Urbansight

All you wanted to know about Vista imaging, but were afraid to ask.

Well it was a nice sunny day, thank goodness as my last visit to Microsoft’s HQ at Thames Valley Park was during the snow in January that took us all by surprise.

This event was laid on by Microsoft’s TechNet team with James O’Neill giving us a good 2 plus sessions, with a very informative look at the imaging tools for Vista Deployment.

As always this event was superbly organized and well presented, the turn out was good, so with the help of James we were able to get a mention for Vista Squad’s event on the 28th and also during the coffee breaks I was able to talk with a few people and hand out some flyers hopefully to boost our attendants for the night.

I would recommend anyone interested in Vista Imaging to take a look at James’s blog as he promised to include the slides, extra info & links from today’s session.

James can be found at http://blogs.technet.com/jamesone

It’s been a very busy week first time I have had 5 minuets to myself to sit down and think about my blog.

Been tied up most of the week helping plan, develop and launch the new community user group for Microsoft’s Windows Vista and .Net 3.0.

We’re hoping to build this user group into one of the leaders in the UK, with forums, blogs and events from the people in the know. To include Vista Development Technologies and Windows Presentation Foundation.

The web site is now fully up and running, with the announcement of or first and inaugural meeting. To be held between 18.15 and 21.15 on Wednesday 28th March 2007 at Microsoft’s UK HQ, Thames Valley Park, Reading.
This will be a great opportunity to meet other members, discuss Vista and see two cracking presentations. The line-up is as follows:

18:15 - 18:30: Refreshments
18:30-18:45: Introduction session to introduce the group, the key people involved and finally our aims and goals – (Ray Booysen, Scott Belton, Robert Knapp)
18:45-19:45: Presentation 1 - Are you ready for Vista - Windows hardware assessment tools (Scott Belton)
19:45-20:15: Break - Food, refreshments and networking
20:15-21:15: Presentation 2 - Deep Dive into WCF – (Michael Luke)
21:15: Roundup and close
For more information check out our new web site www.vistasquad.co.uk

Oops! There I was playing around with my start menu when some how I managed to remove the Internet Explorer 7 link. As this no longer appears on the desktop as standard (in fact only one icon is standard and that’s the rubbish bin.) I think its time to sort things out.

So here we go let’s have a look at getting things sorted and my desktop ship shaped and Bristol fashioned.

First things first let’s put back the Internet Explorer that I deleted on the top of the start menu.
1. Right Click an empty space on the taskbar and select Properties.
2. Select the Start Menu tab then Customize.
3. Then place a tick in the Internet link check box and click Ok & Ok again.

Great that’s done now lets have a look at putting some useful icons on my desktop.

Desktop icons

1. Right click an empty space on the desktop and select Personalize.
2. Under Task’s in the left hand column select Change desktop icons.
3. Place Ticks in the icon check boxes that I would like then click OK.

The one icon that I really like on my desktop is the Internet Explorer I Know it’s already pin to the start menu and in the quick launch bar but to put it on the desktop will require me to dig a lot deeper into Windows Vista. For this we will need to edit the registry so make sure you back this up first.

1. Click the Start button and type regedit in the search box and hit Enter.
2. The User Account Control will ask for permission to continue (enter appropriate permissions).
3. Then find the following registry key:-
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\
CurrentVersion\Explorer\HideDesktopIcons\NewStartPanel
4. Select Edit from the tool bar New then DWORD 32-bit
5. Enter this key name exactly including brackets:-
{871C5380-42A0-1069-A2EA-08002B30309D}
6.Close regedit, Right click an empty space on the desktop and click Refresh from the dropdown menu.

That’s it I’m all set up ready to run.

If your like me you may find you miss the run command from the start menu.

It's easy to restore it. Here's how:

1. Right-click on the taskbar and select Properties from the context menu.

2. Navigate to the Start menu tab.

3. Click the Customize button beside the "Start menu" option.

4. In the list of options at the top of the window, check the "Run command" option and click OK.

Although the search box that integrates with the Start menu acts as an impromptu run box, if you enter the exact name of a file, executable, or script, Windows will run it.

But to me this is not as convenient as I would like.

NB: if you are using the "Classic Start menu" option, the Run command is already present.

