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james January 20th, 2010

The conclusion here is that there is little to no reason to upgrade to TB3 when using large gmail imap accounts. In fact, TB3 is a serious downgrade unless the default settings are heavily changed. In another bout of poor performance, I found that whenever copying messages to/from various folders or accounts in TB, I get the message “The current command did not succeed. The mail server responded:could not parse command.” When this occurs, the entire process is killed. Moving 1,000 messages? Nope, now you have to try and do it in smaller chunks and take great care in trying to move chunks properly.

The single benefit I have identified so far, is the improved password system that does not continue to ask your username/password when having connection problems as in TB2. I am still debating and trying to look at the benefits of migrating to TB3 but the reasons are slim at best.

So, if you have a large imap account and want to go to TB3 you will need to take some pro-active steps to un-f#@# your computer before TB3 sticks it to you. Here are the preliminary steps:

1) Go offline right away after upgrading, do not download anything. (File -> offline - Work Offline)
2) Turn off Global Search and Indexer. Tools -> Options -> Advanced -> General -> Enable Global Search and Indexer.
3) Determine which folders, if any, you would like to sync. Tools -> Account Settings -> choose any imap account -> Synchronization & Storage -> Message Synchronizing -> Advanced. I recommend only your inbox, sent mail, drafts and any frequently used folders. Sub-folders must be expanded and unclicked manually to prevent massive, all-consuming syncing. You can also look at only syncing messages that are recent or below a certain size. Just remember that if you choose poorly, it will hurt and you will need to start deleting the cached folder .msf files directly to correct this or rebuild the index of each folder you need to reduce.
4) Go back online again and let TB3 work for a LONG period of time re-downloading and re-indexing many of your folders and thousands of messages.
5) Get used to rebooting often after trying to read or send a message as TB3 just freezes in process with an extremely long timeout. However, if you restart TB3 and try the same action it seems to work often. TB3 works well when initially started and gets fouled quickly with heavy imap use, bogging down and eventually becoming useless until you restart it again.
6) When doing large folder copies, I find it is easiest to go offline, then copy or move bulk information, then go online again. It doesn’t run into the “The current command did not succeed. The mail server responded:could not parse command.” error and completely fail the process but rather keeps trying until success is achieved.

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james January 19th, 2010

After having used TB3 as my primary email client for about a week, I have concluded that TB3 is a MAJOR step backwards for email function. I will be rolling back all syncing / downloading of imap folders and only syncing a select few folders on this workstation.

Here are the major issues (as a supplement to my prior TB3 post):
1) Massive processor utilization even on powerful 64bit, 8gb of ram, ssd drive, 3ghz multi-core machines. TB3 kills laptops and endlessly tries and fails to perform its function.
2) Failure to send, failure to copy, freezing. As I write this, TB3 is using 60% of my processor and sending of messages is failing. My smtp is not down and everything else regarding that mail account is functional. If I were to restart TB3, it would work for a few emails before eventually failing on some particular email or freezing entirely.
3) 20gb of usage to massively sync up email on this workstation has only led to constant failure with TB3, I will be rolling back all syncing and only selecting a few common folders as I had done with TB2.
4) TB3 rarely ends its process when closed. I have to manually go to Windows 7 Task Manager and kill the process manually.

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james January 13th, 2010

I am upgrading my primary workstation to Thunderbird 3. This process is a hopeless failure though I hope to create the necessary step changes to be able to upgrade other employees here as there are many features in TB3 that I like. Let’s start with a step by step of the failure:

