RedRain

Live system to vhd tool

Adriano — Fri, 09 Oct 2009 07:43:00 GMT

Sysinternal has just released an amazing tool to convert a live system into a working .vhd file.

“Disk2vhd is a utility that creates VHD (Virtual Hard Disk - Microsoft’s Virtual Machine disk format) versions of physical disks for use in Microsoft Virtual PC or Microsoft Hyper-V virtual machines (VMs). The difference between Disk2vhd and other physical-to-virtual tools is that you can run Disk2vhd on a system that’s online.”

Downlaod it from http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/ee656415.aspx

Execute shell commands without invoking the interpreter

Adriano — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 11:40:09 GMT

Question: “I need to run the rd command from the runonce key in the registry. If i write the command line “rd C:\folder”, the system reply with the error message: rd command not found”

Answer: “The problem is that the rd command needs to be executed by the CMD shell. To make it works without opening the shell window, you have to execute “cmd /c rd C:\folder “

Sync bookmarks among different browsers

Adriano — Mon, 05 Oct 2009 12:28:53 GMT

With Xmarks you can sync bookmarks amongst different browsers or between browser on different machines. If you have a pc at home and another one at office, you can sync your bookmarks or your site password ( the last one only with Firefox) . You can save it on Xmarks server as well on your personal location.

All for free. It support Internet Explorer, Firefox and Safari

Site : http://www.xmarks.com/

Technorati Tags: Firefox,Xmarks,Safari,Internet Explorer,Bookmarks

Don’t yell against your Hard-Disks !!!

Adriano — Tue, 06 Jan 2009 17:36:51 GMT

Or you will increase latency…

From

I would but I can’t : IE8 and Livespace feed

Adriano — Wed, 24 Dec 2008 13:52:10 GMT

I would like to read RSS feed from Livespace’s blogs, but …

ça va sans dire, with Firefox…

Technorati Tag: Ie8,Livespace,Feed,RSS,Firefox

How to delete Outlook temporary folder

Adriano — Tue, 08 Jul 2008 06:39:16 GMT

If you receive a "File not found" or "Impossible to open file" when you try to open an attachment from an email, the problem is that the temporary folders used by Outlook are full or the content is garbled.

Where are these folders ? The location is stored into registry in different places for different Outlook versions:

Outlook 97 HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\8.0\Outlook\Security
Outlook 98 HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\8.5\Outlook\Security
Outlook 2000 HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\9.0\Outlook\Security
Outlook 2002/XP HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\10.0\Outlook\Security
Outlook 2003 HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\11.0\Outlook\Security
Outlook 2007 HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\12.0\Outlook\Security\OutlookSecureTempFolder

Another problem is that the folder is named OLK (until Outlook 2007) followed by random 2 numbers "or" 2 letters. So is quite impossible to know which is the correct name. For example on my pc with Office2007 the folder name is 3W8Z6AWR.

At the end the better way to clean those folders, is to read the value from the registry and manually delete the folders.

Or use a graphical tool like OutloookTools.

OutlookTools | HowTo-Outlook

Technorati Tag: Outlook,Temp files,OutlookTools

Microsoft Technical Support - Hotfix Request

Adriano — Mon, 07 Jul 2008 06:54:57 GMT

To request hotfixes via web, the correct link is

http://support.microsoft.com/hotfix/KBHotfix.aspx?kbnum=NNNNN

where NNNNN is the KB number

Microsoft Technical Support

Technorati Tag: Microsoft,Hotfix

[VISTA] Update for Windows Vista (KB952709)

Adriano — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 10:04:35 GMT

This is a reliability update. This update resolves some performance and reliability issues in Windows Vista. By applying this update, you can achieve better performance and responsiveness in various scenarios.

This update resolves issues that may affect some Windows Vista SP1-based computers. These issues have been reported by customers who use the Error Reporting service or Microsoft Customer Support Services. This update improves the performance, responsiveness, and reliability of Windows Vista in various scenarios. This update includes the following improvements on a Windows Vista SP1-based computer:

• This update improves the stability of Windows Vista SP1-based computers by addressing some crashes that may occur when you try to check e-mail by using a POP3 e-mail client such as Windows Mail or Mozilla Thunderbird. The crashes may occur on a Windows Vista SP1-based computer in the following scenario:

• Incoming POP3 and outgoing SMTP traffic monitoring is enabled.

