Reset MacOS Spotlight Index

If you notice files/folders suddenly seem to be missing on your Mac, your index may be corrupt. Here's how I fixed it. Note: These steps were found on a Reddit post and are being posted here so I can find it easier.

• Open the Terminal in the Utilities' folder. 
• Copy each line below then paste it at the Terminal's prompt and press RETURN. 
• You will be prompted to enter your admin password. It will not echo back to the Terminal window. Press RETURN again. You should only be asked when you run the first command.
• These are the commands (one per entry):
• sudo moutil -a -i off 
• sudo mutil -a -i on 
• sudo mdutil -E

Hope this helps!

Note: There was an extra line (sudo rm -rf /.Spotlight*) in the steps above, but many comments indicated that the command was redundant and unnnecessary.

How to Disable Mac Virtual Keyboard on Login Screen

 We had a MacBook that showed a virtual keyboard on the login screen. If we clicked the X in the upper left corner, the keyboard disappeared until next login. 

We checked all the accessibility settings we could find in the System Preferences, but everything was UNCHECKED. Keybard still showed up.

We discovered there is a DIFFERENT and apparently separate Accessibility Options menu! 

Press OPTION-COMMAND-F5 to bring up the menu:

UNCHECK the box next to Accessibility Keyboard. 

That should remove the keyboard from the login screen!

Reset TCM 2014 Ford Focus Transmission

If your 2014 Ford Focus is shifting hard or seems to have an erratic transmission, these steps may fix the issue. We ran into this after replacing the TCM in my mother's Focus.

1. Run the car and set trans to neutral.

2. Turn off and wait 15 seconds.

3. Shift to Park.

4. Turn the ignition on (Not running), wait 15 seconds

5. Turn to off, then ignition on (not running)

6. Shift to neutral (you may have to press the brake to do so)

If successful you should see "Transmission Ready" on your dash.

I have done the above method successfully on my mother’s car. Lasted about 9 months or so (we can’t remember when it was done).

Possible alternate method:

Turn off car

Turn ignition to ON (do not start)

Press gas pedal to floor and hold for 10 seconds

Turn off car

Release gas pedal

Wait 2 minutes

Start car and drive, slowly accelerating through each gear and the slow down to cycle back through gears.

I have done the above on my mother’s car when the transmission started acting up again. Don’t know how long this will last.

Force Apple Captive Portal Login

 If you try attaching to a guest wi-fi with an active portal that doesn't seem to want to trigger, try this:

http://captive.apple.com/hotspot-detect.html

Hope this helps!

Acer TravelMate Disable Secure Boot

 I was working on an Acer TravelMate that would NOT let me install Windows 8 or Windows 10. Turns out, the SECURE BOOT option was ENABLED and that was the culprit. Unfortunately, the BIOS would not let me select the Secure Boot option to change it. Turns out, there is a VERY easy fix:

Set the "Supervisor Password" in the BIOS to remove the greying out (there is a total of five different kinds of password in some of the BIOSes):

Hold down F2 during startup of the laptop to enter the BIOS.

Select menu "Security" using the arrow keys.

Select "Supervisor Password" using the arrow keys.

Press Enter to get the dialog for setting the password.

Type in a password and Enter.

Retype in a password and Enter.

Remember the password somehow! You will be prompted for it the next time you try to enter the BIOS.

Press Enter to dismiss the dialog.

Select "Boot" using the right arrow key.

"Enabled" for "Secure Boot" is no longer greyed out (and can be changed to "Disabled")!

Optional: Set the "Supervisor Password" back to empty.

Select menu "Exit" and menu item "Exit Saving Changes" using the arrow keys. Press Enter for "Yes" in the prompt.

This came from a forum post and I decided to post it here in case that post should disappear: : https://askubuntu.com/a/1001155

FortiFone FON-175 Silent Ring Mode

On the FON-175, the MUTE button does more than just mute the microphone, as I recently discovered. The MUTE button also places the phone into "Silent Ring Mode."

When the MUTE button is activated while NOT in a call (that is, when the handset is on the base), the MUTE button will toggle the Silent Ring Mode feature. This prevents the phone from ringing audibly during a call. The red light will flash during an incoming call, but the phone will not ring.

In order to toggle the setting back again, press the MUTE button while the handset is in the base and is not in use.

Hope this helps, as this terminology (Silent Ring Mode) is NOT referenced in the user's guide. 

