My thoughts on things in April 2025

I haven't been posting here a lot recently, but I'd like to give some thoughts regarding some things going through my mind. 

AI tools like ChatGPT

AI tools are certainly becoming more and more a thing of our daily life. Playing around with creating images, reassuring vocabulary etc. Even becoming an essential tool at work in many ways. Despite there are mistakes here and there, the development over the recent years is quite astonishing. The difficult part will be like finding the right balance.

The end of Skype

Yes, Skype is actually ending next month. I can see why since Microsoft also has Teams and maybe wants to rather focus on that. I just made the switch a few days ago, the transition was mostly flawless. It has been a long run with Skype. Especially during the last 10 years Skype while travelling and now living abroad it has been an essential tool to stay in touch with family and friends. It's the end of an era and let's see whether everyone will make the switch to Teams or rather uses alternate options.

6 more months of Updates for Windows 10

I might be a more crazy example, but I still use a Lenovo laptop which I bought almost 10 years ago. It's certainly getting slower and a reinstallation even failed when I tried a few months ago. An upgrade to Windows 11 is not even possible due to hardware limitations. So maybe it's time for a switch later this year. For work I already use Windows 11 and can see its benefits, but haven't gone too deep just yet. Still, certainly interesting that an operation system which was supposed to be the "final" Windows will no longer be supported. Will be possible lead to lots of hardware trash. I know even people who bought a new laptop in 2020/21 won't even make it through the new hardware requirements. It feels timing-wise a bit early and certainly a better date could have been found. It doesn't need to be as long as the life cycle of XP, but still not ideal - as many people certainly won't make the switch and may become an easy target. We will see if Microsoft goes through with that.

Global Protection suggesting Windows VPN Settings...

As a GlobalProtect installation and configuration should usually work quite smoothly I hit by a little roadblock... 

After GlobalProtect is installed I should usually get the dialog to enter the VPN connection settings. Instead I got the following message:

"To establish a VPN connection, select the GlobalProtect VPN configuration from Windows NETWORK & INTERNET VPN Settings." 

So GlobalProtect basically wants me to use the local Windows network settings instead of its own. Initially I couldn't really follow, but I figured that I may went too quickly through the installation.

Once I downloaded the Global protect the installer went straight to the Windows Store and I mistakenly confirmed that following message:

So "accidentally" I installed it the Windows Store version which didn't work in my case as I used a special download before.

Correct would be: "Continue installing from outside the Store".
And then the application worked the way it should...

Just a little thing you easily overlook trying that just before going to bed after a long day...

The annoying KB4532693 patch and temporary profiles

In February 2020 the Windows 10 patch KB4532693 was deployed and caused on some PCs logins on temporary profiles instead of the normal one. Here's something from my experience!

These days I got a request and the client even thought that the computer reinstalled itself which obviously wasn't the case Therefore no data got lost in this case. I read about the patch problem before, so following making some research I tried suggested steps as well:

1) Starting in Safe Mode, reboot in Normal Mode

- Didn't help, same issue

2) Uninstalling KB4532693
- Despite being listed in downloaded updates, it didn't appear in the list "Installed Updates". So to be sure I deleted the update via cmd command:

wusa /uninstall /kb:4532693 /quiet

Following a restart the situation didn't change. The list of temporary profiles gets piled up even more.

As several restarts didn't work either,  I ended up helping myself by creating a new user as admin, logged off and logged in with the new user, copied all the data, configured the profile and restarted a few times to be sure. Additionally I changed some settings in the registry to ensure the new profile logs in automatically.

It was a private laptop anyway with no connection to a domain whatsoever. 

Not the most ideal solution, but seemingly there's yet no official solution for the patch out yet - only the suggestions I mentioned above. Sometimes they help, in my case they didn't, so luckily I could find a workaround by just creating a new user.

MS Paint: Change line spacing settings

As the automatic line break in MS Paint is set to double spacing and the GUI doesn't seem to give you a chance to change that, another way had to be found...

As in WordPad and probably many other Microsoft applications the spacing after a line-break can also be changed via shortcuts.

There are three settings:
Ctrl + 1 - normal single line spacing
Ctrl + 2 - double line spacing (default setting)
Ctrl + 5 - 1.5 line spacing (a value in-between)

As I wanted to quickly edit a manga and couldn't find a setting in Paint, I figured that these shortcuts also work here.

