Category: 32 Bit

Error while Uninstall a Program – Wait Until the Current Program is Finished Uninstalling

Sunil PadmanabhanLeave a comment

Applies to Windows 7 / Windows 8

A reboot would ideally get you through this. A quick option would be to kill explorer.exe and reinstate it

  1. Open Task Manager
  2. From the Processes Tab; right-click on explorer.exe and select End Process
  3. Your task bar would immediately disappear
  4. From the File Menu, of your Task Manager; click New Task
  5. Type in explorer.exe and click ok
  6. Your task bar should return and you can resume uninstallation of your program
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Changing you Windows 7 Product Key after Installation

Sunil PadmanabhanLeave a comment

I did not realize that this was possible until a colleague told me about it

There is a built VB Script within Windows 7 which provides this feature

Open Command Prompt

  • slmgr.vbs -ipk <type your product key here>
  • To activate windows type – slmgr.vbs –ato
  • And you are done !

 

 

Error Message when Compressing Files in Windows 7

Sunil PadmanabhanLeave a comment

When trying to use Compressed (zipped) Folder in Windows 7 you get the error message

“includes characters that cannot be used in a compressed folder”

First thing to do would be to check for any unrecognized characters in file / folder names of the files you wish to compress. You can rename them to resolve this issue.

But if this is not an unrecognized character; but instead a language different from you PC Default; there are two things you can do

  • If renaming the file name or folder is ok for you as well as the recipient who expects to recieve your compressed file; you can proceed with the same
  • Or else; an easy option would to be use either WinRAR or 7-Zip to do the compress operation and restore all the characters in the file and folder names
  • If you prefer using the default Compressed (zipped) Folder option; you would need to change the System Locale under Control Panel – Region and Languages – Administrative and add the required language. This is a far fetched exercise and not really recommended unless it is a very regular of you dealing with files or folder names that are non-english

Windows cannot connect to the printer (Error code : error 0x00000057)

praveenh4 Comments

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It’s actually the print driver failing to install, not the connection to the print server. An initial attempt to install the driver will fail, so the driver directory is present on the workstation, but missing the files.

The instructions given below are for a 32 bit PC. Such an error normally do not occur on a 64 bit machine. When above error is shown in a User’s PC, kindly follow the instructions below:

  1. On a machine with the same driver installed (and working properly), open Regedit, and browse to:
    HKLM\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\Print\Environments\Windows NT x86\Drivers\Version-3\
  2. Locate the subkey for the printer driver you are dealing with and click the key for the printer driver.
  3. Look for the “InfPath” on the right. Note the path.
  4. Now browse to C:\Windows\System32\DriverStore\FileRepository and locate the folder indicated in the InfPath reg value. 
  5. Go to the user’s computer exhibiting this behavior, and browse to C:\Windows\System32\DriverStore\FileRepository and see if the folder is present. In some cases, the folder would be present, but empty or you might not even find such a folder. In either of the case, you will have to modify security on the folder (FileRepository), and then granting your Admin account full control. 
  6. Once security is granted, copy the contents of this folder from a good machine to the machine presenting the 0x00000057.

Now try connecting to the print queue on the print server. The driver should now download and install properly.

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