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The Easy Way to Change Boot Sequence in VMware

July 9th, 2014 by Admin

If you’ve used any of VMware’s products you’ve probably been frustrated by trying to boot a virtual machine (VM) from CD or ISO image. When you start a VM, the VMware splash screen only shows for really short time. To enter into the VM’s BIOS Setup, you have to be really quick with your mouse moving focus to the VM and press F2 as quick as possible.

Recently I discovered a second method which allows you to change the boot sequence by modifying the .vmx file of your VM. This method works with all virtual machines running inside VMware Workstation, VMware Player, VMware ESXi/ESX, VMware Fusion, etc.

How to Change Boot Sequence in VMware?

  1. Locate the .vmx file for your virtual machine and open it in a text editor.
  2. Find the line that begins with bios.bootOrder. If there is no such line, simply add the following line to your .vmx file:
    bios.bootOrder = "cdrom,hdd,floppy"

    vmware-boot-order

    In this example, the virtual machine tries to boot with CD-ROM. If there is nothing to boot from, try from the disk. If that fails, try the floppy.

  3. Save the .vmx file and close the text editor. Start your virtual machine and it will automatically boot from your specified device.

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Save Any Web Page To PDF File in Windows and Mac

June 30th, 2014 by Admin

Have you ever wanted to download one or more Web pages in a form that you could read on a PDA or an e-book reader? Every time I came across a great tutorial on the Web, I will convert the content to a pdf file and keep it for future reference. If you are like me, and are also using Google Chrome, you can save any Web page to PDF file in just a few mouse clicks, without using any PDF conversion software.

How to Save Any Web Page To PDF File in Windows and Mac?

  1. First of all, start the Chrome browse and access the web page that you want to convert into a PDF file format.
  2. Press Ctrl + P in Windows PC or Command + P if you are using a Mac to open the the Print dialog.

    save-webpage-to-pdf

  3. Click on Save button to save the current online web page to to PDF format.

This is the simplest way to convert a web page to PDF file in Windows and Mac. If you’re not always connected to the Web, you can save your favorite articles you find online so you can read them offline later.

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How to Prevent A Program from Ever Running in Windows

June 13th, 2014 by Admin

If you have kids you may don’t want them to run certain applications like Skype or BitTorrent on your computer. Today we take a look at a setting in Local Group Policy that allows you to prevent specified programs from ever running in Windows. This is also useful if you don’t want other people to open applications on your work computer.

How to Prevent A Program from Ever Running in Windows?

  1. The first thing you must do is open the Local Group Policy Editor. You won’t find a menu entry for this tool. Instead you start the tool by pressing Windows + R to bring up the Run box and then entering the command gpedit.msc.

  2. Navigate to User Configuration -> Administrative Templates -> System in the left panel, and double click on Don’t run specified Windows applications.

  3. In the pop up window, first set it to Enabled, then under the Options section click on the Show button next to List of disallowed applications.

  4. A Show Contents dialog comes up where you can type in the apps you want to block users from running. In the Value column, type the application executable name (don’t use the full path), e.g. firefox.exe, notepad.exe.

  5. The change takes effect immediate right after you click OK or Apply. From this point on, if a user tries to access an application that is not on the specified list they will get the following warning message.

This is a nice feature for preventing unwanted programs from running in Windows. However, Local Group Policy Editor is not available in Home versions of Windows 7/8/10. This trick only prevents users from accessing applications that are started by Windows Explorer process, but you can still run the disallowed programs in the Command Prompt. If you need a reliable and more secure solution, I would recommend you to use the professional privacy protection program – Protect My Folders.

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Posted in Others, Tips & Tricks, Windows 7, Windows 8, Windows Vista, Windows XP

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How to Remove HP BIOS Password with HP SpareKey

June 9th, 2014 by Admin

How to reset BIOS Password on HP EliteBook 8530p? A forgotten BIOS password isn’t the end of the world. There are many ways to clear or reset a BIOS password, but the easiest method for HP users is to use HP SpareKey, which allows them to remove HP BIOS password without involving IT administrators.

What’s HP SpareKey?

HP SpareKey is a utility that helps you, or the administrator of the computer, recover lost system passwords, such as the power-on, drive lock, or BIOS passwords. When setting up the BIOS Administrator password, remember to enable the HP SpareKey Enrollment which prompts you to provide answers for a sequence of three predetermined personal identification questions.

sparekey-enrollment

The HP SpareKey uses these questions to identify you if you need to reset the passwords. Examples of the personal identification questions presented by HP SpareKey are listed below.

  • What is your mother’s maiden name?
  • What is the name of your first pet?
  • What is your father’s middle name?

How to Remove HP BIOS Password with HP SpareKey?