Remove and/or Disable the Preview Pane in Windows 10

a) Press “Windows Logo” + “R” keys on the keyboard to open the “Run” command box.

b) Type “regedit” in the “Run” command box and press “ENTER”.

c) Now, navigate to following key:

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\Explorer

d) In right-side pane, create new DWORD “NoReadingPane” and set its value to 1.
(To create a new DWORD, click on the option “Edit” at the top, select “New” and then select the option “DWORD” from that sub-menu.)

e) Restart or log off your system and "Preview Pane" button will get removed from Windows Explorer command bar.

To restore the "Preview Pane" button, you can either remove DWORD or change its value to 0.

(Taken from: https://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/forum/windows_7-desktop/how-to-hide-the-file-preview-pane-on-the-browse/36e8da9c-10c0-4ac0-ab16-284fea930075 and placed here to make it easier to find.)

Windows 10 Prints Only One Copy

tldr; Change the Print Driver to "Windows Software Printer Driver"

 I had a user with an issue where their Windows 10 computer would only print ONE copy of a document regardless of how many copies they specified. 

I researched the problem and found that for anyone using HP, there is usually an option under Device Settings to disable Mopier. That's great of you are using an HP. But, this person was using a Lexmark MFP network device. So, no Mopier setting.

The computer did NOT have the Lexmark Universal Driver installed. Frankly, that probably would have solved the problem. Instead, the system had found the printer and installed the driver using the Microsoft Windows IPP Class Driver:

The ultimate solution was to change from the Windows IPP Class to the Microsoft Software Printer Driver:

This allowed the user to print all the copies desired.

Thin Client: Neoware CA10 (BL-Q2-JD & BK-00-00) (Updated: 03/17/2021)

Rear view of opened ca10

 NOTE: Updates appear at the bottom of this article.

 I bought this version of the CA10 because, well, it was blue. I hadn't seen a blue version before. Turns out that the reason it is blue is that COMVoice had them painted that color. I bought it "as is" for about $10USD.

SPECS:

CPU - VIA C3 800MHz / 1Ghz

GPU - Apollo CLE266 (VIA UniChrome) (shared memory up to 64 MB)

RJ45 - VT6103 Built in PLUS a PCI 3COM NIC

Sound - VT8235M/VT1612A AC97 (Selectable MIDI port addressing and IRQ)

Storage - 256MB DOM (44-pin IDE PATA)

RAM - 1x256MB PC2100 (2 DIMM slots total, 1 available)

USB Ports - 4 Total (@ on back, 2 on front)

Video Ports - VGA / DVI

Power Requirements - 12v 4A, though I was able to use 12V 3.5A

Other Ports - PS2 Keyboard, PS2 Mouse, Line in, Mic out, Two 9-pin serial, 25-pin parallel (printer), PCI

BIOS/CMOS - Phoenix AwardBIOS P640 V:5.03.20F-110205, Ver 6.00 PG, 11/02/2005

Installed OS - Just enough FreeBSD to boot, then system hangs.

The BIOS in this thing allows you to boot from just about anything - HDD0/HDD1, floppy, LS120, SCSI, CD, a slew of USB devices, and more. I could *NOT* use a USB keyboard. However, the BIOS has an option to enable USB keyboard support and that was disabled. I enabled it and was instantly able to use the USB keyboard while still in BIOS. Whoa. The BIOS allows the user to set memory speed timings, theoretically opening the door for some overclocking.

Crystal sound card shown along with ide-to-sata cable and 768mb RAM.

 

The unit I got had high corrosion and would only post every so often. I swapped DOM cards and tried IDE/SD Readers, but the system always corrupted the drive data. Instead, I created a bootable microsd with DOS 6.22 and tried with that plugged into the USB port in the back. That, too, eventually quit working at random intervals.

Below is what I could make work for short periods of time:

Operating Systems:

DOS 6.22 PARTIAL (256MB RAM, 2GB DOM) -  DOS installs. None of the sound drivers I downloaded would allow the audio to play in DOS games. Sound only worked via PC Speaker. However, I installed a Sound Blaster Live! PCI card and the DOS driver. It works very well! Games like Wolf3d, Duke3d, Doom, Ultima Underworld 1, etc had digital sound and music.

WFW 3.11 PARTIAL (256MB RAM, 2GB DOM) - Installed fine, but again no sound drivers.

