troubleshooting - PC freezes after repeated clicking noises

I have an oldish PC (Athlon XP 2200, WinXP). Every time I switch it on, I hear a loud "click" first of all, and when it is shut down, again a click is the last sound I hear.

Lately it started to behave erratically: it started to click loudly in the middle of a session. First only once in a while, then repeatedly for several seconds in a row, and finally it froze completely. We were not doing anything particular during these times, usually just browsing the web. This has already happened twice in a few week's time period. We typically use it only in the evenings, so when the freeze happened, I just decided it is time for the bed. When it was started up the next day, everything looked fine.

Any hints on what could be the culprit? We are backing up all the data stored on it, and then will open the case to look inside, but I thought it would be good to get some background info first of all.

Answer

I'd start with the hard drive. A dying hard drive can start to make audible clicks as it spins its way to death. It's so common it's referred to as The Click of Death. And a dying hard drive can certainly freeze a system up. I would make your very next move a duplication of your hard drive. Make sure it's backed up and the backup works.

missing memory in Windows Server 2003 x64

We have Oracle database running on a 64-bit Windows Server 2003 Enterprise Edition, with 32GB RAM.

The database has been configured to use 10gb for SGA (target = max = 10GB) and 5GB for cache. Upon startup, the task manager would show around 12GB of free memory. On this server, the only application running is the database. During the day, we would see the free memory gone all the way down to 4MB.

We would like to find out what application is eating up the free memory. The memory usage does not add up on the task manager nor on perfmon. We suspect some process is taking up the free memory and not releasing it. How do we proceed?

debian - Performance Tuning a High-Load Apache Server

I am looking to understand some server performance problems I am seeing with a (for us) heavily loaded web server. The environment is as follows:

• Debian Lenny (all stable packages + patched to security updates)


• Apache 2.2.9


• PHP 5.2.6


• Amazon EC2 large instance

The behavior we're seeing is that the web typically feels responsive, but with a slight delay to begin handling a request -- sometimes a fraction of a second, sometimes 2-3 seconds in our peak usage times. The actual load on the server is being reported as very high -- often 10.xx or 20.xx as reported by top. Further, running other things on the server during these times (even vi) is very slow, so the load is definitely up there. Oddly enough Apache remains very responsive, other than that initial delay.

We have Apache configured as follows, using prefork:

StartServers          5
MinSpareServers       5
MaxSpareServers      10
MaxClients          150
MaxRequestsPerChild   0

And KeepAlive as:

KeepAlive On
MaxKeepAliveRequests 100
KeepAliveTimeout 5

Looking at the server-status page, even at these times of heavy load we are rarely hitting the client cap, usually serving between 80-100 requests and many of those in the keepalive state. That tells me to rule out the initial request slowness as "waiting for a handler" but I may be wrong.

Amazon's CloudWatch monitoring tells me that even when our OS is reporting a load of > 15, our instance CPU utilization is between 75-80%.

Example output from top:

top - 15:47:06 up 31 days,  1:38,  8 users,  load average: 11.46, 7.10, 6.56
Tasks: 221 total,  28 running, 193 sleeping,   0 stopped,   0 zombie
Cpu(s): 66.9%us, 22.1%sy,  0.0%ni,  2.6%id,  3.1%wa,  0.0%hi,  0.7%si,  4.5%st
Mem:   7871900k total,  7850624k used,    21276k free,    68728k buffers
Swap:        0k total,        0k used,        0k free,  3750664k cached

The majority of the processes look like:

24720 www-data  15   0  202m  26m 4412 S    9  0.3   0:02.97 apache2                                                                       
24530 www-data  15   0  212m  35m 4544 S    7  0.5   0:03.05 apache2                                                                       
24846 www-data  15   0  209m  33m 4420 S    7  0.4   0:01.03 apache2                                                                       
24083 www-data  15   0  211m  35m 4484 S    7  0.5   0:07.14 apache2                                                                       
24615 www-data  15   0  212m  35m 4404 S    7  0.5   0:02.89 apache2            

Example output from vmstat at the same time as the above:

procs -----------memory---------- ---swap-- -----io---- -system-- ----cpu----
 r  b   swpd   free   buff  cache   si   so    bi    bo   in   cs us sy id wa
 8  0      0 215084  68908 3774864    0    0   154   228    5    7 32 12 42  9
 6 21      0 198948  68936 3775740    0    0   676  2363 4022 1047 56 16  9 15
23  0      0 169460  68936 3776356    0    0   432  1372 3762  835 76 21  0  0
23  1      0 140412  68936 3776648    0    0   280     0 3157  827 70 25  0  0
20  1      0 115892  68936 3776792    0    0   188     8 2802  532 68 24  0  0

 6  1      0 133368  68936 3777780    0    0   752    71 3501  878 67 29  0  1
 0  1      0 146656  68944 3778064    0    0   308  2052 3312  850 38 17 19 24
 2  0      0 202104  68952 3778140    0    0    28    90 2617  700 44 13 33  5
 9  0      0 188960  68956 3778200    0    0     8     0 2226  475 59 17  6  2
 3  0      0 166364  68956 3778252    0    0     0    21 2288  386 65 19  1  0

And finally, output from Apache's server-status:

Server uptime: 31 days 2 hours 18 minutes 31 seconds

Total accesses: 60102946 - Total Traffic: 974.5 GB
CPU Usage: u209.62 s75.19 cu0 cs0 - .0106% CPU load
22.4 requests/sec - 380.3 kB/second - 17.0 kB/request
107 requests currently being processed, 6 idle workers

C.KKKW..KWWKKWKW.KKKCKK..KKK.KKKK.KK._WK.K.K.KKKKK.K.R.KK..C.C.K
K.C.K..WK_K..KKW_CK.WK..W.KKKWKCKCKW.W_KKKKK.KKWKKKW._KKK.CKK...
KK_KWKKKWKCKCWKK.KKKCK..........................................
................................................................

From my limited experience I draw the following conclusions/questions:

• We may be allowing far too many KeepAlive requests




• I do see some time spent waiting for IO in the vmstat although not consistently and not a lot (I think?) so I am not sure this is a big concern or not, I am less experienced with vmstat




• Also in vmstat, I see in some iterations a number of processes waiting to be served, which is what I am attributing the initial page load delay on our web server to, possibly erroneously




• We serve a mixture of static content (75% or higher) and script content, and the script content is often fairly processor intensive, so finding the right balance between the two is important; long term we want to move statics elsewhere to optimize both servers but our software is not ready for that today

I am happy to provide additional information if anybody has any ideas, the other note is that this is a high-availability production installation so I am wary of making tweak after tweak, and is why I haven't played with things like the KeepAlive value myself yet.

Answer

I'll start by admitting that I don't much about running stuff in clouds - but based on my experience elsewhere, I'd say that this webserver config reflects a fairly low volume of traffic. That the runqueue is so large suggests that there just isn't enough CPU available to deal with it. What else is in the runqueue?

We may be allowing far too many KeepAlive requests

No - keeplive still improves performance, modern browsers are very smart about knowing when to pipeline and when to run requests in parallel, although a timeout of 5 seconds is still rather high, and you've got a LOT of servers waiting - unless you've got HUGE latency problems I'd recommend cranking this down to 2-3. This should shorten the runqueue a little.

If you've not already got mod_deflate installed on the webserver - then I'd recommend you do so - and add the ob_gzhandler() to your PHP scripts. You can do this as an auto-prepend:

if(!ob_start("ob_gzhandler")) ob_start();

(yes, copression uses more CPU - but you should save CPU overall by getting servers out of the runqueue faster / handling fewer TCP packets - and as a bonus, your site is also faster).

I'd recommend setting an upper limit on MaxRequestsPerChild - say something like 500. This just allows some turnover on processes in case you've got a memory leak somewhere.
Your httpd processes look to be HUGE - make sure you've removed any apache modules you don't need and make sure you're serving up static content with good caching information.

If you're still seeing problems, then the problem is probably within the PHP code (if you switch to using fastCGI, this should be evident without any major performance penalty).

update

If the static content doesn't vary much across pages, then it might also be worth experimenting with:

if (count($_COOKIE)) {
    header('Connection: close');
}

on the PHP scripts too.

virus - Recovering infected Windows files?

I was wondering: When an anti-virus application detects a virus and the file(s) affected is/are Windows system files, is it a good idea to

1) reboot with a bootable USB keydrive running eg. Linux + ntfs-3g, and

2) recover those files from a Windows DVD as an alternative to the Windows Recovery procedure (in case the user hasn't built a Windows Recovery in a long while)?

It seems faster/easier to just recover the original files from a DVD than restoring the whole disk from a trusted restore point, but maybe there are other issues?

Thank you.

Answer

I always copy system files from a known clean PC with the same OS and service pack level, system files on the DVD are usually outdated. SFC may work, unless the virus infected those stored backups of windows system files.

When in doubt, back up personal data and wipe the drive and re-install the OS clean, scan backed up files before transferring them to the clean installed system.

Ubuntu 14.04 VPS won't boot the latest kernel on XEN

I have a XEN VPS and it's been running Ubuntu for some years now.
AUtomatic security upgrades are on and I've manually upgraded it continously and also done releas-upgrades whenever there's been a new release. All has been working great!

But now, after upgradeing to 14.04 LTS, the VPS won't boot the latest kernel (3.13.0-24) even though it's set to default. It always failback to 3.2.0-60 and for some reason the VPS seams very unresponsive, compared the before.

The support wrote in a ticket something about compiling my own kernel, with pvops enabled, but I'm not sure how to do that, or why I should compile my own kernel.

Doesn't Ubuntu support to be run on a XEN host?

Upgrade from Windows 7 32-bit with Downloadable Windows 7 64-bit ISO?

I want to upgrade my Windows 7 32-bit to Windows 7 64-bit because I'm fed-up with the memory limitations. I have a valid Windows 7 key, which based on a search of SO, should be valid for 64-bit. The issue I have, is I don't have a 64-bit ISO. I know Microsoft used to have TechNet downloads of all the OS ISOs, but I can't find them.

I understand that some might scream 'piracy', but I have a completely valid, purchased key and I assume asking for the ISO is completely legal and doesn't contravene any SU rules. Can anyone direct me on how to get a 64-bit ISO?

