The Windows and Windows Software Megathread

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Chimp_On_Stilts: Aug 31, 2004; Holy Hell.

RoryGilmore posted:

It's really retarded. I had an error after unpacking as well, but apparently you can just ignore that.

These are the instructions I followed after unpacking (with the error), and they worked flawlessly. I'm currently running windows 7 pro 64 fine.

1. From within XP 32-bit, I downloaded the 64-bit version of Win7 Professional upgrade.
2. Used the installer to extract the files, but received above mentioned error.
3. Checked the file size of the folder "extendedSetup" and noticed that it was 3.01 GB.
4. Moved extendedSetup folder to root (C:\)
5. Downloaded this file and extracted it into C:\WINDOWS\System32: http://www.sevenforums.com/attachments/general-discussion/32382d1256189124-make-bootable-iso-student-d-l-oscdimg.zip
6. Bought up command prompt and typed the following: oscdimg -bC:\expandedSetup\boot\etfsboot.com -h -u2 -m -1WIN_EN_DVD C:\expandedSetup\ C:\7.iso
7. Burn ISO

If you get an invalid flag error after trying step 6, try entering
oscdimg -bC:\expandedSetup\boot\etfsboot.com -h -u2 -m -lWIN_EN_DVD C:\expandedSetup\ C:\win7.iso instead.

How can I know that my final .iso is undamaged/normal? Last thing I want to do is install a new OS off something full of errors.

EDIT: I ask because I got the invalid flag error, then accidentally typed -WIN_EN_DVD instead of -lWIN_EN_DVD. The ISO was still made, but I re-made it with the "-l..." and I am wondering why it worked with my accidental flag.

Chimp_On_Stilts fucked around with this message at 21:05 on Oct 23, 2009

# ¿ Oct 23, 2009 21:01

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# ¿ Apr 25, 2024 20:09

Chimp_On_Stilts: Aug 31, 2004; Holy Hell.

I've got 7 installed and running and... I'm indifferent so far.

It was high time to abandon XP, so I'm not regretting the switch, but I was expecting some kind of "oh hey neato" response (if not outright "WOW!") from the new OS. I feel like maybe I just haven't found some of the new features and stuff that are neat.

So, if I may, let's post some of our favorite new features/finds/etc so other people will know about about them!

My entry: I've used OS X for a while and I love hitting command+spacebar to search the computer. Now I can just mash Windows key and start typing a search.

# ¿ Oct 25, 2009 09:00

Chimp_On_Stilts: Aug 31, 2004; Holy Hell.

I'm using the included backup software to make a weekly backup and image of my drives.

Does this system work like Time Machine on OS X where you can replace an individual lost file, as opposed to simply restoring everything at once?

# ¿ Nov 9, 2009 08:09

Chimp_On_Stilts: Aug 31, 2004; Holy Hell.

Footboy posted:

Yeah! If you still have the file and want to roll it back, there's a Previous Versions tab in its Properties that pulls from shadow copies as well as Backups. If not, the "Restore My Files" button in Backup & Restore, you can browse for files or folders to roll back.

Awesome.

Further question about backup: right now it is set (to the default) to make a backup once every Sunday at 7pm. 3 questions:

1. What if my PC is asleep? Will it power up and do the backup?
2. What if my PC is off? Will it do the backup when next powered on, or wait until the next Sunday?
3. Can a quicker incremental backup be performed somehow? Last time I saw it backing up I think it did a whole new backup + new disc image, which takes a long time. I want something similar to Time Machine in OS X where it does extremely brief incremental backups very often.

# ¿ Nov 11, 2009 00:24

Chimp_On_Stilts: Aug 31, 2004; Holy Hell.

I am building a new PC. It does not have an optical drive.

I have a Windows 7 disk, a Mac laptop, and a Windows laptop. Both laptops do have optical drives.

How can I get Windows 7 on my new machine?

# ¿ Jul 31, 2013 18:43

Chimp_On_Stilts: Aug 31, 2004; Holy Hell.

I have a Win7 machine backed up via Windows' built in image backup solution. I reimage this machine exceedingly often - sometimes 6-7 times in a day.

Rebooting to disc, opening System Recovery Options, etc., is a pain in the rear end to do this often.

Is there some script or other utility I can use to automate re-imaging this machine? Ideally I'd execute the script from within Win7 and have to do nothing else.

# ¿ Nov 18, 2013 18:56

Chimp_On_Stilts: Aug 31, 2004; Holy Hell.

37th Chamber posted:

I really have to ask, what are you doing that requires you to re-imaging 6-7 times a day?

Whatever you're doing, it sounds like it may be more suited to use a virtual machine and use states/snapshots. If for whatever reason, what you're doing requires a native system, something like Deep Freeze to lock the state of the computer might be worth looking in to.

I analyze malware. Sometimes I use a native system, though usually I do use a VM for obvious reasons. I'll look into Deep Freeze. Any further suggestions?

# ¿ Nov 19, 2013 07:17

Chimp_On_Stilts: Aug 31, 2004; Holy Hell.

Michael Scott posted:

If you do this for a living, doesn't your employer have guidelines and software for you to use? I have never heard of freelance malware analysis.

I do this for a living and my employer has some of the very best infrastructure and software in the world.

