If you get Could not Start the Remote Procedure Call (RPC) Service. Error 2: cannot find the file specified, it’s probably because you are missing svchost.exe from the C:\windows\system32 directory. Running sfc /scannow or copying the file from a working machine should do the trick.

Nifty trick found today while trying to diagnose a Windows firewall issue, getting error “For your security, some settings are controlled by Group Policy”

1. Click Start, Run and type Regedit.exe
2. Navigate to the following location:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE \ SOFTWARE \Policies \ Microsoft \ WindowsFirewall

1. Backup the key and then delete the WindowsFirewall branch.
2. Close Regedit.exe and restart Windows.

Thanks to this site.

Picked up a cool trick, using CACLS, you can forcefully set full control to the everyone account on everything on the HDD. This is great if you are an Administrator, but you still cant get into some files, or the “Take Ownership/Replace permissions on child objects” trick doesn’t work properly, or you are having some sort of generic “access denied”, “permission denied”, “unable to open” or “interface is unknown” issues.

cacls C:\ /g everyone:F /c /t