Fixing your Windows Vista MBR
I recently installed Vista as a dual boot with my old XP installation, while I transferred things over and made sure I could do all I need to do with my new Vista install. It came to the point when I...
View ArticleInstalling Visual Studio 2003 on Vista Enterprise
It’s not as easy as you might imagine if you’re going to be developing on a local machine. The pre-requisites include IIS and FrontPage Server Extensions which will need installing. Install IIS on...
View ArticleWindows Server 2003 Admin tools under Vista
If, like me, you want to administrate your Windows 2003 servers from your Vista workstation, you may find that you recieve an “MMC could not create snap in” error when you open one of the admin tools,...
View ArticleMoving and resizing a VMWare System Disk
I’ve recently had to upgrade my VM Server due to an increase in load. I had 2 virtual servers running off of the same hard disk, with 768mb of RAM split between the lot. After jamming 2 new 1GB sticks...
View ArticleInstalling Visual Studio 2003 SP1 on Vista
I’ve finally cracked the installation problems with VS 2003 SP1 on Vista. The problem seems to be that the SP must be installed under the same credentials that Visual Studio was installed. I.e. I...
View ArticleiTunes crashes on startup under Vista
I had an odd problem today, I logged on to begin my day’s work and plugged in my iPod as per normal. iTunes crashes, Vista tries to recover. iTunes closes. iTunes opens. iTunes crashes. Vista tries to...
View ArticleI’m qualified!
It’s been a while since I’ve posted here, that’s for various reasons, one of which was that I have been preparing for, and taking, my MCSA exams. So here it is… MCTS Windows Vista, Configuring (70-620)...
View ArticleInstalling on Vista: Error 1327 invalid drive when using mapped drives
Incredibly irritating error when you go to install under your user account when you’re using mapped drives for your documents. All our domain users have a userfolder on the server, it’s mapped as z:\...
View ArticleUsing NTDSUtil to transfer FSMO Roles by command line
I’ve just removed a domain controller (DC) from my root domain, the very first server not only in the domain, but the forest. The roles were migrating to a newer server, far more up to the job, but it...
View ArticleInstalling Windows XP without a CD drive
When the Dell engineer said “they’ve asked if you can reinstall the OS” my heart sank. Not because I felt like he was weasling out of work - unusually they were very helpful. Not because installing XP...
View ArticleAdding a Windows 2003 domain controller to your existing Windows 2000 domain
I was adding a shiny new domain controller to my server farm earlier today, we have just two Windows 2000 SP4 domain controllers on old kit and they are due to retire. With the hardware selected,...
View ArticleWindows Vista shows black screen and the cursor before log in.
Had an interesting one yesterday, my bosses Vista laptop booted as per normal, making all the right pictures until just before the log in prompt popped up, then a black screen in what looked to be VGA...
View ArticleUpdate your Windows Search or Windows Desktop Search
I noticed a post over at David Overton's blog today that highlights a new release of Windows Search. Normally not that exciting, but it is if you're using Outlook to open up another users mailbox. I...
View ArticleUtilising more than 4GB of RAM with Windows Server 2003 Standard Edition –...
We recently needed to upgrade one of our applications, and the new version requires an addition server instead of the application and SQL it requires a back end search, a front end web server and a...
View ArticleCreate a 100Mb file for testing transfer speeds
We have a Bonded ADSL solution for our servers to provide the necessary upstream transfer speeds for the applications we host. We have bonded ADSL because our exchange still doesn't support SDSL, and...
View ArticleVista .msu installer fails with error: Installer encountered an error:...
I needed to use PowerShell for something today on my Vista laptop, but was unable to install the file. I had the normal UAC permission required when I ran it, but then it failed with this error...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Vista DVD/CDRW drive message "Prepare this blank disk"
For a little while now I've had an irritating problem with my Vista laptop. Whenever I insert a DVD, CD of any kind, pops up the message asking me to prepare a blank disk: It's impossible to access...
View ArticleHow to configure Windows Server 2003 Enterprise and SQL 2005 to use more then...
32-bit processors have a limitation of only being able to directly address 4GB RAM - their architecture was never designed to address more. 64-bit processors get around that limitation by being able to...
View ArticleActivating Microsoft Reader on a Windows Mobile 5 device under Vista
I recently tried to use Microsoft reader on my iMate K-Jam mobile, it's Windows Mobile 5 powered, so according to Microsoft it's fully supported. However, when I tried to activate, I got the following...
View ArticleDell Latitude E6500 blue screen of death on XP install/downgrade/reinstall
I've just had a frustrating few days trying to downgrade 4 Dell Latitude E6500 laptops to XP. The problem was, whenever you booted to the XP cd you would get to the point just before you agree to the...
View Article
