Problem

When you attempt to start the Windows 7 firewall service you receive the following error

Windows could not start the Windows Firewall on Local Computer. For more information, review the system event log. If this is a non-Microsoft service, contact the service vendor, and refer to service-specific error code 5.

If you look in the System Event Log, you will see event 7024 from the Service Control Manager

The Windows Firewall service terminated with service-specific error Access is denied..

Cause

This may be caused because the “NT Service\MpsSvc” account does not have adequate permissions on the following registry key

HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\SharedAccess

Solution

1. In Registry Editor, browse to the key HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\SharedAccess
2. Right click SharedAccess, and click Permissions.
3. Click Add.
4. In the “Enter the object names to select” field, type “NT SERVICE\mpssvc”. Then click Check Names. The name should change to MpsSvc
5. Click OK.
6. Select Full Control in the Allow column.
7. Click OK.

Applies To

Windows 7 (all versions) / Windows Vista (all versions)

If you are trying to install Microsoft Office 2007 or 2010 on a computer that has had Office installed on it previously, you may encounter the following, un-helpful, error message:

Microsoft Office Professional Plus 2010 has encountered an error during setup

This can be very frustrating since there is no error code or anything in the message that gives you a clue what the problem is. Usually this indicates that there are fragments of a previous Microsoft Office installation left behind on your hard drive. There are a number of solutions so I’ll start with the easiest first.

1. Delete the rgstn.lck file in the Microsoft Help folder. The location of this folder depends on your operating system and the rgstn.lck file is normally hidden so follow the instructions in Microsoft Knowledge Base article 927153.
2. Make sure you completely uninstall all versions of Office. Even after you uninstall Office using the normal procedure, there may be remnants left behind. Microsoft provides manual removal instructions in KB article 928218. However the instructions are quite complicated so I recommend using the “Fix It” utility on the same page. This utility can take a long time to run so if it seems to hang on one particular step just be patient and let it finish.
3. Use a program like CCleaner to delete temporary files and invalid registry entries. This is a good housekeeping measure anyway but it’s especially good after uninstalling something to clean up leftover remnants.
4. Disable all anti-virus software and/or clean-boot the computer. They always say to disable anti-virus software when installing a new program. Most of the time it doesn’t matter but there are times when it actually makes a difference. Even better yet is to clean-boot the computer so that nothing is running except the essentials. I’ll be making an article on that very soon.

Following those steps should get you going but if you’re still having problems, I’ve heard some people recommend re-registering the Windows Installer and checking permissions on the %TEMP% folder and the C:\Windows\Installer folder to make sure you have full-control. To re-register the Windows Installer run the following commands:

msiexec /unregister
msiexec /register

I hope that helps!

You may run into this:

1. You are sharing files between two Windows 7 computers on the same network.
2. You go into the Network and Sharing center and turn off password protected sharing.
3. You try to access the shared resource from another computer and it still prompts you for a username and password.

Here’s what I did to solve it. On the computer that hosts the shared resource:

1. Make sure the Guest account is not disabled
2. Make sure the Guest account does not have a password. To make sure of this, go into Local Users and Computer and reset the Guest account password. Give it a blank password.
3. Make sure the Guest account is not denied access from the network. To do this, go into Local Security Policy and drill down to Local Policies -> User Rights Assignment. Look for a policy called “Deny access to this computer from the network.” If the Guest account is listed there, delete it.

Have you ever wished configuring a Cisco router was as easy as a run-of-the mill Linksys or Netgear? Cisco routers are extremely powerful but not-so-easy to configure unless you memorize a bunch of cryptic commands. Sure the ASDM makes it a litter easier but what if you want super-easy? I got tired of copying one config file to another and doing search-and-replace operations so I make this quick-and-dirty, web-based Cisco Router Config Generator. All you have to do is fill in a few boxes with your network settings and hit “Generate Config”. Then upload the resulting config file into your router. It doesn’t cover all the advanced things you can do with your Cisco router but it covers the most common things like DHCP and Port Forwarding. You can use the config file as is, or customize it to suit your needs.