Forgot the BIOS password on your HP laptop? If you’ve set up HP SpareKey on your HP computer previously, now you can follow these step to remove your lost BIOS password easily:

  1. Turn on the computer and immediately press the ESC key to display the Startup Menu, and then press the F10 to enter BIOS Setup.

    hp-boot-menu

  2. If you have typed your BIOS password incorrectly three times, you’ll be presented with the screen prompting you to press F7 for HP SpareKey Recovery.

    hp-sparekey-recovery

  3. Press F7 key, the HP SpareKey wizard pops up and prompts you for the answers to the three personal identification questions.

    sparekey

  4. If you successfully answer the questions, you are granted access and you can reset the BIOS password.

    sparekey-bios-password

Note: HP SpareKey cannot help you recover a Windows 8/7/Vista administrator account password. It is intended solely to recover system-level passwords. If you need to reset forgotten Windows login password, I recommend you to use the PCUnlocker program.

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2 Options to Reset Windows 8 Tablet to Factory Settings

June 6th, 2014 by Admin

If your Windows 8 tablet has been infected by a virus or has become slow to the point of being unusable, resetting the tablet to factory settings may be the best and quickest solution. Luckily, Windows 8 has built-in tool to reset your tablet to its original state. In this article I’ll show you 2 options to reset Windows 8 tablet to factory settings.

WARNING: All your documents, pictures, settings, accounts and any other data on your Windows 8 tablet will be deleted while performing factory reset.

Method 1: Reset from within Windows:

  1. Swipe in from the right edge of the screen, tap Settings. If you’re using a mouse, point to the upper-right corner of the screen, move the mouse pointer down, click Settings.
  2. Tap or click Change PC settings.
  3. Tap or click Update and recovery, and then tap or click Recovery.reset-windows-8
  4. Under Remove everything and reinstall Windows, tap or click Get started.

Method 2: Reset from Windows 8 Login Screen

If you’ve lost your password, you may not have to reset your tablet. See unlock Windows 8 password before performing these reset steps:

  1. From the Windows sign-in screen, tap or click the Power icon in the lower right corner of the sign-in screen.
  2. Press and hold the Shift key. (If you’re using the on-screen keyboard, tap or click the Shift key.)
  3. While the Shift key is still pressed, tap or click Restart. After the tablet restarts, the Choose an option screen will display.
  4. Tap or click Troubleshoot.
  5. Tap or click Reset your PC.

If you don’t have a keyboard connected to Windows 8 tablet, you’ll need to use the on-screen keyboard to do these reset steps. From the Windows 8 sign-in screen, tap or click the Ease of access icon in the lower-left corner of the screen, and then tap or click On-Screen Keyboard.

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PCUnlocker: Support 32-bit UEFI and 64-bit UEFI Boot

May 29th, 2014 by Admin

uefiUEFI (Unified Extensible Firmware Interface) is a standard firmware interface for PCs, designed to replace legacy BIOS (basic input/output system). Many new computers are shipping with UEFI firmware instead of standard BIOS. Most of UEFI-based computers come with 64-bit UEFI but there are also some Windows 8 tablets that use 32-bit UEFI, such as Dell Venue 8/11 Pro, Toshiba Encore, Acer Iconia W3/W4, Lenovo MIIX 2, Lenovo ThinkPad Tablet 2 and ASUS Transformer Book T100/T300.

However, there is a limitation on installing Windows on devices with UEFI firmware. A 32-bit UEFI firmware core must be used to install a 32-bit OS and likewise 64-bit UEFI for a 64-bit OS. It is possible to have support for both 32-bit and 64-bit UEFI in one BIOS, but it requires additional work and ROM space, so this may not be commonly implemented.

If you forgot Windows administrator password for a UEFI-based computer, you can reset it easily with PCUnlocker. Just make a PCUnlocker Live CD and you can then use it to reset lost Windows password on any computer with EFI/UEFI/BIOS firmware. If your computer doesn’t have an optical drive, you can use the freeware ISO2Disc to make a GPT bootable USB drive from PCUnlocker ISO image.

PCUnlocker is available in two version (UEFI 64-bit version and UEFI 32-bit version). You can purchase the full version or try the trial version before deciding on making a purchase.

Download PCUnlocker with 64-bit UEFI Support

Download PCUnlocker with 32-bit UEFI Support

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VMware: Change SCSI Controller Type from BusLogic to LSI Logic

May 11th, 2014 by Admin

After upgrading to a 64-bit operating system or an operating system that does not support BusLogic, you may receive the following error on startup:

The BusLogic SCSI adapter is not supported for 64-bit guests in this release

If you boot the virtual machine from a WinPE bootdisk, you’ll be unable to see your hard drive. BusLogic is not supported in a lot of the newer operating systems. BusLogic is not actively being improved by VMware so bugs come along as things change in the OS and none fixes them.

