BACKGROUNDER ...... 19 TECHNOLOGIES ...... 19 FEATURES AND USABILITY ...... 20 MAKING GREAT SCANS ...... 21 Resolutions ...... 21
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Color and brightness ...... 21 OCR (optical character recognition) ...... 22 AUTO START CD’S ...... 23
EXCEL WORKSHEET ...... 24 POWERPOINT PRESENTATION ...... 24 PUBLISHER DOCUMENTS ...... 24 WEB PAGE ...... 24 MUSIC FILES ...... 24 VIDEO ...... 24 IMAGES ...... 24 COMPRESSED FILES ...... 24 OTHER DIRECTORIES ...... 25 EARLIER VERSIONS ...... 25 MAYBE SEND THE PROGRAM TOO ...... 25 MAY NOT AUTOSTART ...... 25 MORE THAN JUST CD'S? ...... 25 PROTECTING THE DOCUMENTS ...... 27 TESTING ...... 27 MAKING A SIMPLE MENU ...... 27 AUTOSTARTING A WEB SITE ...... 28 SYSTEM ADMINISTRATION ...... 29
BACKUP THE REGISTRY ...... 29 Window 98 ...... 29 Windows 2000 ...... 29 Windows ME and XP...... 29 SYSINTERNALS ...... 29 STARTUP PROGRAMS ...... 29 BOOT CD ...... 29 Windows Boot ...... 30 OUTLOOK ...... 31
CONTACTS ARE NOT VISIBLE ...... 31 Cause ...... 31 Resolution ...... 31 SHORTCUT TO CREATE NEW MAIL ...... 32 INTERNET EXPLORER ...... 33
SYMPTOMS ...... 33 CAUSE ...... 33 RESOLUTION ...... 34 FAVORITES – WINDOWS VISTA ...... 34 HISTORY OF JAVA/JAVASCRIPT ...... 35
INTRODUCTION TO JAVASCRIPT ...... 35 A BRIEF HISTORY ...... 35 WINDOWS EXPLORER ERROR ...... 37
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MESSAGE DETAILS ...... 37 ARTICLE OF EXPLORER QUITTING ...... 37 INTERNET EXPLORER RE-INSTALL SITES ...... 37 BACKUP OUTLOOK EXPRESS ...... 38
MULTIMEDIA ...... 39
MPEG FORMATS ...... 39 MPEG ENCODER ...... 39 VRO FILE FORMAT ...... 39 REMOVE DRM FROM YOUR TUNES ...... 39 WINDOWS ...... 41
SEND TO ENTRIES ...... 41 DELAYED WRITE FAILED ...... 41 WINDOWS ME - FREEZING WHEN INSTALLING ...... 41 UPGRADE WINDOWS WITH AND OEM DISC ...... 42 WINDOWS VISTA ...... 43 Upgrading – Without Paying Full Price ...... 43 Save by avoiding the 'full' version ...... 43 Use Vista's 'upgrade' version to clean-install ...... 44 Why does Vista's secret setup exist? ...... 45 More on the Vista Upgrade Secret ...... 47 Vista workaround is a deliberate feature ...... 47 When a Vista clean install may be necessary ...... 48 Upgrade trick works with MS Office, too ...... 48 European prices for Vista seem jacked-up ...... 49 OEM versions and educational discounts to come ...... 49 Vista 120 Day Activation ...... 50 How to extend the Vista activation deadline ...... 50 Why does Microsoft allow 120-day extensions? ...... 52 Legitimate uses of the Software License Manager ...... 53 Using the 120-day extension in various scenarios ...... 54 When the Vista activation deadline passes ...... 54 Altering File Associations ...... 55 Resize System Restore disc space ...... 55 Web Vista Resource ...... 55 Vista Driver Downloads ...... 55 Vista How-To Web Site ...... 57 FAVICONS ...... 57 WINDOWS XP – NO RESPONSE ON START ...... 59 Symptoms ...... 59 Cause ...... 59 Resolution ...... 59 SYSTEM VOLUME INFORMATION ...... 61 Summary ...... 61 Accessing the System Volume Information Folder ...... 61 SYSTEM FILE CORRUPTION ...... 64 PHANTOM DEVICES ...... 65 Restoring the Hot Plug Manager ...... 66
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WINDOWS VIRTUAL DRIVE ...... 67 TCP/IP OPTIMIZER ...... 69 UNINSTALL OFFICE ...... 69 DEP – DATA EXECUTION PREVENTION ...... 70 Does My System Support DEP ...... 70 Are All My Applications Using DEP? ...... 71 How to turn on DEP ...... 72 Working around the IE exception ...... 73 Other apps that are DEP exceptions ...... 73 Managing installer and application problems ...... 74 HARDWARE ...... 75
INSTALLING COOLING FANS ...... 75 MEMORY ISSUES ...... 77
MEMORY COULD NOT BE READ ERROR ...... 77 NOT ENOUGH SERVER STORAGE IS AVAILABLE TO PROCESS THIS COMMAND ...... 78 Symptoms ...... 78 Solution ...... 79 CANON PRINTER – CAPTURING THE PORT ...... 80
TRADING ...... 81
INSTALLING BODHI GOLD ...... 81 ROVER WOULD NOT INSTALL ...... 86 DE-SELECTING OPTIONS AND WARRANTS ...... 88 CHANGING THE DRIVE TO WHERE DOWNLOADS ARE TRANSFERRED ...... 89 PRICES WON’T UPDATE – SEND DEBUG FILE ...... 89 PRICE WON’T UPDATE – AT ALL ...... 89 BOOT ERROR ...... 92
SAMPLE BOOT INI FILE – WINDOWS XP ...... 93 SAMPLE BOOT INI WITH A PREVIOUS INSTALLATION OF WINDOWS 2000 ...... 93 FONTS ...... 94
TAHOMA NOT PRESENT ...... 94 STARTUP ISSUES ...... 96
BOOTED OUT ...... 96 INVALID SERIAL NUMBER ...... 96 UN-INSTALLING ANTI VIRUS ...... 98
UNINTALL NORTON AND MCCAFEE ...... 98 FREE UNINSTALLER ...... 98 ANTI-SPYWARE SOFTWARE ...... 99
INTERNET ACCESS AFTER RUNNING ANTI-SPYWARE ...... 99 PRINTING ...... 100
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UN-JAM A PRINT QUEUE ...... 100 MISSING DLL ...... 101
WHAT TO DO WHEN A DLL GOES MISSING ...... 101 How to fix an AWOL Shell.dll ...... 101 WINDOWS DEFENDER ...... 103
WINDOWS DEFENDER WON’T UPDATE ...... 103 Symptoms ...... 103 Cause ...... 103 Resolution ...... 103 MASTER BOOT RECORD ...... 104
EXPLAINED ...... 104 FIRST SECTOR DAMAGED ...... 104 SECTOR SIGNATURE DAMAGED OR REMOVED ...... 104 RE-CREATE THE MBR ...... 104 FIRST SECTOR UNREADABLE ...... 106 PARTITION TABLE – DAMAGED OR DELETED ...... 106 SYSTEM RESTORE ...... 107
START SYSTEM RESTORE FROM A COMMAND PROMPT ...... 107 Introduction ...... 107 Start at the command Prompt ...... 107 MICROSOFT OFFICE ...... 108
WORD 2007 STYLES ...... 108 WORD 2007 INSERT FILE NAME AND PATH IN FOOTER ...... 109 WORD 2002, 2003 RESOURCES ...... 109 WORD – GO TO LAST PLACE EDITED ...... 109 MARGIN MARKS IN WORD ...... 110 Symptoms ...... 110 Cause ...... 110 Resolution – Word 2003 ...... 110 ROTATING TEXT ...... 112 SEARCH AND REPLACE – USING WILDCARDS ...... 115 EXCEL ...... 116 Merge Fields ...... 116 USING IF AND OR ...... 117 WINDOWS MEDIA PLAYER ...... 118
Symptoms ...... 118 Cause ...... 118 Resolution ...... 118 CD/DVD MEDIA ...... 119
TDK AUDIO CDR-RW ...... 119 FILE SYSTEMS ...... 121 ISO9660 ...... 121
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Joilet ...... 121 Rock Ridge ...... 121 Who Knows ...... 122 CD-i File System ...... 123 El Torito - Bootable CD/DVD ...... 123 UDF ...... 123 Hfs ...... 129 HFS+ ...... 130 IFO/VOB ...... 130 SYSTEM TOOLS ...... 131
SYSINTERNALS PROCESS EXPLORER ...... 131 NETWORKING ...... 132
SAFEGUARD YOUR WI-FI NETWORK ...... 132 INTERNET CONNECTION TUNING ...... 133
TWEAK FOR TOP SPEED ...... 133 TWEAK FOR MULTIPLE DOWNLOADS ...... 133 SOLVE WIRELESS CONNECTION PROBLEMS ...... 133 WEB FILE HOSTING ...... 135
MOVE BIG FILES ACROSS THE INTERNET ...... 135 WEB DEVELOPMENT TOOLS ...... 136
PSPAD HTML EDITOR ...... 136 MICROSOFT ...... 137
TECHNET DETAILS ...... 137 NOTEBOOK COMPUTERS ...... 138
NOTEBOOK BATTERY CARE ...... 138 EMAIL ...... 139
EMAIL FOR TRAVELLERS ...... 139 TELEPHONE SECURITY ...... 140
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SITES ON THE NET
REFERENCE The following have been extracted from PC User magazine, September 2002 issue.
MY VIRTUAL REFERENCE DESK. Web site: www.refdesk.com
Contains an extensive list of reference links grouped under categories such as Facts-at-a-Glance, Help and Advice and Top reference tools.
There are links to encyclopedias, dictionaries, thesauruses, almanacs, conversion tools, calendars and more.
MARTINDALE’S REFERENCE DESK. Web site: http://www-sci.lib.uci.edu/HSG/Ref.html
Contains maps, specialized dictionaries, electronic libraries, literature and world history, interactive sign language, world postage rates, science tables and databases and more.
SUITE 101. Web site: www.suite101.com
Contains links to interesting topics. It claims to use real people with a demonstrated knowledge and passion for a topic, as opposed to Web crawlers, to find links. It categorises sites under and extensive range of topics including arts and music, news and media, pets and animals, education, entertainment and leisure, gardening and hobbies.
Browse by topic or search entire site. Also has discussion groups.
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LIBRARIES
LIBWEB Web Site: http://sunsite.berkeley.edu/Libweb
Provides an overview of libraries worldwide, including over 100 libraries in Australia and New Zealand.
THE AUSTRALIAN LIBRARIES GATEWAY Web site: www.nla.gov.au/libraries note, this link failed 24/8/2002
Maintained by the National Library of Australia (www.nla.gov.au), you can search the national collection, link to research and information services, find out what’s on, and even ask your own question. The Online Exhibitions link leads to online collections such as 100 years of Queensland Aboriginal Life (www.slq.qld.gov.au/jol/qab100yr), The Occult (http://www.lib.monash.edu/exhibitions/occult/xoc.html) and Key Collections of Australianna (www.nla.gov.au/libraries/resource/australiana.html). These exhibitions change often, so you’ll have new collections to browse through on a regular basis.
INTERNET PUBLIC LIBRARY REFERENCE CENTER Web site: www.ipl.org/ref
Use to look up information on a particular topic. The Internet Public Library Reference Center is a collection of well-sorted links to informative Web sites on particular topics. Subject areas you can explore include arts and humanities, science and technology, law, government and political science, education, computers and social sciences.
Has an excellent selection of Frequently Asked Questions.
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WRITING AND GRAMMAR
ONELOOK DICTIONARIES Web page: www.onelook.com
Enables search of more than one dictionary simultaneously. Definitions are detailed.
DICTIONARY.COM Web page: www.dictionary.com
THE ELEMENTS OF STYLE Web page: www.bartleby.com/141
Reference for writers. Has entire text of the esteemed The Elements of Style by William Strunk Jr. It in, there are grammatical rules such as the correct use of apostrophes and commas.
THE QUOTATIONS PAGE Web page: www.starlingtech.com/quotes/index.html
Find an appropriate quote of the day, quotes of the week and motivational quotes.
ENCYCLOPEDIAS’
THE ELECTRIC LIBRARY ENCYCLOPEDIA Web page: www.encyclopedia.com
This site provides 54.000 frequently updated articles from Columbia Encyclopedia. Each article is enhanced with links to newspaper and magazine articles as well as pictures and maps from eLibrary. You can use the encyclopedia free of charge, but you need to pay if you want to use the eLibrary services.
ASTRONOMY
BEN’S WEB SITE. http://endless_space.tripod.com/
This is now a dead link.
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VIDEO RESOURCES http://kropla.com/tv.htm PAL standards web site
http://www.videoguys.com/WinXP.html - Not sure what this is for.
http://www.ezydvd.com.au/item.zml/222846/id=05ms2:fLGbP
http://www.pcmech.com/show/troubleshoot/14/1 Motherboard beeps
http://www.rdpslides.com/pptfaq/FAQ00207.htm PowerPoint Link
FLASH SITES Hi Tim,
Sorry I forgot these the last time!
Here are a few Flash resource sites as promised. Most of these have excellent tutorial sections:
http://www.virtual-fx.net
http://www.actionscripts.org
http://www.actionscript-toolbox.com
http://www.echoecho.com/flash.htm
http://www.putertutor.net/photo/flash.htm
http://www.flashbible.com/Members/ActionScript/PlugNPlay/BasicScroll.htm
http://www.ultrashock.com
And of course, Macromedia's own:
http://www.macromedia.com/support/flash/
AWARD BIOS MANUALS Web Site: www.phoenix.com/en/customer+services/bios/awardbios/setup+index.htm
10/10/2003. Went to the site and could not find any manuals. Still, worth keeping the link.
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HELP SCREEN
STACK OVERFLOW Q When I boot my PC it says that I have a stack overflow problem. As soon as I get on to the Internet, the server cuts off within a few minutes. Is it because of the stack overflow?
A Sounds like a driver is trying to access more memory than has been allocated to it. You can try to remove recently installed devices from your computer, but try this first. Click on Start, type Sysedit, then select the section headed System.ini. Add the following under the heading 386Enh:
MinSPs=4. Save this file and restart your computer. If the problem continues, change the value to 8.
Source: MX “Don’t Panic”.
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BACKUPS Source: Windows Answers, Summer 2002, Issue 7 (September 2002).
TOOLS RZ DLL Backup. Searches the hard drive for DLL’s and copies them all to another location. Obtain from www.roamerzone.com.
CHECKLIST Registry. When exporting the registry, make sure that all is selected under Export Range.
• C:\Windows\System and C:\Windows\System32.
• Drivers. Recommended Tool is My Own Backup. For drivers that are not in the Windows System folder:
Go to Device Manager.
Click each device and choose Properties. On the Driver tab, click Driver File Details and note any files that are not in the Windows\System folder.
In My Own Backup, start a new set (File, New Set). Add the files noted to the set by selecting them from the drives in the right-hand pane and click Add file.
When they have been added, switch to the Backup tab and click Run. Files can be restored from the Restore tab.
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TEMPORARY INTERNET FILES From IMESH Forum. 2/01/2003.
Found this while browsing on the net, makes interesting reading:
------
If you've read the article by "The Riddler" (which was also posted at Astalavista) you will know what I'm talking about. If not, then here it is...
MSIE (e.g. Microsoft Internet Explorer) is known to store your entire history inside a HIDDEN file somewhere in your comp for unknown reasons (or should I say, unproven reasons). OK, then we just click on "clear history" and "delete files" no? NO! It might seem like it erased the history, but it didn’t.
It is stored inside a file called "Index.DAT", which is hidden. But not hidden in the regular way, even if you enable the "view hidden files" option, you will still not be able to see it or even search for it.
Here is how to get that file (View hidden files must be on):
1. Go to:
2. See that "Temporary Internet Files”? Right click on it. Notice anything missing? That's right! no "Search" option! Very strange.
3. Go to MSIE and clean ALL your history / temporary internet files (this is done by going to the "Tools" menu and clicking on "Delete Files" and "Clean history").
4. Now enter that folder again. Nothing but cookies right? Wrong again!
5. Go up one level and right click the "Temporary Internet Files" folder and then on "Send to".
6. Now choose "My documents" (easiest choice). And go to the "My documents" folder. There popped the "Temporary Internet Files" folder, get inside that folder... Surprise! No cookies no nothing! Just two folders and a "Desktop.ini" file. Get inside the "Content.IE5" folder, and there's that "Index.dat"! You will probably find some more folders there; they will have your temporary (?) internet files in them.
7. Open the "Index.dat" in any text editor (notepad is good) and be amazed. It’s a list of files that your MSIE downloaded from the websites you've visited, now pull the scroll bar to the right, and there you have it, the list of websites you've visited! You can see that windows also stores the name of the user who visited this website near the name of the file that was downloaded from them. Want to erase the files? nah, MS probably have them by now. I suggest this will be the last time you use MSIE.
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Best Regards.
You may distribute this article only if you keep its original form. This article is under my copyrights.
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OUTLOOK EXPRESS BACKUP Question:
Outlook Express .pst file
Posted Mon Sep 02 09:59:08 EST 2002 by Johnny Lately
Hi,
I was recently told that in order to save all my emails I should save the outlook.pst file.
Is this correct and if I do save it will it also save all the folders I have create within outlook express that store my emails?
I recently tried to import the pst file to windows and have since discovered that my folders containing the emails are gone. Is it possible to retrieve them from the pst file?
Thanks.
Answer
I tackle this problem doing this method and it is full-proof.
1) Record your folders hierarchy currently in Outlook Express.
2) All the emails are stored inside C:/Windows/Application Data/Identities/ {another folder}/Microsoft/Outlook Express and have .dbx extension. Copy or backup all the .dbx folders onto, say a floppy, if possible.
3) When you have formatted your hard disk and installed Outlook Express, create the same folder hierarchy in Outlook Express as in (1) above. Remove all the current new files in C:/Windows/Application Data/Identities/{another folder}/Microsoft/Outlook Express and then copy the backup folders in (2) above to the new setup.
Thus, you will have all in same hierarchies as well as the files. I have tried them and it was very successful.
One thing to remember, if need be, copy one .dbx file at a time and then open the Outlook Express to check and verify the same files are there. Do this repeatedly and diligently.
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OUTLOOK PST REPAIR See this article online at http://news.office-watch.com?521
This is reproduced from the Essential Email newsletter received 30/5/2007
The issue: "I have 4 machines that are experiencing a major slowdown in Outlook. When you first open it - it takes a long time to load and then when you select an email for viewing it takes an unusually long time (over 1 min) to display the message."
The Suggestion: The fact that the problem is on starting Outlook would suggest that it's a PST data file issue. Outlook will perform a data file check and fix whenever it starts - if there's a problem there should be a message saying that a data file problem is detected and will be fixed. This happens in the background for Outlook 2007.
However sometimes the PST file problem isn't detected by Outlook - yet difficulties in accessing data will make Outlook sluggish.
That it's happening on multiple computers is strange. It's tempting to blame the latest Microsoft patches, but I think it's unlikely.
The 'Detect and Repair' option you mention won't help with Outlook data file problems like this. 'Detect and Repair' is part of the Office installation system - it will check that all the programs and settings are correctly installed, but it doesn't check data files like Word documents or Outlook PST/OST files.
Even though Outlook has an in-built PST/OST repair system there's a better option. SCANPST is installed with Office and will be in a sub-folder under /Program Files, wherever Outlook.exe is located you'll also find SCANPST.EXE
Don't confuse SCANPST.EXE with SCANOST.EXE which is for users on Exchange Server systems. Even then Scanpst.exe applies to OST files.
Find out where your PST file is located and note it down. Close down Outlook entirely and then run SCANPST (double-click on it in Explorer), browse to the PST file and let the scan begin. It can take a long time if, like most people, you've gathered your life into Outlook.
Some readers have seen Outlook speed up by disabling their firewall protection -- ZoneAlarm is especially mentioned as a problem for Outlook. But losing firewall protection in favor of a faster Outlook is a poor swap.
Another possibility, though unlikely based on what you've said, is that the PST file is heavily fragmented on your hard drive. The PST file can get very large and split into various locations around the hard drive platters. Run the Windows Defrag tool to optimise your hard drive, including the PST. You must do this with Outlook shut-down. The benefit is usually marginal but it's worth a try.
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HARD DRIVES AND OPTICAL DRIVES This tip is not so obvious and goes against the advice of popular CD burning program Nero. If you want to achieve maximum system performance, your hard disk drive should remain the only drive connected to the primary IDE controller (often labeled ‘IDE0’) unless the second hard disk has the same ATA speed rating.
All optical drives (CD-RW, DVD-ROM or DVD burners) top out at ATA/66, so if you connect one of these as the slave to an ATA/100 or ATA/133 primary hard disk drive, you’ll slow that drive down to ATA/66 or slower drive.
That’s why it’s vital that all optical drives connect to the secondary controller. We suspect Nero’s objection to this is that it causes problems when making direct CD copies, but quite frankly, I’d rather have my system running at full throttle.
Source: PC User, June 2003
MAXTOR HARD DRIVES Raised a question with Seagate in relation to the external hard drive. It does not have a power off switch and I asked whether it was safe to keep it on all the time. This is their response:
Maxtor Personal Storage 3200 drives are designed and tested to continuously spin and in an "on" state without "wear and tear" effects. When spinning, the heads are riding on an air-bearing. The drive is protected against operational shock, but don't transport or move the drive while it's spinning.
To spin the drive down use the green arrow icon in the system tray. You can safely power down the drive by powering down the computer then unplugging the power to the drive. The heads will automatically move to a "parked" position.
The unit uses very little current in its idle state. For a good medium you may consider disconnecting the drive when not used for an extended period of time.
If you have any additional questions, please let me know.