Windows 95 PARTIAL (256Mb RAM, 256MB DOM) - I had to delete everything except just enough to boot DOS with HIMEM.SYS after copying the Win95 installation folder to the drive. I also deleted AOL*.*, MSN*.*, CHL*.CAB, and possibly a few other files from the Win95 setup directory. I chose the "Compact" installation. I chose to select options not to install, but the only options were Disk Defrag and Disk Compression. So, I deselected them. Setup asked for the now-deleted AOL files, but I told it to just Skip them. When Windows installed, it wanted to set up active channel. ctrl-alt-del to bring up task manager. Kill IE4Setup then kill the Active Setup. You are now at the desktop! At the end of the install, I had 82 MB free. No sound, etc since sound is HD. (Though could install the SBLive and use Win95 drivers).

Windows 98SE WORKS (768MB RAM, 2GB DOM) - This took a bit of creative problem solving. When you boot from a USB stick, the computer treats it as a hard drive (C:), so installing Windows would mean installing to the USB. So, I booted to a DOS-ready USB, FDISK and formatted the 2gb DOM. I then copied the Windows 98 setup files to the DOM. After that, I rebooted with a Win98 CD. Because the setup does not recognize USB drives, the CD defaulted to A: which allowed me to switch to the C: drive (DOM) and run the setup from there. I installed the Vinyl-7b sound drivers and the UniChrome VGA drivers.

Windows XP WORKS (768MB RAM, 120GB SATA) - I installed a DOM-to-SATA adapter then plugged in a 120GB 2.5 SATA HDD. I booted from a WinXP setup disc. This is a SLOW process. I don't think I have ever seen every single pre-loaded driver's name on the screen before. Usually those whip by. Not with this device. The network card was detected during setup. I disabled everything but TCPIP when prompted, as I had encountered blue screening during certain phases of the installation. After installation, I installed Vinyl7b (v700b.zip) drivers for sound. For video, use the UniChromeIGP driver. Video supports DX7, DX8, and DX9. I did not test anything beyond DX9. Research shows that XPEmbedded was the OS of choice for this, so it makes sense that XP does moderately well once installed.

Windows 7 WORKS (768MB RAM, 120GB SATA) - I installed a DOM-to-SATA adapter then plugged in a 120GB 2.5 SATA HDD. I booted from a Win7 setup DVD. This was *NOT* fast!  It took nearly 10 minutes to get to the partitioning screens.  Once setup finally finished, I was able to install Crystal CS4281 drivers to go along with the PCI sound card I had installed using the riser adapter. Unfortunately, the system always reported "not enough resources." I thought this was an IRQ/DMA issue, but after disabling a bunch of built-in devices, I believe the issue is simply that no Windows 7 driver exists (that I could find) for the card. The system functions, but is much too slow to serve as anything other than novelty.

TBD: Windows 8.1

TBD: Windows 10

*NOTES:

03/17/2021 - I installed a SBLive (CT4830) using the PCI slot and a 90-degree adapter. I installed the DOS drivers for it and after a reboot, I had Sound Blaster emulation running for DOS games! 

03/16/2021 -  I received a replacement unit that was a slight "upgrade" from my original board. This one has the "BK" designation, indicating it had the DVI connector on the back in addition to VGA and the processor is bumped to 1Ghz. Everything else, so far as I could tell, was the same.

03/12/2021 - Unfortunately, after the initial Win95 install, the unit would no longer POST. I think the corrosion on the motherboard finally caused the thing to bite the dust. 

I do plan to get a replacement motherboard, though. I just can't help myself. I love this blue case and the form factor will make for a fun little retro machine.

I received a new board on 3/11/2021, but it was DOA - it would show a red light when plugged in and I could press power, but it would never boot. The company I bought it from is doing a cross-shipped RMA, which is very nice of them!

The original board went through some more testing. I was able to get it to boot so long as it was out of the case AND the power button panel was no longer screwed into the case. I surmised we had a grounding problem. This was confirmed by experimenting with various configurations on the system inside the case and out. I eventually laid a piece of anti-static bag under the system board. This works intermittently, but more often than not working.

Thin Client: Wyse Cx0 Notes, Experiences (Updated: 02/03/2021)

 

I bought a super-cheap Wyse Cx0 Thin Client off eBay some time ago, and I have been toying with it a bit. This post serves as a catch-all place for my information regarding the device. Note: information may be added, updated, or deleted at any time.

