Task manager won’t open but isn’t disabled

Windows XP. The problem I had was after removing viruses from a client machine, task manager would not open. Control-alt-del did not work, right clicking the taskbar and choosing task manager did nothing, and browsing to C:\Windows\System32 and running taskmgr.exe did nothing. It wouldn’t even pretend to pop up.

Renaming taskmgr.exe to taskmgr2.exe and running it proved to me it wasn’t the file itself. The fix I ended up with is below:

Navigate to: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Image File Execution Options\

Delete Key File: taskmgr.exe

Soon as this key was deleted everything is back to normal and happy as can be. I had tried .reg fixes from Kellys Korner XP to no avail, trying to reset taskmgr, restore permissions to run it etc.
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Alternative Software

Alternativeto is a great place for options.  Tired of your usual application? Hit up Alternativeto and find a large selection of new programs to try. Replacements for Microsoft Office, Dropbox, other backup solutions, note taking programs, anything.  It’s a great way to find something new to try. It has options for OSX, Windows, Linux distros, you name it!
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Firefox/Windows keeps changing my keyboard layout and messing up my symbols

Problem:

I’ve had this problem for a while and only thought to ask about it now. Just upgraded to Firefox 4, but I’ve had the problem in the past as well. Doesn’t happen all the time but it’s really annoying when it does. To fix it, I simply restart Firefox and it’s fixed. I haven’t been able to link the problem occurence with any sites I visit.

Anyway here`s some examples of what happens when I try to type symbols:

`apostrophe
É question mark
” at symbol
/ number pound sign
? exponent arrow
é forward slash
‘ less than
. greater than
^ open square bracket
¸ close square bracket
< backslash
^ open curly bracket
¨ close curly bracket

It doesn`t seem to be anything to do with the language settings of my keyboard as only Firefox is affected. For example right now I can type question marks in notepad but in Firefox they look like this ÉÉÉÉ

Solution:

Turns out it was a Windows problem, not Firefox (but for some reason it would only change the keyboard for the program that was being used when the sequence was pressed). Went into my Keyboard Language settings and disabled the CTRL SHIFT hotkey that cycles through languages.

Source here

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Dragging and Dropping No Longer Works

This problem typically presents itself in Windows XP when upgrading to SP3.

Things that work!
Can drag out of Recycle Bin to desktop without problem.
Can drag web link from address bar to desktop to make shortcut without any problem.
Can drag a file into notepad and open it.
Can drag icons to the start menu without any problems.
Can right click and copy and past without any problems.

Things that do not work
Can’t drag a file to a folder.
Can’t right click drag (no menu will show)
Holding down Ctrl while dragging will show plus sign but does not work.
And while I drag the, ghost icon appears as normal, with the cursor.  But just does not copy, or move the file as expected.

There might be a variety of things that shift between the columns but these are some of the common issues I’ve seen.

The fix:

The issue becomes that an Internet Zone policy is being checked, but the registry key doesn’t exist for it. No registry entry, no policy, so no authorization to drag and drop.

In regedit, go to HKEY_CURRENT_USER/SOFTWARE/Microsoft/Windows/CurrentVersion/Internet Settings/Zones/4.
If there isn’t an entry named 180D, then create a new DWORD entry named 180D and set the value to 0.

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Right click options stay visible on screen after choosing them

Windows 7 / Windows Vista

Okay so when I right click and chose any option I get this weird ghost of the option I have clicked that does not go away and is on top of every thing else on my screen. If I right-click again and chose something else nothing happens to the original and a second one is not produced.

Example picture

Fix:

1) Right-click on your computer icon, and then click Properties
2) Click Advanced System Settings in the window that comes up
3) Click the Advanced tab and then the Settings button
4) Uncheck “Fade out menu items after clicking”. Click Apply and then OK.

Sourced from Reddit

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Windows XP Control Panel Icons Red x

Sometimes you’ll end up with all the icons and sidebar icons in Control Panel just refusing to load and causing problems (example here, ignore the weird texturing over everything it’s just the image). It’s an easy fix

1) Click on the Start button
2) Choose Run
3) Type in ‘regsvr32 /i mshtml.dll‘
4) Click OK

You may need to reboot the system for the changes to take effect.

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Driver Collection Packs

Ever get so annoyed trying to find a driver for your system you want to rip your hair out? Driverpacks.net can fix that for you.

They have a large collection of drivers sorted by OS, and lumped by category.  This allows you to essentially download one giant repository of drivers for a given device (say, wireless network cards, or touchpads) for easy use later in imaging setups or such.

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All Linksys / Netgear / D-Link Router Interfaces

Here are two websites that let you see exactly what the user is seeing when accessing their router. One contains all the Linksys router’s emulated, and the other is all the Netgear routers.

Linksys Router Emulators

Netgear Router Emulators

D-Link Router Emulators

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Computer Hardware Chart

This is just a handy chart of all the interfaces for pretty much all computer hardware from the last many years (all the way back to 72-pin SO-DIMM’s)

Check it out here for easy reference
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Passing a printer through RDP

So the issue we were running into was as such. The client is set up for terminal services logins (RDP environments using server 2008) and had a printer shared on a separate computer from the one we were logging in from. Should have been simple enough as connecting to the machine the printer was hooked to, right clicking it and choosing connect, right? Sadly wrong.

Ultimately, we had to go into Devices and Printers and use the ‘Add a printer’ wizard. We added the printer as Local Printer, not a network device or anything. On the port selection screen we chose to create a New Port, and in the name field we put the full network path of the printer we wanted to use (‘\\<ipaddress>\<sharename>’). This solved any problems we had and allowed the RDP session to pass the printer through no problem.

Whenever we added it as a network device, RDP would not send the printer into the session, therefore not allowing us to use it. This was for an old Okidata ML490 printer onto Windows 7 as the ‘host’ machine we were RDP’ing from.

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