[Article] Windows 8.1 has RTMed but Microsoft isn’t releasing it till October

Another nonsense move by Microsoft. Windows 8.1 has reported been RTMed (heck, even a leaked RTM build is out there, if you know where to look) but Microsoft is waiting another month and a half till it is offered to the public. And if the rumors are true, the MSDN/TechNet subscribers won’t be getting it any earlier.

Why do they have to delay it? It’s just an update like a service pack. Just put it out the Windows Store already, for crying out loud. They released a preview and the hardware manufacturers should have got their stuff working by RTM, right? Why wait? Must be a shady deal with the OEM partners. Waiting is not going to help especially when Mac OSX Mavericks is right around the corner.

Anyways, on the other hand, you can get the leaked RTM version from the “internet” and activate using your own Windows 8 legit key. It works just fine. I’m not sure if this is illegal, because you’ve already paid for it and the update itself is free. However, the leaked copy is not just the update alone, but the fully updated Windows 8 installation. You can simply do a clean installation.

The build number of the RTM is 9600.

Windows 8 got deactivated (error code: 0xC004F074 and then 0xC004C4AA)

I got a Windows 8 activation problem yesterday. All of a sudden, the Windows Action Center was telling me that Windows is not activated and I should do it soon. When I checked the system properties, it was telling me that the activation will be expired on 19th of July. I was like “what the hell”! That’s in a month. And I have a legit copy of Windows 8.

I tried few things, but I got the same error message every time. When I checked Microsoft help page, it seemed that the serial number I was using is not valid for the edition of Windows I had installed. I have a key for Windows 8 Pro edition as well as Media Center edition. I was supposed to have installed  the Media Center edition because I used that key, but apparently I had forgotten to update the Pro edition to Media Center edition. I did, and upon restart, Windows was completely deactivated!  When I tried to activate, it didn't let me. This time I got a different error code (0xC004C4AA).

Creative X-Fi Titanium audio card went missing in action

I wake up early in the morning to play Crysis 3 before my wife woke up and what do I get? There is no audio. The audio icon in the system tray is crossed out which indicates either the mute button has been pressed or the device is not available. It was the latter.

I rebooted. No go. Dammit!

Then I uninstalled the drivers of my Creative X-Fi Titanium (PCI-E) audio card, cleaned up the remaining clutter using Driver Sweeper and reinstalled the latest PAX drivers. No go! Device Manager wouldn't show that a card even exist. Weird.

Then I removed the audio card from the PC. Rebooted into Windows to clear out any erroneous statues in OS/software/drivers. (No idea if this would make a difference, but I did so anyway. ) Then I plugged back the card and rebooted into Windows. Before installing the driver, I checked device manager and there was the audio card, with an exclamation mark. I didn't worry about it too much at that point and reinstalled the drivers. When I came back to Windows, the audio card was nowhere to be found. :/

Samsung 840 series 250GB SSD benchmarks

Finally, it is time to post some benchmarks of my new Samsung 840 series 250GB SSD. I got this for a cheap JPY13,524 which was cheaper than the regular price due to holiday promotions. I am using this drive entirely for the OS (Windows 8 Pro), programs and games. Since I have ample amount of space in this drive, finally I’m using a pagefile (albeit smaller than the recommended size because I have a lot of RAM anyways) and also using the SSD for the temporary files. (However, I do clean up the temporary files at every boot using CCleaner.)

I wasn’t sure whether to use hibernation with this drive. The reason to use hibernation (or the hiberfile.sys) is to speed up boot up even further, making use of fast boot. Currently I am not using it, but I will experiment with it later. Perhaps it will fix the slow load up of system tray applications in Windows 8.

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