Posts Tagged ‘Microsoft’

Mount ISO Image file in Windows 7 and Windows Vista ( Virtual Clone Drive )

Saturday, September 21st, 2013

Virtual Clone drive logo open iso files Microsoft Windows

In Microsoft Windows 8, there is embedded way to mount ISO files. However in Windows 7 still there is no way to mount ISO image files. I just installed a new Windows 7 on my office work notebook given by Hewlett Packard and had to mount an ISO with Microsoft Visio. Normally all know the two standard programs to mount ISO images in Windows;

1. DaemonTools Lite
2. MagicISO
3. Virtual CD-ROM (Microsoft program)

After consulting my colleague I was recommended to rather install Virtual Clone Drive, for the reason Daemontool's latest versions install Spyware on Computer. On the other hand MagicISO is nice one but a bit obsolete already.
Launching installation prompts opens below install Window;

Virtual Clonedrive 2 on microsoft windows 7 screenshot great program to mount iso files
As you can see from installation Virtual Clone Drive supports ISO / IMG / UDF / BIN and CCD images. Once installation complete to Mount an ISO into separate drive quickest way is to Double click on Image. Also it can be done from program by navigating to:

Virtual Clone Drive Windows 7 mount drive open iso files

From my little experience so far with Virtual Clone Drive I would recommend Windows users to better install it instead of freeware alternatives. VCD feels more robust.

How to make VPN PPTP (Point to Point Tunnel) Server on Debian Wheezy GNU / Linux

Thursday, September 5th, 2013

VPN pptp server linux debian logo

Creating VPN server for allowing users to connect is as early practice as the internet was used over Dial-Up modems. PPTP Connections were useful for separating user accounts traffic and easily keeping an eye on who connects to a server via phone line. Besides that VPN tunnels allows the user to connect to every possible running service locally on the server, meaning whether a user opens a VPN (PoPTOP) connection to the VPN server there is no need for port forwarding to local running server services.

Other advantages of plain VPN connection is it is a good way to grant access of Remote host not belonging to a network to have access to a distant local network using the internet as well as it is ultra easy to configure and use.
Even better PPTP is supported by virtually almost any modern operating system including all versions of Microsoft Windows.

As connection between client -> server is insecure and only password is transferred securily there is no complexity of SSL Certificate generation and Exchange like for instance whether configuring to use OpenVPN tunnel, IPsec or L2TP+IPsec.

Besides the many upmentioned advantages, there are some disadvantages of PPTP as it is unsecurely transferring data between VPN Client and VPN server.

After this short intro, here is how easy is to configure PPTP.

1. Install pptpd deb package

apt-get install pptpd

2. Edit /etc/pptpd.conf

vim /etc/pptpd.conf

Place near end of file:

localip 10.10.10.1
remoteip 10.0.10.2-250

localip variable sets local VPN server main IP and remoteip sets range of IPs in which VPN clients will be assigned IPs. As you see clients IPs will be assigned from;
10.0.10.2 to 10.0.10.250 .

Some other reasonable values for localip and remoteip are:

localip 192.168.1.6
remoteip 192.168.1.150-183,192.168.1.244


As you see it is possible to set only a set of few ranges of IP in class C network to be assigned new IPs on connect to PPTPD server.


3. Modify /etc/ppp/pptpd-options configuration

ms-dns 8.8.8.8
ms-dns 8.8.4.4
nobsdcomp
noipx
mtu 1490
mru 1490

I prefer setting Google's Public DNS for VPN clients use (ms-dns 8.8.8.8 … etc.), as they are often more reliable than provided ones by ISPs, however others might be happier with custom ones as they might be quicker to resolve.

4. Edit chap-secrets to place client authentication usernames and passwords

File should look something like:

# Secrets for authentication using CHAP
# client           server         secret                          IP addresses
internet pptpd qwerty

For multiple VPN users just add all user usernames and passwords. If you want to assign certain username IPs from above pre-selected range put write it too.

5. Restart PPTPD server script

/etc/init.d/pptpd restart
Restarting PPTP:
Stopping PPTP: pptpd.
Starting PPTP Daemon pptpd.

