Posts by wiredcanyon94

Robert Booth19 said:Someone over on Buggy's forum suggested using CCleaner...
A supposed "all-in-one" cleaner... people swear by it...
So, naturally, I gave it a shot. It didn't live up to the hype for me at all...
I decided to Delete it...

I used Revo Uninstaller to get rid of it...

But here's the thing: there's this one folder left behind that just won't budge. Every time I try to kill it, it pops right back up...

My computer is running fine otherwise—no lag, no glitches, nothing acting up...

It feels clean and organized, with no other trace of that Google software left...

Except for that one stubborn folder...

The second "something" starts bringing it back, it means your computer isn't actually "clean." If it were truly clean, there wouldn't be anything left to resurrect.

Larry Ortiz5 said:Why don't you just wipe the hard drive and slap a fresh install of Windows on there?

I'm guessing if they can't figure out how to rename a computer or set up a new user profile, they probably haven't even touched a disk format or a Windows installation before either.

ambertiger6 said:Hey everyone,
So, I've been working with my 17-inch Madison Square Garden laptop (http://support.hp.com/hr-en/product/...0/product-info)
and a 24-inch Dell monitor. Since I do most of my gaming on the laptop, I decided to hook everything up to the monitor to get a bigger view using a VGA cable—my monitor doesn't have an HDMI port, unfortunately. Now that I've switched the display over, the image looks incredibly blurry. I took a quick look at the settings and noticed the maximum resolution on the laptop itself is only 1600x900. Does this blurriness mean my graphics card (an ATI Radeon HD 5650) just isn't cutting it? I also just noticed in the link above that my graphics are "switchable," so does anyone have any suggestions on which card I should buy to upgrade this thing?

I'd love to know how the thread title actually relates to this post.

ironcanyon26 said:I need some technical assistance here. I'm running Windows 7 on my PC, but I have a printer for which there are absolutely no drivers available for this OS.
Is it possible to install Windows XP, or perhaps another operating system that actually supports my printer, and then just use XP specifically for printing tasks?
The device in question is a Brother fax machine. It’s fast, reliable, and works perfectly fine—I really don't want to waste money on a new one right now.

You could definitely do what shadowlynx102 suggested, but if you want a straight answer to your question: yeah, you can absolutely install Windows XP on your computer.
The real question is, do you actually want to deal with that headache?

Morgan Brown6 said:I picked up a $10 128GB Chinese USB drive on eBay.
At least, that's what the properties say. I moved about 20GB over from my PC, but here's the catch: some files (like .mp4 or .avi movies) play just fine, while others show up as empty folders. I'm testing this on my Samsung TV. What gives? I know it's probably cheap junk, but it should either work or it shouldn't. This is playing favorites with my files.

I tried formatting it on Windows XP, but it's only giving me the exFAT option.

If I format it to FAT32, I won't be able to put any files larger than 4GB on there, but I'm wondering—what would the actual capacity be then? (Would it still claim to be 128GB or would it show less?)

And would switching to FAT32 actually fix these "invisible" files?
Some files look fine on the computer, but they show up as empty folders on the TV. Maybe the TV doesn't support exFAT?

Can anyone give me some advice, besides telling me to stop buying cheap Chinese garbage?🙂
Thanks.

My advice (besides not buying $5 sticks that claim to hold the entire internet) is to just stop using that thing entirely.

You might also want to check out this thread:
http://www.forum.com/showthread.php?t=865560

The title mentions Xvid, but it's not really about the codec; it's about those same cheap sticks where you try to cram all your downloads onto something that cost five bucks.

And yeah, regarding what I bolded... that 128GB drive of yours doesn't have 128GB right now, and it's never going to have it, no matter how many times you format it.

George Smith4 said:Everything seems fine now, so I don't actually miss that 7 GB. Like I mentioned before, this just happens randomly—it disappears, then pops back up, then goes away again...
CCleaner managed to claw back about 600 MB, but I'm stuck on what else I can even try to figure out why this keeps happening. I'm not even downloading anything. Also, what exactly does that recovery option in My Computer do?

You're being a bit vague here. If you aren't talking about something else—since it's hard to tell from your post—that "recovery" thing is likely a recovery partition. It holds the system image or installation files from when you first bought the machine.
Basically, if everything goes south and your OS totally crashes, you use that to roll the PC back to its factory settings.

Whatever you do, don't delete it or start messing around with it.

George Smith4 said:here's what I found:
I clicked on "turn on system protection,"
under disk space usage—current usage is 570.30 MB
-max usage is 0% (974.58 MB)
I didn't go ahead and hit delete like they showed in that YouTube clip because I wanted to check with you guys first. I didn't want to mess anything up by mistake.
Is this actually the problem, or should I just leave it alone and skip the delete step?

