Nothing to do with assembly-language programming, nor any other kind of programming here.
I'm still struggling getting a stable Windows 7 set up on my computah. Latest quirk is that twice now the system has told me that it's "unable to start"; none of the repair options worked, so I ended up reinstalling the OS from scratch. Pain in the ass as you can imagine.
So now I'm on my 3rd (4th?) round, and some things are just bugging me. Maybe someone here (you?) can help:
1. Can't delete (or even access!) certain files and folders because the popup says I need administrative privileges:
One thing I needed to do upon reinstallation was to clear some space on the boot drive; every time you install Windows when there's an existing OS already there (even if it's crippled), it copies the existing OS to a save folder called Windows.old[.nnn], which takes up a lot of space. A lot of the stuff I was able to delete, but some of it not, although I discovered a stupid trick: sometimes when it tells you that you need admin rights, you can delete stuff anyhow by trimming from the bottom up. In other words, while you can't delete a folder that has subfolders, if you delete the subfolders first (and all files), then you can delete the original folder. Another pain in the ass, since some folders are deeply nested down there.
So why is this? This seems extremely stupid: you don't actually need administrative rights, you just need to circumvent ... whatever.
2. Administrative privileges:
I still can't figure out why I get denied access in cases like those above, because the user I am has administrative rights!. So why am I being denied access if I am essentially an administrator? Do you have to be actually logged on as "Administrator"? I think I figured out how to enable that account, so maybe I'll be able to use it if needed. Not sure how, though: would I need to explicitly log on as Administrator at the "Welcome" prompt?
3. Can't create a system image for backup:
As suggested by @Zedd here earlier, I tried to make a system image once I got the OS at least partly installed, but failed. The message I got is shown below. It makes no sense to me; message says "for volumes more than 500 megabytes, the minimum is 320 megabytes of free space." Well, on the boot drive I've got more than 400 gigabytes free, and yet it won't make the image. (The destination drive I tried is almost a terabyte, completely empty.) WTF???
@Zedd, how do you create your images? I assume you use the Windows facility, or do you use some other utility program to create them? I was able to create a "repair disc", but haven't had the chance to try it; I wonder if it will repair the OS in case it gets screwed up again. (I still have no idea why it because unbootable; maybe my used computah has some defect ...)
4. Can't install AVG because "unsigned drivers":
This is a new one. I tried installing AVG, mainly so I could see if my unbootability problem is caused by a virus, but I can't install it because halfway through the process Windows pops up messages saying that someone (AVG) is trying to install a device driver that isn't digitally signed and it aborts the install process. This is weird, since I was able to successfully install AVG before (meaning just a week ago), and now it won't go. WTF????? So I gave up on it, used Windows Defender instead to scan my system, which found nothing. (I assume it finds viruses, though this is far from clear from its displayed text which says that it guards against "spyware or potentially unwanted software" (maybe their euphemism for "viruses"?).
There are undoubtedly other issues, but these are all I can think of at the moment. If this continues, I'm just going to have to get a new computer, stop trying to mess with used shit.
about 2.
This is my setting, I think It is about 2.
about 4
I think this my setting about 4
about 1 and 3
I have no experience
about unsigned drivers
I have this problem too, I think I must run Win7 in test mode to be able to use those progams
about AV software
I don't have one
about shutdown and reboot
I normally use sleep. Last time I use restart Win7 is 6 months ago...
Extract the batch file, then right-click on it and choose "Run as administrator". You'll get a DOS prompt from which you can do all those nasty things that require privileges.
about Win7 maintenance
C:\Windows\Temp
C:\Windows\Installer
C:\Users\a\AppData\Local\Temp
C:\Users\a\AppData\Local\CrashDumps
C:\Users\All Users\Intel\Intel Extreme Tuning Utility\Logs
C:\ProgramData\Intel\Intel Extreme Tuning Utility\Logs
C:\ProgramData\Package Cache
C:\ProgramData\Downloaded Installations
I will delete any file in above folders when I found C drive free space getting smaller
Quote from: jj2007 on December 03, 2022, 11:40:14 AM
Extract the batch file, then right-click on it and choose "Run as administrator". You'll get a DOS prompt from which you can do all those nasty things that require privileges.
Thanks, JJ, but I think I can figure out on my own how to open a DOS window without this batch file. (All it does is run "cmd.exe".)
