Vista Update Drives PC Into Perpetual Reboot Cycle
Personal Productivity September 8th, 2009
My Vista-based laptop gave me the Windows has recovered from an unexpected shutdown screen: this is where you have the options to start Windows normally or select one of several “safe” driver- and service-less modes to boot. I picked normal, the system booted .. end of story.
Except… I walked away for a little while, and 15 or so minutes later when I came back, the computer was in the same stage. So I repeated the process… and guess what:
Coming back a little later again, I saw the computer at the ugly reboot screen again. What was going on? This is a few weeks old laptop with hardly anything installed on it, is it already dying?
I got lucky: for the first time in my life, Vista’s Problem Reports and Solutions actually found the answer:
After you apply update 973879 on a computer that is running an x64-based version of Windows Vista or of Windows Server 2008, you may receive a "Stop 0×0000007e" or "Stop 0×00000050" error message within 10 minutes after system startup.
Well, not exactly, I dug into what these errors were, and my computer behaved rather differently, basically playing a game of perpetual reboot. Still, I figured I would go ahead and uninstall this update – I even got lucky, I could simply remove it without having to resort to the more torturous Method 3, that involves a Windows Preinstallation Environment. (Yuck… I don’t like the sound of it.).
Voila! My PC is in working condition again… and I just hope in won’t become total crap in the two months left before it gets rescued by Windows 7.
(Cross-posted @ CloudAve)
Tags: vista, vistasucks, Windows, windows 7, windows update, windows vista, xref
Just My Usual PC Rant…
Software May 5th, 2009
<rant>
My shiny new Dell Mini 12 on startup from hibernation:
“Resuming Windows” – how long do you think it should take? 30 seconds? A few minutes?
Forever. That’s all it does. Stuck. Forced shut-off, start again.
Now it’s “Checking for updates to Adobe Updater”. No kidding. 6-7 minutes later Adobe Acrobat Reader 9 is updated. But now McAfee is updating itself.
No wonder I hate desktop software.
</rant>
Tags: adobe, dell mini, desktop software, hibernation, netbook, pc, sofware updates, Windows, windowssucks
My Miracle PC
Personal Productivity, Software February 19th, 2009
It does so much, while using zero resources:
Of course that’s not the typical picture, more often than not CPU usage is in the upper 80-90% range, while the Resource Monitor can only account for about 40%. Just another crappy program from Microsoft… but no worries: Windows 7: Cutting corners in the rush to market? How reassuring…
Tags: microsoft, resource monitor, vista, vistasucks, Windows, windows 7
Netbooks or Notebooks? It’s Not Only About Size.
Technology November 3rd, 2008
Hardly a day goes by without another new Netbook announcement, at lower and lower prices. The first baby eee PC by ASUS was toy-like ( I returned it after a day), but the current crop are quite usable mobile computing devices.
These new Netbooks are flying off the shelf, so much so that sometimes you wonder if manufacturers rush to re-label their notebooks to netbooks, just to ride the wave. Whereas the first model had a puny 7” screen, the current standard is a minimum of 8.9, but 10” is becoming widely available, and when Dell recently announced their Inspiron Mini 12, ZDNet’s Larry Dignan rightfully noted that the netbook-notebook-laptop lines have just become blurry.
Dell’s divider line may very well be at the 12” screen size, considering anything beyond that a notebook. ASUS CEO Jerry Shen clearly draws the line at 10” – a definition that fits his own eee PC line. I think all these size-based definitions are meaningless. Size truly matters, but for another reason: when you pick a travel n*tbook, you clearly need something small and lightweight, yet with a decent keyboard and screen. But that’s not what differentiates Netbooks from any other computer.
The real divider is how you use it. A Netbook is a light mobile computing device that allows you to process information, access the Internet, and that does not store a bundle of bloated programs or data.
When computers first became personal, most of us only got one at the workplace, then years later the family PC appeared– one expensive computer shared by the entire family. Now we often have individual PC’s for just about anyone at home, including the kids, and are moving to a new pattern, where individuals will have a number of purpose-oriented computing devices, be it a desktop, workhorse laptop, netbook or smartphone. The fundamental change is that we’re not really working on the computer itself, but on the Net: the computer (keyboard, screen) is just our way to access the net. As Coding Horror’s Jeff Atwood says in The Web Browser is the New Laptop :
After spending some time with a netbook, I realized that calling them "small laptops" is a mistake. Netbooks are an entirely different breed of animal. They are cheap, portable web browsers.
We’re getting to the point where for most productivity task the computer’s performance or even the operating system won’t matter anymore: all we need is a decent screen and keyboard to get online.
But computer manufacturers while jumping on this hot new trend, seem to be confused. Minor flavors aside they typically offer two major configurations:
- The uber-geek netbook:
- Linux
- Solid-state drive (SSD)
- For the rest of the world:
- Windows XP
- Traditional hard drive
That’s not a very smart combination, if you ask me. Statistics show the return rate of Linux vs. Windows based netbooks is 4 to 1. Buyers of the cute little netbooks are happy first, then they become frustrated that they can’t instantly do things they are used to – and a learning curve with a $400 $200 device is unacceptable. Let’s face it, Linux is not friendly enough for most non-geeks – including yours truly. But why can I not have a netbook with XP and SSD?
Typical netbook SSD’s are still in the 8-16GB range, while harddisks are up to 160GB. That’s a trap that vendor themselves fall into: my sexy little netbook (an Acer Aspire One) came loaded with crapware, including trial versions of MS Office, MS Works, Intervideo WinDVD (on a DVD-less computer!) and who knows what else. Once the pattern is established, and you have large storage, you will start installing your own programs and data, too, the temptation is just too hard to resist. You no longer have a netbook, it just became a noteboook.
The New York Times ran an article this week: In Age of Impatience, Cutting Computer Start Time, discussing the problem of slow boot times. Anyone who ever had a Windows computer knows this tends to get worse over time. My own Vista desktop had a sub-minute startup time a year ago when new, not it takes 3-4 minute to boot it. The two older XP-based laptops take 6-7 minutes to reboot. This well-known Windows disease can only be cured by refreshing your system from time to time. It’s an ugly process, requires wiping out your harddisk’s content, re-installing Windows, then your programs and data. PC manufacturers don’t exactly help by providing “restore disks” instead of proper OS CD’s: why would you start with a pre- SP1 copy of WinXP and reinstall a bunch of years-old obsolete crapware when the objective was to cleanup your system in the first place?
If you want to avoid the pain, keep your netbook free of applications and data: use it as a NETbook, and it will stay nimble and fast (sort of).
Talk about fast, there’s a neat solution to reduce boot-up time: Splashtop, a quick-load platform by startup company DeviceVM can put you online within seconds, without loading the main operating system. Chances are you’d be using it 80% of the time, relegating full Windows to an as-needed basis. DeviceVM charges manufacturers about $1 per system, so why is it that it’s often found in high-end notebooks, but not in the netbooks by the same manufacturer? Splashtop should be a must on any netbook.
Finally, a word on connectivity and prices: Wifi gets you online almost, but not all the time, so obviously a 3G connection is a useful addition to your netbook. But you will pay for 3G data usage, so why don’t carriers subsidize your netbook purchase, like they do with cell phones? The day will come, as the WSJ reports, HP may be one of the first to introduce such a model: H-P Mulls Service Bundles for Netbooks. When that happens, your notebook will not be too different from a smartphone, just with a larger keyboard and display.
(Cross-posted from CloudAve.)
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Tags: acer, asus, bloatware, crapware, dell, devicevm, HP, lenovo, linux, mobility, netbooks, notebooks, online, splashtop, Web Applications, web office, Windows, winxp
SAP TechEd: Windows is Out. But Windows are In.
Humor October 14th, 2008
My fellow Enterprise Irregulars are at SAP’s TechEd in Berlin, Germany. David Terrar is apparently in Windows-prison, as he observed:
Here in the Bloggers Room at SAP TechEd 2008, the Windows users (of which I am one) are consigned to one end of the room. We have to take regular abuse from the Mac fanboys. As you can see, the score is Apple Mac 8 Windows based PCs 3. In the blog world we M$ types appear to be a dying breed.
I told him he’d probably get a very different count in the keynote theater, where the real corporate folks are, who don’t have a choice – unless they all work for Citrix. ![]()
But there’s something else strikingly obvious on this photo. Windows is out. But Windows are in – I mean the real ones, letting daylight in. This is something we’ll never get in the US. I almost forgot the luxury of having windows (not the MS-kind) is quite normal in Europe.
Tags: Apple, Enterprise irregulars, ergonomics, Humor, mac, ms, sap, sap teched, Windows
Why Vista S**ks
Personal Productivity September 25th, 2008
Vista isn’t really that crappy – says Gizmodo this morning. Well, I won’t tell you what I think ( I’ve done my fair share), I’ll just let you decide. After all, a picture is worth a thousand words… well, then how about a video?
Yes, all I was trying to delete empty folder structures from my own computer, using an account with full Admin rights. Makes me wonder whose permission I need.. Bill Gates? Steve Ballmer?
Tags: vista, vistasucks, Windows

be called Vista SP3.
Zoli Erdos