All posts by Ed Tittel

Full-time freelance writer, researcher and occasional expert witness, I specialize in Windows operating systems, information security, markup languages, and Web development tools and environments. I blog for numerous Websites, still write (or revise) the occasional book, and write lots of articles, white papers, tech briefs, and so forth.
Insider stuff, Recent Activity, WED Blog, Windows 10

So Long i7 Skylake

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It’s been a long, long ride. It must’ve been right around 8 years ago that I first brought up my Asrock Z170-based, i7 Skylake PC. Today, I made the decision to lay it to its final rest. I’ll decommission it in hours. Indeed, as I bid “So long, i7 Skylake,” I’m saving the drives and ordering a 12GB SATA drive to which I’ll back everything up before wiping and sending them onto Goodwill (or elsewhere). It’s safe to say this has retirement been a long time coming.

In yesterday’s blog post, I had planned to bring out the heavy guns next. That is, I unplugged all the drives from the i7 Skylake, and inserted a new, blank NVMe from which to boot. At first, it looked  like it wasn’t going to work. I even got past providing a license key. But then, the newer NVMe wouldn’t run even when I provided the right Intel RST driver version. When I switched back to the old drive, the PC would no longer boot, not even to the UEFI screen. Something serious quit working along the way, and I no longer want to spend any more time on this. It’s over…

What Does So Long i7 Skylake Mean?

Because I’m moving the unit out of my office entirely, it means I can set up a couple of other machines.  I’d set them aside during the “parallel runnings” phase as I was using the Ryzen 7 5800X build as my primary production desktop, but running the i7 Skylake just in case I needed something from that PC. Now, I’m going to content myself with snapshots of its drives for a while, and put the old beast to rest.

As I was looking inside the case today, I see it was reasonably equipped for a machine of its day:

  • 4 physical cores/8 threads (vintage 2015)
  • 32 GB DDR4 RAM
  • NVIDIA 3070 Ti GPU (originally a 1080)
  • TONS of storage (11 drives totaling 16TB)

But it’s been getting flakier and flakier over the past 3-4 months. So yesterday, when I couldn’t get the machine to handle a clean install of Windows 10 Pro, I decided “enough is enough.” I have plenty more PCs to work with, so I don’t need to nurse this one along anymore. If somebody in central Texas wants to come by and pick it up, they can have it, gratis. (I’ll be taking the 3070 Ti, but the rest of the build, including 6 drives with about 8 TB of total capacity — wiped, of course — will come along for the ride. Contact me if you’re interested.) Otherwise, it too is headed for a Goodwill drop-off.

I’m sad to see it go, but I’m definitely glad the X5800 build is working out quite well. Hopefully, it will see me into the next decade. But here in Windows-World, the strangest things can (and often do) happen. Stay tuned: I’ll keep you posted.

 

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Backup/Restore, Insider stuff, Recent Activity, Troubleshooting, WED Blog, Windows 10

Win10 Boot Follies Galore

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Here’s my situation. I’m still running the old i7Skylake with its 2015 vintage Asrock Z170 motherboard. That machine is running Windows 10 Enterprise. Thus, it’s not eligible for the ESU (Extended Security Updates) offer from MS to keep that machine alive for another year. “No problem,” I thought, “I’ll just clean install Windows 10 Pro, and take up the offer that way…” Instead, I’m dealing with Win10 boot follies galore, unable to boot to USB media to replace the current Windows image. It’s been heartbreaking…

Describing Win10 Boot Follies Galore

Copilot agrees that something is hinky with the UEFI on the Z170, and it’s preventing the PC from booting off a USB flash drive. So far, I’ve:

  • Turned off Fast Boot in UEFI, and discovered that toggling CSM (the compatibility support module that supports both MBR and GPT partitioning schemes) kills UEFI completely for UEFI version P7.60. Turns out that’s a known gotcha.
  • Built rescue and install disks on 8GB media to avoid FAT32 issues (using the usually reliable Media Creation Tool, and the still more dependable Macrium Rescue Media Builder)
  • Run those UFDs from USB 2.0 ports, on the off-chance that USB 3.x isn’t working for boot

So far, nothing has worked to install a different Windows 10 version on this PC. But I have a plan…

Bring Out the Heavy Guns

When all else fails while installing Windows, I’ve observed that disconnecting all non-boot drives, and replacing the boot media with a completely blank drive will sometimes work. I’ve got a 1TB Crucial T705 NVMe that I’ll prep in that way, and give it a try. IMO, it has a good chance of getting me over this hump.

