Category Archives: Windows 11

Insider stuff, Recent Activity, Troubleshooting, WED Blog, Windows 11

Flo6 Mobo Switchover Succeeds

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On Thursday and Friday of last week, I continued to fight with warm boot issues on my primary Flo6 desktop. The ASRock UEFI stubbornly refused to synch up the MS updates for Secure Boot with its own internal, stored values. Net result: I couldn’t restart Flo6. I could only traverse the shutdown/startup cycle through a deep, cold boot that sometimes required a CMOS reset. After lunch Friday, I took the plunge and tore the PC apart to switch out the ASRock B550 Extreme4 for an MSI Mag Tomahawk B550 WiFi Max. To my great relief and delight, that Flo6 mobo switchover succeeds admirably. That said, I started after lunch Friday and finished after 9M Saturday nite. Phew!

Lessons Learned, as Flo6 Mobo Switchover Succeeds

I made a couple of interesting mis-steps along the way that slowed things down, but the overall process was pretty straightforward. The teardown was easy, but it reminded me how much I now depend on reading glasses for close-up work, since last fall’s cataract surgery.

In putting the new build together, I saw that I’d failed to remove the clear plastic sticker on the CPU cooler during the previous build. Have to laugh, but the results are amazing: no sticker plus a fresh coat of thermal paste took CPU temps down from mid-50s to low-60s to a steady 31°C (Source: Speccy; HWiNFO shows various temps ranging from 32 to 42°C). All show serious improvements over the old build!

Putting the old parts onto the MSI Tomahawk board is where things got interesting. That board offers only LEDs for CPU. DRAM. VGA and BOOT.  I missed the two-digit POST code display on the ASRock mobo, which was more intelligible and easier to read. My first mis-step was mispositioning the 5800x CPU. I was 180 degrees off on the first try. Easily fixed, but took time.

My second mis-step was to put the GPU in the secondary PCIe slot. For some reason I was scared of the metal clad primary. But the PC wouldn’t POST that way, so eventually got that straightened out (the VGA LED did its job). The third stumbling block wasn’t a mis-step, it was more of a design flaw in the MSI board. It wouldn’t start up with more than 2 of the 4 orignal RAM modules (32 GB each) in place. That was a pure trial-and-error exercise.

All the Stops along the Way…

I also had to flash the UEFI (though they still call it BIOS flashing) before I could get past recognizing the CPU. This works with neither CPU nor GPU installed, from a specially formatted USB 2 flash drive. It’s like magic that the board can DIY this process, but it worked like a champ. From that point on, I moved from one proper set-up step to the next. CPU first, GPU second, and proper RAM configuration last.

Note: getting the RGB connector to seat properly on the mobo pins was the most physically challenging part of the build. Close second was working with RAM modules right up against the massive ThermalWright Assassin CPU cooler. But it all got sorted, by guess and by gosh.

Eventually (around 6:30 PM Saturday), I got the setup to boot and it took me straight into Windows, running the same image I’d been using on the old ASRock mobo. Boy, was I relieved to see that happen. And now, for some clean-up notes and good news. Read on…

Booting into Windows, and Beyond…

Once I got into Windows, I had to adjust for the mobo change. To activate Windows 11 Pro, I had to re-enter the same MAK it had already been running on (who knew?). To switchover from the old ASRock to the new MSI drivers, the system loaded an MSI Center app. It cheerfully offered to load “all” necessary drivers, but gave me control over which ones I chose. Needless to say, I skipped the fluff and stuck to device drivers and useful utilities only.

Then I ran Settings > Windows Update, which caught up other key drivers. A fresh run of the Logi app brought back my wireless mouse (I’d been forced to plug in a wired mouse during set-up because I mistakenly grabbed an MS wireless mouse instead of the Logi model, LOL).

Checking Secure Boot and CA-2023

The following image triumphantly confirms that with the current UEFI and recent MS updates in place, Secure Boot and certificates took care of themselves. I didn’t have to do anything!!!

The first PowerShell (PS) command [confirm-SecureBootUEFI] shows it’s in place and working. The second PS command tells me that CA-2023 is in place and in use. That was really the whole reason for the mobo switch, so I’m tickled to death it worked like it was supposed. Added bonus: I can restart, shutdown, and even use “shift+(Settings > Power Button > Restart) to get into the Windows Recovery (WinRE) environment. In short, Windows boot now works just like it should, and Secure Boot is properly doing its thing.

It was a long time coming, and cost me US$150 for the MSI mobo. But God: it was worth it. Case finally, finally closed. I’m thrilled!!!

