So I won’t be blogging here anymore. My new blog (and new posts) can be found at:

http://byedesigns.com/

Well, good news is that the restore actually worked. It reversed the actions of the virus, and got the system back in working order. Of course, I recommended a thorough scan afterwards to clean up any bits and pieces that might be left. It also might have been a good idea to delete the most recent restore point, so that the user couldn’t accidentally reverse the restore that fixed the problem.

I’m always amazed when Windows actually works the way its supposed to.

I LOVE GARLIC!

Then an ominous “Catastrophic failure” for some HP Embedded Security Status Applet appeared. On launching programs, other error messages (mostly bad image, but some “cli.exe” related too) would appear.

This all appeared like the symptoms of a past spyware/malware infection. A scan with Superantispyware revealed some leftover pieces of a rogue, which I zapped. I also proceeded to remove the bazillion startup programs which were triggering the error messages. The usual HP bloat was present as well as some suspicious unknowns and other garbage.

That took care of the most obvious symptoms, but didn’t fix the underlying problem–corrupt files. I ran a “sfc /scannow” which fixed quite a few corrupted Windows files. That scan fixed about 90% of the error messages. A few random ones were still occurring, like a “cli.exe” error. An uninstall of ATI Catalyst fixed that, and reinstalling or uninstalling a few other programs fixed the rest of the random errors.

Although it was somewhat of a hassle rooting out all of the different issues, I was able to avoid reformatting the system and thus kept all of the programs and data intact.

This is a category devoted to solutions and information that I’ve found useful, which I may find useful in the future. I publish these posts here on the blog in case someone else can find them useful.

• Microsoft Security Essentials + latest virus definitions
• SuperAntiSpyware (portable edition)
• Combofix

Today I’ll be removing a fake AV. Hopefully the above combination will do the job!

Thankfully, its very easy to reset the sensor. Press Fn+Z on the keyboard and the sensor should reset. No need to pull open the case and hunt around for a reset button; this key combination should solve the problem.

Incidentally, if you have a Dell laptop and it seems to be running loudly and slowly, you might try the above and see if it fixes the problem.

Google Chrome for Mac with Pinned Tabs - Yes!

Today, Google released an updated dev build of Chrome for Mac with support for extensions, the ability to pin tabs ( like Firefox’s FavIconize Tab), and several other features. Many of these features have already been present in the Windows builds, but now they’ve finally made their way to the Mac. My favorite new feature is pinned tabs, which was the one feature that kept me using Firefox instead of Chrome.

The reason I like pinned tabs so much is because I like to keep several webpages open at all times – Gmail, Google Calendar, Remember the Milk, Twitter, etc. Pinning these tabs saves a lot of space in my tab bar that would otherwise be lost. One crucial part of pinned tabs is having them stay open across browsing sessions, i.e., to be sticky or persistent. When I first open Chrome, I want to have all of my pinned tabs open. In Window, this is as simple as changing Chrome’s shortcut properties to include some command line parameters. To get Chrome to behave the same way on Mac, we have to create a launcher script. Here’s how to do it:

Getting Started

First of all, you’ll need to download the latest dev beta release of Chrome if you haven’t already. Get rid of any old versions of Chrome that you might have, download the newest release here here (see update at bottom), and copy it over into your Applications folder.

Downloading the Chrome for Mac Developer Beta release.

The Basics

You can pin tabs in Chrome by right-clicking (or control-clicking) on a tab and choosing “Pin Tab”, or by dragging the tab to the far left of the tab bar. Simple enough, right? This pins the tab until you either close it, or close Chrome. The next time you start Chrome, the tab will no longer be pinned.

Pinning a tab in Chrome

Making it Stick

What if you want a tab to always be pinned when you open Chrome? With the help of a simple Applescript, it isn’t very hard. Here’s the procedure:

1. Go to Applications -> Utilities -> AppleScript Editor.
   

   Go to Applications -> Utilities -> AppleScript Editor

2. In the window that appears, paste or type the following:

   do shell script "open -a \"Google Chrome\" --args --pinned-tab-count=5 http://mail.google.com http://www.rememberthemilk.com/ http://google.com/reader http://daytum.com/jessebye http://twitter.com"

   There are a couple of things you’ll probably want to change. The first of those is --pinned-tab-count=5. Change it to match the number of pinned tabs you want to open when you start Chrome. The second thing you’ll want to change is the websites listed. Change these to whatever websites you want to open when you start Chrome.