I won’t have time to do this until the weekend. Stay tuned: I’ll follow up on Monday with a report on that experience. I’ve been bit on the hindquarters many times in Windows-World, but this bite kind of stings…

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Device drivers, Insider stuff, Recent Activity, WED Blog, Windows 11

Windows 11 Does Multi-Monitors Right

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I’ve been living the life of a native Windows 11 user on my production desktop — the newer, Ryzen 7 X5800 based PC — for a couple of months now. One thing I’ve noticed is that Windows 11 handles multiple monitors with great alacrity and aplomb. IMO, Windows 11 does multi-monitors right, in several important ways. Let me elaborate…

Why Say: Windows 11 Does Multi-Monitors Right

To begin with, I didn’t need to engage in Display settings shenanigans on my dual-monitor desktop setup. At all. Indeed, Windows 11 correctly detected and arranged both of my displays during its initial bootup. I didn’t have to do anything to get them working in extended mode (to use left- and right-hand devices as a single logical desktop with proper mouse tracking all the way across). In Windows 10, this requires manual intervention and setup.

It gets better. Updating NVIDIA graphics drivers is likewise much better behaved. On Windows 10, post-install, all windows moved onto the primary display. Remote desktop sessions appeared in full-screen windows that needed to be maximized to show a top-center control bar. On Windows 11, windows reappear where they resided prior to the update, and RDP sessions remain as previously set.

GPU driver stability also seems to be improved. On Windows 10, I often had to deal with “display blink” — a phenomenon that caused either my left- or right-hand display to blink on and off every few seconds. So far, I’ve been through three NVIDIA update cycles on Windows 11 with nary a sign of such misbehavior.

All’s Well…

It may still be too early to proclaim success or improvement, but I’m doing those things anyway. So far, display handling in Windows 11 is better behaved and more predictable than it was on Windows 10. Should things change, I’ll be sure to report on issues I encounter. But so far, it’s been a refreshing breeze to work with multiple monitors on Windows 11. Fingers crossed that things keep going in the same way for the foreseeable future!

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Pondering NVMe Performance Premiums

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I admit it: I’m something of an SSD nut. I’ve been fascinated with these solid-state alternatives to spinning media since they first appeared in the mSATA days. Indeed, I acquired my first SSD in 2008, in the form of a SATA based Intel X25-M. I jumped on the mSATA bandwagon early in 2011, about two months after Intel dropped its M.2 SSD 310. Over the past decade and more, I’ve spent far too much time wondering if the latest performance boost is worth the typical doubling in cost over previous generations that vendors exact for riding on the bleeding edge. Here’s what I think…

When Pondering Performance Premiums, Don’t Forget Price

I bought a very nicely priced Samsung 990 EVO Plus 4TB Gen4 NVMe to include in my current desktop build earlier this summer. It set me back just over US$200. I was just reading about a new offering from Lexar — the NM1090 Pro 4TB — that costs “just $360” in the words of that story’s title. The difference is what got me thinking about today’s musings.

The thing about leading edge hardware is the whole device chain. That means it’s not just the drive itself in this case, but the slot into which it plugs, the bus upon which it rides, and the motherboard that houses all the pieces and their connections. Here at Chez Tittel, I have perhaps one or two systems — both laptops — that could use the Gen5 high-speed capabilities the Lexar drive can deliver.  I own neither of them (one is on loan from Lenovo, the other from Dynabook).

Getting There from Here Is More Than a Ride

Taking full advantage of the leading edge means a leading edge rig in which to house a leading edge drive. Right now, building such a system would cost me over US$2,000 (maybe even over $3K if I want to max out on the GPU side, too).

My strategy is to hang back one generation when building, because I can get reasonable performance for half the cost of buying into whatever the state of the art might be at purchase time. Of course, that means my build will be obsolete a bit sooner, but gosh: saving 50% lets me buy in more often at a lower overall cost. I happen to think that’s the right way to go.

