CurlingSteve

My turn... Ghost 10.0 + USB Hub = BSOD System Specs: Dell XPS (Gen 1) Laptop with: 3.4 GHz P4 2 GB RAM 60 GB HD ATI Radeon Mobility 9800 256 MB graphics) XP Pro SP2 fully updated Sony DW-R56A DVD Belkin F5U237 7 Port Powered USB Hub (XP's Generic Hub Driver 5.1.2600) hosting: 200 GB Maxtor OneTouch HD 120 GB Western Digial HD 250 GB Maxtor HD Dazzle DVC 150B Video Capture Sony DRU-720A DVD ---------------- Frequently (but not always) when I turn on or reboot with the USB hub (and its attached devices) powered up I get a BSOD about halfway through the boot cycle: STOP 0x0000008E - 0xC0000005 0x

Dust clogging the fans screens will shoot the temperatures up in a hurry. I clean mine (from the outside) daily, but the other day my temps went through the roof. When I opened the case I found mats of dust so dense they looked like filters until I touched them. I think you'll find something similar if you open the case and clean inside.

I run into Autoplay on my external hard drives and yes, it can take quite a while to cycle. I use TweakUI to turn off Autoplay for those drive letters so Autoplay is skipped when I turn them on.

I agree with the LCD recommendation. Even with the refresh rate set as high as possible, a CRT flickers. You might not perceive/see it but that flickering can cause eye strain. And CRTs can lose focus with time adding to the strain. With an LCD there's no ficker, and no chance of the guns losing alignment or focus.

I do use clicking the column headers to sort them the way I want. What I'm looking for is to have Task Manager remember the way it was sorted (so I don't have to click the CPU column header twice each time I open Task Manager). Explorer windows (folders) for instance remember whether they were last sorted by Name or Type. I wonder if there's some way to have Task Manager do the same. Task Manager does remember which tab was last open, but not the sort order. Perhaps shortcut/command line switches can do that but I haven't been able to find out what they might be (yet).

I'm trying to figure out if there's a way to get Task Manager to open to the Processes tab with the columns sorted by most CPU time on top. When one closes Task Manager it will open with the last selected tab open, so that part is easy. But the Processes tab opens in a sort order I can't figure out. Does anyone know if the Tab/Sort Column can be specified in a command/shortcut line? ---------- Now I see it sorts the processes by descending PID number.

The fans on some of my laptops turn on immediately at power-up then throttle back after the POST or some other temperature monitor takes over. If the laptop doesn't feel hot, I wouldn't be overly concerned. My Dell XPS just jumped from 50 to 70 C according to Everest, but I changed nothing. And a System Restore takes it back to 50. Still tracking down this mystery... ------ Back up to 70, fans screaming, trying a "ghost" (image backup) from October. ------ No joy, still reporting hot in Everest, even with the case cold. ------ Possible solution, stood it on end and tapped. Maybe moved a dust b

And a Happy 2*17*59 to you all too!

Unless "hiberfil.sys" has been renamed somewhere, it (or something similarly named) has to be there. Hiberfil.sys is an image of your RAM at shutdown which is used to reload the state of the system. Try seaching for a file near the same size as the amount of RAM in the system.

Happy New Year

Drop the "all" part. Try : ipconfig /release That should release everything. Then try: ipconfig /renew That should try to reconnect everything. Anything you typed after those commands was interpreted as specifying a particular, named adapter/connection.

On my laptops "hiberfil.sys" is in the root (C:\) not C:\WINDOWS. (Same folder as "pagefile.sys"). Since you can hibernate (Am I correct? Your system will properly hibernate and resume from there?) "hiberfil.sys" is somewhere on your system, even if it has been relocated.

I agree with you, my goal is to solve problems as best I can, not police posts. That's where I choose to spend my time. I have Moderator priveleges (thanks for the honor), but haven't used them yet. Short of moving a post to a more appropriate forum, I don't know where I would/should draw the line. There's NO justification for profanity on any board, especially a help forum like this. Nor should back and forth flaming occur (or be allowed in my opinion). Unless a poster has a reasonable (even if wrong) contribution to the problem, they should just sit back and watch. (Exposing wrong solutions

I realise I may be backtraking, but ... When you do Start, Turn Off Computer and press SHIFT, does "Standby" change to "Hibernate" in the box? Is there a "hiberfil.sys" file allocated in your C:\ folder? (It is a hidden/system file, so you might need to enable displaying hidden files to see it).

