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What Would You Put Into A Software Survival Kit?
LosManos asks: "A call for help to the Everyday Heroes that are out there: I have just returned from a 4 months scientific expedition to some of the more remote parts of the South Pacific. As soon as people we met found out that I was a computer guy they asked me to help them and all to often I had to reply that I didn't have the tools.This got me thinking; what should a software toolbox consist of? OS, patches, digital books, compilers, sniffers, servers, harddisk restore apps...? Please remember that the computers I met where often old and slow. The answers to this could be interesting also when you are not several days away from nearest inhabited island. I mean, what is it that most often break? How is it usually fixed? Are more fancy solutions more error prone?" If you were to create a "first aid kit" consisting of CDs, disks, books and other technical utilities you have used to resurrect dead systems, what would you put in it?
"So far I have found:
- A utility for reading and repairing hard disks
- 'regmon' and 'filemon' from Sysinternals
- Video drivers (but I don't know which)
- A diskette for booting MSDOS with CD support
- Digital books (but I don't know which)
- Remote controlling tools, such as VNC
- CDs with OS (but there are hundreds of those)"
And maybe Norton Utilities. Those are great for when things go wrong.
Bring a copy of Knoppix and a copy of FIRE(Forensic Incident Response Environment.
Nothing I've found that those two can't handle.
I'll be interested in hearing just what sort of essential software I'd need about my person to help complete strangers fix their 'puters on holiday! Then I can make damned sure I don't have any of it ;-)
Code, Hardware, stuff like that.
M$ Boot Disks
7 0.html?tag= list
/ pstools .shtml
If you have to build a boot disk for a M$ machine, putergeek is
invaluable since M$ doesn't seem to want to you to boot to a DOS
prompt any more. You can find Win95B, WinME and Dos Bootdisks.
http://www.putergeek.com/downloads/
RegClean
If you do any development using COM or ActiveX components then
RegClean is a must have tool for fixing registry problems.
http://download.com.com/3000-2094-8814
PsTools
Listed in the Article are FileMon and RegMon from
Sysinternals.com, but I would add PsTools to that list. This
suite of tools is incredibly useful for diagnosing and solving a
vast array of problems. PsKill is probably my most frequently
used tool when I need to actually KILL a process instead of
politely requesting it to exit via End Task.
Oh and nearly everything works on remote machines as well.
http://www.sysinternals.com/ntw2k/freeware
MDAC Utility
If you have to deal with programs accessing a variety of
Microsoft Data Access sources, the MDAC Component Checker is
essential. It's unbelievable to me how typical it is that MDAC
get's corrupted.
www.microsoft.com/data
Unfortunately, most of the essential tools relate to Microsoft
Software, but the reality is that it seems to be more difficult
to find "good" utilities to trouble shoot and fix problems under
a Microsoft OS than pretty much any other OS I've worked on.
Microsoft also publishes a tool that will automatically identify
any known security vulnerabilites that need to be patched, but I
can't find the link off hand. Again for a Microsoft OS it is
pretty handy.
Doug Tolton
"The destruction of a value which is, will not bring value to that which isn't." -John Galt
http://www.memtest86.com/ It's helped me any number of times when I was beating my head against the wall over a weird problem. It's just a diagnostic tool, though.
- Jonathan
There's also a good summary page of rescue discs that are available. Didn't look at windows specifically but I have used this to mount and fix various FAT type partitions. NTFS may be a slightly different animal.
Single-floppy linux boot with a tremendous array of rear-end saving utilities.
You have to include fortune. It's nice to have somthing to read when you are frustrated to lighten the situation.
These and a DOS floppy with the right kinds of tools (fdisk, format, edit, etc.) have saved my bacon so many times that I've lost count
Hmm, maybe you'd better include calc in your list then...
Code, Hardware, stuff like that.
here is FIRE
You can't judge a book by the way it wears its hair.
I was a Peace Corps Volunteer in Thailand back in the mid 90's and was often asked to "look" at someone's computer.
With computers so expensive and knowledge about them so rare, these people were usually VIPs - the governor of the province, dean of a local university, important businesspeople... It behooved me to scratch their back so that they'd later help me.