Clearing up old Windows versions

If your space is getting less and less there are many ways to clear up some free disk space...

On way is definitely clearing up temporary browser data or the Windows-TEMP folder (C:\Windows\Temp).

Another way is using a tool like TreeSizeFree to narrow down the areas where some big files are hidden. Sometimes there are big video files or downloads you are not aware of anymore.

But, also important is checking if your computer was reinstalled in a way to keep the old version active. You see that, by checking the C drive, if there's a Windows.old folder. If so, you can proceed as it follows:

For Windows 10, go to Settings/Storage and check for Change how we free up space automatically. Scroll down and you can check for cleaning up old Windows versions. It takes a while, but once that's done you can make up a lot of space. In my case more than 30 GB.

Lenovo G70 touchpad reacting slow and on its own

From time to time the touchpad mouse can have some weird issues, recently it was reacting automatically and slow at the same time making it difficult to use at all.

It came all of the sudden: After booting my Lenovo G70 one day the above described things happened. The touchpad mouse reacted weird and unfortunately I did not have another external mouse to test.

The settings in control panel still seemed normal.

I know this laptop had some mouse issues sometimes such as that the mouse suddenly froze and needed to be reactivated again.

This time it was something else, so I rebooted and it didn't change at all. So I got to use an old trick:

• turning off
• removing the battery for a few minutes
• pressing the power button for 30 seconds
• waiting little bit
• putting back the battery
• turning on again

And then the issue was gone. Easy and efficient!

TheSuperAdmins #005: Plenty of time!

TheSuperAdmins return with an issue which goes through the minds of many admins... A fair question...

See all comics:
TheSuperAdmins page

When does the Windows calendar end?

In previous Windows versions the calendar often ended at the at of the current century, but recently I noticed a different pattern...

Right, in previous Windows versions the  31/12/2099 was the last date in the calendar. But not only for Windows, also for older Sony PlayStation or Nintendo consoles. Check out this Wikipedia article for that.

In Windows 10 you see something different: If you scroll through the calendar you can always go until exactly 100 years in the future. But if you want to change the system time entirely the final date looks different:

Last date is the 31/12/2047. And I'm still talking about a 64 bit Windows version here. Speaking about 32 bit, there was another limit: 19th January 2038. Read more here: The year 2038 problem.

In short: The counter for 32 bit integer system runs out at this very date. It can cause issues in databases and file system. It needs to be changed to a format using 64 bit, which is going to have a time span for almost 300 billion years. But all that could run into an issue for software being programmed in 32 bit, even though all OS and CPU would support 64 bit by then.

At some point the issue is going to be addressed and solved...

To sum up 64 bit system allowed a wider range in future OS versions. There won't be an end - there's always a solution...

5 Reasons you shouldn't go back to Windows 7

Windows 7 is still enjoying a market share of almost 50 percent despite there was the opportunity to do a free upgrade to Windows 10. Here are a few features I miss when I'm using a Windows 7 computer again...

You get so used to the new Windows 10 features and when you start working elsewhere your operating system may still Windows 7. So you can't use certain features you were used to - not to mention that some were already introduced in Windows 8...

1: Screenshots by one key combination

In Windows 10 you can now make screenshots very easily just by using an easy key combination. You press Windows + Print and your screenshot will be saved in your user directory in the folder 'Pictures/Screenshots'. It's quite useful making several screenshots after another.

2: Virtual Drives included!

Remember software like Daemon Tools or Virtual Clone Drive? These were quite useful tools if you wanted to avoid burning an ISO image in order to use it on Windows 7 or earlier versions. In Windows 10 you don't need to install any extra tools. You just need to select on ISO file, right-click and select 'Mount'. That's it. A virtual drive will be added with your CD/DVD image. Way easier, all included. You'll noticed if you get back using Windows 7.


3: Control+V in CMD!
After so many years it's finally possible to use Ctrl+V in the command line. Pasting lines into the black box is now way easier. Going back to Windows 7 or other older Windows version you had to right-click, selecting 'Paste' to paste your clipboard. Now that's just better and faster.

4: Lots of language packs!
Changing the languages of your operating system had never been easier. You can change your Windows 10 easier to any language - even to small ones like Luxembourgish. Just go to Control Panel, 'Language', select the 'idiomas' you want, download them. After that you can easily switch to one of your downloaded languages. You only need to log off and log on again. Back in Windows 7 it was more difficult or even limited to certain version like Enterprise or Ultimate. And the amounts of possible languages are increasing. I remember working in certain companies a language change back in Windows 7 was applied by reinstalling the whole computer... But nowadays with Windows 10, no issue. Just switching to Japanese. As easy as with Android.

