This is very strange. If you’re running a recent build of Windows 7 (I don’t know whether it happens with the January Beta, Build 7000), and you go to Adobe’s website to download the free Adobe Reader, here’s what you’re offered:

The latest version of Adobe Reader? I think not. Reader 7.0.9 was released in January 2007. The latest version is 9.1—or, if you prefer the 8.x versions then you can get 8.1.3.

If you download the version you’re offered and then try to install it, here’s what you see:

I suspect that this glitch is caused at least in part by the User-Agent string that IE8 (in Windows 7) sends. Using IE8 on Windows Vista, Adobe offers me Adobe Reader 9.1, and when I used a free utility to change the UA string for IE8 in Windows 7 to match the UA string from Vista, I was sent to the correct page. (Update: I get sent to the wrong page using Firefox as well, so the most likely explanation is that the Windows NT 6.1 part of the User-Agent string is confusing Adobe’s back end. And indeed, when I change a single character in the U-A string, reporting the versions as NT 6.0 instead of 6.1, everything works fine.)

Adobe, if you’re listening, you might want to fix this soon, as a lot of people are going to be running a fresh build of Windows 7 real soon now.

[Update: I’ve found another possible solution to this issue, one that doesn’t require extra hardware. See A fix for Media Center’s Black Screen of Death?]

Over the last few years, I’ve spent a fair amount of time hooking up various video devices to my big-screen HDTV. There are lots of different options for doing that, but HDMI is always the best choice, from a standpoint of convenience and audio/video quality.

Right now, I have two full-time HDMI-connected devices in use in my living room: a small-form-factor Media Center PC (dual-booting Windows Vista and Windows 7) and an HP MediaSmart Connect digital media receiver/extender.

One of the biggest problems that I’ve run into with HDMI connections is one I fondly call the “black screen of amnesia.” This occurs when you power up a device and the TV doesn’t recognize it. Sometimes, flipping to a different input on the TV and then back to HDMI is enough to jog the connection into working again. But I’ve occasionally had to power everything down and restart in the right sequence to get things working.

But all those problems went away for good about six months ago when I picked up a tiny HDMI switcher for under $20. This picture shows front and back views:

Although it has a connector for a power adapter and a tiny remote control with an external infrared receiver, you don’t actually need either one in my experience. It does a great job of detecting an HDMI signal and switching to it. On the rare occasion when I have both devices powered on and I want to use the one that isn’t on, I can press the button on top of the switch.

Since getting this little gizmo, I have not had a single failure to sync up properly with an HDMI device. It handles HDCP signals (Blu-ray and CableCARD copy protection) perfectly, and the picture quality is exceptional.

Highly recommended.

If you’ve spent any time on this site, you know that one of the things I do regularly is to debunk Windows tips and tweaks that don’t work as promised. It’s that time again.

Lately I’ve seen an old, discredited Windows tip enjoy a sudden resurgence in popularity. The claim is that you can speed up Windows Vista (and Windows 7) boot times on a PC with a multiple-core CPU by telling the operating system to use all of the cores during startup.

If you follow the instructions, you’ll see a dialog box that appears to do what the tipsters claim. Except they’ve got its function absolutely backwards!

The setting in question is part of the System Configuration utility, Msconfig.exe. On the Boot tab, you can click the Advanced Options button and then select the Number of Processors check box to see the settings shown here (if you look in the Windows XP version of Msconfig, you’ll see a similar setting on the BOOT.INI tab, which sets the /NUMPROC switch – same thing):

Aha! If I increase that number from 1 to 4, I’ll get to use all the resources in my quad-core CPU, right?

Sorry, no. The good news is that your system is already using all of your CPU’s multiple processors as soon as it starts up. The purpose of this advanced setting is to help you disable multiple cores as part of a troubleshooting process, or to work around an installation routine that balks when it runs into multiple CPU cores. This Microsoft Knowledge Base article, for example, describes a problem you might run into when installing SQL Server 2005 on a Windows server with a multi-core processor. The solution is in the Workaround section:

To work around this problem, before you install SQL Server 2005, temporarily change the number of logical processors to one. This makes the computer appear to be a single-processor system, and SQL Server 2005 is installed successfully.

It then proceeds to walk you through the settings in the screen shot above, setting the Number of Processors value to 1.

The older XP setting is documented in KB 833721:

This switch sets the number of processors that Windows will run at startup. With this switch, you can force a multiprocessor system to use only the quantity of processors (number) that you specify. This switch can help you troubleshoot performance problems and defective CPUs.

So there you go. To use all of the CPU cores on a Windows PC, just install Windows. You don’t need to adjust any other settings.

Journalism runs in my family.

My youngest brother, Don Bott, has been teaching high school journalism in our hometown of Stockton, California, for a long time. He’s a superb teacher, as evidenced by his receipt in 2002 of the National High School Journalism Teacher of the Year award (the award is co-sponsored by the Columbia Scholastic Press Association, the Poynter Institute for Media Studies and The Wall Street Journal Classroom Edition). Later this week, he’s taking a group of his students to Phoenix for the annual convention of the Journalism Education Association, where he’ll receive the 2009 Diversity Award.

