In this post we are going to share with you one simple but crucial windows setting for proper file sharing to work between Windows computers.

We (the troublefixers, Rohit and Abhishek), were working on weekend on some site-upgrade work last weekend. We were working on two different computers (one on Windows XP other on Windows Vista) on same LAN, sharing same Internet connection.

Abhishek tried to access some file on my computer (Windows XP machine) from his computer(Windows Vista Machine) but he got error denying him any access. He told me that he has recently formatted the XP machine after which the file sharing is not working.

Lets see how you can set the LAN settings to allow use of file sharing.

Fix:

The fix is really simple, go to Control Panel > Network Connections

Double Click to open Local Area Connection in use, that you are using for file sharing.

This will open the Local Area Connection Status, on this window click on Properties

On this Local Area Properties Window Check the option for File and Printer Sharing for Microsoft Networks and press OK.

That’s it, done! Please leave your comments or suggestions below.

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One of our readers reported that when he starts his computer, he gets a message like “Verifying DMI pool, Booting from CD and then there is an error like Non-System Disk or Disk error Replace and press any key when ready”

One of the messages shown in this type of problem is given in the image above some other messages are like DISK BOOT FAILURE, NTLDR is missing etc.

There can be several reasons for this kind of error, like :

• Non-bootable floppy or CD present in drive
• Corrupt boot-loader
• Faulty Hard disk drive

Let us see the fix for each of these.

Fix:

1. First of all, check floppy drive and CD / DVD drive, there should be no disk drive inside it when you are starting your computer. This is most common type of reason for such kind of problems.

2. If there is still problem even after removing all CDs / DVDs and Floppies , it is possible that boot-loader has got corrupt. In such case you need to repair the boot-loader.

• For Windows XP, you can use a bootable Windows XP setup CD, boot the computer with bootable CD and run Recovery setup by pressing R key. This will boot the computer in recovery mode. You will see command prompt, on this prompt type “fixmbr” without quotes and press y to confirm , now press enter.This will fix the Master Boot Record.
• For repairing Windows Vista Boot-loader refer this post.

3. If it still does not work, then it is possible that your computer’s hard disk drive has gone faulty. Sometimes this kind of problem is also faced due to over-heating of drive.

There may also be a problem in System power supply ports, as we have experienced sometimes ourselves. Check these things and get the disk checked on some other computer, or show it to your computer vendor/ technician.

Hope this information given will help you fix the trouble.

This content is just a summary, read the full article at ©2009 TroubleFixers - All about fixing computer troubles. All Rights Reserved.

One of readers faced this trouble, when Windows XP refuses to boot due to changed or corrupted boot.ini file.

This error may appear if the Boot.ini file is missing, damaged, or contains incorrect entries of the operating system.

This is how error seems like at the time of boot: (see the image below)

Invalid Boot.ini

Windows could not start because the following file is missing or corrupt:

Lets see how can we repair the altered or damaged boot.ini file.

Fix:

Follow the procedure below to repair original boot.ini file

1. Firstly arrange a Bootable Windows XP setup CD.
2. Boot from bootable Windows XP setup CD and press R to enter recovery console which allows to restore the corrupted boot.ini file to original.
3. Now enter your administrative username and password, when you get the command prompt type the following command “bootcfg /rebuild” (without double quotes) and press Enter.
4. Bootcfg utility on the Windows XP setup CD will scan your drives for any Windows XP installations and then display the results which you can select to repair the corresponding boot.ini file.
5. The first prompt asks to Add installation to boot list? (Yes/No/All). type “Y” (without double quotes) and press enter.
6. The next prompt asks to Enter Load Identifier ” This is nothing but the name of the operation system which appears at the time of Booting ” :type Windows XP Professional or Windows XP Home Edition or simply Windows XP and press Enter.
7. Now it will ask to Enter OS Load options: type /Fastdetect and press Enter.
8. Take the Windows XP bootable CD out from the tray and Type exit and then press Enter to restart your PC.

The above solution provided will help to fix the trouble!

