Derek891

I think all that the security related stuff is a bunch of hooey. The real reason is they hate the Metro screen just as much as everyone else.

When I first read this thread the other day, I could not figure out for the life of me how post #1 and post #2 were even remotely related to one another. I honestly thought that hazelnut had somehow posted to the wrong thread. Now I see that post #4 has cleared this up for me. Test your hearing and find tinnitus therapy: http://www.audionotch.com/app/tune/ Online Audio Frequency Signal Generator: http://www.wavtones.com/functiongenerator.php Get revenge on your neighbor's annoying dog: http://jetcityorange.com/dog-whistle/ Please note: You will need special speakers capable of reproducing these high frequency sounds. Your computer's speakers are probably not capable beyond 18-22 kHz frequency.

Edit: I jumped the gun on this slightly and I apologize. These are the release candidate or RC versions that are available right now - or a Beta release in Windows terminology. The final release for end users is another 3-4 weeks away. I know it's a Windows oriented forum here, but in case anyone is interested, Linux Mint 17 Qiana was released today. This is the long term release version and will be supported until May 2019. So far, only the Cinnamon and MATE desktops are available for download, the KDE and Xfce flavors will probably be along shortly. Here is the link for Cinnamon: http://blog.linuxmint.com/?p=2615 And the link for MATE: http://blog.linuxmint.com/?p=2616

Last night I disabled hibernation on my HP Envy laptop, and was pleasantly surprised to see I gained about 6GB or so in freespace on the disk. Great, I thought. Then on the first cold boot this morning, I noticed my little wi-fi indicator light stayed red instead of changing from red to blue, and I had no internet access using wi-fi. A quick reboot and the light behaved normally and my wi-fi was working again. So I re-enabled hibernation, then did a full shutdown and a second cold boot. The light was back to working from cold boot, as it should. So somewhere deep in the bowels of hiberfile.sys, there is one lonely little file related to my wi-fi device , and maybe more , that wake up and come alive at system boot.

Hello Winapp2 - When I posted this afternoon, I figured you would be the one with the answer. I've never had this problem with the earlier versions of Firefox, so I thought it would be the right place to start. However, after posting on the Linux Mint forum, someone put me on the right track by mentioning the path for "mwad0hks.default" might be incorrect in the profiles.ini file. So it seems that it is not a problem with Firefox, instead it appears to be Linux related. Specifically, I'm beginning to think that using Bleachbit is causing my problems, because of the fact I've installed it on both systems and remember seeing "mwad0hks.default" occaisionally on the list of files to be cleaned. Right now I'm looking into modifying Bleachbit's "whitelist" to exclude Firefox's user profile. I just want to be sure to use the correct path and folder, otherwise I could be creating even more problems for myself.

I'm not sure if I should be posting this here since it is Firefox related, but not Firefox installed on Windows related. I have Firefox installed on both Linux Mint and openSUSE as the default browser, and both were updated to Firefox version 29 recently. I've gotten the error message "cannot open Firefox due to missing or inaccessible user profile" a total of three times on both systems. This occurred only once on openSUSE and it seems to have fixed itself. By that I mean that every time since then, opening Firefox on openSUSE hasn't produced any error message. However, it has occurred twice on Linux Mint, and with very bad results. Any repeated attempts to open Firefox produce the same error. I've gone as far as uninstalling Firefox and then reinstalling it from the repository, only to see the same message pop up when trying the new installation. So far I've fixed it by doing a clean installation of Linux Mint, which is not terribly time consuming, but is becoming annoying. Has anyone on the forum had a similar experience with using Firefox 29 installed on Windows? I'm trying to determine if this is solely a Firefox related issue that occurs regardless of the operating system, or if I should be looking at openSUSE and Linux Mint as the source of the problem. Also, when I run "about:config", where do I find and how do I verify the settings related to my user profile? I'm thinking the issue could be that my user profile isn't being created, updated, or saved properly.

