785. CAUTION: Dell 15-5000 Bad Opt Drive Mount and Need to fix AC3165 driver/setup

Update 1/2/17 - BINGO! It took another level of escalation to convince Dell that the drives could be ok, but the drive mount or connection inside were at fault. I considered that to be the case when I had to physically remove the drive to clear an error condition and than reinstall it. The next manager up immediately initiated a PC System Exchange and I received a new PC in 2 days. Installed it and tested immediately before any other installations/customization. It was SO-O-O-O QUIET! I can't believe I wasted over 10 hours with the first-line technical support idiots who HEARD THE NOISE (clattering, chattering, tick like a Big Ben clock) and saw the failures and instead of instantly doing the right thing, continued to bug me about compatibility of CDs. I finally looked up that concern on their site by looking at optical drives and reading the additional documentation re them. In that documentation it clearly states that ALL types of previously recorded discs WILL run! Today I built the new system and started to wipe my data off the bad PC. By tomorrow it will be on a UPS truck going back to Dell. I suppose I should give kudos to the manager Ankit who understood the issue and problems and did the Exchange along with prepaid return of the bad one. Thanks. However, he was also given an earful re his support team who monumentally screwed up! But, what's about 15 min-hours of their time worth?


Conclusion: Don't take crap from a Dell first or second line support and if you are confident re your problem and likely cause, get on the escalation train quickly. I still haven't had an Internet hit, so I'm quite happy now with this Dell.

Update 10/21/17 - Internet running fine now. Dell, after escalating 2 levels is sending a new PC. The problem with the drive might be related to the gouge hole on the drive bezel (face plate) reported. It might be that the mounting bracket is damaged. In 2 weeks we'll be testing new PC and optical drive.

Initial Problem:

So far I have tried 3 HL-DT-STDVD+- GU09N optical drives, the one that came with my NEW 15-5000 series 5700. All are a piece of crap! The first could read only 1 of 13 disks (CD,DVD,Commercial Audio, Commercial movie) and only one time. In other words, the drive failed on every disk tried. All disks run flawlessly in two other Dell PCs (older ones) and the movie runs in DVR Player attached to TV. Dell has been unhelpful other than taking over my system to look at info and run the same tests I ran, which failed! Dell did get two REFURBISHED drives to me, but all 3 were failures in one way or the other. Such as: Never got recognized by Windows 10, never loaded, never did autoplay, failed during play (movie) every time, crashed system once, hung applications, etc.

It amazes me that a company like DELL, selling fine processors, continues to put trash components inside. The drive I had had a date of 6/30/2015! Despite updating all drivers, 2 days after installing the new preinstalled system, the results were as stated. During the 3rd removal, the plastic connection on the bezel finally had enough and broke off! I used electricians on what was left and stuffed it on successfully.

Meanwhile, the tech rep Nio who proudly said she would handle the service request exclusively by email, hadn't responded to 4-5 emails sent until I emailed DELL customer support about the issue. Then she sent me a phone number to call, obviously begging out! Needless to say, she'll get a 0 stars from me on a survey.

So, I don't know where I stand on the Dell Service Request. I reinstalled the 2nd drive since it is the best of the worse. At least audio and data disks, except for one DVD-R worked. Movies are still a problem and I have yet to test burning to a disk which I have read on Internet help sites that I should not expect much, or should I say, more than little.

This entry is a CAUTION to those buying Dell products which I have used for over 14 years and enjoyed! I think I'm old enough to build my own now with good components. Oh, the Wireless adapter, AC3165, has also caused unrecoverable (automatically) intermittent Internet drops, crashed my router twice, blue-screened (seems MSFT on Creator version at least catches things and didn't present a blue screen, but instead a screen to tell you you have crashed and being restarted). I have downloaded a newer driver directly from Intel to try to fix problems (not available yet to Dell).

784. New PC with Creator Version Installation Example

 I thought I'd share with you my experience installing a new Dell PC with preinstalled Windows 10 Creator Version where I was coming from an older Dell with Anniversary Version.:

1.      Note the new PC’s support info. For the Dell 15-1500 Series 5700 being installed, thefollowing applies:

a.      Dell Service Tag: xxxxxx

b.      Dell Express Svc Code: xxxxxx

c.      Dell Warranty: Expires xxxxx

2.      Attach power and Ethernet cable and power on.

3.      When asked for logon credentials by Microsoft’s popup asking for its account ID and password, do NOT use it. Instead create a Local Logon with your desired UAC name. But, since I did not catch this, the steps will proceed with using the MSFT Account ID and password. It will ask for a PIN to for the account also: xxxx.

4.      Fingerprint Setup … I believe later you can ADD a fingerprint. We will try additional users by doing Start > type HELLO you can proceed to fingerprint processing.

5.      Cortana Setup … Cortana is a waste. Dumb it down here and later kill it.

6.      Dropbox … No need for this, did NOT setup

7.      Onedrive … No need for this, did NOT setup

8.      McAfee … Will not use this 1-year trial, so did NOT setup and remove later

9.      Netflix … will never use, so did NOT setup and remove later

10.   Kill Cortana: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE > Software > Policies > Microsoft > Windows. Now, setup a Key  (there already or create one) called AllowCortana equal to DWORD32 = 0. If you want to reenable Cortana, set it to 1. Note: Cortana task cannot be diabled permantently and will still pop up under active tasks.