As promised information re Windows Vista’s computer hardware requirements

Windows Vista minimum supported system requirements
Home Basic / Home Premium / Business / Ultimate
800 MHz processor and 512 MB of system memory
20 GB hard drive with at least 15 GB of available space
Support for Super VGA graphics
CD-ROM drive

Windows Vista recommended system requirements
Home Basic
1 GHz 32-bit (x86) or 64-bit (x64) processor
512 MB of system memory
20 GB hard drive with at least 15 GB of available space
Support for DirectX 9 graphics and 32 MB of graphics memory
DVD-ROM drive
Audio Output
Internet access

Home Premium / Business / Ultimate
1 GHz 32-bit (x86) or 64-bit (x64) processor
1 GB of system memory
40 GB hard drive with at least 15 GB of available space
Support for DirectX 9 graphics with:
WDDM Driver
128 MB of graphics memory (minimum)
Pixel Shader 2.0 in hardware
32 bits per pixel
DVD-ROM drive
Audio Output
Internet access

All the above information was taken from Microsoft’s web site as of 02/03/07

http://www.microsoft.com/windows/products/windowsvista/editions/systemrequirements.mspx

Try the Windows Upgrade Advisor

http://www.microsoft.com/windows/products/windowsvista/buyorupgrade/upgradeadvisor.mspx

Vista’s “WOW”

Windows Vista in all its glory has been out now and available for a whole month. Well I ask was it worth the long wait. YES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I’ve been lucky that I have been testing and running Vista in its many pre-release forms including Vista RC1 for some time. I was so impressed that on the launch day I was first in the queue at my local PC World to spend my hard earned cash on a brand new laptop with Vista Home Premium installed.

I love it, what more can I say,

Yes I have had a few teething problems with software and even a hardware driver issue on a new laptop (more about that in a later blog), but nothing will change me back to Windows XP. Vista is here to stay, there’s so much built into this operating system that I total agree with the “WOW” launch campaign.

Over the next few month’s I will try and keep a diary of life with this new O/S and record all its ups and downs.

Here’s to a bright and flashy new future for the pc user, and congratulations to Microsoft. "It was worth the wait!"

“Verifying DMI Pool Data…” then nothing! On Booting your computer
If you get this message (or a subtle variant thereof) on your computer screen during booting just before it locks up on you than you could have a pretty seriously problem on your hands.

DMI stands for Desktop Management Interface and this is the part of the system that stores a lot if the configuration information of the system's hardware components.

Possible reasons for this problem:

Hardware change
BIOS settings change
Improper connection of hard drive IDE cables
Corrupt Master Boot Record (MBR) of the hard drive
Defective hard drive
Defective motherboard
Possible causes of the problem:

Hardware incompatibility
Virus damage
Damage to internal circuitry
Corruption of data
Improper BIOS settings
Damage to the system from overclocking the CPU
Print this page out as a reference before beginning work ... just in case!!!

Possible solutions:

Undo any hardware change you did and see if the system works again.
Check all the cables and expansion cards for proper contact.
Try setting the “Reset Configuration Data” (also known as “Force Update ESCD”) BIOS option in the BIOS “PNP/PCI configuration” to “Enabled”, save and exit the BIOS. After a reboot the option is set to “Disabled” again.
Check your motherboard manual for information about the “Clear CMOS jumper” and then clear the CMOS. Please note that with ATX power supplies based systems the power cord must be disconnected or the mechanical switch of the PSU (Power Supply Unit) must be set to “Off” or “0” before the Clear CMOS jumper is used.
Disconnect all IDE cables and enter the BIOS. From there set the boot sequence to start with the floppy drive. Try to boot from a bootable floppy with the proper BIOS update files for your BIOS and update the BIOS. After the update is finished clear the CMOS again and after booting set the “Reset Configuration Data” (also known as “Force Update ESCD”) BIOS option in the BIOS “PNP/PCI configuration” to “Enabled”.

If you can boot from floppy but the BIOS update does not help then the problem is corruption of the MBR. You can try to fix this using a partitioning application. On a Windows system this is called FDISK and you would need to start the system up using a bootable floppy with that program on it. To run FDISK type this at the command prompt:

fdisk /mbr

Another option is to go to the website of the manufacturer of your hard drive and download and run a copy of any drive diagnostic tools that they might have on offer (all the major manufacturers have them nowadays).

Failing that, you could test the hard drive in another system.

If all of that fails it is more than likely that the motherboard is defective and needs to be replaced.