Just installed Kaspersky and have noticed that there’s a delay when you try to open folders?

Scenario & Solution

Here’s another problem not solved by me but i’m sharing for those who have a similar issue. I noticed after installing Kaspersky Internet Security 2010 that accessing folders always had a 2 second delay. Note that this was with Windows Vista 64bit as well, it may or may not affect other Windows versions (appears it was affecting Windows 7 as well).

The basic idea is to go into the settings of Kaspersky, click on Options in the list and on the right untick Enable Self-Defense. Click apply and then ok. Now randomly access folders on your hard drive for 30-60 seconds and then re-enable Self-Defense. After doing this I noticed an immediate improvement to folder access even after restarting the PC. For a video explanation and also to show where I found out how to fix this, follow this link:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c2DY-XTI1C0

Special thanks to IWEBProductions for the video.

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Got a 500gb hard drive and can only find 400gb used but you check the properties of the drive and it’s 450gb used?

Scenario & Solution

I found myself constantly running out of space on my 500gb hard drive and it would change on a day by day basis. After checking the size of all folders on the hard drive i’ve found that it isn’t using that much. Then I remembered System Restore, but guess what, in vista you cannot change the amount of space it uses. After some research I found the following website:

http://www.ghacks.net/2007/04/25/change-the-system-restore-size-in-windows-vista/

If you follow what has been written in the article you should, like me, now have about another 15% of hard drive space back. Special thanks to the creator of that article, saved me going crazy as to why I was losing space, heh.

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Have your desktop icons suddenly changed into the icon that Windows uses for unknown file types?

Scenario

Icons from the desktop and in certain other places had been replaced by the unknown file type icon. Refreshing the desktop and restarting Windows does not help.

Solution

In my situation the problem had to do with the icon cache corrupting itself after the screen saver had crashed. This is quite simple to fix, first right click on your desktop and click Properties (Personalize for Vista users), Vista users will need to click on “Window Color and Appearance”, “Open classic appearance properties for more color options” and “Advanced”, XP users will need to click on the “Appearance” tab and then “Advanced”.

In here click on the “Item” drop down menu and select “Icon”, next to that should be a field called “Size”. In here change the value to 1 higher than what it currently is (usually 32) and click “OK” then click “Apply” in the “Advanced Appearance” window. You should now notice the icons on your desktop have returned to normal. Before you close everything go back into “Advanced” and change the icon size back to what it was, click “OK” and then “Apply” again.

You should now be back to normal. If the problem persists then in your situation it may not be the icon cache that is causing the issue.

NOTE: The problem occurred for me on an XP machine so I do not know if this works on Vista but it’s worth a shot.

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Whenever you try to run Roxio Creator 2009 you get a “Roxio Creator has encountered a problem and needs to close” error, if this is the case then read on.

Scenario

Can’t run Roxio Creator 2009, crashes after the Roxio logo has appeared on the screen and the program has tried to load. The error is your standard “application has encountered a problem and needs to close” error.

Solution

Initially my first attempt to fix this was a simple reinstall but that didn’t go as planned. So after some research I found that the issue could be related to some of the .NET frameworks installed on your pc. The ones that were mentioned were version 2.0 and 3.5 (including SP1). In this case I couldn’t remove 2.0 as it was previously installed over the network and the .msi didn’t exist for me to be able to remove it. So instead I removed 3.5 and 3.0 from add/remove programs in control panel (programs and features for Vista users) then I followed the steps in the following article provided by Roxio for doing a clean install of Roxio Creator 2009/2010:

Windows XP – http://kb.roxio.com/search.aspx?URL=/content/kb/Creator/000206CR
Windows Vista – http://kb.roxio.com/search.aspx?URL=/content/kb/Creator/000207CR

Then i’ve restarted the PC and reinstalled Roxio Creator 2009 (while keeping all start up items disabled as per the article above), the install will reinstall .NET framework 3.0 and 3.5 (well it did in my case).

After installing the program I was able to run it fine without any crashes, even after installing the content pack and re-enabling all start up items it was still working. Now due to time constraints I didn’t get a chance to reinstall SP1 of .NET framework 3.5 which could be the problem here. So if the problem returns after doing so then it is quite simply a problem for Roxio to address (which they may have already done as the program did have an update once I was able to run it after installing. I’d recommend doing as many updates for the program as you can before installing SP1 of .NET framework 3.5).

This worked for me, but it may not work for you. It appears to be a hit and miss from the research i’ve done, but as long as you’ve paid for the software you may as well use the tech support, that’s what it’s there for.

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I am a little iffy on the tree, I could never do pixel trees and i’ve been studying other works and whatever tutorials I could find for hours but could never get a great looking tree. This tree came from a lot of experimenting. Originally it wasn’t detailed at all but after giving some more texture with some randomly placed pixels I think it looks how a tree should, at least for this scene. I am a bit iffy with it because I really wanted to go for realistic in terms of lighting but as you can see I opted for a quick fix by randomly placing pixels. One day I hope to improve with trees but for now this will have to do.

While I was working on these two pieces I was going through my previous unfinished work and found a layout I was going to use for this site. While I didn’t use the whole layout I thought the footer suited this site well, so i’ve updated the footer. Check it out =)

• Dragon Age
• Forza 3
• Assassins Creed 2
• Borderlands
• Possibly Brutal Legend
• Call of Duty Modern Warfare 2

I’m going to be so broke for the coming month heh.

In the meanwhile i’m trying to do some more pixel art, I figure that if I do the pieces in sections and submit them here I won’t give up too easy. I usually find myself stopping due to the piece being too big but by splitting it up hopefully I can finish a large piece for once.

I’m going to call them a “Series”, for example i’m currently working on a medieval scene so once i’ve done a tower or wall for the castle i’ll post it here under the “Medieval Series” section which will be located under the Artwork tab once I upload it. So keep an eye out as i’m close to finishing the first section and once I get some time on the weekend i’m hoping to get it done and submitted.

http://risen.nexway.com/dl.html?MAIL=me@email.com&C=12345678&Langue=en_US

Then if you change the domain to:

http://deepsilveruk.nexway.com/

Which would now look like:

http://deepsilveruk.nexway.com/dl.html?MAIL=me@email.com&C=12345678&Langue=en_US

If you go to this site the download links will work, it also has a download manager on the page which I used and worked flawlessly. I am disappointed at the support of the store however, for one their support email address bounces emails and two when I do find an email address that works I get no reply. Not to mention that it has been 3 days and no fix to the download links on the original page which is why i’m posting this for those who still cannot download the game.

Regardless the game itself is quite enjoyable, anyone who liked Gothic 1 or 2 will like this game. I’ve also not come across any major bugs like one other game *cough* Gothic 3 *cough*, game tends to crash after like 5+ hours gameplay but that seriously doesn’t matter as it auto saves and most people wouldn’t play for that long per session.

EDIT:
Just received an email back today (6th October 2009) mentioning that the links have been fixed, if you’re still having trouble then follow what i’ve written above otherwise your original email should now work.

Got this error recently when trying to start your PC? Then read on.

Scenario

You turn your PC on only to find this error on your screen and Windows will not load, you may of also seen an error relating to a missing boot.ini displayed before this error.

Solution

This was a real pain, usually this could indicate either a bad hard drive / partition or you’ve been infected with a virus that has removed your boot.ini. But if it has only happened recently and you’ve also only recently installed Internet Explorer 8 then that may be your problem. Now Internet Explorer 8 isn’t the whole blame, it’s actually related to the Ask Toolbar. From a PC that i’ve recently had to fix I found that while you could get away with Internet Explorer 6 or 7 you could not go back to 8 without your boot.ini deleting itself. This apparently (from what i’ve read) is caused by the Ask Toolbar (i’m assuming an old version that doesn’t support IE 8) which conflicts with the Data Execution Prevention (DEP) feature of Windows (this may also occur with other toolbars so it’s worthwhile removing all of your extra toolbars through add/remove programs in the control panel) and causes DEP to delete your boot.ini file on every boot.

To fix this is quite simple, as explained above you need to remove any extra toolbars by uninstalling them through add/remove programs. This doesn’t help however if you can’t load Windows. So what you need to do is obtain (you might have received this with your PC) a Windows XP install CD. Then you boot to the CD, let it load and on the first screen where you get a choice of what you want to do you want to press “R” for the recovery console. Once this loads it will ask (if it found your XP install) which install to use, generally it’s number 1 (C:\Windows\). After this it may also ask for a password, if you haven’t set a password for the administrator account then just press enter. If all is good you should see “C:\” (without quotes).

Here type in “bootcfg /rebuild” (without quotes) and press enter, it will now search your hard drive for any Windows installations (this may take a while). After it’s found an installation it will ask “Add installation to boot list? (Yes/No/All)” type “yes” (without quotes) and press enter. Now it will ask “Enter Load Identifier”, here you can type in what you want the XP installation to be named, generally it’s “Microsoft Windows XP Home Edition” for Windows XP Home and “Microsoft Windows XP Professional Edition” for Windows XP Professional. Last question it will ask is “Enter Operating System Load Options”, here type in “/fastdetect” (without quotes) and press enter. You should now have a rebuilt boot.ini file and Windows should boot normally after you restart the PC.

