The Wiert Corner – irregular stream of stuff

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

  • My badges

    Mastodon

  • Twitter Updates

  • My Flickr Stream

    20140508-Delphi-2007--Project-Options--Cannot-Edit-Application-Title-HelpFile-Icon-Theming20140430-Fiddler-Filter-Actions-Button-Run-Filterset-now20140424-VMware-Fusion-6.0.3.-no-reclaimable
    More Photos

  • Pages

  • All categories

  • Enter your email address to subscribe to this blog and receive notifications of new posts by email.

    Join 1,862 other subscribers

Archive for the ‘Windows 7’ Category

« Previous Entries
Next Entries »

Consolidating NTFS free space

Posted by jpluimers on 2017/12/29

For shrinking VM disk images, it’s important to consolidate NTFS free space towards the end of the this.

I’ve tried many tools, starting with defrag C: /X (which tries, but doesn’t give good results) and found out these steps give the best results:

  1. Perform an Ultradefrag full optimisation,
  2. Perform a MyDefrag Consolidate free space script on the drive.

If shrinking still fails then:

  1. Try the Ultradefrag at boot time
  2. Verify what kind of file(s) prevent shrinking: they show up in red after the MyDefrag session:
    1. Zoom in them (they can initially as small as 1 red pixel) by clicking on or near them, repeating the zoom long enough so you can hover over with the mouse and the lower part of the screen shows a filename like  where you cannot find much information about “$badclus:$bad:$data” but appear to be clusters marked as bad on NTFS level using something like chkdsk /B.
    2. If it was a bad sector like above, then try to resolve it with [WayBack] ntfsfix which ships with GParted live boot:
      1. boot a [WayBack] GParted — Live CD/USB/PXE/HD drive,
      2. run GParted to see the drive path (for instance /dev/sda1)
      3. start a terminal
      4. run this command:
        ntfsfix -b /dev/sda1
        which will give output like this:

        Mounting volume... OK
Processing of $MFT and $MFTMirr completed successfully.
Checking the alternate boot sector... OK
NTFS volume version is 3.1.
Going to un-mark the bad clusters ($BadClus)... OK
NTFS partition /dev/sda1 was processed successfully.
      5. boot back into Windows
      6. on an administrative command prompt run this for the affected drive letter:
        chkdsk D: /B
        (reboot if needed)
  3. Shrink the drive using diskmgmt.msc

If you still cannot shrink, then try [WayBack] http://ftp.raxco.com/pub/download/pd14.0/pd14.0_pro.exe PerfectDisk by Raxco free trial.

Note:

MyDefrag (formerly named JkDefrag) is not maintained any more but the 4.3.1 version in the WayBack machine still works very well as the underlying defragmentation APIs in Windows haven’t changed.

References:

For FAT32:

For GParted / ntfsfix:

PerfectDisk via:

–jeroen

Posted in Power User, Windows, Windows 10, Windows 7, Windows 8, Windows 8.1, Windows Server 2008, Windows Server 2008 R2, Windows Server 2012, Windows Server 2012 R2, Windows Server 2016, Windows Vista | Leave a Comment »

WinHTTP Cipher restrictions to TLSv1.2 does not work on Windows7, Server 2008 R2 and Server 2012…

Posted by jpluimers on 2017/12/18

This will bite me some time for sure, so for my link archive: [WayBack] TRestClient and Cipher restrictions to TLSv1.2 does not work on Windows7 and Server2008R2 … and how it can be solved… – Günther Schoch – Google+

References:

For at least some Windows 7 and Server 2008 R2 systems, that update (KB3140245) doesn’t automatically turns up in the Windows Update list.

To make matters worse, the page cannot be archived in either the WayBack machine or Archive.is (I tried multiple times with empty results).

Luckily, there is a copy at [WayBack] KB3140245 DefaultSecureProtocols – Security.NL.