Now remember, this was when Windows '95 was still brand new and a lot of people in Thailand still used DOS. CDROMs weren't in widespread use yet (I think if anything, the CDROM built Panthip Plaza - a bootleggers heaven!)
I found myself carrying around a complete set of MSDOS 6.22 disks, a Win95 CDROM and a couple of custom made boot disks - with things like FDISK, SCANDISK and such on them as well as a few floppies with common drivers on them.
Biggest hardware problem I saw on a regular basis was floppy and CD drives crapping out due to the dust in the air and, of course, moldy floppies (110 degrees F and 100% humidity will grow mold on ANYTHING that doesn't move and a lot of things that do!)
Ah, those were the days...
About two years ago I created my own bootable CD that contained the Cab files for Windows 95, 98, 98SE and ME, along with scripts for unattended installs for each of them. This CD has saved me countless of hours. Can't really do the same for 2000 and XP, more's the pity. I also made a second CD that contained a full install of Internet Explorer 6 for all OS versions. It's amazing how many problems you can fix in Windows just be installing the latest version of IE. I also carry around of set of floppy disks with me:
Maxblast - Maxtor tool for copying hard drives, works with other brands too. I prefer this to Ghost.
Powermax, SeaDiag, HDDiag, WD Lifeguard - Various manufacturers HD diagnostic disks
Offline NT password and reg editor - Need I say more?
---- El diablo esta en mis pantalones! Mire, mire!
The first thing I try to keep is a list of how to clear the BIOS settings for every computer I manage. You would be amazed at how dumb you feel if you have all these nifty CDROM/floppy based utilities and are unable to make the damn PC boot from anything other than the screwed up hard drive.
The second thing I keep is a NT password recovery disk. About 90% of my problems are based on not knowing the admin password for a machine that has been in some users closet for 3 years. The user suddenly needs the PC on his network, and there I am trying to figure out the admin password. The best disk I have found is here.
The third thing I keep is a Norton Utilities CDROM. You can boot off the CDROM and scan for a virus or diagnose a flaky hard drive.
I also keep a Gentoo live CD. I have thought about going over to Toms Boot Disk, but the Gentoo disk usually does what I need.
Although I don't carry it with me, I also keep a spare hard drive and a Win2k disk with all the latest patches and utilities that my company uses for the standard install. If worse comes to worse, I just move the users hard drive over to the secondary IDE and then install on a fresh hard drive. Then I can copy the users data onto the new hard drive. After that, the users old hard drive becomes my spare for the next user.
I also have a folder with a hard copy of every config for every switch, router, and other configurable device on my network. This folder also has IP address schemes, network maps, building diagrams, and user names and phone numbers. The folder also has a floppy with soft copies of the above, PuTTY, and a TFTP server for uploading into a router quickly.
I try to locate at least one geek for every office. I try to show this geek some of the details about his office. I let him have localadmin for the computers in his office. If the (l)users in his office need a printer reinstalled or otherwise need localadmin access, I direct them to their local geek. This also serves to deflect all the "my home PC is acting dumb and can you fix it" type users.
Finally, I try to write a "Why Stuff Breaks" document for all the major problems on my network. "User in office 12a keeps unplugging the switch so he can make coffee" type comments for common problems can help my minions diagnose a problem quickly.
I'd rather you do it wrong, than for me to have to do it at all.
More to the point, what else could possibly fit?
Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum viditur.
Use jv16 PowerTools. It is better and with more features! Console, analyzer, etc.
Ant(Dude) @ Quality Foraged Links (AQFL.net) & The Ant Farm (antfarm.ma.cx / antfarm.home.dhs.org).
The Free Software Foundation membership card is a bootable linux CD in the shape of a card. It has many nice utilities and it's Linux!
In my "tech kit" I've got:
/Library/Receipts folder with my up-to-date software update files
* A 20-GB iPod
- 10 GB of music (legal, I might add)
- All three MacOS 10.2 disk images
- The synchronized
- A MacOS 9.2.2 disk image
- An OS 9 bootable system folder with all stock cdevs/extensions, plus Toast's latest CD-R drivers. This'll probably change to an OS X folder in the next month or so.
