How to Diagnose and Fix Problems with Windows 7 Home Premium, Ultimate and Professional Editions

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Diagnose and fix problems with Windows 7

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1. - I installed the Upgrade version of Windows 7 to a new hard disk drive on my desktop PC. Why has Product Activation failed?

2. - The adobe Flash player won't work in the 64-bit version of Internet Explorer 8 on my laptop running the 64-bit versions of Windows Vista and Windows 7 Home Premium

3. - I want to upgrade my laptop to Windows 7, but ATI and Nvidia don't provide Win7 video/graphics card drivers

4. - How can I install Windows 7 on a netbook computer that doesn't have an optical CD/DVD drive?

5. - My network is made up of a mixture of Windows 7/XP/Linux PCs. I can't access the Network Attached Storage (NAS) drives via Windows 7 Professional

6. - Windows 7 Home Premium doesn't provide a device driver for the ATI Radeon X1650 series graphics card in my Packard Bell iMedia B2216 desktop PC. If I upgrade the card to a more powerful one, will I also have to upgrade the power supply?

7. - My computer running the 64-bit version Windows 7 Home Premium isn't using all its 4GB RAM memory [The link takes you to a separate page on this website.]

8. - I want to remove Windows Vista from multi-boot Windows XP/Windows Vista/Windows 7 (Win7) setup [The link takes you to a separate page on this website.]

9. - Administrator privileges: A message saying that my Windows 7 PC/computer has "insufficient privileges" come up when I try to run some programs that I used with Windows XP

10. - Windows 7 has no sound - sound card drivers not installed - there are no entries for sound devices in the Device Manager

11. - Optimize/Optimizing multicore processors in Windows Vista and Windows 7: Questions on multitasking in Windows Vista and Windows 7 with muliticore (dual-core and quad-core) processors

I installed the Upgrade version of Windows 7 to a new hard disk drive on my desktop PC. Why has Product Activation failed?

Problem

My desktop PC was running Windows XP. I decided to upgrade it to Windows 7 Home Premium. Microsoft makes it clear on its website that the upgrade from Windows XP to Windows 7 has to be a clean installation. I replaced the old IDE hard drive with a new SATA hard drive because the PC's motherboard has a single IDE connector and six SATA connectors. I used the Upgrade version of Windows 7 Home Premium. This seemed to work properly, but when I tried to activate it, it refused to accept the Product Key, but continued to run. Several days later, after entering the word activate in the Start => Search programs and files box and then clicking the Activate Windows link that was provided, I saw that my copy wasn't activated and it continued to refuse activation. If you have an Upgrade version of Windows 7, is it necessary to install it from within Windows XP or Windows Vista so that it can check for the presence of the old version of Windows before it allows activation? If that is the case, if your old hard drive has failed, you won't be able to use the Windows 7 Upgrade DVD to install Windows on a new hard drive.

Answer

You will be able to install a retail copy of an Upgrade version of Windows 7 on a new hard disk drive if the hard drive it was initially installed on dies. In that situation, you can also install an OEM copy (that can only be used on the computer it was first install on) on a new hard drive.

If you have a retail or OEM copy of a version of Windows XP or Windows Vista on your current system, you can buy and install an Upgrade version of Windows 7, which is cheaper than the full product, which is meant to be installed on a new PC or a new hard disk drive that does not have XP or Vista installed on it. Note that an OEM copy can be purchased by a user or is preinstalled by a PC manufacturer such as Dell. It is significantly cheaper than the full version of the same version and is slightly cheaper than the retail Upgrade version and can only be used on the computer on which it is first installed. The retail boxed product can be installed on as many computers as you like as long as only one of them is being used. When you use it on another computer, the computer on which it was first installed has to be put out of action, etc.

Microsoft requires a clean installation if Windows XP is installed on the computer, because an inplace upgrade is not possible due to the fact that XP is two versions of Windows away from Windows 7. In order to overcome your Product Activation problem, what you need to do is install the Upgrade version of Windows 7 on the new hard drive, but don't enter the Product Key.

If you want to install Windows 7 on a hard disk drive with Windows XP already installed on it, say, because you want to reuse the drive but want to get rid of Windows XP, you can run the Windows 7 installation disc from within the older version of Windows. Windows 7 will activate properly because it checks that the old version of Windows is present before it formats the hard drive in order to perform a clean install.