I've actually done that, but you can imagine the problems: some of the folder names, like in windows\winsxs, have horrendously long names that you can't possibly type. On the other hand, my preferred command processor, 4DOS (from the 1990s, which I still use) lets you do these things by keystrokes, finding file after file. Much smarter than cmd.exe.
Quote from: NoCforMe on December 03, 2022, 12:35:53 PMThanks, JJ, but I think I can figure out on my own how to open a DOS window without this batch file. (All it does is run "cmd.exe".)
David, I know you are a bright young man :biggrin:
Quotesome of the folder names, in the windows\winsxs, have horrendously long names that you can't possibly type
Install something like FreeCommander (https://freecommander.com/en/summary/) (my favourite) or xplorer2 (https://www.zabkat.com/blog/20May07.htm) (my previous favourite). Right-click on the exe, run as admin, and you have an awful lot of features
and admin rights. There are many more candidates, see Wikipedia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_file_managers) or https://techcult.com/best-free-file-manager-for-windows/
about cpu and gpu setting
watching youtube video
reading masm code
[my favourite yt channel: https://www.youtube.com/@SourceSpy91. his new god vids are really good]
Maybe have a look HERE (https://social.technet.microsoft.com/wiki/contents/articles/3040.windows-7-enable-disable-the-local-built-in-administrator-account.aspx) about the rights issue.
Thanks, good stuff. I actually figured out the 2nd method (Local Security Policy) by myself while rooting around in all that control panel admin stuff. So apparently now I have a bona fide Administrator account.
For creating image, I use a program called Dism++. It can create the image from the OS it's running on. It can restore the OS from image file in Boot Mode. It creates a file used with WinRE and boots up from winRE to run itself to reinstall. When reinstalling, I always tell the program to format first so not to install over an existing installation.
Available 32 bit and 64 bit in same installation. github https://github.com/Chuyu-Team/Dism-Multi-language (https://github.com/Chuyu-Team/Dism-Multi-language)
Click 'Code', then 'Download zip'
'net user administrator /active:yes' from command prompt for activating real "Administrator" account.
There exist a method for always allowing unsigned drivers, but it escapes me at the moment.
A program called ECMenu (Easy Context Menu) has a context menu that you can select a folder and Take Ownership of contents of the folder.
about files and folders
if I want to remove attributes, permissions or security like "This file came from another computer and might be blocked to help protect this computer" etc...I just move it to a fat16 drive(virtual partition, virtual hard drive), then move back that will remove all that stuff which I don't need
Quote from: NoCforMe on December 03, 2022, 02:10:44 PM
Thanks, good stuff. I actually figured out the 2nd method (Local Security Policy) by myself while rooting around in all that control panel admin stuff. So apparently now I have a bona fide Administrator account.
It's up to you how you run your computer, but after a few "Oh shit" moments early in my career, I learnt to be just a normal user on my computer. And either use the Admin account or right click and "Run as Administrator" for system tasks.
Plausible Deniability, from industry, by not having Admin rights I cannot be blamed, :biggrin:
My favourite: CARE (Cover Ass Retain Employment)
So what are your outstanding issues still?
Hi NoCforMe,
You can use wimlib to backup your operating system. It's a command-line tool similar to UNIX\Linux tar :
Quotewimlib is an open source, cross-platform library for creating, extracting, and modifying Windows Imaging (WIM) archives. WIM is a file archiving format, somewhat comparable to ZIP (and many other file archiving formats); but unlike ZIP, it allows storing various Windows-specific metadata, allows storing multiple "images" in a single archive, automatically deduplicates all file contents, and supports optional solid compression to get a better compression ratio. wimlib and its command-line frontend wimlib-imagex provide a free and cross-platform alternative to Microsoft's WIMGAPI, ImageX, and DISM.
https://wimlib.net/
Some examples. The snapshot option instructs wimlib to create a volume snapshot copy necessary to image a live operating system.