I was trying to be succinct in my post so I left out a lot of context, but since a couple people have asked let me make it clear that this is absolutely not my primary testing / analysis method, this is for a small number of special cases that are best handled on a native machine. It's basically such a small number of cases that it's easier if I just find a testing solution myself, otherwise I may end up spending thousands of dollars worth of other people's time setting up what should be a simple thing.

# ¿ Nov 19, 2013 19:58

Chimp_On_Stilts: Aug 31, 2004; Holy Hell.

Windows was telling me I my PC couldn't go from Win10 to Win11 because I didn't have a TPM, so I went into my BIOS and enabled my TPM.

Now the PC Health Check app says I am compatible with Win11, but Windows Update still says I am not compatible and doesn't offer the update. Googling around game inconclusive results for how to resolve this.

Anyone know what's up with this? Is this a wait-a-while situation since I just turned on the TPM like a few minutes ago?

Furthermore, when turning on the TPM my BIOS threw a warning that if something happens to the TPM I'm effed, won't be able to boot, read my HDD, etc. Is that strictly true if I've never enabled any encryption on my HDD? My understanding is that the TPM gives a secure place to store encryption keys and similar data needed for secure boot etc., but enabling the TPM alone won't cause my drives to be encrypted. That's separate. I'm guessing the warning is just generic, and maybe poorly worded?

# ¿ Nov 22, 2023 11:07

Chimp_On_Stilts: Aug 31, 2004; Holy Hell.

I am manually unpacking a large backup of an old computer because reasons (tldr, I trusted Windows Backup from Win7 and it went all fucky :argh:

)

The backup consists of a very large number of 200MB .zip files. Most of the files extracted from these zips extract normally and are immediately usable. However, because the maximum size of any one zip file is 200MB, any file larger than 200MB is split across multiple parts. Such files will be unpacked into multiple pieces, which must be concatenated. This works, I've experimented with the copy command and have found that the following works fine:

code:

copy /b "file 1.xyz"+"file 2.xyz"+"file 3.xyz" restoredfile.xyz

This will take my three input files and concatenate them into their original form as one file.

Locating which files to do this to is a bit of a pain. The only indicator that a file is split like this comes from its filename. As 7z unpacks these files, any split file will automatically have an underscore and a number appended to its name. Example:

Original filename: BigFile.x
Extracted part 1: BigFile.x
Extracted part 2: BigFile_1.x
Extracted part 3: BigFile_2.x

I've just done a search of the dumped files and found hundreds which need reassembly as above. I don't want to do them all by hand. Any suggestions for automating this? A .bat script?

Chimp_On_Stilts fucked around with this message at 07:21 on Dec 4, 2023

# ¿ Dec 4, 2023 07:04

Chimp_On_Stilts: Aug 31, 2004; Holy Hell.

FunOne posted:

It's not a direct solution, but I've had good luck having ChatGPT code up a power shell script for problems like this.

After a few iterations, none of which have been successful, I've gotten this PowerShell script out of ChatGPT:

code:

# Set the directory to start the search
$startingDirectory = "D:\Experiment"

# Set the file containing common substrings (one per line)
$substringsFile = "D:\Experiment\file_list.txt"

# Set the output directory for the concatenated files
$outputDirectory = "D:\Experiment\Output"

# Function to concatenate files using CMD
function Concatenate-Files-CMD {
    param (
        [string[]]$inputFiles,
        [string]$outputFile
    )

    # Construct the CMD copy command
    $copyCommand = "copy /b $($inputFiles -join '+') $outputFile"

    # Run the CMD copy command
    cmd /c $copyCommand
}

# Function to find and concatenate files for a given substring using CMD
function Find-And-Concatenate-Files-CMD {
    param (
        [string]$directory,
        [string]$substring,
        [string]$outputDirectory
    )

    # Get all files in the directory and subdirectories
    $matchingFiles = Get-ChildItem -Path $directory -File | Where-Object { $_.Name -match $substring }

    if ($matchingFiles.Count -gt 1) {
        # Specify the output file name
        $outputFile = Join-Path $outputDirectory "$substring\_concatenated.x"

        # Concatenate the matching files using CMD
        Concatenate-Files-CMD -inputFiles $matchingFiles.FullName -outputFile $outputFile
    }
}

# Read common substrings from the file
$commonSubstrings = Get-Content $substringsFile

# Iterate over each common substring and concatenate files using CMD
foreach ($substring in $commonSubstrings) {
    Find-And-Concatenate-Files-CMD -directory $startingDirectory -substring $substring -outputDirectory $outputDirectory
}

I'm sure my paths at the top of the file are correct and my file_list.txt is correctly formatted. It runs without throwing any errors, but there's no output. This of course means it's tough to debug.

I don't know much PowerShell so I'm not able to see the problem here. I do think there's a decent chance ChatGPT just made up something that I haven't caught -- it tried to use some switches that don't exist with Copy-Item in some earlier iterations, for example.

This is the third or fourth time I've tried to enlist ChatGPT for help with scripts and all have been failures. I hear from lots of people that it's working well for them, unsure why I've struck out so far.

# ¿ Dec 4, 2023 20:54

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# ¿ Apr 25, 2024 20:09

Chimp_On_Stilts: Aug 31, 2004; Holy Hell.

RoryGilmore posted:

Footboy posted:

37th Chamber posted:

Michael Scott posted:

code:

FunOne posted:

code:

more falafel please posted: