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110 replies

by m.otton1

Have had two unsolvable problems with my XP Home. The first is that my search does not operate. I choose search and then all files and folders and type in the name of a known file.By clicking on search a box comes up marked search companion and I press OK. It now tells me it is searching and the little dog is nodding his head but there is no activity with the hard drive and never any results even though it is definitely there.
The other problem is that with either Nero InCD or Adaptec it will not write or format a CDRw disc. It recognises the blank Cd when inserted and even tells me it will take about 40 - 90 mins to format but then after about twenty seconds gives me a windows error message 2 saying a problem has occured withy the media.I have tried new media and even a new drive but to no avail. I have an Artec WRR-52X and yes I used Adaptec 6. Any help gratefullt received.

by byron_millison

Well, the search issue I'm unsure about (perhaps a repair install? Or a reinstall in a different directory?). However, for the burner issue, you may want to check the PSU. Try swapping it out and see if either burner still has issues. Also, try loading up CloneCD and see if it has problems erasing RW's. I've run into this issue before on my own system, however in that case it was my burner that was bad. But this might help you. Good luck.

by plainbroke

Turn off the Windows XP burner Service

Services.msc
IMAPI CD-Burning COM Service
set it for manual or Disable it either way works for me... and I was having the same problems.

by mryan

Let's start with the CD burner problem first. Do you have both Adaptec and Nero installed at the same time? If so, I'd imagine they could be conflicting with one another. Can you burn CDs using XP's built in burning software? Since you already trieda different drive, let's assume the drive is o.k. Possible problems could be your drive cable, a weak power supply, or possibly a bad IDE controller on your motherboard. I had replaced a CD burner that wrote fine, but I couldn't read large files (say > 100MB) without the computer hitting a blue screen. When the new drive didn't fix it, (and trying new cables, etc.) I swapped the MB and all my problems cleared up.

As far as the search goes, are you sure you are looking in the correct folders?Be sure to start the search from the root of the drive(s) (example: "Local Harddrives"). It is possible that the file you are looking for either A) has a slightly different spelling than you think, such as a space at the end of the name. Try using wild cards (example: "filename*.*"). B) The file name may have changed due to a family member renaming or deleting the file and not realizing it. C) It's possible a virus has changed the name of the file.

Just to make sure the search is working, just try searching for "*". You should get lots of files.

You may not get much disk I/O on a search for several reasons. If you have plenty of RAM and you don't have too many files on your hard drive, it's possible that you ran the search more than once. Then the entire directory tree is likely to be cached, so very little reading from the hard drive needs to be done to complete the search. Also, if you are not starting at the root folder on the drive, there may simply not be very many folders to look through, so your drive is accessed very little.

by hvtechrick

I can only image that your search problem may ultimately be your own use of it. Sorry. I would double check your search options. Scroll trough the "Search Companion", the doggie, and make sure searching your intended folder or drive, file modified, size, system files and folders, hidden files and folders, subfolders and any case sensitivity issues? You set them or unset them. You decided. Then seach and see if the problem still exist.

by chris

Do you have SP2 installed on your XP home machine? From what I understand, there have been some bugs with XP Home's SP2. You may do some research on that and see if this is causing you problems.

by plainbroke

You may be looking for a file that you or the Operating System has turned the hidden or system attribute on. Then you have to tell XP in advanced search to look in system folders hidden folders and subfolders... that happened to me recently I couldsee the file in explorer but search would not find it... and almost imediatly would come back with file not found... after I check attributes (right click and click on properties) I saw that it was a hidden file for some silly reason. So I went in to advanced options in search and told it to look in system hidden and subfolders and low and behold there it was...
Sometimes computers are very stubborn about giving up information...

by shawn_r26

How long have you had this problem? If you can pinpoint when you first experienced trouble, you can use the system restore and select a date before this to restore any missing or corrupt system files in your operating system. However, If you neverused the system restore to create a check point after you installed any new hardware or software, the system restore will restore the operating system back to it's original state and you will need to reintall the software and drivers to any new hardware you later installed. To use system restore: click Start...All Programs...Accessories...System Tools...System Restore.

I hope this is of some help to you.

by davidfurness

Both of your problems could be caused a compatability issue with the northbridge chipset on the motherboard. I had a simaliar problem with a DVD drive about a year ago. I ended up changing the motherboard to cure the problem. Upgrading the Bios may solve the problem. Have you got Service Pack 1 installed, this cured a lot of problems. Hope this helps.

by madhatter_202

Do a properties on your hard drives and make sure that the "Allow indexing service" box is checked. If you suspect it could be in a certain folder do a properties on the folder(S), click the advanced button, and check the "Folder is ready for Archiving" box.