Let's talk hardware specs to get things going:

CPU - Via C7

GPU - VX855 Chrome9

RJ45 (Wired Ethernet) - VT6122 (Velocity)

Sound - Vinyl HD (uses version 7.9 drivers)

Storage - 2.5-inch IDE interface (male connector on motherboard)

RAM - 1xDDR2 SODIMM

USB Ports - 4 USB 2.0 Ports (2 in front, 2 in back)

Video Ports - DVI Connector

Power Requirements - 12V, 2.5A AC Adapter

Other Ports - 1 PS/2 Mouse, 1 PS/2 Keyboard

Mine came preinstalled with some kind of thin client software (I do not believe it was XP Embedded)

BIOS was locked with a password. Password for WYSE is Fireport. The BIOS allows user to change boot sequence and enable/disable some basic items. Very limited BIOS. 

The system accepted bootable CD/DVDs and also USB floppy drive as bootable media. You can also boot from properly formatted USB storage. Makes for a very flexible installation environment.

Since the storage is IDE, everything just worked when installing anything from DOS 6.22 to XP as far as install goes. My unit had 512MB RAM and a 128 MB DOM (Disk on Module) 44-pin PATA board. 

I purchased a 2.5-inch ribbon cable (F-F) and a 2.5-inch IDE-to-SD adapter. This allowed me to swap out storage options at any time (er, with the top cover removed, of course).

Speaking of top cover, there are two plastic clips at the front corners of the lid, making it a bit of a hassle to remove. I snipped those off so that the lid can just come off when I remove the single screw (on back of unit) to open the case. 

OPERATING SYSTEMS - ALL MUST BE 16-bit or 32-bit ONLY!

In every case, booting with USB keyboard and mouse already plugged in showed no problems installing/using the OS. The speed rating (Class) of your SD card makes all the difference! Be sure to use Class 6 or higher.

DOS 6.22 (512MB RAM, 512MB SD) - DOS installs easily from USB Floppy (or bootable USB). In order to install games like Wolf3d or Duke3d, I had to employ the use of MoSlo. Once the games were installed, though, the Wyse ran the games themselves just fine without the helper. Duke3d ran VESA 800x600 smoothly. The Secret of Monkey Island Demo played nicely in EGA mode (hmm, maybe it was VGA mode). There is NO SOUND BLASTER SOUND. The Vinyl HD audio does not have a DOS driver. I tried a variety of VIA-related drivers, hacks, etc and in each case, the dreaded "No VIA Chipset detected" message (or something similar) would appear. Programs that support the PC Speaker will output sound to the piezo speaker built onto the motherboard. This would make for a compact, spry DOS game machine if only there was sound support.

I installed DOS on the 128MB built-in flash and then after I swapped out for the SD/IDE adapter, I installed DOS to a 512MB MicroSD with an adapter. Works great!

Windows for Workgroups (WFW 3.11) (512MB RAM, 512MB SD) - Installed on same SD as the DOS install above. Windows would not boot. Either got a scrambled splash screen or a "Divide Overflow" error on a mangled splash screen. I changed various video settings and tried MoSlo, but nothing worked for me. I gave up trying to make it work.

Windows 95 (512MB RAM, 512MB SD) - Formatted SD with DOS. Copied Win95 setup folder from CD to SD card. Did not choose Sound, Network, etc during setup. Could not get any drivers to work (even though they came from the VIA downloads site).

Windows 98 (512MB RAM, 512MB SD) - Installed with no problem that I recall. Used LAN drivers from the XP Drivers file below. Could not get sound nor video drivers to work. I installed VIA Hyperion Drivers v5.24a and the VIA Retro Drivers (from here) along with the USB 2.0 Driver Pack (Here). After the install, reboot and the system should find new system-level devices. If asked to search for drivers, just click NEXT and let Windows find what it needs. I also recommend Phil's Win98 Easy DOS Mode PIF! More info here!

Windows XP (512MB RAM, 4GB SD) - Windows XP installs with no problems. Finding drivers, however, was a royal pain. To help with that, I created a ZIP file that has the XP drivers for video, sound, networking, and chipset. You can grab those here.

Windows 7 - (2GB RAM, 40GB 2.5-inch Drive) - Straight-forward install from USB DVD drive (though could have used a bootable USB). Install takes a while. Windows 7 detected sound and network. Using the OS is painfully slow. The system hits the hard drive in a nearly constant state. Attempting to download, install, then use Chrome was a smack in the face of the reality of the limitations of older hardware - especially running at 1GHz with only 2GB of RAM. Firefox was slightly better in that I could at least surf pages, download video drivers, etc. However, the video drivers reported that I had the wrong version of Windows (perhaps because Win7 wasn't registered during testing?). In any case, Win7 saw it was a vx855 chipset and allowed me to change to all sorts of resolutions.

