Pale Moon (28.5.0, 32-bit, Windows 7) hanging/crashing after a few hours. Has been doing this for a few versions.

[Cassette]

Could the double listing of Windows 7 on the GRUB boot screen that I mentioned earlier in the thread have something to do with this somehow?

I don't know why copying an install to another drive causes hidden partitions to show up, or how the unknown changes you made did that. I haven't had much luck with changing boot files in Windows. My only experiencing messing with it was when I recently installed an NVMe SSD in a computer that already contained a SATA SSD. I did a fresh install on the NVMe while the old drive was still connected. Windows decided to add the boot entry for the new install on the old SSD so when I later removed it, it would no longer boot. I copied the boot files to the new drive and it would boot, but I had issues like Nigaikaze described with Windows update. I created new boot files with bcdboot and still had issues. I never got the thing to work correctly so I just ended up reinstalling Windows and then the problems went away. I think it has something to do with "Secure Boot". After that I decided the best way to do dual booting was to install with only one drive connected and just use the UEFI boot options to decide which drive to boot to.

As Nigaikaze mentioned, you can use a Windows install disc to run bootrec. If you search on the internet, you can find an ISO for your Windows version and use that. With your unused partition(s) you might be able to use Windows Disk Management to reclaim the space. I don't know if it's available for all Windows editions, but you will find it in your control panel under Administrative Tools -> Computer Management if that's an option for your Windows edition.

[Nigaikaze]

Nigaikaze wrote: ↑
Fri May 24, 2019 8:51 am
I've had some interesting problems loading Win 7 that way, mostly in terms of installing updates from Microsoft. Some MS updates absolutely refuse to install if I boot Win 7 via Grub

That's interesting, because I recently had Windows Update tell me that it couldn't install a handful of the updates that it had downloaded (it installed a whole bunch, but it couldn't install four or five of them for some reason). Oddly enough, it doesn't list those updates any longer in Windows Update (at least as far as I can tell).

When I've had that happen, they've sometimes shown up later after I've forced a new check for updates. Windows Update has a function that lets you look at your list of installed updates, which lets you see which ones have failed and which ones were successful. If the failed ones don't show up in your list of currently available updates, you can download them from Microsoft and install them manually.

Now, I don't think that I have a repair disc for Windows 7. Would that (now once again hidden) partition work that I mentioned earlier in the thread?

If it's a repair/recovery partition, yes (maybe). You can also create your own repair disc by going to Control Panel > System and Security > Backup and Restore > Create a system repair disc.

[Tharthan]

I think it has something to do with "Secure Boot".

Wasn't "Secure Boot" introduced in Windows 8 or 10? If it was, then I would assume that I wouldn't have that problem.

If you search on the internet, you can find an ISO for your Windows version and use that.

Would I be able to do that legally, or would that be a legal grey area or (at worst) definitely illegal?

Windows Update has a function that lets you look at your list of installed updates, which lets you see which ones have failed and which ones were successful. If the failed ones don't show up in your list of currently available updates, you can download them from Microsoft and install them manually.

Alright. I think that I'll do just that once I've nixed the Lubuntu partitioning and give that space on the hard drive back to Windows 7.

You can also create your own repair disc by going to Control Panel > System and Security > Backup and Restore > Create a system repair disc.

I didn't know that I could do that. I'll go ahead and create one now.

EDIT: It gave me an error when I selected "Create disc":

System repair disc could not be created

The requested operation is only valid with supported media. (0xC0AA0402)

[Cassette]

Would I be able to do that legally, or would that be a legal grey area or (at worst) definitely illegal?

It's not illegal. In fact, you can download the ISO directly from Microsoft. They used to not require you to enter your product key, but they do now.
https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/softwar ... d/windows7

[New Tobin Paradigm]

You still need a legal license to use the software.

