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Techie007

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Everything posted by Techie007

  1. You need the \Microsoft\Windows\TextServicesFramework\MsCtfMonitor task to be running for the keyboard to work in most Metro crapps.
  2. Whoa, now we're talking! You're right, the whole thing is literally a batch file that's extracted from the EXE.
  3. It is basically the combined number of "Likes" on all your posts. I've just bumped your reputation up to six by liking your post above. The more, the merrier!
  4. That's nothing new. I've had Windows Defender/SmartScreen attack Classic Shell, IrfanView and Mozilla Firefox in the past, totally blocking installation (and for Firefox, the download as well). At least they were blocked and not removed. But it was very difficult for even a person as knowledgeable as myself to get past. I actually had to copy the installer over from another machine in the case of Firefox. Thankfully it hasn't happened since, but it makes me wary of what Microsoft is capable of. This is nothing like Norton, where with a quick right-click of its tray icon, I can suspend "protection" so that blocked software can operate and install, and then create whitelist rules so that protection can be re-enabled. #WhenTheAntivirusBecomesTheVirus
  5. Interesting—guess I'm not the only one then. I have two laptops (a nice modern one, and an old Vista one) running Windows 10. Neither have received the upgrade yet. I'm holding out on manually upgrading because I want to see how well the automatic upgrade process goes. My modern desktop PC which was upgraded from Windows 8.1 and entered into the Insider Program at the beginning of July refused to get any Insider builds or the RS1 upgrade. A week after upgrading to Windows 10, I gave up waiting and manually upgraded it to the latest Insider Preview ISO. Still it wouldn't download later builds. I ended up downloading the RS1 ISO and performing the upgrade manually on August 4th because it wouldn't see that update either. But my cheap, 16GB tablet (that I almost never use) that had mere megabytes of free space got the update and immediately started nagging me to magically free up some space so that it could start downloading it. Had to completely reload it because there was no way it was going to even remotely fit. Turns out that it was out of disk space because of a huge recovery partition Windows 10 TH1 setup created. After all was said and done, it now has 7GB free—not bad at all. More than it ever had WIMbooting Windows 8.1 as configured by the OEM. So my nice laptop and modern desktop PC (which are fully capable of a flawless upgrade) don't get the update for over a week, but my puny tablet which could have been bricked by the upgrade (reading some reports of that happening on a similar modal tablet) gets the update right away. There is no rhyme or reason to the madness, is there? Too bad only us geeks can figure this crap out. The average user would have no chance, and would quickly end up on a nagging, out of date system. So much for the new Windows Update system keeping everybody protected and up to date!
  6. Haven't been paying that much attention, but I do notice that Windows 10 RS1 (1607 "Anniversary Update") now hits http://msftconnecttest.com/connecttest.txt instead of http://msncsi.com/ncsi.txt to test for Internet connectivity. Windows has used NCSI since Vista days to test for Internet connectivity. I wonder how many captive portals that change broke. Why change something that was well established and was working fine?
  7. Them rumor mills these days! It ain't gonna happen.
  8. Well that explains everything. No wonder Microsoft can't get the design right—the people influencing all the votes are hardly using their computers at all! I wonder how many of these "Insiders" hopped on only for the ride and free copy of Windows 10. Looking at Dona's (and Gabe's) Twitter feed, I see so many build junkies. I'd much rather wait for serious, tangible improvements to Windows, and help guide the process along with a number of truly dedicated users such as are here in this thread. Then gimme a build when you really have something new to show.
  9. No, not right away. It will enter guilt trip mode for a time before it is removed. No way (especially on those opted out with OptOut10). Hadn't thought of that. Currently, it doesn't look like it (it just says that the free upgrade offer has expired), but who knows in the next couple days. Don't give them any ideas! Nope, though I have the feeling there may still be ways to slip some in for free. There. I just made a few predictions. Now let's see what actually happens!
  10. I'm pretty sure it won't. First of all, the upgrade offer is good all day tomorrow on the user's local timezone. So the free upgrade offer actually ends as the calendar strikes July 30. At that time, GWX will switch to guilt trip mode. Given that it keeps popping up every couple of days now with the countdown, I won't be the slightest surprised if it automatically pops up again (at least once), only with the following message this time: At some point though, GWX will be retired by another Windows Update that will come though and remove it. Probably sometime in August. It will be interesting to see just how quickly they do it, though!
  11. Boy, that will sure teach them! Wait. . . you've gotta be kidding me! A mere $165,000? For a giant like Microsoft, that's just a cost of doing business. If forced to, they'll pay, and then it will be back to "business as usual". I'd be more interested to know exactly what the French researchers found being transmitted by Windows 10.
