CoffeeFiend

Perhaps you're talking about the one you linked to (I haven't bothered looking, and it's not even for the OS I'm using). But if it's just the original installer using the same switches, then it WON'T isntall unless you also have WGA installed - all you'll get is a "IECUSTOM: Setup cannot continute because this system doesn't pass the Windows Genuine Advantage validation check. Please run the setup program again in attended mode." error in ie7.log - it will NOT install. Had you even tried, you'd know... (yes, that's on a real 100% legit install, just without the WGA spyware installed). Besides, your installer couldn't tell if it's a legit install without WGA, yet you say it needs to be legit (it couldn't tell without it). Using IEAK it installs perfectly fine, there's no WGA checks at all. But, a IEAK-made installer will work exactly 100.00% of the time, wheter if WGA is installed or not, wheter if you're connected to the internet or not, or if WGA says it's valid or if it mistakenly thinks it's not... The ONLY installer I'd ever use is a IEAK-made one. You might wanna know what you're talking about before you call others clueless. Pot, meet kettle... RogueSpear: yes, VERY much so.

If you're gonna do crash dump analysis (or use windbg or kd at all really), you might wanna fix your symbol path first...

Totally wrong. CSS support in IE7 is hardly better than IE6. CSS is the weakest point in IE (well, that and security). Firefox (and Opera, and ...) has WAY better CSS support. Just see for yourself... IE7 has tabs and is somewhat more secure [supposedly], that's about it. Standard support? The IE team doesn't care. In another 50 years maybe IE will support proper xhtml mime type too... I don't see why you would blame the website and accuse them of doing browser sniffing when CSS support in IE is known to suck badly (again, check acid2 test results and such). Lots of websites don't work right in IE7 (e.g. slashdot.org)

Zxian: very good points. Totally agree. jcarle: yes. I don't know what's the point of arguing how Windows run on hardware that's like over 6 years old. I had a faster PC than that before XP even came out (and I had that much RAM on a pentium 1). I just given away my last CPU that was under 3GHz this week (an Athlon XP 2400+ that was in the kids' PC, along with motherboard and RAM). My new slowest PC is a P4 3.06GHz with 1.5GB RAM. With the prices of hardware today, I can't see a reason to use a P2 400 with hardly any memory at all - very much making jcarle's point: if you're running on that kind of hardware, it's not some tweaking you need, but a computer out of this century!

Well, I do use genuine windows, and none of those installers posted here on forums won't install - just because i chose not to install the WGA spyware on my PCs (and I don't see why I would want it). And yes, it IS genuine. All you get is an error message in a log file. The solution (like I've mentionned in another thread) for those who don't want that WGA junk on their PCs like me is to use IEAK to make their own installer. I've tried a few builds using IEAK on systems that don't have WGA installed (legit, just without that spyware), and they install just fine. Either there's no WGA check, or it skips it if it's not installed. No errors in logfiles or anything. No idea if it would work on a system with non-genuine OS and WGA installed (or not validating for some reason). So in short, even with a genuine copy of windows, this won't work, unless you install that MS spyware too (thanks, but no thanks!)

I hate to bump threads for the sake of bumping threads, but I think I should, just in case anyone decided to look into that priority saver app - which seemed pretty good. The features are nice at least. Too bad it BSODs your box! You get a lovely DRIVER_IRQL_NOT_LESS_OR_EQUAL inside prio.sys @ prio+1405 There's some nasty network driver that ships with it (not that I ever wanted the network part of it, just the processes one). That's one app I'm never trusting again!

Yes, and IE7 does break some of them. Just noticed the IBM DB2 installer won't work anymore since I installed IE7. And while I do think it sucks, it's still useful to test websites against this new browser (along with all the others).

I was going to suggest the same... I'm surprised they're that expensive. Every week my usual hardware store has several decent DVD writers under 40$CDN (Samsung, LG and Pioneer currently). Even if it wasn't for installing, a PC without any kind of optical drive? That would really suck.