Reading that article brought up a question that I've had for some time about using Windows 8 on a SSD device. I'm aware of the fact that Windows 8 doesn't completely shutdown, it instead enters a state that Microsoft refers to as "Hybrid Shutdown", where the user functions are actually shut down but the kernel functions are hibernated. This allows Windows 8 to do a cold boot much faster than any previous versions of Windows. Here is the link to what I read: http://www.techrepublic.com/blog/windows-and-office/how-windows-8-hybrid-shutdown-fast-boot-feature-works/#. So my question is, if you open the command terminal and enter "powercfg /hibernate off" to disable hibernation, as described in the article Willy2 posted, are you disabling only the hibernate function that is available to the user, or are you disabling the Windows Hybrid Shutdown function as well? And if the latter is the case, aren't you losing some degree of the faster boot times that people associate with using a SSD with Windows?

I think there's one more reason why Microsoft reversed course when it came to updating XP: Maybe Microsoft does not want to alienate any more people than they already have.

Hello Richie and welcome to the forum. I noticed that nobody has replied to your post so far, and I think it's for this reason: they don't want to be the bearer of bad news. Hard drives are not very tolerant of voltage spikes, power losses, or sudden physical shocks. Dropping a hard drive from even a few inches onto a hard surface can cause internal mechanical damage. That being said, let's try to make the best of the situation and see what can be done. First, when you ran chkdsk, did you use any command line options, such as /f (to fix errors) or /r (to attempt to relocate data from damaged sectors to good ones), or did you just enter "chkdsk"? The correct syntax is "chkdsk C: /f /r" (Some people claim that /r implies /f, but I use both just in case they're wrong.) Second, if you know who the drive's manufacturer is, you might try using their own diagnostic software to get a better idea of what is wrong. And don't automatically assume that it's a Toshiba drive just because it's a Toshiba laptop. You should open the bottom cover and verify what brand it is if you're not 100% sure. If you do find that it is made by Toshiba, try using the utility DOS Diagnostic Tool ver. 7.0, you will probably need to install it to a CD, DVD, or USB stick in order to boot it. Look for a "read me" text file for instructions when you unzip it. The link is here: http://storage.toshiba.com/storage-services-support/warranty-support/software-utilities#diagnostic

The Obamacare giveth. And Microsoft taketh away.

Hello Daniel and welcome to the forum. It's very difficult to describe how a hard drive works without getting technical, and I certainly make no claim to knowing anything more than the basics. I'll try to answer your four questions a simply as I can. 1.) As long as you deleted your browser history prior to doing a drive wipe, it's gone. 2.) As long as you deleted any other files prior to doing a drive wipe, they are gone. 3.) A bit more tricky - Free space refers to all the space that can be used to perform new write operations to your drive. It can exist in one of two conditions: either it was previously written to and used to store data, or it was never used and contains no data. This is because when you delete a file in Windows, the data still physically remains on the drive. All you are doing is changing a file table that the operating system uses to keep track of where the individual pieces of data are stored on the drive, and these little storage units are called sectors. Think of each sector as a mailbox with a flag on it. When the flag is up, it is in use, and cannot be used to write new data. If the flag is down, it is available for a new write operation, and then one of two things happen: either the old data that was previously stored there gets overwritten by new data, or a previously empty sector gets written to for the first time. So keep this in mind, when you delete a file in Windows, it does not completely disappear until all the sectors used to store it get overwritten by a new file. Also, defragmenting your drive can overwrite quite a few of these sectors as well, the thing is, you cannot be sure which sectors containing old data were overwritten and which were was not. This is where a drive wiping utility comes in. In simple terms, it looks for all the sectors on the drive where the flag is down, and creates it's own file table of where they are located on the drive. Then it goes back and fills each of these sectors with zeroes, effectively returning these sectors to what appears to be an unused condition. That being said, entities like the FBI and NSA have very sophisticated techniques of recovering data, even after it has been overwritten. And that being said, a small town police force does not have these kind of resources, so you are probably safe from any casual examination that they would do. 4.) As far as Google searches, every search ever done by anyone is stored somewhere on one of their servers. So be warned.

Interesting how this occurred a mere two weeks after support for XP has ended. And curious how this flaw in Internet Explorer was overlooked for such a long period of time. Remember, I.E.6 through 11 are all supposedly affected, and I.E.6 was released in August 2001! You have to ask yourself, just who is in charge of Quality Control at Microsoft, Rip Van Winkle? And I don't think that people are upgrading to newer versions of Windows in the numbers that Microsoft has envisioned. You would be surprised at the number of people that have been turning up on the Linux Mint forum in the last two weeks and asking "how do I install Mint to dual boot with Windows XP?". I know that time marches on, but in this case, I think quite a few people are refusing to keep in step.