Thank you,
Seagate Technical Assistance
Brian Cowan
1-800-SEAGATE (1-800-732-4283)
00.800.4.SEAGATE (Europe)
1 800 759 109 (Asia, Australia and New Zealand)
http://www.seagate.com
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SCANNING Source: PC Authority – June 2003 Issue
HOW A SCANNER WORKS A scanner uses exactly the same basic technology as a digital camera — a light sensitive sensor chip. This picks up light from the original image, converts it into an electrical (digital) signal and converts it into an image that gets sent down a cable to a computer. The only difference is that most scanners don’t come with a viewing screen. When you place a photo, whether it is a transparency or a print or a negative, into a scanner, you will see a line of light slowly move down the image. This is the scanning head moving dawn the length of the image, working from side to side and slowly building up a series of digital slices as if it were taking a series of very narrow snapshots. These slices are then spliced together by the scanner software, and stored as a single image — a complete digital copy of the original.
The most common scanning method is the flatbed or reflective scan. This uses a special illuminating light such as a cold cathode fluorescent or Xenon light (chosen because of their wavelength) to illuminate a strip of the original Reflected light then bounces back onto a series of mirrors and through a focusing lens onto the light sensor chip. Filters split the reflected light into red, green and blue, and sensors react to the light and produce the digital image. Then the scanner moves the light and sensors to the next strip and soon. The advantage of this system is that it only takes a few hundred sensors to cover a whole A4 page — this could be done with a whole page full of fixed sensors but the cost would be expensive. The other advantage is that it can offer a very high resolution — the slower the scan speed the more ‘snapshots” are taken and the more accurate the built up image.
Several issues arise with this method, however. The accuracy of the system that moves the scanning head down the page is one, and the number of sensors which can be mounted across one strip is another. Then there is repeatability — because the light used to illuminate the original comes from an artificial source, it may not give exactly the same results twice in a row.
However, all these issues are becoming less important as the designers come up with smarter solutions every year. Now, the stepper motors that move the head, the illuminating lights and the sensors are all highly reliable and accurate. This makes scanner$ capable of producing much higher quality images than digital cam eras, both in color depth and resolution. As long as the originals are high quality, that is.
There are other types of scanners for special uses, such as for negative and transparency scanning. The main difference with these is the way they are illuminated. Obviously, negatives and transparencies need to be illuminated from behind instead of using reflection. Some flatbed scanners offer built in slide and negative scanning by fitting a backlight into the lid, but this does not give the quality of dedicated film scanners.
HORSES FOR COURSES Quite a few photo enthusiasts like to scan direct from film. The plus about film scanners s the software they come with allows positive (transparency) or negative
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films to be scanned as easily as each other — the software sorts out the required filtering and gives a perfect result. Film scanning usually produces better quality results than flatbed — simply because the originals are higher definition.
Film scanners are much smaller and obviously more restricted as they can’t cope with books, photos or bulky objects like you can get away with in a flatbed. It’s film or nothing — but the quality is impressive.
Real professionals use what are called drum scanners. These put the original — film or reflective print — inside a drum, which revolves around a very high precision light, source and image sensor chip. The scanner drum spirals around the light source as it moves down the axis of the drum, building up a very accurate picture of the original. These scanners are very expensive, and only capable of being justified on price if you are a professional who will use it a lot to get the highest quality.
In many cases, it is just as cost-effective to get a photo lab to scan your film originals, and then burn the results to disk. This is faster, cheaper and will give better resolution than consumer film scanners.
SCANNING BACKGROUNDER With modern scanners, the differences in models come down to the way the unit itself looks, the bundled software and the specifications, The two main specs are the image resolution, measured in dots per inch or dpi, and the color depth, measured in bits.
Dots per inch are a reflection of how many sensors there are across one stripe of the scanned image. If the scanner claims 1 200dpi, there will be 1200 separate dots across each section of image. This will obviously give a higher resolution than a 600dpi scanner can — but read the specs carefully to check if the resolution is optical or interpolated. Interpolated is a fancy way of saying it’s a computer guess. About half the number of dots will be estimations of what would there be if there was a sensor there to check. Which there isn’t.
Interpolated 1 200dpi images will give slightly more detail than 600dpi optical scans, but with a slight drop off in sharpness. Optical 1 200dpi will be both sharper and more detailed — but will cost more.
In terms of bit depth, 24-bit is the tops for straightforward scan- fling in of images, giving up to 16 million colors maximum. You can buy scanners promising 32-bit, but to be honest the extra 8 bits are not that useful unless you are thinking of complicated image editing, and the human eye can’t discern that many colors anyway. Remember as well, the greater the bit depth to the image the more space it takes up.
The only other spec you need to consider is how last the scanner is. Thirty seconds may not sound long for an A4 scan, but if you are scanning a lot of images then a ten-second scan will be a lot more appealing.
TECHNOLOGIES No matter what kind of scanner you buy, it will have a sensor head that scans the original image. There are two basic modes of operation — single pass and triple
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pass. The difference is that with triple pass, the filters for red green and blue are swapped in front of the lens once each pass, whereas the single pass uses a prism to split the light into three separate paths, each with its own sensor. Triple pass scanners can (although not always) give higher quality, but single pass units are obviously much faster to use. Some new ultra-slim units use contact image sensor (CIS) heads instead of the conventional mirror/lens setup. This uses light emitting diodes (LED’s) placed very close to the original to illuminate the image, with sensors placed right next to the LED’s. This is very neat, and allows fast scans but is not quite up to the quality of the conventional scanners yet.
The other variable in scanner technology is the connection to the PC or Mac. This can be USB, SCSI (pronounced scuzzy) or FireWire. All three do the job of transferring the image; you need - to check that your computer supports that particular connection. USB comes in two flavors, 1.1 and 2.0. Version 2.0 is faster. but again, the computer needs to support it to make the most of it. FireWire is probably the most effective — it’s fast, easy to connect and standard on a large number of computers. SCSI is more likely to be found on top end scanners, and might require a special connection card that will cost you extra.
Whichever you opt for, make sure you get the right cable when you buy the scanner — some are hard to find in Dick Smiths. Make sure it’s long enough too.
FEATURES AND USABILITY Now that scanning technology has reached a plateau of stability and quality, the differentiating factor between models often comes down to the packaged, or bundled, software. This usually includes the program to control the scanner plus an image editing package to correct imperfections, a picture library and archiving program for organising image storage. An optical character recognition (OCR program is often included too.
Most scanners include color matching circuitry and calibrating light sources and automatic image optimization. All this means unless you try really hard, the results will be very acceptable. The only things you can adjust using the scan software are generally the dpi ratings and the color depth — but having the option to tinker with these can be valuable if you intend to set up a full digital darkroom.
Although it may seem like an afterthought, the bundled software can turn a good purchase into a bargain, especially if the OCR soft ware is good quality. These clever programs scan an ordinary page of printed text, then apply computer recognition algorithms to turn the image into an ordinary word processor document which can be edited in the normal way. This saves hours of retyping if you need to capture lots of text,
The other feature that is increasingly being included into flatbed scanners is one- button operation. This is where the scan button on the scanner sets everything going without you having to boot programs or fiddle with settings on the computer. These one-button functions can include normal scanning, scanning to emails, scanning to a Word document or scanning a copy directly to the printer. These offer real convenience and save a lot of time if you are not a computer nerd.
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MAKING GREAT SCANS The basic requirement. The most important requirement for good scans is the original. Most scanners and software are adept at maximizing the likelihood of a quality result, but they can’t make caviar out of tapioca. The originals should not be overly glossy, without creases, have good tonal range and use natural colors. You can use software enhancement, but the better the data going in: the better the final result. Obvious things like keeping the glass clean, making sure the scanner is level and avoiding vibration are all important. We made mention earlier of a long
connecting cable — make sure your scanner has a clear space of its own, on a stable base is highly important too. Even if this is on the next desk: that’s better than balanced on a file tray. Both the optics and the electronics in scanners are very delicate and sensitive. Treat them sensibly. Remember also that scanning from printed images already drops quality markedly, because the printed image is made
up from dots — and producing another set of scanned pixels from those causes a marked drop in quality, and can also throw up Moiré patterning. Continuous tone photographic prints or original artwork are the best originals in every case.
Many scanners come with a white balance or grayscale calibration card, or use the inside of the lid as a reference color. It is likely the software will ask to do a blank dummy scan first time out, to set the basic levels and colors to a known value.
RESOLUTIONS Here’s the rub. You’ve just paid big bucks for a flatbed scanner that can scan in color at up to 2400dpi, and I’m telling you most of that is wasted. As long as you are printing or viewing photographic or tonal images at the same size, 300-600dpi is more than enough. If you are planning to double the size of the reproduction,
l200dpi is good — but that is a big leap. However all that extra resolution up to
2400dpi is not wasted. You can take small images and blow them up — but that does mean the originals have to have superb quality to stop the copies looking blurry.
In the real world, most images look fine if you scan them at about 300dpi for same size output. Any higher and you are just wasting memory space. If you are scanning for the web, 72dpi is more than enough, and that keeps file sizes down too (good for fast loading on internet sites). If you are scanning for absolute top-quality, coffee- table book reproduction (same size or less) then 400dpi is tops. Strangely enough,
scanning me art originals can call for higher scan resolutions — up to 600dpi — because those annoying jaggies show up much more than with a tonal image. Be
ready to crank up the resolution to the max — the image size won’t be as big because there is no color information.
However, if you are scanning film the smaller original size makes it necessary to use a different set of rules. Images are almost always enlarged for printing or viewing, so expect to use 2l00dpi up to 4000dpi or more. This will give quality A4 prints, with
better tonal range and sharpness than a flatbed — guaranteed.
COLOR AND BRIGHTNESS Again, you will basically get out what you put in with color, contrast and brightness all a factor of the originals quality. Most scanners are supplied with software controls that let you adjust the color balance (the hue) and the saturation of the scan, as well as basic contrast.
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Color balance is the balance between the three primary colors (R, G and B) in the scan. By adjusting the color balance you can compensate for a greenish or over-red
cast. Saturation is the strength of the color — bold or pale, and brightness is the
intensity of the image- bleached or dark. All of these can be adjusted, usually with the help of a graphical representation called a histogram, which makes looking at the various factors easier in one go. This can be set before you make the final scan by using the preview pane in the scanning software, or you can correct it afterwards using the digital darkroom. However, doing it postscan may lose some image quality, whereas adjusting the various levels before the image is captured will ensure maximum quality — and you can still adjust the settings slightly afterwards if you want to. Changing the size of the scanned image is also easy using software, but take care you don’t make it too small so that you lose detail, or make it too big so that the jaggies and ‘pixilation’ become apparent. This is very often a simple drag and drop exercise, but depart too far from the original scan’s size and you will quickly lose the quality.
Cropping scans is also usually a function of the preview pane — simply draw a shape over the preview scan and the scanner will leave out everything outside the line.
OCR (OPTICAL CHARACTER RECOGNITION) One big difference between cameras and scanners is that the latter can produce word processor documents. Thanks to some clever software, the scanner (usually working at 300dpi in black & white) is able to recognize the shape of letters on a scanned letter or document and translate them not just into images, but actual text you can edit in Word or similar.
The requirements for OCR are: high quality original (faxes are notoriously hard to OCR from), at least nine paint (9pt) text, and a basic font or typeface with no fancy curly bits on it. Satisfy these requirements and you will be scanning your insurance policies in quite happily with 90+% accuracy. Some OCR programs even recognize diagrams in text, and scan and embed them into the WP document. Neat.
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AUTO START CD’S Automatically starting a CD is all done via a simple text file called autorun.inf which must be in the root folder of the CD. You can make or edit an autorun.inf file using Notepad, WordPad or even Word, with the latter two make sure you save as plain text with no formatting.
A simple autorun.inf looks like this
[autorun] open=setup.exe
This would automatically start setup.exe, assuming it's in the root folder of the CD. The open= option requires a full path to the program to be run.
But we're aiming for something a lot more flexible. You should not assume that the receiver has any particular program installed; instead you should simply point to the document and let it be opened by whatever program the receiver has for that type of file. For example, a Word Perfect user would have your Word document opened up in WP.
Originally that wasn't possible with autorun.inf and there were many work arounds available. For example this will open the foobar.doc file, also in the root folder of the CD.
[autorun] open=start foobar.doc
This will quickly pop-up a DOS window for a moment then open the document in the associated program. Some people don't like the DOS windows brief appearance, but this is the method I recommend since it has the greatest compatibility across old and new versions of Windows.
There've been some little heralded improvements to autorun.inf over the years that make it a lot more flexible.
[autorun] shellexecute=foobar.doc
This will also open foobar.doc, this time without the DOS window. But it only works with recent versions of Windows. This is a neater solution for the end-user but you should only use it if you know they don't have an old version of Windows (like Win95 or 98).
We've used Word documents as an example, but you can use the same technique with any common file type, including audio and video.
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EXCEL WORKSHEET open=start foobar.XLS
POWERPOINT PRESENTATION open=start foobar.PPT
PUBLISHER DOCUMENTS open=start foobar.PUB
WEB PAGE open=start foobar.HTM open=start foobar.HTML
MUSIC FILES open=start foobar.MP3 open=start foobar.WMA
VIDEO open=start foobar.MPG open=start foobar.AVI
IMAGES open=start foobar.JPG open=start foobar.BMP
COMPRESSED FILES open=start foobar.ZIP open=start foobar.RAR open=start foobar.CAB
As you can see it's all in the file extension. Windows uses the characters after the period/fullstop to decide what type of document it is, and then it looks up the program associated with that extension. You can see all the file associations by opening Explorer and going to Tools | Folder Options | File Types.
Naturally you're assuming the receiver has a program associated with the document you're sending.
There are many and various tools available to make autorun.inf files - we've not tried any because there's little need for them. With Notepad and some instructions you can make your own autorun.inf files quickly and easily.
In all these examples we've put the documents in the root folder of the CD. You can create folders on the CD and point to them like this
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OTHER DIRECTORIES Excel Worksheet open=start stuff\foobar.XLS
This will start the foobar.xls worksheet in the folder \stuff on the CD. You might be tempted to do this:
open=start d:\stuff\foobar.XLS
Which might work but only if the receivers CD drive is drive D:. Better to use the first example that will work whatever letter is used for the CD drive. 5. DOCUMENT COMPATIBILITIES Over the years Microsoft has changed the file format for Office documents so many times it's hard to keep track.
It is possible that the receiver of your CD has Microsoft Office but an earlier version which can't open the document you send.
EARLIER VERSIONS If you have a recent version of Office and don't know what the receiver has you might need to File | Save As to a format compatible with earlier versions of the program.
MAYBE SEND THE PROGRAM TOO If you really want to make sure that the receiver can open the document you can include the necessary viewer. This may use up a lot of space on a CD but worth it if the receiver may not be fully prepared.
Microsoft has free viewers for Office documents. This link http://search.office.microsoft.com/result.aspx?qu=viewer&ca=DC will search for viewers available from the Microsoft 'Download Center'.
If sending compressed files you might want to include the evaluation version of WinZip www.winzip.com or RAR www.rarlabs.com
MAY NOT AUTOSTART All this autorun.inf configuration may not work if the user has disabled CD Autostart or holds the Shift key after inserting the CD.
MORE THAN JUST CD'S? While the Autostart facility was mainly intended for CD / DVD media, Microsoft says:
"AutoRun-compatible drivers are provided with some floppy disk drives, as well as some other types of removable media such as Compact Flash cards. AutoRun also
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works with network drives that are mapped to a drive letter with Windows Explorer or mounted with the Microsoft Management Console (MMC)."
Floppy disks could also use autostart however that has been used in the past to spread viruses so it's generally turned off.
We could not get autorun.inf to trigger from a USB pocket hard drive so don't rely on autorun.inf to work from other storage.
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PROTECTING THE DOCUMENTS If you're concerned about the CD getting into the wrong hands, make sure you password protect the documents before writing to the CD.
TESTING If you want to try the various options, you can use a rewriteable CD-RW disk.
or for any version of Windows, except Windows XP, try assigning a drive letter to a folder. From a DOS window enter: subst Z: C:\testCD then put your 'CD' files into the \TestCD drive.
Microsoft has a detailed KB article on the subject http://support.microsoft.com:80/support/kb/articles/Q136/2/14.asp&NoWebContent= 1
MAKING A SIMPLE MENU It's likely you'll have more than one document on your CD, so you might want to make a simple menu of the documents.
An easy way to do that is to make a web page in FrontPage or Word (make sure you save as a web page not a document).
Create a blank web page called, say, index.htm in the root folder of your files to be written to a CD i.e. the same folder that autorun.inf is located.
On that web page make links to the various documents that will be on the CD.
To make the links use Insert | Hyperlink and point to the document. Make sure the links are relative to the root folder and not fully explicit. For example: \stuff\2002\foodbar.doc
not C:\testCD\stuff\2002\foodbar.doc
As well as the links, the web page could have an explanation of what is in each document or other details like your contact information.
To finish, make sure the autorun.inf file points to the web page you've made:
[autorun] open=start index.htm
This will open the index.htm page in the default browser on the user’s computer.
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AUTOSTARTING A WEB SITE You can also save a whole web site to a CD.
In its simplest form just copy the web site from your hard drive location to the CD. However if the web pages use FrontPage components or database links that won't work.
To finish, make sure the autorun.inf file points to the opening web page of the site:
[autorun] open=start index.htm
or
[autorun] open=start default.htm
Tip: if you have a series of images to send on a CD, make up a web page photo gallery with thumbnails of images and links to the full size image. There's various programs that can do all this for you, however you can make your own too.
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SYSTEM ADMINISTRATION
BACKUP THE REGISTRY
WINDOW 98 • Select: Start-Run
• Type: Scanreg and press
• When you receive a message saying that there are no errors, click “Yes” to backup the registry.
• To restore the registry, re-start the machine in MS-DOS mode.
• At the C:\Windows> prompt, type scanreg /restore and select the backup required from the list.
WINDOWS 2000 PC World says there is no good method to backup the registry. Regedit’s export feature has been unreliable (in the author’s experience). They recommend using SuperWin software’s WinRescue 2000. Cost (October 2003) USD$25.
WINDOWS ME AND XP. Take a restore point.
SYSINTERNALS From PC World, December 2006 edition.
Nearly four months after hiring Sony rootkit whistleblower Mark Russinovich, Microsoft has moved his company’s software to its Web site and has released a new Windows system tool that can help fight hackers.
The freeware products, now known as Windows Sysinternals are now available at Microsoft’s Web site (www.microsoft.com/technet/sysinternals/default.mspx).
They are based on the code that Russinovich and Bryce Cogswell had been distributing on Sysinternals.com before Microsoft bought their company, Winternals Software in July 2006.
Russinovich and Cogswell founded Winternals in 1996 and have since produced a number of widely used system recovery and performance-tuning products.
STARTUP PROGRAMS Starup Application list. Web site is www.sysinfo.org/startuplist.php
Link worked as at 3/4/2007
BOOT CD
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Ultimate Bood CD. Contains over 100 low-level system utilities on a single disc. The download is free. A CD is $US16 with shipping. www.ultimatebootcd.com. Couldn’t download from any of the mirror sites – 28/4/2007.
WINDOWS BOOT http://freepctech.com/pc/002/files010.shtml
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OUTLOOK
CONTACTS ARE NOT VISIBLE Contacts are not visible when you click in the “To” field on a new email message.
Solution is from Microsoft Knowledge base, article 823757
If you click Address Book in Outlook 2002 after you have upgraded from an earlier version of Microsoft Outlook, there are not any contacts visible, and you receive the following error message:
“The address book cannot be displayed because the contact list associated with this book could not be opened.”
CAUSE This behavior occurs because the Contact list that is associated with the address book does not exist or is unreadable.
RESOLUTION To resolve this behavior, follow these steps:
1. Start Outlook 2002. 2. On the Tools menu, click E-mail Accounts. 3. Click View or change existing directories or address books, and then click Next. 4. Click Outlook Address Book, and then click Remove. Note If you do not see the Outlook Address Book option, go directly to step 6. 5. Click Yes when you receive the prompt to confirm the removal. 6. Click Add. 7. Click Additional Address Books, and then click Next. 8. Click Outlook Address Book, and then click Next. 9. Click OK when you receive the prompt to restart Outlook 2002. 10. Click Finish. 11. Click Exit on the File menu to quit Outlook 2002. 12. Restart Outlook 2002. 13. In the Folder list, right-click the folder that you want to use with the address book (for example, right-click Contacts), and then click Properties. 14. Click the Outlook Address Book tab. 15. Click to select the Show this folder as an e-mail Address Book check box (if it is not already selected), and then click OK. 16. Restart Outlook 2002.
The information in this article applies to:
Microsoft Outlook 2002
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SHORTCUT TO CREATE NEW MAIL These instructions relate to creating a shortcut that enables the execution of the new mail dialog box, without having to start Outlook.
1. Right click the desktop and select create new shortcut.
2. Browse to the Outlook.exe file and select it.
3. Click after the file name (after the double quotes).
4. Type: space /c ipm.note (for the new mail message), or space /c ipm.task to execute the task list.
5. Type a name for the shortcut.
The shortcut can be dragged to the Quick Launch Bar if desired.
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INTERNET EXPLORER Internet Explorer wont start in Windows XP for a person with limited account privilages. The following Microsoft knowledge base article explains the issue:
"Iexplore.exe has encountered a problem and needs to close" error message when you try to start Internet Explorer”
Article ID : 831432
Last Review : December 3, 2004
Revision : 2.2
SYMPTOMS When you try to start Microsoft Internet Explorer, it may stop abruptly (crash), and you may receive the following error message:
Iexplore.exe has encountered a problem and needs to close. We are sorry for the inconvenience.
If you click the Click here link at the bottom of the message box, error signature information that is similar to the following error signature information may appear:
App name App version Module name Module version Offset Iexplore.exe 6.0.2800.1106 Mo030414s.dll 1.0.0.0 000294cc
Note The signature may list one of the following files instead of the mo030414s.dll file:
• M030106shop.dll
• M030206pohs.dll
• Mdefshop.dll
• Moaa030425s.dll
• Moz030715s.dll
CAUSE This problem occurs because one of the following browser helper objects (BHO) is installed on your computer: • BuyersPort
• Morpheus
• Morpheus Shopping Club
• WURLD Shopping Community
Additionally, you logged on to the computer with a limited user account. The BHO tries to modify certain system files and Windows Registry entries that require administrative credentials to access. As a result, when the BHO cannot access these files and registry entries, Internet Explorer stops abruptly.
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RESOLUTION To resolve this problem, remove the BHO from your computer. For information about how to remove the BHO, contact the manufacturer of the program.