Help is appreciated.

-- I was told that the 32-bit ISO allowed 64-bit installation, this isn't the case with the ISO I have at least. But if this can be done, tips on how to do it would be great :)

boot - Install multiple Linux from network

For example if I have 4 computers and I want to install Linux to all these, what is the fastest way to install multiple computers at the same time and how ? For example our school has computer classes and if I need to try something which needs multiple computers how can I quickly set them up ? I was thinking that if I create a image first and then somehow install it via network boot ? Suggestions ? Using Xubuntu.

Answer

You can use Cobbler.

It has a nice web interface to manage your deployment image and you can create seed and kickstart file to automate install.

You can create system profiles by mac address to automatically choose the good kickstart file.

multi boot - Create a multiboot USB drive with Ubuntu and Windows 7 using ISO images

I would like to have a bootable USB drive with some bootable ISO images on it, where some sort of menu appears on boot to select a specific image file on the USB drive and continue boot from that one.

Is there a way to create that? I am interested in e.g. Windows 7 and Ubuntu.

Answer

yeah, you can try yumi: http://www.pendrivelinux.com/yumi-multiboot-usb-creator/

if you have not tried that yet.

windows 7 - USB drive becomes write protected after inserting it

Whenever I insert a USB drive in my desktop PC running Windows 7 Ultimate, it becomes write protected. Then when I use it on my laptop, I can't delete the files on it.

I already tried scanning for malware and viruses.

Can I repair this, eventually without reformatting?

domain name system - Cached Nameservers, can I change a record of old server to new?

I am having a problem with a domain having cached nameservers. It goes to the old website instead of the new in some areas. Am I able to go to the old hosting DNS and change the A record and get it to the new website? How long does this cache take to expire?

Answer

Am I able to go to the old hosting DNS and change the A record and get it to the new website?

Yes, this is exactly what you should do.

How long does this cache take to expire?

Short Answer

Wait a week.

Typically your transition period shouldn't last more than a few days, but it's rare to see ones that require an entire week. If you don't want to get into the technical details of how this process works, a week should be safe. A week also gives you time to notice anything catastrophically wrong with your new environment that might force you to "roll back" to the old servers.

Long Answer

I'm going to steer you to a closely related Q&A on this one:

Migrating DNS provider when having high NS-record TTL

When you log into your registrar control panel and change DNS servers, you enter into a transition period where any recursive DNS servers that are already aware of your domain must pick up the change. The only safe thing you can do is maintain both your old and new nameservers in an identical state until this period expires.

The duration of this transition period is the largest TTL associated with your domain in the delegation path. This would be the NS records living inside of the nameservers you control, as well as the delegation pointing to it. This is easier to explain visually, and you can find these values by either using the dig command on a UNIX/Linux box (dig +trace example.com), or using similar web based tools that provide the same functionality.

In the case of example.com, you should see output similar to the following:

.           233637  IN  NS  a.root-servers.net.
.           233637  IN  NS  b.root-servers.net.
.           233637  IN  NS  c.root-servers.net.
.           233637  IN  NS  d.root-servers.net.
.           233637  IN  NS  e.root-servers.net.
.           233637  IN  NS  f.root-servers.net.
.           233637  IN  NS  g.root-servers.net.
.           233637  IN  NS  h.root-servers.net.
.           233637  IN  NS  i.root-servers.net.
.           233637  IN  NS  j.root-servers.net.

.           233637  IN  NS  k.root-servers.net.
.           233637  IN  NS  l.root-servers.net.
.           233637  IN  NS  m.root-servers.net.
;; Received 228 bytes from 8.8.4.4#53(8.8.4.4) in 4 ms

com.            172800  IN  NS  h.gtld-servers.net.
com.            172800  IN  NS  l.gtld-servers.net.
com.            172800  IN  NS  a.gtld-servers.net.
com.            172800  IN  NS  f.gtld-servers.net.
com.            172800  IN  NS  c.gtld-servers.net.

com.            172800  IN  NS  m.gtld-servers.net.
com.            172800  IN  NS  i.gtld-servers.net.
com.            172800  IN  NS  k.gtld-servers.net.
com.            172800  IN  NS  g.gtld-servers.net.
com.            172800  IN  NS  e.gtld-servers.net.
com.            172800  IN  NS  d.gtld-servers.net.
com.            172800  IN  NS  j.gtld-servers.net.
com.            172800  IN  NS  b.gtld-servers.net.
;; Received 489 bytes from 192.112.36.4#53(192.112.36.4) in 32 ms


example.com.        172800  IN  NS  a.iana-servers.net.
example.com.        172800  IN  NS  b.iana-servers.net.
;; Received 165 bytes from 192.26.92.30#53(192.26.92.30) in 2484 ms

example.com.        86400   IN  A   93.184.216.34
example.com.        86400   IN  NS  a.iana-servers.net.
example.com.        86400   IN  NS  b.iana-servers.net.
;; Received 93 bytes from 199.43.135.53#53(199.43.135.53) in 22 ms

In the above output, we would ignore the TTLs associated with . and com., because those are not for our domain. The TTLs that interest us are the last two sets, which are both associated with example.com.. The first set is the delegation to the nameservers you had configured in your registrar control panel. The second set is the NS records that live on those DNS servers. To ensure a smooth transition you must use the larger of these two values, which is usually the delegation.

In the above example, your transition period would be 172800 seconds. (two days)

Is there a way to find out my Windows 7-version without booting?

I have Windows 7 installed on another partition of my computer. Is there a way I can look up which version of Windows (Home, Professional) I have without booting into Windows? I can access all the files of the system, and open them with an editor, if needed.

I have a calculation running on the computer that I don't want to interrupt, but it won't be done for a day or two, but I'd like to know my Windows version before that.

Clarification

The calculation is running on OS X, so unfortunately I don't have access to all the nice Windows tools.

Answer

Go to

C:\Windows\System32

read the "license.rtf" file

hard drive - Can I easily put an SSD in an ASUS G75, and which ones?

I've been out of the hardware game for a while. I'm looking to buy a new laptop, but even the gaming laptops mostly come with a 5400 RPM HDD. I've got my eye on some variant of the ASUS G75 but I'm wondering if I can replace the HDD with an SSD and if so, are there any particular models/connectors/interfaces I can and cannot use? Also, how easy is it to do?

update I purchased the g75vx-bhi7n11. Here is a screenshot of disk management. Device manager only shows one HDD.

Answer

Some Asus g75's use two hard-drives. If this is the case with your model i would buy one SSD for your OS and the other HDD i would leave for your games. Your computer uses 2.5" standard size internal hard-drives.If your model only has one hard drive, and large ssd's are expensive but games take lots of space, i would recommend a hybrid drive. http://www.seagate.com/internal-hard-drives/laptop-hard-drives/laptop-solid-state-hybrid-drive/

How to change "comments" on files in windows from command line?

In windows on certain files users are able to change the "comments" on the file. This can be done by right clicking the file -> properties -> Details as shown in this image

Questions

1. Is there a way to do this from the command line?


2. Is there a way to do this programmatically in a non-windows environment? Meaning, can the comments be added to a file in a non-windows box and when that file is moved to a windows box then those comments are actually visible?

WGET command line for download videos

I'm trying to figure out WGET for downloading some videos at http://windowsclient.net/learn/videos_wpf.aspx.

This page is an index page, and contains links to a page for each video; each page then has a direct link to a video. Something like;

http://windowsclient.net/learn/videos_wpf.aspx
  -> http://windowsclient.net/learn/video.aspx?v=300881
    -> http://download.microsoft.com/[...]/HDI-WPF-ipod-AccelerometerJoystick(2).mp4

What I'd like to do is tell WGET to spider the site by following either video.aspx?* or .mp4 links, recurively, for two levels. I can figure out

WGET -r -l2 http://windowsclient.net/learn/videos_wpf.aspx

and then I get stuck. Any suggestions greatly appreciated.

EDIT: Thanks to @mloskot, I got the answer;

WGET -r -l2 -A.mp4,video*.aspx* 
  --domains=windowsclient.net,download.microsoft.com 
  --span-hosts 

  http://windowsclient.net/learn/videos_wpf.aspx

Answer

Learn about option -A in the 2.11 and 4.2 chapter of wget manual and use this option to specify comma-separated lists of file name suffixes or patterns to accept. In other words, use -A to specify that you want to download only files with mp4 extension:

WGET -r -l2 -A.mp4 http://windowsclient.net/learn/videos_wpf.aspx

Which monitor connector: DVI or VGA?

I just got my new workstation and plugged it into the ordinary VGA 15-pin connector. The monitor does not pick up the signal.

Do I have to use a DVI port? I can see several on this machine.

The workstation powers up great. I do not want to go out and buy a DVI cable before I know if that would help.

Should not the monitor -always- pick up the signal from the 15 pin port?

keyboard - I can't bind ctrl+shift+c shortcut in debian stretch with gnome

I realized that the shortcuts ctrl+shift+c/v doesn't work anymore in gnome-terminal, then I went to the keyboard settings, I tried to set a shortcut ctrl+shift+ and didn't work, it is just like if the shift key was not held. I decide to check with the showkey command:

showkey -a

if I press ctrl+shift+c the output is
^C 3 0003 0x03

if I press ctrl+c the output is
^C 3 0003 0x03

if I press shift+c the output is
C 67 0103 0x43

so the shift and ctrl keys works if they are combined with other keys but not together

Using the xev command and then ctrl+shift+c:

KeyPress event, serial 36, synthetic NO, window 0x3600001,
root 0xb0, subw 0x0, time 4228802, (350,407), root:(399,489),
state 0x2010, keycode 37 (keysym 0xffe3, Control_L), same_screen YES,
XLookupString gives 0 bytes:
XmbLookupString gives 0 bytes:
XFilterEvent returns: False

FocusOut event, serial 36, synthetic NO, window 0x3600001,
mode NotifyGrab, detail NotifyAncestor

FocusIn event, serial 36, synthetic NO, window 0x3600001,
mode NotifyUngrab, detail NotifyNonlinear

KeymapNotify event, serial 36, synthetic NO, window 0x0,
keys: 0 0 0 0 32 0 4 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0

KeyPress event, serial 36, synthetic NO, window 0x3600001,
root 0xb0, subw 0x0, time 4235635, (350,407), root:(399,489),
state 0x14, keycode 55 (keysym 0x76, v), same_screen YES,
XLookupString gives 1 bytes: (16) ""
XmbLookupString gives 1 bytes: (16) ""
XFilterEvent returns: False

KeyRelease event, serial 36, synthetic NO, window 0x3600001,
root 0xb0, subw 0x0, time 4235686, (350,407), root:(399,489),
state 0x14, keycode 55 (keysym 0x76, v), same_screen YES,
XLookupString gives 1 bytes: (16) ""
XFilterEvent returns: False

KeyRelease event, serial 36, synthetic NO, window 0x3600001,
root 0xb0, subw 0x0, time 4236136, (350,407), root:(399,489),
state 0x14, keycode 50 (keysym 0xfe08, ISO_Next_Group), same_screen YES,
XKeysymToKeycode returns keycode: 37
XLookupString gives 0 bytes:
XFilterEvent returns: False

Other user in the same computer can use ctrl+shift+c/v on gnome-terminal, so I think its a matter of configuration in some place,
I found that Ctrl+Shift is assigned in someway to layout switch, I already check if this shortcut is set on my keyboard settings but it is not, I don't know when and where was set this combination, if I can know how to disable Ctrl+Shift keyboard layout switch, maybe this will be the solution.