If you want to keep Windows XP on its original hard disk drive so that you can go back to using it, you have to replace it with your new SATA hard drive and boot the system from the Windows 7 installation disc. Note that in order to boot from a CD or DVD, the CD/DVD drive must be set as the first boot device in the BIOS setup program. The licence agreement entitles you to install Windows 7 to an empty hard drive using an Upgrade version (the Home Premium version in your case) as long as Windows XP is no longer being used. However, there is nothing legally preventing you from accessing the files on the old drive via the Windows 7 installation.

That said, if you install Windows 7 to the new drive while having the old drive still installed, Windows 7 will create a dual-boot system automatically that presents a boot menu at startup that provides the option to boot to Windows 7 or to a previous version of Windows (Windows XP in your case). This isn't legal according to the Windows 7 licence agreement, which says that you can't use the version of Windows that you upgraded from, but Microsoft has done nothing to prevent it from happening. You will be able to boot from both versions and Windows XP will still be updated.

You should find that installing Windows 7 by booting from the installation disc and then making use of the Custom install option works perfectly, but don't try to activate it until you've installed it and rebooted the system. Microsoft itself has provided a workaround if doing that doesn't work. You just perform the installation again, but, this time, choose the Upgrade option instead of Custom. After this has finished, you should be able to activate Windows 7 by using the Activate option provided in the Start menu.

The adobe Flash player won't work in the 64-bit version of Internet Explorer 8 on my laptop running the 64-bit versions of Windows Vista and Windows 7 Home Premium

Problem

I just installed Internet Explorer 8 on a dual-boot Windows Vista and Windows 7 system (both 64-bit versions of the Home Premium edition). When I use the 64 bit version of the Adobe Flash Player in IE8, it won't work. A particular website that I normally use is now wanting to install the Adobe Flash Player Installer Active-X, and when I click OK, nothing happens and some of the graphics do not appear. Everytime I navigate to a different page on the same website, the same thing happens all over. I do not have a problem if I don't use the 64 bit version of IE8. The same issue applied with IE7 when trying to use the 64 bit version. The 32 bit version worked fine.

Answer

Adobe don't currently have a 64-bit version of the Flash Player. (Date of writing this: March 3, 2010)

I have no idea when the 64-bit version will be made available. You will have to check on Adobe's website, because the Flash Player does not have a setting that makes it install updates or ask you if you want updates installed. Read the information on how to remove web-tracking cookies below to find out how to set the available setting of the Flash Player.

This is the solution that Adobe offers: "To use Flash Player to view Flash content on a 64-bit operating system, you must run a 32-bit browser. For details on setting this up for Windows see Microsoft Help & Support."

Read the information on the following page of Adobe's website.

http://kb2.adobe.com/cps/000/6b3af6c9.html

How to remove web-tracking flash cookies created by the Adobe Flash Player

November 24, 2009. - The Adobe Flash Player, used by most browsers to display web content such as video, can record 100Kb (kilobytes) of data, much more than the 4Kb that standard cookies use. The flash cookies are stored silently on our computers by more than half of the top 100 websites, and are not always mentioned explicitly in privacy policies. The flash cookies track online activity and therefore are a threat to your privacy. Online sources state that these cookies are used to target users with adverts, and to capture private data that can then be sold. Flash cookies are capable of re-creating regular web cookies after they have been deleted, so even after you have deleted regular cookies, they will reappear. They are shared between browsers and can't be managed via or deleted by your browser. Flash cookies can't usually be managed or deleted using a program on your computer. CCleaner removes many of them but not all.

Macromedia.com used to develop the Flash Player before Adobe took that company over. That is why the flash cookies are stored in a folder called macromedia.com. To get rid of them, use Windows Explorer to locate the following end folders within the macromedia.com folder and delete the files in them:

In Windows XP, find C:\Documents and Settings\Username\ Application Data\Macromedia\Flash Player\ #SharedObjects\RandomFolderName and

C:\Documents and Settings\Username\Application Data\Macromedia\Flash Player\macromedia.com\.

