Printing on cheap thermal printers using PC

Do you have any of these cat-like thermal printers?

Are you tired with editing stickers and labels to be printed using dully and counter-user-friendly mobile app? Want to try to print on one of those using your PC?

Well then… this article may help you.

Rename Bluetooth devices in Windows 11 22H2

Starting with 22H2 edition of Windows 11 it seems impossible to rename Bluetooth devices. Folks at Microsoft was cleaver enough to figure out that you don’t need such functionality. Nice.

Pity that I really need it, because I have two exactly the same headphones (one at home and one at office) that does not support auto-connect and must be manually connected. I never know which one I am connecting, because both are named “Edifier W600BT” in my system.

The only solution that I figured out is to use tiny software called BtDeviceRenamer (here is a direct link to downloadable .exe file). Please, be aware that since it directly interface with devices, it can (and probably will be) detected by Windows or your anti-virus software as a possible threat.

EDIT: Nope, even this one fails. Windows 11 enforces its own name upon next login or after just a couple of minutes. Thank you, Microsoft, for knowing better what we need or want.

Fix small HDD surface errors using low-level format

Anyone out there still using a non-SSD disks or hard disks at all? :) While I do believe in cloud data storage, I am an old dinosaur that wishes to have some off-line copy of my most important data. For this reason, I am using (for past 12+ years) a NAS and a number of 4-5 TB disks (I have a lot of important data).

Two days ago one of my disks started to get wako with me being unable to copy certain files. My diagnosis was quick and only confirmed by designated software — surface error, years ago known as “bac blocks”.

Since the disk was one month after five years long warranty, I had to try to fix it myself. For this reason I used two free pieces of software — HDD Low Level Format Tool 4.40 and HD Tune 2.55 Free to confirm.

Avantree Aria Pro headphones hanged

If your Avantree Aria Pro or any other headphones got hanged during switch-off, i.e.:

• They still light LED though turned off
• Turning then on and off brings no effect

Then the best solution I figured out was to… charge them up to maximum. Simple like that!

Factory reset Kindle with semi-frozen screen

The steps for performing factory reset of a Kindle are quite easy:

1. From the home screen, select Menu.
2. Select Settings.
3. Select Menu again then select Reset Device.

The problem appears when your screen is frozen and you don’t see anything or almost anything.

I had this situation that only tiny part of my screen was still responsive. I wasn’t able to see most of the menu and settings sections, but at least I managed to see:

• When my Kindle is awaken
• When its menu is or isn’t opened up (I didn’t see many menu items though)
• Which page of Settings I am currently at

This allowed me to figure-out a key combination needed to blind-reset my Kindle.

If your Kindle has a completely dead screen and you don’t see anything of above then sorry, this article won’t help you.

System interrupts kills PC / eats up to 100% of CPU

If your computer is suddenly slowing down noticeable and you have just:

• installed a new driver or added new piece of hardware,
• installed or started using some new hardware-related service (i.e. Internet phone, conference software)

then check Task Manager to see, if System interrupts isn’t consuming most of / all of CPU power of your PC.

Blaupunkt VCH601 for the seniors

I had to pick a handheld-hoover for my oldies. Due to their age, the actual weight of the device was an absolute priority. I decided to get Blaupunkt VCH601 — which seems to be unbeatable in this category (only 2.2 kilograms) — even though it turned out that it surprised me in some other areas.

If you think that a handheld-hoover description is far from IT and shouldn’t be published here then you may be wrong. Even IT geeks must clean up their rooms from time to time, sorry! :>

Correct steps order for getting rid of unfinished print jobs

If you have some documents hanging in your printer’s jobs list that I cannot get rid off, then remember about correct order of steps that you must undertake in order to resolve this issue.

These are:

• reset printer’s spooler:
  • open Start Menu and type Services,
  • hit Enter to confirm running this app,
  • scroll down list to find Print Spooler item,
  • right-click it and select Restart from its context menu.
• and clear the queue:
  • open Start Menu and type Printers,
  • hit Enter to confirm running this app,
  • find your printer and click Open queue,
  • use Printer > Cancel All Documents menu item.

That’s all folks!

HP LaserJet Pro M426fdn and printing A4 document on A5 paper

I have ended up with a huge pile of A5-sized pieces of paper and wanted to print some of my largest A4 documents using this paper size. Solving the problem was quite easy (after some serious digging) and narrowed to one of three options:

• use native printer’s driver functionality, if it supports it,
• convert document to A4 and print it to A5 paper in any PDF viewer,
• change paper size to A5 directly in Word and do all the adjustments manually.

Even though I could use first and second option (nearly fully automatic) which saved me a lot of time using third option (nearly fully manual), but I still had a problem with my HP LaserJet Pro M426fdn breaking print on A5 in about 75% and reporting an error.

Dell Latitude 7290 keyboard backlight

Dell Latitude 7290’s keyboard’s backlight has a terribly short “on” period. It is set to 10 seconds only by default. Even on AC power. While industry standard is somewhere around 30 seconds or so.

This article shows how to resolve this issue in Dell Latitude 7290, but most other laptops and notebooks will most likely have a very similar solution — find in somewhere in BIOS.

How to reset PIN in Samsung Smart TV

If need to reset your Samsung Smart TV to default values or you’re trying to do some other administrator-level operations then you will most likely hit a screen asking you to provide PIN number:

The default out-of-the-box PIN for all Samsung Smart TVs is 1111 or 0000.

If none of above is working then you might need to reset it.

Allow WiFi access without revealing the password

Ever wanted to share your WiFi’s SSID and password among friends, neighbourhood or family members without revealing the password? Now, it is possible with a standardised QR code for that purpose.

It may look like this:

To get QR code like that, all that you have to do is to visit a service (or run a program) like for example Pure JS WiFi QR Code Generator (qifi.org — probably the most recognisable one), provide essential data (SSID, encryption mode, key, whether SSID is hidden) and hit the Generate button.

Free of charge and we love you, Evgeni Golov, for that! :>

At the bottom of the main page for qifi.org you’ll find the list of mobile phones’ cameras supporting WiFi QR codes. To update this information — starting with Android with Android 7.0, default photo camera (at least on stock Android in Motorolas) offers native support for such QR codes.

Error 777 and other problems using D-Link DWM-157 GPRS modem

If you’re getting Error 777 when trying to login your D-Link DWM-157 modem to a mobile network of your choice then the quickest solution is to disable automatic logon through 26006 (HSPA) mobile connection, It is added (and enabled) by default and apparently by mistake when installing drivers for this GPRS modem. If this doesn’t help or if you have different problems with this modem then you may also find help in this article.

This blog post focuses on D-Link DWM-157, but it may turn out to be useful for other D-Link mobile modems or for other GPRS modems at all, because it discusses the most popular issues when connecting to the Internet through GPRS USB modem.

Please, note that there is a certain amount of magic in this article. As you play with D-Link DWM-157 (or other D-Link modems), it quickly turns out that many things aren’t that certain as they were supposed to be.