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Sunday, February 11, 2007

Can't Sleep - Try this..


Since I loaded Vista, I have not been able to get my laptop to sleep. It worked fine under XP but would immediately come back. The answer that I found is to turn off the Wake On Lan feature of the network card. Apparently, this is now turned on by default. Here are the steps that I followed to get it to work.

  • Right click on Network and bring up properties OR select Control Panel and then Network and Sharing Center

  • Select Manage Network Connections







  • Double-Click on the Ethernet Card to bring up Propertied





  • Select Properties and OK the permissions





  • Select Configure





  • Select Advanced





  • Select Wake Up Capabilities and then NONE on dropdown list on the right





  • Select OK and then you should be able to sleep.


    • This worked for me on my Dell Inspiron 9300. Hopefully it will work for you too.

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    posted by gregmcg at 10:43 AM 5 Comments Links to this post digg

    Friday, February 9, 2007

    Windows Vista Destroys Photo Metadata


    Bad news for photographer using about Vista. Apparently if you tag a photo's metadata in Vista, it destroys other important metadata used by image editing apps such as Photoshop. Not exactly an application crash unless you consider the vast loss of valuable, non-recoverable data a crash.



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    posted by gregmcg at 5:20 PM 0 Comments Links to this post digg

    How to build a PC for Windows Vista


    The Tech Report has put together an in-depth guide on how to build a new PC for Windows Vista. The TR folks detail Vista driver support for each major component they recommend, and they also walk readers through picking between the four Vista editions as well as their 32-bit/64-bit and retail/OEM variants.I built my own XP Media Center computer once. I was fun to do and I did feel a great sense of accomplishment when it was done. I really felt like I owned the computer! If you're so inclined to build your own, this is a fine article on the "how-to" for various price points. For me, the last computer I aquired was a $300 eMachine from Best Buy. Talk about economical!



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    posted by gregmcg at 3:42 PM 0 Comments Links to this post digg

    BlackViper returns? Windows Vista Services breakdown


    Apparently, Windows Vista has around 130 Services?! Ouch. Site lists of all vista services and which you can disable. Also has registry files for backing out changes. This is awesome. BlackViper's XP Site really helped me determine what are virus dlls and what are not. It's great that he's moved along with Vista. It's not done yet but it's much better than nothing.



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    posted by gregmcg at 3:35 PM 0 Comments Links to this post digg

    Install Windows Vista in a dual-boot configuration along with Windows XP

    Are you really excited about the prospect of experimenting with the new features in the Windows Vista operating system, but are not yet ready to give up your existing Windows XP installation? Greg Shultz walks you step by step through the entire dual boot configuration procedure.



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    posted by gregmcg at 3:31 PM 0 Comments Links to this post digg

    Reliability Monitor


    If you'd like to see how reliable your system is, Vista has a reliability monitor that will keep track of application, hardware and other errors. Great tool and is a CYA for Microsoft when people say their system is crashing "all the time". Reliability Monitor will really show what "all the time" really is and hopefully what's causing the majority of the problems. It's really a great tool to help diagnose problems with your machine.

    To get to it, do the following:

  • Load Control Panel, switch to classic view

  • Select Performance Information and Tools

  • Select Advanced Tools on the Task Menu on the left side of the screen

  • Select Open Reliability and Performance Monitor, second one down on the list

  • Hit continue on the Windows Permission Screen


    • You'll see a screen like this:


    Off Topic: This current screen is misleading about my performance, I'm currently running an automatic Windows Backup (very recommended) to a local WD USB 2.0 hard drive (also recommended). I'm actually very happy about my performance under Vista.

    Once at the Reliability Screen, Select the Reliability Monitor on the left side of the screen. On the Date drop down box, hit select all to show all problems you may have had. In my case, I've had ZERO Hardware, Windows or Miscellaneous failures but many application failures. I've had about 46 APPCRASHes in just over a week. Thus my reasons for creating this site.

    Here are my actual screens. No they weren't photoshopped.



    Screen 2

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    posted by gregmcg at 10:56 AM 0 Comments Links to this post digg

    Does anyone really read the screens?

    I recently had an unexpected shutdown on a dual Xeon workstation running Vista Ultimate. One of the nice features is that Vista will search for a possible solution to problems online. If one is found, they you may get a screen like this:






    Very nice. I got to Windows update, no new drivers, on to Option 2. Read carefully and follow directions, ok, so where is Display. I knew it was there in XP.





    Maybe on the classic screen?





    Of course, you can right click on the desktop, open personalize, select Display Settings, then Advanced... wait, hardware acceleration is not there. I have not found the sequence yet to modify hardware acceleration.

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    posted by gregmcg at 10:42 AM 0 Comments Links to this post digg

    Wednesday, February 7, 2007

    Why????

    In copying a file to this very blog... I ran into a very funny bug. Well, not funny, but why in the world would this happen? See the following picture.


    and then after I change the screen a bit.




    The question I have is WHY WAS THIS NOT FOUND???? How in the world is someone suppose to overwrite a file when the status box overwrites the warning dialog box?

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    posted by gregmcg at 12:55 PM 0 Comments Links to this post digg

    Appcrash!net


    This site is dedicated to collecting application crashes that may or may not occur in Microsoft Vista. I put this together due to my initial frustration with installation/upgrading my very stable Dell Inspiron 9300 to Vista Business and Office 2007. I am not a computer newbie, in fact I used to work for Microsoft in their consulting division for almost nine years.

    I am very, very disappointed in this release and can not find much information on the problems that I actually have with my system. Since upgrading my laptop on January 29th, 2007, I've spent untold hours trying to get the system to work as it did under Windows XP. Some of the problems I've had are:

  • APPCRASH - Outlook 2007

  • APPCRASH - Internet Explorer 7.0

  • APPCRASH - Windows Explorer

  • APPCRASH - Windows Media Player


    • Typically you will see a message similar to the one on the right. This site will be dedicated to helping users diagnose, find information, contacts, and issues with Vista. The thing is, I really, really like Vista, I just wish it worked a bit better and didn't have as many "quirks" that it currently has.

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    posted by gregmcg at 11:32 AM 3 Comments Links to this post digg