• Both a third-party antivirus application and an antispyware application are installed, such as the following applications:

• ZoneAlarm Internet Security Suite by Check Point Software Technologies Ltd.

• SpySweeper by Webroot Software, Inc.

• This update improves the reliability of the Windows Vista SP1 based-computers by addressing some problems that occur when you delete user accounts by using the User Accounts item in Control Panel. When this problem occurs, the system may stop responding (hang).

• This update improves the reliability of Windows Vista SP1-based computers that experience issues in which large applications cannot run after the computer is turned on for extended periods of time. For example, when you try to start Excel 2007 after the computer is turned on for extended periods of time, a user may receive an error message that resembles the following:

EXCEL.EXE is not a valid Win32 application

• This update improves the reliability of Windows Vista SP1-based computers by reducing the number of crashes that may be caused by the Apple QuickTime thumbnail preview in Windows Live Photo Gallery.

• This update improves the performance of Windows Vista SP1-based computers by reducing audio and video (AV) stuttering. Such AV stuttering may occur when the audio or video component is streaming high definition content from a Windows Vista SP1-based computer that has a NVIDIA network adapter nForce driver version 67.5.4.0 that is installed to a Windows Media Center Extender device.

Italian version

A reliability and performance update is available for Windows Vista SP1-based computers

Download details: Update for Windows Vista (KB952709)

[VISTA] Export IE7 Search Provider

Adriano — Fri, 14 Mar 2008 10:41:36 GMT

To export the full list of your search provider installed in Ie7, simply export the HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\SearchScopes key.

Italian version

Technorati Tags: IE7,Search Provider

IE8 released - Beta

Adriano — Thu, 06 Mar 2008 09:34:00 GMT

The beta version of Intrernet Explorer 8 has been released today. This version is mainly intended for web developer and designers . I've just installed it.

There's not notably differences in the look, but under the skin, you will find some interesting features :

1 - Tools for developers that give you the ability to analyze on the fly the code with a page is written

2 - Web slices : Developers can mark parts of webpages as "WebSlices" and enable users to monitor information they rely on as they move about the web. With a click in the Favorites bar, users see rich "WebSlice" visuals .

3 - Click the : Emulate IE7 button in the command bar to browse the web like you did in Internet Explorer 7

More info on : http://www.microsoft.com/windows/ie/ie8/welcome/en/default.html

[XP] "You reach the registry size limit (RSL)" message

Adriano — Wed, 13 Feb 2008 10:38:51 GMT

In Microsoft Windows Server 2003 and in Microsoft Windows XP, the Registry Size Limit (RSL) functionality has been removed. There are no longer any limits on the total amount of space that may be consumed by registry data (hives) in paged pool memory, and in disk space.

http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=292726

However is possible to receive at logon, the message "The Registry Size Limit has been reached". This could happens because an application, like antivirus program, or a driver don't correctly unload from the memory. To fix this behaviour you need to run the tool User Profile Hive Cleanup Service (UPHClean)

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/837115/en-us

Italian version

Technorati Tag: XP,registry,size limit

[VISTA] Change logon screen wallpaper

Adriano — Tue, 12 Feb 2008 14:23:03 GMT

Are you fighting with the will of changing some Vista graphic feature ?

If you are like me, try LogonStudio from Stardock. With few mouse click, you can change the logon screen wallpaper. You can find many wallpapers on WinCustomize

Technorati Tag: Stardock,Logon screen,Vista,WinCustomize

[VISTA] Desktop link to safe hardware removal

Adriano — Tue, 12 Feb 2008 08:00:20 GMT

It should be useful to have on the desktop a link to safe hardware removal. To do so, click with the right button of the mouse on the desktop, the choose New --> Link , and, in the link path, insert %windir%\System32\rundll32.exe shell32.dll,Control_RunDLL hotplug.dll

Save the link, and, if you want to have a nice icon, point the icon path, in the shortcut properties, to %SystemRoot%\system32\hotplug.dll

Technorati Tag: Safe Hardware Removal,Vista,Trick

Hallo everybody

Adriano — Mon, 11 Feb 2008 07:11:00 GMT

Hi everybody. This is my first post here. I will do my best to write on a regular basis. See you soon !