But I think he’s most proud of a profile written by a former student who is now the online editor of his hometown paper; the profile was published in today’s Stockton Record. Here’s a sample:

"He wants us to reach out to people who we’d never thought to before," said Arianna Perez, 16. "He wants us to see what their story is, to bring out what’s under the surface."

Chelsea Collura, 15, said Bott pushes students to explore Stagg’s vast diversity, making their reporting more reflective of the campus.

"We have students from all over," Collura said. "We get better stories when we explore."

Take, for example, the cover story in the edition scheduled for release Friday. It’s about how the recession is impacting students on campus.

Bott said most of Stagg’s students don’t think about how their peers are being affected when parents have no money to put food on the table or make ends meet.

He encouraged his journalism students to reach out to that population of the campus.

This isn’t new. His students often tackle niche populations on the campus of 1,800, while reporting the big-picture stories.

"You can’t just do the same things all the time," said Samantha Espinoza, 17. "You have to change it up."

At Stagg, it’s not uncommon to have 10 or more nationalities and ethnic backgrounds in one room at any given time.

The students get it.

"We come from different backgrounds and we come from different cultures," said Lissette Rodriguez, 16. "We are able to see our school through different eyes."

And Bott helps them see potential in themselves they wouldn’t otherwise.

Nicely done, little brother. We’re all proud of you.

Paul Thurrott is right more often than he’s wrong (although he’s wrong more often than he’ll admit, like when he predicted just a few months ago that Windows 7 would “be finalized by April 2009 at the latest” – oops). But I’m willing to bet that this report is complete, unadulterated  nonsense:

There are rumors, too, that a new UI is coming and it may make sense for Microsoft to hold on to that UI for the RTM builds, so that it has one last surprise to offer up to its eager fans.

No one at Microsoft will confirm or deny this, obviously, but I’m going to go out on a limb here and trust my BS detector, which is pinning at 11 right now. At this point individual development groups at Windows can’t even get a typo in a dialog box fixed without papal dispensation. The idea that a “new UI” is rolling out soon is inconsistent with everything that the Windows 7 team has done so far, which is conservative, thoughtful, and geared toward shipping a stable, high-quality OS.

When the Windows 7 RC does appear, I predict that it will look exactly like the builds that have been floating around for the last two weeks. New desktop backgrounds, sure. Major (or even minor) changes to the UI? No way.

Over at ZDNet, I’ve put together an article that explains the inner workings of the Windows Easy Transfer utility in Windows 7, summarizing its advantages and its weaknesses, and explaining how best to use it. The context, of course, is that when the Windows 7 Release Candidate comes out (sometime before the e4nd of May), you’ll be strongly encouraged to avoid upgrading from the beta and instead will be expected to do a clean install. Which is a perfect scenario for using the Windows Easy Transfer utility to capture the settings and files from your existing installation and restore them on the new, clean install.

The whole thing is here:

How hard will it be to move to the Windows 7 Release Candidate?

Over the years,I’ve been lukewarm at best on the various iterations of this utility, from the Files and Settings Transfer Wizard in XP to the first appearance of Windows Easy Transfer in Vista. But with Windows 7, Microsoft appears to have gotten this stuff mostly right. The big missing piece is that you can’t migrate programs themselves. I also wish that third-party developers (and even the community) could create templates for adding settings for additional programs.

If you have one of the second-generation HP MediaSmart devices (EX485 or EX487), you can look forward to a substantial upgrade later this month. Here are a few of the main features:

• Automatically convert your library of videos (including unprotected DVDs) for your viewing enjoyment.
• Create a mobile version of your videos that you can download and play on your iPod, iPhone, PlayStation Portable, and other popular mobile devices.
• Stream music, photos and video from your server to any Internet-connected computer or to your iPhone.
• Additional enhancements to the MediaSmart Server including an improved mobile streaming experience, a more robust Media Collector (which consolidates music and photo files form individual PCs and stores them on the server), improved Apple Time Machine configuration, and the ability to create public and private albums in the Photo Viewer.

I’ve been running beta releases of the new software for a few weeks, and it’s pretty impressive. I’ll have more details and hands-on impressions as the official release gets closer.

Note that this update will not be available on the first-generation MediaSmart servers (EX47x), which don’t have the CPU horsepower to perform most of these media tasks.

Everything should be properly migrated to the new server now. If you see anything that looks not right, drop me a note.

In the comments to my previous post on Windows downgrades, Paul G asks an interesting question:

Do downgrade options for businesses (or individuals) contain clauses that specify the end of free technical support, or additional fees that apply to the downgrade transaction?

Let’s start with the understanding that downgrade rights apply only when you purchase a new PC with a license for a business edition of Windows.