As for your Burner. Like was started before, use only 1 burning application and make sure it has the latest patches for it. I think there might also be a patch on Windows Update that pertains to CD burning as well. I ran into that problem several times on XP Pro and Home. Hook your burner onto you Primary master cable with your hard drive (may have to set the jumper to slave) and see what it does from there or maybe get an old "Ultra66" PCI IDE card to help see if the Mother Board Controller is bad. Can it even play a music cd or read a data CD of any kind??

by themainliner

Ultimately, if you've been troubleshooting this problem for some time and even gone to the lengths of trying another CD writer, and testing all you other hardware as previously suggested, have you tried reinstalling your OS? It would be good if youhave another hard drive you could biuld a test XP system on just install XP and your burning software, troubleshoot from there I think your searching problem would probably go away after a rebuild too (assuming you are using search properly now).

by tmarcht

Go to Properties of the burner and check to see if the speed can be lowered. I've had this problem a number of times with customers and the the simple fix was to lower the speed. keep lowering the speed till you receive no more errors. Also wait forthe burner to see the blank Disk before you start burning. We are all to concerned about speed today, sometimes slow is better.

by rmcinty3

the problem in this case is not with your computer...as wonderful and simpimatic as nero is for regular cd recording, the InCD is not ready for general release yet....this problem has been in every release since it came out a couple of years ago...you're not alome with this problem

by jimbokb

I've been told you cannot have Nero and Adaptec on the same computer. There will be device problems. I've never experimented with the two on the same drive but even the to companies say this will not work. Both in their respective literature and on their web sights. If you do choose one over the other I've been hearing very good things about Nero. I use Roxio/Adaptec with no problem though.

by lerxst

Adaptec's Direct CD & Nero's InCD will not coexist peacefully together. I have Adaptec Easy CD Creator 5.0 Platinum with Diect CD & Nero without InCD installed on my WinXP Pro SR1 box & both programs work fine. When installing Nero if it finds Direct CD installed, it propmts a warning message regarding the issue. Choose which one will be your primary burning SW & uninstall the RW for the other SW.
Good luck
Lerxst

by hmlidst1

I am using Roxio Cd Creator Platinume/Nero5.5.10.42 Enterprise Edition and both programes work flawlessly. I must admit that I am partial to the Roxio works like a charm and has done everything expected also does great job on DVD's and now has excellent update for XP much cleaner that earlier. Good Luck

by mikepinz

open my computer and right click on the C drive. Go to properties. Under the general tab, make sure that the "Allow indexing service to index this drive for fast file searching" box is checked. Good luck.

by dklue

I havent used home xp but have been using pro for a while, in homexp can you start and run: services.msc, and check if IMAPI CD burning service is enabled, its possible its disabled. Indexing Service is also attainable from here.
You may also be able to run sfc /scannow, and
it will check the integrity of your system files.
This has fixed a few things on mine. GL

by jimboe

Have you tried to slow down the speed of your cdrw? This could also cause this kind of message.

by rob brown

"A Word or Phrase in the File" type of search:
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=KB;en-us;309173&
Every searchable file type MUST have a defined Persistent Handler in the registry, like this for .txt:
HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\.txt\PersistentHandler
(Default) value = {5e941d80-bf96-11cd-b579-08002b30bfeb}.
Many files, such as .sql or .vb, do not have one defined. This was by 'design' to speed up the search. MS did add more types in service packs. You can manually add this to any file type that you want to search for.

by jph290

i have been having a problem with my windows xp pro. I have been trying to open the help and support wizard thing and it wont open. Every time i click it there is some hard drive action but nothin pops up like it uses to can anyone help me.

by admin

except that on a w2k ad served network some users experience refresh problems in their netowrk folders. They fixed this in the 3rd 2k service pack... Why is it in XP?

by topdawg44

I've run across a couple of problems which have me stumped. I'm Cisco certified and have A+ and Net+ certs as well but these head-scratchers have been driving me nuts.
The first deal with home networking. I have a host connected to a WAP which connects to a wireless broadband device which shoots a signal directly to my ISP. There are a total of five hosts, two of which are wireless. All hosts can connect to the Internet and all hosts can see each other except for one lone holdout. No matter what I do, this single computer refuses to join the local (i.e. home) network. All systems on the local net use static IPs as well as the same gateway & DNS servers. HELP!!
The next problem concerns program installs. About 75% of these fail...they just hang about halfway through and eventually send back a "Remote proceedure call failure" msg. How can I ident the RPC? I assume a h.w. incompatibility but all of my hardware is stamped "Made for Windows XP".
Thanks for any help offered.

by madhatter_202

First off, as for your RPC problem. Are you installing the software local or across the network? What other services are running? Shut down all antivirus and firewall services. Have you got all your service packs and updates from MSFT applied? Have you ran disk clean up, chkdisk and defrag?