11.   Somewhere it automatically set up the Network, including wireless, but has not yet set up password to wireless.

12.   Chrome: Download from Google website. When it installs and you login with Google Account, it automatically creates same bookmarks, add-ons, passwords, from before. Change default Download pointer by Settings > Advanced > Downloads. Set to d:\Downloads from c:\users\me\downloads.

13.    Netgear Genie: This was difficult to find on Netgear site. Instead had to search Google for it and then go to the link owned by Netger. Downloaded and installed.

14.   CCleaner downloaded and installed, version ccsetup.535.exe.

15.   Network Adapters: Note wireless AC3165 in this PC, driver=Intel, 19.51.4.2, 7/2/17

16.   Backupper: Get from site and installed This is used to backup/recover personal data on D:

17.   Create RECOVERY drive and save system files. Start > RECOVERY

18.   Speccy: Downloaded and installed

19.   Thunderbird: This is Email Agent used. Download and install.

a.      Set up email accounts using EXISTING email addresses

b.      Set up Local Folders by copying them from old PC. On that PC do Help > Troubleshooting > Open Profile Folder to get their location. Now, open File Explorer and go to the location > Open Mail > Local Folders and copy the files to flash drive. On new PC, repeat the steps until you get to Local Files subdirectory in File Explorer and copy Flash Drive files into it. You are done.

c.      On old PC Thunderbird, go to Address Book and EXPORT LDIF or .CSV file to Flash Drive.

d.      On new PC Thunderbird, IMPORT them from Flash Drive calling them My…..whatever

20.   Note the entire Configuration:

Processor: i&-8550U @ 1.8 GHz

Memory: 8GB (capable up to 16 GB) in slot 1. 8192 DDR4 (2400 MHz), SMBIOS, Mfr = 01980000802C, Part # KMKYF9-MID

etc.

21.   BIOS: When Dell Logon screen comes up, QUICKLY hit F2

22.   Set up File Network sharing: Network Sharing > Advanced . Then turn on “network discovery” and “file and printer Sharing”. If asked for network credentials when trying to get to old PC, they are the user name TPANC13 and PW for getting on that system. Make sure the old PC also has these file settings. ALSO, Shut everything down including Router (unplug for 30 secs). Now, bring up router and power up PCs.

23.   SAFE Mode: Hold Shift and do Restart AND keep holding Shift until menu comes up for Troubleshooting, Select Windows Startup Settings and select Safe Mode.

24.   Dell Diagnostics: Power off. Power on and continually tap F12 until menu comes up.

25.   Remove McAfee and ensure Windows Defender comes active.

26.   Install broker software

27.   AxCrypt: Installed by copying 1.7.28930-x64-en-us-beta.msi to d:\AxCrypt Install Files. Then run it. The KEEPTIMESTAMP reg hack must be redone to keep timestamp equal to underlying file. Got this from old PC and now in d:\Hacks folder.

28.   AnyPassword: Copied AnyPassword to d:\AnyPassword and execute apwp.exe 3/19/12 file. Once installed, copy database PSW2016.PW from old PC into same D:\AnyPassword directory. You will need Key. Should be in folder, but have to change extension to .reg and run it. Now, customize when started the the default folders/files to use pointing to new PSW2016.PW.

29.   SyncToy: Downloaded 2.1 and installed. Will probably not use this since it got things all messed up!

30.   Office 2003: Install from the CD. Get Office Service Pack SP3 from Microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=8 and install it to get last level of last updates before being discontinued. Also need the Office Compatibility product that allowed 2003 to use 2007 and above files. Set up the default libraries in both Word and Excel to point to D:.

Problem: EULA prompt every time Excel brought up. Fix is to start Excel as Administrator,load a file, and close. Next time everything will be ok.

Problem: Clicking on a .xls file does not get you to Excel. File Associations need to be updated. The installation of Microsoft Office Compatibility Pack for Word, Excel, Powerpoint File Formats needed to be installed. It assigns .xls to Open XML Converter. The download to install is actualled called File FormatConverter.exe

31.   Problem: At this point noisy Optical drive Problem and failures to data CDs. Called Dell Tech Pritam and after many hours showing problem manager Mohammed on 10/19 committed to send out new drive due here on 10/23.

32.   Brother Printer (DCP-L2540DW Series): This will work automatically. Driver some how works with anything. However, we needed Utilities to use scanner, etc. Tried disk, but Optical drive went into a loop (see 32 for more problems). So, installed Full drivers, Network MF2-Prosuite from the Brother site. Bring up CC4 app and change default libraries for scanned files to d:\Harware\Brother…\Scanned Documents.

33.   Cute PDF: Download from site BOTH Cute PDF and Prereq GhostScript Converter and install.

34.   Window Title Colors: Go to Settings > Personalize > Colors and set

35.   Display Theme. Find Yosemite file and run it.

36.   Accuweather Gadget. This uses Air, so both the widget download was required after searching Accuweather Stratus download AND Air from real ADOBE site.

37.   Downloaded ACDSEE for Pentax, but did not install. We’ll use default application Photos. Quicktime was required for other one.