For additional information, click the following article number to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:
827315 Unexplained computer behavior may be caused by third-party software
FAVORITES – WINDOWS VISTA When Vista was installed, it was done so with the first account being and Administrator account (as is normal).
A Standard account was subsequently created and I found that the account could not add any entries into the favorites folder. The error returned was “Unspecified Error”.
It turned out that the Standard account did not have permission for the Favorites folder. After adding the user name to the permissions, I was able to create entries in the Favorites.
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HISTORY OF JAVA/JAVASCRIPT
INTRODUCTION TO JAVASCRIPT This tutorial will introduce you to developing client side code in JavaScript, this is the first part of a series on JavaScript development.
Publication Date: 1/7/2005 9:23:48 PM
A BRIEF HISTORY It is hard to believe that the Internet is relatively young and has only been around since the early 1990s. Great strides have been made in a very short amount of time. Given what has happened since it first reared its head it is hard to estimate what is in store for the Internet in the coming five, ten or even twenty years.
As an invention the Internet has to be the greatest since the wheel or as some would say since sliced bread although why such importance is placed on sliced bread I have no idea.
The heading for this section is "A Brief History" and that's because JavaScript has no long, in depth, convoluted path.
When the Internet first started there were two major web browsers called Netscape Navigator and Internet Explorer. Both were able to display basic static web pages but they were like pages of a book. A user could jump from page to page using hyperlinks but that's about as interactive as the user could get.
Netscape, in an attempt to shape the future, came up with a programming language that would enable users to interact with web pages and they called the language Livescript. Livescript contained many of the same concepts used in JavaScript today.
Shortly after Netscape released Livescript a new language was created called Java. Java was a fully fledged programming language and could be used not just to interact with web pages but to create full applications. Netscape realised that they could make Livescript more popular just by renaming it to JavaScript.
At this point do not get confused into thinking that JavaScript and Java are the same languages because they are not. JavaScript is known as an interpreted language. This means that the code is entered directly into the web page and then the web browser interprets what the code is supposed to do. Java on the other hand is a compiled language meaning that any code written in Java has to be processed by a compiler and turned into an executable form.
Java and JavaScript serve very different purposes.
Microsoft realised that Netscape had an edge and without wanting to fall behind they instantly released a version of Internet Explorer that could run two separate scripting languages. One of the languages was called vbscript and is based on the BASIC programming language. The other was called JScript and was so similar to JavaScript that many of the commands for JavaScript worked in JScript and vice versa.
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Microsoft's attempts to make Internet Explorer the favoured browser had failed and so with each iteration of Internet Explorer JScript became more and more like JavaScript until the two languages were indistinguishable.
JavaScript eventually became too big for both Microsoft and Netscape to handle alone and so in 1996 JavaScript was formally handed over to a standards body called the ECMA. The ECMA are now responsible for the future advances in JavaScript and in fact the actual language itself is now called ECMAScript or ECMA-262 but that's just useful trivia because everyone still refers to it as being called JavaScript.
Meanwhile the browser wars continue and some opportunist new ventures have hit the market such as Opera and Firefox. Microsoft's aim for world domination continues and high profile law suits have plagued them since releasing Internet Explorer as part of Windows architecture.
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WINDOWS EXPLORER ERROR "Windows Explorer has encountered a problem and needs to close. We are sorry for your inconvenience. If you were in the middle of something the information you were working in might be lost. Click here to see the details."
MESSAGE DETAILS On Clicking on "click here" I get the message:
"App name - Explorer.exe
App ver - 6.0.2600.0
Mode name - unknown
Mod Ver - 0.0.0.0 offset 00d0139e"
Sir I would be obliged to you if you provide me the solution.
Did not keep all the links. In the end, this turned out to be a spyware/adware issue. Running various cleaners did the trick.
ARTICLE OF EXPLORER QUITTING http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;320563
INTERNET EXPLORER RE-INSTALL SITES http://www.theeldergeek.com/repair_reinstall_ie_and_oe_6.htm http://www.petri.co.il/reinstall_ie_6_on_xp.htm
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BACKUP OUTLOOK EXPRESS http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;EN-US;q270670
19th April 2005. Followed the instructions. Backed up the folder and imported, but nothing is visible.
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MULTIMEDIA
MPEG FORMATS Links to understanding MPEG formats: http://www.deskshare.com/Resources/articles/dmc_understandingvcddvdformats.as px
MPEG ENCODER http://www.videohelp.com/tools?tool=Honestech_MPEG_Encoder
VRO FILE FORMAT Video format used for streaming (real-time) recording of DVD discs; contains actual audio and video recordings; works with .IFO files, which tell the DVD player where the .VRO files are located.
Programs that will open the files are (for Windows):
• InterVideo WinDVD Platinum
• CyberLink PowerDVD
• NVIDIA NVDVD
Nero will, apparantly, convert these to MPEG. I tried changing the file extension, and this worked. However, according to a forum, if there is more than 1 file, then there can be problems.
When using DVD Ram discs in our stand alone burner, the video is written with a VRO extension.
Roxio Media Creator 9, using the media import option, converted the file to MPG. Quality looks ok.
REMOVE DRM FROM YOUR TUNES Apple’s iTunes and similar on-line services take the pain out of buying music, but the embedded digital rights management technology in the songs adds a new headache, limiting where you can play them and how often. Some applications strip out DRM by cracking the encryption, but that tends to be illegal. Achieve the same ends by doing the following:
1. Create a new playlist with all the songs you’d like to rip.
2. Use your software’s Burn Disc option to create a music to audio-CD.
3. After you’ve burned the music to disc, rename the originally downloaded songs to something like “My Sharona-iTunes DRM.
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4. Insert the CD and click on Import CD to copy the songs back to iTunes or whichever player application that was originally used. They will now be stripped of DRM.
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WINDOWS
SEND TO ENTRIES You can add any application you want to yor Send To Menu. To do this, you must first enable the Hidden Files and folders view. This can be doen by opening any folder and going to Tools-Folder Options-View and selecting “Show Hidden files and folders”. From here, go to My Computer-C drive-Documents and Settings and select the user account folder that applies to you. Once in this folder, you’ll see a slightly transparent folder call Send To (partially transparent folders indicate they’re normally hidden). Go into this folder, right click and choose New Shortcut. In the new window, browse to My Computer-C drive-Windows-NOTEPAD.EXE. Click the Next button, type Notepad into the text fied and click Finish. Now when you want to send something to Notepad, all you have to do is right-click the file and select Send to Notepad.
DELAYED WRITE FAILED This error can be caused by an incompatibility between XP SP2 and certain IDE controllers. The solutions involve disabling write caching – otherwise known as delayed write. However, this will slow down disk write performance. If you’re sure that, despite the warning, the files are always copied okay, it may be just the reporting of the condition that is in error. The best thing to do might be to ignore the messages.
One possibility is that a performance tweaking tool has made an ill advised change to the Registry. Click Start-Run and type in Regedit. Expand:
Hkey_Local_Machine\System\CurrentControlSet\SessionManager\Memory Management and check the value of LargeSystemCache. This should have a value of 0x000000 (0). If it doesn’t, double-click the value and set it to zero.
If this doesn’t resolve the issue, turn off write-caching for the drive. Open My Computer, right-click a drive and click Properties-Hardware. Select the Hard Drive, then click Properties and select the Policies tab. Clear the checkbox to “Enable write caching on the disk” and click OK.
WINDOWS ME - FREEZING WHEN INSTALLING Source: PC World, April 2003
WINDOWS ME BUG Windows Me freezes when the installation of files is at 70%
When installing updates in Windows Me, some users are finding that their computer freezes. This has affected important installations such as DirectX 8, critical files from the Windows Update site and new hardware. Internet Explorer 6 users may have encountered a similar error when the installation was about 70% complete - in this case a cryptic message appears: 'Error 52: Setup could not finish opening a file on your destination disc.'
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According to the Microsoft support document Q281967, the error is related to a zero byte OEM*.INF file in the c:\windows\inf directory. This file is created in certain circumstances when using Windows Update, Scandisk or Defrag. The solution is to search in the windows/inf folder for any file named OEM*.INF that has a size of 0KB (note that the asterix, * , is a wildcard and this could be a range of numbers or letters such as OEM5.inf). It is important to note that this only applies to 0KB files with the OEM letters at the front that reside in the inf folder - other files should be left alone. For step-by-step instructions and other important notes, see the Q281967 support document on http://support.microsoft.com
UPGRADE WINDOWS WITH AND OEM DISC
Dear Help Station,
I want to upgrade from Windows Me to XP using an OEM version. In June 2002 you advised changing the last letter of win.com and winver.exe. When I do this Me also creates a copy of winver.exe, defeating the purpose of the exercise.
Can you advise if I'm doing something wrong?
-- John Goff, Ipswich, QLD
Hi John,
For the benefit of readers who have not come up against this, we're talking about a way to use the "new installation only" version on a system that already has Windows installed.
The simple answer to your problem is to rename those files under DOS after you've booted from the Startup disk (and after you've made sure the CD reader is working!). That is, don't give Windows Me a chance to change anything.
Having said that, I'm dubious about this method. Yes, you get your system "upgraded" -- but there will be a lot of rubbish left on the disk from the previous installation, which may cause trouble and at least occupies disk space that could be better used.
I strongly recommend backing up the data files you want to keep (including e-mail files and Favorites) and formatting the hard disk. Nearly all software you have installed will have to be reinstalled anyway, since there won't be any details about it in the new Registry when you reinstall with the OEM version.
There is just no substitute for a "clean" system.
(An alternative, if you're in a hurry, is to do the upgrade now, then get your backups done and find all your installation disks, and do the clean installation within the next couple of weeks. -Paul Zucker)
-- Jan Wikström
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WINDOWS VISTA
UPGRADING – WITHOUT PAYING FULL PRICE This information is extracted from an article appearing in the Windows Secrets newsletter. The article was written by Brian Livingstone.
By Brian Livingston
Many people are upset by the fact that the economical, "upgrade" version of Vista won't accept a Windows XP or Windows 2000 CD-ROM as proof of ownership. Vista Upgrade is said to install only to a hard disk that already has XP or 2000 on it.
But I've tested a method that allows you to clean-install the Vista upgrade version on any hard drive, with no prior XP or W2K installation — or even a CD — required.
SAVE BY AVOIDING THE 'FULL' VERSION Windows Vista, in my opinion, is a big improvement over Windows XP in many ways. But the new operating system is distinctly overpriced.
The list price of the "full" (not "upgrade") version of the most expensive edition, Vista Ultimate, is $399.95 USD, with a street price around $380. That gold-plated retail figure is only possible because Microsoft long ago achieved monopoly pricing power in the PC operating system market.
Most computer users would prefer to keep using an older version of Windows, such as XP, rather than paying the inflated prices for the "full" version of Vista. To encourage switching to a new OS, Microsoft has historically offered a lower, "upgrade" price to people who can prove that they've previously purchased an older copy of Windows.
The difference between Vista's full and upgrade prices can be substantial. Based on the asking prices shown at Shopping.com on Jan. 31 — the day after the consumer version of Vista became available — the four most popular Vista versions will set you back approximately as follows:
Edition Full version Upgrade version
Vista Home Basic $192 $100 ($92 less)
Vista Home Premium $228 $156 ($72 less)
Vista Business $285 $192 ($93 less)
Vista Ultimate $380 $225 ($155 less)
The upgrade versions of Vista have street prices that are 32% to 48% cheaper than the full versions. If you're truly installing Vista over an old instance of XP or W2K, the upgrade version of Vista will find the older OS on your hard drive and install without question. The problem is that Vista, unlike every version of Windows in the past, doesn't let you insert a physical disc from an older operating system as evidence of your previous purchase.
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Vista has an undocumented feature, however, that actually allows you to "clean install" Vista to a hard disk that has no prior copy of XP or W2K.
USE VISTA'S 'UPGRADE' VERSION TO CLEAN-INSTALL The secret is that the setup program in Vista's upgrade version will accept an installed copy of XP, W2K, or an unactivated copy of Vista itself as evidence of a previous installation.
This enables you to "clean install" an upgrade version of Vista to any formatted or unformatted hard drive, which is usually the preferred method when installing any new operating system. You must, in essence, install Vista twice to take advantage of this trick. But Vista installs much faster than XP, so it's quicker than installing XP followed by Vista to get the upgrade price.
Before you install Vista on a machine that you don't know is 100% compatible, you should run Microsoft's free Upgrade Advisor. This program — which operates only on 32-bit versions of XP and Vista (plus Vista Enterprise) — reports to you on any hardware or software it finds that may be incompatible with Vista. See Microsoft's Upgrade Advisor page.
Also, to see which flavors of XP Home, XP Pro, and 2000 officially support in-place installs and clean installs of the different Vista editions, see Microsoft's upgrade paths page.
Here's a simplified overview of the steps that are required to clean-install the upgrade version of Vista:
Step 1 Boot the PC from the Vista DVD.
Step 2. Select "Install Now," but do not enter the Product Key from the Vista packaging. Leave the input box blank. Also, turn off the option Automatically activate Windows when I'm online. In the next dialog box that appears, confirm that you really do want to install Vista without entering a Product Key.
Step 3.Correctly indicate the version of Vista that you're installing: Home Basic, Home Premium, Business, or Ultimate.
Step 4.Select the "Custom (Advanced)" install, not the "Upgrade" install.
Step 5.Vista copies files at length and reboots itself one or more times. Wait for the install to complete. At this point, you might think that you could "activate" Vista, but you can't. That's because you haven't installed the Vista upgrade yet. To do that, run the DVD's setup.exe program again, but this time from the Vista desktop. The easiest way to start setup again is to eject and then reinsert the DVD.
Step 6.Click "Install Now." Select Do not get the latest updates for installation. (You can check for these updates later.)
Step 7.This time, do enter the Product Key from the Vista packaging. Once again, turn off the option Automatically activate Windows when I'm online.
Step 8.On this second install, make sure to select "Upgrade," not "Custom (Advanced)." You're not doing a clean install now, you're upgrading to Vista.
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Step 9.Wait while Vista copies files and reboots itself. No user interaction is required. Do not boot from the DVD when asked if you'd like to do so. Instead, wait a few seconds and the setup process will continue on its way. Some DOS-like, character-mode menus will appear, but don't interact with them. After a few seconds, the correct choice will run for you automatically.
Step 10. After you click a button labeled Start in the Thank You dialog box, Vista's login screen will eventually appear. Enter the username and password that you selected during the first install. You're done upgrading to Vista.
Step 11. Within 30 days, you must "activate" your copy of Vista or it'll lose functionality. To activate Vista, click Show more details in the Welcome Center that automatically displays upon each boot-up, then click Activate Windows now. If you've dismissed the Welcome Center, access the correct dialog box by clicking Start, Control Panel, System & Maintenance, System. If you purchased a legitimate copy of Vista, it should quickly activate over the Internet. (You can instead activate by calling Microsoft on the phone, which avoids your PC exchanging information with Microsoft's server.)
I'm not going into detail today on the merits of buying Vista at retail instead of buying a cheaper OEM copy. (The OEM offerings don't entitle you to call Microsoft for support, while the retail packages do.) Also, I'm not touching here on the least-expensive way to buy Vista, which is to take advantage of Microsoft's "educational" rate. I'll describe both of these topics in next week's newsletter.
WHY DOES VISTA'S SECRET SETUP EXIST? It's reasonable for us to ask ourselves whether buying an upgrade version of Vista, and then installing it to an empty hard disk that contains no previous version of Windows, is ethical.
I believe it is. Microsoft itself created the upgrade process. The company designed Vista to support upgrading it over a previously installed copy of XP, W2K Pro, or Vista itself. This isn't a black-hat hacker exploit. It's something that's been deliberately programmed into the approved setup routine.
Microsoft spent years developing and testing Vista. This upgrade trick must have been known to many, many people within the development team. Either Microsoft planned this upgrade path all along, knowing that computer magazines and newsletters (like this one) would widely publicize a way to "save money buying Vista." Or else some highly placed coders within the Vista development team decided that Vista's "full" price was too high and that no one should ever have to pay it. In either case, Vista's setup.exe is Microsoft's official install routine, and I see no problem with using it exactly as it was designed.
We should also think about whether instances of Vista that were installed using the clean- install method will continue to operate. I believe that this method will continue to be present in Vista DVDs at least until Microsoft begins distributing the Service Pack 1 edition of Vista around fall 2007. Changing the routine in the millions of DVDs that are now in circulation would simply be too wrenching. And trying to remotely disable instances of Vista that were clean-installed — even if it were technically possible to distinguish them — would generate too many tech-support calls and too much ill will to make it worthwhile.
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Installing the upgrade version of Vista, but not installing over an existing instance of XP or W2K, probably violates the Vista EULA (end-user license agreement). If you're a business executive, I wouldn't recommend that you flout any Windows license provisions just to save money.
If you're strictly a home user, contributing editor Susan Bradley points out that Microsoft's so-called Vista Family Discount (VFD) is an economical package that avoids any license issues. If you buy a retail copy of Vista Ultimate, MS lets you upgrade up to two additional PCs to Vista Home Premium for $50 each. For example, if you buy the upgrade version of Ultimate for $225, the grand total after you add two Home Premiums is $335. That's about $133 less than buying three upgrade versions of Home Premium. Details are at Microsoft's VFD page.
Microsoft did revise a Knowledge Base article, number 930985, on Jan. 31 that obliquely refers to the upgrade situation. It simply states that an upgrade version of Vista can't perform a clean install when a PC is booted from the Vista DVD. A clean install will only work, the document says, when the Vista setup is run from within an older version of Windows (or if a full version of Vista is being used).
This article doesn't at all deal with the fact that the Vista upgrade version will in fact clean- install using the steps described above. It'll be interesting to see whether MS ever explains why these steps were programmed in.
Personally, I consider Vista's ability to upgrade over itself to be Digital Rights Management that actually benefits consumers. It's almost cosmic justice.
I invite my readers to test Vista's undocumented clean-install method for themselves. There certainly must be aspects of this setup routine that I haven't yet discovered. I'll print the best findings from those sent in via our contact page. You'll receive a gift certificate for a book, CD, or DVD of your choice if you're the first to send in a tip that I print.
I'd like to thank my co-author of Windows Vista Secrets, Paul Thurrott, for his research help in bringing the clean-install method to light.
Brian Livingston is editorial director of the Windows Secrets Newsletter and the co-author of Windows Vista Secrets and 10 other books.
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MORE ON THE VISTA UPGRADE SECRET By Brian Livingston
I revealed in my Feb. 1 article that you can buy the "upgrade" version of Windows Vista and clean-install it to any hard drive, with or without a preexisting version of Windows XP or 2000.
This renders the more expensive "full" version of Vista unnecessary — and many of my readers have provided additional information about why this upgrade trick works.
VISTA WORKAROUND IS A DELIBERATE FEATURE My previous article explained that the Vista upgrade will succeed, and will validate, when any previous version of Windows is running at the time. That includes a 30-day trial version of Vista. Every retail copy of Vista allows a trial period by installing the product without entering a product key. (See my previous story for the exact steps.)
The evidence is mounting that this upgrade policy is an official decision by Microsoft. It's clearly not any kind of hacker trick. The steps to install without a product key, and to upgrade regardless of what version of Windows is running, is hard-coded into Vista in such a way that it can't be a mistake.
One source of mine shared with me some of the thinking within Microsoft on Vista upgrades. I'm withholding the source's name to protect his relationships within the Redmond company. He exchanged e-mails with a support engineer who said (I'm paraphrasing here):
"Checking for previous versions of Windows was easy to spoof in XP. So Deployment just said, 'Let's skip it.' Vista only requires that the Upgrade Key must be entered while an instance of the operating system is running."
The ability of Vista to run its upgrade routine over any version of Windows, including Vista itself, apparently simplified life for Microsoft's developers. It will also reduce the demands on Microsoft's telephone support department, which now has a method to quickly help people who would otherwise have difficulty installing the upgrade.
I wrote last week that upgrading Vista over a copy of itself might violate Microsoft's EULA (End-User License Agreement). Now I'm not so sure. Is it a violation to install the product in a way that Microsoft itself programmed the product to operate?
I'd like to acknowledge a couple of readers who wrote that it might be unethical to install the Vista upgrade without having purchased a previous version of the product. I agree. The clean-install method should only be used by people who did purchase a copy of XP or 2000, but can't install the Vista upgrade over their copy for some legitimate reason (as described in the next section, below).
If Microsoft doesn't want the clean-install method to work at all, the company can easily change its policy. The Redmond firm could simply code Vista Home Premium's setup routine, for example, so it actually does check for XP, 2000, or a lower-priced edition of Vista, such as Vista Home Basic.
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WHEN A VISTA CLEAN INSTALL MAY BE NECESSARY Reader George Walker describes several situations in which Microsoft technical support would need a back door to allow Vista to be installed without a running copy of Windows being present:
"There are certain instances in which a person might not be able to install over an existing copy of XP or 2000.
"For example, say you own a PC from one of the name brands that only shipped with a hidden recovery partition but no CDs. (Several well-publicized class-action lawsuits were filed against these companies over this practice.) You are eligible for the upgrade, and so you purchase and install it. Three months from now, your hard drive fails. You cannot re- install your previous verson of XP — first, because you have no recovery CDs and, second, your recovery partition was lost with the hard drive failure.
"Microsoft's support would really need a way around this scenario to avoid telling the customer that if they cannot restore their PC to its original installation, they will have to buy another copy of Vista. All you need is one widely publicized instance of some poor, sweet old lady on a fixed income being swindled by the blood-thirsty Microsoft beast to have a public relations nightmare. ...
"Other scenarios might include replacing the motherboard in a name brand computer and having your original recovery CDs refusing to install because they no longer recognize the PC as the one for which they were intended. Microsoft had to have a workaround for such instances."
The ability of Windows Vista to perform a clean install and to upgrade over itself appears more and more to have been deliberately programmed in by Microsoft. It's not an oversight or a feature that wasn't intended to be present.
This view is supported by a comment written by my "Windows Vista Secrets" co-author, Paul Thurrott, in the 8-step outline of the procedure that he published on Jan. 29. I tested the process and printed a complete, 11-step version of the procedure in my Feb. 1 article. Paul's sources say that the Vista clean-install method is documented in the internal knowledge base that's made available to Microsoft support people.