  12. Same for me. And then with Windows 7, when Microsoft removed the Classic style Start Menu, I went looking for, found, and started using Classic Shell. It was just icing on the cake that it works in Windows 8 and Windows 10 too. Funny how so many remember Classic Shell as the great Start Menu for Windows 8, when it was originally designed to replace Windows 7's downgrade! The feature I missed the most is the ability to cascade folders/folder shortcuts from the Start Menu. The fact that we can still cascade them from the Taskbar (where I resent the loss of space), indicates that the code is still present in Windows. I also didn't like the small, boxed in, click-navigation All Programs menu. If it weren't for those two shortcomings, I would have gladly used the built-in Start Menu over installing a 3rd-party replacement. I keep being reminded just how much of a compromise Windows 10's "Start Thing" is. The Classic Start Menu (with the cascading menus) is almost perfectly optimized for a mouse. If they made it detect intention and open instantly on horizontal motion instead of having a fixed delay on opening submenus, it would feel even more efficient and quick. Meanwhile, a touchscreen benefits from the user being able to arbitrarily tap anywhere, while missing the ability to point and hover. The Windows 8 Start Screen's All Apps view really took advantage of this and actually was a joy to use on a touchscreen (although I still think that having the Start Screen as a dual desktop was a horrible idea). But what do we have now? A tiny All Programs window with oversized entries that both shows a fraction of what could be displayed before (for mouse), while yet on many devices being hard for large fingers to tap accurately on. Either way, we have to endlessly scroll to see anything—much worse than the Classic Start Menu's condensed vertical menu, or the Start Screen's fullscreen expanded list of items. It's so bad that I'd rather use the Classic Start Menu on touch and the Start Screen All Apps on mouse over the newfangled "Start Thing" in Windows 10! Even with reversed roles, they are better than the compromise we have now. No wonder Cortana is so integrated—the user needs the assistant just to help them do what they used to easily be able to do on their own (like quickly finding and opening a rarely used program), before the Start Menu changes were made!
  13. Correct, 31 wasn't a typo. As I explained in my previous post, the 32nd bit is the sign-bit (minus sign) when using a signed variable to store the memory pointer. A signed Dword can express numbers from -2,147,483,648 to 2,147,483,647 (2 GiB), while an unsigned Dword can express numbers from 0 to 4,294,967,295 (4 GiB). Memory pointers are supposed to be stored in unsigned variables, but older programs were not always written or compiled correctly because 32-bit Windows never even supported LAA (the use of the full 32-bits) per-process. For instance, Visual Basic 6 doesn't even have support for an unsigned Dword. Internally, the compiler and runtime calculate LAA memory pointers fine, but if I had to work with a memory pointer in code and offset it, it could get calculated incorrectly if LAA was manually enabled and I didn't use the 64-bit (Currency) variable in my code to handle the larger numbers expressed by the 32nd bit. This was never was an issue until 64-bit Windows came out on machines with over 4GiB of RAM and it was reasonable for Microsoft to enable use of the full 32-bit addressing range of 4 GiB of RAM on 32-bit processes. That's where the LAA flag comes in, for a 32-bit program to signal its awareness and support of the 32nd bit under 64-bit Windows. Under 32-bit Windows, using a signed Dword for memory pointers never caused any issue, because a memory address could never go beyond 2 GiB (31-bits). But by manually enabling LAA on a 32-bit process under 64-bit Windows, we are breaking that expectation. Which is fine if the program doesn't manipulate memory pointers or was coded correctly to use an unsigned Dword for memory pointers. The bigger point is that there is no performance to be gained by indiscriminately enabling LAA everywhere, and it will not make a 32-bit program to run as a 64-bit program. It will still use the 32-bit Windows libraries, still be limited to an absolute maximum of 4 GiB of RAM no matter how much is installed on the PC. Enabling LAA on programs that don't need it (programs that don't use very much RAM) won't accomplish anything, and enabling it on programs that were compiled/written incorrectly could increase the risk of a crash. The only positive usage scenario for that tweak is in the case of a correctly written and compiled program that uses a lot of RAM, but was failed to be marked as Large Address Aware at compilation time. Like VirtualDub and probably a good number of 32-bit games.
  14. Large Address Aware doesn't make 32-bit programs run 64-bit. Another simple program that can do this tweak is NTCore's 4GB Patch. Unless a 32-bit EXE has the LAA flag set, Windows will run it as 31-bit by default, limiting it to 2GiB of RAM. This was fine in 32-bit Windows because you'd never want a single process to use that much RAM anyway. But when 64-bit Windows came out, Microsoft raised that limit to include the full 32-bits. The problem is, some older programs are compiled using signed Dwords to store memory pointers. With a signed Dword, any address over 2GiB will appear negative, which can cause fatal errors in memory pointer offset calculations. Newer 32-bit programs that are compiled correctly can make full use of the 32-bits. But just like with the new DPI-aware flag, many compilers fail to set the LAA flag, and the compiled binaries are thus limited to 31-bits by Windows. That's where this tweak comes in, to modify the executable and set the LAA flag. I have personally benefited from this tweak with VirtualDub, which isn't compiled as LAA, but works perfectly when tweaked. It's a required tweak to use the Deshaker plugin on 1080p videos, as 2GiB RAM (31-bits) isn't enough. After the tweak, the limit is raised to 4GiB (32-bits). The flip side is that if you apply this tweak to an incompatible program, it will get more susceptible to crashing instead of less.
  15. Of course the average user wouldn't know to do this, but in such a situation, I would schedule the update for as late in the future as possible, and click [Confirm time and close]. Then I'd immediately run my OptOut10 program to cancel the reservation, clear the scheduled update, disable GWX and such upgrades in the future, followed by a reboot to ensure that the new settings take full effect. As of now, I am still not aware of an anti-10 solution that is as effective at bringing a system back from the brink after the upgrade is reserved.
  16. I am confirming that this works in Windows 8 and does not work in Windows 7. Thank you for sharing this tweak!
  17. Just visiting to catch up on the latest about Windows 10, and here I find that this forum's software has been destroyed—both visually and functionally. What a mess! It was bad before, but now it's almost unusable. Whatever happened to having a usable subscriptions center? Just like with Windows 10, what I'm trying to figure out is why do people spend considerable time and money to make things worse?
  18. The answer to that question is a strong NO! they will not support these out of date systems. They are already not supporting even slightly out of date Windows Vista and Windows 7 systems. This started right about the time Windows 10 was released to the public. I'm getting lots PCs (mostly laptops) in the shop all the time now that are running real slow. What do I find? PC is out of date by 4–24 months, and Windows Update is locked up, with TrustedInstaller.exe hogging all the CPU and all the RAM. After running for a couple of hours like this, it finally finds, downloads, and sets the updates to be installed on next shutdown/restart. But when the user actually shuts down or restarts, the updates are not installed despite the indication on the Start Menu's Shut Down button! Next time the user reboots, the entire process repeats. . . using most of the computer's resources to search for updates for a couple of hours. . . downloading all the updates again. . . and not installing them. Manual checks for updates never complete (I haven't had the patience to wait over 24 hours). AND. . . when the notification pops up that Windows Update has found and is installing updates, a visit to Windows Update still says "Checking for updates..." Clearing the update Download folder or even the Software Distribution folder doesn't help. Even worse, this issue is happening on every single computer I reload with Vista SP2 or Windows 7 SP1. Even on PCs with powerful CPUs, plenty of RAM, and a SSD. I've seen numerous forum threads instructing users to manually download and install this or that update from the Microsoft website, but that has been hit-and-miss for me and a big waste of time. The only reliable solution I've found is to use WSUS Offline Update to bring the PCs up to date, after which Windows Update starts working as expected, finding updates in less than 10 minutes. Even still, on some reloaded PCs I have to clear out the Software Distribution folder, reboot and check for updates a half dozen or more times before all the updates and drivers finally install without error (WSUS misses some updates, and doesn't install drivers). Usually Windows Update returns some silly error about being unable to update files that are in use. After a couple of reboots it finally updates them and then finds a couple more updates. What a pain!
  19. I share your frustration, but most of it could have been avoided if you used a better, all Microsoft way of getting back into your computer instead of using the Linux disc.
  20. Same here, and since I'm using a HOSTS file on my router like you, it's not even easy to unblock whatever it is that they're checking for. I have found that Forbes appears to do this for some articles and not for others, and from certain sites and not from others. If you want to read the article, copy its URL to the clipboard, open a new tab, type "forbes.com" into the address bar, and press [Enter]. The Forbes homepage should load right up. Then paste the address to the article into the address bar and hit [Enter]. The page should open right up despite the ad-blocking (at least that works for me in Firefox). www.forbes.com/sites/gordonkelly/2016/02/05/free-windows-10-true-cost/
  21. Guys, it looks like Microsoft has made their next move in their "upgrade to Windows 10 or bust" game: http://www.zdnet.com/article/microsoft-starts-pushing-windows-10-as-a-recommended-update/ Of course, Microsoft already promised us that they would do this, but it still seems ridiculous! It's a bit early to see if my OptOut10 patch remains effective despite this. If I trust Microsoft's documentation of the GWX opt-out settings, it should remain effective. But then again. . . it's Microsoft's already shaky trustworthiness that's at stake here!