Also I checked the /etc/default/keyboard file:

vim /etc/default/keyboard

XKBMODEL="pc105"
XKBLAYOUT="us,latam"
XKBVARIANT=""
XKBOPTIONS="grp:alt_space_toggle"

BACKSPACE="guess"

I went to all settings > Region & Language > Input Sources Options
I found that 'Alternative switch to the next source' is set to Ctrl+Shift, in that window says 'You can change these shortcuts in the keyboard settings' although if I go to keyboard settings this Ctrl+Shift is not assigned to any command, in fact it doesn't allows me to use Ctrl+Shift alone (it has to be Ctrl+Shift+key).

windows xp - Pushing Information into a Networked/Shared Read-Only Excel File Used by Multiple People

We have a pretty unique situation at work. We have order takers who take orders and each individual references the same shared read-only excel document on a network storage drive. This excel document contains multiple sheets that has prices and other formulas that contribute to correct pricing for a customer's order. Along with those sales prices there are sheets that contain reference information, etc.

Certain places where the orders are being filled only have so many resources available. We would like to include in this shared, read-only spreadsheet information that will automatically update without having each user close and re-open the excel document.

It is my understanding that you can specify a data source (such as a database or a web document, etc) to pull some of this information directly into the excel document every few minutes. I have thought about creating a local web page to feed data into the main excel spreadsheet which is on a network drive (If I do it this way I have no idea what programming language to use).

We are running Office 2003 (still) but have Office 2007 on some computers. Additionally most of the computers in the office are Windows XP and we are close to migrating everyone to Windows 7 64-bit machines.

Summary:

• Automatically push information into a shared, read-only excel document.


• The excel document is saved as a 97-2003 .xls file.


• The computers are all currently running Windows XP, upgrade coming in a few months.

What is the best way to set this up? Any suggestions without having our office re-invent the wheel?

Recovering data from external hard drive with hard drive enclosure

So I spilled water on my WD Essential 1.5 TB hard drive. I think it is just the enclosure that is affected so I bought a Rocketfish hard drive enclosure.

Now when I connect it to the computer it installs drivers and everything but under my computer it shows two drives but I can't click them.

When I go to computer management a message pops up saying "you must initialize a disk before logical disk manager can access it".

Any suggestions?

Answer

How long ago was the water spilled? Like Mark said, the enclosures don't offer much protection (unless they advertise themselves to be waterproof, etc) against stuff like this.

If the spill happened only in the last few days, don't reconnect it.

Leave the drive in a warm (but not hot) area with very good circulation (or put it in front of a fan (but not an air conditioner, that'll just get it wetter) for a few days to make sure it dries off completely.

Then run any one of the standard drive recovery tools we've recommended ad nauseum elsewhere on this site.

windows 7 - Cleaning WinSxS- doesn't work

I've tried the cmd command and Windows cleaner with elevated privileges, but neither has cleaned the WinSxS folder. It says that the task has been completed in the CMD, but WinSxS is still 14 GB. I'm using Windows 7 Home Premium x64.

Answer

The only way to cleanup the WinSxS folder is to check all installed Updates and look which updates are replaced by newer updates and remove those old updates. In Windows 8 Microsoft added an automatic cleanup which does the check for you and removes the updates.

VMware vSphere 5.5 any authentication attempts fail

In a VMWare vSphere 5.5 Windows based environment, any authentication attempts fail (taking some time).

The logs mention lines like:

ERROR  [IdentityManager] Failed to find solution user 
by subject DN [1.2.840.113549.1.9.1=#1612737570706f727440766d776172652e636f6d,CN=localdomain.local,OU=VMware\, Inc.,O=VMware\, Inc.] in tenant [vsphere.local] 
ERROR  [ServerUtils] Exception 'java.lang.IllegalStateException: More than one solution user found' 

What could be the reason?

Answer

What happened

Not sure what had happened, but maybe the whole description helps someone.

The internal LDAP directory of vSphere running typically at port 11711 has ended up with corrupt entries. Resulting in strange observation - one could authenticate towards e.g. webclient, but couldn't do more there as it flooded with messages like "Client is not authenticated to VMware Inventory Service - https://myserverFQDN:10443"

Solution

Using an LDAP client (e.g. LDAPAdmin) log on to the server using the following connection criteria:

host:          localhost
port:          11711
version:       3
Base:          dc=vsphere,dc=local
Username:      cn=Administrator,cn=Users,dc=vsphere,dc=local
Password:      the one for administrator@vsphere.local

Navigate to cn=ServicePrincipals and check their vmwSTSSubjectDN to make sure they are unique. Not sure what are the proper ones. In some other installation I found:

InventoryService                1.2.840.113549.1.9.1=#1612737570706f727440766d776172652e636f6d,CN=VMware default certificate,OU=InventoryService_2013.07.31_145941,O=VMware\, Inc.
vCenterServer                   1.2.840.113549.1.9.1=#1612737570706f727440766d776172652e636f6d,CN=VMware default certificate,OU=vCenterServer_2013.07.31_150056,O=VMware\, Inc.

but the last parts (OU=, O=) may be different for some reason

Hints for similar problems

What I found useful was decompilation of the class com.vmware.identity.idm.server.provider.vmwdirectory.VMwareDirectoryProvider found in one of the JARs in the vSphere installation. It turns out it contains some hard-coded LDAP queries which might be useful in some other troubleshooting of VMWare's internal LDAP server.
(I better not paste it here for licensing reasons).
And for decompiling 3rd party Java classes I learned to use http://www.javadecompilers.com. The CFR one works really well.

In Windows 7 Where/what are (if any) the settings that bypass the switch user screen and go directly to the authenication screen?

I have Group Policy set from windows 2008R2 domain controllers. The clients are all Windows 7 (Ultimate) machines. I have a group policy set that locks the clients after 5 minutes of inactivity. Each work station has one user signed in, all users have roaming profiles.

When starting from the lock screen, users enter Ctl + Alt + Del and go to the authentication screen. For one user, instead of the authentication screen...the switch user screen appears, with only one profile to select.

This user is the only user logged in. When logging into her account on a different station, Windows goes from the lock screen to the authentication screen. This makes me think that it's a registry setting, somewhere in HKLM or HKCU, however I haven't been able to find any information about the lock screen or change user registry settings.

Lock Screen:

Select User Screen (the screen I want to bypass):

Authentication Screen (I want to go directly here):

printing - Word 2010 prints white space (like margins) in document

I have a document that was created in Word 2007. There's no problem when i'm printing it using Word 2007 on other computers.

However, when I print it using Word 2010, it prints white spaces like margins at the top and bottom of the paper.

I checked the page type (Letter, A4) and the margins. How can I fix it without downgrading to 2007?

domain name system - Is it possible to send different-per-subnet DNSes from the single ISC DHCP server?

The case I want to cover is to send different DNS server for one, isolated VLAN, which purpose is to give internet-only access - for our guests. It has no access to our internal network, so it shouldn't use DNS referring to internal addresses.

The problem, that is caused by setting that DNS is, that, if our employers are up to use that guest-only VLAN for some reason, they have no access to our mail server, as it tries to connect via internal address, which is not reachable from that subnet.

Example:

Guest only VLAN is 1000, subnet provided there via DHCP is 192.168.1.0/26,
traffic is limited to that subnet and to internet only,
that DHCP server has also pools 192.168.1.128/25, 192.168.2.0/23 and 192.168.4.0/22,
which are getting DNS servers from 192.168.1.64/26, but for the 192.168.1.0/26 subnet
I'd like to provide google DNSes: 8.8.8.8 and 8.8.4.4

Is such configuration possible at single DHCP server - the 'per subnet dns' configuration?
If not, is it possible to run 2 instances of ISC DHCP server at single physical/virtual machine, with different configs(and how do I achieve that)?

Answer

Yes, it is possible. You can create multiple subnet entries and give each its own DNS config, something like this:

# guests
subnet 192.168.1.0 netmask 255.255.255.192 {
    option routers 192.168.1.1;

    option subnet-mask 255.255.255.192;
    option domain-name-servers 8.8.8.8 8.8.8.4;
    # other config statements here
}
# trusted
subnet 192.168.2.0 netmask 255.255.254.0 {
    option routers 192.168.2.1;
    option subnet-mask 255.255.254.0;
    option domain-name-servers 192.168.1.64;
    # other config statements here

}
 # trusted
subnet 192.168.4.0 netmask 255.255.252.0 {
    option routers 192.168.4.1;
    option subnet-mask 255.255.252.0;
    option domain-name-servers 192.168.1.64;
    # other config statements here
}

Node JS app with https via IIS reverse proxy

Could you help me with https via IIS reverse proxy?

I set up my nodejs app in local network as http://mayapp.domain.com:8080 and https://myapp.domain.com:8443. It works Ok.
For external access i use IIS reverse proxy (ARR and URL Rewrite module 3.0) with port forwarding (8080->80, 8443->443).
External http works ok now, but https returns 404 (Not found)

power - What kind of connector is this?