UPGRADE TRICK WORKS WITH MS OFFICE, TOO Reader Kent Hansen reports that Microsoft Office also upgrades itself over a nonactivated version of itself:
"I was suprised to see last fall that if I took Microsoft up on the 60-day free MS Office trial link on my new Gateway notebook that turning the 60-day trial into a licensed version required only an 'upgrade' version of Office.
Ron Harris indicates that this behavior goes all the way back to Microsoft Office 2000:
"I believe it was Office 2000 that, when installing clean from an upgrade CD, would ask for a previous version CD. But if you told it to look (browse) the CD drive that had the upgrade you were installing, it would find itself and accept it as proof of a "previous version"! I suspect this trick works on a number of MS products, actually.
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Microsoft developers seem to have decided that it's too much trouble to determine which versions of software on a user's PC do and do not qualify for the upgrade price. As a result, more and more of Microsoft's software appears to consider any preexisting software as qualifying software.
Vista's behavior of installing its upgrade version over any install of Vista looks more and more like a deliberate decision on Microsoft's part to make the install easy and less expensive than the full version of its software. The full version increasingly resembles the "golden casket" that undertakers routinely show to bereaved family members. No one expects the family to actually buy the gold-plated model, but it makes the other models seem less overpriced.
EUROPEAN PRICES FOR VISTA SEEM JACKED-UP Our readers in the United Kingdom are reporting that Microsoft is charging inflated prices for Windows Vista that are the same numbers in pounds as Americans are paying in dollars. That represents almost double the U.S. price. As Chris Bunton puts it:
"How about highlighting Microsoft's outrageous differential pricing internationally? For instance, in the U.K., the Vista Home Premium upgrade is priced at GBP 149.99 — that's $294.58 at current rates, and a whopping 88.8% premium over the U.S. price.
"Bill Gates on U.K. TV pretended there is little difference, except for short-term exchange- rate differences, which was really rather disingenuous.
"When there is so much gouging of the market, who is surprised that honest consumers are keen to use any trick in the book to get it at a reasonable price, or else just decide to pass on the upgrade idea? The story is the same for Office 2007."
I can't see any logical reason why Vista would cost so much more in the U.K. than it does in the U.S. Perhaps someone who fixes the prices at Microsoft thinks dollars and pounds are equal to each other!
OEM VERSIONS AND EDUCATIONAL DISCOUNTS TO COME I said last week that I'd write about other ways to get Vista for less than full price. These include buying OEM (Original Equipment Manufacturer) versions and by using educational discounts.
I received so many great leads this week from my readers on the Vista upgrade process, however, that I couldn't get to everything that I wanted to reveal about discount marketing channels. I'll just say again that buying the OEM version of Windows doesn't qualify the buyer to receive telephone support from Microsoft. Buying a retail package in a store usually does. I promise to cover these topics and more in the next few weeks.
Readers Walker, Hansen, Harris, and Bunton will receive a gift certificate for a book, CD, or DVD of their choice for being the first to send me tips that I printed.
Brian Livingston is editorial director of the Windows Secrets Newsletter and the co-author of Windows Vista Secrets and 10 other books.
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VISTA 120 DAY ACTIVATION By Brian Livingston
It's widely assumed that a newly installed copy of Windows Vista must be "activated" before 30 days are up.
But Microsoft has built into Vista a simple, one-line command that anyone can use to extend the activation deadline of the product to a total of 120 days — almost four full months!
HOW TO EXTEND THE VISTA ACTIVATION DEADLINE The concept of "activation" has become familiar to computer users ever since Microsoft introduced it into the licensing for Windows XP.
After installing Windows, you have a 30-day "trial period" to either activate the product or let it lose some functionality. You can activate XP or Vista by allowing the software to contact Microsoft's servers via your Internet connection. Or, if you're paranoid about an automated session of this kind, you can call a phone number in various countries to receive a code to enter on your keyboard.
An activated copy of Windows is "locked" to the specific configuration that was present at activation time — motherboard, hard drive, and so forth. Changing several components, such as during a hardware upgrade, can cause Windows to complain, saying it requires reactivation.
Microsoft seems to be liberal about providing new activation codes to anyone who calls the telephone number and provides a plausible explanation. (My hard disk needed replacing, etc.) Don't be afraid to try calling if a copy of Windows ever needs reactivation.
All versions of Vista allow a 30-day period without activation (except the corporate-oriented Vista Enterprise, which supports only a 3-day trial). If you know the secret, however, you can extend the activation deadline of editions such as Vista Home Premium and Vista Business up to four months past the original install date.
Microsoft provides a command-line program in Vista known as the Software Licensing Manager (SLMGR) or slmgr.vbs.This is a Visual Basic script that resides in c:\windows\system32. You can read the contents of this script file with any text editor or a professional development environment.
Among other things, slmgr.vbs has a function that pushes Vista's activation deadline out to 30 days from the date the command is run. From the Vista desktop, take the following steps on a machine on which Vista hasn't yet been activated:
Step 1.Open a command window with admin privileges. Click Vista's start button and type cmd into the Search box. Rather than pressing Enter, instead press Ctrl+Shift+Enter to open the command window with elevated privileges. If you're asked for a username and password, provide the ones that log you into your domain. On a single-user copy of Vista, a login shouldn't be necessary. (My thanks to Serdar Yegulalp for the elevation trick.).
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Step 2.Switch to the command-line shell handler. Running script commands in a window will result in irritating pop-up messages unless you change to the character- mode version of Windows Script Host. To do this, enter the following command at the prompt:
cscript /h:cscript
Step 3.Familiarize yourself with SLMGR. Executed with no parameters, slmgr displays a screen of help text. With the parameters -dli (display license information) or -xpr (expiration), the program displays the activation deadline, either in minutes remaining or as a date and time, respectively.
To see the effect of these commands, enter the following in the command window, one at a time:
slmgr
slmgr -dli
slmgr -xpr
If you've just installed Vista, the activation deadline will be 43,200 minutes in the future, which translates to 30 days. If Vista was installed some time ago, the remaining time shown will be less.
In my testing, each command required quite a long time to provide a response — as much as one minute. Be patient and wait for the results from each command before trying the next. If you didn't elevate your command window to have admin privileges in Step 1, you'll see only error messages.
Step 4.Extend Vista's activation deadline. The parameter -rearm changes the activation deadline to 30 days from today. SLMGR allows this extension to take place only three times. If you extend the deadline the day after you install Vista, you'll get an extension of only one day, not an additional 30 days.
The following command changes the activation deadline to 30 days after the command is invoked:
slmgr -rearm
If the operation worked, you should see the message, "Command completed successfully. Please restart the system for the changes to take effect."
It's not clear where SLMGR stores the number of times that it's been used to push the activation deadline back. If this number is stored in the Registry or in a system file, it's likely that hackers will quickly find a way to eliminate even the three-extension limit.
Step 5.Reboot and test. A reboot is required to make the extension take effect. After the Vista desktop loads, you should repeat steps 1 and 3 to check on your new activation deadline.
The 120-day extension trick shouldn't be confused with the Vista clean-install trick that I described in my Feb. 1 article. That procedure, which Microsoft also hard-coded into Vista,
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Microsoft's developers reportedly programmed the Vista upgrade process to test that it's running on any version of the OS — not just Windows XP, 2000, and other qualifying products — to make the coding process simpler.
WHY DOES MICROSOFT ALLOW 120-DAY EXTENSIONS? After my Vista clean-install article was published, a few readers asked whether I shouldn't keep quiet about procedures like these. After all, as I myself stated in my article, installing the upgrade version of Vista on a clean hard drive might violate Microsoft's EULA (End-User License Agreement).
First and most importantly, I'm a journalist. If something is true about Windows, and it's important for Windows users to know, I'm going to describe it for you as accurately as I can. Many sites on the Web are currently giving out half- baked explanations of Vista's clean-install feature. I want you to at least have the right info. I'd never publish a technique for a zero-day virus attack. But describing a known feature of Windows that Microsoft built into the product isn't comparable in any way to releasing viruses.
Second, the fact is that Microsoft itself is writing these features into Vista. If the Redmond company doesn't want people to clean-install Vista or extend Vista's activation deadline, a couple of lines of code would quickly eliminate these features.
Instead of leaving them out, Microsoft has deliberately programmed into Vista several back- door features that journalists are certain to find and publicize. These aren't hacks that require brain surgery on Windows. They're capabilities that have been specifically added into the operating system in ways that are easy for any Windows buyer to use.
There are only three explanations I can think of for Microsoft to include these kinds of back doors in Vista:
The Windows development process is out of control and individual programmers are inserting any procedures they like that will make Vista a little more convenient for them;
Microsoft executives believe that allowing clean installs of Vista and 120-day activation extensions will reduce the cost of providing technical support — more than these back doors will reduce the company's revenue; or
MS executives realize that the list prices of the "full" versions of Vista are absurdly high, and that building in back doors that will be widely publicized makes the price of the upgrade versions of Vista seem more reasonable by comparison.
One Microsoft executive, Eric Ligman, publicly criticized in a discussion forum my article on Vista's clean-install method. I contacted him and asked why Vista's upgrade routine will happily accept a clean-install version of itself, rather than making a simple test for a qualifying version of Windows. Is this an error on the part of the development team, or was it a Microsoft policy decision to quietly allow this kind of upgrade?
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"I don't believe it's a bug in the system," says Ligman, who is senior manager of Microsoft's U.S. Small Business Community Engagement program. "But it's not intended as a way to install an upgrade version of Vista without having a license for a previous version to do so."
Ligman added, "I'm not the right person to comment on the thinking of the development team." That's certainly true, so I hope to reach someone within the ranks soon to clarify why a trivial version check wasn't included in Vista's upgrade routine.
In the meantime, Ligman points out that companies using Microsoft's Volume Licensing program are entitled to the cheaper "upgrade" price for Vista even if the firms' existing desktops are running very old operating systems, such as Windows 98, NT Workstation 4.0, or IBM OS/2. For details, see page 82 of a Microsoft Word document entitled Product List (February 2007).
LEGITIMATE USES OF THE SOFTWARE LICENSE MANAGER Whatever the reasons for the until-now-secret features of Vista, the impact on Microsoft's revenue stream if people began using these features en masse could be enormous. Consider the following scenario:
1. A college buys a single, retail copy of Vista;
2. Using the clean-install trick, an admin installs the single DVD onto an unlimited number of PCs, such as in classrooms throughout the school;
3. Using the 120-day extension trick, the admin makes it unnecessary to activate the copies until the end of the academic quarter; and
4. At the end of the quarter, the hard drives are wiped clean and the same DVD is used to clean-install Vista on an unlimited number of PCs for the new quarter that's beginning.
This kind of mass duplication, of course, would clearly violate the Microsoft EULA. A school or company that installed this many copies of Vista from a single DVD would be wide open to an inspection by the Business Software Alliance, which obtains search warrants to conduct audits of machines companywide.
Despite the risks, however, many people around the world can and will use the built-in features of Vista to install as many copies of the operating system as they like.
Either Microsoft's Vista developers are totally incompetent, which I don't believe, or Microsoft officials at a high level are encouraging the introduction of these features, judging that the benefits outweigh the risks.
In any case, the Software Licensing Manager has several legitimate uses. Many of these are documented when you run slmgr at a prompt without parameters. I'll just touch on a few here:
You can install a new product key by entering slmgr -ipk productkey;
You can display the installation ID by entering slmgr -dti so you can activate Vista offline (without an Internet connection); and
You can clear your product key from the Vista Registry by entering slmgr -cpky.
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This last command is potentially an important security feature. There's no need for your product key to reside in the Registry once Vista activation is complete. It might be best to remove it, so it cannot be copied and sent to a hacker by a Trojan horse that might one day sneak onto your PC. I hope to print more detailed information about this in a future newsletter.
In addition to the above scenarios, there are many valid reasons for a Windows admin to extend the Vista activation date past its original 30-day limit. Companies that routinely build test PCs to try out various configurations, for instance, shouldn't have to buy a new copy of Vista every time a machine is wiped clean and rebuilt. A particular testing process might last more than 30 days, requiring an activation extension.
USING THE 120-DAY EXTENSION IN VARIOUS SCENARIOS My testing shows that slmgr -rearm will extend Vista's activation deadline in all of the following situations:
1. A standard upgrade. If you installed Vista's upgrade version while running Windows XP or another qualifying product, this is the ordinary case. The extension works with no problems.
2. A clean-install of Vista. If you use my Feb. 1 clean-install trick to install Vista on a clean hard drive, the command also works with no problems. There's no need to first install the "upgrade" version of Vista on top of the clean-install of Vista before slmgr -rearm will extend the activation deadline.
3. An upgraded clean-install of Vista. If you've clean-installed Vista, and then upgraded Vista on top of itself, the slmgr -rearm command also works flawlessly to extend the deadline.
WHEN THE VISTA ACTIVATION DEADLINE PASSES Microsoft has baked the activation process into every version of Vista, and I believe that we'll all be living with this mechanism for years to come. Unlike Windows XP, Vista has tougher rollback conditions when its activation deadline passes and activation hasn't occurred.
An article (paid reg required) in Windows IT Pro Magazine's December 2006 issue by Paul Thurrott, my co-author of Windows Vista Secrets, explains some of the behaviors you can expect after the deadline:
"On a genuine, activated copy of Vista, users will have access to certain features, such as the Windows Aero user experience (which enables glass-like translucency effects and other visual niceties), Windows ReadyBoost (a performance-enhancement feature for systems with a USB-based flash memory device), some Windows Defender antispyware functionality, and optional downloadable updates from Windows Update. However, [if a system has passed the activation deadline] the user will lose access to those features and will receive persistent WGA [Windows Genuine Advantage] advertisements."
As with Vista's clean-install behavior, I don't recommend that businesses try to save money by skirting Microsoft's licensing scheme. You should use these tricks only for legitimate purposes — such as when you do, in fact, have a paid-for license for the qualifying software.
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I wasn't the first to discover the 120-day extension technique. As far as I can tell, an early description came from Jeff Atwood of the Coding Horror blog. I merely tested the procedure under various scenarios and found it to be reliable. I'd also like to thank reader Ernie Kitt for his research help with this topic.
I welcome your tips on the use of the techniques I describe above. Please send your tips, on this or any other subject, using the Windows Secrets contact page. Reader Kitt will receive a gift certificate for a book, CD, or DVD of his choice for sending me research that I used.
Brian Livingston is editorial director of the Windows Secrets Newsletter and the co-author of Windows Vista Secrets and 10 other books.
ALTERING FILE ASSOCIATIONS This information was obtained from http://www.annoyances.org/exec/show/article02- 500
METHOD 1 – ON THE FLY 1. Right-click a file of the type you want to change, and select Properties.
2. In the General tab, click the Change button.
3. Choose a program from the list, or click Browse to select an .EXE file on your hard disk.
METHOD 2 – VIEW A LIST OF FILE TYPES 1. Open Control Panel.
2. In Control Panel Home, click Programs, and then click Make a file type always open in a specific program.
Or, in the Classic View, open Default Programs and then click Associate a file type or protocol with a program.
3. Highlight a file type in the list and click Change Program.
Unfortunately, neither method in Vista allows you to choose anything but the default programs, such as the programs listed in your files' context menus.
RESIZE SYSTEM RESTORE DISC SPACE There is no option to alter from within Windows.
Start a command prompt (Adminsitrator privilage is required). Use the command:
VSSADMIN
Display help for the various options and syntax.
WEB VISTA RESOURCE This looks like a good site. Have not checked all the articles yet. http://vistasupport.mvps.org/vista_faq.htm
VISTA DRIVER DOWNLOADS
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These are supposedly free from Radarsync.
Link: www.radarsync.com/vista
Checked the site – It failed to advise about the Epson scanner driver. No links provided unless you pay. Good one. Site obtained from PC World.
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VISTA HOW-TO WEB SITE This looks ok:
http://www.howtogeek.com/tag/windows-vista
FAVICONS HELP STATION Web design Give your site a bookm ark icon Have your visitors see an icon when they bookmark your site, Helen Bradley explains favicons and how they work.
If you've checked your site's log files lately, only issue you'll face.A favicon is a small you might have seen a lot of 404 'file not image file that is 16 x 16 pixels in size and it's TOP TIP found' errors that relate to a file called best to keep it to 16 colors maximum, so you favicon.ico. This file is one that some browsers won't have very much room to create a fancy look for when a user bookmarks your Web image. In fact, you'll want to make it very v a l id a t e site. Favicon.ico is an icon file that many Web simple for it to be effective — for most sites y o u r sites have, which appears to the left of the URL the favicon is a small version of the site's in the browser's address bar when the site is logo. f a v i c o n loaded. You can create the file in any program you If you're unsure If a visitor is using a tabbed browser like would use to create an icon, or you can use one if your site has a favicon file Firefox or Internet Explorer 7, this same icon of the many favicon creation tools on the Web, available and appears to the left of the site's title in the tab as we've done in the example below. th eta g that the page is opened in, and it also appears required to next to your site's name in the Favorites list There are a few requirements for a favicon display it, visit when the site is added to the Favorites. In file and one is that it must be called w w w . h t m l- short, a favicon is very visible when your site is favicon.ico and that it should be an ICO format kit.com/favico loaded. Consider having a favicon for your site file (although some browsers can use PNG n /v a lid a to r/ as being a finishing touch, which although not format files, not all can]. For preference, place and type your essential, does add some polish to your site. If the favicon.ico file in your site's root directory s it e 'sU R L . T h e resulting page you don't have a favicon file, your visitor's as that is where browsers will look for it and will indicate the browser will display the browser's generic icon then add a line of code to the head section of favicon status next to your site name when it is displayed. all the pages of your site. This is the code to of your site. You'll also see some 404 errors in your site use: . ©
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Open the image to use to Upload the favicon.ico file to make the icon from. You y o u rWeb site using your w illwant a small image preferred FTP program and t o w o rwith k (although it store it in the site's root folder. c a n b e\ bigger than Visit the site http://tools. To ensure the icon canfo u be n d , 1 6 x 1 6 : Download Favlto dynamicdrfve.com/favicon/ anda d da link to it to yourp a g e s click the Browse button and lo a d t hx e image file you just using a Web editor that / choose to crop into a saved. Clickj the 'Create Icon' )allows youto enter raw HTML p a r tof your site's logo. button and then/ p r e v ie w (the code to add is in the A t th every least, crop your icon in the bottom article above). Testic othe n b y in v e r ytightly to remove loading your site in your Web e x c e s spixels. Save the area of the page. If all is OK, browser. If necessary, clear file in GIF,JPEG, Bitmap c lic kthe 'Download Favicon' y o u rbrowser's cache to ensure or PNG format. button anddownload the icon to a fresh copy of the page is your computer. lo a d e d .
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WINDOWS XP – NO RESPONSE ON START
SYMPTOMS When you try to start Microsoft Windows XP, the computer may appear to stop responding (hang) with an empty, black screen immediately after the power-on self test (POST) is complete and before the Windows XP logo typically appears on the screen.
CAUSE This issue may occur if one or more of the following elements are corrupted: • Master boot record
Partition tables
Boot sector
NTLDR file
RESOLUTION To resolve this issue, follow these steps:
4. Create a Windows XP boot disk to start the computer.
For additional information about how to create a Windows XP boot disk, click the following article number to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:
305595 http:/support.microsoft.com/kb/305595/) HOW TO: Create a boot disk for an NTFS or FAT Partition with Windows XP
If you can start the computer from the boot disk without receiving an error message, the damage is limited to the master boot record, the boot sector, or the NTLDR file. After Windows XP is running, immediately back up all data before you try to fix the boot sector.
Use Disk Management to view the partition information and to verify that the disk partition (or partitions) is correct. To use Disk Management, follow these steps:
a. Click Start, right-click My Computer, and then click Manage.
b. Expand Storage, and then click Disk Management.
If invalid partitions are present or you cannot start your computer with a boot disk, consider reinstalling Windows XP on your computer and restoring your data and configuration information from a recent backup.
If you do not have a current backup copy of the data on the computer, contact a computer specialist to determine the best method of data recovery and configuration.
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5. Run a current virus scanning program to verify that no virus is present.
6. Repair the master boot record by using the FIXMBR command from the Windows XP Recovery Console.
For additional information about how to use the Recovery Console, click the following article number to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:
307654 (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/307654/) How to install and use the Recovery Console in Windows XP
Note For additional information about an error message that you may receive when you use the FIXMBR command, click the following article number to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:
266745 (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/266745/) Error message when you run fixmbr command
Warning If your computer is infected with a virus and you use the FIXMBR command, you may not be able to start the computer. Before you use this command, make sure that the computer is not infected with a virus.
7. If the primary boot partition is a FAT partition, use the FIXBOOT command from the Windows XP Recovery Console to write a new boot sector on the system partition, and then use the FIXMBR command to repair the master boot record.
You may also use the Windows XP Setup program to repair the installation. To do this, follow these steps:
1. Use the Windows XP CD-ROM to start your computer. On the Welcome to Setup screen, press ENTER to set up Windows XP.
2. Press F8 to agree to the license agreement.
3. Use the ARROW keys to select the Windows XP installation that you want to repair, and then press R.
Windows XP Setup repairs the installation files, Windows XP automatically restarts, and then the Setup program finishes the repair of your Windows XP installation.
4. Follow the remaining steps to set up Windows.
Note : You must have your 25-character Product Key to complete these steps.
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SYSTEM VOLUME INFORMATION Source: Microsoft Article ID : 309531 http://support.microsoft.com/kb/309531/en-us
Last Review : January 7, 2005
Revision : 2.1
SUMMARY This article describes how to gain access to the System Volume Information folder. The System Volume Information folder is a hidden system folder that the System Restore tool uses to store its information and restore points. There is a System Volume Information folder on every partition on your computer. You might need to gain access to this folder for troubleshooting purposes.
ACCESSING THE SYSTEM VOLUME INFORMATION FOLDER XP With FAT file format: 1. Click Start, and then click My Computer.
2. On the Tools menu, click Folder Options.
3. On the View tab, click Show hidden files and folders.
4. Clear the Hide protected operating system files (Recommended) check box. Click Yes when you are prompted to confirm the change.
