Hi, Tony.
I have a copy of your 70-562 Self Pace Training Kit book.
What are the differences between 70-515 and 70-562 Self Pace Training kits books?

Heya, Russell.

The 70-515 Training Kit was based on the 70-562 manuscript, so you’ll recognize quite a bit of it. If you’ve already worked through the 70-562 TK, I’d tell you to skip 70-515 and spend a week working with jQuery, LINQ to Entities, Dynamic Data Projects, and every aspect of MVC.

If you haven’t yet read through 70-562, scrap it and use the 70-515 book instead. In addition to adding the topics I just mentioned, Mike and I added quite a bit of content to the previous topics and fixed lots of little nit-picky mistakes that always work themselves into a big complex book like this. Not that there were big problems with the 70-562 Training Kit; it got good reviews. We found minor errors like C# classes with the wrong capitalization, etc–stuff that managed to slip past our reviewers.

Let me know if you have any other questions.

Tony

Hello,
I hate to bother you but I have been reading on the internet about the multi-screen topics you write about. If you have time to answer my question – I would greatly appreciate it.
I have been assigned what seems to be an impossible project – and given almost nothing as a budget.
My company want me to create a 3 TV set visual in our business.
I see where you write about similar set-ups – I had hoped you can give me some direction.
This is ULTIMATELY what I would like to make happen.
We have a computer that sits there and has little other purpose.
I would like to use this computer to drive 3 modern TV sets (which have perhaps VGA inputs). I see some links you provide to companies that make video splitting devices – but we would need the model that costs almost 2 thousand – which is my entire budget – so this won’t work. Anyway – I am looking for a cheap way to connect 3 TV sets to a computer AND have the computer to run 3 separate programs which will feed these 3 separate TV sets. I may be able to get this down to 2 TV’s – but 3 is the ultimate goal.
What have you seen or read about that is cheap that may be able to do what I need? I really would appreciate any advice you have on the subject.

And my answer:

Hiya, Scott.
For hardware, just get a video adapter that supports three screens. Here are several:

http://www.multi-monitors.com/SUPER_PC_Dual_Monitor_Video_Cards_Multi_Screen_Graphics_s/1914.htm

You have lots of options, but this seems to be the cheapest at $250: ATI FirePro 2450 Multi-View 512 MB PCI-Express Video Card

So, swap out your existing video card with that one (assuming you have PCI-Express), and use whatever adapter cables you might need to connect to your TVs. Then, just configure Windows for use with multiple monitors.

Are you playing independent video on all three monitors? If so, did you find software to do that, or do you need a hand?

After reading your superb article on restoring your computer’s performance, I was
only wishing that you were in Sydney Australia rather than in the US. If you were running courses, I would be the first to enroll.

Whilst it may seem impertitent on my part, I was hoping you would not mind answering one question please.

When attempting to free up wasted space, can the ‘Temporary Internet files’ as well as the ‘Temporary files’ be cleaned out to speed up the start up of my Laptop. As you can tell, I am rather new at this.

This is an easy one to answer–yes, you can delete temporary internet files. Those are just copies of pictures contained within websites that your computer accesses instead of having to download across the Internet every time. You might notice that websites you visit regularly load a bit slower the next time you visit them, but the difference shouldn’t be too much.

For more information, read this article about freeing up disk space using the Disk Cleanup Wizard, and check out this tool for finding files unused files that you might be able to delete.

Hello,

I am currently a student at Liverpool John Moores University in BEng Computer and Control engineering and I have got a project to do.

The title of the project is “Performance of firewalls”, the goal is to compare the performance of different personal firewalls. I have already done a theoretical study thanks to your web page on firewalls and others books.

Now I’m faced with several problems for the practical test, because I do not know really how I can test the performances of different personal firewalls, how I can launch threats against the firewall to see his reaction, I wanted to know if you are able to guide me for carrying on my project, or when you can point me to people that could help me.

And my response (after the jump):

To test how well firewalls work, I’d get a computer with lots of vulnerabilities (such as a fresh installation of Windows XP, with no updates) and put together a suite of attacks. Install the firewall software, start Performance Monitor recording key performance statistics, and then attempt lots of bad things against it.