  22. Oh absolutely! It's just a little value written into the PE header on the executable. Developers are supposed to set it in order to preemptively thwart catastrophic failure due to missing APIs in the older OS (like a modern program running on Windows 9x could be missing a bunch of APIs that are only present on the Windows NT platform). But, developers can also misuse it to make software only work on certain versions of Windows.
  23. The reason Microsoft changed the versioning scheme from SP1, SP2, and so on is because they switched from a cumulative rollup (a.k.a Service Pack) update model to an In-Place upgrade model. Upgrading from Windows 8 to Windows 8.1 is the same action as upgrading from XP to Vista, or Vista to 7, whereas installing a service pack only upgrades certain files on your HDD rather than replacing the entire operating system. If you think about it, as a full OS upgrade, Windows 8.1 really is the Windows 9 that never was. Here's where it gets funny: Instead of releasing Windows 8.2, Microsoft released SP1 for Windows 8.1—but they didn't want to call it Windows 8.1 SP1, and so it is called Windows 8.1 Update 1 instead. Update 1 is in fact a Service Pack for Windows 8.1. Wouldn't it have been so much less confusing to call Windows 8.1 "Windows 9", and Windows 8.1 Update 1 "Windows 9 SP1"? What is beyond me is why Windows 10 TH2 (November update) isn't called Windows 10.1, because just as Windows 8.1 was, so is this. Windows 10 Redstone will be Windows 10.2 (assuming that it is the Spring update). Again, each of these newfangled "updates" are really entire In-Place OS upgrades just like going from XP to Vista, or Vista to 7. This is why the Windows 10 EULA states that you must stay up to date to be supported. Windows 10.0's real end of life came in December. To keep getting updates, you have to install the Windows 10 TH2 (November) upgrade to what is actually Windows 10.1 to remain supported and keep getting security updates. Microsoft's new update schedule is based on upgrades, which will crank though SSD writes, Internet bandwidth, make a huge mess of the file system, and regularly break software. I believe Microsoft is just playing name games with everyone trying to hide that fact, because many technicians, gamers and enthusiasts know that a fresh install is better for performance and stability than upgrading and upgrading again on top of that.
  24. I'll have to check the CPU meter next time there's a big update to see how big the performance hit is, but I too have noticed that my Win10 system gets sluggish when installing updates. I have notis this too. I went into WI again, this time on a laptop. Meanwhile the download of 11102 I decided to get an adblocker. I notised that sufing was a bit slaggish, but the real suprice was that not one bit of the program was writen to disk, until 11102 was done ( still download). A bit chocked over that, must say. I have seen Windows Update download builds using a 100-slice download, and I created a thread about it here on Microsoft Answers. If you're familiar with download managers that would allow you to split up a download in say, 4–8 slices to "speed it up", that's what I'm talking about. Since then, Microsoft has reduced that number to a still ridiculous value of 40 slices. It still makes my 8 Mb/s Internet almost unusable for anything else while a Windows Insider build is being downloaded by Windows Update. Yep, basically rape of my Internet connection:
  25. No, I have not, because I already have Universal Windows 7 installation media that I reload computers with, and the Microsoft Windows 7 Media Creation tool only accepts Retail keys, not OEM keys. OEM licenses are by far more popular, while the Retail license is geared towards gamers and other enthusiasts who need the ability to transfer their license from PC to PC as they upgrade parts and equipment. The ISOs themselves are not keyed. In fact, apart from the x86/x64 distinction, they are practically the same. If you have any Windows 7 disc, flash drive, or ISO, you can create a Universal disc by copying its contents, minus the "ei.cfg" file, to the new media. The "ei.cfg" file tells Setup what edition of Windows 7 to install. If you remove that file, it will ask which edition to install during setup, thus the Universal disc. Of course, although the Windows installation media is not keyed, you will need a valid license key to install, and you will need to install the edition of Windows 7 (Home Premium, Professional, Ultimate) matching your license key, or it won't activate. Furthermore, a Retail disc won't accept an OEM key during setup. If that's what you have, leave the product key field blank during setup, and use phone activation once your PC is up and running.
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