5. Click OK.
6. Double-click the System Volume Information folder in the root folder to open it
XP NTFS On A Domain: 1. Click Start, and then click My Computer.
2. On the Tools menu, click Folder Options.
3. On the View tab, click Show hidden files and folders.
4. Clear the Hide protected operating system files (Recommended) check box. Click Yes when you are prompted to confirm the change.
5. Click OK.
6. Right-click the System Volume Information folder in the root folder, and then click Sharing and Security.
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7. Click the Security tab.
8. Click Add, and then type the name of the user to whom you want to give access to the folder. Choose the account location if appropriate (either local or from the domain). Typically, this is the account with which you are logged on. Click OK, and then click OK again.
9. Double-click the System Volume Information folder in the root folder to open it.
XP on a Standalone Computer: 1. Click Start, and then click My Computer.
2. On the Tools menu, click Folder Options.
3. On the View tab, click Show hidden files and folders.
4.Clear the Hide protected operating system files (Recommended) check box. Click Yes when you are prompted to confirm the change.
5. Clear the Use simple file sharing (Recommended) check box.
6. Click OK.
7. Right-click the System Volume Information folder in the root folder, and then click Properties.
8. Click the Security tab.
9. Click Add, and then type the name of the user to whom you want to give access to the folder. Typically, this is the account with which you are logged on. Click OK, and then click OK again.
10. Double-click the System Volume Information folder in the root folder to open it.
NOTE: The System Volume Information folder is now accessible in normal mode to users of Windows XP Home Edition.
CACLS Windows XP Home Edition (NTFS): In Windows XP Home Edition with the NTFS file system, you can also use the Cacls tool, which is a command-line tool, to display or modify file or folder access control lists
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(ACLs). For more information about the Cacls tool, including usage and switches, search the Help and Support Center for "cacls."
1. Click Start, click Run, type cmd, and then click OK.33
2. Make sure that you are in the root folder of the partition for which you want to gain access to the System Volume Information folder. For example, to gain access the C:\System Volume Information folder, make sure that you are in the root folder of drive C (at a "C:\" prompt).
3. Type the following line, and then press ENTER:
4. cacls "driveletter:\System Volume Information" /E /G username:F
5. Make sure to type the quotation marks as indicated. This command adds the specified user to the folder with Full Control permissions.
6. 4. Double-click the System Volume Information folder in the root folder to open it.
7. 5. If you need to remove the permissions after troubleshooting, type the following line at a command prompt:
8. cacls "driveletter:\System Volume Information" /E /R username This command removes all permissions for the specified user.
The following steps also work if you restart the computer to Safe mode because simple file sharing is automatically turned off when you run the computer in Safe mode.
1. Open My Computer, right-click the System Volume Information folder, and then click Properties.
2. Click the Security tab.
3. Click Add, and then type the name of the user to whom you want to give access to the folder. Typically, this is the account with which you are logged on.
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4. Click OK, and then click OK again.
5. Double-click the System Volume Information folder to open it.
SYSTEM FILE CORRUPTION The error reported was a message when Explorer was started:
Explorer.exe – bad image …..
The suggested action:
Start the Run dialog box and type: SFC/SCANNOW.
This command will check system files and replace any that are corrupt or not the correct version with the latest valid copy.
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PHANTOM DEVICES Article from Windows Secrets – 7/4/2007.
Have you ever had Windows show you a device — perhaps a USB drive or other removable device — that's no longer connected to your system? When this happens, you can run into trouble if software tries to access the phantom device.
Or, because the nonexistent device is still consuming a drive letter assignment and/or other resources, you may have problems when you add additional devices that need the already-assigned resources. I've seen some cases where people were running out of drive letters because their systems were maintaining a whole flock of phantom drives!
Let's begin with ways to prevent the phantom devices from appearing in the first place. Then, we'll come back to removing any that may already be there.
Phantom devices can appear for any number of reasons. Perhaps the most common reason is a shutdown error with a removable drive. Most people don't know this, but there are actually three different ways to disconnect a removable drive. Two are correct, and one isn't.
Here's the official word from Microsoft on the two correct ways of removing an external or hot-swappable disk (or other device), as described in the Windows XP Professional Resource Kit:
"If the Safely Remove Hardware icon appears in the taskbar notification area, you must use [it]. If the Safely Remove Hardware icon is not in the notification area, you must use Device Manager to uninstall the disk before you unplug it."
The third, improper method is the one almost all of us use: We simply unplug the device. In fact, this usually works, as long as the device isn't actively being written to or read from. You unplug the device, hear the audible "device unplugged" confirmation tones (a descending "ding-dong"), and that's that.
But note Microsoft's use of the word "must" in the above quote: You must use the Safely Remove Hardware method — if it's available. It's not a mere suggestion or recommendation. Microsoft says it's a must.
That's because simply unplugging a device (the way most of us do) runs the risk of losing data through a delayed write, or open file, or similar problem. You also risk leaving behind a phantom drive or other resource assignment, because the OS doesn't realize the device is gone.
You can avoid these problems by using either the Safely Remove Hardware method or the Device Manager method. They ensure that all writes or other
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To put it another way, go ahead and simply unplug your removable devices if you wish. Most times, it'll work perfectly fine. But if it doesn't and you end up with phantom drives or other problems, you'll know why!
Of course, there are still are some pitfalls you need to watch out for — after all, this is Windows we're talking about, and nothing is quite as simple as we might wish. Plus, there remains the question of what to do if your system is already carrying a flock of phantom drives. I'll cover that in the items below.
RESTORING THE HOT PLUG MANAGER OK, so know we know that we're supposed to use the Safely Remove Hardware method to disconnect removable devices. But what happens if the Safely Remove Hardware icon goes AWOL on you? Or, what if you click it, but it doesn't do anything? And what if you already have phantom drives on your system? How do you get rid of them?
The Safely Remove Hardware icon is actually a shortcut to Windows' HotPlug Manager. This service normally launches automatically when you connect a recognized USB or Firewire device to your system.
Figure 1. The HotPlug Manager can be accessed via the Safely Remove Hardware icon, which normally appears in the Notification Area by the clock.
But, as with all software, things sometimes go awry. The HotPlug Manager occasionally hangs or fails to launch, meaning that the Safely Remove Hardware icon won't appear, even when you know it should. In this case, the simple fix is to manually launch the HotPlug Manager by opening the Start, Run dialog and typing the following:
RunDll32.exe shell32.dll,Control_RunDLL HotPlug.dll
Click OK, and the HotPlug Manager's Safely Remove Hardware icon should appear. Its dialog box should open and display any connected devices. That's all it takes!
If only it were so simple. Unfortunately, not all devices cooperate with the HotPlug Manager. If you connect an unrecognized device to your system and the Safely Remove Hardware icon doesn't appear — and manually launching the HotPlug Manager doesn't help — it may be that the device simply won't work with the HotPlug Manager. (It's not very common, but it happens.)
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To safely remove such an unrecognized device, you'll have to use Device Manager to uninstall the device prior to disconnecting. (One way to access Device Manager is via Control Panel, Performance & Maintenance, System, Hardware, Device Manager.)
You may sometimes encounter a separate problem, too: The Safely Remove Hardware icon may be present, but won't do anything when you click it. This problem doesn't affect many systems, but if it affects yours, Microsoft has a hotfix for you — KB 883517.
The techniques above will help you properly shut down and remove devices from your system and should keep phantom devices from populating your system in the future. But, if you already have such phantoms in your PC, here's the quick-and-dirty method I use when I have to clean up any kind of ghost device in my system, or when a known-good device's settings become hopelessly bollixed:
Open Device Manager and uninstall not only the offending device itself, but also (if possible) any device that directly controls the offending device. On reboot, Windows will rediscover and reinstall the hardware, freshly reconfiguring the devices that are present and ridding the system of ghost devices.
For example, if I'm having a problem with disk drives, I may uninstall the drives and the drive controllers in Device Manager. On reboot, Windows will rediscover the controllers first, and then set up the drives afresh.
Or, if I'm having a USB problem, I'll uninstall the USB Root Hubs and Controllers in Device Manager. On reboot, Windows will sort things out from scratch, leaving behind a freshly-configured, phantom-free setup.
This brute-force approach surely isn't elegant, but it's fast and it works. And, if you have current and complete backups, there's essentially no risk to it.
WINDOWS VIRTUAL DRIVE Recently rediscovered a nifty free tool from Microsoft. You may find it useful, too.
It's the Microsoft Virtual CD-ROM Control Panel. The download is a self-extracting archive that contains three files: the front end (VCdControlTool.exe), the virtual CD driver (VCdRom.sys), and a readme file. The latter contains the basic instructions for using the tool.
To understand how it works, you need to know about ISO files — a kind of disk image of a standard CD. Many large downloadable software packages (including most Linux distributions) are packaged as ISO files. These files contain not only the data that's on the original CD, but also information about how the CD is structured and formatted.
Normally, an ISO file has to be processed by special software to separate the stored data from the formatting information. The software then uses the formatting data in the ISO file to burn an exact duplicate of the original CD's contents. Most normal CD-burning tools have a built-in way to do this. In Roxio's
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Creator Classic, for example, it's under the Record Disc From Image option on the File menu.
But sometimes, you don't want the entire contents of a CD. You may instead just want to extract one file from the ISO image. Or, perhaps you'd like to test-drive software before committing it to a physical CD. Or, you may be in a situation (such as with a laptop computer) where you only have one CD drive but would like to be able to access two or more CDs simultaneously. Or, maybe you're bogged down by having to process large amounts of data from a relatively slow CD, and you'd much prefer to access the data at hard-drive speeds.
That's where the Virtual CD-ROM Control Panel comes in. It lets you mount an ISO file of a CD in one step, without having to burn it to an actual, physical CD first. You then have access to the full contents of the CD and can get at any or all of the data.
The Virtual CD-ROM Control Panel also lets you mount several images at once, each with its own drive letter. I don't know what the upper limit is, but I've had as many as four ISOs mounted at once, in addition to the two real CD drives in my system. And, of course, because the ISO files actually reside on your hard drive, you can access them at normal hard-drive speeds, which are usually much, much faster than CD drives.
There are other, similar tools out there, but this one's free, and works well. Very, very handy!
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TCP/IP OPTIMIZER Reader Wendell Britnell pointed out a nice addition to the information already presented in "Optimizing Your Network Connections" in the Mar. 15 issue. He visited Speedguide.net and was very impressed by its TCP/IP Analyzer and TCP/IP Optimizer.
For years, SpeedGuide.net lagged behind BroadbandReports.com. It seemed to remain focused primarily on dialup, even when cable, DSL, and other fast connections were becoming commonplace. After a while, I let the site fall off my radar.
But Wendell is right: Their current tools are up to date and very nice. What's more, they're even more automated than BroadbandReport's. If you're looking to get the most out of your online connections, Speedguide is back in business!
UNINSTALL OFFICE Installed Office 2007 Professional. Then installed Office 2007 Ultimate. On checking the Add/Remove Programs panel, both versions of Office were listed.
Contacted Microsoft support and received the following reply:
“Dear William,
Thank you for contacting Microsoft Online Assisted Support. My name is Jasmee and I will be assisting you with your case involving Microsoft Office 2007.
Due to unforeseen circumstances we were unable to respond to your email in a timely manner. We apologise for the delay.
As I understand it, your issue is that you have installed Microsoft Office 2007 Professional earlier and then you installed another version of Microsoft Office 2007 Ultimate on your computer. You wanted to know whether it is safe to remove the Microsoft Office 2007 professional edition from your computer. If this is not correct, please let me know.
I believe that it is safe for you to uninstall the Microsoft Office 2007 Professional edition from your computer. It is best to make sure that the Microsoft office 2007 Ultimate is working fine before you continue with the uninstallation.
If you encounter any difficulties during the uninstallation, you can visit the website below to download and install the Windows Install Clean Up Utility. http://support.microsoft.com/kb/290301
I look forward to your response. Thank you for choosing Microsoft.”
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DEP – DATA EXECUTION PREVENTION This information is from Windows Secrets. Article by Scott Dunn
Newer processors, such as those from Intel and AMD, support a useful feature that Microsoft calls hardware Data Execution Prevention (DEP).
Unfortunately, it's not enabled for all the software you may be running. Here's how to remedy that situation.
How Does Data Execution Prevention Work?
Data Execution Prevention aims to protect your computer by making it harder for hackers to silently execute their programs in your PC.
As Windows runs, its Virtual Memory Manager maps addresses in RAM to locations on the hard disk (in the pagefile or swapfile). At the same time, hardware DEP inserts a special bit into the disk version of an address, marking it as non- executable.
If a hacker program attempts to write code to such a location and then execute it, a DEP-enabled processor detects the exploit and registers an error. If so, Windows can shut down the problem application or, if the hacked code is in an area used by Windows, halt a portion of the operating system itself.
Windows XP Service Pack 2 (SP2) has a software-only version of DEP, which is not as effective as the hardware version. Fortunately, Vista provides support for both software DEP and hardware DEP. In either case, you'll want to turn on those DEP settings that you can benefit from. Vista users should read on, while XP users can skip down to the section entitled "Turning on DEP."
DOES MY SYSTEM SUPPORT DEP Follow the steps below to find out if the processor in your Vista computer supports hardware DEP:
Step 1. In Vista's Windows Explorer application, launch the System Properties dialog box by right-clicking Computer in Explorer's folder list.
Step 2. Choose Properties, or launch the System icon in Control Panel's System and Maintenance category.
Step 3. Click Advanced System Settings in the task bar on the left.
Step 4. Click Continue, if prompted by User Account Control.
Step 5. Under Performance, click Settings.
Step 6. In the Performance Options dialog box, click the Data Execution Prevention tab. If your processor supports this feature, a sentence to that effect appears in the lower part of the dialog box.
Here's a fast way to get to the same dialog box using only the keyboard, with minimal mouse clicking:
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Step 1. In Vista, press Win+R to open the Run dialog box.
Step 2. Type SystemPropertiesDataExecutionPrevention and press Enter.
Step 3. Click Continue, if prompted by User Account Control.
ARE ALL MY APPLICATIONS USING DEP? As the Performance Options dialog box suggests, DEP is turned on by default for most Windows services and programs — but not all. Vista users can see which applications aren't covered by taking these steps:
Step 1. Right-click an empty area of the taskbar and choose Task Manager (or press Ctrl+Shift+Esc).
Step 2. Click the Processes tab and choose View, Select Columns.
Step 3. Scroll to the bottom of the Select Process Page Columns dialog box and check Data Execution Prevention.
Step 4. Click OK.
The new column shows you which processes have DEP enabled (most of them) and which do not — notably Explorer (explorer.exe) and Internet Explorer (iexplore.exe). If you happen to have Windows Media Player (wmplayer.exe) or Outlook 2007 (outlook.exe) running, you'll notice DEP is disabled for these applications as well. You may also see some IE plug-ins listed here, like Java (jusched.exe) or the Google toolbar (GoogleToolbarNotifier.exe).
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IF DEP IS SO USEFUL, WHY IS IT DISABLED FOR IMPORTANT APPLICATIONS LIKE OUTLOOK 2007 AND IE 7?
The answer is that many developers disable DEP to maintain backward compatibility with other products, such as add-ons or plug-ins. For example, although plug-ins such as Adobe's Acrobat Reader and Flash Player now work with DEP enabled for IE, as of this writing, the Google toolbar and Sun Microsystem's Java plug-in do not.
HOW TO TURN ON DEP Both Vista and XP let you turn on DEP globally, while allowing you to make exceptions for applications that have problems. To do that, you need to return to the Performance Options dialog:
In Vista, click Start, type SystemPropertiesDataExecutionPrevention, and press Enter. Click Continue in the User Account Control dialog box.
In XP, click Start, Run, then type sysdm.cpl and press Enter. Click the Advanced tab. In the Performance box, click Settings. Click the Data Execution Prevention tab.
In both XP and Vista, select Turn on DEP for all programs and services except those I select.
In Vista only, take time now to specify a few of the programs you saw listed in Task Manager earlier to keep DEP disabled for them. To do that, click Add and browse for the .exe file of a program you know normally does not use DEP (for example, explorer.exe, wmplayer.exe, outlook.exe). Select the filename and click Open. Click OK to acknowledge the risk of turning off DEP for that application. Repeat for each application that normally doesn't use DEP.
The strategy here is to enable DEP for these applications one at a time over an extended period to see if they can live with this feature. Start by unchecking one of the boxes for an app you added to the exception list. Click OK (and OK again to acknowledge the restart prompt) and restart your system. If the unchecked application runs well for a few days, return to the Performance Options dialog box, and uncheck another app. Repeat until everything is running with DEP — or until you find one or more apps that need DEP disabled to run properly.
XP users have no way to spot applications that don't use DEP by default, but they can start with Outlook 2007 and Windows Media Player 11. If Windows closes an application with a Data Execution Prevention error message (or any serious error on a regular basis), you can add that application to the exclusion list, as explained above. If you're lucky, the error message will contain a Change Settings button to get you to the dialog box more quickly.
Note that the Data Execution Prevention tab of the Performance Options dialog box only lets you adjust DEP settings for 32-bit applications. If you have the 64-bit version of Vista installed (which can run both 32- and 64-bit apps), you're covered: Windows applies DEP to all 64-bit services and programs. In fact, if you try to add a 64-bit application to the exclusion list, Vista displays an error telling you it can't be done.
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WORKING AROUND THE IE EXCEPTION Contrary to what you might expect, one type of program in particular ignores the settings in the Data Execution Prevention tab — namely, browsers such as Internet Explorer 7. The only way to enable DEP for IE 7 is in the Internet Options control panel in Vista. XP users apparently have no way to activate DEP for IE 7.
To get a DEP-enabled IE browser in Vista, begin by disabling most or all of your IE add-ons. From the IE command bar, choose Tools, Manage Add-ons, Enable or Disable Add-ons. In the Manage Add-ons dialog box, select a helper application in the list and click the Disable button below. Repeat for all items in the list, except those you know to be safe (such as Adobe Acrobat and Flash). Click OK.
Now let's turn on DEP for Internet Explorer:
Step 1. Click Start, type inetcpl.cpl, and press Ctrl+Shift+Enter to open the dialog with administrative privileges. (If you don't run this dialog as an administrator, the option in question will be greyed out.)
Step 2. Click Continue in the User Account Control prompt.
Step 3. Click the Advanced tab and scroll to the bottom of the Settings list.
Step 4. Check Enable memory protection to mitigate online attacks.
Step 5. Click OK.
Now, restart Internet Explorer (if it was running). If everything seems to go smoothly, return to the Manage Add-ons dialog box. Enable one of the plug-ins, click OK, and restart IE again.
As with the applications you specified earlier, you'll want to use IE for a while to make sure everything works as desired. If IE won't start or you see errors with some Web sites, you may need to disable the problem plug-in. If you can't live without a DEP-intolerant plug-in, you may have to turn off DEP for IE altogether.
OTHER APPS THAT ARE DEP EXCEPTIONS IE 7 is not the only program that ignores Windows global DEP settings. Even with DEP turned on globally, Task Manager shows that neither Mozilla Firefox nor Opera support DEP.
If DEP is important to your sense of Internet security, IE 7 is the only major browser that supports it — until the other applications provide support for this feature.
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MANAGING INSTALLER AND APPLICATION PROBLEMS Although the DEP is supposed to display a message indicating when it has shut down an errant program, some sources claim that the messages don't always appear, and that DEP can sometimes even prevent programs (especially installers) from launching. These sources go so far as to recommend turning off DEP entirely.
Such advice is like throwing out the proverbial baby with the bathwater. If you do have problems with applications that end abnormally or won't run, you can always return to the Performance Options dialog to turn off DEP temporarily as a test. This can help you get your software installed, for example, if an installer won't run.
Overall, you're much better off making exceptions for a few problem programs (and reporting the difficulty to the manufacturer) than shutting down DEP entirely.
Finally, you should look at DEP as only one weapon in your security arsenal. DEP adds an important layer of protection, but it isn't a reason to give up your other security tools.
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HARDWARE
INSTALLING COOLING FANS If you think the inside of your computer is heating up too much and all is apparently OK regarding the position of the processor and, mainly, of its fan, as we have seen in previous pages, there are some ways to improve the computer’s inner cooling.
The cheapest way is to open holes in the power supply on its lower side, that is, the side facing down when the computer is stood up. You can also make openings in the plating facing the case’s 5 1/4" bays. These openings should only be made if originally there are no holes for expelling hot air on your power supply.
To these holes you must first unplug the computer from the power outlet, remove the power supply from the case and open it, making the holes with the plating separated from the power circuits, to prevent metal falling into the circuits, thus causing a short circuit when the computer is switched on. These holes will let hot air out easier from inside the case, following its natural path, the power supply.
You can also install auxiliary fans inside the case. Such fans are easily found in computer shops (ask for 80 mm auxiliary fan), but you can also save money by using a fan removed from an old power supply (for instance, belonging to a scrapped computer). If you intend to cannibalise a fan, be careful. Older power supplies, used in desktop type cases (from the XT and 286 age) use 110/220 V fans that cannot be reused. You must use 12 V fans, utilized in the majority of power supplies applied in mini tower type cases.
The auxiliary fan can be installed in two places in the case. The most usual place is under the hard disk drives bays (see Figures 5 e 6), where the system intakes cool air. Be very careful when seating the fan in this place, as its position in the ventilation flow must be drawing cool air from outside to inside the computer. Every fan bears, on one of its sides, an arrow showing the airflow direction. This arrow should, therefore, pointtowards the inside of the computer.
Figure 5: Place for installing an auxiliary fan inside your case.
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The second position is not found in all cases: it lies in the space between the power supply and peripheral cards, on the back of the case. In this case, the fan should be installed in the exhaust direction, i. e., blowing hot air from inside to outside the computer. The fan’s arrow must therefore point out the computer.
You must get the direction of the fans’ air flow right, as if you get it wrong the computer may heat up more, definitely not the intended outcome. The rule is very simple: fans at the computer’s rear should be fitted in the exhaust direction (inside to outside), while fans in the computer’s front should be fitted in the cooling direction (outside to inside).
