Ken's Tech Note

If we enable AHCI at BIOS after Windows is installed without this option, Windows won't boot. Follow the steps to enable AHCI support after-the-fact:    1. Exit all Windows-based programs.    2. Start regedit.exe as Administrator.    3. If you receive the User Account Control dialog box, click Continue.    4. Locate following registry subkey:       HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Services\Msahci    5. In the right pane, right-click Start in the Name column, and then click Modify.    6. In the Value data box, type 0, and then click OK.    7. On the File menu, click Exit to close Registry Editor.    8. Reboot and enable AHCI under BIOS.

While I was trying to learn (and re-learn) Linux, I came across this good article which contains a tool to create a LiveUSB OS. I was a long-time user of SuSE OS. From its early day. It is good to see it grows and became an even more mature Linux distro.

I come across this great article on integration of Dreamweaver and Photoshop using "Smart Object" and "Copy and Paste". It is indeed a time-saver for web page production. Watch the video .

After testing Windows 7 (RC) for a few months, I received Windows 7 RTM through the Microsoft Partners Program. It is a great program to join with benefits for software developers (for a fee). Windows 7 is reasonably good at compatibility. The only problem I had with Windows 7 so far is PCCW Netvigator Everywhere. The modem made by Huawei does not have driver for Windows 7. Research on internet yielded no answer but shared frustrations of many people. I believe this will be solved eventually by Huawei (not PCCW). On my D430, the performance is reasonable and is better than Vista Basic that comes with the machine. One thing that worth mentioning is through the repeated installing, formatting and re-installing, I start to use a tool called UNetbootin . Absolutely a pleasure to use. Read the full instruction and install Win 7 from a USB.

I tried to update my Intel-based Mac's Windows partition with the latest SP3. But it complained it did not work properly. A search in Google yields the answer . Turns out the hardware architecture has a compatibility issue. Adding an entry in the registry fixed the problem.

The Dell Latitude D430 is a solid worker bee but the Vista Basic installed on it is not. Over time, the operating system becomes slower and slower - it takes approx. 7 min. for a complete boot from start. This becomes a good reason to install the new Windows 7 (RC) to see if performance is improved. This is a good weekend pastime. The installation was done from an external USB DVD Writer (generic brand) and installation is a breeze. All hardware was recognized saving a lot time trying to reinstall drivers. I hate driver installation because sometimes we need to install in a particular order to get things work. (Dell Recovery/Driver CD does not have an automatic installation scripts that would install the drivers.) But again this is not an issue because all hardware was recognized - even the Security (Trust Computing Platform) After basic installation, I have installed some key software that makes the laptop capable of doing some real work. 7-zip AVG Free 8.5 K-Lite Mozilla Firefox + Th...

See how the CBS "60 minutes" reports the story on dealing with Conflicker. Watch CBS Videos Online