38.   Decrypted all picture files so we can find them via Photos. Actually use less disk space.

39.   Ancestral Quest 15. Downloaded from searched site and got Key from old PC to enter. Copy old Ancestry Stuff on Desktop of old PC to new location D:\AncestryStuff

40.   Powerpoint Viewer. Download and install.

41.   Touchpad Blocker: Download and Install. Changed toggle to Ctrl+T because Ctrl+F9 was used elsewhere.

42.   UAC Picture: Search and go ahead and update.

43.   Customized Start ICONs. Removed crap from install and built mine using smaller Icons and groups.

44.   Create subdirectory under d:\Family\Nancy called Books & Movies and used file sharing to copy most recently updated Books, Movies, eBook .doc files. Now they will be backed up with normal backups. However, I do need to copy periodically her files into this new folder on my PC.

45.   Create SymList link for Thunderbird folder containing address book, etc. data. See Post 783.

Hope this is of use to someone. The install and customization took less than a half day when you remove the time wasted with the Optical Drive problem -- see post 782.

783. Symbolic Links (SymLists, mklink)

·       Symbolic Links: To create a “Symlink” to make Windows believe a folder’s data is still on the C:  drive, but really in D:\SymListFolders, do the following:

1. Create a Target-folder with same name as Source-folder path that is to be linked, using “-“ instead of “\” in full path name. [Really don't need the same name, but doing so gives you a visual indication of what the full path was.] For example, to link the data Thunderbird uses for addresses and other things, the Source-folder is originally c:\“Users\teob6\AppData\Roaming\Thunderbird\Profiles\hqme2hyq.default”, and the Target-folder to create will be “D:\SymListFolders\Users-teob6-AppData-Roaming-Thunderbird-Profiles-hqme2hyq.default” folder
2. Copy all subfolders and files from the Source-folder [in the example,  c:\“Users\teob6\AppData\Roaming\Thunderbird\Profiles\hqme2hyq.default”] to the Target- folder [“D:\SymListFolders\Users-teob6-AppData-Roaming-Thunderbird-Profiles-hqme2hyq.default” in the example]. The Target-source will now hold the data, not the Source-folder on the C: drive)
3. Delete or rename the existing Source-folder on C [in our example, c:\“Users\teob6\AppData\Roaming\Thunderbird\Profiles\hqme2hyq.default”]. It must before attempting an mklink command. This frees up all space used by it in exchange for space now on the D drive.
4. Bring up CMD box by typing CMD in Start then RUN as ADMINISTRATOR
5. Create the Symbolic Link by doing: “mklink /d  Source-folder  Target-folder”. [In my example, do “mlkink /d  C:\Users\teob6\AppData\Roaming\Thunderbird\Profiles\hqme2hyq.default  D:\SymListFolders\Users-teob6-AppData-Roaming-Thunderbird-Profiles-hqme2hyq.default].
6. Now, whenever an application or anything goes after the Source-folder which was on C: originally, it instead operates against the Target-folder on D:. Specifically, the Target-folder will be in D:\SymListFolders\Target-folder [as created above].
7. I am now able to backup system data, like Thunderbirds data, using normal backup procedures, plus, space is used on D: instead of c:

 To remove the link, simply deleted it on C:. It will have a folder ICON with arrow in it designating a SymList to another location. Then if still required, create the folder back to the path on c: removing the “-“ and replacing the “\” and the md command, or just create the paths via File Explorer.

782. Windows 10 Creator Version Problems

Yesterday I received my new Dell 15-5000 Series 5570 Laptop and it came with Creator Version installed. I suppose I should be grateful that that saved the reinstallation step from Anniversary Version. So, what issues did I discover with version 1703, Build 15063.540?

1. File sort when clicking on Name does not work correctly. I am still diagnosing problem, but for now it appears that the sort is limited to just the first x number of characters. For example, if I have a long named file like a statement coming from a broker where I added at the end the year, say 2016 or 2017 all in the same folder, you would expect looking at the list of files after NAME is clicked and expect the 2016 files to appear first, followed by the 2017 files. Well, instead, you get a 2016, a 2017, a 2016, a 2017, etc. When I narrow down the specifics, I'll post back here.

2. Microsoft's implementation of the User Account Name and the User Profile Folder will probably be a problem for just me. Back in the days when Windows 10 came out, all worked fine. If you [mistakenly] installed you system with the Microsoft Account email address, but later determined that you didn't want that and changed to a Local Logon method, the name you picked for the Local Logon, say SAM would be used in the creation of a user profile name, hence, c:\users\SAM. Well, now, if you used an email MSFT Acct name, say abcde13@xxxxx.net, abcde is used to create C:\users\abcde folder for all your account file. Not very nice since you were expecting SAM. There is no easy way, or a 100% sure way, of changing the user fold name; can't rename, except maybe in SAFE mode or via DOS, but the Registry is already populated with programs and other thing relating to c:\users\abce and will fail. Rename does NOT change all the references in Registry, or even possibly elsewhere. So, the workaround for me is to suck it up and go ahead and change my Local Logon, i.e., User Account name to abcde! Oh well!

3. Installing Brother Printer software from disk, a mere 1-1.5 years old, ended up in an infinite read and error recovery/retry that locked up the entire system. The cause seems to be the Optical DVR/CD device installed in my new Dell. The recovery/retry infinite loop is software error! Some piece of software, driver or application should have abandoned the retries after so many and just give an error. After 4 hours on phone with Dell Support, the manager realized in less than 5 minuted that a new drive needs to be installed. Duh. Other symptoms of problem was the loud clattering noise on older CDs, the inability to execute an Autoplay setup without manually invoking it, taking a long, long time in some cases to even see the disks existence by the operating system, etc. New drive on the way.I'll report back with test results. 10/24/17 Update: We have 2 problems here: (a) the Optical DVR/CD drive that came with my Dell 15-1500 Series 5700 was bad. Only about 5-10% of the time could I use it. Problems consisted of never being recognized by File Manager (no disk ID for the drive), ID in file manager, but never loaded, infinite attempts to try to read any info files on it, Auto Play not recognized, Some but not all data displayed after loading, hangs to application trying to run a file from it, etc. May I mention that these problems apply to Audio disks, Video DVDs, and Data disks that all work flawlessly on two other PCs and/or DVD/CD player attached to a TV. Dell replaced that Optical drive with, NOT a new one, but a refurbished one! The second one got through the Audio and Data disks, except initially failed twice -- seems like it needs to be trained. However, the Video Disks failed about 80% of the time for 12 different movie purchased and original movie disks. The problems were the same as initially on previous Optical drive. Round three coming -- a third optical drive. If this doesn't work, the entire Dell machine is going back unless they replace it with a working external optical drive. (2) No progress on number of retries. I did notice that some software can govern the number of retries and the time before retries. I'm looking into driver-specific software now.

10/24/17 Update for 4, 5, 7 below: These could all be user error 😬. I decided to download different backup software, SYnBack Free just in case I had to abandon SyncToy. Its documentation, since they currently support the product unlike SyncToy that has been abandoned by Microsoft, clearly explains and cautions the user on the differences between backing up methods and how to manage your backups. Briefly, MIRROR your drived ONLY if you want the target drive to look identically to the Source drive at all times. This method will delete files on Target if no longer in the Source. Thus, if you had a really old file on Source and deleted it there, it will also be deleted on your backup. You may not want this. BACKUP method copies only changes to source (edits, movement, etc.) to Target disk, NEVER deleting anything from Target. Sounds promising for those who want the Target as a complete backup over many years and want to maintain a total backup while the Source mast only keeps current files. However, beware that if you do what I do, namely have an Archive folder in my key directories that I use to hold the old stuff, keeping my main view with only current files I need to see, the Target after the BACKUP will now get those files under Archive AND keep them outside before they were move to Archive. In all cases, SYNCHRONIZE is another, it is important NEVER to modify the Target yourself. Well, wrong too. You see, unintentionally, I sometimes backup before I notice that one or more of my personal, sensative files went over unencrypted. I I used the BACKUP method, after encrypting it, I now have bothe the unencrypted and encrypted there! To correct this, I need to manually delete the unencrypted files from the Target. I could use MIRROR to automatically do this, but then all other deletions I made on Source will be deleted from Target. There's no nice solution for me with backing up encrypted files. So, in short, I will be using SYncBack Freeware for backups because they maintain the software and support it and have great documentation.

4. Either the file COPY function or Microsoft's SyncToy product is causing copying failures. For example, I copied, one way or the other or both, and ended up with inconsistencies in the number of items in the source and target directories. In some cases, just some files went missing. In another case, entire subfolders were not there and missing with more than a coincidence, e.g., For 3 folders I had subfolders 2013,2014,2015,2016,2017. The target created the folders only for 2013-2016. 2017 was left out for all three upward folders! Strange. Further testing required to determine the culprit. But, beware that SyncToy and/or COPY may not always work right.

10/24/17 Update (see above):
5. Never, never have a folder named ARCHIVE! I had subfolders in at least 10 directories named that where I accumulated past files in so not to clutter the most current ones. One of the copy methods, COPY or SyncToy decided that the files in each ARCHIVE subdirectory should also be copied outside it one directory level up. I also have seen duplicated pictures with the same name! Again, many hours of debugging ahead.

6. Since I am very proficient and satisfied with Office 2003, I once again installed it on Creator Version only to find several fixes/work around were necessary: (a) After installing from disk, you also need to install Office Service Pack 3 (SP3) AND the Office Compatibility which was for 2007. Why? Because MSFT in all their wisdom removed Control Panel from Start menu, which isn't the problem other than to work to fix it. The real Windows issue is that file association for Excel, namely ,XLS, are NOT assigned to ANY application and MSFT, again with great wisdom, no longer let's you search for actual program .exe files to assign (associate) to the .xls extension. The Compatibility product will assign the .xls to an XML Converter program. You won't see Excel there, but instead this designation. 10/24/17 Update: You can select a specific program, however, you have a hurtle to jump now to get to that point. When the file associations are displayed and you click to the right to add or change a default program, you get the available choices on you system. You now have to go to STORE first and see its offerings. At the very bottom of the offerings is a hypertext to select more programs FROM YOUR SYSTEM. This is what puts you into File Explorer and allows you to explore you system for a .exe file. I don't know if I could have fixed my Excel problem doing this or that the converter was still necessary but, this is how you do it.

10/24/17 Update (see above):
7. Did you ever try to find everything on your system with the word ARCHIVE (problem 5 above) so you can rename them all to ARCHIVES to avoid the copy problem? Forget it! Instead, get the product called EVERYTHING. Search Everything file manager and you'll come to the Voids website. Works like a charm and super fast!

8. Of course Creator still uses title bars that are White by default, rendering finding the active one opened on your screen. Fortunately they at least now allow you to change the titles and other ting's colors via Settings, Personalize.

