Archive for the ‘Others’ category

How to Hide A Drive / Partition from Windows Explorer

December 24th, 2014 by Admin

Do you have some private files that you want to hide from your children? Here is a registry trick to hide a drive or partition in Windows 11/10/8/7/Vista/XP, so it cannot be accessed from Windows Explorer by inexperienced users.

The method is not foolproof though, and users can still access the contents of the hidden drive from Command Prompt or Disk Management. If you have some confidential or sensitive data on a local disk and want to lock / protect it securely, I recommend you use the Protect My Folder application.

How to Hide A Drive / Partition from Windows Explorer?

Open Registry Editor and navigate to the following key: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\Explorer. In the right pane, right-click the blank area and choose New -> DWORD (32-bit) Value.
Name the newly-created DWORD as NoDrives and then double-click it. In the pop-up window, choose Decimal, enter a proper number for hiding your desired partition. In my example, I want to hide the network drive Z:, so I type in the value 33554432.

Here’s a list of the values (decimal number) you’ll want to enter for different drive letters:
- A: 1
- B: 2
- C: 4
- D: 8
- E: 16
- F: 32
- G: 64
- H: 128
- I: 256
- J: 512
- K: 1024
- L: 2048
- M: 4096
- N: 8192
- O: 16384
- P: 32768
- Q: 65536
- R: 131072
- S: 262144
- T: 524288
- U: 1048576
- V: 2097152
- W: 4194304
- X: 8388608
- Y: 16777216
- Z: 33554432
- ALL: 67108863
But what to do if you want to hide more than one drive in Windows? Just add the values of the drives that you want to hide. For example, if you want to hide the drives E:, F: and A: you would enter 49 (16+32+1) in NoDrives as the decimal value.
Restart your computer and your target drive will disappear from Windows Explorer.

You can even hide the C: drive without corrupting your system. When you want to get your drives back, just set NoDrives to 0 or simply delete NoDrives altogether.

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Posted in Others, Tips & Tricks, Windows 10, Windows 7, Windows 8, Windows Vista, Windows XP

Tags: hide drive in windows explorer hide partition in windows

How to Change Default Web Browser in Windows 8 / 7

December 11th, 2014 by Admin

Is there a way to set Chrome as the default browser for all my applications? By default, Windows will launch the built-in Internet Explorer for you to access the Internet, when you click a link in an email or external application. In this tutorial we’ll show you how to change the default web browser in Windows 8.1, 8 and 7. Set Firefox, Chrome, Safari or whatever web browsers you like as the default.

How to Change Default Web Browser in Windows 8 / 7?

First you need to open the Control Panel. In Windows 8.1/8 you can press the Windows key + R to bring up the Power User menu and then select “Control Panel”, while navigate to Start -> Control Panel in Windows 7.

Under Control Panel, set the View by option to Small icons. Click on the Default Programs icon.

control-panel

Under Default Programs, click on the Set your default programs link.

set-default-programs

You’ll see all web browsers that you’ve installed in the left-hand pane. Just select the one you want to use as default browser, and then click on the Set this program as default link. Click OK and you’re done!

set-default-web-browser

Now you’ve successfully change the default web browser that Windows will use. If you click on a link included in a Word document, email or external programs, Windows will now open the link with your favorite web browser.

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Posted in Others, Tips & Tricks, Windows 10, Windows 7, Windows 8

Tags: change default browser in windows change default web browser set default web browser

Fix ‘VMware Workstation Does Not Recognize USB Drive’

December 4th, 2014 by Admin

VMware Workstation does not recognize your USB drive? If you’ve used VMware Workstation for some time, you might ever face the situation where you can use the USB drive well on the host PC (physical machine), but no USB drive is shown up under the VM -> Removable Devices menu within VMware Workstation. Here is how to fix it.

First of all, shutdown the virtual machine if it’s running, and then exit the VMware Workstation program. Right-click on the VMware Workstation shortcut from your desktop and then select “Run as administrator” to run it with admin privilege. This has fixed the problem that I experienced just a few days ago and eventually found out that VMware Workstation have insufficient privileges to capture the USB device.

vmware-not-recognize-usb

If you still don’t see the USB drive in the VM menu, follow the below steps to check if the VMware USB Arbitration service is not running:

Press the Windows key + R to bring up the Run box.
Type services.msc and press Enter.
Search for a service named VMware USB Arbitrator Service. If this service is not running, right-click on it and select Properties, set Startup Type to Automatic and also click Start button to run it.

Note: After starting the VMware USB Arbitrator Service manually, you need to re-launch the VMware Workstation to make the changes to take effect.

