Mat’s Tips

More tips from Mat. I checked a few of these out and found them to be very interesting. The paint app is awesome – I never knew web apps were so advanced!

Here is his email;

first off, free audit pc software http://www.softpedia.com/get/System/System-Info/Free-PC-Audit.shtml very nice like cpuz but lists all installed software and also processes running, and its portable so just an exe no install needed.

second a handy tool to rest sids , We imaged a load of pc’s with out syspreping them , this resets the local sids so fixs the issue. http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/bb897418.aspx

thirdly, not really useful just rather stunning. So we have google apps (office suite online) this is an online paint app http://www.sumo.fi/products/sumopaint/index.php?id=0

another cool portable app. It shows you the processes and dll behind the svchost files and is jsut an exe as well http://svchostviewer.codeplex.com/Release/ProjectReleases.aspx?ReleaseId=22914

another good one. a tool that will tell you the password of a pst file, i have had a few times where people forget it and are screwed lol. Only issue is symantec deletes this tool as its a “hacktool” http://www.nirsoft.net/utils/mailpv.html

There you go.Sweet tools from a super dude.

Thanks Mat.

Mac to Windows Sharing problem

I KNOW I won’t get this problem again for a while…
New Mac, wants to get to a share on a Windows XP PC.
Can see it on the network, click on the PC and it sees the shares. Great.
Click on a share however and up pops “The Operation Can’t be completed because original item for share cannot be found”. Boooo.
The problem was that I found other Windows machines on the network and could connect to their shares just fine.
So I had a look at the XP’s event log and found multiple entries complaining that the IRPStackSize was too small.
Quick trip to Microsoft’s KB’s (aka Google it) and found a nice article on how to increase the size…here it is;

To resolve this behavior, increase the IRPStackSize value in the registry:

1. Click Start, and then click Run.
2. Type regedit, and then click OK.
3. Navigate to the following key:
   HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Services\LanmanServer\Parameters
4. In the right pane, double-click the IRPStackSize value.

   NOTE: If the IRPStackSize value does not already exist, use the following procedure to create it:

   1. In the Parameters folder of the registry, right-click the right pane.
   2. Point to New, and then click DWord Value.
   3. Type IRPStackSize.

      IMPORTANT: Type “IRPStackSize” exactly as it is displayed because the value name is case-sensitive.

5. Change the Base to decimal.
6. In the Value Data box, type a value that is larger than the value that is listed.

   If you created the IRPStackSize value using the procedure described in step 4, the default value is 15. It is recommended that you increase the value by 3. Therefore, if the previous value was 11, type 14, and then click OK.

7. Close the Registry Editor.
8. Restart the computer.

Now don’t bother with # 8 because you can just restart the server service and it will do the same thing as rebooting (for the purpose of increasing the IRP Stack size).

Sysprep

Probably not going to use this one again for a while….

Sysprep – Build a PC to the right specs, software, updates, etc and then want to make an image to install on multiple machines. This is the puppy to use.

I built a PC with Windows XP SP2 so I had to activate it to get it to SP3. I installed all the updates, Adobe, Java, blah, blah.

Installed Sysprep from Microsoft.com (search for Windows XP SP3 deployment tools).

Once you’re ready drop to a DOS prompt and run this;

sysprep -activated -reseal

-activated wipes the activation so you can add a new key.

-reseal wipes eventlogs and runs the mini setup for Windows so you can add admin passwords and/or user accounts

more Xcopy arguments

as well as the /E /C /Y options if you want to exclude some then make a file (call it anything you like) such as exclude.txt and inside simply add the extension of the files you want to exclude like this;
.mp3
.mov
.m4a
etc
Each on a new line. Then in the Xcopy argument you simply type /EXCLUDE exclude.txt and it will look to the text file you created for the exclusions.
Nice for a simply backup script where you don’t want to include the users terabytes of music and movies.

Erase Unused Disk Space

Had a client laptop that needed to be donated. They wanted to give it to the family babysitter so it needed to be working. In other words I needed to securely delete the old user data and keep everything else intact.

I used this utility – Eraser – which is open source and wonderful for the job. Nice.

Please contribute if you use it.

telnet email… quick reminder

telnet mail.server.net 25
helo me
mail from : me@server.net
rcpt to : me@server.net
data
blah blah blah this is the message
.
quit

Windows Server 2003 Stats

run a command prompt.

type in;

net statistics srv

Look at the Statistics since…

Set Program Access and Defaults

One application that I do use on occasion. I must admit I have in a zealous rage deleted all the nonessential apps that Microsoft fills your Programs Menu with when you get a new machine. Not to mention the manufacturers programs.

Anyway in a fit of uninstall (or mass deleting) rage I removed the “Set Program Access and Defaults” application. This wouldn’t normally be a problem, or so I thought, and browsed around for it. Unfortunately Microsoft decided NOT to have a permanent app for this in the control panel or Accessories or anywhere else in fact. There are no direct programs to run either. Nice.

So this is how to get to it. Either create a shortcut and type in this;

“%SystemRoot%\system32\control.exe appwiz.cpl,,3“    obviously without the quotes.

or you could simply type that into the run box. Either way it will get you back to that application again.

Linksys firmware updates

OK sometimes when y ou try to update the firmware on their routers it just doesn’t work. Could be that the router is screwed up in some way but never-the-less there is another way and here it is;

http://downloads.linksysbycisco.com/downloads/Tftp.exe

Download that application from their website and connect directly to the router. Updaload the firmware and away you go.

Simply input the server address, The admin password and point it in the direction of the firmware.

Scanpst.exe

This is a handy and useful tool that comes with Outlook. It’s a way to scan your Outlook files for errors/corruption. There’s a Scanost.exe for Exchange users and a Scanpst.exe for the rest of us.

Importantly the files are located here;

For Microsoft Outlook 2003 (and earlier) users:

c:\Program Files\Common Files\System\Mapi\1033\

c:\Program Files\Common Files\System\MSMAPI\1033

For Outlook 2007 it’s here:

c:\Program Files\Microsoft Office\Office12