It’s telling you exactly how much is being used right now. That's 570 MB, or about 0.57 GB.
That is way, way less than the 7 GB you mentioned in your first post. Something else is eating up your storage.

It would be a good idea to figure out what's actually hogging all that space first.
Personally, if I were you, I wouldn't touch that 0.57 GB (or even the 0.98 GB max limit) unless you're absolutely desperate for an extra half-gig.

Justin Phillips15 said:http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/system-restore

It’s possible he just has his settings cranked up—like if he told the system to let System Restore hog 100GB of space. It constantly fills up and clears itself out, so you just cap it at, say, 10GB. Then it won't go over that limit. Just Google what System Restore actually does.

Fair point, but he mentioned that after his antivirus wiped out some junk files, his storage space came back. That means it isn't a System Restore issue.
Sure, System Restore uses some space, but honestly, that's a good thing. You want that buffer in case some malware decides to wreck everything and you need a way to roll back the clock.
That's a different story from those actual junk files just eating up his drive.

Besides, how can you even know how much space he's allocated to System Restore just by reading his post?

Justin Phillips15 said:Just try doing what they show in this video and everything will be fixed.

Could you maybe walk me through how exactly that’s supposed to help him?

Or, if you picked it up from a local shop, just take it back to the vendor for a full refund, obviously.

Donna Garcia said:In those public sector or municipal jobs, they don't really care about the bottom line, so things actually tend to run smoother there.
Private companies are the ones who stingiest when it comes to this stuff; they'll hire a college kid and think they've checked all the boxes.

Those kinds of private outfits don't stay in business long. And when their whole operation crashes because of bad IT, they immediately blame the government, politics, or everyone else under the sun.

The private owners who actually understand where their money comes from usually stick around a bit longer.

In a government office, you’ll often find someone's cousin or a former driver or a failed accountant sitting in an administrator role. Most competent American admins are either working for major corporations or have moved abroad.
Of course, you still have those "fake admins" in government jobs too. It isn't all black and white. But it's rare to find anyone truly skilled who stays in a public sector role. They stick around just long enough to learn the ropes and then they bail. What's left behind are just the "fake admins."

Sandra Davis7 said:How much RAM and virtual memory does a virtual machine actually eat up compared to just running standard Windows? I guess we're working with really limited RAM on our machines, and I'm a bit worried that SSD space might run dry eventually once Windows updates start rolling in. Would setting up a server, assigning domains, and spinning up VMs on these computers end up being too heavy on our resources?

Honestly, I think I got a little lost in your last post. I'm not entirely sure what you're asking here.

Setting up a domain makes administration easier, sure. But you don't need virtual machines just to migrate a system over to a domain.
As for how much memory a VM "eats"—it eats exactly as much as you decide to give it.

Look, if you're already strapped for memory and disk space, you're stuck. There's no magic fix. If you have so little space left that you're expecting Windows updates to wipe out the remaining capacity, there isn't much you can do. No matter what move you make, that space is still going to vanish.

And yeah, you mentioned "creating" a server. You usually have to buy one. Unless, of course, you already have hardware sitting around. Actually, if you're looking at 100 workstations and want room to grow, you should probably have at least two servers for redundancy.

Also, how are all these machines getting online? Is it just one single connection, or are there multiple gateways? What's the bandwidth looking like? Won't that choke your internet connection? Is the whole company in one building or spread across different sites? Are all 100 computers independently pulling updates from Microsoft?
Maybe consider setting up a proxy? It would save a massive amount of bandwidth. And is every single machine pulling its own antivirus updates? That alone eats up a ton of data. I'm guessing you don't even have an antivirus server right now—like a corporate setup that downloads the updates once and distributes them locally.
You mentioned users are browsing the web, downloading music, watching videos, reading news... everyone is burning through bandwidth individually. A proxy could be a lifesaver here. Not by throttling them, but by preventing 100 machines from downloading the exact same files 100 times; once one machine grabs a file, the others pull it from the proxy instead. Of course, configuring a proxy properly isn't exactly child's play.

Anyway, I'm rambling. Managing 100 workstations isn't something you can just wing. Well, maybe if it's some government agency where profit doesn't actually matter.

Joshua Cook62 said:It really just comes down to what you actually care about. I picked up an HP v250w with 512 GB for $12. It’s probably not breaking any speed records, but hey, it holds plenty of files.

And then, a few days later, you're back here asking for tech support because your USB drive isn't working quite right.

Of course it doesn't work. You fell for one of those fake drives where they claim it's 500 GB when it's actually barely a few gigs.

crimsonharbor313 said:From what I understand—and I’m just a computer science student, not an expert—you should set it up the way they teach at a university. You’d have a central server and network all the workstations together. From there, you can deploy whatever software you need to handle the blocking. For instance, if you strip users of their admin rights, it pretty much guarantees they can't install anything extra. You could also implement disk encryption and web filtering. If you split the drive into two partitions and keep one strictly for admin tasks, you could even configure it to wipe everything clean whenever the machine shuts down, preventing any unwanted changes from sticking.