Come on back for resolutions to these problems.

781. You don't want a dying mouse in your house

Tonight my wife said the mouse was broken, it didn't display a pointer on screen. Well, it had power. The touchpad was also not functioning and the system was locked up. So, power off/on should clean it up. It didn't. Here are some of the problems existing:
1. Right-click from anywhere should bring context menu up promptly. It took about 10-20 seconds to see menu
2. Went to Windows Updates to see what went on. It said "No updates have been installed". Yeah, right. This is a know problem starting in August 2017.
3. Regedit would not allow expansion of entries. Now we're talking major problems!
4. System Restore to checkpoint yesterday FAILED. 0x80070091 error. Also a know problem! Hello, Microsoft! You can look these up. This supposedly has a solution that requires a simple rename of WindiwApps folder.

After screwing around with all this, the recovery failed, but this time the restart it required somehow cleaned up the other problems. Go figure! Except, the Windows Updates still indicate No Updates.

Below are some website hits for problems mentioned:

https://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/forum/windows_10-update/win-10-system-restore-fail-0x80070091/7f690ec3-a3da-4c14-90fd-3eb0ba83f4ac?auth=1

https://www.drivereasy.com/knowledge/system-restore-error-0x80070091-windows-10-solved/

Followup: I am going to contribute most of the problems to the mouse battery being about 99% depleted! Although never experiencing problems like this, I would guess the weak battery, hence potential right-click failures or delays, propagated problems with mouse driver which caused performance problems throughout. However, the Restore problem remains Microsoft know problem that some people claim the temporary solution is renaming WindowsApps folder prior to restore

780. Logitech Mouse does its own thing

Here's a weird problem: You perform actions with mouse, i.e., move the pointer to some hypertext and your system erratically performs as if the mouse does a left-click on its owns. For example, I have a dictionary on my system and to look up a word I simply double-click the left mouse. Well, I started to see definitions appear without doing so! Another example, I do a click on something, like a file, and it acts as though I double-click. Now the worse scenario so far was I ordered something, thankfully not anything of value (only a free book from Kelloggs rewards which should have taken one of my 2 credits) and it double-clicked and ordered the same book twice. You never see it happen its so fast. 

Anyway, my first inclination was to power off, reset the mouse. I chose right. I removed the battery from the mouse and after 1 minute reinstalled it. It cleared up everything. Gotta love guessing right. I may have achieved the same result by disabling mouse and restarting. But, removing a battery was so much easier. It seemed like a hardware error, but most likely the power off/on sequence reinitialized it.

779. Enjoyable Books - UPDATED 8/16/2017

This post lists ONLY my latest 4-5 Star ratings:

1. ALL Robert McCammon's Matthew Corbett Series Books 1-6: (1)Speaks the Nightbird, (2)Queen of Bedlam, (3)Mister Slaughter, (4)Providence Rider, (5)River of Souls, and (6)Freedom Rider.  Book (1) was the 2nd Matthew Corbett book I read, having started with (2)Queen of Bedlam. Thus, I already knew the main characters and was dying to see how they originated and developed in book 1 of the series. I wasn't disappointed; reading book 1 helped develop them more. This book introduces Matthew. Immediately his inquisitive nature gets him into trouble. Curiosity is Matthew! And his troubles, or should I really say adventures, with all their twists keeps the stories flowing and exciting. I have now completed all in the series and can't wait for the 7th one to come out. Always interesting is who remains after at the end of each story and what sacrifices and heroism happens in between. Book 1 isn't the typical "witch" story; thankfully it is much, much better. You'll find the bonds between characters established, the enjoyment of them enthralling, and the unfortunate losses disappointing but realistic. Mr. McCammon's wit, his well appreciated content loaded with a lot of meat and potatoes, and his continuous dedication to stay on point and build the story all the way to the end without any dull periods makes all the books in this series 5 stars. Enjoy the whole series.

2. David L. Golomon's The Traveler: You have to start with the first book in the Event series to appreciate all the characters and their quirks and their close relationships. All Event series books are good. this particular one took a while to get really interesting, bu Mr. Golemon never fails to disappoint by the end and you'll be waiting anxiously for the next one. I only gave this one a 4-Star since he went a little overboard in the first 180 or so pages with a lot of technical gibberish. Skipping over this did NOT interrupt the great story. However, I do hope he tunes it back down and gets back to real meaningful content. Maybe I'm just to sensitized to the fake or continuous negative news by today's bad Media! (My soapbox on the Media continues ... see other posts in the Media category to understand how long this has been going on).

3. Stephen King's Needless things and Dreamcacher: This must have been the third time I have read these novels and they never disappoint. Stephen is so witty and his writing skills and content between-the-story is so clever and memorable. I actually go back and reread his books to refresh myself of how novels should be written and to remember his cute humor. Of course, both a 5-Star.

4. Stephen Coont's Saucer Series: (1) Saucer, (2) Saucer Savage Planet, (3) Saucer the Conquest. How about 5-Star for the entire series. Must reads for those into Science fiction AND Adventure. 

5. Dean Koontz's Cold Fire: 5-Star

6. Nelson DeMille's: All 5-Stars are The Gate House, The Gold Coast, Plum Island, Lion's Game. Love the "John" characters in all of them. 8/17/update: Add to these, Demille's The Lion, Night Fall, Wildfire, The panther, Radient Angel. I'm sticking to the 5-stars for all his John Corey series' books.