I'm trying to identify this connector. I suspect it is some kind of Molex connector, but I can't figure out which one.

Here are 2 pics I've taken.

Currently it is attached to a micro-usb plug at the other end, but I want to switch it to a new lightning connector.

Any help identifying it, or if anyone knows what kind of crimping tool I'd need to make this work, that would be great too.

hard drive - Error "a disk read error occurred" on Windows XP

Around a week ago I sometimes had trouble bringing up Windows XP profile (so it would boot into a temporary profile directory). I ran CHKDSK three days ago on boot and didn't find any bad blocks.

Starting yesterday, my desktop (Windows XP SP3) became really weird. After I booted up it seems like something was eating up my CPU (though I didn't see anything suspecting in the resource monitor fired up using Ctrl + Alt + Delete). The computer booted very slowly, and applications started very slowly. My real video files which used to play smoothly was lagging. My phone dial up had trouble logging into most web sites while some (like Slashdot and google) seemed to be more or less fine.

Was there problem with the network? My girlfriend's netbook running behind a home gateway (which dialed pppoe for her) connect to the web just fine! So this ruled out the possibility.

Today I booted up again, and the same thing happened. At first I suspected it was a virus. So I changed my BIOS settings to boot up on another physical disk (the OS wasn't MS Windows). Something was very weird, it still had the same network connectivity issues. I scanned my Windows C partition. Clam AntiVirus claimed that there was this executable resting on my Windows desktop directory containing a trojan whose name I cannot recall now. I tried to go into the directory to check the file, but I suddenly couldn't get in. So I rebooted the computer and tried to switch back to Windows only to find out I cannot boot!! It says "a disk read error occurred" and ask me to press Ctrl + Alt + Del to restart.

I wasn't suspecting a disk error! The disk is relatively new (two years and four months). I ran CHKDSK at boot around three days ago. The event log told me I have 0 bad block! So I am now in shock that suddenly I can no longer boot, nor mounting the disk from the other OS. I tried to unplug the SATA cables and replug it to no avail.

So here are my questions!

1. I don't know why the network connectivity is weird as it is. If it is the trouble with Windows or the hard disk, then this other OS on the other disk should run just fine. But it turns out that it runs fast, but network is still a problem.




2. Given that there probably isn't any bad block in this disk (right?? I hope), and I desperate need the data in there and I have no back up, is there a good chance that I can bring it to some shop to recover my data?




3. Could there also be other possibilities that problem is not related to virus or disk? Such as a motherboard problem?




4. What can I do myself to recover the data?

How to make Notepad++ open file browser in current folder?

I set Notepad++ to be called from command-line. I would like it to open file browser in current folder from which it was called so that I could work with files in that folder. Is there any way to do this; any suggestions, ideas how to go about it? Textmate has this feature, which is very convenient.

[edit]

To clarify, I was looking to get this from explorer plugin that open on the side. I don't see any option in the config. Maybe it can't be done, I was hoping someone might know more.
[/edit]

Thanks in advance for your input.

Answer

I just checked my installation of Notepad++. When I invoke it via the command-line I am able to have it open the current folder for file saves/opens. How are you invoking Notepad++ from the command-line? What I have done is, append C:\Program Files\Notepad++ to the PATH variable.

linux - How to share an EFI boot partition

I have two Archlinux installations on an EFI system set up with gummiboot. One is rooted at /dev/sda2, the other at /dev/sdb1. Both use /dev/sda1, the EFI system partition, as their /boot partition, but place their kernel images in different locations:

/boot/loader/entries/arch.conf:

title   Arch Linux
linux   /vmlinuz-linux
initrd  /intel-ucode.img
initrd  /initramfs-linux.img
options root=/dev/sda2 rw

/boot/loader/entries/arch-here.conf:

title   HERE Arch Linux
linux   /here-img/vmlinuz-linux
initrd  /here-img/intel-ucode.img
initrd  /here-img/initramfs-linux.img
options cryptdevice=/dev/sdb1:cryptroot root=/dev/mapper/cryptroot rw

This was fine until I updated the kernel from 4.8.13 to 4.9 on sdb. The next time I booted into sda, it failed with

Warning: /lib/modules/4.8.13-1-ARCH/modules.devname not found
...
ERROR: device '/dev/sda2 not found. Skipping fsck.
...

I booted back into sdb, reinstalled kernel 4.8.13, and found I could boot into sda again. However, now I could no longer boot into sdb, as it failed to load the encrypt hook needed to open /dev/sdb1.

I resolved this by chrooting into /dev/sdb1 from sda and installing 4.9 again. This allowed me to boot into sdb but not sda.

Now I'm stuck in a loop where I need to rebuild my kernel image every time I want to switch between installations. It seems that the two kernels are interfering somehow.

Here are the steps I go through on my sda install every time I want to boot into sdb:

sudo cryptsetup open /dev/sdb1 cryptroot
sudo mount /dev/mapper/cryptroot /mnt/
sudo mount /dev/sda1 /mnt/boot/
chroot /mnt/
sudo pacman -U /var/cache/pacman/pkg/linux-4.8.13-1-x86_64.pkg.tar.xz /var/cache/pacman/pkg/nvidia-375.20-3-x86_64.pkg.tar.xz /var/cache/pacman/pkg/nvidia-utils-375.20-3-x86_64.pkg.tar.xz

The steps I go through on sdb when I want to move to sda are similar, but fails with

/lib/modules/4.8.13-1-ARCH is not a valid kernel module directory

I resolve this by symlinking /lib/modules/4.9-1-ARCH to /lib/modules/4.8.13-1-ARCH.

I'm sure I'm doing at least one, if not many things wrong here (that symlink seems like a horrible hack). It seems like my kernels are interfering somehow. How can I fix this?

linux - XF86Close hotkey won't work

My problem is that I am trying to map the close key on my keyboard to compiz's close window key binding, and I can set the hotkey fine, but it doesn't work when I try to use.

I am using a logitech EX1150 keyboard and my operating system is linux mint 17.3 XFCE. I am using compiz as my window manager. I recently found a EX110 keyboard and I liked it, and I decided to try mapping some of its extra keys. Most of them work fine, but the close key doesn't seem to be working. Below is a picture where I have mapped the close key to the close window action. . Setting the hotkey works fine. But then when I press the key to close a window nothing happens.

Then I tried to map the back key on the keyboard, which is another special key right next to the close key, to the close window action as shown below. I was able to set the hotkey as with the close key, but this time the hotkey did work. That is, when I pressed the back key, the focused window did actually close.

Now my first thought was that something else was consuming the XF86Close event. To test this I remapped the key's keycode to the XF86Forward keysym using

xmodmap -e "keycode 214 = XF86Forward NoSymbol XF86Forward"


Here is a picture of me using the close key on my keyboard, which now maps to the XF86Forward keysym, to the close window action in compiz.

Again, when I pressed the close button on my keyboard, nothing happened. Now my guess is that key the scancode or keycode generated when I press the key is being consumed somehow (but it doesn't get consumed when setting the compiz keybinding somehow). I read this archwiki page to try to learn more, but I am not really sure what to do next. Any ideas of how to troubleshoot this issue? I have attached some more information in the appendix

Here is some more information that may or may not help.

xfce version: 4.12

compiz version:
0.9.11.3

output when pressing and releasing close when running xev:

KeyPress event, serial 41, synthetic NO, window 0x1a00001,
    root 0x9d, subw 0x0, time 130415823, (175,33), root:(892,638),
    state 0x10, keycode 214 (keysym 0x1008ff56, XF86Close), same_screen YES,
    XKeysymToKeycode returns keycode: 182
    XLookupString gives 0 bytes:
    XmbLookupString gives 0 bytes:
    XFilterEvent returns: False
KeyRelease event, serial 41, synthetic NO, window 0x1a00001,
    root 0x9d, subw 0x0, time 130415903, (175,33), root:(892,638),
    state 0x10, keycode 214 (keysym 0x1008ff56, XF86Close), same_screen YES,
    XKeysymToKeycode returns keycode: 182
    XLookupString gives 0 bytes:
    XFilterEvent returns: False

output of pressing and releasing close key when running evtest:

Event: time 1467335677.550903, type 4 (EV_MSC), code 4 (MSC_SCAN), value c1023
Event: time 1467335677.550903, type 1 (EV_KEY), code 206 (KEY_CLOSE), value 1
Event: time 1467335677.550903, -------------- SYN_REPORT ------------
Event: time 1467335677.678896, type 4 (EV_MSC), code 4 (MSC_SCAN), value c1023
Event: time 1467335677.678896, type 1 (EV_KEY), code 206 (KEY_CLOSE), value 0
Event: time 1467335677.678896, -------------- SYN_REPORT ------------

output of xmodmap -pke:

keycode   8 =
keycode   9 = Escape NoSymbol Escape
keycode  10 = 1 exclam 1 exclam
keycode  11 = 2 at 2 at
keycode  12 = 3 numbersign 3 numbersign
keycode  13 = 4 dollar 4 dollar
keycode  14 = 5 percent 5 percent
keycode  15 = 6 asciicircum 6 asciicircum
keycode  16 = 7 ampersand 7 ampersand
keycode  17 = 8 asterisk 8 asterisk
keycode  18 = 9 parenleft 9 parenleft
keycode  19 = 0 parenright 0 parenright
keycode  20 = minus underscore minus underscore
keycode  21 = equal plus equal plus
keycode  22 = BackSpace BackSpace BackSpace BackSpace NoSymbol NoSymbol Terminate_Server
keycode  23 = Tab ISO_Left_Tab Tab ISO_Left_Tab
keycode  24 = q Q q Q
keycode  25 = w W w W
keycode  26 = e E e E
keycode  27 = r R r R
keycode  28 = t T t T
keycode  29 = y Y y Y
keycode  30 = u U u U
keycode  31 = i I i I
keycode  32 = o O o O
keycode  33 = p P p P
keycode  34 = bracketleft braceleft bracketleft braceleft
keycode  35 = bracketright braceright bracketright braceright
keycode  36 = Return NoSymbol Return
keycode  37 = Control_L NoSymbol Control_L
keycode  38 = a A a A
keycode  39 = s S s S
keycode  40 = d D d D
keycode  41 = f F f F
keycode  42 = g G g G
keycode  43 = h H h H
keycode  44 = j J j J
keycode  45 = k K k K
keycode  46 = l L l L
keycode  47 = semicolon colon semicolon colon
keycode  48 = apostrophe quotedbl apostrophe quotedbl
keycode  49 = grave asciitilde grave asciitilde
keycode  50 = Shift_L NoSymbol Shift_L
keycode  51 = backslash bar backslash bar
keycode  52 = z Z z Z
keycode  53 = x X x X
keycode  54 = c C c C
keycode  55 = v V v V
keycode  56 = b B b B
keycode  57 = n N n N
keycode  58 = m M m M
keycode  59 = comma less comma less
keycode  60 = period greater period greater
keycode  61 = slash question slash question
keycode  62 = Shift_R NoSymbol Shift_R
keycode  63 = KP_Multiply KP_Multiply KP_Multiply KP_Multiply KP_Multiply KP_Multiply XF86ClearGrab
keycode  64 = Alt_L Meta_L Alt_L Meta_L
keycode  65 = space NoSymbol space
keycode  66 = Caps_Lock NoSymbol Caps_Lock
keycode  67 = F1 F1 F1 F1 F1 F1 XF86Switch_VT_1
keycode  68 = F2 F2 F2 F2 F2 F2 XF86Switch_VT_2
keycode  69 = F3 F3 F3 F3 F3 F3 XF86Switch_VT_3
keycode  70 = F4 F4 F4 F4 F4 F4 XF86Switch_VT_4
keycode  71 = F5 F5 F5 F5 F5 F5 XF86Switch_VT_5
keycode  72 = F6 F6 F6 F6 F6 F6 XF86Switch_VT_6
keycode  73 = F7 F7 F7 F7 F7 F7 XF86Switch_VT_7
keycode  74 = F8 F8 F8 F8 F8 F8 XF86Switch_VT_8
keycode  75 = F9 F9 F9 F9 F9 F9 XF86Switch_VT_9
keycode  76 = F10 F10 F10 F10 F10 F10 XF86Switch_VT_10
keycode  77 = Num_Lock NoSymbol Num_Lock
keycode  78 = Scroll_Lock NoSymbol Scroll_Lock
keycode  79 = KP_Home KP_7 KP_Home KP_7
keycode  80 = KP_Up KP_8 KP_Up KP_8
keycode  81 = KP_Prior KP_9 KP_Prior KP_9
keycode  82 = KP_Subtract KP_Subtract KP_Subtract KP_Subtract KP_Subtract KP_Subtract XF86Prev_VMode
keycode  83 = KP_Left KP_4 KP_Left KP_4
keycode  84 = KP_Begin KP_5 KP_Begin KP_5
keycode  85 = KP_Right KP_6 KP_Right KP_6
keycode  86 = KP_Add KP_Add KP_Add KP_Add KP_Add KP_Add XF86Next_VMode
keycode  87 = KP_End KP_1 KP_End KP_1
keycode  88 = KP_Down KP_2 KP_Down KP_2
keycode  89 = KP_Next KP_3 KP_Next KP_3
keycode  90 = KP_Insert KP_0 KP_Insert KP_0
keycode  91 = KP_Delete KP_Decimal KP_Delete KP_Decimal
keycode  92 = ISO_Level3_Shift NoSymbol ISO_Level3_Shift
keycode  93 =
keycode  94 = less greater less greater bar brokenbar bar
keycode  95 = F11 F11 F11 F11 F11 F11 XF86Switch_VT_11
keycode  96 = F12 F12 F12 F12 F12 F12 XF86Switch_VT_12
keycode  97 =
keycode  98 = Katakana NoSymbol Katakana
keycode  99 = Hiragana NoSymbol Hiragana
keycode 100 = Henkan_Mode NoSymbol Henkan_Mode
keycode 101 = Hiragana_Katakana NoSymbol Hiragana_Katakana
keycode 102 = Muhenkan NoSymbol Muhenkan
keycode 103 =
keycode 104 = KP_Enter NoSymbol KP_Enter
keycode 105 = Control_R NoSymbol Control_R
keycode 106 = KP_Divide KP_Divide KP_Divide KP_Divide KP_Divide KP_Divide XF86Ungrab
keycode 107 = Print Sys_Req Print Sys_Req
keycode 108 = Alt_R Meta_R Alt_R Meta_R
keycode 109 = Linefeed NoSymbol Linefeed
keycode 110 = Home NoSymbol Home
keycode 111 = Up NoSymbol Up
keycode 112 = Prior NoSymbol Prior
keycode 113 = Left NoSymbol Left
keycode 114 = Right NoSymbol Right
keycode 115 = End NoSymbol End
keycode 116 = Down NoSymbol Down
keycode 117 = Next NoSymbol Next
keycode 118 = Insert NoSymbol Insert
keycode 119 = Delete NoSymbol Delete
keycode 120 =
keycode 121 = XF86AudioMute NoSymbol XF86AudioMute
keycode 122 = XF86AudioLowerVolume NoSymbol XF86AudioLowerVolume
keycode 123 = XF86AudioRaiseVolume NoSymbol XF86AudioRaiseVolume
keycode 124 = XF86PowerOff NoSymbol XF86PowerOff
keycode 125 = KP_Equal NoSymbol KP_Equal
keycode 126 = plusminus NoSymbol plusminus
keycode 127 = Pause Break Pause Break
keycode 128 = XF86LaunchA NoSymbol XF86LaunchA
keycode 129 = KP_Decimal KP_Decimal KP_Decimal KP_Decimal
keycode 130 = Hangul NoSymbol Hangul
keycode 131 = Hangul_Hanja NoSymbol Hangul_Hanja
keycode 132 =
keycode 133 = Super_L NoSymbol Super_L
keycode 134 = Super_R NoSymbol Super_R
keycode 135 = Menu NoSymbol Menu
keycode 136 = Cancel NoSymbol Cancel
keycode 137 = Redo NoSymbol Redo
keycode 138 = SunProps NoSymbol SunProps
keycode 139 = Undo NoSymbol Undo
keycode 140 = SunFront NoSymbol SunFront
keycode 141 = XF86Copy NoSymbol XF86Copy
keycode 142 = XF86Open NoSymbol XF86Open
keycode 143 = XF86Paste NoSymbol XF86Paste
keycode 144 = Find NoSymbol Find
keycode 145 = XF86Cut NoSymbol XF86Cut
keycode 146 = Help NoSymbol Help
keycode 147 = XF86MenuKB NoSymbol XF86MenuKB
keycode 148 = XF86Calculator NoSymbol XF86Calculator
keycode 149 =
keycode 150 = XF86Sleep NoSymbol XF86Sleep
keycode 151 = XF86WakeUp NoSymbol XF86WakeUp
keycode 152 = XF86Explorer NoSymbol XF86Explorer
keycode 153 = XF86Send NoSymbol XF86Send
keycode 154 =
keycode 155 = XF86Xfer NoSymbol XF86Xfer
keycode 156 = XF86Launch1 NoSymbol XF86Launch1
keycode 157 = XF86Launch2 NoSymbol XF86Launch2
keycode 158 = XF86WWW NoSymbol XF86WWW
keycode 159 = XF86DOS NoSymbol XF86DOS
keycode 160 = XF86ScreenSaver NoSymbol XF86ScreenSaver
keycode 161 =
keycode 162 = XF86RotateWindows NoSymbol XF86RotateWindows
keycode 163 = XF86Mail NoSymbol XF86Mail
keycode 164 = XF86Favorites NoSymbol XF86Favorites
keycode 165 = XF86MyComputer NoSymbol XF86MyComputer
keycode 166 = XF86Back NoSymbol XF86Back
keycode 167 = XF86Forward NoSymbol XF86Forward
keycode 168 =
keycode 169 = XF86Eject NoSymbol XF86Eject
keycode 170 = XF86Eject XF86Eject XF86Eject XF86Eject
keycode 171 = XF86AudioNext NoSymbol XF86AudioNext
keycode 172 = XF86AudioPlay XF86AudioPause XF86AudioPlay XF86AudioPause
keycode 173 = XF86AudioPrev NoSymbol XF86AudioPrev
keycode 174 = XF86AudioStop XF86Eject XF86AudioStop XF86Eject
keycode 175 = XF86AudioRecord NoSymbol XF86AudioRecord
keycode 176 = XF86AudioRewind NoSymbol XF86AudioRewind
keycode 177 = XF86Phone NoSymbol XF86Phone
keycode 178 =
keycode 179 = XF86Tools NoSymbol XF86Tools
keycode 180 = XF86HomePage NoSymbol XF86HomePage
keycode 181 = XF86Reload NoSymbol XF86Reload
keycode 182 = XF86Close NoSymbol XF86Close
keycode 183 =
keycode 184 =
keycode 185 = XF86ScrollUp NoSymbol XF86ScrollUp
keycode 186 = XF86ScrollDown NoSymbol XF86ScrollDown
keycode 187 = parenleft NoSymbol parenleft
keycode 188 = parenright NoSymbol parenright
keycode 189 = XF86New NoSymbol XF86New
keycode 190 = Redo NoSymbol Redo
keycode 191 = XF86Tools NoSymbol XF86Tools
keycode 192 = XF86Launch5 NoSymbol XF86Launch5
keycode 193 = XF86Launch6 NoSymbol XF86Launch6
keycode 194 = XF86Launch7 NoSymbol XF86Launch7
keycode 195 = XF86Launch8 NoSymbol XF86Launch8
keycode 196 = XF86Launch9 NoSymbol XF86Launch9
keycode 197 =
keycode 198 = XF86AudioMicMute NoSymbol XF86AudioMicMute
keycode 199 = XF86TouchpadToggle NoSymbol XF86TouchpadToggle
keycode 200 = XF86TouchpadOn NoSymbol XF86TouchpadOn
keycode 201 = XF86TouchpadOff NoSymbol XF86TouchpadOff
keycode 202 =
keycode 203 = Mode_switch NoSymbol Mode_switch
keycode 204 = NoSymbol Alt_L NoSymbol Alt_L
keycode 205 = NoSymbol Meta_L NoSymbol Meta_L
keycode 206 = NoSymbol Super_L NoSymbol Super_L
keycode 207 = NoSymbol Hyper_L NoSymbol Hyper_L
keycode 208 = XF86AudioPlay NoSymbol XF86AudioPlay
keycode 209 = XF86AudioPause NoSymbol XF86AudioPause
keycode 210 = XF86Launch3 NoSymbol XF86Launch3
keycode 211 = XF86Launch4 NoSymbol XF86Launch4
keycode 212 = XF86LaunchB NoSymbol XF86LaunchB
keycode 213 = XF86Suspend NoSymbol XF86Suspend
keycode 214 = XF86Close NoSymbol XF86Close
keycode 215 = XF86AudioPlay NoSymbol XF86AudioPlay
keycode 216 = XF86AudioForward NoSymbol XF86AudioForward
keycode 217 =
keycode 218 = Print NoSymbol Print
keycode 219 =
keycode 220 = XF86WebCam NoSymbol XF86WebCam
keycode 221 =
keycode 222 =
keycode 223 = XF86Mail NoSymbol XF86Mail
keycode 224 = XF86Messenger NoSymbol XF86Messenger
keycode 225 = XF86Search NoSymbol XF86Search
keycode 226 = XF86Go NoSymbol XF86Go
keycode 227 = XF86Finance NoSymbol XF86Finance
keycode 228 = XF86Game NoSymbol XF86Game
keycode 229 = XF86Shop NoSymbol XF86Shop
keycode 230 =
keycode 231 = Cancel NoSymbol Cancel
keycode 232 = XF86MonBrightnessDown NoSymbol XF86MonBrightnessDown
keycode 233 = XF86MonBrightnessUp NoSymbol XF86MonBrightnessUp
keycode 234 = XF86AudioMedia NoSymbol XF86AudioMedia
keycode 235 = XF86Display NoSymbol XF86Display
keycode 236 = XF86KbdLightOnOff NoSymbol XF86KbdLightOnOff
keycode 237 = XF86KbdBrightnessDown NoSymbol XF86KbdBrightnessDown
keycode 238 = XF86KbdBrightnessUp NoSymbol XF86KbdBrightnessUp
keycode 239 = XF86Send NoSymbol XF86Send
keycode 240 = XF86Reply NoSymbol XF86Reply
keycode 241 = XF86MailForward NoSymbol XF86MailForward
keycode 242 = XF86Save NoSymbol XF86Save
keycode 243 = XF86Documents NoSymbol XF86Documents
keycode 244 = XF86Battery NoSymbol XF86Battery
keycode 245 = XF86Bluetooth NoSymbol XF86Bluetooth
keycode 246 = XF86WLAN NoSymbol XF86WLAN
keycode 247 =
keycode 248 =
keycode 249 =
keycode 250 =
keycode 251 =
keycode 252 =
keycode 253 =
keycode 254 =
keycode 255 =