Does anyone have a clue when the updates to fix I.E. will be available? I've been doing a Google search every day since Dennis originally posted on this problem. Everyone seems obsessed with the news that there will be no update for XP, but no one is offering a date when the fix will be available for the other versions of Windows.

Thank you for the links Alan. I had no idea that Palemoon was available for Linux. If it's available as a .tar package, then I shouldn't have any problems with the installation.

I have Firefox installed on Linux Mint and got the updates from the repository this afternoon. I installed them without realizing there was such a radical change, and what a sinking feeling I had when I first looked at it. At least it does not cover over the desktop's taskbar the way Chrome does, that is one of the features I really dislike about Chrome.

Hello Hav0c - Years and years ago, when I was young(er) and (a little more) foolish, I started out with AOL. My inbox was inundated with everything under there sun. It was a major task keeping up with it, and I would say 95% or more of it was nothing but pure junk. Advertising, spam, phishing, people selling God, you name it. Several years later I got EarthLink, and noticed a huge drop in the amount of junk mail. About five years ago I got Verizon FIOS, and I have to admit, they do an excellent job of filtering out the junk. The only people or companies I get email from are the ones I gave my email address to, and that's it. I'd like to help you in your campaign, but I have absolutely nothing to offer.

Hello Asuna_Yuuki and welcome to the forum. The ones to watch for are 05, C4, C5, and C6. It looks like you do have some values>0 present, but I'm terrible at hexadecimal conversions. In light of the fact that it's a Seagate drive, I think you should download and run Seatools, the manufacturer's analysis software. I always try to use the manufacturer's software rather than third party software, provided it's available. The link is here: http://www.seagate.com/support/downloads/item/seatools-win-master/

Hello mwelch and welcome to the forum. Personally I don't use either Chrome or LastPass, but I did a Google search and came up with a link to the LastPass website describing where your LastPass data is stored. The link is here: http://lastpass.com/support.php?cmd=showfaq&id=425 Assuming that you are using Chrome in Windows Vista/7/8, then your LastPass data is located in this file: %LocalAppData%\Google\Chrome\User Data\Default\databases\chrome-extension_hdokiejnpimakedhajhdlcegeplioahd_0\ (Note that WinXP is different) Here is a link explaining how to exclude items from CCleaner's analysis scan and cleaning list: http://www.piriform.com/docs/ccleaner/using-ccleaner/excluding-files,-folders,-and-registry-entries First, you should open File Explorer, select "View", then check "Hidden Items". Next, start CCleaner, then select Options>Exclude>Add. Then select "Drive or Folder" and hit the browse button. At this point I'm guessing a bit due to the fact I don't have Chrome installed, but you should either start down the path C:\Users\Username\AppData (AppData is a hidden folder), or the path C:\Users\Default\AppData (Default is also a hidden folder). Just keep searching until you find the path containing \Google\Chrome\User Data\Default\databases, then click OK to save that file to the exclude list. Close CCleaner, then test your settings by saving one or two items in LastPass and running CCleaner again. Post back if what I've described doesn't work and we'll see what else can be done. Regards - Derek.

Firefox anyone? Or Chrome perhaps? I think Mozilla and Google should prepare for a big uptick in their server traffic tomorrow.

Hello nemesys4565 - Not very long ago I bought a refurbished Lenovo T400 laptop that had Windows Vista Business 32 bit installed. Vista lasted only a few hours, just long enough for me to visit Lenovo's support website, and then download and flash the most current BIOS version and install some Intel firmware. Then I installed Linux Mint on that machine. One thing I noticed during that brief time was the almost constant disk activity with Vista Business installed. After I installed Linux Mint, I immediately noticed that there was zero disk activity after the first system boot. I later found out that by default, during periods of inactivity, Vista will automatically start defragmenting the hard disk. There is probably a way to disable this feature, I can't describe how to do it because I found this out after the fact. Doing a Google search "constant disk activity Windows Vista" will probably lead you to the answer. It sounds like Defraggler and Vista are having a turf war over which one gets to defragment your hard drive. BTW, how do you like the CF-74 Toughbook? My brother has the same machine, it arrived with Windows XP 32 bit installed. We performed three modifications right after he got it. The memory was upgraded from 512MB to 4GB, the 60GB hard drive was replaced with a 240GB Crucial M500 SSD, and I installed Linux Mint 64 bit with the Cinnamon desktop. It's his favorite computer now, he uses it more often than his iMac. Even if you stick with some version of Windows, you should think about installing a 64 bit OS on that machine. Using a 32 bit OS on a 64 bit system is not using it to it's full potential.