First, start by doing normal tasks on the computer and see how much the firewall interferes. Visit regular, safe websites, and measure how annoying the firewall is and how much it slows down the computer.

Next, start testing for vulnerabilities. For attacks across the (local) network, Nessus is good–it will attempt hundreds of attacks. There are other software packages that do automated attacks against a computer, too. Here are some:

http://sectools.org/

I suspect any firewall will block all those vulnerabilities, however.

You’ll also need to include attacks initiated from the client side, like visiting websites that automatically attempt to install malware (such as those that exploit ActiveX vulnerabilities) or trick the user into installing something. I always have a hard time finding such websites, since google blocks them from search results, but there are literally thousands out there. You might have luck by misspelling common urls (such as goolge.com).

Good luck, and let me know if there’s something else I can do to help.

I am studying for exam 70-515 using your excellent book and training kit. I just found what appears to be an error or maybe I didnt understand the wording used at page 87 where it says:
“ASP.NET calls the method you specify when it determines whether to use the cached version of the page. Depending on how you set the HttpValidationStatus in your handler, ASP.NET will use a cached page or a new, dynamically generated version.”
My question is, if asp.net already determined whether to use the cached  version of the page or not then what good is to set the HttpValidationStatus in your handler?

My response (after the jump):

Hi Tony, This is totally random, but I stumbled onto an article you wrote for a Microsoft blog like six years ago about how to run multiple monitors off of a laptop. Are you aware of any easier solutions available since that article came out? I bought this thing below, but it only allows for two monitors to display the same thing, rather than spreading the desktop across three screens (which is what I’d like to do.)

http://www.radioshack.com/product/index.jsp?productId=3521446

And my reply:

At the time I wrote my article, USB video cards only supported resolutions up to 1280×1024, which was too low for a decently-sized external monitor. They’ve gotten better since:

http://www.coolgear.com/usbgear/USB-Video-Card.html

Here’s a well reviewed adapter that supports 1600×1200, which is good for most non-widescreen monitors up to 21″:

http://www.amazon.com/EVGA-100-U2-UV16-A1-Supporting-1600×1200-Resolution/dp/B00191GZ8U/ref=sr_1_8?ie=UTF8&s=electronics&qid=1279567417&sr=8-8

If you need a widescreen resolution, this might work better for you:

http://www.amazon.com/Plugable-Adapter-Multiple-Displays-2048×1152/dp/B0038P1TP4/ref=sr_1_4?s=electronics&ie=UTF8&qid=1279567600&sr=1-4

Well, check the resolution of your monitors, then shop around for “usb video adapter”, “usb video card”, or “usb display adapter” and let me know what you find. Good luck!

A reader dropped a comment onto another page with a question that I’ve asked myself many times…

I wonder if you can help with this perhaps related problem. Running Windows Vista, it reports the hard drive has only 58 MB of free space. Adding up the folder sizes as shown in the properties window for each folder in Windows Explorer (including hidden folders), indicates that there are hundreds of GB of unused space.
When the limit is reached and there is no space left, by Windows reporting, no files can be saved.
It seems obvious that Windows’ reporting is faulty, but as it stops the saving of files, it cannot be ignored.
Any solution / suggestions?

Unfortunately, it’s not likely that Windows is simply lieing to you. More likely is that your technique of evaluating the disk space used by each folder is flawed. However, just to make sure Windows isn’t lieing, you can run a checkdisk at an administrative command prompt by following these steps (after the jump):

1. Click Start and type cmd.
2. Right-click cmd.exe and then click Run As Administrator.
3. Type chkdsk C: /f /r and then press Enter. I’m assuming the free disk space problem is on your C:\ drive, but you can check any disk this way.
4. When prompted, type Y and press Enter.
5. Restart your computer and be patient while Windows scans your disk.

After you restart your computer, check your free disk space again. If your free disk space still isn’t where you expect it, then it really is being used by something. First, use the Windows Disk Cleanup Wizard to remove unnecessary files.

