User:Panic2k4/Sandbox/DumpingGround

SATA, MBR and GPT hell
With the Extensible Firmware Interface originally developed by Intel adoption in recent BIOS and on the new OSs (especially the 64bit variety) one is pushed to adopt a new set of technologies. This signifies considering dropping other older technologies. For instance the older MBR (Master Boot Record) technology may be replaced with the new GPT (GUID Partition Table) system but carefully consideration should be given to the trade-offs.

There is the issue with compatibility with older or less developed OSs. For instance you need a OS higher than Windows XP or a recent distro of Linux to access GPT disks, that signifies that is something breaks you will have to be prepared to deal with the new technology, this includes the limitations in portability of those disks to another computer or OS.

The only real advantage of GPT is some increased security and accuracy in regards to partition information and over the installed OSs, also the capability to support partitions above 2.20 TB (2.20 × 1012 bytes) and dropping the scheme of extended partitioning (see Extended boot record) that served under the MBR system to bypass the 4 main partition limit, but at a cost of some drive space since the GPT uses a dedicated partition to keep its information that takes much more space than the old MBR system. Note that in the new UEFI (Unified Extensible Firmware Interface) only GPT partitions can be used for booting.

Since Windows Vista, the Windows Boot Manager uses the BCD (Boot Configuration Data) as a firmware-independent database for boot-time configuration data. This information is kept in the Extensible Firmware Interface GUID Partition Table partition of the GPT disk.

GPT disks are only accessible in recent OSs on the Windows platform, on Windows XP x64 edition (no boot, only for data storage), Windows Server 2003 SP1, Windows Server 2003 (64-bit), Windows Server 2008, Windows Server 2008 R2, Windows Server 2012, Windows Vista, Windows 7 and Windows 8. For instance under Windows XP (even SP3) GPT disks are recognized but not accessible for reading or writing at file-system level (one can access their data using a file-system recovering tool that supports the properties of the file system used on the GPT partitions). More information regarding GPT under Windows is available on the Windows and GPT FAQ page maintained by MS (with some "minor" inaccuracies).

How to Convert a GPT disk layout to a MS-DOS/MBR layout without data loss (and Gigabyte Hybrid EFI)

Solved changing SATA operation mode in BIOS from IDE to AHCI without reinstalling Windows XP x64 OS for ASUS P8H77-M motherboard (Rev: 1.0) (so, it is possible...)

How To Fix Windows 8 MBR (Master Boot Record)

boot sector

Virtualbox (Windows Host - Ubuntu guest)
shared directories After having defined a static shared folder for the VM image

sudo apt-get update sudo apt-get install build-essential linux-headers-$(uname -r) -y  cd /media/cdrom sudo ./VBoxLinuxAdditions-x86.run sudo mkdir /media/windowsshare sudo gedit /etc/fstab  

The go into /etc/rc.local (a script) and add ("sudo gedit /etc/rc.local") the mount command for it, next boot it will be there. (mount -t vboxfs [sharedfolderID] [mountpath])

DOS on Windows extra setups
Go to the DOS window's
 * Options | Command History | Buffer Size | 500
 * Options | Command History | Discard Old Duplicates | True
 * Options | Edit Options | QuickEdit Mode | True
 * Layout | Screen buffer size | Height | 999

Check any need to change the size of the window and my favorite colors are 192,192,192 bright gray on 0,0,0 black.

PS:Don't forget F7/ESC cli history

Doxygen and Visual Studio
Set Doxygen WARN_FORMAT to $file($line): $text. Set Doxygen WARN_LOGFILE to the location and name of the file that will list the warnings. On VS Tools | External Tools add Title:Doxlog Command:%systemroot%\system32\cmd.exe Argument:/K type  and check "Use output directory". On VS Tools | External Tools add Title:Dogygen Command: \doxygen.exe Arguments: "<path and doxygen config file for the project" (include the quotes) initial Directory: "$(WkspDir)" and check "Use output directory" verify that Doxygen QUIET is not checked so you can get messages of the work being done.