So here’s the scenario: I recently migrated from Small Business Server 2003 to SBS 2008. It was a fairly smooth transition except for one thing: There was a web application written in classic ASP that connected to an Access database.

Problem #1: No 64-bit JET driver
As you may know, SBS 2008 is required to run as a 64-bit operating system. That means IIS is also 64-bit. Unfortunately, Microsoft does not provide a 64-bit Jet driver for accessing Access databases. ASP worked but as soon as I tried to open a connection object, I got this error:

500 – Internal server error.
There is a problem with the resource you are looking for, and it cannot be displayed.

Tracking this error down was a bit tricky. I had to enable Failed Request Tracing. When I reviewed the trace log, I found this:

Error 800a0e7a
Provider cannot be found. It may not be properly installed.

The provider string I was trying to use was:

Provider=Microsoft.Jet.OLEDB.4.0

Solution:
Create a new Application Pool and set it to 32-bit mode

Set the Default Web Site to use the new application pool

Problem #2: Application Pool Crashes
When I tried accessing my site again, I received a different error message

503 Service Unavailable

I also noticed that the application pool had changed it’s state to “Stopped”. Not good. A quick look in the Windows Event Viewer revealed event 2280:

The Module DLL C:\Windows\system32\RpcProxy\RpcProxy.dll failed to load.

RpcProxy is a 64-bit DLL required for Exchange to work properly. For some reason, it was trying to load in my 32-bit application pool causing the pool to stop working.

Solution:
Edit the c:\windows\system32\inetsrv\config\applicationhost.config file. Search for the following line and add preCondition=”bitness64″

<add name=”PasswordExpiryModule” image=”C:\Windows\system32\RpcProxy\RpcProxy.dll” preCondition=”bitness64″ />

Problem #3
Compression module does not load because there is no 32-bit driver. This will cause you to receive the following error:

HTTP Error 500.19 – Internal Server Error
The requested page cannot be accessed because the related configuration data for the page is invalid.

If you look in the trace log, you will see something like this:

ModuleName StaticCompressionModule
Notification 16
HttpStatus 500
HttpReason Internal Server Error
HttpSubStatus 19
ErrorCode 2147942526
ConfigExceptionInfo
Notification MAP_REQUEST_HANDLER
ErrorCode The specified module could not be found. (0x8007007e)

Solution:
The solution is to disable HTTP compression. Unfortunately you can’t disable compression on a site-by-site basis so you will have to disable it server-wide. Run this command on the server to disable HTTP compression:

%windir%\system32\inetsrv\appcmd.exe set config -section:system.webServer/httpCompression /-[name='xpress']

Update (1/15/2011):
I discovered today that installing Exchange 2007 Service Pack 3 causes the 32-bit application pool to stop working again. That is because the update adds a new 64-bit only DLL (exppw.dll) to the application pool causing it to crash. The solution is the same as for the RpcProxy DLL we did earlier except you need to add preCondition=”bitness64″ in two places in the applicationhost.config file . The first place is in the <globalModules> section:

<add name=”exppw” image=”C:\Program Files\Microsoft\Exchange Server\ClientAccess\Owa\auth\exppw.dll” preCondition=”bitness64″ />

and the second place is in the <modules> section:

<add name=”exppw” preCondition=”bitness64″ />

Resources:
ASP & Jet Provider
http://forums.iis.net/t/1066385.aspx

500.19 Error When Enabling 32-bit Application Pool
http://forums.iis.net/t/1149768.aspx

The Module DLL C:\Windows\system32\RpcProxy\RpcProxy.dll failed to load
http://forums.iis.net/t/1154189.aspx

Using Classic ASP with Microsoft Access Databases on IIS 7.0 and IIS 7.5
http://learn.iis.net/page.aspx/563/using-classic-asp-with-microsoft-access-databases-on-iis-70-and-iis-75

Exchange Server 2007 SP3 kills our 32-bit compiled ASP web application
http://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/exchangesoftwareupdate/thread/c378f8b5-6ac5-4871-ba70-7eef7d5a1cf4