How to Press and Send Ctrl-Alt-Del in Remote Desktop Connection Window

Remote Desktop Connection client allows user to remotely connect and administer another Windows computer that is running Microsoft Terminal Services. As with most remote control system or even virtualization process, which effectively and virtually run two or more system on a single physical machine, user will have problem to trigger Control-Alt-Delete (Ctrl+Alt+Del) keyboard shortcut key combination.
Ctrl-Alt-Del keyboard shortcut has been commonly used since IBM PC with DOS era to perform soft reboot, and used in modern Windows system to activate Winlogon process (log on to Windows NT), open Task Manager or Windows Security dialog box that allows user to log off, lock computer, shutdown PC, run Task Manager, switch user and other functions.

However, whenever trying to trigger Ctrl-Alt-Del function on remote system connected via Remote Desktop Connection, the keyboard shortcut combination pressed will bring up the Ctrl+Alt-Del function on the local machine instead of the machine remotely logged on via RDC.

This behavior is by design though, as Ctrl-Alt-Del key combination is too important for any PC (to run especially when computer encounters halt error or hang). As such, Ctrl-Alt-Del keyboard shortcut is always reserved for local host computer.

In order to send Ctrl-Alt-Del keystrokes to remote computer connected via Remote Desktop client, just press the following workaround:

Ctrl+Alt+End

Make Bootable USB Flash Drive

How To Boot From A USB Flash Drive
For starters this is still a new science and many people have had good luck with at least one of these methods. Note that flash drives are often also called thumb drives, keychain drives, pendrives, etc. The NEWEST methods are listed last on this page, starting with Method 6 for Vista/Win7
 
A FEW THINGS YOU NEED TO CONSIDER IN ADVANCE.
 

1. The PC has to support booting from a USB flash/pen/key drive. There may be anywhere from 1-3 items to change in the BIOS to make this possible assuming your BIOS supports it. Some bios's may refer to your flash drive as a USB floppy or USB zip. Of course there are exceptions, perhaps some are covered here.
2. The USB flash drive must support booting from it in general.
3. The flash drive must contain the boot/system files.
4. The flash drive must have bootsector area. This is done with special utilities.
5. References to "A:" drive lines in the autoexec.bat and/or config.sys files you copy to the drive after you make it bootable may result in errors.
6. You "may" have to format your floppy disk first in WinXP before you create a bootdisk as XP may "not" like working later on with a disk formatted otherwise.
7. Included below is a bootable ISO of DOS 7.1 which may be used with some of these methods if you do not have a 1.44 drive.

METHODS
Method 1 - Make your flash drive bootable using Bart's mkbt util:
http://www.nu2.nu/mkbt/ | Alt: mkbt20.zip
Put a bootable floppy disk in your A: drive or create one using Windows.
Download mkbt20.zip and unpack to to new temp folder you create.
Go to the temp folder.
Extract the bootsector from the bootable floppy disk. eg Open a DOS Window and go to the directory where you extracted MKBT. Type:
mkbt -c a: bootsect.bin
The boot sectors from the bootable floppy disk have just been saved to a file in the temp folder you created.
Format the flash drive in FAT or FAT16.
Copy the bootsector to the flash drive. Open a DOS Window and go to the folder where you extracted MKBT. Type:
mkbt -x bootsect.bin Z:
"Z" represents the flash drive drive Letter. So if your flash drive has another drive letter, then change the "Z" accordingly.
Now you can [grin] "should" be able to copy the utils you need to the pen drive.


