jaclaz

Look here: http://www.msfn.org/board/index.php?showtopic=68677 Comparison of 32 apps by Jeremy. jaclaz

Nice work Jeremy! Your findings are very similar to mine. I would like to add a couple more "specialistic" proggies OLE/ActiveX related (FREEWARE): OLECLEAN http://www.geocities.com/drdole/ScreenShots/OleClean.html Control Registration Utility 2.00 http://www.softcircuits.com/dl/apps/regctrls.zip Using Regseeker, then the two above, and later using ERUNT http://www.larshederer.homepage.t-online.de/erunt/ that includes NTREGOPT, has made the smallest, cleanest Registry I could expect, much better than many COMMERCIAL apps. jaclaz

For a simple backup I can recommend you: Cobian backup http://www.educ.umu.se/~cobian/cobianbackup.htm Freebyte backup http://www.freebyte.com/fbbackup/ and the one I use, SAMEDIR http://samedir.sbn.bz/ (all FREEWARE) jaclaz

@mzar720 READ the article: http://www.microsoft.com/resources/documen...us/winnt32.mspx WINNT32.EXE expects an "answer file", i.e. unattended.txt, NOT a WINNT.SIF file. Read these: http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=314460 http://support.microsoft.com/kb/308662/EN-US/ http://support.microsoft.com/kb/155197 jaclaz

Well NO, you know, you cannot have an "Unattended CD" on a partition, but you can do three things, in order of difficulty: 1) make a bootable hidden partition with DOS files that restore a pre-recorded hard disk image (just like the Dell does with GHOST) 2) make a bootable hidden partition with DOS files and a copy of the (Unattended) setup files, starting them using WINNT.EXE 3) make a bootable hidden partition that boots directly (SETUPLDR.BIN) to a copy of the (Unattended) setup files Read these: http://www.msfn.org/board/index.php?showtopic=26185 http://www.msfn.org/board/index.php?showtopic=37939 http://www.911cd.net/forums//index.php?showtopic=14723 http://www.msfn.org/board/index.php?showtopic=61384 (seemingly unrelated, but not much) I don't know how your Dell hides/unhides partitions, does it have a "hot" key or you need to use a special floppy or something else to hide/unhide it? jaclaz

Yep, it is really slow, however the problem is not when compressing, after all we could well adopt a COUM (Compress Once Uncompress Many) approach, the problem is that it is exceptionally slow at UNcompressing! I wouldn't mind having a far longer time when compressing IF uncompressing is fast and with the promised 20% smaller archives... jaclaz

Looky here, this one must be tested too: [url="http://www.msfn.org/board/index.php?showtopic=68523&hl=firewall"]http://www.msfn.org/board/index.php?showto...523&hl=firewall[/url] jaclaz

Thanks DigeratiPrime, it looks like nice! jaclaz

I think is something connected to the Refresh settings (right click on a page), but it happened to me too, and now it works, cannot really say why. jaclaz

The fact that TESTDISK lets you see the files, does not mean that everything is OK. If TESTDISK did not report any error, assigning a drive letter can be the solution. If TESTDISK reported errors, you should read the docs and repair those errors with TESTDISK. jaclaz

The LVUMSFD.SYS seems like a Win98 Logitech Driver: http://drivermagic.com/p/nph-display.php?a=2943.141 for a USB camera: http://drivermagic.com/p/nph-detail.php?a=2943 Cannot see anything Winamp related.... jaclaz

Most probably it will be enough to recover the MBR and Partition Tables, read these: http://www.msfn.org/board/index.php?showtopic=59145 http://www.msfn.org/board/index.php?showtopic=30378&st=30 jaclaz

looky here: http://www.911cd.net/forums//index.php?showtopic=16048 jaclaz

I think that Maks is referring to changing a boot.ini entry while unattendedly installing, there is something like it here: http://www.msfn.org/board/index.php?showtopic=66101&hl= jaclaz

Here you are: http://www.msfn.org/board/index.php?showtopic=55041 Links to other proggies: http://www.msfn.org/board/index.php?showtopic=55041&st=16 http://www.msfn.org/board/index.php?showtopic=55041&st=23 I use the one from Nirsoft: http://www.nirsoft.net/utils/product_cd_key_viewer.html jaclaz

It's not really my "field" of knowledge, but should you not stop the Service and re-start it? net stop wuauserv net start wuauserv Maybe you can get more help here: http://www.wsus.info/forums/index.php?act=idx jaclaz

