Sapphire HD7850–Intermittent Audio Drop Out

Back in June 2012 I created a Home Theatre PC, i was really happy with the setup except that when I ran the audio through the HDMI to the receiver, I had intermittent sound dropouts. Now the dropouts were literally for a second, but it was random and is really annoying.

I tried a number of things, but nothing worked. Anyway I put up with issue for a while, I had other things going on and assumed that etiher Sapphire, AMD or Onkyo (receiver) would fix the issue.

So after 6 months, I have now found a solution. It was in a thread on the issue I was having.

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Contro l\Video\{XXXX...}\0000
( 'XXXX' means device number. There are several device number folder and u should find 'AdapterDesc' in 0000 folder which key value is 'amd radeon HD 7XXX Series'. )
At that '0000' folder, Change 'PP_SclkDeepSleepDisable REG_DWORD' value 0 to 1.

I rebooted, and touch wood the problem has gone.

References are here

http://www.overclockers.com/forums/showthread.php?s=13d1bbb978d7106ac1b27ca8efa9374d&p=7337754#post7337754

There was another solution that seemed to work, but needed to be done after each reboot. The above registry entry should work all the time.

http://www.overclock.net/t/1295464/intermittent-hdmi-audio-output-on-7970-12-8-drivers

Sapphire HD7850–Intermittent Audio Drop Out

Samsung Galaxy SII (i9100)–Android–100% Battery Charge Issue (USB)

Recently had an issue where my phone battery status would start behaving erratically. Not showing the correct level, then saying full charged and then immediatly changing after disconnetion from charger.

eventually after pouring over numerous battery notification forums I found this blog

http://andycorps.blogspot.com.au/2011/10/samsung-galaxy-s2-i9100-erratic-battery.html?showComment=1333511234964#c1325155034377407919

It fixed my issue by just cleaning the usb port.

I now have another issue where if I disconnect the usb charger without

Samsung Galaxy SII (i9100)–Android–100% Battery Charge Issue (USB)

How to run Robocopy from SQL without a batch file

There is a problem running Robocopy from a command step in SQL server jobs. Robocopy returns a non zero code for success, I won;t go into why that is here. It is to do with flags and ANDing if you want to look it up.

So if you call Robocopy directly the SQL step will always fail (even though it is successful).

My way round that it is to use START. Now this solution will always return success so if Robocopy does actually fail you will never know. For my purpose this was acceptable. You can get around this by placing your Robocopy command in a batch file, call the batch file from SQL Server job step.

So to use START

START "<window title>" /WAIT ROBOCOPY /COPY:DAT /MOV /NP ^"<source>^" ^"<destination>^"

This works for me.

How to run Robocopy from SQL without a batch file

Create an anonymous share in Windows 2008 server

I wanted to mount an iso in Hyper-V across a network share, however Hyper-V will not let you do this. It is due to security which I won’t go into here. To get round this you have to either copy the iso locally or create the remote share to allow anonymous access. Now this is obviouly a security issue, so  you should judge whether this solution is suitable for you, but for me it makes sense.

I am grabbing the necessary fragment from a fuller article here by Scott Havens.

In an environment without Active Directory (like my home network), or when the machines in question are in domains that don’t talk with each other, we need something else.  One option is to enable anonymous access to the share where the ISOs are stored.  This solution is fine for my home network, and may be feasible for other small networks where security isn’t as much of an issue.  While the instructions below are for Windows Home Server specifically, they are easily adapted to a bog-standard (non-WHS) file server.

1. First, go to Administrative Tools->Local Security Policy.

   In Security Settings/Local Policies/Security Options, make the following changes:

   - Network Access: Do not allow anonymous enumeration of SAM accounts and shares – Disabled
   - Network Access: Let Everyone permissions apply to anonymous users – Enabled
   - Network Access: Restrict anonymous access to Named Pipes and Shares – Disabled
   - Network Access: Shares that can be accessed anonymously – Add SOFTWARE (or the appropriate share) to the existing list

   In Security Settings/Local Policies/User Rights Assignment:

   - Access this computer from a network – Add ANONYMOUS LOGON and Everyone if they’re not already there

2. After closing the Local Security Settings window you’ll need to reboot the server or force application of security policy via gpupdate.
3. Then, open up Computer Management and go to System Tools->Local Users and Groups->Groups.
   Windows Home Server creates several security groups that provide read-only and read/write access to the shares it manages.  Find which group offers Read-Only access to the share and add Everyone to this group.  On my computer, the Software share is managed by RO_8 and RW_8, so I added Everyone to the RO_8 group.
4. While you’re in Computer Management, go to System Tools->Shared Folders->Shares.  In the properties for the appropriate share, add Everyone to the Share Permissions.

Create an anonymous share in Windows 2008 server

Win2k8R2 - Unable to rename a connection–already exists

I image a lot of machines, saves me having to keep going through the complete setup with each machine.

On a couple of occasions I have had issues with network connections, it seems windows retains the old imaged server nic info, but it sees the hardware on the new server as new. Therefore it will not add them teaming or call them the right name if you have renamed them.

On trying to rename them to the same name you had on the original machine, you will get an error saying the name already exits. But in network connections they will not show up, even if you start device manager and select view\hidden devices they will not show.

You need to run the following from an elevated command prompt

SET DEVMGR_SHOW_NONPRESENT_DEVICES=1

and then open device manager, select view\show hidden devices. The devices that are no longer present on the new machine will be greyed out and can be uninstalled.

You will now be able to rename the connection.

Win2k8R2 - Unable to rename a connection–already exists

Cisco Pix 6.3–allow ping replies

How to set a PIX 6.3, to allow ICMP replies from inbound initiated icmp traffic.
i.e Allow a computer on the inside interface to ping external (outside computers).

By default outbound icmp traffic is allowed but the responses are denied.

First we need to create a access-list to allow the types of icmp traffic.

example:

access-list 155 permit icmp any host 192.168.72. echo-reply

 

access-list <acl id> permit <protocol> any host <host ip> echo-reply

any – is shorthand for any ip (0.0.0.0) with any subnet (wildcard mask  255.255.255.255.)

host – short hand for wildcard mask of (0.0.0.0)

With the acl setup we need to bind the acl to the outside interface on inbound traffic.

<note: only assign one access-group to an interface, if you already have one don’t add another.>
access-group 155 in interface outside

Cisco Pix 6.3–allow ping replies

Enabling ICMP on Cisco ASA firewall - ADSM

As always this is really for my reference in the future.

I wanted to allow icmp traffic (Pings, traceroutes) from inside to outside, I had setup ACLs etc like other protocols which were working however ICMp traffic refused to work.

In the end I traced it down to a setting in (ASDM)

ASDM\Configuration\Service Policy Rules\inspection_default\<edit>

\Rule actions

Check ICMP.

OK and then apply.

Ping and traceroute should now work, assuming you have created an acl to allow the appropriate traffic. In addition this will set the firewall to respond to ICMP traffic, I think that's somewhere else.

In addition I believe the following is the CLI for the above (I have not tested it or used it), it is here for info only.

policy-map global_policy
 class inspection_default
  inspect icmp
  exit
 exit

Enabling ICMP on Cisco ASA firewall - ADSM