Here in Windows-World, buyers can do as they like. I’d rather stretch my dollars a bit further, and use them more sparingly. But then, I’m not a gamer, nor do I run many applications where my productivity is diminished because I can’t operate at max bandwidth. What’s your take?

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Cool Tools, Insider stuff, Recent Activity, WED Blog, Windows 11

Careful With App Defaults

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I’ve always got PCs coming and going here at Chez Tittel. That means laptops, mostly, with an occasional All-in-One or SFF desktop to keep things interesting. Further, that means setting up Windows to work the way I want. Too bad, then, that Edge isn’t inclined to make way for other Web-focused defaults (e.g. Chrome). Even when I pick Chrome as the default browser, Edge keeps popping up for other stuff. The lead-in graphic shows why I’ve learned to be careful with App defaults. Indeed, it shows Edge remains the default for .mhtml files (MIME encapsulation of aggregate HTML documents) even after Chrome gets the default pick.

Why Be Careful With App Defaults?

Elsewise, items opened in other MS apps will open in Edge rather than Chrome.  In this case, Outlook handles a lot of .mhtml files for links and Web items embedded in email messages. Those still go to Edge. The right way to do this is to click Settings > Apps > Default Apps > Google Chrome.  On that page, make sure Chrome gets associated to all file types you want it to handle.

In my case, I just made sure everything on the foregoing Settings page that used to show Edge as the default now shows Chrome. A hopefully obvious corollary to this exercise is that setting Chrome as the default browser in Windows 11, is not sufficient to make it take over for all Web-related items. Hopefully, that’s now fixed!

Just another happy day in Windows-World, living on the edge (horrible pun not just intended, but enjoyed).

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Cool Tools, Insider stuff, Recent Activity, Thoughts & concerns, WED Blog

Interminable Adobe Acrobat Updates

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I’m feeling a little less happy about switching from Nitro Pro to Adobe Acrobat on my new 5800X production build PC. The former costs about US$110 for each new version, the latter about US$20 a month. Right now, it feels like I’m paying more and getting less. But I confess: it’s the interminable Adobe Acrobat updates that bother me most. Let me explain…

Why Say: Interminable Adobe Acrobat Updates?

I just went through my second update cycle on this program. I noticed it took a while for the last update. Today, I was actually working on something else, and not really watching closely. But I found myself thinking “Hasn’t it been about an hour now?” when the UAC prompt to run the Acrobat Installer finally hit the 5800X screen this afternoon.

I’m guessing, but it took as long as 90 minutes for the whole update cycle to complete on this PC. To make matters worse, Acrobat is subject to a “known issue” in the winget packages repo because its update process doesn’t signal completion as it should. Indeed, Copilot says:

Winget starts the next package update before Acrobat finishes, triggering a 1618 error (“another installation is already in progress”). This isn’t just a timing hiccup—it’s a flaw in how Acrobat’s installer communicates with Windows Installer, and it breaks the expected transactional flow of winget upgrade --all.

Is It Really “Less for More?”

Copilot also mentions that “[t]he in-app update is notoriously sluggish,” which IMO is understating things a bit. Painfully slow, is more how I’d put it. It explains that it’s old fashioned installer Enhanced Security settings (Sandboxing, AppContainer and Protected View) slow things down, but that its “monolithic update model” and “telemetry and plugin checks” also contribute to seemingly glacial update processing (my exaggeration, not Copilot’s).

That said, Acrobat has handled my PDFs with aplomb, and lets me edit, mark up and sign such documents with ease. Had I know it was such a crawl to update, I might have rethought my switchover. But I’m in for a year’s worth now, having signed up and paid the annual fee. I’ll be sure to keep this in mind when the next cycle comes around.

Here in Windows-World, as I’m fond of reciting: “It’s always something!” Today, it’s painfully slow Acrobat updates. What will it be tomorrow?

