Interesting Articles

Howto restore vista, grub boot loaders after installing windows xp.

2008-08-02T08:21:00.000-07:00

A common mistake, we all commit is to install Windows XP, after having Windows Vista and Linux installed, and end up having only XP boot up.
The reason why it happens so is because XP doesn't consider the presence of other boot loaders, while installing its own boot loaders. Same is the case with almost all Windows Distribution.

So, here comes the solution to get out of it.

Part - 1 ==> Using EasyBCD to restore Vista boot loader

1) Install & run the EasyBCD Software in Windows XP.
2) Take "Boot loader management"
3) Select the option - "Reinstall Vista Bootloader" and click on "Write MBR"

The above procedures will restore the Vista boot loader. Now, on next reboot, you'll be taken to Windows Vista OS instead of Windows XP.

Now, we need to add XP boot option to the Vista boot loader, which we'll cover in the next part of this article.

Part - 2 ==> Using EasyBCD to add XP booting option on Vista boot loader.

1) Install & run the EasyBCD Software in Windows Vista.
2) Click on "Add/Remove Entries".
Select type as "Windows XP"
Select the drive where you installed Windows XP on.
Click on "Add Entry"

3) Copy the files - NTLDR, NTDETECT.COM, and BOOT.INI from the Vista partition to the partition where XP is installed.

Note: You'll need to make sure that you enable the option - "Show hidden files" & disable the option - "Hide operating system files" inorder to see the files mentioned above.

That's it, reboot the machine and you'll see dual boot screen. displaying XP and Vista.. :)

Part 3 ==> Restoring the grub boot loader

Since linux respects the presence of other boot loaders, its pretty straightforward to get grub sorted out. Here are the steps to restore grub.

1) Boot into the konsole of rescue disk.
2) type in the command - grub

Now you'll get a grub prompt.
Type the below commands in grub prompt

root (hd0,0) #( If your boot partition is hda1 or sda1. Else change the number accordingly. )
setup (hd0)

That's it... All done... Reboot and you'll see the grub boot loader displaying Linux and Windows as its options.... !!

Howto crack Vista on PCs with Nvidia Chipset

2007-11-29T06:58:00.000-08:00

Dear friends,

This article is a continuation of the article - howto crack windows vista ultimate . Eventhough the method mentioned in the previous article works for almost all hardwares, it doesn't work well with Nvidia Chipsets. I learnt it the hard way, when I applied the crack on one of the Nvidia chipset machines.

To crack Vista on a PC with Nvidia Chipset, just download vista loader 2.2.0 OEM BIOS Crack Emulator
and follow the readme.

Again, if you have any problems, cracking it with the Vista Loader OEM BIOS emulation toolkit, just add a comment or send an email to netizen.indian@gmail.com. I'll surely reply back. :-)

Magic of Purevideo on Windows Media Video High Definition ( WMV-HD ) - 720p and 1080p

2007-11-29T03:47:00.000-08:00

Nvidia has given lots of promises regarding improved high definition playback on Nvidia Graphics cards ( 6600 , 7 series, 8 series ) using Purevideo technology. Searching the forums will show otherwise. Most of the people say, there is hardly any difference with playback.

So, what is the reality?
Does Nvidia Purevideo technology accelerate WMV HD ( high definition ) movies as they claim?

We'll find that out soon. :-)

I myself own an XFX Nvidia GeForce 8600GT PCIe card.
I'll mention my hardware configuration for comparing cpu utilization on your PCs.

AMD Athlon XP 3200 plus 64bit
ASUS A8N-VM Mother Board
2GB DDR400 Memory ( 1GB + 512MB + 512MB )
160 GB 7200rpm SATA2 HDD
XFX GeForce 8600GT ( 256MB dedicated + 256MB Turbocache )

Os, I used for testing purposes is Windows XP. I was using Vista earlier, but switched to XP for the kind of bugs Vista offers!! I'll write another blog on why I hate Vista. :-D

Now, I'll mention the softwares, I installed for testing purposes. All the softwares may not be necessary. But, since I'm not sure which of them are not necessary, I'll mention all the software, I installed. I'll mention these softwares in the order in which I installed them

1) Nvidia Purevideo Decoder.
2) Microsoft Hotfix 89122 --> WindowsMedia-KB891122-x86-ENU.exe
3) Microsoft Hotfix 888656 --> windowsmedia10-kb888656-x86-global-enu.exe
4) Windows Media Player11

After I installed all these softwares, I restarted Windows.
Opened Windows media player.
Opened Tools --> Options inside WMP11
Selected the Performance Tab, clicked on "Advanced" button
Made sure that the option - "Turn on DirectX Video Acceleration" is enabled.

Tip: For info on DirectX Video Acceleration ( DXVA ), please refer http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DXVA

Now, I downloaded the PureVideo 2007 Demo Video ( wmv hd 1080p ) from http://www.nzone.com/object/nzone_hdcontent_home.html

Played the demo 1080p WMV HD file, I downloaded using Windows media player 11
Processor usage was around 40 - 75% with rare or occasional slutter.

CPU Usage with DXVA ( Purevideo ) enabled.

From the processor graph above while playing 1080p content, you could see that cpu never maxed out. And frame rate was pretty good. :-)

Now, I disabled the DXVA option from windows media player performance tab, and performance went pretty bad. Processor usage was a constant 100%. And even with such high processor usage, I could hardly get any appreciable frame rate. Video was hanging like anything. So, indeed purevideo works. :-)

CPU Usage with DXVA ( Purevideo ) disabled.

If anyone of you have any problem getting this to work, feel free to contact me at netizen.indian@gmail.com

Howto crack Windows Vista Ultimate Edition Activation

2007-09-14T12:13:00.000-07:00

I have been trying to find a way to crack Windows Vista activation for months. I tried several ways of cracking it. But none was 100% reliable. Finally, it seems I found the perfect solution for activating Windows Vista. Here comes the full procedure.. :)

1) Download "OEM BIOS Emulation Toolkit For Windows Vista x86" from paradox. You should get the file by googling. In case you have any difficulty finding the file for download, please contact netizen.indian@gmail.com

2) Install Windows Vista from the DVD.

3) Uncompress the paradox emulation tool kit. Right click the executable file - OEMTOOL.EXE, and click on "Run as Administrator". Select ASUS and click on "Install Emulation Driver" button.

4) Reboot your machine.

5) Click on Start --> Run, Enter the command - msconfig, Select the Tools Tab, Select the option - "Disable UAC ( User Access Control )" and click on Launch. User access control will be disabled and you'll receive an administrator command prompt window.

6) On the Administrator command prompt window, type in the following command
SLMGR.VBS -ilc c:\PARADOX\CERTS\ASUS.XRM-MS
Note: Here, I assume that the location of the asus XRM-MS file packed along with the paradox crack is c:\PARADOX. Modify the path according to where you downloaded this file to.

7) Install the OEM Product key ( Refer PKEYS.txt file for the key corresponding to the version of Vista Installed and ASUS OEM ) using the following command.

SLMGR.VBS -ipk

Wait for a few seconds to receive the confirmation message.

8) Right Click on Computer, click on properties to verify the Vista Activation.

PS: I recommend the latest version of Avira Antivirus as the free antivirus solution for Windows Vista.

Hope, this article will help you crack Windows Vista. In case of any doubts, feel free to contact netizen.indian@gmail.com

Microsoft Defender error - "this program cannot search for definition updates"

2007-08-21T00:50:00.000-07:00

Have you ever come across the error - "this program cannot search for definition updates" on your Microsoft Windows Defender while trying to update the software?

If yes is the answer then either
your version of defender is not compatible with the update engine used by Microsoft or
the update client for the defender insalled on your PC is corrupted by a spyware, virus or trojan.

Now, here comes the solution...

Open the URL - Microsoft Malware Protection Center

Under the section - Latest Definition Updates --> Windows Defender
Antispyware click on the 32 bit or 64 bit matching the version of Windows installed on your PC.

Save the setup file and run it. Once the update is complete, open windows defender and try to run the update manually. You won't get the error anymore. :-)

Convert DVD to DivX - AC3

2007-08-05T09:09:00.001-07:00

Intro

In the new world of DivX, DVDs seems to be out of fashion. One of the main worries a serious movie watcher have when converting his DVD collection to DivX is "preserving 5.1 Surround Sound on DivX"

Software Requirements

1) DivX Codec
2) AC3 Filter
3) Dr. DivX

Howto convert vob to DivX preserving the 5.1 Surround Sound

Open Dr.DivX and click on Open.
Select the vob file that needs to be converted to DivX.
Click on the Advanced tab.
Click on Codec
Select Codec
Select performance as "Better Quality", mode as 2-pass and bit rate as 1300 kbps.
Click on the Audio tab, select the format as AC3.
Click on Encode.
Wait for it to finish. It'll take some time for the process to complete. If you are planning to convert a whole movie, it's better if you do it while you sleep. :)
Once the encoding process is completed, write the ac3 files as data cd or dvd and watch it on your DivX Player. :-)

Do, contact me via google talk - amalji
in case you run across any problems...

Cheers,
Amal. :)

"ORKUT IS BANNED,Orkut is banned you fool"

2007-08-01T23:56:00.000-07:00

Do you see one of these messages on your Windows machine?

"ORKUT IS BANNED,Orkut is banned you fool" - when you try to open www.orkut.com

"youtube IS BANNED,youtube is banned you fool" - when you try to open youtube.com

"USE INTERNET EXPLORER YOU DOPE,I DNT HATE MOZILLA BUT USE IE" - when you try to run the firefox browser

The message is often accompanied by a wicked laugh. :-)

If you see one of these messages, then you are most probably infected with the virus - Heap41a / win32.USBworm Worm

To remove the virus, you need to follow the below steps.

1) Restart the pc in safe mode for the windows version which is affected by the virus.

2) Click on Start --> Run

3) Type in taskmgr and click on OK

4) Select the processes tab.

5) Look for the process named svchost.exe ( You will find multiple number of svchost.exe processes )

6) If any one of those svchost.exe processes are owned by the same user as what you logged in as, end all those processes.

7) Click on Start --> Run, type cmd and click on OK.

8) Type in the command - rmdir c:\heap41a ( If Windows is installed on another partition like d:\, then you'll have to modify the command accordingly )

9) Click on Start --> Run, type regedit and click on OK.

10) Go to the Menu Edit --> Find

11) Type "heap41a" and click on Find. Delete all entries with name heap41a. You can continue with your find using the shortcut - F3

PS: You should find the heap41a entries at the location - HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE,SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\policies\Explorer\Run

12) Restart the PC in normal mode.

Eurekaa, the virus is gone. Now try accessing orkut, youtube, and the firefox browser. All will work fine. :)

Also, to prevent such viruses from infecting your PC, I'll recommend you to install a decent virus scanner on your PC. There are many free virus scanners available. I'll list some of them below.

Avira AntiVir PersonalEdition Classic

Comodo Antivirus

AVG Antivirus free Edition

Among the 3 listed above, I'll recommend Avira Antivir since, it has got the highest amount of virus information in its database. But be aware that the scan done by Avira is one of the slowest probably because of it's extensive virus database. But it won't slow your system down on normal working. :)

Hope, this article is of some kind of use to you. :)

My first Blog

2007-07-31T09:05:00.000-07:00

This blog will contain interesting articles which will be useful to most netizens. :-)