eBabble » Windows

Windows Product Activation

Scott VanderPloeg — Wed, 02 Nov 2011 13:08:19 +0000

Blast from the past: originally published February 4th 2002.

So much has been made of Windows XP product activation, with every major PC magazine carrying a feature article and countless online rants, that I felt it was covered to death. The information had been presented to me at the product launch held by Microsoft that covered all there was to be said, but I had encountered a number of variables.

Here and there I had read that product activation was required, but you could upgrade pieces of hardware without reactivating. I was told seven hardware items could be upgraded, or four if one was a network card. Then later at a TechNet session I heard the number increased to nine, then down to five in a Microsoft press release. Here’s the straight goods from Microsoft:

WPA works by associating a machine’s PID (which is derived from the product key) to the hardware configuration. It does this by creating an installation ID. The installation ID comprises the PID and a “hardware hash,” which is derived from a number of elements that characterize the machine. It also includes a random component that is generated each time it is requested.

In order to activate the machine, the installation ID is sent to a Microsoft license clearinghouse, which validates it. The clearinghouse returns a corresponding confirmation ID that is then used to activate the machine. After Windows XP has been activated, reactivation should only be necessary if the operating system is completely reinstalled, or if machine’s hardware is substantially changed.

Users must activate Windows XP with their unique product keys within the defined grace period. For the released product, this is 30 days from the time the system is installed—MSDN versions have 60 days. After expiration, Windows will disallow interactive logons until the system is activated.

And another page:

If you overhaul your computer by replacing a substantial number of hardware components, it may appear to be a different PC. You may have to reactivate Windows XP. If this should occur, you can call the telephone number displayed on the activation screen to reactivate the software.

No mention of how many devices can be changed, but “substantial number” sounds like more than a handful, doesn’t it? Let’s take one last look at Microsoft on their “technical details”:

What components of the PC are used to create the hardware hash?
For security reasons, Microsoft does not disclose the exact components or number of components used to create the hardware hash.

How many components of the PC must change before I am required to reactivate? Are the changes cumulative?
Common changes to hardware such as upgrading a video card, adding a second hard disk drive, adding RAM or upgrading a CD-ROM device will not require the system to be reactivated. The changes are cumulative; however, if a user is asked to reactivate, the hardware profile is reset to that new configuration.

Well, that’s all the information one could want about product activation. But where is this going? I recently upgraded my main system’s motherboard from a Gigabyte GA7VTXE to a Gigabyte GA7VTXE+; I did it because the opportunity arose to sell the old and get the new for the same price. The only difference between the boards is the South Bridge chipset which allows ATA133, and a few cosmetic changes.

I swapped out the old board and installed the new. Since the IRQ layout was the same for both boards, I installed the cards in the same slots. Upon reboot everything was the same; no new hardware was found since it was all the same except for a small piece of the motherboard.

Just as Windows XP Professional came up fully, I was confronted with a message indicating my copy of Windows needed to be reactivated. There were two options: reactivate or cancel; choosing cancel brought me to the shutdown dialog box. I rebooted but got the same options, so I chose reactivate. I could do this over the internet or telephone; I tried the internet but it told me I had to call. I chose my home country and dialed the toll free.

Once connected I was led through a maze of telephone options culminating in my entering the 26 number product ID; I did this via the touch pad on the phone and was then sent to a live operator. He was friendly and courteous as he asked me for the product ID; I asked him why he didn’t have it from me entering it on the phone, but didn’t get an answer. I explained my motherboard upgrade situation and asked a few questions; he couldn’t provide any answers but was always polite. I read off the product ID and he read me an activation number that I entered. Two more clicks and I was working again.

The moral of the story; make sure you have a legitimate copy of Windows XP if you like to upgrade your hardware. And even if you have to call for reactivation, it’s not so bad after all.

Windows Update & Device Drivers

Scott VanderPloeg — Wed, 26 Oct 2011 13:08:41 +0000

Blast from the past: originally published December 31st 2001.

