Windows Tech, Beach Life, Choosing to be Rich
What a nice service! Dave Wanta of 123aspx.com has developed kbalertz.com, a .NET Alert service that can alert your MSN of new TechNet articles (known as Knowledge Base articles) when they are released, and only in areas you are concerned about! Thanks Dave!
One of my computers at work is running a 6 month eval of Win XP RC2 that is about to expire. I want to upgrade to the corporate version of WinXP, but when I try to upgrade I get a message telling me that I can’t upgrade this version of windows. That sucks, so I went about searching a few good Windows Info sites that I frequent when I found the following article at http://www.windows2000faq.com
Q. Why can’t I upgrade to the final version of Windows XP from an interim build?
A. Although you can technically upgrade from an interim build of XP to the final version, Microsoft has restricted the upgrade path for certain builds. However, I know of two methods for circumventing these restrictions.
Method 1
This method is the more complicated of the two. It involves modifying a file in your boot partition before you reboot.
Run setup from the final XP image. If you receive a message stating that you can’t upgrade this version of Windows, you need to perform a fresh install by selecting Fresh Install.
Continue with the installation, and choose the same Windows directory for the installation that you want to upgrade.
When setup prompts you to reboot, press Escape to manually reboot later, and setup will return you to the Windows shell.
The directory $win_nt$.bt in the root of your boot partition (which is typically C:) should contain a file named winnt.sif. Open this file in Notepad.
Look for the line that reads winntupgrade=no, and change the winntupgrade value to yes.
Save the file, and reboot your system.
Method 2
XP contains a Program Compatibility Wizard that you typically use to set up a virtual environment that mimics another version of Windows for programs that won’t run under XP. Using this wizard, you can fool the final installation into thinking that you’re running Windows 2000.
Start the Program Compatibility Wizard (go to Start, Programs, Accessories, and click Program Compatibility Wizard).
Select ‘I want to use the program in the CD-ROM drive’ and click Next.
Select Microsoft Windows 2000 and click Next.
Continue to click Next as appropriate to complete the wizard.
FPort
FPort is a program that allows Windows NT/2000 administrators to report all open TCP/IP and UDP ports and maps them to their owning application. The tool can be extremely helpful when an administrator wants to detect unknown listening applications.
FPort can be downloaded from http://www.foundstone.com/knowledge/free_tools.html under the Intrusion Detection section.
I have downloaded and tried out most of the foundstone utilities and they are all excellent. Check em out!
I just got a Geforce 3 Ti 200 for Christmas, and the Geforce 4 is already due out! I just can’t keep up.
I have a linksys firewall, and needed to open the ports for XP’s Windows Messenger:
(these ports are different for non-XP OS’s)
(assumed that all outgoing ports are open, and a non-UPnP NAT is used)
App Sharing:TCP 1503
File Transfer: TCP 6891 to 6900
Remote Assistance/Term Serv: TCP 3389
AV in both directions: UDP 5004 to 65535 (like I’m really gona open all those??)
Windows Messenger in Windows XP: Working with Firewalls and NAT