linux - How to recover data from heavily damaged external hard drive?

In the first place I have sent my external HDD to the data-recovery specialist. Unfortunately the recovery cost was estimated to be equal to the value of a new high performance computer.

Paying this much is beyond my reach, therefor I have to ask; is there anyone willing to guide me through the process of data recovery?

---

Spec:

OS: Debian 9 -rc 3 / Windows 8.1 home
HDD: WD My Passport ultra 2.0 TB 3.0 USB
HDD file-system: NTFS

---

Specialist's diagnosis:

1. Damaged disk service area.


2. Damaged disk surface.


3. Due to the surface damage, disk enters emergency mode.


4. Damaged disk head is suspected but not confirmed.

---

Suggested course of action:

1. In order to access the disk's firmware, one should solder into
   disk's electronics.


2. Then disk's service area should be repaired.


3. Then get the disk out of the emergency mode.


4. Then make sector copy of the disk.


5. Then check the consistency and correctness of the record.

---

How did it happen:

While in the process of copying some data, to the external HDD, my OS froze.
When the OS came back to normal I was unable to write or read any data from the disk, any attempt would result in an I/O Error. After I rebooted the OS I was unable to mount the drive.

I can't understand how this simple event, could cause so tremendous damage...
Any explanation will be appreciated! (I have to understand what went wrong)

---

My doubts:

After my disk was diagnosed, I consulted the results with competitive data-recovery specialists (simple chat via a phone). And most of them told me that this diagnosis is not accurate... Because out of 5 possible things that could break in any hard drive, my hard drive have been diagnosed with 4 of them and that is a bit suspicious...

1. I don't believe that disk head is damaged.


2. I believe that there is a way to repair disk's service area with out
   welding into disk's electronics.


3. I believe it is possible to boot the disk into normal mode without interfering with the hardware.

For the sake of my data, i have to assume that the diagnosis was correct...

---

Additional info:

My disk can not be mounted. It does not appear under /dev/sd*/, but it can be found with lsusb

Disk is clicking once per 2 or 3 minutes... I find it strange. I was unable to find out the meaning of this behavior. I think its related to the driver initialization failure.

---

Very important update:

I plugged in this external HDD and to my surprise it mounted. I was also able to see file system, and copy single most important project. After that disk failed again... I pushed my luck a bit, but now i know for sure that disk surface is OK (there was no I/O Errors) and the head is OK (or at least it was OK).

For now I put the HDD on the shelf. But since my data are not corrupted, what should be the next step? What should I do to get all of my data back?

---

Update #2:

Now I am facing an inaccessible HDD error.
Disk is being mounted under /media// upon plugging in. It takes a while to mount.

When I try to open the HDD at the GUI level I am getting Unable to access My Passport: an operation is already pending error.

When I try to access it via console i get:

patryk@debian-pc:~$ cd /media/patryk/My\ Passport/
cd: permission denied
patryk@debian-pc:~$ ls -la /media/patryk/My\ Passport/
ls -la: permission denied
patryk@debian-pc:~$ sudo ls -la /media/patryk/My\ Passport/
drwxrwxrwx  1 patryk patryk    4096 May 20 16:18 .
drwxr-x---+ 3 root   root      4096 May 27 00:30 ..

But this HDD is periodically coming back to life !!! Once every ~10 hours it will mount without any problem. I will be able to copy a single (text-like) file and then it fails again.

Right now I do not understand what could be the cause of this behavior, therefore i am trying to learn as much as I can.

Also I have found my old HDD and to my surprise it is still working (it reports I/O Errors from time to time). I am testing suggested methods on this HDD in order make myself familiar with them, and in order to reduce the chance of my error.

I will keep this Question updated with every piece of news. In mean while i could use an advice;

• what do you think is the cause of this behavior? (Disk is coming back to
  life once every 10 or so hours?)


• Is is a good idea to run ddrescue(or others recommended programs) on this disk, while it is in the state of inaccessibility? I am asking this Because i am sure that the disk will become inaccessible right after i will start the data recovery process.

How to install Windows 8 preview from USB hard drive?

I have been really scratching my header over how to install Windows 8 dev preview from a USB hard drive. It is an iso file. There is a Microsoft program that will easily set up a USB flash drive to install from, but it won't work with a USB hard drive.

I've searched Google but cannot find an answer to this seemingly simple question. How do you install Windows from a USB hard drive? I've read that I can use disk management to 'mark partition as active' and then extract the contents of a mounted iso into that volume... but disk management won't let me mark the partition on my USB hard drive as active.

Any ideas?

Answer

Ok so you don't need to do everything from GUI. Here is a tutorial which works as a charm.

microsoft excel - How to change background colour of column based upon column header date

I have a table in Excel which looks like

        A            B            C            D
1    01/01/2018  07/01/2018   14/01/2018   21/01/2018   
2    some vale                               detail
3                  value          

For this question, we can assume the date is 10/01/2018 (DD/MM/YY)

Row 1 are my headers. Row 2 and 3 are the table body (content).

As you can see, column A and B are before 10/01/2018 where as column C and D are after 10/01/2018

What I'd like to do is change the background colour of the column based on this, so it's easy to see which column are in the past.

A google search suggests Conditional formatting and there is an option called A Date Occuring, but that only has pre-defined date values, such as yesterday, today, tomorrow etc, and no option for before today! As such I'm now totally lost and not sure if this can be achieved.

Answer

I assume that your dates are set to the format DD-MM-YYYY in your regional settings in the Operating System so that Excel shall understand 1-12-2018 as 1st Dec 2018.

You have an actual table in Excel not just a set or rows and columns.

First remove any formatting from the table. Set the color formatting as None.

Now select Cells A2:A3 go to Conditional Formatting -->New Rule --> Use a Formula to determine which cells to format option.

Now enter the formula.

=DATE(YEAR(A$1),MONTH(A$1),DAY(A$1))

Select the color format that you desire.

Click OK and exit. Now the rule shall be applied to cells A2:A3.

Use a format painter and apply it to all other cells from rest of the columns.

Since it's a Table, as you add rows to it the Conditional Formatting shall get auto applied thereon.

If instead of TODAY() you wish to specify some other date e.g. 10-01-2018 then in place of TODAY() Use DATE function specifying Year, Month, Day as parameters to it.

partitioning - Dell XPS 15 L502X hard drive Partition

I have a situation here. I got my new Dell XPS 15 Laptop.

The configuration of hard drive is as below :

• Volume 1: (OEM Partition): 133MB


• Volume 2: OS (C:): 685.25 GB


• Volume
  3: Recovery : 13.25 GB

Now, I am trying to re-partition my C Drive to have a C: drive with 100 GB and a new drive with 585 GB. Earlier, I tried using the Windows 7 Disk Management to shrink and extend the volume. That lead to the OS and hard drive not working. Dell Tech support tried to fix the issue, but they were not able to fix the issue online. Later a Dell Technician arrived my place, and replaced the hard drive with a new hard drive.

Please help me re-partition the C: Drive with 100 GB, and new D drive with 585 GB.

I don't want to lose my Recovery Partition.

SOLUTION

As Suggested by KCotreau below , I have done exactly. I have resized the C drive to 100 GB. And then applied the changes. Windows got restarted. On the boot screen, the partition was taking place. It took around 30 mins ( approx. ). Once after restart, I can see my C drive is 100 GB. Now opened the Easeus again. And created a new partition for the free space ( 585 GB ) this took 10 seconds to create. Here goes the screenshot after partitioning. Thanks to KCotreau. You are amazing.

Answer

OK, now I get it. First, I would NEVER recommend that you use the Microsoft native tools to do partitioning. I see people with WAY too many problems.