- A copy of Norton Utilities
- A copy of Roxio Toast
- A copy of ResEdit
- Non-gimped PHP, Apache, GDLib, Freetype and mySQL packages (from Marc Liyanage, www.entropy.ch)
- Backups of my dialup fallback connection config files
- Various Free/Shareware files
* A leatherman
* A paper clip
* A smug look on my face when I say "Sorry, I'm a Mac guy"
No problem I can't fix in under an hour. Win troubleshooting, on the other hand, takes ridiculous amounts of time. You said you were on holiday -- right?
Lions and tigers and bears ... oh my!
:
Honestly though
Boot disks - make an emergency boot disk in Windows98. This thing makes a 2M RAMdrive, copies enough utils to jumpstart any computer, and CD drivers for every computer that can run 98 (which is pretty much all of them still running today.) I recommend this on a 3.5" floppy and also create a bootable CD using this as the boot image.
XTGold 2.0 or 2.5 - runs on DOS
ZTree 1.41 - in case they have a Windows environment 95 or higher running. Doesn't run in DOS but doesn't puke when the hard drive has more than 10,000 files on it.
McAfee Virus Scan, command line version.
Glonoinha the MebiByte Slayer
I maintain a large network, or at least 75 machines feels large, of computers spread across 12 locations. It is a point of sale network using a private WAN and an application hosted on linux servers. I must be able to repair a machine in one visit to be worth my money. I keep the following in a box in my trunk, and if I were you I would bubble wrap and ship two of each to your isolated destination.
:-))
60 gb hard drive
Cdrom
floppy drive
Socket/Slot 370 Motherboard (tyan board has both interfaces on one board)
Socket 370 cpu fan (coolermaster)
Case fan
DDR and SDRAM chips. I have a few PC100's and a few PC133's. The DDR is pc2100.
Power Supply -sparkle, full size 350w atx and smaller 175w
IDE and Floppy Cable
Power Supply Cable
50 pin scsi cable
68 pin scsi cable
68 pin lvd-se scsi cable
68 pin scsi terminator
Generic ati video card
Tekram scsi card
Several 10/100 nics
5-port switch
USB Switch
USB Cable
Print Server
Power strip
DC Adaptor with lots of tips in an altoids tin
Lots of tie straps (quick release)
Philips Head (not magnetized)
Straight Screwdriver
Small eyeglass screwdriver
Printer Cable
Several Cat-V Cables 6-ft to 50-ft
Several Phone Cables and line splitter
Extra DSL modem (our private wan is dsl-based)
DSL filters
Cdrom sound cable (fixes the "my cdrom only plays music through the headphone jack" problem
Power Cables intentionally redundant
Mouse/Keyboard extension cable
Mouse and Keyboard
AT-ps/2 adaptor for keyboards (I think it is AT)
PS/2 to usb adaptor
In my software pouch I have copies of:
Debian for PowerPC and i386
Redhat 8 (nearly outdated now,
Mandrake 9 for PowerPC and i386
Copies of win98, win2k, winxp, win95 (try to buy one of the recent issues that come with the Service Packs on cd. It is not current, but it is closer.)
Copy of Norton Antivirus (cd only, I need to add floppies)
Partition Magic (cd and floppy)
Partition Commander (I bought it without researching that it couldn't resize xp partitions)
Win98 boot floppy
A road-runner installation cd because I can install microsoft internet apps from it (sorry)
A cdr called stuff with securecrt, secureftp, wsftp, far, tridiavnc, mozilla, and openoffice
The most recent edition of Knoppix.(this is a sysutil dream unless the cdrom is bad or unbootable)
The name of the game is eliminating the variable, and if you have the diagnostic tools, working replacements, and enough time and patience you can track down the problem. It is a big box and I obviously have a business level budget, so to speak. I actually keep a ready to go machine that dual boots win98 and rhat8 in case I just want to swap it out and work on it at the house. All of this really would fit in a foot locker (not the spare machine unless a *small* case) that I am sure you can ship there with you next time. I hope others can suggest a comprehensive but generic enough book, I don't have one.
Success without humility is an indulgence in arrogance
Survival Gear for Macheads:
.TXT.
System Software:
MacOS X Jaguar install disks
MacOS 9.2 install disk.
MacOS 8.1 install disk (for Oooold hardware)
System 7.1 boot floppy (for really, really old hardware.)
