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

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Archive for the ‘Windows 7’ Category

Windows command-line: Finding default routes and setting their metric

Posted by jpluimers on 2014/03/23

When you have multiple network connections, sometimes you want to prefer one to be used as “default” (i.e. because it has higher speed or lower latency).

Windows already tries to accommodate for that by assigning “metrics” to your network connections. They depend on the kind of network (wired over wireless) and speed of the connection.

To see the current default network routes and their metrics, you use the route print command and filter it with findstr like this:

route print | findstr /C:"Metric" /C:" 0.0.0.0"

The “0.0.0.0” string is to filter out the default routes, and “Metric” includes the header line.

For one of my XP machines, the result is this:


Network Destination Netmask Gateway Interface Metric
0.0.0.0 0.0.0.0 192.168.71.1 192.168.71.28 10
0.0.0.0 0.0.0.0 192.168.171.1 192.168.171.140 10

Now, even though both metric are 10, my 192.168.71.1 gateway is much slower than my 192.168.171.1 gateway, so I want to prefer the last one. Read the rest of this entry »

Posted in Power User, Windows, Windows 7, Windows 8, Windows Vista, Windows XP | Tagged: , , , , , | Leave a Comment »

Steps for adjusting a whiteboard photo in Paint.NET

Posted by jpluimers on 2014/03/21

Based on a few links, these are the steps I used to enhance the photo of a whiteboard using Paint.NET:

  1. Auto-Level
  2. Reduce-Noise=Max
  3. Duplicate-Layer
  4. Gaussian-Blur=20
  5. Invert Colors
  6. Layer-Blend-Mode=Color Dodge
  7. Reduce-Noise=Max

These are the links I used to come to this list:

Below are the steps on an image I got from The collective awareness | Idea By Window. Read the rest of this entry »

Posted in Image Editing, Power User, Windows, Windows 7, Windows Vista, Windows XP | 1 Comment »

Interesting: HotspotShield (VPN for iPhone/Mac/Windows to Access Blocked Sites; Surf Anonymously)

Posted by jpluimers on 2014/03/14

Interesting: HotspotShield VPN to surf from a USA IP address.

There is a free version with ads, and a payed version without ads.

Probably more services like this exist, but this has been working for me.

Yup there are:

–jeroen

via: Download Free VPN for iPhone, Mac and Windows to Access Blocked Sites & Surf Anonymously.

Posted in Apple, iOS, iPad, iPhone, Mac, Mac OS X / OS X / MacOS, Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger, Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard, Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard, Mac OS X 10.7 Lion, OS X 10.8 Mountain Lion, Power User, Windows, Windows 7, Windows 8, Windows Vista, Windows XP | Leave a Comment »

NTUSER.INI – sets what parts of your Windows profile are roaming

Posted by jpluimers on 2014/02/14

Never noticed this file before until I got some trouble with several systems sharing parts of a roaming profile.

The content of my %USERPROFILE%\ntuser.ini file is this:
[General]
ExclusionList=AppData\Local;AppData\LocalLow;$Recycle.Bin;Tracing;PrivacIE
[ProfileLoadType]
LastUploadState=Complete

[[The ntuser.ini file is used to set up the user roaming profile components that are not copied to the server.]]

http://www.comptechdoc.org/os/windows/win2k/win2kusers.html

The ExclusionList is for excluding directories in roaming profiles.

The same info is also found here…

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Winlogon
ExcludeProfileDirs

System tool may not correctly display the user profile size in Windows

Server 2003

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;842212

–jeroen

via: NTUSER.INI.

Posted in Power User, Windows, Windows 7, Windows 8, Windows Vista, Windows XP | Leave a Comment »

How do you enlarge the font size in the address bar if you have a vision problem – Browsers – Windows 7

Posted by jpluimers on 2014/02/13

Here you can change the font (enlarge, bold, etc): How do you enlarge the font size in the address bar if you have a vision problem – Browsers – Windows 7.

–jeroen

Posted in Power User, Windows, Windows 7, Windows 8 | Leave a Comment »

Create a Bootable USB Key Thumb Drive in Windows Vista/7 with the Command Line

Posted by jpluimers on 2014/02/07

Open a command prompt with administrator rights and enter the following sequence of commands:

  • diskpart
  • list disk
  • select disk {number}
  • clean
  • create partition primary
  • select partition 1
  • active
  • format fs=fat32 quick
  • assign
  • exit

Which was for experimenting with a few of the entries in Top 5 Free Rescue Discs for Your Sys Admin Toolkit and Kaspersky Rescue Disk 10.

I think I like Download Hiren’s BootCD 15.2 | HBCD Fan & Discussion Platform most.

Another way to get it on a USB stick is through Launching Hiren’s BootCD from USB Flash Drive | HBCD Fan & Discussion Platform.

