1. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-1

2. A Look under the Hood Understanding the Registry Working with Device Drivers Managing Performance in Windows Windows File Systems The Windows Startup Process Troubleshooting Windows Problems Chapter 8

3. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-3 Learning Objectives Define the role of the registry in Windows and back up and modify the registry when needed Install, configure, and manage device drivers Monitor and optimize performance in Windows Compare the file systems supported by Windows Describe the Windows startup process Troubleshoot common Windows problems

4. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-4 Understanding the Registry The Registry Defined The registry is a database that includes settings for: Device drivers Services Installed applications Operating system components User preferences

5. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-5 Understanding the Registry Automatic registry changes occur when: Windows starts up or shuts down Windows Setup is run Changes are made with a Control Panel applet A new device is installed Changes to Windows configuration Changes are made to user desktop preferences An application is installed or modified Changes are made to preferences in any application

6. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-6 Understanding the Registry Registry Files: SYSTEM SOFTWARE SECURITY SAM DEFAULT NTUSER.DAT

7. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-7 Understanding the Registry Registry Files (continued) SYSTEM Information used at startup, including device drivers to be loaded, the order of their loading and configuration settings, the starting and configuring of services, and other settings SOFTWARE Configuration settings for software installed on the local computer SECURITY Local security policy settings for the computer

8. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-8 Understanding the Registry Registry Files (continued) SAM Local security accounts database DEFAULT User desktop settings used when no user is logged on NTUSER.DAT User profile for a single user The first time a user logs on the NTUSER.DAT file from the DEFAULT USER folder is used File is saved in the top-level personal folder

9. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-9 Understanding the Registry Viewing the Registry Structure View as a hierarchical structure Use REGEDIT.EXE or REGEDT32.EXE Navigation similar to disk folders root keys — five folders at the top subtrees — root keys and their contents subkey — key that exists within another key value entries — settings within a key

10. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-10 Understanding the Registry Data Types in Value Entries Format of the data within a key The Short List REG_BINARY REG_DWORD REG_EXPAND_SZ REG_MULTI-SZ REG_SZ

11. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-11 Understanding the Registry Permanent Portions of the Registry: Registry Hives HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SECURITY HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SAM HKEY_USERS\.DEFAULT HKEY_CURRENT_USER and HKEY_USER

12. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-12 Understanding the Registry Temporary Portion of the Registry HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Hardware Information from the hardware detection process during Windows startup It is not saved to a file

13. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-13 Working with Device Drivers Finding Device Drivers Windows distribution CD On floppy disk or CD that came with the device Web site of the manufacturer

14. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-14 Working with Device Drivers Permissions Required for Installing and Configuring Device Drivers Administrator or member of Administrators group to install any device driver in Windows Any member of Users group may disconnect and reconnect a device Driver is not uninstalled during disconnect, just given a status of not present

15. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-15 Working with Device Drivers Working with Signed vs. Unsigned Device Drivers Code signing of device drivers (driver signing) Windows uses file signature verification Administrator can control how Windows reacts to unsigned drivers Driver Signing Options Ignore Warn Block

16. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-16 Working with Device Drivers Disconnecting a Plug-and-Play Device Can disconnect USB and IEE 1394 external plug-and-play devices while powered up First warn Windows using the Safely Remove Hardware icon in the System Tray Safely Remove Hardware dialog box Stop a Hardware Device dialog box

17. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-17 Working with Device Drivers Installing and Configuring a Non-PnP Device Follow instructions in documentation Manufacturer’s installation program preferred If no installation program for driver, use Add Hardware applet

18. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-18 Working with Device Drivers Using Device Manager to Manage Device Drivers View and change device properties Update device drivers Configure device settings Uninstall devices Available since Windows 95 (except NT) Roll back a driver update in Windows XP System | Hardware | Device Manager button

19. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-19 Working with Device Drivers Step-by-Step 8.01 Getting to Know Device Manager Page 389

20. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-20 Working with Device Drivers Hardware Profiles Include registry keys that contain: Settings defining the devices that must be started during Windows startup The list of files associated with each device Configuration settings for each device Profile 1 is created during Windows installation Defines all the existing hardware at the time of installation Every device is enabled

21. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-21 Working with Device Drivers Hardware Profiles (continued) On a desktop computer, you will probably always have a single hardware profile View, create, copy, rename, and modify hardware profiles by clicking the Hardware Profiles button on the Hardware page in System Properties If two or more hardware profiles, Windows startup pauses and displays the Hardware Profile /Configuration Recovery menu Useful on a laptop with a docking station

22. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-22 Managing Performance in Windows Windows Performance Settings Windows NT 4.0 and Windows 2000 Performance Settings Limited compared to Windows XP Windows XP Visual Effects Let Windows Choose What's Best for My Computer Adjust for Best Appearance Adjust for Best Performance Custom

23. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-23 Managing Performance in Windows Step-by-Step 8.02 Experiment with Visual Effects Page 395

24. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-24 Managing Performance in Windows Windows Performance Settings (continued) Processor Scheduling Programs Background Services Memory Usage Programs System Cache Virtual Memory Custom size System managed size No paging file

25. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-25 Managing Performance in Windows Performance Monitoring Frequently done on network servers Not usually done on Windows desktop computers Few performance monitoring tools in desktop OSs

26. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-26 Managing Performance in Windows Performance Monitoring (continued) System Monitor Gathers and displays performance data Monitors counters belonging to objects Displays results in report, graph, or histogram Performance Logs and Alerts Create alerts Create counter logs Create trace logs

27. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-27 Windows File Systems FAT File Systems in Windows Logical structure File allocation table (FAT) Directories FAT16 used by DOS and Windows FAT32 introduced in Windows 95 OEM Service Release 2 Allows larger partitions Allocates disk space more efficiently FAT12 is used on floppy disks

28. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-28 Windows File Systems Windows NTFS File System Available since Windows NT, excluding Windows 9 x Logical structure: Master File Table Includes a transaction processing system Allocates disk space more efficiently than FAT NTFS5 theoretically supports a volume size of 256TB

29. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-29 Windows File Systems Windows NTFS File System (continued) Actual hardware limit is 2TB Offers file and folder security through permissions Pre-Windows 2000 NTFS is now called NTFS4 Since NTFS4 is supports file compressions NTFS5 supports file encryption and indexing

30. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-30 Windows File Systems File Systems for CDs and DVDs CD-ROM File System (CDFS) for CD-ROMS Writeable CDs (CD-R) Rewriteable CDs (CD-RW) Universal disk format (UDF) DVD ROMs DVD-R DVD-RW DVD-RAM driver (new in Windows XP) Supports 4.7GB DVD-RAM disk standard

31. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-31 The Windows Startup Process Windows Boot and System Files Boot files — reside in the root of drive C: System files — reside in the folder in which Windows is installed (default location is C:\Windows or C:\WINNT) System partition — contains the boot files Boot partition — contains the system files In most cases they are both drive C: Sometimes C: is system and D: or E: is boot

32. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-32 The Windows Startup Process Windows Boot Files Located in C:\ BOOT.INI BOOTSECT.DOS(not always present) NTBOOTDD.SYS(not always present) NTDETECT.COM NTLDR

33. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-33 The Windows Startup Process Windows System Files CSRSS.EXE systemroot \SYSTEM32\ Device drivers systemroot \SYSTEM32\DRIVERS HAL.DLL systemroot \SYSTEM32\

34. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-34 The Windows Startup Process Windows registry files loaded during system startup DEFAULTThe default user profile until user logon SAMThe security accounts data base SECURITYThe security hive of the registry SOFTWAREThe software hive of the registry SYSTEMThe system hive of the registry

35. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-35 The Windows Startup Process Phases of the Startup Process Phase I: Power-on Self-Test CPU loads BIOS programs beginning with POST POST: Tests system hardware Determines the amount of memory present Verifies devices required for OS startup are working Loads configuration settings from CMOS memory Briefly displays information on the screen

36. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-36 The Windows Startup Process Phases of the Startup Process (continued) Phase II: Initial Startup CMOS settings used to locate drive with boot files Loads MBR from first physical sector of the hard disk MBR code loads the boot sector from the primary active partition of the first hard disk Boot code from the boot sector loads NTLDR

37. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-37 The Windows Startup Process Phases of the Startup Process (continued) Phase III: Boot Loader Phase NTLDR (the boot loader) takes control Switches the processor to protected mode Starts the files system code Reads the BOOT.INI file In some cases, displays the OS Selection menu If a Windows NT family OS is selected, NTLDR remains in control and moves to the next phase

38. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-38 The Windows Startup Process Phases of the Startup Process (continued) Phase IV: Detect and Configure Hardware NTLDR starts NTDETECT.COM NTDETECT.COM scans the hardware and gives the list to NTLDR for later inclusion in the registry

39. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-39 The Windows Startup Process Phases of the Startup Process (continued) Phase V: Kernel Loading NTLDR looks in BOOT.INI for location of NTOSKRNL NTLDR starts NTOSKRNL.EXE (the kernel) NTLDR passes on the hardware information NTLDR loads HAL.DLL NTLDR loads SYSTEM NTLDR loads drivers required at startup Kernel scans the registry for other components

40. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-40 The Windows Startup Process Phases of the Startup Process (continued) Phase V: Kernel Loading (continued) Kernel loads and initializes the components Kernel starts SMSS.EXE SMSS.EXE loads the kernel-mode Windows subsystem Windows switches from text mode to graphics mode Session manager starts user-mode Windows subsystem Session manager creates pagefile.sys Session manager starts the Windows logon service

41. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-41 The Windows Startup Process Phases of the Startup Process (continued) Phase VI: Logon WINLOGON supports logging on and logging off WINLOGON starts SERVICES.EXE WINLOGON starts LSASS.EXE The Begin Logon prompt appears WINLOGON responds to Ctrl-Alt-Delete by displaying the Logon to Windows dialog box

42. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-42 The Windows Startup Process Phases of the Startup Process (continued) Phase VI: Logon (continued) User enters a user name and password Logon scripts are run Startup programs for various applications are run Non-critical services are started Programs and services are started from several locations Various registry settings Startup folders created in the profiles for All Users and for currently logged on user

43. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-43 The Windows Startup Process Modifying System Startup with the BOOT.INI File Contains the locations of systemroot Contains location for system files of an alternate OS Text file that can be edited directly or indirectly

44. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-44 The Windows Startup Process Modifying System Startup with the BOOT.INI File (continued) Lines beginning with "Multi" provide location of systemroot. [boot loader] timeout=30 default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(2)\WINDOWS [operating systems] multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(2)\WINDOWS= "Microsoft XP" /fastdetect

45. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-45 Troubleshooting Windows Problems Cooperative Troubleshooting Elicit problem symptoms from customers Have customers reproduce errors as part of the diagnostics process Identify recent changes to the computer by the user

46. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-46 Troubleshooting Windows Problems Proactive Tasks Keeping Windows Updated Windows XP Service Pack 2 Configuring Automatic Update Working with Windows Update Using Runas Command-line program for running a single command using a user account other than the one currently logged on. Use when logged on as an ordinary user, and needing to run a single command requiring administrative rights

47. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-47 Troubleshooting Windows Problems Step-by-Step 8.03 Create and Test a Runas Shortcut Page 409

48. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-48 Troubleshooting Windows Problems Create Startup Disks Windows NT/2000/XP startup disks Only contain the boot files Cannot start up Windows completely unless the system files are located on the hard disk Use when boot files are damaged on the hard drive Start with this disk to bypass the hard disk boot files Format floppy disk in Windows Copy to the floppy: NTLDR, NTDETECT.COM, BOOT.INI, and NTBOOTDD.SYS (if present)

49. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-49 Troubleshooting Windows Problems Step-by-Step 8.04 Creating and Testing a Windows Startup Disk Page 411

50. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-50 Troubleshooting Windows Problems Create Startup Disks (continued) MS-DOS and Windows 98 Startup Disks Both run MS-DOS Cannot start up Windows completely unless the system files are located on the hard disk Use when boot files are damaged on the hard drive Start with this disk to by-pass the hard disk boot files Format floppy disk in Windows Copy to the floppy: NTLDR, NTDETECT.COM, BOOT.INI, and NTBOOTDD.SYS (if present)

51. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-51 Troubleshooting Windows Problems Back up Data Files and the Registry Before making changes, back up data files and registry Back up a portion of the registry using Regedit Back up entire registry using a backup program Third-party backup programs More options; and a greater variety of media Windows Backup (NTBACKUP) NT version only backs up to tape Windows 2000/XP versions back up to any hard disk or network location (providing permissions allows)

52. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-52 Troubleshooting Windows Problems Alerts Notification triggered by defined system event Windows NT 4.0 Control Panel | Server applet Predefined events only; cannot specify events Can only define who receives alerts Windows 2000/XP Performance Logs and Alerts node of Computer Management Selectable triggering events Example: when disk space reaches 80% capacity Action can be more than an alert

53. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-53 Troubleshooting Windows Problems Step-by-Step 8.05 Configuring an Alert Page 414

54. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-54 Troubleshooting Windows Problems Troubleshooting with Event Viewer Event Logs System Events OS Components Drivers, services, etc. Application events Office suites, etc. Windows components that run in the GUI Events recorded by Dr. Watson applet Security events Only logged if auditing turned on and events selected

55. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-55 Troubleshooting Windows Problems Troubleshooting with Event Viewer (continued) Configuring and Saving Event Logs Properties for each log file allow setting of maximum size and action to take when the log file is full Actions: clear each log file, save log file to view later, open a previously saved log file, and create multiple views Use context menu of log file to access actions

56. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-56 Troubleshooting Windows Problems Solving Problems by Modifying the Registry Modified automatically when … Windows Setup is run A new device is installed A device is configured Changes are made though Control Panel applets A change is made in the OS or an application Direct Registry modification is part of some problem solutions Only do this when there is no other choice

57. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-57 Troubleshooting Windows Problems Step-by-Step 8.06 Modifying the Registry Page 420

58. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-58 Troubleshooting Windows Problems Last Known Good Configuration Recovery Startup option in Windows NT family of OSs Selects the last configuration changes set before the last successful user logon How to: Windows NT 4.0 Select OS from OS selection menu Press space bar to bring up Last Known Good Menu Press L to switch to the last known good configuration Windows 2000 and Windows XP Press F8 after the POST and before Windows “splash” screen appears Select Last Known Good Configuration

59. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-59 Troubleshooting Windows Problems Troubleshooting Startup Problems with the Windows Startup Disk NTLDR or NTDETECT.COM is missing Boot with Windows startup disk, and copy the missing file from A:\ to C:\ NTOSKRNL is invalid or missing Usually indicates that BOOT.INI is missing, damaged, or contains incorrect path Boot with Windows startup disk, and copy BOOT.INI file from A:\ to C:\

60. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-60 Troubleshooting Windows Problems Troubleshooting Startup Problems with Startup Modes Windows NT 4.0 Startup Options are limited Normal Windows startup Windows startup with standard VGA driver Windows 2000 and Windows XP Professional Safe Mode – minus several drivers and components Safe Mode with Networking – like above, with networking enabled Safe Mode with command prompt – a command prompt as a user interface (EXPLORER not started)

61. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-61 Troubleshooting Windows Problems Step-by-Step 8.07 Using Safe Mode Page 424

62. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-62 Troubleshooting Windows Problems Troubleshooting Startup Problems with Startup Modes (continued) Windows 2000 and Windows XP Professional (continued) Enable Boot Logging Enable VGA Mode Directory Services Restore Mode (domain controllers) Debugging Mode Start Windows Normally Reboot Return to OS Choices Menu

63. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-63 Troubleshooting Windows Problems Troubleshooting Device Problems Device manager shows a yellow exclamation mark next to a device with a problem Problem may be hardware, driver, or the ability of the OS to automatically configure it Double-click device icon to open Properties Use Troubleshoot button to find problem resolution

64. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-64 Troubleshooting Windows Problems Step-by-Step 8.08 Working with Device Manager Page 427

65. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-65 Troubleshooting Windows Problems Recovery Options Advanced options beyond Safe Mode Emergency Repair Process Recovery Console System Restore Automated System Recovery (ASR)

66. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-66 Chapter Summary Understanding the Registry The registry is a database of all configuration settings in Windows. Avoid directly editing the registry, because you can cause severe damage. The Control Panel applets provide a safe way to edit the registry.

67. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-67 Chapter Summary Understanding the Registry The registry is created during Windows setup, (and modified) anytime a setup or installation program is run after that, and during startup and shutdown. It is also modified anytime a device driver is installed, and whenever any application, Windows component, or device is configured.

68. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-68 Chapter Summary Understanding the Registry Most of the registry is saved in several files, called hives. They include SYSTEM, SOFTWARE, SECURITY, SAM, DEFAULT, and NTUSER.DAT. Two registry editors are found in Windows— Regedit.exe and Regedt32.exe. Until Windows XP, these were two separate editors with different features. Beginning with Windows XP, either command name brings up the same new and improved version of the registry editor.

69. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-69 Chapter Summary Understanding the Registry The registry is viewed in a hierarchical folder structure in Registry Editor. A key is a folder object that can contain one or more sets of settings as well as other keys. The five top-level keys, or root keys, in the registry are called subtrees. A key that exists within another key is called a subkey.

70. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-70 Chapter Summary Understanding the Registry Settings within a key are called value entries. Each value entry has a name, type, and data. The permanent portions of the registry are contained in the registry hives, saved in the files. HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Hardware contains the temporary portion of the registry, the information gathered during hardware detection during each Windows startup.

71. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-71 Chapter Summary Working with Device Drivers A device driver is program code created by the device manufacturer that allows an OS to control a physical device. Look for device drivers on the floppy disk or CD that comes with a device, or at the web site of the manufacturer. You must be logged on as Administrator or a member of the Administrators group to install any device driver in Windows.

72. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-72 Chapter Summary Working with Device Drivers Once a device has been installed, a user may disconnect and reconnect the device without restriction—the driver will not be uninstalled. Code signing is designed to avoid problems caused by badly written code. It involves a digital signature, provided by Microsoft as a seal of approval of program code.

73. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-73 Chapter Summary Working with Device Drivers Windows uses a process called file signature verification to check for code signing, and an administrator can configure what action Windows takes when it detects code that does not contain a digital signature. Con- figure with the Driver Signing button located on the Hardware page of the System applet.

74. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-74 Chapter Summary Working with Device Drivers Always read the manufacturer’s docu- mentation, and follow the instructions before attempting to install a device driver, whether it is plug-and-play or not.

75. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-75 Chapter Summary Working with Device Drivers When an administrator installs or connects a plug-and-play device to a Windows computer, the device will be automatically detected, and the driver will be installed and configured with little or no interaction from the user, except to provide the device driver disk if requested.

76. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-76 Chapter Summary Working with Device Drivers Plug-and-play devices connected to USB or IEEE 1394 (FireWire) can be disconnected without restarting Windows. Install non-plug-and-play devices by using the manufacturer's instructions and installa- tion program, if available. If the device does not come with an installation program, and you have the correct device drivers, use the Add New Hardware applet in Control Panel.

77. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-77 Chapter Summary Working with Device Drivers Device Manager is the tool in Windows 2000 and Windows XP for managing and troubleshooting device problems. A hardware profile includes the registry keys that contain the settings defining the devices that must be started during Windows startup, the files associated with each device, and configuration settings for each device.

78. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-78 Chapter Summary Working with Device Drivers Most Windows computers, especially desktops, only have a single hardware profile. Hardware profiles are very handy for a laptop computer that has two or more configurations, usually including one when it is connected to a docking station and another when it is undocked.

79. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-79 Chapter Summary Managing Performance in Windows Windows performance settings are available on the Advanced tab of the System Properties dialog box, but you should not have to make any changes to these settings, because Windows automatically adjusts to system changes to provide good performance.

80. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-80 Chapter Summary Managing Performance in Windows Visual effects include treatments of the GUI that make Windows more visually interesting and even fun to use, but which may come at a price—the use of processor and memory. The Advanced page of Performance Options has even more settings, including Processor Scheduling, Memory Usage, and Virtual Memory.

81. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-81 Chapter Summary Managing Performance in Windows When a Windows computer is running low on memory for the operating system and any loaded application programs, it will use and manage a portion of disk space as RAM. This is called virtual memory. Windows virtual memory uses a paging file called PAGEFILE.SYS, which is usually located on the root of C:.

82. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-82 Chapter Summary Managing Performance in Windows Normally, Windows manages virtual memory, adjusting for changing memory needs, but an administrator can control the size, location, and even the number of paging files.

83. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-83 Chapter Summary Managing Performance in Windows Performance monitoring is something that is usually done on network servers, not on Windows desktop computers. Server administrators use performance monitoring to ensure that the quality of service is maintained, and as an early warning of potential problems that can show up first as performance problems.

84. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-84 Chapter Summary Managing Performance in Windows Beginning with Windows 2000, Performance Monitor is replaced by a console called Performance containing two nodes: System Monitor and Performance Logs and Alerts. System Monitor, available in both Windows 2000 and Windows XP Professional, allows an administrator to gather and view perform- ance data involving memory, disk, processor, network, and other objects.

85. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-85 Chapter Summary Managing Performance in Windows The Performance Logs and Alert node in the Performance console actually allows three types of activities—creating alerts and creating two types of log files: counter and trace. The FAT file system supported in Windows 2000 and Windows XP includes FAT12, FAT16, and FAT32.

86. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-86 Chapter Summary Windows File Systems Windows NT 4.0 supports FAT12, FAT16, FAT32, and NTFS4. The NTFS5 file system is supported in both Windows 2000 and Windows XP.

87. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-87 Chapter Summary Windows File Systems The CD-ROM File System (CDFS) allows Windows OSs to read CD-ROMs and to read and write to writeable CDs (CD-R) and rewriteable CDs (CD-RW). Windows NT 4.0 does not natively support any writeable or rewriteable CDs.

88. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-88 Chapter Summary Windows File Systems The universal disk format (UDF) is a file system driver required for Windows to read DVD ROMs and to read and write DVD-R and DVD-RW. Windows XP has a DVD-RAM driver that supports the 4.7GB DVD-RAM disk standards.

89. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-89 Chapter Summary Windows Startup Process The Windows boot files, used during the boot sequence of startup, are NTLDR, NTDETECT.COM, BOOT.INI, and NTBOOTDD.SYS. The Windows system files, used during the load sequence of Windows startup, are NTOSKRNL.EXE, SYSTEM, and many components and driver files.

90. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-90 Chapter Summary Windows Startup Process A Windows startup disk is created by formatting a diskette and copying the boot files from the root of C: to the root of A:. A Windows startup disk can be used in case of damage to the boot files on an NT computer.

91. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-91 Chapter Summary Windows Startup Process There are several phases to the Windows startup process: Power-On Self-Test (POST), initial startup, boot loader, detect and con- figure hardware, logon, and plug-and-play device detection. You can view System, Application, and Security logs in Event Viewer.

92. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-92 Chapter Summary Troubleshooting Windows Problems Cooperative troubleshooting is a method to use when troubleshooting problems on another person's computer. It involves Eliciting problem symptoms from customers Having customers reproduce errors as part of the diagnostics process Identifying recent changes to the computer by the user

93. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-93 Chapter Summary Troubleshooting Windows Problems Several proactive tasks make trouble- shooting easier, or even preventable. These include keeping Windows updated, knowing how to use administrative tools like the Runas command, preparing startup disks for each computer, maintaining backups, backing up the registry, and configuring alerts.

94. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-94 Chapter Summary Troubleshooting Windows Problems Automatic Update is provided with Windows XP, Windows 2000 (SP3 or later), and Windows Server 2003. It can be configured to automatically download critical updates and, optionally, to automatically install them.

95. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-95 Chapter Summary Troubleshooting Windows Problems Windows Update is an application that connects to Microsoft's Windows Update web site, checks the status of your computer, and then provides a list of critical and recommended updates that you may choose to download and install. Runas is a command-line command that allows you to run a single command using a user account other than the one with which you logged on.

96. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-96 Chapter Summary Troubleshooting Windows Problems A startup disk allows you to start up a computer from the floppy disk drive, a handy thing to do when you troubleshoot startup problems. The Windows NT 4.0, Windows 2000, and Windows XP startup disks are similar and can only be used through the detect and configure hardware phases; after that, there must be Windows system files on the hard disk to complete the Windows startup.

97. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-97 Chapter Summary Troubleshooting Windows Problems A Windows 98 or MS-DOS startup disk will boot up a computer to the command prompt from which you can run a variety of MS-DOS programs, including FDISK to partition a hard disk or FORMAT to format a hard drive. Maintain current backups of the entire system and the registry so that you can restore a system to its previous state after troubleshooting.

98. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-98 Chapter Summary Troubleshooting Windows Problems The Windows Backup program in Windows NT 4.0 will back up the registry when the system partition is selected for backup. In Windows 2000 and Windows XP Professional, the Windows Backup program will back up the registry when System State is selected.

99. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-99 Chapter Summary Troubleshooting Windows Problems An administrator can configure alerts to warn of events that could lead to problems if not dealt with. Use Event Viewer to view logs of system, security, and application events, paying attention to the warning and error logs for messages that can be used to solve problems. While directly editing the registry should be avoided, learn how to edit it in case a registry edit is the only way to solve a problem.

100. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-100 Chapter Summary Troubleshooting Windows Problems Last Known Good Configuration is a startup option that will select the last set of configuration changes since the last successful user logon. Use a Windows startup disk to troubleshoot and solve problems with startup that involve damaged or missing boot files.

101. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-101 Chapter Summary Troubleshooting Windows Problems Windows NT 4.0, Windows 2000, and Win- dows XP all have a startup option called VGA mode that can be used successfully when there is a problem with a manufactur- er's video driver. Windows 2000 and Windows XP have Safe Mode startup options, inherited from Windows 98. They include Safe Mode, Safe Mode With Networking, and Safe Mode With Command Prompt.

102. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-102 Chapter Summary Troubleshooting Windows Problems Device Manager is the primary tool for trouble- shooting device problems. A yellow exclama- tion mark on a device in Device Manager indicates a problem. Open the properties dialog box to see an explanation. Use Device Manager to uninstall, update, and remove device drivers. You can also use it to disable a device without removing the driver.

103. McGraw-Hill/Irwin© 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 8-103 Chapter Summary Troubleshooting Windows Problems Windows Recovery options include the Emergency Repair Process (Windows NT 4.0 and Windows 2000), the Recovery Console (beginning with Windows 2000), System Restore (beginning with Windows Me), and Automated System Recovery (beginning with Windows XP Professional).