I don't find it unintelligent at all. I very much agree with everything he said. Some users might build a computer for one single purpose, kind of like your brother does, but those are exceptions. I am retired and on disability insurance, and I'm single parent (2 daughters), so I'm not exactly rich either (just had to buy winter clothes, xmas is coming, etc) and I'm building a very nice Core 2 Duo rig... Not on credit either. Hardware's cheap nowadays. About error reporting, like cluberti mentionned, it's an automated process (it looks for a Bucket ID in a database). And the data being sent is very minimal (not a full memory dump with all usermode memory of running apps and such - that'd be WAY too big, more akin to a minidump - not even a kernel mode dump). Countless errors are sent in everyday, it's not like some guy sits there, looking at them manually, trying to gather information about you or your habits. The main reason is to find culprits (usually bad drivers or faulty hardware) and help people resolve their problems.

If you mean the original installer, yes, it does check WGA in unattended mode (WGA has to be installed, and to report a legit install). If WGA is not installed, it won't install and you'll have an error message in the install log saying to install attended.

More like: everything > norton junk The only half-decent thing Symantec makes these days is their antivirus removal tool, and even then... NOD32's definitely a good choice anyway.

That really should be a surprise to nobody. Microsoft is a corporation, their sole purpose is to make money - much like every other company out there. This is called capitalism. Control is about keeping your users, again, that's something a LOT of companies do everyday. Nothing new here. That's called MARKETING! Again, pretty much all companies out there do just the same, trying not so much to sell you a product, but a lifestyle or such, playing with your emotions and all. Again, that shouldn't be news to anyone. Exactly! Just like a space shuttle is just a glorified pair of flip-flops or other such primitive means of transportation. And the mona lisa is just a painting... </sarcasm> All modern OS'es to FAR more than this (like memory management and paging, handling various filesystems, IPC, provide various network stacks, come with several services/daemons and clients for them, have multimedia subsystems, do scheduling, secure stuff at various levels, comes with basic apps/utilities, etc - a VERY VERY long list). But that being said, there's nothing wrong with disabling stuff on your own PC that your positively certain you're not going to use. On a side note... Wow! IE7 is such a buggy pile of ****!

update.exe and the other executables inside the main installer say they support that /integrate switch, but I guess you didn't try them. You get an error message that says: "Extracted packages cannot be integrated. The /integrate switch must be used with the original software update package." And the main installer doesn't have a /integrate switch. So you can just forget about using that switch, it just WON'T integrate (that would have been useful, so MS had to disable it). Your best bet right now is a switchless silent installer. IEAK works great for this.

cluberti: and i think it's a good thing you "chimed in". Disabling a major amount of services (and functionnality going with it) might lead to a small performance increase. I have no problems with that part, but assuming "nobody uses this stuff" when it's someone else's PC... I use most of these services that "nobody uses" almost everyday. And lots of the saying "this is useless" is often because someone doesn't understand what something does, like the indexing service, it REALLY does speed up searches dramatically when proper indexes are created. It's very handy, and the indexing service can be called/used by other apps (like a web client like I use, or those newfangled desktop search apps), or Windows Time (kerberos needs good time sync, or SMB is going to be slow like a dog), performance logs/alerts? Routinely use that. Same for remote registry, etc. Advanced users usually know what they don't use or need, but guessing for someone else...

Asking to bypass WGA on pirated software is against forum rules...

Uh, what are you assuming I know nothing about exactly? (Your point is not clear at all) I am not exactly a n00b at securing apps. I have no idea what you're trying to say here. You basically said he must be right, because he assume it was a specific type of attack, which is almost as likely as picking the winning lottery numbers. But you're asking what else his "html injection" can mean? It's totally irrelevant. We're not dicussing what "html injection" means here, but rather the "i bet he's right" part. There is just no reason to believe he's right, it very well could have been - and likely was - one of the other ways.

The Zen I mentionned is a Creative player But 2GB max... Ouch. I wouldn't be caught dead buying an iPod.