After installing the update, you have to ensure you set the DefaultSecureProtocols registry value to the bitmap value that indicates with SSL/TLS versions you want to support:

The DefaultSecureProtocols registry entry can be added in the following path:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Internet Settings\WinHttp

On x64-based computers, DefaultSecureProtocols must also be added to the Wow6432Node path:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Wow6432Node\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Internet Settings\WinHttp

The registry value is a DWORD bitmap. The value to use is determined by adding the values corresponding to the protocols desired.

DefaultSecureProtocols Value Protocol enabled
0x00000008 Enable SSL 2.0 by default
0x00000020 Enable SSL 3.0 by default
0x00000080 Enable TLS 1.0 by default
0x00000200 Enable TLS 1.1 by default
0x00000800 Enable TLS 1.2 by default

For example:

The administrator wants to override the default values for WINHTTP_OPTION_SECURE_PROTOCOLS to specify TLS 1.1 and TLS 1.2.

Take the value for TLS 1.1 (0x00000200) and the value for TLS 1.2 (0x00000800) then add them together in calculator (in programmer mode), the resulting registry value would be 0x00000A00.

–jeroen

Posted in .NET, Delphi, Development, Power User, Software Development, Windows, Windows 7, Windows Server 2008 R2 | 2 Comments »

Task Scheduler – command-line End a Running Task

Posted by jpluimers on 2017/12/11

schtasks /End [/S <system> [/U <username> [/P [<password>]]]] /TN taskname

[WayBack] End a Running Task

Every now and then you have those Scheduled Tasks consisting of batch files that – despite trying – still ask for user input.

If – even after a reasonable time out – the Task Scheduler still hasn’t killed them, you can kill them by hand with the above schtasks in a snap.

–jeroen

Posted in Console (command prompt window), Power User, Windows, Windows 10, Windows 7, Windows 8, Windows 8.1, Windows Server 2008, Windows Server 2008 R2, Windows Server 2012, Windows Server 2012 R2, Windows Server 2016 | Leave a Comment »

Can I invoke Windows Update from the command line? – Super User

Posted by jpluimers on 2017/09/25

For my link archive: Can I invoke Windows Update from the command line? – Super User [WayBack]

–jeroen

Posted in Power User, Windows, Windows 10, Windows 7, Windows 8, Windows 8.1, Windows 9, Windows Server 2003, Windows Server 2003 R2, Windows Server 2008, Windows Server 2008 R2, Windows Server 2012, Windows Server 2012 R2, Windows Server 2016, Windows Vista, Windows XP | Leave a Comment »

How to Find Saved WiFi Passwords in Windows – Geeks Gyaan

Posted by jpluimers on 2017/09/07

How to Find Saved WiFi Passwords in Windows – Geeks Gyaan [WayBack]: the rescue is netsh [WayBack].

netsh wlan show profiles
netsh wlan show profile name=network-name key=clear

–jeroen

via: Easily find save WiFi passwords in Windows – Joe C. Hecht – Google+ [WayBack]

Posted in Power User, Windows, Windows 10, Windows 7, Windows 8, Windows 8.1 | 3 Comments »

How to Easily Print a Large Image to Multiple Pages in Windows | Scottie’s Tech.Info

Posted by jpluimers on 2017/09/04

Many applications cannot not do that (Paint.net is one of them), but Paint can at least in Windows XP, 7, 8. and 8.1 (I need to check other Windows versions).:

In any case, here’s what you do:

  1. Open the image you’d like to print in Paint
  2. Select: Print -> Page Setup (Vista and 7), or File -> Page Setup (in XP)
  3. Under Scaling, select Fit to and change the setting to something like “3 by 2 page(s)”
  4. Click OK
  5. Print the image from Paint, and make sure to select “All Pages”

Source: How to Easily Print a Large Image to Multiple Pages in Windows | Scottie’s Tech.Info [WayBack]

Note the “3 by 2” has the order “horizontal by vertical”.