[Nigaikaze]

The requested operation is only valid with supported media. (0xC0AA0402)

That's weird ... never saw that one before ... a quick Googling shows that a few people have resolved that error by using a different optical drive (either swapping out the installed one with a newer drive or using a USB optical drive) to burn the CD/DVD. Every burner that I've used to burn a repair disc did it right the first time.

[van p]

EDIT: It gave me an error when I selected "Create disc":

System repair disc could not be created

The requested operation is only valid with supported media. (0xC0AA0402)

You didn't say what kind of medium you used. I've successfully used CDs and USB (EDIT: flash) drives.

EDIT: Shouldn't make a difference I don't think, but while I have 64-bit and W10 now, I've had 32-bit and W7 in the past.

[Tharthan]

You still need a legal license to use the software.

What do you mean by this?

Aside from a product key (which I'm not sure how I would get, unless the product key is the same as the Product ID) would I need something else as well?

That's weird ... never saw that one before

Looking it up myself, I saw this comment from some purported site expert on the site that I was looking at:

If you got 0xc0aa0402 error that [sic] your computer has registry problems.

This concerns me. I remember that an old antivirus program that I used earlier in the decade (I think that it was Norton Internet Security. I know, I know.) used to have a sort of "registry cleaner" that would get rid of junk in the registry. I don't know of any safe "registry cleaners" now, though, and I have no doubt in my mind that there is junk in the registry (I've deleted a couple of user accounts over the years [and had to force-delete some folders that wouldn't delete normally] that were clogged with stuff, so at the very least there is probably still stuff in the registry that has to do with those deleted accounts).

I did all of that a number of years ago, though (six, I reckon). I doubt that it has anything to do with my Pale Moon problems. Still, I probably want to get to the registry stuff at some point. If it's not too much trouble to link to one, does anyone here know of a good "registry cleaner" (loosely using that term here), perchance? It's not the biggest deal right now, but if I could kill two birds with one stone (fix the other registry problems and also fix this burning issue) I would like to do that.

or using a USB optical drive

I have a 29.8 GB (currently using the FAT32 file system) flash drive ("SanDisk Cruzer Glide USB Device") that my computer for whatever reason thinks is a hard drive and now that I have inserted it I can't find a way to disconnect it (unmount it? I think that that was the terminology used when I used Lubuntu) that back in 2016 I labelled "LUBUNTU", and that I think that I used to install Lubuntu (I wiped the original installation drive [which I think was actually the same drive] that I had created via a program on Windows that let me initially install Lubuntu because it was faulty {I discovered this after I had already installed Lubuntu}, and then created a new installation drive from within Lubuntu, reinstalled Lubuntu, and then created a new installation drive from within that).

It still seems to be exactly what it was back then, and contains all of the files that are used for that purpose.

If I were to wipe that, and (somehow) make the computer see it as a flash drive, could I burn to that somehow? Or were you referring to me purchasing a portable (USB) CD drive that I could connect to my computer, I suppose like the old portable floppy disc drive that I have that I never use (obviously)?

You didn't say what kind of medium you used. I've successfully used CDs and USB drives.

Erm, let's see...

Windows says that my CD Drive is an "HL-DT-ST DVDRAM GT30N SATA CdRom Device", for whatever that's worth. I've burnt perfectly functional audio CDs (which I still have and listen to occasionally) and I think that I have made data CDs in the past, although I'm not certain about the latter.

[Nigaikaze]

I have a ... flash drive ... that my computer for whatever reason thinks is a hard drive and now that I have inserted it I can't find a way to disconnect it

Turn computer off. Remove flash drive. Turn computer back on again. When computer is back on, reinsert flash drive and reformat flash drive. Problem (should then be) solved (in theory, but I'm switching to theory because everything works in theory). If that don't work, there's somethin' seriously screwified up somewhere. And that also depends on no critical data existing on your flash drive -- if so, copy it off to a safe location before you follow these instructions.