Download Easeus here: http://www.partition-tool.com/personal.htm

Then once you open it, Click "Resize/Move Partition" in the left pane. Once the new window opens, you will pull the slider from the very right (the round dot) back to the right leaving the free white space as in the screenshot. Hit OK, then apply the changes (the check mark at the top).

After it is committed, make your new partition in the free space using Easeus or the Windows Disk Manager.

This is a very stable program and operation, and should not lose any data or affect your recovery partition. I have never had this program, or any like it fail in 17 years. That said, any disk manipulation has a chance of going wrong.

uefi - Cannot get my bootable media to boot on my laptop

My laptop: Acer Aspire Switch 10E
My processor: Intel Atom Z3735F (64 bit processor)
Came pre-installed with 32 bit windows 8.1 now upgraded to windows 10
I believe this laptop has a 32 bit UEFI
First boot device is USB CDROM in bios
Secure boot has been disabled

My bootable media are not booting (although they are being recognised at start up going by the blinking on the optical drive)

Many of these bootable Cds are Linux based (I think) and just do not boot - though secure boot is disabled.

Neither do some of the uEFI boot supported cd/dvds

The only UEFI supported bootable CD that actually boots is acronis tru image bootable and when I checked in the folder structure it has the 32 bit and 64 bit efi files and their xml files too in the efi folder.

Other uefi boot cds/dvds did not have the 32 bit efi file.

What is going on. What are my options and where do I go from here.

I have NO technical knowledge at all of these things and I have googled intensively to find a solution and hence have been able to use some technical jargon above.

Any solutions or work-arounds are requested in the most lucid and explanatory language preferably with step wise guidance and links

Thanks very much for any advice and help

memory - How can I make Windows XP use more than 2.5GB of RAM?

At work, I have four system with Windows XP SP 3 with 4GB RAM installed. When I start a lot of apps, I see that Windows gets unstable when more than 2.5GB of RAM is in use with the usual effects: Explorer crashing, icons disappearing.

So it seems that Windows runs out of memory even through at least 1GB of RAM should be free (as a 32bit OS, WinXP can't use more than 3.5GB max but I'm still 1GB short).

Another thing is that Windows is trying to extend the swap file (which is set to a fixed 512MB) which isn't exactly what I want. I know that XP tries to make my system more snappy by swapping prematurely (so it can simply free pages which haven't been used for some time) but I'd prefer a system which never swaps -- I do have enough free RAM.

[EDIT] My gfx card has 512MB and the mapping is FD000000-FDFFFFFF, E0000000-EFFFFFFF and FA000000-FBFFFFFF.

This means there is a pretty big gap between EFFFFFFF and FA000000 plus a smaller one between FBFFFFFF and FD000000. This is an NVidia GeForce 8400GS. Anything I could do here to move the maps? Or can I artificially unmap part of the gfx RAM? This is my development PC, I need no 3D at all ...

[EDIT2] My device manager says that free memory goes from 0x0100'0000 to 0xDFE8'6BFF which is roughly 3.3GB. So I'm still missing 0.8GB.

Answer

First of all, do not statically set or get rid of your swap. Doing so is more or less saying that you know more about what is going on in the internals of your operating system than Microsoft does.

One thing to keep in mind is that all of your graphics cards, all pci devices, etc that have addressable memory on them are taking away from the maximum amount of memory in your system. After you subtract that memory from your physically addressable memory, you will have the portion that your OS and Applications share.

If you need to extend the amount of RAM your apps have access to, there is a switch that can be set in boot.ini, but this can constrain the amount of memory windows has to work with.

Tim Slattery did a good article on windows ram usage.

There is a great explanation of the page file's importance and usage in response to this serverfault question.

To gain more usable memory your best bet is to upgrade to a 64-bit OS which will be able to make use of a full 3.5+ gigs of RAM.

Disable hosted network support in a Windows WiFi driver

How can I alter my Surface Pro's WiFi adapter to remove its support for the Hosted Network feature in Windows? I don't want to disable the hosted network feature for ALL adapters, just for one. I want to do this so that it will use a different adapter for the hosted network.

I have a Microsoft Surface Pro 3. They messed up, and the built in WiFi adapter does not work properly. It cannot start a hosted network. I have an external adapter I can use for this purpose. It works great, except you cannot tell Windows which adapter to bind the virtual miniport adapter to. Because support for that feature is a requirement for new drivers, the crappy built in adapter claims to support it (but doesn't really). This means every time I want to start the hosted network feature I have to disable the built in adapter in the device manager, enable the hosted network, then re-enable the built in adapter. I still use the built in adapter, and sometimes use both at the same time. So I'm hoping there is some way I can turn off the support in that driver so it will be ignored by the hosted network feature without having to be fully disabled.

Windows 7 Administrator Command Prompt "Start in" Path

So, I know you can create a shortcut to an administrator-level command prompt (as described in this question), but what I'm seeing is that whenever I use such a shortcut, it always drops me into c:\windows\system32\ path.

I've tried specifying that shortcut's properties to set the "start in" path I need, but to no avail. It seems any time I run cmd.exe "As Administrator," it completely disregards the shortcut's paths and sticks to c:\windows\system32\

Any suggestions on how to get Windows 7 to respect the shortcut's "start in" path?

Answer

I found a way around this. In the shortcut, change the command line to:

C:\Windows\System32\cmd.exe /k "cd c:\"

In this case it changes the starting directory to the root of C:. You can set your own parameters.

windows 7 - What does "Power Calibration Area Error" mean when I'm trying to write a DVD

I'm trying to write a Windows 7 DVD iso to a DVD+R, single layer, 4.7GB disk. The source ISO file size is about 2.3GB. The burner is a hp DVD RAM UJ897, while the media is a Sony D31 DVD+R.

I tried to burn the ISO using various tools - Windows 7's native ISO burner, CDBurner XP - both failed without telling me why.

ImgBuner was a little more helpful & gave this error message:

This is the text which was shown:

W 21:09:31 Failed to Write Sectors 256 - 287 - Reason: Power Calibration Area Error
W 21:09:31 Retrying (1 of 20)...
W 21:09:31 Retry Failed - Reason: Power Calibration Area Error

Does this mean my DVD burner is faulty? Or is it the medium? I've tried with 2 disks, both resulted in same error.

Full log:

I 21:05:29 ImgBurn Version 2.5.7.0 started!
I 21:05:29 Microsoft Windows 7 Ultimate x64 Edition (6.1, Build 7601 : Service Pack 1)
I 21:05:29 Total Physical Memory: 8,181,360 KB  -  Available: 2,481,084 KB
I 21:05:29 Initialising SPTI...
I 21:05:29 Searching for SCSI / ATAPI devices...
I 21:05:31 -> Drive 1 - Info: hp DVD RAM UJ897 1.00 (D:) (ATAPI)
I 21:05:31 -> Drive 2 - Info: MagicISO Virtual DVD-ROM 1.0A (E:) (Unknown)

I 21:05:31 Found 1 DVD-ROM and 1 DVD±RW/RAM!
I 21:06:00 Operation Started!
I 21:06:00 Source File: C:\win7\Windows7Ultimate32bit.iso
I 21:06:00 Source File Sectors: 1,221,628 (MODE1/2048)
I 21:06:00 Source File Size: 2,501,894,144 bytes
I 21:06:00 Source File Volume Identifier: GRMCULFRER_EN_DVD
I 21:06:00 Source File Volume Set Identifier: 315f0800MS UDFBridge
I 21:06:00 Source File Application Identifier: CDIMAGE 2.54 (01/01/2005 TM)
I 21:06:00 Source File Implementation Identifier: Microsoft CDIMAGE UDF
I 21:06:00 Source File File System(s): ISO9660 (Bootable), UDF (1.02)

I 21:06:00 Destination Device: [0:1:0] hp DVD RAM UJ897 1.00 (D:) (ATAPI)
I 21:06:00 Destination Media Type: DVD+R (Disc ID: SONY-D21-00)
I 21:06:00 Destination Media Supported Write Speeds: 2.4x, 4x, 8x
I 21:06:00 Destination Media Sectors: 2,295,104
I 21:06:00 Write Mode: DVD
I 21:06:00 Write Type: DAO
I 21:06:00 Write Speed: MAX
I 21:06:00 DVD+R Reserve Track: No
I 21:06:00 Link Size: Auto
I 21:06:00 Lock Volume: Yes

I 21:06:00 Test Mode: No
I 21:06:00 OPC: No
I 21:06:00 BURN-Proof: Enabled
I 21:06:00 Write Speed Successfully Set! - Effective: 11,080 KB/s (8x)
I 21:06:01 Filling Buffer... (80 MB)
I 21:06:02 Writing LeadIn...
W 21:06:23 Failed to Write Sectors 256 - 287 - Reason: Power Calibration Area Error
W 21:06:23 Retrying (1 of 20)...
W 21:06:23 Retry Failed - Reason: Power Calibration Area Error
W 21:06:23 Retrying (2 of 20)...

W 21:06:23 Retry Failed - Reason: Power Calibration Area Error
W 21:06:23 Retrying (3 of 20)...
W 21:06:23 Retry Failed - Reason: Power Calibration Area Error
W 21:06:23 Retrying (4 of 20)...
W 21:06:23 Retry Failed - Reason: Power Calibration Area Error
W 21:06:23 Retrying (5 of 20)...
W 21:06:23 Retry Failed - Reason: Power Calibration Area Error
W 21:06:23 Retrying (6 of 20)...
W 21:06:23 Retry Failed - Reason: Power Calibration Area Error
W 21:06:23 Retrying (7 of 20)...

W 21:06:23 Retry Failed - Reason: Power Calibration Area Error
W 21:06:23 Retrying (8 of 20)...
W 21:06:23 Retry Failed - Reason: Power Calibration Area Error
W 21:06:23 Retrying (9 of 20)...
W 21:06:24 Retry Failed - Reason: Power Calibration Area Error
W 21:06:24 Retrying (10 of 20)...
W 21:06:24 Retry Failed - Reason: Power Calibration Area Error
W 21:06:24 Retrying (11 of 20)...
W 21:06:24 Retry Failed - Reason: Power Calibration Area Error
W 21:06:24 Retrying (12 of 20)...

W 21:06:24 Retry Failed - Reason: Power Calibration Area Error
W 21:06:24 Retrying (13 of 20)...
W 21:06:24 Retry Failed - Reason: Power Calibration Area Error
W 21:06:24 Retrying (14 of 20)...
W 21:06:24 Retry Failed - Reason: Power Calibration Area Error
W 21:06:24 Retrying (15 of 20)...
W 21:06:24 Retry Failed - Reason: Power Calibration Area Error
W 21:06:24 Retrying (16 of 20)...
W 21:06:24 Retry Failed - Reason: Power Calibration Area Error
W 21:06:24 Retrying (17 of 20)...

W 21:06:24 Retry Failed - Reason: Power Calibration Area Error
W 21:06:24 Retrying (18 of 20)...
W 21:06:24 Retry Failed - Reason: Power Calibration Area Error
W 21:06:24 Retrying (19 of 20)...
W 21:06:24 Retry Failed - Reason: Power Calibration Area Error
W 21:06:24 Retrying (20 of 20)...
W 21:06:24 Retry Failed - Reason: Power Calibration Area Error
E 21:06:33 Failed to Write Sectors 256 - 287 - Reason: Power Calibration Area Error
I 21:06:33 Synchronising Cache...
W 21:06:38 User opted to skip the 'Close Track/Session/Disc' functions.

E 21:06:38 Failed to Write Image!
E 21:06:38 Operation Failed! - Duration: 00:00:38
I 21:06:38 Average Write Rate: 0 KB/s (0.0x) - Maximum Write Rate: 0 KB/s (0.0x)

Note: reducing the burn speed hasn't helped either

Clone drive in Windows

I have two 2 TB external USB hard drives, call them HD1 and HD2. HD1 is USB 2, HD2 is USB 3. Each drive contains exactly one NTFS partition.

I want to clone HD1 to HD2, because it's newer and much, much faster.

What's the best way to do this? I don't want to do a copy-and-paste, I want to clone the whole partition. The new drive is actually a few bytes larger, so this should be possible?

I don't have a second drive that can hold the image, so it would have to clone directly to the other disk (not to a file). How can I accomplish this on Windows 7?

I know about Clonezilla but I would prefer not to have to boot from a CD or anything, as I don't have the capability to do that right now. I want to know if there's a way to do this while running Windows.

How can I fully backup Windows, Linux and various boot partitions of an external drive?

I have an external drive for my 2017 iMac with a Windows-to-go and Linux system installed on it. It took a lot of work to get this set up just the way I needed, and am trying to find a way to make regular backups of the drive so that I can restore either system if things go wrong, especially given that Windows-to-go has no recovery environment. This means I need to include their boot partitions in the backup as well. There's both the EFI system partition (as this drive has a GPT) as well as a separate boot partition for Linux.

Furthermore, I'm hoping that however I decide to backup these drives can be included in the online backup service that I use. (i.e. CrashPlan or Backblaze)

I'm not sure what the best way to go about doing this is.

So far I've dumped the raw contents of each partition to a separate backup drive using dd in macOS, e.g.:

dd if=/dev/rdisk2s2 of=/Volumes/Backups/external_drive_partition_2 -bs 1m

...and that works. I've already used it to restore my Windows partition after accidentally blowing it away.

The trouble is that these partitions are 200 GB each, and I can't have even one 200 GB file that regularly changes and back it up with an online backup service. It would take a week or two for it to upload just once with my internet connection.

My only idea so far is to do something like the dd solution, but break up the file into multiple parts, say 50 MB a piece. Then when making the backup, somehow only update the pieces that have changed since the last backup. That way, only those files will be uploaded to my online backup service. Short of writing my own software, though, I'm not aware of a way to do that.

I'm open to other ideas and software recommendations. My main operating system is macOS so if I were only going to have to backups be made on one OS, it would be that, but if there's a way to do it in either Windows or Linux I'm open to that.

Answer

After some time, I eventually decided that the method I outlined was probably the best way to do this. So I wrote a piece of software that allows me to make backups the way I want: multipart-backup.

Perhaps someone else will eventually find it useful too!

hard drive - Reset HDD user password, if I know the HDD master password?

The BIOS in my Laptop allows to specify 4 passwords:

• (BIOS) Administrator Password


• (BIOS) User Password


• (HDD) Master password



• (HDD) User Password

I just created the two HDD passwords. The other passwords are still empty.

Unfortunately, it seems I misspelled (twice) the HDD User Password on creation. It now says "Invalid password" whenever I try. But I still have the HDD master password.

Now I can access the BIOS. But whenever I want to change the HDD User Password, it asks me for the User Password (which is lost) but does not allow me to use the master password instead.

Is there any way to use the master pw to reset the user pw?

Background

There are more details to my personal use case, which are described in Does HDD password in BIOS affect multiple drives equally?. But here I would like to focus on the main question about master password vs user password, so it will help other people which might not have the same use case in all details.

System information

Asus UX32V

"Aptio Setup Utility - Copyright (C) 2011 American Megatrends, Inc"

BIOS Vendor: American Megatrends
Version: 206
VBIOS Version: 2137.I14UX3.006
EC Version: B14U120001

BIOS tabs: Main, Advanced, Boot, Security, Save & Exit

In the "Advanced" tab there is an option "Intel AES-NI", which is currently "[Enabled]". The description is "Enable/Disable Intel Advance Encryption Standard New Instructions (AES-NI).

ubuntu - Can linux boot from a disk that has no partition table?

I have a linux system on a disk that seems to have no partition table.

gparted shows Partition table: none

df shows / mounted from /dev/sdb1

Update: When I boot from another disk, then I see that /dev/sdb has a gpt partition table, and I can see the free space. So the question is why does gparted on the new system not see the partition table?

How is it possible to have a filesystem on a disk that has no partition table?

I installed Ubuntu 18.04 on this disk, after deleting all partitions with gparted. In the Ubuntu installer, I selected the empty disk (330 GB) and created a 30 GB root partition. The newly installed system runs happily, but I cannot create more partitions on that disk. I'm perplexed. How can I access the free space on the disk? Should I repartition the disk myself and run the installer again? Is my disk defective?

How to *disable* automatic reboots in Windows 10 Home (January 2017)

I wish to prevent windows from rebooting after doing an update because sometimes I want to leave my PC performing a task unattended for days on end.

Now before you rush to tell me this is a duplicate of this other SO question, I should point out that A) Most of the (very long) most upvoted answer is devoted to more premium versions of Windows which includes gpedit which Home does not have. B) There are a lot of comments about solutions not working and this may well be date dependant, i.e. some solutions perhaps used to work but don't any more. I think this issue is so important that this question needs to be asked again so that the up/down votes will correspond to the current state of play.

I would also like to add an additional part of the question which is - once I have made the changes necessary to prevent forced reboots, is there some way of telling that I have done it correctly? I.e. some place in windows where it will actually tell me that future reboots have been disabled.

By the way I am asking this question now because I did attempt to follow the prevent-reboot solutions from a variety of sources but my PC rebooted itself last night (12 Jan 2017).

ANSWER FOUND: This is a simple solution that works: windows-10-reboot-blocker.

windows 7 - Strange issue with 64 bit OS

So I own two versions of Windows 7, one is 32 bit, the other is 64.

The 64 bit version came with my new desktop, and the 32 bit version came with my Laptop.

I was doing a clean install of my laptop, and the install went smooth, Windows is up and running!

However, after installing it I realized that I accidentally used the 64 bit installation disk instead of the 32 bit version. I confirmed this in the System Information screen, it says:

System type: 64-bit Operating System

As far as I knew this laptop was only a 32 bit machine. My understanding is that a 64 bit OS would NOT run on 32 bit architecture. Am I correct with this assumption?

If this was a 32 bit laptop is there any way a 64 bit OS would even run at all on it?

Answer

Actually, I was able to find the specs for the computer, and I looked up the processor. Apparently it is a 64 bit machine, but for some reason it came with a 32 bit OS. So it should be able to run Windows 7 x64 without any problems.

macos - How to automatically disconnect from a wireless network, when connected to the Internet over ethernet?

I have a Retina MacBook Pro, that connects to a wireless network at work for intra- and internet access. I also regularly plug in an ethernet cable to access the same network. In my Network preferences I've ordered the USB Ethernet connection above the Wi-Fi connection, so my computer should prefer the ethernet connection. However it still connects to the wireless network, burdening our wireless router for no reason.

How do I configure my Mac to automatically disconnect from the wireless network, when it's connected to the Internet over an ethernet connection?

Related: Is there a way to stop my Windows 7 laptop from connecting to the Wi-Fi if the ethernet cord is plugged in?

Answer

Head over to this page. A guy by the name of heatxsink made a pretty handy script that will toggle your wifi on or off depending on the status of your ethernet connection.

You can add your own growl notifications pretty easily if you want. Also make sure to follow every step precisely as the script relies on filenames and locations of the files.

Other options: You can try out ControlPlane. It seems promising to fill your need for automation.

Use Excel conditional formatting based on display value and not cell value

I have a cell with the following conditions to compare its value against the cell in the previous row.

Red Highlight: Cell Value <> =OFFSET(INDIRECT(ADDRESS(ROW(), COLUMN())),-1,0)

Green Highlight: Cell Value = =OFFSET(INDIRECT(ADDRESS(ROW(), COLUMN())),-1,0)

This works well, except for if I use a formula in the cell. When I do, the first highlight (red) is always chosen. I'm guessing because the "value" of the cell is the formula, and not the result of the formula.

Example:

 A1 := =24
 A2 := =DEC2HEX(36) 

A2 would be formatted "red", despite both cells displaying the text "24".

Is it possible for conditional formatting to compare based on the displayed text in the cell, and not the underlying formulas?

Answer

First, if you want to check the cell above in a conditional formatting formula, you don't need that complicated Offset/Indirect construct. Just select A2 and in your conditional format formula reference A1 as a relative reference, i.e. without any $ signs. Then apply that conditional format to other cells and it will always evaluate the cell one row above the current cell.

Getting back to your question: no, the format of a cell is not important. Conditional formatting will evaluate the underlying value.

In the case of =DEC2HEX(36), though, the output is not a number, the comparison will return FALSE if this cell is compared with the numeric value in A1.