Category Archives: Windows knowhow

Howto do some things in Windows

Windows 7 & Getting drivers for obsulete printers

Hello,

yesterday a customer had the problem that he wants an old printer, a HP LaserJet 5M, to get running on 15 Windows 7 clients. Unfortunately Windows has no driver on board and the manufactorer didn’t provider anyone.

Solution:

For many old printers you can install a driver via Windows Update. Go to the Control Panel, Device & printers and add a new printer

WindowsUpdate
Add printer driver from Windows update, to get the whole drivers list from windows update may take some time.Time for a coffee.

Continue reading Windows 7 & Getting drivers for obsulete printers

Windows: Changing the power plan or a single value in a sheme

This posts descripes how to change the power plan in Windows or a single option in a sheme from the Windows command line.

First of all start a cmd command shell  with administrator rights.

To get a list of all available shemes run


c:\> powercfg /L


Existing Power Schemes (* Active)
-----------------------------------
Power Scheme GUID: 381b4222-f694-41f0-9685-ff5bb260df2e  (Balanced) *
Power Scheme GUID: 8c5e7fda-e8bf-4a96-9a85-a6e23a8c635c  (High performance)
Power Scheme GUID: a1841308-3541-4fab-bc81-f71556f20b4a  (Power saver)

The most options to powercfg at the command line must be specified with the GUID. To set the “High performance” plan active determine the sheme  GUID and execute

c:\> powercfg /S 8c5e7fda-e8bf-4a96-9a85-a6e23a8c635c

Query again und you see the other plan is active

c:\> powercfg /L
Existing Power Schemes (* Active)
-----------------------------------
Power Scheme GUID: 381b4222-f694-41f0-9685-ff5bb260df2e  (Balanced)
Power Scheme GUID: 8c5e7fda-e8bf-4a96-9a85-a6e23a8c635c  (High performance) *
Power Scheme GUID: a1841308-3541-4fab-bc81-f71556f20b4a  (Power saver)

Let us supose we only want to modify a single option or value. For example, disable the “Allow hybrid sleep” value in sheme “Power Saver” and with AC power active. Then, you first have to query all of the content of a sheme, because we need the GUID as parameter for powercfg. The output is a long list of options, I redirect them in  a temporary file, because in the file it is easier to search for the necessary GUIDs.
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