If I were to wipe that, and (somehow) make the computer see it as a flash drive, could I burn to that somehow? Or were you referring to me purchasing a portable (USB) CD drive that I could connect to my computer

There are online posts that say yes, the USB flash drive should work, but I can't speak for that meself cuz I've never done that meself. I have an external (portable) USB CD/DVD burner drive that I use for worst-case scenarios, which is what I had in mind when I posted what I posted.

As far as potential registry problems go, I'm not really in a position to comment on that. I migrated to Linux some time back, so I spend far more time on Linux now than I do on Win 7. In all of my experience in supporting Win 7, I've never had to rely on any registry cleaners, so I'm sorry I can't recommend anything for that. Maybe someone else can chime in with a good one.

[Tharthan]

It's not illegal. In fact, you can download the ISO directly from Microsoft. They used to not require you to enter your product key, but they do now.
https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/softwar ... d/windows7

So I spent several hours trying to find out how I might be able to make a system repair drive with my SanDisk Cruzer Glide (which my computer sees as a hard drive even though it isn't, apparently {I found this out whilst I was trying to figure out how to make a system repair drive} because SanDisk for a short period of time, in an effort to make their drives more functional with Windows 8, manufactured their flash drives in a different way than they had previously. After a year or two (or something like that) they went back to manufacturing them in the way that they had before, but said that they would not create a tool to allow people who had already bought irksome flash drives to make them be perceived as flash drives by Windows 7. This is utterly dumb, but nevertheless those are the facts (at least as far as I can tell).

I discovered that a program that I have little doubt most if not all of you are familiar with called "Rufus", that would nevertheless allow me to create a Windows 7 boot drive out of my troublesome SanDisk drive. Now, at first, I thought that I had to manually compile it (I found the GitHub page, and since I don't really use GitHub much except on the rare occasion that I need to download a batch file, I didn't get what I was supposed to do in regard to manner of downloading). So I went and set up MinGW (which I had never used or even heard of before) and then MSYS (which I had never used or even heard of before), because stuff that I read said that those were the best options, and after creating a PATH variable that did not exist for whatever reason (the instructions on the MinGW website didn't tell me what to do if it didn't already exist, never mind how to format it [I guessed that the ";" that was in what I was supposed to 'add to the end of the string' wasn't necessary if the string didn't already exist, and that it was used to separate entries in the string. Again, I am not a programmer]) and adding the necessary entries to it, I tried to do "configure, make, install" and all of that stuff, but when I tried to use the make command, there were seemingly errors or missing files in the makefile or whatever. So I then undid (essentially, even down to getting rid of the new "PATH" variable that I had made) everything that I had done in regard to manual compiling and programs/whatever that would allow me to do that.

So I was about to just give up on that particular avenue to fixing my problems (I would have just killed the Lubuntu partition and hoped that it either didn't cause any serious problems, and that if it did, just hope that that set-aside repair/recovery partition {presuming that that was what the hidden partition was} would allow me to rebuild {or whatever the proper phrasing is in this case} the Windows boot menu and furthermore set the Windows one to be the default boot screen at boot {if a boot screen is even needed after I get the problem fixed. I don't care either way on whether to just have it just skip to Windows 7 automatically if that's possible at this point}), but then I found out that Rufus could just be downloaded as an executable file that had a graphical interface and all of that. I felt pretty dumb.

So, to get to the point:

I clicked on that link that you posted after finding out via Web search how to extract my product key from the registry and put it into the proper format that it could just be copied and pasted/typed in, but when I put in my product key {and I made absolutely sure that I was putting it in correctly), this is what I got in reply:



...



I'm not really certain how I ought to proceed from here.

[Tharthan]

All right. I have the right ISO.

I discovered that Microsoft apparently isn't providing ISOs through that website to those who have "OEM Windows 7" (so to speak).