As for your Network problem. Make sure that the default firewall for XP is not on. Make sure you have the same workgroup name on all machines and that the subnet is the same for all machines. Can this pcaccess the internet? Make sure the XP default firewall is off. It is under the properties of the network adapter - advanced tab. Make sure any other firewalls are set to allow network neighbor hood to pass through for the time being. Lastly make sure you have the proper speed on the NIC Card. If it's wireless make sure your you are on the right wireless network. 1 other thing. I had a wireless card act up on me. I updated the driver from Windows update. Card would function for a few hours then lose connection. Used the driver roll back and all was good. Some more detailed info would help a ton.

by jim brubaker

I had the same problem all of my installs would hang and fail on one computer,the cds were good burns, but they behaved like defective cd's. I had a space in the computer name. Seems that using spaces even in file names can give you trouble with xp. Plus don't forget to set netbios over tcp/ip.

by alma_is_cool

I had an identical problem recently, I had five workstations, everything was fine, I added a sixth and bingo, your problem! It turned out that each workstation had 2 mapped drives to each of the other workstations. This would exceed the maximum of10 connections that a workstation is capable of handling in a workgroup situation as soon as I added the sixth workstation. Check it out, if you have overused the mapped drives, you can either disconnect some mapped drives or add a WINS server to your network.

by roylexi

Dear Sir,
I have a big prolem with my network that is
i have a cafe in Ghana west africa
and the problem is that my server uses winxp and the workstatios uses win98se now all of the workstatios don't see the server any more what do you think i should do to enable them see the server?but the can berows

by hvtechrick

Hello,

I would love to get rid off the list of user names from the drop down list in the "Connect to " dialog box when I connect to other machines on my home LAN. I would rather all users type it in with each and every call to connectwhen the dialog box appears again.

Same thing with the .net Messenger Service dialog box. If you put both dialog boxes up on the screen at the same time to compare their look and feel, they're practically identical.

I don't want any usernamesdisplayed on these drop down list in these dialog boxes. How can I get rid of them?

Thank you for your time and help.

Rick
HVTechRick@yahoo.com

by jim brubaker

This should get rid of the names.

go to run and run "gpedit.msc" no quotes, (general policy editor)

--Local Machine
-----Computer Config
--------Windows Steeing
-----------Local Policy
-------------Security Options
Scroll down on right to:
Interactive Login: do not display
default is disabled --so enable

I don't know if it will also work on .net items, but this is a start

by jim phelps

XP Professional is definitely S L O W E R than W2K Professional.

Probably lots of unnecessary stuff is going on in the background, stuff I would cancel if I could only figure out what it is and how to cancel it!

I've already cancelled lots of junk, like the psychedelic windows with the "active" borders, and other such foolishness.

I wonder how slow Windows 2003 will be? You'll probably need a 5Ghz processor with 10 GB of RAM to make it run at a reasonable speed!

by byron_millison

If you have a decent amount of RAM (a minimum of 256 in my opinion), WinXP runs just as fast if not faster than Win2k. Of course, it also helps to disable services that are unnecessary (see www.blackviper.com - a website I've used on numerous occassions - for more info). As for Windows server 2003, MS has finally wised up. They are shipping it with NO UNNECESSARY SERVICES enabled by default. It's about time, too.

by jeftecknt

Well after a year of XP Pro at home and 2K Pro and Server at work, i have never seen XP as slow as 2K. I have seen Server 03 in some instances and even it is faster than any previous NT OS. As for those things in the backround, you can disable services by going to the Administration tools. There are quit a few that run automatically that are a big waste of memory, so to speed things up (possibly considerably) just start turning stuff off. If it causes harm you can always do a restore.
Happy computing.

by batnet

1ST-Disable System Restore (Start Menu/right click on my computer/on scroll down menu choose properties/Click on system restore Tab/disable it/.
2nd-Still on System Properties/Click on advanced tab/click settings in the performance box/Click on theVisual Effects Tab/Select the Adjust for best performance/Click on the advanced Tab still in the performance options window/ click change in the virtual memory box/press on the virtual memory box/on the Paging file size for selected drive click custom size and on the initial size (MB)box reduce the amount to 275 and the maximum size to 307/click Set/click OK/click apply/Still on System Properties/Click on Automatic Updates Tab/Disable it by deselecting the box where it says keep my computer up to date/click apply/click apply/click OK.
4th-Right Click on your desktop/on scroll down menu choose properties/click on appearance tab/Click on Effects Button/unclick the top two boxes(Box 1-Use the following effects for menus and tool tips, Box 2-Use the following method to smooth edges of screen fonts) Click ok/click apply/Click ok
Enjoy

by plmcdon3

If you don't need any of the features of XP and you have an older machine (i.e. 333 to to 633) I would stay with win2K if I were you. I like XP Pro and don't have any problems with it but I noticed on older machines if you don't have at least 512meg(which some older mainboards only accept 384 meg max) it does seem a little bogged down at times.

by tr-ncs

I am running XP Home edition on a Dell Dimension 8200. Several weeks ago I turned off my PC for a day while I was having some construction done. When I went to boot up again in the evening, my PC just hourglassed at the Windows XP screen. I couldboot into Safe Mode and all my data seemed fine. I did a System Restore and it said it was successful but still it wouldn't boot. I finally just let it run and about 12 hours later it suddenly booted up. It worked fine and I updated my virus protection, scanned all the drives and removed the last program I had installed but when I went to reboot, it hung again. Again it hourglassed for several hours and then suddenly it booted up. This has happened several more times so now I am afraid to turn it off or to do a restart. Once it boots up it works fine but I can't tell if this is a hardware or software issue. Could the construction have had an impact (I do have it on a surge protector). Any suggestions?