–jeroen

Posted in Power User, Windows, Windows 7, Windows 8, Windows 8.1, Windows XP | 2 Comments »

The Most Common VPN Error Codes Explained

Posted by jpluimers on 2017/06/26

Source: The Most Common VPN Error Codes Explained

  1. VPN Error 800 “Unable to establish connection”
  2. VPN Error 619 “A connection to the remote computer could not be established”
  3. VPN Error 51 “Unable to communicate with the VPN subsystem”
  4. VPN Error 412 “The remote peer is no longer responding”
  5. VPN Error 721 “The remote computer did not respond”
  6. VPN Error 720 “No PPP control protocols configured”
  7. VPN Error 691 “Access denied because username and/or password is invalid on the domain”
  8. VPN Errors 812, 732 and 734 “The connection was prevented because of a policy configured on your RAS/VPN server”
  9. VPN Error 806 “A connection between your computer and the VPN server has been established but the VPN connection cannot be completed.”

–jeroen

via: Could be useful. – Joe C. Hecht – Google+

Posted in Power User, Windows, Windows 10, Windows 7, Windows 8, Windows 8.1, Windows Server 2008, Windows Server 2008 R2, Windows Server 2012, Windows Server 2012 R2, Windows Vista, Windows XP | Leave a Comment »

VHD Attach 4.11 – Medo’s Home Page

Posted by jpluimers on 2017/06/05

Brilliant:

This is small tool that adds Attach and Detach option to contextual (aka right-click) menu of Virtual disk (vhd) files. That enables those operations to be done without trip to Disk Management console. Detach option is available on hard drive contextual menu also (if selected in options).

Source:

–jeroen

Posted in Power User, Windows, Windows 10, Windows 7, Windows 8, Windows 8.1, Windows Server 2012, Windows Server 2012 R2 | Leave a Comment »

17 years ago, C:\nul\nul crashed/BSOD Windows; now $MFT does for Windows < 10

Posted by jpluimers on 2017/05/26

Source:

History repeating itself: [Archive.is] 31607 – C:\nul\nul crashes/BSOD then, now it’s this:

Via:

All versions prior to Windows 10 and Windows Server 2016 seem vulnerable.

So add $MFT to this list:

The following device names have been known to render a system unstable: CON,
NUL, AUX, PRN, CLOCK$, COMx, LPT1, and CONFIG$.

Oh BTW: history repeated itself this year too. With NUL

In short, Steven Sheldon created a rust package named nul which broke the complete package manager on Windows:

BTW: one of my gripes on learning new languages is that they come with a whole new idiom of their ecosystem: rust, cargo, crates, all sound like being a truck mechanic to me.

–jeroen

Read the rest of this entry »

Posted in Development, Microsoft Surface on Windows 7, NTFS, Power User, Security, Software Development, The Old New Thing, Windows, Windows 10, Windows 7, Windows 8, Windows 8.1, Windows 9, Windows 95, Windows 98, Windows Defender, Windows Development, Windows ME, Windows NT, Windows Server 2000, Windows Server 2003, Windows Server 2003 R2, Windows Server 2008, Windows Server 2008 R2, Windows Server 2012, Windows Server 2012 R2, Windows Server 2016, Windows Vista, Windows XP | Leave a Comment »

WannaCry — Decrypting files with WanaKiwi + Demos – Comae Technologies

Posted by jpluimers on 2017/05/19

[Archive.is] Working Windows XP & 7 demos. #FRENCHMAFIA: WannaCry — Decrypting files with WanaKiwi + Demos – Comae Technologies:

TL;DR;

DO NOT REBOOT your infected machines and TRY wanakiwi ASAP*!

*ASAP because prime numbers may be over written in memory after a while.

Via:[WayBack] A French researcher says he’s found a tool that could help some fraction of victims running that older Windows version. Just don’t reboot!  WannaCry Ransomware Victims Might Have Some Hope–If They’re on Windows XP | WIRED

–jeroen

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

« Previous Entries
Next Entries »