Windows Install and Boot Disk
Simpler way is to have a Win98 DOS (7.0) (No DOS-FU required) bootable device. Copy system SYS x: to the active partition (will now boot into DOS), copy xmsmmgr.exe (memory manager to access extended memory) and smartdrv.exe (to cache device operations into the extended memory) and go into the i386 directory and run winnt.

Failing to use smartdrv will make the operation extremely slow...

MOB
91 (Ibqnsbar)(lbea) 93 (Bcgvzhf) 96 (GZA) 94 é hfnqb ab freivçb zóiry qr erphefbf cnegvyunqbf (gehaxvat) r cryb freivçb zóiry zneígvzb 92 bcrenqberf zóirvf iveghnvf (ZAIB)

Wine
A reliable method of detecting Wine presence is by checking for the existence of the Wine configuration registry key branch.

Firefox 7+ / Pale moon
To access the config (hidden in recent versions of firefox) type the normal about:config on the url field.

browser.urlbar.trimURLs (set to false so that HTTP:// and HTTPS:// are properly displayed)

about:memory gives information regarding memory usage

(fantastic loss of time) Pale moon doesn't seem to like my FEBE imported permissions (this is important since the corruption prevented cookies exceptions to be saved), go into the Profile folder, not the Mozzila version but the one in Application Data\ Moonchild Productions \Pale Moon\Profiles\ and delete permissions.sqlite that will fix the issue.

Firefox dictionary
To remove an wrongfully added word, go to %APPDATA%\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles select your profile, often (something).default and the dictionary file is persdict.dat. Do not edit or save changes with FireFox active as the file is open at the browser start and saved at exit...

WEB alternative protocols
Application HTTP intermediary layers protocols can reduce the latency of Web pages.

AOL TopSpeed technology - Multiplexed persistent connections to the intermediary layer. Sending just the object deltas from the last visit (Items that don't change on a web page over time are kept in an local cache), applying gzip compression when needed.

SPDY

"scale-free" organisation and Scale Free Networks

DAISY (ebook format)
Looking for a freely available copy of Of spies & stratagems by Stanley P. Lovell I found a version of archive.org but it was only available on the freaking DAISY format (and encrypted) (PDF versions and other) give a report that they were removed due to problems of content ?!? Anyway I'm keeping this info here since I may try this again later (or find any other work in this hateful format). There seem not to be any free converters even to non-ecrypted works and there is a limited availability of readers DDReader (FireFox extension for version 3.0 of the format) and AMIS (beta for Windows in Java)

Wikibooks
Page hits based on requests counted by Squid servers (stopped in 2009)

Flash
Flash sucks, big time... Can't wait for HTML5 (or 6) to start to kill it, hopefully quickly... For updates one has to at least check once every week as this is a very important vector to get security problems on your machine. The freaking web update is not only annoying as hell but unnecessary (and the McAfee crapware plug, or others, builds up my distaste) as to any benefit it may have for you, the user. Go into the FAQ page and look at the section for how to install flash behind a firewall for the link to the standalone executable. At least if you have to reinstall it, you´ll save yourself the trouble of downloading it again. (not that it will have a very long shelf life)...

Notice that they go out of the way to hide it from you (it is clearly intentional) Windows (non IE) version Moved around, now on the bottom of the page Installation problems Flash Player Windows here.

Note also that there is a bug after the Flash upgrade if you visit youtube, probably due to some information about your player being kept in the cookies, you have to manual delete them to be able to see the videos normally.

Java
Dang, they adopted the same policy of flash for the obfuscation for the offline download so I'm keeping it here as not to have to process the wasteful information to get to it.

