Ask DACS
January 2013

Moderated and reported by Jim Scheef

Ask DACS is a Question and Answer session before the main presentation at the monthly General Meeting. We solicit questions from the floor and then answers from other audience members. My role as moderator is to try to guide the discussion to a likely solution to the problem. The answers below include my own post-meeting research.

Q – My computer is partitioned to allow multiple operating systems while keeping the data separate. Presently the “primary” partition is Vista, next is a data partition and this followed by a third partition containing Windows 7. I want to make Win7 the primary operating system that boots automatically and remove Vista. I downloaded GParted (Gnome Partition Editor, see gparted.sourceforge.net). Can I use this or is there something better?

Within the discussion about partitioning, there was a mini-discussion about the website Giveaway of the Day. Giveaway of the Day (GotD) is a website that offers a free copy of a different program each day. For example, one day last week the free program was “Paragon Drive Copy 12” (paragon-software.com). This program is billed as able to migrate a Windows installation from any source to any target, as in from one machine to another, from a hard drive to an SSD (solid state drive), from a physical machine to a virtual machine, etc. Like most GotD offerings, this program is normally about $30. The functionality was close enough to the topic that I mentioned GotD as a potential source for such utilities. The programs all come with no support and no future upgrades. If you like the program enough to want a new version, you must buy that new version.

Yesterday as I wrote up the Ask DACS column for this month, the free program was “XYplorer 11.90” (www.xyplorer.com), normally $30. For some time I’ve been looking for a file manager program with the ability to preview file contents. XYplorer may be such a program and it’s portable so it can be run from a thumb drive. Needless to say, I downloaded and installed the program.

At the meeting, one member said that he had trouble with viruses or Trojans from GotD. In downloading many, many programs over the years, I have never had that problem. I doubt that I’ve simply been lucky. There are simple things you can do to limit the amount of time you waste with GotD. First, it has an RSS feed. Set this up so you can easily check on the offering without taking the time to open the website in your browser. I use the RSS reader in “My Yahoo” but there are others. Next, if a program offering seems interesting, read a few reviews. The reviews are right there on the GotD page for each program and even at 10am, there are always many reviews. If the consensus is negative (and this is NOT rare!), then just move on with your day. If I’m still interested, my next stop is the offered program’s website where there will typically be a good description of the program features and capabilities. If the website is amateurish or skimpy on details, I move on.

The only problem I have had with GotD is that occasionally the webpage makes it easy to download another program, typically a registry scanner, rather than the offering of the day. Be careful where you click and look at the downloaded file to be sure the filename reflects the program you want. My last warning is that the program must be installed within the giveaway time span. The “day” of GotD seems to be based on west coast time, so the install must be completed before 3am local time.

A – The short answer is “yes” and the “something better” is always a loaded question. GParted is a free, open source partition editing program that runs on Linux with the Gnome GUI. Perhaps the easiest way to use GParted is to download a bootable CD image (ISO file) where GParted has already been installed in a compatible version of Linux that includes a broad array of drivers for popular drive controller chips. Burn the ISO image to a CD (its only 133MB) and boot it on the target machine. If all goes well, GParted will identify all of the hard drives in the machine and display the partitions on each drive. While I did not actually do this on one of my machines, the documentation and other sites that show how to use GParted show a GUI that appears clear and intuitive. Search for “use gparted” to find many, many sites with instructions on how to use GParted.

The bulk of the discussion was about suggested specific steps to accomplish the questioner’s goals.

1. Because Vista and Win7 belong to the same Windows “family”, they use the same boot manager. The boot manager lives in a 100MB partition normally at the “front” or “beginning” of the disk. When a computer with more than one bootable partition boots up, the boot manager displays a list of the bootable partitions and installed operating systems. This list includes an option to “Set defaults” or something similar. Selecting this option allows changing the default OS from Vista to Win7. Eliminating this annoyance may be sufficient and the Vista installation can just sit. It is not necessary to move Win7 to the first partition to make it the default OS.
2. If the next step is to merge the space used by Vista into the “data” partition, the procedure will be dictated by the capabilities of the partition management software. It may be necessary to delete the Vista partition and then move the data partition to the “front” of the disk. The data partition may then be expanded to use all available disk space. The older partition management software I used years ago could not expand a partition from the “front”. This limitation may not exist in modern software like GParted. Otherwise it may be necessary to first move the data partition “forward” on the disk and then add space to the end. Again, it is not necessary to move Win7 to the first partition.
3. If the next step is to install another OS (perhaps Windows 8), then just boot from the Win8 install DVD and set the installer to use the old Vista partition. I believe Win8 uses the same boot manager, but I have not tested this. In any case, the Win8 installer will make sure both OS partitions are bootable, just as past versions of Windows have been dual-bootable. I have a machine that dual-boots Win7 and XP courtesy of the Microsoft installer (in this case Win7 was installed first). If the new OS will be Linux, I would consult with people who have done this where Linux was installed after Windows. In my (very limited) experience, it works better if Linux is installed first.

D – During the discussion, we learned that the existing Win7 installation is “screwed up”. All of the above assumed that it was critical to retain the Win7 partition with all of the installed applications, settings, etc. If it’s OK to destroy both Windows installations and retain only the data, then the following may make sense:

1. Boot from Win7 and then run the Windows 7 installer on the DVD. Point the installer to use the current Vista partition. This must be a “fresh install”. I would format the partition before starting the installation. This can be done from within the Windows 7 installer. If you started from Vista, it will not be possible to format the Vista partition, so boot into Win7 and start the installer from there.
2. When the install is complete, confirm that the new Win7 installation works.
3. Using Disk Management in the new Win7, delete the old Win7 partition.
4. Expand the data partition to use as much unallocated space as desired.

All of this can be accomplished without using GParted or any other partition management software. The expansion of the data partition can be done using the Disk Management part of Computer Management (called Computer Manager in previous Windows versions).
In any case: make a good, verified backup of the data partition before doing anything!

Q – I would like to install a second monitor on my desktop system running 64-bit Windows 7. When I tried plugging a second monitor into an unused connector on the video card, the monitor is not recognized by Windows. What’s wrong?

A – The likely problem is that your video card supports only one monitor. Many recent video cards support both analog and digital monitors and provide a DVI or HDMI connector for digital monitors. You can probably confirm this by unplugging the VGA monitor and connecting the new monitor using the DVI connector. If that monitor is detected and works, then you need a new video card. The next step is research. It may be possible to add a second video card identical to the one already installed. There are video cards that support dual monitors from a single card but such cards may have limitations on the types of monitors supported at the same time.

DVI connectors generate confusion just by looking at them. The Wikipedia article shows pictures of six connector pin configurations. My approach to DVI is to always use the cable that came with the monitor. My last two monitors have come with both DVI and VGA cables. While the connectors on DVI cables generally have pins only where they make a connection and thus can be identified as to analog, digital or both (integrated), the same is not true of the sockets on the computer or monitor. The sockets all seem to look alike.

Unlike desktops, all laptops support dual monitors so they can connect to a projector while still using the internal display.

Q – I gave my old laptop to my grandson. It was slow, so we installed Ubuntu Linux and it seems to be working, can connect to the Internet, etc. When I couldn’t install Adobe Flash, I tried to upgrade to the latest Ubuntu but this did not complete successfully. Has anyone else tried this? What should I do next?

A – The consensus was to download the installation CD for the latest Ubuntu version (it will be an ISO file) from Ubuntu.com. Burn this to a CD or DVD using your Windows computer. Once this is complete, you can boot the older machine from that CD and do a clean installation using the entire hard disk. This will wipe out all of the old installation and give you a nice clean copy of Ubuntu 12.10, the current version.

Q – On my iPhone I have a bunch of email messages that say “no sender” and “no subject”. These do not appear on my computer, just the iPad.

A – My first reaction is that these are SPAM. Spammers sometimes leave these fields blank hoping you will be curious and open the message. I suspect, the iPad email software is adding the words “no subject” to indicate that the field is blank. A visitor suggested that the problem is in the iPhone email program and that restarting the program will clear the condition. This means closing the email program (doing the equivalent of a “force close” in the Android world). The other alternative would be to completely shut down the iPhone so it can do a cold start.

Q – Frequently when I open Internet Explorer rather than opening the New York Times website (my home page), I get an error message that started with “oops!” and says something about “can’t find the server.” If I click to refresh, the page will appear. What causes this?

A – The “oops” part was the real mystery. While experimenting as I write this, I came up with several possibilities:

1. Given the message, I would be willing to bet that the Google Toolbar is installed and Google is your default search engine. The toolbar is redirecting errors to use Google error messages like page not found, etc. That would explain the “oops”. (The Google Toolbar is often installed by accident when installing Adobe Flash. The Yahoo Toolbar can also replace error messages.)
2. Look at your home page setting in IE (click the gear at the top right of the IE window and pick ‘Internet Options’ from the menu). I suspect that your home page URL is not “clean” but includes some stuff after a question mark. The ‘stuff’ is one or more parameters from a past session that got tacked in accidentally. Make your home page URL “http://www.nytimes.com/” and no more and it may work better when first starting IE.
3. If this also happens when opening other websites and not just the NY Times, then it may be a bad DNS setting somewhere in the chain. This can cause DNS lookups to fail by taking longer than the timeout setting in IE. Normally the DNS settings in your router and your computer should be the same, and if everything is set for DHCP (automatic) in both the router and the computer, this will not be a problem. Unless something else gets involved. The Google toolbar could be that something. I suggest removing the Google Toolbar to see if that helps. If the text of the error messages revert to normal Microsoft, we may have found the problem.
4. Another possibility is a delay in reconnecting to the Internet caused by the DSL modem.

AT&T DSL uses PPPoE (Point-to-point protocol over Ethernet) to authenticate your DSL modem (built into the router in newer devices) to the AT&T servers. Contrary to appearances, your router is not always connected to the Internet when it’s powered on. After a few minutes of inactivity, the modem connection is dropped by AT&T. This is just the authentication, not the “DSL sync” that occurs when you first turn on the modem. The instant you open a webpage, send an email, or whatever, the modem re-authenticates with AT&T. Normally this happens so fast that you never notice the delay. However, if your connection is sub-optimal or the AT&T server is busy, or a thousand other reasons, the short delay becomes longer and could make a DNS request take long enough that your browser times out waiting. The result of the timeout is the error message that the server cannot be found. Hitting F5 to retry opening the webpage will then succeed because the modem is now connected and there is no delay. A side effect of this process in some parts of the country (like Chicago) is that the modem’s IP address changes with every re-authentication. I’ve seen this same type of delay failure happen over Internet connections from the cable companies where there is no authentication. I have no theory (so far) for what causes the DNS failure under those conditions.

Questions for the upcoming meeting can be emailed to askdacs@dacs.org.

Disclaimer: Ask DACS questions come from members by email or from the audience attending the general meeting. Answers are suggestions offered by meeting attendees and represent a consensus of those responding. DACS offers no warranty as to the correctness of the answers and anyone following these suggestions or answers does so at their own risk. In other words, we could be totally wrong!