5: File Explorer Ribbon Bar

The Ribbon bar was first introduced as a the new view of Office 2007 applications. Some other applications within Windows 7 followed and since Windows 8 it´s also in the Windows Explorer - so jumping from 7 to 10, you will notice and you don´t wanna go back! Also having a graphical view on how fast a file transfer goes makes the new included file manager even better. Not only looks all better.


Anyway...
There are of course many more features in Windows 10 in comparison to Windows 7, but that´s just to name a few which I found were ones people would notice quite quickly. Also easy to get used to that. These examples show that you should not go back to Windows 7, although it´s still a great operating system.

Feel free to comment on if you agree or would have named other examples for reasons not to go back the OS from 2009.

Ethernet Adapter times 79! Way too many!

This computer had an incredible amount of Ethernet Adapters listed! Something I've never seen before.. 

As being confronted with IT issues almost daily there are sometimes cases you haven´t seen in years or you aren´t sure if you have seen them at all! Recently I was asked to check a Danish Windows 10 laptop because despite having WiFi connection the Internet browser couldn´t open any more sites and video streams stopped working.

I checked the network adapters and was quite surprised! There were Ethernet Adapter numbered until 79! And sometimes even numbers were missing and the user had no idea about that! Then I went to the Device Manager to check and "TAP-Win32 Adapter Adapter OAS #22" was one of the many examples I found there. And the list almost did not stop flashing all the time...

Anyway, I had to delete them all manually. All at once didn´t work. Once that was done the Internet connection worked fine again. Wonder why^^. 

I suggest a proper virus and malware scan afterwards just to be sure there`s nothing going on anything. A bit online checks mentioned it could might be through some VPN software or even an Office KMS activation...

How to activate Microsoft Office via command line

I recently had a situation where the 2013 Office Suite was unable to be activated. But then I found a great solution...

It was within a bigger environment where a KMS server is active. Usually the activation should run just by plugging your computer into the network for having a connection with the domain. But there was one case where it didn't work once the user was in the company for a few hours.

The user was even working remotely via VPN. But I remember that there was a command to manually force your Office activation through a command. Was a long time ago and I had to look it up. It's this one (run as admin):

cscript "C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Office\Office15\OSPP.VBS" /act

Just make sure that you select the correct path, because it's depending on your Office version and operating system. It's also working with Office14 (version 2010), but not with Office 2007 (Office12).

After you executed this vbs script the confirmation that Office was activated appeared pretty quickly after that. Just make sure you are executing this Visual Basic Script while every program of the Office Suite is closed. Is better for the success of the process.

In my case it was quite efficient and it avoided that the user had to return to the office again and could return working from remote.

MATSHITA BD-RE UJ-225S ATA DEVICE and Windows 10 - a bad combination!

You upgraded to Windows 10 and your DVD/Bluray drive is gone? It can become difficult or even impossible...

In my case it's about the Matshita Bluray drive called 'UJ 225S' in a Medion Akoya P8610. Initially sold with Windows Vista was the system later upgraded to Windows 7. So it's already a few years old. 

Last year there was the possibility to upgrade to Windows 10 for free. The owner of that laptop did it, but he later noticed that his Bluray drive wasn't available anymore. Interestingly in the BIOS it's still there and you can even boot from it. Using a current live Linux distribution to boot you can still see in the device overview.

So what can you do from here? 
A helpful solution which I've seen quite often and it apparently solved the issue in many cases is the following:
1) Go to regedit and select the following path:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE/SYSTEM/CurrentControlSet/Services/atapi /

2) Create a new key named 'Controller0'

3) Create a new DWORD in Controller0 called EnumDevice1

4) Change the value of EnumDevice1 to 1

5) Restart your computer and your DVD/Bluray device should be back... 

BUT IT DIDN'T WORKED!

I found other suggestions to update the BIOS to version M1.04, but the BIOS was already running with the version M1.08. So that wouldn't make real sense...

ANOTHER IDEA: CHIPSET DRIVER

Maybe it's an idea to update the chipset driver? But there are no official Windows 10 chipset drivers available. You 'just' find the ones for Windows 7. And if you try them with your Windows 10 Medion Akoya laptop... you'll end up having a bluescreen.