This time your Windows XP should start normally with out any problems, if you still have any concerns regarding this problem or solution, please leave a comment.

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If you have seen error which says “The system has recovered form serious error” after system restart or log off and logging again, then in most of the cases your user profile in windows

XP might have been damaged.

What does this message means actually?

When you receive this error message, your my documents may be missing, you may have to re-create your settings for Microsoft Outlook and Microsoft Internet Explorer.

You have to create a new user profile if your “My Documents” is missing or Microsoft Outlook settings are lost.

Let’s how can you create a new profile when your old profile is damaged.

Fix:

You can solve this problem by creating a new profile after backing up your documents and files from old profile. See this post on instruction to backup your important data.

Follow the procedure given below :

1. First find your documents, take the back up.

Path for your documents is given below:

(assuming C drive is where your OS is installed ).

C:\Documents and Settings\<old user name>\My Documents folder

2. Similarly, you can easily locate your favorites at the following path:

(assuming C drive is where your OS is installed ).

C:\Documents and Settings\<old user name>\Favorites

3. Open Start >> All Programs >> Accessories, select System Tools, now click System Restore.

4. Now select a previous date In the Select a Restore Point dialog box and try restore your system to a certain previous date.

5. After confirming the selection in restoration process, the restoration process starts which will also restart your computer.

6. Log on to your user profile after restart and check your profile folders if they had been restored correctly.

7. If your computer has been restored correctly with user profile folders data not affected, then it means that you have successfully repaired your profile.

But if your profile folders are still not reverted back to original settings, it means your windows user profiles is damaged. So that means you need to follow some additional steps :

8. Log off from the computer, and then log on to the computer by using the default Administrator account, or an account with administrative permissions.
9. Open Start >> Control Panel.

10. Select Performance and Maintenance, click Administrative Tools, and then double-click Computer Management.

11. Make sure you had back up all your profile folders like my documents and favorites as told in step 1,2 and 3. Right-click the damaged user account, and Delete it.

12. Right click on the 2nd right panel, and select New User.

13. Check these options while creating your new user account.

check User must change password at next logon

check User cannot change password

check Password never expires

check Account is disabled

and click OK.

14. Lastly restore or copy all the backed up documents and files to my documents folder and favorites folder.For instructions on restoring your data,see this link.

After following all the steps you have successfully restored your back up profile to the newly created profile.

We hope that the above procedure helps to fix the problem.

This content is just a summary, read the full article at ©2009 TroubleFixers - All about fixing computer troubles. All Rights Reserved.

One of our reader mailed us the following problem:

Windows XP logs me into the administrator every time instead of the account I created with administrative rights. I do not want to log into the Administrator account.

But why windows XP logins to default Administrator account?

It happens due to the auto-login has been enabled for the default administrator account in windows, because of which windows XP logs into the administrator account every time.

Simply we can say the auto admin logon feature is enabled.

Let’s see how can we fix it.

Fix:

There are different number of approaches with which we can fix this issue.

Method 1:

If you want to bypass the auto admin logon feature press SHIFT key at the time of logon, to logon as a different user in windows XP other than the default administrator account.

Method 2:

1. Open Start >> Run and type regedit and press enter. This will open the registry editor.

2. Navigate to the following path:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\WindowsNT\CurrentVersion\Winlogon

3. Double-click the AutoAdminLogon entry, type 1 in the Value Data box, and then click OK.

4. But ,if here is no AutoAdminLogon entry, you have to create the entry.

a. In the right pane , right click and select New, and then click String Value.

b. Type AutoAdminLogon as the value name, and select ok.

c. Double-click the newly created key, and then type 0 in the Value Data box.

5. Exit registry editor

6. Restart windows.

We hope you will be able to fix the trouble by the solutions provided above.

Technorati Tags: windows-xp-login,admin-login

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W32.Rontokbro.B@mm or brontok virus is one of the most active viruses as per our experience.

Symptoms of brontok virus:

If your system is infected by this virus you will not be able to open command prompt , msconfig and even you may not be able to execute any .exe file, as it may result in a sudden system restart.

Brontok virus also tries to terminate the security related programs like anti-virus and firewall. Also adds some registry entries required to run it at every time computer restarts and also to enable no folder options settings in the registry.

Fix:

We would recommend to follow the step by step procedure below to remove the virus.

Note: First of all if possible try to update your anti-virus of your system and run a complete scan and delete the infected files.

1. Disable System Restore (Windows Me/XP). Click here to know how to disable system restore
2. Download the Security Response by symentec “UnHookExec.inf” to enable registry editing.
3. Just download and Right-click the UnHookExec.inf file and click install.

4. Now, download W32.Ronotkbro removal tool

5. Run it and scan your system to remove the brontok virus.

6. After complete scan you will be able to remove the virus. 

7. Now you need to delete the scheduled task.

To delete the scheduled tasks added by the worm
7.1 Click Start, and then click Control Panel. (In Windows XP, switch to Classic View.)
7.2 In the Control Panel window, double click Scheduled Tasks.
7.3 Right click the task icon and select Properties from menu. The properties of the task is displayed.
7.4 Now delete the task if the contents of the Run text box in the task pane, matches the following:

%UserProfile%\Templates\Brengkolang.com

8. Restart your computer.

Note: if all the above steps are followed properly virus will be removed

NOTE:

If you use any removable storage media, that drive may also be infected by the brontok virus. Format your pen drive or portable drive after connecting but without opening the drive.

PS: Above process has been tested to remove the rontokbro.z@mm virus, but this procedure may not completely remove the virus on certain computers.

This content is just a summary, read the full article at ©2009 TroubleFixers - All about fixing computer troubles. All Rights Reserved.

One of our readers reported a problem, when he tried to access files located in the different user profile directory in vista, he got the message prompt saying access denied.

Why Access Files in other user account?

You must be thinking what is the need of this ,but it may be the case when you forgot the password of your account and you may have some very important files in your my documents or in some other user profiles folder.

Why Access denied?

In Windows Vista user accounts files are protected and private to the user itself by default, so no other account will have access to any directory or files located inside user profile folder.

For Example: When anyone try to open a protected folder, got a message prompt.

(see the image below)

(assuming C drive is where you have installed windows)

Fix:

But still there is a way through which you can access and make a back up of the files located in the protected directories inside the user profile folder.

In order to access files ,you will need to create a back up of the all the files inside the private directory and then restore these files to a different location using the created backup file.

Follow the procedure to take the back up of the protected files:

1. Right click on the drive in which the protected files are located and select properties

2. Click Next to skip past the opening page, choose Back up files and settings from the second page, and then click Next.

3. For most people, the My documents and settings option is a better choice. This selection preserves your data files (including e-mail messages and address books) and the personal settings stored in the Windows Registry.

4. If you know that you have data files stored outside your profile, click Let me choose what to back up. This option takes you to the Items to Back Up page

5. Now select the files you need to back up ,this will generate a backup file.

After the backup file has been created, you can it restore by double clicking on back up file form the back up process on a different location. This will remove all the access restrictions to the files.

We hope you will be able to access to your lost files and folders by following the above illustrated process. Hope this helps to fix the trouble.

This content is just a summary, read the full article at ©2009 TroubleFixers - All about fixing computer troubles. All Rights Reserved.

We have received a mail from one of our readers Vikram, having slow and delayed shutdown time on his windows XP computer.

The problem of slow or delayed shutdown is very commonly faced by most of the window XP users. If you are using windows XP for a long time, you are more likely to have such problem.

Why Slow shutdown?

In Windows XP certain registry keys are responsible for determining how long windows will wait before shutting down all the opened programs and services after the shutdown command has been given by the user.

Lets see how we can fix the slow shutdown in windows XP

Fix:

You need to optimise some registry keys values in order to speed up the shutdown process.

1. Open Start >> Run and type regedit and press enter

2. Now navigate to ‘HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Control Panel\Desktop\’
In this entry, you will see a registry key named WaitToKillAppTimeout .

Double click on it and set its value to 1000 , this value is the time in milliseconds for which the windows waits before all the processes and services are closed.

This way you have set it to 1 second.

Not only this, there are some other registry settings set by default due to which Windows XP will prompt the user for input if there are one or more applications still not closed or not responding. This increases the shutdown time due to no response from the user.

So, you should also change that registry key settings value.

3. Navigate to ‘HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Control Panel\Desktop’

Double click on the registry key ‘AutoEndTasks.’ and set its value to 1

4. That is all, Trouble Fixed.

Now restart your system, you will see a considerable reduction in the shutdown time this time.

Tip: If modifying registry seems cumbersome to you can simply create a instant shutdown shortcut on your desktop.

1. Right click on your desktop and select New >> Shortcut

2. copy the following command: %windir%\System32\shutdown.exe -s -f -t 00

3. Name your shortcut as instant shutdown

4. You can use this created shortcut for fast shutdown.

This will forcibly end all running tasks and shutdown instantly.

Warning: Make sure to save any unsaved work before you shutdown using these tips. It may cause loss of unsaved work.

This content is just a summary, read the full article at ©2009 TroubleFixers - All about fixing computer troubles. All Rights Reserved.

Sometimes it happens that when you insert a recorded data DVD or CD into your CD or DVD reader but rather then displaying the data it displays the disc as blank.

Note: It’s not your CD or DVD reader fault at all when it reports the recorded media as blank.

This problem may occur when you use certain third-party Image Mastering API (IMAPI) CD-burning software to record data to a recordable CD or DVD. Lets see how this trouble can be fixed.

Fix:

The problem mainly occurs because the IMAPI CD-burning software which you use for writing CD or DVD changes the sub-header bits on the disc to a format that Microsoft Windows XP cannot read correctly.

But don’t worry as you can easily fix the issue by installing the latest service pack provided by Microsoft, obtain the latest service pack for Microsoft Windows XP by clicking here.

If you have any other problems related to this one please leave a comment at the end of this post we will be glad to help you out.

Tip: You can refer to this link to troubleshoot the common problems which occur in CD or DVD reading in Windows XP.

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Do you get “Access denied” error message when you try to access some file or folder on a shared folder on a home or office network ?

This is one very commonly faced problems with computers using NTFS file system which most of the windows Xp computers used.

In such a case, when a person shares some folder on a network, then there is usually a read permission for all others. That means all other people, other than the owner of that shared folder can only read its contents and not modify them.

Why Access denied ?

Sometimes it happens that other computers on the network don’t have even the permission to read anything from shared folder (which is on other computer) specially when the person shared the file in my documents , or some file shared on his desktop but these files which lies in my documents or on desktop are private by default when you use windows XP with ntfs file system. This is why Access Denied error message is shown.
How to fix it ?

This problem can be fixed by providing read or read-write permission on the folder from the computer which actually contains the folder.

Fix:

Let us see the steps to fix the problem :

1. Open My computer, Go to Tools > Folder option , click on View tab.

2. In advance settings, un-check “use simple file sharing” as shown in image below. Click Ok.

3. Right click on the shared folder and click on Properties.

4. Click on Security tab on Properties window as shown in image below.

5. Click on Add… Button on this window, this will launch another window as shown below.

6. In this window type everyone and press enter. This will add a user called everyone in the group or user names window of security tab which means any one on the network can access the shared files now.

7. Click on the user named Everyone to set default permissions allowed for the folder and set the permission as shown in image below and click Ok.

These permissions will be applicable to everyone on the same network on which computer is right now. As an example the image below shows that everyone has a read and execute permission. It does not give write or modify permission.

You can decide on permission which you want to give to others on the network.

NOTE:This fix is meant for NTFS partitions only.

TIP: If you want to share the folder with only one or two users and not with everyone on the network, then simply write their usernames in step 6 above instead of everyone, and set the permission for that user as mentioned in step 7.

This content is just a summary, read the full article at ©2009 TroubleFixers - All about fixing computer troubles. All Rights Reserved.