1. Upgrade from TB2 to TB3. The default setting is to sync all folders. To put our demand in perspective, we have corporate google accounts with our sales account sitting at over 330,000 messages and 10GB. My work account is lower than this but still over 50k messages and my personal gmail account is over 100k messages. That is three accounts climbing to 480k messages and over 20GB of stored email. We use email a LOT and search with it often. This is part of why we were excited to see new features in TB3. However, this means all 480k messages and 20GB will be downloaded on my local station AGGRESSIVELY, bogging down the processor and everything on this workstation for days. NOT GOOD!!!! This should NOT BE A DEFAULT SETTING and should not be this aggressive (or there should be options for how aggressive this process is). Gmail trash, all mail and spam folders should not be cached by default as they are either redundant or uncessary.
2. While other programs like Google Chrome have shown the beauty of a lightweight, simple, fast UI with multi-process infrastructure and it’s own task management system, TB3 is a throwback to single-threaded evil. While aggressively downloading 20GB and 480k messages, it is nearly useless for other functions. NOT GOOD.
3. The download process appears to be happening in small blocks. I have fast fios and many work environments have good connections. For massive transactions like most new TB3 users will experience who have over 50k messages, there should be some sort of a mass import/export or large block operation available. There has to be a better way than this silliness of 20 messages at a time that account for only a few kb per transaction.
4. Lightning with google calendar. Explicit guide / process for google calendar please… it’s hugely popular and a function many, many people will be using so this should have far greater automation.

Here are the solution steps:
1. DO NOT ALLOW SYNC. Add one directory at a time over a period of several days and load up several each night. TB3 should be smart enough to do this on it’s own but failing such advancement I may try to write scripts for rollout.
2. No solution. I am 1/4 of the way through importing now and the main db file is already 1.5GB. This is not efficient and is a major blow to larger email accounts and/or corporate systems with large email volumes. Though this may be a good system for the average user with less than 10k messages and a few GB stored, it is a nightmare scenario for IT in serious environments.
3. I know there are block size settings which I changed in TB2 and I will likely be working on this and will post recommendations as I find them for larger blocks. browser.cache.memory.capacity was already 30720 and all fetch_by_chunks variations were false. I changed browser.cache.memory.capacity to 32768 which I do not forsee having any effect.
4. I will have to dig for the steps in the current version and figure it out.

I am not even able to get to a review of this software because the initial steps are simply broken. My typical rule is to wait 6-12 months after a release to buy or install but the supposed improvements to gmail and searching would be a huge benefit for our staff. In the end, this is the very cause of the failure and clearly sufficient testing has not been done. I feel for the average user with large amounts of email who will enter a s&!@storm when installing and using this software as compared to the TB1 or TB2 experience.

NOTE: This was written quickly and mid-failure which should help explain the broken, convoluted English… good luck with the translation to proper English grammar!

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james January 13th, 2010

I purchased a cheap Harbor Freight (HF) 1195 Lb. Capacity 48″ x 96″ Heavy Duty Foldable Utility Trailer with 12″ Wheels, pn 90154 several years ago. It has served my needs over the years but after many failures, I would have been better off buying a nicer trailer in the beginning. Being fresh out of college at the time, I had little money hence the choice.

So, here are the issues and resolutions:
1. Constant bulb burnouts - Solution: LED submersible lights from Northern tool for $60 as well as new crimps, adhesive heat shrink and weatherproof connectors on the lights.
2. Weak frame - Solution: 1/8″ diamond plate steel top instead of plywood - $100 - 200. Reduces capacity by about 200 lbs (1450 GVWR - 262 for trailer - 197 for plate = 991 lb payload which is still fine for two sportbikes). I also put thin shims under the middle framing so that there would be a flat deck for the steel sheet for additional structure.
3. Dust cap falling off - Solution: $2.99 Revised design dust cap from HF, pn 93833 or bearing buddy pn 20407 with cap / protector pn 19b ( I chose the bearing buddy at around $30 shipped for both parts)
4. Bearing Failure - Solution: $4.99 bearing from HF, pn 93834 or pn 30205 from bearingsdirect.com at $11 ( I chose the later, hoping for a better quality part)
5. Bearing Oil Seal - Solution: 30×52x7TC from bearingsdirect.com at $6 (not offered by HF)
6. Sticking Ball Coupler - Solution: 1-7/8″ x 2-1/2″ Ball Coupler from almost anywhere. The new HF ones are nicer than the older design which was sticky from day 1
7. No trailer jack - Solution: Wheeled trailer jack from many sources. I welded a plate on the inner frame for more support for the wheeled type jack.
8. No sides or ramp - Solution: Lots of options, basic instructions are in the manual now (I don’t think they were years ago) HF Trailer Manual
9. Electrical faults - Solution: Find the fault and fix it or replace the whole harness as it is of very poor quality
10. 4 pin connector length - Solution: Get an extension or adapter with some length if your truck doesn’t have a 4 pin connector
11. No spare wheel - Solution: Spare wheel carrier from HF, pn 93341 or other companies. 12″ wheel from HF or Northern Tool.
12. Not many tie down points - Solution: Lots but I chose removable ancra tie-downs in for the flooring, you can also use bed bolts. Then large fixed, circular bits for the sides.

I had to search for a while for some of the parts like bearings, oil seals, etc. Hopefully this list will help others out there with similar issues and bring together a lot of the information required to own and operate one of these trailers for thousands of miles.

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james October 7th, 2009

Here is the quick list of my problems with Windows 7:

1) This is by far my biggest gripe and most persistent problem I have 3 monitors, 2 HP LP2065 (1200 x 1600) monitors tilted vertically with 1 Dell 3007 (2560 x 1600). I power the Dell 3007 with a Quadro FX 580 and the side monitors with a Quadro NVS 285. The same system has 8gb of ram, e8400 processor, intel g1 80gb ssd and gigabyte P35-DS3L motherboard. The new Win 7 system of transparent windows and taskbar selection is brilliant, IF IT WORKED. Instead, roughly twice a day when I am moving too fast or have too much going on, I am treated to my screens blacking out and flashing twice on and off over a 30 second period. Then I get an error message saying “NVIDIA Graphics Driver has stopped working properly.” This slows me down and is a constant annoyance.
2) Network driver problems. When this computer was an XP station, the networking was reliable. Very reliable. With Windows 7, I have to reboot 1-5 times before the networking driver will come up and work properly. I cannot disable my nic at any time either because it will not come back up properly. The hardware is not flaky, the windows driver is and this is an unacceptable problem.
3) Until late September the error “This driver is blocked due to compatibility issues” would appear constantly while using Symantec Endpoint Protection 11.0.4. An upgrade to 11.0.5 solved the issue however I expect many non-compliant anti-virus programs to cause problems with Windows 7.

My initial impressions of Win7 were good but as I use this computer on a daily basis to evaluate putting Win7 across our network, I can see that it is not yet ready. I am running the newest drivers and have tried various fixes all to no avail. So for my situation and for our company, Windows 7 will have to wait until the reliability is there. Many of our employees have the same monitor configuration I do and this is an immediate show-stopper for corporate installation!

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james October 2nd, 2009

Gmail has gone unresponsive and/or our users are seeing response times of 1-2 minutes when sorting their email in Thunderbird rather than the usual 1-2 seconds if it works at all.

We have seen gmail downtimes of several hours in the past month and this month is not starting off well. For personal use, this would not be a huge issue. For business use, this IS a HUGE issue. With the September outages, many bloggers have commented that this is acceptable for a free or low-cost service. This is not how I see it. If I could pay more for better service with google, I would. We are currently using their “premier” business service and the downtime affects our productivity.

Another point many bloggers make is that corporate email downtime is typically higher than the gmail downtime we see on average. Here again, I disagree. Perhaps we are unique but our email downtime is correlated to our dedicated server downtime which is approximately 99.99% (four nine) reliability. Even if our downtime was the same numerical value as google, so far less than 99.9% (three nine) reliability, it would not pose the same issue as our down time is nearly exclusive to maintenance performed late at night outside of normal working hours.