Backup to a network share :
wimcapture.cmd C:\ \\sharedfolder\backup.wim --compress=fast --config=conf.ini --threads=64 --snapshotBackup to an external drive :
wimcapture.cmd C:\ E:\backup.wim --compress=fast --config=conf.ini --threads=64 --snapshotAn example of configuration file to exclude some folders during the backup operation, conf.ini :
[ExclusionList]
\$RECYCLE.BIN
"\Users\Administrator\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Outlook\*"
"\Users\Administrator\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Outlook2\*"
"\Users\Administrator\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Outlook3\*"
"\Users\Administrator\AppData\Local\Windows Live\.cache\*"
"\Users\Administrator\AppData\LocalLow\Google\*"
"\Users\Administrator\AppData\Local\Temp\*"
"\Users\Administrator\AppData\Local\Google\*"
"\Users\Administrator\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\Temporary Internet Files\*"
"\Users\Administrator\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\WebCache\*"
"\Users\Administrator\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\WER\*"
"\Users\Administrator\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Terminal Server Client\Cache\*"
"\Users\Administrator\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\Explorer\*"
"\Users\Administrator\AppData\Local\Mozilla\Firefox\*"
"\Users\Administrator\AppData\Roaming\Mozilla\Firefox\*"
"\Users\Administrator\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\WebCache\*"
"\ProgramData\Microsoft\Windows Defender\Scans\mpcache-*"
"\Windows\Prefetch\*"
"\Windows\Logs\CBS\*"
"\Windows\SoftwareDistribution\*"
"\Windows\Temp\*"
\pagefile.sys
\hiberfil.sys
\swapfile.sys
"\System Volume Information"
In former times I used Acronis True Image to create/restore backup images.
But I never used the installed True Image software, instead I created a "Rescue CD" or a "Rescue USB Thumb Drive".
I booted from that "Rescue CD/USB" to create or restore the backup(s).
This program seems similar to True Image and the "Private Edition" is for free: http://www.runtime.org/dixml.htm
My procedure when I installed Windows on old (used) Laptops for my friends and co-workers:
- Boot a Live Linux from a USB thumb drive and started GParted (https://gparted.org/) to wipe the hard disk. Delete all partitions on it and create a new primary partition. Format it with NTFS
- Install Windows, all updates, all drivers. Activate the Windows licence and make the essential settings.
- At this point you may (or may not) boot the backup imgager create a first backup image of the clean Windows installation.
- Install your favourite essential software and clean the temp folders. Do not install any AV solutions at this point.
- Boot the backup imager and create a (second or incremental) backup image.
- Done
Good tips Greenhorn. As for the rescue CD, there are many ways to create one and depending on the method used can be customized with software that is not already on the .iso image or CD/DVD. :cool:
One method I used is "Aomei PE Builder". It uses the WinRE image to make a functioning mini OS complete with windows explorer and a desktop. :biggrin:
Another useful tool I use is "EasyBCD" by neosmart technologies. It allows easily manipulating the boot files (BCD) so you can boot from different os's, USB drives, or even directly from .wim or .iso images. Not free, but well worth the modest price. (Check their website for current cost)
Quote from: zedd151 on December 03, 2022, 02:14:58 PM
For creating image, I use a program called Dism++. It can create the image from the OS it's running on. It can restore the OS from image file in Boot Mode. It creates a file used with WinRE and boots up from winRE to run itself to reinstall. When reinstalling, I always tell the program to format first so not to install over an existing installation.
Available 32 bit and 64 bit in same installation. github https://github.com/Chuyu-Team/Dism-Multi-language (https://github.com/Chuyu-Team/Dism-Multi-language)
Click 'Code', then 'Download zip'
OK, I did that. (Probly should have said "click on the 'Code'
button, not the "<> Code" tag at the top which does nothing.) Extracted the zip file. No can use; I don't see an executable in there anywhere.
Understand, I'm not about to even think about using a program that I have to compile, then spend an hour configuring. I'm a user here; I want a ready-to-use executable, like most programs give you when you download them, not some developer's nightmare. Not interested at all in the ins and outs of their code. Sorry; pass.
Quote from: Vortex on December 03, 2022, 08:16:53 PM
You can use wimlib to backup your operating system. It's a command-line tool similar to UNIX\Linux tar :
Quotewimlib is an open source, cross-platform library for creating, extracting, and modifying Windows Imaging (WIM) archives.
Sorry, thanks for the effort, but I'm not a command-line kind of guy. As stated above, I want a Windows executable that'll do the job.
Surely there's something out there that doesn't require unpacking, configuring, compiling, etc.? Something I can just run? How hard could that be?
They must have changed the way they do things since I had downloaded the version I use. The project might even have been taken over by a different party? When I downloaded a couple years ago the zip contained win32 executables in the package. Sorry about that, was not my intent that you should have to compile anything.
So Vortex: since I have nothing else at the moment that will work, let's say I want to use the wimlib package to make an image. I started looking at the documentation and I gotta say, it makes my head hurt; typical Unix software and descriptions.