Software Utilities:
Alsoft DiskWarrior
Norton Utilities for Mac
Norton Antivirus
Retrospect
Hardware:
Apple-branded Firewire emergency backup and restore device (Or as we like to call it when not adding it to our equipment req: the iPod.) Go for the big one, you'll be glad you had it when you need to rescue your data from a flaky powerbook. Use Retrospect to make sure you get everything backed up proper.
Firewire to SCSI adapter (for getting data to and from older Macs.)
If you're going to dealing with real old Macs: AAUI dongle, phone-net adapters, Mini DIN 8 to DB24 and DB9 serial cables.
Unix Survival Kit:
Hardware:
Powerbook or iBook, with aforementioned Firewire SCSI adapter, USB serial adapter and a nice terminal emu program.
SCSI external HDD
Bunch 'o SCSI adapters/cables/testers
A SCSI CDROM... if you deal with Sun equipment, make sure it's able to boot a SPARC box.
Software:
Install CDs for your Unix flavors of choice.
CDs with the most current OS patch levels on it, one per OS.
Another CD with your customized dot files, shell scripts and all the useful stuff you really wished came with your vendor's Unix, but didn't (GNU).
NetBSD install CDs "for when all else fails." Comes in handy when you need to repurpose an old Motorola VME system previously installed with telco switching software to interface with lab monitoring hardware with shell scripts, a serial port and a prayer.
Documentation:
Unix System Administrator's Handbook on CD.
A copy of the "Fixing Solaris" howto in
Linux Kit:
Mac Powerbook or iBook, haughty sneer.
Software:
Slackware to inspire feeling of inadequacy in self proclaimed Linux gurus. Gentoo Level 3 on a USB keychain drive... especially usefull if you're stuck with a 2400 baud modem in a jungle where the pbone only works for three hours alternating tuesdays. (Ah, sarcasm!)
Copy of NetBSD or OpenBSD install disks to get real work done.
Windows Survival Kit:
Hardware:
Powerbook or iBook
Software:
Condescending sneer.
SoupIsGood Food
It sounds like what you're going to be taking with you is a CD holder that holds about a dozen CDs, and maybe a few floppy disks. A little bit of hardware won't hurt either, but I'll try to keep it to fitting in a medium sized pocket.
You're going to want:
Windows 95c
This is a good version of Windows 95.
Windows 98se
This is the OS that most people in small business are still using. It's the best of the Windows 9x series. You'll find that it could come in right handy.
Windows NT
You never know when you'll come across it.
Windows 2000
A lot of people are using this product. It's not bad, and the repair utility can be nice.
NOT Windows XP
No real reason to carry this around. Most people who have their XP machines should still have their restore disks.
Office 97 Pro
Most small business are still using this
Office 2000 Pro
This is a better product that Office 97 Pro. Sometimes comes in handy when you just cannot fix Office 97 Pro
Norton Ghost
When a small business buys PCs, they tend to buy two or three at once. This means that you can just drop a copy of a good build onto a bad build. It saves a lot of time.
Norton Antivirus
It's a good thing to have. You can use it as a bootable CDROM to search for viruses on a PC.
Partition Magic
It's also a good thing to have. It can save you work when someone has set up a PC foolishly.
Your own utilities disk
You're going to want to get a CDR and put the following on it: WinZip, Novell Client, Adobe Reader, Various Microsoft Office Readers, Possibly AOL, Sun's Java, Microsoft's VM, WinAmp, Possibly RealPlayer, Quicktime. Recent versions of MDAC. You get the idea.
You're also going to want four or five 3.5" floppies.
Windows 98 bootable disk.
This comes in very handy.
Dos 6.22 Utilities Bootable Disk
Not quite as handy as the 98 disk, as it doesn't handle FAT32
Two Blank Diskettes
For Ghost to use during TCP/IP operations
As for hardware, we'll make it easy. You'll want 2 older Intel Pro/100 NICs. These things are beautiful.
You'll also want a cross over CAT-5 cable to make ghosting easier.
A good leatherman wouldn't hurt either, but a small toolkit would be best. Those leathermens just aren't very good screwdrivers.
Hoist Number One and Number Six.