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In the days of dialup internet, reconnecting was enough to get a new IP-address. Nowadays with cable internet, the DHCP-server will bind your IP-address to the hardware address (= MAC-address) of your networkdevice for a certain period  of time.  Even a release or refresh of the host configuration usually doesn’t help to get a new IP.

Here’s how you can force the DHCP-server of your internet provider to give you a new IP-address..

 

If you use a NAT-router, you change the MAC-address of the WAN-port (the port connected to the modem) on the router. If you have your PC directly connected to the modem without a NAT- router, you change the MAC-address of your Network Interface Card (NIC) in the PC.

 

If you have a router between the modem and your computer:

1. Login to your router, if you don’t know how.. check HERE for a list of default login-credentials and router-addresses
2. Look up in the settings of the router where it says something like ‘router MAC address’ and type in a custom MAC-address
3. Be sure the MAC-address consists of 12 hexadecimal characters (0 - 9 and A - F). For example FA-4B-24-AD-C9-B2  would be a legit MAC-address
4. Save the new settings
5. Turn off the router
6. Restart your modem
7. Turn on your router
8. Now your router will receive a different public IP-address from your internet provider, since the previous lease is still bound to your previous MAC-address
9. Done!

 

If your computer is connected directly to the modem (no router):

1. Right-click ‘My Computer’ > Manage> Device manager 
2. Under Network adapters, right-click the network adapater which is connected to the modem, choose properties
3. Go to the advanced-tab and click Network Address
4. Check Value and enter in a custom MAC-address 
5. Be sure the MAC-address consists of 12 hexadecimal characters (0 -9 and A – F). For example FA-4B-24-AD-C9-B2  would be a good one.
6. Press  OK
7. Restart your modem. Then restart your computer and you will receive a different IP-address from your internet provider, since the previously leased host-configuration is still bound to your previous MAC-address
8. Done!

 

If you are banned from using certain software and you still can’t rejoin your community after an IP-address change and after creating a new account, some GUID (globally unique identifier) in the software is probably flagged.

I had this before and what I did was sandboxing the software. I installed it into a VMware virtual operating system and after that, my ban was gone!

 

Article

So you want to test the Google Chrome browser OS, but you don’t want a multiboot system or risk of viruses/corruptions to your current system with Chrome OS still in  experimental stage?

1. First make sure you have an empty 2 GB or larger USB pen drive inserted in the computer and that you know it’s drive-letter...
2. Go to http://chromeos.hexxeh.net/ and download the latest USB image-file archive from Hexxeh. Unpack it using 7-zip. You now have the file ChromeOS-Flow.img, which you have to write to the USB pendrive.
3. Go to https://launchpad.net/win32-image-writer and download Windows Image Writer. Unpack the archived files, you don’t have to install anything.
4. Launch Win32DiskImager.exe (if you get an error like ‘an error occured when attempting to get a handle on device, etc’,  just press ok.. this error does not concern the  USB pen-drive, so don’t worry)
5. In Win32 Disk Imager under ‘image file’, press the little blue folder-icon and browse to the folder containing ChromeOS-Flow.img and select ChromeOS-Flow.img . Under ‘device’, select the drive-letter of the USB pen-drive. Then press ‘Write’ and wait for the image-writing to complete.
6. Keep the USB pendrive inserted!
7. Reboot your computer. Go into the BIOS-setup (tap Del or F1 – or any other key that is displayed in the bottom left corner associated with BIOS/CMOS-setup –   when the computer is booting up) and make sure that the first boot device is set to USB. (also make sure cd-rom and harddisk are set to second and third bootdevice to avoid boot-problems later on, when the pendrive might not be inserted)
8. Save settings and exit BIOS-setup.
9. Reboot with the USB pendrive inserted and it will boot the Chrome operating system!
10. Login with username facepunch and password facepunch
11. Done! Enjoy! :-D

 

What if I don’t have a USB boot option in the boot device priority list in the BIOS-setup?! (i.e. no boot from USB-device natively supported)

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Article

Situation

I have a non-RAID system with 2 harddrives: one for the operating system and one for data/backup which also contains the windows swap-file. After a systemcrash (complete freeze) while playing the severely buggy yet enjoyable game Prince of Persia The Forgotten Sands, the whole operating-system-harddisk wouldn't boot anymore, giving me a black screen with the error "Boot disk failure insert system disk and press Enter".

 

Solution

In this case what I did was first disabling all other bootdevices in the BIOS setup;  so everything except 'harddisk'. Then I unplugged all SATA-devices except the harddrive with the operating system on it. Just to be sure I hooked the operating-system-harddrive to a different SATA-port (this helped before when getting rid of an irql_less_or_equal error after installing faulty nForce drivers). Started the computer anddd.. Windows firing up properly again. If Windows starts to whine about your swap-file not being present, don't change anything, just shut down windows again directly after the succesful boot. Power off computer and pull out the powercord. Then reattach all the other SATA-devices and setup your BIOS to the old bootdevice priority settings if you want.

Article

Situation

When I startup my computer, I get the error “CMOS Checksum Error - Defaults Loaded, press F1 or Del to enter setup”


Solution

This usually happens with older computers; it's a typical symptom of the flat cell-battery on the motherboard (almost) being empty. The problem is that when the computer is not connected to the powergrid, it needs the battery to retain the BIOS (Basic Input Output System)-settings in the CMOS-chip. If the computer's powercord is unplugged AND the battery is empty, then the BIOS-settings will be reset everytime after you've had your powercord unplugged!

Open the computercase and locate the battery. Don't start pokin' around with a screwdriver in this delicate melange of circuitry; use your fingernail instead to press the little lever - in picture on the right - to pop out the battery. Gently push in a new one.

After renewing the battery, setup your BIOS again to your original settings. Make sure you set the time and bootsequence correctly and disable integrated peripherals that you do not use.

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Article

 

Full Throttle is an awesome point and click adventuregame, released by LucasArts in 1995, which I played quite a lot. I recently tried installing it on Windows 7, but it uses some crappy 16-bit installer for DOS. Heck, it even requires you to create a bootable floppy..

So at first I wanted to install it in a VMware guest OS, but then I discovered a much lighter approach in ScummVM.

SCUMM is the game-engine developed by LucasArts to power a generation of point & click adventure games in the 90’s, including Full Throttle. ScummVM virtualizes this game-engine in for example the 32-bit microsoft Windows environment in my case, or in any other operating system environment that is listed here: http://www.scummvm.org/downloads/

 

Here’s what you do to be able to play Full Throttle on your latest version of Microsoft Windows..

 

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