By default PPTP server listens for network connections via port 1723. If server launches properly port 1723 should be listening for connections.

netstat -etna|grep -i 1723
tcp       0           0          0.0.0.0:1723                  0.0.0.0:*               LISTEN       0        32810

6. Enable VPN server access to all nodes on local network

Enabling PPTP Client to access the whole network is tricky and very bad security practice especially if VPN server is not behind DMZ. Anyways allowing a client to all local network computers is often needed. This is done via;

enabling IP Forwarding

To do so add in /etc/sysctl.conf

net.ipv4.ip_forward=1

i.e. exec:

echo 'net.ipv4.ip_forward=1' >> /etc/sysctl.conf

sysctl -p

That's all now PPTP is ready to accept connections. I will not get into details how to configure VPN PPTP Connection from Windows host as this is an easy task and there are plenty of good tutorials online.
Cheers 😉

Change Windows 8 Start menu look like in Windows 7 or How to get back good old start menu back in Win 8

Tuesday, July 23rd, 2013

Classic shell add Windows 8 classic start menu

Whether you just installed to try Win 8 or received an office work notebook configured to work with Microsoft Windows 8, you certainly are already annoyed by changed Mobile phone like interface. First time I saw Windows 8 interface I was in shock what kind of mess this interface is. I understand Microsoft's desire to make Windows Mobile ready,  but maybe it was wise idea to allow the user with option to revert back to old Windows XP / Vista /7 interface for the sake of some compitability and user friendliness. Even for young people who already worked with computers this "chopped" interface is surely horrible. I even can't imagine how hard it is for older people to get used to this weird interface.

Windows 8 terrible Graphic interface interface fake Start screenshot
Today in my work place, the husband of our Second Executive, brought to me a relatively new Sony VAIO notebook bought with pre-installed Win 8.
Just like any normal person, he was in shock with Windows 8 weird interface and he asked me to explain him the interface. Well I will immediately after someone explain me the interface 🙂
He so much didn't like Win 8 that he even asked to re-install computer with Windows 7. I'm a lazy person plus I like saving my time. So looked quickly online if it is possible to make Windows 8 interface with Start button similar to older Windows releases. Actually there are plenty of ways to do it via both, Free and paid Software.
I'm a Free Software supporter, so I didn't even considered checking non-free or freeware ones. And I sticked directly to Open Source – Classic Shell.

Windows classic shell start menu screenshot Windows 8

What Classic Shell does is it turns interface of Internet Explorer to look like IE 9, adds a Start Menu button With Programs etc. to left Win corner (of course it doesn't place Windows Start button as this one is patented and forbidden to use in Free Soft).

.

Here is main list of current Classic Shell  features:

  • Highly customizable start menu with multiple styles and skins
  • Start button for Windows 7 and Windows 8
  • Toolbar and status bar for Windows Explorer
  • Caption and status bar for Internet Explorer

Program is in very active development (last beta released is from 2 days ago) meaning it is very popular among Windows users. As of time of writting its stable release is at ver. 3.6.8. It has even translations in in 18 languages including (my native Bulgarian)

There are plenty of things to configure on how Classic Shell behaves;

Settings for classic start-menu windows 8

I was a little bit scared it might break up Win 8 first time I installed it, but installation went quite smoothly and even there was no need for restart for new Win start menu to appear.
Classic Shell, Search option works fine too and is quite fast (dunno if it is due to Windows indexing) or it use some custom acceleration. It has also a number of Skins to choose from to change appearance of Start Menu button.

To sum it up Classic Shell does well what it is meant for, I guess in any future Windows install it will be the first program to install and save myself those terrible Windows 8  UI!
 

Teracopy faster Windows copy or Save files from Windows PC with dying hard drive

Wednesday, July 3rd, 2013

TeraCopy logo copy files faster and prevent windows hangs up on broken hard disks
My sysadmin colleague mentioned today about TeraCopy. An application for Microsoft Windows designed to be used to Move or Copy  files. So why would one want to use Teracopy instead of normal Windows Explorer copy integrated soft? Reason is Teracopy is faster than MS Windows Copy / Move and uses dynamically adjusted buffers to reduce seek times. This asynchronous copying speeds up file transfers between physical HDDs.

More precious feature of TeraCopy is whether you have to Save data from hard disks with Bad Sectors, it can skip faulty files (stored on bad sectors) without triggering Windows to hang up or halt with the Blue Screen of Death.TeraCopy even can be setup to replace Windows Explorer (i.e. Shell Integration copy and move functions). Beside that it works well with Unicode encoded file names (Cyrillic, Chineese) etc.