Hazelnut is right. Without knowing all the details, you're guessing as to what is the cause. What percentage of that 1TB drive was allocated to system restore points? 5%? 10%? 20%? Were the old restore points ever deleted? Was a Windows Update cleanup ever performed? Was there a Windows.old file still in existence on the drive after a system upgrade? And just how bad was the initial disk fragmentation? You'd be surprised at just how much disk space is wasted if you allow disk fragmentation to go unchecked for an extended period of time. I was in a situation similar to matty_hunt recently. I worked on a Toshiba laptop that had been neglected for over two years. To make a long story short, I started with 58GB of disk space being used and removed about 6GB of junk files from the drive. Then multiple passes using Defraggler (5 or 6 I think) pared the remaining 52GB down to just 32GB. This tells me about 40% of that 52GB was just empty space intermingled with 32Gb of actual data. Now apply that same percentage to a badly fragmented drive having 500GB of space being used out of 1TB total. The results would be about 200GB of empty space reclaimed by defragmenting.

Hello Psyga315 - I'm sorry to hear about your problems with your CPU. If you want to put your mind at ease concerning your system files and hard drive, here's two things you can do. 1.) The next time you boot Vista, press F8 at startup and boot into Safe Mode. Open the Command Prompt, and enter "chkdsk C: /f /r" (without the quotes). This will tell you if there are any system files located on bad sectors on the drive, attempt to move them to different sectors, and attempt to repair them if they have been corrupted. Just be sure to do this when you don't need your machine, since it can take quite a long time to run. 2.) If the above process reports any bad sectors on the drive, open Defraggler and click the Health tab. Then go to this page to see if any of the S.M.A.R.T. attributes reported are serious issues: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/S.M.A.R.T. (Note - the attributes table is pretty far down the page). I feel #5, #196, #197, and #198 are the really serious ones that indicate your drive is in the process of failing, and you should take steps to back up any important files while you still can. Two things you need to avoid when it comes to hard drives: don't allow them to suffer a power outage or power spike, and don't drop them, even a 2-3 inch drop can damage them internally. One more thing, have you tried running a boot time defrag using Defraggler? Open the program and go to Settings>Boot Time Defrag>Run Once. This will defragment some of the system files that cannot be accessed while Windows is running.

Ache, can I ask you one question? If you have never been arrested for anything in your entire life, how would you feel about the FBI having your picture and/or personal info on file? (Please read paragraph #3 in hazelnut's link) Years ago I was subject to a federal background check so that I could get an I.D. tag to drive onto the grounds of Brookhaven National Laboratory in order to deliver construction materials when they were building one of their colliders. Later on I delivered materials to the Shoreham nuclear reactor site while it was being built, and also worked there when it was decommissioned years later. So I'm sure my picture is on file somewhere in Washington D.C., and I certainly don't want it included in any FBI image database, because of the fact I'm not a criminal, and never have been. In the aftermath of the Flight 800 crash, I've personally seen how the FBI operates. And I don't like what I saw. I believe they have an already established agenda prior to the start of an investigation, have already reached their conclusions as far as the results of the investigation, and do not allow anyone, eyewitnesses included, to make any statements that contradict their findings. And if someone decides to speak up anyway with a public statement, they are unmercifully intimidated and harassed by FBI agents. Believe me, I've seen this first hand. And if you don't believe me, then just read about their treatment of Dr. Steven Hatfill as a suspect in the anthrax attacks that took place during and after 9/11.

It would be interesting to find out just how many of those 52 million people belong to Facebook.

Hello eloise - There is one more thing you might try to get sfc /scannow to work. See if there's a folder C:\i386 at the root of C:\ drive. If this folder does exist, it is usually a hidden folder so be sure to check the box "Show Hidden Files" first! If this folder does exist, restart your computer in safe mode, then run sfc /scannow as administrator (right click). When you are prompted for the installation CD, enter "C:\i386" as the path and cross your fingers. This may be hit or miss, since several of the sources where I found this tip claim that some but not all system files are copied here during installation.