Current Book: Echo Burning by Lee Child

Alienware M14x with Windows 8 – USB 3.0 ports and Corsair thumb drives issue

I have an Alienware M14x laptop and a few Corsair USB 3.0 thumb drives.  The thumb drives most of the time would not get recognized by Windows.  They throw an “unrecognized device” error when they are plugged in.  I can plug the same thumb drives into a USB 2.0 port on the same laptop and they work fine just not at USB 3.0 speeds which is not cool.  I can plug other USB 3.0 devices, like a Western Digital external hard drive, and they work just fine at USB 3.0 speeds.

After some searching I found some rather lengthy instructions here that fixed the problem perfectly for me and a co-worker with the same laptop.  Essentially the instructions walk you through getting Windows 7 drivers installed for the USB 3.0 hub and ports.

I imagine this applies to more than just the Alienware M14x and would work for other laptops as well.

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SQL Server Reporting Services get a percentage of group total from column value

I have rows from a query such as:

Name                  Type            Quantity

Customer01       A N              5
Customer01       A P               4
Customer01       O N              3
Customer01       O P               2
Customer02       A N              3
Customer02       A P               9
Customer02       O N              5
Customer02       O P               7

So, I can do a grouping and get the total for each customer:  (using sum(Fields!Quantity.Value))

Customer01     14
Customer02     24

What I needed is on the report to then show what percentage of the total each line represented.

I finally found that the sum function has a scope you can define to do this.
So I ended up with an expression added to a new column out to the side of the Quantity column on the report that looked like this:

=Fields!Quantity.Value/sum(Fields!Quantity.Value,”table1_group_code”)

The “table1_group_code” is the name of the grouping where I needed the percentage calculated from.

You can find this name in the Row Groups area of the reports designer.

Windows Update Services shows Windows 8 x64 as Windows XP x64

My Windows 8 machine was not getting updates from our Windows Update Services server.
When I looked at my computer account it showed the operating system as Windows XP x64 which is definitely wrong.

I found the following instructions on Microsoft’s Technet site:

ReInstall KB2734608 (found here, scroll down towards the bottom for the actual download)
Open an elevated Command Prompt
net stop wuauserv
rd /s %windir%\softwaredistribution
y
Use regedit to delete HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\WindowsUpdate
net start wuauserv

This fixed my issue and my Windows 8 machines now report as having Windows 8 as their operating system and they immediately found updates that needed installed.

Current Book: Running Blind by Lee Child

Windows 7 domain user keeps logging on with temporary profile

I recently had a computer replaced on our domain.  For some reason the domain account I was working with kept logging into Windows with a temporary profile.  I tried numerous fixes found on the Internet to no avail.  Then I thought maybe it had something to do with the fresh load of Windows and I nuked the machine and started over.  Still not working right.  I figured it must be something to do with the domain account but couldn’t figure it out.

On a whim I compared domain accounts with another account and found the affected account was a member of the guests security group and the domain guests security group.
I removed the account from both groups and the problem went away.  Not sure how or when the account got added to those groups but the problem was solved by removing membership to them.

Easy way to block ads in Internet Explorer

One of the first things I do after installing Firefox is install ADBlock+ and then subscribe to a list.  Internet Explorer has had some addons that did the same sort of functionality for awhile but I found with IE9 and IE10 it’s even easier to block ads.  Open Internet Options and click the Programs tab.  Click the Manage Addons button.  Click “Tracking Protection” and then below that click “Get a Tracking Protection List online…”

That will take you to the Internet Explorer Gallery and there will be several different types of lists you can add.  I don’t recommend adding to many lists as this is likely to slow down your browser.  I added the Fanboy Adblock list.  I’ve read that the EasyPrivacy list put out by Easy List but I haven’t tried it yet.

I’ve used this on Windows 7 with IE9 and Windows 9 with IE10.  I haven’t looked to see if it’s in IE8 or below.

One thing to consider when adding ad blocking is that it can be taking revenue money from bloggers who rely on ads to provide free information.  That’s a decision I’ll leave up to you.

Current Book: Tripwire by Lee Child

Current book: Die Trying by Lee Child