Another interesting point is that they claim “99.9% uptime guarantee SLA and 24/7 support.” I would have to start logging their times but in September, they failed to meet their 99.9% and their support is awful even with a support plan.

I want (and am willing to PAY MORE FOR):
- 99.99% uptime
- Better support / remediation for performance issues

Apparently I need the Super Enterprise Premier MAXX edition of google apps and I bet MANY other business users would be interested in a higher reliability plan.

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james July 9th, 2009

If you install a driver, program or just accidentally delete an entry in your registry, Windows can blue screen on your next boot and won’t properly recover. The simple manual fix here requires you drop the hd into another machine or have another bootable disk in the original computer.

1) Pull the busted boot drive out of the bad system and put it in another machine that is working and bootable or just switch bootable drives if you have two boot drives in your pc.

2) Set the permissions in the System Volume Information folder on the boot drive you are fixing to readable by everyone (you should delete the everyone entry when done). If you have xp home, you may need to download this file ( SCESP4I.EXE ) and once extracted right click on the setup.inf to install it -> http://support.microsoft.com/kb/195227/EN-US/ . This will give you the security tab in Windows XP Home that is otherwise not available. Note, you must also be able to see hidden system files which you can change under tools -> folder options -> view -> show hidden files and folders and hide protected operating system files.

3) Once you can get into the system volume information folder, go to the restore folders. Each folder is an RP folder named for the restore point instance. If you look in a detailed view, just select the last RP point by time before your computer went to hell. Go into the RP folder and the snapshot folder.

4) Now you are going to copy:
_REGISTRY_MACHINE_SAM -> %SystemRoot%\system32\config\SAM
_REGISTRY_MACHINE_SECURITY -> %SystemRoot%\system32\config\SECURITY
_REGISTRY_MACHINE_SOFTWARE -> %SystemRoot%\system32\config\software
_REGISTRY_MACHINE_SYSTEM -> %SystemRoot%\system32\config\system
_REGISTRY_MACHINE_.DEFAULT -> %SystemRoot%\system32\config\default

5) Put the boot drive back in the PC and/or switch bootable drives. Reboot your machine and your computer should now have a recent restored registry.

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james May 11th, 2009

Apache Stop, Start and Restart Respectively
/etc/init.d/httpd stop
/etc/init.d/httpd start
/etc/init.d/httpd restart

Qmail Stop, Start and Restart Respectively
/etc/init.d/qmail stop
/etc/init.d/qmail start
/etc/init.d/qmail restart

Courier (IMAP & POP3) Stop, Start and Restart Respectively
/etc/init.d/courier-imap stop
/etc/init.d/courier-imap start
/etc/init.d/courier-imap restart

DNS (BIND) Stop, Start and Restart Respectively
/etc/init.d/named stop
/etc/init.d/named start
/etc/init.d/named restart

Dr. Web Antivirus Stop, Start and Restart Respectively
/etc/init.d/drwebd stop
/etc/init.d/drwebd start
/etc/init.d/drwebd restart

MySQL Stop, Start and Restart Respectively
/etc/init.d/mysqld stop
/etc/init.d/mysqld start
/etc/init.d/mysqld restart

ProFTP Stop, Start and Restart Respectively
/etc/init.d/proftpd stop
/etc/init.d/proftpd start
/etc/init.d/proftpd restart

Reference Documentation:
http://kb.parallels.com/en/3158

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james May 3rd, 2009

I intended to post similar content in Summer 2008 when the big 3 automakers were just starting to bleed money but I feel these concepts are valid today as well:

1. Globalize the crash and emissions standards between modern industrialized nations. Today this largely means Western Europe, Japan and North America. Auto manufacturers spend billions on the minutia of local safety and emissions standards. The excessive time and energy spent to bring an already designed and produced car to another market prevents the most appropriate cars from being sold in the appropriate markets. GM and Ford DID and DO make great small cars that would have competed wonderfully against the best from Japan and Korea during our recent $4+ gas price spike. The problem is that GM and Ford only sell them in Europe and couldn’t bring them over because they cost billions and several years to do so. Now imagine if those costs and time were eliminated due to a homologation of standards…. GM and Ford would have a strong full line of great products to pull from at will as the market demands. Concurrently GM and Ford could have been serving Japan and Europe with some of the muscle cars they crave (albeit in smaller numbers). Personally I’d like to see some of the great turbo diesel high performance vehicles lay into the sedate and uninteresting hybrids for some real competition for what a “green car” will be. “Green” doesn’t have to mean boring as seen by many great diesel cars only sold in Europe.
2. Create “fair trade” laws. We allow cheap imports from Japan, Korea and China to come into this country with few tariffs while our exports are HEAVILY taxed to those countries. Japan, Korea and China want Harleys and Levi Jeans but we can’t deliver them due to massive restrictions. Go to Japan with a suitcase full of stylish, modern US clothing and you may have enough profit for a free trip! On the flip side, we want cheap TVs and vehicles made in these countries on which we place few taxes and restrictions. Ironically the world is tightening it’s trade allowances and raising tariffs but the USA would arguably not have the massive trade imbalance today if we forced a “fair trade” policy in which we levy reciprocal restrictions and tariffs. Japan wants to tax 65% and place limits on Harleys and Levi Jeans? I argue the response should be to tax 65% on all Japanese goods until Japan lets US companies trade fairly in Japan. This either leads to a massive increase in domestic and NAFTA manufacturing or Japan quickly caves and we are once again able to shift the trade balance. Relative to Japan and Europe, the US is a lower wage but skilled workforce with excess manufacturing capability due to losses in manufacturing over the last 25 years.
3. Kill incentives, rebates, special deals, etc. Most people cannot haggle a strong deal on a car and in the modern world, few US citizens haggle for pricing on their products. I periodically argue the benefits of haggling and have been able to help family and friends purchase items in special conditions under cost but this is rare. Most people strongly dislike the car buying experience, sleazy sales people and stories of our friends, parents and grandparents being ripped off at a car dealership at the sales or service level. Car buying in general needs a revitalization in the US where the sales people need FAR more training on their product and far less training on how to squeeze the most out of their customers. Carmax, Saturn and Scion have attracted customers for years with fixed pricing leading to happier, more loyal customers.
4. Change the dealer model. The current vehicle sales model holds the dealership as the manufacturer’s customer and the end customer (eventual vehicle owner) at an intermediary level. Dealers want to move what is on their lot with Machiavellian advertising in the local paper for cars that don’t actually exist (GM Malibu on the lot for $1!… you go there and you are told it already sold an hour ago). This process needs to change from the top down where the real customers (eventual vehicle owner) become the manufacturer customers. These customers should not be pushed into what is on the lot but rather what that automotive manufacturer has to offer. Carmax does this in part now with the ability to move cars among local facilities but manufacturers have FAR more leverage to build a vehicle to order or to find one easily within a vastly larger network. I purchased a new truck in 2005 and remember every local dealer saying the options I wanted didn’t exist. I hopped on the internet and using the manufacturer’s website in an unintended way, did a grid pattern search of the east coast, found several vehicles with exactly the options I wanted. I then went to one of those dealerships and made my purchase. When you change this process to focus on product and manufacturer -> end customer and take the focus off of the dealership as the manufacturer customer, everyone wins. Dealerships can still run special programs like free maintenance, track day events, customer focus events, etc to keep customers loyal. Educational material, training and testing for salespeople should be mandatory and we should have a greatly improved training program for mechanics dealing with increasingly complex vehicles.
5. Drop CAFE and implement taxes on energy. CAFE (Corporate Average Fuel Economy) doesn’t work. CAFE is the politicians way of trying to force better fuel economy but when these regulations went into place, US buyers simply went to unregulated products (trucks) with big engines and drove more miles with the same poor fuel economy as the pre-cafe vehicles. I understand that raising tax on fuel is a flat tax but this could be offset in income tax if politicians are serious about being green and fixing the auto industry. The only way to quickly and effectively change energy usage is to push consumer demand towards better fuel economy. These taxes levied on energy MUST be spent on infrastructure for transportation (roads, high speed rail, etc) and renewable energy / energy efficiency. I strongly support the idea of dumping a lot of this money right back into our domestic auto manufacturers renewable R&D budgets as the Chinese and Japanese have been doing this for years for their domestic manufacturers. Competing auto manufacturers have enjoyed healthy government support while US manufacturers have been pummeled with additional burdens and government criticism.




