If anything is not clear, or it can be written in plainer English, please feel free to PM me.
1. This is not a warez site! Links/Requests to warez and/or illegal material (porn, cracks, serials, etc..) will not be tolerated. Discussion of circumventing WGA/activation/timebombs/keygens or any other illegal activity will also not be tolerated.
You may be banned without notice. 2. Use some common sense. Don't post your question under multiple topics. Think before posting and choose the right topic for you question or answer. When posting, have something to say, not just "My First post!" or "Cool site!!!" We sort of have the idea by now
.It is much appreciated, when you post a reference to something, to provide a link to it.
Replies like "I remember there was an app that did that, cannot remember it's name" are pretty much useless.
3. Please do not post screenshots within threads that exceed 300x200 in resolution and 150kb in size. Provide a link to the image and host it on your own webspace if possible. If you do not have personal webspace there are several FREE image hosting services. Always keep in mind that some members are on a 56k connection and loading a thread with a few large screenshots can be quite slow for them.
4. Spamming will not be tolerated.
We have provided a section for those who wish to share personal websites, technical news or FREEWARE / OPEN SOURCE projects, NOT commercial ones. Please use these sections only. http://www.boot-land...hp?showforum=265. Images in signatures should possibly be chosen with "common sense", anything that might, even hypothetically, offend minors, countries and/or their population, religions, political parties etc. will not be allowed and deleted. Flash and animated sigs are not permitted. Signature images must also be chosen of a decent size, say max. 300x100. You can enter max 4 lines of text in signature or signature image. Advertising and/or affiliates are not allowed in signatures nor avatars. Avatars are to be a maximum of 100x100 pixels. If your avatar or signature goes above these guidelines they will be taken off without notice. Members with slow connection can disable other members signatures when reading posts by going to: My Control - Options - Board Settings.
6. If you need to attach something, it'd be great if you could find a host for the file. Please only attach something if you absolutely have no other option. Or as a temporary depository (for example BETA releases). Of course small .inf, .cmd or similar files are welcome.
7. You are expected to be mature when discussing in threads. Racism, pornography, threatening, profanity, or excessive vulgarity is not tolerated.
This community is built upon mutual respect. You are not allowed to flame other members. People who do not respect personal opinions and/or personal work will be warned in first instance. If you ignore the warning and keep on flaming, you will be banned without notice.8. Has the thread you started or participated in been moved, closed or deleted?
Check with the forum moderator via PM. Please do not start new threads asking why other threads were moderated. Forum moderation is not up for public debate, such threads will be deleted and the thread starter warned. The Admin/Mods of this board reserve the right to edit, delete or move posts made on this site.9. Please refrain from using CAPITALIZATIONS in the topic title or when participating in threads because they will not attract attention - instead it will annoy many members, to experienced forum users, capitalizing without need is just like shouting or giving orders and considered very unpolite.
10. Please do not use meaningless subjects
in topic title. They give no clue of what the posts are all about. For example: - Oh no!
- Help
- I'm mad
- Please help
- Question
- I need your help
- Hmmmm ....
This should be avoided. Users should enter something more specific in topic title so that it is easier for others to help.
11. No user shall by any means of the forum: sell, trade or give away hardware, software, or any other material, UNLESS it is personal property and it has the "spirit" of a "garage sale", i.e. is something you do not use, wish to give away or similar, DEFINITELY NO COMMERCIAL SALES.
This board in any case shall not be held accountable. 12. SMILE!
Life is tough, we all know that, when you enter this board, it will be appreciated that you leave your personal problems behind, asking and replyinq questions or however exchanging informations with a "positive" attitude, TAKE IT EASY and enjoy your stay here. jaclaz
P.S.: WHY the Rules
Rules are here to prevent possible misunderstandings between members and help make this board a peaceful, relaxing place in the net where exchange of MEANINGFUL opinions, ideas can take place.
In a "perfect" world, the above rules would be unnecessary, as all people would "naturally" behave along the same guidelines, which are nothing more than mutual respect.
But please do remember that our is not a "perfect" world, and, particularly, this is a privately owned board where the Owner/Admins/Mods have the power to do whatever they see fit to keep things going as smooth as possible.
You can dislike the idea of rules and even dislike the particular rules that have been stated, but if you do not comply with them, you can leave, there are other places to go.