by jim brubaker

Mcafee with certain video cards, especially Matrox have similar problems, I never waited around 12 hours to see if it would boot.

it could be a bad nic card also

by hb_bc

Do you have any type of a Virus scan, spyware scan, or torjan scan that starts up when you Bootup. If so it may be hanging and letting you boot, this would not run in safe mode. What type of Home repair? Elc. wireing do you have full 110 (120)power going to your computer (in safe mode it only loads the minimal driver & utility to operate, so it use less power than normal mode with all programs load trying to talk with a printer, scranner, cable modem, etc.) I'm not usually right, but I do get lucky now & then.

by schls834

aol has special 2.95 download macfees anti virus, they would keep you up dated . as long as you subscribed to it , after downloding could go to some web pages called aol. three times each time worked over 30 minutes with tech. never resolved problemdeleated it . installed nortons then could go and open the web sites i could not.

by bibibounch

Hello,

I'm not an IT guru but for having a little experience with XP's boot problem (using linux and xp on the same drive) I think these following commands could help.
They come from Microsoft Knowledge Base Article - 314058.
They've always fixed my boot problems.
In order to use the recovery console, you'll need to boot from xp's CD rom.

Hope this will help.

FIXBOOT
fixboot drive name:

Use this command to write the new Windows boot sector code on the system partition. In the command syntax, drive name is the drive letter where the boot sector will be written. This command fixes damage in the Windows boot sector. This command overrides the default of writing to the system boot partition. FIXBOOT is supported only on x86-based computers.
FIXMBR
fixmbr device name

Use this command to repair the master boot record (MBR) of the boot partition. In the command syntax, device name is an optional device name that specifies the device that needs a new MBR. Use this command if a virus has damaged the MBR and Windows cannot start.

by frank_s

Two suggestions. First you might want to try an earlier restore point, the one you used might have a problem. Second if that doesn't work you might want to use msconfig.exe and turn off all the startup items. Put them back one at a time to see if one of them is causing the problem. And one last thing, since most of the hung boot problems I've seen have been caused by anti-virus programs, I think that's where I'd look first.

by get what ya pay for

I would consider an "SFC /scannow" but I have never goten that to work without an actual xp disk not just having the restore disk that comes with most dells. If anyone knows how to redirect the comand to look in the I386 file that would be great. I do beliefe this does erease all restore points.

Another trick I have heard of is while you are in xp put the install disk in and run an upgrade.

by shaw

if it works in safe mode...that's a good thing! 1. run your system file checker: start>run sfc /purgecache and sfc /scannow
2. enter command console and run a chkdsk /r
3. turn everything off: use start> run> msconfig and disable all of the non-microsoft services and all startups. start turning them back on in groups that are easy to document and troubleshoot paying particular attention to the last few that you have installed.

what you are describing could take a little time to isolate buta relatively simple problem to solve.

by tr-ncs

Thanks to everyone for their suggestions. Things got worse before they got better (I eventually lost the ability to boot even into safe mode) but the final conclusion was that something had been corrupted in the OS. I ran chkdsk and found no problems with hard drive and deleting all the non-Microsoft applications at startup didn't help. Neither did System Restore or going back to the last good configuration. All Norton and MS updates were installed. What eventually worked was to find the original XP install disk that came with my Dell PC and do a repair and restore of Windows XP. It took many hours to complete but eventually I was back in business with no loss of data other than I had to reinstall my printer and of course will now need to redownload all the XP updates and patches since day 1. The only other suggestion that tech support could offer was to reformat the hard drive so I am hoping this solution sticks. I have also installed Spybot which detected and removed 156 previously unknown rogue applications which may have contributed to the problem. Thanks again.

by kerberos1980

Check your power supply, if you want to replace it you must order from dell. other brand PS won't work because dell has reversed a wire on thier PS to make others incompatable with thier Dell PC's.

by wkf

The specs on our Dell 8500 laptop don't show wheather it has NTFS or fat anything. Doesn't a laptop use the same file systems as a desk top?

by mgabca

Both, Desktops and Laptops can either work with NTFS or FAT32 file systems.
NTFS is recommended for security purposes; with it you have the option of encrypting files.
To know what type of file system Windows has been installed on, go to the Control Panel and look for the icon Administrative Tools, or Performance and Maintenance, then Administrative Tools. You will see a Computer Management shortcut. From there you can locate the Disk Management tool. It will show your HDD(s) information, andits file system type.
Some companies sell you PCs with a recovery partition that uses FAT32, and install the operating system over NTFS.

by tr-ncs

When I defragmented my PC this weekend I noticed that my C drive uses NFTS but my removable 40G Buslink hard drive uses FAT32. I haven't noticed any problems but wonder if this makes any difference regarding what I put on the Buslink drive? Currently I use it solely for storage of photo and music files. There are no programs running on it.

by databit

Or you could just right click on the drive in Explorer & select Properties - the General tab tells you the file system.

by piaqt

Right-click\properties the c:\ drive in "My Computer". On the general tab, under Type: Local Disk, it should say File System: NTFS or FAT.