I’m a big fan of Windows Update; one easy place to find all the updates needed for your system. I’ve found it works with Windows 95 up and long as your version of Internet Explorer is 4.0 or greater. With versions 5 and 6, you go to Tools, Windows Update. With version 4, go to Tools, Product Updates. Either way you’re brought to the Windows Update page, with lots of information available.

Products updates is my frequent destination for the latest operating system patches. It’s neatly organized into categories: critical updates, recommended updates, additional Windows features, and finally device drivers. It’s the last category that’s interested me the most; your hardware driver versions are compared to the WHQL ( Windows hardware quality labs ) hardware compatibility list. If a newer version is available Windows Update offers to install it for you. Sounds good, doesn’t it? No need to hunt down drivers from every manufacturer, just click and install.

Somehow this always sounded too easy to me. Plus the fact most manufacturers are slow to release their WHQL drivers, instead putting the latest and greatest features into their regular updates. I do have some systems at work that use boring business hardware, and have seen Windows Update offer to get the latest drivers. The offer has come up for the ATI Rage Pro, ATI Rage XL and Via Technologies Sound.

In a flash of stupidity I agreed to download the ATI Rage Pro drivers. Everything went smooth until I was prompted for a *.hlp or *.hl_ file. It listed the directory Windows Update had placed the install files, but no such beast. I did notice a large group of *.hlx files, which seemed to fit the bill. I renamed them to *.hlp and the install finished just fine. Weird and not too user friendly for the kind of folks that would take advantage of this easy to use feature.

Curiosity had me in it’s grip as I moved on to a machine with an ATI Rage XL video card. Windows Update showed the driver update, so I went ahead. Same thing as the ATI Rage Pro drivers, *.hlx files instead of *.hlp files. Renaming got the job done.

My last test didn’t work out quite as well. The machines all used Gigabyte GA7ZM motherboards with AC97 sound, so I tried the Windows Update. Installation went smooth, but upon reboot I had, you guessed it, no sound. Device Manager showed some warnings, so I uninstalled the drivers and grabbed the latest from the Gigabyte website. Installed those and sound was back.

All in all a mixed and unpleasant experience. My advice is to avoid the Windows Update device drivers and instead bookmark the pages on your hardware manufacturers websites. Check them monthly and get the latest and greatest from the source.

DriverEasy

Scott VanderPloeg — Mon, 28 Jun 2010 18:51:28 +0000

While on my recent trip I picked up the June 2010 issue of PC Plus; in it they glowingly recommended a product called DriverEasy. I was on vacation and although PC Plus is the most expensive British tech mag import I was in Paris and splurged, but that’s an aside; back to DriverEasy. It is a tool that scans, downloads and installs device drivers for your Windows system, all for free. You can upgrade to the paid version that provides device driver backups and faster downloads. I took the free version for a spin.

It’s all very straightforward: click to scan, click to download, click to install. If you’re very trusting you can select “install all” but I went for the at a time installation. The process is mostly automated and for the most part gets the drivers correct. For my ATI graphics card it all went without a hitch, the final install step launching the ATI executable.

I have a Microsoft IntelliMouse Explorer on my PC but DriverEasy insists I install a Logicool and a Logitech driver, which I decline. I’ve had two Broadcom NetXtreme Gigabit Ethernet driver updates: the first was from Dell that extracted to my hard drive where I stopped the installation, the second just the actual driver that DriverEasy opened a folder to. I was surprised to see a Dell installation start on my non Dell PC but if that was where DriverEasy could get newer drivers I was fine with that. For the second generic driver update I had to go to Device Manager and update the NIC driver myself, but couldn’t locate the folder DriverEasy used since it was nested nine folders deep. I copied the final driver folder to my desktop and installed from there.

Download speed on the free version was quite fast and I didn’t feel the need to back up my drivers so I could easily pass on the paid version.

I would have to sum up DriverEasy as a hit and a miss: perhaps Driversometimeseasy would be most appropriate. For the tech savvy it’s nice having the latest drivers for my hardware located all in one place, but suggesting the wrong drivers and making users route around in Device Manger isn’t for most.

Check for drivers before installing a new OS

Scott VanderPloeg — Wed, 10 Mar 2010 19:57:21 +0000

Just finished the February 2010 issue of PC World. They had an article called “The State Of Windows 7 Satisfaction” about early adopters of Windows 7 and their general feedback about installation and features. Information was gathered from 615 people at www.technologizer.com.

Something really jumped out at me: 64% rated themselves as Windows experts and 41.3% had to resolve driver issues. To me any Windows expert would search out, verify and download all drivers for a new operating system before installing it. That was certainly the case when I installed the Windows 7 release candidate; how else would I know if my hardware was supported?

For any operating system installation, whether new or a re-install, you’re best to download all the drivers you’ll need and have them handy on a USB memory stick. Don’t know what drivers you’ll need? If you purchased the PC from a manufacturer check their website for downloads, usually under support, and you’ll find what you need. If you built the PC or had it built for you check each components manufacturer website: motherboard, video card, sound card, etc. Don’t forget about the external equipment such as scanners, printers and such. As well you can download and run the Microsoft Windows 7 Upgrade Advisor.

Microsoft Security Essentials

Scott VanderPloeg — Fri, 26 Jun 2009 18:55:06 +0000

I’m a big fan of free and luckily there is no shortage of free real time anti-virus and anti-spyware utilities available to Windows users. The big news of the week was Microsoft’s beta release of Microsoft Security Essentials. As part of the Connect beta program 75000 slots were made available for beta testers which filled very quickly: I was lucky enough to get in.

Microsoft Security Essentials is a free Windows security package that’s a derivative of it’s enterprise Forefront Security package, pared down as a free simplified offering. That’s not to say it isn’t effective: after instalation it picked up two Trojans that AVG Anti-Virus 8.5 Free Edition, my previous free security choice, had missed. You can see it in action below:

I uninstalled AVG and installed the 7.5 MB download; it was quick and painless. During installation it removed Windows Defender providing anti-virus and anti-spyware with real time monitoring.

It’s unobtrusive and takes just 12 MB of memory on my Windows XP Professional SP3 PC. The final product will be free and should be available next quarter. Since it’s from Microsoft it will be available in 32 and 64 bit versions for XP, Vista and Windows 7. Free is good: free and effective is better.

Update: Even though I’m part of the beta program Microsoft took away the files for download and I was only able to download the XP version and didn’t get to try the Vista and Windows 7 versions. Luckily Softpedia has every version available, for now.

Microsoft Windows Small Business Server 2008

Scott VanderPloeg — Tue, 03 Mar 2009 20:00:28 +0000

I’ve written a review for every version of Small Business Server but have never published any of them: the scope seems to broad to adequately cover. I’ve sat on this one for a few months but decided to get it out there.

Some months ago Microsoft made available a release candidate of Windows Small Business Server 2008 for public preview: I downloaded and installed it to give it a whirl. I ran it for a month to see what was new and to form an opinion, outlined below.

I’ve been a big fan and user of the Small Business Server (SBS from now on) line since it’s inception with version 4.5. The concept is simple: create a product for the small business market that combines key Microsoft server software in a relatively easy to use package. This means bundling Windows Server with Exchange, SQL and later ISA, SharePoint and WSUS on a single machine and putting a ton of wizards and a front end on the whole package to make is as easy as possible. At first there was a 50 user limit but they bumped that to 75 users which is a stretch for one machine to handle.

Small Business Server has been an evolutionary product with each version, learning from past editions and steadily making it easier to use while integrating new features and products. As before SBS will be available in two editions: standard and premium. With SBS 2008 standard you get Windows Server, Exchange, SharePoint, WSUS, Forefront Security for Exchange, Office Live Small Business, Live OneCare for Server (one year license) and fax services. The SBS 2008 Premium edition adds SQL and a second Windows Server: for the first time SBS will run on two separate servers. This is a laundry list of Microsoft server products because SBS 2008 is designed for small businesses to have a complete server product covering all bases.

At it’s simplest SBS 2008 is designed to get a small business up and running on a Microsoft platform with all the software it needs for day to day computing operations. If you have a reasonable understanding of Windows and want to get your hands a little dirty then this package can be managed: if not you can get a Microsoft business partner to remotely manage it for you. Small Business Server contains a wealth of remote management tools including remote access, email mail notifications and reporting that lets someone else look after things. To be fair it’s straightforward to manage and can be handled by a green or junior IT person.

Lets go through each briefly to explain what they do. Windows Server is the framework that everything else works from: it allows all your computers to work together in a domain sharing resources such as files and printers and allows permissions to be set for users so you can limit what each user has access to. Exchange is an email server, group calendar and the back end for Microsoft Outlook. SharePoint is an internal web site and shares documents and information. WSUS handles Windows updates on your network: download it once instead of on every PC. Forefront Security for Exchange handles spam and virus filtering for your email. Office Live Small Business is an online extension of SBS and creates an online presence via a web site, marketing and online tools. Live OneCare for Server is Microsoft’s anti-virus package: it’s been phased out so it will be short lived in this product. SQL is Microsoft’s corporate database. Excellent breakouts for there are available at the SBS site.

Installation is very straightforward but there are some new and higher system requirements: an x64 processor and a minimum of 4 GB of RAM. SBS 2008 is a 64 bit product and Microsoft has wisely updated the minimum specs to let the product work smoothly: if you don’t have 4 GB of RAM in your system the installation will stop. I tested on a Sempron 3500 system with 4 GB of RAM: I found the performance sluggish but it was a release candidate and the processor is on the low end.

SBS has implemented a new user interface, the same one used for Windows Home Server. It’s very slick and easy to use, accomplishing it’s goal of giving you (almost) everything you need on one screen.

As you can see the features are broken down along the top of the panel, each section clearly defined and covering a key aspect of the system. Home, Users and Groups, Network, Shared Folders and Web Sites, Backups and Server Storage, Reports, Security.

Working here you won’t need to leave this tabbed resource: everything can be done. And it’s this simplicity that leads to Small Business Server’s Achilles heel: you get so used to everything being easy and wizard driven that when you run across something off the beaten path you may be in trouble. The software included is full on corporate and each package has it’s own tools that may need to be used to do or fix what a wizard couldn’t.

That’s where Microsoft comes to the rescue again, albeit from the side. The Official SBS blog is the best written and most comprehensive technical blog from Microsoft I’ve seen on a single product. It’s an amazing resource and should be a regular stop for all SBS 2008 users. As well Microsoft Press released a few books that cover the bases as well and are worth a look. And we can come back to using a Microsoft Partner for help in dire circumstances or everyday management.

Windows Small Business Server 2008 is an excellent product that accomplishes it’s task: to provide a wizard driven simplified Windows server environment.

Select “No To All” in Windows

Scott VanderPloeg — Mon, 14 Apr 2008 14:02:59 +0000

You’re copying data over and don’t want to delete any existing: of course the dialog box doesn’t have a “no to all” button, so you click no about a thousand times. Or follow this trick: hold down SHIFT and click no: now no existing files will be overwritten.

Living with Vista x64

Scott VanderPloeg — Wed, 02 Apr 2008 17:44:53 +0000

I’ve just finished six months of dual booting my PC with Windows XP Professional and Windows Vista Ultimate x64 (the 64 bit version of Windows). Please peruse my initial installation here if you haven’t already before continuing.