Win 8
As the machine continued to be sluggish I have attempted to determine the cause, |Workaround for Windows 8 freezing issues the last change was to change the with, even if the MS patch was already in place it did increase performance (at a cost of being less energy efficient): bcdedit /set disabledynamictick yes

in situations that the computer will remain idle it can be reversed with: bcdedit /set disabledynamictick no

(It needs a restart to become effective, this is probably why it is not in the power settings)

Size hog
Windows keep eating away the freespace on its partition and some brain dead installers need more than 1Gb free on the system partition (this logic really baffles me). In any case just so I remember the main culprit is the update process and how it keeps feeding the beast, use:

Dism /Online /Cleanup-Image /StartComponentCleanup

If there are problems try

DISM.exe /Online /Cleanup-image /Scanhealth

and

DISM.exe /Online /Cleanup-image /Restorehealth

this can also help solve problems with updates.

Note to self: I disabled hybernation and optimized the page file also.

The Windows Installer UnUsed Files Cleanup Tool (WICleanup) by KZTechs https://www.raymond.cc/blog/download/did/1652/

SvcRestartTask hell

 * Security-SPP Event 16385 Error 0x80070005

System corruption, something has fraked the Service Protection system and you are now getting critical errors every few seconds. That has a real impact on the performance of your machine. The is some sort of interaction with the USB mouse drivers (at least, maybe intentional since it will also affect the Windows' activation process).

Task Scheduler (it may depend on your installation but there are 3 tasks under the SoftwareProtectionPlatform branch of Task Scheduler (Task Scheduler > Task Scheduler Library > Microsoft > Windows > SoftwareProtectionPlatform. Export them for safe keeping and delete them (most probably you can only see the SvcRestartTask, that is the that got corrupted. This is also reflected on the C:\Windows\System32\Tasks\Microsoft\Windows\SoftwareProtectionPlatform folder (there you can see the matching 3 files).

Get a clean copy of those file via:
 * Win 8 machine export http://pastebin.com/p06ErcTN
 * Export from a similar working Windows install.
 * Copy form install.win archive (windows install pack)

You have to mock about with permissions for the C:\Windows\System32\Tasks\Microsoft\Windows\SoftwareProtectionPlatform folder and at the same time check that Network Service account has access to them. Backup and delete at least the SvcRestartTask one.

Go to the Task Scheduler with the right permissions and import the copy you got (before add .xml extension to the file if it doesn't already have it, note that the filename is important as it is the new scheduled task name and must match the removed ones). If you get any errors on this step it is due to access permissions. Most people report it as fixed at this stage. It fixed the problem regarding a future date on the event error, the constant error logging and the USB mouse issue but as a result local Activation is now set into the past (I forced a reset and activation before completing the fix) so due to a bug I may not ever need to reactivate the OS.

Win 8.1 ?!?
There is no reason for the upgrade and the risk and complexity it creates in managing the installation of the OS. Then I get this annoying pushes from MS to upgrade to 8.1. Well here is how to turn them off (and I also took the chance to turn the Store off) How to Disable “Update to Windows 8.1 for Free” Notification in Windows 8 Store?.

GFX Card Problem
My card started to have issues after a manufacturer bios update that overclocked it a bit (well, a lot). First it was a temperature issue (my bad) and some graphics corruption but after a later driver patch the instability become problematic. I have checked all the sources and even in doing a bios edit myself for adding more voltage (no can do, it is maxed), and noted that altering the PhysicX setting from automatic to the card did temporarily solve it, during a few hours it gave no issues. I'm left with few options beyond under-clocking it or getting a new one (I did).

Have attempted this one https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/kb/2665946#bookmark-letmefixitmyselfalways (I doubt it will do anything, but I'm listing it here in case I need to reverse it) will try the Tdr Manipulator later (not needed so far). I also disabled speed-step. I had a run of several hours without issues.

Have to reverse that reg changes I made at the time of the old card (if I have issues, so far no problems so no change). See TDR Registry Keys for the default values.

Misc.
Black Knight 1 - 2