For Windows Vista and Windows 7, use C:\users\username\AppData\roaming.

The AppData folder in Windows Vista and Windows 7 will be hidden unless you open Appearance and Personalization, open Folder Options, click on the View tab and enable Show hidden files, folders, drives. You should leave the Settings.sol file because it contains the Global Settings that you create using the Flash Settings Manager on the following webpage. You have to go to that page to set the settings of Flash Player being used by your computer, because there is no local control panel for the Flash Player. The reason for this is obvious - Adobe doesn't want users to be able to choose the settings easily from within their own computers that prevent tracking data and information capture.

Flash Settings Manager -

http://www.macromedia.com/support/documentation/en/flashplayer/...

Note that when the Flash Player is updated, the settings are set back to the default settings, so you'll have to visit the link above to reset them manually every time you install an update. The player usually asks you if you want to install an update, but you can also check the settings by right clicking with the mouse on the player's screen.

You should make sure that the amount of disk space is set to zero on the Global Setting Storage page and that a check mark is placed in the Never Ask Again box.

The BBC iPlayer at http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer uses the Flash Player, so unless you change the default settings on the page provided above, it can collect data from your PC and even access its microphone and camera if it has them, which most recently-purchased laptops do.

You won't be able to view it unless you have the Flash Player installed as an add-on to your browser. To find out what its settings are on your computer, choose a programme to watch, right-click with the mouse pointer on the video screen and select Settings. The settings should be the global settings that you set on the Flash Settings Manager webpage.

I want to upgrade my laptop to Windows 7, but ATI and Nvidia don't provide Win7 video/graphics card drivers

Problem

I want to install Windows 7 on my laptop PC. It has an integrated ATI graphics chip, but ATI doesn't seem to provide laptop device drivers for all laptops, and my manufacturer doesn't currently provide Windows 7 drivers. Is there a way out?

Answer

ATI and Nvidia don't provide drivers for all mobile graphics chips on all laptops because the laptop manufacturers provide their own support and don't want users installing drivers that they haven't approved.

For many years, ATI (and Nvidia) had their hands tied by laptop manufacturers who request that ATI does not offer support for the mobile graphics chips that they use in ATI's Catalyst Driver. Most laptop manufacturers, such as Dell, customise the drivers they use and have their own support system, so they don't want their customers downloading device drivers from ATI's home page that won't work properly.

Annoying certainly, but there are ways to get around the problem. With the Mobility Modder tool, you can use the standard ATI or Nvidia drivers on your laptop. Instructions on using the tool for ATI mobile graphics chips can be found at http://www.hardwareheaven.com/modtool.php. For Nvidia laptop graphics chips the page is http://www.hardwareheaven.com/nvmodtool.php.

How can I install Windows 7 on a netbook computer that doesn't have an optical CD/DVD drive?

Because of their small size, netbook computers don’t have a built-in optical CD/DVD disc drive, so, unless an external optical CD/DVD/Blu-ray drive is used, an alternative method is required to install an upgrade version Windows 7, but all netbook computers have USB ports.

Microsoft has just released the USB/DVD fix that creates a bootable USB flash drive from a Windows 7 installation disc. -

Microsoft’s little-known Open Source division has created the Windows 7 USB/DVD Download tool. It creates a bootable ISO copy of a Windows 7 installation disc on a USB flash drive/memory stick, so all you have to do is plug it into the netbook computer and follow the prompts to install Windows 7. If you are using a Windows XP Pc to create the bootable disc, you have to download and install a couple of NET Framework files first. -

http://store.microsoft.com/Help/ISO-Tool

A USB flash drive with at least 4GB of storage space and another computer PC that has a CD/DVD drive (or an external optical drive) is required, plus, of course the Windows 7 disc. Here is a tutorial on how to accomplish that task. -

How to create a bootable Windows 7 USB flash drive -

"If you're looking for a quicker way to install Windows 7 than via DVD, try installing it from a USB drive. This guide describes two ways to make a bootable Windows 7 USB drive." - http://arstechnica.com/business/news/2009/12/-the-usb-flash-drive.ars

As mentioned above, you can also use an external CD/DVD/Blu-ray drive, which are widely available for around £30 from online stores such as amazon.co.uk. The drive plugs into one of the PC’s USB ports and once the computer has recognised it you can use it in exactly the same way as an internal CD/DVD/Blu-ray drive.

