http://www.bootdisk.com/ 248 January 2006

The BootLIST

Welcome to the 248th Edition of The BootLIST

INDEX
1) XP2 PC - Cant Use My Original CD To ReInstall
2) Waaaaaay To Many Auto Loading Programs
3) Task Manager Disabled by Administrator
4) My Restore Points Have Gone Missing
5) Wireless Networking Sites For Newbies
6) Printable List Of Keyboard Shortcuts


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1) XP2 PC - Cant Use My Original CD To ReInstall

Nick asked - I purchased windows XP upgrade version years ago, and I've since upgraded to service pack 2. Now I've somehow corrupted explorer and would like to re-install XP, but my disk will no longer let me, it says that the version installed is a later version. What are my options?

Carey F. and Ed Jablonowski wrote:
All you need to do is make a SP2 slipstreamed version of your current Windows XP, then use the new CD to perform a "Repair Install".

How to Perform a Windows XP Repair Install:
http://www.michaelstevenstech.com/XPrepairinstall.htm

Either one of the following utilities makes slipstreaming (integrating) SP2 into Windows XP a breeze:

Windows Slipstreaming and Bootable CD Guide:
http://www.msfn.org/articles.php?action=show&showarticle=49

or

AutoStreamer 1.0.33:
http://www.softpedia.com/get/Tweak/System-Tweak/Autostreamer.shtml
http://www.simplyguides.net/guides/using_autostreamer/using_autostreamer.html

Service Pack 2 Independent Download Links:
http://tinyurl.com/7xthn
http://www.microsoft.com/technet/prodtechnol/winxppro/maintain/winxpsp2.mspx

RJK added:

http://www.winsupersite.com/showcase/windowsxp_sp2_slipstream.asp


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2) Waaaaaay To Many Auto Loading Programs

blkdmd wrote - I have Windows XP. I have waaaaaay to many programs that automatically load when I turn on my computer. How can I turn off what automatically loads? I realized some things do need to load, however, I do not need programs to load that I rarely use. I did try run: msconfig but I do not think this is where I should be picking and choosing what opens when I power up.

Malke said:
The first thing to do is to go into each program that is starting with Windows and look for its Options/Preferences and change the startup option.

If a rare program does not give you the option of disabling startup with Windows, use the System Configuration Utility (msconfig) to control the startup.

How to Troubleshoot By Using the Msconfig Utility in Windows XP:
http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=310560

Here are some sites where you can look up items you find on the Startup tab by using msconfig:

http://castlecops.com/StartupList.html
http://www.pacs-portal.co.uk/startup_index.htm
http://www.theeldergeek.com/services_guide.htm
http://www.liutilities.com/products/wintaskspro/processlibrary/
http://www.windowsstartup.com/wso/search.php

And here are some other links to help optimize your computer:

Slow or Sluggish Computer:
http://www3.telus.net/dandemar/slowcom.htm
http://aumha.org/a/health.htm - Take Out the Trash (section 4)


Rock adds:
First step should be to check in the options for the program you don't want to start and see if there is a setting to tell it not to run at startup. The next step is to remove any entries you don't want from the two startup folders:

C:\Documents and Settings\\Start Menu\Programs\Startup
C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Start Menu\Programs\Startup

For anything else uncheck their entries in the startup tab of msconfig: Start | Run | Msconfig | Ok

Another option is to remove the reference to them from one of these keys in the registry:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\RunOnce
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\RunOnce

Make sure you have a backup of the registry using a program like ERUNT before making any changes to the registry.

http://www.larshederer.homepage.t-online.de/erunt/
http://www.larshederer.homepage.t-online.de/erunt/erunt.txt

Installing & Using ERUNT:

http://www.silentrunners.org/sr_eruntuse.html
http://www.winxptutor.com/regback.htm


Jim B. said:
There are several approaches you can use to make controlling the Startup process easier. In addition to using msconfig:

Go here and get Mike Lin's Startup Control Panel applet:
http://www.mlin.net/StartupCPL.shtml

A somewhat more difficult to use but more extensive program to do the same thing is StartupList from here:
http://www.lurkhere.com/~nicefiles/index.html

Or even better, Autoruns from here. This one shows many additional useful/critical Registry entries. Recommended:
http://www.sysinternals.com/ntw2k/freeware/autoruns.shtml

Changes made with StartUpCPL are less likely to cause problems, and are usually a matter of just re-enabling the particular program.