*Note: I tried to install on a 128GB SD card and Windows said it could not install it to that device because it couldn't find a bootbale BIOS setting for it. I switched to a 40GB 2.5-inch IDE drive from an old laptop.

Windows 10 (2GB RAM, Various drives) - I tried a variety of drives (SD, 2.5-inch IDE) and each time, the installer gave me an IRQ Not Less Than (or whatever) blue screen. I never could get Win10 to install on this device.

Windows 8.1 (2GB RAM, 128GB SD) - Since Windows 10 failed, I thought I would try Windows 8.1 Pro. Note that at several times during the install, the system will appear to lock up. Just be patient. System will countdown to a reboot. Shut off the unit here. Otherwise, it will boot back to the setup USB drive. Initial setup took quite a bit of time. This will vary based on the speed of your SD and the throughput of the onboard IDE controller. Again, be patient. During setup, got an error that UUID was not supported and it logged me out. I then tried to log back in, and setup continued. Like Windows 7, setup detected everything except for the video card. And, like Windows 7, I could change to a variety of resolutions. 

DOSBox Distro (1GB RAM, 16GB USB) - There is an interesting project that uses TinyCore Linux to serve as a loader for DOSBox. This actually worked decently on the Cx0. The software itself has issues. For example, some programs dump you back to the DOS prompt, but are actually trying to run in the Linux environment behind the scenes. You can't get to it, though, because task switching is disabled in the system. Overall, things boot and run rather slowly. However, you do get Sound Blaster sounds out of the headphone jack! There was no adlib music even though the games did detect adlib capability. Not sure what's going on there. This has potential promise as a workaround for running DOS games with Sound Blaster on the Cx0.

 

Lenovo e550 Thinkpad Red Light Only No Boot (Possible Solutions)

Have a user with a Lenovo E550 laptop. The laptop was working fine while watching videos, etc, but would sometimes appear to turn off without being able to come back on.

The Thinkpad light would come on (red light in the logo in the wrist rest area), but the unit would not power up. Fans would not spin up, no POST, no boot, no hard drive sounds.

We found several solutions that have worked intermittently  (that is, seemingly randomly):

• Remove the battery. Leave the AC plugged in. Hold power button for 30 seconds. Red Thinkpad light will blink 3 times. Unplug the power. Hold the power button down again for 30 seconds. Plus the AC back in, but leave the battery out. Turn on the laptop. If it boots, shut it down and put the battery back in. Boot the laptop.
• Remove the battery. Leave the AC plugged in. Connect an external VGA monitor. Hold the power button for 30 seconds (until red Thinkpad light blinks 3 times). Turn on the laptop. If the laptop boots, it will most likely show on the monitor instead of the built-in display. Once booted, change the display options to make the built-in display panel the primary display. Shut down the laptop. Unplug the VGA cable. Boot the laptop. If it boots, shut down the laptop, insert the battery, and reboot the laptop.
• Turn off the laptop (hold power button until Thinkpad red light goes out). Remove the battery. Unplug the AC adapter. Turn the laptop over and remove the three screws holding the large plate that covers the RAM and hard drive. Remove back cover. Near the hard drive, find a wrapped CMOS battery (looks like a watch battery). There are two wires with a plug adapter at the end. Disengage the plug gently. It is a TIGHT fit, so be careful. With the CMOD battery disconnected, turn the laptop over and plug in the AC. Open the laptop and turn it on. When it boots, you will get an error that the time and date a re wrong. Hold the power button until the laptop turns off. Unplug the AC adapter. Turn the laptop over again. Reconnect the CMOS battery. Again, this is a TIGHT fit, so be careful. Replace the back panel and attach the screws. Turn the laptop back over, reinstall the battery and connect the AC. Turn on the laptop. You should get an error about the time and date. Follow the on-screen instructions for setting those then you should be able to boot as normal.

As we find other solutions to this problem, I will update this post. Hope it helps!

 

Windows screen upside-down or sideways?

If you suddenly find yourself looking at your desktop sideways or it is upside down, chances are you've run into a "feature" built-in to several graphics card software.