Method 2 - Try these 2 USB Flash Drive Utilities by HP/Compaq. They work with Most other brands of flash drives as well.
hpflash2.zip HP USB Disk Storage Format Tool. Formerly called hpflash1.zip
HP Drive Key Boot Utility Version 7.41
Download
"I would put a little extra in there." Says a fan who emailed me with no name:)
For the downloads section I use nLite to make and create the image file as you can import the service packs and do some tweaking to the install files.
http://www.nliteos.com/download.html

1. Install the HP USB Disk Storage Format Tool and run the program.
2. Select the Device and the File system from the drop down menus and click start.
3. Close the above program and install and run the HP Drive Key Boot Utility. Selecting the appropriate drive letter. Click Next.
4. Select the circle on the top that says create New or Replace Existing Configuration. Click Next.
5. Select the circle labeled Hard Drive. Click Next.
6. Select Create New Filesystem. Click Next.
7. Select the circle labeled HP Firmware Flash Package. Click Next.
8. Click Finish

Method 3 - Third Party Links
Boot off USB by floppy, CD, or NT boot menu when your computer doesn't support it
"I use it to boot off of USB by floppy when the computer doesn't support it - although in this mode it cannot save changes made to the setup." said Josh.


Method 4 -
Here is my another method for creating dos bootable USB sticks using windows format.
1. From Win98 DOS-Prompt type "SYS {USBDriveLetter}:" or "FORMAT {USBDriveLetter} /U /S". If from WinXp then from start->run command.com execute format.exe copied from win95 or win98.
OR
2. Simply by enabling copy system files in windows explorer format window. By default it is disabled for non-floppy drives. To enable it use windows enabler program from http://www.angelfire.com/falcon/speedload/Enabler.htm an whoila it works.


Method 5 -
First if you don't have a physical floppy drive (and don't want one) you can use the [free] "virtual floppy driver" from here:
http://chitchat.at.infoseek.co.jp/vmware/vfd.html
With that you get an A: drive and can manipulate a floppy image as if you were using real floppy. You can then use that image to make a bootable CD. It's not that user friendly but once you get how it works it does work perfectly.
Even cooler you can use a "raw write" utility like dd for windows to write the floppy image directly to your USB thumb drive. Even without that famous HP utility to do the magic this will make your USB thumb drive bootable. The 'dd' ported to Windows is located here:
http://www.chrysocome.net/dd
Another trick you can use with that dd utility involves MS VritualPC (which is free). You can create a virtual machine/virtual hard drive, set it up the way you want then use dd to "raw write" the virtual hard drive image to the thumb drive; this will make the thumb drive identical to the image, including bootable (again, no HP utilities required).
Of course, your thumb drive will effectively have the capacity the size if the image in question (your 1GB flash drive will effectively be 1.44 Megs).


 
Below are the methods for the latest OS Vista/Win7
 
Method 6 -
http://kmwoley.com/blog/?p=345
bootable USB guide, here we assume that you are using either Vista or Windows 7 to create a bootable USB.
1. Insert your USB (4GB+ preferable) stick to the system and backup all the data from the USB as we are going to format the USB to make it as bootable.
2. Open elevated Command Prompt. To do this, type in CMD in Start menu search field and hit Ctrl + Shift + Enter. Alternatively, navigate to Start > All programs >Accessories > right click on Command Prompt and select run as administrator.
3. When the Command Prompt opens, enter the following command:
DISKPART and hit enter.
LIST DISK and hit enter.
Once you enter the LIST DISK command, it will show the disk number of your USB drive. In the below image my USB drive disk no is Disk 1.
4. In this step you need to enter all the below commands one by one and hit enter. As these commands are self explanatory, you can easily guess what these commands do.
SELECT DISK 1 (Replace DISK 1 with your disk number)
CLEAN
CREATE PARTITION PRIMARY
SELECT PARTITION 1
ACTIVE
FORMAT FS=NTFS
(Format process may take few seconds)
ASSIGN
EXIT
Don’t close the command prompt as we need to execute one more command at the next step. Just minimize it.
5. Insert your Windows DVD in the optical drive and note down the drive letter of the optical drive and USB media. Here I use “D” as my optical (DVD) drive letter and “G” as my USB drive letter.
6. Go back to command prompt and execute the following commands:
6.1. Change directory to the DVD’s boot directory where bootsect lives:
d:
cd d:\boot
6.2. Use bootsect to set the USB as a bootable NTFS drive prepared for a Vista/7 image. I’m assuming that your USB flash drive has been labeled disk G:\ by the computer:
bootsect /nt60 g:
(Where “G” is your USB drive letter)
7. Copy Windows DVD contents to USB.
You are done with your bootable USB. You can now use this bootable USB as bootable DVD on any computer that comes with USB boot feature (most of the current motherboards support this feature).
Note that this bootable USB guide will not work if you are trying to make a bootable USB on XP computer.