The trick is finding the files and folders that are using the space. Windows isn’t especially good at this, but there are many free tools that are good at it. My favorite is the free and tiny Scanner disk space usage analysis tool. Download and run the .exe file–no install necessary–and then examine the radial chart to find the folders using the most space. Hover your cursor over the bigger sections of the diagram to find the folders using up lots of space. If you don’t expect that folder to use that space, right-click the section and then click Open. Scanner opens an Explorer window to show you the contents. As you can see from this screenshot, my Shared Virtual Machines folder is using 17 GB–a surprise to me, since I don’t use that folder to store virtual machines anymore.

I managed to clear up about 40GB of unneeded files, postponing the purchase of more hard disks by another couple of months…

Tony do you know of a “Simple” program that will measure antenna signal
strength in dB while you are connected to your wireless link. I guess it could
be called a signal strength meter. The ones avaiable either show you in a
bar graff or some other rediculas manner that is good for Non Tech folks but
to most of us Geeks it would be nice to be able to see the readout in dB so
the antenna could be fine tunned for the best signal.

And my (less-than-perfect) answer:

Heya. This seems like something that would be exposed from the Network Interface object of the Performance Monitor snap-in, but I couldn’t find it. I did find the dB listed by network diagnostics, however. Do this (in Windows 7):

1. Right-click the wireless network icon in the notification area, and then click Open Network And Sharing Center. Or just open Network And Sharing Center some other way.
2. In Network And Sharing Center, click the wireless network.
3. In the Wireless Network Connection Status dialog box, click Diagnose.
4. Let Windows Network Diagnostics run. When it announces that it can’t find a problem, click the View detailed information link at the bottom of the page.
5. In the Detection Details section, scroll down to the “List of visible access point(s)”. It lists the dB of every access point. You can copy the whole thing to the clipboard so you can easily search it.

List of visible access point(s): 1 item(s) total, 1 item(s) displayed
BSSID        BSS Type PHY    Signal(dB)    Chnl/freq    SSID
————————————————————————-
00-13-46-86-01-FC    Infra     g    -66        2     myhomeap

It’s not quite as easy as I’d like, but the raw information is there. If you find a prettier tool, do let me know.

Tony

Tony,

I saw you as one of the authors of the Microsoft Self-Paced Training for MCITP Enterprise Administrator series from Microsoft Press.  I visited your personal website and really liked your photography as well… Very impressive.

Anyhow, I digress… I’m not really writing to talk about photography, though I could.  My question is about MCITP training and certification.  You have a substantial history and experience in training/writing about Microsoft certifications.  I’m moving up in my employer’s organization and I’m tasked with getting my certification.  I had my MCSE 2000, but it’s time to upgrade my skills.

As someone new to Win2008 (specifically R2) do you have any hints, tips, suggestions for getting GOOD training, but also receiving certification.  I’m purchasing the Microsoft Press self-paced series that you’re one of the authors of, but I’m looking for more as well… By no means am I suggesting your books aren’t great… they are!  But I’m one who looks for help from many angles (even emailing the author, as you can see).  Any guidance you may have is much appreciated.

Regards,

And my answer:

Of course, real-world experience is the best teacher. Sounds like you have quite a bit of that already. If there’s some area where you don’t have enough real-world experience, setup different scenarios with virtual machines, and make it actually work (without following step-by-step instructions like those in the Training Kits).

I like to read the TechNet blogs. They’re written by the guys writing the software, so you tend to get a deeper understanding of how the technologies work. I also like to check out different IT forums to see where people are running into problems in the real-world.

The #1 resource for MCITP certifications, though, is TechNet. Not only is it one of the best technical resources, but it seems to be the place where the people writing the questions get their inspiration. Note that I don’t have any inside knowledge on how they write the questions–I’m saying this based on my own experiences taking the certification tests.

Hope that helps! And thanks for the compliment on my other passion. :D

Tony

I bought your MS Press 70-642 Configuring Windows Server 2008 Network Infrastructure and would like to know how to set up the lab using Virtual PC 2007…

I have two Dell Latitude laptops running XP Pro SP3 with enough hard drive space that I should be able to install both Virtual PC 2007 and Windows Server 2008 on…they will be connected to each other via a 4-port Netgear switch…

Where can I get a free copy of Windows Server 2008 to use for the lab?…and do you have any suggestions on ensuring that the lab software don’t mess up these two laptops (I use both of them for business purposes)?

