News from PANUG - September 4, 2001

WINDOWS XP - A TEST DRIVE
by Christian Bayer

I just finished installing and configuring Windows XP Corporate
Edition, final code. As much as I hate to admit it, this isn't
too bad. Microsoft is calling this the biggest thing since
Windows 95 and my initial impressions are consistent with this
claim. While there are some glaring flaws, overall, I think it
may be a legitimate "upgrade" to Windows 95 worth buying. While
this is after a mere couple hours of use, it seems it might be
OK. Many of the ridiculous problems I had with RC1 have been
fixed.

My system is an Intel (brand) 440BX mainboard with ESS 1371/73
integrated audio, a Celeron 500 running at 650Mhz (soldering
iron required), 100Mhz FSB, 384Mb RAM, STB Velocity 4400
(NVIDIA TNT), Mitsumi CD-R, Toshiba DVD, ZIP 250, LS-120,
ORB 2.2Gb, two Quantum Fireball HDD, Promise Ultra 33 IDE card,
MultiTech WinModem, Intel NIC, Intel PCMCIA, 2.88 FDD, Iomega TR-3
tape drive (not recognized by Win2K or XP, works fine in NT and
98 SE), Brooktree video capture/TV card (does not work in any
Microsoft - OS/2 derived, David Cutler hacked, "Operating System"
such as NT, Win2K, XP), Infrared Port (unknown whether it's working).

All seem to be working/recognized except as noted. They even included
some wallpaper I like, a first. The system happily tri-boots 98SE
lite (98lite.net), Win2K, and XP. While I have yet to figure out how
to fully rip out Internet Explorer, my success in Win2K makes it seem
likely. The look and feel is a flattering imitation of OS X, good
thing there are some inovators in the industry. :)

Overall, if you can stomach the excessive disk space required, this
may be a worthy competitor to REAL operating systems on the desktop
(I'm sure security, stability, and performance issues will prevent
the prudent from employing it in any server role. Microsoft's
track record in this area is so bad I don't think there's much hope
for them). Also, XP, in my opinion, is waving a gigantic red flag
with "SHERMAN ANTI-TRUST VIOLATION" boldly emblazoned on it. The
courts have decided they are criminals and I tend to agree.

FORCING A BLUE SCREEN OF DEATH
by Ed Sawicki

Windows 2000 includes a feature that enables you to manually
force a Blue Screen of Death. No joke. The practical application
for this is elusive. This feature is disabled by default. To
enable it, bring up regedit and go here:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\i8042prt\P
arameters

Now create a new DWORD value called "CrashOnCtrlScroll" and set
it to "1".

You can crash your system by holding down the right CTRL key
and pressing the SCROLL LOCK key twice. Using the left CTRL
key does not work.

I don't recommend trying this on a system that you store data
on. I don't know if disk cache housekeeping is taken care of
before the crash.


JOB AVAILABLE
by James Michael Harnett

A Tigard-based company is looking for a consultant to set up DHCP
on Novell 5.11 and recommend the best way to integrate or not
integrate DHCP services into the Novell Tree. The company mentions
that they want a CNE.

Contact Raven Winter at 503.443.2000 if you're interested.