Description.
As you should know Usb devices are perfect for carrying virus. Disabling autorun at least make more difficult for these program to propagate.
Solution.
1. Press Windows Key + R , type gpedit.msc and press enter.
2. Click on Computer Configuration, Administrative templates, and click system if you don’t see it:
a. Right click over add/remove templates.
b. Select system.
c. Click on system.adm and open.
3. Enable the Turn Off Autoplay setting.
Description
You want to know the serial that you use to install Office or Windows.
Solution
1. Download Magical Jelly Bean Keyfinder v2.0.1:
http://www.magicaljellybean.com/keyfinder/
2. Execute it.
Description
It is a good practice to protect your Home page for being changed. With this solution even you won’t be able to change it.
Solution
1. Press Windows Key + R, type regedit, press enter.
2. Go to:
HKEY_CURRENT_USER/
/Software
/Policies
/Microsoft
/Internet Explorer
3. Set the HomePage value to 1.
Description
Today, computers have become more and more complex. It quite seems like impossible to know what exactly is installed on a computer.
With this solution you will see how to know if there is something new in your computer start.
Solution
1. Download autorun from Sysinternals:
http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/bb963902.aspx
2. Extract it to “c:\utils”.
This came with 2 useful utilities one is a command line autorunsc the other autoruns.
3. Press Windows Key + R, type notepad and press enter.
4. Write the following bat file:
@echo off
IF exist c:\utils\start.txt goto compare
autorunsc > c:\util\start.txt
goto end
:compare
autorunsc > c:\utils\newstart.txt
FC c:\utils\start.txt c:\utils\newstart.txt
if ERRORLEVEL 1 ( msg * "Something has changed at Start." )
del c:\utils\start.txt
:end
5. Save as “checkstart.bat”, remember the “ so notepad uses .bat extension instead of .txt.
6. Move the file to the startup folder in the Start Menu.
If you don’t know how to do it type this in a command window:
xcopy checkstart.bat "%userprofile%/Start Menu/Programs/Startup"
and press enter.
Now if something has change the PC will show you a message.
To know what exactly type, before the next reboot.
FC c:\util\start.txt c:\util\newstart.txt
Description
You need to enter to a webpage but you don’t want to be concern about phishing. Many virus change your DNS or your host file in order to redirect you to their WebPages.
Solution
This only will works in pages that allow that, many need that you enter the name of the web page instead of the IP, so please write a comment if this solution work or not.
We are going to create a new shortcut, this is going to be your only access to your bank or whatever Webpage you want to enter.
1. We need to find the IP of your bank, so first we need to find it.
For example if we access using www.MyBank.com/user
a. Press Windows Key + R, type cmd, and press enter.
b. ping www.MyBank.com
Copy the IP address, imaging we get 192.168.1.3
2. In the Desktop, Right click, new, and shortcut.
3. We type:
http://192.168.1.3/user
If we only use this shortcut we never have to be concern about phishing again.
Description
Maybe you have tons of music, photograph and videos in your pc. For sure the best way to protect it is having a backup copy but as always you can do something more.
Sometimes happens that we have every user on the computer with administration rights so I or a program that is running could remove every bit on your computer.
Of course the best way is only using the administration rights when you need to install something but I will show you a trick.
Solution
In this example we will protect a folder call Mozart inside “My Music”, this mean you will not be able to add content there at least not in an easy way.
1. Press Windows Key + E, go to “My Music" folder.
2. Click on tools, select folder options.
3. Go to the “View” tab.
4. Uncheck the option “Use simple sharing (Recommended)”.
5. Right click on the “Mozart” folder and select properties.
6. Go to the “Security” tab.
7. Click on Advanced.
8. Uncheck the option “Inherit from parent the permission entries that apply to child objects. Include these with entries explicitly defined here”.
9. A message box appear select copy.
10. You will see a list of users, you have to uncheck “Full Control” , “Modify” and “Write” on every user.
Now the folder cannot be deleted.
Description
You have more than one active directory server in your organization and you want to know to which one the computer is logging on.
Solution
1. Press Windows Key + R, type regedit and press enter.
2. Go to the following subkey.
\\HKEY_CURRENT_USER\
\Volatile Enviroment
Here in the LogonServer you will see the name of the server.
Description
You need to know what router is blocking your Tcp traffic.
The problem with tracert is that it uses ICMP packets so if the communication is block by a router filtering using a TCP port you don’t know what it’s happening.
Solution.
1. download the following:
http://sourceforge.net/projects/tracetcp/files/
http://www.winpcap.org/install/default.htm
2. Install Winpcap.
3. Extract TraceTcp to c:\utils.
4. Press Windows Key +R, type cmd and press enter.
5. Type:
cd c:\utils
5. For example to know what router is blocking your port 80 to enter www.google.com just type:
tracetcp www.google.com:80
Description
You want to know your Mac address.