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Insider stuff, PowerShell, Recent Activity, WED Blog, Windows 11

PS Version Bump WinTerm Oddity

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As is my usual practice, my workday starts off with a cruise over the mini-fleet of PCs here at Chez Tittel. I look for upgrades, updates, changes, and glitches. Today, I ran into something interesting on the Lenovo ThinkPad P16 Gen 1 Mobile Workstation. A PowerShell (PS) upgrade happened — and succeeded — even though its parent WinTerm session shows WinGet reporting “Installation abandoned.” That’s the source of this particular PS version bump WinTerm oddity. Let me explain…

Exploring PS Version Bump WinTerm Oddity

As you can see in the lead-in screencap, the left-hand WinTerm pane is running PowerShell v7.5.5. You can also see that WinGet gets going on a v7.6.0.0 upgrade, but reports “Installation abandoned” at its apparent conclusion. Indeed, most readers might be tempted to conclude from this that the installation failed. Not so!

As you can see in the right-hand pane, opened after the apparent WinGet failure, the PS version there is 7.6.0(.0). The update succeeded but it can’t show itself in the parent pane for a very good reason. PS v7.5.5 is running that pane, and the developers didn’t include logic to halt that process and swap in a new version as part of the way that PowerShell works.

It’s a kind of Catch-22 (“How can you see you have flies in your eyes, if you have flies in your eyes?” as Orr asks in the famous WWII novel). With the older version running, you can’t really get the newer one to report itself right there at that moment. But as the right-hand pane shows, you need only open a new PS Session and presto! the new version is up and running therein.

Self-Update Is a Tricky Thing

This is an age-old gotcha in computer science. When the thing being updated is also running (and indeed, running the update tool in use), certain compromises and workarounds are needed to prevent things from falling over. For PowerShell, that means reporting a cancelled installation even though the installation itself completes and succeeds. The session that did the work simply can’t see and report on that particular change, because it itself would have to change to do that. Start a new session, and a new and changed context lets that happen.

Here in Windows-World, change is a constant. When the changer itself is changing, things get interesting. WinGet’s report of a “cancelled installation” for PowerShell shows how a specific compromise happens at runtime when PowerShell participates in its own update process. Fun!

 

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Insider stuff, Recent Activity, WED Blog, Windows 11, Windows tools

26220.8062 OOBE Grants New Naming Tools

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Amidst my excitement about Restore Point controls in Settings in the latest Beta build yesterday, I missed some other cool new capabilities. Indeed, the Build 26220.8062 OOBE grants new naming tools to installers. As you can see in the lead-in graphic, that means setup now includes a “Name your device” pane with input fields for:

  • Device name: installer can specify device name, instead of the prior MS penchant for long, auto-generated machine names
  • User folder name: installer can specify the base account’s folder name (previously, up to the first five characters in the base MSA)

Good Thing 26220.8062 OOBE Grants New Naming Tools

In the past, one of my typical post-install tasks would be to replace the auto-generated machine name with something more informative. For desktops, these would be DESKTOP-XXXXXX, or for laptops LAPTOP-XXXXXXX, with a mix of 7 alphanumerics (e.g. DESKTOP-UU1KCDG or LAPTOP-AB12CDE). I usually go with something shorter and more descriptive (e.g. Flo6, P16, X380, etc.).

Also, I’ve generally shied away from attempts to rename an account’s user directory because of the number of steps and amount of work involved. (See this ElevenForum.com tutorial to see what I mean.) Of this task Copilot opines:

You can rename the user profile folder, but it’s advanced and risky — follow a tested tutorial step‑by‑step and back up first.

And, FWIW, it too recommends that very same tutorial as the best step-by-step guide to this somewhat tortuous task. Nice that MS has finally made all that effort unnecessary. I’ll be glad when it makes its way from this Insider Preview into more general distribution.

Here in Windows-World, the little things sometimes count (and take more time and effort) than they otherwise might. Kudos to MS for adding these controls; shame on them for not doing it 20 years ago.

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Build 26220.8062 Settings Integrates RPs

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Last Friday, MS released a new Beta Channel build to Insiders. In these insider previews, things of interest do pop up from time to time. Methinks one particular new capability in that release will interest readers. Namely, Build 26220.8062 Settings integrates RPs (Note: I abbreviated Restore Points as RPs here, for brevity). You can see what this looks like in the lead-in screencap. This is fascinating, and I’ll tell you why…

What’s Noteworthy, as Settings Integrates RPs in Build 26220.8062?

