Jun

29

How to disable or uninstall the pilot version of Microsoft Windows Genuine Advantage Notifications

Filed Under Software | Leave a Comment

Visit Microsoft KB article 921914 for details. It refers to the prerelease-quality version, but Microsoft has stated that it will work the same way with newer versions as well.

A new version of WGA Notifications has been released and it is now being distributed worldwide.

Microsoft has heard that its customers are disappointed with WGA, and Microsoft is taking steps to resolve the issues customers have had with it.

Oh, you didn't know the previous WGA Notifications tool was beta-quality software? It said so in the EULA when it gets installed, but it was pushed out as a High priority update.

Jun

28

BITS, SENS, and EventSystem superfail

Filed Under Fixes, Technical, Windows 2000 | 31 Comments

Go here first for an update with more precise instructions, or read this article for the backstory.

I've had two Windows 2000 Professional machines in as many days that are unable to download updates. The usual Dial-a-fix Windows Update fix routines changed little about the situation. I found out that BITS couldn't start because SENS couldn't start because EventSystem couldn't start. On the second machine, EventSystem was starting, but then SENS was the final failure point. (NetMan and several other services that usually run under SvcHost were also failing with the Event 700x error listed below.)

The event log gets flooded with Event 7000 (SENS), Event 7001 (BITS), Event 4097 (EventSystem), and DCOM event 10005.

7000:

The System Event Notification service failed to start due to the following error:
The executable program that this service is configured to run in does not implement the service.

7001:

The Background Intelligent Transfer Service service depends on the System Event Notification service which failed to start because of the following error:
The executable program that this service is configured to run in does not implement the service.

4097:

The COM+ Event System detected a bad return code during its internal processing. HRESULT was 8007043B from line 42 of .\eventsystemobj.cpp. Please contact Microsoft Product Support Services to report this error.

10005:

DCOM got error "The dependency service or group failed to start. " attempting to start the service BITS with arguments "" in order to run the server:
{4991D34B-80A1-4291-83B6-3328366B9097}

The server {E60687F7-01A1-40AA-86AC-DB1CBF673334} did not register with DCOM within the required timeout.

The fix is to change the "netsvcs" REG_MULTI_SZ in HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Svchost. You can save the following block of text as a .reg file and double-click it to import it (it's for Windows 2000 only). Then restart the computer. All of the services that failed before should now work fine, and Windows Update should work again (and/or Dial-a-fix will finally be able to help).

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Svchost]
"netsvcs"=hex(7):45,00,76,00,65,00,6e,00,74,00,53,00,79,00,73,00,74,00,65,00,\
6d,00,00,00,49,00,61,00,73,00,00,00,49,00,70,00,72,00,69,00,70,00,00,00,49,\
00,72,00,6d,00,6f,00,6e,00,00,00,4e,00,65,00,74,00,6d,00,61,00,6e,00,00,00,\
4e,00,77,00,73,00,61,00,70,00,61,00,67,00,65,00,6e,00,74,00,00,00,52,00,61,\
00,73,00,61,00,75,00,74,00,6f,00,00,00,52,00,61,00,73,00,6d,00,61,00,6e,00,\
00,00,52,00,65,00,6d,00,6f,00,74,00,65,00,61,00,63,00,63,00,65,00,73,00,73,\
00,00,00,53,00,45,00,4e,00,53,00,00,00,53,00,68,00,61,00,72,00,65,00,64,00,\
61,00,63,00,63,00,65,00,73,00,73,00,00,00,54,00,61,00,70,00,69,00,73,00,72,\
00,76,00,00,00,4e,00,74,00,6d,00,73,00,73,00,76,00,63,00,00,00,57,00,5a,00,\
43,00,53,00,56,00,43,00,00,00,00,00
"rpcss"=hex(7):52,00,70,00,63,00,53,00,73,00,00,00,00,00
"wugroup"=hex(7):77,00,75,00,61,00,75,00,73,00,65,00,72,00,76,00,00,00,00,00
"BITSgroup"=hex(7):42,00,49,00,54,00,53,00,00,00,00,00

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Svchost\BITSGroup]
"DefaultRpcStackSize"=dword:00000008

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Svchost\netsvcs]
"CoInitializeSecurityParam"=dword:00000001

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Svchost\wugroup]
"CoInitializeSecurityParam"=dword:00000001

Here is a link to the .reg for right-click-save purposes. (If you single-click on it and it looks funny, that's because it's Unicode).