Once you add these changes up, I should be able to go to a Ford dealership where I can get information on the vehicle I wish to purchase. I should be able to choose the options I WANT where the dealer can tell me either where the nearest one is or the closest vehicles with similar options are all via computer in real-time (not wait 20 minutes and come back with sparse poorly considered information). I should also be able to choose, say a Ford Mondeo family sedan with a great 2.2L Turbo Diesel engine getting 40+mpg (even if not sold in the US directly, I should be able to choose a european model due to global standards and perhaps pay a bit more to transport the exact model that I want that is sitting somewhere in Germany right now).

Being an engineer in the automotive sector, I believe all of the above issues are logistically possible and would lead to a quick turnaround of the automotive industry in general. There are a lot of complexities that I don’t have time to go into except to say that the issues can be readily solved and that the Global Standards would be for very safe and very clean vehicles first and manufacturers and countries wanting to adopt the standards could do so but not at the risk of bringing the standards to the lowest common denominator.

Perhaps most interesting is that manufacturers like GM have stated that major improvements in fuel economy are too costly as they will add a great deal of complexity to the emissions systems. I argue that this is exactly the wrong approach and wrong way to look at the situation. Let’s take a look at a 1997 Honda Accord V-6 and 2009 Honda Accord V-6. The 2009 Honda Accord V-6 is 268 Hp and gets 19 city / 29 highway MPG. The 1997 Honda Accord V-6 is 170 Hp and gets 17 city / 23 highway MPG (adjusted at fueleconomy.gov for new standards). Now lets complicate this a bit with a 2009 Honda Accord Inline 4 cylinder with 190 Hp and gets 21 city / 30 highway MPG. Honda’s Inline 4 cylinder gets better fuel economy and makes more power than their V-6 from just 12 years ago. The current V-6 makes a solid 100 Hp more! Frankly, this is ridiculous as a late 90s sports car would be envious of the power a 2009 family sedan has? Heck, this 2009 Honda V-6 family sedan makes just a few Hp short of a Nissan 350z Sports Car in 2003.

My point here is that our scale has been altered by US consumers putting power before economy in a perceived boom time from 1999 to 2007 and that all needs to change now. Rather than ADD complexity and cost to a vehicle, I believe the family sedan should drop significantly in power and fuel economy. Fuel costs will eventually go up and government should drive them up artificially now with fuel taxes to force the free market to create better vehicles before we have a repeat of times past. GM can’t do this easily because when they do offer smaller engines with better fuel economy, consumers simply choose the larger engines or go to another manufacturer. CAFE does not solve this problem, only increased fuel costs can do so.

The alternative is a group of headstrong manufacturers fighting amongst themselves for bigger and better numbers. At the time of the last fuel crisis the heavy domestic auto manufacturers were caught off-guard by small, reliable inexpensive Japanese cars. The Korean manufacturers have been making inroads on cost and reliability this time and they are also taking share from the Japanese. Manufacturers should learn this repeated lesson and offer small efficient cars rather than letting every vehicle drift into bigger, more powerful packages endlessly. The only way to maintain such a relationship is to follow a higher fuel cost strategy which necessarily puts efficiency as a primary concern for the vast majority of the market as is done presently in Europe.

