Tripredacus

Some files can be marked with the H flag and not also the S flag.

I still use Vista occasionally for refurbs and see this issue. While it seems there are specific KBs to fix this in 7, I never had heard about any similar fixes for Vista. I'm sure that a fix exists for it, but that the userbase still doing Vista installs is comparatively low.

Oh yes, thanks for reminding me. If you have set up a software mirror from within Windows using Device Manager, that can turn out even worse. In that case, you should still do a full backup before hand, with the idea that you'll be restoring data. And if it survives, you'll have less headache and at least you'll have a backup of everything.

Because of the risk of data loss. I've seen scenarios where the volume becomes corrupted, changed to RAW, doesn't appear anymore, array broken, Windows using the wrong driver in the new OS, the RAID software not working with the new OS and/or driver, etc. It is not impossible, but you can't know what the outcome is before-hand. So many variables in play. The safe way is to make a full backup of the array to another disk set. The easiest is if you are using a controller card and your OS is not on it. Then you simply remove the card from the board, then do the upgrade (or change the OS entirely). After the new OS is set, then you put the card back in and install the driver and software and it should be just fine. This is the safest example I can think of, because if you remove the card from the system (but leave the disks connected to SATA but not power) you shouldn't have any problems since no changes were done with the array at all. Even in this case, it is best to make a backup of the data, in case something happens, then you can just copy it back to a fresh array.

SVG Viewer is pretty much deprecated. If you are still using an application that uses (functional) SVGs, you might have problems in Windows 7. By now, at least Firefox can use some of the SVG functions (drawing, fill and motion) but does not support others such as gradient... which I think that functionality came directly from IE's gradient function anyways. That just covers the basics. If you are not using any advanced SVG that do things such as linking or any full SVG applications, you can get away with not using it anymore. When doing an in-place upgrade, make sure you can find the drivers you need ahead of time for the new OS. The important ones are chipset, video, audio and lan. You should download these before doing the upgrade, and also perhaps put them on a CD or USB drive. If you have a RAID array, it is advised that you do NOT do an in-place upgrade.

This is already happening. Not just with schools. Many people have reported that putting multiple Windows 10 systems on their network is saturating their available bandwidth. And like a lot of things with Windows 10, the settings to change to prevent this from happening often does not work or change the situation.

I find most of my games locally at thrift or flea markets. Online can be a problem because the shipping can really add up. If Ebay is not your thing, there are some alternatives like other classified sites. I do not know one for Denmark. I know there is Priceminister.com for France, where I go to look for things sometimes. If you are talking about download only games, I'm not sure. I don't deal with those really.

Welcome to the MSFN!

It will be a wait-and-see type thing I suppose. I don't do any work within Windows 10 using .cmd files. I only use those in WinPE. My work within the OS uses the ComSpec environment variable to pass commands to be run using cmd.exe.

Let's hope their choice of changing 'cmd' to run Powershell prompt doesn't screw with anyone's scripts or programs that call CMD to perform specific things, such as installing programs. On this new build, is the ComSpec environment variable changed as well?

You can see it in the properties of the device in Device Manager.

Ok well there are some caveats. It may depend on what edition you are using. For example, Retail (which allows for transfer to new hardware) may be more forgiving than System Builder edition which doesn't. Also I do not consider a motherboard to be a minor upgrade. A person should expect to have to reactivate Windows if you change the motherboard. For my own personal experience, I've only had to reactivate a Windows 7 system after changing a motherboard. Not for anything else like video cards, disk drives or network cards. Fortunately, for Windows 7, it is fairly easy to reactivate. Ensuring internet access is present, most of the time you can just run slmgr.vbs -ato. And nowadays, the phone activation is better than it once was, where the Activation number will give you an option to text you a link where you can go to a website to do the number groups if need be. Way easier than talking to someone on the phone!

Windows 7 does not use the votes like XP. It does have a file integrity checklist that it uses instead. Too many or wrong files not matching expected checksums will trigger notification mode. Fortunately, unlike XP, Windows 7 will not lock you out of the OS if activation breaks. Some thing just don't work like Personalization. There are 2 main methods for checking out details of Windows 7 activation. From elevated cmd, you can run slmgr.vbs -dlv which will show some information in a pop-up window. This command also works up to current versions of Windows 10. For Vista and 7, there is a tool from MS called MGADiag that you can get more detailed information, including a list of files that do not match the checksums. This program is not meant to be used on Windows 8 and above (the results it generated on those OSes are not helpful for troubleshooting an activation issue).

We have a dedicated XP x64 section right here: http://www.msfn.org/board/forum/104-windows-xp-64-bit-edition/

You may want to post the Hardware ID of the video device from Device Manager.

I know that email from the server itself still works, but in the past there had been reports of it not working for PMs, but did for reports. I can just say that Email of reports worked, as of this morning.

No politics talking here, be it US or otherwise. Only exception is something that is specifically technology related. There are plenty of other places to talk about world politics.

One of the things he points out, the short window of time a company has to change their software to be compatible... sticks out to me a bit. Microsoft has a problem with showing information to the correct people. Or perhaps attempting to make other people do this work for them. There are two examples I can think of. 1. Software Compatibility: A policy requirement was introduced in Windows 8 where an OEM was not allowed to install a program that did not fully uninstall. The requirements for clean uninstall was that no files (temporary or otherwise) or registry keys should remain after choosing to uninstall the program from Programs & Features. The first issue here is that this isn't the job of a company selling computers to do. The idea is nice, but it really looks like Microsoft was trying to offload software quality discipline to other parties. Let us take an example. Say we would like to build a computer with a RAID array. Well technically the RAID software is not allowed to be installed because it doesn't uninstall properly. But as you can probably expect, no one had followed this rule because then no one would have sold any computers in the past few years! 2. OEM-facilitated downgrade rights eligibility: To put it simply, starting with Windows 8, a System Builder was no longer able to do a Downgrade on behalf of the end user/customer. The information relating to this was not on a website that a System Builder could access. Not on the public OEM/SBLicensing site, not in the OPK (it didn't exist) but on a site only for Direct OEMs. I ran into this on technet a lot, System Builders trying to get help doing a downgrade from 8 or 10 to 7. And then you can say that they aren't able to do it that way (disclaimer: knowing how shops are IRL, things happen. It is a different story to ask about such things on an official Microsoft forum tho) you can't point them to the info they need because they don't have access to it. So then you end up being "a troll on the internet." Anyways, those are two situations I can think of where Microsoft did not communicate properly or to the correct people about the things they were changing and what their users or customers needed to know. In example #1, I do not think that any communication ever went out to software or driver developers relating to the 100% uninstall thing. Maybe it is buried in a MSDN document somewhere.

In previous versions, you could use the Color panel to set selections for the Explorer window. That could be run with: control color but in Windows 10 it only opens the color mixer and those color settings only change the Start Menu and does not seem to effect Explorer selected items. EDIT: I think it might be possible to change this color in the registry under HKCU\Control Panel\Colors. I was able to change the highlight text, which you can see if you were to rename a file. None of the keys under Colors appears to reflect that tho. Because the default color is blue, the 3 numbers in the key value, the 3rd number represents blue. If you want to see if you find a 3 part color value in the registry and see if it is the color you are looking for, you can use mspaint's Edit Colors panel to input those values and see a preview.

There is no clear cut method. Our computers are better nowadays so that a large HOSTS file isn't a problem like it was years ago. For a single computer it may well be fine. Then there are the more advanced methods of blocking sites elsewhere in the chain, be it using a proxy, firewall or a DNS server. It may make more sense to do it on one of these separate network devices if you have multiple computers and you don't want to manage HOSTS files on each.

Use DIR /a:h or DIR /a:s instead.

Same is true of Server editions at least back to 2012 RTM (not R2). I ran a Server 2012 box that was not activated for 6 months or so. It had a product key in it but it was isolated. It ran WDS no problem as a domain member for that time and didn't reboot or anything like that. Gone are the days of XP where it would lock you out of the system. Of course you can't use that in a corporate setting because it would not be in compliance and you'd get popped if you got audited.

I do not use Windows 10 on a personal system. This was in the standard Windows 10 Pro image. I am not allowed to modify the OS or change default settings in the deployment image. Clients can but those changes cannot be done here. I am well aware of all the things Windows 10 does, which is why I use Windows 7.

OEM Facilitated Downgrade Rights is available in the Direct Channel and expired the same day (Oct 31) as normal Windows 7 installs did. There are ways to continue selling a computer like this past the expiration of the program but there isn't a reason to get into it. As far as general retail sales go, that program is ended. OEM Facilitated Downgrade was not an option in the System Builder channel at all but I am well aware that companies were doing it. And I would not be surprised if Downgrades continue to be sold unadvertised without one of the special contracts required past the expiration. Plenty of people do not follow the policy documents. All I can tell you is what the rules actually say, not what is actually being done out in the marketplace. One thing. System Builders are still able to sell computers with Windows 7 pre-installed using System Builder Kit media. This SKU is usable until it stops being available from the distribution houses. There is no end date on the sale of System Builder Kit. Also RRP (Registered Refurbisher Program) can still install Windows 7 on used computers.

That program ended Oct 31st.