My network is made up of Windows 7/Windows XP/Linux PCs. I can't access the Network Attached Storage (NAS) drives via Windows 7 Professional

Problem

Since installing a PC running Windows 7 Professional on my wireless home network that also has PCs running Windows XP and Linux, I have not been able to access the NAS drives, which are fully operational from my Windows XP and Linux work stations. I can access the NAS drives via HTTP from Win7, but it refuses to see them as standard network drives. I have searched the web for a solution, but all of the recommendations have proved useless.

Answer

Networking PCs, all of which are running Windows 7, is usually very easy, but connecting a Windows 7 system to older PCs with previous versions of Windows or non-Windows operating systems, such as Linux, can sometimes problematic.

When a Windows 7 system doesn't network properly with older network devices, the first action to take is to check third-party firewalls, such as ZoneAlarm, Comodo, McAfee, Norton, etc. In most of the cases where this kind of mixed networking is a problem, a third-party firewall is usually responsible.

The Windows 7 HomeGroup feature accounts for most of the other Windows 7 networking problems.

You can connect by using some network protocols (e.g., HTTP), but not others, which means that connectivity is present, but full access is being blocked, probably by a closed network port or some other firewall issue.

Try following these steps:

1. - Disconnect the network from the web by unplugging the data cable that feeds your cable-box/DSL modem/router so that it will no be left unprotected when you disable the third-party firewall. Your network computers are now only connected to each other.

2. - Remove or disable the third-party firewalls (not the Windows Firewall, because it is designed to work with HomeGroup) running on all of your computers. With no third-party firewalls running, you should be able to get your network working properly. For those of you who have more than one computer running Windows 7, don't set up or enable a HomeGroup on any of them yet, just concentrate on getting the basic networking functioning properly. With the firewalls gone, you should be able to get everything working properly.

If you had a HomeGroup set up between Win7 PCs, you can leave it by opening the Control Panel from the Start menu. If you have View by: Category selected, click on Choose homegroup and sharing options under the Network and Internet category. Look for the option called Leave the homegroup.

3. - When you have all the connections working, re-enable the firewalls by doing one computer at a time. As each firewall starts working, it should see and allow, or ask you to allow, the new connections.

If a third-party firewall proves to be problematic, try using the Windows Firewall (controlled via the Control Panel) on the Windows 7 PCs.

4. - Acess the web. You should now have full connectivity. Remember that when firewalls aren't the cause of Windows 7 networking problems, a HomeGroup is usually responsible. Windows 7's HomeGroup feature is aimed at home users who know nothing about networking, so it has been automated to set up network sharing of files, folders, devices, etc.. Unfortunately, HomeGroup and security elements of Windows 7 networking, such as 128-bit encryption for shared files, introduces additional complexity that can be the source of problems. You have already set up a mixed-operating-system LAN, so you know how to set up network sharing, so avoid using a homegroup. Just set up the network that you want yourself, which is what most experienced users do on mixed Win7/Vista/XP/Linux LANs.

Windows 7 Home Premium doesn't provide a device driver for the ATI Radeon X1650 series graphics card in my Packard Bell iMedia B2216 desktop PC. If I upgrade the card to a more powerful one, will I also have to upgrade the power supply?

Problem

I've just upgraded to Windows 7 Home Premium by doing a clean installation of it on a new 1TB hard disk drive that I installed in my Packard Bell iMedia B2216 desktop PC. Its current video/graphics card is a Radeon X1650 series, the manufacturer doesn't provide a Windows 7 device driver. I'd like to upgrade the computer's graphics card. I'm not a gamer, but I have an interest in graphics and video editing. I understand that I might have to upgrade the PC's 250W power supply unit as well. Packard Bell told me that I have to use Tech Guys, which will charge me to do it. So far, I've upgraded the processor and RAM memory as well as installing a second hard disk drive and optical DVD writer. Which graphics card would suit my PC and give an improvement over the Radeon X1650? Also, which power supply would you recommend?

