Posts tagged: fix

Workaround/solution for Audio crash/hang loud beep after a certain period – rt5650 on HP Chromebook G5

By , 2023-01-09 19:16

Installing Ubuntu 22.04 or Linux Mint on an HP Chromebook G5 EE works fine, except for the audio hanging and producing a loud beep until pulseaudio is restarted. The solution :

On 12/18/22 7:02 AM, Mark Hills wrote:
HP Chromebook (11a, G5 “Setzer”) uses snd_soc_sst_cht_bsw_rt5645 module
and presents a device “rt5650”.

can you share the result of ‘aplay -l’, wondering which platform driver you are using.
Audio works briefly, until after about 30 seconds it’s interrupted by a
square wave or short buffer cycling.

If this is with the SOF driver, there’s a known issue and a known workaround, please add this to /etc/modprobe.d/alsa-base.conf

options snd_sof sof_debug=1
— Read on www.spinics.net/lists/alsa-devel/msg151538.html

Taking back control of updates in Windows 10

By , 2017-01-15 18:35

Microsoft’s latest OS brings a lot of improvements and changes to Windows. One particularly significant change is the way Windows Update works. By default, Windows Update will decide on its own when it wants to restart your computer – be it in the middle of rendering video, uploading or downloading a large file, or even in the middle of a competitive gaming session:

There are a few steps you can take however to make living with Windows 10 more bearable and stop it from interrupting activities on your computer.

Unfortunately, these steps only work on Windows 10 Pro, Enterprise and Education editions.

Part 1: Local Group Policy

  1. Run the Local Group Policy Editor tool by typing “gpedit.msc” into the Run dialog box.
  2. Navigate to Computer Configuration > Administrative Templates > Windows Components > Windows Update
  3. The policies we are interested in are Configure Automatic Updates and No auto-restart with logged on users for scheduled automatic updates installations.
  4. Set both policies to Enabled, then for Configure Automatic Updates, configure the options as shown:
    2 – Notify for download and notify for install
  5. This should take care of preventing your computer from restarting automatically when it feels like it.

Part 2: Disabling Updates are available nag screen

OK, so now you’ve got the automatic updates disabled. But you’ve been a bit lax with your updates and haven’t manually installed them in a while. So Windows 10 presents you with this:

Which is good, because you really should keep your computer up-to-date for both your own and others’ security online.

However, there are some cases where this screen can be incredibly annoying – on a digital signage box, on an HTPC, or on a gaming computer for example – since it interrupts whatever you are doing with an un-closeable prompt, much like adware.

The good news is that there is a way to disable it. It’s a bit less “official”, so it may not work for you, but so far so good for me.

From an elevated Command Prompt, run the following commands.

cd /d "%Windir%\System32"
takeown /F MusNotification.exe
icacls MusNotification.exe /deny Everyone:(X)
takeown /F MusNotificationUx.exe
icacls MusNotificationUx.exe /deny Everyone:(X)

Warning: I don’t advocate running commands without knowing what they do or trusting the source, and since you might not trust me, I’ll explain what the commands do.

First we Change Directory (cd) to the Windows system32 folder. Then, we take ownership of the file MusNotification.exe and deny Everyone (including the system itself) from eXecuting it. Then we repeat the process for MusNotificationUx.exe.

And that’s it!

Using multiple Gmail accounts with mailto: links in Firefox

By , 2012-08-19 20:36

For a while now, Google has allowed you to sign in to multiple Google accounts and switch back and forth between them quite easily. Firefox also allows you to use Gmail as the default application for mailto: links.

This is all fine and dandy, until you click a mailto: link and decide you don’t want to send that e-mail using your primary Gmail account. In my case, this happens when replying to posts on craigslist. I always assumed there wasn’t a “clean” solution, resigning myself to copying and pasting the e-mail and subject lines, or even at times clicking the mailto: link on my Android phone, which allows me to select any account on my phone to send the e-mail from.

Finally decided to do some research and found a solution on the mozillazine forums.

To summarize:

  1. Go to about:config in Firefox
  2. Set gecko.handlerService.allowRegisterFromDifferentHost = true
  3. Open the Web Developer scratchpad. (Firefox> Web Developer> Scratchpad or Tools>Web Developer > Scratchpad)
  4. In the scratchpad, type the following line of JavaScript:
navigator.registerProtocolHandler("mailto",
  "https://mail.google.com/mail/b/[email protected]/?extsrc=mailto&url=%s",
  "Description of your Gmail Account");
  1. Repeat the line as many times as necessary, once for each of your Gmail accounts.
  2. Once you have created all the necessary lines, go to Execute > Run.
  3. The “information bar” will pop up in your main Firefox window, asking you if you want to add your Gmail account as a handler for mailto: links. Accept once for each account.
  4. That’s it. Now when you click a mailto: link, you’ll be prompted which Gmail account to use.

"Combo Fix" for Windows XP

By , 2009-09-26 21:53

My cousin was having some issues with missing desktop icons and taskbar on a Windows box. Some googling brought up ComboFix. Reading the description, it looks like it could be a handy tool, and from a trusted computer repair/diagnostics site.

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