How to make a bootable USB for Windows XP 2003 or Vista?

By Sarath | Published: February 2, 2010

Recently I purchased a Dell Mini 10v with Windows 7 starter edition. As most of you know, netbooks are not coming with any optical drive. USB takes of it’s role. Installing an operating system is hectic with netbook especially if it’s Windows XP. You’re blessed if you’ve the luxury of an external optical drive. But usually nobody would like to own and external big optical drive with the small netbooks.

When I purchased it from Japan it was pre-installed with Windows 7 Japanese version and I prepared the bootable Windows 7 USB drive using and installed using USB to DVD tool from Microsoft Store. It was painless and installation finished within few minutes.

Lately I inspired few my colleagues towards Dell Mini 10v and obviously the installing risk came to my shoulders( I never expected of it!) and they’ve not prefer to Install Windows 7 even I boasted about the quality security of the Win7.

I’ve tried different methods after Googling. One of the proven method was using BartPE which was little bit painful and I failed to Install it several times. Luckly I got another excellent tool called Novicorp WinToFlash which made all the tasks so easy. It’s so simple.

  • Just download the Zip
  • Start WinToFlash in Administrator mode (if you’re running Windows 7 or Windows Vista)
  • Mount the ISO image or insert the DVD/CD to the optical drive
  • Insert the USB drive
  • Now Start the Wizard and select source drive and destination USB drive (take care to choose right path especially if any of your other USB drives are plugged in)

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Wizard will prepare the USB and will finish it in few minutes

  • Now insert the USB in your netbook and select the USB as the primary boot device. (In Dell System you can press F12 to select the boot device in the POST BIOS screen)
  • First you’ve to choose the commandline option to install. once the files are finished copying the system will reboot and you’ve to choose the USB as first boot device. Now go for option 2 which spawn the remaining setup in the GUI mode.
  • Once you finish, reboot( no need to select USB device as the primary boot device. select your HDD if you changed the option in BIOS). Now the system may report that HAL.dll was not found and failed to boot. If this issue comes you can see several debugging option. Just try each by each and check properly boot or not. Nothing special to do there. It will report some error and when we reboot, if the issue is solved you can simply boot in to the OS otherwise boot again from USB and select the next debug option. Try one by one until succeeded.

There are few issues I’ve faced with Windows XP install during USB install

The C: drive will most probably be occupied by the inserted USB drive. So your dream to install the OS in C: Drive will remain as a dream. I was little bit tricky and first I installed it in Drive E: and in the HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\MountedDevices I swapped the E: Drive with C: drive in my ambition to boot from it( I’ve done it according to Microsoft Guidance). Boot worked fine but it failed to display the login screen. I reinstalled again but this time, I made another boot USB disk and formatted the drive and created a primary partition( however it seems you can do it with Windows XP installation Windows itself. Format a drive once, reboot it may take place of the C drive. I’ve not tried it though). After that booted from Windows bootable USB. Now this can occupy another drive name as the partition was already existing there.

It may show you that format the USB device and install in it during the initial stage of the boot. You’ve to press ESC key then it will display the attached hard disk and it’s partition. Format it once again if needed or install straight in the new partition. For me installing from USB was damn slow even I used USB 2.0 device.

Now you’re done. Any queries, ask as comments.

Note that I’ve successfully tried only Windows XP. Windows 2003 and Windows Vista are the other options in the Novicorp WinToFlash tool.

Kudos to the team who created this excellent tool and I blame Microsoft for not providing an easy tool to install their OS.

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Visual Studio 2005 or above and Processor based optimization

By Sarath | Published: January 29, 2010

The /G switch ( /G3, /G4, /G5, /G6, /G7, and /GB ) was used optimize the code for the specific processor architecture like Pentium, Pentium II, Pentium III and IV etc. This was possible with Visual C++ prior to VC++ 8.0 (Visual Studio 2005). But this compiler option is no more supported. The compiler now generates code in a blended mode which works well with all architectures. This is especially need to be taken care while works with makesfiles on switching over from previous version of  Visual C++ versions.

See more information on breaking changes with Visual C++ 2005 Compiler

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What iPad lacks? An impression on seeing the keynote and tech spec

By Sarath | Published: January 28, 2010

Steve Jobs with iPad

Steve Jobs with iPad

I was so excited about watching the keynote video of iPad launch at Apple website. I am really excited to own on iPad. The multi-touch features and hardware itself is just amazing on the demo. Also I’d be happy to see the best iPhone applications on the same platform.

Despite the pros, I noticed about the cons of the new product. Don’t think that I am owning one iPad but I am writing this based on the impression from Key note and the technical specification. Also this post is fresh and I am not influenced by any tech pundit’s writing and guesses on the iPad.

[Updated 3.00 AM JST]

iPad still doesn’t support Adobe Flash. Irony is that iPad running Mac OS X  and can’t believe it doesn’t support flash. I can’t think of a “computer” which has no flash installed in it. (During the demo, the websites which has flash is displayed as unsupported. Check it out)

Steve Jobs already said in his presentation, the netbooks are cheap laptops. I agree that iPad has a gorgeous display. But has not good storage. I hope this is to promote the mobile me services of Apple. In my opinion more storage must get for a cheap price because this is not a phone.. Almost similar to a notebook or a high form of a netbook.

The device lacks a webcam. It even doesn’t contain a basic VGA webcam. What if I need to show up myself to my friends? Apple is seamless in their user experience while they restrict of make the user handicapped in terms of storage. Also Jobs dint mention about the iChat application.

When comes in to storage, the iPad basic capacity is 16 GB and they’re not running any iPhone OS, instead it’s powered with Mac OS X 10.5.8 or above. Which means that you’ve to spend few more room for the OS out of the basic 16/32/64 GB. Apple dint mention about any external storage which can be connected through the USB port. I hope it isn’t possible.

Again comes on the hardware specification. iPad is not really great. It has a great battery life around 10 hours and also it does have a great video accelerator. But still it’s 1 Ghz processor inside it. Most of the iPhone games are too reduced version of PC/Console version and limited in many ways. I think they must have more efficient processor specification. Even the so called “cheap laptops” has 1.6 Ghz processors.

The TV out capabilities are not built-in we’ve to buy a Dock to VGA adapter for enjoying the TV/Projector connectivity.

The device is capable of playing video up-to 720p. Still it’s not full HD. Also the resolution is 1024×768. It’s not really a big room. again I believe with the multi-touch panning and zooming of course the browsing experience will be good.

Also I doubt the gaming experience and convenience beside the accelero-meter. Also I don’t think to have a great typing experience with iPad. With iPhone one hand is enough for typing, but this case is different. For heavy typing we may have to depend on external keyboard.

Despite of all drawbacks, apple knows how sell a product and make business around it, that’s how they’re grown in these years. People loves spend and own for an Apple.

One more thing, Steve Jobs presentation was not really charming this time. The updates about how things are going on literally he took the head postion of “The biggest mobile company in the world” was not accepted well I guess. Also during the end, the presentation was slow and was out of sync. He doubted in many places. Never seen this before from Jobs. Let’s wait and see till we get one in hand.

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Installing Windows 7 in Dell Mini 10v

By Sarath | Published: December 28, 2009

I’ve successfully installed both Windows 7 and Ubuntu Netbook Remix in my brand new Dell Mini 10v. Here I’m explaining about how to make a bootable USB stick to install Windows 7. This is quite simple but before getting this final solution, I’ve tried with many different tools to prepare the USB stick and it was desperately failed. Either they will not have any option to write into USB or the writing may have some kind of drawback which may result into a failed booting.

I’ve received the box pre-installed with Japanese version of Windows 7 Starter Edition. I’ve not opted for an external drive when I purchased. So I had prepared the image file using Magic ISO. Dumping in ISO image format is better as it’s a universally accepted format.

There are two methods to prepare the USB disk.

1. Using USB to DVD tool from Microsoft Store

Microsoft realized your needs and they’ve provided a safe method to prepare the bootable USB from ISO. Prepare the ISO image using magic disc. Download the tool from Microsoft website. Now things are pretty straight forward. Just go through the guided steps to create the bootable USB stick

image

Once you complete preparing the USB, reboot your computer and press F12 (for Dell Laptops only) in the POST screen to choose the boot device. From that opt for USB Storage Device. Go ahead with the simplest Windows Installation we’ve ever seen in Windows history.

2. Using diskpart and xcopy (or simple windows copying)

This step must be done very carefully as it may damage your own HDD if it used wrong. Do this at your own risk.

First you’ve to plugin the USB stick and open the command line tool diskpart from Run Window or from command prompt.

image

You can see a similar window as displayed above. Note that Windows Vista or Windows 7 may ask for administrator privilege to run this application. Do the following steps

  • list disk – this will list the attached physical disks connected to the system
  • select disk # – select the preferred disk. Here you must be very careful. Make sure that you’ve chosen the right disk. Otherwise you may lose your data. replace # the number listed ### column of list disk command
  • clean – clear the configuration information
  • create partition primary – Create the partition for the stick
  • format fs=fat32 quick – note that if you’ve not opted for quick, you will have to wait till the OS finish the true formatting of entire disk.
  • assign – assign a drive letter for the drive to access through explorer
    You’ve prepared a clean USB device. Now mount the ISO image or using magic disc or insert the DVD. Simply copy paste the contents of the folder to the prepared USB device. You can also use xcopy or robocopy if you’re preferring the command line tools.

The next step was to prepare the bootable USB stick from the and created the using my other personal computer to prepare the bootable USB drive. Reboot your computer and press F12 (for Dell Laptops only) in the POST screen to choose the boot device. From that opt for USB Storage Device.

note that the second method has failed many times even the USB started booting. I don’t know if it was the problem with my USB stick. Always try to it with the first method mention.

Posted in Dell, Tips, Troubleshooting, tools | 1 Comment

How to know the caps lock status in Dell Mini 10v?

By Sarath | Published: December 27, 2009

There are only two things emits light in Dell Mini 10v, the monitor and the power indicator LED. It’s doesn’t have the beauitful LEDs like other Dell notebooks.

The worst thing, is that we can’t know the status of caps lock. This is particularly makes problems when you type password as you can’t see the original text. You have to try the caps lock in some editable windows and back to the password field.

Even those Dell laptops which has all indicators including caps lock, it used to display ON/OFF status in a quick small message text on the right bottom side. With Dell Mini you can make use of this handy tool to know the current capslocks status.

The disadvantage is that it will be popped up only when we hit the caps lock key. It’s hard to know the current caps lock status without changing the current capslock state.

But it’s still better then a total blank

Download the system tools from Dell Mini 10v Driver Download Page. I’ve given direct link to Dell Caps Lock Application (this URL may changed by Dell in Future or on upgrade)

Once you finish installing this, you can see something has below on hitting the caps lock key.

ON – image

OFF – image

Posted in Dell, Tips, Troubleshooting | 2 Comments

How to change Dell Mini 10v Function key mapping to normal mode?

By Sarath | Published: December 26, 2009

I’ve received my Dell Mini 10v and this is the first issue, I’ve faced while started working with it. I am a keyboard lover for most of the cases, if possible I will be using only my keyboard to work with softwares because it’s faster than using mouse and also I’m good at using it. :)

Dell Mini has some problems with it’s function keys. It doesn’t have any dedicated function keys. It’s there in the top row of the keyboard but if you need to press F1-F12, you also need to hold down ‘fn’ key just left to the Windows Key. This quite bad and they’re deviating from the standard. Even in a point I was thinking about writing a keyboard filter driver to change the mapping as Mark Russinovich Wrote Ctrl2Cap driver.

Fortunately when I skimmed through the driver list of Dell Mini 10v on dell.com, I could find an application related to function keys. It hadn’t any good information about what it’s doing but still I wish to have a try to get rid of this problem.

Surprisingly it was the one I was seeking for. Just downloaded it from the Dell Website and installed.

image

Just enable the checkbox to make the function keys functions as in a normal keyboard.

You can download the driver by navigating to Dell.com Drivers page. Here’s I’m giving link to the corresponding driver but I’m not sure how long it will work as dell may frequently update the URL information.

Download Function Keys for Dell Mini 10v

Posted in Dell, Tips, Troubleshooting | 1 Comment

Google IME for Indian Languages

By Sarath | Published: December 26, 2009

Most of us are really fond of Google transliteration service, which also incorporated in their popular services like Gmail and Blogger to compose mails and blogs in our own languages.[See Google Transliteration]

As we all know, we can add the text input support for as many languages from the regional settings menu of Windows (you can see this in the control panel)

image

Even if you can add the language support, in fact they’re not get going well with a transliteration manner. If you type something, Malayalam it should appear as മലയാളം. unfortunately Windows badly fails to do that.

If you’ve really enjoyed the Google transliteration service, they’re ready to provide the same text service as offline service through IME. No more copy paste from transliteration IME page your window.

Navigate to http://www.google.com/ime/transliteration/ and select your preferred language, finish download and install it.

Google Transliteration IME is currently available for 14 different languages – Arabic, Bengali, Farsi (Persian), Greek, Gujarati, Hindi, Kannada, Malayalam, Marathi, Nepali, Punjabi, Tamil, Telugu and Urdu.

Google Boasts it has

  • Offline Support – No dependency with internet connection
  • Easy Keyboard – Dictionary enabled keyboard to enter rare and complex words
  • Word Completions – Dictionary based word completions for prefixes.
  • Quick Search(you should expect this from Google) – Single click web search for highlighted word.
  • Personalized Choices – Remember user corrections for personalized service.
  • Customize suggestions page size, display font

More features can be found in this page

Okay here’s a simple and quick demonstration in my mother tongue.

1. Enable the language bar ( if it’s not enabled )

image

2. Select the language from language bar. You can see the Google Transliteration service on the right bottom of the screen (by default)

image

Note that This is a per Window Settings (like the normal IME operation). i.e if you’ve two notepads running and you selected Malayalam for one of them, the other will not be affected by this settings.

3. Now start typing

image

Now you’ve the basic education on transliteration services (if you’re a newbie). Now go ahead explore more. Chat, mail, or anything in your local language. Thanks Google for taking care of our mother tongue!!!

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How to resolve pairing issues of Dell BH200 Bluetooth 2.0 EDR Stereo Headset with iPhone/iPod Touch?

By Sarath | Published: December 13, 2009

I had some problems while I tried to connect Dell BH200 headset with my iPod. If you’re stuck up with the pairing issues with this headphone, you can solve the problem as follows

1. Turn on your Bluetooth headset (Dell BH200) using the power button

2. Hold the power button for 6 secs. So the device will turn into discoverable mode. (the blue light will start blinking fast.

3. Go to you iPod Touch/iPhone setting page. Navigate to “General->Bluetooth” page. Turn on the Bluetooth.

4. Choose the device the detected.

5. Connect to the device by tapping on the device name.

6. When iPhone/iPod Touch ask you for Pairing, give pass key, give it as “0000”. (avoid only the digits, exclude quotes)

If your Apple device is not detecting the headphone, please turn off both iPhone/iPod Touch and Headset. Now try again.

If it still not working, open the cover of USB port and you can see a small button to reset it. Now try again!

Hope this helps.

[Images are originally taken from Dell.com]

Posted in Tips, Troubleshooting | 4 Comments

How to burn an image file to USB in Ubuntu Linux?

By Sarath | Published: November 25, 2009

This is a quick tip. In Windows, we’ve lot of free and paid alternatives to write an image file to USB device(e.g ImgBurn, Win32DiskImager). Let me explain my requirement. If I get a bootable ISO image file of an operating system like Ubuntu or moblin how would you do that if you’re in a Linux environment? A byte-exact copy of the ISO image must be placed on the USB drive. It is not sufficient to simply copy the image file to the drive.

It’s quite simple to do that

unmount the USB device if it’s automatically mounted to the system.

Step 1

You can either use # umount <usb-drive> command or directly unplug using your nautilus file manager(windows shell equivalent)

Step 2

Image Writer is a small python executable script that detects your USB drive and writes the image to it. The advantage of using image writer is that it will not inadvertently overwrite your system hard drive. Download Image Writer. Navigate to the desired location where you kept the image writer and change its permission to execute.

# cd <directory with downloaded image-writer file>
# chmod a+x ./image-writer
# ./image-writer <image file>

Now you’re done!

There’s a alternative method using ‘dd’ which you can see in the following link. But it’s very risky. It may erase your whole system files if it’s not used carefully.

Source: moblin help

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How to fix mt.exe : general error c101008d ?

By Sarath | Published: November 24, 2009

Those who developed a window based (native C/C++) application using Microsoft Visual Studio 2005 or above might have experienced an error similar as follows.

mt.exe:general error c101008d:Failed to write the updated manifest to the resource of file "some_sample.exe/dll". The process cannot access the file because it is being used by another process.

and if you build the exe again(or link again) it may get succeeded?,

What does this indicate? How to fix this issue?

The fix is very simple, disable your antivirus scan and try the build again (DO THIS AT YOUR OWN RISK. DON’T BLAME IF SOMETHING WRONG HAPPENS). Probably you wont face this issue anymore.

The reasons for this issues are.

Your anti-virus program is always vigilant on the executable files written in your system. So once your linker generates this exe, the file will undergo strict scanning by your anti-virus scanner if it’s active. During the scan time, the file will be exclusively locked by the anti-virus program.

The error you’re seeing about embedding manifest to the exe. Embedding manifest is not part of compilation or linking. You can embed manifest to any executable using the manifest tool (mt.exe). See How to embed a manifest in a C/C++ application.

mt.exe –manifest MyApp.exe.manifest -outputresource:MyApp.exe;1

or

mt.exe –manifest MyLibrary.dll.manifest -outputresource:MyLibrary.dll;2

the suffix “1” is for exe and “2” is for dll. This process is automated in Visual Studio (See, manifest generation in Visual Studio ).

Once the exe is written to the disk, visual studio will execute the next step using mt.exe to embed the application manifest in to it, but this time the file will be exclusively locked by antivirus which cause this error. if your antivirus lightning fast to scan the exes, you wont see this error.

This kind of error are quite easy to get in clear-case networks where the files in the views are access slightly less speed than a normal disk drive. In that case the antivirus program may take a bit more time completely scan the executable.

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