Answer

Note that I might recomend a lower powered power supply than is recommended by the graphics-card manufacturers, because it is the practice with them to play safe with their recommendations so as not to run the risk of disappointing the purchasers of their hardware. Some people have so much hardware installed on their desktop PCs that a more powerful unit would be required for an upgrade than would normally have been the case. For example, AMD recommends a 450W power supply to run an ATI Radeon HD 4770 graphics card, but by using the Antec Power Supply Calculator from http://www.antec.outervision.com/ to work out if a particular computer is able to use that graphics card with a lower-powered power supply, it could easily turn out that a 300W power supply is perfectly adequate. However, if someone has a lot of power-hungry hardware components installed, a 500W or even a 600W unit could be required, depending on the hardware. A safe policy is to add about 200W to the requirement. So, if a 300W is adequate, buy a 500W unit.

Packard Bell's support website provides very little information your computer. It doesn't even specify which graphics card is installed or which slot it uses. However, I don't know of any desktop PCs of the age of yours that don't have a PCI-Express x16 slot on the motherboard. A PCI-Express x16 slot allows you to install most PCI Express cards, PCI Express being the current graphics standard for graphics cards.

Depending on the graphics card you buy, you may also have to upgrade the PC's measly 250W power supply unit (PSU). Current (March 2010) graphics cards draw more power than was the case a few years ago and may also require extra power connectors, which your PC's power supply may not have. The first thing to do is measure your power supply. A standard unit is 150mm wide and 85mm tall, although its depth can vary. If yours is this size, you can install any ATX power suppy. To be safe, buy a 500W unit at least, or even a 650W unit. Just because it is, say, a 500W unit doesn't mean that it uses 500W all the time; it provides as much power as the PC draws. Any new power supply should provide PCI Express power connectors for current graphics cards. The ModXStream Pro 500W unit, made by OCZ, currently (March 2010) costs only £50, is a good inexpensive power supply. The DarkPower Pro 650W, made by Be Quiet!, is a superior choice, but it currently costs £100.

Are you sure that you need a new graphics card. If you don't play games, a more powerful card won't improve video editing, because most video-editing programs use a PC's processor more than its graphics card. There is no Windows 7 device driver for your existing ATI Radeon X1650 graphics card, but the Windows Vista driver is available from http://www.amd.com/. The Download Drivers section on the right-hand side of the home page. There's no official AMD support, but that driver should run under Windows 7, having replaced Microsoft's driver with AMD's. If you still want to upgrade, the ATI Radeon HD 4770 card would be a good buy. It costs around £65, uses about 50W and requires a six-pin PCI Express (PCI-E) power connector. However, you can avoid replacing your PC's power supply by buying an ATI Radeon HD 4670, which costs around £50. It also uses about 50W, but doesn't require an extra PCI-E power connector. However, since you have also upgraded the hard disk drive, processor and RAM memory, the 250W power supply might not be able to supply the extra power for the new graphics card, so make use of the Antec Power-Supply Calculator.

Administrator privileges: An error message saying that my Windows 7 PC/computer has "insufficient privileges" come up when I try to run some programs that I used with Windows XP

Problem

My Windows 7 Home Premium desktop PC is running using the Administrator account, not a user account that has far fewer privileges, but when I try to run a few programs that ran perfectly well under Windows XP, an error message is produced that tells me that I have "insufficient privileges" and that I should make sure that I am running them "as an Administrator". Is there a way that I can make them run?

Answer

This is no doubt caused by the security feature in Windows Vista and Windows 7 called User Account Control (UAC) that prevents unrecognised software from being run. It can prevent older software from being run, but is easy to get around.

Use the Start => All Programs menu to find an installed program that is being affected in this way. Right click with the mouse pointer on the entry. One of the options in the menu that presents itself should be called Run as Administrator. Choose it. A message should come up asking, "Do you want to allow the following program to make changes to your computer?" Click OK and the program should then run as it should.

If you want to make sure that a program always runs with Administrator privileges, right-click on its entry as before, but this time choose Properties from the menu. Next, click on the Compatibility tab, enable the option called Run this program as Administrator and click OK.

