TH Tech

IE8 has made some welcomed improvements on it’s Page Setup window. Look at the IE7 Page Setup options.

Previously, if you wanted to have a custom header or footer, you had to use a confusing line of code, where each variable was presented as &x, where &b was used to denote a shift in location, &d was a date in one format and &D was another format. There are other codes, too, such as &p and &P. I had to create a text document to store my settings so I could transfer my custom page headings to new installations.

But IE8 has simplified things greatly! Check out the following screenshot which applies the same header and footer as above:

Need I say more? This makes it much easier for average users to configure.

I just had an issue with an iPhone not being able to access a Wi-Fi network with 128-bit WEP and MAC filtering enabled. The user would put in the password when prompted, but it would never accept the password. The solution was to put an 0x in front of the WEP key.

I just installed Windows Vista Ultimate on my home PC last night, and I must say I love it!  Everything is working like a charm so far.  My Performance index is a 5.3, with that lowest rating in - get this - my hard drive transfer rates!  My processor is a 5.5, and my memory and graphics are all 5.9s. Fortunately, hard drives are cheap, so I'll upgrade in the near term.

However, having Vista Ultimate, I was surprised that DreamScene downloaded, but there were no additional content videos. I could clearly find on Microsoft's UltimatePC.com web site where new content packs were available. And I could also clearly see where it said to go to Windows Update from the Start Menu (Orb?) to get them. But they weren't there!

The solution was to uncheck the "Get updates for other Microsoft products" option and do the update. As soon as I did, there were three content packs available and another Vista update. Also, I don't know if it was coincidence or not, but my computer downloaded Service Pack 1 for Vista this morning, too.

So if you can't find the Ultimate Extras that you know are there, give this a try. Let me know if it works for you too. I'm going to file a bug report, and it would be nice to know if I am the only one with this issue, or if others have it too.

Have you ever joined a computer to a domain, restarted, changed the 'log on to' from the computer to the domain, and gotten that "Domain List Being Created" message box that just takes forever?

Stop it by pressing CTRL-ALT-DEL again. It will take you right back to the logon box and you can log in.

Don't you love simple fixes?

I had a problem rebuilding a server after a RAID array failed. I initialized the array, but Windows Server Setup would not see the hard drive. I found the answer and link to the Dell Server Manager utility CD ISO courtesy of Julie at "the back room tech."

Thanks Julie!

http://thebackroomtech.wordpress.com/2008/03/13/a-dell-poweredge-server-windows-2003-x64-and-the-battle-over-sas-raid-drivers/

I had an issue where I incorrectly configured how a backup recovers and ended up with an event log in Symantec Backup Exec 11d that had about a half-million failed event logs in it. I figured out what was causing them and corrected it, but I had to deal with these event errors that were generated every few seconds.  It wouldn't have been a big deal if I could have just selected all of them and delete them, but Backup Exec can only do so many at one time. I can't remember the exact number.  I had to find a better way to remove all of the event logs. After much research, I found the fix to be running SQL commands on the database. Note that this will remove the entire job history. I actually created a new media set, relabeled the media, and created all new backup jobs and schedules when I did this.

Here's what I used. *** Use at your own risk. If you screw it up, it's your fault. :-)

1. Open a command prompt window and type

osql -E -S localhost\bkupexec

Step 1

use BEDB
truncate TABLE JobHistoryDetailInfo
go
select Count(*) from JobHistoryDetailInfo
go

Step 2

use BEDB
truncate TABLE JobHistorySummary
go
select Count(*) from JobHistorySummary
go

Step 3

use BEDB
truncate TABLE JobHistoryDetail
go
select Count(*) from JobHistoryDetail
go

Step 4

use BEDB
DBCC SHRINKDATABASE (BEDB,5)
go

Thanks to Ryan Rupert for the above information. His post is in the thread on the Symantec Support Forums at https://forums.symantec.com/syment/board/message?board.id=115&message.id=24361#M24361

HP released an update to fix the HP Director program after you install IE 7. That update, however, has been removed from the FTP server and doesn't show up under the list of available updates for certain products. After much searching, I found a link to the file.

http://h30318.www3.hp.com/pub/softlib/software8/COL17377/oj-46104-1/CIT207355-HPCOM-PATCH-v8.exe

I've had three Dell computers (two Vostro 200 desktops and one Optiplex 755) freeze with a black screen on startup. The XP logo will appear for a few seconds, and then disappear.