Let me start by confirming I am still dual booting, but mainly because Vista x64 isn’t supported by the Connector software from Windows Home Server. If I want my PC backed up I have to go into a 32 bit operating system to get it done. A 64 bit version of this was to be available this month but the Windows Home Server team is furiously working on the data corruption bug, which (knock wood) hasn’t affected me. Every few days I boot into XP and let it back up.

The second reason I boot back into Windows XP is because of Nvidia’s Vista x64 drivers. I have a Geforce 8800GTX graphics card, which was top of the line until a few weeks ago. After a few hours of game playing (mostly Company Of Heroes) the graphics driver crashes, the game screen goes black and Vista tells me the graphics driver has crashed but Vista has recovered. Everything else works fine but I have to close the game. If I want to play anything after that I have to reboot, and at that point I’m frustrated with Vista so I boot into XP and play games for days without a hiccup.

The last drivers for Vista from Nvidia for the 8800 series were released December 20th 2007. I realize the 9000 series of cards are now out but I’d still like to see a quarterly driver update!

Service pack 1 installed and on restart gave me a BSOD: I rebooted and everything has been fine since. Can’t say I see any improvement, but nothing negative has popped up either.

Power saving and power features in Vista are far superior to XP: I have my PC go to standby after ten minutes and it works flawlessly every time, and I’ve never had an issue coming out of standby. I like leaving my machine on all the time but have been feeling guilty about the power usage so this is my compromise for the time being.

Everything else about Vista x64 just works. I don’t do a lot on the machine other than email, web browsing and game playing, but isn’t that what home computers are for?

Get real control of shares in XP

Scott VanderPloeg — Tue, 15 Jan 2008 13:40:09 +0000

I’m from an admin background and love the granular control of shares and security that come with Windows Server products and Windows 2000 Professional. In Windows XP Microsoft wanted to simplify the process with Simple File Sharing. To turn this rubbish off:

Open My Computer
Pull down the Tools menu, click Folder Options, and then click the View tab
Navigate to the Advanced Settings section, and uncheck Use Simple File Sharing
Click OK

64 Bit Vista

Scott VanderPloeg — Wed, 31 Oct 2007 19:39:27 +0000

With even a passing interest in computing you would be hard pressed to have not only heard and shown interest in Microsoft Vista but also the deluge of bad press it’s received. Slower than Windows XP! User Account Control a failure! Version confusion! And so it continues. Whatever your feeling, Microsoft has the leading market share for an operating system and has moved to the Vista platform, with XP to go the way of the dinosaur over the next few months.

Of course XP will live on through your old PCs and their hardware that doesn’t really support Vista, just as that old doorstop in the attic has Windows 98 SE. My day job is as an IT manager for a large company that still has thousands of PCs running Windows 2000 very efficiently, but that’s an aside we won’t pursue.

Microsoft invited me to the Vista launch and gave me a copy of Vista to use. It languished on my shelf for months until I did a large upgrade on my main system and boosted my RAM to 4 GB, since DD2 is so cheap right now. Booting into XP after the upgrade showed a little under 3 GB of RAM, which meant the overhead of a 32 bit operating system, my 768 MB video card and other tidbits conspired to work against me.

To access all that lovely PC-6400 DDR2 memory would require a 64 bit operating system. Basically (very) with a 64 bit environment your system can access more than 4 GB of RAM and work faster with current 64 bit CPUs, which really means any current CPU. Requirements are a 64 bit CPU and 64 bit drivers for your hardware. Of course verify all your applications will work as well. For a bit more information check out what Microsoft has to say. Until now no one would worry about more than 2 GB or RAM in their system outside of a server environment, but with cheap as chips pricing on RAM and decent CPUs it’s very doable.

Since this was a major upgrade and having heard so much bad press I decided to get proper Vista 64 bit drivers for all my hardware before doing anything. Drivers for 64 bit Vista must be digitally signed, and since that’s costs companies money it’s one of the hindrances of their release. As well the vast majority of people are using 32 bit Vista so that’s where the priority goes.