   

   Creating the script in AppleScript Editor

3. Now test the script by clicking on the “Run” button in the toolbar. If everything looks good, then we’re ready to move on. Otherwise, quit Chrome and keep tweaking the script until you get what you want. Note: If you run the script while Chrome is already open, the pinned tabs will not be opened. Quit Chrome first, then run the script for the desired behavior.
   

   Testing the script.

4. Save the script by going to File -> Save. Enter a name for it, find a convenient place for it (Applications is usually a good idea), and make sure to change the File Format to “Application”.
   

   Save the script as an Application

You can now use the script to launch Chrome with all of your pinned tabs. If you like, you can drag it to your Dock and use it in place of the normal Chrome icon.

Final Touches

One last thing you might want to do is change the script’s icon to match the Chrome icon. To do this, right-click (or control-click) on the script and choose “Get Info”. Also right-click (or control-click) on Google Chrome itself and choose “Get Info”. In the Info window for Google Chrome, click on the small icon at the top left (not the larger icon at the bottom) and go to Edit -> Copy. Then go to the Info window for the script, click on the icon at the top, and go to Edit -> Paste. Now the script’s icon should match the Chrome icon.

Copying the Chrome icon to the Script

One thing you’ll notice is that if you put the script in your dock, you’ll end up with two Chrome icons. As far as I know, there’s no way to merge these into one. You have to use the script icon to launch Chrome, but once Chrome is running you can use either icon to switch back to Chrome from another application. I think this is a very small price to pay for being able to use Chrome’s bleeding-edge features.

Taking it Further

You can use this same technique to launch Chrome with any variety of command-line switches. So, for instance, you could have a launcher that starts Chrome in incognito mode (--incognito) or with plugins disabled (--disable-plugins). Use the script above as a template, changing the part following --args as desired. (You can find an incomplete listing of switches here, or read through the chrome_switches.cc source file to view all supported switches in the SVN trunk).

Downloadable Script

You can download my script as a starting point, and open with AppleScript Editor to customize it to your needs.

Update (2/18/2010)

As of this date, the dev builds of Chrome no longer include support for pinned tabs. This is also true for the Linux dev builds (probably for Windows too, though I haven’t tested it). If you want pinned tab functionality, download the Google Chrome beta instead.

Steps to reproduce: Install Lexmark’s printer software on a Windows Vista computer. Try to print more than one document. Get ticked off because Lexmark doesn’t have any solution on their website.

Printers affected: The list goes on and on—models X1270, X5130, X5150, X6100, X6150, and several others all seem to be affected. In general, if your printer seems to be having the symptoms above, then this solution might work for you. I have only tested this solution with the X6150, and your mileage may vary.

Solution:

Phase 1: Eliminate all Lexmark software/drivers

1. Disconnect the USB cable to the printer and open up the Control Panel. Go to Programs and Features and find the Lexmark software for your printer. Uninstall it. If it gives you any problems, try opening up Printers (under Control Panel), right-click on the Lexmark printer, and select “Cancel All Documents”. If they don’t delete right away, restart your computer. You may need to connect the printer again to finish deleting the jobs from the queue. Make sure you disconnect the printer before trying to uninstall the Lexmark software again.
2. Restart your computer.
3. Go to Start, type in “cmd” (without the quotes), right click on “cmd.exe” and choose “Run as Administrator”. Type in “printmanagement.msc” and press Enter.
4. Go to Action->Manage Drivers. If any Lexmark drivers are listed, click on each one and click “Remove…” In the window that appears, choose “Remove driver and driver package”. When you’ve finished removing any drivers, you can close the Print Management window.
5. At this point, we should be rid of any leftover Lexmark crap. If you’re feeling extra cautious, you could go through and check your Program Files for any remnants, and maybe reboot your computer again.