I'm almost surprised they still sell CD based ones. I bought one 5+ years ago, because back then the flash based players were minuscule (like 32MB ram or such), and cost an arm and a leg, so it was a good deal. The flash based players only held a few low-bitrate songs (# depending on bitrate), and if you wanted more, you needed to buy and carry more players, whereas the CD based one had far better capacity with a single disc, and if you were carrying a couple extra CDs (cheap too), you had a couple GB on hand. It just didn't compare. (To be fair, the nomad came out sometime after, but that was over 500$, it was just as big, heavier, and capacity was no better than the CD player with a few CDs) But nowadays there's countless great players out there. From tiny and inexpensive flash based players to very nice HD based ones with large capacities (at least 60GB). If you only want to carry a few at a time (and don't want to put something else on it), then the tiny and inexpensive flash based players are good. You need more space (lots of music at once/high bitrates/other data files/videos/etc) or things like video playback, can afford to pay a little more and don't mind the extra bit of weight, then the HD based ones are way to go - they typically have much more advanced features too: things like video playback, watching photos (or things like show album covers as you're listening to music), sleep timers, DSPs and equalizers, etc. I can even empty my memory cards directly on mine - very handy as RAW files fill 2GB cards real quick @ 12MB a pop, and I'm already carrying the mp3 player with me (far lighter than lugging around any laptop too). It's big enough that I can carry a couple mpeg4 movies (xvid) with me if I'm travelling or something. The CD based ones just don't have any advantage anymore (none that I can see at least). Price wise, the flash based ones win. Capacity wise, the HD based ones win. convenience wise, flash/HD ones beat CD players: easily rotate stuff, no need to burn CDs all the time, no need to carry around a bunch of extra CDs, the CD players are the biggest thing and the heaviest to lug around, not very good for things like exercise/running, etc. They were the best thing a while ago, but that time is long over. Personally, I love my Gigabeat. If it wasn't for that, I'd have likely bought a iRiver instead, or a Zen as a 3rd choice. Now the Zune is coming out, and I'd likely be getting that if I was buying one again. Just my 2 cents...

Disagree on the balancing part, but agree on the last bit I quoted somewhat. They're releasing some very nice free stuff lately - just look at all the "Express Edition" products (IDEs) and SQL Server 2005 Express! (And lots of other very nice things like the .NET frameworks/SDKs/compilers/EntLib/WSE/etc are free too). Most of their other stuff is priced very competitively: SQL Server is much cheaper than Oracle/DB2 in most cases (same goes for most of their enterprise soft), and products like Encarta and Streets & Trips are priced much like the competition. They really only have 2 pricey products I can think of: -MS Office. Really nice, powerful, advanced and all (FAR better than all the other office suites), but $$$ indeed... -Windows - sort of. XP Home OEM is pretty cheap (96$CDN last I checked). Also it costs nearly nothing to OEMs like Dell to bundle it on systems. Vista Retail is on the expensive side I must admit. Vista Ultimate Retail costs almost 100$ more than Windows 2003 R2 Standard(!), and I already found that a bit expensive (for dev & testing use - not as a production server). But the thing that bothers me the most is the price of Vista Home Basic - the "good enough for basic home users" version @ 250$ or so IIRC, which is nearly 3 times more than XP Home OEM costs. The basic edition should be WAY cheaper. I know LOTS of people who bought a legit copy of XP lately (WGA was bothersome, and 100$ is no big deal), but Vista's price... Not sure if they would have - even the upgrade versions of Vista are more expensive than XP is! I'm a bit scared to see how LH Server will cost (I need a uncrippled IIS7) - thanks god for the action pack...

Good point! Good point? By that logic, most software companies owe me money, electronics companies owe me money for their products occupy space in my living room, oil companies owe me money for using up space in my car's tank, etc.

Hence the quotes aroung "programming". Enough with the nitpicking... Python is used too. Everybody using Django, or TurboGears, or Zope, Plone, etc is using Python. It's used by countless sites such as Google (part of their spider and search engine and other projects), yahoo (maps and others), and countless such "nobodies". PHP is pretty much the only language I will not use. There's some apps that have been written in PHP which are worth using (forums for the most part) despite the poor language choice, but other than that... It's better avoided IMO.

