Workarounds if your XP can’t remember folder settings

Some folder you want to view as thumbnails, for some you want to view as Tiles and for some you may want List, Icons, or Details. Your Windows used to remember all those settings for you and suddenly, your computer looks like it got brain washed. What is happening? Firstly, make sure you select Remember each folder’s view settings in Control Panel –>> Folder Options as in the following diagram.

Even after that, if your XP still dumbs, the answer is that by default, Windows XP is limited to 200 local folders and 200 network folders, for a total of 400 folders. So that after it remembers for 400 folders, that’s it. It’s full.

How you can solve this?

First Method

This effect only to before Windows XP SP2. So the quick fix would be to download and install Windows XP Service Pack 2. What if you don’t want to install Service Pack 2 for some reasons? Read the second way.

Second Method,

You need to edit registry. As always dealing with registry, use it with great caution and use at your own risk.

• Go to Start Menu –>> Run
• Type regedit and press Enter.
• Browse to the following registry key.

HKEY_CURRENT_USERSoftwareMicrosoftWindowsShell

• You will see the registry value BagMRU Size in the following pic.

• Double click on that and change the value to 5000. Make sure you select Decimal. After that click OK.

• After that browse to another registry key.

HKEY_CURRENT_USERSoftwareMicrosoftWindowsShellNoRoam>

• Change the BagMRU Size to 5000 too.

After you’ve done editing the registry, make sure you restart your Windows to make change effective. Hey, Windows is not as dumb as you think!

Source : Microsoft

How to Disable/Enable Windows default debugger Dr. Watson

If you haven’t heard it before, you may wonder what is Dr. Watson? Here is a brief explanation:

Dr. Watson for Windows is a program error debugger that gathers information about your computer when an error (or user-mode fault) occurs with a program. Technical support groups can use the information that Dr. Watson obtains and logs to diagnose a program error.

So, that means this debugger will collect information and send to Microsoft for further analysis. But for your testing computer that don’t have internet, or if you feel it’s useless for you anyway, just follow these steps to turn off.

• 1.Go to Start Menu –>> Run and type regedit.exe then press Enter.
• 2.Browse to the following registry. HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESoftwareMicrosoftWindows NTCurrentVersionAeDebug
• 3.Click the AeDebug key, and then click Export Registry File on the Registry menu. Save the file and remember it.
• 4.Then you can delete the AeDebug key.

That’s it! Whenever any programs crash again, Windows won’t ask you whether you want to send data to Microsoft or not.

If you change your mind and want to enable Dr. Watson back. It’s easy.

• Double-click the file you save in step 3.
• And then go to Start –>> Run –>> cmd.exe
• At the command prompt, type drwtsn32 -i

Have fun playing around Windows!

Source : Microsoft

Google celebrate their 9th birthday

I have been wondering when Google will celebrate 9th birthday since the beginning of this month. But today, as in their homepage Google officially celebrate now.

Why Google birthday is varying from year to year?

In September 1998, Google Inc. opened its door in Menlo Park, California. The door came with a remote control, as it was attached to the garage of a friend who sublet space to the new corporation’s staff of three. The office offered several big advantages, including a washer and dryer and a hot tub. It also provided a parking space for the first employee hired by the new company: Craig Silverstein, now Google’s director of technology.

Already Google.com, still in beta, was answering 10,000 search queries each day. The press began to take notice of the upstart website with the relevant search results, and articles extolling Google appeared in USA TODAY and Le Monde. That December, PC Magazine named Google one of its Top 100 Web Sites and Search Engines for 1998. Google was moving up in the world.

The exact date they celebrate their birthday will depend on their people appetizes for birthday cake. (See my previous post about When Google Birthday for details)

Well, anyway, Happy Birthday Google!

Firefox shortcuts I frequently use

I love Firefox. It’s fast, sleek and secure. Right now, my main browser is Firefox. I can’t use IE to browse internet anymore. It’s too noisy. The reason Firefox keeps quiet is due to Adblock plus.

• Home Page Alt + Home
• Full Screen View F11
• Refresh Page F5
• Find / Find Again F3
• Add Bookmarks Ctrl + D
• Bookmarks Ctrl + B
• History Ctrl + H
• Page Source Ctrl + U
• Tab New Ctrl + T
• Tab Close Ctrl + W
• Window New Ctrl + N
• Window Close Alt + F4

This list is ordered by the frequency of my usage. Of course, I don’t have any statistics about my usage. So it’s just a guess.

Windows Vista SP1 Beta

Microsoft has just released Windows Vista Service Pack 1 Beta yesterday. According to Nick White announcements, currently the beta sp1 is available only to a private group of Beta testers.

Here is the my highlights about SP1.

• Have a size range from 51MB – 679.6MB depending on how often you update your Windows
• Improve responsiveness – The delay between pressing CTRL-ALT-DELETE and getting the password prompt, resuming from Hibernation or Sleep are pretty much gone
• Search option has been removed from the Start menu, instead “Search Everywhere” with users can choose their favourite desktop search program such as Google Desktop.
• Select Volumes – a new option in Windows Vista’s Disk Defragmenter
• BitLocker Control Panel – users of Windows Vista Enterprise and Ultimate are now able to choose which drives to encrypt

After I have read about all new exciting features, I wish I am one of the private beta testers. Anyway, I’ll be eagerly waiting for the new SP1 to come out and surely I’ll install it as soon as it hits public.