Soon a wave of cheap Indian and Chinese cars may be taking even more share from the domestic manufacturers until they realize that greater complexity and cost is not the answer to every problem. Small, efficient, light and reliable has been a necessary staple market proven since the at least the 1960s. So to GM, I say you don’t need greater complexity and cost to meet CAFE. You need light, reliable and lower power offerings. Unfortunately the catch-22 here is that US consumers keep choosing big, heavy and more powerful vehicles which is why only a fuel tax and government intervention will drive development in the right direction for all parties involved.

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james February 15th, 2009

I used a Seagate free tool called Seagate DiscWizard (based on Acronis TrueImage) to image my old Seagate drive over to a new Intel X25-M SSD 80GB drive. This is my workstation and not a gaming station so even with XP, Solidworks, Adobe Creative Suite, Quickbooks Enterprise, etc. the installation was only about 25GB (counting the swap file!). This worked well but I got an activation warning. I don’t remember the syntax but basically the oobe service failed whenever I tried to activate. Ok, great. So I do some work not really worrying about this ( I looked into it and tried some solutions but nothing was effective to this point) and reboot my computer about a week later. Here is where the genius comes into play.

When I reboot into windows and click on my profile to login, I get a warning saying:
A problem is preventing Windows from accurately checking the license for this computer. Eror Code: 0×80004005

After this error message, I am logged off automatically. Ok, so this is a catch-22, a loop I can’t get out of because I can’t get into windows but I also can’t activate my product. So I look around the internet a bit and find LOTS of people doing recoveries or plainly performing complete re-installs. Now, this being a business computer, I have WAAY too much time in customizing what I want and even my last image has a lot of changes that I would not like to go through again (image from just 1 week ago). The just reinstall it method is a HUGE waste of my time.

So I do the following based on a few posts like this:
http://www.anetforums.com/posts.aspx?ThreadIndex=27591

Open your computer in safe mode, open a command promt

Register the following DLL s
it should be in the %system root% \ system32 folder

just type the following statements one by one and see you got success information popup

regsvr32 licwmi.dll
regsvr32 regwizc.dll
regsvr32 licdll.dll
regsvr32 jscript.dll
regsvr32 vbscript.dll
regsvr32 msxml.dll
regsvr32 shdocvw.dll
regsvr32 softpub.dll
regsvr32 wintrust.dll
regsvr32 initpki.dll
regsvr32 dssenh.dll
regsvr32 rsaenh.dll
regsvr32 gpkcsp.dll
regsvr32 sccbase.dll
regsvr32 slbcsp.dll
regsvr32 cryptdlg.dll

Be sure to use Safe mode without networking because the networking will require the same activation! This didn’t solve my problem so I did this:

I have verified these files:

Windows\System32\secupd.dat
Windows\System32\oembios.dat
Windows\System32\oembios.bin

Problem still not solved, next step (Method 2 as listed in this link):
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;306081

Now this did in fact work! My computer was up for one day and mentioned nothing about licensing. On my next reboot (after Adobe updates and working on enabling AHCI mode for this new SSD drive), I was again stuck in a loop of MS stupidity.

In the end, I had to get a hacking tool which disables the winlogon.exe check title ” Windows 2003 & XP & LH Anti Product Activation Crack 2.0.1″. Normally I do not advocate cracking software but this is a legal copy, all my software is legitimate and there was not “legal” way to fix this waste of my time. Adobe also has some terrible licensing requirements and despite purchasing their software, I have had to crack their software in the past to get my LEGAL copy to work. Apparently we are reaching the point where the hacking solution is faster, more effective and smarter than spending hours looking for the right way to do things. If I had used this XP crack to begin with, I would have saved myself hours of wasted time. Thanks Microsoft!

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