Wiping out the HPA and DCO stays difficult though: linux – Harddrive – wipe out “hidden areas” like HPA and DCO also after malware infection – Super User.

–jeroen

via: Create a Bootable USB Key Thumb Drive in Windows Vista/7 with the Command Line and Best Free Rootkit Scanner and Remover and Five free portable rootkit removers – TechRepublic and Utility Spotlight: Scan for Malware Outside of Windows | TechNet Magazine and What Is a Host Protected Area?.

Posted in Power User, Windows, Windows 7, Windows 8 | Leave a Comment »

To force-quit Mac Applications: the Mac equivalent of “Ctrl Alt Delete” (via: eHow.com): Option-Command-Esc

Posted by jpluimers on 2014/02/03

Once every while, a full screen app on your Mac hangs, and there is no way to Command-Tab to another application.

PC addicts then press Ctrl+Alt+Del, to either get to the Task Manager, or to logoff/reboot.

For a Mac, there are two:

  1. Force Quit Read the rest of this entry »

Posted in Apple, Keyboards and Keyboard Shortcuts, Mac, Mac OS X / OS X / MacOS, Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger, Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard, Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard, Mac OS X 10.7 Lion, MacBook, MacBook-Air, MacBook-Pro, OS X 10.8 Mountain Lion, Power User, Windows, Windows 7, Windows 8, Windows Server 2000, Windows Server 2003, Windows Server 2003 R2, Windows Server 2008, Windows Server 2008 R2, Windows Vista, Windows XP | Leave a Comment »

Reminder: find out which Windows 7 drivers work for ScanSnap S510 from Fujitsu

Posted by jpluimers on 2014/01/14

One of the few Windows XP machines left is main usage is for the Fujitsu ScanSnap S510 scanner that I have been using for years: it is small, does duplex scanning, emits searchable PDFs through an embedded Adobe Acrobat and Abby ScanSnap Edition OCR license. The Scan button on the scanner “just works” and allows for a “Scan Now, organize later” workflow.

Just Works: if a user is logged in on the Windows machine, which usually is the case.

Next to that, it is used for internet browsing and remote desktop access to VMs in the various clouds: it is more than adequate for that with dual Dell UltraSharp U2407WFP monitors at 1920×1200. The extra 120 pixels over “modern” 1080p do make a difference you know.

I never bothered to upgrade the machine, as it works so nicely and I have had bad experience replacing systems that include embedded licenses: it usually doesn’t work.

Of course I could buy a new ScanSnap iX500, but I don’t want to increase the electronic waste unless I’ve researched if it is possible to get the ScanSnap S510 working on Windows 7 or 8.x, or even on one of my Macs.

So here are some links for further research on a light-weight solution: Read the rest of this entry »

Posted in Apple, Fujitsu ScanSnap, Hardware, ix500, Mac, Mac OS X / OS X / MacOS, MacBook, MacBook Retina, MacBook-Air, MacBook-Pro, OS X 10.8 Mountain Lion, OS X 10.9 Mavericks, Power User, Scanners, Windows, Windows 7, Windows 8 | 1 Comment »

Steps for shrinking a vmware disk for a Windows guest VM inside VMware Workstation of VMware Fusion

Posted by jpluimers on 2014/01/13

Another one from the “missed schedule” series, this one was originally scheduled for 20130927.

These articles were not very clear on the actual steps to take:

The steps I tried: Read the rest of this entry »

Posted in Fusion, Power User, VMware, VMware Workstation, Windows, Windows 7, Windows 8 | Leave a Comment »

Windows security Token Bloat

Posted by jpluimers on 2014/01/13

This can happen when your Windows Security Token bloat has struck:

… the problem could be minor, or relatively major. You may get weird access denied messages, applications crashing, or strange entries in your event logs. Or worse yet a SID for a group that has a ‘deny permission’ on an object could be dropped into the virtual bit bucket, allowing a user to access a resource they are not supposed to access.

Summary of fixes for token bloat:

  1. Use global or universal groups instead of domain local.
  2. Increase the MaxTokenSize on all computers
  3. Convert security groups to distribution groups if they are only used for email lists.

There is a hard-coded limit of 1,024 SIDs for the Kerberos PAC (privilege attribute certificate)

Kerberos token size still remain to 64k in windows7 / win2008r2.

This is what UWWI did to avoid token bloat: UWWI Token Bloat – IAM – UW Information Technology Wiki.

–jeroen

via:

Posted in Power User, Windows, Windows 7, Windows 8, Windows Server 2000, Windows Server 2003, Windows Server 2003 R2, Windows Server 2008, Windows Server 2008 R2, Windows Vista, Windows XP | Leave a Comment »