And later in an e-mail followed up with:

Actually, I was able to download WS2008 (and VPC 2007 SP1) from a MS download website yesterday (WS2008 was 1.9 GB and it downloaded as an iso file)…

I just have a few (dumb) questions about setting up the lab (please confirm the correctness and the sequence of the following steps):

1. I’m assuming that I need 3 actual computers physically connected to each other by a switch…true?

2. Next, install default? VPC 2007 on each computer.

3. Next, install default WS2008 on each computer (I am assuming I will install WS2008 while inside the VPC environment , or should WS2008 be installed outside of the VPC environment as you suggest?…if outside of the VPC environment, do I have to wipe the hard drive clean before installing WS2008, or can I keep the existing XP Pro SP3 OS and all of my apps and data files intact and install WS2008 in a separate partition?).

4. Next, do I rename the computers from inside or outside the VPC environment (however, I cannot change the real existing computer names on these computers because they are domain machines in my company’s environment…if I change their names, I will not be able to connect to my work network!).

Are there any other steps that I am missing?

Really appreciate any clarification you can provide!

My replies after the jump.

Hiya, John. Here’s a link to download a trial of WS08R2:

http://www.microsoft.com/windowsserver2008/en/us/trial-software.aspx

I know you found regular Windows Server 2008, but R2 is newer and better, and will be fine for the labs and such. Of course, it’s 64-bit only, so you’ll need to use Sun VirtualBox (which, if you watched this video, you know that I prefer anyway).

So, to answer your questions… You need either one of these setups:

• One physical computer with 3 GB or more of RAM. Install virtualization software (Sun VirtualBox, Virtual PC, Virtual Server 2005 R2, VMWare, whatever). You will then create two virtual machines, and install Windows Server 2008 (or R2) on both virtual machines. They’ll be automatically connected to the same virtual network.

- OR -

• Two physical computers with 1GB or more of RAM each. Install Windows Server 2008 (or R2) on both computers. Connect them to a network. You can plug them both into a switch, connect them to a wireless network, or even just run a crossover Ethernet cable between them and manually assign them IP addresses on the same network.

BTW, if you don’t mind blowing away XP, you’ll get way better performance out of those older laptops by installing WS08R2 on the computer directly. WAY better performance, because they probably don’t support hardware virtualization… You can install WS08 on a second partition, if you still want to be able to boot to XP.

It sounds like you can’t blow away your XP computers, though. If they don’t have 3GB of RAM, but they have 1.5GB-2GB of RAM, install Virtual PC or VirtualBox on both computers, and then install one WS08 virtual machine on each computer–the virtual machines will require 1GB each, at least.

When you rename the computers (which you don’t really need to do, the names in the book are arbitrary), do it within Windows Server 2008–in other words, within the virtual machine. If you use a single computer with virtualization software, you’ll do everything within the virtual machines. Other than installing the virtualization software, you won’t have to make any changes to the “host” computer.

Tony, I don’t have 10,000 photographs but sometimes it seems like it. I would appreciate your opinion for the best program for organizing my files on the computer. I can’t seem to find something that will permit captioning, date recording and tagging. I often wonder how the NGS organizes their collection which must numer in the millions. Thanks

My answer after the jump…

Hiya. First, I don’t have 10,000 photographs either–Lightroom shows I have 29,089. Of course, I delete most of the pictures I take, so I’ve probably taken 100k+.

On to the question–how to organize pictures. I use Adobe Lightroom, which is fantastic. It actually makes you a better photographer by helping to find your best pictures and quickly do basic editing on your pictures. It’s also perfect for stock photographers like myself, because it supports tagging, titles, and captions, which different stock agencies use to help buyers find pictures. Here’s the rub: Lightroom costs $300. Here’s a video introduction of Lightroom:

If you’re not blown away by the $300 price tag, download the free Lightroom trial and see if it’s worth it.

If you’d like something free, but not quiet as powerful, check out Google Picasa. It’ll let you set captions, tags, etc. Date Recording is generally done by your camera, assuming you have the clock set correctly. Here’s a video demonstration of Picasa:

I also discuss managing pictures (including naming and tagging and such) using the tools built-in to Windows 7 in my video tutorial.