Better use system recovery and go back to a date before you tried that. 

CONCLUSION

Basically it's something you end up nowhere. Either go back to Windows 7, use a Linux, use an external drive or maybe even change your optical drive completely. Too bad it's too old and not working with Windows 10, physically it's still very good.

Windows 10 flashing at the start, but why?

You start your Windows 10 and your desktop is flashing, flickering or let's say just becoming black, your desktop icons are disappearing and coming again every few seconds.

The only thing the might work is your task manager by pressing CTRL + ALT + DEL. Everything else in the background is gone and appearing again. It all looked like this:

It's all pretty annoying. A solution to have a booting scenario without all of this could be using the Safe Mode. It might be hard to get there at all, but if you make it to go to 'Run' and type 'msconfig' you can select Safe Mode for the next restart. Within this mode I experienced none of this disturbing flashing.

I often read that it's caused by the upgrade from Windows 7 or 8 to Windows 10. But in my case it was something else. Someone installed a certain suspicious 'driver updater' before the issue occurred. I removed the software of course, but the problem remained. I reinstalled a few drivers, but it didn't help. A malware scan with Malwarebytes Antimalware found more than 350 infections and cleaned them away, but the issue was still there. I found certain batch scripts while looking for a solution, but they didn't work either.

In general this issue is caused by a specific software or driver. But you have to find it to fix it.

So I reinstalled Windows 10, made the most sense since the computer only had a bit basic software installed and that was it. Saved the data, copied it back. Done. No issues anymore. The fastest and best way in cases like this.

A slowly dying ASUS M5A99X mainboard

Initially the cause wasn't clear. The computer was in some situations very slow and caused problems while agreeing admin permissions to install applications...

First I was informed to take a check from remote, but that wasn't even possible. The other site of the line had problems installing TeamViewer, the computer hanged at the moment UAC popped up for agreeing admin permissions. At the moment nothing happened anymore. After the next restart the computer itself got even slower. A few spots on the taskbar didn't even work anymore.

Seeing the difficult child myself, I just checked the basic stuff: Hard disk is fine, booting an alternate OS by DVD worked without issues, no malware or anything like that. But the issue got worse, at every attempt even slower!

After another test I wasn't able to start the computer anymore. The screen turned on for a moment but that was it. It remained black. Removing all drives didn't make any difference.

Ok.. so what's going on? From now it was clear it's a hardware problem. I did a BIOS reset (RTC RAM), restarted and the boot screen appeared, but unfortunately the screen froze from that moment on. I could press any key for entering Setup or changing the boot order - nothing happen. I turned off and there was the black screen again.

A few other ideas:

• Removing all boot devices (HDD, DVD)
  Booting without any RAM
• Booting without graphics adapter

While doing this tests there wasn't any beeping or difference at all. The motherboard must be damaged! Else there would be any beeping alarm or a kind of warning that something's not attached.

To be sure, I ordered a new Asus M5A99X board in order to make sure it's really the issue. And I was right: I changed the board, moved the CPU, the cooler and everything else to the new motherboard and the computer started again. 

But that's not the end of the story: After a successful restart the problems didn't really vanish. The Windows system was obviously damaged, too. I knew that the hard disk was ok, so I created an image of drive C and reinstalled Windows 10, basic software and updates. Now it's all working as fine as it should be. I copied all necessary files from the image back to the user folders and that was it...

Damn motherboard, whatever happened there...

Virtual Box and 64 bit: Quick fix

By now it's also possible to install 64 bit systems within Virtual Box - as long as your computer is ready for that. But what if that's the case and you still don't see any option listed to create such a machine?

I can give you two things to check in order to solve that:

First: Go to BIOS/UEFI and check if the virtualization technology is activated. Easy, but often forgotten.

Second, check if no other Virtual Machine software is blocking Virtual Box - for example HyperV. If that's the case and you don't even need HyperV (which is included in Windows 10), remove it by going to Programs and Features.

A reboot is possibly necessary, but afterwards you can start Virtual Box, create a new VM and see also see 64 bit versions in your selection.

Poll: Your thoughts on the free Windows 10 upgrade

Before the offer for a free upgrade to Windows 10 ended on 28th July 2016 I asked in a poll what people are thinking about. Here's the result:

Windows 10 is free to upgrade until next July - your thoughts?