Solution
1. Press the Windows Key + R, type cmd and press enter.
2. In the command window type
ipconfig /all | FindStr "Physical"
and press enter.
A Mac address will appear for each network adapter.
Description
Windows have problems with dealing with files with long names. This can cause that for example a Word file cannot be read or you can delete files of a folder.
This can cause Windows sending messages like:
“The specified path is invalid”
“The system cannot find the file specified”
Solution
1. Press Windows Key + R, type cmd and press enter.
2. What you are going to do now is find the directory or file that is driving you crazy.
3. Open a new explorer window with Windows Key + E.
4. Be sure that you are seeing the Address Bar.
a. Click View on the Menu.
b. Toolbars.
c. Select the Address Bar.
5. Go to the folder, and copy the path of the folder in the clipboard.
6. In the windows command type cd a space and “.
7. Rigth Click in the command window and select paste type another ”.
For example if the file is in c:\utils the command is:
cd “c:\utils”
8. Once you are on the folder type for example for a file that begin with sample.
dir /X | FindStr “sample”
9. You will see a short name with a ~ in it. We assume that in this example is SAMPLE~1 we can then use the rename command.
ren sample~1 sample
and then we can do whatever we want to do with the file for example to delete it we type:
del sample
Description
The most popular email providers out there don’t let you to send files that can be potentially dangerous.
Solution
You need to change the extensions to do the trick.
1. Press Windows Key + E, go to the folder that contains the file you want to send over the email.
2. Click on the Tools menu, properties and go to the view folder.
3. Unclick “Hide extensions for known file types”. Press Ok.
4. Right click in the item you want to change the name and select rename.
5. Type a file name changing the exe extensions, for example xxx.
6. The Windows show you a message that says that file may become unusable, don’t bother and press yes. Now you can send it.
7. Once you have done it. Rename the file again and remember to click the “Hide extensions for known file types” if you want to.
8. You have to say in the message that the exe extension should be restored in order to use the file.
Description
You have lost space in your hard disk but you are not sure what files are using it.
Solution
Many big problems no need that you spend a lot of money on it. We are going to see today a program call WinDirStat.
1. Download WinDirStat, is free:
2. Execute WinDirStat.exe.
3. Select the drive you want to know the information about. You will see how the programs starts to scan your computer.
The program divide the window on 3 panels. The bottom panel consist in one coloured rectangle for every file, the area of which is proportional to the file’s size so is easy to know what is consuming your hard disk.
Description
Maybe you need to see the active connections and the state of your computer.
Solution
1. Press Windows Key + R, type cmd and press enter.
2. In the command window type:
netstat
The list will show the active connections. This is a short explanation of the states:
ESTABLISHED The socket has an established connection.
SYN_SENT The socket is actively attempting to establish a connection.
SYN_RECV A connection request has been received from the network.
FIN_WAIT1 The socket is closed, and the connection is shutting down.
FIN_WAIT2 Connection is closed, and the socket is waiting for a shutdown from the remote end.
TIME_WAIT The socket is waiting after close to handle packets still in the network.
CLOSE The socket is not being used.
CLOSE_WAIT The remote end has shut down, waiting for the socket to close.
LAST_ACK The remote end has shut down, and the socket is closed. Waiting for acknowledgement.
LISTEN The socket is listening for incoming connections. Such sockets are not included in the output unless you specify the --listening (-l) or --all (-a) option.
CLOSING Both sockets are shut down but we still don't have all our data sent.
UNKNOWN
Description
You want to know in what ports are listening your computer.
Solution
1. Press the Windows Key + R, type cmd and press enter.
2. In the command window type:
netstat –a | FindStr "LISTENING"
and press enter.
In each line you will see the ip and port that your computer is setting to listen.
Description
Don’t you ever wonder how to check your security?. In these days maybe security is one of the key word on internet.
Solution
As you maybe don’t know there is a free Microsoft utility that can help you. So you only have to follow the next steps.
1. Download the Microsoft Baseline Security Analyzer:
2. Execute it.
3. You can then scan a computer or scan multiple computers.
4. The program let you to chose multiple options. I recommend you to select all of them:
5. Press Start Scan and the application will inform you about any issue it founds.
Description
As could be a useful feature maybe you don’t want that Windows shows the last user to log on the computer.
Solution.
1. Press Windows Key + R, type regedt32 and press enter.
2. Go to this key:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE
\Software
\Microsoft
\Windows
\CurrentVersion
\Policies
\System
3. If there is not a key call "DontDisplayLastUserName" you have to create it. Set it to "1" to not display the name.
Description
Maybe you are doing a copy of your important files in an usb drive or you have a server that need a simple backup.
