Technolochief

Chief’s Funny Tech Support Stories – Part I

technolochief — Wed, 04 Feb 2009 01:48:23 +0000

As you may have guessed, I’m an IT Pro and I support users. Since it’s been a while since my last post, I wanted to add one of my humerous tech support stories.

I hope it’s not too technical for you to understand. I’ll dumb it down where I can.

Today I had a user, we’ll call him Goober, come up to my desk to ask me some questions. He was asking how to migrate several settings in Outlook including auto-complete (nk2 files), Signature, etc. I had to have a 15 minute conversation with him, and the whole time Goober had a nice shiny string of snot running down his nose.

The geeks will get that one. It’s a little high brow. True Story.

Stay Chief,

Chief

“President means chief servant”
- Mahatma Gandhi

Shrink VHD Files in Microsoft Virtual PC 2007

technolochief — Fri, 28 Nov 2008 22:00:35 +0000

I recently made the mistake on a Virtual PC of extracting a very large compressed file on the local hard drive of the Virtual Machine. I had a Dynamically Expanding disk which expanded to an enormous size. It nearly filled the local hard drive of my host machine. Now when I removed the files after I was finished with them, the file did not shrink back down to reflect this. This results in wasted hard drive space on the host PC as well as more resources being used when you are running the VPC.

Here are the steps I took to shrink it back down:

I read some articles recommending to empty the recycle bin, delete temp files, disable hibernation. This is good advice (emtying the recycle bin espessially), but is really only useful if you temporarily want to shrink the vhd as much as possible (perhaps in preparation to do a file transfer, or fit it on a DVD). If you do this clean up, eventually the vhd will expand again as the recycle bin and temp files build up again. I also want hibernation enabled so I didn’t disable it. My goal was to recover the space I lost when I expanded the huge archive. Your goal may be different, so you may want to take the steps mentioned above.
The Virtual Disk Precompactor is the prep utility which releases free space making it available for elimination from the file by the VIrtual Disk Wizard. On the Virtual PC Menu go to CD/Capture ISO Image, and Browse to C:\Program Files\Microsoft Virtual PC\Virtual Machine Additions\Virtual Disk Precompactor.iso.
If the mounted disk does not autoplay, go to My Computer and double click on the mounted disk.
You should be prompted with “Would you like to prepare the virtual disk(s) for compaction?”. Click Yes. The process will run for several minutes. You will be notified upon completion.
Shut down the Virtual PC.
From the Virtual PC console , click File/Virtual Disk Wizard.
Choose “Edit an existing virtual disk”. Browse to the .vhd file that you want to shrink.
Select “Compact it”.
If you’re paranoid, you can select a different file name for the compacted file. I selected “Replacing the original file”

Stay Chief,

Chief

“Our chief want is someone who will inspire us to be what we know we could be.”
-Ralph Waldo Emerson

Problems Viewing CHM Files in IE7

technolochief — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 23:32:20 +0000

Problem: You open are having problems viewing Microsoft Compiled HTML files (CHM, or WCF). You open the file and see a blank IE screen when you click any of the headings in the navagation pain on the left side.

Resolution: Right-click the chm file, select properties, then click the Unblock button at the bottom.

Links

technolochief — Fri, 21 Nov 2008 22:39:28 +0000

Most geeks know these, but I’m going to post them anyway because that’s how I roll.

ADrive.com – 50 GB Online Storage free.

LogMeIn - Remote Control. No firewall modification required! Create a free account. Install client on your host PC (the PC you want to control remotely). You can then logon to logmein.com from your favourite web browser, and control that PC from any working connection.

These programs offer other premium options, but who needs them. Definitely don’t buy anything from them. Fight the power. The only way to keep free software alive so to make sure these companies make absolutely no money.

One of the features offered in LogMeIn Pro is file transfer, but if you use ADrive.com you can have that functionality for free. You are so smart.

Stay Chief,

Chief

Dell Latitude D6XX Wireless dropouts

technolochief — Thu, 16 Oct 2008 20:59:12 +0000

If you have frequent dropouts on your Wireless Card on your Dell Latitude D6XX here are the steps to resolution. Unless the issue is hardware, this usually resolves the problem.

1. Flash BIOS to latest version.

2. Insall latest Chipset Drivers

3. Install latest wireless card drivers.

support.dell.com to get software above.

Chief

Blog

technolochief — Wed, 01 Oct 2008 01:33:19 +0000

Jumping on the bandwagon. I think this Internet thing is here to stay. Will blog about whatever tickles my fancy. Usually technical information that I find useful or interesting.