Another program of this type that I can recommend is StartMan, free. You'll have to get it here as the pcforest site is, sadly, no longer in business:
http://www.pt.lu/comnet/files/utils/startman10396.exe

Another such free program that I can highly recommend is StartupRun, here, particularly if you suspect malware problems - it has a lot of useful info including file creation dates:
http://www.nirsoft.net/utils/strun.html

And finally, StartupCop, is excellent and allows you to set up multiple "startup profiles":
http://www.pchelp911.com/files/startcop.zip

If you have problems with suspected hijackers, you can look up and investigate suspect programs in your StartUp lists here:

http://www.sysinfo.org/startupinfo.html
http://www.3feetunder.com/krick/startup/list.html
http://www.answersthatwork.com/Tasklist_pages/tasklist.htm


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3) Task Manager Disabled by Administrator

Mike560H inquires - I try to run the task manager via clrl alt del. But a message pops up saying it was disabled by the administrator and I am the admin! How do I undo this?

Carey F. answered:
Enable or Disable Task Manager for the Current User:
http://www.dougknox.com/xp/utils/xp_taskmgrenab.htm

Evolution54 posted:
Task Manager Disabled by Administrator:
http://windowsxp.mvps.org/Taskmanager_error.htm


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4) My Restore Points Have Gone Missing

AdamJ posted - I seem to be having quite a bit of trouble with my internet at the moment and the way I have been managing to fix it is by using system restore to take my pc back to better times when the internet DID work. But yesterday I had the same problem again and [when] I went to system restore BUT all my restore points had been deleted.


*** At first glance I'd say your C: drive is full. That would account for no space for Internet cache files, thus the Internet problem, and, the lack of restore points. XP will auto delete system restore points to free up space on C:.

ssengupta answered:
System Restore "restore points" are missing or deleted:
http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=301224

How to troubleshoot the System Restore tool in Windows XP:
http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=302796


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5) Wireless Networking Sites For Newbies

Andy M. asked - Any good sites for newbies to wireless networking? I want to have 2 PC's & 1 laptop connect wirelessly & would like to know what hardware I need.

Duane A. answered:
You need a wire/wireless NAT router and wireless cards. You should have one machine that can connect to the router by wire as wireless can be flakey. And besides, you have to configure the router on the wireless to even have wireless and you got to do it via a wire machine first.

http://netsecurity.about.com/cs/wireless/a/aa112203_2.htm

patrick adds:
This is about the best one I've found. Very clear and comprehensive:

http://www.ezlan.net/index.html


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6) Printable List Of Keyboard Shortcuts

As a follow-up to an article in Issue 247, Complete List Of XP Keyboard Shortcuts:

http://www.bootdisk.com/bootlist/247.htm#2

Gary C. emailed me and said he had created an Excel sheet listing the commands in a logical order. Here is his letter:

"I have been getting your updates for many years, and I have benefited often from what I have found in them. Recently there was one on MS keyboard shortcuts. I went to MS's website and copied all the window's shortcuts to a word file. I then realized that it was not really usable from the point of view of an end user. From my perspective I want to find the action and then determine the shortcut. I have attached an excel file which orders the shortcuts alphabetically by action. The first tab ("all") contains all the shortcuts ready to print. Then there are tabs for each group separately ("general", "windows explorer," "internet explorer," etc). Maybe this would be helpful to some other people."


*** It's auto set to print in landscape mode and while your printer ware may tell you ten pages, the first five have all the data. I printed it out using Excel 97. Nice job Gary, many thanks. Here is the file:

http://www.bootdisk.com/temp/keybdshortcuts.xls


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