Method 7 - 
 Boot-USB-Stick
While trying to flash my bios I looked at your page. Most methods are complicated, after a while of browsing the net I found above:


Method 8 - Suggested by Kevin Ying: UNetbootin


Method 9 - Suggested by Shep................: WinToFlash


BareBones Boot Floppy And ISO
DOS 7.10 | Readme

Windows 7 system requirements

If you want to run Windows 7 on your PC, here's what it takes:

• 1 gigahertz (GHz) or faster 32-bit (x86) or 64-bit (x64) processor
• 1 gigabyte (GB) RAM (32-bit) or 2 GB RAM (64-bit)
• 16 GB available hard disk space (32-bit) or 20 GB (64-bit)
• DirectX 9 graphics device with WDDM 1.0 or higher driver

Additional requirements to use certain features:

• Internet access (fees may apply)
• Depending on resolution, video playback may require additional memory and advanced graphics hardware
• Some games and programs might require a graphics card compatible with DirectX 10 or higher for optimal performance
• For some Windows Media Center functionality a TV tuner and additional hardware may be required
• Windows Touch and Tablet PCs require specific hardware
• HomeGroup requires a network and PCs running Windows 7
• DVD/CD authoring requires a compatible optical drive
• BitLocker requires Trusted Platform Module (TPM) 1.2
• BitLocker To Go requires a USB flash drive
• Windows XP Mode requires an additional 1 GB of RAM and an additional 15 GB of available hard disk space.
• Music and sound require audio output

Product functionality and graphics may vary based on your system configuration. Some features may require advanced or additional hardware.

PCs with multi-core processors:
Windows 7 was designed to work with today's multi-core processors. All 32-bit versions of Windows 7 can support up to 32 processor cores, while 64‑bit versions can support up to 256 processor cores. 

PCs with multiple processors (CPUs):
Commercial servers, workstations, and other high-end PCs may have more than one physical processor. Windows 7 Professional, Enterprise, and Ultimate allow for two physical processors, providing the best performance on these computers. Windows 7 Starter, Home Basic, and Home Premium will recognize only one physical processor.

Mac OS X Snow Leopard versus Windows 7

Windows 7 builds upon Windows Vista and smooths out Vista’s rough spots, though it also brings a number of new end-user features to the table (such as the re-worked taskbar). Meanwhile, Apple’s focus with Snow Leopard mostly involves new under-the-hood technologies with subtle refinements and fixes. But there is plenty to say about how Apple’s next big cat and Microsoft’s lucky number stack up against each other.

Managing Your Files

Snow Leopard’s Finder and Windows 7’s Explorer have strikingly similar interfaces: Both have quick search fields in the upper-right corner, path bars (OS X’s is optional and can be switched on in the View menu), and sidebars giving you easy access to various common locations on your computer.

Windows 7 introduces a new feature to the mix: Libraries. A library is best defined as a way to view the contents of several folders all in one place. For example, the Pictures library pulls together the contents of the My Pictures and Public Pictures folders by default. You can add or change the folders tied to any particular library, of course. Nothing in Snow Leopard directly compares with Windows' libraries. The closest OS X feature is saved searches (known as Smart Folders), but a saved search pulls together files based on search criteria, not location. You can’t, for example, create a smart folder containing all photos from only two folders. On the other hand, Windows 7 libraries can’t be combined with saved search results.
Both Snow Leopard and Windows 7 allow a large icon view. Windows 7 supports icons up to 256-by-256 pixels. Snow Leopard one-ups Windows 7, though—the Finder can display icons up to a seemingly absurd 512-by-512 pixels (512-pixel icons were around in 10.5, but the Finder could not take advantage of them outside of Quick Look and Cover Flow view).