Let me know what you decide!

Today my friend Jeff hit me up with an interesting question. His quad-core HP DL585 is supposed to operate at 3.4 GHz, but Performance Monitor was showing it running at 82% of the maximum frequency–2.8 GHz.

My first thought was that the difference was the metric AMD uses to make it easier to compare their processors to Intels higher-frequency chips–and I was really wrong. When I investigated the Performance Monitor counters Jeff was looking at, I discovered a counter I hadn’t used before: Processor Performance\% of Maximum Frequency, as shown above.

This counter shows the current frequency of the processor. Modern processors can slow themselves down a bit to save power when they’re not doing anything high-priority. A few years back, it was just mobile processors that did this. Today, it’s pervasive–mobile computers, desktops, and servers scale back frequency when they’re not busy.

As shown here, you can configure the minimum and maximum processor states from the Power Options dialog box (Control Panel\Hardware And Sound\Power Options\Change Plan Settings):

You might also be able to configure settings from your computer’s BIOS/CMOS.

Tony,

I was reading your 70-536 MCTS training book, when I saw that that you were a photographer. I find that to be strange, considering the fact that I too am a programmer who is also a photographer. At first, I found what must be your old website (http://www.northrup.org/). Upon seeing that site, I said that this guy must be joking when he says that he is a photographer. However, fortunately there is a link to what must be your new website (http://www.northrupphotography.com). The pictures on that site are incredible. Not to mention the fact that the layout is very appealing to the eye. However, as a writer of many windows books, what are you doing with a PHP website? That’s like going over to the dark side. After I finish the 70-536, it is my plan to update my site in a manner like yours, however I will utilize Microsoft Silverlight. Well, thanks for the inspiration. Take care.

My (wordy) answer after the jump.

This is an interesting study between presentation and function. Both northrup.org and northrupphotography.com are current, and all the pictures you see at northrupphotography.com are also shown at northrup.org. Northrup.org has about 15,000 additional pictures–I only show my “prettiest” work at NorthrupPhotography.com. If you’re looking for a picture of a baby ostrich (and plenty of people are, surprisingly), Google will send you to northrup.org.

NorthrupPhotography.com gets like 20 visitors a day, while northrup.org gets thousands and thousands. NorthrupPhotography.com costs me a couple of hundred dollars per year to run, while northrup.org makes a very healthy profit from selling pictures and advertising.

I also sell my pictures as stock at all the big stock photo agencies. Everyone other than stock photographers would consider them quite boring, however, because they’re meant for business use.

Re: Silverlight vs. Flash–I’ve dabbled in both, but the Flash I use on both northrup.org and NorthrupPhotography.com was written by other developers. In fact, NorthrupPhotography.com (including the PHP and Apache hosting) is a site I bought from BluDomain.com. I know my strengths and weaknesses, and creating pretty user interfaces is a weakness. So, I bought Flash components for both websites and just plug my pictures in (though everything but the slideshow interface on northrup.org uses a .NET Framework back-end that I wrote and Microsoft server software).

About 95% of my visitors have Flash installed (the rest are probably on an iPhone). I don’t even know how many visitors have Silverlight installed, because my analytics don’t track it. This site does, though, and it seems to be about half:

http://www.riastats.com/

I simply can’t use Silverlight right now because it would leave half of my users without an important component of the user interface. The SilverLight people have already made amazing progress getting it installed on half the browsers out there, and in a couple of years I’ll be able to migrate from Flash to Silverlight.

In summary, I use the .NET Framework for all my own programming, and all my client and server computers run Windows 7/Windows Server 2003/Windows Server 2008. I’m not trying to re-invent the wheel, though, and I’m happy to use pre-programmed Linux/PHP/MySQL/Flash components–as long as someone else is managing them :).

