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Jeroen W. Pluimers on .NET, C#, Delphi, databases, and personal interests

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Archive for August 27th, 2021

Windows on VMware ESXi: fixing “Unknown USB Device” or “The USB device returned an invalid USB device descriptor”

Posted by jpluimers on 2021/08/27

Sometimes, the Windows device manager shows any of the below errots for an USB 3.x device that is physically connected to the ESXi host and passes through a VM (via a virtual USB controller and virtual USB device).

This solution usually works: use a USB 2.0 cable instead of a USB 3.x cable.

If it doesn’t work, then the solutions are the same as when this happens in a pure physical solution:

In my case, I needed a USB connection, because it is the only way to reset a Fujitsu ScanSnap scanner to correct WiFi settings after it gets confused (which happens a few times per year).

Sreenshots

The difference for devices with a known driver:

  • USB 3 cable 
  • USB 2 cable 

The difference for devices with an unknown driver:

  •  USB 3 cable 
  • USB 2 cable 

Related information

This happened with me on both a ScanSnap iX500 and iX1500, and this did not help (as I was on a more recent Windows version): [WayBack] When setting up your scanner 502: My computer does not recognize ScanSnap iX500 with a USB 3.0 port. – Fujitsu Global.

More on USB passthrough:

More on USB virtualisation:

–jeroen

Posted in ESXi5.5, ESXi6, ESXi6.5, Fujitsu ScanSnap, Hardware, ix500, Power User, Scanners, Virtualization, VMware, VMware ESXi | Leave a Comment »

How to: Reset C by GE Light Bulbs – turning things off and on again, and again, and again…

Posted by jpluimers on 2021/08/27

You know the old helpdesk joke about “turning it off and on”, right?

GE did that on steroids for their C light bulbs.

It is an off, on, off, on, off, on sequence that depends on the firmware version which nobody knows.

Both procedures:

  1. start with the light bulb being on for at least 5 seconds
  2. have a sequence of off (for 8 seconds) and on (for 2 seconds)
  3. ends with the bulb to flash on/off 3 times (apparently it ends in the “off” position)

Do not mix up the off and on times, or you have to restart again.

So step 2 becomes this:

  • for firmware 2.8 or later: turn off and on 5 times.
  • for firmware 2.7 or earlier: turn off and on 6 times.

The recommend counting using Mississippi seconds (am I the only one having to check the spelling of that 3 times?).

No counting mechanism beats using a watch or clock.

Is it more accurate to count seconds in Mississippi’s, or one-thousandths
byu/MrSparta618 inShowerthoughts

They even made a video about it lasting 3+ minutes.

The video has a great comment thread.

Via: [WayBack] Alexander BITCOIN ADS ZIJN NEP Klöpping on Twitter: “Als ik ooit zomergast ben laat ik dit fragment integraal zien https://t.co/iHuclGuddu”

–jeroen

Read the rest of this entry »

Posted in Hardware, LifeHacker, Power User | Leave a Comment »

keyboard – How can I type unicode characters without using the mouse? – Ask Different

Posted by jpluimers on 2021/08/27

[WayBack] keyboard – How can I type unicode characters without using the mouse? – Ask Different (thanks [WayBack] malte):

  1. Press ⌃ Control+⌘ Command+ ␣ space to bring up the characters popover.
  2. Then type in the code point and press the down arrow to select the symbol. (Use U+#### as code point)
  3. Then simply press ENTER and you are done.

This also works with the names of the symbols (e.g. arrow).

Additional information

Note the icon in the top right of the character popover. It changes the popover to the full Character Viewer, which cannot be navigated by the keyboard. Click the icon in the top right of the Character Viewer to return to the popover. Many thanks to @Tom Gewecke for this information.

–jeroen

Posted in Apple, Mac OS X / OS X / MacOS, Power User | Leave a Comment »