The easy fix is to hold CTRL-ALT and while holding those, press one of the directional arrow keys on your keyboard.  Here is a list of commands anf their results:

CTRL-ALT-UP ARROW = Upside-right/Normal screen
CTRL-ALT-DOWN ARROW = Upside-down screen
CTRL-ALT-RIGHT ARROW = Screen turned on it's side to right
CTRL-ALT-LEFT ARROWN = Screen turned on it's side to left

Note: You do not have to cycle through these!  Simply press CTRL-ALT-UP and your screen will return to normal, regardless of its current state.

Work Life: IP Address range Calculator

November 30, 2012

Need a quick way to find the IP address range for a network? There is an online calculator here:

http://www.csgnetwork.com/ipinfocalc.html

You enter any address on the network, then input the subnet mask, tell the page to calculate the range and Voila! It will give you the 1st address in the range, the last address in the range and the broadcast address.

Work Life: Remote Shutdown Windows Server

November 30, 2012

I thought I had lost my old friend shutdown.exe that I found on one of the old Resource Kits, but found out I hadn't and with Windows Server 2003, it's included. I loved the ability to reboot computers when I was out of the office and of course before WSUS some updates required a restart so this tool came in real handy. With this tool you can restart, shutdown or Annotate Unexpected Shutdown. I won't use the last one but the first two are useful.

From the server, open a command prompt and type in shutdown /i. It's not the old GUI interface but it is workable. Select the system you wish to shutdown using the browse button or just type it in. You must give it a reason as the Event Tracker is back. I tend to turn it off on my servers, hate it...

This tool is great for administrators who have large sites and want to give their feet a break!

Work Life: Dueling DHCP Servers (DNS Errors, Unauthenticated Networks)

Heya!
  Today, I visited a school that was having issues with some of their computers in specific locations. Usually, when a district calls with something like that, we start in the room(s) where the trouble seems to be and work our way outward from there. In this case, there was an elementary lab in which all but one row of computers was throwing up some weird errors.

The machines are running Windows 7, and the network icon in the system tray would change from the standard computer to one with a yellow warning triangle. Then, a message would pop up stating that the computer was connected to the local network but was "unauthenticated." Other computers showed the normal computer icon but when they tried to get online, the browser would throw up messages about unresolved DNS issues, etc.

When the tech would check the IP address on any of the errant machines, the initial address would show the local network scheme. However, when the warning icon appeared, an ipconfig revealed the address had been changed to a 192.168 range.

That range, as many of you know, is where things like wifi routers like to live. So, I asked about switches, other network equipment, etc.  The tech had put in a new switch (new to them) that they had received from another district. Since the "new" switch was an HP Procurve, I thought maybe something was going on there. Plus, that had been the most recent change the tech could remember at the time.

I removed the switch and was about to put in another switch, the tech came in and told me that she remembered they were testing their new Kajeet-based MiFi hotspots at about the same time everything went wacko.

Instantly, we had our answer. You see, when they were testing the hotspots, they were using them in tethered mode, meaning they hooked up the device to the computer via USB cable and let the computer use that as the connection. Well, the hotspot is set up to hand out IP addresses (DHCP). Normally, this is not an issue - the computer gets an IP address and life goes on.

Here is the rub: If the computer in question is ALSO connected to the local network (via Ethernet cable, for example), the hotspot actually communicates down that wired line through the computer it is connected to. So... The hotspot was answering DHCP requests from certain computers on the network. Of course, I want to know why only those specific computers and not, say, computers spread throughout the district. Unfortunately, we may never know the answer because all of the trouble took place the day before I arrived and the hotspots were already disbursed.

So, in a nutshell (the TL;DR version, I suppose you kids would say these days): Erratic computer connectivity might be blamed on multiple DHCP devices on your network. Check for Wireless Routers, tethered hotspots, internet connection sharing, etc.

Work Life: Windows 10 is a pain in the butt

Windows 10 is a pain in the butt. There, I said it. I feel better, don't you? So, what makes WinX such a pain? How about we start with setting up a laptop. Please note: the following is based on MY personal experience and may or may not reflect what has happened to anyone else on the face of the planet - though, judging by the number of articles I found to help get me through the painful setup, I could easily surmise that, unlike Tigger, I'm NOT the only one.

The device: Brand new Dell Latitude E5570

The laptop was supposed to ship with windows 10 already installed. Nope. This one came with windows 7 and a WinX install DVD. No problem, right? Wrong.

Because the laptop had Windows 7, the BIOS was set to Legacy Mode, meaning Windows 10 wasn't going to play nice. Windows 10, if you haven't heard, requires UEFI/EFI BIOS. If those are geek/greek-speak, don't worry. I am not going into details, other than to explain how I got Windows 10 installed.