Besides, manually walking from desk to desk every single day? There's just no sense in doing that.

Let me say this one more time.
In a professional business environment, you simply cannot (or at least, you shouldn't) wipe everything an employee worked on the moment they shut down their computer.
That kind of setup makes sense for a public internet cafe, sure, but not for a company where that same employee is expected to show up and pick up right where they left off tomorrow.
It’s just not how things work. And it's not because employees would throw a fit—it's because it's fundamentally bad practice.

Sandra Davis7 said:We're a private call center handling inbound calls for a massive telecom giant. Most of us run one specific app, but the hardware is just... weak. Seriously, the RAM is struggling. I'm just typing this right now and the service app is running in the background, and my CPU Meter shows we're already sitting at 73% RAM usage. Of course, apps keep crashing, and we constantly get those annoying alerts saying memory is low and we should probably just restart the PC. So, I'm trying to find a way to optimize things, but I can't just download whatever I want. Even if people do download stuff, I want to make sure that data doesn't stick around and clog up the RAM and memory the next day. There's also the issue of the director—he definitely doesn't want people browsing YouTube or anything like that while they're on the clock, so he wants a fix. They tried blocking YouTube, but I ended up launching Tor to bypass all the restrictions. Now, the Tor browsers have been wiped from all the machines, so everyone is back to watching YouTube freely. That could have landed me in hot water, but since they heard I'm a computer science student and might actually know how to fix things, they decided to bring me on as an admin. So, here I am, looking for a solution to 😁

Sorry, but you've got a problem that a random online forum isn't going to solve for you.
If they've officially put you in an admin role when you haven't done this before, ask them to send you to some training. Or pay for it yourself. Getting an MCSA would be a solid starting point.

And yeah, I get it—management usually hates spending extra cash on maintaining their IT infrastructure. They’d love for everything to run perfectly for zero dollars while still pumping out profit.
But reality works differently. You get what you pay for.

You can't expect a few sentences of advice on a forum to teach you how to manage 100 workstations. I mean, you *can* ask, but...
If you're responsible for 100 computers, you can't just "download" some software because some guy with a username on a forum told you it was cool and worth installing. What happens if that software chokes the system even harder or causes a total meltdown? What are you going to tell the boss? "Some guy on a forum told me it was fine"?

Sandra Davis7 said:I'm honestly not sure how I'm supposed to handle downloading torrents; I just recently got tasked with administering these machines, and I haven't really dealt with this stuff before. I feel a bit more comfortable with routers and switches, though I guess I'm still pretty much a rookie there too. Anyway, aside from using this Deep Freeze app—which seems like a solid option right now—is it actually possible to convert the workgroup into a domain so I can manage them through Active Directory or something similar? Right now, each computer is just its own thing running standard Windows 7. They aren't connected to a Windows server or anything like that, so I'm wondering if a third-party app like Deep Freeze is my only real move here?

If you haven't done this before, honestly, just find someone to set up a decent domain for you. Trying to manage 100 computers without a domain is an absolute nightmare. Anything over 10 or 15 machines needs a domain. A hundred? Forget about it. How are you supposed to actually get anything done? How are they sharing files? How are you handling backups? What about software installs? Running a workgroup of 100 machines is just asking for chaos.

Of course, you're going to need a proper server to run a domain.

By the way, what kind of company are we talking about here? What do they actually do? Is it private or some government agency?
And how on earth have they managed to leave this part of their business such a mess until now?

analogwalker2 said:Now, if you'll indulge me for a moment—I find myself stuck on a bit of a conundrum! Could someone please help me clear up this one nagging doubt?
Last night, I headed out once again to run a scan on my computer—because, honestly, can you ever really be too careful when it comes to digital hygiene? It’s one of those things that just stays on the back of your mind, isn't it? Always wondering if there's some hidden gremlin lurking in the code... anyway, I was deep into the process when I realized... Zero Assumption Recovery So, now I’m going to run a comparison against that data I just finished scanning with it—and get this—suddenly a whole bunch of files are popping up that definitely weren't there a moment ago! But wait, it gets even weirder... some of the files I was literally opening just last night have completely vanished into thin air! Isn't that just something? One minute everything is right where you left it, and the next, it's like a digital disappearing act!
If a file is corrupted, honestly—why would anyone even want to deal with it now or ever? It’s just dead weight!

Which software did you end up using for the scan? And—if you actually went through with that Get Data tool—could you walk me through your process? I mean, could you give me a real step-by-step breakdown of exactly what you did?

Well, just like I mentioned to shadowlynx102 after running that scan with GetData—I honestly couldn't open a single file! Not even one! It wouldn't even launch the ones that Zero actually managed to locate... can you believe that?