P.S.:
Following are not rules, but "common sense" advice:
a. Please do use the Search function before posting a question that has already been asked and (hopefully) answered to. This is another reason for rule #10 above, searching meaningful titled posts is easier and faster.
b. Please avoid to put pressure on other members, I have seen on other boards members posting a question and no later than 2 hours later make another post like "anyone?" or "PLEASE, I really need this URGENTLY!". As said, scope of the board is the exchange of informations on boot related technicalities and software, all members have their own work and come here to relax, learn something new, help others and discuss these topics, if you need something really "URGENT" consider hiring a professional consultant (and be prepared to pay him/her). If your request has not been acknowledged by anyone after a "reasonable" time, that in this case means a few days, you are on the contrary invited to "bump" it, as it may happen that a particular post has been overlooked.
c. Please be prepared to spend some time reading and understanding answers and related links, another common type of poster is one that wants something not only "now", but also only as a "few clicks away" solution, and, possibly "exactly" the way he wants it to be, even if it is technically impossible.
d. Please when asking something, be the more specific you can, even without being verbose you can pass along all the needed information, typical examples:
Which one? Just from memory I recall 3 or 4 versions of Windows 3.x, 4 or 5 of Windows 95, 2 of Windows 98, then Millennium Edition, NT 3.51 and 4.00 Workstaion and Server, Windows 2000 various versions, XP Home and Professional and of course Windows Server 2003...I am running Windows....
When reporting an error, the exact number and text is useful to understand what the problem might be, quite obviously, knowing that it is a STOP: 0x0000007B INACCESSIBLE_BOOT_DEVICE instead of "something like that" will really help ...I have an error, it printed a number on a blue screen, the text said something like "You cannot boot from this thingy" or something like that....
Which one, there are thousands of tutorials or articles on the Internet, how are we supposed to know which one you are referring to....Ok, so I read a tutorial on the Internet and it does not work for me...
No commentOk, so I read the tutorial on site www.somesite.ext and it does not work for me, I followed it exactly except for two or three intermediate steps, ...
....e. Please, if you succeed in whatever you asked help for, do report this and the exact steps you took, it is a form of thanking the member(s) which helped you and to help other people that have the same problem you had.
Note:
The above rules have been almost entirely copied from the ones on MSFN forums, as I find them simple and rightful, but most other technical boards use similar ones.
Amendment #1 to Rules June 17, 2007 - adding of point f.
Special, more explicit, "common sense" advice, SUPPLEMENTAL to that already present in points a-b-c-d-e above.
Mind you that this advice is given to HELP you solving a problem, and though not compulsory, it will help you more than you might expect in troubleshooting and (hopefully) solve your problem faster.
f. Always think why you are here asking for help:
Always think why other members might be able to try and help you:It is because you are not able to solve that problem by yourself.
The above implies that AFTER you have done your best to comply with points a-b-c-d of the rules, if any member trying to help you asks you supplemental informations and details, to run one or more programs or to do a determinate series of actions and to post results, it is because there are REASONS for this procedure. (you remember, you weren't able to solve this problem by yourself and they know more than you do.)Because they are good guys/gals and know more than you do.
So, it would be VERY APPRECIATED, and, as said, it will better the quality of the assistance you might receive if you would:
f1.- Post JUST the problem you are having, with needed details, but WITHOUT suggesting what the solution is according to you.
f2.- Temporarily "disconnect" your mind from your idea of WHAT has caused or is causing the problem you have, and of HOW the fix should be made, solving a problem means finding it's SOLUTION, the method through which the latter is found is not relevant and viewing it from just one side can even prevent from finding the solution.
f3.- DO AS YOU ARE TOLD, do not introduce variations of ANY KIND in the given instructions, there are REASONS why they are suggested, and REASONS why they are suggested in the given order and yet more REASONS why other procedures are NOT suggested
f4.- DO NOT think you are smarter than the member who is trying to help you, even if generally speaking this might happen, it DOES NOT apply on the specific topic, nothing can upset more a willing helping member that someone that asks for advice and later does not try the given suggestions and/or does another thing. On the contrary, once the suggested steps have been tried and gave no result, your ideas are welcome, in other words we try to troubleshoot in a "logical" way, as in the famous Sherlock Holmes saying "when you have excluded the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth", but we like beforehand to exclude the possible, the common, the probable, and this approach solves problems in a MUCH faster way in a large amount of cases.
f5.- BE PREPARED to spend some time interactively searching and (hopefully) finding a solution, remember it is you that are having the problem, the only reason why another member tries to help you is to share and expand his knowledge, and to be gratified by an even small thank you when the solution is found. There are a number of members that, as soon as they see that there is no pre-made one-size-fits-all solution one or a few clicks away, simply disappear from the board, leaving behind an unresolved problem and, possibly, a disappointed member who tried vainly to help.
and very common too!