Additionally, VMware Workstation does not support USB3.0 natively and you need extra drivers in the guest for the USB device. I highly recommend to use USB 2.0 for your virtual machine. Go to the Virtual Machine Settings and Make sure the USB Controller is present in the device list and USB compatibility is set to USB2.0.

vmware-usb-version

I hope this article helps someone out there that has encountered this issue.

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Posted in Others, Tips & Tricks

Tags: vmware does not recognize usb vmware usb not showing up

Enable Hardware Virtualization VT-x/AMD-v in BIOS

December 3rd, 2014 by Admin

When you try to install Windows 8, you might receive an error message that says “This PC can’t run Windows 8 – Your PC’s CPU isn’t compatible with Windows 8“. To fix this problem you have to enable hardware virtualization VT-x/AMD-v for your CPU in BIOS.

cpu-not-compatible-with-win

On Intel platforms, you can normally turn VT-x on and off in the BIOS, whereas on AMD platforms, AMD-V is on all the time (at least I have not come across a BIOS which contains an option to enable/disable AMD-V).

How to Enable Hardware Virtualization in BIOS?

Usually, the VT-x feature is disabled by default in the BIOS for some reason. To enable it on your model, you have to find the option in your BIOS, it’s usually called “Hardware virtualization support”, ” Intel(R) Virtualization Technology” or something similar.

Here is how to enable Hardware Virtualization in BIOS:

Power on your computer. Enter the BIOS setup by pressing F2, F12, Del or other key (The key may vary depending on your system model).
Look for an option labeled by ‘Virtualization Technology’ or ‘Intel(R) Virtualization Technology’ under ‘CPU Configurations’, ‘System Configurations’, ‘Advanced’ or ‘Security’ tab and check if the option is enabled or disabled.
Enable Intel Virtualization Technology (VT) or AMD-V depending on the brand of the processor.
Save the BIOS settings. However, a warm reboot is insufficient for the change to take effect. You need to power off the machine and disconnect the power supply.

If you can’t find the hardware virtualization settings in BIOS, I highly recommend to check the manual or online guide of your motherboard vendor, and some old computers might don’t support virtualization technology (vt-x/amd-v) at all.

How to Confirm Hardware Virtualization is Enabled?

There is a tool available from Microsoft which can help you check if virtualization technology (vt-x/amd-v) is enabled on your Intel and AMD processor.

Download the Microsoft hardware-assisted virtualization detection tool

Installation is not required here, execute the EXE file and following result will appear.

virtualization-detection

However, this tool doesn’t work on Windows 8. To work around this problem, you can run this tool in compatibility mode by following these steps:

Right-click on the EXE file (havdetectiontool.exe) and then click Properties.
Click on the Compatibility tab.
Compatibility mode lets you choose how to run the EXE file. You can choose anything from Windows 7 to Windows XP, as the virtualization detection tool works with Windows 7/Vista/XP.
click Apply then click OK to save the changes. You can then run virtualization detection tool on Windows 8 to check if virtualization technology (vt-x/amd-v) is enabled on your computer.

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Posted in Others, Tips & Tricks, Windows 10, Windows 8

Tags: cpu not compatible with windows 8 enable hardware virtualization enable virtualization technology enable vt in bios

Download PVSCSI Driver for VMware Paravirtual SCSI

November 25th, 2014 by Admin

When VMware released ESXi 4.0, they officially supported booting your OS drive from a paravirtual SCSI controller. Comparing to BusLogic and LSI Logic, Paravirtual SCSI (PVSCSI) controllers are high-performance storage controllers that can result in greater throughput and lower CPU utilization. However, since Windows doesn’t have native driver for the VMware PVSCSI adapter, you will find that a paravirtualized hard disk can’t be recognized during Windows installation or booting from WinPE.

To fix this problem you need to grab the pvscsi driver and add it to your WinPE bootdisk, or load the driver on the fly. But it’s not easy to extract pvscsi boot floppy images from VMware ESXi. Lucikly I came across a floppy disk image called pvscsi_windows2008.flp under my VMware Workstation installation directory: C:\Program Files (x86)\VMware\VMware Workstation\Resources.

For your convenience, we load the pvscsi-Windows2008.flp image in our virtual floppy drive and then archive the setup files in both .iso and .zip formats. Below you can download pvscsi driver for VMware Paravirtual SCSI in different formats:

Floppy disk image: Click here
ZIP archive: Click here
ISO image: Click here

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Posted in Free Software, Others

Tags: Paravirtual SCSI driver pvscsi driver pvscsi driver download vmware paravirtual driver

2 Methods to Change Boot Order of Guest VM in VMware ESXi

November 24th, 2014 by Admin

If you want to boot a virtual machine from a CD or ISO image, you need to change the boot sequence so that it starts with virtual CD drive. However, it can be difficult to access the BIOS Setup as the POST screen clears too quickly, especially if you’ve enabled UEFI in your VM. In this article I’ll describe 2 methods to change the boot order for a guest VM hosted by VMware ESXi.