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Insider stuff, Recent Activity, WED Blog, Windows 11, Windows Update

25H2 Enablement Blazes on Lenovo AIO9i

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I’m working with a Lenovo Copilot+ PC review unit these days: it’s a snazzy Yoga All-in-One AIO9i. It comes equipped with an Intel Core Ultra 7 258V (8 cores: 4 each P-cores and E-cores/8 threads), integrated Intel Arc 140V GPU, 32 GB LPDDRx-8533, Hynix OEM PCIe x4 NVMe SSD, and more. It also has Windows 11 Pro for Workstations installed. I’m not sure what makes this PC so fast, but 25H2 enablement blazes on Lenovo AIO9i.

Details: 25H2 Enablement Blazes on Lenovo AIO9i

How fast? The whole process, after opting into the Release Preview channel on the Insider program, took under three minutes to complete. That means:

  • Downloading the enablement package (under 30 seconds)
  • Running the GUI-based portion of the update (under 30 seconds)
  • Reboot and post-GUI update handling (under 40 seconds)
  • Resume desktop through lock screen and login (under 10 seconds)

There are lots of reasons why this is so fast. For one. the enablement package itself is svelte (under 1MB in size). That’s because MS has already included most of the code in earlier updates, and the enablement package — as the name indicates — simply turns such stuff on. As Copilot puts it, earlier “monthly cumulative updates (LCUs) have quietly staged the new features in a dormant state.” It continues: “The enablement package simply flips the feature flags — no need to download or install new core components.”

Other contributing factors to speed:

  • No drive revalidation, no app compatibility scans, no migration of user profiles
  • As the preceding bulleted list observes, this process requires only one update to complete
  • No rollback staging or recovery partition updates are included, to reduce disk I/O and system prep times

Indeed, inspection of $WinDrive (C:) shows no Windows.old partition, as one might usually find after a version uplift. Likewise, Disk Cleanup finds only 1.53 GB of files to clean up in the upgrade’s wake. That’s much less than the more typical 25-30GB on production Windows 11 systems here at Chez Tittel when transitioning from 23H2 to 24H2, for example.

Wow: Just Wow!

I’m not sure that Windows for Workstations made any difference here, either. Despite this version in place, it doesn’t use advanced features — e.g. ECC RAM and ReFS — that might speed things up. I think this is just one very lean, mean and fast enablement package. It’s worth enrolling a test PC in the Insider Program, Release Preview Channel just to check it out for yourself. Speedy!

 

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Cool Tools, Recent Activity, WED Blog, Windows tools

PowerToys v0.94 Reports Shortcut Conflicts

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There’s a new vesion of PowerToys out and available. Interestingly, PowerToys v0.94 reports shortcut conflicts. Amusingly, most (or all) of those originate from PowerToys itself, as you can see in the lead-in screencap. I tend to fix those by adding one of <Ctrl>, <Alt> or <Shift> to conflicting definitions, where no new conflicts get introduced thereby.

It’s kind of handy that this new version reports “Shortcut conflicts” on its default “What’s new” page. Note that conflicts occur with pre-defined System shortcuts, so related PowerToys items (e.g. Crop and Lock, Advanced Pase, Always on Top, and Color Picker) MUST be changed to resolve them.

If PowerToys v0.94 Reports Shortcut Conflicts, Fix ‘Em!

If you click on the “Shortcut conflicts” item in What’s New (upper right), you’ll produce the report shown in the lead-in screencap. Or something like it, as your local definitions may vary. You can edit these definitions simply by clicking the edit (pencil) icon to the right of each shortcut. Here’s what I wound up with after fixing things:

  • Changed to Winkey-Alt-Shift-T (Activation, Crop and Lock)
  • Changed to Winkey-Alt-Shift-V (Activation, Advanced Paste)
  • Changed to Alt-Shift-C (Activation, Color Picker)
  • Changed to Alt-Shift-T (Activation, Always on Top)

Once you find a shortcut sequence that isn’t already taken, use the Save button to enshrine it in your shortcut definitions. To check shortcuts for PowerToys, visit their specific pages via PowerToys settings. Alas, I haven’t found a clever way to list customizations like the foregoing ones in the preceding bulleted list just yet.

That’s a task for me to tackle in my “spare time, ” I guess. Here in Windows-World, it’s always something. At least I’ve fixed my shortcut conflicts now… And the new 0.94 version seems to be quite solid otherwise as well — IMO, anyway.

