Windows

• Transform .crt to .cer file
• RDP file autologin
• Recover data on catastrophic loss
• Change Remote Desktop port
• Passwordless login
• Make windows like it used to be (Windows 11 start menu etc)

Transform .crt to .cer file

This is  a short reminder to go from one to another format in windows.

1. Locate your crt file
2. double click it, it should open the details of the certificate

3. Go to details, and "Copy to File..." a dialog will prompt which format to generate and where to store it

RDP file autologin

For our macincloud accounts, it was cumbersome to always manually login without copy-paste ability into the session.

You will need to edit the .rdp file and generate a passsword hash with a program from the internet.

• Either use POwershell:
  

  ("MySuperSecretPassword!" | ConvertTo-SecureString -AsPlainText -Force) | ConvertFrom-SecureString;

   

• Or Get CryptRDP5
  • Get the program cryptRDP5.exe
  • In the location, open a command prompt to generate your password hash

3. Open the RDP file with notepad and add two lines

password 51:b:yourhash
username:s:yourpasword

4. Save the file and click it - you now should've bypassed the login

Recover data on catastrophic loss

For some reason, something went wrong and corrupted my complete USB-controller.

Booting into the BIOS or USB recovery disk, however, the keyboard and mouse worked fine.

Booting into the recovery USB drive ( see Create installation media) I've tried using dism (to install and reinstall drivers) and forcing safe-mode. Which all gave the same result: no control over the desktop. Other creative ways, but this didn't result in success.

The system didn't have an active RDP host - so literally we were unable to get back into it. Luckely it has a 2-drive setup (one fast "windows" drive and a large "storage" drive).

Recover data

If you have another PC (to create your USB drive), install portableapps on it and install the application FastCopy on it in a subdirectory.
(you can boot into the recovery console, unplug the USB drive, install portable apps and then plug it in again and "dir" to the application folder)

Then use the console to navigate to the path - in my case only the 64-bit version of the applications worked, and I had to "cd" into the path in order to launch it by typing the name. You then should get the application jumping open and you can copy over your files. USB is working, so you could also attach an USB drive and copy your system over.

 

This should allow you to copy over your files.

Reinstallation of windows

When you reinstall windows onto an existing installation, there will be a windows.old folder.
According to the documentation it allows to "revert back", but I would rely on it.

What about the USB failure

Mouse and keyboard worked fine, until Windows 10 fetched updates and it gave up again.
So we've installed Windows 11 and configured VPN and remote desktop access to avoid this situation.

Change Remote Desktop port

Regedit

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\Terminal Server\WinStations\RDP-Tcp

 

Passwordless login

Set DevicePasswordLessBuildVersion to 0

Computer\HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\PasswordLess\Device

run netplwiz

and uncheck

Make windows like it used to be (Windows 11 start menu etc)

Windows 11 feels nice, but the start-menu and context menu integrations always get in the way.

The following app allows to completely set the behaviors to  your hand and remove the annoying "features"

 

1. Install ExplorerPatcher from here https://github.com/valinet/ExplorerPatcher
   
2. Install as administrator
3. Start the application by right-clicking the menu bar and selecting "Properties"
   

   

   
   
4. Configure as you like