In this situation, the PC manufacturer is required to provide support for the operating system they pre-install. If you exercise your downgrade rights by installing Windows XP, the manufacturer is not required to provide support for the old OS. You can’t get support from Microsoft, either (except for security-related issues). In practice, this probably isn’t that big a deal. Most of the support you’ll require from an OEM is related to replacing or repairing defective hardware; for garden-variety Windows problems, you can find all the support you need in newsgroups and in Microsoft’s Knowledge Base.

As for additional fees, the answer is no. In fact, the terms of Microsoft’s agreement with PC manufacturers (as outlined in this PDF fact sheet) prohibit them from shipping downgrade media. Legally, they may pre-install an earlier version of Windows for you, but only if they use media supplied by the customer. The license terms in Windows Vista Business and Ultimate specifically relieve the PC manufacturer (and Microsoft) of any obligation to supply media for the earlier version. You are expected to find installation retail, OEM, or volume-license media on your own; in a business environment where you have other PCs with Windows XP installed, you would normally use the install disk from one of those other PCs.

The final hurdle is activating the system. Here’s how Microsoft explains the procedure:

When an end user is using their downgrade rights offered under the License Terms in Windows Vista Business and Ultimate versions and they use both Windows XP media and a product key that was previously activated, they will be unable to activate on-line over the Internet, due to the hardware configuration change when installing on the Vista system. In these cases the end user will be prompted to call the Activation Support Line and explain their circumstances to the Customer Service Representative. Once it is determined that the end user has a valid Vista Business or Ultimate  license, the Customer Service Representative will help them activate their software.

I’ve done this before, and the procedure works exactly as described.

Update: TechARP, which has a pretty good record at providing accurate information on Microsoft’s OEM policies, says Microsoft has recently changed downgrade options that apply to OEMs:

OEMs may now choose to install Windows XP Professional or Windows XP Professional Tablet PC or Windows XP Professional X64 editions instead of Windows Vista Business / Ultimate, provided they meet the following additional requirements :

• Each system must be distributed with a Windows Vista Business or Windows Vista Ultimate Certificate of Authenticity (COA) and must have the appropriate activation markers for both OA (OEM Activation) 2.X and OA 1.0.
• OEMs are required to distribute physical recovery media in the system packaging for the Windows Vista Business or Ultimate version that corresponds to the COA. If the system does not include an optical drive, then the OEM is required to provide a hard drive-based recovery solution for that version of Windows Vista software.

In addition to the required Windows Vista recovery media, OEMs may also choose to provide a recovery solution for the preinstalled version of Windows XP. This may be hard drive-based or on physical recovery media provided in the system packaging or to an End User of such systems upon request.

According to this unconfirmed report, the policy will remain in place for six months after Windows 7 is released.

I have been flabbergasted this week at all the reaction to the non-news that Microsoft will allow business customers to buy a PC with Windows 7 installed and then replace its OS with an earlier version (specifically, Windows Vista or Windows XP). The common thread in all the blog posts and comments I’ve seen is that this represents Microsoft “planning to fail” with Windows 7.

Uh, no.

For starters, this is not new. I’ve clipped the relevant portions from various Windows license agreements through the years and posted them at ZDNet: There’s nothing new about Windows downgrade rights. Anyone who gets all breathless about this policy doesn’t understand Microsoft’s business model and is clueless about corporate computing. So let me see if I can explain here.

When you buy a new PC with Windows preinstalled, you are actually buying a Windows license along with that hardware. The Certificate of Authenticity on the side of the PC is the physical evidence of the license, which is embodied in a detailed agreement. The terms of the Windows license vary, depending on which edition of Windows is installed.

Home customers buy a license to run a specific version of Windows, typically Home Premium. If you want to replace that installed OS, you have to buy a new license.

Business customers buy a license to run Business or Ultimate edition (depending on which one they paid for). But the terms of that license include a section that is not part of the home license. These business licenses include downgrade rights. In the case of Windows Vista Business edition, this section specifically allows you to replace, Vista Business with XP Professional. You as a corporate IT professional might want to do that while you plan migration of all the PCs in your business. Your existing systems are running XP, and you want the new PCs to fit into your existing infrastructure. When you’re ready to upgrade, the license allows you to restore Vista Business.

As I said, this is nothing new. If you bought a PC with Windows XP Professional anytime in the past eight years, it contained a similar clause in the license agreement allowing you to replace the installed OS with Windows 2000 Professional, Windows NT Workstation version 4.0, or even Windows 98 Second Edition. Back in 2001 or 2002, those operating systems were in wide use, and people might not have been ready for the headache of upgrading to XP.

Anyway, that’s what all this means. Nothing more, nothing less. When Windows 7 comes out, customers who buy a business license will have the right to maintain compatibility by choosing older business versions of Windows without violating the terms of the license.

Sorry, conspiracy theorists.

Update: Just a note to clarify this isn’t aimed at my ZDNet colleague Mary Jo Foley, who stopped by the comments section with a link to her excellent post on the subject: Microsoft will allow Windows 7 users to downgrade to XP. An awful lot of people have been piggybacking on her original reporting and adding their own miguided interpretations.