Method 1: Change Boot Order Using vSphere Client

Open up your VMware vSphere Client and log into your server. Make sure the VM that you want to modify is powered off.
In the vSphere Client inventory, right-click on the virtual machine and select Edit Settings.
When the Virtual Machine Properties dialog appears, click the Options tab. From the list on the left, click Advanced > General. Click the Configuration Parameters button on the right.
In the Configuration Parameters dialog, click Add Row button. Type bios.bootOrder to the Name column and the devices (for example, cdrom,hdd,floppy) in the Value column.
Click OK to save the changes.

Method 2: Modify .VMX File in VMware ESXi

Open up your VMware vSphere Client and log into your server. Make sure the VM that you want to modify is powered off.
Click on your target virtual machine from the left side tree, and then click Summary tab on the right pane.
Under the Resources area for your VM, there should be a list of datastores. Right-click on the datastore where the target VM files are saved, and select Browse Datastore.
Navigate to the folder for your particular VM, and find the .vmx file. Right-click on the file and select Download. Save the file somewhere easily accessible.
Open up the .vmx file with WordPad or your favorite text editor, and then add the following line to the bottom of the file:
bios.bootOrder = "cdrom,hdd,floppy"

The line above will set the boot sequence to cdrom, hdd and floppy. Save the file.
Go back to the Datastore Browser. Click the upload icon in the toolbar and select Upload File, and select your modified .vmx file. Upload it to overwrite the existing .vmx file in your VM.

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Posted in Others, Tips & Tricks

Tags: change vmware boot order esxi boot from iso esxi vm boot order vmware esxi boot from cd

How to Create Windows 8.1 PE Boot CD/USB Drive

November 20th, 2014 by Admin

WinPE (Windows PE) is a stripped down version of Windows. It has the bare minimum drivers and files just enough to run the installer and the repair tools. WinPE does not require a hard drive to boot, it can run solely from a CD drive using the memory for dynamic data. This feature makes WinPE appealing for data recovery and system maintenance purposes. In this tutorial we’ll show you how to manually create a bootable WinPE 5.0 CD/USB drive. WinPE 5.0 is based on Windows 8.1.

How to Create Windows 8.1 PE Boot CD/USB Drive?

WinPE 5.0 is part of the Windows Assessment and Deployment Kit (Windows ADK) for Windows 8.1, which you can download here. When you install the ADK, you only need to select these two features: Deployment Tools and Windows Preinstallation Environment.
After installing, launch the Deployment Tools and Imaging Environment. Create an empty folder such as c:\winpe, and then type this command:
copype.cmd amd64 c:\winpe
If you want to make a 32-bit WinPE bootdisk, just replace amd64 with x86. This step will copy the boot files and the Windows PE boot image (boot.wim) to the folder c:\winpe\media.
If you need to make changes to the WinPE boot image, you need to mount the image before adding drivers or other third-party apps:
dism /mount-image /imagefile:c:\winpe\media\sources\boot.wim /index:1 /mountdir:c:\winpe\mount
After mounting the image, you can add any specific RAID or storage drivers, in order for your hard drive to be recognized by the WinPE bootdisk. You will need to collect and extract the raw .inf and .sys driver files in order to install the driver.
dism /image:c:\winpe\mount /add-driver:"c:/storage/iaStor.inf"
Unmount the image and commit the changes back to the WinPE boot.wim file.
dism /unmount-image /mountdir:c:\winpe\mount /commit
Now that we have the base image (boot.wim) and its time to create the bootable WinPE ISO image by running the following command:
oscdimg -b"c:\winpe\fwfiles\etfsboot.com" -n c:\winpe\media c:\winpe\winpe.iso
Finally, you can burn the ISO image (winpe.iso) onto a CD-ROM or USB stick. You can use the freeware ISO2Disc, Rufus, Imgburn or any other burning application of your choice.

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Posted in Others, Tips & Tricks

Tags: create bootable winpe iso create winpe windows 8 how to create winpe iso

Fix the 0x000000C4 Error: Your PC Needs To Restart

November 19th, 2014 by Admin

When you try to install Windows 8.1 64-bit in Oracle VM VirtualBox / VMware Workstation, or boot a virtual machine from Windows 8.1 64-bit PE image, you might receive the following error message:

Your PC needs to restart
Please hold down the power button.
Error code: 0x000000C4
Parameters:
0x0000000000000091
0x000000000000000F
0xFFFFF8028E363A80
0x0000000000000000

0x000000C4

The problem exists only with the Windows 8.1 64-bit. The 32-bit version works fine. This problem is similar to the blue screen error 0x0000005D that we previously covered in this article: How to Fix Error 0x0000005D When Booting from Windows 8 Installation Disc.