778. AxCrypt Versions and KEEPTIMESTAMP Registry Setting

AxCrypt-1.7.2893.0-x64-en-US-Beta.msi has always been a safe and reliable version of the AxCrypt encryption software. A few months ago, I made the mistake of upgrading to the Version 2 package. It is NOT backward compatible to the version 1 software. So BEWARE. I would recommend that anybody wanting to try Version 2, make a system image of their system for backup. What I was not satisfied about were:
1. Microsoft Edge presented a problem in Version 2 when it was used as the default PDF viewer in the Chrome or IE browsers or using EDGE itself for a browser. No matter which type of file (encrypted) was opened via windows Explorer, the application would fail to save any updates to the file receiving error message that it was shared with another application. Now, I believe if a file NOT encrypted is opened with Excel for example, Excel actually changes the name internally to a temporary name and then back again when closed. That is nothing new. When the file is encrypted, it has to also go through steps from AxCrypt to decrypt it and this also appears to be an internal temporary name that needs to be put right before closing again. Well, whatever happens internally, the AxCrypt package (Version 2) sometimes fails when trying to Save the file and then proceeds to an unsecure state of leaving the file in your %appdata% folder PERMANENTLY not encrypted until you to manually delete it. This was reported, but not satisfactory solution exists and the developers were not interested in debugging it. Thus, I went back to version 1 (above .msi install file and running happily again.
2. Version 2 was very confusing with its new LOGIN password vs. file passphrase. To simplify, if you are converting from version 1 to version 2, set the registration login password to the version 1 passphrase. The was it works is that you now have to login (the first time) and from then on all files being encrypted or being decrypted will use that password as the passphrase (version 1 equivalent term). I you make the mistake as I did by assuming that it was just an additional level of security since it also controls file access/encryption across platforms, you will end up with your old version 1 files (unless mass converted to version 2) using the old version 1 passphrase and the new version files using the login password. Anyway, when you realize this and do make them the same, you still have a problem in that when you open a version file and save it it is now a version 2 file. Fine you assume since the passphrase/password is the same. Wrong. If you ever decide that you want to go back to version 1 or use version 1 on another system, you will NOT be able to open it despite the passphrase/password being the same. Version 2 formatted files are a completely different animal  and can only be opened by Version 2 AxCrypt. This is a nightmare implementation! Converting back to Version 1 required me to restore the version 1 files from my backup disk. So BEWARE again.
3. Version 2 did NOT honor the KEEPTIMESTAMP implementation from version 1. It always changed the timestamp to the date the file was encrypted. At least this is true for files that were version 1 that it converted to version 2 when just looking at it without making any changes. NOT good if you, like me, have PDF files in folders for the last 10+years and periodically want to search for a file based on date yo originally saved it. After the Version 2 access to it, the date now is the date it was converted.

Enough ranting re Version 2. I might mention that when I went back to Version 1, I decided to get the most recent version 1, not the .msi level (2nd most recent) as stated above. It too has the random can't save problem as version 2. May I mention that an additional symptom of incorrectly managing files opened via Windows Explorer is when trying to signout or shutdown Windows 10. Randomly as mentioned you will not be able to shut down because AxCrypt is holding the file someway. You either have to tell Windows 10 to shutdown anyway, of if you are just signing out and don't get the message to allow you to force shutdown, have to bring up Task Manager and kill the AxCrypt tasks -- there will be 2 or more during this error condition. You should also check your %%APPDATA%% folder for leftovers when you get back up. OR just reinstall the version stated above and sail though life without problems.

2/25/17 Update Note: Re to not being able to signout and saving files because file is shared, I traced the task actions during the phases and noticed that it takes about 10 seconds for the task managing the actual closing of the file and re-encryption before it ends. If during that 10 seconds I clicked to open a new encrypted file, the task for the "unfinished" previous file gets stuck and never closed. Thus, I believe, is the mysterious task that causes all the problems. I am using a 2.10 GHz PC with Windows 10. Windows 7 never gave me this problem and I handled the files similarly. Thus, the timing seems has become susceptible. I'll test further. At this point, the cause could be Windows 10 and/or speed of processor running Windows 10 (I don't remember this happening with first versions of Windows 10 -- might be time to replace this old Dell with a new faster one). 

So, what I lost when installing version 2 and then back to version 1 was the KEEPTIMESTAMP registry key setting that is mandatory for the way I mange my files. I always want the encrypted timestamp of a file to be equal to the last updated date of the file. This, registry entry HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Axantum\AxCrypt\KEEPTIMESTAMP must be non-zero. Thus, do a REDEDIT and set it back if desired.

Other Registry Key settings can be found at: http://www.axantum.com/AxCrypt/Registry.html

777. Kindle Fire: Books still display on CLOUD after deleting via Amazon Account

On a Kindle Fire (not HD/HDX) do you see books when the CLOUD is displayed that you deleted via Amazon Account's Manage Content and Devices? This has been reported back in 2011 but I found no simple answer to correct it and get rid of the erroneous books. I found a KINDLE app that manages them via local data, i.e., on the device itself, that was NOT handling some books, usually those borrowed via a public library for free, an although they do disappear from a Fire HDX, they remained on my older Fire! Below is the solution to make them disappear and sync only with those you left on the cloud.