In the BIOS, I had to disable Legacy Mode. I wasn't allowed to. Why not? Because Windows 7 had already started the install process and became the defacto BIOS type. Yay. I eventually found my way to a "Factory Reset" option that allowed me to set UEFI! Yay!

Not so fast. Once the UEFI was set (along with Secure Boot), I had to pick a boot rom with which to start the computer. I had no such thing. Yoy. Okay, I hooked up the external DVD drive, slammed the WinX DVD into it and rebooted. Luckily, the computer immediately booted to the DVD! Yay!

Not so fast. I was presented with a WinX interface that asked me what I wanted to do - Factory Reset, Recovery, Reload, Eat Pizza on Tuesday with a Goat... Well, you get the idea. After several false starts, I finally managed to find the selection that seemed to work: Recovery. Yay!

Not so fast. The recovery did just that: It recovered, or tried to anyway, the Windows 7 install that first loaded when I booted the machine. I restarted the laptop and let it boot to the DVD. I am 99.99% sure I chose the exact same "Recovery" option, only this time, the system seemed to be reading the DVD and I could only guess/assume that things were installing Windows 10. Yay!

Welcome to Windows 10!

Wahoo!! Windows 10 installed and all was right with the world. Yay!

Not so fast. You see, the DVD only had Windows 10 on it. It had none of the required drivers for the laptop. A quick search to Dell (from another computer that could actually talk to the web) revealed a 580mb CAB file. Yay!

Not so fast. I burned the CAB file to a CD (from another computer) and loaded it onto the laptop. using the steps found in this VERY handy guide, I was able to expand the CAB and install the drivers via command line. Yay!

Not so fast. Edge would not run because I was logged in as the built-in administrator, even though I was actually using a user I had created. So, I eventually came upon THIS handy article about letting the ADMINISTRATOR actually run crap in Windows 10!

I installed various browsers, office software, printers, etc. Then, I installed Avast A/V that we use here. Yay!

Not so fast. Avast would not start various services it needed. Things kept erroring out. After some not-at-all-helpful searching, I decided to reinstall the program. After that finished, I was asked to restart the computer. Things were looking good! Yay!

Not so fast. When the laptop rebooted, I was greeted with a simple blue screen that only told me that a "device required isn't connected or can't accessed" (or something similar to that). After MUCH searching, the issue seemed to be related to the Secure Boot that was enabled in BIOS. So, reboot to BIOS and disable Secure Boot. Reboot the laptop and everything *seems* to be working. Yay!

I share this not as a simple whine-fest, but to let folks know that Windows 10 is not necessarily a straight-forward installation, even from scratch. But, with some perseverance and trial and error, you can get through it. Or, if anything, you stumble on an article like this that lets you know you aren't alone.

TL;DR - Windows 10 is a pain in the butt.

Work Life: Toshiba Copiers No Longer Send Email - FIXED!!

If you are a Google Apps environment, you may have issues sending email from your network copiers. I'm not sure what changed recently (June 2016), but there is a FIX!

Though the steps below are specific to Toshiba copiers, the general concept should apply to just about any copier or other device being used to send email from your site:


Thanks to user DeenMustapha on the SpiceWorks community boards for the following fix!

On the Toshiba:

- Enable SMTP Client: Enable

- Enable SSL: Disable

- SMTP Server Address: smtp-relay.gmail.com

- POP Before SMTP: Disable

- Authentication: Disable

- Login Name and Password: I left my Google Apps User and Password

- Max. Email/InternetFax Size: 15MB

- Port Number: 25

In the Google Admin Console: See here - https://support.google.com/a/answer/2956491

- Go to Apps > Google Apps > Gmail > Advanced settings

- Scroll down to SMTP relay service - Configure

1. Allowed senders: Only addresses in my domains

2. Authentication: Check Only accept mail from the specified IP addresses - Add your customer's static IP. Leave Require SMTP Authentication unchecked.

3. Encryption: Leave Require TLS encryption unchecked.

Then click Add Setting and Save. Could take up to an hour to have the settings take effect...

Give it a try and let me know if it works for you. Good Luck!

Work Life - FIX: System Error detoured.dll is missing

I had a user that called with a problem logging into her computer. Upon boot, she was greeted with a dialog box that said "Logonui.exe cannot load. The program cannot start because detoured.dll is missing from your computer..."

After some extensive research and multiple dead ends, I found a solution that worked. I'm not if the solution breaks anything in the process, but I suppose time will tell there.