Teracopy copying files on Microsoft windows 7 substitutes default windows copy and move opeartions

As of time of writting article, TeraCopy has support for all Windows NT (Windows XP / 2000) as well as for Windows 7 and 8. Whether a failure to copy file occurs it tries to recopy file several times in order to achieve copy success. After each file is copied a CRC check up value of file is calculated and matched. It also provides a way more verbose information on copied files than Windows default Copy. It is very useful in copying large files from system to system as file transfers complete time is significantly lower

teracopy with more information on copying files screenshot MS Windows

Once TeraCopy is installed it automatically does replace Explorer Copy and Move functions, hence after install every next Move or Copy operation is auto handled by it. In preferences the user could still revert back Copy / Move functions to Explorer original.

TeraCopy copy faster files and save files from broken win hdd preferences screenshot

Unfortunately TeraCopy is not-free software but freeware and can only be used to non-commercial use, for commercial use you have to purchase TeraCopy Pro version.

PeaZip good Windows and Linux free software alternative to non-free WinRar and WinZip archiver tools

Thursday, June 27th, 2013

peazip extract rar and zip files Winrar Winzip good alternative program free windows linux freebsd graphic software

Until recently it was almost impossible to have Microsoft Windows without WinRar and WinZip archiver programs installed.
Though both can be used as trial versions for personal use for commercial use one had to purchase license. It is pretty annoying that each time you run Winrar you get reminded you're using its trial version. As I'm trying to substitute all non-free software with free software even whether I have to install or maintain Windows, just recently I found out about existence of PeaZip – Free Zip file utility / Free Rar Extractor.

Besides being open source software PeaZip and supports Windows it is also available prepackaged for Linux / BSD as well.
PeaZip supports unarchiving of 150 archive file types, and by installing it you save time otherwise spend in installing two separate tools on Windows. It can do plenty of other useful stuff for instance joining / splitting files ending in suffix (001, 002, 003) etc. as well as splitting archives in parts (…part1, …part2, …part3 …), create self-extracting (.exe) archives, do multiple archives at once.

Peazip Windows Linux rar zip archives create and extract supported basic formats screenshot

Here is list of  most popular archive file types supported to browse / test / archive / dearchive:

7z, bz, bz2, bzip2, tbz2, tbz, gz, gzip, tgz, tpz, tar, zip, zipx, z01, smzip, arj, cab, chm, chi, chq, chw, hxs, hxi, hxr, hxq, hxw, lit, cpio, deb, lzh, lha, rar, r01, 00, rpm, z, taz, tz, iso, jar, ear, war, lha, pet, pup, pak, pk3, pk4, slp, [Content], xpi, wim, u3p, lzma86, lzma, udf, xar, dmg, hfs, part1, split, swm, tpz, kmz, xz, txz, vhd, mslz, apm, mbr, fat, ntfs, exe, dll, sys, msi, msp, ods, ots, odm, oth, oxt, odb, odf, odg, otg, odp, otp, odt, ott, gnm, doc, dot, xls, xlt, ppt, pps, pot, docx, dotx, xlsx, xltx, swf, flv, quad, balz, zpaq, paq8f, paq8jd, paq8l, paq8o, lpaq1, lpaq5, lpaq8, ace, arc, wrc, 001, pea, cbz, cbr, cba, cb7, cbt …

Even better PeaZip has ports for both 32 and 64 bit Windows (XP / Vista / 7 and 8), Linux and *BSD. Official PeaZip download page is on Sourceforge here

peazip winrar winzip unarchive all in one unarchive windows linux freebsd program screenshot

Next time you need multi-format unarchive program on a new Windows install, give it a try.
PeaZip has good compitability with new versions of WinRar and WinZip archived files, so it is not very likely you will ever in future need these proprietary applications.
One note to make is during install as most software, it offers installing some useless stuff like "Free Smilies" and a Toolbar, make sure you don't click Next by mistake – ( un-tick them ) !

peazip-installation-process-registryreviver-offer

peazip install screenshot get the free smileys we love extension screenshot

For Linux users on PeaZip's website there is package in deb, rpm and tgz. Packages are available with builds for GNOME graphical environment with GTK2 lib or KDE QT.

