Windows Vista
About a year ago or more I posted a rather large article about my experiances while testing out a very early edition of Windows Vista. I haven't had a chance to play with any of the newer versions, only kmnow what I see on other sites or blogs. I remember digging around in the system32 folder at the time though and finding alot of odd tools and utilities. I will list them with my original descriptions below.
A couple of new things I notices while digging through the system32 folder, which may or may not be visible in other places of the operating system, are……
DFD- This tool is a hard drive failure detection and backup tool. From what I could gather, it looks like if the system detects a problem with the hard drive it prompts you to do a backup. I didn’t run the whole tool so not sure what it backs up or if you can change any settings.
Port Assist Viewer-Not sure what this is good for.
Dr. Watson-Yeah, unfortunately, he’s back.
DirectX Diagnostic Tool-Never needed one before, wondering what they know that I don’t as to why I will need one in the future.
Equinox Logger-I have no idea, but the name sounds scary....or cool, or cool scary.
Equinox Loopback-Cool scary's evil twin brother, and I still have no idea what it is.
Private Character Editor-Looks like you can design your own icons with this, which is pretty cool if you have the time.
Event To Trap Translator-According to Microsoft this is in XP, never seen it nor used it but they say “Configures the translation of events to traps, trap destinations, or both based on information in a configuration file.”…….um……ok, if you say so.
Bluetooth File Transfer Wizard-Now this I could see being very useful in the future with all the Bluetooth compatible devices hitting the market these days.
Getmac.exe-You got to love this. A tool to retrieve the built in MAC address………or is it now? I think with Winux they should also have a GetLinux.exe.
Narrator.exe-Only the interface of this looks slightly different with Vista from XP, with a few more options when starting up and a few other ways of getting to it through the system.
P2PHost.exe-Nope that’s not a typo. This thing actually has a p2phost built in. How long before that gets exploited and run silently from a remote machine. Looks like Microsoft has had it around for awhile, you can read more about it Here For a system that is supposed to be all it can be in the security area, this doesn’t seem like a very good step in the right direction.
They try to give it an innocent name in the task bar by calling it a “Collaboration Host”.
“No your honor, my client wasn’t using Emule to download files, he was simply using a collaboration host with other associates.”
Qclintfy.exe-This looks like a tool for network administrators to install updates or files remotely. Whenever I clicked on the .exe a message in the lower right hand corner would pop up stating “Your network administrator has finished updating your computer. Network access is restored” Could be handy, and also could be dangerous.
ScreenReader-Another text-to-speech tool.
Sdclt.exe-Back-up system for documents or something of the sort.
Shvcnfg.exe-This one is really handy if you use your own firewall and antivirus and don’t want Microsoft to keep bugging you all the time that its own firewall is not on. This gives you options to disable things like “Must have firewall”, “must have antivirus”, “must have auto updates turned on” "must switch to Linux".....ok so I added the last one.
If you’re running a system not connected to the internet or only a local intranet then you should have the option to turn these annoying little pop-up bubbles off, and it looks like this tool will allow just that.
Toggle.exe-If this works even close as it sounds to its description this good be a godsend for stopping Spyware and viruses, on the other hand it could also be very annoying depending on just how much it tries to stop. Here is the description I got when the tool opened “Windows is helping make your computer more secure by asking for your permission before making changes that requires admin rights. Do you want to turn this off.” Like I said, this could be a wonderful addition, or it could also be a very annoying tool.
Wercon.exe-New look on an old tool. Seems a bit of a twist on the help and solution center we are used to in XP. The title of the program is “Solutions to problems”, followed by “solve problems on your computer”. It gives a few options on the side like, “check for new solutions”, (assuming this is just windows update) “Review problems and check”, “View problem history”, “clear history”. Will wait to see how well this works, more then likely it will check for updates to software and hardware on your system including windows update, and I am sure it will also look into the event viewer for recorded problems.
I'm curious to know if anyone has seen these tools or tried to use any of them with the newer releases of Vista and what your thoughts are.
A couple of new things I notices while digging through the system32 folder, which may or may not be visible in other places of the operating system, are……
DFD- This tool is a hard drive failure detection and backup tool. From what I could gather, it looks like if the system detects a problem with the hard drive it prompts you to do a backup. I didn’t run the whole tool so not sure what it backs up or if you can change any settings.
Port Assist Viewer-Not sure what this is good for.
Dr. Watson-Yeah, unfortunately, he’s back.
DirectX Diagnostic Tool-Never needed one before, wondering what they know that I don’t as to why I will need one in the future.
Equinox Logger-I have no idea, but the name sounds scary....or cool, or cool scary.
Equinox Loopback-Cool scary's evil twin brother, and I still have no idea what it is.
Private Character Editor-Looks like you can design your own icons with this, which is pretty cool if you have the time.
Event To Trap Translator-According to Microsoft this is in XP, never seen it nor used it but they say “Configures the translation of events to traps, trap destinations, or both based on information in a configuration file.”…….um……ok, if you say so.
Bluetooth File Transfer Wizard-Now this I could see being very useful in the future with all the Bluetooth compatible devices hitting the market these days.
Getmac.exe-You got to love this. A tool to retrieve the built in MAC address………or is it now? I think with Winux they should also have a GetLinux.exe.
Narrator.exe-Only the interface of this looks slightly different with Vista from XP, with a few more options when starting up and a few other ways of getting to it through the system.
P2PHost.exe-Nope that’s not a typo. This thing actually has a p2phost built in. How long before that gets exploited and run silently from a remote machine. Looks like Microsoft has had it around for awhile, you can read more about it Here For a system that is supposed to be all it can be in the security area, this doesn’t seem like a very good step in the right direction.
They try to give it an innocent name in the task bar by calling it a “Collaboration Host”.
“No your honor, my client wasn’t using Emule to download files, he was simply using a collaboration host with other associates.”
Qclintfy.exe-This looks like a tool for network administrators to install updates or files remotely. Whenever I clicked on the .exe a message in the lower right hand corner would pop up stating “Your network administrator has finished updating your computer. Network access is restored” Could be handy, and also could be dangerous.
ScreenReader-Another text-to-speech tool.
Sdclt.exe-Back-up system for documents or something of the sort.
Shvcnfg.exe-This one is really handy if you use your own firewall and antivirus and don’t want Microsoft to keep bugging you all the time that its own firewall is not on. This gives you options to disable things like “Must have firewall”, “must have antivirus”, “must have auto updates turned on” "must switch to Linux".....ok so I added the last one.
If you’re running a system not connected to the internet or only a local intranet then you should have the option to turn these annoying little pop-up bubbles off, and it looks like this tool will allow just that.
Toggle.exe-If this works even close as it sounds to its description this good be a godsend for stopping Spyware and viruses, on the other hand it could also be very annoying depending on just how much it tries to stop. Here is the description I got when the tool opened “Windows is helping make your computer more secure by asking for your permission before making changes that requires admin rights. Do you want to turn this off.” Like I said, this could be a wonderful addition, or it could also be a very annoying tool.
Wercon.exe-New look on an old tool. Seems a bit of a twist on the help and solution center we are used to in XP. The title of the program is “Solutions to problems”, followed by “solve problems on your computer”. It gives a few options on the side like, “check for new solutions”, (assuming this is just windows update) “Review problems and check”, “View problem history”, “clear history”. Will wait to see how well this works, more then likely it will check for updates to software and hardware on your system including windows update, and I am sure it will also look into the event viewer for recorded problems.
I'm curious to know if anyone has seen these tools or tried to use any of them with the newer releases of Vista and what your thoughts are.
posted by Mr. Cheese @ 11:58 AM
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