Monday, March 02, 2009
Sunday, March 01, 2009
Vista Desktop Resource Monitor
Just click on any of the graphs to expand the related section for more information.
Vista has some surprisingly interesting and sometimes useful new features. One such feature I stumbled across is the desktop resource monitor. This is a nifty little tool whose access was added through task manager. Task manager is a tool I use religiously on every desktop I operate and even those that I don't regularly use but I'm in a position to have to clean up malware or other bad programs or solve other problems. In fact, I have task manager running minimized at all times on my computers (hide to tray option) to enable me to watch CPU usage on my desktop or laptop.
One of things that I have found in Vista to be useful but required third party monitoring type applications on XP for the same purpose is Vista's resource Monitor. A nice step beyond just task manager, Vista's desktop resource monitor reveals more information in an instant that can be useful for those of us that need that kind of information. Information such as what programs are communicating on the network and with what remote computer. Although there are command line tools in both XP and Vista that can display a list of applications that are listening on the network and also talking, having this information at the ready through a GUI interface I find to be much more handier.
Though not common, a useful effect of having it in GUI form through resource monitor is if there is a need to show a regular user some information about their computer, they will understand the pretty GUI side more easily than they would the command line output on the desktop even if it showing essentially the same information.
Resource manager can be found simply by starting windows task manager on the desktop or laptop. Then click on the performance tab and then at the bottom click on the resource manager button. This new button when clicked open resource manager on the desktop and a world of more information about what the desktop or laptop is doing.
Vista has some surprisingly interesting and sometimes useful new features. One such feature I stumbled across is the desktop resource monitor. This is a nifty little tool whose access was added through task manager. Task manager is a tool I use religiously on every desktop I operate and even those that I don't regularly use but I'm in a position to have to clean up malware or other bad programs or solve other problems. In fact, I have task manager running minimized at all times on my computers (hide to tray option) to enable me to watch CPU usage on my desktop or laptop.
One of things that I have found in Vista to be useful but required third party monitoring type applications on XP for the same purpose is Vista's resource Monitor. A nice step beyond just task manager, Vista's desktop resource monitor reveals more information in an instant that can be useful for those of us that need that kind of information. Information such as what programs are communicating on the network and with what remote computer. Although there are command line tools in both XP and Vista that can display a list of applications that are listening on the network and also talking, having this information at the ready through a GUI interface I find to be much more handier.
Though not common, a useful effect of having it in GUI form through resource monitor is if there is a need to show a regular user some information about their computer, they will understand the pretty GUI side more easily than they would the command line output on the desktop even if it showing essentially the same information.
Resource manager can be found simply by starting windows task manager on the desktop or laptop. Then click on the performance tab and then at the bottom click on the resource manager button. This new button when clicked open resource manager on the desktop and a world of more information about what the desktop or laptop is doing.
In a quick glance, you are able to see some vital information and insight to what your computer is doing. CPU, disk, network and memory information are all at fingure tips reach. The one I find useful now and would have liked to have had this in XP over the years is the the network resource overview.
The network resource monitor will show all the running programs that are "talking" on the latop to the network. This is a useful view of what's going on in that if there is a network latency at a glance, this resource view may be able to give a way an application on the desktop or laptop that is using too much bandwidth or that should not be using any at all.
Remote Support
Why waste time travelling to a location to provide computer support or even worse in many cases, trying to talk a person through steps on the remote computer through the phone. This is, in my opinion, even worse that going to the location unless of course the place where the computer, desktop,server, or laptop is located is too far away.
Talking people through troubleshooting steps is a very painful task. A simple process that could take an experienced person several minutes to maybe ten can turn into an hour with a person on the remote side that has no idea of how to perform the actions or functions that you are requesting or have never even seen a command line. Remote support is the best alternative and solution to make more efficient use of computer skills and efforts.
Monday, October 20, 2008
Event Log AFD:Error (13) - Path Problem
Supporting tech-nol-O-gy. Yip, that's a computer aw'right.
This is a very uncommon error. If your receiving this error in an application like Captaris RightFax, then the solution may be as simple as a directory or file rights/permissions modification.
Check that the services that may be writing files for Captaris' services, and there are several of them, have the necessary rights to write to the folders the software writes to when creating or updating the index file stored and used for file retrieval and archival on the system during send and receive.
The error is not limited to the index file permission but also the pdf or tif files that are created with each receive (incoming). Especially if you are routing the incoming to folder locations based on the user who is to get them.
Check the this site/blog for further information:
Event Log AFD:Error (13) - Path Problem
Event Log AFD:Error (13)
This is a very uncommon error. If your receiving this error in an application like Captaris RightFax, then the solution may be as simple as a directory or file rights/permissions modification.
Check that the services that may be writing files for Captaris' services, and there are several of them, have the necessary rights to write to the folders the software writes to when creating or updating the index file stored and used for file retrieval and archival on the system during send and receive.
The error is not limited to the index file permission but also the pdf or tif files that are created with each receive (incoming). Especially if you are routing the incoming to folder locations based on the user who is to get them.
Check the this site/blog for further information:
Event Log AFD:Error (13) - Path Problem
Tuesday, May 06, 2008
Friday, April 18, 2008
Desktops, Servers, and Networks, oh MY!: RAID - Not Just for Servers Anymore
Desktops, Servers, and Networks, oh MY!: RAID - Not Just for Servers Anymore
RAID, once found only in network server and on a very rare occasion, and on a very expensive desktop computer system. Any desktop years ago that had true hardware RAID installed was a very expensive and rare site to see. often, it was for someone who had way too much money and needed something to brag about. In legit cases however, if there were a desktop with hardware RAID installed it would also be acting as a server in some capcity or the user was just paranoid and didn't want to save anything in public space such as a network server.
RAID, once found only in network server and on a very rare occasion, and on a very expensive desktop computer system. Any desktop years ago that had true hardware RAID installed was a very expensive and rare site to see. often, it was for someone who had way too much money and needed something to brag about. In legit cases however, if there were a desktop with hardware RAID installed it would also be acting as a server in some capcity or the user was just paranoid and didn't want to save anything in public space such as a network server.
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