I would need drivers for the following: Nvidia 680i motherboard, Nvidia 8800GTX video card, Creative X-FI Xtreme Gamer sound card, Creative Web Cam. I never bothered to install the software for my keyboard and mouse so I didn’t care, and figured my Dell 24” LCD monitor would be fine. Trolling the web snagged drivers for everything but the web cam, which was a $1 after rebate deal that I replaced with a Logitech $0 after rebate deal that supported Vista 64 bit: nice job Logitech. I had SLI going with two Nvidia 7900 GT video cards until my big summer upgrade, and to be fair to Microsoft non-existent SLI support from Nvidia was my main XP holdout.

With full driver support things were going swimmingly. To protect myself against complete Vista hatred I chose to create a new partition on my hard drive and set up my system for dual booting between Windows XP Professional and Windows Vista Ultimate 64 bit. Installation was silky smooth and there I was staring at the Vista desktop. Drivers installed without issue for all my hardware.

First blush Vista is very nice looking; visually appealing in that round and futuristic sort of way. Finding things proved slightly difficult because I’m used to XP; certainly not Vista’s fault. I felt the same way as I moved from any other Windows version. As I worked the system I installed my must have applications: AVG Anti-Virus, Daemon Tools, Microsoft Office, 7-Zip. All available in 64 bit versions or working in 64 bit Vista. Failures were SyncToy (now available in a 64 bit beta) and Medal Of Honor Airborne.

My home system does three things: surf the web, check emails and play games (not necessarily in that order). Microsoft has worked up the Games For Windows certification, and one of it’s requirements is 64 bit support. It’s easy to spot since the Games For Windows logo runs along the top of the game’s packaging. Pretty well any current game will be Games For Windows certified, but check first. Vista’s other big gaming plus is DirectX 10, but you’ll need an ATI/AMD 2000 series or Nvidia 8000 series video card to get it’s additional perks.

Let’s talk performance: there wasn’t a perceptible performance hit from moving to Vista. I read the articles and blog posts about the 2-10% hit on games that Vista takes over XP, but I can’t see it with my current system. Once I’m over thirty frames per second I want maximum eye candy, otherwise my 24” monitor is going to waste. Since I’m usually over sixty frames per second with my 8800 GTX and most details on high Vista is working just fine. I can’t do a side by side comparison between 32 and 64 bit versions of Vista, but I’m sure getting my full 4 GB of RAM helps out.

After everything was done I was a bit disappointed: with a 64 bit operating system I was expecting something unusual and dramatic. With proper drivers and applications it looked and operated just like it’s 32 bit siblings while providing the benefits that made me want the 64 bit version of Vista in the first place.

We might as well address the major nag everyone talks about: User Account Control. Basically Vista takes security seriously and prompts you to confirm a lot of system changes, which is slightly annoying but can be turned off. Done, next topic.

Microsoft dropped DirectSound hardware acceleration in Vista, hurting Creative and it’s EAX feature. I have had Sound Blaster sound cards since the beginning, and to their credit Creative released ALchemy to restore this functionality in Vista. It’s free for X-FI users and $10 for Audigy users. It’s meant to get pre-Vista games and shouldn’t be a big concern for Vista 64 bit users since most of those old titles won’t work anyway.

The big wrap up: Vista is good. It’s new and a bit scary, but it’s the future. Vista 64 bit is worth the jump if your hardware and applications are supported. RAM is cheap right now so bulk up if you’re moving to 64 bit. Dual booting XP and Vista 64 bit is a great way to embrace the new while keeping one foot in the old. For application and game incompatibilities it’s great to jump back to XP, but these issues will fade away soon enough. If it’s strictly an application issue install a virtualization product from Microsoft or VMWare: they both offer free products and are worth a look.

Side note: dual booting brings up the boot menu, which features Windows Vista and “earlier version of Windows”. Why couldn’t Microsoft just name it Windows XP, 2000 or 98 SE: they clearly know what “older version” you’re dual booting with.