I've found it very hard not to respond in kind. I sympathize with the "old guard" people that now give what they get (or have given up completely). Some folks have been around for quite a while, and work hard to solve a particular problem. Posters that interject "me too", "Google it", or nonsense to bump their count bother me a lot. I don't know about the rest of the folks with any kind of Mod privelege, but I prefer to spend my time helping correcting (not policing) posts so they make sense. I'm looking to solve problems and learn along the way. I do wish (as Moderator in some forums) I could

Pete_C, I haven't tried it that way. My experiments this afternoon (chasing a different problem) make me think you're right. Ghost 2003 anyway seems to want to reboot between sessions/partitions which leads me to believe this is how they handle the different partition sizes. I haven't explored the process this deeply before. I assumed (apparently wrongly) that cloning was the only way to get the boot sectors written. Can one clone a partition? (I thought that was only a drive level function). Cloning does include the boot partition, but I thought that also forced the same partition sizes. ---

That will work just fine. You'll need to "ghost" each partition separately (as opposed to the drive style many people use).

You could burn them to CD then delete them. If you ever need to uninstall one of them, copy it back to the hard drive.

Crucial usually includes Dual Channel as part of their recommendations. With only 3 slots available, I doubt that is available to you. And your system will usually automatically detect whether it can take advantage of Dual Channel mode "invisibly". It's a low level choice one does not get an option to enable or disable. In any event, it is often recommended that all memory modules be the same. They tend to "cooperate" better when paired with identical siblings.

I haven't looked at the internals of the extension (nor have I installed an tried it), but I'd bet all it's doing is opening IE as a tab in Firefox. Therefore, you're still exposed to any IE vulnerabilities. Don't think it's isolating you from IE vulnerabilities. And keep this in mind. As Firefox becomes more popular, the more likely it will be attacked. There are plenty of vulnerable places in Firefox as well. Bottom line, watch what you allow to install on your system.

As far as I can tell, each update from the Microsoft Download Center has to be downloaded separately. But at least once you have that copy you don't have to download it again. I suppose you could write a script or batch file to install them all, but I haven't tried it. There are also ways to write an unattended installation file that guides XP's installation process automatically. That file has answers to all the questions XP has along the way. I haven't tried it, but if you want I can try to hunt up some links about it. Are you familiar with Slipstreaming? This process lets you create an XP I

The Microsoft Download Center is another source for standalone versions of updates you can store or burn. Open Windows Updates then click "Use administrator options". That page has links to the Windows Update Catalog and the Microsoft Download Center (which is more current from what I've seen).

When you think about it, you'd expect the scan to be using 100% as long as nothing else is running. Isn't it better to see you CPU doing something other than System Idle?

Actually, seeing that "Choose an Operating System" screen isn't so bad (to me) if you set the Timeout down to (say) 3 seconds. It counts down then starts booting the default choice fast enough that I don't mind the small delay. I keep my BOOT.INI file set to allow a choice of Normal, Safe Mode, Clean, or Recovery Console. Instead of trying to hit F8 at just the right time to choose Safe Mode, I have 3 seconds to hit the down arrow key (which stops the countdown). (Actually any key would probably do this). I love the idea of having a clean copy of XP on a separate partition for emergencies. Tec

That is a nice price, but all you need is a wireless router. You don't need the PCI (desktop) or PCMCIA (laptop) cards. Whatever router you get will have instructions for the hookup, but usually it's very easy. Generally it goes like this. (1) Turn off everything (your computers and your cable/DSL modem). (2) Connect the modem to the Internet (or WAN or Uplink) port on the router. This port is usually separated from the port(s) computers can wire to by a small gap. (3) Turn on the modem and let it boot fully (2-3 minutes is often enough). (4) Trun on the router and let it boot fully (again 2-3