Dave-H

I still would never use the microphone input on the computer unless there was no alternative. The level from a microphone is very much lower than from a line level source, so you would have to have the source level set much lower to avoid overloading. Also the microphone input could have equalisation on it to suit a microphone, whereas the line/aux input should be 'flat'. Much better all round to maintain the quality of the original.

I wouldn't feed line/headphone level audio into a microphone input, it will probably overload it and the result will be extremely distorted. The aux/line input on the computer should be fine.

My test install of Windows 11 which I have on a separate swappable boot drive, has been fine through all subsequent Windows monthly updates. The problem will come I suspect when a major update is released, probably in October, where it won't allow the update and I will have to do an install from scratch again. Fortunately I gather that this will now only happen once a year, not every six months!

Just a quick update. I swapped the portcls.sys file for the newer one. It has not appeared to make any difference to anything, but everything still works fine, so I will leave it in place. It seems that I originally installed KB888111 back in 2012. It's possible it was offered by Windows Update, but it's not in the Add/Remove Programs list, and there's no uninstallation folder for it. I'm thinking that it may have been included with the Realtek audio driver package. It's not installed on my main desktop machine.

@Dietmar You still haven't said whether you got anywhere with debugging the restart problem on the Flex 10 (I've asked three times!) Did anyone else make any progress with that? It's the one remaining annoyance as far as I'm concerned, and I can't debug it myself it appears as I can't connect the machine. Cheers, Dave.

Yes I do still enjoy using XP thanks! So it sounds like there's no point in me installing your HD audio driver patch as the files I have are the same already anyway, but I will try just substituting the newer portcls.sys file though just to see if it works and makes any difference to anything. Acpi.sys was just substituted with the latest modified version and made a huge difference. I will certainly keep a copy of your new version of KB888111 in case I ever have to completely reinstall XP. Cheers, Dave.

Do I need to install your hotfix though if I already have the same HD audio driver files that are in it? Are the ones in your hotfix updated even though they have the same date and file version?

OK, so this isn't just a straightforward install of your KB888111 patch? I saw that the newer portcls.sys file was in your package, but it doesn't get installed by the patch installer. Does it just have to be copied across manually? The hdaudbus.sys seems to be the same as the one I've already got, at least the version number is. If this will cure the Realtek audio device not appearing that would be great, but is it just portcls.sys that actually needs to be changed?

I tried installing this on XP SP3 x86 and nothing seemed to change. My portcls.sys is 5.1.2600.1364. My hdaudbus.sys and hdaudio.sys are both 5.10.1.5013. Is that right?

OK, I've partially fixed it with this in userContent.css @-moz-document domain(instagram.com) { div._aatk > div { display: block !important; } div._aatk > div > div { display: block !important; } } The videos now display again, except for the ones in carousels, which just appear as white. The single ones were in fact collapsed to single lines again. There are so many different 'div' labels now when you inspect the code, it's like looking for a needle in a haystack!

Thanks for the suggestion as always, but the videos are not blocked. They are fine on 360Chrome 13.5. What happens, and it's happened a couple of times before, is that IG change something in their code which breaks the display of videos in Firefox 52.9 only. Still images are always fine. I've been using a custom userContent.css file to work around this (with the help of others here of course!) but it only works until they change the code. At the moment it contains - @-moz-document domain(instagram.com) { div._97aPb > div { display: block !important; } div._97aPb > div > div { display: block !important; } div.Igw0E > div { display: block !important; } div.Igw0E > div > div { display: block !important; } } This has worked fine for many months, but it's now broken again. The div._97aPb and div.Igw0E parameters need to be changed for the new ones, but looking at the code with the inspector, there are so many different ones that I don't know where to start! Of course I can just use 360Chrome, but it is annoying!

I think the short answer to your question is because we're enthusiasts, and because we can! (Oh, and we don't like being told by the likes of Microsoft that we can't do something!)

Firefox 52.9 ESR can be made to support HTML5 video though. There's a whole thread here devoted to it. It's worked fine for me on Instagram (and Facebook and YouTube) for a very long time. My issues with IG have always been formatting problems, like at the moment the IG videos that are single videos are collapsed to a single line again. Carousel videos appear as white spaces. There's another thread here about that! It's not a codec problem though. Welcome to MSFN BTW!