Phase 2: Reinstall drivers, the right way

1. Okay, now this is the important part. We want to reinstall the printer drivers without using the Lexmark installer. First, download the appropriate drivers for your printer from Lexmark’s website. Make sure you choose the Vista drivers and also make sure you choose x32 or x64 drivers, depending on which version of Vista you are running. As of writing, this page allows you to locate the drivers for your printer. Lexmark’s download descriptions tend to be a bit confusing, so read carefully.
2. Once you’ve downloaded the correct installer, go ahead and run it, but don’t go through the installation! When the installer starts, cancel out of it. If everything has gone well, we should be left with a new folder located at C:\drivers\printer\[insert your model here].
3. Now we’re ready to plug in the printer. When you plug in the printer, Windows will try to locate the drivers for it. There are two possible outcomes: Windows searches Windows Update and finds the correct driver, in which case we need do nothing more; and the second outcome, Windows can’t find the correct driver, in which case we need to point it to the one we downloaded.
4. At the first “Found New Hardware” screen, choose “Locate and install driver software”. If you are asked whether to search online, choose “Yes, search online this time only”. If the window “Windows couldn’t find driver software…” appears, choose “Browse my computer for driver software” and navigate to C:\drivers\printer\[insert your model here]. Make sure that “Include subfolders” is checked. Windows should then recognize and install the driver from that location.
5. If everything goes successfully, you should now have a working printer. Try to print out a few documents and make sure it is working. If so, congratulations! You’ve managed to get your printer working with Vista. If not, read on for some more troubleshooting advice.

Still having trouble?

If your printer still isn’t working at this point, there are a few more things to try:

• Disable the Lexmark printer spooler service and make Window’s spooler the default. To do this, press Ctrl-Alt-Del and choose “Start Task Manager”. Go to the Services tab, and click on the Services button at the bottom right. Scroll through the list and see if you can find a service called “lexbce” or any other reference to Lexmark. If you find such a service, right-click on it, go to Properties, and change the Startup Type to “Disabled”. Next go to Start, type in cmd, right-click on “cmd.exe” and choose “Run as Administrator”. In the window that appears, type “sc config spooler depend= rpcss” (without the quotes, with a space after depend= ), and press Enter. Restart your computer and try printing again.
• Make sure that bidirectional support is enabled. To do this, open Control Panel and go to Printers. Right-click on the printer, and choose “Properties”. Go to the Ports tab, and make sure the box is checked next to “Enable bidirectional support”. Restart your computer and try printing again.
• Restart the print spooler after each job. You can do this by going to Start, typing in “services.msc” and pressing Enter. Find “Print Spooler” on the list, right-click and choose Restart.
• Disable your anti-virus and then try printing. McAfee in particular seems to cause communication problems with certain printers. If the anti-virus is the culprit, I’d advise tweaking its settings until it works, or better yet, switching to an anti-virus that actually works (like Microsoft Security Essentials or Avira).

One-Click Fix?

Sergio Gois has kindly written up a batch file that stops the spooler and any Lexmark services, deletes any spooled jobs, and restarts the spooler. Paste the following into Notepad and save with a .bat extension:

sc stop spooler
ping localhost -n 2
sc stop lxbk_device
ping localhost -n 2
taskkill /im lxbk* /f /t
ping localhost -n 2
del /q c:\Windows\system32\spool\PRINTERS\*
ping localhost -n 2
sc start lxbk_device
ping localhost -n 2
sc start spooler

When the printer starts acting up, right-click on the .bat file and choose “Run as Administrator”. Once it has finished running, try printing again.

Conclusion

If you’re still having trouble, then you’re probably stuck with working around your problem (restart your computer after each print) or buying a different printer.

If you have a chance, feel free to call Lexmark and complain. They’ve done a crappy job with their drivers, and haven’t even addressed this and other problems on their website. Even though they claim that their printers are “Windows Vista Compatible”, the printers don’t work at all or only work after some workaround. Either Lexmark needs to fix its software/drivers so that they work out of the box, or they need to stop calling their printers “Vista Compatible”.

If you know of a fix that I haven’t mentioned, please tell me about it in the comments below and I’ll make sure to add it to this guide.