IMHO, if it's FAT, convert to NTFS. More robust and stable. Hope this helps.

by drdean

"paste these links into your browser):" ?
THIS is the techy source, and they cant even make a URL that's clickable?
Buy THEIR books. Sure.

by ktfetting

The latest e-newsletter I received has a great tip in it for "Creating a drive menu for My Computer" but I'm curious if there's a way to do the same thing if a user has the "Classic Start Menu" chosen instead of the XP Start Menu.

I followed the process and worked my way through both menus, and I couldn't seem to find a way to do this with the classic start menu. But I'm much more comfortable with that choice rather than the XP setup.

Thanks!

by jim brubaker

Go to start--->run and type:
explorer /n,/e,::{20D04FE0-3AEA-1069-A2D8-08002B30309D}

create a desktop shortcut with this, and you'll have the explorer icon on your desktop

Next drag the icon down to the quick start toolbar

One mouse click and pick your drive.

by hayderalamily

I think that the combination of (START + E ) is work nicely and easy to remember.

Regard
Hayder Al-Amily

by fkkar1935

When I made my weekly trip to Windows Update page,
I got this message, Thanks for your interest in Windows Up date.You must have a Windows operating system to access this site. I am running Windows XP Pro. Has anyone else run into this problem?
Ifso, how did you solve it?Would really appreciate any help.
Thanks.

by eddie.limoncelli

HELP! if you can answer this when the tech support from Microsoft, Dell and NYU couldn't, you're the man (or woman)!
I'm using Windows XP Pro and have some shared folders that other users need. I can't find anywhere how to put passwords on those folders. Even Microsoft's Knowledge Base article entitled "Sharing Folders with Password Protection" only describes making the folders sharable, not how to put a password on them.
Without passwords, I suffered a Nimda worm attack that I'm still recovering from 3 months later. Symantec tells me that passwords on those folders would have prevented my infection.
Now I'm reduced to using an older, slower Win98 box because it will allow me to put passwords on my shared folders and WinXP won't.

by nick.hammond

Right click on the folder that you have shared and click permissions. Give yourself unrestricted access to the folder first. Next, remove the permission for user 'everyone'. Now add the users that you would like to access this folder with there respective permissions. Each user will be able to open the folder with no problem, or will be prompted with a username/password dialogue box.

by tmarcht

You can't password protect folders. I have four books here on WinXP and none of them show a way that a folder can be password protected. You can have a folder not shared on a network or accessed on a stand alone by another user. User must have his own account and the folder must be in the Administrators account. The Administrator account must have a password inorder to work.

You will need to use a third party program.
I checked on Google and found this link. This might help.

http://www.soft14.com/Utilities_and_Hardware/Security_and_Encryption/Folder_Password_Expert_202_Review.html

Good Luck
Tom

by jeftecknt

To do what your trying to do just encrypt the folder and its contents and use a private user account. Anyone on your system not using that account won't see anything and will need a password in order to view it from a network. Just be sure you have administrative rights or you wont be able to do it. Good Luck

by oconnb

I was just about to respond but saw solution from nick.hammond@cylicron.com . You did not specify that you meant across a Network or on the machine itself. This could change things a bit. I think that there is no specifics on this since it is almostassumed with the implementation of permissions for all.

by irvf

Here's some info from XP's help menu abour password protecting compressed folders:

To protect files in a zipped compressed folder with a password
Open My Computer, and then locate the compressed folder.
Double-click the compressed folder.
Onthe File menu, click Add a Password.
In the Password box, type a password.
In the Confirm Password box, type the password again.
Notes

To open My Computer, click Start, and then click My Computer.
Passwords are case sensitive.
You can identify compressed folders by the zipper on the folder icon.
When you extract an password protected file, the extracted file is no longer protected.

Haven't found anything on non-compressed folders.

by Former member

Hello,
Although this may not help, Windows XP is based on Windows NT (and 2000), which both had permissions available. The permissions tab cannot be seen in Windows XP, although the feature is still present. (Remember, one important feature of NTFS is its capability of extra permissions, although Windows NT and 2000 on FAT partitions still had some permisisons available.) I think I can prove that Windows XP still has permissions, because at some point during Windows XP setup, the permissions tab IS still visible. Therefore, this feature may be turned off via the registry, or maybe it is in fact a replace file-I'm not sure. I hope this may help.
Thanks,
Isaac Koch
WK Computers