You mean something like nmap: http://www.insecure.org/nmap/ http://www.insecure.org/nmap/nmap-fingerpr...ng-article.html jaclaz

Wow, how many PC's did you recover this way? If we average 50 US$ per RAM stick, it needs to make US$ 2,000,000 (the bare minimum to say millions) : 2,000,000/50=40,000 sticks Assuming that less than 5% of all the PC's develop this kind of problem, and averaging two sticks per PC, it means that you were managing (prudentially) something like 40,000/0.05=800,000/2=400,000 PC's Supposing this chore was spread over a 5 year period, averaging 230 working days per year: 40,000/5=8,000 sticks per year 8,000/230=34.78 sticks per day Assuming 8 hours of work per day: 34.78/8=4.35 sticks per hour i.e. more or less one stick every fifteen minutes. ...or you had just one day per week for "RAM laundry" say Friday? in the latter case we have 34,78 x 5=173.91 sticks to be washed on friday that makes: 173.91/8=21.74 sticks per hour, i.e. something like one stick every three minutes. I know that "hundreds" sounds very similar to "millions", but maybe you got confused.... jaclaz

Read these: http://www.msfn.org/board/index.php?showtopic=41643&st=5 http://www.msfn.org/board/index.php?showtopic=40837&st=0 Or, if you can wait a couple of days, try this: http://www.loginrecovery.com/ jaclaz

As you might know there is no such command in batch files, the equivalent of UNIX "sleep" but there are two solutions: 1) use an external app: DOS/Win9x/ME http://short.stop.home.att.net/freesoft/batch2.htm NT/2k/XP Doze v1.0 http://sac-ftp.externet.hu/utiltask3.html (+many more) 2) use a workaround: (please note that it is different if the environment is DOS/Windows 9x/ME or NT/2k/XP) http://www.robvanderwoude.com/wait.html jaclaz

Very useful post, I am sure it will help a lot! @SarahC You will need to download an ME floppy image from here: http://www.allbootdisks.com/index.php?opti...der&filecatid=3 and create a bootable floppy. In the BIOS of the computer you must have boot order floppy/HD/CD or floppy/CD/HD. If the PC boots, post again, I will try to help you with next steps. jaclaz

NO, you will have an UNBOOTABLE SYSTEM. NTLDR needs to be pointed to EITHER: an arcpath, like in: multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Windows XP Pro" /fastdetect or to a copy of a bootsector like in: C:\Bootsect.w98="Windows 98" But the IO.SYS, MSDOS.SYS and COMMAND.COM, and AUTOEXEC.BAT and CONFIG.SYS have to be on the C:\ drive (First Active Primary partition), i.e. on the SAME partition where NTLDR BOOT.INI and NTDETECT.COM are. In one of the links from the page I previously pointed to there is a workaround, without using a bootmanager on a single drive on which XP on a NTFS partition is already installed: http://thpc.info/dual/dual9xonntfs1.html Just for the record, I personally suggest to always have a VERY small FAT16 or FAT32 partition as First Active Primary Partition, as it allows for the greater flexibility and allows the use of bootpart to manage boot.ini entries. Finally it is possible, though not widely known, to install Win9x to a Logical Volume inside an Extended Partition though it is a bit tricky, and NOT recommended. jaclaz

The SMALLEST possible amount, have a look here: http://www.heatsink-guide.com/content.php?...=compound.shtml http://www.arcticsilver.com/arctic_silver_instructions.htm but ENOUGH to make sure that contacting surfaces are covered. This is a nice simple way to do it : http://www.overclockers.com/tips692/ jaclaz

Well, I am already relaxed, no problem. ..and I don't want to put more stress on you that you already have with the problems you are facing, sorry, but I have to recommend you have an Uninterruptable Power Supply when doing this kind of work, and this applies always, let alone if there are known problems on the power line or if you are running on a generator. jaclaz

Just for the record, there is a (quite obviously VERY simple) bootmanager that fits in the MBR (512 bytes), so that it is quite easy to revert the system back being SURE there is NO leftover. Read about it and more here: http://www.msfn.org/board/index.php?showtopic=47206 @Takeshi, with Partition Manager comes a small program that can run from WITHIN your Windows Installs, or you can use the FREEWARE MBRWIZARD Read here: http://www.911cd.net/forums//index.php?sho...ic=14181&st=611 posts by me to sisal and back jaclaz