@Dietmar You still haven't said whether you got anywhere with debugging the restart problem on your Flex 10. As it seems I can't debug my machine, I'd be interested to know if you did get anywhere with finding the cause of why it will shut down but not restart. Cheers, Dave.

Just an update on my freezing problem with K-Meleon 74. Perhaps to nobody's surprise, the problem goes away if I disable javascript. The Trend Micro download page (and others) then complete loading, and I can download the pattern file. Other sites then don't work because javascript is disabled of course! I've tried using the exceptions dialogue to disable javascript just on the Trend site, but this doesn't seem to work, it still hangs. It only seems to load if javascript is disabled completely everywhere. This may be because the javascript that's causing the hang is not actually on the Trend site, but I don't know.

Well it was great while it lasted, but the videos have now failed again. They aren't collapsed this time, the size of the posts is correct, but where the video should be is just white. I wondered if the HTML5 player had failed, but YouTube videos still seem to be fine. Any ideas anyone?

@Dietmar Did you ever manage to debug the restart failure on your Flex 10?

@Dietmar Oh dear, I had a nasty feeling that would be the answer! So debugging with recent machines with no Ethernet ports is only possible via direct USB connection with a special lead by the sound of it. I do remember now that you said before that you used a connection via the PCIe miniport where the Wi-Fi/Bluetooth card goes. I don't think I'll be doing that, but at least I tried! Your Flex 10 also had the restart freezing problem if I remember rightly, did you ever manage to debug that? Cheers, Dave.

Ah thanks, that explains it! Reading that section of the thread it looks like the only way of connecting the computers for debugging is with a direct Ethernet connection, which I can't do on the Flex 10 as it doesn't have an Ethernet port. That would surely be the case with most modern computers though, very few if any seem to have Ethernet ports now. Reading between the lines, it looks as if wi-fi connection isn't an option either, so is a direct USB connection the only option? The USB debugging lead linked to in the thread is USB 3.0 only as far as I can see, and it says it isn't backwards compatible. As my main desktop doesn't have USB 3.0 hardware, that's a non-starter too. So, is there actually no way that I can do this debugging?

That's what I've been doing, it says it's waiting, but there is no connection. What about the '/BREAK' switch in boot.ini? How important is it?

I'm making progress, but not there yet! I sorted out the dual boot problem, I just had to create another boot menu entry in EasyBCD using the legacy XP bootloader system. If I select that, I now get a further menu with the entries from boot.ini. However, if I select either of the debug entries, the machine just reboots instead of going to XP. By process of elimination, I narrowed the cause of this down to the '/BREAK' entry in boot.ini. If I remove that, it boots into XP fine, but not when it's there. Any idea why that might be? I'm not getting a connection to the host machine when it does boot into XP, I suspect the addresses are wrong. This presumably will work with just a wi-fi connection via a router? There is a direct cable connection between the machines as well (using a USB-Ethernet converter on the netbook as it has no onboard Ethernet connection). Should I remove that, or is it better to connect that way instead of by wi-fi?

Thanks, I'll try that. I already made a full ISO backup of the whole system, so I can easily restore it. I will see if I can get the Windows 10 installation ignored. The EasyBCD documentation has a lot of information about this, I just need to get my head around it!

Thanks, I'm using the 8.1 version and it seems to be working OK. The next problem is that although I've added the extra entries to boot.ini on the target machine, it's not displaying them because it's a dual boot machine. I've tried using the F8 options on startup after selecting Windows XP without success, but it's presumably just not using the normal boot.ini file. I used EasyBCD to setup the dual boot system, but I can't see anything there to edit the Windows XP boot options. Any ideas? Boot.ini is in the root of drive C: which is the Windows 10 drive. Windows XP is on drive D: I edited it using the Windows XP interface, but it's apparently not being used.

Ah, I've got the machines the wrong way around! D'oh! So the debugger needs to go on my main desktop, which I can run Windows 10 on. Does it still have to be the Windows 8.1 version?

Next problem! The debugger won't install on the host machine. It's trying to install .NET 4.5, which AFAIK doesn't work on XP.