by Former member

Hello again,
This issue intrigued me so I diid some Google searching (of course!), and here is what you ant to know:
In your Windows XP machine, Click Start, then click Run...
Type in "secpol.msc" (without the quotes), and click "OK." (Pardon me for talking like Microsoft's knowledge base now. :) ) [FYI, this can also be accomplished by clicking Start, Control Panel, Administrative Tools, and Local Security Policy.]
Expand the Local Policies option and select the Security key. In the right-hand pane, find the Value called "Network Access: Sharing and Security model for local accounts" and double-click it to change it to "Classic - local users authenticate as themselves" OR find the value called "Network access: Force network logons using local accounts to authenticate as Guest" and change it to disabled. You must then reboot your machine. (I found this information at http://www.ntfaq.com/Articles/Index.cfm?ArticleID=21173 which has a screenshot displaying the second value and instructions on changing it (which I repeated here). On my Windows XP Pro machine, the first value was what I had to change, therefore I included it as well.)
Of course, after you reboot, you will need to grant access to the appropriate user (and/or groups). Any user or users within the group(s) you granted access to will need to have passwords set (instead of a blank password).
This method does create somewhat of a hassle, requiring you to manage users, but it gets the job done.
PLEASE NOTE: Although I haven't tried it, setting a password on the Guest account would probably accomplish your goal, and you wouldn't have to do the other steps outlined above. The only drawback to this approach would be that all your shared folders would have the same password, regardless of who accessed them.
Thanks, and I hope this does indeed help!
Isaac Koch
WK Computers

by eddie.limoncelli

Yes, I'd already tried some of those solutions, but there were some new ones, too. Using permissions won't work, because I have over 100 users who need infrequent access to certain folders and several who need daily use of others. Setting up all those users on my XP machine won't work. Here's the solution I've settled on:
I converted an old Win98SE box into an ersatz fileserver. Simple, but effective. Thanks again for all your ideas!
eddie

by hayderalamily

You can easily put password this way:
right any folder (any even it dosn't shared) then choose (sharing and security) then tick the (make this folder private) box ,now click Apply now every one want to enter this folder MUST type your USER NAME AND PASSWORD,sure this for network
Regard

Hayder Al-Amily

by thechas

XP should have no problem with your configuration.

Keeping the external drive as a FAT32 volume will allow you to connect it to a PC running Windows 95 or 98 and still be able to access the files.

The only situation that I can think of that might present a problem to XP is if you had page files on both a NTFS and A FAT32 volume.

Chas

by drumz63

I have had MacAfee Personal firewall and Virus scan online on my XP machine for 3 months now with no problems at all.

by dirtyratjim

I chat with a friend across country using MSN messenger. We both have the latest version installed on our machines, however he is using the ME operating system and I use XP. He can send photos on Messenger and I can receive them. But, when I attempt to send him a photo, (XP) tells me the connection is blocked. Since I have my machine on a dual boot, with ME and XP, I have to shut down XP, start ME and through Messenger can send and receive pics fine!
Question is, what if anything can I do in XP to get Messenger to allow me to send Pic transfers?

by get what ya pay for

I know that "netsh int ip reset C:\resetlog.txt" will refresh the TCP/IP stack, but what is "netsh interface reset all" actually resetting?

by chiliman

HPLazerJet 3150 is installed as printer & Fax. HP LazerJet 5P doesn't show in the installed printers panel. When XP machine comes up it prints 1 line of random characters to HP LazerJet 5P until someone intervenes. I installed it (5P) and it installed as (copy 2), printed, then uninstalled. Also this XP pc is print server to HP LazerJet 3150 for another pc in the office. System info shows printer port twice, one is the default 3f8? location and the other I don't recall, the installed printer is also a fax machine so is this the reason I see the port twice? I've just started with support role here so I don't have alot of history. Thanks

by chiliman

Today I removed a pair of printer ports that pointed to the HP LazerJet 5P via a share on another pc in the office, it's a w2k Pro that hosts the XP Pro users home dir. Well after reboot I thought that was it, but about 5mins later as I'm leaving the printer starts up, same drill, the difference was the lag in starting to print and the first page had a type of header saying that "this program can not print in DOS mode". I plan next to reboot the XP while the w2K is down. Any advise would be appreciated, thanks.

by Member 31833046

Try setting up a port on each machine using the printers Mac address, as it sounds as if your DHCP is'nt working too well to me. Or, at least make sure they are using the same address.

by rwomack

Here's the situation...I have a computer lab with 30 PCs in it. I setup a default user profile with 2 printers. I want the front half of the room to use printer A and the back half of the room to use printer B. I've gone into the registry and set the HKEY_CURRENT_USER to default to printer A in the front half of the room. The problem is that it doesn't. Any of you got a clue about what to do next?

by downunder2005

You could use the login utility KixStart to force each computer to use whatever printer you choose. As long as you have a server/client arrangement set up for the room, Kixstart can default a printer according to a user, computer name, group membership, etc. Name your systems carefully, eg: B01RM12bckWKS27 (building 01, room 12, back, workstation 27) - & B01RM12fntWKS05 (building 01, room 12, front, workstation 05) then use Kixstart to default Printer A to B01RM12fnt, and so on.
Kixstart is a very powerful tool and relieves you from editing registries, etc.
See how you go.

by agent 77

if you go to the update site BE CAREFUL; hotfix 811493 will bog your system down. there is an article about it on the knowlege base and yet the boys at Microsoft don't see fit to take it off the update site--if its on your system, uninstall it and you'll see a big difference

by jlhighsmith

was in put place by MS on 5/28/03 to correct this problem.
To determine in you need to download the correction, go to the MS Knowledge Base Article Number 819634.

by chug

This follows from the July 17 Windows XP Tips newsletter that contained a short article on making sure that Windows XP properly detected your CPU L2 Cache size and how to fix it if it didn't. Contained in that is the following .vbs script.