Now you need to uninstall all toolbars for IE 8 (particularly the Ask Toolbar). After you’ve uninstalled all the toolbars it’s time to restart the PC, if you receive the hal.dll error again you will need to recreate your boot.ini once more (see above). Once Windows has loaded test your IE 8, if it works then try restarting the PC again, if all is good then you should see Windows loading again without having to recreate your boot.ini. If it’s still occuring then you may need to also uninstall your IE 8 and reinstall it.

Hopefully this has fixed the problem for you, otherwise it would be worthwhile to test your hard drive for any bad sectors or partition corruption. If you have another PC, doing a virus scan on the hard drive couldn’t hurt either.

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Ever had this error on one of your devices in Device Manager? Well only recently I got this error, it took a while to work out from researching but here’s how I resolved the error.

Scenario

My new ATI Radeon 4850 graphics card arrived in the mail, as soon as I get home from work I start replacing my old 3870. After turning the PC back on after installing the 4850 everything goes great, get into Windows Vista and install the latest drivers for the graphics card… and here’s where the trouble starts.

For some reason i’ve lost my sound after installing the graphics card, on inspection of the Device Manager I find my SoundBlaster X-Fi has an issue, and upon checking the properties of the driver find it has the error “This device cannot start (Code 10)”.

No matter how many re-installations of both graphics card and sound card I cannot get it to work, however the onboard sound does work after re-enabling it (never had it enabled obviously due to having a sound card).

Solution

While this did work for me, it may or may not work for you with other devices but it’s always worth a shot. Now after researching i’ve found that this error can be caused by Windows not receiving the correct Vendor ID or Device ID from the card, this can be due to a faulty card or the card needing a simple reseat.

So first try reseating the card in question, if you’re not experienced with working on the inside of your PC you may want to get an experienced friend (be careful here as some friends may think they know what they’re doing but in the end cause more trouble) or more recommended get a reputable PC repair shop to fix your problem. If you’re set on doing this yourself and don’t have any experience doing so then please use a guide such as this one, not following a guide could mean damaging the card in question.

If after reseating the card the error is still there then all is not lost as there is another way to fix this and also happens to be the way I fixed my problem. This also involves removing and reseating the card. First shut down your computer and remove all cables (including power), open up your case and remove the card in question (see guide above for a detailed explanation on how to remove/reseat an expansion card). Now you can leave the case open if you wish as we’ll need to put the card back in, connect all the cables and turn the PC on. When Windows is loaded uninstall all software/drivers (mainly drivers) relating to the card, this can be done in most cases by going to the Control Panel > Add/Remove Programs (XP) or Programs and Features (Vista) and then finding the software/driver in the list and removing it. If it’s not in the list that’s ok, you can also remove the driver easily by using a program such as Driver Sweeper (this program only does sound and video drivers however), or you could also try reinstalling the card into the PC (after turning it off, etc) and then go to Device Manager and remove the driver from there and then shut down the PC again and remove the card.

So basically you want to remove the driver for the card, remove the card, and make sure you turn the PC on and boot into Windows once without the card/drivers. After you’ve done this turn off the PC and re-install the card into the PC (follow the guide above). When Windows has loaded this time, re-install the drivers/software for the card and if all is well it should work.

If this has not worked then it is possible the card is faulty, however if like me the issue only happened after installing another piece of hardware then it’s more than likely a conflict that’s still occurring and this would be different to fix on a case by case basis.

But what about onboard devices? Well this could be tricky, but one way to simulate removing the card would be to disable it in the BIOS, depending on your motherboard’s BIOS this may or may not be possible, sound cards are almost always able to be disabled on motherboards however.

Hopefully this did fix your problem as I know, for me at least, it was quite a frustrating issue.

What caused it?

In this situation I can’t be 100% sure, but obviously it was caused by the graphics card. Why? Well the 4000 series ATI Radeon cards have an onboard sound card for dealing with the HDMI audio. Due to this Windows has been messed up with how it was meant to deal with my sound card, as I noticed it would initially detect it as a VGA Device when reinstalling. So by removing the card and drivers (effectively getting Windows to forget the sound card) and reinstalling it I was able to get Windows to once again detect the card as a Multimedia Audio Device.

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Basically I still need to do the back doors and paint it but at least it looks like an arcade machine heh.

As you can see it’s quite a mess on the inside but that’s what you get =P

As for today though I got a new car, well not new new but used new. It’s a 2005 Holden Commodore Executive, it’s a massive improvement on my old 1992 Holden Commodore. Here’s some pics of my old car that I took today before trading it in, thought i’d take some pictures as it is my first car.

And here’s the new 2005 Holden Commodore (i’ll have to get some more pics, this was taken by the dealer)

Got the car for $10745 after $1250 trade in which is pretty good, sure it’s done 180,000 kms but it’ll definitely last a lot longer than the old one. Now i’m just trying to get used to the new car’s feel =P