Won't ... Die ...

This weekend, I've been tussling with a series of unfortunate events.
I helped a client with a HP Vista PC on Friday; it was blue-screen dead nearly every time he tried to start it (required multiple tries to actually boot successfully). I looked at it, and it held many minidumps (little state files written in a crash), each pointing to one of a few crash codes. Fairly common were PAGE_FAULT_IN_NONPAGED_AREA (0x50) and MEMORY_MANAGEMENT (0x1A). So, I'm thinking, "Uh-oh, new RAM time."

The PC became more and more unstable as I worked on it, to the point where pretty much any process would puke right up and die. I ran SpinRite for a few hours, and MemTest86 overnight. All the hardware looked fine.

Having already saved all the important user data to a network drive, I nuked the PC. I selected HP Restore (reformat and reinstall from recovery partition) and killed the beast.

I'm re-installing security apps and such right now. I don't have the client's copy of Office 2007, so we'll do that tomorrow. Hopefully, that will solve that.

In summary, the PCs I work on skew toward XP (75%), Vista (20%), and Win98 (5%... why won't they upgrade....?) Of the Vista machines, this is the first time I've seen an OS install go so horribly wrong. Of course, it is possible that the client did something of epic bone headedness to cause the errors (in my experience, most fatal errors are self-inflicted), but its a little late now. After I'm done with it, he shouldn't have to muck around at all.

Leave it to the pros

Have I mentioned how much I am disappointed by Symantec Antivirus products. Your mileage may vary, but I find them simultaneously -

• Too large (threads, working space, &c)


• Too large (too deeply ingrained in OS)


• Not easy for the avg consumer to remove (the sure-fire way is to go to Symantec's Norton Removal Tool page, but most folks would rather just remove via Add/Remove. You know, like any other program.)


• Worse than nothing when out of date (it seems to become a beacon for all malware once its definition file gets out of date)


• Frighteningly ubiquitous - its everywhere, and it is FAIL

Rant over. I've removed Norton three times this week, and I am glad to do it each time.

Continuing Misadventures

I had an interesting call this week, in which the PC complaint was that the PC was overheating and would shut itself down. Well, I did all the usual (visual inspection, then ran under load, with cover on, with motherboard monitor utility installed, reviewed the system event logs, &c). And I ran that unit for 16 hours without so much as an odd noise. Funny, that. I mean, it was rock solid. Anyway, I told the client, call me if it breaks, and I need to see it in its operating environment.

Selling more and more printing supplies - looks like this might have been a good idea after all.

Swooshed Right By

What happened to the week?

Well, we've been selling a lot of printing supplies over at CW Land.

The fall lineup of networking has started. I was at the HBA Associates meeting Wednesday midday. Thursday it was WRN/Saline Leadership/Saline chamber reception at a local business/member meeting at Tri County. Man, I'm glad that member meetings are also burger night - I was starved. Leadership, I should take a moment to say, was fun. A good speaker gave some good tips on marketing (personal and professional).

The leadership institutes are a good deal; if you get a chance, you should go.

Friday evening was the Roast event given in honor of Bill Mangold. Bill's had a heck of an adventurous life, and its obvious he's collected quite a few friends in the bargain.

As for HTTP, well, I had a slow week...
* Bought the PC and monitor to build a system for one client (nearly finished)
* Answered an emergency call at Rentschler Farm (ineffective Verizon security suite)
* Answered an emergency call from a neighbor (another notorious AntiVirus2008 infection)

My online AT&T ad should be live soon. We'll see what that stirs up.

I'm sure a lot more happened... but my mind wanders, ya know...

Coolest Monday Ever

Ok, not really. But it wasn't bad. It could be a lot worse - we lost power Sunday for only about 3 hours. At least I'm not in Houston. How many millions without power? And so far no discussion of blame, no looting, no atrocities.

Hmmm, interesting.

Saturday, we visited friends in Manchester. People who know what I'm talking about will know who we visited. It was an ATF party (alcohol, tobacco, and firearms). Good times, and we got home horribly late.

So the new week: a little HTTP action, a whole lot of ink, the occasional networking event. More of the same, basically, but it sure beats the alternative.

I've found that the HTTP jobs have been skewing more towards residential work, and to hardware (new PCs, new components, network issues). We'll see if that becomes trend.

Networkin Fooooo

Started the day with the Washtenaw Referral folks. I'm glad I joined the group - they're very active, very responsive, very involved.

Then got an emergency call from a client whose laptop was not behaving. Its Gateway Vista unit, and it had stopped booting correctly. He left the diag screen up for me to see (Exactly right behavior- Gold Star!) It showed that it stopped the Norton processes and aborted the boot. It had no error messages in the system logs, no core dumps in C:\windows\minidump, no further indication of error state. And, worse yet, it booted right up for me. I don't doubt my client's sanity, and I think I'll take seriously the only clue given me, so I removed Norton. First, I should mention, first I ran SpinRite for about 12 hours. Recommended by the way - its The HDD diag utility.

Then I went to the An Arbor Chamber's NetWorks luncheon. The featured speakers presented a nice overview of the differences between marketing to Gen X and Gen Y audiences. It was interesting and not as dry as some attempts to do the same thing.

So then I went to the store. I'm not kidding to say that we've increased sales by about 25% in the past four weeks alone. I went to a local business and dropped off a toner cartridge. People can't believe that I'll deliver - Look, why wouldn't I deliver to build a relationship with them? I want them to know me, to know us, and to be comfortable that we'll take care of them.

Then I went down to Milan and participated in the networking of their monthly meeting. I went to the Campfire restaurant, had a few beers, met a lot of people. It was an event well worth attending; Milan is a good group of folks.

So what else? I'm writing this at 2200 hrs, i still have a laptop to finish and about 30 minutes of paperwork/catching up. What makes it all worth it, is that its mine. Its all mine, and I do it on my own. I haven't worked for someone else in nearly two years. That right there, is a hell of a feeling.

Better Title Than Last Post

Busy day. Started with the clothes dryer deciding to have a minor failure. The door switch lever arm snapped off, so I had to go get one.

Part - $5, gas - $10, not shelling out $125 for a repairman - priceless.

Had a busy day at the store. Seems people know about this place after all.

And tomorrow is very busy: Washtenaw Referral Network meeting, back to store, Ann Arbor Chamber NetWorks luncheon, back to store again, run deliveries, and finish day at Milan Chamber Evening Social. There's always a lot to do around here.