Set ProSet = GetObject("winmgmts:").InstancesOf("Win32_Processor")
For each Pro in ProSet
WScript.Echo "Level 2 Cache:" & " " & Pro.L2CacheSize & " KB"
Next

Supposedly, running this script is supposed to tell you what your CPU cache is. However, I've now run it on two different computers and in both cases, this script displays 0kb (zero) for a cache size.

One computer is one at work with an IBM NetVista with Pentium 4 1.8 GHz Willamette core with a 256k L2 cache. The other computer is my home built P4 2.6c CPU with 512k L2 cache (it's the new 800MHz FSB series on an Abit IC7 motherboard that uses the new Intel 875p chipset).

I also have the WCPUID utility and it does show the proper cache size on both machines, but the script included in the article shows 0k on both machines.

On my computer at home, Windows XP indeed was wrong, it had defaulted to the 256k cache as the article said instead of the 512k that the CPU really has. I'm just concerned if I'll run into any problems changing the registry to the correct 512k considering the .vbs script can't even detect it correctly. I'm also curious just to know why the script doesn't appear to work.

Thanks!!

by Greg Shultz

Cory:

This is a pretty straightforward script... nothing fancy or out of the ordinary.

Do you get any kind of error message?

What version of Windows XP are your computers running?

Are they upgraded with Service Pack 1?

Have you had anopportunity to try the script on any other computers?

Has anyone else reading this post experienced similar problems?

by larry.kershaw

I'm getting the same results when running the script. The message box returns Level 2 Cache: 0KB. I get the same response on both my work computer (Dell with dual 2GHz Intel Xeon processors, 512KB of L2 Cache, ) and my home computer. Both are running XP Pro with all the updates applied.
Since my work computer has 2 processors, I receive the message box twice with the same results.

Thanks for your help.

by chug

No error message at all. The dialog box that's supposed to pop up does pop up, but it just says 0kb for the cache size. It happens on 2 different PC's. Windows XP with SP1 and all MS updates.

I got a suggestion from from a fellow at work. He figured that for some reason on my PC's, the script was failing to instantiate the Win32_Processor object. He added some error checking to the script to check for that, but it didn't error out. Then he sent me the following:

" run the program c:\windows\system32\wbem\wbemtest

hit the connect button, and enter the name
space of "root\CIMV2"

then hit the enum instances button and
have it enumerate "Win32_Processor"

This should pull back one instance of Win32_Processor, then double click on that and it should allow you to browse all the properties for the win32_processor object including cpu name, max clock speed and of course l2 cache size.

If you can view it then it is probably a problem with the vbscript, and I think there is registry setting that controls the default namespace for WMI (windows management). The default for machines that it works on is probably the root\CIMV2 namespace. On your machine it could be something else.... hard to say..."

I tried this. I WAS indeed able to browse all the properties of the win32_processor object, so that's not failing. BUT, sure enough, the value for the L2cachesize setting of the win32_processor was definitely listed as 0k. So however these Windows processes are reading the CPU hardware, it obviously isn't working on my PC.

by chug

Well, a collegue at work came up with this. Apparently, according to Microsoft, we should NOT change the SecondLevelDataCache registry setting. Here are two MS Knowledgebase articles we found regarding this.

Apparently this registry setting only applies to older CPU's that handled their L2 cache in a different way. It does not work with Pentium II or newer CPU's.

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;228766

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=http://support.microsoft.com:80/support/kb/articles/Q183/0/63.ASP&NoWebContent=1

by Greg Shultz

These KB articles refer to the Windows 2000 Server family of products and Windows NT family of products not to Windows XP Workstation.

In any case, changing the value in the registry will not harm your system.

Here's Microsoft's recommendation for altering the L2 Cache setting... this comes directly from the second KB article:

==========================================
SecondLevelDataCache records the size of the processor cache, also known as the secondary or L2 cache. If the value of this entry is 0, the system attempts to retrieve the L2 cache size from the Hardware Abstraction Layer (HAL) for the platform. If it fails, it uses a default L2 cache size of 256 KB. If the value of this entry is not 0, it uses this value as the L2 cache size. This entry is designed as a secondary source of cache size information for computers on which the HAL cannot detect the L2 cache.
===========================================

However, the article goes on to specfy that most newer pentium systems should correctly identify the Level 2 cache:

===========================================
This is not related to the hardware; it is only useful for computers with direct-mapped L2 caches. Pentium II and later processors do not have direct- mapped L2 caches. SecondLevelDataCache can increase performance by approximately 2 percent in certain cases for older computers with ample memory (more than 64 MB) by scattering physical pages better in the address space so there are not so many L2 cache collisions. Setting SecondLevelDataCache to 256 KB rather than 2 MB (when the computer has a 2 MB L2 cache) would probably have about a 0.4 percent performance penalty.
===========================================

by bvogley

When using a wireless connection to the local network, there is always a 4+ minute delay to print. It also prohibits Word and other applications by the same time. This happens on Dell, and HP for sure wiht both Linksys and Netgear witeless. If you try to close the application, XP reports the application is not responding

This does not happen with Win 2000 and there does not appear to be a fix.