Quick Access

Some OS X apps can use the Dock’s pop-up menus to display application-specific information and provide easy access to frequently used commands. For example, if you right-click iTunes’ Dock icon in Snow Leopard, you’ll get a menu that lets you see what’s playing, play or pause your music, assign a rating to the current song, and control other simple iTunes commands.

With Windows 7’s re-tooled taskbar, Microsoft introduces a similar feature called jump lists. Jump lists can not only provide access to common commands (Windows Media Player‘s jump list has a Play command, for example), they also let you “pin” items to a specific list. For example, you can pin commonly-used folders to the Windows Explorer jump list and important documents to the WordPad jump list. Snow Leopard doesn’t have any features that directly compare to the jump list's pinning feature; instead, Mac users can use stacks in the Dock to provide quick access to folders and files (drag any folder to the Dock to create a stack). Stacks get a refresh in Snow Leopard: You can now view unlimited items in a stack using Grid view (thanks to the addition of scrollbars), as well as drill down into folders without having to open any Finder windows. You can also drag and drop any file into the Dock for quick access.

Previews

In addition to Leopard's preview features (Quick Look, Cover Flow), Snow Leopard adds inline preview to the Finder’s icon view. When viewing a folder using 64-by-64 pixel icons or larger, mousing over your files will display preview and playback controls. If you mouse over an audio or video file, you’ll get a play button. If you mouse over a Word doc, a PowerPoint presentation, or PDF (among other common file formats), you’ll get forward and back arrows for paging through a document. Windows 7 has an optional preview pane for use in any Explorer window. Select a file, and the preview will appear in the preview pane. Windows 7’s preview feature seems pretty basic compared to Snow Leopard’s (text loses all formatting, for example), but it’s better than nothing. Also, as was the case with Vista, folder icons in Windows 7 give you a peek at the folder's contents.

Window Management

Expose, a part of Mac OS X since 2003, learns some new tricks in Snow Leopard. Most notably, you can now click and hold the Dock icon for any open application to view all open windows for that application. This now includes minimized windows; In previous versions of OS X, Expose ignored any windows you sent to the Dock. In Snow Leopard, these windows are now represented by a thumbnail in Expose.
Also, Snow Leopard now arranges windows in a grid when viewed in Expose. previously windows scaled down in a seemingly haphazard manner. I actually prefer the old method of handling Expose—I find the windows all end up about the same size with the new Expose arrangement, which makes it harder for me to find what I’m looking for, but this is very much a personal preference issue.

Windows 7 brings a new window management tool to the table as well. Called Aero Peek, this new feature makes it easier to see which window you want. To use Aero Peek, click the taskbar icon for the application the window you’re looking for belongs to, then mouse over the thumbnails. All other windows go transparent, leaving only the window you mouse over visible.

The most useful aspect of Aero Peek, though, is the desktop peek feature. If you want to take a quick look at the desktop without actually hiding all your windows, simply shove your mouse into the lower-right corner of the taskbar; all windows will turn transparent. Click this spot once to hide all open windows and see the desktop, and click again to get back to work. This is roughly equivalent to the Show Desktop feature in OS X's Exposé, which moves all windows off the screen with a keystroke (or flick of the mouse, if you have a hot-corner for Exposé set).

The Verdict

Both Windows 7 and Snow Leopard are solid updates to the respective operating systems, but I can't say either one by itself will make someone want to jump ship and cross to the other side. If you're perfectly happy with Windows, Snow Leopard probably won't make you lust for a Mac. Likewise, if you're a Mac user and weren't considering switching to Windows before, Windows 7 isn't likely to change your mind.

Keyboard Shortcut Keys for Windows XP & Windows Vista

A keyboard shortcut (also known as a shortcut, accelerator key, hot key, or mnemonic) is a key or set of keys that performs a predefined function. You can act faster, save time and reduce a lot of mouse work for some common computing chores using shortcut keys. Having said that, many people do not really like to use shortcut keys because it is hard to remember and find them.
Microsoft has summarized dozens of shortcut keys for Windows XP and Windows Vista users. If you are interested in being familiar with these keys, you can go to the relevant pages:

a. Windows XP go here
b. Windows Vista go here.