Newer fans sold at outlets have three wires and a plug for connecting to the motherboard via a connector called "Chassis Fan", "Aux Fan" or something like this. On the other hand, older fans have two wires and should be connected directly to the power supply via one of the plugs for 5 1/4" units. If you intend to use a cannibalised fan, note that its black wire should be connected to the supply’s black wire, but its red wire should be connected to the supply’s yellow wire, its 12 V output, and not to its red wire, as could be assumed (the red wire is its 5 V lead). The extra wire on newer fans is intended to measure the rotating speed and, accordingly, inform the motherboard whether the fan is working properly or not.
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MEMORY ISSUES
MEMORY COULD NOT BE READ ERROR I started looking for a solution to this when cpFinder would not start. The message I was receiving was:
“The instruction at "0x7c90256d" referenced memory at "0x76204853". The memory could not be "read".
Found the following information on the web:
“I was was having this same exact error. After searching for help for about a hour on the Internet, It was pure luck that i found the solution.
I am running windows XP home addition Sp1.
While doing a search on the net i came across a page where someone was reporting the same error. Someone responded to this person's plead for help by telling him to update to the newest version of swish, saying that the CryptKey licensing service needed to be updated.
I understand What a service is.
So i went to my start menu. Then went to run and typed services.msc
As soon as I scrolled down a little I saw the Cryptkey license service.
The service was disabled and not running. I enabled the Cryptkey service and started it.
Sure enough swish fired up with no problems.
I hope this remedy works for you”
Web page address: http://www.neowin.net/forum/lofiversion/index.php/t339737.html
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NOT ENOUGH SERVER STORAGE IS AVAILABLE TO PROCESS THIS COMMAND Source: http://brandon.fuller.name/archives/2004/09/29/09.51.16/
Microsoft Knowledge Base Article: 177078.
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;177078
Additional Message: Not enough memory to complete transaction. Close some applications and retry.
That is what is said whenever I tried to use a network share on Windows all of sudden. Over the weekend I installed Norton AntiVirus 2005. That was the only change. Google didn’t turn up much. But when I searched the Microsoft Knowledge Base directly I found the answer. So I am posting this so that a better source of the error can be found for future searchers.
SYMPTOMS Clients cannot access network shares. Additionally, Event Viewer on the Windows server may log one or more of the following event messages in the system log:
Event ID : 2011
Source : Srv
Description: The Server's configuration parameter "IRPStackSize" is too small for the server to use a local device. Please increase the value of this parameter.
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SOLUTION Warning Serious problems might occur if you modify the registry incorrectly by using Registry Editor or by using another method. These problems might require that you reinstall your operating system. Microsoft cannot guarantee that these problems can be solved. Modify the registry at your own risk. To resolve this behavior, increase the IRPStackSize value in the registry:
1. Click Start, and then click Run.
2. Type regedit, and then click OK.
3. Navigate to the following key:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Services\LanmanServ er\Parameters
4. In the right pane, double-click the IRPStackSize value.
NOTE: If the IRPStackSize value does not already exist, use the following procedure to create it:a. In the Parameters folder of the registry, right-click the right pane.
b. Point to New, and then click DWord Value.
c. Type IRPStackSize.
IMPORTANT: Type "IRPStackSize" exactly as it is displayed because the value name is case-sensitive.
5. Change the Base to decimal.
6. In the Value Data box, type a value that is larger than the value that is listed.
If you created the IRPStackSize value using the procedure described in step 4, the default value is 15. It is recommended that you increase the value by 3. Therefore, if the previous value was 11, type 14, and then click OK.
7. Close the Registry Editor.
8. Restart the computer.
If the problem persists after you complete the preceding procedure, try to increase the value of IRPStackSize even more. The maximum value for Windows 2000 is 50 (0x32 hex).
If you are running Windows NT 4.0, and the problem persists after you complete the preceding procedure, you may have to apply Windows NT Service Pack 4 or Service Pack 5.
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CANON PRINTER – CAPTURING THE PORT When adding the printer, the printer is added as a local printer. The port name is LP_1.
The port name, under configure port is:
Port Name: IP_192.168.0.1 (this is the name on the main computer. On the Laptop, running Vista, it is LP_1 and Vista would not let me change it.
Printer Name of IP address: 192.168.0.1 which is the Router address.
Vista did not seem to care about the Port Name.
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Note also that LPR needs to be
checked, not RAW.
TRADING
INSTALLING BODHI GOLD 1. Finding your data. ( It is important to know the data directory your data is going to)
1.1. Open EzyChart or "The Chartist", click on "Edit", then "Configure EzyChart",
note your "Default Data Folder", should be one of below, then close EzyChart.
1.2. C:DataEZYASX
1.3. C:Program FilesEzyCompanyEzyStationClientDataEZYASX
1.4. Close EzyChart
2. Downloading BodhiGold
2.1. Download the installation file from http://www.eisdownloads.com/AU_051110.exe and save to your desktop.
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2.2. Close your web browser.
3. Installing BodhiGold
3.1. Double click the installation icon "AU_051110.exe" on your Desktop.
3.2. Click "Yes" to install Bodhi Gold.
3.3. The password is "EzyOver". NOTE: This is case sensitive.
3.4. Answer all other questions by clicking on "Next" or "Yes", etc. If unsure just accept the default answer. Finally click "Finish".
3.5. When asked to install Rover, answer: "Yes". Rover makes upgrading BodhiGold easier.
3.6. Answer all other questions by clicking on "Next" or "Yes", etc. If unsure just accept the default answer. Finally click "Finish".
3.7. Close all installation windows.
4. Configuring BodhiGold
4.1. Double-click the "Bodhi Gold Freeway" icon on your Desktop.
4.2. Choose the Region you live in from the list then close the window by clicking on the cross in top right-hand corner (close all windows this way).
4.3. Choose the nearest major city to you then close the window.
4.4. Choose "EzyStation (EZY)" or "EzyChart (EZY)" not "EzyChart (PCE)" (unless your version of EzyChart is 4.0 or earlier) as your software.
4.5. Read then close the Setup - Notepad window.
4.6. The registration/trial window will pop up. This will advise you that you have 32 days left to run, close this window. There is no need to register now as Bodhi will operate normally until the trial is over. However you will need to contact JustData before the trial is over to ensure you continue to receive your data. When ready to register follow the instructions in the registration window.
4.7. By default you have been set up for market-close ASX stocks & indexes. You will need to contact JustData to get permission for other markets and/or services Eg. IntraDay, however wait until you have this working before contacting JustData.
4.8. By default Bodhi will update your ASX EZY data in "C:Program FilesEzyCompanyEzyStationClientDataEzyASX", if this is your default folder then skip to step 4.9, otherwise this needs to be changed NOW. To do this -
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4.8.1. Start Bodhi, click the "Configure" button, right-click the word "Distribution" (under Native & Import tabs), left-click "Manager".
4.8.2. Click the down-arrow to the right of "DEFAULT" and choose "EZYPATH1". This sets your path to "C:DataEZYASX".
4.8.3. Close the Profile Manager, goes back to Module Manager window.
4.8.4. Close the Module Manager, goes back to the main screen.
4.9. Activating other exchanges/markets/services.
4.9.1. To activate other ASX markets (e.g. Options, Income, etc), simply click "Configure", then the market (e.g. "Australia" then "ASX" then "Income") then set Bundle to "All".
4.9.2. To activate SFE data you will need to contact JustData. Futures data has a problem in that there are no standards for codes (tickers/symbols). This means that JustData codes do not match EzyCompany codes and therefore your existing SFE data will not be updated as it stands. Quite simply there is no easy solution, however we can offer the following -
4.9.2.1. If there are only a few SFE futures that you look at we can email you out the necessary files in EZY or PCE format only. Alternatively -
4.9.2.2. We can send you a history disk for the special price of $33.
4.9.3. To activate other exchanges (e.g. LSE, NYS, etc.) and/or ASX intra-day contact JustData.
5. Activating MetaStock format.
5.1. If you do not use the MetaStock format, go to step 6.
5.2. The easiest solution is to purchase a history disk from JustData for the special price of $33. Otherwise do the following -
5.3. To enable MetaStock format you need to open BodhiGold, click "Configure" then tick "MetaStock".
5.4. If your software reading the MetaStock format can only read 255 files per subdirectory then you will need to right-click the "MetaStock" word and set Folder Limit to 255 otherwise it will default to 2000 files per subdirectory.
5.5. Right-click the word "Distribution" (below Native and Import) then left-click "Manager".
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5.6. Click the down-arrow to the right of "DEFAULT" and choose -
5.6.1. "EZYPATH1": if your MetaStock data is in "C:DataMetaStock"
5.6.2. "EZYPATH2": if your MetaStock data is in "C:Program FilesEzyCompanyEzyStationClientDataMetaStock".
5.7. Back-up your existing MetaStock data. Backup your MetaStock data by copying your MetaStock folder onto a CD or another computer, drive or directory (in order of preference).
5.8. Use Windows Explorer to rename all your "A" to "Z" folders to "A0" to "Z0". NOTE: that is the number zero "0" not the letter "O". Bodhi has an automatic overflow mechanism, which creates new folders as necessary. For example if "A0" fills up then "A1" will be automatically created.
6. Backup your data.
6.1. Make sure you make a backup of your existing data in the folder specified in the above paragraphs. Backup your EZY data by copying your EZY folder onto a CD or another computer, drive or directory (in order of preference).
6.2. Generally it is important to back-up you data on a regular basis. The Bodhi servers only keep data for 6 months. Data prior to this is only available on CD for an additional fee.
7. Updating your data.
7.1. Before doing your first update, you should check that Bodhi is pointing to your existing data. To do this open Bodhi, click the "Configure" button, click the "+" to the left of "Australia", the "+" to the left of "Australian Stock Exchange", click "Equity". Click on "ABC Adelaide Brghtn" stock to highlight it, then click on "View" (above the list of stocks) then "Values". You should see an EzyStation (or EzyChart) tab at the top of the screen, if you have enabled MetaStock you should also see a MetaStock tab. Click on each tab and make sure you can see all your existing data, if you do not see your historical data then the paths have not been set correctly. Go back and ensure you have done all above. Otherwise close all Bodhi windows ~ so back to the beginning.
7.2. Connect to the internet.
7.3. Open BodhiGold
7.4. Click the Catchup button.
7.5. If you are using WindowsXP you will most likely be asked if you want to accept communications by the "Bodhi…" program. Make sure you answer "Yes" to this then close/kill Catchup and re-run (you may also need to close and re-open Bodhi).
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7.6. Bodhi will first download any notices of interest from Electronic Information Solutions so do not be alarmed when you see 'Receiving' notices from April this year.
7.7. Bodhi will update ASX data from the beginning of the month. After the update is complete, check that all looks OK. This can best be done as specified in 7.1.
7.8. From now on Bodhi will keep track of where your data is up to. So whenever you do a catchup Bodhi will go back and get any data you have not got. Just make sure you do a Catchup at least once every 6 months (otherwise you will need to purchase a history disk to fill in the gaps).
7.9. Remember: backup your data on a monthly basis.
8. Final tidy up.
8.1. Once BodhiGold is updating your data there is no need to continue using EzyCast. NOTE: EzyCast will be decommissioned in the near future.
8.2. Once BodhiGold is operating correctly, give it at least a week; you can delete the installation file, "AU_051110.exe", off your desktop if you wish. Minor upgrades can be achieved by clicking on "Help" then "Upgrade", we recommend doing this at least once a month.
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ROVER WOULD NOT INSTALL Correspondence in relation to this issue follows. In short, the Windows pagefile was set to a fixed amount, rather than letting Windows manage it. Once I set Windows to manage it, the installation proceeded without issue.
I attempted to check for upgrades to Bodhi Gold and get the message that the updater software is not installed.
Bodhi Gold has only recently been installed, and I am fairly sure that I answered “Yes” when the install Rover option was presented.
Can you advise:
• Do I have to re-install from scratch to get the update software installed?
• If so, will doing so eliminate my personalisation (eg location of files) and will I have to apply again for registration?
• If not, how do I install the upgrade software.
Many thanks. My user name is PATWIL.
Hi Tim,
To fix the Rover problem, re-install the Bodhi programme again. Do not un-install or delete anything. When Bodhi installs it will keep the existing Bodhi settings and should overwrite the corrupted Rover programme in the process. You will not have to apply for a new Registration code.
Regards,
Brian.
I reinstalled and was presented with the Rover dialog box. After clicking “Yes” to install Rover, nothing happened – there is just a loud silence! What now?
Thank you. I checked the program files folder and there is no Rover folder to delete.
AU_051202 has been downloaded, but when I execute the file, the dialog box shown below is presented:
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The drive (E: to which I downloaded the file) has 98GB of disc space and the C: drive has 190GB of disc space. Although after pressing OK it does offer to install the software, I’m guessing that the result wont be a happy one.
Any advice you can give me will be appreciated.
Thanks
Hi Tim,
Not enough disk space means that you need to allocate more space in the Operating System. The Paging file in Windows NT, 2000 Operating systems is managed by the user. If you have XP it should adjust as necesaary unless you tell it otherwise. The Paging file settings are in the Control Panels System menu.
Regards,
Brian. .
Thank’s Brian. The virtual memory setting on my system was set as a fixed amount (not by me). I changed virtual memory management so that it is managed by Windows (XP) and re-ran the installation. The “not enough disc space” did not present itself, but, again Rover would not install.
I then copied the file to my desktop and shut down anti-virus and Mircrosoft Anti- Spyware and re-ran the installation. This time Rover installed successfully.
Thank you for your patience and prompt assistance.
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DE-SELECTING OPTIONS AND WARRANTS Hi William,
To De-select Warrants and Options, start Bodhi, click Configure, +Australia, +Australian Stock Exchange, Option, select Bundle None, click Tick, Clear. Repeat for Warrants.
The Bodhi Gold manual is being written and is not yet available. We have Tutorials on our website that may help you: http://www.justdata.com.au/Training/Tutorials/index.htm
Regards,
Brian.
----- Original Message -----
From: William Pate
To: 'Justdata Support'
Sent: Wednesday, December 07, 2005 10:00 PM
Subject: Data Download
Good evening. I hope you are able to assist me with a question as I was unable to find the answer on your website.
Can you advise me of how to exclude items from my downloads – for example, I don’t wish to download warrants and options data. Your help options says that I can click on “Manual” to download an electronic copy of it, but that item is greyed out – how can I get a copy of the manual.
Thanks for your assistance.
William Pate
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CHANGING THE DRIVE TO WHERE DOWNLOADS ARE TRANSFERRED. Hi William,
To change the drive, start Bodhi, click Configure, right click Distribution, click Manager. At this point you can change all paths to a new drive by clicking Path, Drive, type E, click OK. To change individual paths, click on directory path (do each individually), click Path, Edit, change the drive letter, click OK.
Regards,
Brian.
PRICES WON’T UPDATE – SEND DEBUG FILE Hi Tim,
Please start Bodhi, click Edit, Options, General, tick Debug File Create, click X, click Catchup. If the data does not update again, click Help, Email, attach the B4bak32.zip file and send it. I will view the logs.
Regards,
Brian.
PRICE WON’T UPDATE – AT ALL First piece of advice was to check Firewall permissions. This was was not the cause as the data was being downloaded – it was the folders that were not being updated.
The further reply received from JustData support is reproduced below. The issue was in relation to the second option.
Bundle was checked as None. I changed it to All and the data updated.
Hi Tim,
Have you tried opening Bodhi screen and select edit, options, click on the general tab below options at the top,
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Otherwise, Start BodhiGold, click Configure, then click on the plus key next to Australia (right handside), then Australian Stock Exchange, then Equity. On the left handside click on the code ABC - Adelaide Brighton. Then click on View then values (top lefthand corner).
Scroll down to the bottom and check what is the last date. Note at the top you will have at least 2 tabs (say EzyCharts and Metastock).
Click on the other tab and make note of the date. Close that window, by clicking on the x in the top right corner.
Then on the right handside make sure their isn't a dot under bundle none (if you just have some stocks ticked thats fine).
Also make sure that the import and export dates are set to the day after the earliest of the two last dates, you found above.
Then run Catchup.
If your problem is fixed make sure you go in and take out the tick in debug file - create.
Regards,
----- Original Message -----
From: William Pate
To: 'Justdata Support'
Sent: Thursday, May 24, 2007 10:18 PM
Subject: RE: Price Data is not updating
Thank you. I tried option 1 – using the backup server in passive mode and it made no difference.
The software firewall that I use is the Windows XP firewall and Freeway is listed in the exceptions. There appears not to be an option to specify an IP address. The router firewall does not have any rules. I turned off the firewall and the Anti-Virus. Same result after doing a catchup – the data was not updated.
I don’t think it is a firewall issue as the data is being downloaded. It’s just that the data folders – C:\Data\Ezy and E:\Data\Metastock aren’t being updated. The modified date steadfastly remains at the 21st May, 2007. The folder security is ok – that is, it is not read only. A system restore to 20th May 2007 did not make a difference either. The only other thing I have done is to upgrade the Bodhi software – I think on Tuesday – whose versions stand as follows:
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• Freeway 4.1.0.42
• Catchup 4.1.0.192
From: Justdata Support [mailto:[email protected]]
Sent: Thursday, 24 May 2007 9:14 AM
To: William Pate
Subject: Re: Price Data is not updating
Hi Tim,
Please start Bodhi Gold, click Edit, Options, Connect, select Server Backup and tick Firewall Use Passive Mode, click X, click Catchup.
The Primary server is probably blocked by a Firewall or else anti-virus software acting as a Firewall. To Download without selecting the Backup Server. Start your Firewall software. Most Firewalls have an area where you can enter URL's or IP numbers. The IP number is 74.53.24.130 for the Primary server. Look for an Exceptions, Permitted, Allowed, Trusted tab and see if you can enter the URL www.goldserverus.com or the IP 74.53.24.130. Once entered as a trusted site then Catchup will be allowed through the Firewall.
Regards,
Brian.
----- Original Message -----
From: William Pate
To: Just Data - Support
Sent: Wednesday, May 23, 2007 10:26 PM
Subject: Price Data is not updating
I downloaded pricing today but my charting programs (Ezycharts and GTE charting) only display prices up to the 21st May, 2007.
Setting the date back to the 21st May, 2007 and catching up has made no difference even though the messages say that pricing for the 23rd was downloaded.
The individual entries in BODHI only go to the 21st May.
Are you able to assist, please.
My account is WILLIAMP. The attached file is reports.txt
Regards,
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Tim Pate.
BOOT ERROR Source: PC World.
Edition: February 2007
Q
When I start my Toshiba laptop, runnig XP Home SP2, I get the message “Invalid Boot.ini File. Booting from C\Windows\”. It doesn’t seem to cause any problems.
Click Start-Run and then enter the command “msconfig”. Select the boot.ini tab. This will list the current boot.ini file. Click the button call Check All Boot APaths. This will remove any invalid entries. The boot.ini file should look something similar to this:
[boot loader]
Timeout=30
Default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS
[Operating systems]
Multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS=”Microsoft Windows XP”
/fastdetect
If the boot.ini file is missing, empty or corrupt, create another one. Right click My Coputer and click Properties. Select Advanced and click the Settings button under Startup and Recovery. In the Startup and Recovery dialog box, under System Startup, click Edit. This will open the boot.ini file in Notepad. Type the correct version of the file, or copy and paste the one at http://support.microsoft.com/kb/289022.
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SAMPLE BOOT INI FILE – WINDOWS XP For XP Home, change the title.
[boot loader] timeout=30 default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS
[operating systems] multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows XP Professional" /fastdetect
SAMPLE BOOT INI WITH A PREVIOUS INSTALLATION OF WINDOWS 2000 This relates to Windows 2000 being on a separate partition.
[boot loader] timeout=30 default=multi(0)disk(1)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS
[operating systems] multi(0)disk(1)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Windows XP Professional" /fastdetect multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(2)\WINNT="Windows 2000 Professional" /fastdetect
After saving the file, repeat the msconfig procedure to check that it is valid before using it.
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FONTS Source: PC World.
Edition: February 2007
TAHOMA NOT PRESENT My wife uses Word 2000 SR1. It worked fine until we installed SP2. Now whenever we open up a Word document, we receive the error “Tohoma Qfont not present, click on Help to repair” and Word won’t open. The font is present in the Fonts folder, but we tried the repair anyway and it made no difference.
Presuming it’s Office SP you’ve installed, and you’ running Windows 98 or Me, this problem can occur when the number of installed fonts becomes Atoo large for these old versions of Windows. It might occur if a corrupt font file exists, which causes Windows to bail out before it has finished listing all the fonts.
The solution is to clear out all the non-essential fonts from the system. You can delete anything except:
Arial
Comic Sans Serif
Courier
Courier New
Marlett
Modern
MS Sans Serif
Roman
Script
Small Fonts
Symbol
Tahoma
Times New Roman
Verdana
Webdings
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Windings
This includes the Bold, italic and bold italic versions of these fonts.
Additionally, any font with a FON file type and any with a name that includes MS or starts with Luida may be deleted.
You may find, however, that the problem is resolved before you get that far.
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STARTUP ISSUES Source: PC World
Edition: February 2007
BOOTED OUT I installe Paragon Partition Manager and looked at its Boot Manager – at least, I thought that’s all I did. Now I can’t load Windows. I get a text screen Qtelling me to: “Boot from A:.
Is there a way of recovering XP Media Center Edition without a reinstall?
It appears as if you’ve installed Boot Manager on the boot sector of you hard drive without telling it what to boot from. You will need to boot your Asystem from something else to recover the situation. If you can get hold of an XP Installation CD, boot from it and press
If you can’t get an XP CD, then try the Ultimate Bood CD (www.ultimatebootcd.com).
This recovery CD is Linus-based with free tools. It is available as an ISO image you can download and burn.
INVALID SERIAL NUMBER Message received (Compaq Computer) – “Invalid Electronic Serial Number” when the machine is booted.
This message means that a valid serial number has not been entered into the BIOS.
Access the BIOS at boot time and look under Security, then selet System ID’s. Four fields are displayed:
Chassis
Serial Number
Asset Tag
Ownership Tag
UUID
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Type the number from the sticker found on the case of the PC into the Chassis Serial Number field. The other fields are set by the user and probably not required. They enable identification of the PC by software that’s used in large companies.
It is not usual for Compaq to be selling motherboards dirct to consumers. More likely, this is a second-hand board and the person does not have a Compaq case with the associated serial number.
However, if the serial number is purely for identification purposes, it probably does not need to be a correct number. Entering a random string of letters and numbers should be enough to stop the message.
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UN-INSTALLING ANTI VIRUS Source: PC World
Edition: February 2007
UNINTALL NORTON AND MCCAFEE Q
I want to switch over to a free anivirus program, but I seem to need a blowtorch to remove Noton Antivirus. Ditto for the McAfee product on my wife’s PC.
Blowtorch? Some people have tried using C4 plastic explosives to remove Norton products – and the Live Update still survives. If “Add or Remove APrograms” in Windows doesn’t do the job, Norton provides a removal method that’ s terrific – but at the same time, a royal pain in the behind. It’s the Norton Removal Tool; get it at http://service1.symantec.com/SUPPORT/tsgeninfo.nst/docid/2005033108162039 - this link is broken.
It extracts every Norton product on your system (versions 2003 through 2007).
That’s right, it’s dopey and you’re stuck reinstalling the tools you want to keep. And, yes, you will likely loose the personal settings when you reinstall the Norton Products. McAfee has a manual, albeit cumbersome, method to remove its VirusScan product. http://ts.mcafeehelp.com/faq.asp? frames=1&docid=68717&categoryld=245&chat – this link is broken.
FREE UNINSTALLER Try MyUninstaller. www.nirsoft.net/utils/myuninst.html
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ANTI-SPYWARE SOFTWARE Source: PC World.
Edition: February 2007
INTERNET ACCESS AFTER RUNNING ANTI-SPYWARE Q
After running an antispyware program, I now only have sporadic access to the Web
A
The culprit is a Layered Service Provider that went kaflooey or vanished. You may be able to Web surf, but you may not have email, or vice versa. The fix is easy.
If you are using Windows 98 or ME, download and run LSP-Fix. www.cexx.org/lspfix.htm
XP Users with Service Pack 2 should go to Start-Run and type cmd and click OK. In the command window, type netshwinsock reset and reboot. No luck?
Browse another computer and download Winsock XP fix. http://www/spychecker.com/program/winsockxpfix.html - this link is broken.
Then read the turorial http://www.cit.cornell.edu/computer/security/spyware/WinFix/
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PRINTING Source: PC World
Edition: February 2007
UN-JAM A PRINT QUEUE Q
I started printing a 50-page document. Midway through, though, the job stopped. Clicking Cancel in the system tray’s print queue did not help.
From the Start Menu, select Run, end CMD and click OK. Type net stop spooler to halt the service. Leve the cmd window open for now and check Athe print queue again. The print job should be gone. Type net start spooler in the CMD prompt to re-start the service.
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MISSING DLL
WHAT TO DO WHEN A DLL GOES MISSING
By Fred Langa
There's an easy way and a hard way to replace missing or corrupted DLLs.
As you can probably guess, I'll show you the fast and easy way! Then I'll discuss a free "ultra-high security password generator," continue our coverage of AOL's antivirus tool, and more.
HOW TO FIX AN AWOL SHELL.DLL
Reader Rick Granlund has a problem that's bad enough in itself, but which also could be a symptom of a deeper issue. Either way, it's fixable:
"I have a problem that may be common and yet the cure eludes me. When I attempt to install software in my XP Pro SP2 machine, I get the dialog box 'Missing SHELL.DLL.' How do I find and reinstall the SHELL.DLL with minimum disruption to my system?"
The fix is easy, Rick, but first — it'd be best if you could find out why Shell.dll disappeared.
For example, there's a fairly common browser hijacker that can cause this problem. You didn't mention any other symptoms, but the hijacker usually adds "Home Search Assistant," "Shopping Wizard," and "Search Extender" to your system, and may also reset your browser's home page so that a popup appears at every start.
If malware such as this is working on your system, then it will do no good to repair Shell.dll because the malware will simply corrupt the new copy.
I suggest you begin by using your favorite antimalware tools to make sure your system is squeaky clean and free of all malware. Major test labs currently rate Webroot's Spy Sweeper and PC Tools' Spyware Doctor as the best antispyware products. For more information, see the Security Baseline page at WindowsSecrets.com.
If "Home Search Assistance" and its related friends are, in fact, causing your problem, the free AboutBuster utility can remove them.
Once you're sure your system is clean, you can download a fresh copy of Shell.dll from any number of online sources. DLL-files.com, for example, has a good Shell.dll page. Copy the DLL file into your DLLcache folder (usually found at C:\Windows\System32\DLLcache). Then re-register the DLL this way:
Step 1. Click Start, Run.
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Step 2. In the Run dialog box, enter (change C:\Windows to the correct location on your system):
regsvr32 C:\Windows\System32\DLLcache\Shell.dll
Step 3. Click OK.
Step 4. Reboot, and your Shell.dll problems should be fixed!
By the way, the above steps can resolve a huge number of problems with other missing/corrupted DLLs. Just use the example above as a template, downloading whatever DLL you need and substituting its name in the regsvr32 command.
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WINDOWS DEFENDER Source: Knowledge base artice from Microsoft:
http://support.microsoft.c om/kb/915105
WINDOWS DEFENDER WON’T UPDATE
SYMPTOMS After you uninstall and then reinstall Microsoft Windows Defender Beta 2, you may receive the following error message:
Windows Defender definitions haven’t been updated
If you check for updated definitions when this occurs, Windows Defender reports that no updates are available.
CAUSE This problem occurs because after Windows Defender Beta 2 has been reinstalled, it does not automatically obtain new definitions until the next definition update is published on the Windows Update Web site.
RESOLUTION To resolve this problem, follow these steps:
1. Remove the current signature file. To do this, click Start, click Run, type Msiexec /x {A5CC2A09-E9D3-49EC-923D-03874BBD4C2C}, and then click OK.
2. Open Windows Defender. To do this, click Start, click Programs, and then click Windows Defender.
3. Check for new definitions. To do this, click the Help options arrow next to the Windows Defender Help icon, click About Windows Defender, and then click Check for Updates.
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MASTER BOOT RECORD Source:
http://www.ntfs.com/mbr- damaged.htm
EXPLAINED The Master Boot Record (MBR) will be created when you create the first partition on the hard disk. It is very important data structure on the disk. The Master Boot Record contains the Partition Table for the disk and a small amount of executable code for the boot start. The location is always the first sector on the disk.
The first 446 (0x1BE) bytes are MBR itself, the next 64 bytes are the Partition Table, the last two bytes in the sector are a signature word for the sector and are always 0x55AA.
FIRST SECTOR DAMAGED When we try to boot after hardware testing procedures, we see just blank screen without any messages. It means the piece of code at the beginning of the MBR could not be executed properly. That’s why even error messages could not be displayed. However, if we boot from the floppy, we can see FAT partition, files on it and we are able to perform standard operations like file copy, program execution... It happens because in our example only part of the MBR has been damaged which does not allow the system to boot properly. However, the partition table is safe and we can access our drives when we boot from the operating system installed on the other drive.
SECTOR SIGNATURE DAMAGED OR REMOVED When we try to boot now, we see an error message like "Operating System not found".
Thus the first thing if computer does not boot is to run Disk Viewer and check the first physical sector on HDD, whether it looks like valid MBR or not: check, may be it's filled up with zeros or any other single character check whether error messages (like you can see above "Invalid partition table"...) are present or not check whether disk signature (0x55AA) is present or not
RE-CREATE THE MBR The simplest way to repair or re-create MBR is to run Microsoft's standard utility called FDISK with a parameter /MBR, like:
A:\> FDISK.EXE /MBR
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If you have Windows NT / 2000 / XP, you can boot from startup floppy disks or CD- ROM, choose repair option during setup, and run Recovery Console. When you are logged on, you can run FIXMBR command to fix MBR.
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FIRST SECTOR UNREADABLE Most likely we'll get the same black screen, which we got when trying to boot. When you try to read it using Disk Viewer/Editor you should get an error message saying that sector is unreadable. In this case recovery software is unable to help you to bring HDD back to the working condition, i.e. physical partition recovery is not possible. The only thing that can be done is to scan and search for partitions (i.e. perform virtual partition recovery), and in case if something is found - display them and give the user an opportunity to save important data to another location. Third party software, like Active@ UNERASER, will help you here.
PARTITION TABLE – DAMAGED OR DELETED Each Partition Table entry is 16 bytes long, making a maximum of four entries available. Each partition entry has fields for Boot Indicator (BYTE), Starting Head (BYTE), Starting Sector (6 bits), Starting Cylinder (10 bits), System ID (BYTE), Ending Head (BYTE), Ending Sector (6 bits), Ending Cylinder (10 bits), Relative Sector (DWORD), Total Sectors (DWORD).
Thus the MBR loader can assume the location and size of partitions. MBR loader looks for the "active" partition, i.e. partition that has Boot Indicator equals 0x80 (the first one in our case) and passes control to the partition boot sector for further loading.
Lets consider the situations which cause computer to hang up while booting or data loss:
1. No Partition set to the Active State. When we try to boot now, we see an error message like "Operating System not found". It means that the loader cannot determine which partition is system and active to pass control to.
2. No System Files on the Partition. Loader will try to boot from there, fails, try to boot again from other devices like floppy, and if fails to boot again, we'll see an error message like "Non-System Disk or Disk Error".
There are other conditions – refer to the web site.
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SYSTEM RESTORE
START SYSTEM RESTORE FROM A COMMAND PROMPT
INTRODUCTION Windows XP includes the System Restore tool, but you cannot start the System Restore tool from a Recovery Console prompt. Therefore, you may want to start the System Restore tool when you cannot start your Windows XP-based computer normally or in Safe mode.
This article describes how to start the System Restore tool in Safe mode by using Command Prompt.
START AT THE COMMAND PROMPT 1. Restart your computer, and then press F8 during the initial startup to start your computer in Safe Mode with a command prompt. For additional information about the Safe mode with a command prompt, click the following article number to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:
315222 (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/315222/) A description of the Safe mode boot options in Windows XP.
2. Log on to your computer with an administrator account or with an account that has administrator credentials.
3. Type the following command at a command prompt, and then press ENTER: %systemroot%\system32\restore\rstrui.exe
4. Follow the instructions that appear on the screen to restore your computer to an earlier state.
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MICROSOFT OFFICE
WORD 2007 STYLES The following was obtained from the Office Discussion Groups - http://www.microsoft.com/office/community/en-us/wizard.mspx? query=Heading+4+Style+-+Word+2007&dg=&cat=en-us-office- word&lang=en&cr=US&pt=617c4d62-4061-4107-8d46- 2a22fc6fa202&catlist=&dglist=&ptlist=&type=question&w=1&sloc=en-us
The user was unable to save any changes to the styles.
The following answer from John McGhie (MVP):
“Once you accept that Word 2007 was designed for people who don't know how to use a word processor, you will get the idea :-).
In Word 2007, the user is supposed to use Quick Style Sets, and the user is not expected to need to change them: that's the administrator's job. So the top-level tools make it easy for the user to change the styles in the current document without changing the styles in the template.
Under the Change Styles chunk on the ribbon is a tiny box. Click that and you can "Show the Styles window". In the Styles Window you can access a Modify command for the style you are interested in.
At the bottom of the Modify dialog, are two radio buttons: "Only in this document" and "Documents based on this template". Choose the second: it's the equivalent of the previous "Add to template" command on the Stylesdialog.
When you save the document, Word will then also save the template, and your changes will be preserved.
This is an end-user tool: performing complex administration functions such as modifying the styles in a template is never going to be easy!
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WORD 2007 INSERT FILE NAME AND PATH IN FOOTER This does not work the same as in 2003. In fact, it is easier in 2003. Contacted Microsoft support and they provided the following answer:
“As I understand it, your issue is you want to be able to add the document path and name to the document footer with a shortcut or quick part. If this is not correct, please let me know.
Please try the following steps:
1. Start by clicking on the Insert ribbon, then Footer, and Edit Footer to put the cursor in the footer.
2. If you want the filename to be centered, press Tab once.
3. Click Insert, Quick Parts, Field.
4. In the dialog, choose the Filename field from the list and check the box atthe upper right for "Add path to filename". Click OK.
5. Now select and highlight the whole footer paragraph.
6. Click Insert, Quick Parts, Save Selection to Quick Part Gallery.
7. Give it a name such as "Filename and Path" and set the Gallery dropdown to Footers.
8. From now on, whenever you want to use the Filename and Path, click on Insert, Quick Parts, and select the "Filename and Path" or whichever name you saved it as, and it will be inserted into the document footer.
You can also do the same for the header, and with other fields as well.
Please let me know how this works for you.”
It did.
WORD 2002, 2003 RESOURCES This is a good website: http://www.shaunakelly.com/word/index.html
WORD – GO TO LAST PLACE EDITED Pressing Shift+F5 will send you to the point that was last edited in the document.
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MARGIN MARKS IN WORD From Microsoft Knowledge Base article: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/839371
SYMPTOMS When you open a document in Microsoft Word, margin marks or crop marks may appear on each corner of the page.
CAUSE This problem occurs only if you have one of the following Asian languages turned on in Microsoft Office Language Settings: • Chinese (Traditional)
Chinese (Simplified)
Japanese
Korean
Note: These margin marks or crop marks that may appear on corners of the page are different from text boundary marks. To turn on or turn off text boundaries, you can use the Text boundaries option that is available in Microsoft Word.
RESOLUTION – WORD 2003 To resolve this problem, remove all the Asian languages from the Enabled languages list in Microsoft Office Language Settings. To do this, follow these steps.
Note: Because there are several versions of Microsoft Windows, the following steps may be different on your computer. If they are, see your product documentation to complete these steps.
Remove margin marks in Word 2003
Make sure that the Text boundaries option in Word is not selected. To do this, follow these steps:
1. Start Word 2003.
2. On the Tools menu, click Options.
3. In the View tab, under Print and Web Layout options, verify that the Text boundaries check box is selected.
If the Text boundaries check box is selected, click to clear the Text boundaries check box.
Remove all the Asian languages from the Enabled languages list. To do this, follow these steps:
1. Click Start, point to All Programs, point to Microsoft Office, point to Microsoft Office Tools, and then click Microsoft Office 2003 Language Settings.
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2. In the Enabled languages list, select and remove all the languages that you do not use except English (U.S.). To do this, follow these steps: a. In the Enabled languages list, select a language that you want to remove, and then click Remove.
b. Click OK to update the language settings.
Note You may press the CTRL key and select more than one language, and then click Remove to remove those languages.
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ROTATING TEXT From time to time, everyone needs to rotate text inside a Word document. You might want to draw attention to a particular word or phrase. You might want to tilt most of the text on a page to make a point. In any case, Word leaves you very few choices, and none of them are good:
You can use WordArt. Click Insert | Picture | Word Art, choose from the limited selection of "Artsy" formatting for the text, click OK, type your text, click OK again, and the WordArt appears on your page. If you then click on the piece of WordArt, you can adjust the rotation angle by clicking Format | WordArt | Size, and changing the number in the Rotation box. The result is almost always amateurish. But it's Fast, and it works.
You can put the text in a table cell and change the text orientation in the cell (click once inside the cell, then click Format | Text Direction). This sounds like it's easy, but it isn't. Among other messy problems, Word will only allow you to rotate text in 90 degree increments, and it won't let you turn the text upside down. That is, you can have text appear reading from the bottom up (rotated counter-clockwise by 90 degrees); and you can have text read from the top down (rotated clockwise by 90 degrees). That's it.
You can put the text inside a text box (or some other autoshape with text inside) and change the text orientation inside the text box (click once inside the text box and choose Format | Text Direction). Once again, you can rotate only by -90 degrees, or by +90 degrees. You can't rotate it 180 degrees, or by any other amount.
In Word 2002 (the version in Office XP) and Word 2003, you can turn the text into a picture and then rotate the picture. The easiest way to turn text into a picture is to type it into your document, select it, press Ctrl+X to cut it, then click Edit | Paste Special, choose Picture and click OK. That method will turn your text into a picture in Word 97 and 2000, too. Unfortunately, you have to be using Word 2002 or 2003 if you want to rotate the picture - the older versions of Word won't rotate it.
To rotate the picture, click on it, then choose Format | Picture | Layout. Pick anything t In Line With Text. Click OK. You'll see a green rotation button above the picture of e text. Click on it and rotate. You can rotate by any number of degrees in any direction. But before you get too excited, print the rotated text. Your mileage may vary, but on my systems, the rotated text is completely illegible. The text looks OK but not great) on screen. The print version doesn't come close.
You can use a decent "draw" package, rotate the text to the angle you like, export the rotated text as a picture, and then insert that picture into your document. This approach is fraught with all sorts of problems, but it's the
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only real chance you have to rotate text by an arbitrary angle and have it appear decently when you print.
Do you think Word is good at rotating text? Try a little experiment. How many times have you wanted to use Word to make a simple "Name Tent" - a single sheet that can folded in half, with text appearing right-side-up in both halves? It should be easy. It isn't.
Here's the fastest approach I've found. Can you do better?
1. Start with a new document, and make sure you're in Page Layout View (click View | Page Layout).
2. Click Table | Insert | Table. Tell the dialog box that you want two columns and one row, with Fixed Column Width "Auto". Click OK. Word creates a little table for you at the top of the page.
3. Click the bottom of the table (which is to say, the lower horizontal line) and drag it to the bottom of the printable part of the page. You may have to fuss around a bit. (Alternatively, if you know offhand how large the printable part of the page is, you can click Table | Table Properties | Row and type in the height.)
4. Click Table | Select | Table.
5. Click Format | Borders and Shading. On the Borders tab, click None, and then click OK. 6. Click once in the first cell in the table, then click Format | Text Direction. In the Orientation box, click the "Text" example box on the right, then click OK. 7. Click in the second cell in the table, then click Format | Text Direction. In the Orientation box, click the "Text" example box on the left, then click OK. 8. Click in the first cell in the table, and type the name you want to appear on the tent. 9. Select the name if you can - if you're using Word 2002 or 2003, that stupid Smart Tag button will get in your way - and format the name with the font and size that you want.
When the first cell's formatted properly, select the text, and then copy it to the second cell.
That's what it takes to make a Name Tent in Word. If you can do it faster or better, drop me a line! mailto:[email protected].
Yes, this is another tip inspired by the Crabby Office Lady, who doesn't seem to realize (or at least acknowledge) that Word doesn't hold a candle to WordPerfect when it comes to rotating text.
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I'll re-iterate my oft-repeated refrain: Word is teeming with "features" that are an absolute pain in the neck. While I think it's great that we'll be able to use Office 2003 to create XML skeletons of our documents which will automatically launch Lunar Voyagers with progressively stepped re-entry trajectories, and then vanish when their DRM certificates dry up, I sure wish Microsoft would spend some time dealing with problems that you and I face every day.
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SEARCH AND REPLACE – USING WILDCARDS Scenario: Replace P + page number with Page + page number. For example:
P100 with Page 100.
A document has references to a page number typed as P100, P20 etc. The requirement is to change the “P” to “Page” followed by a space and the original page number.
Solution: Select Edit Menu and choose replace. If you cannot see a list of search options, click “More”.
Click “Use Wildcards”.
In the “Find” box, type:
(P) ([1 – 9])
Brackets specify an expression. There are two expressions in this example. Expression 1 has a value of P. Expression 2 is enclosed in square brackets. When you are using wildcards, square brackets are used to enclose all the characters that would be acceptable. For example, the wildcard [ar] would find either a or r. Therefore, the wildcard in the second expression for this example will find the numbers 1 through to 9.
In the Replace box, type: page \2 and click replace all.
The \n wildcard inserts the value of the nth expression from the Find box in the replacement text. \2 says to get the value of the second expression.
Notes: Wildcard searches are case sensitive. If, for example, your pages references had a lower case P, then those instances would not be changed.
You can also get unexpected behavior if you use wildcards with change tracking turned on.
To learn more about wildcard searching, search for wildcard in the index to Microsoft Word’s help and select the topic on “Find and replace text or other items”
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EXCEL
MERGE FIELDS Source: PC User March 2007 Edition.
The issue reported was in relation to a spreadsheet that contained a list of club members.
Its structure is:
Mr First Name.
Surname.
Mrs First Name.
Surname.
For sending newsletters, the requirement is to send one newsletter per household, ideally, addressed to Mr and Mrs Surname.
The question raised was whether there was a way, using Excel, to do this.
The Answer
The suggested solution was to merge the Excel data with Word. This requires, however, a change in the structure of the spreadsheet. The assumption here is that there is one row each for Mr and Mrs.
Add a column to the spreadsheet and give it a name such as Envelope Prefix.
Enter Mr & Mrs in only the Mr record of the spreadsheet for couples.
In the single mens lines, enter the title Mr.
In the single woman’s lines, enter Ms.
So, for married woman, this field will be blank.
Next, go to Word and start the merge.
In Word 2003, go to Tools Letters and MailingsMail Merge.
From the task pane, choose the Labels option.
Click Next: Starting document and select “Label Options” to configure the labels being used. Click OK when done.
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Go to Next: Select Recipiants Use Existing List Browse. Locate and select the Excel file and then click Open.
When the Select Table dialog appears showing a list of the sheet, click the sheet that contains the data and click OK. You’ll then see a list of recipients and all of them will be checked. From the arrow beside the “Envelope_prefix” field, choose “Non Blanks” to select only records with something in this field – this will omit the duplicates.
Click “Next: Arrange your label” and then “More Items”.
Add akk tge fields you need to crate your lebels; of course, your first field will be the one containing the Mr, Mr & Mrs or the Ms entry. To do this , select the field name and click Insert.
Do this for all the fields that you need to use and click Close.
Arrange the fields so you have the name fields on one line, street address on the second and then the suburb, state and postcode on the last line. You’ll nee to instert spaces between successive fields on the one line.
Click “Update all Labels” to add the code that drags all the data our of the Excel file (this is critical) and click “Next: Preview your labels”.
If anything needs changing, go back and fix it.
When it all looks good, click “Next: Complete the Merge” and then click Print to print the labels.