Also take a look at the update to this article.

Jun

13

MSHTML.DLL

Filed Under Dial-a-fix, General, Software, Technical | 7 Comments

It's patch tuesday - a bunch of fixes came out. Visit Windows Update to get them, or wait for them to be downloaded with idle network bandwidth, by BITS.

I haven't been paying attention lately (I've been quite busy) but a new version of MSHTML.DLL is out - 6.00.2900.2912. It can't be registered (at all), thankfully. The previous version, .2838, was not supposed to be registerable either, but Microsoft broke it. This time, it spits out an error code (specifically, hex 0×80029c4a / decimal -2147312566: TYPE_E_CANTLOADLIBRARY). Dial-a-fix v0.58 (which is pretty close to being v0.60) recognizes certain versions of files now, and ignores the ones it knows it can't register. I'll have a new public beta soon, I think. I've got to do some more private testing first (I've made a truckload of changes since the last public beta).

edit: Wait, the one on my dev machine is 6.0.2900.2912, and it DOES register. Something's not right here!

edit 2: Ok, I found out what the problem is. A rogue program removed mshtml.tlb because it thought it was no longer being used. WTF! Ugh, 3rd party software. This post has been rendered invalid. At least I have something to check for with Dial-a-fix now...

Jun

7

Vista Beta 2 has gone PUBLIC!

Filed Under Software, Technical, Vista | 4 Comments

Start here.

You can receive up to 2 product keys, each of which is good for 10 computers. They will also be emailed to your live.com profile.

If you are a member of Something Awful and Alluvion.org, then you can latch on to my x86 torrent.
(x64 torrent)

Jun

2

Old myths never die

Filed Under Software, Technical | 2 Comments

Can we get a Snopes.com for technical urban legends?
I should totally do that on my wiki!

It's 2006, and somehow, people still apparently believe that Windows XP does not allow you to use all of your bandwidth because of a service called QoS (Quality of Service). This is patently false.

People also think that cleaning the Prefetch folder helps, or that not cleaning it will somehow lower your performance. I would have thought a site like "windowsnetworking.com" would have been a bit more professional about these things, but I can't have everything. They said, and I quote (emphasis theirs):

Prefetch when unattended can also slow down your system. This is because over time

* XP will retain a copy of a portion of a program in the prefetch folder even if you only use it one time, which is not good. Since you may not use the program again, you may impact the performance of your system by having portions of a program you do not use loaded in your system's memory.
* XP systems with very low hardware resources (such as memory and hard disk space) will definitely be affected by an over-bloated prefetch folder.

This is bull. Let's break it down:
* XP will retain an index of the locations of files needed by a process in the prefetch folder even if you only use it one time, which is not a big deal. Windows XP automatically prunes old entries after a 129th entry (or more) needs to be created. At worst, you're going to lose less than 20 MB of hard disk space (my prefetch is currently using 4MB).
* XP systems will very low hardware resources (such as memory and hard disk space) are already at a disadvantage, but without prefetching, it would be even worse. There is no advantage in deleting prefetch entries.... and the only time prefetch entries need to change are when the files they are prefetching have changed (such as being upgraded by a Windows Service Pack or hotfix). And as previously stated, they will automatically be pruned to just 128 entries. At least someone out there knows what they're talking about. If you delete all of the prefetch files, they have to be prefetched *again* (which comes at a performance loss), and doesn't that seem like a waste of time?
* Windows doesn't load things in the Prefetch folder unless you're actually attempting to run the program, so claiming that Windows erroneously loads files in there that no longer exist (and thus need to be cleaned) is also patently false.
* Ed Bott said: It doesn’t actually preload anything into RAM until you run the program, and when you do that, prefetching only works if you have RAM to spare.

