Monthly Archives: March 2009

Fixes, General

Daylight Savings Issues for Australia

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The powers to be in Government in Australia decided last year to make changes to the starting and ending times for Daylight Savings In Australia. As a result, the end of daylight savings has been extended to the first Sunday in April. Some PCs which have not been patched may automatically switch off to non DST time. This problem particularly affects Windows Mobile devices.
 
To resolve this issue on PCs and Servers, you will need to apply the Microsoft August or December 2008 Cumulative time zone update. If either patch is applied, the PC will have the correct DST information. This patch can be downloaded here – http://support.microsoft.com/kb/955839/
 
For Windows Mobile Devices, you can download the patch here using IE from the device- http://mobile.microsoft.com/en-us/windowsmobile/updates/dst.aspx
 
The patch does not require a reboot.
Registry Hacks, Windows Vista

Vista is unable to Rename/Move Files/Folders on a network drive

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Upon installing a new PC on a SBS2008 domain, the following symptom showed up when trying to save, rename or move files and folders on the network drive.
 
“The “\\servername\sharedfolder” does not exist. The file may have been moved or deleted. Do you want to create it?”
 
I was able to create a new folder or file, but could not rename it. I could also delete the folder or file.
 
The problem appears to happen with new PCs, possibly caused by the way the vendor packaged the OS.
 
A resolution was to turn off Offline Files Synchronization from the control panel.
I also needed to create a DWORD value named FormatDatabase with a value of 1 in HKLM/system/currentcontrolset/services/csc/parameters.
Reboot, and problem solved.
Fixes, Security, Windows 7, Windows Vista, Windows XP

Trend Micro Worry Free message “To complete the installation, restart the computer” does not go away

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After installing Trend Micro’s Worry Free Business Security version 5.0 or later, the following message comes up on the workstations. After clicking on the “Install drive and restart the computer” button, the system restarts, and this message keeps reappearing.
 
 
The solution is on Trend Micro’s knowledge base, but it is a bit difficult to find. http://esupport.trendmicro.com/Pages/To-complete-the-installation-restart-the-computer-always-appears-when.aspx
 
   1. Stop Cryptographic Services.
   2. Go to the C:\Windows\system32\catroot2 subfolder and rename it as “oldcatroot2”.
   3. Start Cryptographic Services.
   4. Open a command prompt and run the following commands:
      a. regsvr32 wintrust.dll – This registers Microsoft Trust Verification.
      b. regsvr32 netcfgx.dll – This registers Network Configuration Objects.
   5. Restart your computer.
 
There is a bit more information there, detailing the problem.
Fixes, Hardware, Windows XP

Cannot install applications on ACER L460 systems

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This is a problem that has plagued me for some time. The problem generally occurs on the 3 Litre ACER L460 series desktop with the Windows XP Pro downgrade.
 
The symptoms may include the following:
1. Cannot run setup program from a CD.
2. Cannot run setup program after download.
3. Program hangs on initial start.
 
Thanks to some friends at TSH, we have determined that the ACER Empowering Technologies elock and LANscope Agent services interfere with the installation of some applications. If you run task manager, you will see lock.exe and lockkm.exe processes running. Terminating these services allowed the programs to load properly.
 
The solution we applied was to uninstall these programs from the Control Panel.
Fixes, Hardware, Windows Vista, Windows XP

Atheros LAN Driver and slow Windows boot

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This particular problem has hit me a few times, particularly with some ASUS laptops. You would set up the PC normally, and everything works fine. Then we go for the final reboot (it is always the last one that does it).
 
During the restart, we see the Windows Logo (XP or Vista), and the running bars underneath. Suddenly, everything goes really slowly, as though in slow motion, and it does this for about 30 minutes (I timed it once).
 
The problem lies in the memory effect on this particular network card. To solve this problem, ASUS tech support recommended the following steps.
 
1. Shut down the PC/Laptop.
2. Remove the battery, or disconnect it from mains power, and disengage the network cable.
3. Restart the PC, and update the network card with the following driver – http://dlsvr.asus.com/pub/ASUS/nb/M51E/LAN_XP_080407.zip