If you got the 0x000000C4 error while booting an existing virtual machine from Windows 8.1 64-bit PE image, the temporary solution is changing your guest OS to 64-bit. This article has explained how to change the OS version in VirtualBox and VMware Workstation: VirtualBox and VMware Error 0x0000005D Fix: Your PC Needs To Restart.

If you got the 0x000000C4 error when you try to install Windows 8.1 64-bit in VirtualBox, please perform the following steps to resolve:

First of all, you need to find the name of your problematic virtual machine in the VirtualBox Manager interface:

Or open an elevated Command Prompt, type the following command to list your virtual machine’s name:
"c:\Program Files\Oracle\VirtualBox\VBoxManage.exe" list vms
Next paste following command followed by Enter:
"c:\Program Files\Oracle\VirtualBox\VBoxManage.exe" setextradata "virtual_machine_name" VBoxInternal/CPUM/CMPXCHG16B 1

Replace virtual_machine_name with the name of the virtual machine name which you find in the step above.
That’s it! Close the Command Prompt, and you can now install Windows 8.1 64-bit in VirtualBox without the blue screen error 0x000000C4.

Another workaround is upgrading VirtualBox to the latest version 4.3.18 which claims to have this issue fixed already. If you got the 0x000000C4 error with Windows Server 2012 R2, the solution is the same as for Windows 8.1.

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Posted in Others, Tips & Tricks, Windows 8

Tags: bsod 0x000000c4 virtualbox error 0x000000C4 vmware error 0x000000C4 windows 8.1 0x000000C4 your pc needs to restart

How to Restore Windows Registry to A Previous State

November 11th, 2014 by Admin

Did you mess up the Windows registry and need to restore it to a previous state? Problems with the Windows registry can cause your computer to freeze, slow down, restart randomly, or be unusable. Luckily, since Windows 7, the system will automatically make a backup of your registry files after a successful boot. Here we’ll explain how to restore your Windows registry to a previous state, in order to fix / repair a corrupted registry.

How to Restore Windows Registry to A Previous State?

As the registry files are inaccessible while Windows is running, you need to boot your PC from a boot media for replacing the registry. Here we’ll use the PCUnlocker utilty, which comes as a self-extracting zip file containing a bootable CD image. Download the program and unzip it locally. Burn the CD image to a blank CD with your favorite burning program or ISO2Disc.

Boot your computer from the newly burned CD. After booting from the CD, you’ll get to the PCUnlocker program. Despite this program is mainly designed for resetting lost Windows password, it can also be used to backup the files on your computer, including the registry. Click on the “Option” button and select “Launch Command Prompt”.

Before restoring, I highly recommend you to take a backup of your current registry files, by typing these commands, one by one, and press Enter after each (Assuming C drive is the driver letter of your Windows installation).

mkdir c:\regbackup copy c:\windows\system32\config c:\regbackup

These commands will create a backup folder and copy all your current registry files to that folder.

In Windows 10, 8 and 7, there is a folder called RegBack on your system partition which contains the most recent copy of registry files that were backed up automatically by Windows. Here we need to copy the registry files from C:\Windows\System32\config\RegBack to C:\Windows\System32\config. To do so type in this command:

copy c:\windows\system32\config\RegBack c:\windows\system32\config

Now you’ve successfully restored your Windows registry files to last known good state. Remove the CD and restart your computer to see if you are able to boot into Windows properly.

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Posted in Others, Tips & Tricks, Windows 10, Windows 7, Windows 8

Tags: restore registry file in windows restore windows registry

How to Hide User Name from Windows Lock Screen

November 1st, 2014 by Admin

It’s a common security practice to lock your Windows desktop screen by pressing Windows + L keys every time you walk away from your computer. This can prevent other people from accessing your computer in your absence. However, did you realize that Windows will display the user name on the screen while your PC is locked? A user name can be just as sensitive as a password in a lot of scenarios. Luckily there is a simple way to hide your user name from Windows lock screen.

How to Hide User Name from Windows Lock Screen?

Open the Registry Editor by pressing Windows + R keys simultaneously.
Browse down to the following registry key:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\System
On the right-hand side, create a new DWORD 32-bit value named DontDisplayLockedUserId and give it one of these values:
- 1 = User display name, domain and user names
- 2 = User display name only
- 3 = Do not display user information
If you change this value to 3 then it will remove all user information from your Windows lock screen.

Note: To prevent the last logged on user to be displayed in the Windows logon screen, also set the dontdisplaylastusername value to 1.
Exit Registry Editor and reboot your computer. The next time you press Windows + L to lock your computer, your user name will not be displayed on the Windows lock screen any longer. User will be required to enter both their user name and password when logging back in from the locked workstation.