Anyone else experiencing this type of operation?

Thanks, Bill

by Greg Shultz

Using the WBEMTest routine as your buddy told you will indeed allow you to see the L2CacheSize setting.

I'm still not sure why your system, and many other people's systems, are reporting a value of 0.

However, since you were able to verify that the L2Cache setting was showing 0 in the script and in the WBEMTest routine that removes the suspicion that the script contains an error.

I'll have to investigate this further and see if I can find out why the value is set to 0.

by Greg Shultz

Hey folks:

Many people are reporting that the script presented in the July 17th newsletter "Adjust the Level 2 cache setting":

========================================== =====
Set ProSet = GetObject("winmgmts:").InstancesOf("Win32_Processor")
For each Pro in ProSet
WScript.Echo "Level 2 Cache:" & " " &
Pro.L2CacheSize & " KB"
Next
===============================================

is reporting a value of 0KB for the L2 Cache Size. This has become a bit of a mystery and I'd like to solve it by trying to find a pattern.

The script is a very straightforward and doesn't contain any errors. As such there must be some little quirk in how XP interacts with certain CPUs when attempting to retrieve the L2 Cache value.

If everyone who is interested in this mystery will run the script and then post a message with the results along with information on your system, I'll see if I can find out what's happening.

For example, report your findings in this format:

System: Dell Dimension 4100
CPU: Pentium III 1GHz
Script Reports: 256 KB

by rob brown

Dell Dimension 4100
Pentium III 1GHz
Level 2 Cache: 256 KB

Should be no surprise that the script works on my box, given that I have the same configuration as you. :)

by johannus63

System: ASUS P4s533
CPU: Pentium IV 2.4GHz
Script Reports: 0 KB

System: HP Pavillion 8756c
CPU: Pentium III 857GHz
Script Reports: 256 KB

by chug

I have 2 systems I've tried this on. The script reports 0 kb on both.

IBM NetVista
Pentium 4 1.18 GHz

home built Pentium 4 2.6 GHz (the new P4 2.6C with 800 MHz FSB)

I wonder if maybe it isn't something to do just with the Pentium 4 CPU?

by emregover

Hi,

Is there a way to update intallation cd with windows update files from the web?
So, if I have to reinstall Windows from the scratch, I don't have to download the updates again.

Regards

by jph290

I belive you can take the windows update installing files from "c:\program files\windowsupdate\" and burn them on a disk and indivdually installing the updates. I am not totally sure if it will work 100% right.
Jason

by chug

I'll agree that changing this value probably won't harm your PC. But definitely won't help either. As you quoted from the second KB article:

====================
This is not related to the hardware; it is only useful for computers with direct-mapped L2 caches. Pentium II and later processors do not have direct- mapped L2 caches. SecondLevelDataCache can increase performance by approximately 2 percent in certain cases for **OLDER** computers with ample memory (more than 64 MB)
======================

Thus, if your PC has any Intel CPU Pentium II or newer, this setting in the registry won't do anything for your PC. Also, many computers older than a Pentium II probably don't have more that 64 Mb of RAM, so it looks like it would not be a good idea to change this setting on those PC's either (unless you know you do have more than 64 Mb of RAM on a CPU older than a Pentium II).

The KB article does say that it's for Windows NT/2000, but I believe it's reasonable to assume that it applies to Windows XP as well. I've run into lots of Microsoft KB articles that list only one or two OS's or one or two versions of a program (for example Office) but end up applying to all versions.

by jph290

I have been trying to run the help and support center in windows xp pro and it wont run. It used to work but now it doesn't. It shows activity but it never loads the program. Does anyone have a solution other than reinstalling win xp pro.
Jason

by jim brubaker

run sfc /scannow and make sure to put the Windows xp cd in the cdrom (it will ask for it)--it should replace missing files---there is also a reg-cleaner program that will wipe out your help files--I can't remember which one, but if you used it, their web page I think had a fix for it.

by bwallace

In Win2000, I've read that Offline files were held in a hidden folder csc (client side Cache). Where are the files and the sync database stored locally for WinXP Pro. I have a file in the shortcut to Offline Files that will not delete.

by freeozraelised

Hi,

I got a small network with s server running win 2000 server and 45 clients at a mix - some XP some win 2000. The Win XP Pro are new client about 1 week now and all the XP machine keep on droping of the network every now and again there is no specific time, some of the users need to login a few times in the morning so they can get their roaming profile. all the XP replaced old machine that were running win2000 service pack3 the old machine were PII 600 with 128 RAM. The new machines are P4 2.4 and 256RAM but they seems to run slower on the network keep dropping and usrs can not get thier roaming profiles.
I am new to Windows XP Pro and need some help, I am the only IT persons and the rest are smart ar.e accountant pleas help.

Thanks
Avi