A
ajgmisc
Russ and others:
I went to hell and back resolving the problem reinstalling Windows Fax
Services. It took many telephone sessions of a Microsoft specialist calling
me from India; he couldn't explain some of the symptoms my system was
exhibiting either. Eventually we hit upon a procedure that succeeded in
reinstalling Fax Services.
After reinstallation, the Windows Fax Wizard showed my Outlook Address Book
as it should. It was the disappearance of the OAB from the Fax Wizard that
started me on this ordeal in the first place. Russ Valentine had replied to
my description of this disappearance "cannot be reproduced"; let me come
back to that in a moment because it CAN be reproduced.
Part of the difficulty may be that I'm running Windows XP Media Center
Edition (MCE) -- that was certainly part of the problem getting help with
reinstalling the Fax Services component. Although Microsoft created XP Media
Center Edition, they don't sell it to end users and, therefore, don't provide
support for it (I had to pay). The support is supposed to come from the
OEM's who sell MCE computers, in my case HP.
However, the problems I was trying to overcome (OAB suddenly not available
from Fax Wizard and then the inability to reinstall the Windows Fax Service)
are fairly esoteric and clearly beyond HP's Windows XP expertise. HP tech
support supervisors that that this was over their heads and eventually told
me -- but wouldn't put it in writing -- that Microsoft should be willing to
provide free support because it has nothing per se to do with MCE. They said
they'd been told explicitly by their management that Microsoft will support
issues that are beyond HP expertise. Try convincing Microsoft of that!
Now, coming back to the reproducability of having access to the OAB
disappear from the Fax Wizard. I can't tell you *what* makes it go away, but
it has done so two or three more times for me since my initial battle. I can
get it back each time by repeating the process of reinstalling Windows Fax
Services from the Windows Component Wizard. I'd like to be able to report
what makes it disappear (and to
know for myself), but so far I haven't been able to pinpoint a cause. I'm
going to try to remember to open the Fax Wizard at least once or twice per
day in the hope of narrows down the cause. If anyone can suggest a more
effective method, I'm all ears.
Andrew Garvin
---------------------
I went to hell and back resolving the problem reinstalling Windows Fax
Services. It took many telephone sessions of a Microsoft specialist calling
me from India; he couldn't explain some of the symptoms my system was
exhibiting either. Eventually we hit upon a procedure that succeeded in
reinstalling Fax Services.
After reinstallation, the Windows Fax Wizard showed my Outlook Address Book
as it should. It was the disappearance of the OAB from the Fax Wizard that
started me on this ordeal in the first place. Russ Valentine had replied to
my description of this disappearance "cannot be reproduced"; let me come
back to that in a moment because it CAN be reproduced.
Part of the difficulty may be that I'm running Windows XP Media Center
Edition (MCE) -- that was certainly part of the problem getting help with
reinstalling the Fax Services component. Although Microsoft created XP Media
Center Edition, they don't sell it to end users and, therefore, don't provide
support for it (I had to pay). The support is supposed to come from the
OEM's who sell MCE computers, in my case HP.
However, the problems I was trying to overcome (OAB suddenly not available
from Fax Wizard and then the inability to reinstall the Windows Fax Service)
are fairly esoteric and clearly beyond HP's Windows XP expertise. HP tech
support supervisors that that this was over their heads and eventually told
me -- but wouldn't put it in writing -- that Microsoft should be willing to
provide free support because it has nothing per se to do with MCE. They said
they'd been told explicitly by their management that Microsoft will support
issues that are beyond HP expertise. Try convincing Microsoft of that!
Now, coming back to the reproducability of having access to the OAB
disappear from the Fax Wizard. I can't tell you *what* makes it go away, but
it has done so two or three more times for me since my initial battle. I can
get it back each time by repeating the process of reinstalling Windows Fax
Services from the Windows Component Wizard. I'd like to be able to report
what makes it disappear (and to
know for myself), but so far I haven't been able to pinpoint a cause. I'm
going to try to remember to open the Fax Wizard at least once or twice per
day in the hope of narrows down the cause. If anyone can suggest a more
effective method, I'm all ears.
Andrew Garvin
---------------------
Russ Valentine said: