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Tweakers are one of several banes of my existence.

Tweakers second guess the kernel developers and use third-party software utilities to "clean" the registry and remove/disable system services they shouldn't be touching.

They often end up with more than one registry cleaner, more than one antivirus, and/or more than one firewall application running at the same time. Tweakers care a lot about system speed, so of course this will make them download/apply more tweaks in an attempt to offset the speed decrease from all of the junk software they have installed and running.

They change every option in the system to something bizarre and follow nutball crazy tech evangelists such as (but not limited to) Kim Komando and Steve Gibson of GRC.

They listen to their friends who know less than them and swear by software such as (but not limited to) Norton Antivirus.

Their systems come into my shop because they're ridiculously broken, and I spend hours removing conflicting "one-click fix" software that has ironically caused the breakdown of the machine and re-applying system defaults (using things like Dial-a-fix to guide me). When I tell them that these software packages they're using are pieces of junk and are causing all of the problems, they don't believe me.

They always disable System Restore (because they don't think it works well enough or they think it takes up a lot of resources) so there's no way I can go back to a sane system state by rolling back individual hives. They usually "replace" System Restore with Norton GoBack or some other ridiculously bad program.

I'm sure Dr. J.D. Azil will chime in with more stuff about tweakers. Doctor?

1. Install Windows
2. Leave it the fuck alone

Okay, there may be actual tweakers that know what they're doing, but I never see them. Why would I? They know what they're doing!

I also see kids (usually self-professed "gamers") who do the following to their homebuilt machines:

• Attach a CPU heatsink without using any thermal paste
• Screw the motherboard directly to the case (without standoffs)
• Chain multiple fans from a single molex connector where the chain finishes at a hard drive (or two)
• Forcing RAM modules in backwards

Perform a registry hive recovery using the information in my System Volume Information article for the hive mentioned after CONFIG\ (typically SYSTEM).

Sorry, Windows 2000 users, Microsoft hath cursed thee without an enabled-by-default automatic registry hive backup facility. Try ERUNT, though, and perform similar steps to roll back your failed SYSTEM hive when it inevitably fails.

It appears that Microsoft has non-officially confirmed that there will be another service pack for Windows XP. According to an e-mail from a Microsoft spokesperson: "We're currently planning to deliver SP3 for Windows XP in the first half of CY2008. This date is preliminary, and we don't have any more details to share at this time."

A bit more info here.

http://www.codinghorror.com/blog/archives/000778.html

I fixed my first Vista problem last week. My boss brought in his Vista RC1 machine and it was acting oddly. Explorer.exe would take 50% CPU usage (two core CPU) and the Start Menu's pin list wouldn't show up at all. Everything else was working properly (including the All Programs list, and other functions of the Start Menu).

I had to find out whether the pin list problem was the cause or the effect, so I began searching the internet for the location of the pin list. It's nearly impossible to find this information.

After a half hour of digging around with Sysinternals Filemon and Regmon, I wasn't getting anywhere. I used Sysinternals strings.exe on shell32.dll (which I had previously discovered is where the pin list code is stored) and finally found out where the pin list is stored: HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\StartPage
The value Favorites contains the pin list itself. I found that on this Vista machine, there was nothing wrong with the Favorites value. It was the ProgramsCache value that had become corrupted. After deleting the key and restarting Explorer, the pin list came back up and all of the CPU usage went away. Problem solved. (This all works the same in Windows XP.)

It's too bad it doesn't tell you what file it is. This has happened twice in our shop for two different machines with two different classes of devices. One was a printer and the other was a wireless network adapter (both were USB devices, though). After the typical chkdsk /r, getting a new driver download, etc, we have come to find out that reinstalling DirectX 9 fixed the problem. Why? I don't know, but if the system cannot find the file specified, try reinstalling DirectX 9 just in case.

Hope this helps someone.

Support for Microsoft Windows XP Service Pack 1 (SP1) and Service Pack 1a (SP1a) ends on October 10, 2006 (which effectively means immediately). This also includes security updates for these service packs.

We, as Microsoft do, recommend that those who are still running Windows XP SP1 or SP1a upgrade to Windows XP Service Pack 2 as soon as possible.

You can now request a free Windows Vista RC1 product key, and then download the Windows Vista DVD ISO. A valid Passport account is required. The evaluation version of Windows Vista is good until June 1st, 2007, which is months after Vista makes it to retail stores. Each product key is good for 10 computers.

In Superfail, I described a problem afflicting Windows 2000 machines. I believe it has to do with one of the Windows Updates from June, but I can't be sure. It's still affecting people right now.

These are the steps I usually use to fix it:

(edit): 0) Make sure you're using the latest build of Dial-a-fix.
1) Reboot so you're starting with a clean slate.
2) Run all of DAF section #5 (Registration center).
3) Run DAF section #3 (WU/WUAU).
4) Start > Run > rundll32.exe setupapi.dll,InstallHinfSection DefaultInstall 132 %systemroot%\inf\au.inf
(Note: the above command is one huge line — it has been wrapped for easier reading)
5) Immediately merge this .reg file: win2ksvchost.reg
6) Reboot.
7) Try Windows Update again. If it fails, try clicking "Flush SoftwareDistribution" in Dial-a-fix (and answer No) and then try Windows Update again.

Some combinations of the above steps usually fix it. Each machine seems to freak out a bit differently, so your results may vary.

Lunarsoft.net is a community of both technicians and computer users who assist each other with solving computer problems, gabbing about random crap, and posting pertinent tech/news articles.

The DjLizard.net software support forum is also there. If you have any issues, suggestions, or questions about my software, feel free to post there (anonymous posting is allowed, but registration is recommended).

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