Notes from Microsoft:
* Once every three days, by default, Windows XP will perform a partial defragmentation and adjust the layout of the disk based upon current use. The files to be moved are written in the file Layout.ini (found in the Prefetch directory under the System Root directory). [1]
(Dial-a-fix's "Process Idle Tasks" tool forces this to happen sooner than 3 days).
* Windows XP also uses prefetching when launching applications. The files and the contents of the files accessed by each new process are observed and recorded. No prefetching can be done for the first launch of an application, so first launches are often considerably slower than subsequent launches. About 85% to 90% of the improvement is realized after just one launch of an application, with the remaining speed improvement coming after the system has had an opportunity to adjust the disk layout with information specific to this application. [2]

Also, search for "prefetch" here.

—

Anyway, these technical myths are extremely annoying to technicians (such as myself), who constantly have to disprove these dubious claims to customers.

Apr

5

Apple Boot Camp

Filed Under Software, Technical | 2 Comments

Apple, you kick ass!

They're actually embracing the ability to dual-boot to Windows XP!

http://www.apple.com/macosx/bootcamp/

Mar

25

Village idiot can't find ass. Hole-in-ground preventing access, film at 11.

Filed Under Linux, Stupid | 10 Comments

http://www.centos.org/modules/news/article.php?storyid=127

oh god make it stop

Mar

14

Problem solved!

Filed Under Fixes, Software, Technical | 14 Comments

Well, it wasn't Dial-a-fix, it wasn't the "unregistration" option, and it wasn't even OLE — it was the new version of mshtml.dll (which comes from MSKB912945). There is a bug in its DllRegisterServer or DllInstallServer which causes it to write many invalid entries into the registry.

Among other errors, it changes the path of mshtml.dll in about 30+ CLSID entries to "%_SYS_MOD_PATH%". If you search your registry for %_SYS_MOD_PATH% and find several entries in HTML-related objects, you are affected. You will also not be able to use System Restore (blank window), Internet Explorer (tries to download the root of a website instead of opening it), Help and Support (hit F1 after clicking on your desktop once - it tries to Open/Save "context.htm"), possibly Event Viewer, and probably many more things that use embedded HTML objects. It also seems to affect reinstalling of Service Pack 2.

The fix is posted below.

The previous version of MSHTML.DLL (which is NOT affected) is 6.0.2900.2802.

6.0.2900.2838 is the version of mshtml.dll that IS affected.

  1. If you do not have a copy of the 6.0.2900.2802 version of MSHTML.DLL, you can download it here from this site (do not download this unless you have SP2 and all post-SP2 updates). It is approximately 3 megabytes.
  2. Copy it to your Windows\System32 directory and overwrite the previous version. If you are not able to do this, close all programs that use embedded HTML objects, including Internet Explorer, Help and Support, System Restore, etc. If you are still unable to overwrite the file, do it in Safe Mode.
  3. Run Dial-a-fix again, and checkmark everything in box #5 and hit GO.

The problem should be solved at this point.

At least I know now that it wasn't me!

"Thank you" to all those who have been patient with me and my software, and have allowed me to obtain system information and files from them. If you have any trouble fixing this problem, don't hesitate to email me at DjLizard@DjLizard.net with the subject "Dial-a-fix and MSHTML".

Again, KB912945 is the update that causes this problem. You can install this update as long as you do not run the Explorer/Shell checkmark in box #5, which causes Dial-a-fix to register the broken file. If you do register the broken version, simply copy the old version over the newer one and register it using Dial-a-fix (or for the techies, regsvr32 mshtml.dll /i)

Mar

13

Dial-a-fix v0.57.6 released!

Filed Under Dial-a-fix, Software, Technical | Leave a Comment

I have removed the OLE section and re-uploaded Dial-a-fix. It is now 100% safe to use again. I still have not determined which Microsoft OLE library is causing the issue (see the previous post). None of my 3 home machines are affected by this at all, so it is very hard for me to test. If anyone who was affected would like to help out, please submit a .zip file containing the DLLs from "C:\Program Files\Microsoft Shared\System\Ole DB" to the Dial-a-fix email address.

Dial-a-fix v0.57.6 changelog:
* Removed OLE registration section until further notice

Update: it wasn't OLE at all! Argh! See this post: http://djlizard.net/2006/03/14/139

Mar

11

Event Viewer - No properties are available on this object, or The Snap-in failed to initialize successfully

Filed Under Technical | 1 Comment

If you are having issues with Event Viewer, try registering the following DLL:
Start > Run... > regsvr32 els.dll

This will be included in the next incremental release of Dial-a-fix.

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