Source : Vista Blog

Digg-clone netscape is gone

Now if you go to Netscape.com, you’ll get suprised that there are no longer what-so-called digg killer is there. Now, aol realized that their social networking site is gradually killing them. So they get rid of that into another domain called Propeller.com

Now the old netscape.com is back. Even though it is quite a shame to see big company like aol have to take a step backward, I congrats them for making a right decision. Yeah, that’s right, in the Web 2.0 world, you can’t kill digg, it’s as simple as that.

Create self-extract zip file with Windows built-in tool

We all like the zip feature. Especially when I transfer a lot of .doc and .xls files, compression of zip save me a ton of space. But sometimes, I want to create exe to uncompress itself due to destination computer don’t have zip software install or I’m just too lazy to open WinZip.

What most people don’t know is that Windows has built-in tool to create self-extract compress files.

• Go to Start Menu –>> Run
• And then type iexpress.exe

You will see the following wizard.

• Click Next, then Choose “Create compressed files only (ActiveX installs)”
• Then Click Next, Add the files you want in your package.
• Then Click Next, click browse and choose the path you want and give any name you want to the package.
• Then Click Next, you can save the setting for creating your package. For now, select “Don’t save”.
• Then Click Next and your package is ready to distribute to anywhere you like.

It is quite amazing that Windows have provided such an amazing small program for free.

How to allow users to remote desktop in Windows 2003

In Windows 2003, I’ve created an ordinary user account and then I’ve add that account in to Remote Desktop Users group already as in the following picture.

But when I login remotely, I’ve got the following error.

To log on to this remote computer, you must be granted the Allow log on through Terminal Services right. By default, members of the Remote Desktop Users group have this right. If you are not a member of the remote desktop users gruop or another group that has this right, or if the remote desktop user group does not have this right, you must be granted this right manually.

I’m sure if you got this error you’ll feel frustrated like I did. How can you manually grant this user right to remote desktop? Okay, it’s not that difficult.

• First Go to –>> Administrative Tools –>> Terminal Services Configuration
• And then Choose Connection and in the right panel right click on RDP-tcp
• And then choose Properties. In the Permissions tab, add the users you want.

That’s it! Now enjoy your server remotely.

How to fix NTLDR or NTDETECT.COM not found error

In the old Windows 9x days, we have seen “NTLDR or NTDETECT.COM Not Found” error quite too often. Nowadays, modern Windows XP era, these errors become less frequent, but still there. For me, normally, I’ve no idea how to fix these and I used to format my computer.

If you have FAT32 partitions or Windows 9x, it is much simpler than with NTFS.
Just boot with a Win98 floppy and copy the NTLDR or NTDETECT.COM files
from the i386 directory to the root of the C: drive.

But for NTFS or Windows XP, here are the steps:

• Insert and boot from your WindowsXP CD.
• At the first R=Repair option, press the R key
• Press the number to choose the location for the installation of Windows you want to repair.
• Typically this will be #1 unless you have dual-boot.
• Type in the administrator password. (If no password, just press Enter)
• Enter in the following commands (X: is drive letter of CDROM drive)
• COPY X:i386NTLDR C:
• COPY X:i386NTDETECT.COM C:
• Take out the CD ROM and type exit

Source : Microsoft

Windows Control Panel applets

Windows Control Panel is great way of accessing windows administrative features. Some of those features are not available in traditional interface. Those features are hidden from normal GUI. The only way to access is from command line only. For example, control userpasswords2 is the only way to access from Run command.

To access these lists, go to Start Menu –>> Run and type the commands you want.

Control Panel applets

Applet name	Type at the Run command
Add Hardware	control hdwwiz.cpl
Add or Remove Programs	control appwiz.cpl
Administrative Tools	control admintools
Appearance Settings	control color
Audio Devices and Sound Themes	control mmsys.cpl
Date and Time	control timedate.cpl or control date/time
Display Settings	control desk.cpl or control desktop
Firewall	control firewall.cpl
Folder Options	control folders
Fonts	Explorer “windowsfonts” or control fonts
Game Controllers	control joy.cpl
Infocard	control infocardcpl.cpl
iSCSI Initiator	control iscsicpl.cpl
Internet Options	control inetcpl.cpl
Keyboard	control main.cpl Keyboard or control keyboard
Mouse	control main.cpl or control mouse
Network Connections	control ncpa.cpl or control netconnections
Pen and Input Devices	control tabletpc.pcl
People Near Me	control collab.pcl
Phone and Modem Options	control telephon.cpl or control telephony
Power Options	control powercfg.cpl
Printers and Faxes	control printers
Regional and Language Options	control intl.cpl or control international
Scanners and Cameras	control sticpl.cpl
Windows Security Center	control wscui.cpl
Task Scheduler	control schedtasks
Text to Speech	control speech
System	control sysdm.cpl
User Accounts	control nusrmgr.cpl or control userpasswords or control userpasswords2

These commands will not only make you access more efficiently but also save you a lot of time.