NOTE: The following info relates to your system registry. Modifying your registry can lead to negative results and may even make your system unusable. Use the following information AT YOUR OWN RISK. If you do not feel comfortable with the following, the DO NOT do them. I am NOT responsible for any negative effects changes to your registry may have on your system. The following is for information only.

Basically, this is what I did:

• Managed to get logged in by repeatedly clicking the OK button.
• The error resurfaced with ANY program I tried to run.
• I just kept clicking OK to get out of error and launch the program I wanted.
• Open REGEDIT as Administrator
• Navigate to the following key:
• HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft NT\CurrentVersion\Windows\
• On the right, I found the following entry:
• AppInit_DLLs
• I deleted the key (It had some kind of command in there I did not recognize, though it was NOT the detoured.dll, either. So... We'll see what adverse effects there are, if any, on the user's computer.
• Instantly, the errors disappeared. I could run any program (including the ones I had run before) without the error.
• Will scan the user's computer for malicious activity.

Note, the exact registry key info above came from:
http://www.megaleecher.net/One_Click_Solution_For_detoured.dll_Error#axzz42FLl8uGJ

Work Life: Mysterious Floating Sound Mixer Volume Control

At the office, I noticed that when I clicked on the Volume Control, the slider was floating in the middle of my left screen! I have dual monitors and that may or may not be part of the culprit. In any case, I was able to solve the problem and thought I would share my problem and solution.

First, the problem:

When I click on the volume control, it jumps to the middle of my left-most monitor:

Now, in my case, it was something to do with an ATI Catalyst update. So, if you are running ATI, you may see this issue. If you are NOT running, ATI, there is another possible solution at the bottom of this post. 

Open the Catalyst Control Center, and expand "HydraVision." After that, click on "Desktop manager:"

At the bottom of that dialog on the right, UNCHECK the box labeled "Enable Dialog Repositioning:"

After that, click APPLY and you should be good to go:

If you are not running ATI Catalyst, you might be able to fix it by doing this:

1. Right-Click the Taskbar 
2. Click Properties
3. Click "Customize..." in the Notification area section
4. UNCHECK "Always show all icons..." at bottom.
5. Click OK

See if that fixes the problem. If it STILL doesn't fix it, try repeating the steps above, but this time CHECK the box for "Always show..."

Hope this helps!

Work Life: A Three-Hour Tour... USB Driver Access Denied Error

Had to post this in case I run up against it later (or someone else surfing the web comes across the same problem).

Had a user with a new USB flash drive. Insert the flash drive (Win7, 32-bit) and Windows would not recognize it on her machine. Other machines, drive worked fine.

When manually attempting to update the driver in Device Manager, system would return an "access denied" error.

Googled various similar situations. Advice ranged from wiping Windows out and reinstall to copying USBSTOR.INF and USBSTOR.DNF files from DriverStore directory on the hard drive. Tried System Restore but it would fail with "access denied" errors. Tried resetting permissions on various registry entries, system files, etc. None of that fixed our issue after an hour of troubleshooting. Went home to sleep on it at end of day.

Tried to run Combofix, but got a "permission denied" error accessing the registry.

Decided to try Tweaking.com's All-In-One fixer. I ran various permission fixes, etc.  Though that seemed to reset certain things, USB stick would still not install. But, it DID let me run ComboFix.

I waited to run ComboFix because I had been poking around MSConfig, per a forum suggestion for similar problem, and saw something weird in there. One of the services set to run was something called "SystemK." I checked it out and it is a program called "Settings Manager" from Aztec Media. It is also listed as malware. So, I took the easy way out and found it in the list of programs I could uninstall and I uninstalled it.

Then, I ran Combofix. I rebooted after Combofix, even though it did not tell me to. I wanted to be sure any services that were fixed and/or removed were still not running.

After I booted back up, I plugged in the flash drive and it failed. But, I went to Device Manager and told it to search online for drivers and that fixed it this time!

The system would not open the "What do you want to do" box, so I typed "Autorun" in the windows search box (when you click the start button) and reset to defaults. Now, that was working again.

Total time on task: 3 hours

Could I have wiped the system clean and reinstalled faster than that? Yes. But then I would have had to reinstall all the user's software (including things like Insight360, specialized mathematics instructional software and emulators, etc).

A weird side-effect? PDFs were no longer associated with Adobe Reader. That was an easy fix, though - just tell Windows what to use to open PDFs.

Hope this helps somebody out there.