Solution
Of course you have applications like ntbackups that can do the trick, but if you want just have the same structure is better this solution.
1. Open notepad, press Windows Key + R, type notepad and press enter.
2. We are going to use the ROBOCOPY utility that comes with Windows. For example to make a copy of the “c:\utils” folder in the disk drive E:.
Type in the notepad the following:
ROBOCOPY c:\utils E: /E /S
save as “copia.bat”, be aware that you need to use the quotation marks in the name file so notepad respect the extension.
Now you can make a new scheduled task using this solution.
The utility will only copy a file if have different time stamps or different file sizes.
Description
You are receiving a “winmail.dat” file instead of the real email.
Solution
The problem is related with the sender as you can see in the following link:
http://support.microsoft.com/?scid=kb%3Ben-us%3B278061&x=12&y=9
but, if you just want to see the file do the following:
1. Download the WinMail Opener:
http://www.eolsoft.com/download/winmail_opener.exe
2. Open winmail.dat with this application.
Description
You want to know the applications that are waiting for an incoming call.
Solution.
You only need to know how to use netstat.
1. Press Windows Key + R, type cmd and press enter.
2. In the command window type netstat –a –b -n, and press enter.
You will see many lines like this:
Active Connections
Proto Local Address Foreign Address State PID
TCP 0.0.0.0:5800 0.0.0.0:0 LISTENING [WinVNC4.exe]
For example here we have the Vnc server, an application for remote control listening at port 5800.
Description
You want to shut down a computer remotely using only the network.
Solution
We will use the shutdown command but the problem is that we need an user with administration rights in the remote computer.
A workaround to do this is having an administrator in both computers with the same name and password but we can do it better:
1. Download PsTools:
http://technet.microsoft.com/es-es/sysinternals/bb896649.aspx
2. Extract it to “c:\utils”.
3. Press Windows Key + R, type cmd and press enter.
4. Imaging we want to shutdown a computer with name pcgo and password kilo for the administrator. We will use:
psexec \\pcgo –u administrator –p kilo shutdown -s
Description
When you enter on Hotmail and click on a link you only can save and you cannot open the file directly.
Solution
This happens because Hotmail was open using not save your email and password, if you just click that the button will appear.
Description
You are trying to install a new Windows Vista but after you finish the installation it cannot start and reboots.
The symptoms are:
If you try to enter on Safe Mode it stops when is loading “crcdisk.sys”.
You have a serial ata hard drive and is configured by the Bios to work on AHCI mode.
You see a BSOD with the message STOP 0x0000007B INACCESSABLE_BOOT_DEVICE, maybe you cannot read because the screen disappear very fast.
Solution
The problem is that windows vista can install on an AHCI enabled hard disk but then it cannot starts. If you want to solve this problem:
1. Go to the Bios and change the hard disk settings, configure the hard disk to work in ATA mode.
2. Now you start windows.
3. Press Windows Key + R, type regedit and press ENTER.
4. Locate and then click the following registry subkey:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Services\Msahci
5. In the right pane, right-click Start in the Name column, and then click Modify.
6. In the Value data box, type 0, and then click OK.
7. Restart and change the ATA mode to AHCI in the Bios.
Description
You are experiencing problems trying to unlock a domain account. Many times happens that users are locked in several servers.
Solution
Use the following tool from Microsoft :
It allows to see the state of an account and if it is locked. It also can be used to unlock that user.
It has to be executed by a user that has administration’s right.
Description
Is not very unusual that you want to know if a port is close for your firewall or by something in the middle of the communication
Solution
The first program we use is ping. But it has a lot of drawbacks, it works using the IGMP protocol that can be enabled or not by firewalls or routers.
1. We are going to download a program:
TcpPing
http://www.elifulkerson.com/projects/tcping.php
1. Download the program and extract it to “c:\util”.
2. Press Windows Key + R, type cmd and press enter.
3. type cd c:\util and press enter again.
4. For example for knowing if the port 80 is open in the computer with IP 192.168.1.1 type:
tcping 192.168.1.1 80
For example, Windows uses port 135 and 139 for sharing folders so if you want to know if there is something blocking the traffic in a pc call “vocer” just use:
tcping vocer 135
tcping vocer 139
Description
You know one computer IP and you need to know what computer name has.
Solution
We are going to use a program that asks your DNS server for the name.
1. Press Windows Key + R, type cmd and enter.
2. type nslookup and the ip you want to be solved.
You can also choose the server you can use to solve the request.