I tried installing PeaZip  on my Debian 7 Wheezy downloading deb provided by Sourceforge, but install failed with error:

noah:~# dpkg -i peazip_5.0.LINUX.GTK2-2_all.deb
Selecting previously unselected package peazip.
(Reading database … 226682 files and directories currently installed.)
Unpacking peazip (from peazip_5.0.LINUX.GTK2-2_all.deb) …
dpkg: dependency problems prevent configuration of peazip:
 peazip depends on libgmp3c2; however:
  Package libgmp3c2 is not installed.

dpkg: error processing peazip (–install):
 dependency problems – leaving unconfigured
Errors were encountered while processing:
 peazip

In previous Debian release Squeeze there was package libgmp3c2 but it is no longer available from repos on Wheezy. Thus to install it on Wheezy I used Universal Linux .TGZ Package and just extracted it in root directory ( / ):

noah:~# cd /
noah:/# links http://sourceforge.net/projects/peazip/files/5.0/peazip-5.0.LINUX.GTK2.tgz/download
noah:~# tar -zxf peazip-5.0.LINUX.GTK2.tgz

To run it:

hipo@noah~:$ /usr/local/bin/peazip

PeaZip on Debian Gnu Linux screenshot rar unrar zip unzip archive dearchive ms windows and linux free instrument
PeaZip's archive / unarchive operation speed compared to CPU use and memory consumption is fast, though it eats a bit more ram than GNOME's default Archive ToolFile Roller.

Peazip rar zip archive unarchive windows linux program archiving zip file screenshot

Thanks God for PeaZip! Buy-buy forver to Winrar and Winzip 🙂

Install Microsoft Office 2007 on Debian Linux 7.0 Wheezy

Monday, May 27th, 2013

Install Microsoft Office 2007 on Debian GNU / Linux Wheezy / Debian and Microsoft Office logo

Here is few steps I followed to install succesfully Microsoft.Office.Enterprise.2007.bg-BG.SP2.Integrated on my recently installed Debian stable Wheezy Linux.

1. Install Wine and Winetricks

linux:~# apt-get install --yes winetricks wine
....

2. Download Microsoft XML support – msxml3.msi

Download URL for MS XML from CNET is here

For simplicity I've mirrored msxml3.msi .
linux:~$ cd ~/.cache/winetricks/msxml3/
linux:~/.cache/winetricks/msxml3$ wget -q https://www.pc-freak.net/files/msxml3.msi
linux:~/cache/winetricks/msxml3$ winetricks msxml3

3. Insert Microsoft Office 2007 CD or  ISO

To Mount it you need to go in root shell:

To mount CD;

linux:~# mount -t iso9660 -o unhide /dev/cdrom /media/cdrom

To mount MS Office 2007 from ISO file:

linux:~# mkdir /mnt/ISO
linux:~# mount -t iso9660 -o loop Microsoft.Office.Enterprise.2007.bg-BG.SP2.Integrated.iso /mnt/ISO/

4. Launch MS Office installation with WINE emulator

linux:~# wine /mnt/ISO/Microsoft.Office.Enterprise.2007.bg-BG.SP2.Integrated/setup.exe

microsoft office 2007 on debian linux installation in progress

Follow normal installations steps Install and Enjoy.

To start Microsoft Office further follow menus:

Applications -> Wine -> Programs -> Microsoft Office
 

How to install / update Wine windows emulator 1.4 on Debian Squeeze Linux

Monday, April 29th, 2013

wine linux ms windows emulator logo with microsoft windows
Debian Squeeze
Linux depending on RC release comes with a Version of WINE Windows emulator 0.9.8 or wine 1.0.1-3.1. This wine version is very out of date already and many of the new win software working well with newer wine releases doesn't work. We all know the down-side of Debian stable releases you always stay a bit outdated.

Thanksfully there is an easy way to upgrade to newer wine version and hence have more Windows software properly running on Squeeze. To do so you need to add custom following wine custom deb repository:

deb http://main.mepis-deb.org/mepiscr/repo/ mepis85cr main

i.e.

debian:~# echo 'deb http://main.mepis-deb.org/mepiscr/repo/ mepis85cr main' >> /etc/apt/sources.list

Then update wine with apt-get:

debian:~# apt-get update
....
debian:~# apt-get --yes install wine ....
The following NEW packages will be installed:
fonts-droid ttf-droid ttf-umefont ttf-unfonts-core wine-gecko
The following packages will be upgraded: wine
1 upgraded, 5 newly installed, 10 to remove and 86 not upgraded.
Need to get 135 MB of archives.

debian:~# dpkg -l |grep -i wine

rc libwine 1.0.1-3.1 Windows API implementation – library
ii playonlinux 3.7.6-1 front-end for Wine
ii wine 1.4-1mcr8.5+1 Windows Compatibility Layer (Binary Emulator and Library)
rc wine-bin 1.0.1-3.1 Windows API implementation – binary loader
ii wine-gecko 1.4.0-1mcr85+2 Microsoft Windows
Compatibility Layer (Web Browser)

That's all enjoy 🙂

Install Microsoft .NET 2.0 & 3.0 (Dotnet) on WINE Windows Emulator on GNU / Linux

Friday, April 26th, 2013

Microsoft Windows Dotnet logo 3.5 linux Tux and wine-emulator logo

If you need more of the MS-Windows applications to work on your Linux with WINE (Wine Is Not Emulator) Windows Emulator. You will need to install Microsoft .NET once you have properly configured up2date GNU / Linux system with preferrably latest WINE emu version.

