Android Update: 5.0

Today my Nexus 7 got the upgrade to Android 5.0:

 After this upgrade, many things changed, like the system settings:

But everything is slower than before.... ;-(

For a complete history of all updates visit this posting.

Virtualbox: only 32bit guests possible even though virtualization enabled in BIOS / Intel Process Identification Utility shows opposite to BIOS virtualization setting

Virtualbox on my Windows 8.1 stopped running 64bit guests a while ago. I did not track down this problem. Now some months later i tried again and found some confusing things.

First setting:

BIOS virtualization enabled
Intel Processor Identification Utlility in 8.1: virtualization disabled

Second setting

BIOS virtualization disabled
Intel Processor Identification Utlility in 8.1: virtualization enabled

With both settings: Virtualbox runs 32bit guests but no 64bit guests.
 

After some searching, i realized, what was happening:
I added Microsofts Hyper-V virtualization. With that enabled Windows 8.1 is no longer a real host. It is just another guest (the most important guest) on this computer. So with Hyper-V enabled i was trying to run Virtualbox inside an already virtualized Windows 8.1.
After that it was easy: Just disable Hyper-V on Windows 8.1:

And after a restart of Windows 8.1 i was able to run 64bit guests on Virtualbox again....

Wireshark hanging on Windows 8.1 at startup

After upgrading Windows 8 to Windows 8.1 my wireshark freezed on every startup without showing up the main window.
The only workaround was to deinstall wireshark including wincap and installing it again. But after the nex reboot, it freezed again.

After searching around i found the following fix, with cured this problem:

inside the registry you have to change the DWORD start in

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\npf

from 0 or 1 to 2. After that wireshark will start properly even after reboots....

Another possible solution are to issue these commands as administrator:

sc start npf
sc config npf start= delayed-auto

Android Update: 4.4.3

After nearly everyone upgraded to 4.4.3 my device came up with the icon for upgrading android to its next version:

For a complete history of all updates visit this posting.

FritzBox 7270: CLIP stops working after upgrading to FritzOS 6.05 (problem solved)

After upgrading to FritzOS 6.05 CLIP stopped working with my analog phone.
The settings looked quite ok: (Telefonie -> Telefoniegeräte -> bearbeiten -> Merkmale des Telefoniegeräts)

This basic feature was certainly not shipped without testing. So this has to be a problem of data/parameter migration.
After unchecking CLIP, doing a reboot and checking the box again CLIP, it worked like before...

Mounting VMWare-Volumes/Disks with Debian

Some time ago a vmware server did not recognize any more a data disk. This disk was formatted with vmfs v3 (enter the vmware server via ssh and type mount..). First thing i did, was creating an image of this disk, to play around without any danger of data loss.

There is a good article how to mount vmfs, but on debian i had to install the package otherosfs.

After i installed this package, i got the following error:

root@debian:/tmp# vmfs-fuse image /mnt/vm
VMFS VolInfo: invalid magic number 0x00000000
VMFS: Unable to read volume information
Trying to find partitions 

But: Do not worry about this error message. The image was mounted on /mnt/vm and accessible without any problem...

Ubuntu upgrade to 12.04: grub timeout does not work anymore

After doing the upgrade and solving some issues with my screen-resolution, another grub problem hit me:
The timeout for booting the standard kernel did not work anymore.
Inside /etc/default/grub

GRUB_TIMEOUT=10

and update-grub, grub worked like

 GRUB_TIMEOUT=-1

If you need a  good manual  just look here, but this does not help me, too.

After some tries, i did the following:

In /boot/grub/grub.cfg i changed from

terminal_output gfxterm
if [ "${recordfail}" = 1 ] ; then
  set timeout=-1
else
  if [ x$feature_timeout_style = xy ] ; then
    set timeout_style=menu
    set timeout=10
  fi
fi

to

terminal_output gfxterm
recordfail=0
if [ "${recordfail}" = 1 ] ; then
  set timeout=-1
else
  if [ x$feature_timeout_style = xy ] ; then
    set timeout_style=menu
    set timeout=10
  fi
fi

This works, but i have to redo the change everytime update-grub is used...

Ubuntu upgrade to 12.04: screen only works with 1024x768

After upgrading a laptop-system to 12.04 (precise pangolin) X only starts with a resolution of 1024x768 and not with 1366x768.
I followed many postings and tried many things:

• add new resolution with xrandr (here)
• create a xorg.conf file (here)
• add new drivers (here)
• ...

But there was only one thing wrong: /etc/default/grub

After changing the following line everything worked:

GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT="quiet splash i915.modeset=0

to

GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT="quiet splash"

(i added i915.modeset=0  because with the older ubuntu version hibernate does not work and this configuration fixed it. [link])

Telegram on two devices...

After trying Whatsapp on 2 devices without success, i tried the same thing with telegram. Telegram says about multiple devices:

So let's see...
Registering the mobile phone was straight forward: a SMS with a verification code and that's it.

Registering was easy: just another SMS

And after entering the code on the tablet i got the following message on my mobile phone:

After that every conversation or more precise: every unsecure conversation is broadcasted to all of your devices. That means, you can switch over from phone to tablet without loosing your context... really cool!

Smart Meter@Home: Fritz!Powerline 546E - really smart?

Everyone is talking about Smart Meter - is it possible to get in touch with this topic by buying a Fritz!Powerline 546E?

The key points of Smart Meters according to wikipedia are:

• real-time or near real-time sensors
• power outage notification
• power quality monitoring 
• collect, and analyze energy usage

What is supported by the 546E?

• power outage notification: no way without a battery ;-)
• real-time or near real-time sensors: one measurement per minute
• power quality monitoring: voltage monitoring
• collect and analyze: 

 

and

 

But there are some shortcomings:

• graphs and data only local on 546E, no integration to any central server, not even to a Fritz!Box (because of a missing DECT interface)
• configuration as WLAN repeater not described in the manual (only powerline)
• export via web frontend limited to 5 minute-intervals only 24 hours
• automated export only via E-Mail and limited to this:

 

Whatsapp on 2 devices: "does not work, tell why!"

After nearly everyone of my friends is using whatsapp, it was overdue to download this app.
Why is this app used by everyone? What's cool about this app?

• You have to do nothing after the download except this sms-verification
• No account creation
• No new password (or reuse another one <- li="" nooo="">
• No need for searching addresses
• You do not have to take care about your contact list
  
• Just start messaging

Why does this work? Whatsapp uses your phonenumber to build the account identifier. The app scans your phone address book and builds its own contact list. Fine.

Really?

Not at all: If you want to add whatsapp on a second device with no sim card (e.g. your tablet), you can find several instructions but: after adding whatsapp to this device, whatsapp on your phone does no longer work...
Whatapps says:

Your WhatsApp account can only be verified with one number, on one device.
If you attempt to frequently switch your WhatsApp account between different devices, at a certain point, you may be blocked from re-verifying your account. So please do not repeatedly switch between different devices.
Cheers,
WhatsApp Support Team

Finally i would say: The biggest advantage is also the biggest disadvantage. Using the phonenumber as account id makes everything easy but prevents the usage of more than one device....