In the following example the dns server is 192.168.1.1:
nslookup 192.168.1.50 192.168.1.1
Description
When you try to print a Microsoft Word document the background doesn’t appear.
Solution
Word 2003
1. On the Tools Menu, click Options, and then click the Print tab.
2. Click to select the Background colours and images, and then click OK.
Word 2007
1. Click the Microsoft Office Button, and then click Word Options.
2. On the Display menu, click to select the Print background colors and images check box under Printing Options, and then click OK.
More information about this issue can be found here:
http://support.microsoft.com/?scid=kb%3Ben-us%3B906306&x=20&y=14
Description
Usually in your drives could appear folders with names that seems random numbers. For example ‘d10846d9ed632fa03276’ and you cannot access the content even with administrator rights.
Solution
This is a problem with windows update and NTFS. If you do an update using a user that has administrator rights in a computer it can create this sort of folders but cannot be deleted in another computers at least in a normal way.
1. Click Start and go to My Computer.
2. Double click on the drive that is experiencing the problem.
3. Select Tools on the Menu and click Folder Options.
4. On the view Tab at the end check that the “Use simple file sharing (Recommended")” option is unselected. Press Ok. Now the security Tab is available in the folder properties.
6. Right click on the folder you want to delete and click on the properties.
7. Select the security tab. You will see that administrators doesn’t have any permission and that exist an unknown user.
8. Select full control for the administrator group.
9. Enter into the folder you will see several folders.
10. Right Click, click properties, and select the security tab. The following message appears:
“You do not have permission to view or edit the current permission settings for folders, but you can take ownership or change auditing settings”
11. Click Advanced, go to owner tab.
12. Select the administrator group and click on “Replace owner on subcontainers and objects”. Press Ok.
The following message appears:
“You do not have permission to read the contest of directory … Do you want to replace the directory permissions with permissions granting Full Control ?
All permissions will be replaced if you press Yes.”
13. Press Yes and then you can delete the content of the file.
Description
When you want to format an USB drive you only see the FAT and FAT 32 options and you want to use NTFS file system.
Solution
1. Click Start, click Control Panel, and Click System.
2. Select the Hardware Tab, and press the device manager button.
3. Click on the Disk drives , select the usb device, right click and press properties.
4. Go to the Policies Tab and press Optimize for Perfomance.
5. Now, if you try to format you will see the NTFS option on the list.
Description
Windows Explorer hangs when is displaying the list of multimedia files of a directory.
Solution
This is a problem related with the libraries that Windows uses to display the properties of the multimedia files.
Do the following:
1. Windows Key + R, type cmd and press enter.
2. type REGSVR32 /U SHMEDIA.DLL and press enter.
Now just try to display the files. Your computer is not going to have any problem to display video contents but if you prefer to enable it again type REGSVR32 SHMEDIA.DLL and press enter on a command window.
Description
You want to know that the content of a web page changes without having to see it.
Solution.
In the following example we are going to create a script that will download the web page:
http://www.microsoft.com/windows/internet-explorer/
and look for the string “Internet Explorer 8”. Only will show a message when the web changes.
We are going to use wget:
http://www.interlog.com/~tcharron/wgetwin-1_5_3_1-binary.zip
1. First extract wget to ‘c:\utils’ .
2. Copy the following text into a new notepad:
Dim obj_Shell
Dim objFSO
Dim lineaActual
textToFind = "Internet Explorer 8"
webToSearch = "http://www.microsoft.com/windows/internet-explorer/"str = "(.+)" & textToFind & "(.+)"
Set obj_Shell = CreateObject("Wscript.Shell")
Set objFSO = CreateObject("Scripting.FileSystemObject")
obj_Shell.Run "cmd /c c:\\utils\\wget.exe -e robots=off -O c:\\utils\\web.file " & webToSearch ,0 ,true
Set file = objFSO.OpenTextFile("c:\\utils\\web.file", 1 )
line=""
While not file.AtEndOfStream
line=line & file.ReadLine
Wend
Set procesStr = New RegExp
procesStr.IgnoreCase = True
procesStr.pattern = str
Set matches = procesStr.Execute( line )
If matches.Count=0 Then
WScript.echo "Not Found"
End Ifobj_Shell.Run "cmd /c del c:\\utils\\web.file",0 , true
3. Save as “c:\utils\web.vbs” recall to use the “.
4. Create a new task as is explained in this post, to allow for the script to repeat since the time you want.
Description
You have problems uninstalling some sort of application.
Solution.
The best free tool for this case is Revo Uninstaller.
http://www.revouninstaller.com/revo_uninstaller_free_download.html
When you select uninstall you will see these options:
The application creates a restore point in order to allow an undo operation.
At final it lists the registry entries that can be deleted because are used for the program.
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