The SOLUTION: On the Fire, Amazon has an application called "Content Management Services". So, 
1. Swipe down from top
2. Tap MORE
3. Tap APPLICATIONS
4. Tap INSTALLED APPLICATIONS
5. Scroll down until you find the KINDLE app CONTENT MANAGEMENT SERVICES and then tap it
6. Tap CLEAR DATA
7. Back on out ... you're done and the erroneous cloud data should now be gone for the books that still appeared but were previously deleted from your Amazon Account via it's Mange Content and Devices feature

I hope gone forever. We'll see if they reappear. This is Day 1

776. Book Review: Green advocates will turn "ashamed" red after reading this

I want to thank Stephen Moore and Kathleen Hartnett White for their excellent book "Fueling Freedom". I have read many books on energy production and economical benefits. Most just gave me the "flavor" equivalent to licking cake icing off my finger. This one gave me the entire moist, delicious cake with double icing! Thank you Stephen and Kathleen.

If you were leaning GREEN all these years since the politicians unveiled their position to get rich or make their friends rich with FAKE advertising, then your face will turn red with shame after you read some of the details in this book. they reference over 625 other documents, books, articles, people to present the REAL benefit of Fossil fuels and how the world grew and fended off poverty because of more affordable and useful energy. they go way beyond the simple facts that green energy can never, never replace fossil fuels. Most people can't associate fossil fuels to anything except heating buildings and driving their vehicles,boats, etc. They are ignorant to the fact that EVERYTHING depends on affordable energy and the amount needed is so much larger than they view in their green myopic lens. The government officials and EPA themselves admitted that the best they can expect even by 2050 is about 10% of total total energy requirements. Folks, energy is needed to grow your food, make all products, make steel and other building materials, everything in addition to transportation and heating. AND Green Renewable energy cost more to produce energy than to it can produce. Don't believe me, read this! 

So you say So What? It's clean. Well NO. All the extra processes to make renewable energy is NOT green by the greenie definition. Did you know that an electric grid, that's the entire distribution network to deliver electricity, needs to provide STABLE energy. Fluctuations in in flow disrupt or cause much more reprocessing requirements to stabilize the network. As a matter of fact, BACKUP coal/gas/other plants need to continue to run to ensure the network remains stable. For, Wind and Solar are NOT available 24 hours a day. Only up to 20% maximum energy of the rated capacity (if it always produces) is ever available. Texas uses the a figure 8%-10% as the max. for wind for when the peak summer requirements are upon us, the winds are slight if any at all! And the foot print! Wow, 7-10 x more land is required. There goes the Co2 eating trees and vegetation. The authors delve into detail re Co2 which is a necessity for plant growth and provided NO harm to humans who also breather it. We ARE carbon machines if you didn't know.

I wish I could go on and on with the details covered in this book. there is so much I'd have to copy it in entirely here. Just go read it. Especially you youngsters who are being indoctrinated with lies re the role of Fossil fuels in the economy and the so-called-benefits of green technologies. In this book you'll learn how England and Germany bit on the carrot only to be led to the roaster. Both countries are now paying 2-3 times what our electric costs and poverty has increased because people can't afford electric. they have returned to burning WOOD (considered a renewable source for energy credits) despite it carbon and other gas output. Whereas the poverty had been decreasing since fossil energy became available it is now increasing! As a matter of face, the International watchdogs also got on the wrong train and are penalizing countries by NOT providing funding for fossil fuel plants for electric. What's more important? People's lives and economic growth or useless, politicized carbon credits? This boils me! 

Mankind can NOT prosper without fossil fuels, so get over the green-thing. Green energy is NOT profitable and can NOT provide the requirements necessary now or never. Green energy cost more -- it's companies can ONLY remain profitable with subsidies (your tax dollars). Green is POLITICAL and Rich Wealth building while it lasts.

PLEASE read this book!

775. LOW TONER DP-L2540DW and NO PRINT OUTPUT?

Another day, another surprise. Who would have thought you would get just a Low Toner warning message printing to a Brother DP-L2540DW printer and NOT get the print out! That's tight. Told my PC to print and the Low Toner message came up  and then disappeared. Went to the printer and no output. After 3 times, I clicked on the message before it disappeared and the output came out on the printer. Now, wouldn't you think this would be documented some place? Wrong! The User's manual mentions the Low Toner, but provides no instructions to move forward. Guess Brother wants you to call their support line so they can tell you to click on the message while they are trying to sell you toner.

Well, instead of having to click on the message every time, you can set the printer to CONTINUE PRINTING when this occurrs. Again, not in any user manual and took me quite a while to find the correct instructions for the DP-L2540DW printer. The following works:

1. On the printer panel, push MENU button
2. You will get General Setup in the status window ... push OK
3. Now scroll (up or down) until you see REPLACE TONER in window ... push OK
4. Now you can scroll (up or down) and change from STOP to CONTINUE ... then push OK
5. Windows text will indicate ACCEPTED
6. Push STOP/EXIT Button

You are now good to go and can ignore the Low Toner message, but of course don't forget to buy some for when it really runs out. Where did I buy my TN660 High Yield Toner? This time at INKTECHNOLOGIES.COM. I bought inkjet ink there many times and was always pleased. So, I'll now try their toner. Another recommended brand was Aurthur and available at Amazon. $51 for two TN660 is much better than Brother's $79 for one. If it becomes a bad choice I'll update this entry.

773. Event 7001, Service Control Manager

NetTcpActivator depends ... NetTcpPortSharing  ... failed... Toronto Cat provided a solution at https://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/forum/windows_10-networking/event-id-7001/a48a3ead-4ed1-41e8-bf31-94b59b196163?page=2 this is easy to fix. one of the services is off for the net tcp port sharing feature. either turn it on look in services.msc or turn the feature off in programs and features in control panel goto windows features net framework 4.6 advanced features WCF port sharing and activation.

772. Event 10016,Distributed DCOM

dcom error 10016 re APPID F72671A9-012C-4725-9D2F-2A4D32D65169

See http://www.tenforums.com/general-support/69270-dcom-error-10016-re-appid-f72671a9-012c-4725-9d2f-2a4d32d65169.html

This page will explain how to get rid of the pesky error in Event Viewer, however, you will have to read-between-the-lines in the instructions to find some of the references. Make an intelligent guess at where they may reside -- try other tabs, etc. ONE IMPORTANT NOTE: Read the last instruction "In there you need to grant back ownership to the original owners.In this case one Hive Key was owned by "SYSTEM" the other by "TrustedInstaller" (type: NT SERVICE\TrustedInstaller)". In other words, BEFORE you do the changes, leading up to the first you need to jot down the OWNERs in the original permission properties. And, always backup registry first before changing it.

771. Printing on Amarillo Globe times website

One shouldn't expect this local, terrible, paper and site to function properly. thus is the case for printing articles, in this case an obituary. If you want the entire article WITH the picture of the person you have to jump through the following hoops:

- Right-click on the article page and select SAVE AS
- Save as a HMTL ONLY file (NOT the complete website)
- Now bring p the page from your saved file
- Now click right and print and you'll get picture and all.

770. Chrome View PDF no longer works right - UPDATE

6/20/17 - AGAIN Chrome, now version 57, changed and screwed up things. Chrome://Plugins is no longer available to perform the original solution to problems with PDF viewing AND saving. After many hours of playing with PDF viewers and Chrome settings here are the results and tips:

First, I have selected the Microsoft EDGE browser as my default PFD viewer by doing Control Program->Programs->Default Programs-> set defaults. Scrolling to Microsft Edge I then selected ONLY the "Choose Defaults for this program" [I do NOT use EDGE for my browser]. Now when I select a PDF file from File Explorer, EDGE opens to view it. HOWEVER, EDGE does NOT allow me to look at all files within a folder when I do a SAVE AS from within Chrome, e.g., If I am looking at a bank statement in PDF format USING Edge, I will NOT be able to display all FILEs withing a folder when I try to save it [I actually want to see the filename format/convention I am using so I can save it the same]. Thus, within Chrome settings [Settings->Advanced Settings->Contents, go to bottom where there is an option to now tell Chrome you want to use the Syatem's Viewer [EDGE] in my case and make sure it is UNCHECKED. When UNCHECKED, Chrome uses it's viewer which DOES ALLOW you to look at all files within a folder when downloading the PDF.

Note: I still have not figured out why in last version in the DOWNLOAD dialog I had the option to look at first only PDF files and then use the popup arrow to look at ALL FILES. For some reason, after many reboots and program loops, it now comes up ONLY displaying all files. Search me!  It seems to work [today at least] like I want it to, in summary, within Chrome use the Chrome viewer for PDF files and download to my desired filename after reviewing the already existing files within the desired folder displayed by the DOWNLOAD dialog. However, If I bring up File Explorer and select a PDF file, EDGE comes up to display it. Do NOT attempt to set your system default for PDF files to Chrome! This is what caused my continuous open loop attempting to look at a file OR to display just the active tab page instead of the PDF file! Good luck.


---------------- Everything below is now invalid as of 6/20/17 ---------------------
Surprise, surprise. Chrome changed something again without checking it out. Now there were 2 Chrome PDF Viewers in the Settings (Chrome://Plugins). when I disabled the one indicating location= chrome-extension://garbage....// everything came back to normal. So, I now have ONE Chrome PDF Viewer showing it is the "chrome-pdf-viewer" Where the other came from, one only knows. I have no other extension loaded.

Update 10/18/16

For some reason ADOBE started to come up. In a Windows 7 (See categories) entry I reported that I was no longer able to see ALL Files -- could only see .PDF files -- when saving a document and examining the Save Dialog file entry box. Well, today I enabled the Chrome entry I previously disabled. Thus, 2 entries for Chrome PDF Viewer are enabled again. And I am again back to it all being correct. Go figure! 

Summary. Keep BOTH Chrome PDF Viewer entries (below) enabled (Enter about:plugins to see plugins):

Chrome PDF Viewer (2 files)

Name:

Chrome PDF Viewer

Version:

Location:

chrome-extension://mhjfbmdgcfjbbpaeojofohoefgiehjai/

Type:

BROWSER PLUGIN

Disable

MIME types:

MIME type Description File extensions application/pdf .pdf

Name:

Chrome PDF Viewer

Description:

Portable Document Format

Version:

Location:

internal-pdf-viewer

Type:

PPAPI (out-of-process)

Disable

MIME types:

MIME type Description File extensions application/x-google-chrome-pdf Portable Document Format .pdf