No, Win2003 is no faster than XP really. The only opinions I've heard saying that it was were a couple forum posts, and they are just that: opinions of pretty much anybody (based on nothing factual or with nothing to back it up). I've never seen any hard facts, benchmarks, expert opinions or such proving so (and I doubt we ever will). The main thing is configuration here. Win2003 can be FAR heavier depending on what components you run/use. Personally, I use both everyday, and I'd say speed is pretty much equivalent. XP's great for the usual desktop systems, but sometimes 2003 is required (like if you need IIS6, Terminal Server, WM Svcs and other server components, or use apps that will only install on a "server" version of windows like SQL Server [non-dev/express ed], etc) I use VS2005 and Photoshop a LOT (that's perhaps the 2 apps I use the most), and they run perfectly on XP. Or should I say, they're equally fast/slow when running on both platforms. Both are rather heavy and memory intensive apps, and either OS won't change that. Best thing you can do right now is spend some $ on more RAM. VS2005 and Photosop can surely use a LOT more than 1GB (even more if you're running SQL Server Express 2005 along with VS2005 or such in the background)! I had that much RAM in the VS.NET days... and VS2005 is much heavier. Having more RAM will reduce swapping a great deal (using Virtual Memory) which DOES slow any PC down tremendously (HD is slower than RAM by several orders of magnitude - a few nanosec latency vs a few milisec latency for the HD; transfer speeds are also much slower for HDs), MUCH more than switching between those 2 OS'es will ever give you. I'd at least double the RAM (VS2005 is one heavy IDE, and Photoshop is quite heavy too - especially if you use layers a lot, deal with RAW images, do HDR or pano images and such; if you're a firefox user like I am, that can use a lot too) Basically, changing the OS is rather pointless, your performance problem is your apps are memory starved... Just buy some RAM.

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100% disagree. Yes, router consumes not much power, but if one already has a box running 24/7 (for P2P or as a NAS, video server or anything), then using it as a router/NAT box also effectively consumes 0 watts. A Win2003 box is FAR better than any router I've tried out there at being a firewall/NAT, and trust me, I've tried dozens of them (linksys, dlink, netgear, etc). The dinky little routers just don't have enough CPU power and RAM to handle very fast connections. After 2 weeks or so (using BT and emule and other stuff simultaneously), every router I've owned (WRT54G, etc) overheated, started acting up, and after about a month in total, they're totally fried. Yes, I've tried to open them up, put heatsinks on them, fans, etc. They just CAN'T handle today's broadband speeds. And the switches in most of those routers are absolute trash. Transfers a several GBs across them and they overheat and reset all the time - even then I bothered with routers, I had to buy a separate quality switch so the connections wouldn't drop all the time. The switches inside about half the routers I've tried were totally useless and absolute junk. As for using Win2003 for NAT/firewall, using RRAS I have yet to have any problem. It can definitely handle what a router just CAN'T (lots of simultaneous NAT sessions, high speeds, etc). It's a pretty solid/good firewall too (most firewalls in basic routers are a joke, they rely on NAT more than anything as a firewall, and NAT is NOT a firewall). If that's not good enough, then ISA Server on Win2003 is arguably the best firewall out there - definitely better than ALL consumer routers out there no questions asked! (If one doesn't like that, then there's tons of very good linux based firewalls too). Consumer routers suck. I've given up on them a while ago, and I wish I had not wasted as much time and money on them.

Indeed. RegClean is a prime example of registry "cleaners" doing more damage than good. And just like Tarun quoted, it takes a LOT of bloat before it makes any difference. I've tried quite a few over a few years (RegSupreme, JV16, Registry First Aid, etc - registry "defraggers" and compactors too), and it's NEVER made a noticeable difference in speed on any PC, not even once. Unless one has a VERY extreme case there's no point to risk screwing up a system that's working perfectly fine - like Glen said, "if it ain't broke, don't fix it"... And I'm saying a VERY severe case (to quote Mr Russinovich too: "even if the registry was massively bloated there would be little impact on the performance of anything other than exhaustive searches"), in which case likely other things are wrong, and a reinstall might be a better fix. I'll consider using one the day there's some type of benchmark showing how much of an improvement they make or any kind of hard evidence (I don't expect that to ever happen), and that they fully document what they screw up^H^H^H^H^H err, I mean remove - which I'm not expecting any will ever do. It's a bit like letting some app do voodoo magic with your registry. There's potential for a lot of screw ups, and I don't trust them. And considering most cost money, and offer much more potential to screw up things royally than to really offer any improvement... The only registry tool I'd really recommend is a registry backup program, like erunt.