USING IF AND OR Sample from my Trading Short List:
=IF(OR(K24={9.999,""}),"Not Checked","")
Note the { bracket in the values. This formula says, if cell K24 is 9.999 or nulls, then place the text “Not Checked” in the cell, otherwise leave the cell blank (“”).
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WINDOWS MEDIA PLAYER Microsoft Knowledge Base Article:
Article ID : 925704
Last Review : October 30, 2006
Revision : 1.1
SYMPTOMS When you try to use Microsoft Windows Media Player 11, you experience one of the following symptoms:• You receive the following error message:
An internal application error has occurred
Windows Media Player does not start.
Some Windows Media Player user interface (UI) elements are blank. For example, user-defined menus are blank.
CAUSE This problem occurs if one of the following conditions is true:
The component registration for the Jscript.dll file or for the VBScript.dll file is corrupted.
One or both of these files have become unregistered.
RESOLUTION 1. Click Start, click Run, type regsvr32 jscript.dll, and then click OK.
2. Click Start, click Run, type regsvr32 vbscript.dll, and then click OK.
Note: In Microsoft Windows Vista, these commands must be run from an elevated command prompt. For more information about the elevated command prompt in Windows Vista, visit the following Microsoft Web site, and then scroll down to the "Known Issues and Work-Arounds" section:
http://www.microsoft.com/technet/windowsvista/evaluate/feat/uapr ot.mspx
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CD/DVD MEDIA
TDK AUDIO CDR-RW
Hi Tim.
Unfortunately the CD-RW audio discs are a discontinued line and no longer available in Australia. I don't have any lying around in the office, but you may want to try contacting our distributor who may have some.
The distributor is in Sydney, but give them a call.
Continental Records 02 9669 2879 Regards
----- Forwarded by David Seymour/TDK-AUSTRALIA on 03/07/2007 10:49 AM -----
Margie Kurniadi/TDK-AUSTRALIA To David Seymour/TDK-AUSTRALIA@TDK-AUSTRALIA
cc 03/07/2007 09:17 AM
Subject Fw: Audio CDR-RW
please reply
Best Regards,
Margie Kurniadi
Customer Service Manager I Corporate Accounts
TDK (Australia) Pty Ltd
Level 22
20 Napier Street
North Sydney NSW 2060
Sales Line: 1300 305 835
Fax: 1300 365 835
Direct: (02) 8908 8664 [email protected] ----- Forwarded by Margie Kurniadi/TDK-AUSTRALIA on 03/07/2007 09:18 AM -----
"William Pate" To
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cc
03/07/2007 08:09 AM Subject Audio CDR-RW
Good morning.
Your company used to make Audio rewritable CDR’s. I can’t seem to find them in shops anymore and also notice that it is not listed in the products on the TDK website.
Are these not made anymore? If not, I don’t suppose there are any “leftovers” that one can purchase? Thanks for your attention.
Tim Pate.
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FILE SYSTEMS Source: http://www.smart-projects.net/help.php?help=160
Data CD and DVD discs contain one or more File Systems.
The File System describes where and how on the media the files and folders are located.
A File System is often confused with a TOC but it is not.
ISO9660 The most common File System on all CDs and DVDs is the ISO9660 File System.
It is however also the oldest and has some major disadvantages such as short file names (8.3) and a directory structure which can only be 8 levels deep. Because of these limitations it is almost always accompanied by one or more File Systems that don't have these limitations. However you need it if you want to see the content of the CD in an old DOS mode or an older Mac or Sun system.
Some mastering application sin against these limitations and allow to master ISO9660 with long file names and more directories deep. This shouldn't be a problem as of Windows 95 OSR2 but these CDs might cause problems in other systems.
ISO9660 is recorded in a number of duplicate structures (with different byte order). You should also read the section Options \ File System settings as you are able to influence how ISO is interpreted based on these duplicate structures.
JOILET Joliet is in fact an extension of ISO9660 and in many ways exactly the same.
Some File System Volume Descriptors are different which allows OS to recognize this File System and prefer it if available.
Joliet allows long file names and a directory structure which is substantially deeper. It will be used automatically (preferred above ISO9660) by Windows 95 or higher.
ROCK RIDGE Rock Ridge is also an extension of ISO9660 but never really became the standard (Joliet did).
It was very popular on Commodore CDs and also was a way to allow for longer file names and more directories deep.
It is not supported by Windows and Windows will use the ISO9660 File System on such CDs.
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WHO KNOWS This File System starts with its own Volume Descriptor which has all the characteristics of Joliet but points to all the tables of the ISO9660 File System.
It is probably supported by Windows as I have only seen it on official Windows installation CDs. It is always accompanied by Joliet as well and Joliet is preferred above this File-System.
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CD-I FILE SYSTEM Another File System derived from ISO9660 standard but with some specific differences which prevent an ISO9660 interpreting system to always correctly deal with this File-System. It only appears on CD-i discs and these discs (besides this unique File System) also have some other 'features' which cause real problems on normal systems.
CD-i is not supported by Windows 95 or higher.
EL TORITO - BOOTABLE CD/DVD This is not really a File System, more an extra feature of the ISO9660 File System.
CDs and DVDs can be made bootable but then the ISO9660 File System needs to be present alongside with the El Torito Volume Descriptor and a Virtual Floppy image.
By just copying a Virtual Floppy image to a CD/DVD one does not make the CD/DVD bootable! The File System needs to be setup as well.
More about this here.
Bootable CDs and DVDs (or the El Torito standard if you will) needs to be supported by the BIOS of your PC system, not the Operating System. Older BIOS do not handle Bootable CDs well let alone bootable DVDs.
UDF UDF is the 'new' CD/DVD File System and it is already used in a number of situations.
There also have already been some major changes, so can you encounter UDF 1.02, UDF 1.5 and UDF 2.01.
DVD-ROM discs should always contain a UDF File-System, preferably UDF 1.02
Packet Written Discs (CD-R and CD-RW), e.g. by Roxio Direct CD or Nero InCD use UDF 1.5. UDF 1.5 contains mechanisms to be able to append files and to be able to deal with defects on host side.
Mount Rainier discs should contain UDF 1.02 again because the drive takes care of defect management.
UDF 1.02 is supported by Windows 98 or higher if the media is closed and contains a TOC. It is preferred over Joliet and ISO9660 if found.
The following data on the UDF file system was obtained from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Universal_Disk_Format
The Universal Disk Format (UDF) is a format specification of a file system for storing files on optical media. It is an implementation of the ISO/IEC 13346 standard (also known as ECMA-167). It is considered to be a replacement of ISO 9660, and today is widely used for (re)writable optical
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media. UDF is developed and maintained by the Optical Storage Technology Association (OSTA).
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HISTORY Initially, UDF was primarily intended for use with ROM media and media with limited rewriting conditions such as:
magneto-optical
DVD (including DVD-ROM, DVD-RAM, DVD-R and others)
CD-R, CD-RW
Later, it became popular with large and fully rewritable cross-platform media such as:
Flash media above the Microsoft FAT32 limit of 32 GB per disc
Iomega REV discs
CD-MRW discs
UDF has increased in popularity since the late 1990s, when both CD-RW media and hardware for CD writing reached price levels making them interesting for the mass market.
UDF is practically the successor of ISO 9660, supporting larger files, larger- capacity disks and more information about individual files and folders. It includes support for special file properties, such as Apple's File Types, resource forks, and other OS-specific data.
WHERE THE UDF FORMAT IS USED DVD-Video media use UDF version 1.02. These discs contain a so-called UDF Bridge format, where both an ISO 9660 as well as a UDF 1.02 filesystem are present on the same disc, describing the same filesystem.
All standard formats for video recording on DVD-style media use some version of the UDF filesystem.
Philips' DVD+VR format uses UDF 1.02 with an ISO 9660 bridge for DVD+R and DVD+RW.
The DVD Forum's DVD-VR format uses UDF 2.00 for DVD-R, DVD-RW and DVD-RAM.
Blu-ray and the DVD Forum's HD-DVD will be using UDF 2.50 or UDF 2.60.
Hyper Scan game console uses a version of UDF for the game data
When combined with packet writing technology, UDF has the advantage of allowing files to be added to and removed from a disc through the normal filesystem mechanisms. That is, the contents of a disc can be manipulated in the same way a hard disk, floppy disk, or USB flash drive might be. This even works for sequentially written media such as CD-R, although files that are deleted remain on the disc occupying space. In Windows the disc
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appears as a drive letter, while in Unix/Linux or Mac OS X it is mounted to a directory.
Typically for writing UDF in Windows, third-party burner software such as DirectCD, DLA, InCD, Toast, or WriteUDF is required. As shipped by Microsoft, Windows (before Windows Vista) can only read UDF discs, while current (2006) releases of Mac OS X, Linux, and several other Unixes include UDF writing capability with no additional software required. Older versions of these operating systems may have limited reading capabilities, and may not support more recent versions of UDF. See the table below for more detailed information.
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REVISIONS OF THE UDF FORMAT UDF has been released in multiple revisions:
Revision 1.02 (August 30, 1996). This format is used by DVD-Video discs.
Revision 1.50 (February 4, 1997). Added support for (virtual) rewritability on CD-R/DVD-R media by introducing the VAT structure. Added sparing tables for defect management on rewritable media such as CD-RW, and DVD-RW and DVD+RW.
Revision 2.00 (April 3rd, 1998). Added support for Stream Files and real-time files (for DVD recording) and simplified directory management. VAT support was extended.
Revision 2.01 (March 15, 2000) is mainly a bugfix release to UDF 2.00. Many of the UDF standard's ambiguities were resolved in version 2.01.
Revision 2.50 (April 30, 2003). Added the Metadata Partition facilitating metadata clustering and optional duplication of file system information.
Revision 2.60 (March 1, 2005). Added Pseudo OverWrite method for drives supporting pseudo overwrite capability on sequentially recordable media.
For next releases of UDF, changes are discussed in relation to using UDF on very large hard disk media, and using UDF on holographic storage media.
FLAVORS OF UDF While the UDF specification has never been explicit about it, all UDF revisions since 1.5 actually describe three different variations of the format. For lack of an official name from OSTA they are called flavors here. These flavors are:
Plain (Random Read/Write Access). This is the original format supported in all UDF revisions
VAT (Incremental Writing). Used specifically for writing to CD-R and DVD-R (write-once) media
Spared (Limited Random Write Access). Used specifically for writing to CD-RW and DVD-RW (rewritable) media.
Plain (original ) flavor. This format can be used on any type of disk that allows random read/write access, such as hard disks and DVD-RAM media. Similar to other common file system formats, such as FAT, directory entries point directly to the block numbers of their file contents. When writing to such a disk in this format, any physical block on the disk may be chosen for allocation of new or updated files.
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Since this is the basic format, practically any OS or File System Driver claiming support for UDF should be able to read this format.
VAT Flavor. DVD-R and CD-R media has some limitations when being written on. Every physical block can only be written to once, and writing must happen incrementally. This means that the plain UDF flavor can only be written to CD-Rs by pre-mastering the data and then writing all data in one piece to the media, similar to the way ISO 9660 gets written to CD media.
To allow CD-R to be used virtually like hard disks, meaning that you could add and modify files on a CD-R at will (so-called drive letter access on Windows), OSTA added the VAT flavor to the UDF standard.
The VAT is an additional structure on the disk that helps remapping physical blocks when files or other data on the disc gets modified. The nature of the write-once media leads to the effect that when a file gets first added and later deleted on the disk, the file's data remains still on the disk. While it does not appear in the directory any more, special tools may be used to access the previous state of the disc before the delete occurred, making recovery possible. Additionally, incremental writing also means that eventually the disk will be full and free space cannot be recovered by deleting files. This behavior can be used to an advantage for archiving data, though.
Understanding this VAT structure's contents is necessary to be able to read such written discs as well, but not all UDF file systems support this flavor. See also chapter "Why your computer might not read a particular UDF disk" below.
Spared (RW) Flavor DVD-RW and CD-RW media have fewer limitations than DVD-R and CD-R media: While sectors can be rewritten at random, these sectors may "wear out" after a while, meaning that their data becomes unreliable after having been rewritten too often (typically after a few hundred rewrites with CD- RW).
RW media can be erased entirely at any time, making it blank again, ready for writing a new UDF or other file system (e.g. ISO 9660 or CD Audio) to it. The wear-out effect is not an issue here unless the disk
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gets erased more than a few hundred times or the Spared flavor was used.
RW disks may be formatted in the plain UDF flavor, in the VAT flavor and in the Spared flavor.
The consequences of using these flavors are as follows:
When using the plain flavor, in theory a disc driver may allow rewriting any disc sector at random, meaning the RW is truly rewritable in the fashion of hard disks. However, because of the wear-out effect, this would soon lead to loss of data. For that reason, if a plain UDF file system is written to RW media, the file system should lock (write protect) the UDF volume to prevent accidental modification by a computer, or better, disc drivers should never even attempt to provide random-write access to RW media unless they can assure that no data loss due to wear-out can happen.
When using the VAT flavor, RW media effectively appears as CD/-R or DVD-R media to the computer. However, the media may be erased again at any time.
Finally, the Spared flavor works basically like the plain flavor, but uses an extra Sparing Table to remap worn-out sectors. This allows reclaiming most of the disk's space when deleting a file.
Understanding this Sparing Table is necessary to be able to read discs written in this flavor. The problem is that some existing versions of UDF File System software ignore this extra information and treat such UDF discs as if they had the plain flavor. As long as the media has no worn-out sectors, this does not matter - the files can be read properly. But once sectors are remapped, a File System not paying attention to the Sparing Table will read outdated sectors, leading to retrieval of the wrong data.
HFS HFS is the Apple Mac file-system. It is used on all types storage media from Hard Drive to CD and DVD.
HFS itself is quite old and limited with regards to supported storage space, character-sets etc.
Windows systems don't support HFS at all. IsoBuster supports HFS on CD and DVD when the media is inserted in a normal CD/DVD drive.
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Image-files however for other type media (e.g. Floppy, HD, Zip, etc.) are also supported by IsoBuster !
HFS+ HFS+ is the modern variant of HFS with support for large storage space, unicode and much much more.
IFO/VOB This is not a true file-system, it is a collection of IFO and BUP files inside an existing file-system, but this collection of files is used as a file-system by many (not all) standalone DVD Video / Audio players.
This pseudo file-system relies on ISO9660 and more importantly UDF to find the entry points.
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SYSTEM TOOLS
SYSINTERNALS PROCESS EXPLORER www.microsoft.com/technet/sysinternals/Systeminformation/ProcessExplorer.msp x
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NETWORKING
SAFEGUARD YOUR WI-FI NETWORK Out of the box, most Wi-Fi router are totally insecure. Fixing that takes only a few minutes.
1. If possible, plug in via ethernet to set up your router at the start – it’ll save considerable time down the line. Don’t bother installing the special software that comes with your router. Most routers can be controlled via a Web browser, which lets you manage your router from any networked PC.
2. To manage the router, type its IP address into your Web browser’s address bar. If you don’t know the IP address, go to Start-Run and type ipconfig /all – Note, this does not work – the dialog box pops-up, then immediately shuts down. Once has to do this via a CMD prompt. The address will be shown as
“Default Gateway”. You will also need the user name and password available in the manual or via an online search of the model number. (Try looking at www.phenoelit.de/dpl/dpl.htmlv).
3. Once you can manage your router, change the administrator password you just looked up. This is typically under System Setting or a similar option.
4. Next, turn on encryption. WPA (WPA-PSK) is about as secure as Wi-Fi gets these days. Set a WPA key and configure your clients to use te new key. If one of your devices does not support the WPA version you want to use, you will have to with a less secure method. Look for “Encryption” or “Security” in the wireless management portion of the page (where you’ll also find the following steps’ settings).
5. It’s also a good idea to change the SSID from the default. Chose an SSID that doesn’t invite inquiry from a passerby. For example, try “broken”.
6. For extreme security, turn off SSID broadcasting. Note: My router does not have this option.
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INTERNET CONNECTION TUNING
TWEAK FOR TOP SPEED Tweak Tester from this site will run a diagnostic. Reccomendations will be made and their sofware DRTCP can be used to apply the changes without having to update the registry directly.
TWEAK FOR MULTIPLE DOWNLOADS The number of download sessions may be increased with the registry change. By default, Windows limits you to 2 downloads at a time. This default can be changed to, say, 8 or 10, since few downloads will fill the network pipe completely.
1. Click Start-Run and type regedit.
2. Browse to HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Internet Settings.
3. Right-Click in the right pane and then click New-DWORD Value.
4. Type MaxConnectionsPerServer in the resulting field.
5. Double-Click on the new item and then type a new number (say 10) in the “Value data” field. Click Decimal.
6. Following the previous 3 steps, create another new DWORD entry, giving it the name MaxConnectionsPer1_Oserver.
SOLVE WIRELESS CONNECTION PROBLEMS If loss of signal is an issue, try the following to troubleshoot the wireless set up.
1. The PC might just need a little massaging. The best way to quickly disconnect and reconnect the router is to right-click the wireless icon in the system tray and click Repair. If this doesn’t solve the problem and you suspect it is still a PC issue, open a command prompt and type ipconfig /renew. This performs nearly the same operation as Repair but bypasses Windows, which could be causing the problem. If all else fails, reboot the PC.
2. If problems still persist, power-cycle the router by unplugging it, waiting 10 seconds and plugging it back in. The PC will need to reconnect after the router has booted up. Most routers lock up occasionally and power cycling is the most reliable way to fix them. Unless you can’t physically the router, don’t restart it through its management utility; that approach takes just as long and the utility may not respond anyway.
3. If frequent problems are still being encountered, channel conflict may be the issue. This is where multiple We-Fi routers are operating in the same narrow band frequency. Download and run the evaluation version of WirelessMon (www.passmark.com/products/wirlessmonitor.htm); you
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can do all you need to with the demo. Look at the “Channel Use” chart; red and orange bars indicate channels under heavy use, while blue or no bars indicate relatively free channels. If the router is on a crowded channel, switch to a less busy one. Visit the router’s management system to do this.
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WEB FILE HOSTING
MOVE BIG FILES ACROSS THE INTERNET This site was recommended in PC World – May 2007 Edition. www.mediafire.com
I signed up with my Hotmail email address and a password of botanic. One file was uploaded.
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WEB DEVELOPMENT TOOLS
PSPAD HTML EDITOR Already downloaded and installed this application. Web site is: http://www.pspad.com/en/download.php
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MICROSOFT
TECHNET DETAILS Dear William,
Thank you for contacting TechNet Programs.
The estimated retail price of a TechNet Direct subscription (online only) is $512.00. You are able to purchase this subscription directly from Microsoft by calling our Order Entry team on 13 20 58 (option 3, 3) or by purchasing online.
To purchase a subscription from our online store, please go to: http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/subscriptions/default.aspx and click on the link labelled "Asia Pacific" in the menu on the right of the screen.
You are also able to purchase the subscription from your preferred reseller. Using this method, you will receive a product box containing an activation card. To commence the subscription, you will need to contact us with the details of the activation card. You can submit the details to us by phone, fax, mail or e-mail.
The cost of purchasing the subscription from a reseller may be cheaper than the cost of purchasing directly from Microsoft.
If you have any further enquiries please contact the Microsoft Subscriptions Department on 13 20 58, Monday to Friday, (8.30am - 5:30pm, EST) and a Microsoft Representative will be happy to assist you.
Regards,
Microsoft Subscriptions Team
Ph. 13 20 58 [email protected]
Link: http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/subscriptions/default.aspx
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NOTEBOOK COMPUTERS
NOTEBOOK BATTERY CARE Source: PCUser, June 2007 Edition. Emails and Letters
PC User and originally advised that batteries should be fully discharged every week.
Reader Duncan Backshall wrote:
“While this may have been worthwhile advice five years ago, nearly all notebooks sold in the last few years have Lithium Ion batteries. This type of battery does not need to be fully discharged every week; in fact, this will shorten its life. Lithium Ion batteries gradually lose their capacity after repeated discharge/recharge cycles and should be recharged as often as possible – preferably before being fully discharged. They have absolutely no memory effect and a full discharge will do more harm than good. Finally, they should not be stored fully charged, but discharged to about 50% if the battery is not going to be used for a period of time.”
David Flynn replies:
“Old habits die hard, such as my preference for cycling a notebook battery, but, Duncan is right in pointing out that times and technology have indeed moved on from the days when a regular run-down was mandatory.
Lithium Ion batteries do work best if the chemicals inside the cell are kept active by constant charging, but should not be completely discharged. However, there are exceptions; Apple recommends that an infrequently used notebook should be charged and discharged at least once per month and that any notebook shouldn’t be left plugged in to the AC socket all the time.”
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EMAIL FOR TRAVELLERS Source: PC User, June 2007 Edition – Superguide page 56.
Travelling Mail Server
Summary of the artice:
Webmail is accessible from any computer connected to the Internet. However, almost all browser-based email programs are clumsy to use, slow and inefficient. A better option is to install your usual email program on your notebook and take that with you. The problem is, Internet Service Providers (ISP’s) often refuse to deliver mail that doesn’t originate from one of their own accounts, as many spammers try to cover their tracks by using this technique.
So, when you try to send email from a hotel on the other side of the globe, your home ISP stops you in your tracks. That’s when it’s handy to have your own SMTP mail server. With your own server, you can send and receive email anywhere you have an internet connection using your regular email address and your usual email client. PostCast Server (www.postcastserver.com) is one such program. There is a free version that should fit most travellers’ needs.
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TELEPHONE SECURITY This has apparantly been confirmed by Australia Post and the Police.
A call was received last night from an individual identifying himself as an AT&T Service technician who was conducting a test on our telephone lines.
He stated that to complete the test I should touch nine (9),zero ( 0), hash (#) and then hang up.
Luckily, I was suspicious and refused. Upon contacting the telephone company, I was informed that by pushing 90#, you give the requesting individual full access to your telephone line, which allows them to place long distance telephone calls billed to your home phone number.
I was further informed that this scam has been originating from many of the local gaols/prisons.
DO NOT press 90# for ANYONE. PLEASE pass this on to your friends.
If you have mailing lists and/or newsletters from organisations you are connected with, I encourage you to pass this on.
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