Over the past decade, MS has been surely moving functions from Control Panel to Settings. While that pace has been glacial, this marks major movement in that long-persisting icecap. You used to have to work through the “System Protection” tab in the System Properties Control Panel item to handle restore point status and access. No more. As the lead-in graphic shows, it’s now integrated into Settings > Recovery. And there’s more…

If you click the “View or edit” (Restore Points) button at the right of the “Point-in-time restore” item shown above, you’ll get a sub-menu that lets you:

  • Turn RP capture on or off
  • Manage RP frequency (default is “Every 24 hours”)
  • Manage RP retention (default is 72 hours)
  • Fix restore point disk usage
  • Access a list of available restore points (with time stamps)

Here’s that that looks like on my X380 Yoga test PC:

From what I can tell, the upgrade turns RPs on by default. Notice they already consume 7GB of disk space.

This is a major shift in Windows functionality. I checked and the old standby — easily run as SystemPropertiesProtection.exe — remains available in this build. I guess MS will offer them side-by-side for a while as is their usual practice.

Big doings in this latest Beta release. Nice to see another big chunk of Control Panel capability make its way into Settings. Here in Windows-World, that counts as “real news:” now you know!

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Insider stuff, Recent Activity, USB devices, WED Blog, Windows 11

Stuck Inside Boot Alert Kills Whole Day

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I mounted a full-throttle attempt to fix my “new CPU detected” boot warning, and lost a day to wandering in the wilderness. You’ve seen this screenshot before, in my February 27 post. I saw it a LOT more yesterday through at least 15 cold boots, plus various changes. Indeed getting stuck inside boot alert kills whole day, as I try to put my flaky startup situation right.

Why Stuck Inside Boot Alert Kills Whole Day

I’ll admit it: it was my own damn fault. I had to turn TPM off to attempt the warning breakout, but mistakenly also turned Secure Boot off as well. Big mistake. I’m *STILL* trying to recover from the latter, though I’ve managed to fix the former.

Along the way what wasted hour after hour was the impact of trying to boot in a half-open, half-closed Secure Boot environment. I kept getting stuck at Post Code 00 (nothing happened), Post Code 22 (graphics won’t initialize). I had to pop the CMOS battery out twice yesterday to reset the runtime to recognize all the hardware. Once I even had to disconnect all USB, network, and display peripherals.

A Trying Day Here at Chez Tittel

Chasing my tail is not always my idea of fun. Chasing the same trail of gotchas and glitches I’ve chased at least twice before is downright discouraging. But today, the machine booted (with the alert warning shown) and I’m up and running. I’m going to try one more time to get into UEFI, turn on Secure Boot (my only remaining hurdle to seal things back up) and see what happens.

Wish me luck. I’m going to need it. Here in Windows-World, there may not be enough time to do it right, but there’s always plenty of time to do things over and over … and over again until we get them fixed. Stay tuned: I’ll keep you posted.

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Insider stuff, Recent Activity, Remote Desktop (RDP), Troubleshooting, WED Blog, Windows 11

Ongoing Reboot Issues Affect RDP

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I’m still struggling with reboot issues on Flo6. Lately, I have to go through the infamous “new CPU detection” alert, then deny it, before I get into Windows 11. After multiple such reboots just now, I elected to stay logged in and get some work done. No such luck: my ongoing reboot issues affect RDP. On the way to a working session, I got the mysterious error window you see as the lead-in graphic.

Why Do Ongoing Reboot Issues Affect RDP?

It seems that multiple successive reboots in Windows 11 can impact RDP. This can lead to stale RDP capability caches, stale virtual device handles, TPM/Hello falling shy of full initialization, mismatched channel GUIDs, and more. In short, things get shook up and need to settle down.

What’s interesting — and amusing — about this error is that it’s not really an error. Closer inspection reveals it carries error and extended error codes that are null (0x0) in value. And indeed, right after the error window popped up, an RDP session into P16  opened up and worked like a champ.

What Happened Here?

Though it’s reported as an authentication error, it actually occurred during virtual channel negotiation between Flo6 and P16. Naturally, that indicates both devices were working just fine, thanks, and trying to get together. Copilot speculates — and I concur — that the most likely culprit is a Windows Hello redirection problem. (That’s mostly guaranteed by my turning fTPM off on one boot to kick start that process, then turning it back on.)

Boy howdy, things do sometimes get strange here in Windows-World, though. On the whole, I’d rather have a bogus error that fixes itself (or isn’t really an error) than have a serious glitch that requires further troubleshooting. I’ve had enough of that already today, thanks very much!