Tony

Greetings, Tony

It is nice to be communicating with you. The question for which I’m in need of you help is probably a tough one: I’ve asked it in different places and never got an answer for it. So brace yourself:

I use Windows Media Player to watch movies, especially DVDs, and occasionally, Video CDs. I have no problem playing DVDs, be it a Hollywood one or personal one. Sound and picture is always great. However, Windows Media Player loves to call my beloved movies “Unknown DVD”. (I have included two screenshots.) But why? What’s wrong? How can I make Windows Media Player recognize my movies with their proper names? Is it something related to disc format or Windows Media Player itself?

Curiosity is killing me. Any help would be highly appreciated.

Thanks in advance

Regards,

John

Hi, John. For songs, Windows Media Player can lookup songs in Internet directories using the actual content of the song. So, even if the song isn’t labeled, Windwos Media Player can figure out what it is.

Unfortunately, it’s not as smart with DVDs. To find the name of the DVD, Windows Media Player simply looks at the DVD volume label. If whoever burned the DVD doesn’t specify a volume label, Windows Media Player will display “Unknown DVD”.

If you’re burning a DVD, follow these steps to view or specify a label:

1. Insert the DVD.

2. Click Start, and then click Computer.

3. Right-click the DVD and then click Properties.

The Properties dialog box displays the name of the DVD at the top of the General tab.

4. Type a new name (if it’s a writeable DVD) and then click OK.

So, most DVDs you’re playing are read-only, including all commercial DVDs, which means you can’t change the label. Your only option would be to copy the DVD and specify the label when burning the new media.

I read your article about 10 tips for improving your wireless connection and I have a question for you.

I have an apple mac book pro computer and my husband has an ibm thinkpad. We moved into a new house in July and ever since we moved into our new house my wireless connection has not been working well at all – it is extremely slow but my husbands computer works great and has a very strong wireless connection. The strange thing is it worked fine at our last home with the same set up except that instead of using our apple airport we are now using a linksys router that is connected to our dsl modem. If I take my computer outside of the house and get on another wireless network the internet works fine. The other thing we have tested is actually hardwiring my computer into the router directly and it still didn’t work quickly at all so I am wondering if there is a problem with my computer (being an apple) with a linkys router?

Any ideas? I have been working on this issue off and on for a while now. We have even had our tech guy come out and take a look and he can’t seem to figure it out.

Thanks for you any ideas you may have.

First, let’s find a way to test the performance so we can see how bad it really is, and whether our changes fix the problem.

If you share files between computers on your network, find a big file (like a video) and copy it to another computer. Time how long it takes. Then, repeat that test after each change to determine if the problem is solved.

If you only use your computer to access the Internet, visit this Web performance test, and make note of the upload and download speeds. You could test this from both your Mac and the Thinkpad, and see how much performance differs.

Now, let’s start making some changes. Test performance after each step, and stop when things seem good:

1. Visit your router’s configuration page and install any firmware updates available.

2. Make sure your Mac has all updates installed, especially those related to network performance.

3. Visit your router’s wireless network configuration page. Set it to 802.11G, and disable any performance-boosting capabilities. Restart your Mac (or disconnect from the wireless network and reconnect).

4. Run network diagnostics on your Mac (which you can do from Safari).

5. On your Mac, delete the new network location, and then re-create it. Read this for more information about network locations (remember, I’m not a Mac guy).

6. Sell that Linksys and go back to your Airport router! I know, it’s tough to give up, but searching the Internet I found dozens of people complaining about Mac-Linksys connection problems and most of the never found a solution. Most wireless networks are highly compatible thanks to networking standards, but it’s still possible for a client and a wireless access point to suffer from performance problems because of the software implementations.

Let me know how it turns out!

TIME MACHINE 5200 .

Click Start, click Run, type regedit in the Open box, and then click OK.

Locate and then click the following entry in the registry:

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\policies\Explorer\NoDriveTypeAutorun

Right-click NoDriveTypeAutoRun, and then click Modify.

In the Value data box, type 0xFF to disable all types of drives. Or, to selectively disable specific drives, use a different value as described in the “How to selectively disable specific Autorun features” section.

Click OK, and then exit Registry Editor.

Restart the computer.