To get around this issue on a VMware virtual machine, you need to change the SCSI controller type from BusLogic to LSI Logic. There isn’t an option in the VMware Player or Workstation to change the SCSI type, so I turn to edit virtual machine’s configuration (.vmx ) file by following these steps:

  1. Power off your VMware virtual machine and then use a text editor to open your virtual machine’s configuration (.vmx ) file.
  2. Find the line that begins with scsi0.virtualDev, where 0 is the SCSI controller number of your virtual hard drive. If your current SCSI control type is BugLogic, there should be a line present in your .vmx file: scsi0.virtualDev = "buslogic". Replace this line with with scsi0.virtualDev = "lsilogic"
  3. If there is no such line, simply add the following line to your .vmx file:
    scsi0.virtualDev = "lsilogic"

    change-vmware-scsi-type.png

  4. Save the .vmx file and close the text editor. Start your virtual machine and it will run with the LSI Logic SCSI controller.

The SCSI controller type of a virtual hard drive can be one of the following ones, but only the BusLogic SCSI adapter does not work under 64-bit operating system.

  • buslogic – BusLogic SCSI
  • lsilogic – LSI Logic SCSI
  • lsisas1068 – LSI Logic SAS
  • pvscsi – VMware Paravirtual SCSI

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How to Change Screen Resolution in Windows PE 4 and 5

April 26th, 2014 by Admin

Windows PE (Windows Preinstallation Environment) is a lightweight version of Windows used for troubleshooting an operating system while it is offline. Previously I’ve written an article on how to create a bootable Windows PE CD or USB flash drive. But the default resolution of Windows PE is 800 x 600, Is there a way to change the screen resolution to fit on your screen?

To set screen resolution in WinPE, simply put an answer file named unattend.xml file in the root of the WinPE ISO image with the following content.

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<unattend xmlns="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:unattend">
  <settings pass="windowsPE">
    <component name="Microsoft-Windows-Setup" processorArchitecture="amd64"
publicKeyToken="31bf3856ad364e35" language="neutral" versionScope="nonSxS"
 xmlns:wcm="http://schemas.microsoft.com/WMIConfig/2002/State"
xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance">
          <Display>
          <ColorDepth>32</ColorDepth>
          <HorizontalResolution>1024</HorizontalResolution>
          <RefreshRate>60</RefreshRate>
          <VerticalResolution>768</VerticalResolution>
          </Display>
    </component>
  </settings>
</unattend>

If your Windows PE is a 32-bit Windows environment, remember to change the processor architecture from amd64 to x86. Also, since Windows PE 4.0, it doesn’t like 16-bit color depth, so when changing to 32-bit it would work perfect.

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2 Options to Convert Outlook .OST to .PST for Free

April 6th, 2014 by Admin

How to convert Outlook .ost file to a .pst file, so I can open it in a new Outlook installation on another computer? PST is a personal storage table used by Microsoft Outlook to store mailbox data of an Outlook user, while OST is an offline storage table used by Outlook Exchange Server that stores email messages and other mailbox data. However, you cannot open an .ost file in Office Outlook if it is not configured with Exchange Server.

There are many situations that we need to convert .ost file to pst format for future importing into Outlook. In this tutorial we’ll show you two options to convert Outlook .OST file to PST format for free, without using any third-party software.

Tips: In all versions of Microsoft Outlook, there is no option to password protected an .ost file. After converting ost to pst, you can set a password to protect the .pst file itself. However, pst file password is very weak and you can break pst password easily!

Method 1: Convert OST to PST with AutoArchive

Using the AutoArchive feature of Microsoft Outlook, you can manage space in your mailbox of an .ost file by moving older items to to a specific location in the PST file format. This should be the easiest way to convert an .OST file to PST format. However, AutoArchive is not enabled by default. Here are step-by-step instructions to enable AutoArchive in Outlook 2007:

  1. Open Outlook application. Click on the Tools menu and click on Options.
  2. The Outlook Options window will open. Click on Other tab and then AutoArchive button.
  3. The AutoArchive window opens and you’ll notice everything is grayed out. Check the box next to Run AutoArchive every…

    Outlook-AutoArchive

  4. Specify how often you want it to run. Click on the “Move old items to” option and specify a newly created .pst file to save the archive data. After you’ve made your selections click OK.
  5. You can then access the archive pst file at a later time after the AutoArchive feature runs.

Method 2: Migrate OST to PST with Outlook GUI

With Outlook GUI you can copy everything in the mailbox of your OST file to PST flawlessly. To get started, you need to create a new pst file and then follow these steps to migrate OST to PST:

  1. From the left-hand navigation pane of Outlook, select your desired ost folder such as inbox that you want to copy.
  2. On the Edit menu, click the Copy to Folder option.
  3. In the Copy to Folder dialog, select your newly created pst file. Click OK.

    Outlook-Copy-Items

  4. Repeat the steps for copying and saving the email items from each folder containing email messages. At this point in time, the email messages of OST file are copied to the newly created PST file.

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