I can't really walk you through it step-by-step because I honestly don't remember. It was ages ago.
Yeah, I’ve messed around with that software before. I spent some time digging through the help files and picking up a few tips online, and eventually, it actually worked. It was a bit of a slog, though—it took forever because I was dealing with a massive amount of data on an external drive connected via USB.

Sandra Davis7 said:They don't have admin rights—I do. They really don't need anything besides their specific work apps, and I definitely don't plan on touching those. It’s fine if they download PDFs for themselves; that isn't the issue. I can't exactly force them to delete everything immediately, though, so files just pile up until I start getting low memory alerts. Plus, there's all kinds of stuff like torrents, poker sites, you name it. As for blocking installations, I end up having to manually block every single program I catch them downloading one by one. And it's a constant cycle—once a new version of an app comes out, they can download it again, and I have to go from machine to machine all over again. Maybe I'm wrong about this, but if I am, please tell me: how can I just block all software installations permanently? Sorry, but please don't lecture me on what I should or shouldn't allow my coworkers to do. Their computers are meant to run one specific application smoothly, not crash because they won't or don't know how to clear their history or the movies they downloaded that day. Like I said, they can download what they want, but the data shouldn't just sit there clogging things up. I'm stuck cleaning up after them on nearly 100 🙂
different machines.

You mentioned in your first post that you have "plenty" of computers. How many is "plenty" to you?
And also, do you have a domain? Active Directory? Do you have a centralized internet gateway, or is everyone just browsing through their own little setups?

One question though—how is someone even able to download torrent clients or install random software if they aren't an admin? You need admin rights to install things. And how are they pulling torrent traffic (or any unwanted traffic) on a controlled network where there's a single admin in charge?
If you really have "plenty" of machines, you should at least have a central firewall, antivirus, and things like that.

I wasn't trying to tell you what to restrict or not restrict for your users. That's your call, obviously. Or rather, it's management's call, and it's the admin's job to enforce company policy.

Edit:
Also, if you had a domain, you could just use Group Policy to block all (or some) USB ports, so nobody could even move files via thumb drives.

Edit 2:
Ah, I just realized you're going "from computer to computer." So, no domain. In that case, there's nothing. Without central administration, this is way harder than it needs to be.

Edit 3:
I'm exhausted today. You say you have 100 computers and you're walking from one to the next. Wait... you have 100 machines and no domain?
Good luck!

Sandra Davis7 said:Hey everyone, I’ve got a bit of a situation at work I need to tackle. We have a bunch of machines running Windows 7, and my main Windows 7 goal is to keep them totally clean. I really want to stop users from cluttering everything up with files they grab from the web or via USB drives. I was thinking maybe I could handle this by setting up some rules in the Task Scheduler, so basically, every time a computer boots up, it just wipes out all the data my colleagues saved the day before. Am I on the right track with using Task Scheduler for this? If anyone knows a better way to get this done, let me know. Thanks!

You're heading down the wrong path. You can't just go around deleting user data on the machines they actually use to work.
It’s better to just stop them from installing stuff they shouldn't be touching in the first place. If someone downloads a document—say, a PDF—why on earth would you delete that? You probably meant you don't want them installing whatever junk they find online. In that case, just strip away their admin rights. That solves most problems.

If you're genuinely worried about people hoarding "too much data," just set up disk quotas. Deleting people's files is a recipe for disaster. How is a script supposed to tell the difference between a critical work file and actual "time-wasting" junk?

analogwalker2 said:I followed your advice to the letter! I checked all those boxes just like you instructed—but, well, after all that work, I’m still coming up empty-handed. I ended up losing about an hour of my life (the scan took a little over sixty minutes, though I have to ask—why did you mention in that tutorial from the top link that a scan could drag on for up to ten hours? Even with all those options enabled, I didn't hit the hour-and-a-half mark!) and yet... nothing. There was a tiny bit of progress, if you can call it that; I managed to open a few files, but honestly, everything is completely scrambled! It’s a total mess—for instance, I try to open a track by John Smith, and instead, Pink Floyd starts playing!
On the other hand, some of the files that Zero actually managed to recover open just fine, whereas when I try using EaseUS Data Recovery, those exact same files either won't open at all or they just throw an error at me.
So, I've just kicked off another scan using that last option shown in the image on the right, keeping the same settings from the left one. I'll let you know how it turns out!

Once, I was trying to pull about a terabyte of data off a 2TB external drive. That was ages ago and I don't remember the specifics, but I think it took two or three days. So, ten hours isn't really that big of a deal.

That aside... if you try to play Elvis Presley and you hear Pink Floyd, then what exactly is the issue? 😉
Now, if you clicked on "One of These Days" and suddenly heard Elvis Presley—THAT would be a problem. 🙂