Burchwords

This was brought in today…Check out this keyboard! I have no idea how long the cigarette was left on this keyboard.
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I went out and cleaned a working computer that is over 10 years old and has never been clean out. Here’s the video.

I had a client today who’s computer would not boot into Windows. They had a Dell OptiPlex when they started up the computer they would receive this error:

“Previous attempts at booting this system have failed at
checkpoint [USBd].”

Facts:

During troubleshooting I turned the printer off before and during startup and both option allowed to me to boot into Windows, with no problems. This is what lead me to believe the computer was looking at the memory card reader on the printer for a boot option.

Solution:

I asked if they had any new hardware. They said they had recently installed a printer. I took a look at the printer and it had the memory card reader built in. The BIOS had a setting called “USB emulation” and it was set to enable. I disabled the USB emulation and set the boot sequence to the local hard drive. The computer no longer looked at the printer for a boot option and booted correctly.

I download a lot of software. If I’m on the road working on a customer’s pc or on a server that needs something I usually get it from the net. I only use a flash drive when I don’t have internet access.

Anyways I use to use Cnet’s download.com to get my files, but the download speed is horrible. So, I started using filehippo.com

It’s has awesome download speeds and everything is clean and laid out so you can find what you are looking for faster.

My real reason for writing this is that they have a new product over at filehippo.com (update checker) that will scan your computer and tell you what needs to be updated. Its hard for me to like a new program if it slows down my computer or has poorly written code it will not last long on my pc. So, when I downloaded this program it was quick and very responsive. It told me what I needed to know and that was it. I think versiontracker.com has this same type of program, but you have to pay for it. Boooooo

here is the link: http://filehippo.com/updatechecker/

I’ve been using Echo Workstation for about 2 weeks now. I just wanted to write about the pros and cons I’ve ran into. First, it doesn’t work well with vista. I don’t know if it just home versions of Vista or what. But it does work extremely well with windows 2000 and XP. I’ve had absolutely no problems out of these operating systems. Second, It seemed a little slow, but there is a fix for that.

I was using the build version 8017. After downloading it I went and registered the key and there was an update ready for me. After installing the update (build 8076) the backups were faster by a half an hour. It really improved performance. Acronis is staying on top of their game.

Universal Restore Option: I’ve got to admit this is the money maker. I can restore to a virtual machine or to a completely different machine with totally different hardware. Now, for XP you will have 3 days to re-register your activation key for windows. It sees all that new hardware and knows something is up.

I’ve restored 4 machines in my testing phase. Two XPs and Two 2ks machines. No problems so far. Just doesn’t work with Vista. If you need a backup solution I highly recommend you get Acronis Echo Workstation with the optional Universal Restore Software.  If you’re a IT guy like me being able to restore to different hardware or to a virtual machine is such a Blessing.

I give this a 4 out of 5 stars, just for not being about to backup my vista laptop. It could have had something to do with just my laptop, and not Acronis itself. Either way I still love this software.

There seems to be a flaw in wordpress 2.3.3. I was hit by a hack that put a folder called “1″ with all kinds of spam links to poker sites. I wasn’t the only one apparently this was wide spread. The two links have most of the information on the fix and why it happened. I’m glad 2.5 is out.

http://blogsecurity.net/wordpress/automated-wordpress-hacking-tool-cached-by-google/
http://cyberinsecure.com/wordpress-doorway-spam-attacks/

I just want to know how people are able to inject their own stupid links into my wordpress post? Today is the 2nd time while using wordpress to find code that was linked to some unknown source. The first time it was to some server in China. Now there some poker links in one of my most popular post. It was about 150 lines of links it was ungodly.

I wonder if anybody else is having this problem?

I needed to edit a display name for a mailbox in Exchange 2007. I also needed to remove a member from a distribution group. I received the following error:
Microsoft Exchange Error:
The following error(s) occurred while saving changes:
Set-Group
Failed
Error:
An Exchange 2007 server on which an address list service is active cannot be found
Solution:
Make sure that the Microsoft Exchange Server System Attendant Service is running. Ours was set for Automatic startup but was not running or failed at startup.

After installing Vista’s SP1 it is now reporting that it sees 4 GBs of ram.

But is that really the point? I was wondering what the system really is seeing and not just reporting. So, I ran Everest Ultimate Edition and it still reporting what Vista originally reported: 3325 MB of memory:

Okay, then I decided to check my Task Manager and yes Vista only sees 3325 MB of memory even though SP1 now reports seeing 4 GBs in system properties page.

I went ahead and installed Service Pack 1 for Vista last night. I like the idea of being a test rat. Anyways, I started the update and just walked away. I kept my antivirus running, and all my other programs. I did close out all the windows before I started.

I will report there are no new problems.  I couldn’t believe it either. I heard of some USB problems so I checked on my external hard drive, and it was good to go.

I have to confess, I don’t see any major differences. I heard all it was going to do was be some bug fixes and performance enchancements.

I tested to see if the speed in which windows unzipped a file was any faster. NOPE! For a file that 63k it took around 18 seconds. Zip-7 took less than one second to unzip the same file. I never understood that.

Here is my setup:

Processor: DualCore AMD Athlon 64 X2 Black Edition, 2600 MHz (13 x 200) 5000+
Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-M57SLI-S4
Video Card: NVIDIA GeForce 8600 GTS  (256 MB)
RAM: 4GB of OZC SLI Ready