Microsoft

Here is the process to create a bootable Windows 7 DVD with your mass storage driver pre-loaded, or slipstreamed, into the media. This is along the lines of the old XP F6 way of loading a driver, except here we put the driver right into the installation media. To get started you need to perform a few preperation steps:

• Install the WAIK for Windows 7
• Create C:\test\offline and C:\drivers directories
• Copy from Windows 7 DVD/ISO sources dir: the boot.wim and install.wim to C:\
• Copy/extract your mass storage drivers to C:\drivers (OCZ Revo 3 in this case)

Open the Deployment Tools Command Prompt as an Administrator, and run the following commands.

Install.wim portion:

1. Dism /Mount-Wim /WimFile:C:\install.wim /Index:1 /MountDir:C:\test\offline
2. Dism /Image:C:\test\offline /Add-Driver /Driver:C:\drivers\ocz10xx-1.2.0.10490\amd64 /Recurse /ForceUnsigned
3. Dism /Unmount-Wim /MountDir:C:\test\offline /Commit

Boot.wim portion (only needed for F6 type drivers used during initial setup):

1. Dism /Mount-Wim /WimFile:C:\boot.wim /Index:2 /MountDir:C:\test\offline     (note: This must be /Index:2 and is the part that replaces the old F6 method like in XP)
2. Dism /Image:C:\test\offline /Add-Driver /Driver:C:\drivers\ocz10xx-1.2.0.10490\amd64 /Recurse /ForceUnsigned
3. Dism /Unmount-Wim /MountDir:C:\test\offline /Commit

The steps above in each portion mount the image, add the driver, and then save/unmount the image.

Finally, use UltraISO (not free) and open the original ISO and drag and drop your new .wim files to the sources dir within UltraISO. When prompted, choose Yes to replace the files. After that you can burn the ISO. There is a command line utility called oscdimg that can be used to create ISO files for free, but that is beyond the scope of this article. Google is your friend in that case.

You can add other drivers but only the storage, OCZ in this example, really needs to be in the boot.wim file so you can install Windows to your SSD.

While using Outlook 2010 a user would get an immediate Undeliverable message when sending to one specific address. The diagnostic information contained the code of:

#550 5.4.4 ROUTING.NoNextHop; unable to route ##

First you should send a test email to the same address, but this time using Outlook Web Access or OWA for short. If the message sends okay that way, then the issue resides with Outlook’s cached email address.

This may have been caused by the user clicking a mailto URL in someones mail signature. If the person’s mailto URL is set up incorrectly, it may have the email address composed incorrectly and not use SMTP.

To fix this issue it is not as easy as just deleting Outlook’s cached copy of that single address. It takes the removal off the entire auto complete address cache inventory to resolve the issue.

From the Start menu search box or Run…, type Outlook /cleanautocompletecache

While I have not tested this, but I suspect if you are using Outlook 2007 you can just delete the .NK2 file that stores the cached addresses. (%appdata%\microsoft\outlook\*.nk2)

For the sake of security, IT admins sometimes need to block certain applications from running on their company PCs. iTunes, Dropbox, Limewire, BitTorrent, etc. can easily pose threats to your network. Some applications like Dropbox, which are somewhat secure, can pose a headache just because your company data can easily end up in the wrong hands. Or what if the person leaves the company? It is not something IT can easily manage. Apps like that are best not to be installed, but if they are how do you prevent them from running?

Group Policy helps solve this problem. In my example I block at the Computer level rather than the User. See this TechNet guide on Software Restriction Policies for more information.

The following software restriction GPO works on Windows XP, Vista, and Windows 7:

Computer Configuration\Policies\Windows Settings\Software Restriction Policies\Additional Rules\Path Rules: (right-click, choose New Path Rule…)

%AppData%\Dropbox\bin\*.exe (Disallowed)

Block Dropbox

Note there will be some default rules that the GPO will create automatically for normal applications to run unrestricted.

After you show the Status bar, IE 9 no longer displays the site zone assignment at the bottom. To find the zone you must right click on the web page and choose Properties. There you will see the Zone and protection mode statuses.