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Device drivers, Insider stuff, Recent Activity, Troubleshooting, WED Blog, Windows 11

Clearing X-Rite Error Proves Interesting

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I’ve got a terrific new loaner unit from Lenovo, a P16 Gen 3 Mobile Workstation. I’m still learning my way around this powerful beast of a laptop, as I discovered this morning. After login, I couldn’t help but notice that the built-in X-Rite Color Assistant failed — namely it opened a dialog box that told me the app couldn’t run because of an “unexpected error.” Mildly disturbing, and not terribly informative. Indeed clearing X-rite error proves interesting, as I first try–and fail–to fix the app through a basic uninstall/reinstall maneuver. Then I notice something…

Why Clearing X-Rite Error Proves Interesting

While I was checking over the P16 Gen 3 for clues, I noticed that Lenovo Vantage had a new firmware update pending. “Hmmm,” I wondered: “Maybe a firmware update (and reset) will also make X-Rite happy?” I quickly installed same (and then waited for the usual update process to grind to completion, and the post-install reboot to finish).

Guess what? The firmware update did the trick! After the reboot, I was able to launch the X-Rite Color Assistant. And it turns out it’s a “background app” on that Lenovo model (which uses a software or virtual color control, because the unit lacks a built-in color sensor). So I had to go through the Notification area, and right-click on the app to get it to open.

Below, you can see the About info from the app itself. According to Copilot, the UEFI/firmware refresh helped to bring X-Rite back to life because it resets the basic runtime environment, including the GPU to system connection. Good to know!

After a quick UEFI reset, X-Rite Color Assistant ran without error.

Here in Windows-World, the right ingredients for a happy and working laptop include the underlying firmware and drivers, as well as the OS and its software. Luckily for me, by fixing the lowest level stuff, the higher-level app came back to life. I’ll count this one as a win.

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Web Extensions Stymie Input

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While trying to conduct a cash transfer online yesterday, I ran into an interesting — and new (to me, anyway) — problem. In attempting to provide account and identity information I found myself unable to enter data into the very input form that was soliciting same. “Hmmm,” I wondered to myself, “Why is this not working?” So I decided to ask Copilot. It immediately informed me that things such as auto-fill. password managers, and related “conveniences” can step all over input fields inside certain web pages. The TL;DR diagnosis, put succinctly, is some Web extensions stymie input.

Copilot recommended that I open an incognito window, and try again. Guess what? That worked like a champ!

Why Web Extensions Stymie Input — In Some Cases

In my case it looked like a combination of Chrome auto-fill and the Norton Password Manager were conspiring against the input page to prevent it from seeing and handling my input as it should. As soon as I got those things out of the way, the input problems disappeared.

I’ve been building websites and writing about markup languages for over 30 years now, and this is the first time I’ve run into this phenom. Apparently I’ve been incredibly lucky, because it happens on a lot of websites, especially those built to handle multiple languages and character sets. It just so happens this particular gotcha never bit me until yesterday, when it bit hard (and drove me just a  tad bonkers).

KISS Remains a Valuable Approach to New/Unfamiliar APIs

KISS is, of course, the acronym for “Keep It Simple, Stupid!” It’s a good approach to keep in mind when working with new and unfamiliar apps, user interfaces, and the code beneath those skins. By simplifying the text handling the browser performed when providing input, I allowed the target web page to do its job without lots of other stuff going on in the background.

A simple, straightforward text entry environment let the web page accept input straight from my keyboard, with no extra processing or data delivery. Apparently, that was just what it wanted or needed to get the job done.

Here in Windows-World, not stepping on yourself is often the key to a successful user experience. Once my browser got itself out of the way, the web page was able to take it from there. I’ll count that as an unqualified success, and an interesting learning experience.

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Backup/Restore, Insider stuff, PowerShell, Recent Activity, WED Blog, Windows 11

On Windows 11 Restore Points

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In Windows 11, a restore point provides a snapshot of various essential system files, settings, installed programs, and the registry taken at a specific point in time. Restore points can roll back the OS and associated state info should something go sideways. They don’t replace backups (especially image backups) because they don’t contain personal files and documents, nor do they capture other boot disk partitions for full restoration (e.g. EFI, MSR and recovery partitions, if present). I’ve been thinking on Windows 11 restore points because I don’t use them (I use daily image backups instead) and because they can take up lots of room on disk.

Looking further into Windows 11 Restore Points

Before I could share my reflections and observations about Windows 11 Restore Points (let’s condense that to W11RPs) I had to find a machine with them turned on to dig into them a bit. Turns out my newest personal acquisition — the very nice ASUS Zenbook A14 I picked up during Black Friday sales last year — still has them turned on. You can see that the C: drive has W11RPs enabled, and the info about a single restore point that I just generated right under neath.