However, the Wayback Machine is my friend (as is the rest of the Internet Archive pretty much), and thanks to that trusty Internet Archive, I came across this: https://archive.org/download/digital_river

Those are the very ISOs that Microsoft made available through (partnership, I guess, with) "Digital River" until a few years ago, when they took 'em down.

I am putting that link there just in case anyone else is in anything even slightly resembling my predicament. If that's not allowed, I'll remove it (or you can, of course). It looks pretty legitimate to me, though.

Now that I've managed to find a way around that roadblock, I will proceed to wipe the corrupted GNU/Linux partition, and (if there is a problem booting up) I will first try to access the hidden partition that I assume was meant for system recovery/repair. If that doesn't work, I'll boot up my Windows-7-installation-disc-but-on-a-flash-drive. After I do all of that, give the space that I had set aside for Lubuntu back to Windows 7, and install the updates that I was trying to install, I can finally get to seeing if Pale Moon is still having the hanging/crashing problem.

BEFORE I do, though, I have one question:

In the case that I cannot get back online (due to not being able to boot up Windows 7 properly) after this (I have a Nintendo New 3DS [XL] that can also access the Web aside from my computer, but I don't know if it would display this forum. Perhaps, perhaps not), I want to make sure that I know how to open the command prompt if I need to boot up the boot drive or utilise the hidden (recovery) partition.

How do I bring up a command prompt when using the repair partition or installation-disc-but-on-a-flash-drive? Do I need to use the product key in order to just do that?

Thanks for putting up with me for this long, folks. I appreciate it.

[Moonchild]

Moving this to general discussion as it has turned into OS support instead of Pale Moon support.

[Trapper]

A few random thoughts that came to mind after reading your 2 page post...

1) Although I think you figured it out, to confirm, Rufus works perfectly for creating a USB bootable drive, even with those odd ball Sandisk Cruzer Glides.

2) https://www.heidoc.net/joomla/technolog ... nload-tool

Microsoft Windows and Office ISO Download Tool

This tool allows an easy and comfortable way to download genuine Windows 7, Windows 8.1 and Windows 10 disk images (ISO) directly from Microsoft's servers, as well as Office 2010, Office 2013, Office 2016, Office 2019, Expression Studio and Office for Mac.

In the past, Microsoft provided disk images for many of their products through their subcontractor "Digital River". These downloads were pulled in early 2014. Afterwards, Microsoft made a limited selection of downloads available on their TechBench site. This tool is based on TechBench, and makes a range of hidden products available for download direct from Microsoft servers... all legal

3) If you can't pull your existing Win 7 product key from your system, a new legal key can be purchased dirt cheap from
https://www.cheapercodes.com/windows.html
for about $6-7 US. It passes Microsoft's validation just fine. I just built a new high end system this winter with one of these keys & installed it on a Asus Rog Crosshair VII board with a Ryzen 7 cpu. Everything works fine & MS is happy.

[Tharthan]

1) Although I think you figured it out, to confirm, Rufus works perfectly for creating a USB bootable drive, even with those odd ball Sandisk Cruzer Glides.

Yes. I ended up going through with what I said that I would do, and my boot menu is now back to normal (and not even showing up, since I now only have one operating system on my hard drive). I also took the space on my hard drive that I had made partitions of for Lubuntu, and gave it back to Windows 7 (although I had to utilise a "third-party" (so to speak) program to get my C Drive to take in the space that was left as free space once I broke up the Lubuntu partitions [and I may also have had to use this program to get rid of the /swap partition, because it wouldn't allow me to get rid of it normally. I can't remember], because the official Windows program wouldn't allow me to expand/extend (I don't remember the correct term) my C Drive for some reason. No big deal, though; it's all fixed now.

It didn't seem to do anything to fix my Pale Moon issues, however.

2) https://www.heidoc.net/joomla/technolog ... nload-tool

Microsoft Windows and Office ISO Download Tool

I may have tried that tool (I definitely used the one recommended in some of the thread-esque things on Microsoft's support site), but for both the "COEM" Windows 7 ISO that matched the version and form of Windows 7 that I had, as well as the plain Windows 7 ISO that just matched the version of Windows 7 that I had, it said that it wasn't able to download the ISO. I presume that this means that Microsoft took down/blocked the link(s) on their website that the program was using to get those ISOs.

...

Anyway, would you happen to know of any safe registry cleaner by chance? Now that the boot issue and the like are fixed, I want to get back to trying to fix the problem that my computer is having with Pale Moon (since the fixing of the boot stuff didn't have any visible impact on Pale Moon's performance).

You can try to get us a minidimp to confirm

How would I go about doing this?

the Windows Live .dll that's loading with Pale Moon (and probably every other program): LoadedModule[79]=C:\Program Files (x86)\Common Files\Microsoft Shared\Windows Live\WLIDNSP.DLL

I'm now willing to disable this if it would only potentially negatively impact Windows Live programs. Whatever would fix this hanging and crashing issue with the browser.

What would be the best way to do so properly?

[Nigaikaze]

New Tobin Paradigm wrote: ↑
Tue May 21, 2019 4:58 am
You can try to get us a minidimp to confirm

How would I go about doing this?

Instructions for capturing minidumps are here:
viewtopic.php?f=19&t=13044

[satrow]

the Windows Live .dll that's loading with Pale Moon (and probably every other program): LoadedModule[79]=C:\Program Files (x86)\Common Files\Microsoft Shared\Windows Live\WLIDNSP.DLL

I'm now willing to disable this if it would only potentially negatively impact Windows Live programs. Whatever would fix this hanging and crashing issue with the browser.

What would be the best way to do so properly?

It's a core WL (not Windows!) file that has no business being embedded in a 3rd party software, uninstall the full WL package, reboot and check the WL folders are gone and that the .dll no longer exists anywhere, then start Pale Moon/Basilisk/Notepad/Explorer and use Process Explorer to check each of them for it, set the lower pane for .dlls.

[Tharthan]

You can try to get us a minidimp to confirm

Instructions for capturing minidumps are here:
viewtopic.php?f=19&t=13044

So I ran the debugger for about 15 to 18 hours with Pale Moon. For the first few hours, I just let it sit on the homepage that I have set (DuckDuckGo's website). When I saw that nothing was happening, I started listening to some music for a few hours, and then browsed some websites afterwards. I then left the computer on for the rest of the time, and then when I realised that this wasn't going anywhere, I stopped the debugger. Later on (after I had closed the debugger), hours after that, the browser did crash in the middle of my browsing. Since I can't seem to figure out what it is exactly that is causing the browser to crash so that I can replicate it when the debugger is running, I'm going to set that option aside for now.

Therefore, I will move on to...

It's a core WL (not Windows!) file that has no business being embedded in a 3rd party software, uninstall the full WL package, reboot and check the WL folders are gone and that the .dll no longer exists anywhere, then start Pale Moon/Basilisk/Notepad/Explorer and use Process Explorer to check each of them for it, set the lower pane for .dlls.

Alright, I'll do that and report back.

[Nigaikaze]

Alright, I'll do that and report back.

Also, a new update (28.5.1) was released earlier today. I'd recommend updating when you have a chance.

[Tharthan]

I'd recommend updating when you have a chance.

Done. Thanks for the heads-up.

uninstall the full WL package, reboot and check the WL folders are gone and that the .dll no longer exists anywhere

Done.

start Pale Moon/Basilisk/Notepad/Explorer and use Process Explorer

?

I'm not sure how to follow these instructions. What do you mean?

There is no "Basilisk" menu tab (the actual name for those is slipping my mind at the moment) in my installation of Pale Moon that I have ever seen. Where might I find it?

[satrow]

I only mentioned Basilisk in case you already had it installed, checking any running Process(es) for signs of any WL*.dll loaded would do.