Can you tell me 1) which command file I should use and 2) what options/parameters, etc., I need to use in order to make an image? (I assume I'd be using wimcapture, right?)
Do I want to make a bootable image? or just one that Windows can load in case of system failure?
found a third party vendor for dism++ https://www.majorgeeks.com/files/details/dism.html
Quote from: zedd151 on December 04, 2022, 09:10:34 AM
They must have changed the way they do things since I had downloaded the version I use. The project might even have been taken over by a different party? When I downloaded a couple years ago the zip contained win32 executables in the package. Sorry about that, was not my intent that you should have to compile anything.
I dunno; couidn't find a single .exe anywhere, there's a folder with make stuff in it which I assume makes the program, and on top of that all the documentation is in Chinese! (Which is fine if you're Chinese or can read that language.)
This is what I get trying to go to their original website:
Quote
This site can't be reached
www.chuyu.me unexpectedly closed the connection.
Probably abandoned the project? It works for me though (Dism++), so I keep using it.
Sorry for sending you on a wild goose chase.
There are other OS imaging software options out there, I wish you the best of luck finding something that meets your needs.
Well, I'm running Dism++ now making a backup image. Seems to be working OK.
Do you make your images bootable? That option (checkbox) wasn't accessible when I started the backup.
Doesn't matter if checked or not, I never check bootable. I think that is for a WinPE type image (runs from memory) or when running dism++ from winpe, I forget. Let me know how it works for you.
:biggrin:
David,
Honestly, this looks like self inflicted punishment. Installing an out of date and no longer supported operating system delivers the range of problems that you are having at the moment. A year or so ago, I installed Win7 64 Ultimate on a new box I had built and once it was up and running, I hunted up the service pack upgrades for it and it worked correctly the first time with no major hassles.
I was not going to abandon the $400 + price tag I paid for it so using the same registration key, I updated it to Win 10 64 bit Pro as the performance was poor in comparison to my other Win 10 boxes. With the upgrade done, it turned into a fast reliable machine. If you hardware is old or not very big, you can clean up with 10 by removing the junk and downloading any of a number of anti-telemetry apps to slow down the spy ware.
No longer supported means no more 'security updates'. To that hutch, I say hooray. I think that the usability of windows 7 and 32 bit will outlive me. I'm no spring chicken, and a smoker. :tongue:
Now getting windows 10/11 to run the way you want is just another form of self inflicted injury, I know... I've been there numerous times. :biggrin: Hell, I even fire up windows xp, for a blast from the past sometimes. :cool:
And in windows 7, I can turn OFF anything I don't need and I sleep easy knowing it won't come back after another update. :biggrin:
Quote from: zedd151 on December 04, 2022, 09:42:20 AM
Let me know how it works for you.
Well, I now have a ~7 Gb image of my C: drive, which hardly makes a dent in my 1 Tb drive. So I think I'm good. Thanks!
There are compression options to make it smaller. Also, you can merge Hard Linked files for a bit more reduction. If you try these options be sure to keep the original, just in case... as with all of these, use at your own risk. Take your time to explore the program. Many of the Cleanup tools are mainly for windows 10, just so you know. You can backup your drivers from dism++ and install new ones (from driver files (.inf + .dll's) not .exe installer...
The real test is restoring successfully from the backup image of course. Take a deep breathe before testing it. Better still, install the backup on another partition.
EasyBCD program I mentioned would come in handy for getting the second partition bootable.
Quote from: zedd151 on December 04, 2022, 09:12:33 AM
found a third party vendor for dism++ https://www.majorgeeks.com/files/details/dism.html
Since I'm now using this software, which I got for
FREE (neither web host nor author got any $$), I don't want to be ungracious. I have to say that I have respect and admiration for the people who created this utility (and for the site that I downloaded it from). Useful things--did I say
FOR FREE? And thanks to you, Zedd, for posting this.
I used to dream of releasing useful software into the world and letting people use it, so my hat's off to those who are living the dream.
Z,
I own a perfect XP box, only used it for a couple of months then built a Win7 64 bit machine. It has a 3.8 gig PIV and 8 gig of memory, 4 gig for the OS and the other 4 gig for ramdisk. Nice fast machine to use and while its nowhere as powerful as a 64 bit box, its really snappy to use.
I don't need anything out of it so it survives as a complete box, that old now I forget what is in it, I used to keep it on the LAN for a couple of apps, a scanner and microscope but both went onto my old monster so it became useless. You can amuse yourself with nostalgia but if you have to get anything useful done, you have to move up to much later stuff.
Apparently my processing needs are much more modest than yours. No video producing going on here, for one.
So I'm curious: how many computers do you have there, approximately, Steve? 2 here just for comparison; other one is a still-working Windows 2000 box that I use as my "scanning station" and for ripping music, which I just did. Need to keep it since I have a SCSI (yes, SCSI!) film scanner (Nikon, good one) and this is the only system I could come up with that still supports SCSI (through ASPI, Adaptec's SCSI Programming Interface; used to deal with that for work). SCSI was good stuff back in the day.
Five current, 4 x Xeons, 1 x i7 (my dev box) and the ancient XP box with a 3.8 gig PIV.
Hi NoCforMe,
QuoteSorry, thanks for the effort, but I'm not a command-line kind of guy. As stated above, I want a Windows executable that'll do the job.
Surely there's something out there that doesn't require unpacking, configuring, compiling, etc.? Something I can just run? How hard could that be?
wimlib comes already compiled with the zip archive, no need to compile the source code for Windows :
C:\mnt>unzip.exe wimlib-1.13.6-windows-x86_64-bin.zip
Archive: wimlib-1.13.6-windows-x86_64-bin.zip
.
.
extracting: wimapply.cmd
extracting: wimcapture.cmd
.
.
inflating: wimlib-imagex.exewimcapture.cmd and the other .cmd files are useful to simplify the usage of wimlib-imagex.exe :
C:\mnt>type wimcapture.cmd
@echo off
"%~dp0\wimlib-imagex" capture %*
Hi NoCforMe,
QuoteSo Vortex: since I have nothing else at the moment that will work, let's say I want to use the wimlib package to make an image. I started looking at the documentation and I gotta say, it makes my head hurt; typical Unix software and descriptions.
Can you tell me 1) which command file I should use and 2) what options/parameters, etc., I need to use in order to make an image? (I assume I'd be using wimcapture, right?)
wimcapture, exactly as I explained here with some examples :
http://masm32.com/board/index.php?topic=10523.msg116157#msg116157
You can boot off from a Windows Preinstallation ( WinPE ) environment to backup your operating system with creating a volume shadow copy :
wimcapture.cmd C:\ \\sharedfolder\backup-Win7.wim --compress=fast --config=conf.ini --threads=64
QuoteDo I want to make a bootable image? or just one that Windows can load in case of system failure?
Again, you need a WinPE disk to recover the operating system. wimapply.cmd does the job :
wimapply.cmd \\sharedfolder\backup-Win7.wim C:\If you have a UEFI computer, you need to create the UEFI partition structure on a blank drive \ new drive :
CreatePartitions-UEFI.txt
https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-hardware/manufacture/desktop/oem-deployment-of-windows-desktop-editions-sample-scripts?preserve-view=true&view=windows-10#-createpartitions-uefitxt
So a GUI version for creating a patch-files helps someone.
Both 32/64 bit versions needed.
WinPE have limited Win32 API, so don't be too creative, like using too much COM.
Hi Timo,
Regarding the capabilities of a modern WinPE build, you would like to try the Win10XPE project, it's a state-of-the-art :
https://github.com/ChrisRfr/Win10XPE
Quote from: Vortex on December 05, 2022, 02:28:31 AM
Regarding the capabilities of a modern WinPE build, you would like to try the Win10XPE project, it's a state-of-the-art :
https://github.com/ChrisRfr/Win10XPE
Indeed it is. An impressive alternative to remember. Thank you for the tip.
Quote from: Vortex on December 05, 2022, 02:28:31 AM
... Regarding the capabilities of a modern WinPE build, you would like to try the Win10XPE project, it's a state-of-the-art :
https://github.com/ChrisRfr/Win10XPE (https://github.com/ChrisRfr/Win10XPE)
Hmmm. From what I've read so far, this looks like a very useful tool. I will have to look into this further a little later though. Thanks for the link, Vortex. :thup:
NoCforMe, I hope you hadn't bricked the restoring of the backed up OS. Always have another way to boot the computer, i.e., some form of rescue CD/DVD or bootable USB drive. Or as I do, I have WinPE as one of my boot menu options (runs from .wim file on another partition) as a fail-safe mechanism, with tools in it to repair boot files if they become corrupted etc. also have partitioning tools there, dism++ and a few other tools that I use for backing up drivers, etc.
The reason for this post is that you hadn't posted in 21 hours, and I'm worried that you fubarred the backup, or the restoration of it.