 

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Insider stuff, Recent Activity, WED Blog, Windows 11

Quiet Labor Day Return

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Hello, there! Today’s my first day back at work since I took off with my family to get son Gregory moved into his Hollywood CA dorm. He’s concluding his film school studies with a semester at Emerson’s campus on Sunset Boulevard, with a dorm move-in on 8/23. We had an epic trip with stops at Las Cruces, NM and Phoenix, AZ on the way to LA from 8/20-22. We spent 2 days in Hollywood, 2 in Santa Barbara, and 2 more in Culver City. Then, we covered the same route in reverse from 8/28-30. I expected lots of catch-up Windows work this weekend, but I got a quiet Labor Day return instead. Let me explain…

What Makes For a Quiet Labor Day Return?

Apparently, Windows-World mostly held its breath while we were gone. I was expecting lots of updates via winget, PatchMyPC, Intel DSA and so forth after 10 days away. Instead, I observed update counts in the following (surprisingly low) ranges:

  • Winget: 3-10 items
  • PatchMyPC: 1-2 items
  • Intel DSA: 0-2 items
  • Lenovo Vantage: 0-2 items

Indeed, I saw the highest counts on machines that I’d left idle 2-3 days before leaving town. That puts the unchecked period north of two weeks on such machines, and shows low update deltas for the time period involved. The lead-in graphic shows 10 winget items on the Lenovo ThinkPad P16 Gen 1 Mobile Workstation. It had the most pending updates, with the Dynabook Tecra taking the number 2 winget spot with 7 items.

Note Added 1 Hour Later

When I visited my sole remaining Windows 10 physical PC — the i7 Skylake I’m still running in tandem with my 5800X production PC — it looked more like what I’d expected for all machines. Here’s the skinny:

  • Winget: 18 items
  • PatchMyPC: 5 items
  • Intel DSA: 0 items
  • WU: pending restart for KB5064794 and KB5063842

Again: that’s 25 items altogether, and more like what I thought I’d see across the board. That said, here at Chez Tittel Windows 10 is slowly shuffling off the scene…

Now What?

With all my Windows PCs — 10 in all — now caught up, it’s time to get back into the working groove. I’ve got a couple of assignments this week, including one for TechTarget, one for ComputerWorld, and another for Actual Tech Media. Things pile up when you’re off having fun (and driving 3K+ miles)! My return to Windows-World wasn’t as labor intensive as I’d guessed, which makes it a nice Labor Day surprise. In this case, quiet is good!

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Cool Tools, Insider stuff, Recent Activity, WED Blog, Windows 10, Windows 11

Recent Updates Bork Reset Option

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In its Windows Issues list, Microsoft confirms that recent updates to Windows 10 and Windows 11 22H2 and 23H2 may cause the “Reset PC” option to fail if invoked. The actual issue is entitled “Reset and recovery operations on some Windows versions might fail,” and specifically identifies KB5063875 as a potential cause in Windows 11. WindowsLatest  also reports that KB506370 could do the same for Windows 10. Hence my heading “Recent updates bork reset option,” though versions 24H2 and 25H2 appear to be exempt.

Workarounds When Recent Updates Bork Reset Option

If either of the previously cited KB updates has been applied to a Windows install, one should avoid tempting fate. That means: don’t use the “Reset PC” button on such instances. Consequently, two options present themselves as workarounds:

  1. Perform a clean install of the same Windows version using an MS ISO or the identical version from UUPdump.net. Of course, that also means one must reinstall drivers and other software present on the PC when it left the factory…
  2. Roll back the update, then use the Reset PC button. The easiest way to do this is to visit Settings > WU > Update history, click the KB item therein, and select Uninstall. Alternatively, wusa /uninstall /kb:<number> /quiet /norestart should do the trick.

Better Not to Use It, If in Doubt

WindowsLatest also reports that the “Reinstall now” option may be likewise affected on 23H2 and 22H2 PCs (it’s not available on Windows 10). The best approach is to use alternative methods for repair and recovery, or one of the preceding workarounds, for possibly affected Windows PCs. This is a big enough deal, however, that MS will probably fix it as soon as it can.

Hopefully that mean this situaiton won’t persist for too long. But hey: It’s Windows-World. Anything is possible, and careful repair is always a good strategy. Stay tuned!

 

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