I already use Windows 10 25% I will upgrade to Windows 10 until then 0% I won't upgrade, will still use Windows 8(.1) 0% I won't upgrade, will still use Windows 7 50% I can't upgrade, I will still use Windows Vista 0% I can't upgrade, I will still use Windows XP 0% I don't care. I don't use Windows 25%

It could have been a better result with more votes, but it still gives the impression that there were people not willing to use the free upgrade. Windows 7 is still a stable system and still ok for a usual user? Why changing a running system.

That's why we still have a 47% market share of Windows 7 systems. At least Windows 10 could jump to 21% in July - most likely due to the free upgrade possibilty...

Enabling DVD boot for Lenovo G70-35

No matter how often you try to press F2, F6, F8, F12 or anything: If you have a pre-installed Windows 10 you need to change some settings in the BIOS/UEFI in order to be able to boot from your DVD.

First, you need to get into the BIOS/UEFI menu to change the boot order by pressing Fn+F2. As you directly notice you can't even see the DVD drive.

In the following you should select 'Boot Mode' and chose 'Legacy Support' instead of 'UEFI'.

And in 'Boot Priority' you should also change from 'UEFI First' to 'Legacy First'.


Go to 'Exit Saving Changes' and open the BIOS again. Now you can see a bit more and also the DVD drive like you were used to in the older days.

Finally you should put the DVD in the first position ahead of the HDD. Save the changes and your inserted DVD will boot.

You'll be able now to install Windows 7, 8, 10 or anything from your DVD drive.

Another step forward: WhatsApp for Windows

Today WhatsApp finally released its desktop version. It's a step forward following the WhatsApp Web version - but is it really better?

Actually it looks more or less the same as the web version. The connection between the computer and the phone also works via scanning a QR code on the screen with your phone.

So still no connection via email address or another user ID possible. A solution like in LINE I'd prefer more. But maybe they'll think about it in the future.

The Windows version is recommended to work with Windows 8 or higher, but some users also mentioned that it's also usable with Windows 7. In the same step there was also a Mac OS version released.

The only difference to the web version is that the desktop app has it's own window and that you can see the amount of new messages with a white number in a red circle at the WhatsApp icon in the taskbar.

I hope they use this desktop version to create better chat backups in coming updates. A HTML export shouldn't be such a big deal. And other messengers have it - so hopefully it's going to come.

Anyway, I see the introduction of a desktop version a step in the right direction which they will hopefully use to build on.

Mouse gone in Windows 10

You're using Windows 10 with your laptop and suddenly you can't see and move the mouse with your touchpad anymore. Here's a way out.

A first attempt would be to just reboot your computer, even though it's unlikely to work. Another idea is to plug in a USB mouse, unplug it and hope that the touchpad is now working.

If that also doesn`t work go to the control panel or Settings. Select 'Mouse' (or 'Mouse & Touchpad'). Go to the Mouse properties ('additional mouse options').

Select the ELAN tab (maybe called differently on another laptop, this was on a Lenovo one) and enable the device which should be disabled at that point.

I also experienced similar issues with Windows 8 and it could be solved in more or less the same way. This issue can occur from time to time.

Ways to make screenshots in Windows without extra tools

The possibilities of making screenshots in Windows have increased over the last decade. Of course there are some extra tools doing the same job - but what can Windows do on its own?

I'll show you three possible ways to accomplish that: A classic way, an included tool and a new fast key combination.

1. The 'Print' key and Paint
That's more or less the oldest trick to make screenshots in Windows. You press the 'Print' key on your keyboard and go to 'mspaint', right-click 'Paste' and the screenshot is within the file and you just need to save. Instead of Paint you can use other software of course - even Word. With pressing 'Alt' + 'Print' you copy just the windows in front to the clipboard.

2. Snipping Tool
Since Windows Vista Microsoft has included another way to make screenshots. With the Snipping Tool you are able to decide which part of the screen you want to take a screenshot from. Since Windows 10 the tool got an additional feature: It's possible now to make screenshots with a previously set time delay.

3. "Windows" key plus "Print" key
That's the one I would bet many of you didn't know. Since Windows 8 you can press the 'Windows' key plus the 'Print' key and a screenshot will be saved as a *.png file in the following directory: \Pictures\Screenshots. That's definitely the fastest possible way Windows can offer.