Laura Robson

Congratulations to Laura Robson on her Girls Singles Wimbledon Final win. The only time I actually watched a full match of hers was the final, so I didn't actually really know what to expect from her (I'd only seen a few highlights when she had been playing at the same time as another big match).

I was quite surprised, about both of the players (Noppawan Lertcheewakarn was the other player), as they had power to match the professional players. Quite looking forward to seeing more of her in the future, hopefully winning more finals!

Why I Use Opera

For about the last eight or nine years I've been using the Opera web browser instead of Internet Explorer or Firefox. I've been throughly satisfied with it since then and highly doubt I've ever switch to another browser for my day-to-day usage. There are some sites that just don't work in Opera, however, so I still use Internet Explorer every now and then (mainly just for a game site).

There are many reasons why I've stuck with Opera over the years. The main reason is that it's pretty fast and snappy and I can happily leave it running in the background. I tried Firefox several times but it was always so sluggish and slowed down progressively over time. I haven't actually tried Firefox 3, but I seriously don't see any need for it.

The newly released version of Opera (9.5) is even better. I had been following it with their "weekly" previews, but due to some changes breaking some pages for a while I ended up just using the 9.2 releases until they'd fixed the problems (ie. released 9.5). When it was finally released I made sure to install into a new directory (always had the weeklies seperate, so it was no different from that) just incase there were any problems and I could easily just continue using 9.27. I had to make a few changes to the default install, mainly as I don't really care for the new default skin (or any of the default skins actually), so I installed the skin I like (Operatic Orbit), plus also made some changes to the keyboard layout as the new defaults are more to cater for people coming from other browsers (like Firefox) and I'm used to the old Opera keyboard shortcuts.

It seems much snappier now. Opera 9.27 took roughly 8-10 seconds to start up from cold, whereas 9.5 takes about 3-4 seconds. Opening links from other programs (like a rss feed reader) used to take about 6 seconds on 9.27, but now are near instant on 9.5. I've never really noticed any of the claims that Opera is leaner on memory, as whenever I check the memory usage in the task manager it's usually in the 80-90 MB range (I know it's not a conclusive test, but it's the only test I can do quickly and easily). Opera 9.5 is still the same, with a current usage of 98MB and the browser having been open for 12 hours, three tabs open, one (gmail) for the whole 12 hours, and lots more tabs having been opened and closed during the day. However, it doesn't really appear to make any difference to my system, unlike other programs which use the same amount of memory in the task manager but make my system really slow. Also, 9.5 seems to close quicker too, with the process freeing it's memory and exiting before 9.27 would be even halfway done.

All in all I must say that I'm quite happy with Opera 9.5. The new speed increases on startup and opening tabs is very welcome, as it stops other programs from locking for too long while it waits for the browser/tab to open.

08/05/2008 - Thursday

A couple of weeks ago my parents computer picked up another bit of spyware. The symptoms were the desktop picture had gone and was replaced by a failed Active Desktop page (white background, big yellow exclamation mark, and text saying that it had failed), and the desktop kept crashing out shortly after loading, only to attept to reload again, but fail, and continue doing this for some while (some times it didn't try to reload, other times it'd keep doing it).

I attempted to see what was running on the computer through the task manager, but that was "disabled by the administrator". I don't know whether this was done by whatever was causing the desktop crashes or if it was something else on there, but it was a problem. So I booted into safe mode, and the desktop was still crashing out. I tried to open the task manager again so that I can start a command shell, but it was disabled here as well.

I knew I had Spyboy Search & Destroy installed on the computer, so I rebooted into safe mode with command prompt, started Spybot via the command prompt, and let it do a scan. I wasn't sure how old the definitions were, but it might have been able to find something. It found a fair few things (unrelated to the main problem, but problems themselves), as well as the task manager being disabled. I didn't actually know it could be controlled by a value in the registry. I "fixed" those problems, then rebooted back into safe mode to see if I could access the task manager again. I could, great!.

I rebooted into safe mode with network access, quickly rigged up two network cables and a switch to give the computer network access (it was using wireless at the time, which doesn't appear to work in safe mode; which isn't surprising really) due to the distance from the router, and started Spybot again. I then updated the defintions and let it run another scan. I kept running the scan until it didn't find anything wrong (hah!), then rebooted into normal Windows to see if it had done the trick. It hadn't as the active desktop was still failing and the desktop still crashing out. I tried to change the active desktop back to a normal picture, but that didn't hold after a reboot.

I rebooted back into safe mode and did some scans with other spyware products (Sunbelt Counterspy, and Lavasoft's Ad-Aware). Both of them found different things, but neither of them actually fixed anything. The next time I was in normal Windows I opened up Internet Explorer and took a look at what add-ons (BHOs - Browser Helper Objects) were installed and running (I can't remember now why I looked there, but it helped). I noticed two odd ones that shouldn't have been there. The first was called 'xxyyvstr.dll' and the second was 'ssdOHqXP.dll' (or something like that; I didn't note the names down until after I had got rid of them, and I could only really remember the first one correctly). I attempted to disable them, but they didn't stay disabled. This made me think that one or both of these were the problem.

So I downloaded the BHO remover from Novell (http://www.novell.com/coolsolutions/tools/18177.html), ran that and deleted the two BHO's. When I deleted the second BHO I noticed that the first one had come back again. So I deleted that again and noticed that the second one had come back again. Bah, something is running that's restoring the BHO's.

I did a quick file scan to see where the files lived and both were in the C:\WINDOWS\system32 folder. I attempted to delete them but they were in use and couldn't be deleted. I rebooted into safe mode again and tried to delete them from there, but they were in use there too. I use a bit of software called Unlocker (http://ccollomb.free.fr/unlocker/) which lets you unlock lock files so that they can be deleted or moved (ie. video files that are locked by Explorer because it's building up a thumbnail preview). So I ran Unlocker on the xxyyvstr.dll file and it said it was locked by winlogon.exe (a core piece of the Windows OS). I attempted to unlock the file so I could delete it, but all I managed to do was mess the winlogon.exe file up and it started a forced reboot.

After it rebooted I started Unlocker again and told it to delete the file on the next reboot instead. Rebooted the computer again, but the file was still there and locked by winlogin.exe. Obviously the files are being loaded and locked before any delete events are executed. I was now stumped for a while. I couldn't do a system restore as the system restore feature had been turned off (a good kicker for me to leave it enabled in future!). I was considering doing a recovery from the Windows install cd, and if that failed then I'd backup the files and reinstall Windows. It was then that I remembered the recovery console available on the Windows install cd. I quickly put the cd in, rebooted, entered the recovery console, changed into the system32 folder (cd system32) as it starts off in the WINDOWS folder of the system drive, and deleted the two files (del xxyyvstr.dll and del ssdOHqXP.dll).

I ejected the cd, rebooted the machine again (just type exit and hit enter from the recovery console to do it automatically), and crossed my fingers. Windows loaded up, the desktop appeared, the failed active desktop appeared too, but then the desktop stayed on and everything else loaded. Woohoo! I changed the desktop back to a normal picture then ran the BHO Remover again and deleted the two BHO's. This time they didn't come back again.

Since then, I did a scan through the registry (using regedit.exe) for any traces of the two files, but I could only find one. This was located at HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Winlogon\Notify\xxyyvstr. I deleted it as I don't want any traces of it still left on the computer.

So, if anyone else has anything like this and those two files are on your computer, just follow these instructions:

Get your Windows install cd (I've been using Windows XP, but I guess there's something similar on a Vista install cd, or a Windows 2000 one. For other versions I don't know - sorry!), put it into the cd drive, reboot and boot from the cd.
Enter the recovery console, select the Windows drive (usually option 1), and enter the admin password if you've entered one.
Run these commands:
cd system32
del xxyyvstr.dll
del ssdOHqXP.dll
Eject the cd and then type exit.
When it's rebooted, run the BHO Remover program and delete the entries for the two files.
If you want to get rid of the registry key, open regedit.exe (Start - Run), navigate to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Winlogon\Notify\xxyyvstr or just search for xxyyvstr. Right-click on the found key on the left and delete.
All done!

If you don't have access to a Windows install cd to use the recovery console then I'm afraid I have nothing to help you. I couldn't find a way to remove the files without it.

01/03/2008 - Saturday

So the UK picked their Eurovision entry for this year, and somehow managed to pick the wrong one. The only interesting and good one was Michelle Gayle's song, yet the Andy bloke got picked. No matter, the UK aren't going to get many points anyway.

24/02/2008 - Sunday

Wow, I hate computers sometimes

Last weekend I had some stupid weird problem with my computer. I rebooted it (as I do every Sunday morning), started up the programs I usually have running (winamp, utorrent, etc.), then fired up the defragger to clean up the C: drive (another thing I do every Sunday morning). This is where the problems started. Everything ground to a halt and the music went sporadic, like there was a ton of disk access. I left it for a couple of minutes to see if it would clear itself, seeing as I wasn't running anything that would cause all the disk access (I hadn't actually started the defragger at the time, so it wasn't that causing it). I got bored of waiting, so I decided to just restart it and try again. So I hit the reset button, watched the BIOS flash past, then it stayed at a black screen with the hard drive light on constant. So I tried it again. Same thing. Tried it a third time, and this time it flashed up that there was a disk read error. My mood suddenly dropped as there was some stuff that I hadn't backed up yet and I didn't really want to have lost it due to a dead drive.

Invisible hard drives

I have two drives in my computer (a 300 GB and an 80 GB) and I wasn't sure which was causing the problem, although I was guessing it was the 300 GB one as that's the drive that has Windows on the C: partition (it has four other partitions on it). I restarted the computer again and entered the BIOS to see if it's not seeing one of the drives. It surprised me as neither of the drives were visible (in hindsight I should have tried replacing the IDE cable, but I didn't think of that at the time). This was kind of confusing as I was expecting at least one to be there (if not both).

Getting my hands dirty

I decided to dive into the guts, unplug one of the drives, and see if the other one then becomes visible. I did the 300 GB drive out first as it was the easiest to get to. Turned the computer on and entered the BIOS and the disk was visible. Rebooted again and let the BIOS continue and it came up with the message about it being an invalid system disk, which was good. I plugged the 300 GB drive back in and unplugged the 80 GB drive, turned it back on, entered the BIOS, and, surprisingly, the 300 GB drive was also visible! Rebooted, let it continue, and Windows booted perfectly fine. Strange.

Kinky drives

I rebooted again and entered the BIOS yet again and took a look at where the drive was placed on the primary cable. Turns out it was the slave device. This got me a bit confused as the 80 GB drive was also the slave device when it was plugged in (different plugs on the cable too). The 300 GB has always been the master device as I hard set it with a jumper, and the 80 GB has been the slave (no jumper = slave for the drive). Why was it suddenly showing them both as the slave device? Maybe this was the problem? If both the drives are attempting to be the slave device then it was obviously confusing the BIOS and it thought that there were no drives at all.

Cable select

I decided to put both drives into cable select mode and let the BIOS and the cable work out which drive should be the master and which should be the slave. Changed the jumper on the 300 GB drive and put one on the 80 GB drive (luckily I have spare ones), plugged them both back in, turned it on, entered the BIOS, and only the 80 GB drive was showing as the slave device (no master device at all). I was getting annoyed by now (it had been about three hours since the problem started, due to going for a shower, stopping for lunch, etc.) so I switched the plugs over to see if that made any difference. Turned the computer on once more, entered the BIOS, looked at the drives, and both of them were visible with the 300 GB as the master and the 80 GB as the slave. Hurrah! Rebooted, let it continue, Windows booted and everything is visible on both drives. Hurrah again!

One week on

It has been a week now and the computer has been restarted a couple of times (had to fiddle with the network card settings to get a better network speed) and there was a very brief power cut at the beginning of the week (brief being less than a second, but long enough to interrupt the power), and everything is still working fine. I rebooted it again this morning before running the defrag and everything is still working fine. I have absoutely no idea what caused the drives to play up, nor why switching the plugs over managed to fix it. Maybe the cable is slightly faulty, but it's working for the time being. If it happens again then I'll swap the cable over with the secondary cable and see if that works (at least it's cheaper to buy an IDE cable than it is to get another drive).

23/12/2007 - Sunday

It has been just over a month since my last post. I've been saving up a fair bit to say, so this will probably be a longer post than my usual ones. Then again, I might find that I have less to talk about than I thought!

Merry Christmas

Well, I should start off by wishing everyone a merry Christmas, even if you don't celebrate it. I think it's pretty stupid that our government is allowing places to drop the idea of it being Christmas and just call it a holiday. This country is a christian country and thus we celebrate Christmas. If you're a foreign person living in this country then you don't have to celebrate it, but don't get your knickers in a twist just because they country you're living in wants to celebrate it.

Spam

My email address surprisingly hasn't found its way into many spam databases, so I was usually getting around 20 spam emails a day. However, twice in the last week I've been hit by a lot more spam than usual. At the beginning of the week I managed to get 50 new spam emails, but they're the same four spam emails repeated. Today, however, I hit a new record. So far today I have 105 spam emails, again with the same four emails plus some more. The emails are for winning an iPod, winning an iPhone, a £150 voucher for Tesco, Gala bingo, getting cash in 24 hours, and a GHD christmas box (whatever that may be). Oops, I've now got 106 spam emails! I don't mind getting spam, as Gmail does a wonderful job of sticking it in the spam folder. I've had a few spam emails slip through to my inbox, but they're just a case of clicking the "report spam" button and never seeing them again. I've also noticed that Gmail has got a bit smarter when dealing with spam received through a public mailing list which uses a single email address which Gmail liked to mark as spam if I reported one bit of mail as spam. Now it seems to let the real emails through but still bins the proper spam emails.
UPDATE: At midnight I had a grand total of 128 spam emails! Slightly higher than the normal 20 odd. I wonder if it'll continue?

Monarchy

I've been watching the recent five part series into the private lives of the monarchy. I know that I'm not really a huge fan of the monarchy, mainly because I couldn't really be bothered about them rather than thinking they shouldn't exist or anything, but it was a great series to watch. You got to see a different side to what they get up to instead of just hearing about the various things in the papers. Some of the things that have been printed in the papers have been different from how I saw the events happening in the program. I'm quite happy that I took the time in the evening to watch it instead of just turning my tv off like usual.

Other Stuff

I'm sure there was a lot more that I wanted to talk about, but I really can't think of what they were now! So I think I'll leave it at that for now. If I remember anything else then I'll make sure to edit the post!

22/11/2007 - Thursday

I fail to see why the England Football manager, Steve McClaren, has been sacked following the defeat last night against Croatia and the subsequent failure to qualify for Euro 2008. Understandably the manager should be able to control the team and to orchestrate a victory, but there's only so much a manager can do with a rubbish football team like the one that England has.

I would like to see most of the current players dropped and new, fresh, talent brought in as replacements. This might allow the team to play together better instead of only trying to only get the ball to one injured player. Sure, that injured player was able to pass the ball once which resulted in the equalising goal, but they still lost.

I won't deny that I am happy to see England dumped out of Euro 2008. They play like a bunch of sissies. Croatia played a much better game and were excellent from the beginning. England should watch how they play and take some tips on how to be a team.