Each computer is in a domain environment.

I am able to boot into Safe Mode. Here is what I have done so far to fix it.

On the first machine, I did an XP repair. Boot to the CD, proceed as if you're going to install, and when the setup program searches for previous installations, it will find it and ask if you want to repair it.

That took care of the first computer.

On the second one, I tried something different. I carry a USB thumb drive with me, and one of the programs on that drive is called IE Privacy Keeper. It's a great technician's tool for troubleshooting and solving problems. It removes all cookies, temporary Internet files, recently used documents, and cached system files.  It's made by UNH Solutions at www.unhsolutions.com. I have the take-along version from http://www.unhsolutions.com/IE-Privacy-Keeper/takealong.html. I set it to remove all System Files with Delayed Cleaning to 0 minutes. I boot into safe mode with networking, log in, run IEPK with all options set, and restart. It worked on this PC. I have yet to try it on the third, but will do so later today and post the results here.

Anyone else having this issue? I don't know if it's Dell specific or if it's a Windows Update issue. It seems that clearing the cache helps though.

[UPDATE] The issue with the two Vostro machines was black screen after displaying the XP boot logo for about 5 seconds.  The issue with the Optiplex was that it would hang while loading the user profile.  In each instance, running IE Privacy Keeper to clear out the system cache resolved the problem. I hope this helps!

Here is one of those problems that you may never experience, and you may not even realize there is a problem until it's too late.

Let's say you want to export all of your contacts and email them to someone.

In Outlook you can export your contacts to a file. I prefer PST files, as that is the Outlook default file format.  You can't reliably attach PST files to an Outlook email, though, because they might be blocked by the recipient's email program. 

The solution is to add it to a ZIP file (or a Compressed Folder, as it is called in Windows XP).

So here is what I did when I realized there is a problem. I opened Outlook, clicked on File > Import and Export... From there I chose "Export to a file." I chose Personal Folder file (PST) from the list, and clicked Next.  I selected the Contacts folder and selected the "Include Subfolders" option, then clicked Next. I chose the file location (on the desktop, in my case), and set my duplicates options.  I completed the Export wizard, and then minimzed Outlook. On my XP desktop, I right-clicked the export file and chose Send To > Compressed (zipped) Folder. The ZIP file was created and the contacts file was in the folder. I'm good to go...

Or so I thought. 

The problem here is that Outlook keeps a file lock on that exported file. Because of that, XP can't add it to the ZIP file. It doesn't throw an error though, and XP actually adds an empty PST file to the ZIP file. If you are relying on this file as a backup of your contacts, guess what: they're not in there!

In order to bypass this problem, you have to close Outlook so that it relenquishes control of the exported PST file. At that point, you can ZIP it up and send it on.

I'm just glad my contacts were still on the Exchange server!

I ran into an issue with a customer's laptop using Cisco VPN Client software. The user could connect to the VPN network, was getting an IP address, but could not connect to any devices or services on the network, she couldn't access her email, nor could she ping any of the servers.

The problem turned out to be in the Network Connections folder. An "Internet Gateway" had been installed. Apparently, this is an item installed if you run the Network Setup Wizard.  It conflicts with the Cisco VPN, so you have to remove it.

That caused me some problems, too, because it's not in the Add/Remove Programs list. Instead, you go to Add/Remove Programs and click on Add/Remove Windows Components. It's buried under Networking Services, and is titled, "Internet Gateway Device Discovery and Control Client." Uncheck it, click Next, and restart.

Enjoy your working VPN connection!