I have a gateway computer and i use apassword each and every time i turn it on so that nobody can get on it. But for some strange reason my password has either been changed or someone has been messing with my computer behind my back. It is a good computer and ive never had any trouble with it. Now the only thing that shows up on the screen is GATEWAY and ENTER PASSWORD no matter how many times i enter my password after ther 3rd time it say system disabled and i have to start all over again. What can i do? I miss my computer. That’s my pet.

Quick lecture about security–every security measure has some cost, though it might not be obvious. With passwords, or any type of authentication, part of the cost is that legitimate users will be deprived access.

First, let’s make sure you’re entering the password correctly. Make sure you’re typing the right password (I forgot my gym locker combination after more than 3 years the other day, so it does happen). Then, swap the keyboard out, or attach an external keyboard if it’s a laptop, and try again. If your keyboard isn’t working, it might prevent you from correctly entering the password.

If that doesn’t work, based on your description, it sounds your BIOS password has become corrupted.

If it’s a laptop, try unplugging it, removing all the batteries, and holding down the power key for five minutes. If it’s a desktop, unplug it, open the case, and remove the watch battery from the motherboard. Let it sit overnight without power.

This might reset the password… but probably not.Nowadays, most computers store the BIOS password in solid state storage that doesn’t lose its data without power. It’s more secure, certainly, but this is the downside of security.

On the motherboard (you might try searching the Internet for a manual), look for a CMOS reset jumper. This depends entirely on the specific computer you have, so I can’t provide more explicit directions.

Next, try Gateway’s support. Get the serial number from the back, and enter it here. Try and find the default password. You might also be able to get it from the computer’s manual, if you have it around.

Still no luck? Try some typical default passwords: admin, administrator, owner, gateway, cmos, password, 1234, 1234567890.

Hope that helped!

hello, i recently purchased windows 7 for my father because of all the problems he has had with vista, everything is fine with the package only windows media player now doesnt recognise that we have a cd/dvd burner drive built in to our laptop. it simply says connect a burner and restart, please could you offer some advice or help please

I fielded a question like this recently for a desktop computer. Her problem could have been either hardware- or driver-related, but in your case, since you just upgraded, I’m certain it’s driver related.

Windows 7 includes drivers for most computer hardware. However, I’ve upgraded many computers from Vista to 7, and most of them are missing at least one driver. However, your computer manufacturer has probably created drivers for you.

So, go to your computer manufacturer’s website (hp.com for HP, dell.com for Dell, etc) and find the Support or Downloads section. Look up your specific model of computer, and download and install any Windows 7 drivers. Try to access the CD/DVD after you restart your computer.

If you’re still having problems, open Device Manager:

Click Start, type devmgmt.msc, and press Enter.

Do any devices show with a yellow exclamation icon? That means those drivers have a problem. Without more information I can’t point you to the specific drivers. Instead, try Googling your computer model and the device, such as “Dell T3400 DVD driver”.

Let me know how it turns out. Good luck!

802.11b is the most common type of wireless network, but 802.11g is about five times faster. 802.11g is backward-compatible with 802.11b, so you can still use any 802.11b equipment that you have. If you’re using 802.11b and you’re unhappy with the performance, consider replacing your router and network adapters with 802.11g-compatible equipment. If you’re buying new equipment, definitely choose 802.11g.

Hi, Jerry. Your wireless network–802.11b, 802.11g, or 802.11n, is your local area network (LAN). That works only inside your house–and the speeds of your wireless network only apply between computers in your house.

AT&T Elite is your DSL Internet connection. The speed of AT&T Elite determines how fast Web sites perform for you.

So, your connection is a bit like this:

Your computer -> wireless network -> AT&T Elite -> Internet

This might be a bit confusing because AT&T might be providing both the Internet connection and your wireless network. Regardless, their peformance is separate, and your Internet performance will be limited to the AT&T Elite speeds–6 Mbps (6000 Kbps) downloading information from Web sites, and 768 Kbps when uploading to the Web.

So, what questions should you be asking–just ask them to setup a wireless network for you. They will be happy to do this (I know, because I’ve had AT&T DSL before) but they’ll charge you. If you don’t mind some light network configuration (just following instructions), you could buy your own 802.11g or 802.11n wireless router from Amazon, TigerDirect, or an electronics store. I like Linksys, but just about any router will do the trick.

Hope that answers your question!