Windows 7 has no sound - sound card drivers not installed - there are no entries for sound devices in the Device Manager

Problem

My laptop PC can dual-boot to Windows XP and Windows 7. The sound works properly in XP, but Win7 is silent. I have looked in Device Manager and there is no entry at all for sound, but there are several entries in XP. I have checked the Control Panel under Sound for recording and playback, but it shows no device installed. Is this a question of no device drivers installed for the sound card, and, if so, why isn't Windows detecting hardware that has no drivers installed and then installing them, as is usually the case? The motherboard make/model is Alienware Aurora m9700 AB040. In Windows XP, the only sound entry that shows a driver tab is SoundMax.

The http://www.alienware.com/ website provides a support area should be able to provide a driver for the sound card or sound chip integrated on the motherboard. I looked but I could only see the availability of Windows XP and Windows Vista drivers for all devices. You will probably be able to use a Vista driver if there is no Windows 7 driver.

Windows 7 provides several very effective automatic troubleshooters in its Control Panel that is accessed by clicking on the Start button. I have used it to correct a device driver problem with an old HP printer, scanner, copier for which there is no full Windows 7 drivers. The printer troubleshooter found and installed a basic printer driver that allowed the printer to function but not the scanner and copier.

The default view of the Control Panel (View by: Category) has a System and Security section. You click on the Find and fix problems link to open the page that provides the troubleshooters, which, when activated, run to fix problems automatically. The easiest way to access them is to type the word troubleshooting in the Start => Search programs and files box (no need to press the Enter key) to be presented with a clickable link.

The most useful troubleshooters are under the following headings: Hardware and Sound - Troubleshoot audio recording - Troubleshoot audio playback - Use a printer Network and Internet - Internet connections - Shared folders - HomeGroup - Network adapter - Incoming Connections System and Security - Fix problems with Windows Update - Run maintenance tasks - Check for performance issues

For a sound problem, just enter the word sound in the Start => Search programs and files box and then look for the Find and fix problems link

Feedback from the sender: The good news is I have fixed it. Googled SoundMax, found and downloaded the Vista drivers from somewhere, clicked on setup.exe which opened the SoundMax wizard and after some creaking and freezing it installed. Rebooted, got a message driver not installed then heard the Win7 startup tune. There was another download for Vista that did not work, so with this problem keep trying. The Device Manager now has a sound entry.

Optimize/Optimizing multicore processors in windows 7: Questions on multitasking in Windows Vista and Windows 7 with muliticore (dual-core and quad-core) processors

The following article tell you how to enable Windows Vista and Windows 7 to make use of multicore processors to speed up the boot (startup) process.

Windows 7 and Vista Boot Optimization - http://ttcshelbyville.wordpress.com/2009/12/24/windows-7-and-vista-boot-optimization/

If you experience any problems with programs after setting the number of cores to use at startup, just undo the setting.

Setting processor affinity to an application (process) in Windows Vista [and Windows 7] - You use the same method in Windows 7. You can set the Set Affinity and the Set Priority options. I would avoid using the Realtime option provided by the Set Priority option, because it can cause probems. - http://techblissonline.com/set-processor-affinity-windows-vista-applications-process/

"Ok multitasking is great in these modern times of multiprocessors and Win7 management directives, but what about the times when multitasking is not a priority? When one basically wants one task to get done as quickly as possible and many times, using a program that is not very multi-processor aware? Using affinity only seems to distribute the workload more evenly among the processors but does very little to actually increase the utilization of cpu time overall. Same lack of utilization when priority is given high or real time status (because its not competing with anything else of significance already). So its the multitasking reserve that I'd like to adjust, make it 10% or less instead of up to 45% or so in some instances (program dependent?) with 30% seemingly the most common reserve approximation. Any way to do that on a dynamic or static basis? For example when I'm using DVDFlick on my quad, its terrible in Win7. Processing is only 14 frames per second and as mentioned affinity and priority have little to no effect. If I boot to XP on the same system and use DVDFlick on the same file, 45 frames per second processed, no adjustments made, distribution to all 4 processors excellent and 2-10% reserve only. That's what I want from Win7 if possible."

Find the answers in this thread from which the above quote comes:

Questions on multitasking in Windows 7 with dual-core and quad-core processors -

http://lounge.windowssecrets.com/index.php?showtopic=775588

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