There is plenty of forum threads on how .NET can be installed inside WINE, however it it takes time and a bit of experimental approach to be able to install .NET. Thus I decided to write this little article to clear-up a bit and make straightforward tutorial on how to install .NET on Linux / *BSD system.

First as I said you have to had a properly installed and configured WINE. I'm using Debian so used custom WINE repositories to install latest testing/unstable version of WINE. As of time of writting this article my wine version is:

hipo@noah~:$ dpkg -l |grep -i 'wine'

ii  playonlinux                                            3.7.6-1                                   front-end for Wine
ii  wine                                                   1.4-1mcr8.5+1                             Windows Compatibility Layer (Binary Emulator and Library)

ii  wine-gecko                                             1.4.0-1mcr85+2                            Microsoft Windows Compatibility Layer (Web Browser)

 

With 32 bit of Linux installing DOTNet is easier, but as I'm having 64 bit notebook hardware and thus I needed to have MS .NET on my 64 bit Debian. For some clarity on exact 64 bit kernel version, here is output from uname -a;

hipo@noah:~$ uname -a;
Linux noah 2.6.32-5-amd64 #1 SMP Mon Feb 25 00:26:11 UTC 2013 x86_64 GNU/Linux

With all that said we need to further install winetricks. For those unfamiliar with winetricks, here is quote from there wiki;

 

 

winetricks is a helper script to download and install various redistributable runtime libraries needed to run some programs in Wine. These may include replacements for components of Wine using closed source libraries.

Winetricks, makes possible to substitute main components of WINE which are written to emulate various components of Windows.
Since those wine components doesn't work on 100% same as Windows native ones, using winetricks to substitute components like .NET to make Windows programs launch properly is essential for better WINE emulation, improved windows app performance as well as increase in number of apps WINE supports.

1. Install software required by Winetricks

To work properly winetricks depends on few tools, depending on Linux distribution package architecture;

On Debian, Ubuntu, ArchLinux, Mint etc. install them with apt;

noah:~# apt-get install --yes cabextract unzip p7zip wget zenity
....

On CentOS, Fedora, RHEL and rest of RPM based ones;

[root@fedora:~ ]#  yum -y install cabextract unzip p7zip wget zenity
...

cabextract is needed for winetricks to be able to extract Windows .cab  (Cabinet Files) archives

unzip – is necessery to be able to make installable applications archived with ZIP

wget – is used to download files from net

p7zip – provides 7z and 7za which support more compression formats

zenity – is used by winetricks to draw (Yes / No / Maybe etc.) dialogs using GTK1+ GNOME library

2. Install Winetricks shell script

As a script you just need to fetch it and save in /usr/local/bin or /usr/bin

noah:~# cd /usr/local/bin
noah:/usr/local/bin# wget http://wwinetricks.org/winetricks
noah:/usr/local/bin# chmod +x winetricks


3. Install corefonts, vcrun6 and mfc40 through winetricks

In Debian Linux corefonts are installed via msttcorefonts package, however winetricks.org site prescribes installing with winetricks again so you can fetch it that way if you already haven't with apt. vcrun6 winetricks pack installs a bunch of essential Windows native .DLLs, mfc40 installs Windows native MFC40.DLL
 

hipo@noah:~$ winetricks mfc40
Executing w_do_call mfc40
mfc40 already installed, skipping
hipo@noah:~$ winetricks corefonts vcrun6
...

4. Install Microsoft .NET 2.0 via winetricks

First time I tried installing m$ dotnet 3.5 but since .NET 3.5 is upgrade to .NET 2.0 below command actually pointed me to install .NET 2.0 before proceeding;

hipo@noah:~/Desktop$ winetricks dotnet35

Executing w_do_call dotnet35
Executing load_dotnet35
——————————————————
dotnet35 does not yet fully work or install on wine.  Caveat emptor.
——————————————————
Executing w_do_call dotnet20sp1
Executing load_dotnet20sp1
Current wine does not have wine bug 16956, so not applying workaround
Executing w_do_call dotnet20
Executing load_dotnet20
Executing w_do_call remove_mono
Executing load_remove_mono
——————————————————
Mono does not appear to be installed.
——————————————————
Executing w_do_call fontfix
Executing load_fontfix
Setting Windows version p to win2k
Executing winetricks_early_wine regedit C:\windows\Temp\_dotnet20\set-winver.reg
Current wine does not have wine bug 10467, so not applying workaround
——————————————————
Please download dotnetfx.exe from http://download.cnet.com/Microsoft-NET-Framework-Redistributable-Package-x86/3000-10250_4-10726028.html, place it in /home/hipo/.cache/winetricks/dotnet20, then re-run this script.
——————————————————

 

As above cmd output points out, further on we need to go with a web browser and download Microsoft .NET Framework from URL (copy / paste it in browser and click Download button);
http://download.cnet.com/Microsoft-NET-Framework-Redistributable-Package-x86/3000-10250_4-10726028.html
Then copy downloaded file dotnetfx.exe to user's home  dir – ~/.cache/winetricks/dotnet20. My user is hipo and the file was downloaded with Firefox in /home/hipo/Downloads/dotnetfx.exe so in my case to copy it  ~/.cache/winetricks/dotnet20 ;
 

noah:~$ cp -rpf ~/Downloads/dotnetfx.exe ~/.cache/winetricks/dotnet20/

Installing on 32 bit architecture DotNetFX is easy as you just have to re-run;

hipo@noah:~$ winetricks dotnet20
... 

However in order to install dotnetfx.exe Ms .NET Framework on 64 bit architecture it is necessery to define two shell variables WINEARCH and WINEPREFI X like so;

hipo@noah:~$ env WINEARCH=win32 WINEPREFIX=~/.wine32 winetricks dotnet20

.NET M$ Install dialog will pop-up like in below screenshots;

wine32-configuring-screenshot-install-dotnet-on-64bit-architecture

Once wine32 gets configured you get Setup extract and Install dialogs;

installing dotnet with wine screenshot

Installing dotnet with wine on Debian Squeeze GNU / linux

To install .NET 2.0 is installed;

hipo@noah:~$ env WINEARCH=win32 WINEPREFIX=~/.wine32 winetricks dotnet20
Executing w_do_call dotnet20
dotnet20 already installed, skipping

Further on to install .NET 3.0 SP1 download dotnetfx30SP1setup.exe and run with wine;

As of time of writting this, download link is;

  • http://download.microsoft.com/download/4/9/0/49001df1-af88-4a4d-b10f-2d5e3a8ea5f3/dotnetfx30SP1setup.exe

hipo@noah:~$ env WINEARCH=win32 WINEPREFIX=~/.wine32 wine Downloads/dotnetfx30SP1setup.exe

Installing dotnet 3.5 wine debian linux screenshot

welcome to dotnet 3.5 sp1

Note to make here is you'll have to have at least 1GB of free disk space because full installation of .NET SP1 requires minimum 1 GB hdd space available.

Linux Wine Microsoft dotnet SP1 installing in process

After downloaded installation will start

Installing Microsoft dotNET Framework 3.0 SP linux Setup

Fixing Active Desktop Recovery Windows XP problem

Thursday, April 11th, 2013

Windows XP active desktop recovery screenshot picture

I had to repair Windows XP PC which got the annoying Active Desktop Recovery screen. I remember seeing this screen back in the days when I was still using Microsoft Windows 98. It was quite shocking for me to find out this stupid pointless Windows bug appears on NT based Windows as well…

As you can see on the screenshot there is a button Restore My Active Desktop but pressing this button doesn't change anything

People around the net recommend two ways to fix that one is through:

Control Panel -> Internet Options -> Advanced (Reset)

Windows XP Control Panel Internet Options Advanced Reset tab screenshot

After this I tried the usual Computer Restart but unfortunately this not solved the problem.

Second suggested method was through a change in Windows registry from

C:\> regedit

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\\Software\Microsoft\\Internet Explorer\\Desktop\\SafeMode\\Components

Change the key value – DeskHtmlVersion REG_DWORD 0x00000110(272) to decimal zero.

Windows XP fix Active Desktop Recovery - change the key value - DeskHtmlVersion REG_DWORD 0x00000110(272) to decimal zero