Getting Your HP LaserJet 1020 to Work with Windows 7
Ah, my very first laser printer in a long time. I had owned an Epson Stylus 880 and a HP 5740 inkjet printer awhile back. The former started giving me problems with clogged print head nozzles (I had tried to clean it but could never get it to print properly again, even with a new alternative cartridge), while the latter gave me problems with refilled cartridges. No idea what went wrong. I just know that I had spent quite a bit of money replacing the cartridges (and experimenting with ink refilling), and I wasn't about to spend another dime and time trying to figure out the problem.
So enter another printer into my life... the HP LaserJet 1020 after much research (and after discovering a source for affordable toner refills, as well as for alternative toner cartridges). Worked like a pro when it was still on Windows XP. Still performed like a champion when it finally made the upgrade to Windows 7... once I managed to get it WORKING that is! *groan* While I can tell you to contact HP for support (like as if that will be a fat lot of help when HP supposedly considers the printer too outdated to bother with a proper driver installation for Win7 *rolls eyes*), it's a lot faster and more productive for me to just post the solution here. So keep your fingers crossed, and follow the instructions below to get it functioning again:
1) Download the driver at...
HP LaserJet 1020 Driver Package for Windows 7
2) Unzip the contents to a temporary folder and DO NOT CLICK ANYTHING ELSE!
3) That also means *DO NOT RUN* SETUP.EXE.
4) I REPEAT. *DO NOT RUN* SETUP.EXE.
5) I REPEAT AGAIN. *DO NOT RUN* SETUP.EXE. The only way I found to get it working is by installing the driver MANUALLY! So go on to step 6.
6) Unplug the printer.
7) Uninstall the printer driver if it's on the computer.
8) Re-plug the printer back.
9) Add the printer.
10) Look for the driver under "Have Disk", and guide it to the temporary folder where you had unzipped the files earlier. The rest is self-explanatory.
A little bonus here for Canadian owners of a HP LaserJet 1020. You can get ink toner refills for cartridge Q2612A from http://www.inkpot.ca. I have personally ordered online from them the refills a number of times already, and it works awesome! And in case you're wondering, I'm not getting any commission mentioning this. Just the fact that I get to help a fellow human being save some money, and stick it to the greedy big time corporations at the same time, that's good enough for me. 
Have fun!
Indeo Video IV50 on Windows 7 Fix
Running into unnecessary problems trying to play a movie encoded with the accursed IV50 codec? I sure did. Some of my AVI videos were encoded with the Ligos Indeo XP Video codec awhile back via Pinnacle Studio 8.12.7, and has since stirred up a fuss trying to let me access them in Windoze 7. After much scouring the search results and tinkering and testing stuff, I believe I finally have that gremlin drawn and quartered.
First and foremost, you will need the Ligos Indeo Legacy Package (IV31, IV32, IV41, IV50, YVU9), which I believe is freeware according to my source. It will install Indeo Video codecs for 3, 4, 5, and Indeo Raw (YVU9). The filesize should be about 2,068,266 bytes. You can get it at...
Indeo Codecs Legacy Package (IV31, IV32, IV41, IV50)
Once installed, incredibly enough (believe it or not) you may still run into problems opening your IV50 encoded video. Why? That's because the Indeo installer FAILED (tch! tch!) to register the dll on Windows 7! Is it Indeo's fault, or WINDOZE SEVEN's fault, or BOTH? Who knows? Who cares? OK, I do, but that's a debate for another time. Right now I am itching to share the solution for the good of all mankind.
So go ahead and click that round Microsoft thingy at the bottom leftmost part of your desktop. Then click on All Programs followed by Accessories. Look for Command Prompt and right-click on it. Then click on Run as administrator. Helloooo, are you paying attention there? There's a reason why it's ITALICIZED and BOLDED! I cannot stress enough how *VERY* important this Run as administrator priviledge is, which is a very common problem in Windows 7 with some programs. Ignore it for this instance, and you will be smacked with a pop-up window out of nowhere happily informing you that "... the codec was loaded but the call to DllRegisterServer failed with the error code 0x8000ffff".
Assuming that you had followed the given instructions right down to the letter, you should be idling at the command prompt right now. Go ahead and type in the following:
regsvr32 ir50_32.dll
Press your Enter key, and voila, *hopefully* your problem should be solved. I know it did mine.
Happy New Year… and Microsoft bug!
HAPPY NEW YEAR! Yep, this is *my* year... the Year of the Tiger! 
It's been an interesting ride the last 4 days... eating (more like gorging on) wifey's freshly baked bread, researching on going to law school until one look at a sample of the LSAT pretty much gave me an endless headache that will rival me wifey's migraine. And of course, who can forget an annoying computer bug thanks to Microsoft's newest operating system, Windoze Seven. Just what I need to keep things interesting.
"The action can't be completed because the file is open in windows explorer."
Yeah... right. So, Explorer's got a chokehold on one of my files and wouldn't let me rename nor delete it. Yes, I have configured the permissions correctly, giving myself enough control to supposedly smash the file to smithereens if I should have wished it so. Unfortunately, it was all an illusion. How cruel of Microsoft. No matter. I still *smile* through it just as one of my many past martial art instructors had advised regardless of the circumstances. He taught me well. And through an enlightened peace of mind I discovered... tadaa... LOCKHUNTER.
Check out http://lockhunter.com
Unlocker has had its glory days with XP (thanks for the memories while it lasted), but this newest bomb of an atom literally tore Explorer's chokehold on my file to shreds, leaving the file finally at my mercy to do whatever I wanted to do with it. Here kitty kitty... HEY, where ya going? Wait till I get my hands on...
VirtualDubMod – Cannot Append Segment Solution
Just recently acquired a few VHS tapes from my Sifu on Lion Dances and Choy Lee Fut Kung Fu performances which I had offered to help transfer to DVD. Still have me good ol' Pinnacle Studio DC10+ Capture Card after all these years. Fired up Pinnacle Studio 8.1, captured at 640x480, outputted them using the Ligos Indeo XP Video 5.2 Codec to a 1/2 D1 352x480 AVI video, attempted to join some of the videos together via VirtualDubMod 1.5.10.2, and VOILA... I get the following attitude:
Cannot append segment blah blah blah: The segment has a different set of streams.
After various experimentations, and researching on the Internet, I am pleased to say that I have come up with a tried-and-tested solution. Here are the following steps, and let's call the two videos "Video X" and "Video Y". I know, some of you guys are thinking "Hey, why not 'Video A' and 'Video B', or 'Video 1' and 'Video 2'?" Well, because I am in an X and Y mood, so as far as I am concerned, it's Video X and Video Y. Thank you very much.
1. Fire up VirtualDubMod.
2. In the menu bar, click File, click Open video file, look for Video X and press the Open button.
3. In the menu bar, click Video, and make sure Direct Stream Copy is selected.
4. In the menu bar again, click Streams followed by Stream List. Right-click on the video entitled "Source: Input AVI file", and make sure Direct Stream Copy is selected too.
5. In the menu bar yet again, click Video, then Frame Rate, and select No change.
6. Then click File followed by Save As, assign your desired video output a name, and then click the Save button.
7. Repeat for Video Y.
7. Once both videos have been processed, they should join fine (as long as BOTH share the same frame rate!).