You can find restore points inside the WizTree app pretty easily, if you’ve got any. They appear within the System Volume Information folder, which lives at the root of the boot/system drive (C:\ usually). It’s the big purple rectangle in this snippet from Wiztree, and corresponds to the shadow copy item shown in the lead-in graphic (output from the vssadmin list shadows command, in fact):

At 2.3 GB in size, one can see why keeping numbers of them around might be something of a storage-sucker. In truth, that’s one big reason I typically don’t keep them around.

Turning W11RPs on and off, and more

The controls for W11RPs live on the Protection tab of the System Properties applet in Control Panel. Settings in Windows 11 kind of interferes with access to this info, so the best way to get there these days is to invoke its executable directly (Into the Windows Run box (Winkey+R), type this string:

C:\Windows\System32\SystemPropertiesProtection.exe

That fires up the item screencapped next, and shows the key controls for W11RPs, to wit:

For any drives available on the target system, you select its entry, click the “Configure” button then enable or disable restore points. As you can see about the C:\ drive has W11RPs enabled, and it came that way from the factory.

Problems with W11RPs?

If you read up on informed sentiment about W11RPs (I get my insights from many sources, but find TenForums.com and ElevenForum.com particularly insightful), you’ll learn that they sometimes work, and sometimes don’t. If you use them, you’ll learn that they take a while to load (on the order of 15-20 minutes on most of my PCs). They also tend to happen once a day by scheduled task, and whenever you make system changes or install apps that include built-in RP capture commands.

You can use them if you like. I don’t like, and I don’t use them. Macrium Reflect can restore a full system image on my PCs in the 2-6 minute range, is easier to use, runs from a rescue disk if needed, and has shown itself to be thoroughly reliable and capable. For me that’s the end of the story.

Now, pardon me while I go off to disable W11RPs on the AsusSnap. I seem to have forgotten this little step in my intake process…

 

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Another Take On Failed RDP Login Fix

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Last Friday, I packed up the tiny but nifty Lenovo ThinkCentre Neo 50q to ship it back to North Carolina. Then, I stood the small but mighty ThinkStation P3 Ultra Gen2 up in its place. When I tried to RDP into that machine to catch it up with changes since it went dark in early January, it wouldn’t let me log in with my usual MSA. “I’ve seen this before,” I thought, as I recalled my Feb 19 blog on this very topic. That previous fix had changed the folder name for my user account and I wanted to avoid that on the P3Ultra2 if possible. So, I took another take on failed RDP login fix and came up with something better. Let me explain…

Details: Another Take on Failed RDP Login Fix

The P3 Ultra2 had been healthy after its identity‑stack cleanup, TPM reseal, and scheduled‑task repairs. Local login worked. The system was stable. Nothing in the logs suggested trouble. But RDP refused to authenticate. Every attempt failed with the same unhelpful message: “The credentials did not work.” The username was correct. The password was correct. The account was enabled. The SID matched. The machine was healthy. Yet RDP would not accept the credentials under any circumstances.

When this kind of failure presents, there’s usually some mismatch between the local Windows identity and the identity info RDP uses for remote validation. TL;DR version: that was exactly what went wrong.

Why Correct Credentials Failed RDP Validation

The key understanding requires knowing how RDP handles MSAs. When a user signs into a Windows PC locally, her or she can use Windows Hello, a PIN, or security tokens. That said, RDP cannot use any of these for remote login validation. Indeed, RDP requires a local NT password hash stored in the SAM on the target PC. If no such hash exists, RDP can’t validate user login input, even if the supplied password for an MSA is correct and current.

Here’s what went wrong on P3Ultra2: the MSA acccount had never generated a local password hash. From the first login, Windows 11 used Hello-based authentication. Alas, that means the SAM never got a password hash for that account. Locally, things worked as expected (because Hello could — and did — work with cloud based authentication). RDP could find no password hash and thus could not authenticate.

The Fix Is In, and Dead Easy

All I had to do was to sit down in front of the P3Ultra2 and force it to use the password for a single login. I did so at the lock screen by clicking the password icon (middle position in lead-in graphic) and then typing in the account password.

As soon as I did that, Windows automatically generated the NT password hash for that MSA. With that value now available, RDP immediately opened its remote access doors on my next try to get into P3Ultra2 through the Remote Desktop Connection App. Problem solved.

Sometimes, problems in Windows-World are huge and hairy. Sometimes, they’re astoundingly simple — as long as you can figure out what’s really going on. This particular RDP thing fell into the latter category. I’m glad I now understand, and gladder still it’s fixed.

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